We do not know how the hell the Gay Pirate Plate was first acquired. This being a point of contention is actually pretty plot-relevant; the saga of the Gay Pirate Plate began with my grandmother and her sister, who, for some ungodly reason, both BADLY wanted the Gay Pirate Plate and believed it to be rightfully theirs.
I should back up, firstly, to establish: The Gay Pirate Plate is the cheapest, tackiest, ugliest plate in existence.
It is in no way a collector’s item. It is physically impossible for it to complement anyone’s decor, because the colors in it are garish. It’s just a ceramic plate with a gay pirate painted on it, and the painting is, this cannot be emphasized enough, extremely bad.
(How do we know the pirate is gay if he’s just posing on a plate? Listen. Fully 100% to stereotype, but he is. He is gay. There’s an energy. That pirate is a flaming homosexual. That pirate has sex with men and does it frequently. That pirate is fucking gay, all right, he just is.)
Anyway. The point is that this is an extremely cheap and ugly plate with a poorly-executed painting of pirate on it who is like a nine on the Kinsey scale.
My grandmother and her sister fought a blood feud over this plate for their entire lives. It would be on the wall in my grandma’s house, and then her sister would visit, and then it would be gone. She’d visit her sister and the plate would be on the wall and her sister would pretend it had always been there. She would steal it back, hang it up, and, when her sister visited, pretend it had always been there. This continued for DECADES.
When the sister died, the Gay Pirate Plate lived triumphantly in my grandmother’s house. And then my grandmother died. And my aunt, who had lived with her and been her carer throughout her life, rightfully inherited their house.
We visit my aunt after the funeral and stay with her for a week or two.
Me, my sister, and our dad. Her brother.
The three of us look at each other. We don’t say anything. We studiously avoid making eye contact with the Gay Pirate Plate mounted proud and ugly on the wall. We notice one another studiously avoiding looking at it. We notice one another noticing. We say nothing. We come to a silent consensus. We pack up to leave. We get in the van. Our aunt comes out to say goodbye. I loudly announce I need to use the restroom before we leave. She obviously stays outside to continue talking to my dad.
I take down the Gay Pirate Plate, stuff it under my oversized sweatshirt, go outside, and get in the van. She happily waves goodbye as we drive off.
Two days later my dad gets a phone call that opens with hysterical laughter and “You FUCKING ASSHOLE did you seriously STEAL THE PLATE–”
Anyway. The gay pirate plate lives in my dad’s house currently.
But he’s trying to get me and my sister out to visit him. And plate mounts are cheap.
The rules of Gay Pirate Plate are simple by the way.
The plate must be clearly and openly displayed in a place of great prominence whenever it is in your possession. When it is not in your possession, the display piece must remain in place. This is where you would put your gay pirate plate, IF YOU HAD ONE.
No active steps may be taken to prevent the theft of the Gay Pirate Plate. That goes against the spirit of the game, as does attempting to hide it.
The plate MUST be stolen and cannot be gifted or removed with permission. Should you witness attempted theft of the Gay Pirate Plate you are required to intervene and return it to its place.
Every time your sibling successfully absconds with the Gay Pirate Plate, you must respond with indignant fury, as if you have not also repeatedly and blatantly stolen the Gay Pirate Plate.
The pepper grinder is small and copper with a brass knob at the top that allows you to hand-turn the grinder. You’re never sure where you picked it up – it’s not a gift or a purchase, otherwise you’d have the saltshaker to match – but it feels right sitting next to your fruit bowl. Logically, it should go by your stove where the rest of your spices have congregated in a misshapen mob, getting stained by Bolognese and fry oil. However, your fruit bowl is a stoneware behemoth you found in the crawlspace under the house, and the shine of the copper next to the earthen tone reminds you of spending long hours excavating in the Italian countryside as an archeology sophomore in college (about two years before you became an English major), so it stays.
Then, of course, you’re too busy to eat fruit before it rots and the bowl sits empty- barring a lemon or lime here or there- and that’s no good either because it takes up over half of the counter to the right of your sink and backs up against the blank wall at the end of your galley kitchen where you can’t hang anything because both the fridge door and the pantry door swing into it.
So when your mother gives you another worry stone for your birthday – rose quartz this time, which means she thinks if you’re not worried about being single in your 30s, you should be – you hold it while staring out the kitchen window, drinking coffee over the sink, and when you finish the last sip full of grounds you toss the mug in the sink and the rose quartz in the bowl. It clinks loudly and then settles between those two lemons that you need to find a use for before the weekend, lest they go hard and unusable except for cleaning your sink.
After that, belated birthday wishes show up in the mail, and you can’t bring yourself to throw them out. Your Aunt Sylvia sends a postcard from Peru that she’s been holding onto for “a special occasion” for the last five years and, -aren’t you lucky?- you’re the special winner of a National Geographic photo of Machu Picchu. And you’re not a monster. The card may not hold the same significance to you as it did to her, but the thought does and so tucked between the bowl and the wall it goes where the very tippy top of the ruins rise over the brown rim, as if from the depths of a valley.
Then your college roommate (the archaeology one who made you want to do the study abroad program in the first place), Audra, sends you a shard of Roman pottery and a note in Latin that you can’t read but understand perfectly by the coffee stains littering the edge of it. The sight of the coffee stains warms your heart more than the pottery shard, so both go in the bowl where you can occasionally glance at them as you drink your own coffee over the sink and reminisce over study dates and the few regular dates you shared before her passion stole her abroad.
(And if the clay and the rose quartz lie next to each other and you suddenly think of marriage and nostalgia and her stoneware eyes that led you to save the same-colored fruit bowl from the depths of your house in the first place, it’s a natural series of associations and doesn’t prove your mother right at all.)
The driftwood isn’t from anyone. Your agent calls to tell you that you won an award for one of your books. The driftwood is in your hand, scavenged along the Potomac from amidst the pebbles deposited by the last storm, and it’s suddenly your only tether to reality as she explains what this means. It means reviews and author readings and an interview - of you! – and a guaranteed sequel. The stick is smooth under your fingertips and you wave it in the air is if it’s a wand in an attempt to burst your bubble.
Only you’re home the next moment and you’ve still got the driftwood in your hand and your bubble is unburst. It feels significant that you brought it back with you so you put it across the top of your fruit bowl as if it’s the award itself. You have a decaf coffee to celebrate that evening and see that stick guarding your rose quartz and your pepper grinder and your pottery shard and you think, I’m doing okay. And the joy you feel from that is so powerful that your next thought is, I’m happy.
Which is, of course, when the power goes out.
Outages happen all the time in a block as old as yours. Before, you’d see it as free time and go lay down in bed and wait for the world to relight or for morning to come. But you don’t have time now. Your agent is planning to call you soon. You are an award-winning author and you have things to do before your 42% battery runs out.
You make your kitchen your base and set the six pillar candles on your counter, lighting them one by one. They’re the rainbow ones from last June your mother bought you in a sweet yet confusing show of support and you’ve never found a special enough occasion to burn them. You smile at Machu Picchu peaking over your fruit bowl. Your aunt is the one who taught you about special things.
Then your agent calls and, while you’re hammering out the details, you see that the candles are about to drip colored wax onto your white, plastic countertops and even though you really want to replace them, you can’t afford to (at least until you sign a contract). You snatch up your driftwood and use it to scoop the wax from the sides until a kaleidoscope of color is collected and you have to keep spinning it to keep it from dripping.
You blow on the hot wax, thinking of Audra and your family and the future your agent is painting for you until it cools. Then you place the driftwood over the bowl where it belongs.
It’s just a bowl. Of course, it’s just a bowl. It does a good job of taking up a huge amount of your counter and of holding onto things you’d forget in a junk drawer. It looks good in the candlelight, warm and earthy and welcoming with the three bright lemons scattering amongst your treasures. It’s nice to see reminders of your loved ones every morning from the summit of Machu Picchu to your worry stone to that shard of pottery, but it’s not anything more.
At least it’s not until you put your driftwood, wax-covered wand back and think, I wish I could see her.
The flames of the candles sputter and turn gold, radiating a pure and steady light that could never come from a mundane fire. Your agent stops herself midsentence, apologizes, promises to call you back when she has a better connection, and hangs up. The bowl rattles and shivers and you take a step back as your copper pepper grinder tips over. You must not have put it together correctly because it spills when it does, little peppercorns that roll across your counter towards the edge.
You expect to hear the dried pepper hit the ground, but it doesn’t. Each peppercorn stops unnaturally.
G…
R…
A…
N…
T…
E…
D…
What?
The candles splutter and return to normal flame. Your bowl is still. The lemons seem less appetizing than they had a moment ago, but your treasures are still there and lovely.
You pick up your Roman shard.
Your phone rings. Audra. Although you can’t imagine talking to anyone after what you’ve just witness, your body isn’t on the same page. Muscle memory and association has you answering before the second ring.
“Mal, I got the job!”
“…The job?”
“Oh, I didn’t tell you. Not because I was hiding it! But nobody ever gets it and I didn’t want you to get your hopes up and then my hopes up—”
Her rapid-fire word is grounding. You laugh. “Because my hopes are your hopes.”
“Obviously,” she says. She takes a deep breath. “I got the Smithsonian. The curator role. The job.”
She’s coming home. The realization hits like electricity, raising all the hair on your arms and almost making you drop the shard. You blink quickly to stop the automatic tears.
“Mal?”
“I’m here,” you say. You go to put the pottery shard back with more care than you ever have, as if it’s Audra herself. She can probably hear the way your voice trembles, but you can’t compose yourself. “Oh, I’m so happy. When?”
“In a month. I have to hand over some current projects, which should only take a week, but finding someone to take over my classes might take a little longer, but not too long! I promise. After that it’s packing—”
You put the pottery shard back in the bowl as gently as you ever have. Audra’s voice is the sweetest music as she says goodbye, in a hurry to start packing. You hear that music long after she hangs up. Your knees are weak. She’s coming home. She’s coming home. Thank whatever god, she’s coming home—
Your fingers touch something coarse and feather-light. Your brow furrows as you pull a scrap of ancient paper from the fruit bowl.
You’re welcome.
“Oh,” you breathe.
The lights flare as the power returns.
---
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Thanks for all the support! Excited for another year on this blog. I'll probably make a mushy post about it at some point, but...EIGHT years! And counting! What an amazing time this has been :D
well yeah i have a pet hydra and it only has one head. i'm not going to cut its head off just to make it look cooler, you asshole. that's seriously unethical. and i'm not letting you cut its head off either. if you really want a hydra with multiple heads, you should go for a rescue- but if you want your pet to look cooler at the cost of its physical health, maybe you shouldn't get any kind of pet at all. no, the hydra's not for guarding my evil tower, it's my pet. have you ever heard of a pet? like a puppy or a kitty? you think i can't defend my evil tower by my self?
"'What if it gets aggressive?' Why would he get aggressive, I'm planning to spoil him rotten and teach him tricks so he doesn't get bored and socialize him properly so he won't be scared by new things. Why is this so hard for you. Stop being weird about my pet."
*two days later, setting a new skull in their crypt wall* "Well, HE was certainly an asshole, wasn't he, baby? Yes he was! But he'll never bother anyone else again. And I'll keep you safe from horrid people like him, darling. Now, who wants snackies?"
It starts with you hearing the soft scrape of claws on the wooden planks - the ones that cover the floor of your closet.
The first night you heard this, you trembled beneath your blankets despite the warmth they provided. You were wide-eyed and kept a bat clutched to your chest like it was a sword. However... after a week of the nightly visitor’s presence and nothing else actually happening - just the soft sounds of scratching and gentle breathing behind the closet door - curiosity replaced the icy fear in your heart.
You sat in bed one evening and waited for the noises to start, as they always did soon after the clock struck midnight. That night, you had a plan. Clutching a spare blanket, you cracked the closet door open. A single glowing eye blinked back at you through the pitch black. It was large, luminescent. A strange, quiet blue. Not the color of eye you expected from a monster.
You didn’t scream, and it didn’t growl. You both just… stared. Frozen.
“Hi,” you whispered, heart hammering in your chest so hard it ached. “I brought you a blanket. You must be cold in there, it's the coldest place in the house...” A deep, gravelly purr answered you. You gingerly left the blanket at the threshold, and in the morning, it was gone.
As more nights passed, little gifts were exchanged between the two of you. Dried flowers, shiny buttons, and smooth pebbles appeared on your windowsill. You would leave food, puzzles, and soft objects for the creature in return.
The monster in your closet never stepped fully into your room, but its silhouette, outlined by the small nightlight in the corner of your room, started to linger longer in the doorway. Its breathing was slow and calm as you hummed lullabies to it each night.
“I think you’re sweet,” You declared softly into the darkness of your room one rainy evening. “You don’t scare me anymore.”
A clawed hand emerged from the pitch black of the closet, hesitantly pushing the door open a little wider. The closet door creaked in protest of the movement. You watched for a moment, transfixed, then reached out your own hand slowly. You touched its rough, warm palm with your fingers.
“You can come out if you want,” you coaxed sweetly. “You don’t have to hide from me... I won't hurt you.” The monster hesitated, processing your words, but only for a moment. It stepped out of the closet, into your room, as you took a step back to accommodate it.
The monster was tall, easily towering over your form. The creature was odd, strange, yet beautiful in a way that defied words. Its eyes were soft and it gave you a crooked smile with too many teeth, which should’ve scared you, but you found it oddly endearing. The expression on its face was awkward and hesitant. It blinked slowly, nervously, like you were more dangerous than it - this creature with teeth and claws that could’ve easily ripped through your flesh like paper.
“You’re not what I expected,” You giggled as you looked up and down the creature’s form, "you're beautiful." You took in this mysterious creature, then looked up to meet it’s eyes with a smile of your own, lips curled upward in wonder. The creature startled at the sound of your laughter, enchanted by the noise.
"You...are bewitching." The monster croaked out, its own hand finally responding as it wrapped around yours. Its sharp claws carefully brushed against your soft skin once its hand fully engulfed your own, the creature afraid to hurt its newly acquired treasure.
The Princess can only be awoken from her slumber by her true love, but countless Princes have failed to do so. When a poor townsman is successful, the royals try to dispose of the man and convince the Princess that one of the Princes is her true love.
You’ve seen dead people before. Your family follows old paths – before and after. There have been hallowed eves where the door remains unlocked and the consequences come creeping down the hall to your room. You learned early that moving isn’t an indicator of life – it’s an indicator of purpose and those two things are not synonymous. There are crucial things that mark the living, and even when the unliving pretend, they can never quite fool you.
That’s why you know the woman in the glass coffin isn’t dead.
It still takes a long time to convince yourself to kiss her. It’s been…years? Yes, it must have been years since you last saw those ruby red lips and that cloud of raven-black hair. Her eyelashes fan across her cheeks and there’s a red rose carefully clasped between her still hands. Those hands once reached for you, accompanied by her sweet voice, inviting you to grab hold lest you stay trapped in the tunnel forever. The longer you stare, the easier it is to see her pulse in the basin of her throat and the shallow rise of her chest.
Of all the lands you’ve traveled, there hasn’t been a single one where kissing a sleeping woman on the lips was considered appropriate.
“You can do this, Lexi,” you whisper. The trees over the glen murmur quiet agreement. It’s nearing the end of golden hour – the next procession will be here soon. The fairytale lighting is the only thing keeping the worst of your anxiety away. It’s like a dream this early in the morning. Only a dream. You twist your travel cap in your hands, squeezing your eyes tight. “You can apologize after.”
When you open them, the first notes of birdsong pierce the air.
