Flash Friday #38: My Mistake

(This is a drabble -- 100 words -- and will only make sense to some of the chat people at FM.  But it was fun to write!)

 

 

DC stepped into the book, dismayed by line of characters doing unaccountably odd things.  She tried to find her people in this mass of insanity. 

Someone sprang by on a Pogo Stick.  "I'm late!  I'm late!"

She snagged him.  "You aren't a rabbit!  This isn't a rabbit hole!  I don't write fantasy!"

"Oh dear."  The man suddenly sprouted long ears.  His nose twitched.  "Now you've done it, haven't you?"

He bounded off and disappeared into a hole.

DC blinked.  "Of course.  My mistake.  This is a Grey world."

She stepped back out and went in search of her own story.

 

100 words

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Flash Friday # 37: The Real Reason Technology and Magic don't Mix

Wizard Elson had begun creating the spell 111 years and 111 days before. The spell was 111,111 lines long, each meticulously memorized because he dared not put something so potent down in script, even in small pieces.

Elson knew the power of one, and he used the power to his best advantage, building and building his spell and preparing to imbue the carefully crafted words with every bit of magic he had hoarded down through those long years.

However, during those 111 years and 111 days, the world had changed dramatically. The people of earth were now ensconced in the age of computers. Many of his colleagues had retreated to caves and tiny islands in abject fear of the new devices, but not Elson. He'd been too busy collecting his spell words and his power, and such a major move would have meant he would need to start over.

Elson, who had for the first 90 years or so imagined himself standing on a mountain top shouting out the spell, now found himself presented with a far better delivery system than the vagaries of the wind.

He had the Internet.

"I'm ready," he told Lexin, his long-suffering assistant. Lexin had been granted his immortality because Elson hated training new assistants, servants and lackeys. Lexin was all three of those in one package. He was also, unfortunately, perpetually 18 and sullen. Of late he'd gotten involved in the goth movement, and at least the black-on-black suited the lackey of a soon-to-be mad wizard ruling the world.

"Ready?" Lexin said with a sigh. He sighed about everything these days.

"At the first minute of the next sunrise, I will begin typing in the spell," he said. He had the joy of seeing Lexin finally look surprised. "You will stay here during the work, give me drink and food when I signal, and say nothing. And no, you cannot play that cursed music, either. You will sit and be silent or you will be an immortal cockroach. Is that clear?"

Lexin, who had been a cockroach on more than one occasion, gave a sullen, but silent, nod.

And so Elson sat in his tower and waited for the sun to rise. Well, actually it was an east-facing apartment in a rather dingy side of town, but that would soon change. He'd suffered for years without using much magic so he would have it all for this one day, this great moment of his triumph.

He booted the computer and opened an email, setting the address to a bit of magic that would take it to every single computer in the world.

As the sun began to rise, he started to type. One word. Another word. He typed each word, knowing that he would never be able to use them again in such a spell. The power he poured into them would burn them out for magic by the time he was done.

He typed and typed. Lexin gave him tea and cookies and held out his hand to catch the crumbs. Lexin hardly paused in the long, laborious work.

Line after line of perfect magic etched its way across the screen, power making the words glow even on the computer. The magic flowed from him and he felt weaker for it, but that would pass once his spell spread through the world and everything came under his control.

His hands trembled and his shoulders ached. His eyes blurred, but he continued to type and type. His heartbeat picked up as he typed out the final line, laughing with glee --

"Sir --"

He snarled at Lexin who ducked and avoided cockroachness by a hair's breadth. A fly on the wall suddenly became a cockroach, however, much to his dismay.

He spun back around to the keyboard and hit the final return, laughing wildly.

He waited.

And waited.

"Typo," Lexin said with a sigh.

Elson looked to Lexin, his breath catching. Then he slowly turned back to the computer, blinking his fuzzy sight back into focus.

"Last line. You typed 'teh' instead of 'the' which is a common mistake --"

Elson didn't even look. He just waved his hand and heard a dramatic cockroach sigh.

Then he pounded his head on teh keyboard for a while.

At dawn the next day he began to collect the new spell, one word at a time. What was another 111 years and 111 days?

Maybe by then he'd have found the perfect mountain top.

751 words

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Flash Friday # 36: One Demand Too Many

One Demand Too Many

 

By Lazette Gifford

 

(This story was published in a slightly longer form several years ago.)

 

"I said never come back." The Sorceress looked up, a feathered quill twitching back and forth in her hand like the tail of an unhappy cat. "I didn't think even you people were this stupid."

 

Four kings and three queens, a veritable bevy of rulers from the Lost Lands of Katkarol, glared.  They were only lost lands because everyone had tired of the endless Katkarolian wars and stopped putting the little clutch of kingdoms on maps.  The rulers realized without trade they were falling behind in technology and wealth.   They came to the Sorceress for help -- and came again and again.  As soon as one prepared to see her, they all converged on her mountain retreat.  She considered retreating a bit farther.

