12-13-2015, 10:35 PM
KINGSLAY
It is too easy.
It is too easy – the way that he finds her sleeping soundly in an almost-cradle made of the bent and yellow meadow grass. The stems of wildflowers sink down against her soft body, and it almost looks as though the petals themselves are woven through the locks of her hair. It is too easy, because she is snoring softly and the heave and sigh of her breath draws him in like the smell of blood draws in a predator. It is too easy, because her spindly legs are curled under her tiny body, and they’re too long for her still. It is too easy, because he finds her faster than she will find her footing.
A cloud of dust rises and settles. The earth runs red with her blood.
He had wanted it drawn out. He had wanted to listen to the howls of her ending, but it was too easy. It was too easy, because the brittle crack of her breaking neck echoes through the meadow as the dust settles in an empty almost-cradle made of the bent and yellow meadow grass. He doesn’t have the luxury of time. He doesn’t get to savor the taste of her death.
‘Why?’
It’s the last and only word she says. She mewls it, soft and sweet against his ear, and he watches the light fall away and turn her eyes to glass. He says nothing as she dies, just feels the thrum of her heart lose itself into oblivion, and then, when there is nothing left of her living he sets fire to her flesh and breathes in deep the acrid spiral of smoke tangled with skin. He watches her body melt away, and to him the crack and sizzle of burning yellowed fat turning to gristle sounds like a chorus.
But it was too easy.
There is something stirring in his gut. It coils around the bones of his ribs, and hammers fists against his chest. It feels like hunger, but it isn’t. It feels like salivating jaws that gnaw on his bones. It feels like instinct, but it can’t be. It asks him for a challenge. It asks him for something new, something harder.
It asks him, and so he moves towards the boughs of an oak tree as the smell of rain mingles with the smell of smoke and death, because he sees something through the eyelets of the low hanging leaves that doesn’t read so simple.
It is too easy – the way that he finds her sleeping soundly in an almost-cradle made of the bent and yellow meadow grass. The stems of wildflowers sink down against her soft body, and it almost looks as though the petals themselves are woven through the locks of her hair. It is too easy, because she is snoring softly and the heave and sigh of her breath draws him in like the smell of blood draws in a predator. It is too easy, because her spindly legs are curled under her tiny body, and they’re too long for her still. It is too easy, because he finds her faster than she will find her footing.
A cloud of dust rises and settles. The earth runs red with her blood.
He had wanted it drawn out. He had wanted to listen to the howls of her ending, but it was too easy. It was too easy, because the brittle crack of her breaking neck echoes through the meadow as the dust settles in an empty almost-cradle made of the bent and yellow meadow grass. He doesn’t have the luxury of time. He doesn’t get to savor the taste of her death.
‘Why?’
It’s the last and only word she says. She mewls it, soft and sweet against his ear, and he watches the light fall away and turn her eyes to glass. He says nothing as she dies, just feels the thrum of her heart lose itself into oblivion, and then, when there is nothing left of her living he sets fire to her flesh and breathes in deep the acrid spiral of smoke tangled with skin. He watches her body melt away, and to him the crack and sizzle of burning yellowed fat turning to gristle sounds like a chorus.
But it was too easy.
There is something stirring in his gut. It coils around the bones of his ribs, and hammers fists against his chest. It feels like hunger, but it isn’t. It feels like salivating jaws that gnaw on his bones. It feels like instinct, but it can’t be. It asks him for a challenge. It asks him for something new, something harder.
It asks him, and so he moves towards the boughs of an oak tree as the smell of rain mingles with the smell of smoke and death, because he sees something through the eyelets of the low hanging leaves that doesn’t read so simple.
And so, he made the Gods themselves bend at the knee.
so, he just murdered a child.