Hello darlings! Guess what?!
It’s time for a subscription drive!
As many of you know, I have a Patreon, where many of my stories, lore, and chapters of each subsequent novel post. Also included are weekly tiers to pick the $1+ story (Weekly poll voting is $2+) and the biweekly poll to pick the $2+ lore post (Biweekly poll is $5+)
If you what I do, subscriptions start at $1 a month. Less than a single candy bar, and much less than a single coffee.
$1 a month gets you instant access to more than 100 subscriber-exclusive stories!
This time the goal is bigger and better! I’m at 65 $1+ patrons now, and we’re shooting for the stars! If we hit 150 $1+ patrons, I’ll go from posting Lore every other week, to posting one EVERY SATURDAY!
Now for the subscription drive bonuses: If you subscribe at one of these levels, or you upgrade to them, I’m offering some LIMITED TIME ONLY rewards in addition to the tier benefits already in place. Physical prizes will begin shipping after October billing rolls over, and will continue from there. Obviously for the physical prizes at $10 and $20, I will also need your mailing address. As soon as your subscription clears, I’ll reach out to you with your prizes!
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$2 - Upgrade or new subscription
- Get a free microprompt dedicated just to you! Select one word, and a character (or a series) and get a mini story just for you!
$5 – Upgrade or a new subscription
- Get a full-length prompt. You pick the prompt, characters and/or series!
- And all of previous rewards!
$10 – Upgrade or a new subscription (requires mailing address)
- Get a personalized hand-written letter of thanks.
- And all of previous rewards!
$20 – Upgrade or a new subscription (requires mailing address)
- Get a copy of any one currently in-print book of mine, signed and personalized.
- And all previous rewards
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Darlings, the last subscription drive was absolutely incredible, and I’m hoping to make this one just as good or better, but I need your help. Even if you can’t subscribe, please, please reblog and spread the word.
If even a third of my followers here on Tumblr subscribed for a dollar or more, I could write full time, and produce a LOT more content for you. I believe in us. Let’s make this happen!
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Giggles, Glitter, and Mayhem
Essylla came zipping in through the door of his tent and landed on a table near where Alek was sitting, reading several scout reports. He glanced up at the pixie, and was about to go back to reading when something caught his eye and he looked back at her sharply. She looked………smug. Extremely pleased with herself, like a cat licking its whiskers after having just finished off a bowl of cream.
He knew that expression far too well, and was instantly wary.
“Well?” he said after a long moment, raising an eyebrow at her. “What did you do this time?”
She merely giggled, then, taking off, crooked a tiny finger at him to follow, and zoomed back out of the tent. With a sigh, Alek set aside the reports and followed after her. He followed the trail of giggles, and eventually followed her up into one of the observation towers. The soldier saluted him when he reached the top, then jerked his thumb at where Essylla was perched. Alek drew his binoculars from a side pocket, and slowly scanned the demon lines.
“Alright, where am I looking?” he asked her after a moment and not seeing anything obvious.
“Just be patient,” she replied in a sing song voice. Movement caught his eye, and he retrained his binoculars in time to see a hellion, one of the demonic mages, walk out of the primary ammo dump bunker, step up onto the firing step of the trench, a spell bomb in his hands, and prepare to throw. Alek had just opened his mouth to warn their lines when he saw the wooden platform beneath the demons feet glitter for a moment, then snap and tilt sideways.
The demon tumbled sideways with a yell, and the primed explosive fell back into the trench behind him.
What happened next was pure pandemonium, and Alek saw it all.
The demon tried to catch the bomb, but misjudged his lunge and ended up slapping it further away. The bomb bounced twice and then rolled to a stop next to a stack of rockets and misfired, igniting like a candle rather than exploding like it was supposed to. This lit the fuses on the rockets, which then banged off down the trench. Several rockets impacted the walls or demons and detonated, causing immense damage, but one rocket spiraled high into the air and then plunged back down into the camp. It slammed through the roof of one of the bathhouses, utterly destroying the building and tossing naked demons left, right, and center. It also startled a nearby ignolioc, a dog-sized, insectoid fire breather the demons used to heat water. They also tended to light themselves on fire when frightened. The ignolioc yelped in surprise and, fully ablaze, pelted away from the ruined bathouse..…..right into the still open door of the primary ammo dump. There was a brilliant flash and a throaty roar as a huge mushroom cloud rose from the bunker, burning ordinance flying in all directions, secondary explosions rippling through the demon forces. As a final touch, the roof of the ammo dump, having been blasted clean off the structure, cartwheeled through the air, then came crashing back down to earth atop the hellion who had dropped the spell bomb that had started the chain reaction.
