oh death, you've got such a pretty face
A naked girl with a dancer’s grace picked her way over the pile of skeletons, her shaved head swaying on her shoulders to some unheard song, the feathers of her tiny black wings nestled between her shoulder blades bristling in the slight breeze. When she reached the top, she pressed her heels together with her feet turned out, just like a ballerina, and lowered herself, knees bending outwards, in a smooth motion to scoop up a bone. As she straightened her legs she cracked the bone in half, lifting one of the jagged, broken ends to her too-red lips to suck out the marrow with a stomach-roiling slurp.
She did this again and again, and with each bone she aged a little bit, her hips and breasts filling out, her limbs lengthening, her black wings growing larger and larger, until finally the girl had become a full-grown woman and had a wingspan of 6 or 7 meters. As she let the final bone sucked dry of marrow fall from her fingers back down to the skeletons at her feet, the woman surveyed the carnage all around her. She smiled, her lips still bright red against skin so pale her body practically glowed in the soft sunlight. She closed her dark, coal-like eyes, and turned her head skywards, smiling with lips pressed together as she breathed deeply through her nose. Then she bent her knees and jumped, wings beating on the air to carry her into the overcast clouds overhead.
may 2010
A line of holymen, cloaks made of gold thread that caught the meager sunlight, hid their faces in the shadows of their as they walked, single file, towards the city square, singing hymns consisting entirely of a low sound caught halfway between a hum and a groan as they marched. When they reached the center of the city square, each of the eight figures took up a position at one of the points on the compass mosaic laid in the floor, and each turned his face up towards the sky. They pulled back their hoods, revealing monsters-men with their teeth ripped out, replaced with triangles of glass that had so shredded their lips that their mouths were nothing more than bloody splotches on their faces. Their eyes were clawed out as well, infection causing yellow and black to drip and ooze from the empty sockets, trailing down their cheeks like filthy tears. Their chanting grew louder and louder as they stood in their circle, their song soon devolving into wailing screams nearly shrill enough to shatter glass. The men clawed at their faces until their nails had carved rivers of fresh blood that ran from their temples to their chins. Dark clouds began to gather, bruising the sky overhead as it crackled with thunder and lightening. There was a flash of light so bright that it seemed to erase the world as it illuminated, and when it faded away, a naked woman stood at the center of the compass the holymen were gathered around. With somewhat jerky movements she looked around before she clenched her fists, arched her back, and howled. Large black wings unfurled behind her as she straightened, and a torrent of skeletal butterflies surrounded her, impossibly keeping aloft on wings made of bones like those in a human hand. The woman whirled her whole body around to growl at the men surrounding her; as she did, her wings caught each man and sliced through him. Eight torsos slid off eight pairs of legs and all hit the ground with a simultaneous thump, eight pairs of knees buckled and toppled and eight screams died as gurgles in eight throats.
The people all around, who had regarded the holymen with indifference at first, then fear as their chanting had summoned the storm brewing in the sky, started screaming and clambered over each other in their attempts to flee. Soon everyone was gone, save for the winged women herself, the corpses of the slaughtered holymen and a few townspeople who had been trampled in the panic, and s single man in suit clapping slowly.
“Oh, Death,” he said, a grin spreading across his lips, “you’ve got such a pretty face, but that temper…”
xxx
Scene from Supernatural featuring the song that inspired these 2 works (sorry, embed disabled for video).
may 2010
She did this again and again, and with each bone she aged a little bit, her hips and breasts filling out, her limbs lengthening, her black wings growing larger and larger, until finally the girl had become a full-grown woman and had a wingspan of 6 or 7 meters. As she let the final bone sucked dry of marrow fall from her fingers back down to the skeletons at her feet, the woman surveyed the carnage all around her. She smiled, her lips still bright red against skin so pale her body practically glowed in the soft sunlight. She closed her dark, coal-like eyes, and turned her head skywards, smiling with lips pressed together as she breathed deeply through her nose. Then she bent her knees and jumped, wings beating on the air to carry her into the overcast clouds overhead.
may 2010
A line of holymen, cloaks made of gold thread that caught the meager sunlight, hid their faces in the shadows of their as they walked, single file, towards the city square, singing hymns consisting entirely of a low sound caught halfway between a hum and a groan as they marched. When they reached the center of the city square, each of the eight figures took up a position at one of the points on the compass mosaic laid in the floor, and each turned his face up towards the sky. They pulled back their hoods, revealing monsters-men with their teeth ripped out, replaced with triangles of glass that had so shredded their lips that their mouths were nothing more than bloody splotches on their faces. Their eyes were clawed out as well, infection causing yellow and black to drip and ooze from the empty sockets, trailing down their cheeks like filthy tears. Their chanting grew louder and louder as they stood in their circle, their song soon devolving into wailing screams nearly shrill enough to shatter glass. The men clawed at their faces until their nails had carved rivers of fresh blood that ran from their temples to their chins. Dark clouds began to gather, bruising the sky overhead as it crackled with thunder and lightening. There was a flash of light so bright that it seemed to erase the world as it illuminated, and when it faded away, a naked woman stood at the center of the compass the holymen were gathered around. With somewhat jerky movements she looked around before she clenched her fists, arched her back, and howled. Large black wings unfurled behind her as she straightened, and a torrent of skeletal butterflies surrounded her, impossibly keeping aloft on wings made of bones like those in a human hand. The woman whirled her whole body around to growl at the men surrounding her; as she did, her wings caught each man and sliced through him. Eight torsos slid off eight pairs of legs and all hit the ground with a simultaneous thump, eight pairs of knees buckled and toppled and eight screams died as gurgles in eight throats.
The people all around, who had regarded the holymen with indifference at first, then fear as their chanting had summoned the storm brewing in the sky, started screaming and clambered over each other in their attempts to flee. Soon everyone was gone, save for the winged women herself, the corpses of the slaughtered holymen and a few townspeople who had been trampled in the panic, and s single man in suit clapping slowly.
“Oh, Death,” he said, a grin spreading across his lips, “you’ve got such a pretty face, but that temper…”
xxx
Scene from Supernatural featuring the song that inspired these 2 works (sorry, embed disabled for video).
may 2010