Drabble Wednesday: Hidden Things

In today’s Drabble Wednesday, I delve under the surface of reality, to find the secrets…

Butterfly

Such a delicate thing. Its wings fluttered on the winds, their white-tipped, crimson pattern vivid against the sunlit afternoon. It danced against the clouds, before settling on a shaded branch of an oak tree.

There it waited, its insect antennae twitching.

Golden hair, and a sunshine smile, the woman passed beneath its tree. She laughed as it landed on silky skin. For a moment, it perched, wings outstretched. She gasped in awe.

“Beautiful.”

It quivered. Minuscule fangs punctured skin, injecting poison into her bloodstream.

“Ow!” One breath, before she convulsed and died.

Such a delicate thing, such a deadly touch.

~*~

The Long Path

“Only a fool begins the long path. Only Death will end it.”

That is the saying among my people. If any remained alive they would call me a fool.

A thousand years I walked this road, past war, past famine, past all I loved. The summer rains have drenched me, the winter snows have chilled my bones.

Yet, I walked.

I was your name whispered on the wind, that shadow on the wall, the ghost in the graveyard. I have strode the path between worlds, and I am at its end.

I stand in the grove of night awaiting Death.

~*~

First Kind

I am the last of my kind. Eons ago we swarmed the skies, the earth, the seas, and fed on the giants that lived here. Then the giants died, and we turned on each other. Only I survived, hibernating all these long years.

I am the last of my kind.

Or I was, until I met the human. This new breed that inherited our domain. Puny, but he served his purpose.

Now my eggs are buried deep under his decaying skin and tissues, feeding off his corpse. Soon they will hatch, and we will feast on more of his race.

© A. F. Stewart 2015 All Rights Reserved 

Drabble Wednesday: Secrets

Today on Drabble Wednesday I delve into the dark shadows and even darker hearts…

A Venice Night

I slip through shadows and sunset and the drifting mist, my near silent footsteps swallowed by the ocean lapping against the bridge. A gondola is waiting; soon I will be lost among the murky waterways and alleys of the city. As I near my escape, I clutch my precious satchel close, my free hand grasping my stiletto.

Too late I see. An empty gondola, the flash of another blade. Pain in my side, my useless knife falls. I watch the assassin snatch away my satchel, the stolen papers reclaimed. Then he rolls me into the water and all goes black.

Winter

A winter snowfall blankets a crisp white across the mountain landscape, imbuing the night with a quiet beauty. Against the weather, welcoming light—cast from a human dwelling—flickers. A sliding door stands open, the frigid air swirling past the bamboo and wood.

A breeze wafts a flurry of the tumbling flakes inside the home. A tiny storm dances, and for a moment, a minuscule of time, the white suspends in air. Then it descends. It spawns a brief contrast to red stains on the floor, before it melts into pooling liquid.

Before it joins the blood of the dead.

Desert Sand

Footsteps, impressions in the sand. Two sets lead out into the desert, the tracks of friends, of two adventurous men. One man, a natural leader, outgoing, handsome, a risk taker. The other quiet, more introverted, cautious, but clever and patient.

One man kissed his beautiful wife as he left this morning, the other shut his door on an empty apartment. Two friends. One careless with his words, never letting his success go unremarked. The other smiles while resentment and envy churn in his heart.

Footsteps, impressions in the sand. Two sets lead out into the desert, only one lead back.