Contests: A Thrilling Mixture

All Good Things Come to Rest

She had watched in silence as the snow cleared, replaced by new buds that sprung up from the ground with the determination of the most powerful rivers coursing through open plains, and life of all shapes and sizes that spread its happiness and tears, love and fear across the world. It was a joy to behold, just as it had been for the millions of years she had watched over it all.

Through each change in season, she was there; she walked amongst the grass heavy with morning dew, lent her strength to the birthing beasts she found in her travels, and cast her love over all that she could reach.

There were others with much more power than she; others who basked in their perpetual strength. Those lording over the elements - the storm and sun and moon goddesses - tended to be the most powerful of them all.

She was Autumn, goddess of the third season of the year. It was a role she'd had for as long as time had existed, but throughout the course of her existence, she had had many different names. Autumn wasn't her most favourite, but it had stayed constant for the past short few centuries, so she'd had time to adjust.

Autumn spent her time waiting for the leaves to turn brown and the sun to sleep in, for the crisp to form at the edge of the wind, and for the sky to become a blank sheet of paper, only just too light for snow. And now, here it all was again.

For the past month or so, Autumn had felt her power return after what seemed like so little time. It never appeared all at once, because there was never a straight transition from one season to the next. It was a gradual occurrence.

For most of the year, Autumn remained almost mortal. She could eat, drink, and sleep to enhance what mortal strength she had, but none of these were necessities. She existed as one of the many beings of the world, a traveller with stories to tell of the past, the future, and the present as she knew it.

She set up small fires in derelict areas and gathered those around her into a huddle, to tell them of what she'd seen and share the fruits of her travels with them. There was always something new, something special. It didn't matter how many times she walked along the same streets, across the same mountain ranges; things were never the same.

She didn't have to walk, of course. Even without being at her peak, Autumn could exist without form; she could simply wish to be wherever she wanted, and her consciousness would be there. Most of the other goddesses used it a lot. They preferred to remain detached from humans and go about their tasks. Autumn was one of few who liked to interact with each generation.

She would use this ability sometimes, to visit specific countries that she felt like going to. There was no harm in it, surely. She had no money after all, so flights were impossible, and unless she planned to swim there were little other options available to her except to make her own way to wherever she wanted to go.

Every few decades without fail, Autumn found herself returning to one place more than any other. It was a small place just outside of a big city in France. It was a place of poverty and malnutrition. Autumn liked to spread the hope and warmth of her season with them. She had seen the difference even just a few words of hers could make time and time again. It was the magic behind the words, the feelings she blew into her stories. They brought people hope that the year had taken from them.

There were a number of people she knew personally from this place, people she'd visited since they were children and who she'd watched grow old while she herself stayed the same, wrapped in her cloak of cinnamon and smoke and embers and rustling leaves.

As the seasons changed, Autumn walked through the cobbled streets, and she recognised those around her from years gone by. Memory was a funny thing. She could remember everything and nothing in the same breath. Jacque De Ville from over one hundred and fifty years ago crossed her mind sometimes: he'd been a pirate, and he'd died far up north when the cold of the ice had stolen the breath from his lungs.

Death wasn't really a bad thing in Autumn's eyes. In a way, she supposed she represented the later stages of life. Death was a peace from struggle, a ceasing of problems, and the end of the most wonderful book in the world. It was both a close and an opening, and she would always see it that way.

Autumn had been upon his ship without form during that final voyage. She'd been there since it had left France to explore the unknown seas, and in that time she'd discovered just how glorious an endless expanse of water could be. She used her essence to keep spirits high, fish plentiful, and storms rare.

Autumn had shadowed Jacque for the majority of the trip, walking beside and just behind him most of the time. He was on deck a lot, facing the elements with his eyes firmly on the path ahead. He commanded his ship with ease, and his men were all the happier for it. He had a good life, Autumn saw, and he was a good person. Following his journey had been a wise idea.

The voyage had in total lasted three months before he succumbed to his illness, and in that time Autumn had seen the seasons change within this man she'd chosen to watch. It was the prospect of travel that had first attracted her to his ship, but it was the rich tale of his life that had kept her there.

On that final day, he had stumbled up to the deck of his ship, and leaned against the edge. Autumn could remember how he'd looked then, hanging onto his fragile life with little more than the barest remains of thread. His eyes had been a brilliant blue. It was then that the goddess had chosen to appear before the captain, dressed in a spectral gown of oranges and browns. She had pressed her hand to his, and passed her warmth to him while his own faded away for good. He had slumped to the deck, landing with a solid thud that sounded at the same time as his final heart beat. The disease that had wracked him would be labelled a curse.

It was after his death that Winter set in upon the ship, morale dropped and jobs changed. The first command upon finding Jacque's body was to lay him to rest. He had been placed in the water, and left to drift away to lands unknown. Autumn had watched from the sidelines. His story would live on within her.

She'd left the ship within the week, and appeared once again in that small town at the back-ends of France. His death was a passing sadness that would live as another ember within her heart, fit for telling around her next campfire to whichever sad souls sought warmth and comfort that night.

October Free Write entry!

This is far from my best work, but it's something.