Ambrose Fiction

By The Lamplight

Oftentimes, the fields of the dead are consigned to small parcels of land, lest the spread of decay infect the land of the living. However, deep in the sprawling hills of Appalachia, lay a vast cemetery, speckled with headstones, stone walls crumbling next to steadfast gates, and opulent mausoleums. Now, this initial description might seem crowded, but the matter of its enormous property meant, despite how populated by the departed the place may be, no one is wanting for space. In fact, some might say the gorgeous cemetery, so solemn and sweet, might actually be rather lonely. At least, that’s what Ewan said.

The young mothfae lad was left to tend to the graveyard a rather long time ago, long enough for his mind to wander far from the who, the when, or the why of being in the eternal grove. Well, not eternal, and technically that wasn’t the correct term to describe distance, but Ewan liked how “eternal grove” sounded, so he kept it. No, the grove in question was in fact finite, though not to say it wasn’t comically massive. See, the hills and valleys, forests and plains that made up this cemetery biome were surrounded by impassable mountains, ones whose peaks stood shear and past the clouds. While wildlife still found its way to sneak into the cracks of this isolated range, the graveyard stood otherwise alone, which meant Ewan did as well. 

Though, despite the crippling loneliness of not a single person to communicate with on any higher level of understanding than the mutual fascination he shared with passing fawns, Ewan found himself rather content amongst the graves and gardens that surrounded him. In fact, on a brisk night in Spring, one where the moon rose perhaps a few minutes sooner than normal, he might call himself content. It was on one of these brisk nights of Spring, in fact, that Ewan experienced quite a shift in his isolated life. 

Now, if you were one of the aforementioned fawns to have stumbled upon a creature such as Ewan, you would find yourself equally fascinated by the strange woodland beast that lay before you. Imagine a cool drink of spring water in a small, isolated clearing in an otherwise rather busy forest, one where the sunlight comes in beams through the leaves, so fine that you could trace them to the star that made them. It feels warm, not the wet, heavy warm you feel when sweat beads at your temples, the air thick with insect swarms, but a dry warm, one welcome to the morning dew on the grass. Your mind empty, as one would expect a fawn’s head to be, you would find yourself jumping at a rustling in the bushes along the tree line, staring intently for danger.

However, what you would see stepping through the clearing would be possibly one of the least dangerous beings in the land. Before you would be a young, bipedal lad, judging off of human standards one would guess at most 16, with the only deviation from the standards being the pitch-black eyes, the two, thin antennae sprouting from his curly bird’s nest of light chestnut hair, and the massive, furry, opulently spotted moth wings that grew from his back. He would’ve made very little commotion coming through the bushes, and you would share a long, paralyzed gaze with the peculiar creature, before bounding off to whatever it is you would do as a fawn in the woods.

In the traditional fantasy, one would expect the fae to go about their business in the nude, being truly connected to nature and all that. However, as Ewan caught onto rather quickly, the fae referenced in literature must’ve not been native to the hollers of Appalachia. As such, Ewan wore a very casual set of black, homemade coveralls, a white button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and a tweed-plaid flat cap. He enjoyed making clothing, not only because it was something to do other than his endless list of tasks, and that he could add his own wing holes out the back of his own shirt, but his previous method of clothing acquirement involved much more tomb robbing and washing away the smell of the deceased than he cared for.

The night shrouded the cobbled path that led Ewan up the side of a hill, overlooking another gated yard.  He was in no rush, as his idle upkeep of the valley held no hard deadlines, only an endless checklist of overdue tasks. He had just finished cleaning a valley’s worth of hedge stones, all apparently sharing a family name. Perhaps some royalty lay beneath. It had taken nearly six weeks of tedious raking, scrubbing, and weeding to make the paths clear, the headstones clean, and the stonework safe from further erosion. It always gave Ewan the slightest sense of pride in seeing the damages done by simple, budding roots from dandelions, although their razing of the artificial made his job all the harder.

