The humans of the story argue over something recoverable (land, an animal, a claim) while what is actually destroyed is irreversible (a bond, a life, a family's means of continuing on their land).

Each act of "this is mine" costs the person claiming something they do not intend to lose, even as it costs the dispossessed everything. In this story, the moral injury is to the one who harms, not only to the one who suffers.

This is a story of listening in the dark, of a voice on a hillside carried far beyond the place where it began. It invites us to stay with the difference between owning something, belonging with someone, and caring for a life we can never completely know.

The following link opens as a pdf ebook that you are welcome to save and share:

ORIGINATOR · Mike de Sousa

ART FORM · Short Story: 30 Pages

COMPLETED · 2026

Free to enjoy. Copyright maintained. Not to be used for ai or commercial gain.