[teddystory]

020825 | angel vision

an angel is looking at me. it terrifies me. it picks me up and holds me. its body is huge and hot. it carries me into another dimension, where every color is shattered into a thousand colors and every object is constantly turning itself inside out. then the angel takes me to a cool gray country where there is nothing but calming, slowly swirling gray mists, and we rest there for a while. then we enter the ship of heaven and fly through an endless kaleidoscope of rainbow crystals until we reach the edges of paradise. we lie down together on a bed of light and hold each other’s hands and close our eyes.

[teddystory]

103124 | apparition

It was a cold storming night. My study was full of shadows cast by the guttering candles. The bookshelves were large and ominous in the dark. A phantom interrupted my work. It dripped with the freezing cold. It faded slowly, bones aching and chains rattling and rattling. The next morning, they found me dead.

[teddystory]

081124 | red cloak and hood

A girl is taking a stroll through a late summer forest. On either side of the path, the grass is tall and yellow under the low blue leaves of the oaks, and out of the grass grows tall purple stalks of sweet-smelling lupins. Cuckoos are calling, and near the brook, the first chill breaths of autumn are blowing through the reeds.

The girl has on a long red cloak and hood. Over her arm hangs a basket of delicious things: cheese, apples, bread, butter, and wine. She’s humming aimlessly to herself in a low pretty voice. She attracts the attention of the wolf.

[teddystory]

080324 | stardragon

Moonchild lived with Stardragon for as long as she could remember. He raised her from a baby and he was her constant companion for years. One day he grew very weak. “I’ll disappear soon,” he told Moonchild. “But I’ll return to you again someday.” Moonchild didn’t want him to go. She was alone and lonely for a long time. Then one day a baby appeared. It was Stardragon reborn as a child. He remembered nothing of his former life. Moonchild raised him and cared for him and became his companion as he had been hers. They lived together for many years. One day she grew very weak, and she knew she would soon disappear. Stardragon was full of tears. “Don’t cry,” she told him, “someday I’ll return to you,” and then she disappeared.

[teddystory]

080224 | lala forest

Lala lived in a forest inside a hole in a big tree. She was friends with a stag, a unicorn, a fox, and a snail. She grew a garden around her house. There were sunflowers, foxgloves, morning glory, jasmine, roses, lupins, poppies, and nasturtium. She watered the flowers every morning with a spiral shell that she filled in the stream. For breakfast she ate strawberries and little wild bird eggs. For lunch she ate cucumbers and beans. For dinner she ate carrots that she roasted on a fire. She was married to the wolf king, but they lived apart. Sometimes he came and stayed in her burrow. His fur kept her warm on the coldest nights.

[teddystory]

073024 | oracle

The Oracle of Oria could only tell self-fulfilling prophecies. Everything she foretold, she could only foretell to the man who would bring about the fate himself. She explained this clearly to anyone who sought her forecasts, but still men came and paid, and still men cursed her when the prophecy came true, when it was clear that they had brought about their own foolish ruin. They wanted the future to be out of their hands, but it never was.

[teddystory]

072624 | electric light show

Alien vessel humming with electric lights. Faceted figure lit like stained glass by the light spilling out of the hatch. Alien with hundreds of limbs emerges, all moving in harmonious synchrony. Speaking in telepathic waves penetrating your mind. Your rapturous terrified delight at seeing it move and hearing its voice. Its thoughts smother yours until you can’t think. Hundreds of limbs touching you. You’re carried on board the spaceship and taken away.

[teddystory]

072524 | king of worms

Elsa dreamed that she dug a tunnel deep into the earth with her pickaxe. She reached a vast chamber and her headlamp illuminated the darkness. In the dark rested a giant worm. It reared up over her when it saw her. It was wearing a golden crown, because it was the King of Worms.

“King of Worms,” she said, “I’m looking for the King of Bats.”

The King of Worms dove into the earth and dug deeper and deeper, and Elsa followed. She followed him into another large chamber full of crystal stalactites illuminated by her headlamp.

At first she thought she saw a very tall man wearing a long black cloak. But then she realized it was a very tall bat with its ominous wings folded about itself. It wore a silver crown on its hairy head. It was the King of Bats.

“King of Bats,” said Elsa, “I am looking for the King of Hell.”

She climbed onto the back of the giant bat, and it flew her deeper and deeper into the dizzying network of vaulted caves.

[teddystory]

072424 | dragon's blood

Once there was a powerful sorceress who lived in a mighty kingdom. She was cunning and grasping, and the people drove her from the city for her wicked ways. She fled into the mountains and met a red dragon deep in a cave.

The dragon was impressed with her sorcerous power. He taught her magic for seven years, and during that time they became friends, then lovers. He gave her hundreds of jewels and diamonds as presents. He used his dragonly blood to extend her life, and they were married for five thousand years.

[teddystory]

071824 | vampire forest

A girl went alone into a deep dark wood. Vampires and other terrible monsters were known to haunt those woods, but the flowers that grew at the center of the forest were the only cure for her mother’s illness.

