Chapter 113: The Enclave Attack I
"We didn't expect help, but help came. Some of the elders joined, swearing they'd rather die than beg; others gritted their teeth and followed us into the places we had no right to go. And one by one, the coughing eased. Beds cleared. Mothers who'd been rowed past the worst of it began to sit up and hold their children again. Hope swelled so quick you could feel it like a tide."
A brittle laugh, meant for himself and not shared, escaped him.
"It felt like we'd stolen the world back. We sang in the streets that night. My father announced, with a drunken grin, that I'd not be alone forever, he said my mother was carrying another, that I'd have a sibling at last. We danced, stupid and loud, because you don't know how to keep still when the thing that's been dragging you down finally loosens."
His teeth clicked. The gladness he described was raw and immediate; then the shadow came. The tone in his voice changed; the words began their slow drop.
