A Dowry of Blood by Gibson S.T

Author:Gibson, S.T. [Gibson, S.T.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Nyx Publishing
Published: 2021-01-30T16:00:00+00:00

I tried to run away once. Even now, I’m filled with shame at the thought. I wish I could say I broke away from you over and over again, valiantly flinging myself towards freedom. But that would be a lie. I was only brave enough to flee once, and it was on such a petulant whim it could hardly be called premeditated.

It was a dreary English summer night, with rain trickling down from the moonless sky. We were on our second decade in the country, and the two of you still had that honeymoon glow, that sparkle in your eyes when you looked at each other. Most days, that looked filled me with warmth, but that night, my heart was cold.

I watched you looking at her in the firelit glow of our flat, your hand on her knee as she bent her head close to yours to show you one of her skillful drawings, and my blood burned in my veins. Earlier that evening you had shouted at both of us for making eyes at the messenger boy who brought you letters from the university, and now you were as sweet as a hen tending her brood once again. It made me sick, watching Magdalena preen for you. She had always been better at fawning over you when your whims turned dark, and so you must love her better, no matter what you said. If I had given it a moment’s more thought I would have realized that I loved you and Magdalena both fiercely, so it was perfectly reasonable for you to love the both of us the same, but I wasn’t thinking clearly. I was sick with misery and jealousy, and the confines of the small London flat suddenly felt oppressive.

I needed air. I needed the starlight and the wild throng of humanity outside our door, I needed to feel like I belonged to myself again.

I dashed through the door while you were kissing her, into the dark and the rain without so much as a bonnet on. I had no idea where I was going, I just wanted to get away from the life we had built together, from the cycle of brutality and tenderness. My legs carried me out of habit to the doors of the great Gothic Southwark cathedral, looming beautifully on the edge of the Thames. I often came there by night to pray, to think, to watch the delectable people come and seek their absolution. Seeking their own scrap of the eternal, which I had in such abundant supply.

Yet, that night, I would have given anything to be a mortal girl once again, flesh dying around me just as quickly as my beauty had come into bloom. An infinitesimal life seemed preferable to an endless one trailing after you like a dog.

I retreated into the darkness of the cathedral, my hair dripping and the hem of my skirt dragging mud across the marble floors. As a girl I had been taught that churches were the dwelling place of God.

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