You drop your cap and grab the edge of the glass. You’ve always been slow to decide and quick to act. If you just keep moving, you won’t have to think about how she might be mad or offended or disgusted—
You miscalculate the lid. You’re a jack of all trades and you assumed something as expensive as a gilt glass coffin would have hinges. It doesn’t. The lid slides off the edge of the platform. Your nails don’t find purchase on glass, of course. There’re flowers scattered all around her resting place, there’s a chance it won’t—
Crash!
The birdsong chokes off. A man yells from the woods behind you. Someone clicks and the pounding of hooves draws closer and closer—
You swoop down and press your lips to hers. They’re cold and unyielding for one moment, two moments—
Then her mouth softens and you pull back as she gasps for air.
Breaking an enchantment feels a bit like falling through a frozen pond. Snow White breathes like a diver surfacing for air and then exhales a frost so bitter that it freezes the breath in your lungs. The spell she was under wasn’t done by accident like you’d hoped. There’s malice in the bite of cold that lingers against your skin. You drink it down in painful sips, pulling the shroud from her aura until her eyes begin to flutter open.
You want to run. You’ve whispered enough twinkling knowledge to her that she’ll know what you did to free her. There are only two antidotes in the world and you whispered their recipes to her over and over until she could recite them from memory. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, about to leave her in a prickling castle with that thing for a stepmother—
You don’t run. You’ve done that all over the world to see every sight you ever dreamed of. Only when one wonder remained in your heart did you finally return to see it.
Come on, darling. Show me what I’ve been dreaming of. Then punch me in the face.
Snow White breathes. Her eyelashes quiver. Her lips close and then part. Is she saying your name? You lean close. Le—Le—
The world plunges into darkness. At the same time, the smell of onions fills your nose. Fuck. You’ve been trapped in enough produce bags to know what’s happened. Your hands fly up to the mouth of the bag that’s been thrown over your head, and you wedge your fingers between it and your neck just in time before the villain behind you cinches it too tightly. That’s the only reason you don’t suffocate as rough hands yank you away from Snow White and throw you onto a hard, wooden surface.
“Take her back to the castle,” a man growls.
Another asks, “The castle? Wouldn’t it be better if she gets lost in the woods--?”
“What happened the last time you let someone get lost in the woods, Huntsman?”
“…yes, sir.”
The Huntsman. His name is the only thing that stills the syllables twisting between your teeth. You chew them as the cart lurches into motion. How is he still alive?
You imagined Snow White would have taken care of him already.
----.
The children of your family often get swept away in stories. All the ancient knowledge is heavy against the thin crucible of a baby’s mind – it’s not uncommon to hear of a cousin or sibling dissolving between dusk and dawn.
So that’s what you’re doing the eve you turn twelve after learning about the razor edge between night and abyss. You’re dissolving. The night drips like syrup from your ears and abyss flows out from between your lips in thin rivulets. Your eyes are trained on the stars as you stagger through the woods, pulled and spun around by the knowledge your brain can’t quite accept.
(Like a lunatic, you will one day say fondly. Foaming at the mouth.
Like a fairy, she will correct. A long pause. A rather messy one.)
The little girl crouched between tree roots is the only thing that doesn’t run when you lurch into the clearing. She’s wearing a silver nightgown that catches every bit of the moon’s light but still doesn’t compare to the radiance of her face. It’s shocking enough that you stop and let your head fall onto your shoulder so your eyes can fix on her rather than the sky.
“I think I should eat you,” you say in a language you don’t remember learning. “Both nights and abysses eat stars.”
“Stars chew through both,” the little girl says. For cowering alone in the woods, she doesn’t sound very afraid. Her voice is strident. Confident. “And even if it were true, little girls don’t eat other little girls.”
Your eyes fix on hers. (They’re a beautiful deep b--) “Is that what I am?”
“Yes,” she says. She scoots over so there is room in the cocoon of her roots for another body. “Little girls are afraid of the dark.”
It’s easier to sew yourself together with the echo of her voice ringing in your ears. You’re young, a child, a girl. You might even be afraid of the dark, though she doesn’t sound very sure of that point. You gingerly pick your way through puddles of mud and brambles to wedge yourself between the roots. Her body is cold against yours. How long has she been out here?
“Did you run away from home?” she asks.
You shrug.
“I did,” she says. Without asking, she tucks her cold fingers under your arm, hugging the appendage to herself like one would a teddy bear. “My father married a woman who hates me.”
“Why did he do that?” you ask.
“Because he’s weak,” she says immediately. Her fingers wiggle as if she’s counting on them. “Too weak to be alone. Too weak to rule alone. Weak to a pretty face. Weak in the face of death. Too weak to believe I’ll be fine when he’s gone.”
The part of you that might actually be a person is swimming to the surface. You examine how deep and warm your skin tone is against the paleness of hers. You know what it’s like to feel fabric and water, and heat on this skin. Now you also know what it’s like to feel the touch of someone close to hypothermia.
“Tell me how you’ll be fine,” you say.
And Snow White, who just needs someone to believe in her, tells you - someone who needs something to believe in- all about being a Princess in a castle after the first queen’s death.
“Someday she’ll kill me,” Snow White says. “Dad or me. One of us will be first.”
“How will she do it?” you ask.
Snow White thinks for a long time. “Poison. Like she did with my mom.”
You’re relieved. This is how you can help the girl who kept you from dissolving. “Oh, that’s easy. There are only two antidotes in the world, you know. Those derived from the World Tree or concocted to mimic it, or—”
-----.
True Love’s Kiss.
In your cell, you cover your face with your hands. The worst part is that it doesn’t have to be both parties in love – it can only just be one. Which is clearly you. Because you’re an idiot and there’s no way Snow White would love you after you left her to face her stepmother alone. And then kissed her without permission.
“Do you mind waiting to off yourself until the execution?” the Huntsman asks. He’s seated directly across from your cell, anxiously twirling a dagger between his hands. “I’ll get in trouble otherwise.”
You ease your hands away from your neck. The half-moon imprints of your nails against your throat throb. “Why are they even keeping me alive?”
“In case you need to wake the Princess up again,” he says. He shrugs. “You know…since one of the princes didn’t do the trick.”
“The princes?” A newspaper article you read several weeks ago comes to mind. Your lip curls. “Oh, you mean the opportunists trying to claim the throne for themselves.”
“The throne needs a ruler,” the Huntsman says simply.
The dungeon is drier than you imagined. You sit up into a cross-legged position and rub at the dust on the cobblestones. “They have one. Snow White.”
“The nobles aren’t eager to have another solo ruler after the former Queen,” the Huntsman says. “Most think it’ll…smooth things out if one of the princes rules alongside her.”
You snort. “You mean control her.”
The Huntsman inclines his head.
They’re all so stupid.
“Why didn’t you take her heart?” you ask. You remember that particular letter as if you read it yesterday; Snow White nonchalantly telling you all about how she escaped certain death by following the paths in the woods you taught her. Your nails draw divots in the cobblestone. “Back then.”
The Huntsman fumbles his dagger. It clatters to the ground and rings like a bell, over and over again. He stares at you for a long moment before he speaks through bloodless lips. “H-how did you—”
You stare at him.
He breathes in deeply. “I wouldn’t have. I couldn’t have. A young girl—”
You snort again.
“—the daughter of the King I served—”
You laugh. He wouldn’t have taken her to the woods at all if that were true.
“—I…I was—That was—”
“You’re a hunter,” you say. You point to the dagger on the floor, and it lifts slowly, like a feather caught in an updraft. He’s still and wide-eyed as you beckon it towards you. “You don’t carry a knife without the conviction to kill. You don’t lure a young girl into the woods at night without the conviction to harm. You just don’t. You do.”
The dagger falls into your palm with a slap.
The silence stretches.
The Huntsman breaks first.
“She told me I was the villain,” the Huntsman says. He swallows audibly. The beard covering the lower half of his face does little to hide the tremble of his lips. “Alright? A 15-year-old girl told me that if I cut out her heart, I would be the villain for the rest of my life. She said that my daughter would hug me and know, that my wife would kiss me and know, that the brothers and sisters I fought alongside would meet my gaze and know. And I—I—”
You twirl the dagger, leaning back against the cold stone wall. “You believed her.”
The Huntsman shudders. “She said it and it was true.”
“Before, when you were first ordered, it wasn’t.”
“Yes. Yes. It was just a job. But she looked at me with those cold eyes, those cold b—”
The dagger thuds into the wooden back of his chair, just an inch from his arm. His teeth click together. He stares at you like a startled horse, chest heaving and hands clenched around his knees so tightly you can hear the leather of his pants creak.
“Why hasn’t she killed you yet?” you ask.
To his credit, he doesn’t feign confusion. You’d wondered why he didn’t react to how you levitated the dagger. There’s a knowing in his eyes.
“Because I sent the letters,” he breathes. “I risked everything to send them.”
You pause. That made it sound like…like the letters were important. Your heart skips a beat. “Just for that? She let you live?”
When he nods, you swear you can hear birdsong.
----.
The first time Snow White asks about love, she doesn’t ask the usual question.
“What would you do,” she starts carefully, “if you loved me?”
You’re surprised enough to look up from your latest reading assignment. Your elders want you to know about the depths of caves after your latest expedition into them. You can feel your ears morphing the longer you read, lengthening and widening to better capture the echoes of sound from objects far away. It takes a moment to remember your human ears and, when you do, you ask, “Pardon?”
Snow White watches you from where she’s lounging on her bed. Her eyes are level on you, but you can’t see much else. The rising sun is coming in from the window behind her, backlighting her so you can only see her like a shadow. “What would you do if you loved me?”
“Um…panic?”
A flash and the sun crests the canopies of the forest. She asks in the same tone, “Why?”
“Because I don’t know who I am,” you say, honest as always. At this age, you’re supposed to be keeping a diary that you study alongside your texts. Your elders tell you that is how your kind develops a personality. Your diary is Snow White. “You’re—well. I hope the person who falls in love with you is capable of supporting someone like you. I’m too…I’m floppy. I’m not real. Not yet.”
Her breath is soft. “So you don’t love me.”
“…Do you want me to?” you ask.
“Do you want to?”
“Yes,” you say. And then, “But the person who loves you should be—”
“You should go on your trip,” she interrupts. She stands and her silhouette is lined in gold. “Now.”
You splutter. She’d been against the pilgrimage your elders were trying to send you on. She said she needed you, she said she couldn’t fight alone against her stepmother—
Snow White knows what you’re thinking. “You can come back when you’ve seen everything you want to see.”
“But I don’t want anything—”
“When you’ve seen it all, you’ll come home,” she commands. Her voice rings like it did the night she declared little girls didn’t eat other little girls. “Understood?”
And what could you do in the face of her conviction?
You leave the next morning.
---------------.
Snow White comes to get you on the seventh day. The Huntsman won’t meet your eyes anymore, choosing to spend his time huddled in the corner with his hands over his ears. Like a child afraid of the dark.
You savor the irony of it.
When she enters, the torches flare to life, flooding the room with light. The first thing you notice is the crown on her head. The second is the lack of ring on her finger. The third is her eyes—
The first thing the Huntsman notices is the blood staining the hem of her dress. “I congratulate the Queen,” he croaks. His hands shake as he bows. “The King…?”
“There is no King,” Snow White says. The torchlight is pulled into her crown and is reflected in her eyes.
“Oh,” the Huntsman says and pales.
“You’re dismissed,” Snow White says, not unkindly.
“Thank you, Your Majesty.” He edges towards the stairs, eyes darting from the fire to the Queen and you.
“Do see the nobles out,” she says as he reaches the base of the stairs. A smirk tugs at her ruby red lips. “Perhaps they’ll enjoy a jaunt in the woods…?”
The Huntsman still. “Yes…” He climbs the first steps, receding into darkness as he leaves the circle of the firelight. As he climbs, his gait turns predatory. “Yes, your majesty.”
Only when the door swings shut behind him does Snow White turn to you.
There is no silence here. Only the hum of your awareness of her and the steady beating of your heart.
“You returned,” she says.
You stand. The dust has settled along your arms and legs, and it falls like snow when you do. You forgot to move as you waited. “I did.”
She stops short of your cell doors. The shadows wrap around her eyes. “Did you see everything you wanted?”
You lick your lips. “No.”
Her lips thin. “I told you not to come back—”
“I saw the pyramids,” you say. You step forward so you are only a few feet apart. You stare at her through your bars. “I saw the valleys of the deep and the mountains beyond the veil. I met the people who live inside the World Tree and I slayed those who tried to escape from beyond the end. It was beautiful, but it wasn’t everything. No matter what I saw, there was one sight I yearned to see again.”
“Yearned,” she repeats. This time, she’s the one who steps closer. She doesn’t protest when you reach out to brush your fingers alongside hers. “You yearned?”
“I did,” you say. She’s warm. You coax her hand to twine around yours. “I came back to see it. But I don’t think once will be enough. A whole lifetime may not be enough.”
Her eyes are black like the night sky. Like the abyss you once lost yourself to, like the shadows that gather around you. “What sight might that be?”
“You.”
It is hard to say how the bars disappear. Maybe she whispered that they never existed in the first place. Maybe you cursed them out of existence. Either way, they disappear, and there is nothing between you and Snow White.
And you live Happily Ever After.
---
Thanks for reading! If you're a fan of my superhero works, there's a new flashfiction about Heroes on Tiktok posted to my Patreon which will be up on Tumblr next week :)
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So one of my neighbors has a lawn Roomba or whatever they're called, and this thing trundles around looking like a background robot in the background of the original trilogy, and ABSOLUTELY BAFFLING THE DOGS.
They have concluded, I think, that it's some kind of prey animal because right after this video ended they decided to crouch down and stalk it, which means I'm 90% sure I'm going to have to stop Arwen from eating it at some point.
While I can’t fault your reasoning on robot taxonomy, apparently we’re both wrong: Arwen, as much as she is a high-prey-drive animal, is foremost, a herding dog, and has decided that the Lawn Roomba is a SHEEP.
What happened is the lawn roomba belongs to the guy that does most of the maintainence on the neighborhood park, and he had it out grazing on a different section of lawn when my parents came down for a walk and Arwen was siezed by 200 years worth fo Kelpie Instincts, rolled out of her Harness and proceded to herd the shit out of this tiny, oblivious robot.
Everything was on display- mock-stalking, intimidating eye contact, barking, running in front of it to try to get it to balk, the scariest barking she can muster (which is actually. pretty scary if you’re not used to Loud Dogs), looking back at my parents for directions. or rather, looking at my Mom while Dad tried unsuccessuflly to capture her.
After about ten minutes they realized she wasn’t biting it, and decided to let her play Sheep Simulator 5000 for a while. She eventually figured out that
It doesn’t respond to Yelling, Posturing or Aggressive Eye Contact
It does respond to having it’s wheels or bump hazards hit
It would respond to its side being nosed or slapped by moving in a different direction
Conent that this was apparently some kind of blind, deaf and particularly stupid sheep, she could now manage the robot by smacking it if it got too close to the creek bed or fence for her liking, and was eventually content to sit on the highest point of the field and Supervise (TM) it.
“Hey.” Said Roger, owner of the robot. “Do you think if I put the ramp down she’ll herd it into the back of my pickup?”
Arwen was mostly asleep in the afternoon sun as roger put the ramp down but woke right up when mom Whistled, then pointed at the truck. She immediately went after the robot and did something that wouldn’t have occured to me, an allegedly more intelligent being: the robot is roughly triangular, and when it hits an obstacle, will change direction so that one of its other sides (rather than points) is now the ‘front’. So to get it to move in a straight line in the direction she wanted, Arwen would smack the two sides of the robot that she didn’t want it to go in in quick sucession, and got it across the field, over a small hill and up the ramp as fast as it’s clumsy little wheels could go.
