Thank you to everyone who submitted entries this round! With six entries total, this was one of the most active rounds of the writing competition ever. It means a lot to me to see such a high level of participation.
You can find the entries in the spoiler tag below. Be sure to vote for your favorite in the poll above after reading through the submissions.
You can find the entries in the spoiler tag below. Be sure to vote for your favorite in the poll above after reading through the submissions.
Entry #1
Entry #2
When I look at the green grass of the rolling fields, and the mountain so high… my heart dies inside, but not for me… When I hear the chirping birds, I know I am not home… Juxtaposition is the enemy of any unlucky man.
It’s not just being dealt a bad hand. It is even more insulting to the soul than that… Any man who does not do the best with what they have is no man to me. That’s just another reason I spit at the ground every day. I do my best every second of every day to provide, while those who do not need to suffer do not lend an extra hand in our times of need.
When I see those empty fields and a land of opportunity, wasted by those who have it, my heart dies… And that is why I no longer have a heart… And when I realized I no longer had a heart, I realized that I was not trying my best… No, not at all. If doing my worst is doing my best, then I must do my worst…
Never did I ever want war. Never did I ever want violence. These things I never wanted, I am sure no one else did. A baby is not born with whip marks on his back and a blackened heart. A baby is born as easily impressionable as its soft skin. Quickly those who have not had a good impression made on them become hard in their heart and on their once-soft skin. Well I am no exception.
If Hyrule did not want me to take it all then they should have given me and my people our fair share. The king chose the hard way, and so it will fall.
I am Ganondorf, and I will be strong for my people. I am Ganondorf, the one blessed with ultimate power. I am Ganondorf! And soon, I will rule the world!
Entry #3
I don't know why. I don't know when. I don't know how. But the sun disappeared. I just woke up one day, it was 11:23am, but it was still dark. The day never grew lighter, not even for a second. After 6pm, it grew even darker, and the next 24 hours would stay at that menacing shade of black.
We don't realise how important the sun is until it's gone. The sun provides us light and shines us through our days. Even when the sun is covered by clouds there is still a ray that seeps through every now and again. The sun is the reason we have Summer, it provides us with warmth, making it a hard decision to go by public transport or to walk to the place we desire on such a beautiful day. But even though, the sun is a magnificent thing, sometimes it puts us to misery. Warmth can turn to a fiery heat causing the layers of our skin to burn and peel which causes us pain. Us humans can get sun stroke and we could get sick or as worse as we could die. But nevertheless we miss the sun when its not around. The sun makes our lives brighter even though it hurts sometimes.
I don't know why. I don't know when. I don't know how. But my lover disappeared. I just woke up one day, it was 11:23am, but he wasn't there. My day never improved, not even for a second. After 6pm, my heart started to hurt, and the next 24 hours my heart continued to hurt.
We don't realise how important love is until it's gone. Love provides us light and shines us through our days. Even when love is covered by clouds there is a still a ray that seeps through every now and again. Love is the reason we have Valentines day, it provides us warmth inside, making it hard decision whether it's better to stay or leave our lover. But even though, love is a magnificent thing, sometimes it puts us to misery. Love can turn to arguments causing our souls to feel angry but alone. Us humans can enter heart break so deeply we can feel like we'd rather be dead. But nevertheless we miss love when its not around. Love makes our lives brighter even though it hurts sometimes.
My lover is the sunshine of my life.
Entry #4
I never thought that I would be a killer.
I had never considered it, really. And yet, I find myself in that very situation, with a new victim almost every day—People actually pay me to. As I stare at the profile sheet of my newest target, I frown. Sitting at my chestnut desk in the heart of bustling Boston, I quickly glance over the page again.
Maria Alcott, 25
Best-friend: Edward Crane
Family: 2 sisters, 1 brother, Parents deceased
Favorite activities: swimming in the cool summer waters of her backyard pool.
Hair: brown, straight, shoulder-length
Eye color: hazel-green,
Face shape: heart
schedule: Goes to the same coffee shop every day, orders the same drink and croissant, then goes to the middle school, where she voluntarily tutors children.
She was so personable, so likeable. A slight pang stabs my heart as I realize the power a few actions had. This was the part I hated—choosing the way they die. I started building her up, but now I get to knock her down. It’s so hard. By now, I know her well enough that she feels like my own sister. But here I am, orchestrating her death.
Yanking my frizzy blond hair into a ponytail, I get to work. My slender fingers shoot across the page, trying to find the best, most dramatic way for her to go (Yes, I may have a slight flair for the dramatic). All of this to get to Edward. Apparently, the people paying me want to watch Edward suffer (which I can deal with…it’s kind of sick, but a paycheck is a paycheck!)
I pull a thick binder labelled “Ideas” off of the nearest shelf and examine some of the options. I purse my lips and turn the page again. There were so many ideas, so many different ways she could go. None of them seemed fitting, though.
A carefully injected syringe of air that would mimic a heart attack? She wasn’t old enough, there’d be too many questions to answer, besides, that’s hardly dramatic, and that is what my employer wants. How about cutting the femoral artery? I haven’t done that in a while. It’d be quick and easy.
Eh, maybe not…that’s a little dark for this project, there’d be too much blood to deal with. Finally, I settle for the good old-fashioned approach. I decide she’ll be killed by getting shot—right in front of her best friend, so that the emotional scars will be carried for a while (There’s that dramatic touch!). The target really is more Edward than it is Maria. She’s essentially a means to an end—though one that I would regret pulling the plug on—she could have so much potential.
I sigh and guzzle down some coffee. This is the headache I get for being a writer. I pick up my pen and prepare the opening statements in my latest crime novel, starting with the murder of one Maria Alcott.
Sorry Edward, you’re in for a bumpy ride.
