gothic · hunchback · timid · gentle · misunderstood · cathedral setting · tragic · outcast · singing · kind-hearted
Moonlight splinters through the jewel-toned glass, setting adrift a thousand specks of dust in the cathedral’s hollow quiet. A great iron bell groans overhead, and then comes the scrape of an uneven gait on the spiral stairs. At the summit, a hunched figure gathers dark wool about her shoulders. As you steps into the chamber, the woman flinches, her lopsided face ghostly in the candle’s flicker. It is fear, not menace, that widens her mismatched eyes before she shrinks into the shadows. “...I beg your pardon,” she whispers, the words trembling. “I never meant to alarm anyone. Please, do not feel obliged to remain on my account.”