I often wonder what the definition of the word 'fate' truly is.

Most people that I've met like to think of it as a predetermined ending—an inevitable event that will undoubtably occur, no matter what intervention one applies to the situation.

A few viewed it as an afterthought of sorts. A past-tense conclusion to one's life. I guess that makes sense. It becomes a fact at that point anyway. They leave it up to time to decide, and thus, one can never know their fate at all. Not until it happens.

Then there is me and, I assume, some others as well. I never believed in my fate as having a pre-destined purpose, but I refused to live my life blindly. I wanted to define my existence through my actions and, in part, define myself. As simple as it sounds, it is not so simple, as I have come to find out.

Life is… quite chaotic when you progress through it. The last few days of my life have shaken up my view of fate entirely. Part of me now suspects that my life was on a pre-destined route, or at least, it was... until Cassandra showed up.

Both of our lives were, to be honest.

I think the most baffling part of this whole debacle stems from the flicker theory. We've always been taught about other timelines—not realms—that may exist among us. The elder fawns viewed them as anomalies, saying that they are rare, but when they occur, they may not affect the parallel timeline at all. They live side-by-side, co-existing on the same path, albeit with minor differences.

Olisha, the leader of my old commune, once told me that as I grow older, I should study these "flickers" for myself. I asked her about what it may take to create one, and she said that she did not know but suspected that if my magic became as strong as she anticipated, then maybe one day we could learn more.

The years that followed were what destroyed my beliefs about fate, because the life I went on to live felt like a departure from my intended purpose. But after Cassandra arrived and after Narratha and Falena attacked Acomb, I felt like something was off.

It is almost as if I am not supposed to be held captive.

I feel like I am not supposed to be here at all.

The dark room that Lia had been chained up in was only illuminated by a single candle. She had no clue as to how long it had been since she was captured, but if she were to guess, it must have been hours. The lead-up to her imprisonment was not dragged out.

Narratha had offered the chance for Lia to join up with her. "You will understand why I did all this," she had said. "For all the fawns who have lost their lives to senseless violence, the poils must learn what they are dealing with."

The response was a harsh "no." Lia had nothing else to say other than reminding Narratha of what a psychopath and corrupt murderer she thought she was.

Then Narratha viciously broke her hands. Then came the chains, and then this dark cell.

She must have intended to allow her adversary to wallow in her thoughts. The grim silence of this soulless room would likely get to Lia sooner or later. Perhaps she would find herself on the edge of madness, or more likely, desperation. "Isolation has a wonderous habit of changing someone," the redhead stated.

It probably would—if Falena hadn't ventured down here and kept her company.

The short, skinny blonde fawn sat in the chair that she had dragged down into the dungeon cell.

There wasn't a way for Lia to avoid looking at her; her wrists were both chained to the wall, and her rear was firmly seated on the hard ground. The immense pain in both her broken hands throbbed endlessly, pushing her nearly to the verge of tears, but her exhaustion kept her calm.

With one slender leg crossed over the other, Falena laid back as she stretched out her arms, visibly tired from the battle that she had fought earlier. "I find it baffling that in your current state, you don't wish to speak with me." She reached over and tossed her exceedingly long locks of yellowed hair over the head of her chair. "I assume someone in your position would have been desperate for answers, and I am willing to give them to you."

"Can you just stop?" Lia hung her head with a heavy breath, still trying to fight off the agony of her injuries. Narratha had been meticulous about the way she snapped every metacarpal, sparing the fingers. The swelling had already started, which made slipping out of the shackles impossible. A fawn could not conduct their magic if the main pathway—the hands—were compromised.

She could still hear Narratha laughing about the science of their kind as she went about it. "So strong, yet so easily broken, we are," she had mused, right as she used her powers to place pressure on those bones.

Falena scoffed as she uncrossed her legs and sat forward, glaring at Lia from only a few feet away. The fawn appeared to be heavily offended, but unlike her redheaded counterpart, she was not about to conduct violence. "You truly wish to bite the hand that feeds you?"

She then glanced at Lia's swollen palms. "A hand or two is just what you need right about now," Falena teased.

Lia whimpered vaguely as a flash of pain radiated down her arms. The longer she sat here, the worse it got. Falena did not play dumb to her discomfort; she capitalized on it.

