A Scottish memory.
The notes rang clear, cutting through the cold midwinter's air. Not disturbed by the wind, which whipped around her straight emotionless face. Her hair flailing across her sight, unblinking, she stared at the cold disturbed earth. Uninviting and careless, she did not want to put him down there.
The violins stirred, notes flowed from their strings interweaving with the pipes serene sounds.
She couldn't stop staring at the small-flattened thistle weed lying dead and mirrored upon the polished wood. Frost biting at its edges. Her breath in white clouds of condensation fogged her vision, or was it the tears she refused to believe. Threatening to freeze on her pale face. Her eyelashes clung together as she clung onto the dirt embedded, blood stained embroidered cloth in her hand. Graced with a fading picture of the same purple petaled weed shadowing his coffin. A weed he'd kept, that she gave to him when they were only young. How ironic she thought, that she gave that small fragile flower to him when he stood where she was now, only burying a brother and father. Now she stood there burying him. And all she had left to cling onto the memories of him was her marriage cloth. Vowed to each other in embroidered tartan fabric of each other's clans, hers lay on his chest, hidden with his face she could no longer see. Only in her mind did his smile haunt her dreams.
She blinked as something icy fell to her hand. Her eyes lowered as she inspected the droplet freezing on her icy skin. She looked up puzzled at the gray clouds; then realized it was not rain, it was her tears. Finally, tears for him. Her heart felt heavy and hollow. As they lowered him in his solid bed, she breathed deep and reached for him.
'No!' she begged.
But they did not stop. For they knew it would do no good. She fell to her knees reaching out for him as he fell away into the cold ground. And she cried in long hauling breaths and tears of pain. He was not coming back, lost forever into the ancient Scottish ground, taken by war standing for his beliefs, for freedom. He will be written into legend, for generations to aspire to.
But to her, it didn't matter what he died for, it only mattered that he was not there with her now. She closed her eyes and spoke the words she hoped he could hear.
'Your heart was strong, your courage brave, your mind of wit and your actions loyal. May you meet your fathers who summon you, and leave your followers who are proud to have known you. You inspired men with your beliefs, and united clans leading nobly. You fought for your brothers, and were loved by all, son of Scotland, be at peace.'
For even though she despised it now, tradition held strong in her heart.
'I will always remember you, my love.' she whispered, inaudible above the music of the pipes, summoning the spirits of the elders to come and take him. She knew it was too late, she had to let him go.
'Bha ag sichaint.' as the words left her pale lips, the wind shot up and swirled around her body. Her eyes closed and she felt his touch upon her cheek, as he was swept away. No longer to return.
The long vacant drawn out music, eerily faded as it swept away with him.
Leaving only the hollow silent howl of the wind, and an echo of notes afar.