 In fact, after the entire six weeks of raking, scrubbing, and weeding, along with the two and a half weeks spent placing flowers he grew on graves, planting eternal candles along walls, and trimming the general hedge work that went along with the typical graveyard, Ewan was ready for something new, perhaps less tedious.  Ewan was on his way to chop down an old oak tree, apparently on a hill where a new mausoleum was to be built. Of course, the mausoleum would be done by him, although who would occupy it was never information Ewan was endowed with. It may have made his job more satisfying to have known the people he would be tending to in their eternal rest, just to give him more connection to the fields of stones and crypts.  

So, as he hiked up the hill, his lumber ax resting on his left shoulder, Ewan couldn’t help but feel a sense of excitement for his new task. It’s been a while since he was given the opportunity to chop some wood, although woodwork did happen almost daily, with fence repairs and whatnot. It was never a malicious thing, chopping trees. In Ewan’s mind, forests stood as a wonderful monument to nature’s perseverance, the comforting cycle of growth and decay. Nothing was ever useless, nor was anything meant to stay the same way forever. For most things, at least. Ewan figured he must’ve done something to warrant his exception from the circle of life, for he could never see his position as one of luxury. Eternity kept getting heavier as it dragged on, and, for some cruel reason, time seemed rather resistant to dilation, days and nights never feeling any shorter.

So, any opportunity to engage in the cycle of wood was one that Ewan was more than happy to exploit. Mainly for the simple satisfaction of using the tools he had spent endless weeks on, such as his prized ax. Its handle was built out of the hardest flamed beech he could find, from the beech trees that grew near where he tinkered. The head was made from the same steel slag that made up his first ax, the one he could only barely remember breaking on his first chopping block. The time he spent working to perfect his craftsmanship felt like the only time that was truly his.

Continuous fascination with his own handiwork kept Ewan occupied on long hikes, along with the natural beauty that accompanied this massive cemetery purgatory in the smoky Gaelic mountains. He often found himself in utter paralysis at the sheer resplendence of his surroundings, walking in a trance as he stared up at the peaks that elude him. As such, the incline change resulted in a small stumble from Ewan to regain footing, almost falling under the weight of his pack. He barely kept himself afloat, thanks in no small part to a combination of a flutter of underutilized wings, and a lean on his precious ax. Mud was bound to get on a tool of foraging, but that didn’t keep Ewan from wiping almost incessantly at the muck that built up on the carved pommel. After scrubbing to satisfaction, Ewan finally looked up, to see the awe-inspiring oak that lay before him.

The lack of light in the night turned the tree into merely a silhouette, yet, despite the featureless presentation, it showcased grandeur. The tree that crowned the hill was a true bastion of timber, its limbs stretching outwards, shrouding the hill in shadows. It felt as if the tree was almost resting upon itself, the branches hanging lazily in a parasol of foliage. It was truly an ancient tree, one that demanded respect by its sheer being. 

It was at this moment, as Ewan arrived at the top of the hill, that a not-so-light fog began to roll into the valley. Well, “roll” is a rather tame way to describe the event, as any squirrel or goat roaming the trees or hilltops respectively would tell you that the valley was practically flooded with fog, as if some invisible hand had poured a pitcher of cloud into the bowl of the valley. In mere minutes, the fog was thick enough to shroud Ewan and the hilltop tree from the rest of the valley, and to fill said hill with a not-so-heavy haze of mist.

Ewan’s admiration for such a goliath of nature had distracted him from his surroundings, which he began to slowly register as his attention returned. The tree was indeed the true crown to this hill, which, in this metaphor, would make the low stone wall surrounding the tree a sort of wreath that goes along. Ewan wasn’t quite sure if one wore a wreath with a crown, although the various flower crowns he had made idly over the eons seemed to bridge the two concepts entirely, so he figured he wouldn’t dwell. He often found himself led astray by passing thoughts in his head, and so, in no small part thanks to the quick-set fog, he missed certain details, such as the old oil Victorian lantern that stood atop the low stone wall. 

The lantern that Ewan had not seen was a beautiful piece to behold, one nearly as old as the great tree that it lay beneath. The ironwork was exquisite, as thin pieces of iron criss-crossed across the glass in a checkered pattern. The handle was of a lovely wood, one Ewan himself may find on his very ax, carved and polished to perfection. The columned base, the mystic cap, and all of its spectral beauty was almost completely missed by Ewan, had his massive moth wings been small enough to fit through the gate, and hadn’t knocked the lantern off the wall with their sliding across.

