Recommended reading on WriteHere: Razing Spirits – http://wh.tl/150915-15
Source: Razing Spirits
Tag: faith
Given
Recommended reading on WriteHere: Given – http://wh.tl/150830-2
Source: Given
Ariana by the Sea
Bring Me No Flowers
Trace (4)
4)
Lydia managed to secure Trace a room in the castle after all, but in the servants’ quarters, where no one would bother him.
In fact, she’d given him Walcroft’s room; the man was long gone, and would not be back.
No one would look for him, but Trace kept him in the back of his mind. Given what he’d said about magic, and him being a member of the court, even though a minor one, he might start trouble for Trace with those who’d want to curry favor with the new ruler, whoever that was.
Walcroft’s room was befitting his station; comfortable, but not opulent.
Used to sleeping in strange places on strange beds, he anticipated no problem falling asleep.
Trace had already incanted to make sure nothing was already inside it that would harm him, then did another incant to seal the room so that nothing could get in.
Trace sat on the edge of the bed, bounced the mattress a few times.
It would do for the night.
He rubbed at his temples, took a deep breath, and poured some water from the pitcher on the nightstand.
His hands shook slightly; it wasn’t the first time it happened, but he felt a fresh stab of alarm every time it did, and it was beginning to happen more often.
He had the night servants draw a bath for him, and he sank deep, letting the steam take him away for a time, letting it take away Lydia’s lingering scent from his body.
He smiled at the memory of her boldness, was caught off-guard by the ferocity of his pent-up need; he had not been gentle, and she, taking his cue, had responded in kind.
Their release on and into each other was so strong it was almost painful.
Where her fingers scratched, his bruised; she took the pain like a warrior, and their mouths and tongues locked in a heated side battle for long moments after.
When she finally broke away and opened those large blue eyes, they were glistening, and her smile was one of affectionate triumph.
Trace, it’s all over you. You need someone.
He got out of the tub, dried himself, unpacked and donned his nightclothes, and tried unsuccessfully to remember the last time he’d had a woman before tonight , much less with the intensity he’d taken Lydia.
He felt a twinge of receding sorcery; the pain in his hands from casting remained long after the scars receded.
Summoning, conjuring, incanting, all of it combined was beginning to take its toll on him physically.
The danger he was constantly in, the near misses of sharpened weaponry, of hot and cold bolts of magic, the narrow escapes, the beatings, both given and received, had their own psychic costs.
Constantly staying cool-headed when he wanted to scream and let the fear overtake him instead of pushing it aside, having to stand and face horrors tangible and otherwise, to resist the powers of demonic hypnotism and temptation, the seductive whispers for him to give up, give in, surrender and die in unparalleled bliss, or unparalleled pain, while others fled and took cover, abandoning him to his fate, was wearing him down.
Training with weapons, training with magic, the long hours spent in the dark before sunrise and after sunset, the reading, the studying, the conversations with things long departed that sought to teach, use, control or just take him, led him to begin thinking about the day he would no longer be able to continue doing this.
He’d already done it far longer than he wanted to.
Far longer than he should’ve.
He had more money than he’d ever need; royalty paid generously to bury their indiscretions.
Peasantry had offered him children, daughters, wives, livestock, a percentage of their harvests.
His sea travels had netted him casks of rare wines, well-aged whiskeys, flowered and fruited brandies and potent rum.
His coffers and larders were full, and would remain so for the rest of his life.
And he had no one to inherit any of it.
His brain, in spite of his best efforts, began racing with thoughts.
He reviewed what he’d seen of Lydia just this night: she was practical, tough, resourceful, sarcastic, which spoke to an intelligence uncommon in a serving girl.
Most of them just went with the flow, hoping that one day the hands that pushed them down onto their backs, onto mattresses, onto haystacks, into mud, the hands that shoved them up against walls of damp, cold stone and splintery wooden planks, would one day lift them to their feet and restore their dignity.
Bedraggled, beleaguered princesses-in-waiting, the lot of them.
No, Lydia was not among those at all.
In truth, he was flattered that she wanted to share his life, but he felt it was for the wrong reasons, although wanting to escape a life of harlotry was a legitimate enough excuse.
But he was a mage who walked in dark places; more often than not, blood was spilled, and sometimes it was his.
You need someone.
He heard the words reverberate in his mind as he drifted off to sleep, wanting to conjure a vision of their potential future together, but he was simply too tired to do anymore.
The darkness took him under, into a rare and dreamless peace.
© Alfred W. Smith Jr. 2015
The Marked Princess (3)
Ocean Enchantress
She has the power to summon spirits, but only by the ocean…a mystery she’s going to work on solving, before it might be too late.
Sailing Home
Author’s Note: A small boy is fishing with his grandfather; as they talk about life, thoughts and feelings emerge that make a lasting impact on the both. The story is told from the point of view of the young boy’s memory now as a grown man.
I was sitting with Grandpa as he cleaned his catch with a knife that he always had, seemingly forever.
The skritch it made against the scales as he worked it with expert hands was like the rhythmic slap of waves on the shore.