Alek lowered the binoculars as cheers and laughter erupted from the Alliance forces.
Essylla was laughing so hard that no sound was coming out, doubled over and clutching her stomach, rocking back and forth as tears streamed down her face.
Alek was laughing nearly as hard. He finally managed to get himself back under control and eventually scooped up the still giggling pixie from her spot on the railing and placed her on his shoulder as he headed for the ladder to go back to his tent, then made his way down and began walking back.
“Well?” Essylla asked him when she finally managed to stop laughing.
He opened his mouth, then simply chuckled and shook his head. “You really are just a disaster waiting for someone to happen to, huh?” he finally said, which set her off giggling again.
((I hope you guys liked this one! Just a bit of silliness I thought might amuse you. ^_^))
@nox919 @kitvinslakte @officialleehadan @dierotenixe @extraordinary-stealth @syalar
For Stacey, who requested Vree’s presentation on dragons. This got WILDLY out of control! I hope you like it darling. Thank you so much for your support!
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“Dragons,” Vree started, his heart already somewhere near the floor. “Are perhaps Humanity’s most unusual Other-variant.”
The venue was spectacular. A magnificent outdoor arena that faced a sprawling nature preserve. It was one of the premier research stations of the galaxy, the home to thousands of species, all under study. Many were thought lost to time, carefully resurrected through cloning and care.
A venue Vree, as a xenobiologist, never thought he would speak at. This arena was home to the most prestigious of scientists. Only two other Ha’reet had ever presented here. He was the third, and kept pinching himself to make sure it was not a dream.
The invitation came at the insistence of the research station’s Dean of New Discoveries.
Human-Amir swore that Human-Luka had nothing to do with the invitation. Vree was not sure he believed either of them when they smiled like that and promised innocence.
To make everything infinitely worse, Lord Petros, accompanied by Lady Petros, sat in the front row, watching him intently.
READ THE WHOLE STORY HERE!
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HGE - UNconventional:
Vree really doesn’t know how he ended up being one of the premere human specialists of the Galactic Alliance, but now everyone wants him to do presentations. Amir thinks the whole thing is hilarious, and insists on ‘helping’ whenever he can.
Firebursts (Subscriber Only!)
Splish Splash (Free on Patreon!)
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More Stories!
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Hot and Cold
Hello darlings! This is the second $5+ Subscriber prompt, for the ever-amazing L! Remember darlings, at $5, you get a prompt of your very own, and the subscriber-drive is running right now, which means EVEN BETTER REWARDS!
Thank you so much, darling L. I love chatting with you about your writing, aand I can’t wait to see what you do you next! You requested Amir, Luka, and Vree in a prank war, and here it is!
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“Okay, see, this is why I needed your help.”
“I like the idea but your execution needs work, cousin.”
Vree came around the corner to discover Human-Amir and Human-Luka with their heads together.
They were doing something to the controls of his shower.
Vree, sensing trouble in the making, immediately ducked back around the corner to observe his humans more closely. Human-Amir had explained the concept of a ‘prank’ to him recently, in preparation for an ongoing ‘prank war’ that he was having with his cousin.
Human-Luka, upon his arrival, had immediately changed Human-Amir’s habitat settings and somehow made it snow in the mess-hall. Human-Amir was not a fan of snow, and was not at all pleased to discover all of his belongings covered in an inch of frozen water.
He responded by replacing Human-Luka’s fur-cleaning products with dye, changing Human-Luka’s hair to a brilliant, although temporary, bright red.
Human-Luka happily set Human-Amir’s alarm clock to go off every twenty minutes.
Human-Amir programed the computer to address Human-Luka as ‘Impie’.
Vree was doing his best to stay out of it. This was a battle of pride-mates and he wanted no part of it. Human battles were always messy, and he knew exactly what happened when they were challenged on ground they considered their own.
Frankly, he was surprised that Human-Luka was willing to engage Human-Amir on Human-Amir’s territory, but from what he knew of Human-Luka, such a strange choice of battlefield was not outside his experience.
Either way, he thought it was better to keep his own tail out of the door altogether.
But this, this opportunity, was simply too good to pass up.
