Chapter 1
Rayas took a long, deep breath, trying to stop his trembling. Rain fell from the sky like tears as he raised his hand up to the sky listlessly. It looked so... dead, like his very skin was bleached of life. No, he told himself, it just seems that way because of the stories where giving your Breath away was to give up a part of your soul. That can't be true, I'm still alive...
It had only been a week since Rayas had arrived in T'Telir, the boisterous capital of his country, Hallandren. Oh the beauty, the colours, the size, the noise, the life, the sheer grandeur of the city on the hill, as it was framed by the sun setting behind it, sinking into the sea.
But then isn't our Breath supposed to be a part of our soul?
He put his hand back by his side. And stared up, up, up at the sky. His eyes wandered back to the top of the buildings. The buildings that once seemed so colourful. Were they always this bland and yet so loud? They seemed ugly now, competing with one another, packed, fake. Where is the life? Where is the beauty? Where did it go? Where did it go?! Where did it go, where did it go, where did it go, where did it go?!!
He took a deep shuddering breath. The rain still fell, he did not feel it.
He was born with a strong, healthy breath. He was always told so, in the small riverside port-town he had grown up in. He had dreamed of this city then, with wonder in his heart. He had believed... Unbidden, his mind went back to that fateful choice. Why didn't I just walk away?
He stood in front of a god. Lifeblesser, the god of healing. He stood nearly seven feet tall with sculpted muscles and a square jaw, with tousled brown hair and flowing robes. He didn't even seem to hear Rayas as he made his request. He was turned away, unheard. Why did he feel so dejected then? As though the fault lay with his own self!
He remembered hearing the call... that Lifeblesser needed to be fed another Breath. He had been so excited! Foolish! Why did he want to feel acknowledged by a god when that god was so uncaring towards his followers?! Why did he believe in those lies? Why was he so naïve? Why did he go? Why did he give his Breath to that uncaring cretin pretending to be a god?!
Rayas' eyes turned to the naked statue behind which he was taking shelter. Whose pretentious drapery he had stolen. Beauty, he spat. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, he knew that he should probably move away from it. The people who dressed up their statues probably wouldn't like it if they found out that a beggar had pilfered its clothes. He just couldn't bring himself to care.
TBC