Neesha climbed over the Forbidden Wall, as she fled from the bloodthirsty crowd, confirming once and for all, their charges of heresy. She had escaped the sentence of being stoned to death, since no one would dare to follow her across the Forbidden Wall, but she had in turn sentenced herself to banishment in the Land of Madness.
It was a harsh sentence for a single slip of the tongue but one could not invoke their own lowly Goddess in the Temple of the Bright Ones without suffering greatly for the offense.
Turning to look upon her home for the last time, Neesha saw only the empty temple surrounded by broken streets reaching out like a web, into an ocean of sand. The city's other buildings had all vanished entirely and the Forbidden Wall, itself, lay broken and half buried. Not one tree was within her sight, nor plant or animal either. The land had just died away in a single heartbeat's passing.
Neesha closed her eyes and ran as fast as she could away from this mirage of the madness. All day and all night, she ran. She kept her eyes closed against the blowing sand but more so against seeing any more mirages of the madness. Running ever faster, as the Father Sun rose on the second day of her flight , Neesha pursued her death rather than wait for it to find her. She dared not stop to sleep, even briefly, fearing that the madness would invade her dreams.
However, as the father Sun sank below the horizon, she could run no longer. She fell to the ground in a great tangled mass of gaudily colored veils. She drew the sacred symbol of the Goddess of harlots in the sand , then fell asleep beside the charm, hoping her deity had not deserted her along with her wits.
Neesha slept fitfully and only for a few short hours. She awoke to find the madness had returned. An unearthly glow clung to the horizon. She couldn't bring herself to look away from the mesmerizing mirage until a terrific glistening bird swooped down towards her from the stars. Neesha ran from the demon as fast as her weary body could carry her but the wind from its motionless wings threw her to the ground. Its roaring song deafened her and its strange smoky musk stung her nostrils.
Cursing the madness silently, as thirst had long ago stolen her voice, she fainted from fear and exhaustion. She lay unconscious on the beach of a beautiful pool her Madness had conjured up for her out of the cruel desert sand.
Neesha's death took her as she slept, dreaming of the supernatural bird that had chased her through the Land of Madness, a merciful way to die of thirst. The Gods could have been more merciful if they had only allowed her to wake and find that the pool wasn't a mirage of any madness but an oasis on the edge of Cairo's airport. Or perhaps, letting Neesha escape the Land of Madness she had fled to into in her desperation, was after all, the most merciful way to die.
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A link to 'A Real Witch' story by Mrs. Strivelli
