For one breath, the village saw only the impossible.
A child's body lay at Kael's feet.
The broken red brooch had fallen beside it, half-buried in dirt and blood, its cheap enamel catching the afternoon light in a way that made the scene look even worse. The older villager who had been watching from nearby stumbled back with both hands raised as if he had somehow been struck instead. His bundle of firewood rolled across the ground, scattering logs near the wall of the house. Someone screamed from the street. A woman at a doorway clutched her own child and dragged him behind her. The climbers in the square spun toward Kael with weapons half-drawn and faces full of the kind of horror that quickly hardened into accusation.
"Murderer!" someone shouted.
