MABEL
The charcoal kept her maintained, rooted, instead of flying off to the woods, shrieking, crying, erupting like the banshees in the middle of their dark, nestled wood. It removed the emotion clinging to her chest, heaving and assaulting her ribs, joining in between bones and pouring out from their walls. The enamel was stark and cold; and she’d be a chilling void again, when she was just beginning to remember her place.
Revenge. That had to be it.
She wrote the words out on the paper, the lines heavy, dark, and brooding, betraying the anger and foulness in her heart. Older man. Tall. Dark hair. “In the Temple. Someone religious?” she whispered – a place where their little haunts had transfixed and disposed. She made no mention of the man they’d assaulted before, where Evelyn had lifted with all her gravity and poise and thrown it down upon the individual’s head. How they’d laughed and mocked and jeered.
Had it been payback? Another brand of justice?
Her head lifted at Wessex’s next statements – pausing in her writing, the piercing slate of her stare going towards the Queen. She could hear the offer, but didn’t want it. Didn’t need it. Couldn’t uproot herself from this world, even if it collapsed down around her. “It’s all I have of them now.” Quieter, stiller, her eyes flickered over the kitchen and the table they had stood and sat within – the hearth bustling even though there was no need for its occupants – for the pipes, for the wood, really. “Aamu is staying here too.” He was a sort of comfort in his own way – another ghost with too many memories left untethered, unmoored. Maybe they were one another’s anchors.
Revenge. That had to be it.
She wrote the words out on the paper, the lines heavy, dark, and brooding, betraying the anger and foulness in her heart. Older man. Tall. Dark hair. “In the Temple. Someone religious?” she whispered – a place where their little haunts had transfixed and disposed. She made no mention of the man they’d assaulted before, where Evelyn had lifted with all her gravity and poise and thrown it down upon the individual’s head. How they’d laughed and mocked and jeered.
Had it been payback? Another brand of justice?
Her head lifted at Wessex’s next statements – pausing in her writing, the piercing slate of her stare going towards the Queen. She could hear the offer, but didn’t want it. Didn’t need it. Couldn’t uproot herself from this world, even if it collapsed down around her. “It’s all I have of them now.” Quieter, stiller, her eyes flickered over the kitchen and the table they had stood and sat within – the hearth bustling even though there was no need for its occupants – for the pipes, for the wood, really. “Aamu is staying here too.” He was a sort of comfort in his own way – another ghost with too many memories left untethered, unmoored. Maybe they were one another’s anchors.
I bare my teeth
and stretch my claws out
and stretch my claws out
