The door opened slowly.
Cold wind slipped into the house like an uninvited guest.
Elowen Vale stood in the doorway with her small cloth bag clutched to her chest. Inside it were the only things she owned—two pieces of bread, a dull knife, and a worn ribbon her father once tied in her hair.
Behind her, the villagers gathered.
They had been whispering all morning. As if her mother cries weren't enough to null her.
Her mother cannot even look at her. Or touch her.
Maris Vale stared past her daughter, out into the gray winter sky, as if searching for something that had already left.
"Take your things," her mother said quietly.
Elowen swallowed.
"Mo-" she mumbled, stretching out her hand towards her mother
A murmur moved through the villagers.
Someone whispered the word again.
Curse.
Elowen tried not to hear it.
Her fingers tightened around the bag.
"Mother… I didn't do anything."
Maris finally looked at her.
And the hatred in her eyes was colder than the wind.
"Your hair," she said.
The words landed like stones.
"I should've believed it" Maris uttered holding her husband satchel closer
Elowen felt the familiar weight of it—heavy, burning, impossible to escape.
Her hair.
Bright red.
Too red.
The same color the villagers said burned the sky the night her father died.
"Since the day you were born," Maris continued, "misfortune has followed this house."
Elowen felt something crack inside her chest.
"But I'm your daug-." before she even able to continue Maris stepped back.
The movement was small.
But it felt like a blade.
"No," she said.
The door opened wider.
"You are the omen that took my husband."
Gasps rippled through the crowd.
Elowen didn't move.
Her legs felt frozen to the ground.
"Leave," her mother said.
The word echoed through the cold morning air.
For a long moment Elowen stood there, hoping—foolishly—that her mother would change her mind.
She didn't.
The door closed.
The lock turned.
And just like that—
Elowen Vale no longer had a home.
She stepped into the road.
Behind her the villagers watched like witnesses to an execution.
Above the hills, far in the distance…
War horns began to sound.
It's like a death sentence for Elowen, grasping the worn ribbon her father once gave her.