Writer's Muse Magazine: Fall 2013 Issue
Page 6
at one point, and a plate with what looked like crisps made from beetroot.
“Thank you Rainbow,”
“You have been shrunk and pulled throw the magic so you will feel hungry and thirsty it is all we can do,”
“So why am I here Rainbow?”
“You’re here to help us out,”
“I am not magic and you look like you have enough fairies to cover any problems,”
“This needs the help of a human with latent magic,”
“Are you saying I might have some magic?”
“Underneath all there is some magic,”
“Ok so I might have some magic this still doesn’t let me know what I am needed for.”
“You will see this board I have here on this I have chalked a castle,”
“Yes I see this,”
“Well this is us we are in this castle,”
“Right so what is the candy floss house then?”
“That is the evil that invades our land,”
“So you want me to go there?”
“They have taken your boyfriends soul and entrapped it there,”
“What would they want with that?”
“He fights in a war and anyone battling is open to them and they will try to turn him evil and then you’ll lose him,”
“So what do I have to do to free his soul and win the day?”
“Yes in a nut shell that is what is needed of you,”
“So do I have any magic to overcome?”
“Yes the darkest of its kind and they will try to make you brake too,”
“Oh I think I’m strong enough to overcome anything they throw at me,”
“They might tell you things that are not true to make you change your mind,”
“I will listen to everything said and make my own mind up,”
“Good. They also will make you think these people that you meet are there to help watch for them,”
“How will I tell from good and bad?”
“That is for you to learn as how do any of us know good from bad at the best of times,”
Lisa sipped the bitter tasting drink and nibbled the crisp. Wondering how she would win the day if she had no magic to counter this evil.
“Will I have help from anyone that I can trust?”
“There is one. His name is Barney the dwarf,”
Lisa wondered why a dwarf would help anyone. Mind you she hadn’t seen any dwarfs outside of the films or in the carnival.
“Oh these ones are not anything like those,”
“You mean they are more like the ones in those board games?”
“Yes the ones that you have to shake dice for,”
“So when do I go?”
“I will have you taken down to the ground and then your journey will begin,”
“Do I get nothing to help me in my quest?”
“Barney will help you. Find objects that will aide you in this quest,”
Lisa finished the drink and crisp. Once the queen saw she had done this she took hold of Lisa’s hand so that she would follow without need of words. They came to what looked like a platform connected to the branch by a thick piece of string. There was a young fairy there she bow on seeing the queen.
“Ginger, take our friend here to the ground and supply her with the snail transport please,”
“Snail wouldn’t a fox be quicker?”
“They might be but you would end up a meal for the crafty fox before you even reached the first obstacle.”
“Wait there’s something blocking our way,”
“Yes but I am sure you will cross that with no problems,”
Lisa felt herself been pushed onto the platform.
“Take care and return safely,”
Lisa felt the platform drop with jerks as the fairy pulled on the string.
“Can I help?”
“No you’re ok I will manage this it is my job anyway,”
“So why you?”
“I was chosen by the mark of my wings,”
They reached the lowest part of the tree and Lisa could see the grass towering over her like large tree trunks. In among these there was a shelter made up of different types of plastic thing under this there sheltered five snails.
“These don’t look like they will get me going over the ground very quickly,”
“Looks can deceive. You know the film with the tortoise and hare well these are racing snails and can out pace ants,”
Lisa turned to see a small man stood next to the snails he wore some chest armour and leather leggings. His beard covered his entire chin and he also had a moustache.
“Barney I assume,”
“Yes I am,”
Lisa took the hand that was offered it was a strong grip with a hard skin to it she could see the years of work in those calluses. The only thing he was missing was the double headed axe that most dwarves carried from what she had seen.
“I have one but it’s on the back of the snail so I can ride it without hurting myself,”
“Did you just read my mind?”
“No but you are a open book and I could see what you might have been looking for,”
“Which snail will I be having?”
“This one here. He is called Ken,”
Lisa suppressed a snigger as she neared the snail. It was then she noted the saddle there was over the shell. Another one of those things from a toy doll. She pulled herself on to the snail just like Barney did.
