The Mystery of The Westbury Faery

The Westbury Faery

I set the trees on fire. Empty carcasses dropped like tears, while the ash in the background separated itself from planes and moved -as clouds- toward a new, ink-stained sky. He has left and is long dead by now of course, but I often wonder whether he still remembers me in his afterlife. I continue to roam the earth alone, here is my story.

I married Philip Ripton on October 17, 1836. The wedding was small yet accommodating, the few that came left merry, and although it was acknowledged we had little financial stability: I was the happiest one could ever be. My dear Philip, he offered me a silver mirror that night- bright love of my heart. It was an heirloom -dusted, polished and engraved- now it was mine. The hand-mirror was delicate in nature and its frame would easily appeal to many women. Yet it casted a cryptic darkness toward me and soon I discovered why.

I began to fall ill the next year. I hadn't picked up the mirror since then. My face was a graveyard, supple ribbons of white twisted and lost amongst shadows. My eyes saddening in progression with the night sky which seemed to be extending over the days. I was habituated to little food but each day brought worse. I was going to die if the conditions did not improve so I picked up the mirror. There was a man on the other side, the reflection was not my own.

I never learnt the man's name, maybe I never asked or maybe he did not have one -I do not quite remember. How mad the concept, to be talking to a reflection, most likely a product of my own illness, born within hallucination and dementia: this is what I thought. But I did not want to leave life yet, I was willing to examine every possible solution, however ludicrous or however dangerous. The mirror let me look into another universe. The man showed me the small and fluttering creatures, free of the chains that held me down. I had a chance to escape, a wish for a life in this new form, a life which would not expire. But it had its own cost.

"A curse will settle." His voice relieved me of the noises inside my head, yet brought its own burdens. "A dark spirit born of the oceans will follow you, past this life and deep into the next. Your wish cannot dispel it." I held the child's lock in my hands. Its bright colour and soft nature cast its animation into me. Like a grandmother playing with children, although she knew of the ageing on her body, she could feel young once more. This lock of hair could make my dream a reality, death in the human form would be my reincarnation.

That night I spoke the wish aloud.

"I wish that happiness may fling her dozen sunbeams round thy path, and hide thee' neath.

Her downy wing, kill life's rough storms away. Have passed."

I remember the hair burning. I remember feeling my heart, letting the mirror drop to the bed, seeing my second life or maybe, my first eternity. Then an unpleasant, intuitive feeling pinched my mind.

I woke up to Phillip bursting through the door. My first thought: when did I lose consciousness? His hands were dyed red. Blood red. I could see the veins in his neck pulsating as if the colour on his fingers was venom. His eyes were crystal balls, although silent, revealed all that had been done that night. I dared not ask him more. He was is a state of sharp upset and confusion, but I agreed when he told me we had to leave Cork.

He passed me a bottle of laudanum poison on the ship. The surfaces were so filthy inside the cabins, one could wonder easily if the boards and posts were held together with anything more than dirt and dust. Canada was far ahead and the journey tiresome. White tips clawed down the ship's hull, bleeding dark blue into the sea. Waves were stallions, aggressive and tall, shaking the ship as if it was a timbrel. I remember seeing something among them, a creature? Then it was gone, lost amongst the deep. I did not think much of this sighting, that is until I realised...