Creative Writing

ETERNAL

I lie in bed and stare at the tapestry on the dilapidated wall. In the distance, I can hear the wailing of hundreds of widows, widowers and orphans as they mourn the loss of their loved ones. It does nothing to ease my own pain, radiating from the strange buboes that cover my neck. A feeling of helplessness and hopelessness washes over me and I turn instead, to stare at the flame of the lamp travelling slowly down the wick. Gentle breeze threatens the flame and it glimmers ever so slightly, as if to fight for its survival. It is in that moment, that I realize that my life too, does not stand a chance against the Great Mortality that has forsaken our people. We were hit by a serious plague and could not find any cure for it.

The sailors had carried the disease with them from Caffa to Genoa, travelling across Italy to my homeland of Pistoia. We had not, at that time felt the need to take precautions against such an infection. It was alien to us all and we did nothing but stand by and watch as one by one, those who we loved and cared for fell prey to this monstrosity. Thoughts and images rapidly flash across my mind; Averill, her breathtakingly fair skin, her innocent eyes, her beautiful visage, reduced to nothing but a blackened carcass. The disease had stolen her from me. I could not help her then as I could not help myself now. 

Hundreds were buried together; their bodies dumped in large pits. Some were lucky enough to have received the honour and respect with which we send off our brothers to the hereafter, but many had lost their identity among the sea of corpses. Clergymen had simply refused to offer last rites to the dying, for they did not want to contract the fatal illness. Pistoia had become nothing but an ocean of illness, drowning those who were unfortunate enough to reside within it. My Averill was treated no different. I had watched her suffer till her final breath, made my presence known to her even when she seemed unaware of her own. I...