The Sorcerer Abides

 

Rhiannon was named for a Fleetwood Mac song her parents loved. As far as names from songs go, she had always thought it was a good one. There were certainly worse options. When her brother Bobbie McGee had complained about his name not being Bad, Bad Leroy Brown, or even Slim Shady, their mother had started singing Flash by Queen. It had shut Bobbie up, and quick.

She wondered what her mom would sing if she were in the car right now. Rhiannon’s best guess was something from the song Horse with No Name by America, although it was just as likely to be the Eagle’s Hotel California. Or maybe it would be from some other hit song about traveling through a desert. The SUV’s stereo played the Green Day piece American Idiot. Rhiannon hoped that wasn’t an omen.

“Are you sure this is it?” Rhiannon asked as her husband stopped next a trailer that looked like it was even older than her namesake song. There were no roads anywhere near the thing and no tire treads to show how it had gotten to its current godforsaken spot in the absolute middle of nowhere.

Terrance pointed at the dash. “Those are the exact coordinates he gave us.” He shrugged and shut off the engine.

In the backseat, Kelsa stirred and removed the earbuds she was wearing. “We’re off to see the wizard?” she asked as she turned off her Nintendo Switch.

“Yeah, baby, we’re here.” Her dad gave the thirteen-year-old a smile over his shoulder before taking off his seat belt and opening the door. A blast of furnace-hot air sliced through the air conditioned interior of their late model Jeep Cherokee. 

As her family got out of th SUV, Rhiannon stared at what was fundamentally a tin can on wheels. It really wasn’t much larger than the Cherokee and the exterior was covered more in rust than paint. She wasn’t entirely sold on this being the place they were looking for. “It looks more like a meth lab than a magic lab,” she said as they approached.

Terrance raised a jet black eyebrow high enough it nearly touched his afro. “Which one of those do you have experience with?”

“Well, neither, but I’ve watched both Breaking Bad and Harry Potter.”

“I’m pretty sure that The Grand High Sorceror doesn’t want to be compared to anyone in children’s fiction.” Terrance paused. “Or to drug manufacturers.”

“On the contrary,” came a voice from inside the trailer. “There is very little difference between a potion and a street drug. It all comes down to mixing unregulated ingredients for a desired effect that the government may not approve of.” The door opened to reveal a man in a long, tattered bathrobe that may once have been white but which was now as beige as the sands around them. He had a long beard that flowed in shades of aqua and teal, a bald head, and eyebrows that closely resembled inchworms in both color and texture. “As for Harry Potter… I’ve always seen myself as more of a Hermione, without the misfortune of having been written by a transphobe. If you need to be told that transwomen are women, then you need to get the hell off my property.”

The visitors didn’t argue. Even if they had been inclined to disagree, they would have had too much sense to give voice to that inclination. They were here to remove a curse, not to get a new one inflicted upon them.

“Hello,” said Terrance. “Are you Carlton May? We spoke on the phone. I’m Terrance Joiner.” He tried to take a step forward, but found himself held back by Kelsa. Her hand had whipped out to grab her dad’s arm the second he tried to move.

The teen stood staring around her in wonder. “Well, Cohaagen, I have to hand it to you. It's the best mind-fuck yet.”

The man with the colorful beard laughed. “I don’t know who Cohaagen is, and you seem a bit young to be cursing like that, but thank you.”

“It’s a movie quote,” said Rhiannon. “Although I don’t know what from.”

“Total Recall,” Terrance offered. “Which is sort of funny because she totally recalls lines from every film she’s ever seen. She was less than three months old when she saw that one.”

The bearded man grunted. “Is that so? Well, I’ll drop the illusion for you folks anyway.” He waved his hand and suddenly they were all standing in front of a Persian-style palace on an oasis. Still dressed in a house robe but now in a less ratty-looking one, he crossed the distance between himself and the Joiner family. Ignoring her parents, he held his hand out to Kelsa. “I am the The Grand High Sorceror Carlton. Not a very good name is it?”

The girl shrugged, but shook his hand. It was the first time she’d ever been offered someone’s hand to shake and she smiled to be treated thusly, like she was equal to the older people around her. She couldn’t think of a suitable quote though. A tingle traveled up her arm, making her laugh.

The Grand High Sorceror Carlton smiled. “You have magic. I thought as much.”

Rhiannon cleared her throat. “She has a curse, Grand High Sorceror. That’s why we’re here.”

“Oh, I’m sure she does.” He grinned and said, “Call me Carlton,” before waving the group to his front door. “Those with magic attract magic. Sometimes it’s a blessing. Sometimes it isn’t.”

“We’re hoping you can remove it. Can you?”

“The magic or the curse?” Carlton kept walking after they were all in the house, leading the way into a sitting room large enough for half a town to fit into. “The answer is different. Magic, no. Curse, absolutely.”

Kelsa’s parents exchanged a look and Terrance cleared he throat. “Um… You said she attracts magic. If we remove this curse, could she attract a new one?”

“Certainly. An argument could be made for keeping this one if it’s one she can live with.” Carlton sprawled into a chair, landing with his legs wide and his arms spread out. His visitors were relieved to see the plaid lounge pants under his robe. He looked at Kelsa, the mirth fading from his expression. “Do you truly want this curse gone?”

“The truth?” said Kelsa. “You can’t handle the truth.”

“A Few Good Men.”

Kelsa nodded. “The Dude abides.”

The Big Lebowski reference made Carlton laugh again. “The Dude has long been a role model of mine. I get the impression you can only speak in movie quotes?”

The girl nodded. “Yes.”

“Yes?” repeated Carlton. “So the quote doesn’t have to be recognizable, just have occurred in a film?”

“It’s an inherited curse,” Rhiannon said. “Skipped a generation and altered itself some. My mother can only speak in hit song lyrics. My daughter can only quote blockbuster movies.”

“Sit,” Carlton urged, indicating a long and ornate sofa that seemed like it would belong somewhere like Versaille under the rear ends of French aristocrats. “But your mother doesn’t want her curse lifted?” he asks as the family sat.

Rhiannon shrugged. “She’s kind of used to it. It happened before I was born. And she’s a painter, so people aren’t too surprised to find out she’s eccentric. But Kelsa… We have to homeschool her. We tried sign language and pretending she’s mute, but she can’t sign except in quotes either. She can write, but try explaining why her communication is so stunted when the general public refuses to admit magic exists. We’d like to send her to high school next year, but… Not like this.”

