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English Chronicles 2025 26printed 55 · PDF 65
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Whispers Of The Wounded Land
"The land whispers, but not to be heard, to be forgotten."
I didn’t know it then, but those whispers would echo in my mind long
after I crossed the border. It wasn’t a line drawn on maps, it was a fracture,
jagged and raw, carved deep into the soul of the land. The moment I
stepped across, it felt as though I had crossed into another world entirely,
one where time moved differently, weighed down by everything that had
been left behind.
The air carried the kind of stillness that wasn’t quiet at all. It was heavy,
like it was holding its breath, waiting for something. In the distance, the
sun bled into the horizon, its light spilling over a broken landscape.
Shadows stretched longer than they should have, creeping along fractured
walls and scorched earth. I could feel it, something lingering in the
silence, watching, waiting.
The town I entered was hollow, stripped of life yet full of its absence.
Buildings leaned like weary old men, worn thin by time and tragedy. The
ground beneath my boots felt brittle, as if the weight of the past could
shatter it at any moment. The air smelled of ash and something else I
couldn’t quite name, something older, something that clung to the edges
of memory.
And then I saw the child.
They stood alone in the middle of the wreckage, their small figure
impossibly still against the chaos around them. Their face was pale, their
eyes dark and unblinking, staring not at me, but beyond me, at something
only they could see. My heart hammered in my chest as I moved closer.
AC Chronicles
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