Fortnightly Writing Challenge: SKELETONS IN THE CLOSET - VOTING NOW

[TheTelephone]

"Listen.
Do you want to know a secret?
Do you promise not to tell?
Whoa oh, oh."

                                                                                                   - The Beatles

Hey all,

We're right on the brink of October, so let's celebrate the time of the season with a few good scares! The main theme of this round of the Fortnightly Writing Challenge will be seemingly typical people or places with a spooky, shadowy past.

Perhaps your story will involve a seemingly average house/town/asylum with a dark and twisted history. Maybe it'll center around a person, a teacher, or a neighbor that "seemed like such a normal guy/girl/birthday clown." Your story can involve ghosts, or aliens, or ax-wielding maniacs. It can be about murder, or possession, haunted halls and houses; so long as it involves someone or something that seems so normal on the outside, but on the inside has a deep, dark and terrifying secret.

Submissions will be judged on the following criteria:

Best Character: Most unique, captivating, believable
Best Plot: Best pacing, most coherent, best overall story arc
Best Atmosphere: Strongest most consistent overall feeling
Best Setting: Best and most memorable use of time and place
Best Word Choice/Style Most unique and interesting narrative "voice"
Most Scary: Which one kept you up at night?

Just a heads up, my drawing skills are unrefined at best, but I will do my absolute best to use my limited pixel-art skills to make something that (hopefully) the winners can be proud of!

The deadline for submissions will be October 14th. Let me know if you have any questions at all.

HAPPY HAUNTING!!!

EDIT: Voting will commence now and end in three days, at midnight October 25th EST!

[Mandle]

NOT an entry, but just something I thought I'd post to try and help set the creepy mood (The poem always creeps me out)...

Yesterday upon the stair
I met a man who wasn't there
He wasn't there again today
I wish, I wish he'd go away

[Ghost]

Anitigone! I LOVE that bit of literature

[Stupot]

I'll have a go at this :-)
In the meantime here's a micro-horror-story I wrote for a contest Dave Gilbert had on Twitter a few weeks ago. It's not too dissimilar to the poem Mandle posted above:

The pale boy with the dead eyes looks and smiles at me on the landing every night. I think he's the only one who can see me.

[Mandle]

I'll have a go at this :-)
In the meantime here's a micro-horror-story I wrote for a contest Dave Gilbert had on Twitter a few weeks ago. It's not too dissimilar to the poem Mandle posted above:

The pale boy with the dead eyes looks and smiles at me on the landing every night. I think he's the only one who can see me.

DUDE! That just gave me serious broad-daylight spine-shivers. DON'T DO THAT!!!

[TheTelephone]

I dunno if you all are familiar with the children's series Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark written by Alvin Schwartz and illustrated by Stephen Gammell, but if not maybe these could provide some inspiration:

[Baron]

I have found inspiration!  (Ahead of schedule too, I might add ).  Stay tuned....

[Sinitrena]

A Sorcerer‘s Eyes

1.

The posters were old, more than ten years old, but they still were displayed prominently in the city and the whole country. Even ten years ago it was probably impossible to recognise anyone from the crude picture of a long-haired man and a description that simply stated that Gebren was a wizard, wanted as one of the last members of the council of the former magocracy that governed the land for a thousand years.

She shook her head, smiling. It was ten years since the end of the war, more than 13 years since the people rebelled against the tyranny. They were happy now, they were free. Was it really that important to find a single man who had escaped the massacres after the end of the war? It wasn't a good time, then â€" not the war and not the time of vengeance, when everyone who knew how to use magic was murdered. But it was ten years ago now, ten years of freedom and peace, of rebuilding and finding a new way to live.

It was ten years to the day of victory, as a matter of fact, and the city was decorated with pennons and flags in all colours of the rainbow. Benches stood on the market place and in the main street leading to the palace, in front of which a stage had been erected a few days ago. Men and boys rolled wine casks into the streets, women brought bread and pastries, a choir of children rehearsed their songs a last time for the festival in the evening and the guardsmen and guards women strolled through the alleys, relaxed, half of them already drunk.

Ralluy didn't like that but there wasn't much she could do. She was a captain of the guard and her men usually listened to her, but not today, not on the day of liberty. On this day, everyone was excited, the beggars and thieves as much as all the other citizens and there was actually less crime on this day. She never quiet understood it. Usually, when a crowd formed, it was a paradise for pickpockets and cutpurses. But maybe the guards just didn't notice it so much and the people were too drunk to care.

She shook her head and cursed. She couldn't change it. And she certainly understood that everyone just wanted to enjoy this day, especially this year: ten years since the magicians finally lost their power and ten years without magic.

She didn't remember much of the time before, she was too young, only a child, but she remembered the fear and the pain on this one day when a wizard put a hand on her forehead and said some words in a language she had only heard this once. He had gone this day but she still dreamt of it sometimes. She was glad they were gone, as was everyone else, and she just wished she would be allowed to celebrate with everyone else today, but she had duties and so she entered the tavern not to drink but as part of her patrol.

“Captain Ralluy! Thought you had to work today?”, Zihnen, the innkeeper, greeted her.

“I do, unfortunately.”, she laughed. “Just making sure everything's all right here and you're not enchanting someone!”

It was an old joke between them. She always said his beer tasted so good that it must have some magic in it and threatened to arrest him.

He laughed too. “Charming as always, Rall. I still have a bewitched keg if you want to enthral a coup' a kids.”

“No, thanks, Zih, I...”, she started to say but was interrupted by a goblet being plunked down hard on a wooden table.

“That is not funny!”, a man who sad in the shadows and had probably already drunk too much said. “You have no idea what you are talking about!”

Ralluy turned around and watched the man. It had been a while since she had last seen him, although she lived next to him. Xolon wasn't a young man any more but he wasn't old either. His hair had greyed considerably in the last year or so and had gone from black streaked with white to white with the occasional black strand.

“Sorry, Xol, I didn't mean...”, Zihnen said and looked at Ralluy at a loss for words.

Xolon was right: It wasn't funny. While Ralluy was still a child when the magocracy fell and Zihnen never had any family, Xolon had a daughter, Flamza, that was born before the fall, and had lost wife and sister in the war. For him the fear that one day a wizard would come to his house and take the child away to do no-one knew what with it was still very real and the pain of his loss even after years still fresh. Ralluy had never seen him drink before, though.

“Ten years to the day.”, he said as if he had read the captain's thoughts, “Ten years ago my Hilra was killed. It was nearly over. The war was won, it was finished, and she died. Ten years to the day and we celebrate and we have forgotten...”

Ralluy crossed over to the table and sat down opposite him. “Xolon.”, she said but he didn't seem to listen to her or even see her.