Entry #5
GRAVE ROBBING
Evon brushed a strand of hair from his face as he studied the lock. A ‘Talbot & Sons’, quality craftsmanship, standardised tumblers. He smiled as he slipped his lockpicks from his belt.
“Are you sure about this, Evon? I mean, it’s a bit… sinister.” Faro’s eyes were wide as he looked between Evon and the dark street.
Evon didn’t respond until he had three of the four pins set. “Feel free to stay here if you’re so worried. Otherwise stay close and walk on the grass.” He lifted the final pin and turned the lock with a click. The gate opened with only the barest whine and Evon slipped through. Faro followed, catching the iron bar in his hand against the metal.
Gravel crunched under their feet, stretching out into the heavy darkness. About three hundred metres ahead of them stood the chapel, two sickly yellow gas lamps by the doors providing a point to aim for. Everything else was thick blackness. Evon hopped from the gravel path onto the grass beside it. Faro followed and placed a hand on Evon’s back.
Evon closed his eyes and concentrated, his brow furrowing. He felt a tingling in his face and opened his eyes again. The darkness was gone. The solid night around him was instead a cemetery, rows and rows of uniform grey headstones stretching away before him in rigidly neat lines. The world appeared to him with a blue tint, as though he were underwater, and he relished the thought of Faro’s face when he saw Evon’s now blue pupils. He turned to his accomplice.
“Stay close to me,” he said, enjoying the look of silent shock in Faro’s eyes, “and keep on the grass.”
The pair moved amongst the graves, staying low, invisible in their cloaks and the deep night. Faro clung to Evon’s shoulder, desperate not to lose him, blind in the darkness.
“This is stupid,” he said. “They won’t have buried him with the rings. His wife’ll have taken them all. Probably got them in some lacquer box. We should be at their house instead of out here robbing graves.”
“He’s still wearing them. Arnold helped dress the body. You know Arnold? Anyway, he counted five rings, a gold pocket watch, and a lapel pin with a ruby in it. He wants a cut for the tip, of course, but there’s a lot of money on that corpse, and it’s just lying there waiting to be taken.”
“Makes me uneasy. We shouldn’t steal from the dead.”
“You can’t steal from the dead,” Evon said. “Ownership expires the same time you do. Besides, he’s in a crypt, so this isn’t, technically, grave robbing. Your precious little soul will be fine. All you have to do is watch for anyone coming by. Think of this as a night-time stroll. Through the cemetery. For a nice payday.”
The crypts were arranged in a line across the path from the chapel. The lamp light didn’t reach them, giving Faro a view of the path and chapel from the impenetrable shadows opposite. The crypts were large rectangles of grey stone with no ornamentation whatsoever, only a family name above each stone door. Evon checked each one until he found ‘Pilfeather’.
“Here it is,” he said. “Hand me the iron crow and keep your eyes and ears open. And for Aor’s sake, stay in the shadows.” Faro handed Evon the metal bar and slunk into the darkness between two crypts. Evon approached his target, raising the crow to the door, and stopped.
It was already open. The gap was as narrow as a gap could be but it was there nonetheless.
Breathing slowly, Evon strained to hear anything from inside. There was a soft murmur. Someone whispering? The tang of smoke touched his nose and drifted away. Someone had to be in there. But who? He stood still, facing the door, and closed his eyes again. Concentrating, he imagined the room beyond the stone. Square. Grey. Musty air thick with dust. A silhouette in the corner. His eyebrows scrunched together as he tried to see beyond the door. Stone coffins in the walls. A candle too weak to light more than itself. He tried to hold the pieces together as a whole and opened his eyes.
Nothing but stone, as opaque as ever.
“How the hell did mother do it?” he whispered to himself. No matter how hard or often he tried, he could never manage to see through solid objects the way she had. He rubbed his face and raised the iron crow again. Slowly, he used the tip to ease the door open a little more. When the gap was just wide enough, he sucked in his stomach and slid through.
The crypt was almost identical to the way he’d envisioned it. Square and dusty with stone coffins interred in the walls. In the middle of the back wall was an altar, the rotund corpse of Abner Pilfeather laid on top of it. Several candles burned beside him, casting dim light around the outline of a woman. She stood over the body, her dark hair blending with her long cloak to form a single black shape. Her hands hovered above the body and she whispered strange words in a low, hurried tone.
Evon cold see the rings still wrapped around the pudgy fingers. The candlelight glinted on the gold and he took an unconscious step forward, his foot scraping on the hard floor. The woman immediately went quiet and spun around, pressing herself against the wall. Evon stepped back, gripping the iron crow to his chest.
“Who are you?” the woman said, panicked. Her eyes darted from Evon to the metal in his hands. She stared at his eyes, confusion sneaking into her fear.
“Nobody,” he said. “Who are you?”
“Nobody.”
He looked to the altar. Wax ran down the candles, pooling near several strange symbols drawn in chalk on the stone. “Right. Good. We’re just two nobodies having a chat. Nice and friendly.” He bent down and put the crow on the floor.
The woman shifted away from the wall slightly. “Look, neither of us wants trouble, correct? You forget you saw me and I’ll forget I saw you. Deal?”
Evon was about to nod and get out when his eye was caught by the soft orange light of the candles dancing on Pilfeather’s rings, gold and silver. One was inset with an oval of black jade, another spiralled along an entire finger. They twinkled at Evon like precious stars.
The woman followed his gaze. “Is that what you came for? The jewels?”
He nodded. “Quick in-and-out job. I was supposed to have been gone by now.” He looked back at the money on the dead man’s fingers. “You’re not here for them, then?”
She shook her head. “You can take them if you forget about seeing me here.”
