Papal Lace

[ Circa 13th Century ]

The ivory lace dripped from his arm and over his wrist; with the black satin folds of his weighted cassock, concealing well the withering frame beneath.

The candle was almost down to the nub and his tired mind, in likeness, was fast exhausting of thoughts - having so many papers, warrants and bulls yet to be sealed.

A succession of yawning deliberations - of moral chasms, of blind ponies, of barbed Christs, in an endless stream of holy determining.

There was a taut rap at the door - 4.00 am: the time for early Lauds ... Charley boy (known formerly as Father Paul) had arrived to dress the frail and failing Pope.

Two blanched feet idled from slipper into soft mule sleeve, and three layers of tunic and gown now encased him. The weight of the cross had become intolerably heavy to bear - its cold metal chain bit his pale wrinkled neck, shining in contrast against the anaemia of age.

The temperature in those halls was always so cold that any drowsiness one had, fast evacuated.

-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

Johnstone Industries

Johnstone Industries had a gloves on approach, packaging mysterious substances that were so far removed from their natural beginnings that they had become almost other-worldly.

Calvin genuinely suspected that the company itself had supernatural leanings - for how far can you go … extracting life from a substance before it becomes just an animated corpse?

He liked to think of preservatives as anti-matter, an invention of the dark gods ... but he kept these suppositions to himself.

-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

Happy Wacky

Privately the old man was very fond of dogs, having come to know quite a few during his days of vivisection (vivisection: from the Latin 'vivus' meaning alive, and 'sectio' meaning cutting). No one actually used that word anymore since the lobbyists had it censored from the industry, leaving replacement phrases of ‘analytical experimentation’ and ‘investigative live screening’ - to mask just about anything and everything involving the torturous trials the animals were put through.

Calvin glanced over to his watery-eyed friend and said blandly, "his name is ... er ...Chips - and he is staying with me."

Before any objection could be made Chips lumbered down and then sprinted through to the entrance of the compound with the three following quickly behind.

Recently the massive building had been effaced and replaced with a much friendlier Chemical Company do-over.

Futuristic styles had become passé - outdated - and they had been advised to ‘change with the times’, finding that businesses everywhere were now preferring the mom and pa, happy-wacky, pretty-pretty, slightly tacky imagery to promote their earth-friendly bleaches, deodorisers, vaccines, tissue-culture baths, tissue fixatives and boutique preservatives.

-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

Wind-chime of Miniature Skulls

Now quite aged and frail, with only a meagre frame and failing eyes, she cursed them twice, packed up her tool kit, and left for the refuge of the dank and the dark, where she lived comfortably concealed from her trolls.

It had proved too troublesome to pursue her, and so Vivien was left to live her following days in chosen solitude.

A feint green mist glowed around her timber home, and a wind-chime of miniature skulls tankled in the sullen breeze.

-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

Vivien

As the town's midwife, Vivien had delivered more still-births than she had those alive - and partly her evil reputation was because her stock of healthy infants had been but a few.

The past year had produced sickly babes and a very cold winter - the Bishop had blamed Vivien for this blight of misfortune and its inevitable consequence.

This nurse was also the go-to abortionist, and everyone knew publicly of her having practiced this black art.


-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

"Go back, go back"

There are dark parts to any forest wherein the woodland creatures hesitate to go - where the overhang exceeds the light, and the corporeal meets the common world in a synthesis of Goblin, bravado and dearth.

In a place where few can laugh, and vagabonds hide within ... stumbling into those shaded parts that drip with moulds and slippery slimes - where the thorns and brambles whisper: "go back, go back" with their limbs in twine, blocking the wayward from pushing their way in any further.

"Go back, go back" echo the crows with their gurgly throats, with a cough, and a shriek "go back, go back, before the Vivien sees you!"

The formidable Vivien was a witch who found sanctuary in the shadows of this darkest of places - where in the innermost parts, the ancient trees still steadfast remained.

She had absconded from the villagers who previously had shunned and then hunted her: with the Church having signed a paper in support of her accusers.

-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

Bee Attack

With an organized mind, the swarm went straight to the attacker's head, filling his nose and ears, then piercing his groin, his bulbs and his spear. He dropped to the ground, convulsed, and died.

The other two ran fast away with the bees still following closely behind.

Francis helped the young girl from the ground.

"I am Francesco.” he said.

"I know" she replied sobbing, "I am Mary".

She had outright lied to Francis, calling herself Mary - for the shame of what had befallen her had told her to.

As he carried her back to the camp an old grey wolf followed beside, and the bees returned, flying in and out of the pathway surrounding.

Her pale white arms were scored with scratches, holding on tight around his sun leathered neck. Hannah’s fear lifted momentarily, and she felt safe once again.


-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances