Ophelia and the Encounter at the Bridge

Ophelia shielded her eyes, blinking through the dazzling glare of the setting sun as she tried to get a look at the two figures blocking her path. The figure on the left was a squat, bulky silhouette against the light, while the one on the right was little more than a tall, brawny shape looming beside their colleague. She had an impression of glinting metal plates strapped crudely over leather garments; the taller figure topped with an old-fashioned bucket helmet while his companion’s bald skull was unadorned.

Their shadows stretched along the path, half-swallowing her.

“Well now,” came the voice of the shorter fellow, “little miss Blackwood is it? You’re an awful long way from home.” The instant the words left his mouth, Ophelia’s blood squirmed with recognition.

“Mr. Copper.” She replied, her tone politely soft, as though they were back at her father’s court. “Mr. Skelton.” She added to the taller man, quite confident in her guess. “What brings you out this far?”

Mr. Copper chuckled; Ophelia could practically see the jowls quivering on his pudgy chin even through the glare. He parted his hands in a broad gesture towards Ophelia, his tone oozing with feigned concern.

“Is it any great mystery, Miss? Your parents have been desperately worried since you disappeared you know. Poor Lord Blackwood was certain you must’ve been kidnapped, while your dear mother has folks scouring the land for you day and night. Though as I can plainly see, seems as though the only person whose taken you away from home is yourself?

I must admittedly confess surprise; the daughter of so prominent a family must have everything she could possibly want for. Was living with your own parents so terrible that you felt you had to run away? Why pray tell would you risk yourself in such a foolhardy fashion?”

“You assume, Mr. Copper, that I consider myself to be at risk.” The pale young woman replied, her bloody red eyes flicking warily back and forth between the pair as she peered at them past her hand, squinting through the glare. They were coming steadily into focus with each passing moment, the seconds granting Ophelia a better idea of what she was really looking at. Mr. Copper’s hands were spread in a gesture of emphatic harmlessness, the very picture of a reasonable, friendly, sympathetic man. A neat distraction from Mr. Skelton wrapped up in his traveling cloak, one steel-gloved hand resting on the hilt of his sword.

“Now that is most unkind, Miss Blackwood; I did not mean to imply that you couldn’t take care of yourself.” The toothy smile on his face very much implied that he didn’t mean a word.

“That being the case,” she retorted in a carefully civil voice, “you can return to my parents and inform them that I am quite well. Consider your job to be done.”

“I’m afraid it is your turn to assume, Miss Blackwood. Your dear mother was not, after all, who sent us here. Evidently she does not trust us to return you safely; an injury to my pride that is most assuredly shared by my good colleague Mr. Skelton.”

“I am sorry that my mother impugned the honour of two such upstanding members of my father’s court. You have my sympathies. But if you are not here on my mother’s orders, then you should have no issues letting me past.”

Skelton’s rasping laugh sounded like steel wool being dragged across bone as the pair continued to stare at Ophelia. The hairs on her neck stood up. She took several steps to the side, making to give the pair a wide berth as she proceeded up the path towards the bridge beyond.

Mr. Copper took two firm strides into her path, while Mr. Skelton began to pace counter to Ophelia’s own movements, mirroring her motion in such a manner that the pair of men would soon be flanking her from both sides.

Once more, Mr. Copper’s laugh broke the silence, though its pitch was lower and uglier than before.

“Well now, Miss Blackwood, it seems to me that I would be derelict in my duties to your dear parents if I were to simply let you leave. And yet, you have made it quite plain that you do not wish to return? You leave me with the option of escorting you to your mother and father, which will doubtless reap significant reward, or we can let you go which will… what?” He shrugged, palms upward. Ophelia could hear Mr. Skelton’s feet scraping on the dirt behind her somewhere.

“I am afraid I do not have access to my father’s accounts right now, Mr. Copper.”

“Oh I’m well aware, Miss Blackwood. But we are not unreasonable men; I am certain that we can find an alternative solution that is to the satisfaction of all involved.” The last few words slithered out with uncomfortable emphasis, Ophelia’s skin crawling as she glared at Mr. Copper with naked disgust.

“Over your dead body.” She shot back flatly, hands curling into fists as she felt Mr. Skelton step firmly behind her, creeping into her own shadow.

“Gracious me but you are sheltered; the saying is ‘over my dead body’. You’ve muddled up the phrase there my dear.”