Evon walked to the altar. He reached out but was distracted by the symbols along the edge. They encircled the whole body, a series of angular shapes and jagged lines. He frowned, sure he’d seen some of them before but unable to remember where. “What are you here for?”
The woman looked away, her mouth a tight line. Evon took in the scene with fresh eyes. Candles. Strange symbols. Black robes. And that whispered chanting. In a crypt, in the middle of the night. He dashed back, eyes wide, almost tripping over the iron crow. “You’re a necroma—”
“No! I’m not.” She glared at Evon, then sighed, her shoulders slumping. “I’m a healer. A damned good one, too.”
“I’m fairly sure trying to raise the dead makes you a necromancer.”
“I’m not trying to raise him like some zombie.” She crossed her arms, defiant. “I’m trying to heal him.”
Evon stopped inching towards the door. “Heal him.”
“Yes. Of death.”
Evon stared at her, face blank.
“I’ve done it before,” she said.
“You’ve healed the dead? Of death?”
“Several times. Trouble is they usually fall to pieces shortly after. It’s the rot that does it. That’s why I’m here, to practice on a fresh patient.”
“Patient? How is anything you’ve just described different from necromancy?”
The woman rolled her eyes and walked to the corpse. She pulled the rings off, the jewelled pin, and dug the watch from its pocket. “Here.” She tossed them to Evon. His hands went out instinctively, catching the watch and two of the rings. The rest clattered to the floor around him. “Take your loot and go,” she said, leaning against the altar, shoulders hunched. “Don’t say a word to anyone about me.”
Evon gathered the rings from the floor and put them in the pouch on his belt. He picked up the iron crow and made for the door but stopped and turned back.
“Just out of curiosity… What happens when the, ahem, recently deceased is strolling through town again?”
“They’ll be thrilled to have him back, and he’ll shower the kind healer who helped him with gifts and praise.” She turned around, a tired look in her eyes. “More like they’ll set him on fire and start throwing the n-word at anyone they don’t like. I’m just trying to prove the concept right now. Changing people’s attitudes will come later. Now get out. I’d prefer some privacy.”
They both snapped to face the door at the crunch of gravel. A moment later, Faro wriggled through the door, sweating slightly. “Evon, what’s taking so lo—” He froze, looking at the woman, to the body, to the altar. She stepped back to the wall, panic returning to her eyes. “Who’s this?” said Faro, his eyes narrow.
“I’m… a thief,” she said, sending Evon a pleading look.
“That’s right,” Evon said, his mouth dry. He stepped between them. “She got here first. Damn shame but fair’s fair, right? We should go.”
Faro looked past Evon at the altar, his eyes on the symbols, fists clenched. “She’s a necromancer.”
“Don’t be daft, Faro. Let’s go.”
“She’s a Godsdamn necromancer!” Faro lunged forward and grabbed the iron crow in Evon’s hands. The two of them struggled to keep hold of it.
“Think what you’re doing for one second, man,” Evon yelled. Faro twisted the crow until Evon’s hands slipped from it. He stepped away and raised it over his head. Evon grabbed it again before Faro could move. They fought again, until Faro wrenched it free once more and flung it towards the woman before Evon could stop him. She screamed as she ducked down, arms covering her face. The metal struck the wall above her, dust and stone greying her hair. Evon tried to restrain Faro, but he struggled free and rushed for the door, yelling.
“Hel—”
The crow spun through the air and struck Faro across the back of the head with a ringing crack. He collapsed into a heap, his hair dark and wet. Evon stared, open-mouthed, as the woman rushed forward.
“Did you just—”
“Shut up,” she said, crouching by Faro. She pressed her fingers against his neck, waited.
“Is he…” She looked up at Evon, grim seriousness across her face. “Oh,” said Evon.
“I could, you know… heal him.”
Evon looked at Faro’s body, one hand resting on the pouch at his belt. “Better not. Some things should stay sacred.”
THE END
Entry #6
I remember vividly the smell of the fetid water. The oily texture, the taste of decay…a boy’s first taste of the world, even before his mother’s milk. I plunged from a world of darkness into a world darker still. My first cries drowned in that tub of viscous slime, as much water as that woman cared to muster for the birth of her only son. Of the only son.
This realm I entered in cool, dark filth; a small pity the woman had taken on me. It was to be the only pity taken on me by her or any other. While the others slept on mats and blankets, my body was covered in sand to hold me in place. The gritty amarillo particles drifted into my nostrils and caked my eyes when I grew exhausted enough to sleep. I don't like sand. It's course and rough and irritating, and it gets everywhere. Each morning was waking in a pile of coals, each evening, a bone-chilling tundra.
This desolation found me learning to crawl. The woman withheld comfort when the cactus' barbs found my infant flesh, showing no sympathy. The sand burned my knees and delicate hands as blisters raised and the skin thickened beneath them. The edible and unpalatable were discovered between bouts of retching, swelling, and psychedelic trips, sans parental guidance. Before my first steps, my well of tears was spent, leaving but desiccate cisterns filled with skeletal briers growing from the rotting remains of green shoots.
When my eyes had bled their last, I believe that to be the time that the woman deemed me weened as I recall her presence no later than this. An ancient pair overtook the tasks involving my rearing beyond this time. A pair of beings so ancient as to seem mystical to my yet blue eyes, weaving songs of incantation over me and preforming singular rituals on me. Never a kind word, a gentle touch, a caring glance. But never did they fail in teaching and discipline.
I recall the heft of the first scimitar I gripped. Not an implement of sport or game, but a tool of brutality, its leather haft crusted with the crimson spirit of its previous victim. Unimportant was my age by this crucial moment, though I could count still my years with the fingers of a single hand. Where one might have expected anticipation or even excitement, a sense of solemnity pervaded the court. The conscious spectator might have picked up on a hint of ceremony, even sacrifice. As the curved blade danced about, clashing with the other's steel, the women looked on with austere expressions of...disinterest?
