It was late by the time everyone was gathered, close to midnight. The heat outside was cooling to something more comfortable than the inferno we had endured during the day and Brygos opened the door to his large barn so the crowd inside could enjoy the wonderful breezes rolling in off the sea. Most people had already eaten their main meal for the day, so we had honeyed pastries and fresh fruit alongside coffee so thick with honey that you could almost stand the spoon on end. Most spread their rugs out on the dirt floor to sit more comfortably and crammed in together like sardines in a tin.

Next to me, a sleepy-eyed boy settled into his mother’s lap while she carefully poured me a cup of coffee. My nerves had my stomach in knots, but I nodded along as she talked because despite the tension in the air, the gathering felt familial. Zita spoke with the comfortable rhythm of an aunt, as if we had known each other years and years.

Then Brygos drummed on a bucket to get everyone’s attention. “As you all know, we have guests,” he said, voice carrying over the hush. “Some hard decisions need to be made now. I asked Karsa if she would say a few words.”

An old man, face wrinkled like worn boot leather, gave me a long and serious look. “Going to war with the regime will get us all killed.”

“As if they need that excuse,” Zita said scornfully. “Look at Helike.”

My stomach dropped like a boulder and I turned to face her. “What about Helike?”

Brygos furrowed his brow. “You haven’t heard?”

Thaïs looked over at me, well aware that my parents lived in Helike. I thought I saw sympathy there, along with a deep worry. Then she turned her attention to Brygos. “We weren’t getting much in the way of news besides a bombardment dropped on our head, at least not from the northeast. What happened?”

Zita covered her son’s ears. “They burned half the goddamn town. I don’t know what happened to the people in the confusion, but I don’t think the soldiers were there to play nice.” She uncovered her son’s ears, squeezing his shoulders to comfort him when he gave her a worried look. “Don’t fret, baby. I just used a word you shouldn’t know yet.”

Everything in me wanted to drop my coffee and just run towards Helike until I collapsed, but it was further than I could reach now. They would have made it out, I told myself. It took me a full minute to realize that everyone was looking in my direction.

Thaïs’s hand came to rest on my shoulder as she explained on my behalf. “Karsa’s family lives in Helike.”

The old man softened his expression. “I’m sorry.”

“Let her say what she’s going to say,” Zita said firmly.

“Here.” Brygos moved off the crate he was sitting on and motioned for me to stand on it. “Talk away.”

I swallowed hard. What could I say? I tucked my hand into my pocket, fingers brushing across the broken pieces of Agathe’s spectacles. A sudden anger welled in me and I was on my feet before I really knew what I was doing. I didn’t know what to say, but I would say something for the people who death had silenced. I owed them that much.

“You know that we came from Seisa,” I said as clearly as I could around the lump in my throat. “Some of us were students, some of us laborers, all of us living in the cracks. They bombed our homes into rubble, they burned our people into ash.” The longer I spoke, the easier it became. “It isn’t my place to tell you what to decide. It’s your future as much as ours. What I can do is tell you what I see.”

I hesitated a moment and Thaïs was there to nudge me onward. “What do you see, Karsa?”

Something inside me screamed for release, clawing up the inside of my ribs. “I see a broken world,” I said bluntly. “One where I grew up hanging my head in shame, speaking a tongue that was not my own, toeing their line and praying to God that the Lathraí in me would be erased.”

In my mind, I thought of Endeis ripping apart the false confession on the stand and throwing it towards the assembled audience. It is a lie! she shouted at them. I still remembered all the fear in her tone, all the determination, all the righteous anger.

I pulled in a shaking breath, trying to control my pain. “It is a world of lies they have built. They tell us that we are nothing in a thousand different ways, they tell us that their power from on high will always be theirs, that the few will always dictate the future of the many. They tell us that nothing will ever change. It is a lie. I know. I swallowed it all my life like cyanide. It kills the soul, it rips you apart, it robs you of hope.”

There were murmurs through the crowd.

Another breath and I was ready to continue. “I see something else.” I looked around the room, taking an immense amount of comfort in the rapt attention they were giving me. At least someone was listening. I tried to fix the future I hoped for in the center of my mind. “I see us. I see a community that stretches across Astera, interconnected and thriving. Not separated and shuttled into the worst hells they can imagine, but growing green in the absence of the State. I see the deserts and the mountains not as they used to be in our grandparent’s day, but better. I see children playing, teasing each other in their mother tongue. I see neighbors looking after neighbors, not polizí with clubs and gas. I see the marks of war vanishing under the bloom of flowers.”

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“It’s not possible.”

I don’t know who said it, but I remember their eyes: doubting, hurting. “We are the children of the desert,” I answered with the ferocity of a lion. I cannot describe the sensation, only that I felt as if I would die if I stopped before the words wanted to. “No one knows how to flourish through hardship like we do. War is the horror of mothers, but it is coming one way or another. If we are together, we can endure the sweep of its sandstorm and build a garden when it is gone. If my blood has to water the earth for that future to blossom, I am willing. I cannot speak for you, I will not speak for you, but that is what I see. That is what I believe.”

