Archive | October 2020

Saving the Cult (if not the World), Chapter Thirty-Two

Saving the Cult (If not the World) "It's time." Manfield Lee knew he was good at sounding authoritative even when he didn't know what he was talking about - he'd turned a fortune into a megafortune doing just that, after all, not to mention running the Organization - but right now, he DID know what he was talking about. After all, it was just a date, wasn't it? And if the date turned out to be wrong, well, then he knew exactly what to blame it on, and that blame would fall on the scholars and the psychics, not on him. The other thing Manfield Lee knew how to do was to place the blame in very specific ways that were not him.

You’d think they’d practiced it, the way they moved to the bus.  Lina’s dad smiled at them and hugged her one-armed.  “You made it.  Some people here said there was some inter-Organization difficulty-?”

“My aunts.”  Ethan made a face.  “They were, ah, pushing people to do something else, or to, at least, push us to do something else.  They’re, I don’t know.  Maybe they’re still waiting for the Old Wise Sage who’s going to save us.” Continue reading

Blog Post: Halloween! 🎃

It’s Halloween!

Okay, it’s the day before Halloween.

I really love Halloween.  I loved it so much as a kid, when I hadn’t learned to be nervous about what I wore.  I can still remember some of my costumes – the year mom made me a full bunny costume, for one.  The year we couldn’t find cat ears so Dad bought a set of mouse ears, cut them, and spray-painted them black.

That was pretty cool.

When I was a kid, trick-or-treating meant Dad driving me (sometimes Mom) to houses we knew – relatives, church people, friends.  My neighborhood growing up was rather rural (less so now).

We don’t keep our light on most years now, but a lot of that is because out here, there are no kids.  This house is even more remote than the one I grew up in, and our neighbors on this street are approximately a hundred and twenty.

But man, I miss costumes, and I miss being brave enough to wear them.  The candy is nice, sure, but all the other trappings of the holiday, that’s what I really love.

The “spookiness” and the harvest and the pumpkin, the black cats (cats, always!), the costumes, the pagantry… it’s an unabashed feeling holiday and I love it for that.

I really do wish I could do costumes the way I did when I was eight, unabashed, fun at wearing something new, loving the way it looked on me BECAUSE it was a costume.  I do hope I can do that again some day, that my brain will let me.

In the meantime, i’m going to dress up my tumblr feed and my twitter feed every October and sit up until past midnight on Halloween getting ready to write for Nanowrimo.

In my cat ears.  Of course.

 

 

 

Beekeeper: In Which Mieve Faces Old Memories

First: A beginning of a story which obnoxiously cuts off just before the description,
Previous: In Which Amrit Takes a Run.

Please note: there are two chapters after “in which they stop kissing…” which have been deprecated.  This re-write begins from Amrit and Mieve ending up in bed.

This is another commission from @Momerath@wandering.shop for another chapter of Beekeeper, (there’s one more of about the same length coming, too).  Thank you so much to Momerath for your patience!

Bee-Keeper

🐝 Continue reading

Warning

Warning (over a pile of squash)

This story is a follow-up to the sixth one to my Squish-Squash, Pumpkins and Gourds Prompt Call

This story is Fae Apoc, BeeKeeper – it is set before the Beekeeper series. The unnamed guy in this story is Amrit, and Roger is the sausage vendor.

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There were often strangers at their market. 

That was why they’d set it up where they had – the highway  might not be quite the hub of traffic it once had, but it was still a broad, easy way for people to move, and they still used it (once Roger and the others had cleared out enough cars to make 2 lanes passible again).  Continue reading

In Tree Years

Curry is a character in Addergoole: Year 9.  This is set – well, it’s got to be an AU which I didn’t think about until I’d finished writing it, or rather, until I started posting it. 

This is set in 2021 or thereabouts, which means it can’t happen the way I wrote it, because it is set 10 years after the apocalypse.  No Victoria’s Secret Angels in 2021 in Fae Apoc. 