Bright sparks lit her soft cheeks and plump lips, her golden skin and russet braids. Her countenance played host to little expression, a lapse in poise would be frowned upon, likely with a cat of nine tails. Graceful was every movement, dangerous and understated. Her svelte form slid like desert shadows over ridges of sand. At last, she allowed her eyes a single candid moment of stark, scintillating emotion. A precious drop of briny moisture rolled from an eye, across the top of her lip to the corner of her mouth where it mingled with her blood as I withdrew the cruel razor from her middle to no discernible approval either from the two crones who raised me or the congregation in general.
On the day a proven adult lay eviscerated at my feet, my hands and feet were shackled to the stone pedestal before the colossus idol and my flesh was drawn open with primitive stone knives. The powdered thorns of our native plants were rubbed into the open wounds, acquainting me with a fresh definition of pain. As the sand scored away the scabrous blood, furious scars rose in their place, tracing across my body with the dark plant matter. Ancient patterns ran over my juvenile muscles and rippled over the veins of my arms. Pride inflated my ego, the closest the tribe would ever come to an act of respect.
When ruddy hair began to appear in certain, predesignated areas of my body, my witch-mothers took me up to the top of the highest mountain, the proven adults of the whole tribe in step behind. In one accord, they spread their arms toward the whole earth, a grand gesture revealing a world for which I only now, at this late day, have words. Verdant plains of grass and flowers, sylvan glades perfumed with sweet pollen and earthy humus, vast spans of cool, coruscating water. Deep within my bosom swelled then a recess, the match of which was only the width and breadth of that heaven beyond. This land which the myths praised, they vowed, was to be my domain.
In that moment, a young lifetime of stifled imagination, squandered potential, and buried love was stripped of its callous scales and a single tongue of flame was ignited within, as if seen from a distance. The stone encasing my undeveloped heart cracked, and a ray of light the color of that land's glory shone upon it. Golden radiance flooded through my life, innocence, peace...hope. For a moment.
The subsequent event divorced a boy entirely from the first and only hope with which he'd ever been provided. Though so very many years have passed, the goddess has yet to expunge the memory from my grotesque and fractured soul. Would that I could take in hand a firebrand forged in the fire of my anguish and burn the obscenity from my mind. It wasn't the bloodletting, the ritual flogging, the clothes stripped from my body. It wasn't the blinding pain that coursed through my body as they implanted the gem of the royal diadem in the front of my skull that night atop the mount.
Sweat beaded on my naked form and slid down the angles and curves of my body, reflecting firelight in the frigid night air. My body heaved spasmodically beneath the weight. I thought in the first hours that I might even find the tears of my youth, but there were none to be found. As the night wore on, each woman came to me and took up the chain that my hag-mothers had latched to the diadem buried in my bloody skull, and mastered me. Each woman in turn took my sex like a robber, stole the innocence of my newly pubescent youth, and soiled it. The crown of my future dynasty that had so recently begraced my bloody brow was the bit by which the steed of my masculinity was broken again and again.
And last to steal my seed, the mothers who had raised me, the two witches in their vile manner. They took me at once, driven by avarice, by envy for their charge. Greedily, madly, they broke my body and my will with zealous fervor. The fetid stink of their breath still curls through my nostrils, my fingers still feel the texture of their oily flesh, my tongue is still thick with the taste of decay...a young man's first taste of manhood, even before his first love.
As the exhausted matriarchs fell prone in rapacious ecstasy, the bloody sun, aloof and unsympathetic, crested the rim of the world, throwing the castle of that land's monarchy into sharp silhouette. In my mind's eye, I saw the inhabitants of that land below dancing in the streets, raising their families, sleeping in warm beds, laughing, loving. A twinge of pain churned in my heart, like a scimitar in a girl's stomach, and for the last time, a tear rolled from an eye, across the top of my lip to the corner of my mouth where it mingled with my scowl. I hated those people. I hated my mothers, I hated the sand, I hated my crown, I hated being the only man, I hated that land below, and I hated their mythical golden power. That land would bow before the name Dragmire.
Descent Into Madness
Four white bare walls stand in every direction. A plain white chair sits in front of me, and I take a seat. At that moment my world changed. It changed into a world of nightmares, a world of despair and suffering.
Darkness surrounds, except for a light 3 feet away. The light is shaped as a sword. I realize I'm in the same room as before, still in the chair, but everything is now black. I stand up and reach for the sword shaped light. My hands grasp air. The light soon disappears leaving me in total darkness. The sound of a baby crying in a distant room was all I could hear. Every few minutes it would become louder. Until I felt something, I pick it up, but nothing was there. It felt like a baby. After I picked it up, the crying stopped. What the hell is this place? I hear footsteps coming down a hall, but there is no hall. It's just this room, it always has been and always will be.
I hear the footsteps for two days straight, until a banging starts. It sounds as if steel is being beaten by a mallet. Suddenly a light fills the room from above. I watch as the chair transforms to dust and the light fades. Then. Silence. No banging. No footsteps. Nothing. Not even my breathing. Only my heartbeat and my thoughts. It's like this for the next year.
Somehow I haven't died yet, but I want to. There is no reason I'm still alive, I have not eaten, drank, or slept. What am I? Who am I? Where am I? Those are the things that go through my head over the year of the silence. This silence is driving me into madness. A loud bang happens, but silence is soon to follow. For the next 3 years. These years drive me closer to insanity, or am I already there? I don't know anymore. I just don't want to live any longer. I cry out to something, though I don't know what. All I want is to get out of here or die. Someone or something help.
