Overdramatic prologue HOOOOOOOOO!
It was the summer of 1349, and London was dying.
A sweltering heat rolled through the city, and the wails of its sick and dying filled the night. Corpses crowded the narrow streets of the city, discarded like so much detritus, to be collected and burned or buried with their fellows. The stench of corruption filled every corner, every edifice, every breath, and all wept for those lost or ailing.
A man sat on the dirt floor of his home, cradling the cold body of his wife, watching flies dance across the eyes of his son. His sobs filled the empty space where laughter once resided. Orange light from the corpse fires filtered through the boards that sealed up the house, casting a hellish silhouette against the walls, and the smell of blood and vomit filled his nostrils. He didn’t care. He rocked silently back and forth, humming a song he had written for his darling when he had courted her, kissing her blackened fingers gently and promising her it would all be over soon.
A hand, white as alabaster, gently touched his shoulder.
“Poor, sweet man,” a woman's voice purred, dark a smoke. “Poor, lonely child.”
The man looked over his shoulder. The woman wore an elegant dress the color of the Thames in winter, and wore the face of a bird with dead, black eyes. He did not speak.
“You miss them, don't you?” she asked, caressing his cheek. He wept at her touch, burying his face in her hand that was cold as ice.
“There, there,” she said, lifting his chin with her finger. “No need to cry, my sweet. It will all be over soon.”
“Are you Death?” he asked, eyes wet and hopeful, tears carving tracks through the grime on his face.
“Yes,” she said, “and no.”
She drew him in her frigid embrace, and he clung to her in desperation.
“Please,” he whispered. “Please...”
“Shhhh...” she caressed his matted hair. “No tears, my sweet. You will never have need to weep again.”
She sank her teeth into his neck, and he gasped in relief for the darkness that was drawing close.
© 2013 Steven Gaughran
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