I sink into the darkness, letting it pull me under. I no-longer feel the searing ache that pierced my belly, just a constant dull pain. I can dimly hear a voice, it calls my name. I want to tell it to go away; I want to slide into the blackness. But it won't let me; it holds me on the edge of the dark.
…
I look at her body, that's all it is now – a body. It stopped being Marian the moment she took her last breath. I, even thinking the name makes me want to cry out. I bite my lip, finding a perverse kind of pleasure in the physical pain – it dulls the hurt in my heart.
Why did she have to be so stubborn, why did she have to stand up to him? Why? I know the answer, just as I know that her actions would be perfectly mimicked by mine were the situation reversed; but it doesn't stop it hurting. My stupid, brave, fearless Marian, what I would give to see your eyes one last time, to her you speak my Marian…my wife.
…
I try to hear her voice in my head, the gentle tones that could stop the darkness from engulfing me even when nothing else could. Because of her I had the strength to fight, all because of her. But her voice escapes me now; it lingers at the edge of my mind, just out of reach. The woman I loved most in the world, and I can't even remember her voice, what kind of man am I?
I feel the blade slice through her, oiled metal against soft skin. I hear her cry of pain, see her back arch, her hands trying desperately to stop it, stop the pain. At first I feel alive, elated, finally she will succumb to my will and mine alone. Then fear closes around my mind, fear and horror. What have I done?
My will? It is not my will that she dies, that she lies in the sand, turning it red with her blood. It is not my will that she screams out again, asking someone anyone to make the pain stop. It is not my will that the last glance she gives me is of agony, burning unrelenting agony. That is not my will.
…
The voice ceases, drifting away- and I sense the presence that anchored me to the surface fade. But I no longer want the blackness. I struggle upwards refusing to let the once comforting – now terrifying, darkness draw me in.
I will not die! I cling to the pain, anchoring myself to it. Letting it envelope me, until I can no longer feel anything else. Something in me refuses to give up, something holds me here in this world of pain.
A memory perhaps, of a face half lost in the darkness, a man with laughing eyes. There are other faces here in the dark, familiar welcoming faces, reaching out to me. I want to go to them, touch them, collapse into their arms, but I can't. The face holds me – I call to it, turn towards it, I must keep fighting, I mustn't give up.
…
I carry the body towards the dunes, ignoring the pain in my arms, my feet. My legs sink deep into the sand, and I collapse unable to continue. The ground feels hot and dry – different from the cold damp ground of home. The air is different too – dry and harsh, full of grit that sticks to your mouth and tongue.
This is not where her body should lie. Not in this strange soil, so far from all she knew. I scream at the sky, yelling my fury and hurt at the heavens. She wasn't yours to take! She was mine, mine…I long to cry, but all the moisture has long since gone from my body, and no tears will come.
They find me like that, they take her body from me, carrying it away across the sand. I try to reach them, tell them this is wrong, but strong hands hold me back. I loved her! LOVE HER! She can't have died, not here, not now – we should have lived a long life together, and the forest cool and green, that should have been her grave. But no- one hears me and I am left calling to the sun.
…
I watch the figure in front of me, it would be so easy…but no, I will never use a sword again. The horse moves steadily onwards, I stay upright out of habit – my whole being is focused inside.
I want someone to blame, anyone, but there is no-one only me. maybe if she hadn't seemed so happy, maybe if she had not confirmed my worst fears, maybe…What good is maybe? What's done cannot be undone, her words or mine?