Having had his wings roll over walls, push past trees, and fold through thresholds, Ewan was rather used to the feeling, one that any wingless person would attribute to brushing a shoulder past a corner. However, the lantern was unlucky enough to fall upon a rock, making a clanking sound that sent Ewan jumping back. Noises that weren’t soft or made by him rightfully concerned Ewan, with his wide, pitch-black eyes staring in attention at the place of origin. The mothfae tilted his head inquisitively as he approached the source of the sound, growing more exaggerated as he grew closer. Upon seeing the first glimpses of black steel, Ewan hurriedly crouched down to investigate further, finding his confusion evolving into excitement at the prospect of a new trinket that he didn’t make, something of a rarity at this point in his purgatory.

And there, amongst the overgrown grass, all crowded with weeds, was the beautiful Victorian lantern, with all the antique majesty that Ewan had missed on his initial approach. Yet, the shadows of night hid most of the grandeur, something Ewan figured his newfound bauble could help with. Sure enough, upon picking it up, he felt the weight and slosh of oil inside; it could light! Feeling at the base of the low wall, he grabbed at stones until he felt the smooth edge of flint. On bended knee, Ewan positioned the lantern in place, opening the small port on the bottom and held his ax choked to the head, with the flint resting in his right hand. A simple strike was all it took for sparks to float into the lantern, and a mystical blaze roared to life. The fire that glowed through the glass, out the port, practically engulfing the entire lantern itself, was a spectral pale blue, one whose light softly touched the world with none of the rage its’ host contained. Ewan, at first worried by the severity of the fire, soon found himself entranced by his discovery.

Bringing himself to his feet, Ewan picked the lantern up for closer inspection, closing the filler cap over the escaping fire. Any ego he may have developed from his endless quest to perfect his tools instantly evaporated at the sheer magnificence of the lantern, the new cerulean flames exposing the elaborate metalwork that captured it in stunning details. Ewan felt as if he were holding moonlight, as the light illuminated the fog around him in a sea of ghostly blue. The unnatural shade of fire that the lantern produced only created more questions as to the properties of the oil, which made even more questions about where it even came from, a rabbit hole that threatened to swallow Ewan into an abyss of speculation. 

So, after his initial phase of engorging himself in the details of both the lantern and the wall it illuminated, Ewan resolved himself to the task at hand: the tree had to be cut down. However, as he turned his attention to the silhouette, he was astonished at how gorgeous it was in the light of the lantern. The tree, the damn wonderful tree, spread panoramic autumn colors across the sky, to the point where Ewan was half convinced the sunset had come once more. The orange, amber, maroon and gold created a peculiar night sky to accompany the ruby red baubled fruits that he could only describe as stars. The pale blue light somehow burrowed into every crevice, making every detail, from the grain of the bark to the veins in the leaves, all crystal clear to Ewan.

Once again, he fought to return his mind and body to his job. As much as he wished he could stare at the sunset tree forever, the list kept growing longer. Literally, as the mornings passed, the parchment and ink of the list seemed to grow, a vine of tasks and demands that did not end. If he ever was to be rid of it, then getting hung up on a job as simple as this was something that he could not afford to do. 

So, as he neared the base of the grand oak, Ewan laid down the lantern, letting it settle amongst the dew-ridden grass. The light settled against the roots as Ewan hefted his ax off his back. The technique never left his mind, as he steadied his shoulders to his knees. The ax carried most of the swing, as long as he did it right. Bouncing the ax always made his bones quake, an agonizing experience whose threat of return kept his follow-through consistent.

As he lined up for his first swing, Ewan couldn’t help but pause once more, in admiration for the piece of natural art he was to cut down. Now, it would be childish to consider this an act of cruelty, but it still would be a shame to lose such a picturesque spot. He shrugged, as not much could be done. Yet, as he lifted the ax next to his head, opposite of the shoulder it crossed, he heard a faint weeping. 

