September 13, 2011
Sherry’s eyes went wide. “Harry, what have you done?”
“Don’t worry,” Harry said, holding up his hands in the most conciliatory gesture he could muster. “It’s just a broken vase. It’s not the end of the world.”
“Actually, Harry, I’m afraid it is.”
Before Harry could reply, he felt the earth quake. The sky turned blood-red, while the heavens and earth were opened, releasing the wailing spirits of the damned.
“Huh,” Harry said. “I’ll be damned.”
“Pretty much, yeah,” said Sherry.
September 12, 2011
“Let me guess. Looking for the Golden City?”
“Yes, yes,” Arn said. “Finally, a man with answers. Can you tell me how to get there?”
“You have already arrived,” the man said, sweeping his arms. “You’re standing amidst it.”
With that horrible proclamation, a veil seemed to tear away from Arn’s sight. He suddenly beheld pieces of stone, long-forgotten walls, and other manmade shapes that had been twisted up in the overgrowth that lined the King’s Road.
“Yes, the city fell close to a thousand years ago, but stories do not always reflect this,” the man sighed. “The road is only kept clear because it is on a direct route from Eversong to Fillkirke.”
“W…why are you here, then?” Arm mumbled.
“I came here long ago, a young man in search of the Golden City. I learned of its history and fall, and in my twilight years I like to give counsel and aid where I can–learning the languages of the seekers that still come, and offering them a roof overhead before their return.”
August 23, 2011
They called it the Cobh Reel, and it had only been played and danced once.
During Cromwell’s campaigns in Ireland, a contingent of men pledged to support a free Ireland found themselves caught between the Scylla of a Royalist garrison and the Charybdis of an advancing Republican formation. Their musicians, drawn from the hinterlands, had knowledge of the Reel passed down from the ancient time of the Irish High Kings, and proposed it to their commander. He, a coward that planned to watch the battle from a nearby escarpment and flee if it went ill, agreed.
He saw the Republicans and Royalists clash with his own force caught between. He even heard snatches of the music through the din of battle joined.
He did not see the force that emptied the battlefield of men, bearing them wailing off to parts unknown and leaving only blood and armor behind.
The few survivors were maddened by what they had seen–blinded, deafened, or shouting only in strange tongues. Every last one was caked in the blood of their fellows. Cromwell’s lieutenants reported that his forces had been wiped out by an ambush, and they were right enough about that. But as to who had done the ambushing, and what the Cobh Reel had to do with it, well…there was a reason it was only used once.
August 22, 2011
The Corvus family has been one of the most respected in the land for generations, producing great men and women of business before culminating in me, Nyla Corvus, daughter of Lady Galina Corvus and Sir Iain Ulworth of the equally-respected Ulworth clan.
Or at least that’s what I thought.
I grew up on my family’s estate , with the best education money could afford (the source of my poise and excellent social manners, naturally) with occasional visits from eminent relatives and the well-heeled in society. All was well with the world…until Sir Iain learned that I wasn’t his daughter. My own mother had been a degenerate, and had had a…a ‘fling’ with someone of questionable lineage!
I was only half the noble I thought I was, and Sir Iain was furious. He cast me out, with only a paltry sum of money (just one-fourth of his estate!). On my own at the tender age of twenty, I was nonetheless able to maintain a semblance of civilized life. The Corvus name and years of song and dance lessons got me into a highly-regarded bardic college, and my money funded a series of delightful social events.
Then, in my last year at the college, the money ran out–I’d bought my last perfumed pheasant.
August 15, 2011
I’m not a thief. I prefer to be called a ‘kleptomaniacal instrumental-free bardlike entertainer’–it’s much more befitting to my status as the best nonsinging bard this world’s ever seen. Back home, just about everybody agreed that the only place for a dashing, talented bloke like me was the bardic college–they even took up a collection to pay my way. You’d think that after all the trampled flowers, broken gates and, uh, missing pocketbooks that they’d be a little less generous, but hey, they’re a good sort, and know godlike talent when they see it.
Only problem was, the hacks at the O’Doullgh college didn’t agree. They had the nerve to tell me that my kind weren’t allowed, and even called the guard when I did an unsolicited audition under their bedroom windows that night! Turns out my singing voice is the kind of stuff that scares cats and small children, but so what? The main job of any good bard is to sweep women off their feet…who needs singing for that?
So, I was forced to live in the city off the contents of, uh, lost purses and change, until I happened to accidentally thrust my hand into Nyla’s pocket. She was immediately overcome by my devilish charm and ravishing good looks, and what’s more, she was a last year student at the bardic college! She, being the nice lass that she is, agreed to tutor me in the bardic arts (not singing, though–no amount of the milk of human kindness can tame the cat in heat of my voice). And, after her graduation, we joined an acting company, and traveled sharing out gifts with the masses–for a fee, of course.
August 14, 2011
“The hero of my fantasy story has to have a tragic background,” said Ellis. “I was thinking orphan. Raised by the elves but never truly one of the elves.”
“Please,” Mickey snorted. “That one’s written in gold ink on page one of the Big Book of Cliches.”
