To the ones subscribed to my substack due to my recent meddling with non-fiction. I primerly write fiction. I hope you’ll still give my stories a go.

“What is a rose without its thorns?” Lady Gwendoline pondered arranging the flowers in the fine Bohemian crystal vase. It was a wedding gift, arrived a month prior, on her Wedding Day. The Lady spent her honeymoon in the castle - the world outside her country estate was on the verge of a war, but this was her safe haven. Besides, the roses were in full bloom, and her Ladyship wouldn’t miss it for the world! Her prized roses, her sweet children… Lady Gwendoline took great pleasure in gardening. When the young man from the neighbouring estate came to call, and expressed his admiration of her Ladyship’s roses, she never imagined it would end with their wedding a year after. A handsome man so much younger than her Ladyship? She never believed such luck would come her way.

Of course, Lady Gwendoline wouldn’t wish to part from her beloved because of the silly war. After his heartfelt request she used her connections to help her love avoid it. Shameful business, the war. Boys playing with guns, her Ladyship thought.

There he laid in the silk sheets of their bed. Young, handsome, his red cheeks blooming like roses… it’s a shame really… her Ladyship sighed. She believed his sincere confessions of love, but when he stepped on a frail rosebud fallen from her wedding bouquet and squished it so carelessly, it made her Ladyship suspicious. Oh, if only she had listened to the roses, they told her the boy was no good! The roses warned her all a long!

Lady Gwendoline inhaled - the scent of roses healed her broken heart. There was a sea of flowers in the bedroom, but her Ladyship had many vases sent as wedding gifts.

Roses were more reliable than men. Roses caused her pain only to protect themselves, unlike men. When her Ladyship found out the truth, it stung her heart like a thousand thorns. Her young fiancé had slept with maids every single time he visited. The young man bragged about it and his grand plans of inheriting the Ladyship’s estate after her early death, which he had planned to hasten after the Honeymoon. He laughed with his friends behind her back. But Lady Gwendoline found out. The roses heard. The roses told her. And they never lied. Oh, her Ladyship was in no hurry! She enjoyed her Honeymoon thoroughly. Only then did she drug his wine. When her young husband fell asleep, she tied him to the bed. Death wasn’t good enough for a scoundrel of this kind. The roses whispered in her ears, telling exactly what punishment he deserved.

The heavy, rose-scented air didn’t ease his suffering, quite the contrary.

He moaned in his feverish slumber. Oh, the infection from the thorn pricks was nasty business. Suited him nicely; after all he was a prick… her Ladyship chuckled. She took one of her thorniest children gingerly, wearing her fine leather gardening gloves; the thorns were sharp as needles. She went to her husband, red and sweating, shaking in fever. She smiled and pressed the rose stem to his chest firmly. He moaned when the thorns pierced his skin. The blood oozed from the touch of the rose. So many red infectious prick marks across his nude body! Let’s add some more! Her Ladyship smiled at the roses and the flowers rustled their reply in a softly murmuring chorus death by a thousand thorn pricks will serve him right.