Tag: fantasy

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     I can’t wear the same outfit in public twice. Not because the tabloids will judge me, but because nothing I wear outside of the ten-foot high electrified fence that guards my house ever makes it back in one piece. Once, when I was feeling particularly masochistic, I looked up how much scraps of cloth that had touched my body were going for on eBay, and it made me sick.

     My hair goes for more, though, which is why I have so little of it left. Most of my money goes towards wigs, to hide the bloody mess that is my scalp, and makeup to hide the blotchy mess that is my skin.

     The line between a blessing and a curse is thin as the thread on a fairy-tale spindle. (more…)

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     In my grandfather’s time, they say there was a sword in the body of a man―no, wait, that’s not right. Was it a man in the body of a sword? Or…. Ah, I remember it now―it was a woman. Yes! A woman’s spirit in the body of a blade, a geas blade grandfather used to call it. What’s that you say, lad? Aw, come on now, I might be well into my cups, but I know this story as well as the back of my hand. There was a woman’s spirit in that sword, yessiree! I’d bet my britches on it.

     What was the woman doing in the sword, you ask? Aw, shucks, I dunno, why do people magic anything these days? Here’s how the story goes, and don’t you be interrupting until I’ve finished the telling, all right?

     So where was I? Ah, yes. The sword! But I can’t talk about the sword till I talk about Lord Eller. Lord Eller was Old Rathan’s son, and he was as cruel of a lord as you’ve ever seen. He’d gone to wenching when he was barely of age, and not all the lasses was willing, if you catch my meaning. Well. Ain’t nobody can say nothing: Old Rathan’s too old to see what’s going on under his nose, and the good lady of the house―well bless her soul, she’s already done passed on. So Lord Eller is the Lord and that’s that, though the lad is barely seventeen, and has about as much wits as a headless chicken.

     One night, the Lord is taking to picking on one of the new maids, a young lass, maybe, oh, twelve or thirteen. Just a baby really―young enough to be my daughter, or your sister! Well. The Lord goes to wenching on her, but this maid was strong spirited, and a quick one, too. Tries to give the Lord the slip, running through the manor all willy-nilly. The poor lass, she’s new to the place and she don’t know where she’s going. She’s sending vases and tapestries to fall as she flies down the halls, takes too many wrong turns, and ends up in the armory.

     How’d she get all the way to the armory you say? Aw, I dunno, maybe it was fate―maybe it was dumb luck. Shut up and listen, would ya? It’s a good tale, and I reckon by your wide eyes and the white knuckles around your mug that you be wanting to hear the rest!

     So there’s the Lord and the maid in the armory. She’s shaking like autumn leaves, poor little chit. And here’s the Lord, stinking like ale―the brute!―towering over her like an ogre. He makes a grab for ‘er, but he’s not very quick, being drunk and all, and it gives the lass an opening. The lassie isn’t thinking. In desperation, she reaches out and grabs the first thing she finds―yep, you guessed it, lad! She found the geas blade you were asking about.

     My Grandfather says the sword took right over in the lass’s hands. It glowed a bright blue, and then, like it had a mind of its own, it swung through the air in a ringing arc and plum removed Lord Eller’s head from his spine―kkkkkrack!―just like that. Can you just imagine it? Oh, to have a sword such as that. I have a few people I’d like to relieve of their swelled heads, if you catch my meaning!

     What happened to the maid, you say? Aw, poor lass. Well, what’dya expect, she was hung the next day for killing the Lord. Oi, don’t look at me like that! There wasn’t nothing no one could do about it. It’s a shame, really…should have been the sword that was hung, and not the unwitting lass! But how do you hang a sword? Ah-ha…well… As for the sword, grandfather said the thing was melted down and reforged into a bell for the church. Every time the damn thing chimed, it sounded like a woman weeping.

     Eventually, the townsfolk took down the bell ‘cause they couldn’t stand the sound of it―word was it would ring of its own accord. All night long, that bell would go to weeping and wailing, tolling from its perch in the chapel, keeping the poor people awake. Huh? You say the townspeople didn’t deserve to sleep well? Ah, lad, you don’t know what you’re talking. It’s like I said, weren’t nothing no one could do for the lass that was hung―and if you’d have been there at the time, you would have kept your mouth shut too, lest the Lord kill you, or take your own sisters into his service. Then where would you be?

     Now hush and let me finish the tale! The townsfolk took down that bewitched bell, and they melted it down again into coins, or wheel spokes, or maybe…. Yes, I think they melted her down into hinges―hinges for doors and such. Yes, I’m sure of it! And every time the doors creaked opened on those hinges, they sounded like the low moan of a mourner. That’s what grandfather said, yessiree.

