*Day 1 - Eastern Quarter, Crysillia*
Seraphina was healing a child's scraped knee when the world ended.
Such a small wound. Trivial. The kind of thing that would have healed on its own in days. But the boy was crying, and his mother was worried, and Seraphina had too much light in her hands that needed somewhere to go.
"There," she said, golden glow sealing skin. "All better."
The first dragon scream hit like a physical blow.
Windows exploded. The mother grabbed her child, ran. Smart. Seraphina stood there, stupid, watching glass fall like snow. Pretty, she thought. Then: Move.
The healing sanctum was three blocks west. Full of patients. Full of other healers who'd know what to do.
She made it half a block before the singing started.
Not music. Not really. Music had rules, structure, beauty. This was cancer in sound form. Notes that ate notes. Harmonies that murdered harmonies. The Crystal Spires—those perfect instruments of a thousand years—cracking like bones.
A man fell in front of her. Old. Clutching his chest.
Seraphina dropped beside him. Hands already glowing. Find the hurt, fix the hurt. Simple. Always simple.
His heart was failing. The dragon song was literally breaking hearts. She poured light into him, forced his rhythm steady. He gasped. Eyes focused.
"Run," he said.
"I'm a healer. I don't run."
Famous last words. Almost.
The sanctum was gone. Where white marble halls had stood, only rubble. She could see arms sticking out. Legs. A face she recognized—Master Healer Corvain, who'd taught her that healing wasn't about the light but about the choice to use it.
Alive. Some still alive. She could feel their pain like beacons.
Started digging. Hands bleeding. Didn't matter. Found a junior healer, barely breathing. Poured light. Pulled her free. Found another. Another.
How many did she save that hour? Twenty? Thirty? Not enough. Never enough.
Then the defenders started killing each other.
She watched Captain Morris—good man, three kids—put his sword through Lieutenant Hale's stomach. Watched them realize what they'd done. Watched them die confused.
The dragon corruption. The song wasn't just breaking buildings.
A child wandered past. Maybe six. Covered in blood. Not his.
"Mama?" he kept saying. "Mama?"
Seraphina grabbed him. What else could she do? Checked for wounds. Nothing. The blood was his mother's, probably. Definitely.
"What's your name?"
He didn't answer. Shock. She carried him to where she'd been gathering survivors. A pathetic little camp in what used to be a garden. Forty people. Most injured. All terrified.
"We need to get underground," said someone. Jareth? Jakob? She'd already forgotten.
"The sewers," Seraphina said. "They're stone. Old stone. Might hold."
They moved. Slow. Too slow. Carrying those who couldn't walk. The child clung to her neck, silent now. Behind them, Crysillia ate itself.
The sewer entrance was narrow. One at a time. Seraphina went last, making sure everyone got through. The child wouldn't let go. Fine. She'd carry him forever if needed.
Dark below. Wet. Sound of dripping and distant screams.
"Light," someone begged.
Seraphina raised her hand. Soft glow. Enough to see faces. Frightened faces looking at her like she had answers.
"We wait," she said. What else could she say?
An hour. Maybe two. Hard to tell. The child finally spoke:
"You smell like mama."
Lavender. She'd washed her hair with lavender that morning. Lifetime ago.
"What's mama's name?"
"Mama."
Of course.
The rumbling started slow. Built. The sewers shook. Dust fell. Stone cracked.
"Move!" But where? They were already underground.
The ceiling came down.
Seraphina threw everything she had into a shield of light. Held it. Held it. Tons of stone pressing down. Her nose bleeding. Eyes bleeding. Light flickering.
The child's hand in hers. Small. Trusting.
She held for thirteen seconds.
The shield shattered.
She woke to darkness and weight. Crushing weight. The child—
No. Don't think about the child.
Somehow her left arm was free. She pulled. Dragged. Inch by inch. Tearing skin. Breaking nails. Up through stone and death and—
Air.
She crawled out into moonlight. Crysillia was gone. Just... gone. Smoking rubble stretched to the horizon. She looked back at the hole she'd crawled from. No one else was coming.
Forty people. She'd saved forty people from the sanctum ruins only to bury them herself.
Started walking. No destination. Just away.
Found more survivors eventually. Helped who she could. Became part of the refugee column. The healer who'd failed to heal what mattered.
Days blurred. She worked. Always working. Set bones. Cleaned wounds. Delivered babies who'd never know a world with crystal spires. But at night, when she tried to sleep, she felt that small hand in hers.
"You smell like mama."
On day eight, she met Marcus Greysteel. Old soldier. Broken like her but different. He was carrying wounded on a makeshift stretcher.
"Need help?" she asked.
"Always."
They worked together. Didn't talk about before. Before was dead. Buried under tons of stone with a six-year-old child whose name she never learned.
Marcus understood. She could see it. The weight he carried. Different weight, same crushing force.
"Can't save them all," he said one night. They'd lost three that day. Infection. No supplies.
"Then why try?"
"Because we can save some."
Simple. Stupid. True.
She kept working. Kept healing. But she never used lavender again. Couldn't stand the smell. It reminded her of trust she couldn't keep, shields that weren't strong enough, and the exact weight of a small hand going cold in the dark.
Some healers mend bodies. Seraphina learned she was the kind who carried ghosts. Every life saved balanced against those thirteen seconds when her light failed.
The child would have been seven now. If. If. If.
She stopped counting the ifs. Started counting the living. Easier that way. Numbers instead of names. Wounds instead of faces.
But sometimes, in quiet moments, she still felt that hand.
Still smelled lavender.
Still held a shield that would never be strong enough.
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*"The hardest lesson for a healer isn't learning how to save lives. It's learning how to live with the ones you couldn't save."*
- Seraphina's journal, Day 20
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