They were stuffing his showerhead with colored dye, but had forgotten one crucial detail. The difference between Human-Amir’s bathing chamber, and Vree’s.
Vree kept to a strict schedule in the mornings. He liked to be able to start the shower as he woke, so that the steam had time to heat up properly. It worked best to get his fur properly sleek. So he programmed it through his data padd.
The one that happened to be in easy reach, on his desk.
He grabbed it before better judgement could prevail. It was always a bad idea to challenge humans to battle, but he couldn’t resist.
The app was simple, a glowing icon left in convenient reach on the front ‘page’ of his padd.
The controls for the shower were a simple slide of one finger.
The shouts from his bathing chamber were highly satisfying.
“Turn it off!” Human-Amir sputtered from the bathing chamber. There was a crash that sounded suspiciously like Vree’s fur-care products hitting the floor. Moments later there was a yelp and an even louder crash that was very probably Human-Luka slipping. “How did it turn on?!”
“I don’t know!” Human-Luka yelled back. “Where are the controls!?”
“You’re the technopath!”
“That dosen’t mean I know how to work a possessed shower!”
Vree snickered to himself, and slid the control bar from warm to cold.
“Why did it get colder!?”
“I don’t know!”
“Turn it off!”
There was a crackle of electricity, and the data padd showed that the shower had turned off, no doubt thanks to Human-Luka’s technopathy.
Vree gave them a moment to get themselves together, and then slid the shower back on, at full blast, and on cold.
The shouts, he discovered, were every bit as entertaining the second time. There was quite a bit more cursing, another crash, and the ominous sound of something spilling. Human-Amir cursed in three languages. Human-Luka cursed in nine, and there was the sound of someone scrambling out of the icy blast.
Before they could try to turn it off again, he obligingly changed the spray to a gentle mist for cleaning fur, into a powerful spray meant for sluicing off muck.
“How does he even function with this thing?” Human-Amir demanded. By the sound of soggy footsteps, he had gotten out of the shower. As soon as a second set of footsteps joined his, Vree turned the shower off entirely and set the data padd on his desk. “This is terrible. Why even?”
“It was your idea to stuff it with powder-dye,” Human-Luka muttered. They were coming for the door, and he hurried to slip out before they could discover the true source of their misfortune. “This is all your fault!”
It wouldn’t do for them to try and prank his bathing chamber again, after all.
Perhaps this human custom was not so objectionable as he formerly feared. Pranks. How entertaining. He would have to give a great deal more time to understanding this form of human culture more thoroughly.
After all, it wouldn’t do to miss out on such an engaging human pastime.
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HGE - UNconventional:
Vree really doesn’t know how he ended up being one of the premiere human specialists of the Galactic Alliance, but now everyone wants him to do presentations. Amir thinks the whole thing is hilarious, and insists on ‘helping’ whenever he can.
Firebursts (Subscriber Only!)
Splish Splash (Free on Patreon!)
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More Stories!
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Call the Stars
Hello darlings! It’s another of the $5+ prompts! This one is for Brandon, who gave me an amazing concept to work with, but that line, the last line of this story, really hit me in the inspiration.
Darling, it went a little sideways. I hope you don’t mind! I just couldn’t put it down once I started!
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“Destroy them. They must not escape.”
Talulah curled her fingers around Grandmother’s braided cedar-bark bracelet and closed her eyes.
The stars around her, suspended in the velvet-black of Space, echoed with the voices that, on Earth, were nothing but the gentlest whispers. Now they screamed, blazing through eternity. They cried out, begging Talulah to reach, to feel for them, to make real the legends that her nation used to promise were true so long ago.
The computer clicked off, the sound of the intercepted message loud even to Talulah’s overwhelmed mind.
But she was not the only person listening.
“We have missiles incoming!” Yaz cried from her station, hands flying over the controls. She could fly anything, form crop duster to spaceship, and was crazy to boot. Beside her Greta worked to raise their pathetic shields, but they were a research vessel, one of Humanity’s first attempts to escape their own solar system on unsteady new engines. The shields were honestly just a joke, added on by some engineer with a dark sense of humor.
The grand, silver-white ship that had, until now, hidden behind Jupiter’s moon, Io, was not a joke.
With all of humanity counting on them, with all of humanity watching, their ship coasted blithely into Jupiter airspace, counting on the planet’s gravity to help them onward.
