Sibyl's Sorrow

Lady Sibyl Lupton, a title for which she held little fondness, being as it was the consequence of her forced matrimony, lived near the Cornish coast within the saturnine walls of Castle Donatien, a Romanesque structure built under the bequest of William the Conqueror, though it had undergone renovations in the 12 century that left it with gothic features. Lord Alphonsus Lupton was a harsh husband who, though providing all the luxuries lucre lent its owner to Sibyl, kept that pour and melancholic soul trapped in in the walls he would do to small creatures.

From the poverty of her family's waning fortunes she had been removed, being damned to matrimony by her choleric father who sought the alliance of Alphonsus, becoming trapped in a gilded cage; whilst Lady Lupton was permitted no unchaperoned trips from out the castle walls, being allowed no pleasure sought from beyond its borders, she was still able to seek the pleasure of the outside world through simulacra painted upon canvas and drawn on vellum page.

Sibyl, denied the joys of Nature's creation, found the time given over to her for solitary engagement spent in artistic endeavour, painting scenes of nature and civilisation alike in their forbidden quality; from her bedchamber she observed the sea and the people going to and through in the fishing town of Nostree. Yet marriage to a merciless man, consumed by Sadean passions, left Sibyl dominated by melancholic humours, resulting in her painting dreadful scenes of, murdered men, raging storms, and a stygian sea. From her art even Goya would flee.

Yet one she felt forsaken by the muses, being afflicted by a drought of ideas that threated to deny her emotions their one release; from fear and despair she had but one surcease and fearing its loss she bid a servant go out in search of the local cunning one, hoping that they would possess some ointment or remedy that would return to her creativity, so through her art she could once again find peace. The servant protested, vehemently recounting reasons justifying their reluctance, yet once plied with gold and wine the servant was from their refusal given surcease.

By dawn's light the servant returned to Sibyls chamber, bearing upon them a jar filled with a waxy substance that bore a purple hue. Once relived of their cargo, having recounted to Sibyl the cunning woman's instructions, swiftly from there the servant in fear flew.

Upon her skin the ointment she rubbed, careful to use a diminutive amount, eager for it to return the muse's blessing: Sibyl covered every part of her body until she was completely covered in the waxen dressing. Once thoroughly anointed Sibyl began her painting with the process of outlining, whilst for the final image her mind was busy divining; she stared out intently at the sea as she finished her drawing, contemplating where the story of her painting was heading.

As Sibyl began to create upon canvas a most violent scene, a depiction of a tartarean tempest that cast ships into oblivion's open maw, she saw from out her chamber window that the air was galvanised, the wind blowing strongly as rolling clouds, black like Hell's smoke, dominated the sky; in response the to the fury of the Firmament the Sea had become engaged with waves that rose Biblically high. To all those just off the coast doom was in that moment nigh, though they would to themselves lie.

Though she only learned of it from the next morning's paper, the storm had sent a cargo vessel crashing against the rocks, wooden debris caught in cliffs' nooks. Though most mourned the tragic loss of life, amongst the town immorality was rife, causing the coast to be scoured by many gleeful crooks.

When the tragic tale had made its way to Sibyl's ear, she felt overcome her a grave dread, foreboding feelings rules her already sorrow filled heart that was to life's joys long since dead, having departed when her father had her to matrimony lead, for she now felt a retrospective fear for her loyal servant whom she had into danger worthy of the greatest dread; by sorrow and dread once more to her canvas Sibyl was led, art being to her like Heaven sent bread. She pulled from her mind sombre images, that in grave detail depicted, the water wrought destruction of her servant in shades dark as lead, manifesting with paint and brush upon canvas the dark emotions that plagued her with fear for that loyal young man called Ged.

That night no home was left for Ged to return to, for it had fallen prey to Nature's temper, for that day as Sibyl sat before her easel releasing her sorrow through paint covered bristles a second tempest brewed; Sibyl created a simulacrum of the storm passed, showing it laying waste to Ged's home while he lay upon his bed by impaled by wooden debris and under stone rubble buried. That day life imitated art for Ged's home, though he was in Castle Donatien far from his bed, his home was by wrathful winds of that second storm thoroughly destroyed. Yet after returning to his home to shift through the destruction, Ged never returned, upon Sibyl's fearful ideas the fates had fed.

In the days after that tragic affair Sibyl's paintings more frequently mirrored the experiences of life, bringing to her feelings of horror rivalled only by Hieronymus Bosch's hellish art, for every scene she painted found in a life a cruel counterpart. By all the horrors first wrought upon her canvas she was touched in her heart, leaving her with sorrow suffered by students of the soothsayers art. Indeed, she believed herself a sufferer of some curse, burdened with knowledge horrific and burdensome to her heart.

The tenebrous truth of Sibyl's paintings was that they did not divine misfortune but was its architect, conjured by paint soaked sympathetic magic malice was left to run rampant and unchecked: Sibyl mourned for the unfortunate without any power to circumspect, being for so long unable to perceive her art's evil effect. Not once did she ever suspect what was so obvious in retrospect.

Sibyl painted and painted, without surcease, many a sorrowful scene; Sibyl pursued her artistic pursuits without reckoning on its occult power, driven by a desire to remedy the heartfelt pain that was in her so keen. Yet one midnight dreary, while she slumbered in her bed, as restful as the decaying dead, in a dream the truth was by Sibyl seen: as Sibyl laid in the grip of paralysis whilst into her chamber flew an owl of the genus Strix, that perched upon her bed post just above her head making sure it was not unseen.

With a voice belonging more truly to a human then beast, the owl spoke to Sibyl in a manner that was commanding, with voice and mien of attention demanding; the owl bid her seek a return to the freedom she had been lamenting, bring about the end of that unjust state of being. It urged her to paint of her husband the image of lying as though dying, feverishly repeating its words until Sibyl awoke to a dreadful and dreary morning.

Remaining half immersed in that words of dreams, dwelling in that state one finds oneself in upon waking at an early hour, when the logic of night-time fantasy merges with the perception of Earthly reality lending it more power, Sibyl heeded that Owl's decree, whose will over hers did seem to overpower, with strength like that of some adamantine tower. Thus, it came to pass, Sibyl wrought from painted a pernicious picture that was in form terribly dower, whose creation gifted unto her power, her paint produced sympathetic magic would her husband overpower.

With her tenebrous task finished Sibyl in anxious anticipation quit her bedchamber, wishing to be as an observer to the effects of her skill as a charmer. Though in her husband bound search she remained hidden through the stealthily art, fearful of his Tartarean temper, lest her arcane art had failed to send is soul into eternal umbra.

Lying upon the icystone floor of his solar, Alphonsus lay in a grotesque pool of his effluvium sowan and wretched; his body by death's corruption already fully infected, hisskin from blueish flesh retracted. In life had been enacted the recreation ofSibyl's painting, her will in reality enacted; through the practise ofsympathetic magic Sybil secured surcease from that malevolent man's tyranny, hisdeath by her arcane art affected, from his evil she was forever more protected