The Salt Window

A 1000 word short story

Do you see it?

It’s watching me still.

This shadow in darkness.

Imperceptible perhaps, yet I know it’s there.

Holding me in place.

A statue in terror.

Down this grim alley where I found you loitering.

Tucked away from the grand canals and their plundering tourists.

The true nature of Venice.

A monster in hiding.

Luring the unsuspecting.

The glittering crown on a fetid corpse.

Death is all around.

Putrid in this stinking swamp.

And I have opened the way.

God help me but I have to follow.

Where is the lion protector to save me?

I see him standing resplendent atop marble pillars.

But his haughty gaze passes me by.

After all my sacrifices.

He leaves me to their favour and cruelty.

Here they are.

Waiting.

A house collapsing into ruin but full of undead life.

Centuries they have wanted to savage me.

A bargain made in haste that I thought I had escaped.

Immortality with the heaviest of price.

Water laps at my bare feet.

This land is sinking and I with it.

We have weathered centuries of storms together.

Now our foundations are fatally wounded.

At last we will face the eternal darkness.

The door swings open.

Rooms smelling of salt and rot.

Empty of ghosts but this lost soul crossing the threshold.

A city who’s battlements I have guarded from marauders and vagabonds, kings and emperors, now turns it back on me in my hour of need.

How dare you?

Vain and preening palace of sin. I see past your gilded mask of pomp.

I fought and died for your honour time and time again.

My blood spilling across cobbles and canals, draining into the great lagoon.

But there was no freedom for me.

No last great sigh. Forever denied my final sleep.

Every time I was called back. Again and again and again and again.

Waking to the smell of dead men and the pounding of endless battle.

This was not what I was promised.

What madness compelled the hellish compact I made with the Council of Ten and their dark witches at the House of Spirits all those centuries ago? Their evil words poured like poison oil into my desperate ears. War looming. Fear rising. My need to keep loved ones safe from harm.

Love? But of what? Of all the women that shared my bed, there were none that I cared for more than myself. Perhaps the city itself. A cruel master, but one I cannot but adore.

After all this time, the jest is on me as I cannot remember. All I know is my mind fractured in self contempt at a betrayal I was too blind to see.

They had made me a vassal to their cruel whims and I did their bidding.

Until finally I couldn’t take it anymore and I ran.

Running from something that is inescapable to us all.

The relentless, pitiless past.

With its horrors and memories forever haunting our days to come.

Rampaging through the dark. Leaving just a screaming gibbering wreck of a man.

Even after all these years.

And so I am drawn back.

To confront my fears, my past, my broken soul.

A warrior I was and a warrior I will stay to the end.

But, oh my feet tremble as I wait for what is to come.

The babbling of the sweating, glutinous mob is dim and distant.

Too busy gorging themselves on sweet breads and fine wines as they watch everything through their small screens and yet see nothing at all.

The glory of St Marks looms above the scuttling crowds. Just another image to be framed. Not remembered. Not cherished.

I pity them.

The throaty roar of frantic speed boats, like the grumble of forgotten gods, signal the pointless tour of these craven vultures around a dying city as though it were a theme park to be experienced.

I hate them.

And yet, in their ignorance, to see the floating city, my home and my bane, for the first time. What true majesty that must be.

I envy them for that.

If nothing else.

Unaware of the grinning skeletons beneath the green waters they trail their innocent fingers through.

But I see them.

They come towards me now.

Torn curtains of grimy plastic billow pitifully through the rusted bars of this once grand facade as the screaming head of Poseidon spews black filth from the lintel above the damp buckled door.

The blue skies of spring do not penetrate beyond this forced open portal. Its dark maw only a gateway to endless winter.

And here they come.

Do you finally see them?

The shadow ripples apart becoming spectres of night.

With the faces of the lucky dead.

Their green skin puffed and putrid. Eel eaten eye sockets silently glaring their outrage at my jealousy and foolishness.

Brutal killing wounds now washed clean, flap ragged and bloodless across eviscerated stomachs. Tiny crabs and sea worms fall from stringy clumps of moss coated hair. Once grand uniforms hang tattered, dripping green ooze and slime onto the listing stone floor. Squelching boots beat a hollow, sodden tattoo as they shamble towards me. An endless brigade of my old comrades in arms. Come to relieve me of my burden.

I feel their wrinkled hands around my throat. Grabbing my arms and legs. Hoisting me into the air. Their claws mercifully gouge into my skin. Pulling apart this weary body. Flesh ripping. Sinews tearing. Snapping my bones like brittle twigs of an ancient tree. Giving me my eternal rest.

Leave me now. You do not wish to watch my end. It is too brutal. Even for this world.

But wait. I sense something.

A familiar scent. The roar of a far away ocean.

I’m at peace. Finally.

No, that’s not …

Something is wrong. What is it?

Oh God! No, no, no! Not again! Please have mercy!

The smell of salt. The tumult of war. Endless screams.

A sword in my hand. The battle begins again.

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So, there we are. My first story in two months, during which time any ideas I had were dead on the slab as soon as I tried to write. However, inspiration can come from surprising places and, sometimes, the most obvious ones.

Last week, we took our first trip back to Venice for 20 years. It is the strangest, most magnificent city. One where I feel both at home and an outsider. As though I have lived there forever but yet still not welcome. Then, to add to that odd feeling, as our water taxi entered the centre, we passed by the building above and, as a horror writer, I was immediately intrigued. So, the next day I bought this leather bound journal, in a paper shop behind the Grand Canal, and frantically scribbled out this bizarre story with the hotel pencil. A tale of being lost and finally being home. And, yes, even I struggled to read my hand writing!

By the way, the Council of Ten and The House of Spirits did exist. I might tell their story one day. Maybe.

I’m still not sure if any of this makes sense, so my apologies for these ramblings, but I hope you enjoyed this little tale.

Lastly, a word of thanks to Garen Glazier and Feasts and Fables who encouraged me to keep going in my quest to rediscover what I really should be doing here. It was a long journey but I got there in the end. I appreciate the support.

Thanks for reading. Until next time.

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