“I didn’t know you had a fully-trained sheepdog!” Said Roger
“Me either.” said Mom.
So Arwen now has a Semi-Weekly Appointment to play with Sheepbot.
"There's no way in hell there was an actual supervillain who actually called themselves-"
"No, no, not officially - we came up with the name when we were assigned to find them, and we were kind of taking the piss, but it's still a good name. It was before your time - they had the power to-"
"I don't want to know what their power was."
"No, listen - their power was that they could summon a pie and throw it at someone."
"Oh. Oh, well, okay - that's the greatest supervillain you've ever fought? Doesn't sound like much."
"But that was the thing. They could throw a pie at someone and it would never miss. So long as they could see their target they'd hit them. We eventually found out they could throw a pie at someone who was on live broadcast, miles away."
"Jesus. Okay, I think I see the issue. But it was still, like. Pies, right?"
"Oh, for sure, it was never poison pies, and they could only summon a pie every 15 seconds so they couldn't drown someone in meringue. But - do you remember Murgatroyd Bentley?"
"Sort of, he was president when I was a little kid - something, something superhuman rights, and he was the guy who nuked Saskatchewan, right?"
"That's the guy. We found out about this guy after the Humboldt Crisis, because after that, whenever there was a live broadcast with the president - the state of the union, addressing congress, the Christmas tree lighting - a pie would splatter across his face every fifteen seconds."
"…Is that it?"
"Hon, it was everything. You haven't lived until you've seen the president try to talk about dignity while being smacked in the face with a banana cream. By the end of term, he refused to show his face in public, and he resigned in quiet disgrace. There were a few other pieings for a few years, but nowhere near the amount that took place when Bentley was president, and eventually they stopped. We never found out who or even where this person was.
"And that - more than anything - makes them the greatest supervillain I've ever had to deal with. Because they didn't do much, but they did it loudly, they did it consistently, and we never caught them."
"...How hard were you trying to catch them?"
"Not very."
"And you decided to call them Dr. Creampie?"
"We were young. The president had just bombed Saskatchewan. It was a weird time. Honestly we took what we could get for laughs."
When I was 3 years old I went to a preschool that had this little green crocheted crocodile finger puppet that was my absolute favorite toy to play with of all time. I named her Chelsea, because Chelsea starts with C and crocodile starts with C and more often than not wild animals in fiction aimed at kids have names that start with the same first letter as their species. I played with Chelsea every day, because she was my favorite toy, and because the other kids weren't really interested in her, and also because I eventually started to hide her in a special secret spot in the room so no one else would find her before I did. She was so beloved by me that when I graduated from preschool, my teachers gave Chelsea to me permanently, because it was clear no one else would ever love that little crochet crocodile as much as me anyway (in part because I hid her). They waited a few weeks after I graduated before doing it, too, and sent Chelsea with some post cards as if the crocodile had been on a whirlwind "travel the world" vacation before deciding to come live with me.
And Chelsea remained my favorite toy all through my childhood. There were others I loved nearly as much, like my Imperial Godzilla and the big red T.rex from the first Jurassic Park toy line and my tiny knockoff plush Charmander, but Chelsea always held the place of honor in my heart. She was my absolute favorite toy.
I kept a lot of my favorite toys through adolescence, even if social pressure eventually got me to give away a lot of them (and some, y'know, broke). That's obviously not surprising to you if you've followed my blog, since I still collect toys into my adulthood. But it's important to note because while I know I made a conscious effort to never throw out Chelsea every time I pared down my collection... at some point, she went missing.
I became aware of it when I graduated from high school. I was feeling really emotional about leaving that stage of my life and, y'know, becoming an adult and shit, and in that state I decided to find Chelsea to reassure myself that I hadn't entirely left childhood behind. But Chelsea wasn't there. No matter how hard I looked, I could not find Chelsea anyway.
And that was, like, devastating, because the only explanation was that somehow, at some point, I had accidentally tossed her out with some other "childhood junk" while trying to grow up and be responsible in my teen years. I had literally thrown away my childhood in a careless attempt to be more grown up.
Of course I knew she was just a toy - nothing more than some yarn twisted together in the loose shape of a crocodile, lifeless and soul-less and more or less worthless in the objective light of day. But she was also Chelsea, my best friend since i was three, my stalwart little pal, a source of comfort for most of my life at that point, and I had just... tossed her out! Like garbage! What kind of person was I becoming if I could do that to my best friend?
I was very visibly distraught, and my mom noticed. Being very crafty, she tried to find the pattern for Chelsea so she could crochet me a new one. The problem is, she had no idea where to find said pattern. She checked all her books of crochet patterns, and when that failed she tried the internet, but no matter how hard she looked, she found nothing.
So my mom found the next best thing.
The original Chelsea was a tiny finger puppet, and I had "met" her when I was three. Well, I was eighteen now - shouldn't Chelsea have grown too? And as has been established, this crocodile was fond of whirlwind vacations. My mom found a pattern that looked as much like Chelsea as possible while also being a much bigger crocodile, and gifted her to me before I left for college - to show that while we can't stop the flow of time or how it changes us, that doesn't mean we have to leave it behind.
And yeah, I decided to believe it. That's Chelsea now. Yeah, I know that in reality it's a completely different set of yarn made by my mom rather than... whoever it was that crocheted the original Chelsea, but then, Chelsea was never really the yarn. She was the feelings I put into the yarn, you know? So that's Chelsea, all grown up, and still my most prized toy.
...
Flash forward... Jesus, eighteen years, holy shit. A few weeks ago I saw a post trying to identify a different crochet crocodile pattern, and thinking it was cute, I decided to try and look for it on ebay and etsy, just to see if maybe I could find it. I didn't, but do you know what I found instead?
A very familiar crochet crocodile finger puppet. An intensely familiar one, you might say. Of course I bought it. And of course I asked the seller if, perhaps, they might have the pattern for it or know where it came from (they did not, alas). And after a few days, she showed up at my house.
She's not Chelsea, obviously. For one thing, she's far too clean and fresh looking - Chelsea was very well loved, and looked the part, while this crocodile finger puppet has definitely not endured years upon years of a child's affection. And, more importantly, she's not Chelsea because we've already established that Chelsea grew up into a bigger crochet crocodile. This has to be Chelsea's younger sister, Cici.
And if I could find another of Chelsea's kind after all these years, then maybe, with a bit of luck, I might find the pattern for her, and be able to make more of them. Fill the world with Chelseas.
As usual, all names have been changed or redacted to protect people’s privacy.
In the fall of 1969, my Dad was hit by a car and suffered a serious concussion, causing him to miss midterms and put his grade in a hole he wouldn’t be able to recover from, as this was the days before a lot of professorial accountability. Like a sensible person, he decided to Withdraw for the semester and focus on recovering and maybe take a part-time job to pay for spring tuition, because you could do that back then.
“Son,” My grandfather asked, sitting on the couch with Dad shortly after he was discharged from the hospital. “What about your college deferment? I’m worried about you getting drafted.”
“Dad,” Dad said, filling in job applications. “I’m legally blind without my glasses! I’d be a danger to anyone around me with a gun. Even if I get drafted there’s no way in hell I’d pass the medical exam.”
“Don’t swear in my house.” Said Grandpa, under the entirely mistaken impression that the US Military was run with any sort of competence.
Literally a week later my Dad’s draft papers came in, and he reported to his local draft board, driver’s license and doctor’s note in hand to prove He Is Legally Blind Without His Glasses, only to be waved through without so much as a sideways glance by anyone resembling a doctor.
“They must be desperate.” My dad concluded when he got home that night to pack.
The news was devastating to the family, as both his parents had siblings to WWII. Grandpa was ready to beg, bribe and otherwise compromise his intensely catholic morals to get Dad out, and Grandma prayed to any available saint that would save her son from the fate of her brothers. She had quite the collection of saints in her sewing room, some forty figurines and dozens more candles and images, along with some stained glass she’d made herself of saints, landscapes and animals, including a large hummingbird that lived on the sewing room window since they’d moved into the house.
Dad pleaded with them to not do anything they’d regret, and returned to the base for basic training.
Dad’s drill sergeant was a man whose real name was “Ross” but insisted on being called “Bulldog” or “SIR!” by everyone depending on rank. Dad supposed this might have been a defense mechanism as Bulldog had an intensely jowled and acne-scarred face that did greatly resemble a fighting dog well past their prime. The image was not helped by the fact that he was constantly smoking rose-flavored tobacco in a pipe that had seen better centuries, and consequently smelled like a terrible combination of trailer park and the women’s perfume counter at Macy’s.
Bulldog was also… not great about following protocol, which is a terrible failing in a Drill sergeant, but Dad supposed at that point in the war Bulldog had become horribly depressed by the sheer numbers of young men he was sending to their deaths and had kind of stopped giving a fuck about their safety and his own.
Which lead to an incident about three weeks into Dad’s training camp when in the middle of a Weapons Qualification lesson, Bulldog pulled Dad’s glasses off and bellowed “YOU WON’T HAVE THOSE COKE BOTTLES WHEN THOSE [incorrect slurs, because there’s no such thing as an informed bigot] BLAST YOUR ASS TO KINGDOM COME.” before stomping off to go change the paper targets, leaving Dad standing there with an M-1, squinting in what he hoped was the general direction of the targets.
To give you an idea of HOW bad my dad’s vision is, I once asked him at what distance things got blurry, and he responded by taking off his glasses, putting his hand up to his face, and slowly moving it back. He stopped about eight inches from his face and nodded.
“So I can see my hand from here but I can’t distinguish my fingers. I think that green blob over there is your mother.”
“I’m in the living room.” called mom. “You’re looking at the blender.”
So it should come as no surprise that as soon as Dad heard someone shouting “Ready! Aim! Fire!” He did precisely that.
Hummingbirds are often mistakenly characterized as Delicate Little Rainbows that are a gift Direct from Heaven when the truth is they’re really Vicious Little Bastards thrown out of Hell for being too Nasty.
You would be too if you could eat nothing but frappuccinos and the occasional chicken nugget, everything around you was at least the size of a pickup truck and regarded you as a tasty snack, and you were forced to defend your fridge from not only equally vicious rivals but goddamn insects that are bigger than you are.
Being a hummingbird is awful under normal circumstances, and now there are maniacs with loud machines and projecties as big as you are stomping around and yelling and well-
At that exact moment, one of the nesting hummingbirds, having grown progressively more exasperated with the activity on the base, dive-bombed my father, hurling it’s tiny body directly into his ear and slicing the lobe up, and making him jerk slightly as he fired.
He missed Sergeant Bulldog by mere inches. Dad still isn’t sure if the Hummingbird caused him to miss or put him closer to accidental manslaughter, but it mattered little as Bulldog grabbed him by the head, shrieking in spittle-flying fury-
“ARE YOU FUCKING BLIND?” He roared.
“YES!!” screamed my father, also hysterical. “SIR THAT’S WHAT THOSE ‘COKE BOTTLES’ ARE FOR SIR!”
Bulldog stopped, suddenly and uncomfortably confronted with the nature of causality. He only let it stymie him for a moment. “GET YOUR IDIOT ASS TO THE MEDIC, I’LL DEAL WITH YOU LATER!”
At the medical center, an extremely befuddled doctor dilated Dad’s eyes, took pictures because Dad had the worst case of myopia he’d ever seen and wanted to put him in a medical journal, and asked him:
“What the HELL are you doing here?”
“Very nearly shooting people sir.”
“Well, we can’t have you shooting people while you’re in the army! I’ll get your medical discharge started.”
Dad decided not to comment on that statement, thanked the doctor, and wandered blindly back to his bunk.
It took them a full thirty days to process Dad’s discharge, perhaps largely due to the fact that actually FINDING the captain was a task for hercules- The man had an almost phobic aversion to his office and a tremendous love of whiskey so actually locating the man and early enough in the day that he was still sober enough to sign anything was a race against time and a battle against the wits of a man determined to get out of work, which is when humanity is at its peak intelligence.
In the meantime, it simply wouldn’t do to let dad bike the five miles back to his home and come back for the paperwork, nor let him sit quietly and not accidentally maim anyone, so he was put on garden duty.
Supervised by recently-suspended-from-instruction Sergeant “Bulldog” Ross.
By the second day Bulldog had mostly run out of steam, perhaps out of a sense of really, whose fault was that? So He would mostly stand in Dad’s general vicinity, waxing philosophical on the nature of war, government and whatever else he could be crotchety about that day while continuously smoking his rose-flavored tobacco in his pipe. Dad planted a frankly absurd number of flowers, trying to make a planted display that would spell out the name of the base in eight-foot letters, just in case someone has managed to miss all 824,594,359 signs beforehand.
On day five, perhaps attracted by the bright colors or the stench of artificial rose, the Hummingbirds found the new garden.
At first, it was timid little trips to the edge farthest from Dad and Bulldog, testing this new territory for both risk and bounty, but upon finding it full of sugary goodness, they became bold, getting closer and closer to Dad, zipping in as soon as he got up to get the next flat of flowers, then not waiting for him to finish planting them before they were up in his face, squeaking angrily for him to get out of the way of their lunch.
One male objected to Dad and Bulldog’s presence particularly strongly, dive-bombing and buzzing angrily at them, an ounce and a half of glittery impotent rage. After a month, he’d gotten quite aggressive, and one day flew directly up to Bulldog’s face to chitter curses at him eye-to-eye, only for Bulldog to take out his pipe and blow a cloud of smoke at him, laughing as the bird tumbled over backwards in midair.
Agitated with the sudden noxious cloud, or perhaps merely a violent psychopath in its own right, the bird flew back, then straight up into the air for a good fifty feet before going into a dive, aimed directly at Bulldog’s face.
Dad doesn’t recall actually moving, only a sense that he ought to do something, and launched himself out of the dirt, arms outstretched to clap and force it off course-
“SHIT! What the hell was that for?” Demanded Bulldog.
“Well, the hummingbird looked like it was going to attack you, Sir. So I stopped it.”
“How noble. What are you standing there like an idiot for?”
“…I think I caught it sir.” Said Dad, staring at the tiny bill poking out from between his gloves. The two of them leaned in close as dad very slowly opened his gloves and peered inside.
The hummingbird immediately forced it’s tiny head out to peep furious profanities at them both.
“How is it,” Bulldog wondered aloud as the hummer continued to curse the both of them for the next seven generations. “That you can’t see to hit the broad side of a barn but can pull a shitty little bird right out of the air?”
“I’m wearing my glasses, Sir.”
Bulldog looked up at him, glaring with such intensity his face ceased to be a face at all and transformed into a dali-esque collection of wrinkles.
“Fuck you. Now go take that damn thing to the other side of the base so it doesn’t come back.”
“Yes sir.” Dad nodded, nearly saluting out of reflex before remembering that he was holding a live and very angry bird. It took him several hours to get to the other side of the base, with literally everyone stopping to ask him what the hell he was doing, well I have this bird sir and I was told to release it on the other side of the base- how in hell did your blind ass catch a hummingbird, well I had my glasses on- Fuck you, go ditch that thing already.
At three o'clock on the dot the very next morning, two MPs woke up my dad and told him he needed to report to the front office right away, no time to get dressed, right away right now.
They marched him directly to the main office, barefoot and in his Pajamas to be greeted by not only Sergeant “Bulldog” ross, but nearly every officer on the base, including the lieutenant and the Captain, all of whom were… attempting to stand at attention with varying degrees of success, most weaving slightly, some snorting with poorly-concealed laughter, and the entire room reeking of booze.