Then, a gunshot rings out. I feel a pain rush through my gut, I cry out. A lone man stands in front of me. He holds a handgun. Before my life fades, I hear him say three words:
“It has Begun.” Darkness is the last thing I see before the angel comes and takes me home.
Four white bare walls stand in every direction. A plain white chair sits in front of me, and I take a seat. At that moment my world changed. It changed into a world of nightmares, a world of despair and suffering.
Darkness surrounds, except for a light 3 feet away. The light is shaped as a sword. I realize I'm in the same room as before, still in the chair, but everything is now black. I stand up and reach for the sword shaped light. My hands grasp air. The light soon disappears leaving me in total darkness. The sound of a baby crying in a distant room was all I could hear. Every few minutes it would become louder. Until I felt something, I pick it up, but nothing was there. It felt like a baby. After I picked it up, the crying stopped. What the hell is this place? I hear footsteps coming down a hall, but there is no hall. It's just this room, it always has been and always will be.
I hear the footsteps for two days straight, until a banging starts. It sounds as if steel is being beaten by a mallet. Suddenly a light fills the room from above. I watch as the chair transforms to dust and the light fades. Then. Silence. No banging. No footsteps. Nothing. Not even my breathing. Only my heartbeat and my thoughts. It's like this for the next year.
Somehow I haven't died yet, but I want to. There is no reason I'm still alive, I have not eaten, drank, or slept. What am I? Who am I? Where am I? Those are the things that go through my head over the year of the silence. This silence is driving me into madness. A loud bang happens, but silence is soon to follow. For the next 3 years. These years drive me closer to insanity, or am I already there? I don't know anymore. I just don't want to live any longer. I cry out to something, though I don't know what. All I want is to get out of here or die. Someone or something help.
Then, a gunshot rings out. I feel a pain rush through my gut, I cry out. A lone man stands in front of me. He holds a handgun. Before my life fades, I hear him say three words:
“It has Begun.” Darkness is the last thing I see before the angel comes and takes me home.
Entry #2
When I look at the green grass of the rolling fields, and the mountain so high… my heart dies inside, but not for me… When I hear the chirping birds, I know I am not home… Juxtaposition is the enemy of any unlucky man.
It’s not just being dealt a bad hand. It is even more insulting to the soul than that… Any man who does not do the best with what they have is no man to me. That’s just another reason I spit at the ground every day. I do my best every second of every day to provide, while those who do not need to suffer do not lend an extra hand in our times of need.
When I see those empty fields and a land of opportunity, wasted by those who have it, my heart dies… And that is why I no longer have a heart… And when I realized I no longer had a heart, I realized that I was not trying my best… No, not at all. If doing my worst is doing my best, then I must do my worst…
Never did I ever want war. Never did I ever want violence. These things I never wanted, I am sure no one else did. A baby is not born with whip marks on his back and a blackened heart. A baby is born as easily impressionable as its soft skin. Quickly those who have not had a good impression made on them become hard in their heart and on their once-soft skin. Well I am no exception.
If Hyrule did not want me to take it all then they should have given me and my people our fair share. The king chose the hard way, and so it will fall.
I am Ganondorf, and I will be strong for my people. I am Ganondorf, the one blessed with ultimate power. I am Ganondorf! And soon, I will rule the world!
Entry #3
I don't know why. I don't know when. I don't know how. But the sun disappeared. I just woke up one day, it was 11:23am, but it was still dark. The day never grew lighter, not even for a second. After 6pm, it grew even darker, and the next 24 hours would stay at that menacing shade of black.
We don't realise how important the sun is until it's gone. The sun provides us light and shines us through our days. Even when the sun is covered by clouds there is still a ray that seeps through every now and again. The sun is the reason we have Summer, it provides us with warmth, making it a hard decision to go by public transport or to walk to the place we desire on such a beautiful day. But even though, the sun is a magnificent thing, sometimes it puts us to misery. Warmth can turn to a fiery heat causing the layers of our skin to burn and peel which causes us pain. Us humans can get sun stroke and we could get sick or as worse as we could die. But nevertheless we miss the sun when its not around. The sun makes our lives brighter even though it hurts sometimes.
I don't know why. I don't know when. I don't know how. But my lover disappeared. I just woke up one day, it was 11:23am, but he wasn't there. My day never improved, not even for a second. After 6pm, my heart started to hurt, and the next 24 hours my heart continued to hurt.
We don't realise how important love is until it's gone. Love provides us light and shines us through our days. Even when love is covered by clouds there is a still a ray that seeps through every now and again. Love is the reason we have Valentines day, it provides us warmth inside, making it hard decision whether it's better to stay or leave our lover. But even though, love is a magnificent thing, sometimes it puts us to misery. Love can turn to arguments causing our souls to feel angry but alone. Us humans can enter heart break so deeply we can feel like we'd rather be dead. But nevertheless we miss love when its not around. Love makes our lives brighter even though it hurts sometimes.
My lover is the sunshine of my life.
Entry #4
I never thought that I would be a killer.
I had never considered it, really. And yet, I find myself in that very situation, with a new victim almost every day—People actually pay me to. As I stare at the profile sheet of my newest target, I frown. Sitting at my chestnut desk in the heart of bustling Boston, I quickly glance over the page again.
Maria Alcott, 25
Best-friend: Edward Crane
Family: 2 sisters, 1 brother, Parents deceased
Favorite activities: swimming in the cool summer waters of her backyard pool.
Hair: brown, straight, shoulder-length
Eye color: hazel-green,
Face shape: heart
schedule: Goes to the same coffee shop every day, orders the same drink and croissant, then goes to the middle school, where she voluntarily tutors children.
She was so personable, so likeable. A slight pang stabs my heart as I realize the power a few actions had. This was the part I hated—choosing the way they die. I started building her up, but now I get to knock her down. It’s so hard. By now, I know her well enough that she feels like my own sister. But here I am, orchestrating her death.
Yanking my frizzy blond hair into a ponytail, I get to work. My slender fingers shoot across the page, trying to find the best, most dramatic way for her to go (Yes, I may have a slight flair for the dramatic). All of this to get to Edward. Apparently, the people paying me want to watch Edward suffer (which I can deal with…it’s kind of sick, but a paycheck is a paycheck!)
I pull a thick binder labelled “Ideas” off of the nearest shelf and examine some of the options. I purse my lips and turn the page again. There were so many ideas, so many different ways she could go. None of them seemed fitting, though.
A carefully injected syringe of air that would mimic a heart attack? She wasn’t old enough, there’d be too many questions to answer, besides, that’s hardly dramatic, and that is what my employer wants. How about cutting the femoral artery? I haven’t done that in a while. It’d be quick and easy.
Eh, maybe not…that’s a little dark for this project, there’d be too much blood to deal with. Finally, I settle for the good old-fashioned approach. I decide she’ll be killed by getting shot—right in front of her best friend, so that the emotional scars will be carried for a while (There’s that dramatic touch!). The target really is more Edward than it is Maria. She’s essentially a means to an end—though one that I would regret pulling the plug on—she could have so much potential.
I sigh and guzzle down some coffee. This is the headache I get for being a writer. I pick up my pen and prepare the opening statements in my latest crime novel, starting with the murder of one Maria Alcott.
Sorry Edward, you’re in for a bumpy ride.
Entry #5
GRAVE ROBBING
Evon brushed a strand of hair from his face as he studied the lock. A ‘Talbot & Sons’, quality craftsmanship, standardised tumblers. He smiled as he slipped his lockpicks from his belt.
“Are you sure about this, Evon? I mean, it’s a bit… sinister.” Faro’s eyes were wide as he looked between Evon and the dark street.
Evon didn’t respond until he had three of the four pins set. “Feel free to stay here if you’re so worried. Otherwise stay close and walk on the grass.” He lifted the final pin and turned the lock with a click. The gate opened with only the barest whine and Evon slipped through. Faro followed, catching the iron bar in his hand against the metal.
Gravel crunched under their feet, stretching out into the heavy darkness. About three hundred metres ahead of them stood the chapel, two sickly yellow gas lamps by the doors providing a point to aim for. Everything else was thick blackness. Evon hopped from the gravel path onto the grass beside it. Faro followed and placed a hand on Evon’s back.
Evon closed his eyes and concentrated, his brow furrowing. He felt a tingling in his face and opened his eyes again. The darkness was gone. The solid night around him was instead a cemetery, rows and rows of uniform grey headstones stretching away before him in rigidly neat lines. The world appeared to him with a blue tint, as though he were underwater, and he relished the thought of Faro’s face when he saw Evon’s now blue pupils. He turned to his accomplice.
“Stay close to me,” he said, enjoying the look of silent shock in Faro’s eyes, “and keep on the grass.”
The pair moved amongst the graves, staying low, invisible in their cloaks and the deep night. Faro clung to Evon’s shoulder, desperate not to lose him, blind in the darkness.
“This is stupid,” he said. “They won’t have buried him with the rings. His wife’ll have taken them all. Probably got them in some lacquer box. We should be at their house instead of out here robbing graves.”
“He’s still wearing them. Arnold helped dress the body. You know Arnold? Anyway, he counted five rings, a gold pocket watch, and a lapel pin with a ruby in it. He wants a cut for the tip, of course, but there’s a lot of money on that corpse, and it’s just lying there waiting to be taken.”
“Makes me uneasy. We shouldn’t steal from the dead.”
“You can’t steal from the dead,” Evon said. “Ownership expires the same time you do. Besides, he’s in a crypt, so this isn’t, technically, grave robbing. Your precious little soul will be fine. All you have to do is watch for anyone coming by. Think of this as a night-time stroll. Through the cemetery. For a nice payday.”
The crypts were arranged in a line across the path from the chapel. The lamp light didn’t reach them, giving Faro a view of the path and chapel from the impenetrable shadows opposite. The crypts were large rectangles of grey stone with no ornamentation whatsoever, only a family name above each stone door. Evon checked each one until he found ‘Pilfeather’.
“Here it is,” he said. “Hand me the iron crow and keep your eyes and ears open. And for Aor’s sake, stay in the shadows.” Faro handed Evon the metal bar and slunk into the darkness between two crypts. Evon approached his target, raising the crow to the door, and stopped.
It was already open. The gap was as narrow as a gap could be but it was there nonetheless.
Breathing slowly, Evon strained to hear anything from inside. There was a soft murmur. Someone whispering? The tang of smoke touched his nose and drifted away. Someone had to be in there. But who? He stood still, facing the door, and closed his eyes again. Concentrating, he imagined the room beyond the stone. Square. Grey. Musty air thick with dust. A silhouette in the corner. His eyebrows scrunched together as he tried to see beyond the door. Stone coffins in the walls. A candle too weak to light more than itself. He tried to hold the pieces together as a whole and opened his eyes.
Nothing but stone, as opaque as ever.
“How the hell did mother do it?” he whispered to himself. No matter how hard or often he tried, he could never manage to see through solid objects the way she had. He rubbed his face and raised the iron crow again. Slowly, he used the tip to ease the door open a little more. When the gap was just wide enough, he sucked in his stomach and slid through.
The crypt was almost identical to the way he’d envisioned it. Square and dusty with stone coffins interred in the walls. In the middle of the back wall was an altar, the rotund corpse of Abner Pilfeather laid on top of it. Several candles burned beside him, casting dim light around the outline of a woman. She stood over the body, her dark hair blending with her long cloak to form a single black shape. Her hands hovered above the body and she whispered strange words in a low, hurried tone.
