Spinning. Reams and reams of golden thread passed through her fingers as the spinning wheel conutinued on its endless spiral of revolutions. She had blisters now on all the fingers of her right hand. Blood seeped from under her nails and dulled the glow of the thread as it piled higher and higher on the floor beside her. She wondered what the point was but knew she couldn't stop. He would be back soon and then she would know her fate. Spinning. He said that if she got through all of it he would give her her freedom. She didn't...
Spinning.
As I drift towards the ground, I spin and the world spins around me. The blues and greens and browns flash past, a kaleidoscope around the carousel of my descent.
The spun silk canopy spinning with me and giving an orange glow from above as the Sun's rays find it in the blue, blue sky.
The Earth rushes up, faster now. Still spinning, I begin to tense. Remember the instructions.
Relax.
Let your legs go limp.
Tuck and roll.
The spinning stops with a thud.
They gathered in the woods. The darkness entwined itself around everything it touched. Filling every hole, every space it could claim.
It was not the darkness that was so frightening, it was that which hide inside. Using it as a clever camouflage.
Something hid, something stalked and watched and he could feel it. It was looking at him, watching and waiting. Its gaze crawling across his skin like tiny spiders.
He hid within himself not wanting to accept it. He built up the layers to keep the darkness out. He would not fear the thing in the dark. he would...
She could tell I was faking it. Every time I cracked a smile or choked out a laugh. All of it a fabrication to please the people around me. An attempt to lie to everyone, especially myself, about how screwed up my life really was, about how everything around me truly was going to hell.
When you've lost everything, why shouldn't you laugh? The bitterness of it is cathartic.
Yet... She stays around. Keeps an eye on me, noting my dulled eyes and chronicling every irrational action. Hearing the broken glass edges of my voice, seeing the glint of tears...
The train in which Natalie happened to sit
Was the train that another train managed to hit
The noise was quite loud,
And in the tracks were a crowd
To which the conductor exclaimed, "holy shit!"
The sweetest honey was the one they daubed on his lips.
This wasn't really torture; not in the traditional sense. Instead of pain, he was given touches of pleasure.
Simple pleasures - gentle whispers, the smell of bread, the touch of soft wool against his cheek.
After a few days, he wondered if they really wanted him to talk, or if they wanted him to stay. If they wanted him to remain there, relying on them, content to be with them until the end of his days.
To call him a pet would be too extreme, but the principle was...
They gathered in the woods.
The circle wasn't complete. It probably wouldn't be - they were a dying breed, a dying art.
None of them were sure if the ceremony did anything - if it ever had. The elder members of the group - the ones who were dying out, the ones who were disappearing before they could share enough information to perpetuate them - claimed that it had worked, that it still worked, but the magic was dying with the belief.
The youngest walked the path of the circle, her bare feet already dirty, her old dress (torn, ruined,...
It was the moment she'd been waiting for her whole life - she just hadn't known it.
She hadn't known she'd wanted to disappear until she could.
On the one side of her was the crashed train, the people screaming, the police trying to keep control, ambulances - so much chaos and pain. Explanations and stories.
And on the other...just sky.
It wasn't as if she had anything she needed to escape from, but that was the point. There was nothing in her life that meant that much to her. She was trapped by her own monotony. Changing her life...
There was pandemonium at the track. Not the racetrack, not the dog track, not even at the running stadium. Nope. It was down on the railroad tracks.
The train driver had spotted a dog on the track and, being an animal lover - a lover of animals, that is, he applied the brakes a bit too sharply. This resulted in the slight derailment of the engine and most of the carriages.
People were quick to disembark and it appeared that there had been no fatalities and only one or two casualties. People wandered around aimlessly searching for the dog that...
They were trapped for seven days. Aleena tried to hold back the tears as it had been seven days since she had seen the wolf- warrior Felan being taken away by Balor. She felt that she had let everyone down: the people who had brought her up as their own. She wondered where they were; if they were still trapped in the cage that she had tried to rescue them from when she and Felan had been caught. She wished she could see them one more time, even if it was to say sorry for bringing them into this. They...