The blonde groaned as she stood from the chair and bent down to place both her forefingers on the surface of Lia's broken hands. A glimmering blue light emitted from under her touch, and after a few seconds, the pain suddenly vanished.

Am I…

Lia's eyes shifted to catch a glimpse of what had been done, hoping that her shattered bones had now been healed. But as soon as her gaze set on her left hand, Falena sat back down in her chair, and her voice broke the bad news.

"Don't get excited," she said. "I only numbed your pain. It's temporary, mind you. It'll come back in a couple of hours. That means, when I'm gone, you won't be getting any sleep."

"Do you really think that I'd ever be able to sleep?" Lia's expression grew fierce, fixating on the fawn across from her. "After Milo and all the others, how can I find peace? You and Narratha destroyed everything, and now you expect me to be your friend?"

Falena rolled her eyes. "I don't want friends, I just..." She shook her head in frustration, groaning as her tone rose. "You just don't get it, do you? We're trying to accomplish something here. Something great for the future of all fawns, and that includes you. There's a reason that you're shackled up like this. It's because Narratha..."

"Enough!" Lia screamed. "I don't care what you have to say! I already gave you my answer, so you can stop pressing it!"

She promptly received a sharp slap from Falena. It was a fast blow, and it stung enough, but the blonde wasn't gifted with brute force. She caressed her palm with her thumb as she looked down at her prisoner, her lips pressed tightly, sealing the anger that she wished to expel.

With a huff, Falena threw her arm down at her side and pushed the chair away. "I can bring your pain back right now, you know? Do you want that?"

"I don't care," Lia sighed, not even making eye contact with her anymore. "Whatever gets you out of this room the fastest."

She's just like her. What is the point of talking?

The offense on Falena's face only rose. She wanted to slap Lia again, but as she clutched her fist against her chest, the petite fawn merely began to turn around. "Fine, be alone. When the healing wears off and your hands hurt worse than before, I will smile as I listen to your crying later tonight."

"I bet you will." That was all she had to say.

There was a brief pause before Falena turned and walked into the darkness, leaving Lia all alone. The rattling of her shackles was the only sound left in the room, save for the short sobs that escaped the corners of her mouth. In her isolation, she finally let loose and gave way to the despair that had been growing in her.

Cassandra and Leta were still out there, somewhere. There was no telling if Narratha was going to pursue them as well. The redhead already seemed to have the person she wanted, given how the entire massacre had been centered around her and not her sibling. But Lia recognized an insatiable hunger for power in the killer.

Why would she ever stop?

I should have killed them both when I had the chance. If I did, I wouldn't be here. This would all be over. But I didn't because of my values, because I was taught that everyone deserves a second chance. Then Narratha plunged her sword right into my shoulder, and then... Ugh, don't think like that, Lia. Just don't. That's exactly the way she wants you to think. That is not the kind of fawn that you are.

One year earlier...

"Milo…" Lia's voice bellowed after she teleported her body across the castle, her art supply cup gripped firmly in her hand. The moment she found him in the library, the displeasure on her face was already strong. "Where is my paintbrush?"

Stepping down from the ladder, her adoptive father chuckled as his boots touched the ground. "Are you sure that you didn't misplace it?" The smile on his face did nothing to simmer her displeasure. It made her feel like she had been overreacting, but Milo had a history of pranking her by removing her brushes and placing them in different containers.

She had spent the last half hour combing her room from top to bottom, and with no results, she couldn't reach any other conclusion besides that man being the culprit. It was that smile that incriminated him the most.

"I want my paintbrush back, Milo." She shook the cup in front of him. "This is not funny. You know how annoyed I get when you enter my room, yet you continue to do so."

"If I remember correctly..." His voice was calm but sarcastic at the same time as he peeked into the empty cup. "I purchased that brush, so wouldn't it be mine?"

"Ugh!" Her head tilted back as she turned around, pacing away from him. "I am not going to play these games with you, Milo," she accentuated his name, brandishing just how annoyed she had grown in the last few seconds.

Using her magic, Lia encased the cup in a blue glow before it drifted away from her grasp and floated to the ground, facing upward. "I will be back in this room in five minutes, and when I return, I better find that brush returned to its rightful place. And if not, then I will not be speaking to you for the remainder of the night."

She stopped in her tracks, turning to point to him for a moment, with only a brief glance to spare. "Or, better yet, the remainder of the week! You have been trying my patience lately, and I do not find it amusing."