“Do you know that there was a letter left behind in the highest tower, the one where Gebren lived? It contained a warning and it spoke of ten years, ten years before magic would return, ten years to built, ten years to find peace, ten years to find a way to live with it.” A tear rolled down his cheek and he drowned the last drops of his beer. “Sorry.”, he said, standing up. “Sorry, shouldn't worry you with this, sorry.”, he mumbled and staggered out of the tavern.

Ralluy and Zihnen looked at each other. They both didn't know what to say and so the innkeeper reverted back to a business attitude instead. “He didn't pay, did he?”

“Ralluy shook her head. “No. You want me to arrest him?” She tried to smile but it was forced.

“Nah. He'll give me the money later when he feels better.”

“Yes, he will.”

They weren't worried about Xolon's words. Even if the sorcerer Gebren had left such a letter, he was probably the last magician in the world. There was no way magic could return, there was no need to be afraid. But Xolon had destroyed the mood.

“Give me something strong.”, Ralluy said and dropped a coin on the bar. “I think I need it.”

*

Zihnen was one of the actors in the re-enactment of the fall of the Nine Towers, the castle that had housed the ruling body of the former government. He played Gebren, the tall sorcerer who sat in his tower and threw lightning on the attackers and then escaped while they stormed the castle. No-one knew how the wizard had escaped â€" or what he actually looked like, for that matter â€" and so Zihnen simply descended through a trapdoor in the stage. While all the other wizards were killed, he was the sole survivor. The audience laughed and jeered as the actors ran across the stage and tripped on their long robes. They laughed even more when red paint was thrown over the bodies and even the actors couldn't help but smile.

“I like this part.”, Fewen said next to her. He was one of the guardsmen in her squad and was watching  the play with her even though they were both supposed to watch the audience in case of trouble.

“Yeah, so do I.”; Ralluy answered, “But I think I'll enjoy the imitation after that even more.”

After the fall, some people had learned to use tricks to make it look like they were doing magic. Before the fall, this was forbidden and seen as mockery by the wizards, but now people enjoyed this kind of magic a lot. People always tried to figure out how the imitators did it and while it was a lot of fun, it was also dangerous. Magic, real magic, was forbidden by death and if someone was too good with his tricks he might get accused of being a wizard. That is why Zihnen had written down all his tricks and drawn some very confusing pictures and given the paper to Ralluy before she had left his tavern a few hours ago.

It took some of the fun of his show away for her because she usually really enjoyed trying to figure out how the imitators did it and to then try to do it herself later at home. This way, she had a manual, so it should be easier to do later, though she never was very good at it. Her talents were strength and agility, not slight of hand.

She soon realized that it was equally pleasant to know the tricks and to laugh silently while the audience gasped and wondered whereas she knew exactly what was going on.

Zihnen gave a metal ring to a spectator and asked her to make sure that it wasn't broken anywhere. He took the ring back, turned around and gave a second one to someone else to test, and then a third. They were all whole. And then he clinked them against each other a few times and suddenly one hung in the other and he held a chain of three rings.

“How did he do this?”, Fewen asked.

Ralluy only smiled. Easy, a slight of hand, nothing more.

“Looked like real magic to me. We should arrest him.”

“Yeah, right. He's probably Gebren and really likes playing himself.”

“The description matches.”

They both laughed.

*

She had never seen the girl so happy and excited and she hated her for it. Ralluy wasn't a morning person, especially not after a night of festivity and heavy drinking, and so the girl's laughter early in the morning really grated on her nerves. Her head ached and her stomach felt woozy. Why was the girl not nursing her own head? She was 15, old enough to get drunk on the day of liberty.

Instead she sat on the wall separating Ralluy's and Xolon's house and whistled a tune the guards woman didn't recognise. The girl dangled her legs into Ralluy's garden, her back ached back and looking up at the late morning sun.

“Mornin'!”, she called without moving her head. “What a beautiful day, what a beautiful life, isn't it?”

“Yeah, sure, if you say so.”, Ralluy grumbled.

Flamza looked at her, then. “Oh, come on, Rall, it is a beautiful day. No need to be so grumpy!”

“Yeah, sure.”, the captain said again.

“Drank too much last night, huh?”

“Yeah.” She thought for a moment and then said: “You shouldn't be so loud. Your father drank too, so he probably doesn't want you to wake him up.”

“Pa's already awake.”, she said and somersaulted back into her own garden. “And he's as excited as I am!”

“Excited for what?”, she called after the girl but received no answer.

This girl! She shook her head. Flamza was certainly a handful.

Ralluy stretched and then sat down next to the single tree in her garden. There was no way she could go back to sleep now, even though she had no duty today and had meant to sleep in. She still closed her eyes and leaned back against the trunk. It was a beautiful morning and the sun warmed her face and even drove the headache to the back of her mind.

It was ten years. They were free for ten years and Xolon's gloomy prophecy was nothing but an old wife's tale and a rumour. The night had passed and nothing had happened. She laughed. Had she really feared that it might be true? Of course not. All the wizards were dead, all of them gone and the world was free of magic. The story hadn't really unsettled her but she had thought about it last night laying in bed in her drunken state. It had seemed more real in the darkness when shadows seemed like monsters to her addled brain. Not now. It wasn't real, just a nightmare from ten years ago that returned to her imagination for a night.

She looked up when she heard steps in the other garden. Xolon was carrying a big wooden plank and put it down on the grass.

“What are you doing this early in the morning?”, she called over the wall.

“Morning”, he answered, “though it's not really early any more. - We're clearing the shrine.”, and went back into the house.

Clearing the shrine? Yesterday he still cried over his dead wife and now he was clearing the shrine? It was a bit strange and a bit early. People usually kept the boiled-off bones of their relatives for a lot longer in their house-shrines than ten years. 15 or 20 years were normal. And it was especially strange to get them out when someone still mourned, like Xolon obviously did. Only afterwards, when nearly all grief had gone, were the bones taken out of the shrine and brought in their shrouds to somewhere under the open sky.

Nevertheless, Xolon and Flamza now carried the red shrouds with golden embroidery to the plank and sat them down carefully. It took a long time because they had to go 200 times, once for every bone, as was the tradition, and then cut open the golden threads until a whole skeleton lay on the plank. They murmured the same prayer over and over again while they ground the bones to dust with a ceremonial stone.

No priest was there. The boiling of the body shortly after death was public, open for everyone who wanted to mourn the dead, and a priest lauded the deceased. When the family sewed the bones into the shrouds, the priests tried to console them. But the clearing of the shrine and grinding of the bones was a private matter and no priest was necessary or wanted.

Ralluy hadn't stayed and watched â€" that would have been improper. She had gone back into the house.

