Of Ravens and Murder: OM&N Volume 2

Day ? - 2018

The woman didn't know how long she'd been wandering the forest; she'd seen the sun rise and set so many times she'd stopped counting. She grew tired sometimes, but her sleep was cold and restless. She grew hungry, too, but sustenance was hard to come by. The only thing she didn't lack was water; the fog that wreathed the trees had soaked through her clothes days ago and now it weighed down her steps and made her nights colder. Her already lean frame had turned skeletal as time passed, her ribs and spine protruding sharply from beneath her ashen skin just as the color had begun to fade from her long hair and her eyes once bright were now cold and lifeless.
The woman once so sure of her direction was now simply lost.
She was a shell, a mere fragment of what once was, but still, she wandered, growing restless quickly as if there was somewhere else she was meant to be, though she couldn't be sure where.
So she walked, and the ghosts of the forest dogged her every step.

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The Lost Woman trudged on, bony hands clasped over her ears as the wails of those cursed to remain in the fog grew louder still; she was beginning to fear the voices were in her own head.Finally, she stopped, her knees collapsing from under her as silent tears tracked down her hollow cheeks and she wrapped her frail arms around her middle. She rocked herself gently as she shook with her own silent wails.Then she began to chant in an ancient language she didn't know with a voice she didn't recognize.Slowly, the wails faded into a sweet, blissful silence.