Blue Morning

Painful howls rent the dawn sky, the hunted silence of the night shatters sending birds screeching into the air. Game springs from their hiding places and the trees groan in protest at the stirring of the land.
And a lean young girl with fiery red hair wearing a torn green and yellow dress opens her eyes in surprise.

She hadn't expected to open them ever again, not after last night. Not after her close encounter with a monster of nightmares, not after her painful and desperate flight through strange woods in the dark of night. And definitely not after her protecting blue candle had sputtered out and she had fallen to the cold ground alone, exhausted and broken.

Tenderly she stirred cramped and frozen muscles to action, they adamantly refused to obey her. Every twitch was a herculean struggle, every movement a torture of knives and fiery pokers. The struggle to rouse her broken body soon stole her still ragged breath and forced her to stop. She barely rolled to her back to let the warmth of the sun energize her.
The sparse sickly rays of morning light brought warmth to her bones and helped to clear her mind of fatigue.

Amalie breathed deep the air of a borrowed day and felt her insides unwind from the nights terror at last. A new pain finally roused her body to action, the ache in her empty belly, a growl escaped before Amalie could finally sit up and have a look around.

The sun was somewhere above the trunks and branches surrounding her, a cool breeze shook the leaves and startled a squirrel. Her bag was a few steps behind her, she crawled to it and rummaged about to see what was within. Her good shoes, a blanket and matches, a loaf of hard bread, and a skin of fresh water were pulled out. Amalie tore into the bread, eating half before thirst caused her to stop and reconsider lunch and supper. She reluctantly re wrapped the bread and took a few cautious sips of water she knew this meagre amount would have to last a long time.

Having eaten Amalie finished rummaging in the bag the priest had given her the night she was banished from home. There was a book of scriptures, well worn but lovingly tended; a map of the surrounding lands little use to lost Amalie; there was a sealed scroll that she felt needed to be kept closed and unknown. Finally there was a tiny knife, a string, and two honey candies, a misguided gift of a priest who had seen too many children leave forever. At once Amalie was overcome with guilt that she could not share with her big sister, then sadness as she remember why.
She was alone and banished from home being chased by evil nightmarish monsters that ate the souls of freaks like her with magic in their blood.

Amalie cried and cried until her tears ran out and she was struggling for air. When her tears at last were spent and no more would fall Amalie felt a stillness come over her. Death seemed a trivial thing now something no longer to be feared. Death could come as a friend to free her from pain, from hopelessness, Death was a certain escape. A queer feeling came over her, her body chilled and her eyes closed, there was no point in going on she thought to herself. She was doomed no matter how fast she ran, eventually she would fall and not be lucky. She had already said goodbye, she was dead to her family, to he village, so why go on delaying? The shadow beasts would be relentless, they were bigger stronger and bloodthirsty, and nothing could stop them from killing her. Come dark, when the warm rays of the sun were a distant dream she would be hunted again, and again, and again. How could there be any hope? The trees held their silence giving no answer, or hope.
The mist thickened and through her closed eyes she saw something.

A hooded visage formed from the mist, a scythe in one hand, an hourglass in the other, his grinning skull looked through Amalie and waited for her. She saw the sands of the hourglass slowly trickling the last few grains to oblivion. Her spirit could leave now, her body would follow soon enough. All she had to do was give up, to accept that the monsters would win no matter what. All she had to do to be at peace forever was go to him, to embrace death and leave all her troubles behind.
Her life was tearing away from her, legs and arms were already cold and numb; her body a frail anchor keeping her tormented soul tethered to a horrible place. Her life was leaving her, all she had to do was wait.

But Death came no closer, something seemed to keep him from finishing his work. Something was keeping Amalie from giving up and dying there and then. Despair could not seem to take root in the deepest warmest core of her soul.
Some stubborn spark, deep deep within her would not go out. The fire that had burned all last night refused to go out; hope kept it burning through her despair. A memory flared to life, the memory of her  father telling her to be brave. The last words he had ever spoken to her before she was dragged from home to save them from herself.
He had called her his brave little girl, he was her father and he was always right. So she had to be brave right until the very end, it was the last loving wish of her father and she would obey, for him. The tiny spark turned into a comforting inferno that banished the cold of despair Amalie would continue. She would run and run until the world stopped,. Amalie smiled despite herself, she was alive and well fed with the entire world before her and monsters behind her. It was really quite thrilling now that she could see her path laid out before her, it was just an adventure like no other. She nodded to Death, and he nodded back to her, the hourglass in his hand he tipped again so the sand fell fast once more.

The no longer feeble rays of the sunlight warmed away the mist, and Death. Rainbows sparkled off the morning dew creating a dome of colour greater than anything the stained glass had ever made. The cool breeze carried the gentle scent of wildflowers hidden nearby. A bit of beauty in this dreary grey and brown forest. Amalie found them in the shadow of a great pine, she plucked one and put it in her hair. It was white and it smelled wonderful. The trees sighed in the wind silent no more, hope and her fire of determination seemed to cheer the forest up.

So Amalie packed her bag, put the knife in her pocket and continued forwards away from the monsters and onwards to hope.