His deft fingers never seemed to get caught on the hooks, though he showed me where they had, when he was first learning. Callouses covered the tender skin there, but never covered over the lessons.
I watched the shallow water eddy about my ankles as I sat on the boat’s edge, watching the wheeling gulls hoping to steal a fish or two, though grandpa always left them something.
“Hey Grandpa?”
“What is it, sailor?”
“Why do you always feed the gulls?”
“Folks call ’em the rats of the sea. I call ’em good luck.”
“Why? The fish swim away when they see them.”
“Yep. Right onto my hook.” He leaned over to catch my eye and said with a wink, “Fish ain’t too bright.”
Then he’d laugh his gentle laugh, and give me a fish head to examine. Somehow, they always looked surprised to be dead.
A gull wheeled in close, and I threw the head into the water to watch them dive and scramble and chase, until finally a victor flew away, three others in pursuit, but there were always others, and they flew in close and bold, curious to see if I held any more treats, but I splashed at them, and they wheeled off, calling me names in their language.
I ran my fingers over the scales of one that was close to me, but didn’t pick it up. The gulls were big, and I was small. I wasn’t afraid, but I didn’t want to test how far they’d go.
“I wonder what they think about when you pull them up…” I said.
“Don’t guess they think much at all.”
“Why?”
He’d finished cleaning the fish, and walked slowly over, and carefully sat next to me, and dipped his ankles in the water next to mine, and the water sloshed in harmony around all the ankles now, and gently swayed the boat beneath our weight.
“I guess they’re in a lot of pain, and just want it to end…” his eyes got far away when he said that, and I knew who he was thinking about.
“Like Grandma?”
He nodded, and took off his glasses, cleaned them with his shirt tail, and dabbed at his eyes with his sleeve.
“Yeah, like Grandma.”
He looked at me then, and put his arm around my shoulder, and we watched the gulls for a while.
“And like me.” he said.
“What hurts?”
“Nothing in particular, and everything in general,” he chuckled.
I smiled, not fully understanding, but he knew that.
He cleared his throat:
“Life’s a lot like a boat,” he said. “You start out in a small craft, and as you travel further out, you take on more, and the craft’s got to get bigger, has to be able to hold all you get. But if you get too much, it slows you down and the journey takes longer. You make more mistakes because you’re always making adjustments for the things you have. You with me…?
“Yes, sir,” I said, proud of myself that I actually sort of got it.
“And then the storms come, and the stuff you have can help weigh you down, and keep you steady, or it can shift and help the waves flip your boat. If it does that, which is most of the time, you not only lose the things, you lose the people too, the people who’ve helped you to become a good sailor. Still there?”
I nodded, swinging my feet in the surging surf, making foam, dangling a piece of seaweed from my toes.
“And then, eventually, you have to get where you have to be. You have to take the boat home, and get rid of the stuff, because it’s just too much. Some of it you drop off along the way, and some of it you unload when you’re back. The journey’s over, and your stuff’s gone, and you’re just glad to be home, in the quiet. You like that?”
“Sometimes,” I said. “When I’m reading, or thinking about stuff.”
“You thinking about this?”
I looked up at him, because his voice had changed. “Yes, Grandpa, I am.”
He tousled my hair, and laughed his gentle laugh again. “Good man.”
“Grandpa?”
“Hmmm?”
“Are you sailing home, now?”
“I am, son.”
“To Grandma?”
He sighed, and looked out at the setting sun.
“To her, and a whole bunch of other folk you don’t know,” and his sleeve moved again, but I couldn’t see if he was crying.
“You getting rid of stuff?”
He chuckled at that, and again, I smiled with him, unsure.
“Most of it’s gone now, but there’s a little more to go.”
“Oh. Wellll, could you tell her I said hello?” As I spoke I tried to write the word “Grandma” in the mud with my big toe, but the waves kept pushing new mud over it. I wrote it anyway, knowing I’d finished it, that it was still under there somewhere, and it would last for all time.
He smiled, a bit sad, “Ok, sailor. I’ll do that.”
We gathered up our catch.
As we walked home, me with my small sack, him with the bigger one and the fishing rods, I turned to look back at the empty boat, sitting empty on the stilling water, in the fading light, and thought about the time he wouldn’t be there with me.
I stopped, and gestured for him to bend.
He did, and I kissed his cheek.
He straightened, a bit puzzled.
“What’s that for?”
“In case you sail for home before I say good-bye.”
*********************************
I was cleaning my catch, and he sat on the edge of the boat with his ankles in the water.
I threw him a fish head, and he caught it, turning it around to look at it as the gulls grew bolder.
Satisfied he found what he was looking for, he kicked his feet, making foam, and hummed a tune, looking at the sea birds.
He watched them for a time, turning the fish head like an hourglass, but he didn’t throw it.
The blue of the sky deepened as the sun dipped toward the horizon.
“Hey Grandpa?”
“What is it, sailor….?”
© Alfred W. Smith Jr. 2014
In the Temple of Her Heart (Chapter 2)
Arlun encounters a fellow traveler, and the journey changes…
Beyond Panic 