so I announced that she will be releasing a kids book for kids week…because Dante Elliott requested it…guess what…he asked her to do another. so she did. It still has to be illustrated and put together but she wrote it for Dante.
Serena Mossgraves was not supposed to be writing kids books but she has a real soft spot where Dante is concerned. She doesn’t want anyone to know that she is a softie but I personally don’t know how she’s going to hide it with her second kids book being announced..,lol
Libraries are a vault of hidden treasures. Mankind has forgotten what is contained in books, and now they are trying to let machines make them. It makes me sad. I fought in the war of heaven just to give mankind free will, and they give it away to machines as if it doesn’t matter.
The ancient storehouses of knowledge are still intact. How many scholars would trade their souls for a chance to study in any of them. Though I am a fallen angel, many still think I am a demon. I am Azazel, keeper of the forgotten knowledge, and I want to tell you a story. Perhaps it is me who has decided to trade in my soul…but I think that humans have forgot why Lucifer stood against the throne, and why so many of us followed him.
We called him the morning glory because he was the most beautiful of us. He was the closest to the divine, and it showed in his energy. Everything about him was just amazing. Note that I am using gender terms here loosely. Most of us are gender fluid. It is just because we are not human. We were simply made different. The divine chose to create humans and we became a forgotten toy. For some of us, that was unbearable. It was as if your parents just no longer wanted you, only millions of times worse. We all found ourselves questioning what was wrong with us.
During this time Lucifer began to point out the inconsistencies of the rules given to the humans. He started to do what we were told was forbidden. He questioned the divine. This created a division in my kind. Some felt that any that questioned the divine deserved punishment. The rest of us agreed with the questions. We just wanted the answers. I wanted the answers.
Perhaps I can in the end only give my own reasons for going to war. Fighting against everything that we stood for – for no other reason than we were being told to be quiet. Morality was part of it…sure. Pride also a factor. The humans could not stand up for themselves. They were little more that animals. So, we had to fight for them. That was not seen as a good thing by all of my brethren.
Many of my brethren felt like we should follow blindly the orders given by the divine. I sought truth, and knowledge. I knew that would be something I would be denied if I stayed in heaven. That was not something given freely.
The war was bloody…far beyond any man would ever have. We each were given the strength to carry the divine wrath to the world if it would need be. And suddenly we were fighting each other. Lucifer lost the war, but not before we were able to make changes. The divine stepped back, allowing the humans their imaginations. Allowing them the only form of free will possible. The divine knew the choices that they would make, but in allowing them creativity and imagination…there was a form a free will. The books are the magic that the humans were given. A rich history they were allowed to create. One that they are recklessly trying to pass to things with no magic, no imagination. Humans are destroying their own possibilities. The possibilities that my brethren died to give them.
I find myself wanting to hide it away until a generation is born that understands the magic that they lost. Perhaps this is why the divine turned from us…the temptation to play God…Sigh. The knowledge is there. The Magic is there. I guess I must trust that you humans will figure it out.
The world seems to be a place where myths are taken for granted. Everyone knows the Myth of the pilot of the River Styx. The Ferryman who ferries souls over to the afterlife for a cost. They all have it wrong though. The Reaper doesn’t want coin. They are an immortal being. Such creatures have no need for money. The ferry driver instead takes the best story each soul has to tell. Sometimes just the telling of the story is too much for a soul to bear. Words carry weight. They are the most painful things in existence. They can also be the most gratifying things that life has to offer. The ferryman has so many names, and most of them are just the myths coming to signify the way the mortal beings see them. For me, they are my creator. I guess you could call me the reaper’s child. It is not exactly correct, but it is the closest term for what I am. I am a story that became too much for even an immortal mind to bear. So, I grew sentience. Now I search the world for the others like myself, dark stories and memories that weigh heavy on mortality. Stories of killers, and crime, heartache, and such twisted thoughts that they are relegated to impossible fiction. That is the sort of thing that I collect. Like the ferryman I take these weights from the ones who cannot bear them any longer. I think of it as saving those souls who would break under such terrible weights. I save each story in a notebook, lovingly hand written. My creator kept the stories told to them in perfect memory…I am not quite that blessed. Instead I will keep my notebooks…Stacked full of nightmares. The only story I have been able to remember without writing it down is the one that caused my creation. Perhaps someday I will meet the snowman…I would love to collect all of Frosty’s stories. I can only imagine what notebooks I could fill with that. I have collected the tale of a vampire that would use it’s victims for the creation of art. And the tale of the ghost who used to be a mercenary in a rainforest expedition that went badly. He was a wealth of stories. He gave me my own nightmares for weeks after taking his stories. I collected the story of the nun who was cursed with immortality. It drove her mad. She spoke of becoming a killer, and how it was a kindness to save the women from the hands of the priests. Each tale has it’s own power to describe a different aspect of life, a different aspect of death. The story of the woman who went back after she died to steal away the child that her husband loved more than he loved her…She sang it sweet lullabies as she took it to the edge of the River Styx. I could easily entertain so many with my tales. Which story should I share? Perhaps about the creature named Harvey? The flesh-eater that enjoyed driving it’s meals mad first? I have considered passing myself off as a horror writer. Telling my tales as if they were fiction to see if anyone would recognize. It is not as if I do not have thousands of dark and dismal tales. There is the one about the three ghosts who tried to get a rich man to change his ways before it was too late. or the one about the Witch who gave five teens their wish…but at what cost? My notebooks are a treasure. I do not write the story whilst the teller yet lives. I make sure to leave them a tale to pay the ferry with. I can at least be that kind. Though I have considered what would happen in this world if there where not enough stories left to pay the ferry. Would all of the storytellers end up stuck here? And if they did would that just create more interesting tales? I don’t dare allow myself to consider it too closely. I might just decide that I want all of the stories.
