Nightmare Fuel, Day 17

A quiet night in a small Italian town.  One of the things she loved about Europe was the attention to detail, the art in everything they made.  Gargoyle rain spouts and fine scroll work on every corner cried to all who would listen how much work, how much care, went into every block laid here.  Even simple fountains were works of art.  She stopped to admire a beautiful stylized dolphin letting water into an enormous shell.

She didn’t hear anything before sudden pain blossomed on the back of her skull.  Falling to her knees, she caught herself on the fountain base.  Someone kicked her, completing her fall and grabbed her purse.  She could hear him now.  He seemed to think she was completely out of it, nothing else could explain why he was rifling through her bag right there.  Well, she would just have to show him that she wasn’t your average tourist.

Mumbling quietly under her breath she looked around for the right tool.  Ah, just there.  He finally noticed she was awake as she shouted the last line of the spell pointing first at him then at the fountain in the wall.

Nothing happened.

He stared at her for a minute then dropped her bag next to her, pocketing the cash and credit cards.  He was halfway across the street when he felt a tug on his foot.  Looking down there was nothing there.  He tried to keep walking but the tug stopped his foot from going forward.  Then, another pull on his other foot.  He couldn’t see anything but there was definitely something keeping his feet from moving forward.  He tried to move forward.  He tried to kick off whatever had his feet.  Slow enough that at first he dismissed it, the thief started moving backwards.  He was pulled faster until he lost his balance and was dragged by his ankles back toward the woman he had just robbed.  She remained sitting next to the fountain.  She was looking at him and pointing at the dolphin.

He screamed.  He kicked.  He fought.  Nothing seemed to do any good.

“Give it back.”  Her voice came out like an arctic blast on such a mild evening.  He had stopped moving just inches away from the fountain.  He quickly pulled everything out of his back pocket and threw it at her.  She smiled.  It was not a nice smile.

“Very good.”

He screamed when his bones started to pop.  He begged as they cracked.  He sobbed when they crumbled.  All his bones except his skull which shrunk.  Suddenly he was moving again, this time lifted.  It felt like his body had been turned into gelatin.  He couldn’t move anything.  All he felt was the pain ripping through his body telling him something was terribly wrong.  Then he was being squished, blended.  How could you blend into something as solid as stone?  But he saw his body begin to disappear into the very fountain which had distracted his mark long enough for him to get the drop on her.

Finally the whimpering ended.  She sat up to admire her handy work.  It didn’t stand out as much as one might think human remains ought.  Still, she was glad she’d had the opportunity to contribute to the art.  Standing up, she gathered her things and continued her walk, leaving the screaming face embedded in stone behind her.

from Carabou of Flickr under a Creative Commons license

Prompt here

Nightmare Fuel, Day 10

Liscroft was a wicked witch, no one contested that.  Whether she had the capacity to love as well was a matter of great debate among those who heard of the most recent addition to her household.

Liscroft had doubted her ability to love.  Now she knew better.  If love was sacrificing so that someone else could have the very best, then she certainly loved.  Setting traps at the edges of perfect meadows and pinning the specimens in the perfect position as the dried were easy if time consuming tasks.  But coming up with the perfect preservation spell had almost exceeded her abilities.  One trial completely destroyed an entire batch of specimens.  But she kept working; only the best would do.  Finally she got it right, a spell that used the power of the sun to preserve the specimens in their full lifelike glory.  However, the twist in the devil’s tail was the second half of the spell, using the light of the moon and stars to reveal the truth of the specimens as they had been preserved.

Yes, she thought as she watched the new mobile hang over her daughter’s cradle, I know love.  She watched the skeletons of the pixies slowly turn as a hint of a breeze caught the perfectly preserved gossamer wings.

Prompt 

Nightmare Fuel, Day 6

Creeping through the darkness, looking for a meal.  Sneaking through the woods looking for prey.  Two predators stalk the night.  Noting and dismissing the local wildlife.  Slipping past without a sound.  Pause, catching the scent from the east.  Change direction.  Hasten.  Faster.  Faster.  Running.  Closing with the prey.

