01.17.2016
Fog and smoke mixed in the warm morning air, clouds broke overhead, and a real sunrise fell on Harsenth. The remaining people were looters or hardheaded. The looters wandered through the abandoned homes and businesses taking what they liked and defacing what they didn’t. The power and control they felt was unlike anything they had experienced before. They were able to stick it to those not there. Their looting was an expression of how their life had been justified. They now repaid people for all the pain they’d given.
The resolute people took the opportunity to fortify their homes. Under the grand delusion that they could stop anything. No harm would come to their family or home while they were on the watch. Preparation was the medicine for a fearful day. And life would not be worth living if they were away from their beloved homes. Nothing would wrest control from their hands and make them flee. That’s not how it works. They’ll live as they please, and if that means their life ends tonight, that’s just fine. Life isn’t worth living unless it’s fear-free and lived on your own terms.
The looters and preparers went about their days quietly, for the most part. None went to see the aftermath of Chustal or Foulal. To do so was inviting doom to them. The people who had fled, the refugees now, had walked all through the night, to and through their exhaustion. But after the sun had risen, most lie down on the side of the road to sink into a fretful, nightmare-ridden sleep.
Families carried children that were now too tired to keep walking. Some had brought along packs of food and ate it silently in the shade of trees off th path, to avoid having to share it with anyone else. For many had fled unprepared, and now begged for a small morsel for them and their weary family. A few did share, just thankful to have made it out of town and through the night without issue.
Behind the silent, chewing faces the minds of those with food felt no pity for their town members without food because they were caught up in self-pity for the home and livelihood and memories that had been taken from them. Even the Mayor and Council were unprepared in that regard. After he had abandoned the town and his post, did he have authority? Was he the appointed leader of that place? Or of the people in general?
He asserted his position as he claimed a place for his wagon to stop and a place to sleep, but was laughed away by the people he intended to displace. He was not respected here. He ended up sleeping on top of sacks of cloths and food in the back of the wagon. The council members in their nearby wagons did the same.
It was the best way to prevent anyone from taking their belongings as well. Each woke in the afternoon to find that the carriage drivers had left as a group, taking the horses with them. Now, the Mayor and his Council had their belongings but no way to transport them. As the group of people woke from their sleep and moved along the trail again, the Mayor tried to enlist help to carry his necessary and well-earned belongings. All those near him passed by, but for one woman who spat at his face. “We’re no longer your work beasts,” her husband said.