I am finishing up with the nano project, now reaching the last few chapters and I am almost done with a short for an anthology so what is next on the list? I think something spooky might be a nice break so here is the start of it. I’ll get to the rest when I have done the other two.

Walking Softly

By C.N. Lesley

She moves through the fayre almost unnoticed. Am I the only one who can see her now? The only one left alive to remember and bear the guilt. Others could have moved away, unlike me, but they didn’t. We didn’t talk about her among ourselves afterward, but we were all drawn to the Fayre every year, waiting, watching for her to come, which she did at the witching hour. Was this her jest?

My bones creak with age, and my breath comes in a wheeze now. Soon, maybe soon, it will be my turn and then give me the mercy to be free of her. I want to believe this and yet my rheumy eyes pick out the faint shadows who follow her soft steps. Is this what happened to the ones who have already gone through the veil into death? Are they condemned to follow her for all eternity?

I was the heir when I first saw her all those years ago. Her hair of gold hung loose and in gentle waves around her shoulders in a way to make the old wives mutter. Her eyes of cornflower blue danced with life and mischief. My heart surrendered to her between one beat and the next, helpless and hopeless in the thrall of so much life and pure joy. I would have made her mine in name as well as in truth, but my father would have none of it, for she was a simple village maid, he said, and I was the decedent of Crusaders. Blue blood and commoner may mix in any way but via a solemn vow in a church in front of a priest.  My summer of love dissolved into the loneliness of a season of mists and mellow fruitfulness far away from my home and my love. I should have fought for her, but I was heir. I let the separation happen.