But the ship, the silver-white ship that glided through space like a hunting seal through dark water, was coming for them. Missiles burst outwards from the hull, as countless as fireflies on a warm spring night, all aimed at one tiny human ship with no weapons and shields made for deflecting space gravel.
But Talulah had the stars in her ears, and Grandmother’s stories in her heart.
‘Call for us’ they whispered to her, flavored of distant suns, ready to answer her call. “Use us.”
Without knowing what she did or why, Talulah reached for the stars beyond the silver-white ship and let herself fall into the embrace of the sun which, even now, shone warm through the viewports at her back.
The stars answered.
With a beat like Grandmother’s deer-skin drum, pounding like a heartbeat and dancing with feathers, power glided through her hands like a heavy serpent. Horns scraped over her fingers, and when she opened her eyes, every inch of her skin was glowing yellow-gold from within. Fireflies of her own darted around the ship in a cloud that flared to life, a thousandfold and a thousandfold more.
The stars had come to her. With their life-song in her heart, Talulah began to dance, feet finding the steps that Grandmother used to dance before her bones grew too old, and she took up the drum instead, counting the measure.
Talulah could hear her now, could hear the drums echoing off the stars.
When her feet came down on the final, defiant stomp, the stars who came to dance with her to Grandmother’s drum exploded outward in the shape of two magnificent birds whose wingspan was wider even than the silver-white ship.
Together they flew into the missiles that even now bore down on Talulah.
The first bird, who left great distortions in the stars as her wings beat, mantled and screamed a soundless cry that shook the ship around Talulah with thunder. The missiles broke on her great wings, and she screamed again, the roll of a storm unlike any Earth would ever see. But as grand as she was, as far as her cry spread, some of the missiles shot past her, spread too wide for her golden feathers to catch.
But her mate, smaller and sleeker, and so fast he left trails of ionized lightning behind him, was there. He crackled around his mate, so fast that his starlit wings, silver and blue against the great black, seemed to vanish, before his talons took the missiles out of the sky with a delicacy Talulah would never expect.
But the drumbeat of her heart was fading, and the silver-white ship was not ready to back down.
Great bolts of light shot out from the bow, too fast even for Talulah’s spirit birds, who tried to block the attack on their wings.
Suddenly Yaz was there, singing an old, old song in her native Turkish. Her eyes were full of light, and Talulah knew suddenly that she could hear the stars too. That her ancestors were with her, and that Yaz trusted them to guide her.
Grandmother’s drum thundered in Talulah’s ears, now in time with the ancient song that rumbled through Yaz’s lilting voice.
This time, when the stars answered, it was to a different song than Grandmother’s. It was to a song that tasted of hot wind across desert rocks and rumbled like stone grinding one upon another.
This time, when the stars answered, it was Yaz who glowed, red and gold as light grew in her heart and bloomed up her throat to form the writing of her ancestors. A tale so old that there was no translation to be had.
This time when the stars answered, they formed giants, as steady as the great mountains they once carved apart to build a long-ago fortress.
When they joined hands, a wall rose up around them, built of star-lined stone and as unmovable as Fate.
The great beams of light broke on the wall, soundless fireworks that could not burn through a wall of living starlight.
But the silver-white ship was not defeated. Talulah’s birds swirled around the giants, protective. The giants stood, linked into a steadfast wall, but neither they nor Talulah’s birds were born of war.
And the silver-white ship would not back down while they yet lived.
It wasn’t until Greta’s voice came, her higher voice a harmony to Yaz even though the song she sang was in a different tongue and of a different legend. She joined Talulah, feet pounding to the same heartbeat that set the time to song and dance.
But when the stars came to her, it was the deep silver-blue of crashing waves. Although Talulah did not know her song, could not know her legends, she felt the sweep of power flow thorough Greta’s blood.
When the stars came to Greta, it was not the roll of thunder, or the strength of stone.
It was the ancient fear and blessing together. The monster that waited in the Unknown. The tide that tore apart ships caught too early or too late in its jaws. It was the promise of fish, but the threat of a terrible death.
Blue light, turbulent and silver-blue burst off Greta’s skin, and a monster answered her call.
Tentacles crept out of the deepest black, lined by turbulent blue-white and born of terror raw and primal. It was the creep of something in the water, just out of sight under the boat. Of teeth that waited for the unwary to get just a little too close.
The tentacles snatched the silver-white ship out of the black with the slightest, most tender care.
