On Black Wings

by Storm, Sylvia

  Will I watch myself die?

  Live.

  Please God, let her live.

  Something bumps the glass patio door behind me. I turn. A large black horse stands on my back lawn, ash blowing around him like the snows of winter.

  A horse? A black horse.

  Why does he live? Why is this horse immune to the fires of death that he himself isn’t swept away by the bitter wind? I walk towards the back door, the giant animal standing directly on our back patio, looking inside at me. What does he want?

  Why are you still alive?

  Ash blows by him, sticking to his mane and coat. His hoof scrapes the stones of the porch. He bumps the window again, leaving an imprint of his nose on the glass, his hot breath steaming the window. I place my fingers on the glass, inches from him, a solid world of nothing between us.

  Who are you?

  I stare into the animal’s eyes, black like night, the inky pools reflecting me. It stares, blinking a piece of ash free every few moments as the storm blows by the animal, but he stares right through my eyes so deeply I feel his presence in my heart. The ash blows by him in an ever-increasing torrent, his fur catching little bits and pieces before the wind comes again and sets them free.

  It huffs again, almost impatiently, and throws its head to the side twice, as if to say, ‘come and see.’ I feel my lips part, and shake my head. Haven’t you seen what is happening? The bodies turning to ash, the death, losing the life I never had or will ever know?

  The black horse stands defiantly in the storm of cinders and death, motioning for me to come.

  I reach for the latch on the patio door, hesitating, watching the animal, making sure it’s safe. The metal latch pops free with a snap, and I hold the handle tight, for fear the horse would force the door open and expose me to whatever is taking the world away.

  The horse blinks at me, as if to say it will be all right. Or as if it does not care. I can’t be certain which.

  What do I do? I stop a moment again, wondering. I pull on the door and crack it, a couple small bits of ash blowing in, and I’m shielding myself with a pane of glass against the storm of death outside. The horse doesn’t seem to care at all, and it snorts out a puff of ash from it’s nose, trying to blink out the bits that blow into his eyes.

  I risk placing my left index fingertip outside. If it burns off, at least it won’t be my whole hand, and I could live with the loss of some skin. I wince and prepare for the inevitable singe, heat, and fire upon my skin. I stare wide-eyed, wondering when the tip of my finger will light up like a cigarette.

  No burn, just skin, and a hot wind playing across my fingertip. I risk placing it further outside, and get my entire finger out before a piece of ash hits it and I jump backwards, pulling my hand inside.

  Nothing, no burn, no heat, and no ash. I inspect my finger and wonder if something outside isn’t blocking whatever is killing everyone. Is it the roof? I’m fine. The horse is fine. The black horse blinks, and scuffs its hoof twice, as if it’s getting impatient.

  I can’t. I can’t do it.

  I can. I put my finger outside again, and risk them all. Nothing, no ash, no burn, and no heat. I shove my whole hand outside and separate my fingers. Nothing, just the hot wind, and the occasional bit of sticky ash on my palm.

  I still have my hand.

  I slide the door open more, with nothing between me and the black horse, his coat covered with ash. The hot wind covers me in sweat, and I feel bits of ash start to hit me. The animal snorts in approval, and I shake my head no. It bobs its large head up and down as if to say yes.

  No.

  If I’m going to die, I might as well get it over with. I stick both arms out, and then realize the stupidity of potentially becoming armless if they both burn off. Yet nothing happens. Ash sticks to my arms, swirls around me, and the same hot wind blows my hair in my face.

  The black horse backs up, inviting me to step further outside.

  Why?

  I step outside, my bare foot in my cheap tennis shoe, pressing into the back patio stones. The stone sits firmly under my foot, my foot not turning to ash, my skin not burning off, and my body not blowing away in the wind.

  Why?

  The black horse backs up again, as if to give me room. Bits of ash stick to the hair on my leg. I should have shaved, but that thought disappears as I step fully outside. Stupid silly thoughts. I worry about how I look when the whole world is burning away. This was me, it is me. I step away from the door. If I’m going to die, it’s going to be worrying about stupid silly thoughts of how I look before I’m incinerated.

