The Starberry Forest

Leon trudged through the sticky mud, his feet sinking deeper the farther he went. He could feel it slinking into his shoes as the foul stench filled his nostrils. If he got through this alive he was going to wring that fairy’s neck. Through the Starberry Forest my ass, he thought, this is a fucking swampland. 

His foot slipped as he moved and he plunged into the black goop. 

“Blegh.” he tried to spit out the disgusting mud that filled his mouth, almost vomiting from the taste. “I swear this place is trying to fucking eat me,” he muttered.

“Well you do look rather tasty,” a voice said. Leon snapped his head up so fast that mud spattered onto the man in front of him. The clean man in front of him.

“How the hell do you not have any dirt on you?” he demanded as he stood up. Unfortunately, he stood up too fast and slipped again. He shut his eyes as he fell only to open them when he felt arms grab his shoulders. He looked back to see that the man had caught him.

“Wha-how did you do that?” he gaped.

The man raised an eyebrow. ”Do what?” 

“That! Catch me here when you were there!”

“Oh,” the man said, shrugging. “I flew.”

“You flew.” Leon repeated.

“Yes.”

“And…who are you again?”

“Ah, forgive me, my name is Ariel.” 

Leon stared. “You’re Ariel? B-B-But you’re a man!” Ariel smiled.

“Well technically, I’m genderless.” He shrugged again. “I’ve gotten used to it.”

“You’re genderless?” Leon asked. He glanced at Ariel’s crotch. “So what, its all smooth skin down there?”

“Yes, actually. Would you like to see?” Ariel grinned.

“NO!” Leon exclaimed, blushing. He took a deep breath to calm down. “Ok look. My parents are really sick and the fairy said if I came here and did something for Ariel I’d get a cure for them. So…can you help me?”

“Shouldn’t the question be, ‘What can I do for you?’”

Leon jaw dropped open. He snapped it closed before swallowing his remaining pride. “What can I do for you?”

Ariel appeared to think for a moment. “Ah!” he snapped his fingers. “How about you play a game with me.”

“A game?” Leon asked.

“Yes.”

“Yes? That’s it, no explanation?” he demanded.

“Take it or leave it,” Ariel declared. Leon thought back to his parents dying in their beds, barely able to move or breathe and bit his tongue until he tasted blood. 

He nodded his head, looking up warily. “Okay,” he said.

Ariel’s face broke out into a predatory grin, his teeth looking sharp as a knife and Leon gulped, suddenly remembering the fairy’s only warning. 

Beware the Trickster whose sharp teeth gleam and red eyes glow.

Leon only had a second to think shit his eyes are red before the Trickster grabbed him and they disappeared. 

MALI I LOVE YOU AND YOUR STORY IS GREAT. Mine is a bit weird…but I think it’s cute? Meh.

~Salvador

Stolen Light (?)

     “GOODMORNING PATIENT 0092876”
     “That’s not my name.”
     “OPENING DATABASE FILE FOR PATIENT 0092876…YOU ENTERED THE NAME “BETTY” ON 5/16/84, “GENA” ON 5/17/84, “LILA” ON 5/18/84, “STEPHANIE” ON 5/19/84, “SHEELA” ON 5/20/84, “AMY” ON 5/21/84, “EMMA” ON 5/22/84, “KRYSTA” ON 5/23/84-“

    The android proceeded on through it’s memory bank, listing the names and entry dates of each change, while the girl rubbed her eyes wearily and stared up at the fuckery before her. She could have been getting more sleep while this was going on, didn’t the robot know that they do this every morning? Standard procedure, her ass. Though, NurseBot736 was a pretty nice droid, unlike the one on the floor below who snapped at her whenever she stole food, but still did she have to go over three months of data every morning with no interruptions? The girl didn’t even try to pay attention; none of those names were her’s anymore. She had gotten over them. The girl stretched a bit, cracking her back and the knuckles on her good hand, taking the time to snap everything into place while NurseBot736 was too busy to tell her it “wasn’t ladylike”.

    She arose, brushed her teeth, pulled the knots out of her hair, rubbed some more sandman shit from her eyes, and when she sat back down on the bed it was almost time for the newest of her plentiful entries. She opened her notebook, the list of names before her filled with scribbles and notes about how she felt about them. She probably had hundreds there, maybe thousands, but hey, one of them had to be her’s.

    “-“COURTNEY” ON 8/09/84, “MACKENZIE” ON 8/10/84, “JULIE” ON 8/11/84, “TALULA” ON 8/12/84, AND “ROXY” ON 8/13/84. WOULD YOU LIKE TO ENTER A NEW NAME?”
    “Yes.” Flipping to the lastest list, she scrolled down past “Roxy” on her list, crossing it out witht he pen the recovery room supplied her. She glanced down to the next name,

    “WHAT IS YOUR NAME?”
    “It looks like today it will be Haley, NurseBot.”
    ” “IT LOOKS LIKE TODAY IT WILL BE HALEY, NURSEBOT”, IS THIS YOUR DESIRED NAME CHANGE, Y/N?”
    “What- Ugh- No!”
    “WHAT IS YOUR NAME? SPEAK CLEARLY, DEAR.”
    “Haley!”

    She practically shouted it.

Salvador I suck don’t be my friend anymore I’m so freakin rusty

- Mali

Witch Charmer

 MERRY CHRISTMAS PEOPLE!! I’m writing a little Christmas tale, or rather trying to write it. Fluff is not easy.

Anyway, part 3!

The window opened and paws landed on Tristan’s desk, the window snapping shut a second later. Tristan was a deep sleeper at the best of times however, and with the added distraction of the music booming in his hears he didn’t even flinch at the noise. The orange tabby settled itself on his desk and kept its yellow eyes fixed on the sleeping boy. After a minute’s silent contemplation, the cat stood up and made its way to the bed. It walked around Tristan, careful not to wake him, until it reached his head. The cat sat down so that it was staring down at Tristan’s upturned face. Its ears twitched and it let out a soft mew as the door to the room opened.

“Tristan?” a woman asked. She shook her head when she saw him on the bed, music blaring from his earphones. She went to turn it off, remembering some article about too much noise being bad for your ears, but as soon as she did, Tristan woke up. 

“Oh, go back to sleep honey,” she whispered.

“Mom?” he asked, his voice hoarse and thick with sleep. He yawned as he sat up. “What time is it?”

“It’s six-thirty.”

“What?” he said, startled. His naps were usually only an hour long, not three. “Ughh.” He had that stupid project due tomorrow that he was supposed to have finished yesterday. 

“What’s that there?” his mom asked, pointing down to the bed and breaking his train of thought. Tristan looked to where she pointed and paled. The cat statue he left in the school parking lot was on his bed.

“Shit,” He breathed. “It’s um, nothing, just this thing I found.”

“And you kept it?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Oh!” She brightened. “Is it for that girl you were talking about?” Tristan groaned at the reminder.

“No. And let’s not talk about it.” 

His mom frowned. “Did you break up again?” He scowled. “I don’t understand why this keeps happening Tristan. You’re a handsome boy—”

“Mom!” He yelled, already horrified.

“—you’re on the baseball team and you get good grades…you’re not being rude to them are you?” she accused.

“Ugh, no Mom, I’m not rude to them. Can we not talk about this?” 

“Oh alright,” she sighed. “But if you want to talk about it you know you can come to us right?” Tristan rolled his eyes, exasperated and she smiled fondly.

“Okay, okay. Dinner will be ready in an hour.” She turned the light on as she left and Tristan blinked as his eyes adjusted to the sudden brightness. He looked down at the statuette on his bed then at his closed window. More than a little disturbed, he considered just chucking it out there but decided to just get it out of his room and figure the rest out tomorrow. He put it on the exterior windowsill and locked it out. He wanted nothing to fucking do with witches and magic from now on; they were too much trouble. Unfortunately, the universe didn’t seem to agree with his resolution.

~Salvador

Witch Charmer

More of the Witch Charmer pt 2

“What’s wrong with me?” he muttered as he stepped into his Honda Civic. Something smashed into his front window and Tristan jumped out of his skin cursing. When nothing else happened, he stepped out, slow and tense, expecting some kind of witch’s retribution even though he hadn’t done anything to Saya. When nothing happened, he moved closer and breathed a sigh of relief to see his window undamaged. That’d have been a bitch to fix. He stepped closer to examine the thing on his car, and after a seconds hesitation, he picked it up. He relaxed when it didn’t jump up and attack him. He looked it over, curious. It was a wooden carving of a cat.

“The fuck?” he said. He looked up at the tree over his head wondering how the hell it’d gotten up there and how the stupid thing hadn’t broken his window. He shrugged, not wanting to look a gift horse in the mouth and had his arm back to throw it away when he remembered that cats were a common witch’s familiar. Suddenly nervous, Tristan looked around and set the statuette down on the ground for some other sap to take. He jumped into his running car and drove away without another thought.

