The Swan by Platon Lobach

The last ray of sun shone its last light on the lazy,

empty plain, long forgotten by people and their Gods. The only living things he'd seen out here were half-dead crows, fighting in dust for the ashes of their brothers, and snakes, rattling somewhere among the stones or dry grass. No tracks. No sounds. Even birds ceased their murmurs and hums. Still, breathless desert cried in unbearable heat.

He stood erect in his saddle, overlooking the vast empty plain. He tried to catch something with his eyes. Those eyes... That pretty swan he met in some town a few weeks ago said that his eyes were as green as emeralds. The radiant light of emerald lasts for long, but in this dead prairie nothing lasts long. All the gleam turned to dim gloom. Red from exhaustion and gray from the dust on the road, the vicious eyes were gazing over the dead earth, looking for something. Not a dot on the horizon. Not a silhouette in sight. No movement whatsoever. Nothing. Just a lone horseman on his chestnut stallion. Both covered in dirt. Their former appearance was lost among the savage winds of the wasteland. That creature, he still had something from a man, but if there were someone around, they'd doubt his human origin. Not a man, not an animal. He stood in that saddle for who knows how long. The sun already set. He was looking still. As if he could see in that eternal dark. Finally, he turned around.

- I reckon, the bastard's gone. 

He wasn't relieved; he wasn't satisfied. He felt nothing. This meant nothing to him. His wound was aching like hell. No food. Little water. If coyotes find him tonight, he's done for. He does not think of that. He does not think of death; he does not feel remorse. He is glad to lie in the dirt and look at the sky. He could see her only here. He wasn't running; he was chasing. He was chasing this pale white face in the sky. Those dull emeralds stared at the circle in the night. He remembered her. She was majestic. Not the type of majestic the human could be. Her tender neck and two granderous skies of her eyes were appearing in his fading consciousness. For a split second then he thought that she could save him. He thought that the swan could take him somewhere far-far away from that lonely world he was dying in. He thought she could come, maybe somewhere in the skies, from the stars, from the night. He looked at that white circle, pale as her face at that moment when her life was fading. It was fading through his fingers, clenched in the deadly caresses around that poor swan's neck. And now there was nobody to caress him. Nobody to save him. Only snakes and crows are waiting for their feast.