SEASON 1: THE DRAFTING

Chapter 1: The Last Morning

POV: Emeric

This is my story of the most thrilling adventure of my life.. I still wonder where it all started… Ah! The chicken part, yes I’ll start from there.

The chicken was mocking me.

I was certain of it. The way it stood there on the fence post, head tilted, beady eyes fixed on mine with what could only be described as smug superiority. As if it knew something I didn't. As if it had somehow figured out the great cosmic joke of my existence and found it deeply amusing.

"You think you're better than me?" I asked.

The chicken clucked.

"That's not an answer."

"Emeric." My mother's voice drifted from the kitchen window, tired and familiar. "Stop arguing with the livestock."

"I'm not arguing. I'm establishing dominance."

"You're losing."

She was right. The chicken had already won this round, ruffling its feathers in what I could only interpret as a victory dance before hopping off the fence and strutting—actually strutting—toward the coop.

I'd been bested by poultry. A fitting start to what was already shaping up to be the worst day of my life.

The sun hadn't fully risen yet over Thornwick, painting the sky in shades of orange and pink that would have been beautiful if I'd had the capacity to appreciate beauty at this particular moment. Instead, I stood in our small yard, arms crossed, glaring at the world with what I hoped was an intimidating scowl.

I'd been practicing the scowl. It was important to have a good scowl when you were about to be shipped off to a military compound to learn how to kill the undead.

The door creaked behind me, and I didn't need to turn around to know who it was. The soft padding of small feet, the slight hesitation—Margot always hesitated before approaching me these days, like she was afraid I might shatter if she moved too quickly.

I hated that. I hated that she looked at me like I was already gone.

"Emmy?"

I closed my eyes briefly at the nickname. Only Margot called me that. Only Margot was allowed to call me that, and only because she'd been saying it since before she could properly pronounce my actual name. Somewhere along the way, "Emeric" had become "Emmy" had become an iron-clad rule that I would respond to it from her and only her, under pain of death, and I would never, ever admit that I actually liked it.

"Shouldn't you be inside?" I asked, still not turning around. "Helping Mother with breakfast?"

"Shouldn't you be packing?"

"I'm already packed."

"Your bag has three shirts and a knife."

"Everything a man needs."

Margot moved to stand beside me, her twelve-year-old frame barely reaching my shoulder. She had our mother's dark hair, our father's stubborn chin, and Roslyn's—

I stopped that thought before it could fully form.

"The Officials are coming today," Margot said quietly, as if I didn't know. As if I hadn't been counting down the days for the past month. As if I hadn't volunteered for this exact moment.

"I'm aware."

"Mother cried again last night."

My jaw tightened. "I know."

"She thinks you're going to die."

"Margot—"

"She thinks you're going to die just like Roslyn did and then it'll just be us, and I'll have to learn to milk the goat by myself because you know I'm terrible at it, and then I'll probably die because the goat hates me, and then Mother will be all alone, and—"

"Margot." I finally turned to face her, and my irritation melted immediately at the sight of her eyes—glassy with unshed tears, chin wobbling despite her obvious attempts to keep it still. Twelve years old and trying so hard to be brave.

Something cracked in my chest.

I crouched down so we were eye level, which wasn't strictly necessary anymore—she'd grown so much this past year—but felt right anyway.

"Listen to me," I said, keeping my voice steady. "I am not going to die."

"You don't know that."

"I know that I'm too stubborn to die. Ask anyone. Ask the chicken."

A tiny, reluctant smile tugged at her lips. "You lost to the chicken."

"That's—" I sputtered. "That was a strategic retreat. Completely different."

"You ran away."

"I made a tactical decision to preserve my dignity."

"You have no dignity."

"Rude." But I was smiling now too, despite everything. Despite the weight in my chest and the dread coiling in my stomach and the knowledge of what today meant. "I'm going to learn to fight, Margot. Properly. And then I'm going to come back, and I'm going to make sure nothing ever—"

I stopped. The words caught in my throat.

Nothing ever happens to you. Nothing ever takes you from me. Not like—

"Not like Roslyn?" Margot finished quietly.

The name hung between us, heavy as a stone.

Roslyn. My older sister. Seventeen years old and fierce as a wildfire. She'd had honey-brown hair too, lighter than mine, and she'd always complained that I'd stolen the better shade. She'd taught me how to hold a blade. How to throw a punch. How to stand my ground when the world tried to knock me down.

She'd also taught me what it looked like when someone you loved turned into something else. Something with empty eyes and grasping hands and a hunger that used to be a smile.

She'd told me to run.

I had.

Some nights, I still heard her screaming.

"I'm going to learn how to kill them," I said, and my voice came out harder than I intended. "Every single one. I'm going to learn, and then I'm going to come back, and I'm going to keep you safe. That's a promise, Margot. That's—"

She threw her arms around me before I could finish, burying her face in my shoulder with a force that nearly knocked me off balance. I caught myself, wrapping my arms around her small frame, and for a moment, I let myself just... hold on.

