Clara reached the top of the hill, her lungs burning and her legs aching, before she looked back. Arcadia sat where it had always sat, silent and unmoving. Finally, she allowed herself to breathe.

The wind and rain had somewhat subsided since she had left the city, but now the boggy ground was hampering her as she walked towards the little village she called home. She must have been in Arcadia longer than she realised, she thought. The jumble of mismatched wooden bungalows was unusually all bathed in darkness. It couldn’t be that late, could it?

Something felt strange. Unlike Arcadia, the village had always felt warm and comforting. Now it felt cold, just like the ruined city it overlooked. She moved slower now, more concerned by what might lay ahead of her than behind her.

For the second time, she found her senses heightened as she moved down the muddy carriage track that ran through the centre of the village. Her eyes darted from one dark building to the next. If it hadn’t been for the rain on the wooden roofs and her feet squelching in the mud, it would have been perfectly silent.

Clara noticed that the door to her house stood ajar, the window beside it revealing only darkness inside. A chill ran down her spine as she approached. No longer was she looking in every direction; instead, she was focused on the door in front of her. Slowly, she pushed the door open.

From somewhere in the darkness, there was a low moan. ‘Clara? Is that you?’ a woman’s voice asked weakly. It was her mother. The hesitation evaporated at the sound of the familiar voice. She opened the door fully.

It took her a moment to spot her mother at first. She was slumped against the wall in the corner of the dark room, a hand held against her stomach. Nearby, a pair of candles cast a flickering light. Something glinted on the floor between them.

Clara moved forward, picking it up off the floor. It was a knife, its black handle embedded with what looked like a dozen emeralds. The blade was about six inches long and slightly curved, the silver blade glistening with a deep red liquid. Blood.

She looked up at her mother, noticing the blood seeping between the fingers of the hand that was holding her stomach. Dropping the knife with a clatter, Clara ran to her side, pulling the hand away.

The wound was deep, with blood seeping through her dark woollen jumper. How much blood had she already lost? Clara wondered as she felt the soaked jumper. ‘What happened?’

‘They came not long after you left. I knew they would come for us one day,’ she muttered, placing her hand over Clara’s as she tried to stench the bleeding.

‘Who came?’ Clara asked. ‘What are you talking about?’

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‘The survivors. He told me they would come back one day. They were looking for Emily.’

‘Who said they would come back? Who’s Emily?’ Clara spoke quickly. Her mind was running a thousand miles an hour, question after question on her lips, each demanding its own answer.

‘Your father,’ she whispered. ‘I didn’t believe him when he told me he had seen them. One day, not long before you were born, he went into the city and never returned.’

‘They found him?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said with a wince, pressing Clara’s hands against the wound tighter. ‘We don’t have long. You have to find her and warn her. They won’t stop until they have her.’

‘Let me get help; just hang on,’ Clara said desperately as she made to take her hands away.

Her mother shook her head. ‘No, there’s no one left, not here.’

‘Surely there’s someone?’ Again, her mother shook her head.

‘You need to go,’ she whispered, her breathing becoming shallower with each passing moment. ‘Take the road east. Go to Oria and find the vault. All the answers are there.’

Clara had heard about Oria on a couple of occasions in lessons when she was younger. It was supposed to be an ancient city in the middle of a desert. Her mother had long ago told her about the giant pyramid that sat at the centre of the city. It was said to hold ancient artefacts that had once been thought to have been lost in time.

‘But how will I get in there?’ Clara asked. Surely they wouldn’t just let anyone walk into the home of thousands of priceless treasures?

Her mother reached out with a bloody hand. ‘This will get you in,’ she said, taking Clara’s necklace in her hand. ‘They wanted the key from me, but I couldn’t give it to them.’

‘Let me go and find help,’ Clara begged as she watched the blood seep through her fingers.

‘It’s too late for me. You need to get Emily before they do, please,’ her mother said as she pulled her closer.

‘Who is she? What do they want with her?’

‘A war is coming, and they’ll never be able to win it without her. She’s the best hope we have if we want to stop Arcadia rising from the ashes,’ she whispered. ‘Go to Oria, find the vault, and you’ll find her.’

‘What do I tell her if I find her?’ Clara asked.

‘Tell her I’m sorry. Tell them both,’ she said weakly. ‘I didn’t abandon them; I was trying to protect them.’

‘Them?’

‘Your brother and sister,’ she whispered.

‘What?’ Clara demanded.

‘Go! Before they come searching again,’ her mother hissed.

‘No, I’ll stay with you,’ Clara begged. ‘I can’t leave you here alone.’

‘You have to,’ she said, wincing as she tried to push Clara away. ‘Take the knife and go before they come looking for you as well.’

‘I don’t want to go, though,’ Clara pleaded.

‘Sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to,’ she whispered.

‘I’m scared.’

‘Run, Clara,’ she whispered. ‘Run and don’t ever look back. Trust no one but her now.’

The bloody hand on Clara’s necklace relaxed and fell away as her mother’s eyes slid closed, a final soft breath escaping into the damp air that filled the room. Clara blinked back the tears in her eyes as she looked down at her mother. She could almost have been sleeping peacefully had it not been for the blood on her hands and jumper.

In a daze, Clara got to her feet. With one last look at the woman who had raised her, she turned her back. As she crossed the room, she stooped to pick up the knife, tucking it into her belt. The tears on her cheeks mixed with the rain as she stepped outside once more.

With her mother’s last words repeating in her head, Clara turned and began to run. The rain and wind whipped around her, but she no longer felt any of it.