“GENTLEMEN!” hiccuped the lieutenant, before shaking himself and continuing, “WE ARE GATHERED HERE TODAY TO HONOR OUR ‘COMRADE’ -snort, giggle- IN ARMS -louder derisive laughter- FOR HIS BRAVERY AND SERVICE IN THE FACE OF EXTREME DANGER-”
“IN THE BEAK OF EXTREME DANGER!” Howled one of the assembled officers.
“-AND FOR HIS SERVICE IN DEFENDING AN OFFICER OF THE UNITED STATES ARMY. I AM ~SO~ PLEASED THAT WE HAVE CAPTAIN [REDACTED] HERE WITH US TO PRESENT THIS MEDAL.”
He turned to the Captain, who took out a small box and motioned Dad forward. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be a chocolate box from See’s Candies.
“[REDACTED], in honor of your brave and frankly improbable service in the defense of Euge- sorry, Sergeant Ross, and the capture of a dangerous wild animal, we award you this medal- The Flying Purple Bastard.”
He opened the chocolate box to reveal this*:
(Image Description: A piece of cardboard cut out approximately in the silhouette of a hummingbird, by someone with only a passing familiarity with what hummingbirds look like. The cardboard has been haphazardly covered in tinfoil and cartoon eyes drawn on. It’s attached to a scrap of ribbon and a safety Pin.)
Which was then pinned crookedly to Dad’s nightshirt, after accidentally stabbing him a bit, saluted him as someone attempted to play the bugle but made a rather melodious farting noise instead, then slapped Dad in the face with a manilla folder full of papers and shouted. “DISMISSED!”
“Dismissed, sir?”
“Those are your discharge papers.” Said Bulldog. “Get the fuck out of here.”
“Yes, Sir!”
At which point Dad biked home in the rain, and thus ends my father’s military career.
*Pictured here is actually The Flying Purple Bastard 2.0, as the original was destroyed when partially eaten and fully regurgitated by one of the cats.
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Your family did fine. You were more comfortable than some, but not so comfortable that you could sit idle. The crops had started to bud, and the shop was filled with all manner of pickled vegetables, fresh eggs, and flowers. You counted the coppers and silvers in the little lock box under the counter. Business was the same as usual, but your brow still furrowed.
Mother was getting tired. The decades of tilling, sowing, reaping, and harvesting had started to toll on her. Especially after your father left. The bastard. Your mother labored at home with an aching back and bad knees. Before long the crops would flourish and need tending. It was more than enough work for two, unfathomable for just you alone.
Jeering came from outside the shop. A band of orc hunters with their catches. They were a threatening bunch. Hard and strong. One orc could have the strength of two men. In the great cities they faced more discrimination, but out here someone either hunted for their meat, or payed other people to do the hunting for them. And the orcs… they were masterful at what they did. And so they were welcomed.
The rusted hinges of your shop door creaked. “Did you miss me?”
Any desire to feign positivity drained from your person. You didn’t even try to hide the sour look on your face. Milo was a repugnant leech that had been stalking your family for years. He had tried courting each one of your elder sisters, losing them each time to men better than him. And now you were the last sister on the list. Unmarried. And running out of time. The latter fact he was quite aware of.
”How is Celina?” You never liked how he called your mother by her first name. It was too familiar. You don’t bother to look up from your coin counting. “My Mother’s wellbeing is none of your concern.” Milo sauntered up to the counter, “y/n-“
You slammed your fist, sending a few coins into the air. “When will you get the idea that my family wants nothing to do with you?” You still couldn’t look him in the eye. He sighed, picking up one of the coppers from the floor, “You would rather your mother toil in the field? You would rather surrender yourself to the life of a shopkeep? It’s a waste.”
You had no answer for him. Because he was right to question your choices. Yes you truly enjoyed running the family shop, but you couldn’t possibly keep this up for long without your mother. She deserved peace and rest. But he was just… a nuisance at best. Frightening at worst. His family owned half the town, and how easy it would be for them to blacklist you and your mother from ever doing business in their marketplace again.
”Anyways…” He dropped the coin down onto your counter with a clank, “Winter will come. And will you be prepared? If your mother cannot help you work the fields…”
”Are you trying to give me an ultimatum?” You had pushed the idea of next winter out of your head the second the ice started to melt. But he was right, what would you do? He didn’t entertain your question with a response. No… it wasn’t an ultimatum. It was a threat. A threat that when winter came you would get what was coming to you. He made his way out the door, the rusty hinges screeching. “You should really fix that.” He gave a nasty grin and let the door slam behind him.
You pushed all the thoughts of worry from your head. It was something you had grown skilled at doing. Gods be damned if you let him spoil such a lovely morning. You threw the windows of the shop open, arranging bouquets from your flower garden for the street to see.
At night when you and your mother pray over dinner, you beg anyone listening for an eternal spring.
~
Two weeks pass uneventfully. You sell many bouquets of flowers to well-to-do ladies, and your mother’s special pickled red onions fly off the shelves as usual. In the early morning you sit counting your coins, listening to the soft bustling of the market just beginning to wake up.
”You know you can pickle these eggs right?”
You keep your eyes trained on the coins, trying not to lose count. There is a long pause, but you can tell the man hasn’t walked away, “We don’t sell any here.”
“You should.” You raise your head to cock an eyebrow at him. You try to stifle a gasp from your chest. An orc man with olive green skin is leaned slightly through the window of your shop. You had never had an orc approach your little shop. They always had bigger and better things to sell and buy.
”We don’t sell those here.” A more rational person would have thought twice before talking back to an orc hunter. But you were tired of men questioning you. A young lady entered the shop, eyeing the orc man still leaning on your window sill. The door squealed unpleasantly, cutting through the tension like a knife. “Fine,” The orc smirked and shrugged, exiting your window.
~
The next day, there was a basket waiting for you on your shop’s doorstep. You groan. This wouldn’t be the first time Milo left gifts for you to find. You take a peek into the bracket and… what was this? Spices? Salt? Garlic cloves? Underneath the goods were two silver coins.
You yelped at the sound of fingers rapping against the window pane. You reeled around expecting Milo. But… it was the orc man. The orc man from the day before. He pointed at the little latch holding the window closed. You were sure he could punch his way right through the window if he really wanted in. “I don’t want any trouble!” You yelled at him through the window.
Another smirk crept onto his face, “I bring no trouble with me, Miss. I just thought you might like a chance to make some more coin.”
What this lecherous orc seriously propositioning you for pay? Before he could say another thing, you hurled an egg at him. You hoped it would have just broken against the window to frighten him off. But to your horror it crashed through the glass, making a direct impact with his face. “Fuck!” You heard him fall on his ass in the street.
You rushed to the window. The orc was splayed out on the cobblestones, his forehead bleeding from the broken glass. He lay motionless, and you started to panic. Oh Gods. Oh Gods no. You just assaulted an orc. A big strong orc man who kills things for his living. Not even Milo or his family’s status could protect you from the wrath of an angry orc. You threw open the screeching rusted front door. Oh gods he was huge. He knew where you worked. He could follow you home. What if he brought his fellow huntsmen with him? What if they hurt your mother as well?
You couldn’t stop any of the thoughts racing through your head. You were worried about making it through winter… now you might not even make it through the summer. You bit down on your fist, trying to keep composure.
”Got a hell of an arm…” The orc grunted, pulling you out of your trance. He sat himself up, bringing his fingers to the drops of blood running down his temple. “Ha!” He guffawed and made his way to stand up.
”Please… please.” You weren’t sure if you were praying to a high power or pleading to him. His eyes met yours but there was no rage, or fury. There was a look of annoyance, maybe a bit of mild amusement. Rubbing his hand over the back of his neck he said, “Miss. I only meant… you should make pickled eggs. There are a lot of orc boys out here far from the motherland. They would pay a premium for a taste of home.”
You were nearly speechless, “I- I don’t know how orcs prefer their pickled eggs-
“That basket has everything you need.”
“Oh… okay. Very well. Sir.” Your voice wavered and he could see how clearly frightened you were.
The orc groaned, wiping more blood off his face. “Sorry about this. See you around.” You hoped that wasn’t a threat, but with that he jogged his way down the street.
It’s my first upper division English literature class and only a month into the semester but I’m already struggling and getting marked D’s and F’s on assignments. I can’t fail this class, I need it to keep my university scholarship to stay in school. I reach out to my professor, asking to meet with him for some extra guidance and he agrees, but only has availabilities late in the evenings. I’m happy to comply, making the trek from my dorm to the English building at 9pm for our first meeting.
The English department is on the edge of campus and when I walk into the building, the whole place looks deserted this late at night. His office is the only one with lights on and I knock softly on his open door before stepping in.
“Hi Professor, thank you so much for finding the time to meet with me for extra help!” He looks up from the papers he’s grading and smiles at me. “Not a problem, I know my class can be overwhelming for a lot of students who aren’t used to the rigor that I expect. Come in and take a seat, we’ll have you whipped up into shape in no time.” He steps out from behind his desk and closes the door behind me as I walk in. I’m too preoccupied with getting my notes out to notice that he turns the lock on the door, locking us in.
“Let’s talk about some of your recent work, and we’ll work on a few things I have my mind on to help with your technique.” He circles around to the bookcase against his wall, grabbing a textbook. “Oh go ahead and reach over my desk to grab that workbook on my desk. There are some exercises there that I think will help you.”
I stand and reach across his large, dark-stained wood desk to grab the book. Suddenly, he’s on me. Before I can straighten up, he grabs the back of my neck and slams me against his desk. I scream briefly as the workbook tumbles out of my hand and I find myself pressed against the desk, the front of my body flush on it while I’m bent over. Before I have time to react fully, he bends down over me, and whispers darkly, “Now don’t struggle, because I’d hate to have to fail you for being a bad student. And I know how badly you need my class to stay in your program so right now, you listen to me and be a good girl and maybe I’ll consider letting you pass my class.”
I cry out, “Stop please professor, I don’t understand, what are you doing?”
“Of course you don’t understand, you stupid little slut. Too dumb to even comprehend what’s going on around you huh?” He chuckles darkly and I feel his hand cup my ass briefly before it cracks down on me, spanking me harshly over my skirt.
“Ah, wait no! Please, you can’t do this!” I try and push up off the table but he’s too strong. “Oh no pretty slut, you are going to take whatever I give you or else I will fail you right now and you’ll be kicked out of the school by the end of the week. Do you want that instead?” His hand rests on my ass, kneading my flesh roughly and the other one increases the pressure on the back of my neck.
“Please, no,” I whimper brokenly. I feel him breathe deep against my hair and he groans softly. “You’re mine for the semester, slut. And you are going to do whatever I want, just to keep your pretty little self on your scholarship.”
I start to cry, shaking slightly as my tears are dripping down my face and onto his desk. His hand comes off my neck and I hold still, knowing I can’t fight back in any way. His hand flips my skirt up and he sees the white panties I’m wearing with pink little bows printed all over them. “So pretty, slut,” he says as he runs a finger down between the globes of my ass, towards my pussy. I whimper softly and my hands come to grip the side of his desk.
“I don’t want you making any noise,” he says and without warning, I feel his hand crack down on my ass again, this time with more force. The spank makes my body lurch forward on the desk, and I have to bite my tongue to keep from crying out. He doesn’t hesitate as he begins to rain down harsh spanks all over my ass and upper thighs. I cry harder, muffling my sobs as best I can as I feel each hit adding to the soreness.
He’s methodical as he continues, not stopping or slowing for what feels like hours. My ass and thighs are burning but slowly, I can feel my pussy reacting as well, swelling and starting to drip more and more with each hit. I squirm slightly, trying to discreetly rub my legs together to relieve some of the tension. He notices.
“You’re getting turned on by this aren’t you, slut?” He laughs softly and I whimper in protest, “Please no, I’m not, please stop.”
He grabs my neck again, “Don’t lie, that’s not the behavior of a good student. I can see your pretty pussy dripping through your panties from here, you dirty little slut.” I whimper, feeling my face burn as hot as my ass. He reaches down and slides a hand against my pussy, through my panties and I gasp. His fingers dance along my lips, my wetness making my panties cling to the outline of my cunt. Without warning, he grips my panties and tears them away from my body, leaving my pussy fully exposed and my skirt still bunched around my waist. I whimper and feel myself gush a little at his actions, the clench of my cunt making me feel even worse.
His fingers come to meet my bare body now, and he slides them against my slit, laughing when he feels how much I’m dripping. “Oh we’re gonna have fun this semester,” he says. His fingers pluck my swollen clit, and I arch my back and moan, the sound erupting out of me unbidden. He’s relentless as he works my clit quickly, my wetness letting his fingers slide deliciously over me, the friction making me eyes roll slightly. My legs are trembling as I feel my orgasm fast approaching and he knows it too. “Little slut, are you going to cum like this? All splayed out for your professor, so desperate for that passing grade that you’ll do anything, even degrade yourself like a common whore?” I whine softly, my head spinning from the pleasure as my pussy clenches.
I vaguely hear his belt jingling and the rustle of clothing but I’m too preoccupied with my approaching orgasm to understand what that means. He doesn’t let up on my clit and I can feel myself seconds from erupting, moans and whimpers coming out of my mouth desperately.
My body seizes and I feel my orgasm rush through me, making me let out a strangled moan as feeling hits. Suddenly, I feel his long, hard cock slam into my cunt and I wail. He fucks me hard and fast through my orgasm, not stopping to let me adjust to his length or his speed. I’m scrambling to stay on the desk as he rails into me, his harsh grunts in my ear and his bruising grip on my hips. “That’s it, squeeze my cock just like that, slut. Fuck, your cunt feels so good.”
My eyes roll back into my head as his cock pound into me, my previous orgasm hasn’t even faded before I feel a second one building. He doesn’t seem to care about slowing down to let me recover as he keeps his unforgiving pace, drilling into me and pulling groans and whimpers out of me. His hand goes back to play with my clit and I scream, the throbbing of my cunt mixed with his attention pushes my second orgasm over the edge. I feel my walls flutter around his cock and he groans in my ear as I cum, sobbing from the overstimulation. He doesn’t stop, he fucks me through my second orgasm, the rubbing of his cock against my g-spot making me see stars.
“Oh fuck, I’m gonna cum in your tight little pussy slut.” I feel his thrusts becoming erratic as he nears his orgasm. “I hope you’re on birth control, slut, because I’m gonna fill your cunt,” he says, his words punctuated by his thrusts. His groan is deep and guttural when he cums, the feeling of his cock erupting inside of me making my cunt clench harder around him, pulling him in. He stops for a second, letting his body cover mine, pressing even harder into the desk. His harsh breathing in my ear sends shivers down my spine.
“Flip over, get on the table, and hold yourself open,” his voice is gravelly as he pulls away from me, his cum dripping out of my cunt onto my legs. I whimper as I force my body to comply, pushing my sore and fucked out body onto his desk and spreading my legs, leaving my dripping cunt exposed to him. He smirks, “Stay there, slut.” He circles around his desk and I hear him opening a drawer and grabbing something before he comes back. It’s a vibrator. My eyes widen and I whimper, “Wait, no please. I can’t, it’s too much.” He leans into my face and growls darkly, “I don’t care, you’ll take what I give if you want to pass my class, got it slut?” I nod as tears start to fall again.
He clicks the vibrator on and I watch as the head blurs with its intensity. He brings it to my cunt, smirking slightly as he places his free hand on my hip, preemptively holding me down. His hand travels down and parts my folds to reveal my swollen clit, red and puffy from his previous attention. Without any preparation, he pushes the head of the vibrator directly on my clit and I scream. The intensity is so high and my body is already reeling from the overstimulation from his cock. The vibrator makes it all so much worse, but so good. I arch my back and buck my hips, desperately trying to dislodge him. “It’s time to earn your next grade, slut,” he says smirking.