“I can see why that might be limiting.” Carlton drew a deep breath. “So… I have the items on hand to remove the curse today, if you’re willing to pay the price.”

Neither parent was dimwitted enough to say, “Anything!” but they both nodded and waited to be told what the price was.

“Or…” Carlton kept his gaze solely on Kelsa. “I can replace it with something else.”

Terrance nodded. “A blessing?”

“Yes. But blessings don’t come cheap.”

A blanket of tension fell on the gathering. No one wanted to ask for details.

“Gee, Otter, thanks. What do I have to do?” whispered Kelsa.

“Animal House.” Carlton grinned. “I think we would get along, Kelsa. And I find myself in need of an apprentice.”

“No,” said Rhiannon, not even pausing to think about it. “We’re not giving you our daughter.” She stood up and even took a step toward the door before realize no one else had risen. “Terrance? We are not giving him Kelsa. She can live with this. We’ll tell the school she has autism or something.”

Terrance didn’t look at his wife or his daughter, instead studying the sorcerer. “I’m not agreeing. But what, exactly, would Kelsa becoming your apprentice mean?”

“You say she’s already homeschooling. She’d just need to add a few extra subjects. She can even stay with you while she does the early work. And you can stop worrying about the cost of college or what she’ll say at her entrance interviews or how to convince experts that someone who is clearly not on the spectrum has autism. By the time she’s eighteen, she’ll be ready to study magic full-time with me. Thanks to a spell I really should have been too smart to cast, I know for a fact that I will die in exactly twenty three years, five months, and six days. At that point, she will inherit my position, my wealth, and my vast network of contacts.”

“You could have chosen anyone. Why me?” Kelsa asked.

Carlton’s eyebrows drew together. “From the sound of it, I think that one’s from a romance. You should avoid that. I am not your love interest. What I am is an old man who wants to pass his knowledge on to someone. And what you are is one of maybe a half dozen people on the planet with enough innate magical ability to do something with it.”

Rhiannon stiffened. “Why are we here?”

Everyone looked at her. Carlton smiled. “You want a curse lifted from your daughter.”

“Right.” The word snapped out, sharp and cutting. “And we just happened to find someone who could send us to you at a time when you are looking for an incredibly rare talent my child just happens to have?”

It was Carlton’s turn to try quoting something. “There’s a fine line between coincidence and fate. The Mummy Returns.”

Rhiannon wasn’t buying it. “Bullshit.”

“Alright, fine.” Carlton chuckled. “I may have had a few friends looking out for cursed children. Children not because I’m a creep or a pedophile, but because younger minds take better to magic than those that are already set in their views of reality. If it would make you feel better, both you and your husband are welcome to move in with Kelsa when she reaches the level where she needs to stay here.”

Kelsa’s mother was still shaking her head, but Kelsa spoke up. “You take the blue pill, the story ends.”

“Indeed,” said Carlton. “Take the red one, stay in Wonderland, and have a real story to tell. But if you go home and I find another apprentice… You could still pay me to remove the curse and maybe whatever replaces it will be fine. But she goes on living in the Matrix and loses the chance to change the world.”

“Please,” said Kelsa.

Some of the resistance flew out of Rhiannon, but this was her daughter’s life they were discussing. “We’re going to have to talk about it.”

“Naturally.” Carlton got out of the chair and started toward the door. “The offer stands until the full moon. That’s in six days. I’ll either see you then, or I assume I’ll never see you again at all.”

The family left, but everyone involved knew they’d be back.

The above image is “My Home in Joshua Tree” by Heather Elizabeth. You can find this and other works by the artist at http://whiskeyandmagnolias.com/

Who Says Camels Don't Ski?

It is said, at least by t-shirts sold outside Ski Dubai, that camels don’t ski. Josef al Shameel, a camel technically owned by a minor noble in the United Arab Emirates but granted the freedom to roam about the desert on account of how he freaked his owner out, could only read Arabic. As the shirts were generally written in English, he didn’t know that they said he shouldn’t do the thing depicted. All he knew was that he’d seen a human wearing a picture of what was clearly a camel on flat planks of wood going down what Josef took to be a sand dune. He’d seen that and thought to himself, “That is a thing I want to do.”

In the history of the Ski Dubai indoor ski area, no camel has ever shown up and asked for a lift ticket. Josef didn’t either, possibly because he didn’t know what snow is and possibly because when he tried to find someone to design camel-sized skis for him, the human’s first thought was to contact a film crew because he’d discovered a talking camel. Sharif the Engineer got on the phone to his cousin Mustafa the Film Student posthaste.

The crew arrived in the early hours of the morning. It was mid-January, which is also mid-ski season, although determining when ski season is in an area that only sees a scattering of snow every decade or so is a challenge. They found Josef sitting by the roadside waiting for them.

After dispensing with greetings, during which the film crew professionals did their best not to blurt of things like, “Holy hellfire, a talking camel!” they moved on to the matter most important to Josef. “Where are my sliding planks?”

Mustafa, who most interested in fiction but willing to start out with a documentary, supplied him with a word in English. “Skis.” He then added in Arabic, “The planks are called skis. And they’re in the van.”

When the documentary hit the internet of the skiing and talking camel, the overwhelming response was for people to complain that they were sick of CGI animals. No matter how many interviews he gave, Mustafa was unable to convince the world that the whole thing hadn’t been faked. And Josef refused to give any more interviews after seeing some of the more hateful things being said about him on Twitter.

The story ends well though. Mustafa landed directing job for an Arabic reboot of Lost in Space featuring a CGI camel in the place of the robot, one of several projects he would undertake for Netflix. And while Josef never did learn what snow was, he can still be found still getting his turns in on the dunes of the UAE. If you look closely in the distance while traveling through some of the less populated parts of that nation, you just might see him.

The above image is an untitled travel piece by Missy Dunaway. Dunaway is releasing her graphic travel diaries soon. Details can be found at http://www.missydunaway.com/travel-journal

The prompt was offered by my Wording Wednesday Project.

Further inspiration came from my Ski Dubai "Camels Don't Ski" t-shirt. I would have taken a picture of it for you, but it appears to have gone into storage and I won't be able to get to it until next year sometime.

