Waiting for his Return

She would stand up there, day after day, looking out over the sea beneath her, stretching out towards the horizon or – on some days – as far as the mists would allow her to see.

She would stand there each day, at the times when the tides would allow boats to enter the harbour, and watch and wait.

He had gone years before. At first, she knew that he would not be coming back. After what had happened we all knew he would never return, except in chains and only then to live a short time until justice was done… probably up there on the same headland she now stood on, waiting for him to return.

We knew he was not coming back. She knew he was not coming back.

One day the grief must have broken something inside her, something must have changed, because from that day on she would make her way up the long twisting path through the trees, past the fallen rocks and the scrubby grass, up onto that bare cliff top where only the gulls gyred and the old broken gallows stood.

There she would stand and watch. There she would stand and wait.

All we knew was that she would wait up there every day until he came back, and then when he did, she would kill him in revenge for what he had done to her when he killed her husband on that night he escaped to the sea.