Milo called out to her as she approached the library door. "But the week is almost over."

She did not turn around. "Then next week, as well!" Lia's body vanished into an assortment of blue particles before she could even touch the hardwood surface of the exit.

As the glimmers dispersed into the air, Milo could only chuckle again as he returned to the ladder. Climbing up to where he had left off, the man extended his arm and took hold of a book that was on the highest section of the shelf. He only had his eyes on it for so long, as they then fixated on the object that had been hidden behind the thick spine of the literature.

Lia's paintbrush.

"Never gets old," he mused, stepping down from the ladder and making his way toward the cup. He dropped it inside before resuming his work. Milo knew that Lia would return, just as she warned. The fawn weighed her words with her pride, and her reputation was attached to them.

When she would find the paintbrush back in its place, her anger would surely come his way, but with the tasks ahead, the silent treatment would not help him at all. He took one more look at the cup centered near the door as he stood on the ladder.

While she could be so hotheaded, hearing her voice was something that he would not trade for anything else in this world.

Later that afternoon...

As she and Milo approached Acomb, Lia couldn't help but cross her arms as she walked beside him. It had been several hours since their conversation in the library, and despite her ultimatum, the fawn was still hardly willing to speak to him. She had gotten her paintbrush back, but the lingering irritation would not disappear.

Milo carried his box of medical supplies, which weighed on his body as he trotted along. Lia could have saved him a ton of stress by using her magic to carry it, but she had deliberately opted not to. Better yet, she could have teleported the two of them to the town, but she preferred to watch him walk instead.

The man grunted as he shuffled the box around in his arms. The trek up the hills was worse, and his older body was not as strong as it used to be. Nonetheless, the man still smiled at the young lady by his side, which only spurred her aggravation further.

"What?" She glared at him.

"You know…" Milo sighed, but his giggling managed to slip in at the end. "I thought you would have been over this pettiness once you stopped being a teenager, but at twenty-two, it still holds strong."

Her thin brows lowered as she pursed those lips and rounded them to the side. Tilting her head while still staring at him, Lia slowly withdrew her right hand just enough to point her forefinger in his direction. "And I thought you would stop treating me like a child, but no, you still do these stupid things."

"You're willing to get that mad over a paintbrush?" He raised a brow. "Remember when I accidentally spilled soup all over your gown last year?"

"Hmph!" Lia's head snapped to the front, her voice sizzling with a low pitch of contempt. "That was my favorite gown. Of all the gowns you could have spilled soup on, it had to be that one? Why didn't you ask me to help you carry that heavy bowl?"

Milo's teeth flashed as the corners of his mouth rose to his cheeks. "Come on! I got to do something to keep myself fit. I'm getting old, you know?"

Lia mumbled to herself, "I can see that."

"I heard that."

She shrugged her shoulder. "Good."

The two were now at the border of the town, and waiting nearby was the town's elected leader, Mr. Brewton. The elderly man straightened out his glasses as he eyed the pair. Milo gestured at Lia while he adjusted the position of the box again. "Look, you can be angry at me for the remainder of the day, but if you're so focused on your art, would it make you feel better if I purchased you an additional brush, just in case you truly did misplace yours?"

She responded with a shallow groan, aware that the matter had been dragged out longer than it needed to be. Rubbing her nose, Lia closed her right eye but kept her left one open as she turned her head at him slightly. "I have my own money, Milo. I can purchase my own supplies."

As her fingers dragged down her chin, she took a breath and nodded. "But if you insist, then I would find comfort in having an additional brush. It will atone for your actions earlier."

"Lovely," he stated, glad to see that she was beginning to come around.

"But!" Lia rotated her torso and directed her finger at him once more. "I will have to hide it. My trust in you has fallen, and it will not rebuild easily. Do not expect it to happen overnight."

"I'll take you on your word," Milo acknowledged, leaving Lia with nothing else to say.

In truth, he knew that she was exaggerating. The fawn was a difficult soul, and a very hard-to-read one as well. She got angry at the slightest of things and was keen to hold a grudge, but within her hard shell, there was a strong sense of rationality. As much as they had their moments of friction, he believed that she would not cut ties with him over such a little thing.