“No, I haven’t.” Ophelia replied coldly as Mr. Skelton’s sword rasped in its scabbard mere feet behind her. Mr. Copper grinned, lowering one hand to his hefty stomach, fingers coming to rest on the pommel of a wicked looking dagger.

Deep in her veins, Ophelia’s blood coiled and rushed in sudden motion. The whites of her eyes flooded black, inky tendrils flickering beneath her skin. In an instant, her shadow solidified into solid darkness, whipping vines snaring Mr. Skelton’s legs. The taller man let out a startled scream that was abruptly cut off as the strands wrenched him down into Ophelia’s shadow like the waters of a lake. The thug's grip on his sword failed with the sudden motion, the weapon tumbling to the road along with the clattering form of his bucket helm.

It was all over in less than a second; one moment Mr. Skelton was there, the next he had vanished. Mr. Copper’s demeanor of faux-compassion was gone just as quickly, the grimy dagger clutched in his fist as he took a horrified step back, eyes wide. His face contorted with shock; any semblance of propriety abandoned in favor of undisguised aggression.

“W-what the bloody Hell did you do to him?! Witch! You’re a bloody witch you are!”

“Witch?” Ophelia replied in a voice that was not her own. “Mr. Copper, you ignorant little pile of sweating duplicity, witchcraft is the domain of those who generally desire to do good in spite of the judgement of their small-minded peers. This ‘gift’ my parents gave me is the sort of thing any witch worth her salt would work tirelessly to protect themselves from.”

She stalked forward towards the man, his heavy frame shuffling rapidly backward as he tried to keep out of Ophelia’s reach, particularly the reach of her shadow. He brandished the dagger at her, tip waggling threateningly toward her face. If Ophelia felt threatened by the dagger, she made no sign as her oozing voice swam in Mr. Copper’s ears.

“Back off! I’ll cut your bloody throat open!” He bellowed; the threat undercut by the squeak in his voice.

“You wondered why I ran away from home? You wondered why my mother didn’t trust you to come recover me? It’s because she doesn’t even trust you to know who she really is. What she really is. Were my parents really that terrible? They were worse, Mr. Copper. Much, much worse. Perhaps I should show you?” She offered, tone dripping with contempt.

From beneath the folds of Ophelia’s dress came long, spooling tendrils of ink, rippling like water even as they probed the air. Like an octopus unfurling itself from beneath a deep-sea outcropping, the shadowy limbs multiplying rapidly. Mr. Copper choked as he took it in.

“Don’t touch me! Back off!” He shrieked, sweat beading on his bald pate. Ophelia didn’t slow, even as the coils of darkness reached for Mr. Copper.

Mr. Copper broke, lips parting in a primal scream as he lunged at her, dagger stabbing down wildly. The blade plunged up to the hilt in the flesh beneath Ophelia’s collarbone, causing her to jerk to one side in response. She gasped in shock and pain, one hand shooting up to clutch at the weapon’s hilt. A spurt of black ink spattered across Mr. Copper’s hand as he reeled back, abandoning the weapon in her chest. He didn’t make it more than a foot before the tendrils whipped out like snares, lashing about his wrists, ankles and throat, squeezing tight enough to elicit a gasp from the terrified man.

He lost his balance, crashing to his knees as he strained against his bonds. His eyes were on the dagger in Ophelia’s chest, the blade having come within inches of her heart as black blood continued to flow from the wound. The daughter of Lord and Lady Blackwood squeezed the weapon in one pale, petite hand – and plucked it out like a thorn from her palm. Her breathing was heavy with pain, another groan of discomfort escaping her throat as the blade slid free of her chest.

Even as Mr. Copper watched however, the black ooze pooled in the wound, pale white flesh knitting itself back together with sickly haste. In a matter of moments, the skin was as flawless and smooth as it had been before, as though the dagger had never so much as grazed her.

When next her gaze fell upon Mr. Copper, the black around Ophelia’s eyes had spread like the roots of a tree through her skin, a web-work of faintly throbbing darkness creeping beneath snowy flesh. The inky tendrils pulled slowly outwards, spreading the man’s wrists and ankles further and further apart, like she was a child bracing to pull the wings off a fly. His eyes bulged madly, head shaking rapidly even as his face went red from struggling to breathe. 