As she was going, suddenly a tall bloodless man appeared before her. He wore a long black cloak and a wide-brimmed hat. His eyes were vividly red. She tried to run, but he caught her in an instant in a grip like steel. Her struggling was useless, and his cold hand was covering her mouth, preventing her scream.

His seductive voice was in her ear. “Stop struggling,” he said. “I won’t hurt you.”

Eventually she stopped struggling. He did not let her go yet. “There are many things in this forest that will hurt you. When I let you go, you must not run.”

She nodded her head into his clutching hand. He let her go, and she did not run. She found his voice mysteriously soothing. It made her want to stay near him.

He led her in a trance back to his manor house in the misty deep of the woods. He kept her mesmerized with his serene voice and his ruby red eyes, and he fed on her blood every night.

One night she woke up and the vampire was gone, and the trance had worn off. She seemed to wake as if from a dream. Terrified, fearing for life and despairing over her mother’s health, she fled into the woods.

She became lost, and large hulking things were creeping after her in the dark. Something jumped out at her, a terrible monster, part dog, part hawk, part spider. It would have devoured her, but she was rescued by the vampire. She wept with relief when he swept her into his cold arms. At least he had been devouring her slowly. She returned to the manor with him, falling again into her laconic trance.

But she had changed, she had remembered her errand. She was melancholy now, and often wept, “Mother, mother.” The vampire found it very distracting.

“Why do you cry for your mother so?” he demanded. She told him of her mother’s illness and of the curing flowers in the center of the forest.

“A simple matter,” he said. “Stay here and do not leave.”

He vanished before her eyes. She did not try to leave the house again. She waited in the luxurious bedroom for him to return. He seemed gone a long time, until she began to feel lonely and afraid.

Then suddenly he was in the room with her again. He took her into his cold arms, placed her in his lap, and nuzzled into her neck, preparing to bite her.

Between mouthfuls, with his voice in her ear, he told her how he had mesmerized her mother and made her eat the medicinal flowers, how he had stayed and watched, hidden, for three days to make sure she was improving, before erasing her memory and leaving.

The girl didn’t believe him. Offended to be doubted, the vampire enchanted one of the mirrors to reflect, not his bedroom, but her mother’s sitting room. The girl saw her mother looking healthy in the mirror. But she couldn’t believe that either, she said. It could all be an illusion.

The vampire was growing exasperated. He took the girl out of the forest, back to the town where she was born, back to the house of her mother so she could see for herself that the woman was well.

“Let me go to her,” she begged. “She’ll worry about me. She’ll wonder where I am.” The girl could not be consoled. The vampire let her go. She went to her mother and the two had a tender and tearful reunion.

The girl and her mother lived happily for a while. But the girl felt perversely lonely for the vampire. Sometimes she missed his cold touch and the ache of his fangs in her neck. Her mother saw her daughter’s pining. “Daughter,” she said, “I am well now and still young yet. You don’t have to take care of me anymore. Disappear into the woods again if you want.”

The girl went back into the forest to search for her vampire. It was very dark, and she was afraid, but it wasn’t long before he found her. She thought he would be angry with her, but he was welcoming, seductive and hungering for her. He took her back to his home to feed.

[teddystory]

071224 | night monster

A monster has been hiding in my room at night. It frightens me, but it seems more afraid of me than I of it. When I wake up I find it crouched in the doorway, peering unerringly at me. Its eyes are two tiny white gleams in the dark. When it sees that I’m looking, it disappears in a rush of swift movement. Shy. I won’t see it again until next night.

[teddystory]

071124 | sea of grass

Cassandra landed on a planet called Bernardel. She landed under the sun in a sea of pink grass. The air was warm and close, the sun glowed anemically in the dull gray sky, and the long pink grass bent in lazy waves before the cool breeze.

Giant gray creatures with long necks as tall as skyscrapers roamed across the plains in slow-moving herds. They were large enough to crush Cassandra like a bug, but they were friendly and gentle, and curious about her. They bent their long necks all the way down into the grass to look at her, and they let her pet their tough gray snouts.

She followed the creatures to their nesting grounds on the coast of a calm green sea. The creatures ponderously laid their eggs in the white sands. The eggs were very small compared to their bodies, numerous, and soft like turtle’s eggs.

Cassandra was holding an egg when it hatched. Out came a miniature creature, gray and wrinkly, and covered in little black heart-shaped spots all over its soft gray hide. She named it Borchok. The silly little creature followed Cassandra everywhere, so that she became like a part of their family for a while, all traveling together through the fields of pink grass bent by the balmy breezes under the dull anemic sun.

Then when it was time for Cassandra to leave, the little fellow wanted to go with her. All of the herd came to see them off, tails wagging and long necks stretching up and up to watch the spacecraft disappear into the sky. Someday when Borchok was too big to fit on the spaceship anymore, she would bring him back home to Bernardel.

[teddystory]

071024 | crystal cathedral

Cassandra landed on a moon called Horold. It was night, but the planet Kairot took up a third of the sky. It was a colossal illuminated disk of swirling orange and pink, surrounded by a golden ring, energetically reflecting the spectacular light of the system’s twin supergiants.