“For every orgasm, you get 10%. Cum 10 times, and you’ll get 100% on the next essay.” My eyes widen and I sob, “No please, I can’t, please it’s too much!”
He smirks, “Or I could fail you now.”
“Ah please, no no no!” I’m crying, from the feeling of my poor clit being so thoroughly overstimulated and from the idea of him failing me. Despite my previous orgasms, I feel myself barreling towards another. The feeling builds as he grounds the vibrator harder against my clit, and I scream it out, feeling my pussy gush as I squirm and shake. He smirks, “10%.”
My next orgasm seems to blend with the first and I’m hardly coherent enough to process his words as he forces me to cum again and again.
Thirty minutes later, I’ve cum seven more times and my body is at its limit. “Please no more, please professor.” I’m almost unconscious, my voice cracking from my constant screaming and my cunt bright red from the vibrator. He’s uncaring as he stands over me, forcing my body to endure orgasm after orgasm.
“Just one more and you get a 100%, you’re so close, slut. Don’t stop now.” His smile is feral as he keeps the vibrator directly in my clit. My legs shake and I feel myself teetering at the edge of one more orgasm. The feeling overwhelms me, pain and pleasure blending into a euphoric feeling and my eyes roll and my back arches for one final time.
As the orgasm fades, my body lies limp, my legs dangling off his desk and head lolling. He finally clicks off the vibrator. “Good job slut, your first A in my class. Keep it up and maybe you’ll be passing in a month or so. I’ll see you next week same time.”
—
The semester ended last week and my grade for the class is already finalized on my transcript, an A+. But here I am, spread wide on his desk again, my cunt clenching and dripping around his cock as I cum like a perfect little whore for him.
Summary: After ten years, you've finally got your shot at your revenge. You've found the Hero. You have him in your sights.
-----
Pull the trigger.
You’ve worked too hard not to pull the trigger. The sweat, blood and tears you’ve shed have been the least you’ve given to be here. The air is crisp and clean nearly a hundred feet up in a pine tree overlooking a remote forest. You’re probably the only person in the world capable of spotting the brown, camouflaged building spanning the length of the small river running through the valley. There’s a hologram of the river it’s covering playing over the building’s walls. Hell, there are even birds flicking occasionally across the illusion, not often enough to draw attention, but just often enough their movement sends your eyes darting to other trees, trying to find where they went.
You breathe in the scent of sun-heated sap so slowly that it takes a solid minute for your lungs to expand. Your pupils flex and adjust whenever the wind rocks your tree. The window you’ve been staring at for the past hour remains in your focus.
The Sun, hair just as fake-gold as it was ten years ago, sleeps on. He’s definitely older now that you can see him in real life instead of on magazine covers or under studio lights. The skin of his neck is loose and folded under the weight of his chin drooping towards his chest. His eyes flicker under his eyelids. The bastard still has the audacity to dream. His arms are crossed over the sun motif emblazoned across his breastplate, his dust-covered boots kicked up on his desk so you can see how worn the soles are. Judging by the way his lips tremble, he’s snoring.
Pull the trigger.
You exhale. This is when you should do it. When your shoulders drop and the wind dies so that, for a moment, the world stands still. There are no whispers across the canopy. Every bough is frozen. The reflection of the sun in the river is overcome by a well-timed cloud and the Sun’s head tilts back to expose the long line of his throat.
The trigger presses back against your finger like an eager puppy. There’s nothing special about the bullets, nothing special about this gun. It’s not the right weapon for what you’re asking it to do, but you’ve had longer and harder shots. You know that you’ll shoot true and the confidence steadies your hand even more. You smoothly pull--
If you kill a Hero, there’s no going back.
Your pupils dilate at the memory. For a moment you don’t see the Sun; you see her with her face burned as red as her prom dress. You try to dispel the image, try to remember that she didn’t die in her prom dress, but it’s too late.
I want you to live, Elian.
You’re suddenly aware of how your lungs ache and your legs burn from the way they’re wrapped around the tree and the bark is digging into your cheek and your fingers are like ice on the trigger. You’re out in the middle of nowhere. This is the Sun’s private residence. The security must be insane even if there doesn’t seem to be anyone else around. What’s your exit strategy again? Your thoughts scatter as her voice rings through your head again.
More than anything, I want you to live.
-------Ten years ago----
You’re what the heroes tactfully call a nuisance. A juvenile delinquent with powers, aka a kid that the police aren’t equipped to handle and the local Hero chapter is too overqualified and too understaffed to address often.
Your moral compass has never had a true north and it only gets worse the more your powers develop. Soon you aren’t just stealing your mom’s car – you’re stealing the neighbor’s and then the neighbor’s neighbor’s and then the neighbor’s neighbor’s neighbor’s until you’re breaking into houses at the top of the hill and joyriding in a car worth more than your entire neighborhood together.
You find out pretty quickly that the heroes care a lot more when money is involved.
You spend your first night in jail after getting chased for three hours in a neon green lambo by the four heroes packed like sardines in a standard issue SUV. It’s laughably easy to out-drive them, choking around corners and careening down alleys that you scouted in the afternoon. Honestly, it would have been easy to get away, but your mom called just as the tank hit empty, asking when you were coming home. You decided to give the heroes a break before they decided to play too rough with a minor.
Mom isn’t thrilled when you tell her you won’t be home in time for school tomorrow.
You kind of expect to be sent to prison the next day when you find out just whose car you stole. The Mayor’s daughter’s car, bought new for her seventeenth birthday a month ago. There are two open secrets about the mayor. One, he’s probably one of the heroes that protect the city judging from how much he praises them every time there’s a mic nearby. Two, he loves his daughter more than anything else.
So when you’re released the next day with a slap on the wrist? Yeah, you’re surprised.
When you’re released the next day to find the golden-haired, blue-eyed Mayor’s daughter waiting outside? Having just bailed you out?
You feel fear for the first time.
“You could have at least crashed it,” she says when she notices you gaping at her from the end of the parking lot. She’s leaning against the hood of a black SUV that looks a lot like the one the heroes chased you in last night. She waves a hand in the air. “Dad says the dents you put in the side will be out by tomorrow.”
Fear, apparently, makes you snarky. “What, you wanted to spend another week getting chauffeured by a hero?”
Her brows jerk up towards her hairline. She throws a glance over her shoulder. “You seeing ghosts? Nobody’s in there. I drove myself.”
“Good for you,” you say. You think you smell. They didn’t give you access to a shower last night. You’re upwind from her and damnit why are you embarrassed if you smell or not? Your chin jerks forward in a challenge. “You gonna give me a ride back home?”
You’re joking, but she nods like it was the plan all along. “Let’s go.”
Is that an answering challenge in her words? Your teeth grind as you force yourself forward. “Very kind of you,” you chirp, swinging up into the passenger seat. The car smells like leather and justice. “Just drop me off on the other side of the train tracks. I can find my way home from there.”
She snorts. “Is that a Footloose reference? Very dated.”
You stare at her profile. “…No. I literally live on the other side of the tracks.”
She flushes. “Right. Well…I’m not dropping you off yet. I want to talk first.”
The doors are locked. You swallow as she carefully pulls out of the parking lot and then guns it into the road without looking. Luckily, no one’s there. “Talk? About what?”
“About how you’re going to steal my car again,” she says. “And this time you’re going to crash it right.”
“You hate the color that much?” you joke.
Her tone is not joking. “You have no idea.”
You don’t find out her name until dinner when your mom’s managed to entice her into a third slice of homemade pizza. She stares down at the slice while your mom waves for you not to stay up too late before going to bed early. Gamely, you’re already on your fifth helping. Criminal activity takes a lot of energy.
“Does your mom know who I am?” she asks.
“Like, in theory,” you say. You’re full and warm as you lean into the hard wooden back of your chair. Mom added olives to your side of the pizza. “She probably doesn’t know you’re the Mayor’s daughter though. Just that he has one.”
“The Mayor…right,” she says. Her jaw firms. She flicks some olives off her pizza and then eats half the slice in one bite. “I’m Gina.”
“Elian,” you say instead of No, you’re the Mayor’s Daughter. You refill her soda cup before your own, just to show her you can be fancy and have manners too. She’s so out of place in your family’s one bedroom apartment. Her shirt is crisp and white, her gold necklace so shiny, that it’s like there’s a sepia filter over the eggshell walls and oak cabinets. “Sprite. Only the finest for the lady who bailed me out.”
“I’m thinking you can take my car next weekend,” Gina says so abruptly you nearly spit out your soda. There’s a hard light in her eyes. “Dad’s out of town for…business. He won’t notice for a few days. You take it, you get out of the city, you drive it off a cliff once you’ve wrecked it doing donuts or whatever.”
“A cliff?” You know exactly where she’s talking about. There’s an abandoned quarry about an hour outside of town. You shake your head. “That’s where people dump bodies. No way am I going out there.”
“They find bodies there because it’s outside of Hero Force’s patrol,” Gina says. She waves her hands in the air so the yellow light from the inset ceiling lights catches on her golden manicure. “If you think about it, it’s the best place to dump a car. Especially when the heroes are going to be out of town.”
You stare at her. “Did you just admit your dad is part of Hero Force?”
Her eyes skitter away from yours. “No.”
“Your dad is out of town next weekend.”
“Yes.”
“And the heroes?”
“Maybe they’re traveling together.”
“I don’t think anyone is supposed to know when the heroes are going to be out of town. Isn’t that like a national secret, or something?”
“We’re not a big enough chapter for it to be a national secret,” she denies. She bites her lip. “Probably a state secret though.”
You stand and your chair chatters against the linoleum. “No. Absolutely not.” It’s time for Ms. Mayor’s Daughter to leave.
She scrambles up after you, following you into the living room. “Why not?! You already mess with the heroes. Weren’t you the one who kept breaking into the mall on a motorcycle? You hijacked one of their delivery trucks a month ago—”
“A food delivery truck,” you say. “Which was more of a commentary about the city’s investment in Hero Force luxury rather than after school programs—” You bite your tongue. You spin so that the couch stays between you. You glance at your mom’s closed door and consciously lower your voice. “How do you even know that?”
“I’ve been watching you,” she says. She laughs without humor, dragging one hand through her golden hair. “Sometimes living in this town is like being in a simulation. We have four A-class heroes for a population of 30,000 and everybody loves them. Nobody thinks it’s strange to have walking nukes in a small town. They love my dad. Did you know no one’s even run against him for the past two elections? It doesn’t matter what he does. He owns this place and these people. He has – could commit murder and it would be justified. People would think it would be justice.”
“He loves you,” you say weakly. Isn’t four heroes a pretty normal number? Sure, the ones in your town are big names, but that’s not weird.
Is it?
“He loves me so he gets to be a tyrant?” Gina scoffs. “If he’s even capable of love.”
“I’m not going to mess around with heroes’ civilian identities just because you’ve got daddy issues,” you say. When hurt flashes across her face, you wince. “Sorry. But it’s one thing to mess with heroes in masks, okay? Messing with a hero’s family—”
“You didn’t seem to have a problem when you were stealing my car the other night.”
“That was before I knew your dad was Mr. Solve or whatever—”
“The Sun,” Gina says.
“What?”
“My dad’s the Sun.”
“That,” you say, “is so much worse. Didn’t he burn some minor villain’s eyes out last week?”
“Yes,” Gina says. Her mouth twists. “The guy got off easy compared to some others.”
You stare at her, momentarily speechless. “And you wonder why I’m not going to antagonize the guy?”
“But you already do,” Gina says. Her eyes are glinting. She looks so out of place against the dim interior of your home, a radiant girl dressed all in white and gold. She rounds the couch and snatches up one of your hands between two of her own. “Everyone else loves my dad. Except you. My entire life, and you’re the only one who dares to make—make statements about Hero Force consumption by stealing their deliveries or make the heroes chase you around an abandoned mall on foot like regular people. You challenge them, Elian. All I’m asking is that you do it again.”
“That sounds like a lot more than just crashing your car,” you say. Your voice sounds very far away. You never thought of your actions as so noble. There’s a tingling in your stomach that you’ve never felt before and your hand is so warm. She sees you. You shake the fantasy out of your head. “I—look. I’m flattered, but I’m not your guy. The heroes know my face. It’s only a matter of time before I get sent to whatever detention super-powered kids get sent to. I have to graduate high school.”
Rather than discourage her, Gina presses closer. “What if I told you there’s a way to do both?”
Her closeness fogs your brain. “Both?”
“Take the heroes down a notch and maintain your identity,” she says. She releases you and whirls to get her purse off the couch. “I can help you. We can train so that the heroes never recognize the new you. You can use your powers in new ways. And you can wear this.”
She thrusts a piece of chewed leather into your hands. A mask.
“I’m thinking,” she says, “we call you Outlaw.”
------ Now ----
You can’t shoot. Night is falling by the time you admit it to yourself. You press your back against the rough bark of the tree and stare up at the first stars. You cradle your gun in your hands.
The bloodlust is still there. You aren’t a fair lily incapable of staining your petals red (as red as her). So why can’t you pull the trigger? Because of her ghost? Her last message to you?
If you kill a Hero, there’s no going back. More than anything, I want you to live, Elian.
You grind your teeth. Easy for her to say. The dying never have to feel the weight of consequence. They can just say whatever the fuck they want.
You aren’t thinking when you climb down the tree. Your powers give you a lot of things – speed and healing, an instinct for the outdoors, and excellent eyesight. You don’t need to look to find one branch and another, dropping to the forest floor in ten-foot increments. By the time your boots hit the ground, you know what the problem is.
Unlike your other kills, this one is personal. It was never going to be enough just to see him dead. You need him to know why you’ve got him in your sights.
The Sun is an old school hero. The traps you were so afraid of are predictable, turns out. You pick your way around bear traps and landmines, sharp eyes easily picking out silver trip wire when it glints in the moonlight. There are cameras, but there’s likely only one person with access. In the past ten years of following the Sun, you’ve learned two things about him.
One, he’ll kill the things he loves before he loses them.
Two, he doesn’t trust anyone but himself.
You get to the building inside of an hour. The first floor is hidden by steel shutters and there’s no light peeking out from behind them. The second floor window where he’d been sleeping for most of the day shines with the faint blue glow of a television.
The front door looks like a bank’s with how thick it is. There’s a keypad and a biometric scanner you don’t have a prayer of hacking.
That’s okay. You’ve already seen your way in.
You climb up the nearest pine tree. The Sun likes to think of himself as a competent hero, but too many mayoral kickbacks over the years made him soft. He surrounded himself with powerful heroes and never once struggled to win. Because of that, he’s missing some caution and common sense. The building’s first floor is locked up tight, but the windows on the second are regular glass.
And he hasn’t trimmed the tree line back far enough.
You fire your first shot of the night into his empty desk chair, exactly where his chest had been hours earlier. Immediately a siren sounds, and the TV glow coming through the office’s open door is consumed by bright light. You run two steps and then leap, neatly flipping through the empty window frame. Your boots slide for a moment on the broken glass and you catch yourself on the edge of his desk. There are medical papers scattered across it, prescriptions and diagrams of the face and eyes and heart.
You chew your cheek at the sight of a pill bottle. There had been rumors that the Sun is sick with his own radiation poisoning. It’s good you’re here before nature runs its course.
The siren wails for another beat before dying. The silence rings. Your heartbeat picks up as your ears strain to hear if anyone’s coming to meet you. Strange. The Sun had to have been the one who shut off the alarm.
So where is he?
