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The Red Tree Follies I – a Metafiction of Fae Apoc for Patreon

Nov27

A bonus post, because I was entertaining myself.

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The series of follies – small buildings, in other situations often in formal gardens, designed to be decorative while often resembling some purpose-built building – known most commonly as The Red-Tree Follies dot the landscape in a wavering set of ovals from east to west, providing lovely places for a picnic, for an evening’s rest, or for a small wedding.  They have been mapped and drawn, painted and studied in recent years.  Still, much about them remains a mystery.

What we do not know about the Red-tree follies far outweighs what we do know, so we will begin with the ascertainable facts. Continue reading →

First thanksgiving – a Tale of Addergoolians for Patreon

Nov23

In which we prove that I am lousy at naming things, oops.
Luke and Mike are from Addergoole. Luke is Seneca Indian; Mike is a gender-swapping Dutch minx.

This story is set in 1864, one year after Abe Lincoln made Thanksgiving a national holiday. Parties take time to plan, dontcha know?

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Luke knew Mike had set him up the minute he walked into the party.

The way the fancy people in their expensive dresses turned to stare, the whispers that he couldn’t imagine he wasn’t supposed to hear:

Isn’t he supposed to be on a reservation?

Do they eat real food?

They let them serve in the Armed Forces? Oh, as scouts, of course — but that rank can’t be real. Continue reading →

Followed, Anticipated- a story of Fae Apoc for Patreon

Nov21

If you are new to my Fae Apoc setting, Kai(lani) and Rozen are from my Addergoole series.

This story takes place 50 years past the original story, nearly 40 years after the apocalypse, after the Retirement stories.

Short summary: Rozen, a “big bad wolf” in school at Addergoole, managed to finally piss off Regine, the school’s Director, enough that she mind-controlled him into a Belonging (magical slavery; “Keeping”) and shipped him, literally, to Kailani, her protege, ignorant of or uncaring about the romantic/sexual/violent tension that had existed between those two in school. 

Since Kai was growing too old to pretend to be human in her current locale, she chose to go on the road with her new, somewhat violent, companion. 

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Kailani and Rozen were being followed.

Not exactly followed — more like followed-in-front-of — and not by a person or people.  Rozen would have been able to deal with people.

(If he was allowed to, of course.  He had no physical collar, because in the places they were travelling, sometimes having a collared person with her would get Kai killed and sometimes it would get him killed and, either way, it was a dangerous luxury.  He wondered sometimes if having a physical collar would have helped him get used to the uncomfortable feeling of being on a leash. )

They were being anticipated by rumor and legend, and Rozen didn’t like what they were saying.

He was Masked, of course, and Kai’s disguise was to go back to the way she’d looked at sixteen and seventeen, fresh-faced and not that much like the aging Dean Storm.  So when people told them about the midnight-skinned man with white hair and red eyes, he was pretty sure they weren’t seeing his middling-brown skin, hair, and eyes and thinking they were talking about him.

“I swear, Kai, I’ve never been through that town before.”  She was frowning, had been frowning since they left the town — in more of a hurry than they normally did, almost enough to bring attention to themselves. “Any of these towns we’ve been through.  I—”  He shifted.  “I stuck to the northwest and, uh, the Lakes, you know that.” Continue reading →

To the Garden – a story for Patreon

Nov14
After The Gardener and The Garden. Set in the midst of the Faerie Apocalypse that gives that setting its name. 

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The would-be gods came and went, and Damkina gardened.

She had not known, when she was younger, how much damage fighting caused.  The last time the gods had been here, she, too, had fought, to hold them off to banish them.

This time she did not fight.  She stood by her apprentice’s side and, with the people of the city, she built a garden.

Her boss – her former boss, she supposed, but better to think “once and future” – directed salvage teams to things that ought to be saved.  A CEO of a famous business was helping to rearrange housing so that all those refugees who asked for a place could be given it.

Today, as almost every day since they had first held off a would-be godling, a small crowd of people followed her, chanting as she had taught them.  Today, as she did every day, she had taken an hour with the strongest voices to show them how to shape the trees and plants to their wishes and not her own.

“Tempero Huamu, Qorawiyay Huamu, Aistrigh Huamu, Quipia Huamu, as Dam-kina Wishes.” Continue reading →