  Nothing.

  I’m fine.

  I’m standing outside, the sky now choking with gray clouds, ash blowing across the back lawn like a hot snowstorm of death.

  Yet I am fine.

  I raise my arms to my sides, trying to expose myself to whatever force burned them all away, yet I’m fine. Ash blows by me, the hot wind catches my pink number 17 shirt, and my hair catches bits and pieces of soot. I blink a piece out of my eye and step forward. The ground is slippery, so I nearly fall, catching my balance in a heartbeat, and keeping my eyes on the horse.

  Why?

  Who are you?

  Am I dead?

  I never heard of the dead losing their balance before, so I assume I’m alive. I walk towards the horse, and put my hand on his warm nose. I feel his hot breaths drift down my arm.

  He is real.

  I brush the ash from his long face, picking bits of it out of his eyes, his eyes closing as I brush over them, cleaning his coat off. No bit, no bridle, and no saddle. Just a large, black horse.

  Who are you?

  Why is everyone dead?

  I run my hand up over his ear, knocking the ash out, and he neighs in approval. I stroke his mane, brushing the ash away, and the hot wind catching my back and blowing my shirt around. I feel bits of ash and soot hit my back, and I reach up and finish cleaning his mane.

  The horse lowers himself to one knee in the front, as if inviting me to ride him.

  I look around my backyard, ash covering everything, the lawn white with soot and the glow of cinders, and I blow a large piece out of my nose. I shield my eyes against the oncoming storm.

  There is nothing left here.

  There is nothing left for me.

  I have never ridden a horse, and I know nothing about them.

  I reach up, wrap my arm over his back, and haul myself onto the animal’s back. I have to struggle to get my knee over him, nearly slipping off, but I manage, and I’m lying on his back. I feel him breathing under me, and he whinnies and neighs before he stands.

  I feel like I’m ten feet tall. I sit up and shield my eyes from the ashen wind. The black horse carries me away into the blinding gray storm.

  CHAPTER II:

  It’s Not a Dream

  Silence, my ears are full. I’m cold.

  I must have fell asleep on the horse. I see the sky, it is choked gray with clouds that drift by in silence. My face, it is oddly cold and wet. I still can’t hear anything. Did I fall off the horse? Am I looking into the sky? Why is everything so quiet?

  I’m wet, from head to toe I’m wet. My toes, my arms, my whole body is so cold. Except for my face, it is wet, but it is not cold. Where is the horse? Where am I?

  I’m wet, am I in a puddle, or in water?

  My head is resting on rocks, I feel them pressing into my scalp. A rock is pressing into my deaf ear. Something is moving through my hair. What is it? It’s moving all around me, it’s like, I’m in deep water. My whole body is in water, my arms, my legs, my head - everything except my face. I’m lying on my back in water, and it is moving past me.

  I blink, looking up at the wafting clouds above. I turn my head, and my nose fills with water, stinging and burning my sinuses, and I gasp for air, sucking in water into my lungs. I choke, I right my head, I cough and wheeze as I try to breath. My lungs burn as I try to cough out the water I sucked in, it hurts, I want
to sit up, I want to cough, I want to cry and vomit and go away forever.

  I try to sit up, and I feel pulling on my wrists. I pull harder, the rocks scratching against my back, the rocks against the numb flesh on my arms, a force tightening against my wrists. Something is holding me flat on my back in this river. I’m still coughing, it hurts so bad, and I can’t breathe. I’m gasping for air, and my lungs are on fire.

  My ankles are restrained as well. I am so numb from the cold I can’t feel what is holding me down, it it a person? I wheeze and suck in a long coughing gasp of breath, and shove my head to the side, forcing my right eye underwater and open.

  It’s blurry, but I can make it out. I am in a shallow riverbed, and someone has tied me down in it. A rope is tied to my wrist, likely my other limbs, and they are secured to rusty iron spikes banged into the riverbed. I pull harder, and they are stuck deep into the rocks and mud.