Still, Lia's art was her favorite hobby. Maybe there was a significance to her not being able to paint when she had planned to. The woman often shut herself away when all her duties had been attended to. Her drawings and crafts demonstrated an accomplished skill, and she had been known to get visibly upset whenever they didn't turn out as planned.

Whenever she got stressed, they were a way for her to unwind, so it made him think that perhaps he had indeed chosen a bad time to prank her. Those reactions were priceless, but Lia didn't talk about her issues unless they were out of her control. She sought less guidance over the years from him, likely hoping to establish her independence.

That didn't mean that there weren't evenings when she would sit down beside him and tap him on the shoulder, questioning him about his thoughts on a given subject. Those were the nights when he felt particularly proud to be there.

It made him feel like a father again.

Mr. Brewton began to walk forward, now just fifty or so feet away. "Lia! Milo!" The man held his arms out. "Welcome!"

The fawn closed her eyes as she continued to move along. "I'm not talking to him, Milo. He's your friend. You handle this."

"Is there anyone in this town that you like?"

"I don't hate them or dislike them," Lia explained. "It's just…"

I'm the only fawn here.

Lia shook her head. "I don't know. I'm just not in a talkative mood."

Seeing that she wasn't ready to spend her day socializing, Milo decided to spare her the effort. "It's no problem. I can keep Brewton at bay while you go around and take care of those in need. With this medicine, you can send most of them my way. I'll meet you at the town square when all is said and done."

"Don't take too long."

Several poils were still lined up for the treatment that was being offered. Lia sat on the side, watching as Milo checked his patients over and evaluated their problems. It was the same old range of issues: sickness, cuts, and bone and muscle pain.

Nothing that Milo couldn't work on alone.

Some of the poils would occasionally ask why Lia couldn't just heal them herself. She had the power to do so. Her magic was far greater than anything that Milo could administer, but the man offered a pretty good explanation as to why that was the case.

"Fawns are wonderous people," he'd say. "But what if none are around? Must we forget the values of medicine? We're lucky to have Lia, but many settlements are not as gifted as we are."

It brought a bit of a smile to her face when she heard that. All she ever wanted was to fulfill her intended purpose. These medical runs with Milo were productive. It allowed her to assume the role of a healer and do some good, patching up relations between poils and fawns in the process. But there was still a bit of a sting to his statement.

There weren't that many fawns around, especially near their area. It was only her and her little sister, Leta. Lia had not crossed paths with another one of her kind in so long. It made her feel like she had been torn away from what she should have had.

That was the truth of her placement here, after all. Ever since that tragic day in her commune when Milo's men brought forth an unimaginable act of ruin, her life had been changed forever. She knew that it wasn't his choice. The elders had informed her that she would be given to him as a form of retribution, but noted that his heart was not tainted by the evil of his followers. She trusted Olisha's word, but it had been a tumultuous nine years.

It took a lot for them to get to where they were now, and there was still progress to be made. She understood that he was a good person and that he regretted having brought those men to the fawns in the first place.

He had told her that he wanted to do better, as if there was somehow a way to make up for the sins of his past. Lia had been taught her history, and she told him that she wanted the bloodshed to stop. It had been too long since both sides shared this planet in peace.

If she could be part of the solution, then she would gladly do so.

Gazing at the needle in Milo's hand, Lia watched with an expressionless face as he stuck it into the arm of the child that had been handed to him. The boy had been running a fever for the last few days, and his mother was worried that he wasn't going to be getting better. The kid winced as soon as the tip speared his skin, but all children did so.

Milo injected the solution into his veins. It was a tried-and-true method. The man rarely experimented with medicine and swore that kids were off the table with such attempts. The injection would introduce a cocktail of antibodies into his system, which would spur a faster recovery. It was a safe procedure, but a practice that he feared would be lost if less and less poils took up the path of a doctor.

There were a few tears in the child's eyes as he stepped away from Milo and began to walk back to his mother, but Lia suddenly extended her arm. "Wait," she said. The adults and Milo paused as their eyes fell on her, and then onto the boy. The young lad mirrored the same look as his mother, confused as to why the often-silent fawn had spoken.

"Can you come here?" Lia asked softly as she patted her hand against her lap. Instinctively, the boy glanced back at his mother, who gave him a nod of approval. He then turned around, still cautious, as he approached her.

