Albatross

by Ross Turner

  Deacon held her ever tighter, and Clare just pursed her lips and shook her head.

  Neither of them could say nor do anything that would ease Jen’s suffering.

  Only she could do what needed to be done, and that just made it harder.

  “I’ll always be here…” Deacon finally breathed in reply, and Jen knew he was telling her the truth.

  His words comforted her, a little at least.

  Then, when he spoke again, for he could see that Jen was looking over at something, though of course he couldn’t see what, he sighed deeply.

  “Is Clare here too?” He whispered.

  In response, clasping her hand about his and interlocking their fingers, Jen began walking slowly away from the grave.

  Clare didn’t move, and Jen knew she wouldn’t follow.

  Not anymore.

  Jen turned to look back, once and only once.

  A single tear escaped her grasp and cascaded down her cheek, streaking warmth everywhere it went upon her cold face. She looked up and Deacon with brimming eyes, before looking back over to her sister, Clare, and took a deep, shuddering breath.

  “No…” She finally breathed in reply, her voice thick with emotion.

  And within an instant, where Clare had just stood upon her own grave, only a moment ago, now it was empty, and Jen’s older sister was nowhere to be seen.

  Jen gazed at her sister’s headstone, all alone, cast into sudden shadow as a lone cloud drifted across the sky and blocked out the sun.

  And Clare was gone.

  Forever.

  “She’s never been here…” Jen whispered, throwing her quiet words onto the wind that wasn’t there.

  Squeezing Deacon’s hand tightly as she looked back up to him, Jen’s eyes were filled with immeasurable grief.

  And so, without another word that need be said, between the endless seas of headstones the two of them departed.

  Side by side, hand in hand, off into the new day they ventured.

  Thank you for reading Albatross

  I hope you enjoyed it

  If you did then you may also enjoy:

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  Young Vivian Featherstone comes from a long line of Lords and Ladies, and her family's seat of unquestionable influence, wealth and power is owed to a much treasured heirloom, passed down from generation to generation.

  But when little Vivian, only eleven years of age, narrowly escapes a plot by a rival, feuding family to eliminate the Featherstones, she finds herself lost in the mysterious Redwood Forest.

  With assassins pursuing her, and strange and dangerous creatures all around, can Vivian survive? And will she discover the power of her family's heirloom before it's too late?

  The Redwoods Rise and Fall - Book Two

  Vivian has returned to Virtus, she has defeated the Greystones, and the once great city even seems to be well on the way to recovery. But something isn't right. Vivian feels stranded amongst all that she has fought to gain, and suffered so terribly to lose. And now it seems there are new threats and dangers, stemming from old evils. Just as all those before her have either succeeded or succumbed, now she too must face her own rise and fall.

  Or

  Voices in the Mirror

  Evening encroached upon them and a deep, vast, endless darkness swept in upon the tiny, insignificant village of Riverbrook.

  Cold winds cut through the trees and bit harshly at the exposed faces of anybody who dared still remain out under the enormous sky, scattered with an ocean of burned out stars that seethed and watched without a sound.

  A million and more shining eyes that had gazed down upon the face of the Earth for a hundred millennia and even longer, turned their cruel eyes now to all that was unfolding before them, and for not the first time in history, something impossible and wonderful, a miracle, began to unfold.

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