Rough Draft: Lady of the Willow

Started up a short story today, one somewhat reminiscent of an older post, The Doll.

Please Enjoy:

“Who are you,” she asks, her voice quivering. Through the thinning mists he stares at her, his grey monochrome eyes like thick smoke. The lady stands beside the charred willow.

Can it be that a thing still is itself once consumed? The willow, by fire destroyed, is no more, and yet by this ancient tree, a tree known by many fathers and generations till now, she stands, as by her title is still called.

“A brute, if milady wants, and servant to your house.”

At these words she touches the tree, feeling the crumbling soot, like smooth sand, stick to her fingers.

“And what house,” she replies, “is that?” With a little meditation, she adds, “Is this not it, ashes, some floating in the breeze, some dirtying my hand?”

“Then I am ashes, and happy too, to be in your hand.”

She rubs away a tear, forgetting the soot, thus blackening her cheek. Blinking to clear her sight, she studies this brute. Under his jacket, she sees his arm resting in a sling. A poor soldier, she thinks to herself, stolen from the fields where he was born, pressed into her house’s service, now spared his life by lucky mal-luck. Checking his eyes again, she sighs.