Fiction

Author: Salis Fern

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A quaint courtyard, overgrown with tuffets of weeds. A crumbling wall, besotted with vines and roots, encircled a small clearing for which he sat. Upon a rock, ladened with moss and lichen native to his home.

Then out of the shadows came a hollow figure. The tree’s thicker than it, the wind a breeze through its form. It’s presence of a natural propensity for darkness, yet it’s being decayed, a transparent thing. As if in its bones you could see through to the memories of its embraced prey.

Death was not cloaked in shadows, nor smelt like the sulphur of damnation and demons. Its claws were non-existent and his evil was missing. He appeared simply as one’s self a reflection of life, a personification of present reality.

Then with rough, ivory coloured, weary bones, the man was welcomed into an embrace, his flesh and blood melting away. Returning to the earth. Until he too was just the hollow scaffolding of a soul now long gone.

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Posted 15 October 2024

Copyright (c) 2024 by SALIS FERN