“Anything else you’d want to sell?” Though he was little more than a skeleton, a harbinger of doom, the man leered. He could only so much as guess what hid beneath the heavy black cloak and hood, but what he guessed was more than enough to satisfy his fantasies.

Dark clouds roiled at the edge of the horizon, a silent threat of the storm that was to come. Now and then the sun still managed to force his bloody fingers through his own shadow, illuminating the patches that he could reach in his useless struggle.

But already was he despairing, for the murderess moon was beginning her slow procession towards her nightly kingdom. She was a stately queen, ascending to her throne after her day’s rest. Her husband, the sun, feared his wife. Every night he fled to the river and, in his fear of and longing for her distant presence, slit his wrists and died upon the river banks.

And the murderess moon watched calmly as his blood spread across the water, turning it a bright, glowing scarlet. Every night it was the same. He feared her and ran, and killed himself. While his wife watched as he died. She always watched, and never intervened when she easily could have had the chance and time to do so.

The person hiding underneath the hood shook her head vigorously. She had not spoken a word, only used her hands to indicate the price. To hand over the ware -- one of the most precious things she had ever possessed. Even though it was in form of a small, worthless piece of glass.

That looked like a shard. A missing piece to a puzzle of a stained glass window. Some skilful artist’s masterpiece, created with loving care. Only to be shattered because its creator didn’t feel it was worthy of his attention. At least not anymore. A piece of broken love.

And the last piece as well, thank the Great Mother.

But maybe those hands of hers were enough to show the vendor her sex. After all, she knew herself to be fine-boned and more feminine than she wished to be. Drat it.

The vendor smirked at her once more before turning back to his cart, parked carelessly on the dusty road. His steps were the shuffling, scuttling kind, reminding the silent woman of a small rodent. A rat, perhaps; since he was just as sly and disgusting.

Without so much as a sound as the deep folds of her cloak brushed the ground, she turned and vanished into the wheat field. The growth welcomed her graciously, like the many hands, faces and voices of the Great Mother. The woman stretched out her hands and let them trail across the stalks, which were heavy with grain.

And they immediately rose again after being briefly bent to the ground, as if only to grant her a passage. She felt empty, despite the rich feel of cultivated nature all around her. Empty and dark. Like a mere shadow of herself.

Her mind was empty, for sure. Entirely hollow. She was sure that, if she knocked against it, her skull would echo hollowly. Because there was nothing left for it to store, except for maybe the little common sense she had.

It didn’t hurt. Not the way she had thought it would. In fact, it was painless. Just a dull feeling of something missing, a feeling that was automatically suppressed by her conscious. But that was alright. It didn’t matter anymore, after all.

Or so she hoped.

Her steps became longer, bigger, so they carried her towards her goal faster. More swiftly. Now she moved like the shadow of a bird, blurry and uneven as it was cast upon the ground. Flitting above the plain at high speed, never minding the obstacles that pushed themselves into her path as if on purpose.

Finally she came stumbling out of the cornfield, the walk through it having felt like an eternity. At that thought, her lips -- hidden in the shadow her hood cast -- twisted into a rueful smile. Didn’t she have all the time in the world now? Did it matter?

Of course it mattered. Eternity was nothing, passing in the blink of an eye. At least now it was. Now it did.

It took her a few moments to ease the strain from her strides. The tension from her body. Long measured breaths were dragged into her lungs, as if they could calm and warm the chill that crawled up her spine. Numbing her mind, finally. Spreading through her body and straight towards another part of herself that she had shielded until now.

Would shield for eternity, because it was the last of herself that she did own. This she would not lose. No.

A small house appeared to her right, more of a cottage upon second glance. With a dark wooden picket fence surrounding its small garden and a few trees hiding the tiny windows, it looked adorable and out of place. One might have expected a huge farmer’s house. A holding, perhaps. But not a cottage as small and fragile-looking as this.

Her gaze turned away from it, pained. No use in looking at it again now. She wouldn’t see it anymore. She couldn’t, and wouldn’t. Her death was certain, but she had no desire to draw it upon anyone else who had known her. That was too brutal a thought to pursue for more than the second that it occurred.

A slim white hand sneaked out from the cloak’s deep folds and draw the cloak closer. Like a shield, to ward off evil of some kind. Though there was none in sight. None that anyone except for her could have sensed, at least.

Haunted eyes searched out the edge of the forest that seemed to hide behind the cottage. Soon, her blood sang. Soon, soon.

She fled past the cottage, no more than an eagle’s shadow flitting by. The trees closing in around her were a comforting shield from the prying eyes of the murderess moon, as her ascend seemed to go on forever and find no end. The trees, however, were dark and comforting and sedating, even with the underbrush snatching and tearing at the woman’s cloak like some assailant trying to halt her.

Somewhere in the trees’ wake, she let herself fall to her knees. Now and then the silver light of the moon broke through the swaying canopy of leaves high above her head, stroking what they touched with surprising gentleness. For a murderess, at least.

Of course, it could always be a bluff. Something to lull everything into peace while the moon slight her victim’s cord of life, the string attaching it to the Tree of Life’s branches. Strings of fine silk, being no more than part of a large, intertwined spider web.

Again, two slender hands emerged from the dark cloak, milky white even in the darkness. An artist’s hands, perhaps. In another place and time. Here, they were only a witch’s hands.

These hands pulled the hood of the cloak back, to reveal a pale, haunted face. Blood-red curls spilled around her face, such a sharp contrast to her shockingly translucent skin. And her eyes, blue flecked with gold, held nothing but sorrow.

Without hesitation, her long fingers began clawing at the soft brown earth. Deeper and deeper they delved, by now scraped and bruised, until they had formed a hole deep enough to bury a small body in. Only then did they seize their frantic digging, to rest on the sides of the hole.

The woman then bent her head towards the earth. Her lips parted, and it was then that an unearthly scream sounded. It tore from her throat, shredding all that was left inside her to pieces. Its claws were terrible and sharp, and its teeth long.

Frenzied, taken by blood madness, it left her in ruins. She screamed, the tears running down her cheeks, screamed until she was raw. And even then, she kept on. Let out all the pain, to bury in forever. The world around her seemed to fade as she wailed, the murderess moon forgotten.

Finally, after an eternity, the cry of pain, rage, terror and hatred faded. The woman was leaning over the hole, trembling from her outburst. With shaky hands she began to push back the earth she had taken from the hole. Shoving it back into place as if it could cover what had just happened.

When the hole was sealed again, she gently brushed over the surface. A thin carpet of grass began to grow where only a heartbeat before there had been an uneven patch in the ground. Smiling faintly, the woman rose to observe her handiwork. She nodded with grim satisfaction, and the movement was hardly visible. No one would ever notice what anguish had been buried into the heart of the Great Mother.

She’d sold everything she had. Her soul, and even her dreams. That day, she’d offered the Merchant of Doom the last piece of what she’d been. Her last dream. The answer to his question.

Caillit. The Lost. This was what she had named herself. Her given name had been far from accurate. In that, she was not lost. She was not Caillit.

But Caillit she was. Fate had chosen it to be so, the Great Mother had given Her consent. The Lost she would be until she found her dreams again.

. . . If only to sell them once more. Over, and over again . . .