II. Morning
“Elso! Elso! Open the
door!”
There was an unusually
loud knock on the door–someone must be impatient yet desperate.
“Elso!”
By the third pounding of
the door, the boy was quite awake. Irritated by the too-early call by his
neighbor, Elso took his time fixing his shirt and finding his often-lost
slippers.
“Elso!” The knocking was
relentless. Elso was impressed that the old door can take beating such as
this—although he reminded himself that it was his father who made that door,
which kind of explained why the door was sturdy in the first place.
Elso dragged himself to
the only window of his room. He barely noticed the reddish morning sunlight
filling up his room when he heard the woman cry out yet again.
“Elso! Elso! Please!”
Not wanting to welcome an
unwelcome guest, he pulled the locks on the windows instead and peered outside.
It was his neighbor, the baker’s wife, from the other end of the street,
carrying a piece of crumpled paper and basket yet to be filled by the morning
trip to market. Seeing the troubled look on her face, he went back and decided
to head for the door. It took him another minute to open all locks; there was
one at the top of the door, three at the bottom, and five near the door knob.
After freeing the door from all of its locks, he opened the it and came face
to face with his sobbing neighbor.
“Madam Korda—”
“Elso, look at this! Look
at this!” the woman pressed the
pressed the paper to his hands. He could feel her hands were trembling. “This
was given out by the minister himself at the market!”
“But…what’s this?”
“News! News from the
city—oh, it’s horrible!” The woman finally let herself cry.
Elso straightened out the
paper and found himself horror-struck. There was only one story, but this one
story left him lost for words. According to reports coming from the nearby town
of Gelden, a massacre beyond imagination took place in the
great city of Dagoria two nights ago. No survivors were found except
for a group traveling merchants who left the town earlier that day—and all were
detained until the Imperial investigators arrive. Some of the people living
beyond the walls of the city were unharmed—they, too, were detained. There were
no witnesses, no evidence, nothing. The only proof that massacre really took
place were the remains—almost a million of them—of those Dagorians who, according
to reports, simply never woke up.
“It’s…it’s terrible,”
Elso said, still lost for words. He folded the paper and gave it back to the
woman, who refused.
“No, I…you can have it…”
“Uh, would you like to
come in? Would you like a–”
“No, lad, I’d rather go
home…tell Goni the news. Tell everyone.” The woman stepped back and walked
away, a little calm but still sobbing.
Elso watched her until
she disappeared at the road bend. He realized the people walking by were either
running with the same piece of paper and knocking on every door or walking,
whispering with a friend, their eyes telling the tales of a horror beyond
grief. He could see some of the traders closing their shops in haste; others
calling out the young ones playing on the street. Carriages passed by in silence;
no doubt its passengers were already aware of the news. Some of his neighbors
gave him an empty greeting, and he politely gave them an empty reply. Realizing
that this day would last longer than the others, he went back inside and closed
the doors, forgetting that the locks were left open.
Elso opened the paper
once more. A second reading would somehow reassure him, he thought, but there
was nothing more to read. The city of Dagoria, dead?
There was another knock
at the door.
“Elso!”
He realized the voice at
once. In fact, he was expecting for that voice to call out any time now. Elso
went back and opened the door. He found himself looking at Dogan sitting in
front of the door and out of breath. He must have run from straight from the
market, Elso thought. When Dogan saw him, he held up the same piece of
paper.
“Way ahead of you.”
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