A maw ripped out of the black of space, swirling with teeth and eyes that weren’t there, and were at the same time.
The silver-white ship crumpled as the tentacles closed on it, a small gleaming fish in the grasp of a monster.
And then it was gone, swallowed whole, with only a single last cry that echoed out of the long-forgotten command controls.
“The sorcerers have escaped. We’re doomed. We never should have imprisoned them there.”
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Star Light Star Bright
Three woman took to the stars. Three women learned that the Stars hold secrets of their own that humanity has yet to rediscover.
Call the Stars
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I freaking love her writing. I have of yet to be even slightly less than thrilled with all of her writing. 😍
“What is the axe?”
Helena had been eying the weapon, which was a beautiful example of blade-craft, even if it did smell so strongly of blood that it made her hungry every time she was in the same room as it was. All the same, she could smell the magic rolling off it, like the smell of a storm right before the very first flash of lightning.
It was heady, and she was intensely curious about it.
Owen held it like it was made for him. Maybe it was. Family weapons often took on the favored grip of the latest family member to handle them. Owen had said the axe was his great-grandfather’s, but it looked, and smelled, significantly older than three generations of human.
“Well, well.”
Teucer drifted in, impeccable as always in his favorite white suit, expensive designer scarf draping around his neck in place of a tie. Owen, who had a good instinct for that which could kill him, was always a little uneasy around Teucer, and still hadn’t figured out why. Helena felt a little bad for not letting him in on the secret, but she held her tongue nonetheless. Her sire’s request was significantly more powerful than her fondness for a human, even this one.
Unfortunately that meant that Owen got nervous whenever Teucer was closer than ten paces away.
Not that ten paces would actually help him if Teucer decided to harm him, but Teucer wouldn’t, and Owen didn’t need to know that.
“The Axe of Perun,” Teucer continued, and ran one fingertip over the blood-stained handle of the ancient weapon. He gave Owen a very speculative once-over, and tilted his head as he thought. “Last I heard, this had vanished during the thirteen-hundreds or so. Something about a particularly violent extermination of the local troll population, and a nasty little war to follow.”
“It’s been in my family for a while,” Own replied, and snickered when the axe, which really didn’t like non-humans touching it, shot a violent spark of lightning into Teucer’s fingertip. He squawked and stuck his finger in his mouth, eyes wide and hurt. Helena smiled faintly. The drama queen. He was healed almost before the lightning faded. “We tried to stick it in a museum once. It appeared under Grandfather’s bed that night. He mostly used it for splitting wood.”
“It certainly does have an attitude,” Teucer observed, and took a cautious step back from the axe, which crackled smugly at him. “And quite the attitude. Is Perun still in there?”
The axe of Perun. Supposedly forged from the steel scale of a god of the underworld, and set into a handle cut from the World Tree. Helena knew the legends, mostly because Teucer loved mythology so much, but she had never seen the weapon in person.
“We don’t know,” Owen said, and lifted the ae with ease. It looked right when he propped it on his shoulder, red handle bright against his soft grey shirt. “Family legend says that Perun gave it to us when we first started hunting monsters. No idea if it’s true. We weren’t big on writing the family history down at that point.”
“Too busy killing trolls?”
“And then there was that war you mentioned. We moved to England and Scotland after that.”
Teucer chuckled and leaned in to look at the axe again. Helena watched as he, without touching the blade, read through the runes that marched invisibly down the handle.
“What do they say?” she asked, unable to contain her own curiosity. Teucer could certainly read them, although she couldn’t. Of course, she hadn’t made a study of the ancient languages like he had.
Also, he was old enough that some of those ‘ancient’ languages were his contemporaries.
“Send back to the Underworld, that which belongs there,” he translated, and beamed at Owen. “Paraphrased, of course. The proper translation is less poetic in English. That’s a fine weapon for one who lives to kill non-humans.”
“Not non-humans,” Owen corrected him, and traced the runes before closing his hand around the handle again and setting the axe back on the table. “Monsters. Right now, the only monster I’m after is human to the core.”
“That may be what’s wrong with him,” Teucer observed thoughtfully, and leaned on the desk, far enough away from the axe that, although it crackled warningly at him, he was out of reach. “You’re an interesting one. I’ll be watching you closely.”
With that he drifted back out of the room the same way he came, and Helena only sighed.
Owen looked between them incredulously, and shook his head.
“I know you’re not gonna tell me,” he said and took a long swig from his water bottle. “But I would really like to know who the hell he is.”
