Fragments

[Sören]

Need-ignited dreams had brought him back to the city, the result of months of curious work in the other place, drifting on docile tides which had seemed to lead nowhere but eventually converged, as ever, at the heart of Moscow. The obsession had a gentle grip, light as the touch of a lover, but insistent. Sören's peripheral life faded to shades of grey when its beckoning sounded strongest, the magnitude of the taunt unbearable. Ever the consummate wanderer, he answered the call.

The girl lay quite still when he stepped out from the shadows, her attackers fled into the maze of alleyways. A few feet away spilled the neon lights and noise of a busy main street, and yet sheltered by the black canopy of roofs above, hidden in shadows pooling inky dark, they might as well have had the privacy of walls. No-one came. One of his hands curled into a fist, raging his senses, while the other replaced a slim Wallet back in his pocket. Five minutes. By which time he did not plan to still be here.

He bent by her body. A bed of snow sucked the warmth from her skin, chilling it blue and freezing the darkness of her hair in a halo round her head. One heel had snapped when she fell, the ankle torn at an unnatural angle. She was not dead; he could hear, barely, the shallowness of her breaths, the sluggish beat of her heart as the wound spilled crimson from the ragged hole in her stomach. Sören placed a hand in the snow, palm flat, spiralling runes that unfurled like petals around them. Then he plucked the necklace round her neck.

With a weak flame of life, she pawed at his hands, fingertips slipping off in her own blood, trying desperately to reclaim the small charm he cradled in his palm. An antique ring, it turned out to be, looped on a cheap silver-plated chain. One yank and it would snap off, but he refrained. "Curious trinket for a whore."
The words were soft, not accusatory so much as thoughtful. Vibrations shuddered against his fingertips, a hum of recognition. He'd been chasing this epiphany for a long time.

His brows drew low as the crunch of footsteps sounded behind. Moments later he felt the perimeter breached. The irritation soured his expression; he'd timed it perfectly, only for chance to frame him as a criminal. Her blood was on his hands, her fingers still clawing at his, the distress palpable in the staring whites of her eyes. He laid the ring down carefully into the tomb of her hands, and turned his head to see who had interrupted.