A quiet settled over the room and I stepped awkwardly down from the box, wiping my hands on my pants. Thaïs watched me move, a smile on her face that I had never seen before. Then again, that was the first time I ever spoke in front of a crowd. I promised myself it would be the last time too.

I think they were as stunned as I was that anything halfway coherent came out of my tired mouth.

“Thank you, Karsa.” Brygos spoke with gravity beyond his years, with a weight that centered the world of the people who heard him. “We should put it to a vote.”

“That is the only way,” I said firmly.

Thaïs leaned over as I sat down, putting a steadying hand on my trembling shoulder. “You’re okay, Karsa.”

I sucked in a deep breath as the townspeople of Raklidí decided what their role would be in the war. It wasn’t my place to speak any more than they had allowed me. Their deliberations would take as long as they would take. I turned my face to her, stomach churning as my heart ached. “What about my parents?” When the fire left me, I felt microscopic and alone.

Thaïs wrapped her arms around me and pulled me into a tight hug. She smelled like Brygos’s pine soap and oiled metal from cleaning weapons, not at all like the perfume she wore in Seisa. “We’ll find them. You have to be strong for just a little while longer.”

“I don’t think I can,” I admitted, voice cracking.

She squeezed tighter for a moment, almost cutting off my breath. “You’re doing so good,” she soothed. “Just a little bit longer.”

I pulled in a deep breath and nodded against her shoulder.

Thaïs let me go and chased some of the wrinkles down my sleeves with her hands. “We’re all in this together, Karsa. You’re not alone.”

I nodded again. “Sorry.”

“Never apologize for feeling,” Thaïs said quietly.

I closed my eyes and pushed it all back. The memory of my sister, of the bombs, of the damaged front of my parents’ shop, of Agathe thrown into the fire, of Sostrate being left behind. All that hurt just knotted up deep inside. I had to be strong, just for a little while longer.

It was always just a little while longer. Longer and longer, until the nerves went dead just from feeling too much for too long.

There was no raging debate, no screamed epithets, no anger or outburst from the crowd as they weighed their options. To fight or to hide? To support quietly or resist with everything?

By the time Brygos stood up on the box with his clipboard of the roll call, I was sagging against Thaïs from exhaustion. His tone was every bit as serious as it had been before. “The war is not going to leave us alone,” he said calmly. “Is everyone satisfied that they have said their piece?”

The murmurs to the affirmative echoed through the large barn, spilling out into the crowd who were seated outside.

Brygos straightened up and made sure his voice carried as far as it could. “I’m not expecting a consensus. We’ll work out something if people decide they don’t want to join, but we do need a vote. Everyone should have a scrap of paper and a pencil. ‘Aye’ or a check mark is a vote for joining, ‘nay’ or an x is a vote to keep our heads down. Is everyone clear on that?”

Again, a wave of agreement swept through the crowd.

“Get to it. I’ll come around and collect them in this box. We can count and come to a verdict.” He stepped off his box and picked it up. “Majority rules.”

A furious scratching with pencils filled the air as people scrawled down their votes. The people who couldn’t read settled for symbols, as earnest and intent as the words themselves. Zita put a hand on my shoulder and shook me slightly when my head drooped. “Go to bed, Karsa,” she said. “You’ve had the longest day of your life.”

Thaïs pulled me up by my hand. “Zita’s right. We both need sleep.”

I saw my exhaustion reflected back in her red-rimmed eyes. It was enough to overpower my stubborn urge to stay awake and see things through. “Alright.”

We staggered back to the little room in Brygos’s root cellar where we could hide and sleep behind stacks of cans and boxes. He’d brought in a rug to soften the floor a little and a sleeping bag with a pillow for each of us. I eased myself down, well aware that I would hurt like hell in the morning from the desperate twelve hour run out of Seisa. Thaïs looked even more sore already. I had been a student athlete more prepared to run and do hurdles, so I would recover faster.

The light of the single carbide lamp shone starkly on our faces as we curled up in the sleeping bags. I rolled to face Thaïs. “Thank you,” I said thickly. “Are you alright?”

She clenched her fist, looking down at her nails. Enough of them had broken in the run that she’d cut them all short. It was the first time in years that they didn’t look pretty. “It doesn’t feel real. I think about it over and over, but I still feel numb.” Eventually, the shock would wear off, but we were barely out of the bombardment.

I knew she meant the destruction of Seisa and the end of the life she had always thought she would have. All the hard work and dedication of running her business had been pulverized into dust in the space of a few minutes. We didn’t know how many people she’d lost. We never would. “If you need me, I’m here.”

Thaïs nodded slightly. “Thank you, Karsa. I’m just...I’m ready to sleep.”

I turned off the carbide lantern with a click and settled in as best I could. I took immense comfort in the lumpy old pillow that Brygos gave me with such kindness. That night I slept like the dead.