The Comfort of Dragons

Farla guided Shyler’s magic in the glass dragon the pair were crafting and smiled at how enthusiastic her partner was about this project. This was the thirteenth dragon and Shyler’s joy over creating smaller replicas of herself had yet to dim. Starting their next project might well lead to a pouting dragon, but creating this mobile for Farla’s niece had been a lot of fun.

After waiting for the crystalline dragon to cool, Farla tucked it carefully into a padded bag with two others and left the studio with Shyler perched proudly on her shoulder. The pair received varying reactions on their journey. Those of the neighborhood who knew them offered waves and cheerful greetings, but strangers shied away. A few people even crossed the street. It was hard to be sure if they were prejudiced against Farla’s elven ears or Shyler’s red hue. Elves tend to be stronger with magic than human channelers, which makes some humans nervous, while red dragons have a completely unearned reputation for aggression. And, of course, there had been a rising sentiment against using magic at all lately.

People who knew Farla and Shyler recognized two of the most highly regarded artists in the nation and remembered how much of their income Farla spent on helping local families. The driver of the city bus the pair caught knew them well enough to shake his head at the couple who got up and moved to a further seat after she sat down near them. He made sure to use both her and Shyler’s names when wishing them well as they disembarked.

Upon reaching her sister’s house, Farla took a deep breath. Her sister was out of town, as was her husband and their six-year-old. The house was being watched by Farla’s brother-in-law’s sister. The sister, Elise, had soft grey eyes, warm brown hair, a gentle smile, a stately figure, and a deeply rooted sentiment against magic-channelers, all of which she’d inherited from her mother. Farla and Elise had known each other for close to a decade, and had a few interesting conversations early on. Then the conversations dried up, leaving only some glances that Farla struggled not to read much into from across rooms and dining tables. It had been two years since Elise did anything other than ignore Farla as much as possible.

When Elise opened the door, Farla expected her to stand aside without a word before going to read in the study as she had done every other time. She did not expect Elise to follow her into Katchya’s room and watch her bring out the final three dragon sculptures.

“These are the last ones?” Elise whispered, sounding scared. Her gaze was locked on the floor tiles beneath her feet.

“Yep.” Farla put extra pep into her voice, trying to pretend that she wasn’t unsettled by the change in routine. Shyler flew up to sit atop a bookshelf along with an assortment of plush animals but watched Elise with open distrust. “Once I attach them, I can hoist this baby up and it’ll be all ready to surprise the birthday girl when she gets home next week.”

Elise’s eyes moved to the ceiling, where the hook for the mobile was already installed. “I wonder how long it will take her to notice.”

The thought of their niece entering the room and going about her normal business before suddenly going, “When did that get there?” made Farla chuckle. “She’ll either see it immediately, or not until she gets into bed.”

“Agreed.” As though mentioning the bed had reminded Elise it existed, she sat down on it as she watched Farla deftly attach the new dragons. Each of the glass reptiles was a different color, which would work perfectly since Katchya’s room already looked like a rainbow had exploded across it. “Um…” Elise said after several minutes. “I don’t want to sound rude. But… Are they enchanted?”

Farla’s fingers paused and she looked up. Her eyes met Elise’s and she processed what she saw there. The other woman was openly concerned. It would have made some channelers angry, but Farla figured it was a mixture of possessing ignorance and honestly caring about a little girl they both adored. She could never be angry at someone wanting to protect her beloved niece. “I couldn’t love Katchya more if she were my own daughter. The only magic in these guys was from their formation and a mild spell to make it harder to shatter them.”

Elise’s lips pressed together for a moment before she nodded. Then she licked them as Farla tried to think about something other than Elise’s lips.

Farla went back to double-checking the attachments on the mobile, making extra certain that the metallic chains the dragons were to hang from were secure. Satisfied, she waved Shyler over. “Time to get this up!”

“Wait!” Elise sprang to her feet.

Shyler hissed at the sudden sound and flew to hide behind a curtain. Elise stared at the lump the dragon formed behind the curtain fabric as Farla waited for an explanation. Eventually, she gave up on that and said, a little testily, “I already told you I didn’t cast any big scary spells on it.”

“Oh.” Elise blinked a few times before meeting Farla’s gaze. Her eyes dipped as though she was cowed by what she saw. “That’s not what I meant. I meant to say, please hold on for a moment because I wanted to ask if you could add an extra enchantment.”

Her head tilted as Farla studied the other woman. “I thought you hated magic.”

“No… Not really.” A hint of tears clouded Elise’s eyes as she continued to study the floor. “That’s… I was raised that way. And my husband, he feels that way…” Her voice trembled as she spoke, but when she looked up her eyes were filled with anger. “But I’m sick of shutting up and ignoring my own opinions just because he ignores them. I’m leaving him. Or I want to. But when I told him that I wasn’t going to come back from this trip, he threatened Katchya.”

As Elise crumbled, collapsing onto the mattress and burying her face in her hands, Farla breathed in and tried to still a growing rage. The bed creaked as she sat and put a tentative arm around Elise. “Have you told Ethaniel?”

“Do you think I told Ethaniel?” Elise asked with a bitter laugh. “Is he on holiday with Katchya and Yvonne or in jail for murdering his brother-in-law?”

“Yeah, alright, I see your point.” Farla’s hand rubbed against Elise’s shoulder in a way she hoped was comforting as her anger turned to resolve and her thoughts shifted to planning. Shylar, reading the change in her partner’s emotions, emerged from the curtain at ground level and took a few hesitant steps towards the pair of elves. She stopped a ways shy of them and watched closely as she sent a sense of support to her partner. “I can enchant the mobile easily enough. But I think maybe you need something too. And we’ll need to put a charm on Katchya to protect her when she’s not in her room. Everyone already knows I made her the mobile, so we’ll need a piece of jewelry we can say is from you.”

Elise nodded. Her expression was numb and her voice toneless as she answered, “Of course. Just tell me what to buy.”

“I have some rainbow stone back at my place. It’s good for holding enchantments. Especially if you wrap it in gold. I have a little bit of that too. So we just need a chain.”

“Okay.”

Farla’s chest felt tight as she gave Elise a squeeze and stood up. “You don’t have to stay for this part if you don’t want to.”

Elise looked up slowly. “I want to stay if that’s alright. I’m curious.”

