It's Still Life

The Accent of Exile

Brigid’s Diary: Part 11.2, Avignon, Spring 1836

I crushed a sprig of tansy between my fingers when the fishmonger’s voice split the morning, “Hear her English accent; she stirs rebellion,” and a bitter, cold metal scent spooled in me like warning smoke.

The market thinned into silence so quickly it felt arranged, bread abandoned on scales, lavender dropped mid-count, the air tightening around me as if language itself had weight; a crowd’s interest can rearrange you without touching you.

Felreil stood two steps back and did not speak, but his hand rested where the knife waited, and I understood how swiftly a rumour can turn flesh into evidence.

“I buy herbs,” I said, placing silver between us like a small shield, and above us, Avignon’s stone watched without mercy, the palace walls swallowing their bells, grandeur hollowed to bone.

The apothecary’s wife began the sign of the cross and stopped halfway; a pear struck the ground and no one stooped to claim it, as though the street were testing how easily it might learn to forget my face.

When Felreil murmured, dry as old paper, that spies should at least pretend to be subtle, I did not laugh, for exile is not the leaving of a country but the moment a crowd decides your voice does not belong among theirs.

Previous Instalments – To access all of the instalments on one page, please use this link. For the Liturgy/mindmapping posts click the link. Written for Denise’s Six Sentence Story including the word “interest”.  Some images created with Midjourney; all writing is authentically my own original work.©Misky 2006-2026.

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