Cedar Sanderson is doing N'inktober, so I'm going to follow along and do what I've been trained to do by the Raconteur Press Postcard books: come up with a story to match her visual prompts. I can't guarantee that I'll have a complete story for every image, but I'm going to at least try to come up with a scene, a start, or an idea!
Sideways Windswept
The air was whispering to her again. Words that were barely audible, slipping through her ears and into her brain without her even noticing. She could actually hear it, if she tried. If she stopped, if she held herself very still, if she ignored the sound of her own heartbeat. Then she could pick out the words on the wind, each one uttered in a different voice:
Turn back.
Lie down.
Give up.
She ignored the voices and stepped carefully from one stone to the next on the Path. Here, it passed through the shallow edge of the sea. The stones that comprised it here were slick and rounded, worn smooth by time and tide. Every step threatened to send her feet out from under her, spilling her into the foamy gray water.
If she lost her footing and fell, she would slip under the gray surface and sink forever in the darkness. She knew that, as sure as she knew the feel of her own name; but she could not recall where she had learned it, or who had taught it to her. So she studied each step carefully, judging the wind and the waves and her own balance before making any move.
Earlier, she’d had to dance carefully along the Path, treading on jagged volcanic rocks. Those had shifted underfoot with the slightest pressure, twisting under her, threatening to drop her onto the razor-sharp stones. If she had lost her footing there, she would have tumbled across them, razor-sharp stones slicing and grinding until there was nothing left of her but blood and memory.
She waited for a break in the waves and took another step. Paused to make sure of her balance, then risked taking her eyes off the waves for just moment to make sure of where she was. With a cry, she threw herself foward, off the last stone and onto the thin strip of white sand underneath the cliff face.
She curled up and let the tension out, shaking like a leaf. She would have cried from frustration, if she could remember how. She’d traded her tears for something, long ago. Maybe. Memory was mutable, here in the sideways places. It came and went and came again; sometimes scattering like sparks from a fire, sometimes swirling like… like…
Like something she couldn’t remember. That started her shaking again. She waited until that passed, then uncoiled and sat up, her back against the rough stone of the cliff. The word-whispers of the breeze stirred her hair, making it twist and tremble.
Dust-devil. That was the word. She’d almost forgotten the word for it. She would never forget what it had looked like, though. That memory was not for sale. If she closed her eyes, she was back there at the old crossroads at midnight. Watching it spin lazily in the moonlight, never quite touching the ground.
That was when she had first heard the whispers. They were different, then. Enticing. The voices had wanted her to make a bargain. They had promised her heart’s desire, if she would step through. If she could make it to the end of the Path.
The Path. She pushed herself up, every muscle aching from weariness, wishing she could cry. She had to keep moving. Where was the Path? The tiny beach she was on was barely big enough for her. On either side of her, it disappeared into the sickly looking water.
She turned, slowly, and looked up.
Above her, growing from the side of the cliff, was an enormous tree. Its leaves were glossy black, ugly things with strange, thick veins. Roots from its twisted trunk plunged into the rock of the cliff face anywhere there was a crack in the stone. As she watched, a root oozed out from a cleft in the rock. It moved slowly, twisting back on itself until it encountered another moving root. The two intertwined into a knot before turning back into the cliff and forcing their way into another fissure with the sound of splintering rock.
She’d have to climb to stay on the Path.
She knew the roots would slither out from under her like slow snakes. They would try to bind her if she stayed too long in one spot. Trap her and squeeze her slowly until her bones cracked and splintered as they wrung the hot blood from her body.
She tilted her head back, looking for the top of the cliff, and froze. Far above her, tangled in one of the roots of the tree, something blue fluttered like a flag. It was too far away to make out more than that, but she knew it immediately. A square of blue cloth, maybe yard or so, just big enough to wrap around a child.
She reached up and grabbed a root that immediately stirred and started to curl around, trying to trap her hand. As she hauled herself up, she heard another voice, one not much louder than the whispers on the wind. It had been so long since she’d spoken that it took her a moment to realize the she, herself, had spoken. She yanked her hand free of the root with a snarl and spoke again.
“Hold on, baby. Mama’s coming.”
This one hits close to home for me. Very well written and realized.