     Aw, I didn’t mean to kill yer buzz there lad, but you said ya wanted to know about the blade, and so I told you. I know it’s a sad story, but don’t blame me if you didn’t like it! Blame grandfather…or blame my cups. Mmmm. Speaking of which, be a good lad and pass the pitcher o’ ale now, would ya? Ah, that’s better, my boy, that’s better. It’s best to forget the things we can’t control, and can’t quite name…

 

END

 

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Rachel Rose Teferet graduated from Rutgers University with a BA in Fine Arts and a penchant for photoshopping the world with her eyes. Her work has been published by Page & Spine, Slink Chunk Press, From Sac, Necon E-Books, Sierra College Literary Magazine as the winner of the 2016 Flash Fiction Contest, and more. Her play has been performed at Synthetic Unlimited in Nevada City, California. Her website is lettersandfeathers.wordpress.com, and her Twitter handle is @art4earthlings.

 

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Dust and rot fill her mouth as she eats.  The food is cloying.  It does not sit well.  She is mostly alone but for the sycophantic phantasma who surround her, constantly back-combing her nerves.  

In her palace of filthy black, her bony fingers strain the muck, searching for someone who will not cower when she smiles.  Her hands bring back nothing but detritus and her heart remains parched and un-whole.

“It has to be a prince,” she tells the fades as they clown and cartwheel around her. (more…)

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     Every year on the eve of the full Capricorn moon is Saturnalia; a celebration of freedom, a display of unrestricted acceptance and unity. The popular and the pariah become one. The gods and goddesses descend from their lofty palaces in heaven to join in on the jubilation. Even Cronus himself takes off his crown for the night and feasts.

     Sofea finishes her daily rituals to her goddess, Aphrodite. Outside her window, the street signs are being decorated with homemade paper lanterns, and her neighbors are stringing fairy lights through the willows near the pond. The sun has not quite reached its zenith, and she realizes she finished her daily rituals much earlier than she has been the past several months. She is vaguely aware that she should be somewhere else—perhaps down the street—helping prepare the cakes for the festivities later on. She continues to gaze out the window, just for a few more minutes, and plans her Saturnalia, the night of spontaneity.
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The Differences between Caribou and Man

My boots feel stuck, attempting to grip the crackles of ice, as I take a walk through the bar strip off of Allen Street. I still wonder how Caribous feel, as their hooves transform into icepicks, trying to piece through the frost just to move a few feet each time. We are both walks of mammalian life, we both need the air of to breathe, but that is where the similarities end. The migration of the caribou is for survival, as they nomadically roam from home to home, not settling in one place for too long. (more…)

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#4

 

Sister Midnight, Queen Midnight, Red Midnight, Red Queen, Carrion Queen, Attic Queen, Sister Twin, Sister Dusk, Sister Eclipse, Sister Arson, Sister Nero, Queen Red, Queen Blank, Queen Tremor, Sister One, Sister Two, Sister of the Velvet Basements, Queen of the Back-broken Chairs, Queen of the Rabid Statuary, Sister of Fortune, Sister of Grace, Sister of Obscurer Elements, Queen Tarot, Queen Serpent, Queen Mourning, Sister Morning: (more…)

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Maevelin knew she had to save her failing brother. He was the only family she had left since her parents had died when they were children. Even though she was only four years younger than he was, he had practically raised her, himself.

She couldn’t just allow Maedri to die.

“Maevelin, we all have a time to go.”

“Don’t talk like that. I will find help. Surely there’s something I can do,” she insisted. “The herbs and potions the healers are giving you aren’t doing anything to cure your ailment. Surely, I can find something better. Something to cure you of this mysterious illness.”

“I would be more content if you would stay, sister. Sometimes you cannot fight fate.”

“Sometimes it’s up to you to change it,” she protested. “I won’t let you die. You don’t deserve it,” she protested, tears running down her cheeks. “Wait for me, I will come back. I promise.” She thought if anyone knew how to save her brother it may have been the strange oracle that everyone avoided. (more…)

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     A city of temples, home to a teeming multitude of gods and goddesses, each with a compound of courts and monasteries, with tombs of saints and sites of miracles, a holy city where religious endowments own and occupy most of the real estate, Ringdongdu might well be called the city of bells, from the constant ringing, tolling, chiming, striking, and tinkling of bells of every tone and timbre, a carillon spread over acres of urban landscape.

     Of extreme antiquity, founded by the legendary King Ringdong, who laid out the city with help from a host of industrious angels, Ringdongdu is the cosmological center of the world. Its religion lacks a name and dogma. Believers say no other exists. Like a magical loom that works on its own, their faith unravels and reweaves all other faiths, from primitive demons to the most advanced theological concepts. The people call their highest deity Lord and epithets including the Many-Layered One, which hints at a range of divine ideas, complex and contradictory. Yet serene amid this welter, they dispense a threefold blessing: “May you find peace, love and joy.”

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     Liam was jailed in the basement of Jedburgh Castle to await his execution by guillotine. He had been the housefather of Bethany Orphanage, and he was innocent of the crimes charged. He had no alibi witnesses. The reigning noble did not believe his defense.

     The guillotine would be quick and his suffering minimal. For that, Liam was thankful. But he wanted to live. Why should he die for a crime he did not commit?

     A grey man with a hollow yellow face snuck into the castle jail. He believed Liam’s story of innocence. He wanted to help. “On the day of your execution,” the man said, “I will release your ankle stocks, and loosen the wooden lunette around your neck.” Liam smiled. (more…)