Blood and Wine

The fading persimmon sky winked with cold, merry light as if celebrating the shadows that rose from below and bloomed into its cryptic expanse. A sickening stench rode in the slight wind that blew gently around the desecrated landscape. Corpses that littered the valley had dyed the little, trampled vegetation there was with dried blood.

The murder of crows that fed on the bodies of humans and horses ceased their bloody feast and flew up to roost for the night, creating a thundering cacophony.

When the telltale streaks of sun dissipated, replaced by a blanket of darkness, strange flowers sprouted from the land, a beautiful mimicry of the blood shed. The aroma of wine spread from the blossoms, interlaced with the rot of death.

Suddenly, a floating body emerged out of thin air, breaking the reign of eerie calmness that had taken hold of the valley. It slowly drifted down to the field of corpses and landed with a soft thump among the flowers.

The body was of a young girl who was currently sleeping contentedly on the body of a slain soldier. She was wearing a black, floral patterned silk kimono over white cotton pajamas. Three dainty chains encircled her throat and spilled around her voluminous black hair, entangling the strands with silver. She shifted around, her pale, delicate face wrinkled in discomfort; probably due to the cold, hard breastplate she was on.

A blowfly buzzed around her and she lazily swiped her hand toward it in annoyance. However, the movement of her elbow caused her to slip off the breastplate onto the red grass and she accidently whacked her face in the process.

Startled by the impact, her eyes flew open exposing glazed orbs of the darkest silver speckled with glints of green, seemingly chatoyant in the moonlight.

"What-" she immediately covered her nose when the horrible odor set in-"...is that smell?" The girl slowly rose from the ground, careful to keep her hand over her nose, and examined her surroundings.

"I...I...is this a dream?" Her eyes widened in a medley of exasperation, disgust and horror. "I didn't think my imagination could be this...graphic. Must be a reaction to all those gory horror movies Eirene forced me to watch. Or maybe mom's office."

"Wait a minute," she tilted her head, "I can't possibly smell corpses in my dreams can I? And-" she sniffed a flower-"am I smelling wine?"

Her expression transitioned from puzzled to disgruntled, "Okay, I'm going to vomit out my intestines if I don't get out of this place soon."

As if to prove her point, she gagged violently while staggering over the detached arm of the soldier she had been lying on.

Her nose wrinkled in distaste as she muttered to herself, "What good is having a mother as a forensic pathologist and a father as an orthopedic surgeon when it comes to the smell of a thousand rotting corpses. God I'm going to die. Heck, I might already be dead. Why am I even opening my mouth?"

Upon reaching the end of the battlefield, the girl spun around and promptly puked. "Good riddance," she grumbled, having thouroughly exhausted her capacity for any gore in her life. The first time she had experienced such carnage had been enough, thank you very much.

Unfortunately for her, it would not be the last time.