Farla quirked her eyebrows. “So you really don’t think you’ll be damned by being around someone misusing God’s power?”

“No.” Elise shook her head and let out a soft sigh. “You couldn’t do evil if you tried, Farla. You’re the kindest, most godly person I know.”

Her lips parted as Farla replayed the words in her head. She had no idea how to respond to them.

“I’m sorry I let you think I hated you,” Elise went on. “I… I just couldn’t let Aris know I didn’t. If he had any idea how I actually feel about you… He wouldn’t handle it well.”

“How you actually feel?”

The softest of smiles graced Elise’s face. “Don’t get distracted. I’ll tell you all about it after we make sure the niblet’s safe.”

“Okay,” Farla all but squeaked. Could Elise be saying what Farla so desperately wanted her to be saying? No… Probably not. She probably just meant she wanted to be friends, right? Farla told herself not to let her hopes get too high and that now wasn’t the time for fantasies.

Early the next week, Katchya ran into her room and spotted the change right away. “Everybody!” she yelled. “There are dragons in my room!”

Laughing, the adults walked down the hall to admire the project. Her mom and dad looked up, making sounds of astonishment while her aunts smiled at each other.

Katchya put a hand on her hip. “Was this you, Aunt Farla?”

“Why would you think that?” Farla asked with a grin. On her shoulder, Shyler clicked merrily in the dragon equivalent of laughter.

“It was,” Katchya said to the others before running back to stand under the mobile. She lay on the floor so she could get a better view. “They’re so pretty.”

“So you like dragons?” Elise asked in a teasing voice. “I didn’t know that, Niblet.”

“Everyone knows that,” Katchya said.

“Okay, fine. I knew. That’s probably why I bought this.”

“Bought what?” Katchya bounced up again and looked eagerly at the package her other aunt held out to her. She grabbed the present and ripped the paper off it with excited efficiency. More gently, she took the lid from the box thus revealed. Her eyes went wide at the sight of a gold dragon clutching a rainbow-colored crystal to its chest. She squealed. “I love it!”

“Good,” said Elise. “I never want to see you without it.”

“You only see me on holidays,” Katchya said. “But I’ll wear it everyday.”

“Alright.” Elise smiled as Yvonne helped her daughter secure the clasp of the new necklace. “You’ll be seeing me more often than that from now on though.”

Ethaniel gave his sister a curious look. “She will?”

“Yeah.” Elise drew a deep breath. “I’m divorcing Astir.”

Everyone paused for a moment, then Yvonne blurted, “Thank God,” as Ethaniel said, “About time.”

“And…” Elise reached out for Farla’s hand. “And I’m moving in with Farla.”

There was another pause, during which Yvonne and Ethaniel shared a smile.

“Thank God,” said Ethaniel.

“About time,” Yvonne added.

“Awesome!” proclaimed Katchya. “This is the best birthday ever!”

Above image is by deviant art user Sandara. I urge you to check out her feed at https://www.deviantart.com/sandara and considering purchasing some of the works she has for sale. (A list which includes this imagine.)

It was offered as prompt on my Wording Wednesday Project

The Queen's Holy Orb

As the three gnomes sat in a tree, Minz, Moin, and Maleka felt rather overwhelmed and quite sorry for themselves.

“They just keep playing with it,” Minz moaned, her eyes on the pair of very large canines batting The Queen's Holy Orb around the clearing. The trio of gnomes were at their wits’ end. Clearly, they couldn’t just let the dogs continue to play with the religious artifact they’d been charged with carrying through the forest from its old home in Egdasmont to its new home in the recently built cathedral in Umnaspurt. But the dogs were massive, both taller than Maleka, who was herself much larger than Moin, who was in turn taller than Minz. And the dogs were obsessed with The Queen's Holy Orb, to the point of ignoring the similar sized ball the gnomes had already tried to distract them with. Although, on the plus side, they were also too obsessed with The Queen's Holy Orb to try to eat the gnomes, something the gnomes greatly appreciated.

“Hey, dogs!” yelled Maleka. “That belongs to the church! It was a gift from Queen Elspin!”

The dogs were not impressed. They didn’t so much as glance at Maleka as they wrestled each other for the honor of being closest to The Queen's Holy Orb.

Moin leaned forward, balancing so that his arms rested on his legs as they dangled from the branch he sat upon. “There are two dogs and three of us. If two of us could each distract a dog, the third could grab The Queen's Holy Orb.”

“Sure,” agreed Minz. “But how would we do that?”

“We could jump on them.”

Minz and Maleka stared at their companion. “Jump on them?” Maleka repeated. “You mean after we ask them nicely to lay down and be still? Hey, dogs! My friend wants to jump on you! So if you could stop running around and lower yourself closer to the ground, that would be awesome!”

No one was surprised when the dogs failed to comply, choosing instead to growl at each other as they tried to push The Queen's Holy Orb in different directions. The growling made Minz shiver. She’d had a bad experience with a Pomeranian as a child that had instilled a great distrust of all canines into her psyche. She’d been the first to climb the tree and was determined to be the last to leave it.

“What if we hit them with something?” Moin said. “You know, knock them out? Don’t you always carry a pouch of sleep powder, Minz?”

“I do,” the shortest gnome answered. “But I’d have to hit them right on the nose, which would be hard to do from up here. And there’s only enough for one of them.”

Maleka made a thoughtful noise. “Okay. So we’d have to send someone down to hit one of them right in the face and then hope the dog doesn’t try to eat that person while waiting for the powder to kick in. But that would still leave one dog obsessed with The Queen's Holy Orb. If we assume we couldn’t successfully jump on him and steer him away, what could we do?”

All three gnomes shook their heads, stumped.

“Do we have any food?” Minz asked, remembering that dogs like food.

Between them, they found a hard candy that had seen better days, a melted piece of chocolate, and a quarter of a donut that Moin had been saving for later. They tossed the donut and one of the dogs did actually notice it, but only for as long as it took to swallow the baked good in one gulp.

“Well,” said Moin. “I think I would have been better off eating that myself.” And the others couldn’t argue otherwise.

“Could we steal a dog whistle?” Maleka asked. “One of us could run far away and blow it, then the others could grab The Queen’s Holy Orb when the dogs ran to the whistle.”

They all liked that idea, but no one had any leads as to where they could find a dog whistle.