As one would expect in an isolated valley of stone and the deceased, Weeping was uncanny for such a place. Yet, as Ewan frantically glanced over shoulder and shoulder, losing his form for his impending swing, the sound of sorrow only continued to swell. He didn’t feel scared, yet he still held a surprised expression in his eyes, simply out of shock. He began to shrivel, only slightly, enough to hold the ax in a more defensive posture than imposing, with wings tucked into each other against the soft, white cotton shirt. He listened intently, attempting to locate the source of the sobs.

Concluding the sound came from behind the stone wall, on the opposite side of the tree, Ewan decided to reposition himself in a more confident pose, with the newly found lantern being held defiantly against the unknown dangers. Whatever demonic threat may produce such a sirenic cry, he was not going to let it falter his task!

Ewan began to shuffle, the most respectful way to put it, around the tree, letting the lantern shift shadows into threatening beasts. The weeping only grew in sound as he felt himself falling into the adrenaline of revelation, dropping his posture and shuffling ever so faster. As he rounded the corner, and the weeping tapered into a breath, he saw, in a trick of his eyes, the pale blue shadows cast from the lantern bend and twist against fog, long tails of wisp following masses of light and mist as they danced and wrapped around one another, amassing into a swirling cloud of blue ether. Ewan watched in both horror and amazement, as the azure fireflies began to outline a form, a rather humanistic form. His stomach dropped as Ewan saw two dots of light dance into the head of the shadow, facing out against the valley, as the form seemed to breathe in the mist around them, and let out an even heavier sob than before, heaving in the chest as their head fell to their chest, knees buckling to the floor.

In the shock of the sentient, terrifying mist, Ewan dropped his newly found lantern, letting the moonlight drop with it. As the gaslight rolled behind him, his sight of the blue wraith went with it. He stood there, in a still pause, much like a deer seen by something foreign, cautiously safe from the mystic form that stood against the roots prior. He considered leaving it like that, not unlike a child holding a blanket over their head against an intruder. The sobbing did not stop, yet somehow formless sobbing was easier to manage than the sight and sound of someone sobbing. Against his better judgment, Ewan shifted his stance to let the moonlight pass through, only to reveal, clear as glass, the form of a scared child.

This caught Ewan by even further surprise than any type of eldritch horror he could have encountered. The light-formed creature wore a beautiful gingham gown, a billowing white cotton sheet underneath a blue-checkered dress, with soft linens tucked under their feet. Pink zinnias were stitched along the skirt, spiraling down towards her ankles. The grass they sat atop was somewhat visible through their translucent form, while still clearly being bent by their presence. Their hair was long and hung around their head like a veil to cover their face. Their back heaved with their sobs, their breath gasping and sputtering over their crying. They hadn’t seen Ewan approach, appropriate for one in the throes of sorrow, but he needed to get their attention, as it didn’t take an expert in social cues to know that chopping the tree that someone else is resting under is plain disrespectful. Had this enigmatic child not been there, Ewan still would’ve taken a minute or two to check the tree for hapless bird nests or vermin burrows. 

Without loosening his posture whatsoever, Ewan took a strained step forward, and inquired a simple, “Pardon, miss?”

The ghostly figure, which Ewan assumed to be a little girl based off of the hair and attire, was, unsurprisingly, just as confused and caught off guard as he was when he first discovered her. However, unlike Ewan, who had the time to process the new entity in his world, along with the concept of a conscious being made from light and condensed, gaseous water, the girl obviously did not. As such, the spectral form rippled as she screamed in fright, flinching at the unknown threat, tapering her howl into a sobbing, “I’m sorry!”

Ewan was shocked. “Miss, it’s ok,” he consoled her, “there’s no harm done. I just need to chop down that tree right there, I don’t believe you meant anything by being here.” He smiled, in a way that he hoped would offset the initial unease. The girl loosened her tense, fetal position as she looked up at the mothfae, her expression changing from dejection to disgust.

“Chop it down? Why would ma and paw want my tree chopped down? I didn’t even know they knew of it, being so far from the valley and all. How’d they even find me all the way out here?” 

