The challenge: 190-210 word limit; character: spy; incorporate assigned picture.
In the following flash fiction, I’ve tried my hand at a bit of allegory based on Hosea 2: 16-20:
“And in that day, declares the LORD, you will call me ‘My Husband,’ and no longer will you call me ‘My Baal.’ For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be remembered by name no more. And I will make for them a covenant on that day with the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the creeping things of the ground. And I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land, and I will make you lie down in safety. And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy. I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. And you shall know the LORD.”
The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
(word count: 210)
Every day. For countless years. Before the morning fog had rolled back into the Savannah River, he was there where once he had been cruelly betrayed and left for dead.
The Shining Folk hardly comprehended it. Why leave their glittering courts for Factor’s Walk where the ghosts of old memories and cotton brokers still roamed the cobbled streets? Why trade a throne for a mat? Why hold a paper cup instead of a scepter? Why exchange the love of his subjects for the contempt of the tourists walking down towards River Street?
Until that day. A slight ghostly figure came out of the cold morning mist off the river bluff. Their king looked up. The pale fingers of the apparition reached out to throw back his hood.
Slowly he stood up, grasping its hands. Slowly it materialized before him into solid form.
The Shining Folk gasped. It was the treacherous spy, the king’s own wife who had fed him the poison of the Enemy from the very cup he now held as a beggar.
“Why? Why not leave me to my deathless doom? It’s what I deserve!”
“Never, my dearest!” he said, as together they left the cold mists of Factor’s Walk. “Your kingdom awaits you. As does your king.”
Dreams from a Pilgrimage 