The Life and Deaths of Rachel Long

The Life and Deaths of Rachel Long is a fantasy short story by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. She has written some Star Trek novels, but I know her from her Retrieval Artist science fiction series. I've read a couple of those and thoroughly enjoyed them.

I read this story online at the author's site. This author can certainly write. She has a way with the words so that you don't think about the story, you get involved in it. It begins:

"The fifth time she died, she took the guitar with her. She went down in a haze of smoke and ash, bullets and flames.

And this time, not even the music remained."

It is a chronicle told by a man who was there through it all.

a quote from the story:

"Only love and hope survive, she sang, for in them lies the best of us."

I read this for the Once Upon a Time Challenge Short Story Quest.