When there was only dust left a few hours later, Xolon and Flamza shook the shrouds out and then burned them in a bonfire. Ralluy watched them from her open window. The burning of the shrouds wasn't really part of the ceremony, only of the ritual and it was far less intimate than the grinding. It wasn't wrong to watch the fire in the evening.

“Are you sad?”,Xolon asked Flamza and put his arm around her shoulder.

“Should I be? - I'm not sure. It felt like the right time to do it but it's only ten years.”

“The world changed ten years ago when she died and when your aunt Bralyn died, whose body was never found. It changed so much.”

“And it's changing now.”, Flamza said silently. “I am glad. It was time.”

He kissed her on her forehead.


2.

It was some kind of rattling that woke her up in the early hours of the morning four days later. First she couldn't place the sound. It was similar to a door opening and closing and scraping on the threshold or an old book creaking and breaking its spine.

She opened her eyes slowly, trying to see something in the darkness of her bedroom but it was impossible. The embers glowing in the fireplace were too weak to do more than cast shadows on corners and behind furniture. She blinked a few times, trying to get the sleep out of her eyes and then she heard the sound again. Being more awake now, her first thought was that a burglar had entered her home.

She felt for her sword, which lay across her bedside table, and slowly stood up. She crept through the room and downstairs, where she thought the noise had come from. A shadow moved in the corner of her eyes and she turned around. Someone stood there in the open entrance of her house, framed by the pale light of the moon and by fog slowly drifting into her home.

“Stop!”, she called but the shadow marched on, away from her and into the streets.

The strange sound followed him out, something hard grinding on something else and a strange clicking with every step. Red cloth hung in tatters from the body and glinted golden where light touched it.

“Stop!”, she called again, “I'm a guard, stop!”

But her call wasn't loud enough for at that moment a blood-curdling scream sounded from somewhere across the street. It was inarticulate and chilling, a shriek so primitive that it spoke clearer of pain and horror than mere words ever could.

Ralluy ran outside, following the burglar and following the scream and stopped in her track in the door. Not a burglar, not alone, not only her house. Though she could not clearly see through the fog, she still noticed the open doors of her neighbours and the slow procession of red-dressed bodies to the north of town.

They scuffled along the street, neither slow nor fast, their hard feet clacking on the cobblestones. Some of their parts were still in the process of arranging themselves to their proper places, jumping up or falling down, gliding along their other parts. Nothing seemed to connect them, other than the red shrouds that were sewn around them and that were flapping in a gentle breeze now.

It would have looked funny if it weren't so utterly terrifying, and so Ralluy could do nothing but stare open-mouthed at the cavalcade of bones and shrouds for a few seconds. Her neighbours didn't fare better. All of them woken by unfamiliar noises in the middle of the night, they stood in front of their houses and watched their dead loved-ones walk away. Some had screamed first, some had run away, some had tried to stop the skeletons and were pushed out of the way by the corpses and had fallen to the ground. Some of them were dead, though Ralluy didn't know that yet. They hadn't allowed the skeletons to push them and fought back. But how can you fight against those you loved? And the skeletons did not care for the living. They trampled on, northwards to the hills and the richest part of town.

She felt more than heard movement behind her near the shrine. The doors opened and bones assembled themselves. Her mother, her father! One of them had already left, one was still there. She turned around and readied her sword. She had no idea what she was going to do. This was her family, her parents. It was also, most likely, a threat. The skeleton stumbled out of the shrine and staggered to the entrance door, the parts circling around each other until they found their position. Ralluy blocked the entrance, the sword angular in front of her body.

“Stop!”, she said, though she wasn't sure if the skeleton even could or wanted to hear her.

It didn't react. It didn't stop and Ralluy swung her sword. It clanked against the bones, slicing the red cloth and a small bone flew further into the house from the impact. The skeleton did not care. It marched on and a small bone ran across the wooden floor, following. It didn't attack her, not really, it just walked on and Ralluy had the choice to be trampled down or to jump out of the way.

She jumped. Her head banged against the door frame and she fell to the ground. She stood up, trying to come up with some kind of plan, with something, anything to do, but she had no idea. The skeletons marched to the north and she could do nothing. She felt tears welling up in her eyes â€" because of the pain, because of the whole situation. It was madness, it was magic and it was sacrilegious.

Not even the wizards had dared do something like that while they still ruled. There were rumours that they sometimes used the bodies of executed criminals for some kinds of experiments but something like that was unheard of. And the magicians were gone, they were dead! There were some that had escaped, like Gebren, but, but, but...

She couldn't think. She looked around. Most of the skeletons were gone. Her neighbours stood shocked and crying on each others shoulders. Xolon had his arms around Flamza's waist and she leaned her head against his shoulder. There was a sombre expression on her face and a distant look in his sparkling eyes.

“You should probably go to the guardhouse.”, Xolon said when he noticed her look.

Right, the guardhouse, he was right. Ralluy nodded and started walking. She didn't care that she was only wearing her nightgown and no shoes and that she carried an unsheathed sword in her hand. She just wanted to feel like she was doing something.

[Sinitrena]

The night's silence was disrupted by sobs. Here and there, shapes shone through the fog. People knelt next to fallen friends, who had been trampled or pushed to death. Here and there, blood had sprayed onto the ground or was smeared at a wall where a head had connected with the stones. It wasn't much carnage, most people had the army of skeletons pass, but it was enough to make her stomach squishy and give her a lump in her throat.

It was strange. It wasn't an attack, the skeletons had not fought, at most they had fought back, but it still felt like an army was marching and war was imminent.

The guardhouse was in pure chaos. The night guards watched the streets confused, fearful and anxious. Other guards, who had not been on duty, arrived in their nightshirts like Ralluy and squeezed into the house, and officers, who didn't know any better what was going on, tried to organize the terrified men and women. It didn't help that some citizens came, asking for help and adding to the panic.

Some guards were organized to keep them away, some were sent to follow the ghostly army and to see what they did, and some, like Ralluy, were gathered in the yard.

“This is obviously magic.”, colonel Statto said to them, “This is an attack, this is war. We thought we killed this scum, but we weren't thorough enough. We will remedy this negligence now. We will find them, we will fight them, we will kill them! They are among us and just because we were lenient until now, doesn't mean we'll not do everything in our power to stop them. We can't fight this battalion of skeletons until the army is here to reinforce us but we can and will find the magicians responsible. We all heard rumours that this man or that were a magician and we never believed it because they were our neighbours, our friends and so we stayed passive. But now is not the time to be indulgent, now is the time to act. We kept records, lists with names of people who were reported to us as suspicious. Find them, arrest them, kill them if necessary. No-one will care if they die without a trial. They need to die!”

The colonel pressed a paper into Ralluy's hand and in the hands of the other squat leaders. There were three names on the list, names of people who lived in her neighbourhood, names of people she knew. There was Dibsen, the baker, Gallu, his wife, and Zihnen the innkeeper whose tricks she loved. Were they wizards? She didn't know. What she knew was that the skeletons needed to be stopped and so she gathered her squad, most of them wearing only nightshirts and boots, and lead them back the way she had come.

More people had found their way to the guardhouse, demanding help and explanations, and blocking the path. Ralluy pushed through. The streets were mostly empty by now. Friends and family members had brought the dead and wounded into their houses and everyone else had either gone back into their homes to mourn and barricade the doors, or come to the guardhouse, he great temple or the town-hall, expecting help that no-one could give.

The squad marched through foggy streets that looked not different than any other night when they patrolled because of thieves and drunkards but felt completely different nonetheless. All of them shivered, for the cold or for fear, Ralluy could not tell.

It had been ten years, ten years since the magocracy was defeated. Most of her squad were too young to really remember what life was like before the war. They all knew that the magicians had stolen children whenever they felt like it and ruled the world with an iron fist and they knew that people said they felt like prisoners then. But they had never heard of something like that. Something like that hadn't even happened during the war. They had fought with fire and wind, they had killed without remorse and they were only defeated because of the sheer number of rebels but they had never desecrated the dead, had never allowed someone to use remains for anything. What had changed? Had they waited ten years to get revenge in a way that was this inconceivably evil?

Yes, they deserved to die, all of them, they deserved to suffer and to beg for mercy that would not be given, they deserved to kneel in front of the whole world and be beaten to death, drowned to death. They deserved to be tarred and feathered and to be quartered. They deserved to have their rotting parts strung up on the flagpoles and hung in the wind. They deserved to be refused the rites and rituals of the dead. They deserved all of it and Ralluy swore that she would do everything, everything to see it happen.

But Dibsen, Gallu and Zihnen?

The bakers weren't at home. Their front door was closed but they saw that the doors of the shrine stood wide open when they had entered the house. Pebbles lay on the floor where a little bowl had fallen from the shrine when the skeletons broke out of it. A burning lamp stood on a table next to a comfortable armchair.

“Search the house.”, Ralluy ordered, though she knew that they would find nothing.

Gallu and Dibsen weren't there. They had gone to the town-hall or the guardhouse or fled from the city like so many others. Had they gone anything wrong? Ralluy doubted it. She knew these people, she knew Gallu and Dibsen and she knew Zihnen. But what if she was mistaken, what if someone had seen a truth she didn't dare believe?

They marched to Zihnen's tavern. It was empty like the streets and was probably closed for a few hours by the time the shrines opened. Zihnen lived in two rooms over the taproom and the squad trampled up the steps in a hardly contained anger. Two of their prey had escaped but they would catch the third.

Zihnen's rooms were at the end of a long corridor. The first room contained a table, some chairs and the house shrine while the second room was the bedroom. The doors of the shrine were closed and there was no sign of disarray. Zihnen wasn't in the outer room but he opened the bedroom door when he heard noises in his house.

“What do you want?”, he asked, rubbing at tired eyes.

“We need to arrest you, Zihnen. Sorry.”, Ralluy said.

“Arrest me? What for?”

But it was too late for an answer. Fewen, who had suspected Zihnen since the festival, rammed his sword into Zihnen's stomach. The innkeeper slumped to the ground. Ralluy wheeled around.

“What did you do that for?”, she screamed.

Fewen smiled but in his eyes lay an expression of coldness and anger. “Didn't want this vermin to run.”, he said.

Ralluy stared at him, then looked at Zihnen, then at the other members of her squad. They were nodding, all of them a sullen look on their hard faces. They all agreed with Fewen.

“We don't even know if he's guilty. He's most likely innocent, damn it!”

“So? The colonel said no trial.”

“No... no trial.” She shook with anger and gestured to the door. “Leave!”, she screamed, “Go! Before I kill you all. This is not justice, this is murder!”

Fewen shrugged and turned around. The others followed.

Ralluy knelt down on the floor and took Zihnen's head in her hands. He was alive but barely. There was no hope to save him.

“Rall...?”, he whispered, not really understanding what had happened.

He had no idea. He had closed the tavern a short while before the skeletons had broken out of the shrines and hadn't heard a thing because he had no family and his shrine was empty. He died in Ralluy's arm.

This was wrong. This was absolutely wrong. Fewen had killed an innocent man or at least someone who wasn't convicted and the look in the eyes of her men told her that all the other squads were probably doing the same thing. They were terrified and angry and they wanted nothing more than to stop this magic. But they didn't know what was going on. They didn't know who did this and, when she thought about it, they didn't even know why. They took their vengeance on random people, men and women that were accused of magic because they were imitators or because someone hated them for whatever reason. This was not justice, this was murder, even if some of them were wizards, even then. And if the skeletons weren't stopped, and soon, then more innocent people would die. Even during the war, the wizards hadn't done something like that, they had never used the dead. Something wasn't right. The skeletons had marched but they hadn't attacked. What was going on? She needed to know, she needed to see it for herself.

She ran to the north where three hills surrounded a small valley and where the rich citizens lived. The streets were wider there and the houses stood further apart. She scrambled up the southern hill to look at the western and eastern hill, between which there was a city gate, and down into the valley. The sun was rising by the time she reached the hill but the fog was far from gone. Part of her expected the hill to be filled with people but it was nearly empty. At the summit, two people stood arm in arm but there were no other spectators and no guards trying to gauge the situation. The two turned around when they heard Ralluy approaching.

“Captain Ralluy.”, Xolon greeted her with a solemn voice.

“Xolon? Flamza? What are you doing here?”, she asked.

Xolon smiled but it was not a happy smile. “Watching the destruction of the world.”, he said.

“The destruc...” She didn't finish the sentence because she saw it now: Dark grey eyes, like usual, but sprinkled with black and white, watched her, distant and far away â€" a sorcerer's eyes. And Flamza had the same eyes. She had seen such eyes once before as a child when a wizard came to her village and put a hand on her forehead and then said that she was of no interest to him. “You!”, she accused, “Both of you! You did this!”

“Did what?” He was calm, unbearably calm.

“This!”, she said, pointing down into the valley where red wrapped heads were visible over the fog, standing in ranks on a big square in a circle around something Ralluy couldn't see.

“And now I'm standing far above them, watching? Instead of protected in the middle?” He laughed bitterly. “Protect. Protect. Protect. That's all they're thinking. Protect. Protect. Protect. Understandable, really.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Them. Isn't it obvious?”

