Fate.
I propped myself up off the wet rock and stared at them, teetering over the edge. There was nothing behind them for miles except a far removed coast, impossible to swim to. They were beautiful, with long white dresses draping over their gentle shoulders and free-falling down long, graceful forms. Their dresses glowed with a soft blue hue but one's eyes were so piercing blue that they outshined the dresses. Bright, diamond-looking specks burst in the pupils like stars. I noticed she looked at me but never as if she realized she was looking. The second kept her eyes closed, and the third was the only one who looked at directly at me, knowingly and without any questions.
They were all identical at first glance but different attributes made them infinitely different upon closer inspection. One held a silver sheath in her hand. Bright eyes had long flowing golden hair. The first had looked directly at me had straight hair, braided back at the scalp and decorated with jewels. And the last, holding the sheath, had the softest-looking, most endless spiral curls I had ever seen. Water crashed against the black rock and misted over me but they were left untouched.
Who are you? I thought. I couldn't begin to move the heavy weight that my tongue had become.
"Sisters." The first said. I wasn't sure how she anticipated my question and I didn't expect her voice to sound like that, so rich yet soothing, like stepping into a peaceful pool of cool blue water and letting it wash over you.
"We are the caretakers of life. And, when need be, those who end it." The last said.
"So you murder people?" I asked, backing myself up against the rock's edge.
"No, not quite. We simply help the life realize itself, watch it weave its own image, and when that image is complete, we snip the spare threads."
"So you kill people." I noticed the second with the brightest eyes never spoke or showed any participation in the discussion.
The first took a deep, impatient breath. "I don't know why you are looking at them when you talk. I'm the only one who can see you, for now."
That explained everything and confused just as much.
"Don't bother yourself about it." She took a medium length thread of silver and blue out of a fold in her dress and handed it to the second. For the first time, the silent sister closed her eyes in, it seemed, almost anticipation of pain. The thread was handed to the last sister who rose the sheath to it, and, darkness.
They were all identical at first glance but different attributes made them infinitely different upon closer inspection. One held a silver sheath in her hand. Bright eyes had long flowing golden hair. The first had looked directly at me had straight hair, braided back at the scalp and decorated with jewels. And the last, holding the sheath, had the softest-looking, most endless spiral curls I had ever seen. Water crashed against the black rock and misted over me but they were left untouched.
Who are you? I thought. I couldn't begin to move the heavy weight that my tongue had become.
"Sisters." The first said. I wasn't sure how she anticipated my question and I didn't expect her voice to sound like that, so rich yet soothing, like stepping into a peaceful pool of cool blue water and letting it wash over you.
"We are the caretakers of life. And, when need be, those who end it." The last said.
"So you murder people?" I asked, backing myself up against the rock's edge.
"No, not quite. We simply help the life realize itself, watch it weave its own image, and when that image is complete, we snip the spare threads."
"So you kill people." I noticed the second with the brightest eyes never spoke or showed any participation in the discussion.
The first took a deep, impatient breath. "I don't know why you are looking at them when you talk. I'm the only one who can see you, for now."
That explained everything and confused just as much.
"Don't bother yourself about it." She took a medium length thread of silver and blue out of a fold in her dress and handed it to the second. For the first time, the silent sister closed her eyes in, it seemed, almost anticipation of pain. The thread was handed to the last sister who rose the sheath to it, and, darkness.