“Hold tight now or you might end up on your back,”
“I’ve yet to feel the speed of this snail,”
Lisa smiled at Barney.
“You misunderstand me Lisa,”
She felt the snail move out of the shelter it didn’t seem fast. She felt this ride was going to be a piece of cake. Then it all happened at once the snail had moved to a clear spot and was going but she had flown off the back onto the floor into a small puddle of mud.
“See didn’t I tell you to hold on tight,”
Lisa stood up mud dripping from her clothes onto the ground. It was now Barney’s turn to laugh. Lisa saw Ken return from the run it had and it still looked fresh. She got back onto its back.
“I will hold on this time,”
“Good idea. Shall we go?”
“Ready when you are,”
Lisa felt the rush of air as the snail pulled away. She was on her way at last the quest laid ahead.
“We have lots of magic to defeat and objects to cross,”
“You’ll be there for me all the time,”
“Yes but even I can’t tell the difference between good and evil all the time so we both have to be on our guard,”
The tall grass seemed to part ways as the snail sailed on through it. Lisa saw ant’s look at them in surprise as they flashed past them. Some even dropped the items they were carrying and shook a leg at them. This was going to be fun.
About the Author
Richard Cotton is the founder of Writer’s Muse Group, a Facebook group with more than 500 writers that supports budding authors and poets in the writing and process by providing a mutually supportive environment. You can find the Writer’s Muse Page at:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/writersmusepage/
Holy Daze
By Serena Toxicat
Time shifted with the earth's faults, and the holidays continued, as ever, to collect over the Amon household like swollen drops of plum wine, splashing their vibrant hieroglyphs on the akashic formica of remembrance. The Amons' day of opulence had fallen in a deeper well than even Renata had fathomed, and her husband finally became the ghost she had been longing for. An unwelcome guest in his own pillaged home, Mr. Amon came to visit only as much as he could stomach.
January ushered the emergence of a new cycle of moons, paper horns, Gallo jugs and clove ham. February bore arrow-pierced aortas and chicken potpie, pink construction paper and sugary messages melting into sticky palms. Mid-March leprechauns brought the wearing of the green and blue and yellow, bot
ched brogue, corned beef and ale, and wilting clovers marked with the three leaves of approximation. April showered candy sprinkles, pastel dyes and eggshells, stiff white bunnies, roast beef and shredded lettuce, and so on until the year's close with its mummified boxes and fuzzy stockings, an uprooted tree weighted down by shiny spheres whose gaudy paint revealed silver as it chipped perennially away.
There were times, usually the day after such feasts, that Renata's kitchen would come alive with forked fire and ball lightning, shooting silverware and crashing ceramic plates. Cupboard doors would fly open and spit out a thousand souvenirs of America's wondrous sights, gaudily frosted wine glasses, plastic superhero cups, spices, cookbooks, weights and measures, calcified dreams of domestic bliss. And when they finally bowed to gravity, they would crash upon Evangeline and her brother, Elijah, or fall with purpose upon Renata's head, sending her groaning and shrugging or raising her palms to the sky through the yellow-stained ceiling in search of the holy water held by the plastic Lady of Lourdes.
She would bless herself first, then sloppily splash the kitchen corners, dousing either of the lingering children before proceeding to the oven to inspect the inner realm.
She had grown accustomed to ridding the house of the souls of various animals sacrificed to the holidays in the guise of stuffed, basted and roasted centerpieces, which had become trapped inside the electric inferno. Many such creatures of artifice and engineering lacked the wisdom of transition, and she would catch their form, prodding them to the light through the portal in the back of the oven. The gnosis of this dimension had been passed on matrilineally, and was a welcome panacea for years upon decades of carnivorous celebrations avenged.
When she peered through the mystical gateway, she saw a pale yellow sky alive with winged animal shapes aglow in their transparency tasting freedom like canapés, rolling through pale gray and white sheep-shaped puffs, migrating away from the land