Ralluy shook her head. Nothing was obvious to her. Xolon was a wizard? And Flamza too? She would never had thought it. She had heard the hate and sorrow in his voice just a few days ago. She had seen the pain on his face. But his eyes, they allowed no doubts. He was a sorcerer and he felt no compassion for the people in the city. And still he said the truth. He had come to watch, not to act â€" he wasn't in the circle, he was on the hill like her, looking down at the army of dead.

“You knew.”, she said suddenly, remembering that Xolon and Flamza had sent the bones of his wife into the wind such a short time ago. “you knew this would happen, you knew someone? something? would call the dead!”

Xolon looked at her but didn't answer for a long time. “I did not know.”, he said finally, “And I feel sorry for you. This is not the way this was meant to go. Ten years. How much can change in ten years. Or even one. We wanted peace. We wanted time for things to change. People get killed in war but afterwards? Your side had won, your people celebrated â€" and they murdered. When we got together and decided to suppress all magic for ten years we thought enough of us would survive to teach those born after the fall. But they were murdered, all of them. Now live with the consequences!”

Ralluy looked at Xolon. There was nothing left of the friendly father, of the good neighbour and friend. The man in front of her was hard and cold and dangerous. She still held her sword in her hand but she didn't even think of using it. She was alone and there were two of them, neither armed but both more powerful than her.

“Consequences? You could stop this, couldn't you? Whatever is happening down there, you could do something about it!”

“And you think I would?”

Flamza had kept silent during this exchange but now she spoke. Her voice was as hard as Xolon's but it held a compassion Xolon had lost a long time ago. “Yes.”, she said, “Yes, you should go down there. Yes, we should stop this. It is wrong. It is wrong to use the dead like that, it is wrong to use magic like that. You always taught me that. You always said I have a responsibility. That I'm responsible for what I do with my magic and that I'm responsible for every child that is like me. We should go down there. There's a little girl that needs our protection â€" like I needed your protection.”

Xolon didn't answer. He just sighed, then started to walk and Flamza followed him. It took Ralluy a moment to decide what to do and to organise her thoughts, then she, too, ran after them.

“You stole children while you ruled and now you're protecting one?”, she said when she had reached them. It was so much to grasp, so much going on she had never thought possible and so she asked the first question that came to mind.

Xolon still didn't speak but Flamza answered: “You know that magicians can't have children? We can get pregnant all right and the children are born healthy but as long as either mother or father is a wizard, the child dies within a day. But some children, children of parents without any magic in their blood, are born with powers. They need a teacher or else their magic will break free one day, wild and untamed, and people die. Parents, children, neighbours. And most of as want children and many saw their own die because there is little to stop you from getting pregnant when you love. We are all stolen children, Ralluy, every wizard is a stolen child. Xolon is not my father and Bralyn was not his sister â€" not by blood. And the little girl that called the dead to her protection is not my sister yet but she will be soon.”

“But...”

“It is the only way. When the council enchanted the world ten years ago so that the magic seemed gone, they hoped for an agreement. They agreed not to rule, even not to take the children, only to teach, but they were murdered and the letter Gebren left just in case was ignored.”

They had reached the army of skeletons. The dead stood perfectly still, only the fog wafted and gave the impression of movement. Every bone had found its proper place some time ago and the skeletons looked like statues wrapped in red and gold. When Ralluy and the two wizards came near them they all turned their heads to them in a single motion. They didn't raise their hands or stepped towards them but it was nonetheless an aggressive gesture.

Ralluy didn't know what Xolon had planned. Was he going to fight them, one after the other until only dust remained on the square? Would he destroy them and take the last ounce of dignity away? Grind the bones and burn the cloth?

He did nothing like that. Instinctively, Ralluy had raised her sword when the skeletons moved but it wasn't necessary. Xolon stood still and seemed to talk to the skeletons though Ralluy didn't hear a single word. Flamza was tense during this conversation but soon she relaxed. A moment later some of the skeletons stepped aside and an allay formed. They went on.

In the middle of the square sat a young child. She was hardly older than three or four years and wore nothing but a shawl wrapped around her scrawny shoulders. She sat on the cold stones with her arms slung around her scraped knees. From time to time her shoulders lifted from silent and exhausted sobs and sometimes a cough shook her small body. Blood crusted her fair hair.

The circle of skeletons around her was a few metres wide but in this first circle a second one had formed, this one not facing to the outside but into its middle. In this second circle lay a man and a single skeleton stood hovering over him. The eyes of the man were closed but he was breathing. His face was bruised.

The girl seemed weak and helpless but Ralluy remembered what Xolon had said earlier. The skeletons had just a single thought: Protect. Protect. Protect. They were protecting the child.

Xolon scrunched down in front of the girl. He didn't touch her. Ralluy wanted to go to her too but Flamza held her back. “Xolon is safe but you are not. Watch, just watch.”, she said.

Ralluy didn't know what else to do. The girl didn't seem dangerous but she was and at the same time she was helpless, just a small child surrounded by an army of the dead. And a wizard crouched in front of her and tried to calm her down.

It felt all so wrong. She had learned to fear the wizards when she was a child and that they were tyrants when she was older. She had thought that the guard was there to protect the people, protect them from every kind of harm, but Fewen had murdered an innocent man and the one responsible for the desecration of the dead was just a child. There was no malice in the fearful girl, no evil that she could see, just a little girl, afraid and hurt, that didn't understand what was going on and that had sent just a single thought to the skeletons. It was all so wrong. The law said that all magicians must die, all of them, but this was just a child. Nothing of this agreed with what Ralluy had learned her whole life.

“Nibalu.” Xolon spoke silent and with a smooth and coaxing voice. “Nibalu, don't be afraid. You are safe now, safe.”

Ralluy didn't know how Xolon knew her name and she didn't now if he just used words to calm her or if some of his own magic was involved but the girl, Nibalu, looked up at him an wiped tears out of her eyes with shaking fists. She cocked her head as if trying to understand who this man in front of her was and then slung her arms around his neck.

“Let it go, Nibalu, let it go. Don't hold unto it, sweetheart, you are safe now. He won't hurt you again, love, I promise, I'll make sure of it. You don't need them now that I am here. Their place is no longer in this world. Don't hold them back, let them go...”

It was difficult to tell how much of this actually meant anything to the girl, if she even cared what the words were, or if she just listened to a friendly voice and relaxed. Nibalu sobbed into the wizard's shoulders and slowly a moan and a groan went through the files of dead. It looked like they stood at ease for a second and then one after the other fell, first the ones closest to the girl and then the ones farther out. Only the single circle surrounding the man lingered for a moment longer before them, too, fell to the ground and just the single skeleton in the very middle remained.

