• Rescue

    The sun burned his face as he sprinted towards the cliff; the red stone bore his weight as he flew to his goal. Just around the next turn he knew what he would see, and he head to stop it. His life would end if he didn’t stop it. He ran faster. He rounded the turn in the path that obscured his view of the fatal event. He avoiding a lethal fall down the mountain by a hair’s breadth, and continued on to the precipice.

    She was there. Her hair, shining copper in the dazzling light, fluttered in a faint breeze, a dying wind. She heard him approach. She heard him approach. She turned from the void to face him. Her eyes, limpid pools of deepest blue, glistened with tears which fell down to the thirsting stones. “No.” Her voice was soft, devoid of will to live and any measure of happiness and yet he heard it well even across the vast distance between them. “It’s done.”

    “No!” he shouted back. “No! Don’t leave me! I’ll die if you leave!” He pressed onward, longing to snatch his beloved from death’s slavering jaws.

    “You can live. I’m done.” She lifted her hands to Heaven, hands that were slender and supple. An angel’s hands. An angel without wings.

    He was halfway to her.

    She leaned back.

    He was three quarters of the way to her.

    She drew another breath, a final breath.

    He was nearly there.

    The earthbound angel entered the air, and plummeted to the razor teeth of stone below.

    Her pursuer followed, throwing himself into oblivion. He made himself into an arrow.

    He drew nearer.

    He reached her. He embraced her. He kissed her.

    They landed.

    Their lifeblood mingled.

    Lovers even after death.