Day 3:

Challenge - Vinyamar: Some people have difficulty embracing changes and moving on. Write a story or poem or create artwork that shows the consequences of refusing to change.

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Red Rose

He saw her again in the morning.

Her hair, dark like the midnight sky flowed freely in the breeze. Her eyes were directed at the sky, at the sun rising where just a few hours ago the night spread her wings. She was beautiful.

She was dead.

The scent of cinnamon and jasmine still lingered around her, and the rich, earthy tune of her skin almost didn't betray the paleness of death. But her eyes, those deep, dark wells with fire burning in their depths – they were cold, the fire extinguished. She was looking unblinking into the blazing sun, but she didn't see it anymore.

He knelt near her, and didn't move for a long time while the sun rose on the sky. He traced the features of her face with his gaze. The high cheek-bones, the almond-shaped eyes. The full lips. A deadly beauty…

Now he knew that she was an assassin. She wanted to seduce and kill him - and then just kill when the first part of her plan failed. But she did not. He could feel the point of her dagger against his heart. He could see the glint in her eyes, like a big cat preparing for a kill. But then her eyes revealed something else just for a short moment. A woman, longing for love… And then she left.

He tried to follow her tracks when the sun rose. He wanted to find out why she wanted him dead. Instead, he found somebody wanted her death for not fulfilling her task…

It must have happened right before the first ray of the sun appeared on the sky. He wondered if she saw it – the pink paleness of the dawn when the sun is still gentle and the stars are just beginning to retreat before its light. Maybe she did. Her face was peaceful, and there was a slight smile on her lips. She saw the first ray of light, and her soul could follow it into the oases of the ancestors, as the people of this land believed. A red flower of her blood blossomed in the white sand of the desert, a rose in the barren land. It was a beautiful death…

He closed her eyes gently, and lifted her slim body. She was light, more a fairy-tale than a woman. He carried her several yards, where the soil was more firm, and the wind would not blow it away. There he began digging a grave.

He knew her murderer might get far away in that time. He might even make new plans for his own death. She also had time to get away, to begin a new life after she failed to fulfil the task. She did not. She would have to leave all her life behind. Maybe she would even find the love that her eyes begged for… She did not leave. The insecurity of the change made her stay – and killed her.

He could not leave her so, either, her beauty falling prey to the scavengers. The sun was already setting when he finished, having only his hands and a dagger for tools. He gently lowered her into the grave, and then the soil covered her beauty forever as she became one with it.

He realized he never knew her name.