Fiction

Banished

With each step I imagined the laughter of those who cast me out

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I stumbled into the wilderness, banished from the city that thrived on order and conformity. The city gates, tarnished iron and towering, slammed shut with a finality that scorched deeply into my psyche.

With each step I imagined the laughter of those who cast me out.

Desperation gnawed at me as I wandered into barren wastes where the silence of nature was broken only by the howls of feral winds. Days blurred into nights, hunger and exhaustion mixing into a fevered haze.

Then they found me — others marked by difference, shunned by the same cold, heartless authority. A seer with eyes like storm clouds, a tinker who whispered to machines, and warriors whose loyalty was forged through exile.

We were a patchwork of broken souls, bound by survival and defiance. In their company, I discovered something raw and electric — a belonging born not of sameness, but of shared purpose.

We built a haven from the ruins of forgotten outposts, carving a place where each voice mattered and power was earned, not taken.

Our community thrived, a living defiance to the city’s rules of order. News of our success rippled back to those marble halls and iron thrones. They sent emissaries, shrouded in false smiles and veiled threats.

“Rejoin us,” they said, promises of clemency and reintegration dripping like poisoned honey. Their eyes gleamed with hunger, not for peace, but for control.

The council gathered. Whispers turned to sharp words as doubt curled around the edges of our resolve. “We need peace,” some argued, eyes weary from endless vigilance. Others stood silent, awaiting my decision.

I rose, every scar a testament to what we had built. I felt the weight of trust, the raw fear behind their hardened gazes. Was I willing to gamble everything for a chance at freedom, even knowing it might doom us all?

“Yes,” I said, my voice steady as the iron gates that closed behind me. “We will not return to their chains.”

The city’s reprisal was swift and brutal. Siege engines rolled through the night like thunder, fire…