In his home village of Desa, the young boy with pale skin and big blue eyes passed away on his sixth naming day.Desa was fifty leagues to the west of the Parbata Mountains, in the middle of the Kedara Plains. It was in a straight line with Torkeln, the capital city, as the raven flies.The boy, wearing a crown of woven prairie grass around his head and sitting at the head of the communal table in the dining hall, had been laughing with his friends, eating the delicious meal that his mother and sisters had prepared for everyone, and listening to his father talk about the Anmah.Although his older brother George, who was fifteen and much wiser, laughed when he said that he believed the stories of beautiful, kind, immortal beings to be true, he was still young enough to believe them.

George mocked, "Everyone knows the Anmah are just a story."The tales are believed by only infants and elderly women.Everyone has a finite lifespan.

"George, do not say that."His father looked down at his oldest son as he interrupted his story.It was easy to imagine what the chief's youngest son would look like when he grew up because the two had almost identical features and shared the boy's coloring.The Anmah exist.I had a personal encounter with one when I was younger than you.

George said with sincerity, "Yes, Father," and then his eyebrows came together.How do you know it wasn't just a stranger but an Anmah?

"Those are their eyes.They have violet eyes that are piercing, and when an Anmah is feeling a strong enough emotion, they are so bright that they can shine without the sun or moon.

Someone screamed as the dogs outside the hall began to bark just as the young boy was about to speak.Together with the others at the table, he quickly got up, and they all looked out the hall's open door.The boy turned to face his father as several yelps and the dogs' abrupt barking stopped.With his hand on the hilt of the long knife at his waist, the village chief was slowly making his way toward the door.The boy thought Jane, his sister, had screamed, but he had no time to think any further because three Asabya, the terrifying, murderous barbarians of the plains, stormed into the room with a ferocious battle cry at the same time.The boy watched in horror as the tall men, their long, dark hair pulled back by leather thongs around their foreheads, painted black with white around their mouths and dark eyes, swung their swords, and killed everyone in his immediate vicinity.Before the chief could draw his knife, the first person in the room severed his father's head from his body. But they didn't stop there.Everyone was killed, from the tiniest infants in their mothers' arms to the elderly with gray heads who had just given the boy their blessing.The pain and blood as a sword was buried to the hilt in his chest were all he could remember when another person appeared in front of him.

He sat up as the constant buzzing of a fly in his ear brought him to consciousness and forced him to take a deep breath to avoid the pain he had anticipated.He had to take a moment to realize that there was nothing—no pain at all.Although his tunic was cleanly sliced and covered in blood, he ran his tiny hands over his chest where the sword had entered and found no wound.He looked around the dining hall with widened eyes.

The room was in disarray.Since the forest was more than fifty leagues to the east, the village's prized gacha wood table was on its side, and each reed chair had been broken into multiple pieces.He slowly got to his feet and realized that he was the only living thing in the hall, aside from the fly that had woken him up. The blood on the dirt floor was dark red, almost black.With his belly cut open and his intestines spilling out onto the ground, George lay close to him, eyes open and lifeless on the ceiling.Emili, his sister of four years, was crushed under the table, her blonde hair red-tinted and her laughter forever silenced.His father was half a pace away from his body and lying near the door.The boy rushed out of the room into the first light of the day as his panic began to take over.He stopped and stared at the devastation around him after taking only one step out the door.

He could see burning huts everywhere, and the village's central stone wall around the well had collapsed.He carefully peered down the deep hole as he walked to it.For some reason, the fact that he could make out the faint glimmer of the rising sun on the water far below gave him some comfort.However, when he realized that the forms he saw scattered around him were his people and his family, which had been slaughtered and left where they had fallen like discarded toys, it fled as quickly as it had appeared.He stumbled through the village, frantically looking for anyone still alive and calling out the names of his loved ones until his voice was gone, but no one was there.He wept and sat down in the midst of the chaos.

On the boy's sixth naming day, he died for the first time.

The wolves and the ravens arrived the same night and just a few hours later.The boy had discovered a hut that was mostly intact and had no bodies in it. He hid inside from the piercing screams and frightful howls that came from outside.He tried unsuccessfully to ignore what the animals were doing.He wept when he thought of his family being treated similarly after seeing a fox carcass that had been picked clean by the scavengers.

Three days after the wolves arrived, he died twice.The boy slowly ran out of water despite the fact that there was water in the well. He couldn't get to it through the vicious animals, so he died of thirst.He only sped up the process by crying.His body shut down due to the lack of water, and one night he slept on the pallet he had made for himself.He remembered the last beat as his heart finally stopped. He could feel it slow down.

He opened his eyes slightly surprised the following morning.He was no longer thirsty, just as he had no pain when he awoke from the sword's death.Certainly not to the point where he felt as though he was about to die of thirst once more.However, he quickly realized that he also had another issue.

After feasting for two more days, the wolves left the village, but there was no food left for the Asabya or the animals.The boy was just a small child. His people's custom was that children could be children until their tenth naming day, and he had not yet learned how to find food.That had always been his responsibility, along with that of his older siblings and mother.He had occasionally observed them, but he had not paid attention because he was more concerned with playing with his friends.

The following day, when there were no more sounds outside, he forced himself to leave the hut and shed more tears as he looked around at the white bones and the red tissue still clinging to many of them.He made his way slowly through the bodies until he got to the dining hall.He entered it and proceeded to the location where he believed his brother had fallen.The weapon he was looking for was close to the bones:The slingshot of George.Despite the fact that he had no idea how to use it properly, the boy took it along with the stone pouch that his brother always carried.He tried to use the weapon throughout the day, but he was unsuccessful, so he put it aside.

He carefully peered into the well by leaning on the shattered stones.When he saw a few white bones sticking out of the water, he trembled.He knew he needed to eat right away or he would die again because he was starving.

He spent a lot of time burying his people and digging up graves.He did not know how to make fire, so he buried the bodies instead of burning them as was their custom.He was uncertain that bones would burn on their own.However, he was disappointed that he was unable to extract the bones from the well.He had the impression that he ought to be able to put them to rest.

He could feel himself wasting away as the days turned into nights, nights into two, and nights into three.He once more laid down on his pallet in the hut and waited to die after three nights of eating grass and failing to catch small animals with his bare hands.

When he awoke the following day, his hunger and thirst pains had diminished to a distant ache, but he had begun to understand what was happening to him.Despite the fact that he was only six years old, he decided to test the idea that had come to him because he had always been told he had a quick mind.

He returned to the dining hall and rummaged through the trash until he discovered a dented metal plate beneath a stack of chairs made of reeds.He brought it outside, cleaned it of dust, and then held it up in front of him.A pair of dark violet eyes looked back at him, as he had suspected.He put down the plate and looked around the village, recalling every Anmah-related tale told by the elders.

In every story, it was implied that they were not humans but a distinct race.They were good and helped others, but no one knew where they came from or that they were immortal and could never die.In any case, not forever and never in the same way twice.He was aware that there were others of his kind, but he had no idea where.He pushed aside the question of how he could be Anmah and not the rest of his family until later.