Lake Rodney Sailor Song

All that moves pivots her ears. Nothing else seems to stir, not a leaf, not the air, but she shivers and nods, a stiff pad towards Machiavelli suited in earth.

It is what he doesn’t say that has her attention, no talk of the abbot nor his death. Against their desert pelts the prickling air burns cold with what they’d left behind, the last vestiges of Machi’s history.

The chill peppers her nose when she looks into his tired face, a long, silent gaze before gently coaxing him towards the span of water where lies the late wintery sun.  Along the banks the coyote dithers in quiet, feeling the tepid pool of water at her paws.

“It plays in my head, too. Not in nightmares, but dreams. Every night I see you kill him.” She does not find the kaleidoscope eyes. There are better words to compensate for his wounding, she knows, but they would not be half as true. Machiavelli had done what he needed to do. There is no disgust in her voice. If they are full of contradictions, let them be so together.

As blood-red orange grows gradually over the sky, Eset slowly submerges into the lake and looks back for the flickering face upon the shore.