my lady mourning
Drab black, as featureless as the intonations of the priest, as drab as the faces of the nobles that surrounded the coffin. Drab as the air and as drab as the grey sky that loomed so bleakly atop their heads, dreary as the silence that could be felt whenever he would pause.
And then he'd continue in his monotone. She tightened her fist. Tautening face, eyes that were shut tightly to fight the headache. Oh, how it hurt.
She opened them. Opened her fist. Let breathe the white petals in her hand, sprinkled them very lightly on the coffin surface. There. Now her son – her dear, dear, beloved son – would take them. They would sit atop his coffin, and he would keep them.
They were bright and mocking – white against black. A wedding sash in a crowd of black mourning robes. Shame. Anger. A feeling of loathing that she couldn't direct.
She swept her hand across the coffin surface. The petals fell to the ground.
' – a man of integrity, a Prince who was cherished and respected by his land and his people – '
he was so young
' – had shouldered the burdens and terrors of his noble nation even before he was called to do so – '
too innocent, much too sane
' – was a King well before his time, but has left us to become a leading figure in a more heavenly, more perfect kingdom – '
oh, how to let go?
And where would she be, she wondered. It was an irrepressible thought, induced by the unremitting selfishness that dwelt in the sinister bowels of human nature. What was to become of her? Her, middle-aged and in this society good for nothing. Her, a widow and now a once-mother. Her, once connected to both Prince and King, but now isolated and left to die next.
You have manors, rationality whispered to her, whispered as she sat by the coffin, silent and cold. You have inherited. You can live in peace, alone but for the memories that will follow you.
It would be a drab life. Not at all like the one she had enjoyed before.
With a final cry of agony, she threw herself upon the coffin surface and felt an intense pain impress itself upon her head. Limp arms, black skirts that spread around her, a creeping blackness that touched the corners of her vision. Pooling blood, all around her head, like a very crimson halo.
The drab crowd watched as she lay still on the ground, and together they knelt in mourning. They are not surprised, for she never was a strong woman. Nobles never were.
fin.