Talia's Echo

The acolyte’s ravaged form offered little in the way of useful intel, mostly just a steaming pile of ash and a faint scent of ozone. Bishop Dark kicked at a charred boot, the leather cracking like brittle bone. Abbot Kale had been ecstatic about the “minor skirmish,” as he’d so delicately put it. Bishop just saw it as another Tuesday. He’d dealt with the rogue coven member, scooped up the few trinkets they’d managed to hoard – mostly dried herbs that smelled suspiciously like burnt toast and a few bits of tarnished silver – and was about to chalk it up as another day of keeping the good folk of the world safe from… well, whatever this particular brand of evil was peddling.

Then his boot nudged something small and hard. He bent down, his gloved fingers closing around it. It was a bird. Carved from wood, smooth and worn from handling, its wings tucked neatly against its body, its tiny beak pointed resolutely forward. It was a simple thing, unadorned, but Bishop felt a jolt, sharp and unexpected, that had nothing to do with the residual magic clinging to the corpse.

He’d made this bird. Years ago. For Talia. His little sister. She’d been ten when she vanished, a bright spark of a girl with eyes that missed nothing and a laugh that could chase away shadows. He remembered the splintery wood, the scraped knuckles as he’d tried to get the wings just right, the fierce pride when he’d presented it to her. She’d clutched it like a lifeline, a constant companion, tucked into the pocket of her worn dress.