  The door to his house was unlocked when he arrived so he figured his mom had come home early. He trudged up to his room silently, not wanting to talk. Once behind the safety of his bedroom door Tristan flung himself onto his bed and stared up at his ceiling. When that got boring he took out his Ipod, put his earphones in and pressed Shuffle. The distinctive beat of “Eye of the Tiger” unfurled in his ears and Tristan lay like that, mind blank, until he fell asleep. He never noticed the yellow eyes watching him at the window.

- Salvador

Witch Charmer

This is another blurb of a story I wrote for my creative writing class. This is the beginning of it.

Witch Charmer

Tristan felt like an idiot. He should’ve known he was falling too hard, too fast for a girl he barely knew. The burn of humiliation scorched his skin as Saya walked away and he could only be glad that the hallway was empty. He stared after her, unable to tear his eyes away, even with the knowledge that she’d completely played him. The stupid love potion must not have completely worn off yet.

Tristan sighed and walked away, as he felt the last drops of the potion metabolize out of his system until the only feelings that remained for Saya were a general appreciation for her pretty face. He really needed to learn to stop staring at girls; they always turned out to be witches. And they always screwed up his life. Why did they always come for him?

Tristan remembered that he had baseball practice as he was getting his things out of his locker, but the idea of swinging a bat for an hour didn’t appeal to him. I’ll just send in a Witch Caught note he thought, shrugging. Those things were really convenient considering how often he was involved with a witch; they got him out of anything. Four of them in two years was not good though and he wondered if he was on a government list or something. He slammed his locker shut and trudged to his car.

This was the third time a witch had set her sights on him and exposed herself to a human. He didn’t understand why the fuck they would put themselves at risk for him if they were just going to throw him away after a while. He could report them to the government if he felt like it, then there’d be a huge witch-hunt, and they’d be screwed. Of course, he knew he wouldn’t do that. They probably knew it too. This was the third time a witch wanted him and the third time one had tossed him away. Tristan couldn’t help but let dejection flow over him. 

— Salvador

Adeo Vita

This is a blurb from a story I started writing before, and mostly a response to Mali’s superhero story :)

“How many books do you sell here?”

“None.”

I blinked, taken aback at the unexpected answer. 

“None? What do you mean none?”

“These books are not meant to be sold.”

“Then this is a library?”

“Of a kind.”

“Why are your answers so damn vague?” I finally snapped in frustration. He merely smiled and went on staring. I sighed in annoyance. “Each of us received cryptic notes that had information no one else should know. They also had a name and address at the end. They led us here…what do you know about it?”

The man smiled again and swept his arm around, motioning towards all the books. 

“Please, go ahead and open a book. However, a note of caution; not all of them are safe.” And on that extremely vague and slightly worrying note, he turned around and disappeared. It happened so suddenly that everyone was left staring, unable to believe their eyes, myself included. I shook myself out of my stupor and jumped over the desk. There has to be some sort of mirror or trap door he went through, but even after ten minutes of looking, five of which were spent with everyone looking, we did not find any logical explanation. Bewildered and kind of  freaked out, we just stared at each other until the blonde kid asked what we should do next.

By the way, I like your superhero Mali! Also,

I have no idea how this thing works so I hope I did it okay.

-Salvador

Wonder Boys

Part of an assignment for creative writing class, that I thrust superheros upon, because hey, every story is better with superheros. Maybe I’ll post the whole thing if I like it enough!  ♥

Oh jeez, he couldn’t pity her! It wasn’t allowed! She was a super villain, she worked the the Feline Fanatic and Ash! He had to remind himself that her innocent naive mannerisms were just a playing card to get guys like him to let down their guards, just the thought of it made her seem all the more evil. He wouldn’t be falling for any of her cutesy crap this time. Damn temptress. He had to take her seriously, because this wasn’t just another petty robbery or public disturbance.

This was different, this was evil. A world takeover via cats? He was allergic, for crying out loud! Adorning his midnight blue super-suit, embellished with the crisscrossing light blue strips that made the shape of the number four, he carefully slid his broadsword into it’s holster on his back, in case he ever needed it. A mask wasn’t needed for his identity to be kept a secret because his dark glasses hid his eyes well enough, without them he couldn’t see a thing, not in the present, or the future. Everything was blurry without them, his one weakness.

This is incredibly silly.  - Mali.

From the Pretty Prophets

Hello there lovelies, and welcome! This is a writing blog, run by Salvador and Mali, two friends that are obsessed with fantasy novels and whimsical literature. Everything we post here is made by us unless we credit one of our fellow writing friends. Please feel free to comment, critique, and enjoy! But no stealing!