Normally, the sun rising over the city of Esselya was considered one of the most beautiful and sought-after spectacles in all of Aclasia. The valley in which the town was nestled was known throughout the country as Meadowlark Valley. Every morning, as the golden-white light of dawn began to seep into the early morning sky, the meadow larks were aroused into a twittering chorus, greeting the new day. On this particular September morning, however, the sun rose blood-red and cold. A dark cloud of smoke hung over the valley, winding up to meet the rising sun from the heart of the city. The meadow larks were silent.
Two grim figures watched the sunrise from the roof of what had once been one of the Healing Houses; the only building within sight that had not been reduced to smoldering ashes or piles of rubble. But even the Healing Houses, which had always remained protected by virtue of the mountain streams which encompassed them, had not survived without the western building burning to the ground. The spirits of the two watchers dampened as the dawn illuminated what was left of the once beautiful city.
Her name was Myra. His was Aaron. At first glance they appeared to be normal enough; an ordinary young man and young woman, each with the proper arrangement of facial features, limbs, and appendages, and perfectly unpeculiar coloring. The young woman had dark, sea-blue eyes and waist-long golden brown hair, which she had tied back into a traditional braid. Her garb was simple and practical; she wore brown trousers, a green, long-sleeved tunic, a brown leather belt with a sword around her waist, and a longbow and arrows on her back. The young man was dressed alike to her; he wore a long, short-sleeved, tan tunic, dark brown trousers, and carried no weapons except a long staff made of cedar. A steel belt was clasped around his waist; it was studded with sapphire stones, which matched his eyes perfectly. Now those eyes and the eyes of his companion were darkened with anger, helplessness, and bitter grief.
A single female voice cried and begged for mercy somewhere in the shadowed alleyways. Under normal circumstances, the two watchers would have dashed off immediately to help; but their hope had been muted from witnessing hundreds of other women and children being raped, beaten, and murdered before the eyes of their husbands and fathers, who perished in a futile effort to rescue their loved ones. As the night grew older, the screams and cries of grief slowly began to die away with those who had uttered them. Now, all that was left was the silence and grey emptiness around them, and one final, desperate voice, pleading for someone in this dead city to rescue her. She soon joined her friends and family in their fate, and the silence took over…
Auria gasped, startling herself awake. Freezing-cold sweat plastered her dark hair to her brow, and her knuckles were white from clutching at the pillow into which her face was buried. She threw off her blankets and sat upright, shuddering. “No…no, the war is over…” she whispered, trying to calm herself. Through her window in the uppermost tower of the library, she could see the beginnings of dawning sunlight. The meadow larks were singing. “It was only a dream…”
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