  Another thing I see shocks me, beneath my body are hundreds of dead birds, feathers float in the water, and between me and the rocks I see hundreds of them. Why have they tied me to so many birds? Why are they dead?

  I am splayed out so tightly it is impossible to pull straight up and free myself. I am so numb from the frigid water, I can’t control my limbs all that well. I pull my wrist up, or what I think is up, as hard as I can, but I can’t free myself.

  Something else is happening. The water, which was on my cheek, is now near my lips. The current is increasing. I feel the cold rush wash over me.

  The water is rising.

  I cough again, wishing I was dead, and wondering why I am being left to die in a shallow river, tied to the rocks, the carcasses of a thousand rotting birds around me. I scream, raising my head, my neck killing me, trying to force my mouth above the water for a gasp of air.

  The waves of the river fight to drown me, but a break once and a while lets me gasp air, suck it down before another wave washes over my face and tries to drown me again.

  I just want to die. Just let me die.

  I close my eyes, and settle my head against the rocks. The water covers my head, and I close my eyes. I’m in silence again. It’s peaceful, but I’m holding my breath. I need to let go. I need to open my mouth and fill my lungs with water. Come on, you can do it.

  I wait, trying to build up the courage. I need to do this. Be brave and let go. I can’t.

  I can’t die yet. I shove my head up as hard as I can, sucking in as much air as my burning lungs will hold. Another wave covers my face, and I’m lost again. I struggle, feeling my numb arms pull against the ropes, the ropes likely cutting into my skin, and my body thrashing and fighting my bonds.

  I need to live.

  I struggle harder, the oxygen depleting from my lungs, the arms and legs I cannot feel pulling and yanking against the ropes holding me down, the bondage which will cause me death, and the sadistic torture someone placed me in.

  As if my day wasn’t bad enough.

  I want to live. I fight harder, my teeth grinding together so hard I can taste bone, my shoulders wrenching upwards, the last feelings I have in my body of pulling and struggling coming from the last drops of warmth in my chest. I press my ass into the rocks, and try to sit up, both of my arms igniting in pain as I feel my shoulders pop out of their sockets, the blinding pain sending red through my vision, the taste of blood in my mouth, and the fire of pain waking me up from my deathly slumber.

  I strain, I grind my teeth, I pull upwards, pain shooting through my body, blood clouding my eyes, the warm trickle of blood, of life, running out of my nose on my wet face. I pull, sitting up, feeling my numb arms yank hard, pulling against God and might to free myself, to sit above this cursed water, to free myself from the bonds of death.

  I’m free.

  I am in so much pain I’m crying, but my arms are free, and I’m sitting in a shallow river. I’m in so much pain, I can’t believe it, my world is a haze of pain and red, and darkness, and tears. My nose is bleeding and running down onto my pink body-shirt with the number 17 on the front. I feel a weight on my back, like some of the dead bird carcasses are sticking to my skin. I hurt so much I want to die.

  But I can’t die.

  Across from me is a camp, like a campsite at a national park. There are tents and cookware, a fire going, and three large black doberman dogs barking at me.

  My ears pop and I can hear again. They are ferocious, mean and vile, foaming at the mouths, pulling on their chains, trying to yank free and come for me. A group of men dressed in hunting clothes sleep around the fire, rifles, bloody hooks, and stained knives leaning against their packs. Their clothes are covered in blood, spatters and arms of their jackets covered with deep black blood.

  These are not good men.

  Their dogs seem even worse.

  The dobermans bark and howl, pulling at their chains as they snap and bark at me. Why, why do they hate me? What did I do to them? I’m in so much pain, both of my arms are on fire. As they warm, the numbness of the warmth coming back into them is replaced by pure agony and blinding pain.

  The dobermans bark and snap in my direction, the wooden stakes holding their chains in place pulling free from the ground as they jump and lunge at me. Black flies crawl across their fur. The dogs howl, and I stare at them.

  They have no eyes.