“We could pray?” Minz offered. “I mean it is a HOLY Orb, right? So maybe the gods would try to protect it? You know, if we told them a pair of dogs was playing with it.”

The other two shrugged and they all bent their heads while Maleka addressed their deities. “Oh heavenly parents, ill has befallen the most sacred Orb of the Heavens. Please help us free The Queen’s Holy Orb from the beasts that have taken possession of it so that we may see it interred in the cathedral in Umnaspurt. Um… We offer you this piece of chocolate and hard candy in addition to our adoration as we pray that you will come to the aid of us, your unfortunate children. Thank you for listening. Amen.”

“Amen,” the others chorased.

Then they all looked around expectantly, their shoulders falling as no bolts of lightening struck the dogs. Moin sighed. “Maybe they didn’t hear us? Should we try again, but louder? Maybe if we all spoke at once?”

Frustrated, Minz ripped a pinecone from the tree they sat in and lobbed it at one of the canines. It bounced off with no effect other than to make the dog let out a bark of annoyance. No one was surprised as throwing things at the dogs to get them to run away was the first thing the gnomes had tried.

From somewhere behind the gnomes, a door opened. A human voice cried out, “Hestor! Brunhilda! Dinner!”

The dogs’ heads snapped up. Before the woman had finished calling for them, they were sprinting toward her, The Queen’s Holy Orb completely forgotten.

“Ah,” said Maleka. “I suppose the gods don’t work instantly.”

The gnomes slid down the tree and the taller two picked up The Queen’s Holy Orb between them while Minz kept a lookout to make sure the dogs weren’t returning.

When the trio finally made it to the cathedral in Umnaspurt, they handed The Queen’s Holy Orb over to the bishop and went straight to the pub, where they offered a toast to the gods but swore never to take another job from the church.

The above image was painted by Alfred de Dreux. 

It was offered as prompt on my Wording Wednesday Project

Roll for Initiative!

Jarreth gulped at the beast before him. He knew he shouldn’t have come this far into the caverns on his own, but it was no use berating himself over the choice now. He gripped his sword before him, settled into a wide stance, and stared directly up at the looming monster. It wasn’t that big. Merely twice his height. And it only had six arms. Or six legs? Jarreth couldn’t really tell. They seemed to all have hands on the end, but several were being used for standing on… And the creature’s skin probably wasn’t really made of stone or it wouldn’t be moving so easily, right?

The monster smiled. With its huge, protruding teeth, its smile wasn’t exactly comforting to Jarreth.

“Roll for initiative,” a voice called.

“What?” Jarreth blurted, his eyes flicking to the ceiling the voice seemed to come from.

The monster picked up one of the odd shaped rocks before him and gave it a toss. The rock had a lot of sides, each one with a number written on it. “Fifteen,” the creature said as the rock came to a rest. The monster then looked up at Jarreth like it expected him to do something interesting now.

Jarreth shifted. His arms were getting tired already.

The voice returned. “The human forfeits his right to roll. You go first, Hubert.”

“The human did what?” the human asked, but everyone ignored him.

“I swing my pitchfork in his direction,” the monster announced. He rolled the rock again. “Curses. Nat one.”

The ceiling laughed. “Okay. You swing your pitchfork at the human invader, but you hit the ceiling by accident. A chunk of rock breaks off and falls on your head. Roll a D8 for damages.”

“A D8? Sheesh.” The monster rolled a different rock and let out a relieved breath. “Two.” He picked up a piece of chalk and made a mark on the wall. I’m down to 20. Could have been worse.”

“Okay,” said the voice. “You’re up, human.”

“Um…”

“I assume you’re going to battle him,” said the ceiling in a leading sort of way.

Jarreth took that to mean he should be taking action. Attacking made sense, so he took a swing at the beast.

“Hey!” The monster jerked back with a hiss and stared at the line of blood that bloomed on its arm. “You swung your sword at me! What the hell, man?”

“Aren’t we battling?”

“In D&D, dude!” The monster put another few feet between them. “What kind of asshole actually swings a literal sword? Did you even bring your dice?”

“Um… No. I don’t own any dice.”

The monster gaped. “You went into a D&D dungeon without any dice? How do you expect to beat anyone without dice?”

Jarreth jiggled his sword around. “Well, I kind of thought I’d use this.”

“Dude!” The monster plopped down on its rump. “This isn’t that kind of dungeon. This is a D&D dungeon. Didn’t you see the sign at the entrance?”

“No?” Jarreth thought back to his entering the dungeon. “No signs… There was a painting of some kind of serpent.”

The monster sighed. “That was the D&D logo. You know, Dungeons and Dragons?”

“Never heard of it.” Jarreth finally allowed himself to lower his weapon. He didn’t seem to be in danger and his arms were seriously aching.

“It’s a game,” the monster explained. “It allows people to fight without getting hurt. Which is better for everyone, don’t you think? You can win without having to get buff enough to actually hold that sword properly. Or you can lose without actually dying. It’s pretty fantastic. You can take my treasure, or I can stop you, but either way, everyone gets to go home and no one has to bleed all over the place.”

“Huh…” Although he’d never heard of this, the idea was intriguing to Jarreth. It wasn’t like he enjoyed working out or having his skin pierced by things like pitchforks. And he was absolutely certain he wouldn’t enjoy dying. “And everyone abides by this?”

“Oh, yeah. If you don’t, the Dungeon Master will smite you.”

“Come again?”

The voice from the ceiling popped back in. “You play by the rules or I kill you. Since you clearly didn’t know any of this, I’m giving you a pass on hurting poor Hubert here, but if you swing that stupid blade of yours around anymore, you’ll get a lightning bolt to the chest.”

Jarreth wasn’t altogether certain the disembodied voice could summon lightning, but figured it probably wasn’t worth taking a chance on. Instead, he slid his sword into its scabbard. “Sword’s going bye-bye.”

“Good,” said the voice. “Now… We’ll pretend you rolled what just happened. How bad’s your cut, Hubert? About a point of damage or is it worse?”

“I don’t think I’ll need a bandage or anything,” Hubert responded. “So certainly not worse than a point.”

“Okay. So you lose a hit point, but so does the human.”

“Why me?” asked Jarreth.

“Because you strained a muscle. Moving on… Hubert?”

“I pick up the rock that fell on my head and try to bash him with it.” Hubert grinned and rolled a die. “Yes! Nineteen. I assume that hits?”

