Challenge 15: Dead walking

White is the colour of purity, the colour of my dress, tight with too many pearl buttons. Red is the colour of passion and of sin, the colour of his blood on my hands, wet from the tears as he dies in my arms. Black is the colour of death, the colour of the gun in my hand, loaded and cocked as I turn away to hunt down his murderer.

My almost-husband died that night, the moon shining through the windows of the church where none but the angels of God should have been able to touch us. I thought I had left that life behind me, but now its siren song was calling me back. Out into the cemetery where the bones were whispering, yearning for me to hear their stories, to grant them peace. How could I give something I have never known?

On, into the night, tripping on the hem of my lace gown, stained with his blood and the mud. I rip away as much as I can, discard the useless shoes, run with the ground pressing between my toes. I reach the beach and do not pause for the waves. The one I hunt is barely a shadow in the moonlight, drawing me out, onto the ocean. What a fool I was, thinking to marry in Bermuda; there are too many ghosts here.

Deep beneath the surface lie the wrecks of ancient ships, forgotten by people, hidden by coral and seaweed. One of those shipwrecks is called the Cyclops and the brave men who once crewed her lie now as smooth white shards of bone between her many rotting decks. I can feel them stirring, my foe calling them to his aid. The light of the moon, touching the sea at just the right angle, those bones begin to knit together and the dead walk once again.

Long ago, in the heady perfumed night of Paris, I made the mistake of giving my love to a man, powerful but dark – a necromancer to my ghost whisperer. Such a pair we made, he said, as we danced through the wild streets, defying death and laughing in his face. But my punishment fit the crime. The Black Plague ripped all humanity from my once-lover but I was not so lucky. My heart shattered, seeing the suffering of children, the loss of whole families, lives wasted, dead whispering, blaming me. Incapable of dying, I walked like a ghost through the streets, desperate for any offer of redemption. I could hear the voices. But the dead were always silent to him, pawns in a game without heart, only lust.

Now he had ripped me from the illusion that I could escape my mistakes. My pretence at a normal life was gone, along with a man who loved me in innocence. The dead were walking again and I was the only one capable of sending them back to sleep.

Black is the colour of death, the colour of the inky sea, bubbling with the rising dead. Red is the colour of passion and sin, my life laid bare before God, a small price to end this madness. White is the colour of purity, the colour of the moon on the quiet Bermuda waters as the dead return to the depths and our souls committed into God’s keeping.

Wordcount: 558

Image 1 was:
White is the colour of purity, the colour of my dress, tight with too many pearl buttons. Red is the colour of passion and of sin, the colour of his blood on my hands, wet from the tears as he dies in my arms. Black is the colour of death, the colour of the gun in my hand, loaded and cocked as I turn away to hunt down his murderer.

Image 2 was:
Deep beneath the surface lie the wrecks of ancient ships, forgotten by people, hidden by coral and seaweed. One of those shipwrecks is called the Cyclops and the brave men who once crewed her lie now as smooth white shards of bone between her many rotting decks. I can feel them stirring, my foe calling them to his aid. The light of the moon, touching the sea at just the right angle, those bones begin to knit together and the dead walk once again.