Ashes at Dawn

They say the sun is the eye of God — ever watching, ever judging.
If that be true, then let His eye fall upon me now and see what His hand has wrought.

The dawn bleeds slow over the crest of the hill, staining the frost-bitten earth in cruel gold.
I stand before it, a creature unbeheld by mercy, dressed in a gown spun of shadow and grief.
The night clings to me still, soft as a lover’s touch, though its kiss has soured upon my skin.

I was wife.
I was mother.
Daughter.
Sister.

Bound by blood and bone to those whose names I dare not speak aloud,
Lest the hunger rise again.

They sleep behind stout walls and shuttered doors,
Unknowing that the devil scratched his mark into my flesh beneath the black of the last moon.
Unknowing that I, their beloved, bear within me a curse sung by wolves and whispered by the dead.

Old wives speak of creatures like me —
Women who walk with eyes of coal, whose hearts throb to the song of the grave.
They tell of the White Maiden of the Fen, who devoured her newborn by the third night’s fall.
Of the Widow of Mirkwood, who drank her husband’s blood while he knelt at her feet in prayer.
Of the Red Bride of Darnam, who smiled as the sun set — and never smiled again.

They called them harlots of Satan.
I know better.
We are the cursed.
The broken.
The ones Heaven turned its back upon before we ever turned our backs on it.

I would not become a tale upon their lips.
I would not let my babes’ blood warm my hands.
I would not let my husband’s heart cease beneath my teeth.

So I shall go where none may follow.
I shall give myself to the dawn,
And let the fire of Heaven scourge this blackness from my bones.

Let them wake to find me gone —
Let them curse my name as coward or madwoman.
Let them pray for a soul already beyond redemption.

Better a whispered scandal than a home soaked in blood.
Better their hatred than their graves.

The sun climbs —
Its light splinters the trees, glances off the iron cross above the chapel.
I step forward, arms open as a penitent,
Breath steady as a widow’s vow.

And in this last moment, as my skin begins to blister,
I do not weep.
I do not curse.

I love them.
And in loving them, I die.

The morning shall have me.