She ground her teeth together again, her eyes staring daggers at anything and everything. The time had come; she could delay no further. But still. Thoughts waged war in her mind as she weighed the few options available. None were satisfactory.
The feast continued all around her. Soldiers out of uniform, drinking wine that was not theirs, eating stolen scraps of meat on borrowed plates. None fit to serve, let alone rule. But try telling them that.
Read MoreSunrays struggled ineffectually to journey over the horizon and through prevailing grey clouds. It had been a dark night and promised to be an even darker day. Gerlach shifted in his saddle. His joints were made stiff by the long journey. As much as he hated to admit the reality, his age was beginning to make itself known in more visible ways each day. Retirement would approach one day, sooner than later. Gerlach rolled his shoulders, one after the other. For this battle, he would be spry and quick to react. For this battle, he would be in his prime once more. If everything went well, this could be the last battle Rheicona would ever see.
Read More“What do we got?” Callum ducked his head to fit through the doorway to the small office. The floors were carpeted. Green walls. Bookshelves took up the entire eastern wall.
“You of all people should recognize a corpse,” the dark-haired man jested from the corner of the room. He lined up his shot, and the camera clicked. His target: the victim. In the center of the room sat a red cushioned chair facing a heavy wooden desk. A woman sat motionless in the chair, back to Callum. From where he stood, she look perfectly fine, still among the living apart from the lack of motion.
Read MoreHe had done it!
Aesc had finally cracked the cryptic book of magic spells. It had taken months to track down such a forbidden text. And years more to interpret. Magic had long since been outlawed throughout the kingdom, and the ealdormen of his village were superstitious and zealous to the point of extremism. Caution was foremost on Aesc’s mind, but never at the sake of progress.
Read MoreThe list of exploits from Gudtlieb’s time as a knight derives almost exclusively from the west. According to the area of Waldbach and its surrounding villages, he stopped an invasion of sirens from stealing away the men of Rheicona with their songs. He seduced their leader and threatened to hang her on a drying rack until her hoard relented. In Charmont, there is a tale of him spending a week tracking a unicorn and another solid day hanging from its back as it ran about the kingdom. Eventually, once it had calmed, he presented it as a gift to the king.
Read MoreDietlinde was as ordinary as a commonplace fox. Her fur as dull of a red as the rest of her family. Her home, a hole in the ground near the edge of town. She was nothing and came from less than nothing. And she would have died nothing had she not caught the eye of a fox with fur of platinum. He came from a long line of magicians and sorcerers and trained at the best schools available to Silirich. By all means, this story ought to have been his. But he settled for mere adequacy. Opened a small elixir shop near the city’s edge. Held no sway with the Ealdorman, or renown even with the locals. And then, a few short years later, he died of the ancient sickness. The incurable plague. So devastating neither magic nor medicine could halt its progress. The same that ravages the southern Wastelands to this day.
Read MoreFarvald was a simple man, ordinary in every way but one: he was gifted with an attunement to the world. Or cursed with it, so he would say. Neither deceit nor disguise could hope to fool him. Magical illusions, because magic was common in those days, could not trick his eyes. He saw only reality in its full unruly glory.
Read MoreBefore the world, there was only Gadall. No one knows where this god came from. Many say he always was. Others question: Who created the god of creation?
———-
When time was naught, Gadall was. He is the shapeless void whence we all came. The storm of relentless fury that castes out entire universes in a timeless age formed into a moment.
Ivory smoke plumed and billowed through the room. An elaborate revolution of Ebania’s arms effortlessly masked the movement of her left foot as she pressed a secret switch. The crimson flame turned a deep violet with the addition of salts through a hidden mechanism beneath a floorboard. The effect was impressive and convincing. As if summoned fiery spirits recoiled fearfully from her oversized robes.
Read MoreHadestown is a Musical with music and lyrics by Anaïs Mitchell and directed by Rachel Chavkin. It debuted Off-Broadway in 2016. Additional productions followed in Edmonton and London before finally premiering on Broadway in 2019, the very same month the world began to shut down over a virus.
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