Ewan found himself in depths of confusion he was unable to keep up with, as the spectral girl looked up at him in an increasingly demanding manner. His eyebrows furrowed as he glanced over his shoulders, as if, out of nowhere, the ghastly forms of her supposed mother and father would appear on cue. He looked back down at the girl, unsure of how to respond.

“I think there’s been a mistake. I wasn’t sent by your parents; certainly don’t know what valley you referrin’ to. I was sent here by…” He paused, caught in his own question. Who sent him here? He pushed the question from his mind, reaching into his front chest pocket for an easy solution, continuing, “-my list, to clear out this old oak, for, erm, maintenance purposes,” he said hesitantly, still unsure of his own job’s purpose. 

“Well, I don’t care who you work for, you’re not cuttin’ down my tree!” the girl exclaimed, rising to her feet. As one would expect from the skittish mothfae, when confronted with the options of fight or flight, Ewan’s go-to was flight. As such, his initial reaction was to turn tail and get off the hilltop before the spectral child revealed some undisclosed soul-retching ability in a practical demonstration. However, the list that Ewan held in his hand was not unlike a commandment from God, one that elicits resolve, but also fear. The prospect of abandoning his duties to his list was inconceivable, never attempted, possibly a death sentence. Again, Ewan did not know his master, yet understood the fundamental unforgiveness of nature, and assumed whoever or whatever created the list, created this valley, created Ewan and his purgatory, was equally as unforgiving as nature.

Therefore, when confronted with a rock and a hard place, or, in this case, the threat of possible, unspeakable pain at the hands of a terrifying banshee and the threat of possible, unspeakable pain at the hands of his creator, Ewan chose to panic. This panic was not expressed through fleeing, but by freezing, almost playing dead standing up, staring vacantly ahead. The phantom girl looked more confused than angry at the reaction, and, after a few more tense moments of silence, instead of sucking the life out of him with some arbitrary death power, she decided to return to her rest, considering the odd creature that stood on her hill like any other passing animal, and ignoring him. 

As she made her way to sit beside the tree, the light from the lantern was once more cut off by Ewan’s frozen body, concealing the specter once more. This time, however, as Ewan shifted out of the way of the light, allowing the girl to take form once more, she appeared huddled on the ground, shielding her face from the light while silently sobbing. Ewan felt awful, and hurriedly picked up and shuttered the lantern, once more breaking their visual link. He knew better than to pry at such a time and decided to walk back towards the entrance of the stone wall.

Once more on the other side of the tree, Ewan took a moment to consider his newly found conundrum, externally pondering the cloudy expanse, letting the blue light of the lantern shine outwards into the night. The fog absorbed the rays of spectral blue, making anything past five meters invisible. He wished he could see out, past the rolling hills once more, as, internally, his panic continued to overtake him, and the sight of the great expanse often helped calm Ewan in his more frantic moments. His decision was met with absolute uncertainty, consequences completely unconsidered and rather unpredictable. Well, the certainty of either the tree being chopped down or the tree remaining were rather predictable, but it was the consequences that were later on, the third, fourth and fifth domino to fall, that worried Ewan. 

What was to say that this ghastly figure, whatever it was that sat on the opposite side of the tree, was real? Figments of imagination were not uncommon for a creature such as Ewan, especially given the nature of living around the dead, paranoia was something that constantly loomed over Ewan. Despite how comfortable he was, performing his endless duties to the list, he constantly battled the bigger, important questions that kept him up at night. It was something he couldn’t live with, endlessly running around in mental circles, hypothesizing and theorizing about his origins, the valley’s origins, the list, the endless death that surrounds him yet never takes him…

Ewan did not want to die. He understood that. The thought of not being himself anymore, at least himself in the way he could perceive himself, a flesh-and-bone-and-wing-and-antennae being, one who could breathe, and eat, and sleep, terrified him. He figured he was terrified of a lot of things, but they all rooted to that simple fear: not being himself. He couldn’t comprehend it, and it tore him apart.

