A Son's Lament

Twilight came, bringing with it a myriad of brilliant reds, oranges and violets as the sun dipped slowly beyond the horizon. A faint breeze carried with it the sweet scent of springtime and the promise of a calm night.

Farfarello sat alone, perched on the edge of a concrete fountain. It had stood at the center of the city park for as long as any of its residents could remember, and the multi-coloured graffiti and crumbling structure remained a sad testament to the amount of care anybody put into it these days.

Farfarello felt an odd kinship with the decaying relic, a sentiment he shared with no living being, and had taken to visiting often. He would sit for hours as the sunshine gave way to moonlight and the bustling crowds hurried home to the comfort of their families. He sat and he dreamed of the past and the present, and silently contemplated his future.

Sometimes, he merely sat and listened to the screaming in his head.

On this night, the screamers were quiet, and Farfarello's mind was bristling with anticipation. His fingers gripped the stone beneath him until his knuckles turned white and he ground his teeth so hard he fancied he could hear them cracking.

The day prior had been trying. His few treasured acquaintances, each as damaged as himself and twice as dangerous, had caught him in the midst of an attack by a rival group of assassins, brought on by his inability to stay away from that woman. She, who had been little more than a vague silhouette against the backdrop of his life for so many years. She, who was once everything he held most dear.

His mentor. His friend. His mother, Ruth.

As the breeze sang quietly through the treetops, Farfarello bowed his head and prayed.

He no longer believed in any God, nor the possibility of salvation, but he prayed anyway, every once in a while, the same as he did as a child. His lips moved silently as he replayed his atrocities in his mind, feeling the blade penetrating flesh and smelling the blood all over again.

Farfarello prayed for Ruth and, near the end, that he would be allowed to see her just one more time before his own death. She had to know it was never her fault, not really. He was broken from the start.

Content, he lifted his head and opened his singular good eye, startled to find a small, ancient looking woman standing just before him. She was staring at him, the shadow of a smile playing across her face and and playful glimmer in her dull brown eyes.

"Are you lost?" She asked.

"..."

"Perhaps this will help you find your way, young man," she said, extending a hand which held an unusual flower, its petals an airy blue tinged with a deep scarlet.

Farfarello had never seen anything like it before, and before he was even aware of himself he had accepted the flower with the slightest nod of acknowledgement.

"Do you know what that is?" She asked. Not waiting for a reply, the old woman turned her gaze to the moon, her face wistful as she spoke.

"That is called a Caritalil. It is said that many years ago, the earth goddess fell in love with a mortal man. But the god of the moon, who had loved the earth goddess dearly, grew jealous of her human lover, and arranged for him to be murdered by a demon. The goddess was so grieved that she created that flower, blue as her tears and red as his blood, so that all would know of her love."

"..."

The woman shook her head, still smiling softly. "Those whom we care about the deepest are never really gone. Parts of them will always remain behind, so long as there is someone to remember the time they spent on earth."

Farfarello, who had been preoccupied by the peculiar flower until this point, snapped his head up, but the woman was no where to be seen. He stood, revolving slowly in his spot, but the woman was gone.

He looked down to the flower in his fist, contemplating the woman's words and whether she had ever really been there at all. Could it have been only another delusion? But, then, where had the flower come from?

Turning to begin his trek home, he let the flower fall from his grip, the spring air carrying it off somewhere unknown.

Suddenly, he smiled.