“Yeah, that hits. The human obviously has a low armor class. What the damage?”

“Blunt damage…” Hubert rolled a rock. “Six.”

“Nice. Human, you lose six hit points.”

“Okay. What are hit points?”

Somehow, Jarreth got the impression the disembodied voice was rolling its eyes. “Okay, we’ll say you had fifteen. Then you lost one to the strained muscle. And now six to being bashed with a rock. So you’re down to eight. You need to grab a copy of the Player’s Handbook before you come back. Now, what are you doing to do?”

“Stab my sword into his eye! The left one!” Jarreth felt clever for coming up with that.

“I don’t suppose you know your agility stat?”

“You would be right.”

The voice sighed. “Okay, well, as you can clearly see, he has tiny little eyes and the lighting in this room isn’t great and he’s a lot taller than you. So you’re pretty much going to need a nat twenty to do that, but go for it.”

Jarreth shook his head. “How? I mean, you told me not to really use my sword…”

“You roll,” said Hubert helpfully. He held out a twenty-sided die. “With this. You can borrow mine.”

“Thanks.” The die was larger than one made for a human would be, but Jarreth managed to toss it anyway. It tumbled a few times, then landed with a one pointing upwards. “One! That’s the best, right?”

Hubert gave him a pitying look as the voice asked, “Were you not paying attention earlier? Twenty is the best. One is the worst you can do. It’s so bad that you’re likely to hurt yourself failing. In fact, you just did. You rush toward Hubert, intent on spearing him in the eye, but you trip and fall onto your sword yourself. Roll for damage. Piercing with a sword is a D6.”

Jarreth rolled the die again. “Twelve.”

“That was a D20,” Hubert said. He held up a cube. “This is a D6.”

“Doesn’t matter,” said the voice. “I’ve realized he pierced his own eye instead of yours and the sword sliced right into his brain. He’s dead.”

“But!” Jarreth threw his hands up. “That’s not fair! I can’t be dead just because you said so.”

“Dude…” Hubert waved four of his hands around. “Drop it. Accept what the DM says and come back with a stronger character next time. Maybe a party. Definitely your own dice. Using your opponent's is bad luck.”

“But-”

The lightning bolt that land right next to Jarreth’s foot got him to shut up. “Okay,” he squeaked. “I’m dead. I’ll leave.”

“Great!” said the voice, suddenly sounding friendly. “There’s a cute little shop in town called Leaves of Adventure. There’s a woman there named Amanda who can sell you all the stuff you need and get you up to speed on the rules.”

“Amanda’s great,” Hubert put in. “Tell her I said hi. I’d go with you, but the townsfolk tend to freak out when we dungeon dwellers show up on Main Street. And they don’t play the game out there, so people get hurt for real. It’s pretty sad. Not to mention barbaric.”

“Right.” Jarreth nodded. “Go find Amanda at Leaves of Adventure.”

“Oh!” Hubert straightening in excitement. “And can you bring some ginger sparkle-sweet when you come back? And maybe some of those cherry sugar ropes they sell at the candy store down there?”

“I guess, sure.”

Hubert waved as Jarreth turned and left the dungeon. By the time he made it to the entrance, he had himself half convinced the whole thing had been a hallucination brought on by some kind of gas in the cavern system. But there it was, the painting on the rockface of what he now realized was a dragon twisted into an ampersand. And when he made it to town, there really was a place called Leaves of Adventure. A book in the window had the same picture as the cavern entrance and it was sitting beside a pile of wildly colored dice in a variety of shapes.

Not sure how his life had gotten to this strange spot, Jarreth nevertheless went into the shop and asked for Amanda.

The above image is by Guy Davis. More of Mr Davis's artwork is on his website at https://www.guydavisartworks.com/ 

It was offered as a prompt on my Wording Wednesday project. Other responses to the prompt may be shared on the official Wording Wednesday blog.

The Modern Gospel of Lady Luck

Marisa was the type of wealthy who could look bored while risking a hundred thousand Geodes on the spin of a roulette wheel. Her kind wasn’t uncommon in Essar’s gambling halls. Congregating in such places had long ago taken the place of attending temple worship amongst the upper echelon of Agrani society. Worship of the gods was out of style, replaced by worship of random chance.

People tended to assume that I was pleased with the state of affairs in Agran. I am, after all, the Goddess of Luck and thus the only deity actually in vogue right then. But I wasn’t. I love my Parent, They who created everything, and hated to see how many of Their creations had turned their backs on Them. In Agran, They used to be called the Father of All and invoked daily. But in the Thirtieth Century, the average Agrani wasn’t even sure They exist.

Choosing Marisa as my Prophet raised some eyebrows amongst the Heavens. No one could understand what I saw in her. Sure, she followed me, but she didn’t exactly do it enthusiastically. She only went to the casino every week to keep her parents from lecturing her on the importance of making appearances. But that was part of her appeal.

It was Marisa’s lack of concern for my whims that made her seem so approachable. That her wealth and social standing made her someone people would at least pretend to listen to was an added bonus. Trying to speak through someone who cleaned bathrooms for a living would appeal to my brother, the Lord of Toil, but would have made things considerably more difficult. When would that person even have time to go around lecturing the realm rather than doing something she would get paid for anyway?

At first, Marisa ignored my call. Although she was my first Prophet, I was expecting that. It was only after I cursed her favorite runball team, the Sarseet Seekers, to a winless season the year after they won the championship that she seemed to even believe I was who I claimed to be. “You have a choice,” I told her the next night I saw her in The Thelton, Sarseet’s premiere casino. “You can either have dinner with me or I can curse your niece’s hitdisc team next.”

“Seriously?” She stared at me. “You’re using a little girl’s peewee team to strongarm me?”

“Yes.”

A laugh burst forth. “Yeah, okay. I guess that does back up your claim to be a god. A human wouldn’t be that much of a bitch.”  

I shrugged and didn’t argue the point, although I was fairly certain any number of humans were capable of being just as shitty.

An hour later, we sat in a swanky restaurant with plates of pasta and glasses of wine in front of us. An hour after that, the pasta was gone and a second bottle of wine had just been opened. “So,” I said as the server left with our empty plates and an order for a fresh baked dessert that would take at least half an hour to fill, “are you willing to work for me yet?”

“Will you hurt Liza if I don’t?”

