After the death of her lover, Agatha goes on a journey of penance, which becomes both harrowing and transformative; meeting both monsters and new friends, and discovering love along the way.
Note: This is actually a completed story, but I have to re...
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The nights are short this time of year, but the light is already taking on a wan, watery quality as the shadows lengthen even further, and the cold winds begin to bite even through the sweat of my toil. Time slows with the monotony of the task and the growing pains of my exertion. More than once, I hit a rut in the road, and I had to stop, to push the coffin out of it before continuing. Sometimes I am thankful for the respite of these occasions, even though restarting the movement is hard on me. Time slows, dragging like this coffin, every moment pristine and clear and as cold as the crisp evening air.
In time, I come to the boundary stones at the end of the settlement. A few people have followed me, and they stopped at the border, wishing me well. They said they will pray for my safe return.
Once they are gone, the road is downhill, and I am thankful for the ease of this. It is not so steep as to allow the coffin to fall by itself, yet I know that soon there will be hills to climb. I do not know if I will be able to manage this.
Dusk comes to greet me at the bottom of the valley, and I am surprised to find the Priest there too, sitting on the stump of some long-chopped tree at the roadside.
"Well done. I'm surprised you made it this far," he announced as I drew near. His presence here could only bode ill, and I was already fighting exhaustion, so I ignored him. He made a theatrical point of looking back towards the settlement, "I see your many idolising fans have left you now."
"What do you want?" I grunted.
He stood, and strolled beside me, his hands tucked behind his back. I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck bristle. I heaved the coffin forward.
"Well, I have been giving some more thought to what you said at your trial, and I've come around to your way of thinking. The Bishop, I think, is soft on you, because of what you did for his son, and the same for so many others." He waved a dismissive hand in an airy, foppish manner which I found grotesque. I was in no state to berate him. "Hence, I think you do indeed deserve a little addition to your punishment, just to send you on your way."
At this, I stopped, and turned to him, frowning as I caught my breath. "Pardon?"
From behind him, he revealed a long flexible crop, and demonstrated the sound it made as he cut the air with it. It was the sort of thing used on livestock, and on wives and children by the less enlightened of our men.
"You're going to whip me?"
He looked me up and down, the way a man does when appraising a woman's body, his expression smug. "Yes. Do you deny that you deserve it? Or is the punishment too harsh for the murder you committed?"
I gave to reply, but stuttered to silence. To say what? Yes, he was right, I did deserve this, yet, his manner, and corrupt motivation rankled me. The thought that I would let him take advantage of my predicament so that he might punish me — not to assuage my sin — but to indulge his own carnal desire for me, his sick, perverted desire to see me suffer... I felt the bile rising from the pit of my stomach.
