Undying Devotion

By Ashley Mason

The first cut is always the deepest.

The woman took the knife in hand. The sharpened edge of the short

blade dug into the pine tree with a precise and deft hand, carving its way

through as the delicate peel of softwood fell away. The woman defined

rough shapes into the wood, the curled shavings piling up at her bare

feet like petals in the worship of her creation. A nose, its bridge crooked,

once broken; a brow that carried no woes of the world; sunken sockets

for eyes above subtle cheekbones, and a thin-lipped smile. A smile that

made her swoon, even now as she sculpted their coarse curves shaped

so seductively. His was a face she knew intimately. Marred by the many

knicks of the blade and rough edges, ‘twas far from how he appeared in

her mind's eye. Never was it to leave her thoughts for a moment in all

the days since seen those rugged yet soft features all those years ago.

The woman worked assiduously carving every minutia of his face,

etched forevermore upon this tree as it were in her heart and soul. From

when the dawn did come till the settling smoky dusk of purple hues

beckoning the night’s howl, an obsession drove her hands in her fervent

love. And when she’d finished chiselling the tiniest of details to the finest

of perfection, dressed smooth of any blemish to note, she would start

anew on another part of the tree. A new portrayal of his face to smile

upon her. No pause between. No breath to take, finding peace behind

the bladed kiss.

A lifetime of adoration was carved upon the tree as the weeks bled

into a chilly winter from the fall of autumn suffered. The days continued

uncounted. Only faces to mark the passage of time, and even those the

woman remained unconcerned with counting. One to the next, they

stacked higher and higher till they reached just beneath the tree’s crown

of leaves. She used a rope to climb, looped around the girthy trunk,

leaning back to hold it taut with her bare feet finding purchase in the

pockets of his eyes or the cheekbones of those faces below. Each

countenance sculpted, a nuance of raw emotions and duplicitous

sentiments baring the soul of the man she’d fallen. All those she’d

witnessed and endured in their time spent, from the ugly sneering

contempt to the beatific smile that told only lies like it was the air needed

to sustain him. Though, it was his eyes that bound her tightly. They

gleamed brilliantly, losing herself in those pools of seductive umbra like

a bee to pollen. Trapped by them. A fool for them. Now they were

wooden shaving on the ground, gutted out with the tip of her knife,

treading upon them coolly as she worked.

When the tree bore no more room for the woman’s obsession

upon its surfaces, she climbed back down, cast the rope beside her tent

nearby and admired her magnum opus. The curled shaving of millions of

eyes admiring along with her. She placed her hand upon the tree of

faces, upon the charming smile she’d first seen by this very spot and

whispered into those hollowed eyes, vacant as they’d always truly been-

‘For each face upon this tree carved in your divine likeness, may

you feel my devotion a hundredfold. All for you.’

Sealed with one final kiss.

Dreary with the weather, the sky clouded and grey. A burst of light

suddenly flashed overhead, followed by a quiet rumble from afar. The air

electric, feeling the energy upon her naked flesh. The woman retrieved

an axe from within her tent, sharpened to a keen edge from her sullen

nights by the fire’s light, and took to the tree with a furious might.

The hefty blade bit into the soft pine- the first cut is always the

worst. Barely a whisper on the wind, she could feel his sudden howl in

pain rising far from below in town. Tingles like gänsehaut upon her skin.

She revelled in the sensation as white-hot scorn pulsed through her

hands, and a heart of rage pumped violently, demanding restitution.

One after another, the axe bore down, biting deeper and deeper

into the tree in a maddening cadence of her beating heart. The muffled

cries of anguish broke out into the streets in a tumultuous clamour of

suffering for the whole town to hear. Confused and panicked murmurs

beneath his wails as townsfolks come to witness the horrific impact of all

her unwelcomed conflicts and emotions that torment her so.

All those to have known- all those to have looked away.

The woman’s chest heaved as she sucked in air through gritted

teeth, and she muttered a few words, each punctuated by the bite of the

axe lodging into the trunk, hacking out a wedge shape for it to falter.

‘A! Thousand! Deaths! Never! Enough!’

Finishing off one side, she snarled. ‘And a thousand more would

not be still my maddening heart.’ The shrill cries from town quietened for

the few steps she took to the other side before delivering her wrath

anew, hacking and spitting chunks of wood with each bite. The axe and

woman, both unsatisfied.

For all their perfection, each face meticulously detailed as only she

knew, scared into the memories she could never forget, and the pain

intensified to unspeakable torment with each bite of the axe, searing

upon his vile and ashen heart in her enduring and undying devotion. The

multitude of faces remained unscathed. Silent and unseeing. Apathetic

to the screams that continued undiminished from the hell of their owner’s

own making. A din of garbled words erupted from the man,

unrecognisable through the agony and distance so far. She imagined

them no less like he were here now, clawing his way to her feet across

the ground covered in his carved-out eyes, begging and pleading

through hollow tears. Theatre of a victim, helpless and confused about

what was happening. Why? He would cry. W-why? 

What did it matter to why? No time to atone for these misdeeds

and wicked atrocities cast upon another, cast upon her. No place to run,

none nearly far enough to escape retribution demanded of the heart and

soul aching. How she wished he were to suffer such fate for all eternity-

the retching and tear of his soul asunder. But that was too high a price,

one she wasn’t willing to pay. And as the final bite came, the tree

groaned before it teetered and cracked and then fell.

In the wake of the tree’s deafening crash, the cloud of dirt and leaves

coming to settle, a mournful hush returned. The screams had

ceased—her screams. The axe slipped from her weary and shaky grip

as she collapsed to her knees as though to pray. Through the tears that

ran down her cheeks, she smiled in the serenity of silence.

By Ashley Mason