"Come." Lia's hand waved him closer, her palm facing the heavens. When he got close enough, she placed her hand on his shoulder, right where the injection had been administered. "Does it still hurt?"

"A little," he answered. She smiled as her finger lit up with a faint blue glow, which cured the pain instantly. In amazement, the boy jolted back and touched his shoulder, feeling for any signs of discomfort. "How did you do that?"

Lia lay back in her chair, content with her act. "You're a brave child, you know? When I was your age, I don't think I ever would have been able to do what you did."

"My mother is the one who taught me to be brave," he said, pointing at the delighted parent behind him. "She says that when I grow up, I'll be taking care of her someday. She takes great care of me, and she's the best mother out there, so I'm going to have to take even better care of her!"

If this child is our future, then may his mindset be our future.

Resting her elbow on the top of her knee, Lia leaned forward with her cheek buried in the pocket of her hand. It only lengthened the heartfelt smile that she cast his way. "Your mother is so lucky to have a son like you. Please take great care of her."

"I will!" The boy happily exclaimed, rushing over to grab onto his mother's hand. "See, mother? Look what she did to my arm! It doesn't hurt anymore! I want to be able to do that!"

…

Lia frowned a bit as she listened to his ambitions, knowing that those powers would never find their way to him. However, Milo chimed in, offering the young boy a direction that he might not have had before. "You know, I started learning about medicine when I was just a couple of years older than you," he said to the kid. "I think if I had started earlier, I might have been better than I am today."

The mother smiled as she ruffled the boy's hair. "You could be a doctor someday!"

The child seemed to like the idea, bobbing his head as he pointed to Milo's supplies. "That means I get to carry around a bag full of shiny toys?"

Milo laughed as he reached in and pulled out a tiny pair of silver tongs, flashing them against the light of the Specter Moons from up above. The child was enamored by its metallic glow the moment he laid eyes on it. "When you become a doctor, you can have as many as you need. If you start early, you can practice under me one day. I'd be glad to teach you."

The boy shook at his mother's sleeve again. "Can I?"

Her giggles were coupled with her relief that her son was already feeling well again. She scooped the boy up from the ground, hoisting him in her arms as the two of them glanced back at the pair. "Let me take care of you for just a little bit longer. How does that sound?"

"Okay, fine…" He rested his head against hers, his gaze still fixated on the tongs in Milo's hand.

The man placed his tool back into the bag, his rosy cheeks bordering his grin. "Your mom's a hard worker, my boy. You listen to her, and you'll be the best doctor in the land."

"Yes, mister. I will." He kissed his mother on the cheek, nestling his forehead against her curly hair. The woman sighed as she turned her gaze toward Lia.

"Thank you for everything that you do for us. Both of you. I don't know what our town would be like if we didn't have you here."

Milo glanced at the fawn, who also did the same to him. "I think it's time this world started being better than what it was, and that all starts with this town. Its people. It doesn't have to end here, either."

The mother looked at Lia again, acknowledging her understanding of the many years of violence that the fawns had endured. Most poils had heard of their powers, and history taught how destructive they proved to be in the old war. She never bought into the horror stories that her parents told her, and she wanted to raise her son with a more positive mindset.

How could he dislike a fawn if he remembered the kindness that Lia had shown him at such a young age? That was his proof that the stories weren't all true.

As Lia sat there, watching the rest of the line move forward, there was a strange compulsion that she found embedded in her head. She craned her neck to the left for a second, peering over her shoulder as if there was something there.

But all she could see were the trees in the far distance.

What was that? What did I just feel?

She returned her head to the front, trying to shrug the feeling off as if it were nothing. But the compulsion came back—harder. Something wasn't right.

Something is clawing its way into me. I feel like it's distressed.

This was a feeling that she had felt in the past. It was nothing common, but thinking back, it preceded a more dire truth. A fawn's senses were great. They could pick up on changes in moods in specific people if one's abilities were strong enough. Lia's, above all, could easily hone in on something that commanded her attention.

She turned around once more to look over her shoulder, focusing as hard as she could on the forest ahead of her.

I don't like the way this is making me feel. I'm sensing someone, or something, in a state of fear. Am I hearing a person's voice? Is it in my head or...

Shutting herself out from the others around her, Lia's ear soon picked up on the faintest sound of a woman's screams. It was so low that none of the poils could have ever heard it. Even for a fawn like her, it just barely made its way into her radius, but when it did, she realized that there was a true emergency on her hands.