 

The Sorceress silently cursed her late, crazy aunt who -- for some unfathomable reason -- had believed the answer to all problems was immortality, and bestowed the blessing everywhere she passed.  Then the old sorceress had immolated herself in a spell gone wrong. Now her niece had to deal with the rulers, cats and what she suspected might be a damned immortal housefly.  Forever.

 

"Well?" She reluctantly put aside her quill and swatted at the fly.  "What now?"

 

"You haven't solved anything!" King Ethan declared.  He pretty much declared everything, having ruled long past any hope of a normal conversation.  "We came to you for help --"

 

"And I have given help, twice over." They pressed their luck, they did.  She felt an instinctive surge of magic she had to quell by obliterating a poor, unsuspecting roach in the corner of the room. Queen Lavena, who had been about to stomp the insect, looked startled when it vaporized.  "I have given you answers to your problems.  You keep resurrecting them."

 

"We signed a contract," Queen Anabel shouted.  "We paid for magic to settle our war and what did we get?  A piece of paper! A Peace Treaty!  By the Gods, we could have done that much ourselves!"

 

"Then why didn't you?"

 

No one answered as they worked up into a good, loud group tantrum.  Complaining and throwing fits seemed the only things they could do as a team.

 

They might have reason to be upset by her second answer, which had been unorthodox, but definitely magical.  They just hadn't realized the extent of the magic for nine months.

 

"Daughters!" Ethan shouted.  "All daughters for our heirs!  How can we force marriages, form alliances -- get control of the other lands --"

 

Everyone shouted, except for Queen Lavena, who glanced at the floor where a small line of scorched wood marked the demise of the roach.  She began edging her way towards the door.

 

The others ranted about their daughters and the Sorceress's late aunt who had been so much better at this work.  The Sorceress finally lifted her hand and the room fell silent, though not out of respect.  Their mouths continued moving long after they stopped making any sounds, confirming her suspicion they never listened to themselves.  She waited until they finally realized they couldn't be heard.

 

"You asked me to end your wars.  I have given you every reason not to fight.  First I created a treaty fair to everyone. Then I gave you daughters so you could make marriage alliances outside of the Lost Lands.  By the Gods, you people are dumber than a box of rocks!  I don't like wasting my time."

 

They glared.  She finally released the spell, knowing they wouldn't leave until they were done complaining.

 

"Your pledge said you never fail!" King Gulab shouted.  "That was your bond to us."

 

"And you have failed!" Ethan declared, his face blotchy with anger.  "We demand --"

 

"Demand?"

 

Lavena moved quickly towards the door, trying to get past King Kaisov and Queen Eastlyn, neither of whom moved.  She looked panicked.  Wise woman.

 

"My bond was to bring peace to the lands," the Sorceress said.  "It occurs to me the lands have no problem with peace."

 

Two more rulers backed hastily towards the door. 

 

"Don't go."

 

With a wave of her hand the door bolted shut.  Kings and Queens froze in silent shock, realizing the danger as she conjured a map of the world and looked it over. 

 

"Peace for the land, peace for the land.  I won't fail, of course.  I never do.  But there's only one answer left."

 

Her finger moved until she found a tiny spot of brown in the midst of lovely sea of blue.  King Gulab shook his head in honest, silent panic.

 

"Bye-bye."

 

She waved.  The spell was elegant and simple, gathering the entire group -- kings, queens, wives, husbands, concubines, lovers and devoted servants -- and sending them elsewhere.  She left only the hard working councilors who had kept the countries from total disaster and the princesses and their nannies. Immortal girls; Aunt Birdy's spell passed to another generation.

 

The Sorceress watched with pleasure as the royal spellbound travelers reached their destination and dropped less than gracefully into a swamp, one quick plop after another. 

 

"I don't think that was our best idea," Ethan declared, up to his royal ass in muck.

 

"What are we going to do?"  King Gulab asked, his face white where it wasn't already splattered in mud.

 

"I think," Ethan declared, "We should talk democracy."

 

The sorceress felt a surge of pride, knowing she'd finally found the answer.  She couldn't guarantee there would be serenity in the Lost Lands of Katkarol when the princesses came to power, but she would have peace for a few more years.

 

Peace?  Oh yes.  The Sorceress conjured the Peace Treaty, which the rulers might find helpful.

 

The damned immortal housefly chose that moment to annoy her, much to its later regret.  She swatted the fly with the treaty and sent both off to the Island of the Lost Rulers of the Lost Lands.

 

The immortal cats, being wiser than rulers and flies, didn't bother her for the rest of the day.

