The staccato of the drums matched the strides of the boy and his comrades as the too long sword banged against his legs. The harp, scratched and worn, swung to and fro across the small of his back. The boy knew nothing of politics or religion, nor the difference between his lineage and theirs; he only knew of the songs of his people. Flutes lifted their fragile melody above the percussion as the boy's voice joined the chorus of his countrymen, warriors and poets all. To the boy, the sound was enough to challenge the betrayal of a world he did not comprehend, and it filled him with a pride impossible to express. 

Fruiting grasses, a vivid collage of greens and golds, bent low against the midday breeze framed by a powder blue sky. The boy knew the scene but had never felt the music of the land so fervently, nor appreciated its harmony with his own so deeply; the boy's pride grew greater still as he drew his father's sword in her defense, his heart faithfully singing her praises. The ranks of the doomed marched forward, unrelenting, their songs filling the air one last time.

The boy fell, the last of his line, but the chains of the foe had failed to bind him. The fruiting grasses before him expressed their colors in such detail now that each grain appeared as a world unto itself. The harp lay before him, and as life left the boy, he saw in his beloved instrument all that his people had been, and ever would be. With waning strength he took it into pale bloodied hands and his trembling fingers tore the chords from her weathered neck. Never again would she sing the free songs of the her people, but she would not sing the songs of the enslaved. The boy joined his comrades in the ranks of the dead, his harp slung behind him as the staccato of the drums beat their retreat from the mortal realm and the flutes played harmony to the voices of his folk as they retired from the lands of their ancestors.