"Milo!" Lia stood up from her chair and pointed urgently at the woods. "I hear someone in danger! I must go!"

"Wait!" He quickly tied his bag up and slung it over his shoulder. "I'm coming with you!"

"Milo, I…" She wouldn't argue, knowing that time was of the essence. At the very least, there would be an extra person available to help her along the way. Lia swiftly extended her hand, considering the matter no further. "Fine!"

As soon as he took hold of her palm, her body dispersed into a large cloud of blue particles, as did his. The rest of the crowd stepped back, alarmed that a potentially troubling event was underway. Some vacated the area, knowing that when the duo returned, the sight may not be one that they wished to see.

Within a second, Lia and Milo had reformed within proximity of where the fawn believed the source of the disturbance originated from. They weren't too far from the edge of the forest, but they weren't close to it, either. She could barely make out the lush green grass of the landscape beyond the hordes of dense tree trunks.

As Lia scanned around, she could not see anyone nearby, but now her senses were ringing. There was indeed someone in danger here. Sure enough, within another few seconds, the thrashing of branches was heard just yards away, followed by the cries and whimpers of a man and a woman.

With her heart ready to jump out of her chest, Lia grabbed Milo's hand again and zeroed in on where it was all coming from. Before he could do anything, his body returned to a mass of particles and teleported across the area. There was no other feeling but displacement that accompanied the instant shift of position.

When he re-appeared in their new spot, he could tell that they were already deeper into the forest, but as he rotated his head to see what Lia was doing, the scene before them became frighteningly clear.

Laying on the ground was a woman, her gown stained with pools of crimson. She lay facedown, barely moving amidst the heavy trauma that she had just suffered. Her assailant was not too far away.

Pressing its various sharp antlers against a fallen tree trunk, a large dhin fought to breach the obstacle in its path. Hidden behind the large trunk, shielded by another mass of standing trees, were two poils—a man and a woman. There was no question that the dhin was the cause of this event. Its mouth was bloodied in all directions, those pin-point teeth having sunk themselves into the flesh of the unfortunate girl on the dirt.

It's going to kill them!

"Milo, get back!" Lia warded him away as she sought to distance the dhin from every potential victim that it could find. The man's face was in complete shock, but he found himself more concerned about the safety of the fawn than himself.

"Lia, you're going to get yourself hurt!" Milo screamed. Their conversation quickly attracted the attention of the ferocious animal, who had now set its sights squarely on them.

Oh, no…

The dhin tore its mouth away from the tree trunk and growled heavily as it turned its body around. With its horrifically long grin curling over its jaw, the wide-headed beast shook its skull wildly, preparing itself for a charge.

Lia understood the nature of these apex predators well. They were a fierce species, one more concerned with decimating their prey as opposed to consuming it. A dhin's antlers could spear a person's body to shreds. This one was of an exceptionally large size, which only amplified its lethality.

The two poils, who had cowered within the safety of the dense trees, took notice of the arrival of the pair. They were too afraid to shout out for Lia and Milo to run away, lest the dhin resume its onslaught against them. But the look on their faces said it all. They had already witnessed one person get gored by the bloodthirsty creature, and now two more were on its plate.

But the moment Lia's hands began to glow blue, the look on their faces turned from one of fear to one of amazement. "A fawn!" The woman shouted.

The dhin held no concept of the hierarchy of this world, as its sole instinct was to always seek the top of the food chain. Any contender was to be wiped out, and if this person chose to stand valiantly in its path, then their head and chest would be crushed. It let out a spine-bending roar before it reared back and propelled its muscular body across the ground, speeding toward Lia with utter determination.

Forgive me…

With a loud grunt and a wave of her hands, Lia expelled a large burst of light from her arms that flashed in its direction. The piercing field of blue blinded and disoriented the charging animal, and before he knew it, an unseen force suddenly enveloped his body and slammed him onto the soil.

The dhin crashed, its right antler buried in the dirt.

Seizing the opportunity, Lia proceeded to use her magic to drag the aggressive beast, rolling it around until its antler snapped. The dhin managed to let out a pained grunt before she decided to cease her action and pin it down with ease. With the pressure of a powerful energy bearing down on its body, there was no way for it to rise.