“No. I’m not that awful. I might make your niece lose a game, but I would never make her lose a limb or her life.”

“Alright…” Marisa took a long drink of wine. “What do I have to do to get you to leave her alone completely?”

“I need you to write a book.”

Her eyebrows went up. “I’m not a writer.”

“Ever hear of divine inspiration? The goddess of arts owes me a favor. I can totally make you a writer.”

“Fair enough.” She swirled the red liquid in her glass, watching it slide along the sides of the container. “But why do you need me? Are you illiterate?”

I laughed. “No. But it’s against the rules for me to speak directly to the public. I need a Prophet to channel my words.”

“That makes no sense.”

“Can’t argue with you on that,” I said. “But my Parent is very clear that it’s a rule, and there’s no arguing with Them.”

“Them?” She put down the glass an leaned forward. “Plural?”

“No.” I shook my head. “Nonbinary. They were the first being in existence and the only one of Their kind. Why would They have a gender?”

“Huh.” Her gaze went distant for a while before she took a long swig of alcohol. “That sounds lonely.”

“I imagine it was. That’s probably why They created all of this.” I gestured around the room, but, of course, meant the entire universe.

“Okay…” She took another drink before meeting my eyes. “So you want to dictate something to me?”

I nodded. “Yes.”

“What?”

“People are turning their back on my family. I want to fix that. Especially for my Parent.”

Marisa made a tutting sound. “So a book about how we should revere the gods and honor the Creator? No offense, but I can’t imagine anyone wanting to read that book.”

“Not even if the luckiest person in the world wrote it?”

There was some amount of jerking about of eyebrows. “I get that I was born to wealth and privilege, but the luckiest person in the world? Plenty of people have more money than I do. Some of them even have epic love stories and adorable children to add in. Whereas my runball team couldn’t even win a single match last year. I lost a million Geodes this evening at roulette. Who would believe I’m that lucky?”

I smirked. “Well, you aren’t yet. But you will be. We’re going to spend the next ten years making sure everything in your life is perfect, that every bet you make you win, that every company you own stock in excels, that you get whatever you want out of life, from even more money to true love.”

“You can get me true love?”

“Of course.” I waved my hand. “Romantic Fate is my nephew, remember? All I need it to know who to match you with, then I use my luck to make certain you meet.”

She considered this for a while, long enough that the waiter came out with our flamed custard pies. As she picked up her spoon, Marisa said, “What will it cost me?”

“I already told you. You have to write a book.” I tilted my head to my shoulder in a partial shrug. “And promote the book. Possibly build a new temple. But you’ll be remembered as a Prophet after living your perfect life.”

“And my children?”

I drew in a breath. “I’ll treat them like my own.”

“Oh, no.” She lowered the spoon without taking a bite. “I’ve read too much about how you divine types treat your kids. I want you to treat them like you love them.”

“Cynical, aren’t we?” I took a bite of my own custard. It was creamy, sweet, and pleasantly tart. “Alright. Deal. I will watch over your descendants as though they are my personal treasures.”

“And I’ll have children?”

“If you want them. I’ve never understood the big deal about having them, but I’ll intercede with the Fertility Twins if I need to. Blen and Blynne have been after me for centuries to have my own offspring, so I can’t imagine they’d hesitate to help my Prophet in that department.”

“Alright,” she said softly before finally started to eat her dessert.

She looks over our opening ten years after that conversation as she sits before her computer screen with me pacing behind her and says, “I don’t like it. I mean, it’s what happened, but it doesn’t read like a holy text, does it? Those are all full of archaic wordings and outdating phrasing. Makes it all sound more official.”

I roll my eyes. “Mar, you’re being silly. Those texts are written in archaic language because they’re ancient. This isn’t. Look at the title, ‘The Modern Gospel of Lady Luck.’ It’s modern. Of course it’s not all, ‘Thou shoudlth look into thyself and observe the holy light of holiness within thine soul.’ Why would it be?”

“But how will people know it’s real?”

With a laugh, I give my Prophet a hug from behind. “Let me worry about that. You just type. Now, for Chapter Two...”

The above image is by artist Isaac Maimon. Learn more about his work on his webpage.

It was given as a writing prompt by my Wording Wednesday project. Other responses can be found in the comments on that site.

The Tangled Tentacles of Fate

Agata swam under a sign labeling her as a eyhnu and blinked her many eyes, wondering for the zillionth time why it was that humans have such a hard time refraining from using flash photography. It’s not like there weren’t signs next to each display at The Zoo Aquatic reminding people not to use it. The worst part, Agata believed, was that since they were taking photos from inside submarines, there’s no way a photo taken with a flash was ever going to show anything other than a burst of light. Which meant Agata was constantly being blinded by people wanting a selfie with the giant tentacle “monster” but actually taking images of them next to a blinding light instead. Some humans, Agata was left to assume, were just dimwitted.

There was a petition going around the displays, as the creatures who acted like zoo exhibits were called, to insist that the human submarines coat their windows in something that would prevent the light from passing out. None of the management really seemed on board, though. Perhaps it was time to consider a strike.

It amused Agata to imagine the angry explosion Mr Apolusa, the owner of The Zoo Aquatic, would engage in should the displays decide they were tired of performing for minimal recompense and under conditions that were deteriorating, not rapidly but certainly with great regularity. The over-use of flash photography was just one of the complaints that could be filed. There were also concerns about the quality of food provided in the cafeteria, the inefficient fuel usage of the submarines, and the long hours during which displays where expected to be in their enclosures without bathroom breaks. The last one really got to Agata, who refused to do what some of the displays did and simply pee in front of everyone.

Nursing a headache, Agata went straight to her apartment as soon as she clocked out of work, stopping just long enough along the way to pick up a fresh algae pizza for dinner. It wasn’t, she knew, the healthiest choice she could be making, but who has the energy to hunt down fish while fighting off a migraine?

Normally, Agata would put something on her screen to binge watch, but she couldn’t deal with the backlighting, so brought out the novel she was reading, a romantic comedy about an orca who fell for a guy from the wrong side of the Puget Sound, or the Eei@ieey!!ie, as it was called natively.

Sometimes Agata dreamed of living in her own romance story, even though her previous attempts had been disastrous in the extreme. And when I say disastrous, what I mean is that of her five exes, only one had survived.