You hold your gun out in front of you and check your mask. The Sun knows who you are by now, but you want him to see the mask she gave you. The handsewn leather, patched more times than you can count, is recycled from one of his old leather jackets. It feels oddly poetic to be dressed in the first iteration of your costume, cowboy hat tipped back and a biker vest embroidered with the name she gave you.
Is the Sun hiding? You creep out of the office, eyes darting from the quaint landscapes hanging on the wall to the tasteful wooden floors. The Sun’s safe house feels more cabin-y than you expected. The property deed has been in his name for the past fifteen years. Did Gina ever visit? Her ghost runs ahead of you, golden nails dragging along the peach wallpaper to the first open door on the left. She looks over her shoulder and smiles.
There are times when you’re glad for the afterimages your brain conjures. This is not one of those times. You don’t think she’d be happy to see what you’re about to do.
You swing around the doorway gun first, a snarl on your lips. “You old bastard, drop what—”
The smell of antiseptic hits your nose first, dashing away the red haze filling your vision in an instant. A TV murmurs against the wall, some rerun of an old western, but it’s not what holds your attention.
There’s a bed in the center of the room. The Sun sits at bedside, his attention wholly invested on the hand he’s holding up. Carefully, he applies gold paint to the nails without once looking up at you.
The woman in the bed is obscured with white gauze and beige compression bandages. Her breathing is soft and even. The one eye you can see is closed and still. No dreaming, no awareness.
“Outlaw,” the Sun says. He gently sets Gina’s left hand down on her stomach and picks up her right. He squints at her pinky nail. “Close the office door, would you? I don’t want the heat to escape.”
“What,” you breathe, “the fuck.”
-----Ten years ago ----
It’s a good year with Gina. You never realized how friend-starved you were until she was there, over at your house every day after school. She always makes it sound like she’s coming over to talk about the Outlaw thing, but there’s other stuff too. Movies and cooking and tutoring.
“Life is about balance,” Gina says sagely during one such tutoring session. “Besides, even heroes don’t go on more than two missions a month. We’re doing just fine.”
There’s always a pressing need to do more though. Whenever you pull off a particularly daring heist, she smiles this secret and pleased smile that makes your stomach flip. Sometimes, when the two of you watch news coverage of your getaways, she murmurs how impressed she is, how smart you are, how cool your powers are.
It makes you want to do anything for Gina.
You’re watching the news one day, waiting for a recap of how you stole the Sun’s favorite shield from the armory, when a rare story comes on. A Hero is dead, some guy named Ibis from Atlanta. There aren’t any leads to the culprit except for eyewitness accounts of a mysterious, winged super-powered individual flying low over the city, hiding in storm clouds.
“I’d kill a Hero,” you blurt out.
Gina jerks so hard that the popcorn bowl goes flying out of her hands. She doesn’t seem to notice. “What?”
“N-not your dad or anything,” you say quickly although yes, if you had to kill anyone, you’d start with the man who makes Gina cry like that. “Just…in general. The news anchor said Ibis was connected to a civilian’s death, right? I could kill a Hero like that.”
“No,” Gina says. She drops off the couch to kneel by you. “No, Elian.”
You flush like you’ve done something wrong. You sink into your hoodie. “I’m not going to, I’m just saying—”
“If you kill a Hero, there’s no going back,” Gina says. She’s too close, so close that you can see the flecks of gold hidden in her eyes. “Your life—it’s not like what we’ve been doing. Dad’s got rules when it comes to stealing. But if you kill a hero?” She shudders. “I want you to live, Elian.”
“I got it—”
“Please,” she blurts out. The plea in her voice makes you really look at her despite the pounding of your heart. Her eyes are wild and her mouth is pressed into a thin line. “No matter what. Promise me.”
“I—” No matter what? You slowly shake your head, trying to get away from the instinctive desire to agree with her. “I-if someone is really bad, I’d—”
“Elian—”
The tension makes you truthful.
“If your dad hurt you, I’d kill him,” you say. When she rears back, this time you follow. You brace your arm against the couch so you can lean into her space. With your other hand, you trace the fading burn on her cheek that could pass for an old sunburn if you didn’t know the truth. “I know you don’t think he will, but he’s been erratic lately. And I know about his temper. If he hurts you, I’d kill him.”
The air thickens between you. It’s rare that you don’t back down, but you’re not backing down now, staring into her eyes. Competing wills. For a moment you let everything you feel come to the surface. Your frustration when she visits with that fucking shadow in her smile, the helplessness when there’s another burn on her arm, the adoration when she’s just there.
Gina shudders and looks away first. She licks her lips. “I—I…appreciate what you’re saying, but I’m fine. You agreed I got to make the rules for Outlaw. I’m telling you one. Don’t kill heroes.”
She’s pulling away. You do too, falling to her side and sitting next to her rather than hovering over her. You try for a careless shrug but fall short. How can she make you feel so powerful one second and so powerless the next? You avert your eyes. “I won’t kill heroes,” you promise.
You hear her suck in a breath. “Good. Because I need you alive.”
“I do like being alive,” you say and don’t finish the sentence with with you.
“We’re done studying,” she decides. She darts up towards the kitchen. “I’m getting another bowl of popcorn before we start the movie. You want some?”
You stare at your reflection in the dark TV. Your jaw works. Finally, you say, “Nah. I’m good. I’ll just eat it off the floor.”
“Don’t be gross, Elian!”
------Now.----
“I will regret that day for the rest of my life,” the Sun says. He hasn’t looked at you once. His eyes are glued to the steady rise and fall of Gina’s chest. He times his breathing to hers and then sighs. “What a fool I was. Drunk on power.”
You’re standing on the opposite side of the bed. Your gaze flicks from Gina to him and back again. “Is she ever conscious?”
“It’s a medically-induced coma,” the Sun says. “The doctors say she should wake up any day now that most of her injuries have healed. Her last surgery was the final one. Now it’s up to her.”
This might be the first time in ten years that you’ve breathed. You suck in air greedily and imagine you can taste her scent under the layers of sickness and medicine. “They told me she died.”
“I told Hero Force you did it,” the Sun says. There’s no remorse in his voice. “They always tell villains they were successful, so they don’t try again.”
A decade of rage slides around your ribs. “You fucking bastard.”
“I did think it was your fault ten years ago.” He carefully picks up Gina’s left hand again to apply a second coat. It takes all your willpower not to slap him away from her. “If you hadn’t stolen Hero Force data, I wouldn’t have had to come after you with my full power. She would never have been in the line of fire.”
You’re fists shake at your sides. “I didn’t steal Hero Force data, I stole your fucking car. Don’t rewrite history.”
“There was Hero Force data in that car.”
“It was your Porsche, your civilian Porsche!”
“My fault to have left sensitive data out,” the Sun says. His confession surprises you into silence. “But I had to get it back no matter what. Then I blamed you by thinking how if you’d only asked me to take my daughter to Prom, I would’ve known she was in the car.”
“She’s not your property and it’s not the 1800s, of course I didn’t ask if I could take your daughter to—”
“I’m telling you what I thought,” the Sun interrupts. He finally looks at you. He looks worse than he did earlier, the years cutting deep lines into his face. There are black bags of exhaustion under his watering eyes. He breathes out shakily. “I had to tell myself it was your fault. It was the only way I could survive, Elian.”
Your real name shocks you. You stumble back. “How do you know that name?”
“She calls for you sometimes,” the Sun says. He drags a hand over his face before grimly returning to his daughter’s nails. “She’s never been really conscious for long. The d-damage took a long time to heal. But when she’s awake, she calls for you and she calls for Outlaw. Wasn’t hard to put the pieces together.”
Your chest throbs. “I should have been here. You should have—I could have—”
“Blaming you let me keep her by my side,” the Sun says. “I don’t expect you to forgive me or even understand me. But I…I regret more than anything what I’ve done to my daughter.”
“You’re going to regret it even more,” you say. The rage you feel is like a tidal wave. Ten years. Ten years. You could have held her hand through her recovery. You could have been there for her. And this selfish asshole who never even loved her like a father should took that away from you. You remember your gun. “You never deserved to be her father.”
“I didn’t, did I?” the Sun asks. He sets her hand down and swallows hard. He looks down the barrel of your gun without flinching. “She says one other thing, you know. When she asks for you.”
The curiosity stills your trigger finger. “What?”
“She says, Don’t kill heroes.”
Your face contorts. There’s the memory of popcorn in your mouth and the heat of her eyes on you. “Yeah, she said that to me before too. Back when I offered to kill you the first time.”
The Sun hangs his head. If he’s surprised to hear that, he doesn’t show it. “I wasn’t a good father.”
“No. But she didn’t want you dead.”
Understanding dawns. “Don’t kill heroes.”
“Exactly.” You tilt your head. “Do you feel like a hero?”
His lips tremble. His gaze drifts back to his daughter. Her eyes are flickering under eyelids. “I—I—”
The trigger presses back against your finger, eager and ready. “Do you?”
He licks his lips. “N-no,” he whispers. He closes his eyes. “No, I don’t suppose I do.”
This time, it’s easy to take aim. Steady your breath. And—
Fuck.
“Leave,” you say. You drop your gun back to your side and scowl when the Sun’s eyes fly open in surprise. “If you do what I say, you’ll live long enough for Gina to decide what to do with you. Leave and don’t tell anyone about this.”
The Sun shakes his head. “No, no I can’t leave her—”
“Then die here,” you snap. You bare your teeth at him. “Leave. We’ll be gone in a week. Maybe she wakes up and calls you. Maybe she—” You take a deep breath. “Well. Maybe she doesn’t. Either way, your part is done here.”
“I need to be there when she wakes up. Please, I’m her dad—”
“You’re her murderer,” you say. More than anything, you want to pick Gina up and run out of here before the Sun can stop you. You eye the monitors and know three people you need to call for advice before you even attempt to move her. A week should be just enough time to disappear. “You think you deserve to stay by her side?”
The Sun opens his mouth twice before he finds words. “I just—let me stay until she wakes up. That way I’ll know.”
“I spent ten years thinking she was dead,” you say. “You can last a month in limbo. If I have to ask you again, we’ll finally see who’s stronger now that I’m all grown up.”
The Sun picks himself up slowly. You think he cries. You’re not sure. He may even plead with you again. You’re deaf to it. Your brain has given up on splitting your attention and every atom of your being is homed in on Gina.
She’s alive. She’s alive.
You kneel at her bedside and wait for her to wake up.
----
Thanks for reading! If you want to read more of work or get access to stories like this a week (or more!) early, please consider checking out my Patreon (X)!
This week's short story for my Triple Shot and above tiers is about a world where being loved adds years to your lifespan!
Based off this prompt (X): Love determines how long you live, some people are in their hundreds, but some don’t even live to be 20.
Based off a world where everyone gets a Destiny they must fulfill. Bakers and Demon Kings (x) and Villagers (X). You? You are a Hero.
----------------
You are a Hero.
Nobody at the orphanage knows. The mark sets during the worst winter in three decades, when the windows have to be barred to prevent snow spirits from ripping them to shreds and the Director takes half the reserves and runs in the middle of the night.
Sarah, the only caregiver left in the rickety building, holds as many of the kids as she can while the snow spirits scream outside. You’d love to be in the circle of her arms, but you’re holding the door shut with as much strength as your eight-year-old arms allow.
She doesn’t tell you to get away from the door.
“It’s alright,” she says, voice trembling. Her brown hair, matted from the months indoors, hides her eyes. She croons to the younger kids like a bird, so softly and gently that you have to strain to hear it over the howling demons and roaring winds. “We’ll be okay. Our land’s Lord will send a Hero, you’ll see. We’ll be okay then.”
Your arms burn as intensely as your eyes. A Hero. Your stomach aches from hunger and your fingers sting from the cold. You aren’t sure how much good you’re doing keeping the door closed, but there’s something deep inside of you that tells you you must do something. The blows from the snow spirits outside vibrate up your arms, nearly throwing you back.
Heroes, you think, only matter if they show up.
Hope is traumatic. Eight-years-old and you’ve been returned from potential families twice. Three days ago, you found the beginnings of greenery in the woods behind the orphanage. When you excitedly raced back to tell the others that winter was ending, it was only to find the Director and most of the caregivers gone with a significant portion of the rations.
Then the storm clouds rolled in.
So that long, dangerous night, you don’t hope. You shut your ears to Sarah’s gentle comforts and the snow spirits’ shrieks. You focus on the burning in your arms, the blisters forming on your heels, the cold nipping at your fingers.
Hope is traumatic but trying is something you can do. You put your small body between all of the horrors outside the door and the other kids. You try to stand firm.
You don’t notice when the burning in your arms hides the arrival of a telling mark on your left bicep.
---------------------.
You are fourteen years old, one year shy of coming into your power, when a couple visits the orphanage intending to adopt.
Sarah is now the Director of the orphanage, awarded the position by the land’s Lord after that terrible winter six years ago. She’s different than she was then. You lost three kids to hunger before spring finally came and she held each one in their last moments.
You and Sarah never develop the close relationship she has with the other kids. But she always makes sure you have more meat in your meals than most and, when you hunt in the woods, you always let her decide how the food will be divided between dinner and winter stores.
“We’re Knights,” the potential adopters tell the Director. They’re a couple, a man and a woman with dark hair and muscular bodies. “Retired. We’re settling just north of here for good and are looking for a suitable child who can follow in our footsteps.”
Director Sarah looks at them coldly, leaning back in her chair and folding her hands over her stomach. If she notices you and two of the younger kids peeking through the crack in the door, she doesn’t say anything. “I apologize, Mr. and Mrs. Bahr, but it seems there’s a misunderstanding. We do not pair children with families based on their Destiny.”
“We’re not saying you do,” Mrs. Bahr says. Her gaze is cutting though her shoulders are relaxed. “Our Lord explained before we came. However, there is no rule against asking the children their Destiny, is there?”
Loophole. You pull away from the crack in the door, letting Hera and Josiah take your spot. You lean against the wall with your eyes closed. Orphanages aren’t allowed to disclose Destinies, but that’s where the protection ends. If someone sees a child’s Destiny or learns of it through some other means, that’s alright.
These people aren’t here to adopt because they want a child. They’re here to adopt for a guarantee. A guarantee of what remains to be seen. An heir like they claim? A prodigy for status? Or a weapon for them to control?
You listen for any other clues behind their motives, but the Bahrs don’t push the issue of Destiny again. They accept Director Sarah’s schedule for meeting the kids, even offering to host a picnic day at their estate as a treat. The couple wants to gain trust, you can tell, and by the end of the meeting it’s working.
Director Sarah sees them off to the door herself.
“We’ll wait for the invitation,” she says. She’s older now, her thin brown hair showing the beginning signs of going grey. But her handshake looks strong when she shakes Mrs. Bahr’s in farewell. “I’m sure the children will be thrilled.”
“I hope so,” Mrs. Bahr says. Her husband nods to the Director gravely, but Mrs. Bahr lingers. “I’m sorry if we came off a little…forward when we mentioned Destinies. Please believe me when I say that my husband and I aren’t so shallow. We are looking for a child – one we can call our own.”
“I see,” Director Sarah says. There’s a hint of warmth in her voice. “As I said, we look forward to your invitation.”
Mrs. Bahr nods and joins her husband in their carriage. They set off down the road without once having asked to meet one of the children on the first day of their introduction.
You can tell Sarah likes them.
“What do you think?” Sarah asks. She doesn’t turn from the road, even though the Bahr’s carriage is out of sight. “Isla?”
You don’t ask how she knows it’s you lurking in the shadows of the orphanage. Director Sarah is a Guardian. Her senses are elevated when it comes to those under her charge.