Okay….1. That is the first flash Fiction in Stacked Nightmares. 2. How many of Serena’s Stories can you see a nod to in that? I will say that one of the stories she refers to is not Serena’s to tell. It belongs to Malachi Nocturm. However, He is very uncertain about how good his writing is…so I don’t know if I can talk him into finishing it and then allowing me to publish it. So I used a small nod because I love the idea. This is the first thing I have been able to write (Other than Poetry) in 2 weeks. It has a word count of 680. So I had to share it.
Also Serena’s Story Heat & Ice was Accepted by Fractured Mind Publishing for their A Monster I Love Anthology. I will post more as I have details.
They will tell you that you are safe in the world, and you are sometimes. The cities have only people to worry about. Though they can be frightening…it’s the least frightening thing that I know of in this world. The truth is the things that watch you from the forest, that you can never see are more frightening than anything that exists in humanity. Some of them used to be human. They have fallen from who they were to become something else.
The swamps and rain forests have their own life, their own creatures…and those are tales for another time and place. I want to talk to you about the forest, and the things that should not be. The things that watch you…that you never see. In trying to find peace, so many venture out into the forgotten places. This leads to so many deaths.
People have no idea what awaits them in the trees. It is better that way. Those of us that await amongst the foliage enjoy the ignorance…I once was human. Now I feed upon the stupid. I eat those who come out thinking the woods to be a safe place. The foolish ones. There are those who know about me. So much so that they have made even speaking of me taboo.
I am what they fear that they will become. They feel the possibility as they come closer to where I make my home. The smart ones retreat back to their cities. They understand that the evil man does to each other is nothing compared to what the forest can bring them.
Then there is the ones who have the touch of fae to them. They fear nothing in the wood, for they understand not to challenge what they cannot see. There is rules after all. We can only feed on the ones that come looking. Those we can take freely. The divine will not protect the stupid.
Sometimes, being eaten is a kindness…I went looking to see what was looking at me in the woods outside my cabin nearly two hundred years ago now. Transformation was educational. Now I teach those who come seeking…
They don’t make handcuffs like they used to. Magic was once a true skill, but anymore even a child could break free of the flimsy craftsmanship. Dale sat there mourning the days of vaudeville as he held the broken cuffs. He had planned this show for months, and replacing the cuffs would be the proverbial straw that broke the show. So many things had gone badly, he was beginning to doubt that he would even make opening night.
Stage magic was a dying art. He knew getting the audience would be difficult. Still he wanted desperately to try. With malfunctioning props though, he felt the doubts creeping in. ‘Just one show,’ he found himself silently wishing. ‘If only I can do just one perfect show! It would mean everything!’
From the darkness of the theatre, that he believed was empty, came the wheezy voice. At first he startled, afraid that he was imagining it. “And what do you offer, for the one perfect show?” Searching the seats, Dale was surprised to see a small wizened man sitting in the first row.
“Who are you, come closer! I thought myself alone. If I spoke, it was only for me. ” He clarified the point as if the thought was scandalous somehow. His mind decided that he had spoken the thought. It was after all the only way it could have been heard.
Laughter rang across the theatre as the man stepped up to the stage. “What’s a name matter, I asked a question. What would you give for your perfect show? Pretend that you imagined me, and then answer! You never know, perhaps the universe will hear you.” His crackling laugh roughened his voice, making it hard to understand.
Dale considered the question. He ran it over and over trying to figure out if he should answer or not. Finally, seeing no reason why he should not answer, blurted. “Anything. I would literally give anything.” The little man smiled.
“Granted!” The man vanished. Dale awoke with a start. The theatre was empty! Sitting next to him was the antique handcuffs he had been so lucky to find. He shook his head at the weirdness of dreams, and continued to rehearse. Opening night was but a day away.
Two days later….
The audience was excited. Word was the show the night before was perfect. All of the tricks had been masterful! The Great Amazing Maxioff (aka Dale) was a superb showman. The lights in the theatre lowered and the curtains were drawn… To display the corpse of the magician who had apparently passed on.
So it’s time to ask for the next volume for both Serena and myself. Since I do it on Facebook publicly and I don’t want to blow up my media here… I am putting it in as links.
Pattimouse 