She spoke, and though the voice was her own, the words seemed ill-fitting of the gentle little doll of Blackwood court.

“I think I’ve come up with an ‘alternative solution’, Mr. Copper.” 

“Please, no! Mercy, little miss, mercy! Don’t kill me!” His voice grunted as he strained to get the words out. Beneath his knees, Ophelia’s shadow began to pool around him like a spreading puddle of blood into which he sank, inch by inch.

“Kill you, Mr. Copper? Don’t be absurd. I am not some common thug out to mug, molest and murder a young woman on the road.” The serpentine quality of her voice slithered into the man’s mind as Ophelia lifted one worn boot, planting it on his face and pressing down, pushing him into her shadow like a tent-pole into soft soil. He had seen how swiftly she had disposed of Mr. Skelton; he knew that she was dragging it out.

“W-what are you going to do?” He managed to croak out from beneath the tread of her boot-sole.

“Do? Why it’s quite simple. I am going to plunge you into a darkness so deep that you will forget the sensation of the sun on your skin. I am going to leave you and your repulsive friend drowning in that endless nothingness until you can think of naught so desperately as how much you want it to end. Then, when you are on the verge of forgetting your own name in your despair, I am going to peel your soul out of that overstuffed sack of meat and wasted potential you call a body. I will leave your freshly discarded shell as a gift for the vermin.” Ophelia’s voice spun the sentences around Mr. Copper like the threads of a spider’s web, even as his neck reached ground level. Nothing but his mortified head remained visible above the surface. “And when I’m done, I’ll leave your soul in my shadow where it belongs, trampled beneath my every step as I go about my life. A life that shall forget you ever existed. Goodbye, Mr. Copper.”

With a final press of her foot, Ophelia pushed the man’s head into the rippling abyss beneath. In the depths of her belly, she could faintly feel the glittering presence of the two souls, each one wrapped in pure, unfiltered terror.

It felt good. It felt so, so good. It felt right. All she needed to do now, was let them drown in that nightmare, let them succumb to the inevitability of that inky madness – and then, their essence would be hers.

In the back of her mind, Ophelia heard the rich, airy laughter of her mother. She heard her voice in distant memory.

“Ophelia my darling, I am so very proud of you.”

Revulsion welled up in Ophelia, her eyes clamping tightly shut as her pale hands clasped the sides of her skull. She shook her head ferociously, the tendrils of ink trembling uncertainly as they turned towards her.

“No. No no no! I… I can’t! I won’t!”

“Do not concern yourself with the plight of these disgusting people,” her mother’s voice told her, full of gentle scorn, “they are beneath you. They are so far beneath you that the dirt in your garden would be a step up for them. They breed livestock in much the same way we breed them; once their purpose is fulfilled, they are fit only to be food. One day, when you are strong enough, you will be able to nourish yourself with their fleeting essence. Then, my darling child, you will truly be my daughter.”

Ophelia bared her teeth as she staggered, fighting to remain upright as the roots of darkness beneath her skin pulsed, shrinking and draining back into her eyes.

“Not now, mother!” She growled, defiance fueling her as her inky black blood retreated into her flesh. “Not… now… not… ever!”

With a shuddering gasp of effort, Ophelia thrust her hand towards the shadows beneath a cluster of roots in the nearby forest. Like balls fired from a cannon, Mr. Copper and Mr. Skelton came hurtling from the darkness, colliding with the trunk of an adjacent tree and tumbling to the ground in a heap of shaking limbs.

The pair looked positively haunted, blinking about themselves with bleary-eyed desperation, scarcely believing they were back in the real world. Together, their eyes fell upon Ophelia – and without so much as a word, they scrambled to their feet and bolted into the trees, whimpering in shameless fear as they went.

Ophelia felt her shoulders sag with exhaustion, looking down at the knife wound in her dress. She couldn’t afford to be that careless, that reckless.

“Ophelia. Come home.” Her mother’s voice was naught but a fading whisper in the depths of her subconscious as the ink drained from her eyes.

“…Never, Mother... never.”

....

Author's Note: This story was written as a thank you to the wonderfully generous Miss Liebefury for her support of my writing! A big thanks to her, and another big thanks to the wonderfully sharp mind of Andii Havok for their editing suggestions regarding this particular piece!

Expect an audio-version of this story soon!