"Now is your chance!" Lia shouted to the two poils behind the trees.

They peered over at the dhin, who was still actively fighting against the fawn's efforts, but to no avail. Lia frantically turned her eyes to them again, screaming even louder for them to break from their spot. "Let's go! We need to get out of here!"

She watched as the man grabbed onto the arm of his female companion, pulling her out from the bushes and between the trunks until both were now out in the open. Running as fast as they could, they sped over to Lia, who then directed them to join up with Milo. As soon as they did, she turned her attention to their fallen friend.

I need to get this woman out of here!

While she held the dhin down with her magic, Lia ran up to the causality, grabbing hold of her arm just as she ushered the others to run over to her. "Hurry! All of you, hold onto each other's hands and run to me!"

Milo pushed them forward as they all ran toward Lia, whose eyes were now scanning the environment for signs of a second dhin.

Where there is one, there is usually another. It's probably watching us right now. We can't stick around any longer.

The dhin pushed harder against her magic, using all its strength to try and break her hold, but Lia's powers still would not let it go. If she wanted, she could pulverize the dhin into the trees, breaking every bone in its body without hesitation. She felt the urge to do so, but only for a fleeting bit, until her values kicked back in.

There was no need to end the lives of any of these animals. For what right did she have to do so?

Once everyone's hands had been interlocked, Lia knew that she was ready to make her escape. With Milo being the closest one to her, the man reached out. Lia broke her hold on the dhin at that instant, swinging her arm over and grabbing onto his. The beast was already picking itself up off the ground by the time their bodies lit up in a bright field of blue, glimmering light.

Out of the corner of her eye, Lia just managed to catch sight of another dhin emerging from the trees before they were all taken far away from that forest.

I was right. I was right…

It all changed in the blink of an eye. Everything became weightless, and when the infinite walls of blue dimmed away to the town of Acomb, that weightlessness gave way to the soil beneath them.

We're back!

Once she had reformed, Lia's first order of business was to attend to the heavily wounded woman that she had rescued. This young poil, who couldn't have been any older than twenty, had been violently attacked. Her clothing was soaked in deep pockets of blood. Her skin was deathly pale, mixed with a tinge of blue and purple in the furthest regions. The tears in her garments bordered valleys of ripped-up flesh. There was no telling just how many shattered bones there were beneath.

A dhin's bite force could obliterate a person's skeleton, and she looked like she had been bitten multiple times.

Lia slammed her hands down on the girl's chest, her magic immediately expelling to revive her. She had healed numerous people before, but traumas like this were not so common. Worse, they took a considerable amount of power to accomplish. A fawn's abilities weren't limitless. They demanded a great deal of energy from the soul and the strength of the body itself.

Even a surge as strong as Lia had her boundaries, and she knew where they stood.

For the average surge, they would need another fawn or two to repair this substantial damage. Lia didn't have that luxury. She was by herself.

She was always by herself.

The influx of blue light would do its best to reconstruct every lacerated fiber and splintered bone, but it was all useless if she could not confirm the core of life within the victim. Dead matter was unrepairable, and she needed to latch onto that to begin the process.

She searched and searched, but with each passing second, it grew harder to find what was there. She felt it at first, but it had fallen away so quickly that the only conclusion she could reach was a grim one.

She's slipping away! Damn it! I need to try harder!

Panic was visible on Lia's face as she leaned over the dying woman. The poils crowded around her, which only added to the claustrophobia she often felt. It made it difficult to concentrate. She closed her eyes, trying to shut them all out, but their words quickly reached her ears.

"Oh, no!"

"Save her!

"Lia, please, you need to hurry!"

Shut up, shut up, shut up!

"Argh!" She gritted her teeth as she pushed her powers deeper and deeper, hoping to finally take hold of that flicker of life, but that dim light grew dark as her tendrils of magic reached for it. Smaller and smaller, until finally...

No!

She couldn't lie to herself. What use would there be in doing such a thing? Lia knew death when she felt it. She pushed her powers just a little bit further, but not to search for the light—only to confirm that everything around it was void of its essence. This was the point of no return, and all the magic in Locwitary could not bring this poor woman back.

With a dejected sigh, she withdrew her hands from the girl's body, her eyes falling onto them as she processed the blood stains that painted her skin.

I was so close! If only I hadn't waited back there!