It was the survivor who knocked on her door this evening. “Oh, Paulo,” she said as she beheld him floating outside. “Why today?”

He moved about half of his tentacles in a struggle to stay put against the weak current. Half the tentacles he moved were solely to counteract ones that had moved erroneously, either in the wrong direction or with too much power. Paulo had always had difficulties staying put when he was nervous, which he appeared to be now if his pale pink pallor was anything to judge by. “Why not today?”

“Because we’re two weeks into tourist season and my head is trying to split in two even without having to deal with you.”

Paulo’s two largest eyes, the ones in the center of his head, dropped in discouragement. “Oh. I’m sorry. I’ll go away.”

As he started to turn, Agata was stricken with guilt over how mean she had been. Paulo really wasn’t a bad guy. That’s why she broke up with him rather than eating him like she’d usually do with a lover she no longer wanted. “Wait,” she said. “It’s okay. Come in.”

With a weak smile, Paulo adjusted course again and managed to navigate through the door. Agata’s apartment was decorated to be as close to a cave as possible, although the walls were far too straight and served to make people a bit uncomfortable with their uncanniness. This was the first time Paulo had seen it as he hadn’t visited since she moved our of their shared place last year. He tried not to stare, but a few of his smaller eyes did anyway. The apartment was so oddly boxed-shaped, he almost couldn’t process it. It reminded him of a picture he’d seen of a human dwelling, and he was puzzled as to why anyone would try to recreate that style underwater.

Agata closed the door and shifted in the uncomfortable silence. “How have you been?”

“Um… Alright. You?”

“Fine I guess. A lot of headaches. I think I’m getting more sensitive to light.” It was a common sign of aging, so Agata moved on quickly rather than discussing it further. “Still at The Zoo, but starting to think I might look for something a little deeper.”

“Really?” The question came quickly and contained an eagerness that threw Agata off.

“Maybe…”

Paulo looped a few tentacles through the water as he settled against a rock that was probably supposed to mimic a natural formation but was really just a singular rock sticking up from a flat floor. “It’s just… I’m moving down to i!eea@. My dad wants help with the hatchery.”

“That’s cool.” Agata mentally poked herself, trying to figure out what the emotion she was feeling in response to this was. It seemed almost like disappointment that he’d be further away. That couldn’t be it though, could it? They weren’t dating anymore, weren’t even really friends. What did it matter if he moved fathoms from her?

“Is it?” he asked softly, a few of his tentacles turning toward lavender. “You don’t sound certain.”

She wasn’t. But she could hardly tell him that. Instead, she shrugged a few tentacles. “Probably the headache.”

“Yeah, probably.” Paulo looked around the room, taking in the details. Whoever had built it clearly hadn’t had eyhnus in mind. It was built for something smaller, something more content to float in the empty spaces rather than wanting to cling to rocks. And it was too warm. And the pressure was too low. And there was too much light thanks to having a window, of all the bizarre things to have. He felt certain he’d have a headache just about every day if he tried to live somewhere like it, but he also knew that Agata wouldn’t welcome comments on the matter, so said nothing.

“Say hey to your dad for me,” Agata said. “I always liked him.”

“And he liked you,” Paulo responded, allowing sadness to weave through the words. “My whole family did.” He let it go unsaid that he had as well. That he still did. That, in actual fact, he adored her completely and wanted nothing more than to whisk her down into the depths to breed a new generation of eyhnus. He was certain she didn’t want to hear it now any more than she had wanted to hear it the day she left him. “Anyway… I just wanted to say goodbye.”

Later, Agata would blame the headache for the way she had just smiled and let him go.

It was the next day before she realized that he hadn’t come to say goodbye at all, that what he had actually wanted was for her to protest his leaving.

It was the day after that before she realized she had wanted to protest, that she still did want to protest. But it was too late, wasn’t it? She’d already let him go and now she was just going to have to live with that.

It yet another day before she realized that maybe it wasn’t too late, that maybe he would still want to be with her even though she had let him go the other night. And maybe, she realized, even if it was too late, that didn’t mean she shouldn’t try. She knew, with suddenly clarity, that if she didn’t find Paulo immediately and tell him that if he was going into the abyss, then so was she, that she was going to… Well, not die. Probably. But certainly regret it for a very long time.

She decided she’d go after work. Then another flash went off and she said to herself, “Self, this is crap. I’m outta here.” Even though the day was only half over, she flipped the sign over to the side that read, “Creature not on exhibit. Try back later!” and quit The Zoo Aquatic without notice.

When Paulo’s eyes landed on her as he swam outside his cavern giving it one last look over before turning his key over the landlord, his whole body went still. “You look awfully pink,” he told her, his own body portraying a pleased deep purple hue even though he had been a shade of green that bordered on white just moments before.

Agata stared at him for a moment as her hearts raced each other to see which would explode first. “It’s not cool,” she said.

Paulo tilted his head. “What isn’t?”

“You moving.”

A small smile skirted across Paulo’s lips. “Oh, it’s not?”

“No.” Agata realized she’d been drifting closer and was now near enough to Paulo to grab a hold of some of his tentacles, so she did. “Not if you’re leaving me here.”

“Is that so?” Paulo was grinning now, his skin now so deep a purple as to be almost black. “Well, the landlord already has a new tenant lined up for this place. So are you asking me to move into your weird box?”

“No.” The answer was quiet, blending into the rush of a school of fish that passed nearby. “I’m telling you to take me with you.”

Paulo’s tentacles rubbed against Agata’s, bringing a feeling of comfort and awakening a desire that she’d nearly forgotten. “I’d never be so foolish as to disobey you, my love.”

“You would too,” Agata said, smiling herself as her color rushed from pink through to navy blue.

“Okay, I would. But not about this.”

The pair brought their foreheads to rest together, the eyhnu version of a passionate kiss.

As soon as they could pack up Agata’s belongings, they moved to the depths and found a lovely little cave that was close to, but not too close to, Paulo’s father’s cave. Paulo helped his father at the hatchery, later taking it over completely, while Agata started a small business selling items imported from the human world. Occasionally she gets a camera, and she always removes the flash.

Above image is Sea Creature And Sub by Malvy Westbrook. This and other paintings by Westbrook can be purchased on Fine Art America.

It was given as a writing prompt by my Wording Wednesday project. Other responses can be found in the comments on that site.