Drabble Wednesday: Cold Revenge

Today on Drabble Wednesday, I serve up a dish best served cold… Revenge.

Country of Shadows

In the darkness I fume, in the blackness I scheme... mine enemies best beware. Revenge is best served bloody.

I still feel their sharp blades, cutting, cutting, draining my blood, my life. They left me to stain the marble and die. I saw their looming shadows as I took my last breath.

Death did not finish me, though.

I yet exist.

Somewhere between, in this eternal night.

Somewhere in the shadows of what I once called home.

I see them. I will haunt them.

I will ruin them.

Then I will see their blood run free to stain the marble.

~*~

Absinthe in the Rain

I stand on a Paris street in the rain.

I can hear the soft strains of happy laughter, and faint music from the Moulin Rouge.

I am waiting.

He will come to me this time.

It has been a year since he abandoned me, abandoned our grand plan. But I did not give up. I succeeded. Now he will be the fool, as he once called me.

He walks up the road. He sees me in under the street light. My men shoot him dead.

I watch his body fall, the bottle of absinthe he held smashing on the cobblestones.

~*~

Dollhouse of Death

“Stop squirming.”

But the miniature man keeps wriggling, so I squeeze, just a bit, to make my point. I hear a tiny crack, and a small high pitched scream.

Oh dear, I’ve broken him. No matter, he’ll be dead soon.

I shrug and place him in the doll house, on the small braided rug. He cradles his arm and moans.

The two others stay huddled in the corner. I think they’re still in shock from my spell. And yesterday’s killing. I did a public execution with a working guillotine.

Their own fault, really. They should not have double-crossed a witch.

© A. F. Stewart 2016 All Rights Reserved

Drabble Wednesday: The Glade

Today on Drabble Wednesday, it’s something a bit different. Three separate stories (the last story is longer than 100 words, but I didn't want it shortened, so I left it) all based on the same picture, the one posted below. I hope you enjoy…

After the Night

The early morning light washed away the night shadows and all trace of the visitors. A low, audible vibration, almost melancholic, settled in the air. The sound prevented any silence, dangling gravely in the air.

They knew. They knew what happened in the night.

A mellow breeze blew through the feathery branches and ruffled the grass. Particles stirred, movement, silver reflections in the daylight. A small noise, much like the sound of weeping, came from the trees.

The hoary dust scattered, floated into sunbeams and dispersed, carried away by the wind.

Lost forever.

Those desiccated remains of the murdered fairy.

Misery

She stood outside the circle of burgeoning sunlight. She felt braver in the shadows; the sombre darkness matched her cold grief. Dew dampened her slippers, wet the edge of her dressing gown, but she didn’t care.

She stared at the tree, so strong, so beautiful. She fought the urge to scratch its bark with her fingernails, to find an axe and chop it down. It wasn’t the tree’s fault.

It was his. His for being lost and weak, for… no it wasn’t his fault either. He wanted the pain to stop. She understood now.

That’s why she brought the gun.

Memory

The tire swing used to hang from that branch.

The old man shuffled forward, leaning on his cane, the woolen throw on his shoulder flapping a bit. He stepped cautiously, shading his eyes from the sun and taking care not to slip in the damp grass.

It wouldn’t do to break a hip at my age.

He stopped by the tree and leaned to catch his breath, looking out at the glade.

That’s where Mary Louise skinned her knee. Maybe I shouldn’t pulled her pigtail. She got me back though. Jumping out from those bushes.

Slowly he spread out the throw and lowered himself to sit and rest. He closed his eyes.

I’ll just take a nap until the family shows up for the picnic.

National Poetry Month Day 28: Flickering Shadows #NaPoWriMo

A little shadow play on this Day 28 of National Poetry Month.

Flickering Shadows

That darkened silhouette playing at dance,

where sunshine greets night, melded in sync.

Framed against hues, red, copper and pink;

an evening of flirting, with shades of romance

Come hither shadow, black depths askance,

its raven obscurity donning a colour of ink

That darkened silhouette playing at dance,

where sunshine greets night, melded in sync

Dusk ever fading, the union’s last glance,

daylight’s course waning, forever to shrink

as night-time envelops, moon on the brink

A shift in the partners, yet it will prance

that darkened silhouette playing at dance

© A. F. Stewart 2015 All Rights Reserved