Among the orbs that passed before her eyes, she could make out faces. Some she recognised, while others were as strange to her as the moment itself. She would later swear that among those faces, she saw those belonging to her grandparents, not as she had known in life, which had been all wrinkly and grey, but revitalised and ready for a new adventure in some other place. She would even say she had seen her father. He had been a glowing orb one second, and then in the blink of an eye he’d changed into a charging bear and then a badger growling at the moon, and even before the tears had left her eyes, he’d become a flying bird the same as her, and as he turned to face her, she realised he was answering the same call, and in that smile of his, she knew she was safe. He’d been gone for so long, but he existed in song, and as the heavenly chords tugged at her heart, the pain of not knowing was suddenly no more. In the next blink of her eye, he had changed yet again into a butterfly, and then a firefly, and as he circled her head like a halo, she flapped her wings and spoke his name, and as the other orbs came and flew by her side, they spoke her name in return. Each voice carried through the trees before rising upwards where all at once the bubbles of words burst like fireworks, and some distance away, the two foxes came to a halt and looked up, transfixed by the flashing lights that exploded overhead.

A Journal for Damned Lovers UK

A Journal for Damned Lovers US

Anthology UK / Anthology US