“You wouldn’t like the answer,” Helena told him, and leaned over to steal a slow kiss. He combed his fingers through her hair, and smiled at her with an emotion she didn’t care to name in his eyes. “I trust him.”
“That’s enough for me,” Owen murmured, and kissed her again before reaching for his axe. “I need to train with this thing. Want to come dance with me?”
“I suppose I could be convinced,” she allowed and took his free hand in hers, all too aware that the coming battle might take him from her. She was fast, but no one was faster than Death, and Owen was human. She would enjoy what time she had with him. “But I may insist you wrap the blade. Bullets are no bother to me, but the Axe of Perun is made to kill things like me, and I would rather not be killed on this day.”
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HGE - Blood and Passion:
Helena is one of the most powerful Elder Vampires in the city, and known for fairness, and ruthlessness in equal measure.
She did not expect a bleeding Hunter to seek her out as his last, best hope.
Ancient Ballroom (Subscriber Only)
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More Stories!
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“Kill it!”
“I can’t!”
“Why not!?”
“It’s already dead!”
Eskyl was not having the best day of his life, and was seriously contemplating the murder of his best friend.
The bone imp, which was fast, hard to grab, and had an impressive set of teeth that did not grow there, had figured out that it could assemble more of its’ kind from the refuge heap, and was eagerly digging for leftover small bones, bits of twine, and more teeth from who-knew-what.
This was a port city. There were teeth from all sorts of things in that bone heap, and Eskyl wanted to be bitten by precisely none of them.
The imp, however, was having a grand old time.
READ THE WHOLE STORY FREE ON PATREON!
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Brothers Bound:
Before they were old monsters, they were young men. The adventures of Eskyl, Zain, and Bald-Face, before they were legends.
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More Stories!
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Adrienne wandered about her house, fingers trailing over polished wood and stone. Over mementos and trophies taken from years of gaming. Over the closet full of spectacular clothes.
She knew she had a whole room full of gold. She put it there.
It was sort of different to see it in person.
At least she didn’t have to worry about money any time soon.
The sight of all that gold, of her house, and the trophies lining the walls, were pretty well the final straw, and she spent a good hour breathing through panic and fear. He was inside a video game! A hard pinch to her arm, and a quick count of her fingers, proved that she wasn’t sleeping, and that this probably wasn’t a hallucination. Honestly, that made it worse.
READ THE WHOLE STORY HERE!
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Cybersecurity 101
Adrienne is one of her server’s top players, but the game is more than a game, and she will have to face love, and betrayal, to survive.
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Red Letters
Tracy was out at a coffee shop, studying for what would hopefully be the last finals she ever had to take, when a letter, written in gold on red paper, appeared by her hand.
She ignored it until she stood to get more coffee, and dropped the note into the recycling on the way.
Another appeared moments later.
She threw that one away too.
The third one served as a coaster when her coffee cup proved to be less than water-tight.
The fourth one mopped up the remains of the spilled coffee.
The fifth one joined the first several in the trash.
She had been finding the red notes in her things for the last two days, and was having none of the demonic idea of letter-sending. It wasn’t from one of hers, and so she wasn’t interested. If they wanted her attention, they could come over and introduce themselves properly.
And if they caused problems, well, it was Glowbat, working as a barista behind the coffee counter, and he had been brewing the coffee with holy water since Tracy arrived. Zuk was beside him, cheerfully flirting with anyone who bought something, and Achel must have been taking lessons from Blake, because everyone he spoke to bought a cookie.
Low grade temptations. Tracy smiled and let them have their fun. They were only here because she mentioned that some help with the rent would be nice.
So naturally, all sixteen cats went off and found jobs in under an hour. She would be bothered, except that they all seemed genuinely happy with the work, and the money served to buy them the goodies they were finally brave enough to buy themselves. Tracy approved completely and insisted on each one of them getting something nice for themselves out of every paycheck.
It wasn’t like they couldn’t afford it. On nineteen incomes, counting Tracy’s freelance work and Angelika’s Heavenly stipend, they had more than enough to go around.
“Mistress.”
It was Trill, holding another of the letters. She looked scared, and Tracy hugged her until she took a slow breath and calmed down. Poor Trill. She was shy and easy to spook. Tracy made a point of snuggling her a lot. Whenever Blake didn’t beat her to it, anyway. Trill was his favorite of the Cats.