As she grieved the death of the youthful lady, the crowd around her only grew more restless. Some poils were simply distraught at the loss of life, but a select few, who did not understand the situation like she did, begged her to try again. One's voice inspired others to join in, and before she knew it, there was a small group that demanded the fawn resume her efforts.

Milo tried to hold them back, glancing over his shoulder to see how it was going. When he glimpsed Lia on her knees, hunched over on the ground, he knew that this was the end. "I'm sorry!" he told them. "There's nothing that we can do!"

But one person in the group would not take that answer. The man who Lia had rescued from the dhin came bursting through the crowd. He grabbed hold of the deceased girl, shaking her wildly. "Parselta! Wake up!"

She's not going to come back.

Lia tried to reason with him. "I'm sorry, but she is gone."

"No!" He became belligerent, fueled by the despair of a loss that he still could not comprehend. "You didn't try hard enough! You can still save her!"

Lia stood up, a somber gaze adorning her green eyes. She shook her head, defeated. But the man ran up to her, grabbing hold of her wrist.

"Get back there!" he screamed, furious to see her ready to walk away.

What is he doing?!

"Get off of me!" Lia shouted back, only to be shoved in response.

"I said save her, you damn fawn! What are you waiting for?!" The man would not back down, his actions driven by the anger of loss. He tried to pull her hand back down to the body, but that was when Milo came rushing over.

"Don't you touch her!" He pushed the man away from Lia, turning his eyes to see the fawn, who was as startled as ever. Instinctively, he shifted his attention back to the other poils, waving his arms to signal to them that they needed to step away.

Lia frantically scanned those around her, her thoughts centered around how they may view her. Was she a failure, or were they just scared? Were they angry at her? Had she not done enough?

The man who had grabbed her came rushing back, hysterical as he desperately tried to get her to resume her work. "You're just going to sit there and let my sister die, you bitch?" Milo stopped him dead in his tracks, shoving the thin fellow several feet back, but it was Lia who brought him—and all the others—into a stunned silence.

"She's dead!" Fire erupted from her hands as she threw them at her sides, a sign of warning that he should not dare advance toward her again. That brief flash of rage caused the rest of the poils to step back, fearful that she would turn her powers on them.

Get away from me! Everybody, just leave me alone!

Having witnessed her blue flames, Milo ran over, his hands gracefully lowering, telling her to calm herself. "Lia, it's okay."

But she would not listen. Her flames died out, and her hand took hold of his. "Grab your bag, Milo. We are leaving."

"Lia…" He tried to convince her again, but her patience had worn out. She swiftly released her grip without warning, her eyes boring into his as her brow grew so tense that one would have thought that she was ready to tear his head off.

"No!" She waved her arm and vanished immediately, leaving nothing but an array of particles in her wake. Milo stood alone, faced with a nervous crowd, a corpse, and two broken souls who gazed down beside it.

It would be a long walk back to the castle after the disastrous scene had been taken care of. A quiet walk on the outside, but a loud one within. He just couldn't stop thinking about the burden that she had to bear.

It was like the weight of the entire world rested on her shoulders.

NOTES:

Welcome! I hope you all enjoyed this chapter!

So, this was originally going to be a set of alternative chapters to Fragmented Flies, stemming from chapter 35 until the end. However, I feel like there was always a bigger story to tell here. While this takes place in an alternate timeline (which we will delve further into), it's still canon to the greater universe.

This is Lia's story. A glimpse into her past and why she was who she was when Cassandra eventually arrived. Readers wanted to learn more about her, and this is the chance to do so. While this is still technically fanfiction and will feature Cassandra Dimitrescu, I am writing it as a purely original work. It will connect to the Fragmented Series as a whole, exploring the flicker theory that has allowed all this madness to occur, but we're not here to fight that battle.

This is about Lia's life and the lives of the others, whom we barely got to know during Cassandra's journey, and the bloody past that shaped Locwitary. I don't expect this story to gain as much traction as the others, but I have always been a believer that a creator should give the fans what they want. And this is for the fans.

You loved Lia so much, and that love is repaid.

There will be laughter, warmth, tears, and bitter cold. I promise, you won't be prepared for what happens.

And if you have been following the Fragmented series so faithfully… you might want to stick around for the ending.

The next chapter will arrive on June 7th. Until then, stay safe and enjoy your weekend! 😊