However, as the days turned to weeks, turned to years, turned to centuries, Ewan began to consider the reality of his supposed immortality not as a relief from the threat of death, but the extent of its hold on him. The thought that he was going to be in the valley forever, cleaning the graves and digging the holes and building whatever useless trinkets he wanted, did not bring him the satisfaction of safety from death, nor did he particularly find his job fulfilling. It was his job. It was that, or what he assumed was death. Why was everything else around him, animals, plants, the people beneath the dirt, permitted the eternal reward, while he was denied it?

It was for these extensive reasons that Ewan found his life easier to live by suppressing such thoughts of existential dread, and instead focusing on such trivial things as his tools and his job. It brought him comfort. However, all that night, long after Ewan had snuffed the flame from the lantern, worried at how much oil he had already used from its’ rather small stockpile, he was kept awake by those returning thoughts of eternal rewards, purgatory, and the inevitability of his stupid list. Lying beneath the tree, nestled between a couple protruding roots, with his pack at his side, Ewan sat and pondered all that troubled him, and didn’t stop pondering until the first rays of sunlight began to shine through the leaves of the tree.

Now, despite all the swirling uncertainties that swam around his head, nothing could distract Ewan from one of the most wonderful times of the day: breakfast. Now, do mothfae need to eat food to survive? Yes, of course. Why wouldn’t they? Do they need to eat food every day and night cycle, multiple times a day? Far from it! Fae have a notably slow metabolism, which is why the simpler of the group finds themselves sustaining themselves off of berries and honeysuckle. However, Ewan was not the most simple of fae, and, in his defense, his career as the sole gravedigger, tender and groundsman was rather rigorous, so he enjoyed treating himself to a nice meal once or twice a day, his favorite of which being breakfast. 

As the sun began to rise and the hues of pink and purple in the clouds faded to a soft, orange glow, Ewan began to rummage through his pack of supplies, pulling out a cast iron skillet, a few cloth-wrapped packages, a jar of salt, and the hunk of flint he found the day before. By the time the seemingly eternal fog shifted to a warm gold in color, he had started a small fire a safe distance away from the tree, weary as to the ghost girl’s reaction to any misplaced embers, as he happily cooked cuts of pig belly in his skillet, using the leftover grease to make his freshly plucked mushroom caps he found along the stone wall all the more delicious, getting a nice sear on each side. Along with a nice slice of homemade bread, also toasted in the fat, Ewan had made himself a hearty breakfast, which he plated on a rather flat slab of rock, also from the wall.

However, as he sat down to enjoy his expertly-prepared campfire breakfast, nestled once more in the notch of roots that he began to grow rather fond of, he heard the shifting of leaves behind him. He froze, wondering if the ghost girl had spent the night equally unable to sleep, or if she was sleeping still. Either way, he began to wonder if he should’ve been making a more active effort to talk to her. After all, if he could get her to consider other hills, other trees to rest beneath, or even find out where she came from, he could do his job without making a terrifying enemy.

As he began to think through all the possible ways he could start a conversation with a semi-corporeal being, he failed to notice the cracks in the leaves getting closer, until, just above his head…

“What’d ya make?”, the girl inquired, startling Ewan and causing him to jump, letting a mushroom cap roll off his plate in surprise. He looked up in shock, expecting to see the girl, yet being greeted with nothing. Of course! He’d forgotten to light the lantern! Yet, at this point, it was a pain to set down his food to get up and light the lantern, so he decided to stay put, retrieving his fallen mushroom and cleaning it on his overall as he took a bite, explaining in the assumed direction of the girl, “pork belly, toast and mushrooms.” It was surprisingly easy to communicate with someone he couldn’t see.

“‘Smells delicious,” the girl said, her voice still hovering above Ewan. “My friend’s ma used to make the most wonderful biscuit rolls, we used to eat them with honey on her front porch. It was nice.” Ewan shifted his gaze down at his meal, unsure of how to respond to the sudden leap in trust and comfortability between the two. He grabbed a piece of pork belly and raised it into the air, away from the voice so as to not accidentally stick food in her face. “Would you like some?” he asked.

There was a small pause before the grass and leaves shuffled some more, and the girl’s voice spoke once more, now on level with Ewan, “thank you, but I can’t eat. Makes sense I suppose, but…no.”

And there they sat.