“I don’t think anything,” you say. You step out from around the corner with a sigh. No use hiding now. “They’re influential people if they were recommended here by the Lord himself. We’re fortunate.”
“You’re the right age for a Knight’s apprenticeship,” Sarah says.
“Hera hasn’t shown me her Destiny, but it’s probably something suitable,” you say. Hera is ten, one of the older kids at the orphanage. Last summer she lifted Josiah, only a year younger than her and already a head taller, out of the well before he could drown. “You should talk to her about what being part of a Knight family could mean.”
Sarah looks at you over her shoulder. The setting sun catches in her eyes, turning the warm brown into an unearthly amber. “I hope you can accept the possibility they might choose you.”
They won’t. “Aren’t I needed here?” you ask.
Sarah’s expression softens. “You are, Isla,” she says. She weighs her next words carefully. “But I am the one who’s responsible for all of you. I can take care of everyone. If the Bahr family is a good fit…”
“Sure,” you say flippantly. You shove your hands in your pockets and slink back into the orphanage. You don’t dare hope. “I’m going to help Josiah.” He’s on dinner duty tonight. He always cuts the onions too roughly. “See you later.”
You feel Sarah’s eyes on your back like a physical warmth.
-----------.
Being a Hero doesn’t change anything about you. You expected it to when you first noticed the mark but, even six years later, nothing’s different.
You aren’t kinder. When Josiah asks for your dessert, you steal a bit of his as punishment for even asking. When Hera asks for a bedtime story, you tell her one so scary that she has to sleep with one of the other girls. When Sarah asks you to fix the fence around the chickens, you whine and complain that you’re the only one who does anything around the orphanage.
“The curse of being the oldest,” Sarah says dryly. She hands you a hammer and a bucketful of nails. “Some posts were dropped off at the end of the lane. Make sure you’re back by sunset.”
Maybe you’re a little stronger than others. You can drag three posts at once and could probably drag more if you wanted. But another curse of being a Hero is that you’re very aware.
It’s not until you’re nailing a third rail to the fence that Mr. Bahr makes his presence known. You don’t turn even when he makes his steps purposefully heavy to avoid scaring you.
“You’re very strong,” Mr. Bahr says.
His shadow is long and thin, just like him. You observe it from your peripherals, unable to speak with the two nails you’re holding between your lips. You take your time pounding them into the wood. He’s arms, a sword at his hip, but his hands are loose at his sides.
“Good thing I am,” you say at last. You stand and turn in the same motion. He waited for you to finish without chastising you for not speaking right away. You perch the hammer on your shoulder. “Otherwise, the chickens would take over.”
Mr. Bahr laughs. Unlike when he was meeting Director Sarah, his face is relaxed and open. His blue eyes sparkle. “We couldn’t have that now, could we? I suppose we all owe you our thanks for preventing the coop’s coup.”
You want to laugh. You don’t. “Director Sarah won’t like you being here uninvited.”
“I just came to drop off an invitation,” Mr. Bahr says. He studies you for a moment and then smiles. “I hope you’ll accept, Isla.”
A chill races down your spine. How does he know your name? You wipe the sweat from your brow with a scowl. “Maybe I don’t want to be adopted.”
To your surprise, Mr. Bahr nods. “I can understand that,” he says. He looks up at the sky. The light is sliding from the sky, catching on the clouds and turning them a brilliant orange. When he looks back at you, he almost looks…sad. “Think of our invitation as a party, hm? No strings attached.”
For some reason your tongue feels heavy. It takes two tries before you can say, “I need to fix this part of the fence before dark.”
“Want some help?” Mr. Bahr asks.
“I couldn’t ask—”
“You didn’t ask, I offered,” Mr. Bahr says. He rolls up his sleeves and nimbly plucks the hammer from your grip. “I may be a Knight, but I’ve done my fair share of carpentry. Let me show you a few tricks.”
You listen quietly as Mr. Bahr shows you how to twist the nails to avoid splitting the wood. What would have taken you an hour to finish, he accomplishes in a quarter of one, talking to you the entire time.
It’s…odd to have an adult’s attention on you for such a long time. He’s careful not to get too close, always offering you the hammer to practice by setting it on the grass between you rather than handing it to you directly. When you manage to replicate his technique on your second try, Mr. Bahr is more excited than you are.
“Wonderful,” he compliments. He glances up at the sky. The first stars are twinkling. “I’ll be going now and you should too. Have a good night, Isla.”
Unlike the first time he said your name, it feels pleasant now. You mutter a goodbye and leave before he does, scurrying towards the orphanage with your bucket of nails clutched to your chest.
He’s gone when you think to check the road for his carriage. Did he walk here? Ride a horse?
You close and lock the orphanage’s doors behind you.
----------------.
The picnic isn’t scheduled until the middle of summer and it’s spring now. Still, it’s all anyone can talk about.
“We have plenty of time to get ready,” Director Sarah tells them. “The Bahrs will be dropping in from time to time until then. I expect everyone to be on their best behavior when they’re here.”
Josiah raises his hand. “I hear they live in a castle!”
“A manor,” Sarah corrects. “Given to them by our Lord for their years of service.”
“The Guard in town says they worked for the King once!” Hera says, wiggling in her seat. “Is that true?”
“You can ask them yourself,” Sarah says. She claps her hands together and starts urging the kids up. “It’s time for chores. Your assignment is posted by the kitchen…”
You stay seated at the breakfast table. You haven’t eaten your third egg or your last slice of toast. Your stomach feels queasy. You keep thinking about Mr. Bahr saying wonderful when you worked on the fence together.
You aren’t supposed to want to be adopted. You’ve had your chance and you ruined it both times. It’s not fair of you to imagine what it would be like learning swordsmanship from Mr. Bahr and what it’d be like to hear him praise you when you got the next move right. One of the other kids deserve that chance.
You can only do what you can do.
---------------.
Mrs. Bahr is alone the next visit.
No one recognizes her at first. She’s wearing a gown like a noble and her hair is gently flowing down her back rather than tightly pinned behind her head.
“I’ve received the Director’s permission to hold a lesson on writing,” she tells the children. She gestures to the bag she’s set on the table. “Come get a slate and a piece of chalk. We will work all together.”
The kids have never had slate and chalk before, not the real ones anyway. Sometimes you find a nice, flat rock they can draw on with charcoal, but it’s not as entertaining as what Mrs. Bahr brings. She watches everyone in amusement as they immediately start drawing instead of starting the lesson, flower and trees and swords.
“Look, Isla,” Hera says, tugging at your sleeve. You’re seated on the spare chair by the wall, away from the table. She twists from her spot to show you she’s drawn a shaky stick figure. “It’s you!”
Your eyes flick up to Mrs. Bahr. She’s not irritated by the distractions yet. You point with your bit of chalk at the drawing. “Which part of it is me?”
Hera points at a blob in the stick figure’s hand. “That’s the horned rabbit you brought home yesterday!”
You snort. The horned rabbit you’d killed yesterday wasn’t half the size of your body. “Are you sure that’s a horned rabbit? Looks like a turtle to me.”
Hera points to the stick figure’s face. “You can also tell it’s you ‘cause you’re frowning.”
“Hey!”
Mrs. Bahr claps her hands together. Instantly, she has the room’s attention. “I’m glad you all like my present. However, it’s time to get started.”
“Present?” Josiah asks.
“If you work hard today, you will be allowed to keep the slate and chalk as a present,” Mrs. Bahr says. She takes care to make eye contact with every kid. “Only those who work hard.”
It’s generous. You watch Mrs. Bahr from under your lashes as she talks everyone through writing the alphabet. It’s too generous not to be genuine. Try as you might, you can’t figure out any ulterior motive to spending so much on the kids. To look good? For who? For Director Sarah?
Director Sarah won’t be swayed by gifts like this even if the kids could be.
Mrs. Bahr stops well away from you, observing your slate from afar. “Very good, Isla. Do you know how to write?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Read?”
“Only a little.”
Mrs. Bahr hums. She doesn’t look disgusted by your stupidity or put off by your clipped tone. Your first family returned you when you told them. Mrs. Bahr’s lips curve. “Your letters are wonderfully steady. I can tell you will be a very good student.”
She turns before she can see you flush.
---------.
Over the next few months, there isn’t a week that goes by without at least one of the Bahrs visiting. They become a regularity around the orphanage to the point that even Director Sarah stops worrying about the state of their rooms with every visit.
“Kids will be kids,” Mrs. Bahr says when you ask her to wait while you tidy the toys in the parlor. “It’s alright, Isla.”
Your head spins. Sometimes, when one of them says something particularly bizarre, you feel like you’re outside your body. There was a time when they didn’t have toys to leave out in the visiting area. Thanks to the Bahrs, every child has a doll, a slate, a new set of shoes, and an abacus. You are still waiting for the strings that come with these presents.
There haven’t been any yet.
The kids love the Bahrs. Hera insists on baking fresh strawberry tarts for them after a day of gathering. Josiah carefully sounds out passages from their new books to show them that he’s still practicing his letters. Annie and a group of the younger kids spend all day weaving a flower crown for Mrs. Bahr that you have to confiscate before they can put it on her head.
“Go wash your hands,” you scold. Despite your tone, your hands are gentle as you push Annie to the schoolhouse. “Don’t touch your eyes.”
Annie blinks rapidly, trying to hold back tears. “I didn’t know it was poison, lady, I swear.”
“Oh,” Mrs. Bahr says, hand fluttering over her heart. She steps towards Annie. “Dear one—”
You give full body flinch when Mrs. Bahr stoops to hug Annie, but you don’t get between them. The Bahrs have won your trust in this. They won’t hurt the kids.
You sigh to hide your flinch when Mrs. Bahr stands. “Now Mrs. Bahr needs to wash. Poison ivy is no joke.”
“It is not,” Mrs. Bahr agrees. She ruffles Annie’s hair. “Go on, do as Isla says. Wash up.”
“We can go together,” Annie says with her big, blue eyes. She reaches for Mrs. Bahr’s hand and then thinks better of it. She tucks her hands behind her back and kicks at the ground. “If you want.”
“I’ll be right behind you,” Mrs. Bahr says, smiling.
Annie nods and races to follow her friends.
“I’m sorry,” you say as soon as Annie is out of ear shot. You busy yourself picking up the fallen flower crown and the various trimmings of poison ivy they’d used for foliage throughout it. You feel flustered. “They really didn’t know any better—”
“I know,” Mrs. Bahr says so gently that you have to look up at her. She’s frowning at your hands. “I’m more concerned about you. Should you be holding onto it like that?’
“I’m immune,” you say. You’re not worried that she’ll guess your Destiny from that. Lots of Villagers are immune to poison ivy, particularly the ones in this region who rely on gathering and hunting. “Since I’m in the woods so much.”
“Knights are immune too,” Mrs. Bahr says. She follows you away from the orphanage and to the tree line. “You’re quite the hunter, aren’t you? I remember Hera saying you slayed a horned rabbit.”
Heat comes to your face. You stomp ahead of her to deposit the flower crown in some denser foliage where the kids won’t be able to get it. “I get lucky.”
“I’d consider it unlucky to run across a horned rabbit,” Mrs. Bahr says. She examines the forest with interest. “A demon is a demon. Even adults have difficulty with horned rabbits.”
It hadn’t been difficult. You’d been armed with a sharpened branch and, when the rabbit leapt for you, you knew right when to stab. You clear your throat. “It was difficult.” Then when Mrs. Bahr doesn’t say anything, you add, “It was frightening.”
She believes you. She lays a gentle hand on your shoulder to get you to look her in the face. “The orphanage budget is enough that you don’t need to hunt, Isla,” Mrs. Bahr says. “I know I don’t like the idea of a fourteen-year-old out here alone and unarmed.”
“Almost fifteen,” you say, “and I had a sharp stick.”
“A sharp sti—” Mrs. Bahr cuts herself off with a deep breath. “Regardless of your…aptitude, Isla, it’s dangerous. I’ve spoken to the Director and she agrees with me. You aren’t to go hunting anymore.”
The forest suddenly feels too hot. The leaves overhead rustle, but you can barely hear it over the roaring of your blood. “Excuse me?”
Mrs. Bahr steps closer. “You’re a very strong girl, Isla, but it’s dangerous. If you want to go out with me or Mr. Bahr—”
You shake off her hand. “The Director agreed with you? She said I’m not allowed to go hunting anymore?”
“Out of concern for your safety.” Mrs. Bahr looks like she regrets saying anything. “Once Mr. Bahr and I explained to her what a risk a horned rabbit poses—”
You run away. Mrs. Bahr calls out after you, but you don’t stop. Beyond the sting of Mr. and Mrs. Bahr not thinking you strong enough to hunt, there’s a deeper hurt. The Director agrees. Really? Really?
“Isla? What’s wrong? I thought you were with Mrs. Bahr,” Director Sarah says when you burst into her office. She sets the papers she’d been reading down and frowns. “You look—”
“I’m not supposed to go hunting anymore?” you ask.
Sarah’s face blooms in understanding. “After what Mr. and Mrs. Bahr said about the increase in demons in the area, I agreed—”
“It’s summer,” you interrupt. You stalk up to her desk, your fists balled at your side.
“It’s time to hunt.”
“The Bahrs have agreed to accompany you—”
“They only come once a week,” you say. You’re being so incredibly rude to the Director, but you don’t care. “I need to hunt three times that at least. The game has been moving deeper into the forest—”
“Where you are not allowed to go,” Director Sarah says, this time interrupting you. She steeples her hands in front of her. “I should have curtailed this activity long before this point, but I thought you needed it.”
“We need it,” you say. You can’t believe what you are hearing. “We need to store up rations, you know that.”
“Our budget allows us to purchase rations in town.”
“But what if that’s not enough? It’s better to have our own supply—”
“It will be enough.”
“It still doesn’t hurt to have some extra jerky—”
“The store we have will be enough.”
“But what if it’s not?!” You’ve raised your voice without realizing it, fists shaking at your sides. “The other kids are too young to remember o-or too new, but you and I do. That winter, we didn’t have enough. Why are you trying to stop me?” To your horror, your voice cracks. “I thought you understood.”
There’s silence in the room except for your panting breath.
“I’m sorry,” Sarah finally says. The sudden apology is enough to close your mouth against what you might have said. She meets your eyes. “You’ve always been so strong that I…Isla, you were a child. I will always be grateful for what you did that winter and for every winter since. I relied on you, a child, because I didn’t have any other option. We didn’t have another option. But now we do. We’re okay now, Isla. You don’t have to work so hard to protect us.”
“Yes, I do, I’m—” the Hero “—I can do it.” There is something inside of you telling you that that is what you must do. You think that it’s part of being a Hero.
((You’re worried that it’s because you’re scared.))
“My decision is final,” Sarah says. She picks up her documents and straightens them. “You are only to go hunting with an adult from now on. If I find out you went to the woods without one, there will be consequences.”
She’s using the same tone she uses on the other kids when they’re misbehaving. I mean business. You stare at her for a long, breathless moment. You jerkily turn to go.
Mrs. Bahr is hovering in the doorway. She looks guiltily between you and Director Sarah. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to eavesdrop…”
You shove past her and run to your room.
-------------.
Somewhat counterintuitively, as an orphan you’re never alone. You throw yourself face down on your bed.
A shocked silence swallows the occupants on the other bed.
“Is she okay?” Josiah asks Hera.
“It’s Isla,” Hera answers. There’s the rustling of bedsheets as Hera climbs out of bed and then the soft sound of socks on hardwood as she comes over. “You okay?”
