The pond wasn’t as the one back at their home. The frogs were quieter, their song replaced by the soft , occasional humming of dragonfly wings, chirping from birds high, high up in the ancient canopy of leaves, the water flowing down over the time worn stones from the ledge above to form a bubbly yet strangely peaceful landing into the otherwise still crystal clear surface. The stones upon the silty bed shone with an ethereal quality, pale and rounded, never cutting into her feet as she stood upon them. She was never told not to venture here. She was never told not to go too close to the trees. She was never told not to stray from the path. She was alone. Many were told these things and wisely paid heed to them.
She was her father and mother, for she had no other, the Witch of Combe they called her. Skarletta did not know her true age, none did, and none would dare ask, but her skin was pale like stretched vellum over candlelight, the veins clearly seen, her hair lacking the vibrancy of youth and adorned with natures bounty of acorns, leaves and whatnot. She did not question Skarletta, a girl now in her thirteenth year, at least not in the way a parent would. No “Where have you been?”s, or “Why haven’t you done that?”s, and more importantly, no “Stop that nonsense!”. She allowed the child to grow like one would a plant that has never seen the pruning shears, a wild child who knew her own way. To the child this was normal, what she saw, was normal, what she felt, experienced, was all normal.
He sat upon the bank of the pond, his long, brown hair flowing straight down his back, a back, arms, neck, chest and likely more, covered in lines of ink, though his worn leather trousers obscured anything else. Swirls that recalled stories of his past seemed to cover every part of his otherwise unimpressive, lanky figure. His nose was sharp, like a beak and it poked out above a straggly mustache and beard which touched his breastbone. His eyes were white, devoid of an iris and pupil, like two pearls had replaced what was once there, and with those, he looked upon the child. He was then known to be the painted man, and was to be known by this name to her present day. A lost soul who went too close to a tree, strayed too far from the path. She did not fear him, he was company in the place where few even dared think of visiting. He saw her but he could not speak. He watched her but he could not touch. When she ate a simple meal of oat cakes and dried apple, his mouth would not water. Yet, every visit to the pond, he would emerge, looking upon her expectantly as if waiting for something to happen. She would recall her day to him, of the taunts from the other children, to seeing perhaps a squirrel or a wolf. Of her mother when she was tiny, of her new mother who would birth the newborn children for those brave enough to ask her or perhaps too scared not to ask her. He would watch, he would listen, he would wait. She would swim, her hair tied high in its ponytail, her rag of a dress upon the bank, and she would splash, play, like any youth, and the water would not trouble him. It would fall beside, beyond and through the painted man without him giving so much as a flinch. To her this was normal, to her there was naught to fear.
Days would turn to years, and the child developed into a young woman. Although her body filled out her dresses, and her child like looks turned to that of beauty, the pond was never changing, it’s waters pristine, the dragonflies hovering, the man always arriving to watch her. It was peaceful, it was familiar, it was what she knew.