I was doing this for her.

I was doing this for Roslyn.

I was doing this because the rage inside me had nowhere else to go, and if I stayed in this village one more day, watching the walls and jumping at shadows, I was going to lose my mind.

"You have to write," Margot mumbled into my shirt. "Every week. Mother said they allow letters."

"Every week."

"And you have to eat properly. Not just bread."

"I make no promises."

"Emeric."

"Fine, fine. Vegetables. Occasional vegetables."

She pulled back, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand in a gesture so painfully reminiscent of Roslyn that my heart stuttered. "And you have to come home. For the visiting days. Every single one."

"Every single one," I agreed.

"Promise?"

"I promise."

She held out her smallest finger—a childhood ritual we'd never quite outgrown. I linked mine with hers, and we shook once, solemnly.

"There," Margot said, with the grave certainty of a twelve-year-old who believed in the absolute binding power of pinky promises. "Now you can't break it. It's the law."

"The law," I agreed. "Absolutely unbreakable."

The front door opened, and my mother's voice cut through the morning air. "Breakfast is ready. And if either of you tracks mud inside, I swear to every god listening—"

Margot shot me a conspiratorial grin before darting toward the house. I followed more slowly, pausing at the doorstep to look back at the village.

Thornwick was small—a handful of houses clustered around a central square, surrounded by farmland that stretched toward the eastern border. The border where the attacks came most frequently. The border we'd reinforced with wooden stakes and desperate prayers.

The border where Roslyn had died.

Three years ago, the Bastion had promised to send more soldiers. More protection. They'd sent twelve cadets fresh from training, barely older than Roslyn herself, and half of them had died in the first attack.

The officials came every autumn now, taking our young to fill their ranks. Taking them to fight and die so that villages like Aldermoor—wealthy, safe, protected Aldermoor—could sleep soundly at night. 

I thought about that sometimes. About the boys and girls from rich villages who volunteered for glory, for honor, for the thrill of it. Who had never seen a zombie tear through someone they loved. Who had never hidden in a cellar, listening to screams, praying that the thing that used to be their sister wouldn't find them.

I thought about how much I would enjoy watching them break.

"Emeric!" My mother's voice again, sharper this time. "Your eggs are getting cold!"

I shook off the dark thoughts—they'd only make today harder—and stepped inside.

Our kitchen was small but warm, filled with the smell of fresh bread and the sound of Margot chattering about something inconsequential. My mother stood at the stove, her back to me, shoulders tense in a way that told me she was fighting to keep her composure.

She hadn't looked at me directly in three days. Not since I'd told her I was volunteering.

I slid into my seat at the worn wooden table, accepting the plate she set in front of me without meeting my eyes. Eggs. Toast. A slice of ham that we probably couldn't afford but she'd made anyway, because today was—

Because today was the last morning.

"Thank you," I said quietly.

She nodded once, turning back to the stove.

Margot filled the silence with stories about the baker's son who'd gotten his head stuck in a fence last week ("He was trying to prove he could fit through any gap, Emmy, and he couldn't, and the blacksmith had to cut him out, and he cried the whole time"), and I let her voice wash over me like a balm.

This. I would miss this.

Not the fear that lived in the walls of this house. Not the way my mother flinched at every unexpected sound. But this—Margot's laughter, the warmth of the fire, the simple domesticity of a family breakfast.

I wondered if the cadets from Aldermoor knew how lucky they were to have mornings like this without the shadow of death hanging over every moment.

Probably not.

Probably they complained about the eggs being overcooked.

"The Officials will be in the square by midday," my mother said suddenly, her voice carefully neutral. "You should finish packing."

"I am finished."

"You have three shirts."

"It's enough."

"Emeric—"

"Mother." I set down my fork, finally meeting her eyes. They were red-rimmed, shadowed with sleepless nights. I hated that I was the cause. I hated more that I couldn't stop. "I have to do this."

"You don't." Her voice cracked. "You could stay. You could—"

"And do what? Wait for the next attack? Hide in the cellar again while more people die?"

"Live." The word came out broken, desperate. "You could live, Emeric. You could stay here with us and live."

"This isn't living." The words were harsher than I meant them to be. "This is just... waiting to die slower."

My mother closed her eyes. Margot had gone very quiet.

I pushed back from the table, suddenly unable to bear the weight of their grief. "I need to check my pack."

I was out the door before either of them could respond.

The village square was already filling with people by the time I emerged an hour later, my meager pack slung over one shoulder. Three shirts, a knife, and a small wooden carving that Roslyn had made me when I was ten—a wolf, roughly hewn but treasured.

I wasn't sentimental. I wasn't.

But I couldn't leave it behind.

Families clustered in groups, some tearful, some stoic. I recognized most of the faces—Thornwick was too small for strangers—but I didn't stop to speak to anyone. I wasn't in the mood for sympathetic looks or well-wishes that felt more like condolences.

*PART 1 OF CHAPTER 1*