Cian did not get up. He lay in the mud, the taste of copper filling his mouth, listening to the rain hiss against the puddles.
He expected shouting. He expected the miller to kick him, or the blacksmith to hit him again. He would have preferred that. Violence was loud; it was chaotic. It was something he could understand.
Instead, hands grabbed him. Rough, callous hands. They didn't strike him; they hauled him upright by his tunic, gripping him tight enough to bruise. It was Thomas, the baker, and old man Hobb. Men he had known his entire life. Men who had given him honey-cakes when he was small.
Now, they wouldn't look at him.
"Lock him in the smokehouse," the blacksmith said. His voice was flat, devoid of the fire that usually rang out from his forge. It was the voice of a man discussing a broken tool.
"My son," a voice cracked from the edge of the torchlight.
Cian's head snapped up. His father, Ewan, stood there. He was wearing his nightshirt, his feet bare in the muck. He looked small. Pale. He looked at the dead Wargs, then at Garret's body, and finally at the miller weeping over his wife.
He didn't look at Cian.
"Ewan," the blacksmith said, stepping between the father and the boy. "Go home. Comfort your wife. This isn't for you right now."
"He's my boy," Ewan whispered, but he didn't step forward. He didn't fight for him. He looked at the destruction, the open door of the miller's house, and the strength seemed to drain out of him like water from a cracked jar. He turned away.
That hurt more than the blacksmith's fist.
"Move," Thomas grunted, shoving Cian forward.
They marched him through the village. Faces appeared in windows—frightened, pale faces illuminated by flickering candles. They saw Garret's body being carried on a shutter behind them. They saw Cian, muddy and bloody, being marched like a criminal.
The smokehouse was a small, windowless shack near the edge of the square. It smelled of hickory and stale grease. They shoved him inside.
"Wait," Cian pleaded, finding his voice. It sounded thin and pathetic. "I didn't... I just wanted to learn. I was trying to train. For the village."
Thomas paused at the door. He looked at Cian, his eyes filled with a terrifying mixture of pity and disgust.
"Garret is dead, Cian. Elara is dead. You didn't train. You played."
The door slammed shut. The heavy wooden bar dropped into place with a final, hollow thud.
Cian stood in the pitch black. The smell of smoked meat was overpowering, choking him. He sank to the dirt floor, pulling his knees to his chest.
Outside, he could hear the sounds of the village dealing with the dead. The scraping of shovels. The low murmur of prayers. The sobbing of the miller's daughters.
He put his hands over his ears and squeezed his eyes shut, but the darkness inside his head was just as loud.