I turned a corner and stopped short.
There was something standing among the ruins.
A statue.
Unlike the rest, it hadn’t crumbled. It was cracked and scorched. But still standing.
I stepped closer.
It was a woman.
Or it had been. Her features were half-melted, as if fire had tried to erase her. One side of her face was smooth and beautiful, with high cheekbones and closed eyes. The other was twisted, damaged, melted and broken.
But it was her expression that stopped me.
There was sadness on her face.
So much sorrow.
Like she had seen something she could never unsee.
At the base of the statue was a single word.
Carved into the stone, it was worn and faded, but still legible.
Althea.
My breath caught.
I stared at the name.
It pulled at something inside me. A memory. A whisper
