Niya is standing on the rooftop, her hands shoved in her pockets with cool air brushing past her cheeks. Tonight is different. Tonight the entire tribe is hushed, as if everyone is put under a spell and are sleeping under the blanket of fear. A tear trickles down her cheek and she sighs at the warmth. Slowly she takes out her right hand and immediately the mark begins to burn and glow. She is accustomed to the agony now, but tonight she feels something different, something she can’t describe; like an invisible tug, like an unspoken language. The longer she looks at the mark the more she loses any other sense, as if the world is muted and only she is real. Suddenly her focus shifts to shadow, a silhouette standing under the birch tree a few metres in front of her cottage. Niya squints her eyes but is only able to see the hooded figure staring back at her. She can’t see the face, nor can she identify the gender but she knows, she knows in her gut that she is being watched. As if in a
Read more