But enjoy it anyway as a look into Curry.

🌲

“You’re.. thirty.”

“Thirty-four.”  Curry shifted.  He had kids that were older than he’d been when he’d – when – when he’d seeded

Which was enough time to figure out a few things, he supposed. 

He cleared his throat.  He’d thought this would be the right sort of person to talk to.  He’d called back to Addergoole and they’d suggested this woman as someone he could talk to about everything Continue reading

Pumpkin Call Round-Up

Hello!

I have written some Pumpkiny Squash Stories!

If you want more, comment on the stories!  First two with 5 comments, then 7 comments, and so on…

The Original Call can be found here: http://www.lynthornealder.com/2020/10/07/squish/

Pumpkin Patch – Stranded World, Summer, Melinda, and Bishop.  A trip to a pumpkin patch and some interesting discussion.
4️⃣ comments

The Pumpkin Witch – a story, a tale, a myth, a truth?
0️⃣ comments! 

A Voluntary Offering – You can find all sorts of things in Crossroads Park. Including squash.
5️⃣ comments

Heirloom Gourds – the Aunt Family. Cordelia’s neighbors grow heirloom gourds.
7️⃣ comments

Heirloom Smiles – Cordelia may have more in common with her neighbors than she expects.
1️⃣ comments

Orange – Stranded.  Autumn setting up a harvest display.
3️⃣ comments

Squashed – fae apoc. Sometimes the bad guys are right behind you. Sometimes you have to be creative to stop them.
5️⃣ comments

Growing Home – Fae Apoc (but fluffyish) – when what you have is a garden and what you need is home…
2️⃣ comments

Pumpkin Diplomacy – when snowed in, you have to do something.
2️⃣ comments

 

Heirloom Smiles

Heirloom Smiles

This story comes from my Squish-Squash, Pumpkins and Gourds Prompt Call and is a follow-up to Heirloom Gourds. Brett and Enid were mentioned and present in Exhaustion

Aunt Family. 

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As with most good things, Cordelia found she couldn’t leave well enough alone when it came to her neighbor with the amazing squash.

More so when, over the short, decorative fence, she could see that her new neighbor Millie was having victors. Continue reading

So, tell me…

Husband got me a new microphone and I’d like to try reading a short story for people to listen to.

This is very nerve-wracking but I want to do it.

Please suggest one of my short stories – Probably something short enough you say “not done yet!” – preferably under 2000 words max – for me to record myself reading for you.

Purchase Negotiation 48: Dressed

First: Purchased: Negotiation

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“This is what you have in mind? You picked this out all by yourself?”

Leander tensed, because Melody’s tone was the sort of thing she could get away with taking with him, but she wasn’t talking to him, she was talking to Sylviane, and whether or not Leander liked the tone — he didn’t, people shouldn’t talk to her like that — Sylviane wasn’t likely to put up with it.

Was she?

“I’m not twelve.” Sylviane huffed quietly. “Yes.  I picked out these options all by myself, Melody.  The tux for Leander —”

“Rather plain, isn’t it?” Continue reading

Saving the Cult (if not the World), Chapter Thirty-One

Saving the Cult (If not the World) "It's time." Manfield Lee knew he was good at sounding authoritative even when he didn't know what he was talking about - he'd turned a fortune into a megafortune doing just that, after all, not to mention running the Organization - but right now, he DID know what he was talking about. After all, it was just a date, wasn't it? And if the date turned out to be wrong, well, then he knew exactly what to blame it on, and that blame would fall on the scholars and the psychics, not on him. The other thing Manfield Lee knew how to do was to place the blame in very specific ways that were not him.

Ethan glared at Lina and Jackson. “I mean it. Stop beating yourself up. We slept, yeah, and now – this time.” He took a deep breath. “This time, we know what we’re going into, and we can call a taxi, rent a limo if we have to, and we won’t need as much sleep, because we won’t have just stopped that riot and then the end of the world. Just the end of the world,” he added, trailing off on that happy note. Continue reading