Xolon looked at this last skeleton and sighed. “She can't stay, Nibalu, she is gone. There is nothing left for her in this world. I now she is your mother and you need her protection from your father, but she can't give it any longer. She is gone. You need to let her go. You're hurting her. As much as she wants to stay with you, she can't. Do you understand me, she can't. I promise you, I promise her, you don't need her now. I will protect you. Your father won't hurt you again. You have to let her go.”

Her mother, she had died and left her with her father but her father didn't protect her and hurt her instead and so she called to her dead mother and called her back and with her all the others came.

The last skeleton slumped down to the ground and a red carpet covered the stones. A sea of shrouds lay in the square and it was impossible to tell which bone belonged to which body. The fog had dissolved and the morning sun shone bright on the ghastly scene and an innocent child fell asleep in the arms of a sorcerer. He stood up and lifted the girl into his arms.

The father, the man the last skeleton had guarded in the circle, moaned and rolled to his feet. Xolon handed the girl to Flamza and then turned to Ralluy. “May I borrow your sword?”, he asked courteously.

She handed him the weapon without thinking and witnessed the second murder that day. Xolon didn't hesitate for a second. He just sliced the sword over the hapless man. Afterwards he turned around again and offered the blood sword to captain Ralluy hilt first. She took it and stared at the hard, cold man she had thought a friend.

She understood him, part of her understood him. If the man had really hurt Nibalu so much that she had to all the dead, then... She wasn't sure, but there was probably more justice in his death than in Zihnen's. And Xolon planned to take the girl with him, he didn't need a witness. It was an awful thought but probably true. No-one was allowed to know that the girl had magic or they were never safe. It was logical, it was ruthless and it meant that she, Ralluy, had to die too. She wanted to turn around and run or attack him but neither was possible. The sorcerer's eyes routed her to the spot and she couldn't move. Whether it was fear or magic she couldn't tell.

“Please”, she pleaded with a choked voice, “please don't.”

Xolon didn't advance and he didn't react to her distress. “She will die, you know.”, he said silently, “If they ever find out about her, she will die. It doesn't matter that she is a child, they will kill her. Now that magic returns, other children's powers will awaken and guards will come and take them to be murdered, murdered like my wife, murdered like my sister. It wasn't planned like that. We wanted peace. Maybe it was wrong to take every child that had magic, but we took them away, taught them and loved them but you are going to kill them. Not all will be found before their magic surfaces and horrible things will happen. People will die and people will murder the children. And because you don't have a way to tell which child is magic... It'll be a child here and a child there that is killed but soon enough it'll be too many. The parents will cry and scream and the children will fight and your tyranny will be so much worse than anything we ever did. There will be a new rebellion and I don't know how it will end. I gave you ten years to create a better world but you have failed. All of us agreed on it when the towers were about to fall and most of us went and tried to talk to the leaders of the rebellion, to find a peaceful solution. We had begun the spell before and only I stayed behind to finish it in case there was no solution. I wrote a letter to explain it all, to warn the world that it had ten years but the letter was ignored and I fled with my daughter. And those that had survived until the fall were hunted down and murdered and I don't know if there is anyone left except for Flamza and me. I can't change anything now. Two wizards can't cast this spell and I have no way of finding anyone else. I can only try to protect my own people: Flamza and Nibalu and everyone else I might find one day. I couldn't search for new wizards until four days ago because for ten years there was no magic in this world and everyone executed as a magician during this time, well... The council chose it's path a thousand years ago and oppressed the world, the rebels chose theirs ten years ago when they murdered my people and I choose now. I'll protect myself and I'll protect the girls and I'll protect every child that shares our powers that I'll find but don't believe for a second I'll protect your society from the consequences of your decisions. You want to stop me? You want to kill me, kill my daughters? Try it! Try! I'll fight and I'll win and I'll kill but it is your choice.” He was silent for a moment, then continued: “I hope you use your new found knowledge instead and try to change the world for me. I changed it ten years ago and it changed four days ago â€" that is why we ground Hilra's bones â€" but I fear all this will end in chaos. I can't argue for my people. I have to leave. I have to find them, gather them, protect them... Maybe you can...” He shrugged and turned away.

“Xolon...”, Ralluy begun, though she wasn't sure what she wanted to say.

“Gebren. My name is Gebren.”

He didn't turn back and walked away instead, followed by Flamza who still carried the sleeping Nibalu. The bones crunched and creaked under their feet where they stepped on them and Ralluy stayed behind in a white nightgown surrounded by sunshine and a red sea of fallen dead.

*

It was chaos. People searched the square for their relatives, trying to identify them by the golden embroidery in the red shrouds they had stitched themselves but it was nearly impossible. People brawled and fought over the remains and trampled the bones. The guards stood by, trying to defuse the situation but there was not much they could do. They had tried to organise the transportation of the bones but everyone just tried to find theirs and stormed the square.

It had taken a while for the news to spread that the skeletons had fallen and when it finally reached the guardhouse and the city, colonel Statto praised the efficiency of his men because by then all suspects he had written on the lists were dead. Some were killed with a single stroke of the sword like Zihnen, some stoned to death by an angry mob. The guards had not tried to protect them and now they believed like everybody else that their deaths had stopped the skeletons. Ralluy knew it wasn't true but what was she supposed to do? Nobody seemed to think twice about the stabbed man in the middle of an ocean of bones. Who would listen to her?

She had gone to Xolon's house shortly after the spell had ended and found it empty. She wasn't surprised and only wondered how many other children in the city would find their magic soon. She feared the day and didn't know what to do about it.

What she knew was that it was wrong what the guardsmen did and that it was wrong to kill someone just because he was born with skills other people did not have.

Fewen, next to her, grinned and she felt sick. Somewhere among the skeletons were her mother and her father and she watched as they were stamped to dust under heavy feet. Once bright red cloth became dirty and dark and ripped when people fought over bones.

The destruction of the world, Xolon had said and Ralluy wasn't sure if he had talked about an attack of the skeletons, this scene now or the future he had described to her. Ralluy turned away from an act that was more sacrilegious than Nibalu's spell ever was and walked away.

[Baron]

The Seer of Orray

   The shrieking began at midnight.

   Slowly candles were lit and lamps turned up as the guests and residents of Orray Manor groggily stumbled to their feet in search of the source of the commotion.  They found it, in the drawing room, in the person Miss Alyned, the young maid.  She was white as the surrounding blizzard that bound them all within that opulent country house, and as hysterical as if she'd just polished the silverware of the devil himself.

   There were nine of them, including the shrieking young woman.  Dr. Bumbleworth, a kindly gentleman of first rate disposition and rather less esteemed intellect, soon mercifully sedated her with an injection from his medical bag.

   â€œWhat the devil is going on here?” demanded Colonel Humus, and ex-military man whose normally brusque manner had a cranky edge to it at this time of night.