 

997 words

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Flash Friday # 35: Once Upon A Time (Drabble)

     Once upon a time a little village nestled close to the mountains in the magical land of Patlin. The humans lived in peace with their giant neighbors and everyone enjoyed life ... except for Carl. He grew up boasting he would be better than all the others. He waved his sword at imaginary enemies and claimed he would be famous and not mundane like the rest of them.

By the time he was twenty, people had tired of his boasts and bullying. That was the year Carl finally went to challenge the giants to battle.

He did not survive.

    The End

100 words

 

 

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Flash Friday # 34: Our Lady of the Woods

By the time the guy with the keg of beer arrived, Danny knew he didn't want to be here with a group of hostile football players heading for a drunken brawl. Unfortunately, he'd hitched a ride with Barry and short of walking back to town he was pretty much stuck.

This fun would go on for hours and then his friends would be too drunk to drive home. He thought about taking a car, but they'd probably report him to the police. He'd have a better chance when they passed out drunk.

Staying close would point out that he didn't want to drink and he'd probably end up the brunt of all that growing hostility. He needed to get away, so he went walking in the woods.

The forest came close to the civilized world here in the canyon; scrub and chaparral giving way to oak, cottonwood, ash and finally pine, so different from the stucco and metal buildings just a few hours away. He'd never been out here, though he hadn't told the others. He'd tried to fit in. It wouldn't work. Again.

He wasn't stupid enough to go off the well-traveled trail. He might have put a quarter mile between him and the party and now all he could hear was the occasional birds and things crawling around in the grass. He wasn't fond of things.

Something large came through the trees to his left. Danny saw a splash of brown against the trees and his heart starting pounding as he froze. Bear!

A deer stepped out into the path ahead of him, looked his way for a moment and moved on across the path and into the trees again. Danny's paralysis disappeared as he hurried forward and squinted into the shadows.

Danny watched until the deer was long gone. He had almost lost his mind and followed into the trackless woods. Maybe he should go back and get drunk. Safer.

Motion to the right again caught his attention. He froze --

A young woman stepped clear of the trees, her ankle length brown dress twirling in the breeze and her bare feet immune to the prick of pine needles. Danny started to step away as quietly as he could. His record with pretty young women was not any better than anything else.

"Don't go," she said with a bright smile.

"Hi," he said. "You live around here?"

God, that was lame.

"Yes, I do. I saw you coming and came out to meet you."

"Me? Saw me?" He looked back at the trail overgrown with bushes and trees, and she couldn't have spotted him. Nutcase. Great. He looked at the dress, wondering if it hid a gun or a knife.

"Do you mistrust all the women you meet?" she asked, daring a step closer to him.

He held his ground, despite his better judgment. "Oh yes," Danny said. "I mistrust any woman who shows interest in me. Seems far wiser than thinking they find me appealing."

"What strange people you must be."

Nutcase, he thought again -- but a pretty one, her brown hair the color of bark, her skin tanned from the sun. She had bright green eyes that watched him with curiosity but no dislike. Well, hell. Better to talk to her than go back to the campground and watch the guys get drunk.

"Your friends are crude."

"They aren't my friends," he said, and wished she'd stop saying things that melded in with his private thoughts. "What are you doing out here?"

"Watching the world go by." She waved a hand toward the trees. "Watching over this forest. What do you do out there, in your strange world?"

"Go to school, at least for the rest of this year," Danny leaned against a tree. "Next year -- who knows? If I get a good job over the summer, I'll stick with it. I'm not rich enough to go to college, and not smart enough to get a scholarship. So if I leave school a year early, it's not really going to matter."

"You make such excuses for yourself, don't you? You don't want to quit school."

She touched a nerve and Danny was starting to get a very strange chill up his back.

"You needn't fear me." She stepped closer and Danny hardly dared breathe, and his heart pounded far too hard. He thought for a moment he could see the wild world in her eyes. "You are not like the others. They rarely stop to breathe in the essence of the forest. The deer run from them. I have waited for one like you to come along these trails. I am fey, and all the magic that is left in this world, boy. I protect the forest. Do you believe me?"

"No."

She held out her hand and an owl swept down from the branches and landed on her pale-skinned arm. Danny winced at the thought of those talons on unprotected skin, but she didn't seem to notice. A deer came to stand beside her. A badger settled at her feet, looking like a fat short-legged Siamese cat.

"Do you believe, Daniel O'Shea?"

"Yes," he whispered.

"Good," she smiled like sunlight in a world that had been dark all his life. "Danny I have something to ask of you."

"Ask," he said.

Danny stayed in school that year and the next. He did very well, but he still wouldn't have made it to college except for the anonymous donation to his college fund.

His parents were amazed when he told them he was going to major in Forest Husbandry.

"You've spent all your life in the city, except for a few hours out in the canyons each week," his mother said. "Are you sure this is what you want?"

"Positive," Danny said.

"Why?" his father asked.

"Because I was called," Danny said and laughed. He wondered if they could see the wildness in him yet.

The End

992 words

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