“Whosoever draws forth this sword, yadda yadda, one true monarch, something like that. Yeah, nobody’s seen that thing since the Uprising. My great-grandma worked in the first People’s Minister’s office, and said he had it quietly smelted down.”
Codex - Melancholy Miscellany
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The last notes of the song died on the wind, with the swan itself. It was truly the most beautiful thing he had ever heard, filling his heart with joy and sadness. His reverie was broken by a snapping twig and a woman’s rough voice. “First time kid? It’s really something, soothes my soul like nothing else.” A tear ran down her cheek as she reloaded the crossbow.
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It took surprisingly few years for even the name of the False God to be forgotten. After Glorious Revolutionary Comrade Leader made public examples of the last prelates and priestesses, people turned over their relics meekly and the daily prayers ceased. It was safest to forget the name entirely—though a few mad youngsters think if they found and spoke the name once more, the spark of reactionary faith could be rekindled.
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The last straw for me was a teeming squeal: “This is the worst thing that has ever happened. I got yogurt in my mink.”
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Yes, mom, I did drop my phone down the man-hole, but at least I got a shot of a family of raccoons playing with it. So cute!
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Without the language of the last of the celestial children, we will never know how much of their writings are about how they would love us - and that they would forgive us for what we did to them.
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Her breath caught in her throat as the words came over the headset, and took a moment to sink in. She bit her lip, wiped the tear from her eye quickly before anyone noticed, and updated the squadron readiness board to show another plane missing.
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The salty wind gently whipped their hair as they stood hand in hand on the cliff, sipping their drinks. The sun was setting out over the sea, turning sky and water into a palette of beautiful shades. But from their vantage point on the cliff, they could see the ship waiting at harbour, to depart on the morning tide.
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The people of the eastern wetlands sink their dead in peat bogs to preserve them, waiting for the day they’ll be made whole again. The process takes hours—and the sound is unforgettable. Unfortunately, the land has also swallowed most of the grave markers.
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The last rose bush from the Duchy of Melcos stand in a neglected corner of the Imperial palace. The Melcovites are all gone, married into the general populace, and the little old gardner who took care of it passed a thricemoon ago. The roses will probably die sooner or later - they are neither very brightly colored nor do they smell exceptionally nice, and then who will remember the Rose-Godess of Melcor and her gentle reign?
Ellen and Bob used to chase hurricanes together, until the one day Ellen didn’t make it out of the eye of the storm. Ever since then, you can see Bob waiting on tornadoes and other violent storms, never daring to go too close, yet never able to leave the winds alone.
You probably don’t know that Valentine Rios continued to write poems after his decline. Dementia took his faculties, and eventually his language before finally claiming everything. Hard to say where his last poems are, really - his partner Musa claims he burned them, but did he? Really?
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There was this cherry tree when you were young, somewhere in the neighbourhood. It was the only tree with branches gentle enough for an awkward child like you to climb, but when new neighbours moved in, the tree had to go. Your parents told you that it had been taken to the wilderness to finish its life there, but the older you grow, the less you believe that.
Once, the city had a wide open space, a park with old trees and swathes of grass for people to gather, fountains for children to play with in the sun. But the city elders wanted to build something grand on that ground, something that would make people remember. The people of the city fought, shouted, lived in the old trees, built a tent city, yet they could not prevail - nowadays, there’s only a hole in the ground and the noise of the builders, and the memory of good times past.
(Yes, okay, that one’s our stupid train station. So I’m bitter about this. So there.)
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The last known Cage Hound was presumed captured in 1912, but with modern techniques scientists have determined that the cage-shaped canine on display in Gaffy’s Traveling Works of Wonder through the 20s and 30s was, in fact, merely an empty cage that resembled the animal, thus setting back the estimated extinction date of the Cage Hound to the late 1800s or so.
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And that’s where the old Meriwether Theatre once stood. It was the cornerstone of the performing arts in this town. Punk bands, the chamber orchestra, childrens’ dance recitals, the annual Rotary Club Talent Show, and even some big-name acts: Joan Baez played there back in '96. It’s been a parking lot since the accident. Three actors died on stage during the dress rehearsal of a play. The owner had the place demolished not a month later… which was kind of weird. The play? It never opened. I think it was called The King in Yellow or something like that.
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“when it was first thrown, no one knows. No one is quite sure where it has been, or how long it has dwelled there. All that is known is that the non euclidean boomerang flies in like a bolt from the blue, causes maximum discord with minimum involvement, and disappears into strange folds of space once again.”
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When the old video store closed, the owner disappeared, leaving his belongings behind and his car parked in front of the shop. Rumor had it, he’d drowned himself in the quarry. But he’d only gone home, through the portal behind the curtain that everyone assumed hid the porn section. Not long after, the building was destroyed, and the portal went the way of all video-store portals. Netflix hasn’t figured those out yet.
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Turning around again, brambles tugged at her clothes, drawing a couple of cruel lines down the back of her hand as she tried to disentangle herself. This was stupid, she’d barely taken more than a few paces off the path, she thought. And she couldn’t even see the little fawn she’d followed into the thicket.
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They perched on the lip of the roof, wings folded around to keep off the snow, the blackened feathers still giving off that awful burnt smell aeons later. Watching the people scurry around below, they allowed themself a smile. Working with people had always been their favourite part of the job, and wasn’t it more fun to give someone what they wanted rather than what they need? They loved this time of year.
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“I had them when I was young, and they were my best friends, always on adventures in the park or bedroom. But one day I said I was too old to play with them, and I’ve been unable to find those dolls every since.”
“There once was a boy who dreamed of the stars, and became the first human to escape the solar system. We’ve conquered spaceflight since then, but we have yet find his ship, and bring him home again.”
“The only thing that will calm the rage of the sky king is the Song of First Light, but the only ones who knew the verses were the Seven Ladies of the Moon and Stars, who were hunted down by the Emperor.”
“There was a thing people would do to each other, something that wasn’t killing and stealing and taking. But that was long ago, and now we only have hate in our hearts”
“It’s there, on the tip of your tongue, the thought that was about to make itself known. But now it’s mine, stuffed in my sack, for I need them for my Queen and master.”
“They took their condemned and their exiled to that spot, and cast them from the cliffs into the whirlpool below. It was only after they were all gone that they knew their innocence, and in their grief they agreed to take the location to their graves. Only Senor Pascal remains from that damned tribunal.”
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Because Rex was a war hero, they overlooked the Domestic Animal Reduction Act and allowed him to live out his final days with us, ironically on a literal farm upstate. He was a good dog, gentle, sharp as a tack, but in those last few years, I’m certain he knew that he was… he was alone. Losing him was harder than any of my children.
Nah, my gramps has this wicked scah ahn his belly! He says they cut out 15 fuckin inches of his guts because of it. He said he had the last operation befoah the gene terapy breakthrough made it go away. They used to give you fuckin’ poison an hope it killed it befoah it killed you. Can you believe how wicked fucked up that was?
“Honey, what on Earth are you doing?” She asked, surprised. “Those rocketships are your brother’s toys.”
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And that’s it! Thanks everyone, and see you next month!
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