   â€œThe poor thing looks as if she'd seen a ghost,” muttered professor Theodore Thursten III, another guest at the manor, although his eyes belied curiosity more than empathy.  The professor was not often found outside the library due to his professional preoccupation with the arcane and the occult, so this real-world manifestation of a most mysterious incident was obviously a great opportunity for him.

   â€œCabernut!” barked Lady Orray to summon her butler.  She was as old and twisted as driftwood stranded in the desert, and had the delicate temperament of a badger with an ulcer.  And she ran Orray Manor rather like the Queen of Hearts might; indeed, given her age she may well have been an inspiration for the character to the late Lewis Carroll.  “Cabernut!  Why are we employing this hysterical creature?  When she comes to I want her dismissed immediately!”

   â€œAye, Mum,” the butler pandered sycophantically.  He still wasn't entirely certain whether this episode was real or just another drunken hallucination, but it was best to play it safe just in case.

   â€œYou'll have to move her, too,” commanded Berty Hotspurt, Lady Orray's distant nephew and presumed heir to the family fortune.  “And don't just roll her behind the tapestry.”  Nature had not endowed Berty very impressively, least of all with brains.  But you didn't need brains if you had money.  Which he didn't.  But he might, soon.  Maybe.

   â€œDon't you think it might harm her?” asked his school-chum Rolly Pauperton.  Rolly meant well, especially when it might bring him some advantage.  And in his opinion this pretty housemaid was definitely worth taking advantage of.

   â€œOh Rolly, don't be such a bore,” crooned Milly Upwell, his chum Berty's fiancé and an aspiring socialite.  Her face was pasted with wrinkle-preventing mud, but a cigarette burned counter-productively at the end of her elegant holder.  With an affected yawn she turned to go back to bed.

   â€œWhat's this?” asked Dr. Bumbleworth from his knees as he examined the victim for wounds.  He pointed out a strange set of parallel marks on right side of the maid's swan-like neck.  “This girl has definitely been assaulted,” he concluded.  “And given the isolation of this house due to the winter storm, I would wager that the perpetrator is someone in this room!”

   The stunned silence began at quarter past midnight.

*   *   *   *   *   *

   â€œI'm telling you, Dr. Bumbleworth,” Professor Thursten was saying.  “It has all the hallmarks of a werewolf -or possibly vampire- attack.  Look at this arcane text, man!”

   But Dr. Bumbleworth was more interested in the second victim on the dining room table.  Rolly Pauperton was hollering like a mad-man, cradling his own head as if his brains were trying to burst out of his skull in some sort of volcanic episode.

   The storm still raged outside, although it was morning now and the spooky shadows of the previous evening were now banished by the all pervasive pallor of the bleak daylight straining through the icy windows.  Again the whole company was gathered together, but now they were fully dressed and ready for their breakfast.

   â€œWhen I was young enough to make social calls,” commented Lady Orray, “it was considered ill-mannered to roll about in the apple marmalade.”

   â€œHe's out of his head!” proclaimed Colonel Humus, grabbing an uncrushed breakfast bun from beneath the thrashing limbs of the young dandy.

   Dr. Bumbleworth sedated the writhing Rolly Pauperton just as he had Miss Alyned.  “Observe,” he said, indicating the marks on the young man's neck.  “Exactly the same pattern as on the housemaid.”

        "What about all the dirt all over his face?" asked Professor Thursten.  "It's like his head was buried ritualistically...."

   Milly Upwell bit her lip self-consciously, but in the intensity of the moment nobody noticed.  Berty Hotspurt held his fiancé closer.  “Do you think it's contagious?”

   Dr. Bumbleworth furrowed his brow.  “No, no, no.  Weren't you listening last night?”

   There was a bunch of shuffling of feet.  Lady Orray mumbled something about the importance of a punctual breakfast.  Dr. Bumbleworth continued: “This is not some disease.  Nor is it some sort of supernatural presence,” he stated, forestalling Professor Thursten's interjection.  “The wounds on Rolly Pauperton and Miss Alyned are consistent with a physical attack.  Given that we are house-bound by this fearsome winter storm, the only logical conclusion is that it is someone in this very room who is perpetrating these ghoulish attacks!”

   â€œBut, logically....” Berty Hotspurt interrupted, trying very hard to use his brain. “Logically it was someone in the room last night as well.  But it couldn't have been ol' Rolly now could it?”

   â€œUnless he faked it,” Milly added, sowing the seeds of doubt in Berty's already much furrowed field.  “He always was fond of a lark.”

   â€œNonsense!” bellowed Colonel Humus.  “I once had a whole battalion of men thrashed to within an inch of their lives for faking wounds, and I must say these marks appear to be genuine!”  Then he rolled the unfortunate Rolly right off the table to reach the cream for his tea.

   â€œThen it must be one of us,” concluded Dr. Bumbleworth.  “And who here doesn't have some motive or other?  Berty Hotspurt, heir presumptive to your great-great-aunt's fortune: perhaps you thought you could scare the old bird to death with these frightful antics?”  There was a collection of gasps from the gathered company.

   â€œBut what about Colonel Humus?” Berty shot back.  “Gold-digging suitor to my sweet old auntie?  What better way to get her to marry him than to make her feel insecure in her own house?”

   â€œB-what?!?” shouted the colonel, spitting hot tea all over the poor butler.  “What about Miss Milly Upwell, your fiancé, who's only using you and half the other men in this house to lustfully mount the social ladder!”

   Milly Upwell blushed slightly despite herself, but quickly diverted the company's attention.  “What about the mysterious Professor Theodore Thursten III, social pariah and certified quack?  Isn't it just a little convenient that vampire-like attacks crop up in the first house off campus that he has visited in twenty years?”

   The professor guffawed dismissively.  “What about Cabernut, the perpetually intoxicated butler?  He's had a lifetime of loathing everyone who's set foot through that door, and now he's finally snapped like the tamper-proof cap of a cheap bottle of wine!”

   Cabernut hiccoughed and swayed slightly.  Were they accusing him of something?  Better think up something fast....  “What about....” he began, trying to point out one of the dozens of people circling about him,  “him!”  Cabernut squinted with determination to make out who exactly it was he had accused.  It looked like an old portrait on the wall, or maybe the stuffed walrus in the conservatory....

   â€œMe?” asked Dr. Bumbleworth.  “I assure you, sir, that I am a first rate gentleman!”

   Why was the walrus barking at him?  Cabernut squinted harder and advanced unsteadily towards his adversary.  “You!  You did it for the free fish and mating opportunities in the rookery!”

   Everyone gasped again, except for Milly Upwell who bit her lip even tighter.