“Who’s it from?” she asked when Trill was in a state to answer. “Did they threaten you?”
“No, Mistress,” Trill said softly. She was honestly the best spy among the Cats. She was so quiet that she tended to go unnoticed even when she was in plain sight. It was a particular talent, and Tracy, now that she was making herself a target, was using to her advantage. “I don’t know who it was from. It appeared in my pocket.”
“Okay,” Tracy said and took the note, before looking around, her newly-changed vision useful for spotting demonic presence in the room. There were her Cats, and she hadn’t noticed Roux and Pookie in the corner but she smiled when she saw them. But there was also a barely-there man-shaped glimmer in the farthest table from the bar. “Go off to the others. I need to see a man about a letter.”
So saying, she neatly folded the note into a perfect paper airplane, caught the man-glimmer’s eye, and lofted it into the trash without getting up.
Trill looked between her, the empty space where she was staring, and made herself scarce.
Tracy went back to her books and waited to see if whoever-it-was would actually show up to have a conversation like a reasonable person.
Demons. All drama. Letters. Really.
The chair across from her scraped on the floor, and Tracy didn’t look up.
“It’s not nice to scare my Cats,” she said mildly, highlighted one more paragraph, and closed the book. “Now, what do you want so bad that you sent six notes to me?”
The man across from her was polished and gorgeous, but now that she got a good look at him, she didn’t think he was a demon. Or, he wasn’t precisely a demon. He looked different than the other demons she knew.
There was a sense about him, of immeasurable size, like he didn’t quite fit in his skin. Tracy hadn’t noticed anything like that around the demons she knew, but then, her demons were all relatively minor or, in Blake’s case, didn’t bother with a monstrous true form. And her brush with Astaroth was before she knew how to spot a demon.
He ran a fingertip around his coffee mug and considered her for a while. Tracy dumped more sugar into her coffee and stared him down. If she was doing this, tossing her name into a war that had been raging for millennia, she was going to do it right.
Maybe that semester of game theory classes was worth the money after all.
“You’ve taken something of mine,” he said finally, voice low and lined with silk. “I wanted to see for myself the mortal who thinks to challenge Hell.”
“I’m not challenging anyone,” Tracy said, and stirred her sugar into her coffee even as she considered praying to Gabriel. Instead, she caught Roux’s eye and nodded once. He vanished out the door at a run. The rest of the Cats were terrified, huddled together and ashy-grey with fear. That alone told her who this must be. “Nice to meet you, Belial. I hear you took a vacation recently.”
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Higher Being Housemates:
As it turns out, rent is really high in Heaven. It’s not great in Hell either. An angel and a demon come to an agreement that works for them both.
Their human housemate still hasn’t decided whether or not to help them, or kick them all out of her house. After all, Grad school is hard enough without the Great War making it worse.
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Shadow Puff (Subscriber Only!)
A Third Side (Subscriber Only!)
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Eskyl sighted, and used a spoon to fish a drunken honeybee out of his mead.
“Ah, Bald-Face is here,” Zain noted, and let the little bee crawl over his fingertip until her wings were dry. No bee of Bald-Face’s would ever sting without a pressing reason, and he handled the tiny lady without fear. “Good.”
“You sent a message?”
As soon as you arrived. Come now, how likely is it that you teleport into my tower with a string of children and don’t need the both of us to clean up your mess?”
“I may have to stab you a bit.”
“Anywhere but the face. Shall we?”
Eskyl grumbled good-naturedly, but followed his old friend down the stairs to the front hall. He could hear the children out in Zain’s herb garden, but at the sound of their footsteps on the stairs, all three drifted in. Little Kia immediately ran over and Eskyl obligingly lifted her onto his shoulders.
“I heard you got stabbed,” Bald-face said mildly as he walked in the door, accompanied by several honeybees, and an handful of hornets. This was relatively normal for him, however, and Eskyl ignored them. He clasped hands with the druid, and got a hug in return. “That seems rude. I assume we’re off to have a conversation about it?”
“I was thinking on it,” Eskyl agreed, much more cheerful now that his side, tended by Zain’s careful magic, was healed. “He’s getting too big for his breeches.”
“Dangerous habit, that. Tends to attract the wrong kind of attention.”
“He’s calling himself the Master of Evil,” Zain said from the stairs, and bent to kiss his lover, who was still shadowing the children protectively. No better nanny than a merciless assassin. Eskyl was glad to have him around. “I’ve yet to decide how offended I am about it.”
