Sharp lips curved in an answering smile, lopsided but sincere, without the savage gleam of teeth for the first time in what felt like an eternity. Tragedy made fortunate fools out of those that lived; if they weren’t smiling and laughing, they’d be crying, and crying never solved nothing. Erron considered the old, battered photograph in his hand in the comfortable silence between them. He reckoned it would eventually crumble to dust after a point with how often he returned to it, the memories contained within, some fond and many others not. A young, arrogant man leaned against a beautifully ornate stagecoach, his long sprawling legs casually crossed at the ankle, cradling a rifle to his chest with all the fondness normally reserved for women and children.
From inside the coach crept the pale, delicate arm of a bejeweled lady whose fingers lighted upon the young man’s shoulder peculiarly talonlike for all their elegance. The cherubic face which peeked out left little to the imagination. A face out of time and place in the new world, through which the old world yet seemed to speak, remind them of all of that wickedness they’d left behind. Erron couldn’t read the flowery, foreign script of her name written on the back of it, but emblazoned along the broadside of the coach in large block lettering was, simply, “Marshall.”
Of the two, his recognition faltered to only passing familiarity of the young man who stared out at him from both the photo and his own reflection, but the woman…
Szkarłat Marszałek. Skarlet Marshall.
Erron leaned into the kiss with relish, eager for the distraction from memories best let alone, left to dust where they belonged. “Closest thing I reckon folk like us come anyhow,” he huffed a self-effacing chuckle right along with Arthur. “Ain’t gonna be no chorus of angels and trumpets heraldin’ my arrival, that’s fer damn sure. Figure I already done my one good deed besides in sparin’ the world the sorta thing to come of a bobcat like her and a monster like me. It’s all fire over yonder and damnation in the holler from here on out, really.”
"hahahaha we're all going to hell," casually chortled every outlaw in the history of ever.
From inside the coach crept the pale, delicate arm of a bejeweled lady whose fingers lighted upon the young man’s shoulder peculiarly talonlike for all their elegance. The cherubic face which peeked out left little to the imagination. A face out of time and place in the new world, through which the old world yet seemed to speak, remind them of all of that wickedness they’d left behind. Erron couldn’t read the flowery, foreign script of her name written on the back of it, but emblazoned along the broadside of the coach in large block lettering was, simply, “Marshall.”
Of the two, his recognition faltered to only passing familiarity of the young man who stared out at him from both the photo and his own reflection, but the woman…
Szkarłat Marszałek. Skarlet Marshall.
Erron leaned into the kiss with relish, eager for the distraction from memories best let alone, left to dust where they belonged. “Closest thing I reckon folk like us come anyhow,” he huffed a self-effacing chuckle right along with Arthur. “Ain’t gonna be no chorus of angels and trumpets heraldin’ my arrival, that’s fer damn sure. Figure I already done my one good deed besides in sparin’ the world the sorta thing to come of a bobcat like her and a monster like me. It’s all fire over yonder and damnation in the holler from here on out, really.”