You are not okay. There’s an intense war of emotions in your chest. Anger that none of the adults seem to think you’re capable. Betrayal that Sarah isn’t on your side. A sick fear at the thought of being unprepared for winter. And, now that you’ve run away so spectacularly, shame. They probably think you’re overreacting, but they’re wrong. They’re the ones who are being naïve. They’re the ones who—
A gentle hand on the back of your head freezes the thought. Hera pets your short, black hairs in an attempt at comfort. “It’s okay, Isla. You can just sleep. Sleep makes everything better.”
That’s what you tell the younger kids. The difference between you and Hera saying it? When Hera falls asleep, you work to fix the problem. If you fall asleep, no one is going to fix the problem for you.
You flip over, dislodging Hera’s hand. You look up at her as if seeing her for the first time. She’s ten, two years older than you were when the winter happened. She was four then. You want to ask her if she remembers, but instead you ask, “Do you think Sarah hates me?”
“What?” Hera’s eyes are wide. “No! What makes you think that?”
“Nothing,” you say. “It’s stupid. Forget I asked.” You turn on your side, your back to them.
“I know she’s worried about you,” Josiah says. He offers the information tentatively. “I overheard her and the Bahrs talking. Did they ban you from the woods?”
You don’t move. “What else did they say?” You’re afraid that he’s going to say they called you weak. Or, worse, a nuisance. “Did they say anything else about me?”
“Not really.”
Nobody hears anything useful around here. You close your eyes. “I just want to be alone for a little while. I—”
There’s a knock on the door. “Isla? It’s me, Marie. Can I come in?”
Marie? Too late you remember that that’s Mrs. Bahr’s name. She’s been trying to get the kids to call her be her first name. So far no one’s taken her up on it and she hasn’t pushed.
Hera opens the door. “Hi, Mrs. Bahr. Isla is being moody.”
You sit up with a squawk. “I am not!”
“If it’s alright, I’d like to talk to Isla for a moment,” Mrs. Bahr says to Josiah and Hera. “Alone.”
“Don’t let her yell at you,” Hera says as she passes Mrs. Bahr. “She never means it.”
You are going to strangle her. “I don’t yell!”
“That’s not an inside voice,” Josiah says. He dodges the pillow you throw at him, pulling the door closed behind him and Hera.
You are suddenly alone in the room with Mrs. Bahr.
You sit up further, pressing your back against the headboard. Mrs. Bahr doesn’t look mad. Her hands are clasped in front of her and she’s looking down at the floor. It almost looks like she’s the nervous one. You hug your pillow to your chest. “You can sit down if you’d like.”
Mrs. Bahr looks up at you. Her lips twitch. “Thank you, Isla.” She sits down on Hera’s bed gingerly as if afraid it wouldn’t be able to take her wait. When she’s settled, she says, “I wanted to apologize to you.”
Your arms tighten around your pillow. “Why?”
“Not for saying you shouldn’t hunt alone,” Mrs. Bahr says. She’s not a mind reader but sometimes it seems like she is. “For not understanding what hunting means to you. I would have approached things differently if I’d known.”
“Known what?”
“About what you’ve been through.”
The winter. That’s the only thing Mrs. Bahr could be talking about. She must have heard more of your conversation (argument) with the Director than you thought. “It was a long time ago,” you say. You really don’t want to talk about this with Mrs. Bahr. Not when you can still feel that winter’s desperation in your molars like a memory. “I’m fine.”
Mrs. Bahr is quiet for a moment. She studies you much like Mr. Bahr did all those weeks ago mending the fence. “I was a knight for 30 years, you know. I supposed it’s not weird that a Knight worked as a knight for so long. As soon as I came into my power at 15, I was compelled to hold a sword. To seek out evils and defeat them. To follow my Lord into battle no matter the cause.” She looks up at the ceiling. “I’ve had a lot of adventures and helped many, many people. But there was a time when I wanted to quit.”
You start. “You did?”
“I wanted to work in a flower shop,” Mrs. Bahr says. She leans back on her hands. “What a life it could have been! Waking up before the sun and hiking to the flower fields…I had my new house all picked out. It’d have a koi pond and a row of red rocks from the Harrow River. That’s where I met Ivan.”
Mr. Bahr. He’s been trying to get you to call him by his first name too. Unlike Mrs. Bahr, he’s much pushier about it. “What made you want to quit?”
“Exhaustion,” Mrs. Bahr says. She closes her eyes. “It seemed that there was a new threat to my Lord every day. An assassination attempt from a branch family. A territorial dispute. A new influx of demon beasts. It got to the point that I hardly left my Lord’s side for fear of returning to find him dead. He was the first Lord I swore my loyalty to. I always felt like I was failing those days. So I wanted to quit.”
You’ve felt like that before. Sometimes it seems like you never catch enough while hunting, that you’re never kind enough, that you’re never strong enough. You’ve never thought about working in a flower shop though. “Why didn’t you?”
“I did.” Mrs. Bahr laughs at your shocked expression. “I was in my twenties. They tell you things calm down after your teen years, but that’s not true. I handed in my resignation and fled for the nearest town.” Her smile softens. “Ivan followed me.”
“He was there?”
Mrs. Bahr nods. “We were sworn to the same Lord. He came galloping up with my resignation clutched in his hand. His face was so red!” She laughs. “’What does this mean, Marie? He was crying! You can’t quit! I haven’t beaten you yet!’”
“And that’s what convinced you to stay a knight?” you ask. That doesn’t help you. You don’t have a significant other to come racing after you.
“No,” Mrs. Bahr said. “Ivan didn’t know why I wanted to quit. I can’t do it, I said. I can’t keep the Lord safe. I’m not enough. You know what he said?”
You shake your head.
“He said, Of course, you’re not enough,” Mrs. Bahr says. She’s lowering her voice in imitation of Ivan’s. “You were never going to be enough.” You’re gaping at his harsh words, but Mrs. Bahr looks amused. “That’s why we have a squadron. The job is too big for one person. All you need to do is your part.”
You stare at her, not understanding.
“The world isn’t carried by one person,” Mrs. Bahr says. “I was so convinced that everything was up to me – the Lord’s safety, the next campaign’s success, or defense from monsters – that I buckled under the pressure. What I didn’t see that it wasn’t all my responsibility. I was part of a team. All I had to do was one part.”
You think of the winter night and holding the door shut. There hadn’t been anyone to help you then. Someone needed to comfort the younger kids. Someone needed to try and protect them. “What if there isn’t anyone else?”
“Then we do our best,” Mrs. Bahr says immediately. She meets your eyes. “But are you by yourself now, Isla?”
Yes. You open your mouth to tell her that, but the word won’t come out. Are you? Director Sarah looked so defeated when you accused her of not understanding. But didn’t she understand better than anyone else. You swallow. “No. There’s Director Sarah.”
“What does she do?”
“She takes care of us,” you say. “She makes sure the money we get goes to the right things.”
Mrs. Bahr smiles warmly. “That’s right. Who else?”
“…Hera,” you say. You remember she pulled Josiah from the well before Annie even had the chance to tell you what had happened. “She watches the younger kids.”
“She’s very good with them,” Mrs. Bahr says. “Who else?”
Your mind blanks. Who else? “Josiah. He helps us study.”
“And?”
And? “T-the Lord. He makes sure we have the funds for what we need.”
“Including winter provisions,” Mrs. Bahr agrees.
You frown. You suddenly see where this is going. “The amount of winter provisions he thinks we need.”
Mrs. Bahr hums. “What happens if he’s wrong?”
“That’s why I hunt,” you say. Maybe now she’ll understand. “So that we’ll be okay if he’s wrong.”
“What if you don’t hunt enough?” Mrs. Bahr asks.
Your chest is tight. You rub at your sternum and try to breathe deeply. “We starve,” you say. You wheeze and then clear your throat. “We’d starve, but that’s not going to happen. Because I always hunt enough.” I have to.
“This year,” Mrs. Bahr says, voice gentle and soothing, “say you don’t hunt anymore. The winter is harsher than expected and the orphanage’s stores are depleted. What do you think will happen?”
You laugh and gasp at the same time. “They’d all starve,” you say again. What doesn’t she get about that? “First the little ones then—”
Mrs. Bahr is shaking her head. “No, Isla, that’s not what would happen.”
Your temper flares. “That’s what always—”
“What would happen,” Mrs. Bahr says in her even tone, “is that Mr. Bahr and I would come deliver extra provisions to you.”
All the air is chased from your lungs. You feel eight again, small and vulnerable and cold. You’re shivering as you stare at her. “You would?”
“We would.” Gently, as if afraid she might scare you, Mrs. Bahr moves from Hera’s bed to yours. She puts a warm hand on your knee. “We’re a fortress. The Lord gives us part of the emergency fund in order to keep our stores and grounds ready for refugees. Mr. Bahr keeps fifteen percent more than the most generous estimate out of an abundance of caution. We would come and make sure nobody starved.”
For some reason, that makes you want to cry. You blink against the sudden heat behind your eyes. “Oh.”
“That’s why we don’t want you to go hunting,” Mrs. Bahr says. Her thumb rubs over your knee. “It was worth the risk before. You worked hard to keep everyone here alive. You are incredible, for that, Isla. I can’t tell you how much I admire your strength and your bravery. But things are different now. You don’t need to do as much as you did before. There are other people on your squad.”
But I’m the Hero, you want to say. Heroes are supposed to save the day, aren’t they?
Knights help save the day too.
You let Mrs. Bahr pat your knee for a long time. She seems content to let you think, her energy a pleasant hum next to you. A knot is untying in your chest. If you don’t hunt, it’s not the end of everyone. There will still be the funds from the Lord. Sarah’s always been excellent at stretching those as far as they need to go. And, if they aren’t enough, there’s something different this year. The Bahrs are here.
“You’d help us even if you’re only going to adopt one of us?” you ask.
Mrs. Bahr’s lips thin. She looks sad, but hides it quickly. “We’re Knights,” she says. “Even if we are retired. We’ll be here the moment you need us.”
You don’t hope. Hope is traumatic. But…
You believe her.
--------
Thanks for reading! There will be a new part of Hope and the Hero every Friday!
If you'd like to read the whole story now, please consider supporting me on Patreon (X)!
There's also a new story up there, a sequel to my Dandelion villain story (X)
Summary: You are free of mind control for the first time in a year. The only things standing between you and your revenge are the heroes.
A fae forms a genuine bond of friendship with a human. As a prank another fae decides to kill their friend. Their ruler decides the murder did not violate any fae laws and issues no punishment, so the first fae dedicates their life to getting revenge by teaching humans all the rules of the fae.
The Court of The-King-Who-Would-Be-Crowned has never seen such uproar. His daughter has never been so loud, so furious, has never filled a space with screams and feathers and the blast of a winter storm. And all over a mortal? She is bid to be silent, and she refuses.
“There has been no crime,” the King insists, the pressure of his authority coming down like a hammer. “Behave yourself in my presence.”
“No crime?!” Her voice has never been so loud. The air crystalises around her. “They were mine and my own, and stolen from me!”
“Were they?” The King asks. “I saw no brand upon them. They had not eaten or drunk of your table. They were mortal. Therefore, I am not bound to answer your call for vengeance.” His voice softens, as though in appeal to the one he calls his daughter. ‘It was just one mortal, dearest. You can find another.“
Agony at his description of a friend unbound to law turns again to fury at the idea that such a person could be replaced. "Never. Never will I. And there must be justice for this!”
“You defy your father’s judgement?” The Honoured Dealer smirks.
Other members of court are not as bold as he, and hide their smiles behind fluttering fans or raised hands or carefully-maintained glamour. There has not been such entertainment had in centuries, to see the polished and poised Winter Swan raving and weeping and defying an open order from her sovereign.
The Swan rounds on the Dealer, hissing, teeth bared, an inch from his face. He flinches, but holds his ground. His confidence is not shaken when she whispers her promise: you shall bear the blame for what is to come. Then she twists herself into feathers, and in swan form she leaves. The whole countryside - fae territory and mortal scope alike - ring with her agonised and mournful howls all night.
Things move too quickly, then, for the Courts to understand. For them, who have centuries of seasons, a week should be less than a blink. Yet in a week, the territory of the Dealer and his kin is laid bare. Mortals come in their greedy droves, with picks of iron shattering the border stones and axes of iron to cut down the ancient oaks. When the Sisters of the Petal went down with song and seduction to call mortals to their doom, these greedy men threw handfuls of salt, and bound each woman to a name, and burned them at stakes of yew wood. A week, and the ancient untouched forest became a logging camp, and all ancient mystery was stripped from this part of the world.
The-King-Who-Would-Be-Crowned sought out his daughter, where she stood upon her frozen pond. He scolded her for her vengeance, for stripping the Courts of one of their own. The Winter Swan looked on her father like she would look on a hated stranger, and told him to go drown himself.
Mortals continued to learn about the sacred mysteries that kept the Courts safe. Rivers were dammed, lakes were dredged, standing stones were defaced and toppled; salt was scattered, names were used like lassos. The Summer season was stripped and shrivelled. Autumn and Spring soon felt their territories likewise invaded, and could do nothing. They were named, and they were burned, and they were lost.
The-King-Who-Would-Be-Crowned sought out his daughter again, and told her she had gone too far. If this continues, there will be no court left. The Winter Swan arched her neck proudly, nodded, and told her father to go drown himself.
Songs full of salt and iron and binding names were sung by children, taught by the wailing bird that circled overhead. Axe and shovel and poker and spear press and push and dig into the territory of the fae. The Courts are broken. All will become fable, or forgotten.
The-King-Who-Would-Be-Crowned sought out his daughter, one last time. “All this for one mortal? Our world ends, our lives end, because of one mortal? You cannot follow him if you die! You will be unmade, and for what?”
“For one mortal,” she said, with a cold smile. “For one dear friend.”
It’s that typical story all over again: you are a princess. You get kidnapped, some random guy saves you, and then your father gets you married to him. No. Not this Time. You have watched a million versions of the same random guy beat a demon and become your husband even though you don’t love him, so this time, you kill the demon. You kill your father, the king. It doesn’t matter to you… After all, he’s only a program in the video game that is your life.
Funnily enough, it’s not the kidnapping that breaks Phaedra. Oh, it’s terrifying every time–the sound of breaking glass in the dark of her bedroom, the feeling of vulnerability as blades tear into the curtain around her bed, the terror as she’s struck and thrown and tumbled over her assailant’s shoulder–but it’s not what keeps her shivering long past the story has ended.
The attack always goes quickly. The demon screams past her guards and takes her in claws and wings and flees out the window. Her captivity sometimes goes quickly, sometimes takes a while longer, sometimes lasts forever. Sometimes the demon makes her cook and clean for him. Sometimes he tries to make her fall in love with him (as if this were that type of story). Sometimes he hurts her, badly, over and over and over again.
She’s no longer afraid of pain. She’s no longer afraid of mind tricks. She’s no longer afraid of him.
She hates being saved. She hates going home. And she’s always so afraid of the moment her father announces her hand belongs to her savior.
There’s become quite a few of these and the blue hellsite’s tag search functionality is garbage, so here: all the #Storytime with Hell posts I can think of:
Bob the Firewizard’s Unwise Pyromaniac Adventures
Revenge Is Best Served Cold
Kitten Little and the Kitchen Murdercat
My Elementary School Nemesis
I Am Not A Lawful Good Character
…and other high school shenanigans
The Stupidest Injury I Can Think Of
The Healing Powers of Throatpunching
Tiny Hellen’s Revenge (and an example of the Scary Voice)
The Shark Story
An Extremely Safe Adventure In Liverpool Cathedral
Mr. Taylor’s Historical History
If there’s any particular topic you would like to hear a story on, let me know, and maybe I’ll have something fitting. No promises, of course, but maybe….