Bald-Face dropped his bags on the floor for Zain’s undead servants to deal with, and leaned on his gold-wood honeycomb-carved staff. “I thought that was one of your titles? Didn’t you get that one when you raised all those skeletons what, ten years back?”
“Twelve, and to be fair, I only destroyed the one kingdom, but it’s still mine.”
“He killed our parents,” Adelaide said, cold anger flowing off her pretty face. Eskyl considered her and caught Zain’s eye. The necromancer blinked slowly, no doubt pulling magic over his eyes, and looked her over. His lips pursed, and he nodded once to Eskyl. Eskyl sighed. One more thing to worry about. Adelaide had magic. They would have to do something about that. “He ruined our home.”
“A bad ruler is worse than none,” Bald-Face told her kindly, and offered a hug. She thought about it, glanced at Eskyl, and accepted. Eskyl approved. Bald-Face was the best of them, and the one who could help heal her grief. “And this young creature will get what he deserves, don’t you worry about that.”
“You’re nice!” Kia said, and wiggled until Eskyl put her down. Trevor watched from the door, one hand on his sword. He trusted Eskyl, and Eskyl’s old friends, but they had one too many close calls for him to let his guard slip easily. Kia, however, had no such hesitation, and giggled when Bald-Face lifted her easily. “You have bees!”
“I do indeed,” Bald-face said, although Kia didn’t see the hard, vicious glitter in his eyes when he said it. Eskyl once again reminded himself how lucky they were that Bald-Face was a friend, not foe. He and Zain together couldn’t take on their druid once he was in a proper temper. “My ladies treat me well. You needn’t fear them.”
“They’re nice?”
“Dear and sweet as honey. I promise.”
Kia, with the trust of a three-year-old, let a hornet crawl onto her hand and beamed up at Bald-Face. “It tickles!”
It would take a stronger man than Bald-Face to resist the little princess’s delight. Eskyl saw the moment Bald-Face decided that he would move Heaven and Hell for these two girls.
Zain snickered unrepentantly and combed his hand through his elf’s silver hair. Nahalis, who possessed a fearsome sense of humor and also liked Bald-Face, whispered something to him, and Zain roared with laughter.
Eskyl decided he really didn’t need to know the joke. Anything that made Zain laugh like that was sure to be ghoulish.
“I brought a few of my ladies with me,” Bald-Face told Eskyl when Adelaide reclaimed her sister and chased the energetic toddler back outside to play. Trevor ghosted behind them, talking with Nahalis, who seemed to be giving the young fighter tips on knife-work. “Now, tell me all about what we face, and perhaps we can make a plan that will suit.”
Bald-Face produced a bottle from his pockets, and poured out for them. This mead was almost fiery on the tongue, with an odd sort of sting that made Eskyl eye the bottle warily.
“He found a type of honeybee that builds immense hives and kills everything that comes near,” Zain explained, taking slow, careful sips of his own mug. “But the honey is magnificent.”
“They’re a delight,” Bald-Face said, the only living man who liked them enough to seed his whole home and Zain’s rock-maze with killer bees, giant hornets, and whatever else caught his eye. “And very reasonable, all things considered. I only take a little of their honey, and keep their hives free of pests in return.”
“Negotiating with bees.”
“Well I have to trade something! I can’t just rob them!”
The sensibilities of a druid. Eskyl would never understand, but he was no less grateful for his old friend. “You’re the only one who thinks of a honey harvest as robbery.”
Zain snickered. Bald-Face rolled his eyes, long used to their teasing, even after so many years with only the occasional letter between them.
“It is robbery!” Bald-Face told him, prim and fussy even as he waved his hand over their mugs, protecting them from the over-eager honeybees who wanted the contents. “Now, tell me all about this little problem of yours. I imagine between we three old monsters, we can come up with something very suitable indeed for this rude young upstart.”
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Unforged, Unforgiven:
Fourteen years ago, Eskyl’s wife and child were murdered. Fourteen years ago, Eskyl’s rage leveled half the country, and left thousands running in terror. Fourteen years ago, Eskyl vanished.
But now the heroes are dead, and the only one who can challenge a terrible new evil is one Old Monster.
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The Little People
Bald-Face is an old Druid, and there is a reason no one risks his wrath. After all, the most deadly creatures of the great forest are the ones who cannot be fought, and take no prisoners.
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