Wrought of Iron and Silk, Book One [2014 Watty Award Winner]

Epilogue - The Iron Monarchy

❝Three lives hath one life - Iron, honey, gold. The gold, the honey gone - Left is the hard and cold.❞ - Isaac Rosenberg, August 1914.

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Epilogue – The Iron Monarchy

It was a freezing night in Stuttgart. With only a light breeze, the first of the snowflakes started to settle on the icy streets, drifting through the illumination of the streetlights to the ground below.

Cecilia trudged her way down an unfamiliar street, pushing her cold-bitten hands deep into her pockets after she'd zipped up her black, leather jacket. Where is this place? she thought, irritated. She'd never been there before, yet her feet trudged onwards as if she knew exactly where she was going. The street was completely deserted, and Cecilia realized that she didn't even know what time it was. In fact, she suddenly had a growing feeling that she seemed completely misplaced in the strange city she once called her 'home'. Had she wandered too far off the main thoroughfare in search of her prize?

She stopped and listened for the buzz of the town, the sounds of people, in order to place herself ... there wasn't any. No cars, no music, no voices; there was just eerie silence.

Walking down what looked to be a narrow residential street, Cecilia looked into the windows of townhouses and was once again surprised to see that there were no lights on in any of the homes. The only light was that of the streetlights, and as she passed under the beam of one, she took a moment to look up and see the gently floating snowflakes as they descended from the heavens above down to the isolated, deserted and lonely place where she was standing.

The cold was starting to crawl into her boots and nip at her toes, and she looked around to see if there were any signs of life at all. Way down, almost at the end of the street she now saw it; a single window of light. It was curious that a sole light should shine out in the formidable dark and even stranger, Cecilia thought, of the building that it emanated from. Amongst the Stuttgart flats that lined the street, the small and flat-faced American brick-styled building at the end seemed most odd. With its partly flashing neon sign, she imagined the pub to be a vision more often seen in New York than a residential street in a remote city in Germany.

Digging her hands deep into her pockets, Cecilia allowed her senses to lead her, quickening her pace as she started for the light, but her senses decided that it was time to stray off the beaten path. As she neared the pub, she veered off, walking down a dimly lit sidewalk, feeling an immense uneasiness as she ventured farther from the light. She stopped about ten feet short of a dark alleyway and looked around again before proceeding. She scoured the block for dangers, but quickly realized that she was alone on the street. Her heart raced as she approached the alleyway as quietly as she could, so as not to provoke anyone who might be lurking there.

Upon reaching it, she timidly peered around the corner and scrutinized the long, dark space. All she saw down the empty stretch of alley were trash bins and fire escapes, as well as litter and reflections from small pools of water. Glancing backwards once more and then in the other direction down toward the pub, she looked to see if she was still alone.

She was.

Inhaling deeply and turning up her nose at the stench of garbage, Cecilia drew in courage and walked toward a shadow cast by a fire escape in the middle of the alley. She lightly patted the ground with the soles of her shoes to check for any broken glass, debris, or moving insects and vermin that might be hiding in the darkness. She closed her eyes and held her breath as she squatted down in the corner of darkness and waited.

It wasn't too long before it came.

"Come on, honey," said a voice, startling Cecilia from the numb void she'd sunken into.