Cassandra stood beside her spacecraft on a vast empty plain of dark blue dust shimmering in the glow of the looming planet. All was flat and empty except for a little twinkling something out on the horizon. Cassandra went towards the sparkling. It grew as she approached into a tall spired structure like a gothic cathedral, made up entirely of thousands of thick panes of crystal of various colors.

She went inside the delicate structure. The planetlight showed through the many-colored faces of the crystal like sunlight glowing mysteriously through stained glass. It painted patterns all over Cassandra’s clothes and body.

At the end of a long aisle was a marble altar bearing the body of a beautiful boy. He had long silvery hair that spilled from the altar in shining waves, and from his forehead there grew a golden horn.

Cassandra leaned over the altar and pressed her lips to the lips of the prince. He blinked open his beautiful golden eyes. He gazed up at her, then reached up to catch the back of her neck and pull her down for another kiss. The crystal walls bathed them in patterns of burning kaleidoscopic light.

[teddystory]

070924 | swamp thing

I dreamed about going down into a deep dark sewer. There was a creature with long arms and long black hair. It offered to sit with me and keep me company in the dark. To pass the time, it told me three stories.

One was about a unicorn who lived in a magical forest and ate nothing but the dew off of flowers at dawn.

One was about a dragon who lived on a craggy mountain and liked to eat the sheep from the valley below.

And one was about a devil who lived in a deep dark swamp and only ate lost little children. This last one was very scary, and I held the creature’s scaly hand while it told the story.

Then a light appeared overhead, and I saw a ladder that led back up out of the dream.

“Won’t you come with me?” I asked the creature, but it told me that it must stay down here in the dark to keep the next traveler company. I climbed the ladder and left the creature behind.

[teddystory]

070824 | spinning granny

One day while you’re exploring your house, you find an old granny up in the attic. She’s sitting in a rocking chair under a quilt, and nearby is an empty old spinning wheel. The rocking chair creeks as she rocks back and forth. She calls you dearie and asks you to go into the forest to collect golden wool from the flocks of the elves. She needs the wool for her spinning.

You go into the deepest part of the forest where the elves live. You find an elf tending a flock of sheep. The elf has pointed ears and piercing eyes, and the sheep have beautiful golden wool that sparkles in the dappled sunlight.

You ask the elf, “Will you let me have the wool of one sheep?”

The elf replies, “Tend this flock for one hundred days and nights and you may have the wool of one sheep.”

You tend the flock for one hundred days and nights. You weather storms and fend off wolves, and attend the births of many golden lambs.

At the end of your contract, the elf returns with a pair of silver scissors, snips the wool from one of the golden sheep, and presents the wool to you. You take the wool back to your house and present it to the old granny rocking back and forth in the attic. She is delighted by what you’ve brought. The spinning wheel clatters merrily as she spins the wool into golden thread. Then she puts the thread on an old loom and weaves it into a shimmering golden bedsheet. She presents the bedsheet to you.

“Make your bed with this golden sheet,” she says, “and the princess of your dreams will appear to become your wife.”

Again you do as the granny commands. You go to sleep on the soft cool golden sheet, and when you wake up, a beautiful princess is lying beside you. She has big sparkling eyes and long waving hair, and her lips are as pink and soft as peaches. The two of you live together happily ever after.

[teddystory]

070724 | sheep thief

You tend a flock of sheep high up in the mountains. Every day you take them out to graze the green grass growing between the rocks. It’s springtime, and the hillsides are blooming, and the wind spreads the scent of the flowers all around. The sheep wear tiny bells that tinkle softly when they move.

A wolf comes by to slyly eye your flock. You can see him slinking behind a rock. But you have a magic flute that makes wolves fall asleep. You sit with your back to the rock and play a lullaby on your little wooden flute. The low sound weaves with the wind in the grass and the tinkle of bells and the baaas of the sheep. The wolf’s head begins to droop. He stumbles closer to you. You fear for your life, but you keep on playing your low sweet song, knowing he must fall asleep. He lies down beside you and lays his big furry head in your lap. Finally you remove the flute from your lips.

“Won’t you let me have just one little sheep?” he asks, looking up at you sleepily. You shake your head. You scratch behind his ears until his big eyes blink closed and he falls asleep. The fluffy white sheep graze peacefully all around you, eating the green grass, unafraid of what is sleeping in their midst.

[teddystory]

070624 | mushroom dragon

You are friends with a dragon who lives in a deep dark cave. Every day you go into the cave and pick off the mushrooms that have popped up all over the dragon’s scaly hide. It’s very damp in the cave, so the mushrooms are always springing back up. There are cute little brown ones, flowery yellow ones, slender pale ones, oily purple ones, and pert little red and white ones. To show his thanks, the dragon lets you keep all the mushrooms, along with some of the game he’s killed. You cook the fresh venison and boar with onions, peppers, rosemary, sage, thyme, and handfuls of succulent mushrooms.