   Dr. Bumbleworth drew himself up.  “Well, perhaps it was even Lady Orray herself!  Tired of the teeming throngs of ne'er-do-wells and hangers-on that storm her threshold every season, she has finally struck back with guile and venom!”

   Lady Orray did not respond until she had finished chewing her breakfast sausage and carefully put down her cutlery.  “My dear doctor,” she said with aristocratic snideness, “you have all the imagination of an intestinal parasite!”

   â€œEvidence!” Colonel Humus roared.  “We need evidence!”  He kicked poor Rolly on the floor out of the way so that he could access the scones.  “And where's the bloody butter?”

   The plot thickened.

*   *   *   *   *

   It happened to Professor Thursten and Milly Upwell next.  They were found entangled together in the pantry, moaning and wailing and clutching at their heads.

   â€œWell at least this time they've got the neck marks as an excuse,” shrugged Berty Hotspurt, taking a drink from Cabernut's platter.  Cabernut took one himself, now that everyone else was distracted by the spectacle in front of them.

   â€œThe perpetrator has clearly escalated their activities,” Dr. Bumbleworth concluded.  “Observe the ripped clothing and gymnastic-like contortions of the female victim.  It must have taken quite a bit of extra effort to pose her in that position.”

   Berty swallowed his drink all in one gulp.  Colonel Humus and Cabernut the Butler just exchanged knowing glances.

   â€œThey look like two snakes got tangled together in a cotton gin,” Lady Orray opined.

   â€œHave any of the other victims come to yet?” Colonel Humus shouted, reaching through the contorted duo to claim a bottle of port from the pantry.

   â€œNo,” Dr. Bumbleworth responded.  “Although the outward evidence of attack is limited to the claw like marks on the neck, all the victims seem to be suffering from some sort of extreme head affliction.  Without thorough sedation the slightest noise or tremor sends them into yet another agonizing spasm.  None has been able to communicate at all about the nature of the attack.”  He reached into the pantry to jab the latest victims with sedative.  “Soon I will run out of this medication,” he mused, “And then the victims will be left to suffer.”

   â€œNot to mention the rest of the household,” Lady Orray complained, rubbing her temples.

   â€œIf only these confounded snows would abate!” Colonel Humus lamented.  “Then we might be able to force some of the ice and dump them out the window!”

   â€œWhy the heads, though?” wondered Berty Hotspurt out loud.  “Are we dealing with some sort of brain-slurping zombie here?”

   Dr. Bumbleworth scoffed, but then was pensive.  “Perhaps we should read through Professor Thursten's papers and see what the old boy was all about, after all.”

   The snow kept falling.

*   *   *   *   *

   â€œNothing,” Berty said, tossing the remaining papers from his stack onto Professor Thursten's bed.  Perhaps they should have taken him and his fiancé out of the pantry?  Maybe he should have learned to read before volunteering to go through the papers?  It was all too much for him right now.  “You?”

   The drunken butler was slouched against the bureau, giggling quietly to himself.

   â€œWhat's this?” asked Dr. Bumbleworth, opening a folder of newspaper clippings.  “They appear to document a strange affliction in the surrounding countryside.  Men and women going out of their heads mysteriously.  And look at the dates!  Do you realize what this means?”

   Berty stared blankly and nodded.  He was even worse with numbers than he was with letters.  Cabernut the butler stared blankly too.

   â€œCome on man!” Dr. Bumbleworth called, grabbing Berty by the collar.  “We don't have a moment to lose!”
   
*   *   *   *   *

   Dr. Bumbleworth huffed as he mounted the last of the stairs.  Behind him the butler had passed out on the steps, while the brilliant Berty Hotspurt had gotten lost somewhere in the corridor below.  Nevermind them, though.  He, Dr. Bumbleworth had solved the mystery, and was now prepared to face the monster himself.  Steadying his nerves, he turned the knob in front of him and opened the door.

   Colonel Humus stared vacantly at him and began to bellow nonsensically.  Attached to the side of his head, latched on by the neck with her great talon-like fingernails, was Lady Orray herself.  “Oh, I get it now,” Dr. Bumbleworth said with realization.  “You're an ear-wax vampire!”

   In an instant the old lady had released the colonel and pounced upon the hapless doctor.

   On the stairs Cabernut the Butler came to enough to giggle to himself once more.

   Berty Hotspurt wondered why there was a bathtub in the kitchen now.

   And when the snows finally stopped, the entire house echoed to the shrieks and moans of Lady Orray's unsedated victims.

~fin~
   

[TheTelephone]

Hey all,

I'm going to extend the deadline for this writing challenge for 48 more hours to see if we can't get a few more submissions. No submissions will be accepted after 12 midnight EST the night of October 16th/morning of October 17th.

I'll be posting trophies soon, and they haven't turned out too terrible if I don't say so myself!

Get those submissions in, and definitely post or PM me if you all think I should extend the deadline further.

[TheTelephone]

Alright, we are about 13 hours from the deadline, folks. Do we want to wait an additional day or should we cut it off and just have a head to head between Baron and Sinitrena?

[Baron]

Would it sound self-interested to speculate that no one else is coming to this party?  I say we lock the doors and bust out the Bananagrams and the whiskey!

[Durinde]

I made a couple of false starts. Couldn't really find my muse for the theme though. Best of luck to the other writers.

[Stupot]

I did think of having a go when Telephone extended the deadline, but looking at the other entries kind if put me off, so for that reason... I'm out. Hehe.

[Baron]

...but looking at the other entries kind of put me off

In a good way, right? 

[TheTelephone]

Hey guys,

I will come back later this evening to post trophies, etc. Sorry about the wait, shit hit the fan at work and I've been stuck out in the sticks with a dead phone for the past 4 days.

Talk soon.

TheTelephone

[Baron]

Er.....  Don't we get to vote?  I know who I'm voting for. 

[TheTelephone]

Go right on ahead, Baron.

Can someone PM me and tell me how to make the white border transparent?

[Sinitrena]

So, we are voting then? All right.

Best Character: Baron For this lovely discription: Nature had not endowed Berty very impressively, least of all with brains.  But you didn't need brains if you had money.  Which he didn't.  But he might, soon.  Maybe.
Best Plot: Baron The plot reminded me of Agatha Chtisties And the there were none. I assume that was intentional?
Best Atmosphere: Baron I like dark humour: “And don't just roll her behind the tapestry.”
Best Setting: Baron
Best Word Choice: Baron As allways, strange, amazing descriptions: She was as old and twisted as driftwood stranded in the desert, and had the delicate temperament of a badger with an ulcer.
Most Scary: Baron  To be perfectly honest, if there were an othercentry, I probably wouldnt vote for Baron in this category. The story is not scary. But I like the humour. (Then again, I dont think my story is scary, either)