The Mephit's Tales

“Give your fears to the fire,” the old seer called to the passersby. “Give a name to your nightmares and see them consumed! Find the courage to face whatever you must!” And some of the people going by would pause, and scribble something on a scrap of paper, and toss it into the brazier while the old man smiled.

“You, sir!” he called out to one in particular. “Yes, you, traveller. Your heart looks heavy – come, put a name to your innermost demons and consign them to the flames. You’ll feel better for it, I assure you!”

“Have you taken leave of your senses, old man?” a young warrior passing by hissed. “That’s the Dragonslayer, the bravest man in the land! He’s not afraid of anything!”

The man who’d been called the Dragonslayer snorted, cuffing the youth on the shoulder as he came up to the seer’s little stall. “The graveyards are full of people who aren’t afraid of anything,” he observed, tapping the fingers of one hand atop a scrap of paper and turning a charcoal stick in the other.

“Aha.” The seer nodded slowly. “It’s a wise man who grows to your age living by the sword.”

(more…)

“This cost us time,” Davik said. “We need to get moving – but where?”

Taren whirled toward one of the captives, seizing his jaw. “You. Where has your master gone? If there’s an answer in you, we’ll get it one way or another.”

The man had just seen his fellows subdued in the space of half a minute, and sported quite a few bruises himself; he was utterly terrified. But he shook his head against Taren’s fingers. “N-no! I won’t…”

Davik sighed. “He gets credit for loyalty, at least,” he observed, tugging off his gloves and tucking them into his belt.

(more…)

She came to the steaming springs and found a man already there.

Sky-clad, sitting at the pool’s edge with his legs in the water, he was breathing heavily when she arrived. Any doubt she might have had over what he’d been doing vanished within the space of a few more steps.

She felt her cheeks heat. Whatever had possessed the man, to indulge his lusts like that, out here open to the wild? Her breath caught in her throat from the shock of it.

(more…)

None who looked down the lane failed to notice the procession. In the blowing snow, perhaps the mourners themselves were a bit less obvious, the white of their robes against the whiteness of winter, the people made visible mostly my glimpses of hair or skin. If the robes had been all they’d had, they would have been easy to miss indeed.

The quartet of bearers at the procession’s heart, however, seized any eyes that drifted their way, carrying a litter on which lay a form wrapped in a bright red shawl.

(more…)

It was Deck’s first time past the wall, and it was well worth the wait.

Nobody lived in Rian’s Green without knowing about the wall. It was a stone barrier twelve feet high, capped with fence that went higher still, and it surrounded a space five miles across in the middle of the city. All homes, businesses, warehouses, and whatever else were outside the wall.

Inside was virgin land. It wasn’t a park in the sense that most cities knew the word. Those were cultivated, tended, shaped. The Greenwardens, though, maintained only a few rough trails – and even those tended to shift over time. This was wilderness – a small packet of it, to be sure; but it was a place that had been left almost entirely to itself since the day Rian’s Green was first settled.

(more…)

Working for the Duke of Barklan wasn’t a bad lot, really. The Duke was stern and intimidating, and his rage could be a terrifying thing to behold – especially around the full moon, when it could make for a great deal of work mending torn drapes or sheets or clothes, or in the worst cases, moving in new furniture. Everyone feared what that temper might do if it was ever turned against them.

But the Duke had always been careful to send his people away when something roused his ire. He was very careful about that.

(more…)

Everything, Ayden had come to understand, had its price. Sometimes that price was harsh and other times it was gentle, but everything had its price.

That was certainly no less true in magic. And for the greatest and most complex works, many prices might be needed.

He took samples from many plants in many places, and even some animal sources as well. All of these he set to dry. Then, one by one, he crumbled leaves and stems and roots and seed pods into small pieces, or chopped thicker stalks – or organs. One by one, he put those coarse things into his mortar and worked the pestle with careful vigour, grinding each thing in turn to a fine powder before tipping them into bowls, cleaning his tools, and moving on to the next.

(more…)

It was so strange, being back in this park again.

This was where it had all crumbled. So many words said – or shouted – in anger. So much venom it was a wonder anything could grow here at all – yet there it was, in full bloom, with birds singing, just like nothing had happened.

She’d avoided this park for so long. The first time she’d happened by it, afterwards, she’d had the whole scene play out again in her head, so strong it was like he was right there shouting at her again, and she’d had to clamp down on the urge to scream back. After that, she’d taken to charting her days so she never had to come to this part of town. As the days turned to week and the weeks turned to months, and the legal battle raged on, him accusing her of the impossible and denying every one of his own misdeeds, that careful gap had taken less and less effort, until it had been automatic.

(more…)