The first hut comes into view.  A small snarl breaks the predawn quiet.  A bright torch-like flare suddenly lights the clearing before the hut.  Predators finally face each other.  The flames licking up the slim, deadly blade almost pulse with the nearness of prey.  The light glistens off bared teeth grown longer than nature ever intended.

The predators charge.  Clashing and snarling.  Slashing and swiping.  Falling drops of blood glow with ruby freshness in the ever moving light of the fire.  A half swallowed scream shows the hut’s occupants are awake, witnessing the clash of two deadly forces.  The eastern sky lightens to grey.  The fighters are tiring.  Soon.  Soon one will fall.  Individual drops of blood increase to flows.  Then a final spray, arcing gracefully away from the gruesome sight of its origin.  One falls, head almost severed from shoulders.  The other takes a few steps before following suite.

But this warrior does not fall alone.  Hands are suddenly there.  Helping her rise.  Checking wounds.  Bringing her into the shelter and healing heart of the small village.  None are brave enough to try to touch the sword that is now quiet in the defender’s hand.  Dawn breaks.  The touch of sunlight reveals the painfully beautiful monster for a heartbeat before engulfing it in flame.

Prompt

Nightmare Fuel, Day 5

It has clearly been years since anyone has lived here.  Yet, the cabin still stands witness to a gruesome tale.

What is left of the door lays crooked off the hinges, clearly broken down from the outside.  The majority of a skeleton sprawls among the rough wooden furniture.  It has enough clothing scraps left to identify it as a man.  He appears to have been trying to get to the brass bed at the side of the room.  Several broken vertebrae explain why he didn’t get that far.  The bedding and mattress have fallen prey to the local rodent population, but dark sections in the remains and a large, dried brown pool below show how much blood there had been.

No second skeleton, but some unusual candles, crystals and chalk occupy an upper cabinet.  Secrets within secrets.  The amount of blood loss means there had been a second person, a second victim that could not have survived long.

A quick skittering outside, nothing is there.  A dead raccoon thunks against the wall.  Suddenly, the door is filled with a screaming figure.  Blurred around the edges, not entirely corporeal, still the figure of a woman is discernable.  Dark tattoos scrawl across her body, occasionally obscured by the long black hair.  Her eyes glow.  No sanity in that gaze, no compassion, no hope.  Only anger remains.  Anger and pain.  From now until eternity, anger and pain.

Prompt

Nightmare Fuel, Day 3

I know.  I'm not writing for every prompt.  I apologize.  But some days it is easier than others to find the time to write something.  So, I'll tell you which day's prompt inspired each blurb and probably set up a link back to the original prompt.  Without further ado, my first Nightmare.


Distant rumbling is the first sign that today is not like any other. I do not want to wake. Until Mother comes in, I do not have to. Finally, a sharp jolt pulls me from dreams into wakefulness. My bed at home never jolted. Why am I in a wooden box? It is lined with bedding and curtains on one side that swayed with movement of the box. It is moving, slowly. Crawling toward the curtain, my hand stops on a cool stem. I look down to see a lovely red flower. I have never seen one like it before, but it is beautiful. I suppose I should keep it. Just as I reach the curtains, the box stops moving. I open the curtains to find the forest. So sad, I let out a little whimper. The forest is a long way from home. I want Mother. Where is she? The horse snorts. I should find the driver and ask him to take me home. I climb down from the box, still in my night gown. Looking up at my box, I notice there is no driver. I am alone. I sit down to begin crying in earnest until I hear a faint noise from further along the road. Is that someone coming? They will help me. I barely notice the horse trying to back away; I just want not to be alone. I walk further up the road until I hear the sound again, this time from the left. I get out a scream as the teeth descend, ending it all.


Prompt here

Introductions

Introductions are very important.  They set the stage.  An introduction determines the direction of the project, to a certain extent.  The direction is further refined by the contributions to it. Not merely the contributions of the author, but those of the audience as well.  To that end, I ask you all to join me on my journey into writing.

These first several posts will come in rapid succession as I publish the short essays I have written to the prompts of Bliss Morgan's Nightmare Fuel project on Google+.  I publish them here to archive them, open them to a wider audience, and initiate my writing blog.  I hope to continue publishing in November my impressions, the joys and trials, of trying to complete NaNoWriMo.

Welcome to Sonnet's Pen.