Evon cold see the rings still wrapped around the pudgy fingers. The candlelight glinted on the gold and he took an unconscious step forward, his foot scraping on the hard floor. The woman immediately went quiet and spun around, pressing herself against the wall. Evon stepped back, gripping the iron crow to his chest.
“Who are you?” the woman said, panicked. Her eyes darted from Evon to the metal in his hands. She stared at his eyes, confusion sneaking into her fear.
“Nobody,” he said. “Who are you?”
“Nobody.”
He looked to the altar. Wax ran down the candles, pooling near several strange symbols drawn in chalk on the stone. “Right. Good. We’re just two nobodies having a chat. Nice and friendly.” He bent down and put the crow on the floor.
The woman shifted away from the wall slightly. “Look, neither of us wants trouble, correct? You forget you saw me and I’ll forget I saw you. Deal?”
Evon was about to nod and get out when his eye was caught by the soft orange light of the candles dancing on Pilfeather’s rings, gold and silver. One was inset with an oval of black jade, another spiralled along an entire finger. They twinkled at Evon like precious stars.
The woman followed his gaze. “Is that what you came for? The jewels?”
He nodded. “Quick in-and-out job. I was supposed to have been gone by now.” He looked back at the money on the dead man’s fingers. “You’re not here for them, then?”
She shook her head. “You can take them if you forget about seeing me here.”
Evon walked to the altar. He reached out but was distracted by the symbols along the edge. They encircled the whole body, a series of angular shapes and jagged lines. He frowned, sure he’d seen some of them before but unable to remember where. “What are you here for?”
The woman looked away, her mouth a tight line. Evon took in the scene with fresh eyes. Candles. Strange symbols. Black robes. And that whispered chanting. In a crypt, in the middle of the night. He dashed back, eyes wide, almost tripping over the iron crow. “You’re a necroma—”
“No! I’m not.” She glared at Evon, then sighed, her shoulders slumping. “I’m a healer. A damned good one, too.”
“I’m fairly sure trying to raise the dead makes you a necromancer.”
“I’m not trying to raise him like some zombie.” She crossed her arms, defiant. “I’m trying to heal him.”
Evon stopped inching towards the door. “Heal him.”
“Yes. Of death.”
Evon stared at her, face blank.
“I’ve done it before,” she said.
“You’ve healed the dead? Of death?”
“Several times. Trouble is they usually fall to pieces shortly after. It’s the rot that does it. That’s why I’m here, to practice on a fresh patient.”
“Patient? How is anything you’ve just described different from necromancy?”
The woman rolled her eyes and walked to the corpse. She pulled the rings off, the jewelled pin, and dug the watch from its pocket. “Here.” She tossed them to Evon. His hands went out instinctively, catching the watch and two of the rings. The rest clattered to the floor around him. “Take your loot and go,” she said, leaning against the altar, shoulders hunched. “Don’t say a word to anyone about me.”
Evon gathered the rings from the floor and put them in the pouch on his belt. He picked up the iron crow and made for the door but stopped and turned back.
“Just out of curiosity… What happens when the, ahem, recently deceased is strolling through town again?”
“They’ll be thrilled to have him back, and he’ll shower the kind healer who helped him with gifts and praise.” She turned around, a tired look in her eyes. “More like they’ll set him on fire and start throwing the n-word at anyone they don’t like. I’m just trying to prove the concept right now. Changing people’s attitudes will come later. Now get out. I’d prefer some privacy.”
They both snapped to face the door at the crunch of gravel. A moment later, Faro wriggled through the door, sweating slightly. “Evon, what’s taking so lo—” He froze, looking at the woman, to the body, to the altar. She stepped back to the wall, panic returning to her eyes. “Who’s this?” said Faro, his eyes narrow.
“I’m… a thief,” she said, sending Evon a pleading look.
“That’s right,” Evon said, his mouth dry. He stepped between them. “She got here first. Damn shame but fair’s fair, right? We should go.”
Faro looked past Evon at the altar, his eyes on the symbols, fists clenched. “She’s a necromancer.”
“Don’t be daft, Faro. Let’s go.”
“She’s a Godsdamn necromancer!” Faro lunged forward and grabbed the iron crow in Evon’s hands. The two of them struggled to keep hold of it.
“Think what you’re doing for one second, man,” Evon yelled. Faro twisted the crow until Evon’s hands slipped from it. He stepped away and raised it over his head. Evon grabbed it again before Faro could move. They fought again, until Faro wrenched it free once more and flung it towards the woman before Evon could stop him. She screamed as she ducked down, arms covering her face. The metal struck the wall above her, dust and stone greying her hair. Evon tried to restrain Faro, but he struggled free and rushed for the door, yelling.
“Hel—”
The crow spun through the air and struck Faro across the back of the head with a ringing crack. He collapsed into a heap, his hair dark and wet. Evon stared, open-mouthed, as the woman rushed forward.
“Did you just—”
“Shut up,” she said, crouching by Faro. She pressed her fingers against his neck, waited.
“Is he…” She looked up at Evon, grim seriousness across her face. “Oh,” said Evon.
“I could, you know… heal him.”
Evon looked at Faro’s body, one hand resting on the pouch at his belt. “Better not. Some things should stay sacred.”
THE END
Entry #6
I remember vividly the smell of the fetid water. The oily texture, the taste of decay…a boy’s first taste of the world, even before his mother’s milk. I plunged from a world of darkness into a world darker still. My first cries drowned in that tub of viscous slime, as much water as that woman cared to muster for the birth of her only son. Of the only son.