  The dogs have no eyes, black flies crawl around their faces, out of their empty, hollow eye sockets, and they look like demonic creations of un-death and hatred. I’m scared, I’m cold. And I can't move my arms.

  I need to pop my shoulders back into their sockets.

  I throw myself sideways, shoving my right shoulder underwater and between rocks. I wedge it between two large rocks, and jerk my body backwards.

  The sickening pop of bone on bone tells me my right shoulder is back in place, but the pain nearly knocks me unconscious. My head is underwater, I am crying, and I want to die in this painful moment.

  But I can’t die.

  I sit up, glaring at the howling dogs, my face a scowl of hatred, and reach around to my left shoulder. I yank it back into its socket without thinking or caring, the pain now too much for me to handle, my eyes a sheen of crimson, my world nothing but cold hatred, pain and misery.

  I’m weak. I’m freezing to death, but at least I have my arms back.

  One of the dogs breaks free and runs for me.

  He splashes into the water, his mouth foaming, his teeth thrashing, and his eyes black and hollow. How does he know I’m here? Is he in pain? For some stupid reason, I feel there is no animal here, just a twisted husk of flesh that was once a loving animal, but now it is sick and twisted by hatred and malice. It doesn’t need eyes to see, only hate.

  It leaps on me, and I hold my hand out, trying to push it away. It snaps at my face, trying to maul me, biting and scratching, thrashing on top of me like a mad and rabid animal. I struggle and push with my left hand, losing a battle with the monster, its jaws snapping a hair’s width from my face.

  I notice the rusty stake still tied to my left wrist.

  I grab the stake with my hand, and I don’t want to do it, but this animal isn’t even alive anymore. I swing as hard as I can and plant the rusty stake in my hand through the side of the beast’s head.

  It dies on top of me, finally at rest.

  I push it off, and the other two dogs are snapping and barking even louder now. They are furious, livid and full of hatred, wanting to kill with razor-sharp teeth.

  The men. The men are beginning to move.

  I notice the same black flies crawling across their faces, and one opens his eyes.

  Hollow and dead, the men have no eyes.

  Wicked hunters, creatures bred of hate, the men slowly rouse and I struggle harder. I grab at my feet and yank the spikes holding my ankles free. I pull the last one free and I want to cry, I want to cry that I don’t have to spend another moment in this cold river staked down, waiting to die.

  I try to stand up.

  Something on my back weighs me dow
n.

  Something heavy.

  I try to stand again, my legs burning, the warmth coming back to them, the numbness fading. I feel them shake as I try to stand again, the weight pulling me backwards and down. I’m so weak, my back is weighed down with whatever is tied to it.

  The men are moving now, groaning, spewing forth chants and verses I do not understand, but the words are filled with bile, hatred and venomous intent. Black flies crawl along their faces. These are not good men.

  I wonder if they are even alive.

  I push harder, trying to stand, trying to flee, trying to get my balance as the weight on my back keeps dragging me down. Damn! I cannot stand, I cannot move. What is weighing me down?

  I look backwards, reaching and trying to free myself from this backpack or carcass, or whatever is tied to my back.

  They aren’t tied.

  Two gigantic black feathered winds protrude from my back, wet and heavy from having been underneath me in the river. I feel the bones of them jut into my shoulder-blades, and the fine but strong muscles along their roots. Black with the shine of a thousand crows, my ebony wings of death weigh me down, pull against me, sit limp and useless in the water around me.

  I have wings and they are black.

  CHAPTER III:

  They Drag Behind Me

  The eyeless men grab their rifles, black weapons wrapped in barbed wire, sporting rusty nails and blood-stained knives on their ends. They turn towards me like they can see, seeing without any eyes.

  I need to go. I need to run.

  I stand on wobbly legs, my feet numb from the ice-cold water, my body weak and wracked with pain. I push myself away, black wings dragging behind me like the tail on my wedding gown, useless and limp. They slow me down as I crawl up onto the opposite side of the river, my lame wings dragging through the water like giant black blankets, soaked wet through and heavy.