“Well, how about an exile? A terrible crime he didn’t commit–or did he?–has led his own people to drive him off, and he finds refuge with the elves after saving one of their own, eventually living among them as one of them.”
“Yes, that’s certainly nothing like the Rangers in Tolkien,” said Mickey. “Weren’t you the one who said ‘if all fantasy authors were going to do was rewrite LOTR, they were better off writing stereo instructions?'”
“Fine then,” Ellis shouted, slamming his notebook down. “Let’s hear your brilliant hero backstory, Mr. Critic!”
“Hero is the incarnate form of the tears of a dead god, with the power to heal the world or destroy it.” Mickey mimed an NBA all-star dunk. “Swish!”
July 9, 2011
We offer kindness and care to people with debilitating physical injuries, and often the mental problems that accompany them. What people who have never been deeply injured cannot realize is that, while physical wounds may heal and people may learn to adapt to a missing limb, the mental scars often persevere. It’s incumbent upon us not only as physicians but as human beings to treat the whole patient, not only their missing leg or sulfur mustard burns.
That is the credo that the Hinison Institute is founded upon, put forth by Dr. Samuel Hinison in 1909 and adhered to in the decade and a half since. Many have challenged it, just as many have embraced it. But we hope to offer patients and their families something that other treatments cannot: serenity and peace of mind.
“I can still remember every line in that brochure,” Ashton croaked. “Who’d have thought we’d wind up like this after such a start?”
June 21, 2011
There was a time long ago when sparrows had no personal names. They all addressed one another as “Sparrow,” which caused no end of confusion; in fact, legend held that sparrows did not flock in those days but were strictly solitary, never associating with one another save to bear young. The elders spoke of these as dark days, when four-leg and two-leg predators had their way and no sparrow stood a chance once it had attracted their baleful gaze.
Then the hero known as Ellw discovered the secret to personal names, to telling one sparrow from another, and flocking together for protection in numbers from the four-legs and the two-legs. The tales disagreed as to how Ellw came upon these secrets, and the storytellers were usually at pains to share the different interpretations–the debate it provoked served to draw their listeners in further. Some said that Ellw had discovered these things through natural genius. Others claimed that he had learnt to speak with another creature, such as the cooing bob-heads or the shrieking whitings, who had revealed the secrets. There were even those who claimed Ellw learned to listen to the two-leg striders–to base predators, llew–in a corner of a far-off island, stealing their names for righteous use.
Regardless of which version of the tale was offered, the end was the same: Ellw’s teaching spread far and wide in the World Beneath, and today he was regarded as the father of all sparrows in spirit if not in fact. Some rejected Ellw’s ways, others sought to improve or modify them, but rare indeed were few isolated sparrows who had not heard them.
May 29, 2011
The minor noble had nevertheless a fierce ambition with which he expanded and enriched his realm. But there came a time when his ambition had reached its limit, and he found himself blocked from further expansion by powerful noblemen with the ear of the Emperor.
To continue on his path would mean war, a war which he was ill-equipped to win. Given the choice between contenting himself with his lot or pushing forward, the noble made the ruinous choice to continue. He engaged to his court a certain magician and alchemist from Dejima, seeking to expand his power to the Chrysanthemum Throne through subterfuge and treason, the only outlets left to him.
As his own claim to the throne was weak, the noble sought to clear out all more qualified claimants through a mass poisoning of the imperial court during a gathering of the houses of the realm from which he would excuse himself. The gaikokujin magician warned him against this course but was rebuffed, and set about fulfilling the noble’s desire. He produced a quantity of poison that was tasteless, odorless, and deadly within an hour and delivered it to the noble with a second warning against its use. For his impudence, and to cover his tracks, the noble had the magician executed.
Days before the grim plot was to take effect, citizens of Wazuyashi began to fall violently ill before dying. The poison had spread, and not one member of the noble’s household was spared. Only a few of the farmers in the outermost parts of his small realm were able to escape with their lives, and their tale of horror kept all others at bay.
Wazuyashi remains abandoned to this day, a monument to those whose ambition knows no bounds and whose fates are sealed thereby.
May 25, 2011
“People disappear all the time, especially in Manhattan,” I said. “What makes you think it wasn’t some unregistered Sphynx strangling and eating him in an alleyway?”
“Well, for one, a member of the Dakeg royal family is always accompanied by a bodyguard,” Aria said. “They’ve disappeared too.”
“I read about that,” I said, pointing to the open encyclopedia on my desk. I usually keep it out of sight, as clients tend to get spooked if they suspect I’ve ever read anything longer than a Moxie label. “He’s supposed to be accompanied by a troop of the Galloping Hooves Heavy Cavalry at all times.”
“C’mon, Mitch,” Aria said. “You think a dozen minotaurs from the O’Downl tribe in full dress uniforms armed with ceremonial but fully functional musket-axes are the kind of subtlety you need to move about unnoticed in this town?”
I shrugged. “Ever been on the square at midnight on New Year’s?”
“Dammit, I don’t need you being flip about this! A Dakeg is missing along with six mujina bodyguards, and I’m letting you in on the ground floor.”
Excerpts From Nonexistent Books 