This realm I entered in cool, dark filth; a small pity the woman had taken on me. It was to be the only pity taken on me by her or any other. While the others slept on mats and blankets, my body was covered in sand to hold me in place. The gritty amarillo particles drifted into my nostrils and caked my eyes when I grew exhausted enough to sleep. I don't like sand. It's course and rough and irritating, and it gets everywhere. Each morning was waking in a pile of coals, each evening, a bone-chilling tundra.
This desolation found me learning to crawl. The woman withheld comfort when the cactus' barbs found my infant flesh, showing no sympathy. The sand burned my knees and delicate hands as blisters raised and the skin thickened beneath them. The edible and unpalatable were discovered between bouts of retching, swelling, and psychedelic trips, sans parental guidance. Before my first steps, my well of tears was spent, leaving but desiccate cisterns filled with skeletal briers growing from the rotting remains of green shoots.
When my eyes had bled their last, I believe that to be the time that the woman deemed me weened as I recall her presence no later than this. An ancient pair overtook the tasks involving my rearing beyond this time. A pair of beings so ancient as to seem mystical to my yet blue eyes, weaving songs of incantation over me and preforming singular rituals on me. Never a kind word, a gentle touch, a caring glance. But never did they fail in teaching and discipline.
I recall the heft of the first scimitar I gripped. Not an implement of sport or game, but a tool of brutality, its leather haft crusted with the crimson spirit of its previous victim. Unimportant was my age by this crucial moment, though I could count still my years with the fingers of a single hand. Where one might have expected anticipation or even excitement, a sense of solemnity pervaded the court. The conscious spectator might have picked up on a hint of ceremony, even sacrifice. As the curved blade danced about, clashing with the other's steel, the women looked on with austere expressions of...disinterest?
Bright sparks lit her soft cheeks and plump lips, her golden skin and russet braids. Her countenance played host to little expression, a lapse in poise would be frowned upon, likely with a cat of nine tails. Graceful was every movement, dangerous and understated. Her svelte form slid like desert shadows over ridges of sand. At last, she allowed her eyes a single candid moment of stark, scintillating emotion. A precious drop of briny moisture rolled from an eye, across the top of her lip to the corner of her mouth where it mingled with her blood as I withdrew the cruel razor from her middle to no discernible approval either from the two crones who raised me or the congregation in general.
On the day a proven adult lay eviscerated at my feet, my hands and feet were shackled to the stone pedestal before the colossus idol and my flesh was drawn open with primitive stone knives. The powdered thorns of our native plants were rubbed into the open wounds, acquainting me with a fresh definition of pain. As the sand scored away the scabrous blood, furious scars rose in their place, tracing across my body with the dark plant matter. Ancient patterns ran over my juvenile muscles and rippled over the veins of my arms. Pride inflated my ego, the closest the tribe would ever come to an act of respect.
When ruddy hair began to appear in certain, predesignated areas of my body, my witch-mothers took me up to the top of the highest mountain, the proven adults of the whole tribe in step behind. In one accord, they spread their arms toward the whole earth, a grand gesture revealing a world for which I only now, at this late day, have words. Verdant plains of grass and flowers, sylvan glades perfumed with sweet pollen and earthy humus, vast spans of cool, coruscating water. Deep within my bosom swelled then a recess, the match of which was only the width and breadth of that heaven beyond. This land which the myths praised, they vowed, was to be my domain.
In that moment, a young lifetime of stifled imagination, squandered potential, and buried love was stripped of its callous scales and a single tongue of flame was ignited within, as if seen from a distance. The stone encasing my undeveloped heart cracked, and a ray of light the color of that land's glory shone upon it. Golden radiance flooded through my life, innocence, peace...hope. For a moment.
The subsequent event divorced a boy entirely from the first and only hope with which he'd ever been provided. Though so very many years have passed, the goddess has yet to expunge the memory from my grotesque and fractured soul. Would that I could take in hand a firebrand forged in the fire of my anguish and burn the obscenity from my mind. It wasn't the bloodletting, the ritual flogging, the clothes stripped from my body. It wasn't the blinding pain that coursed through my body as they implanted the gem of the royal diadem in the front of my skull that night atop the mount.
Sweat beaded on my naked form and slid down the angles and curves of my body, reflecting firelight in the frigid night air. My body heaved spasmodically beneath the weight. I thought in the first hours that I might even find the tears of my youth, but there were none to be found. As the night wore on, each woman came to me and took up the chain that my hag-mothers had latched to the diadem buried in my bloody skull, and mastered me. Each woman in turn took my sex like a robber, stole the innocence of my newly pubescent youth, and soiled it. The crown of my future dynasty that had so recently begraced my bloody brow was the bit by which the steed of my masculinity was broken again and again.
And last to steal my seed, the mothers who had raised me, the two witches in their vile manner. They took me at once, driven by avarice, by envy for their charge. Greedily, madly, they broke my body and my will with zealous fervor. The fetid stink of their breath still curls through my nostrils, my fingers still feel the texture of their oily flesh, my tongue is still thick with the taste of decay...a young man's first taste of manhood, even before his first love.
As the exhausted matriarchs fell prone in rapacious ecstasy, the bloody sun, aloof and unsympathetic, crested the rim of the world, throwing the castle of that land's monarchy into sharp silhouette. In my mind's eye, I saw the inhabitants of that land below dancing in the streets, raising their families, sleeping in warm beds, laughing, loving. A twinge of pain churned in my heart, like a scimitar in a girl's stomach, and for the last time, a tear rolled from an eye, across the top of my lip to the corner of my mouth where it mingled with my scowl. I hated those people. I hated my mothers, I hated the sand, I hated my crown, I hated being the only man, I hated that land below, and I hated their mythical golden power. That land would bow before the name Dragmire.
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