Chips is Dead

Robyn was crying in the court yard when Calvin found her, early that morning.

He did not know what to say - he did not feel very good with such things; he just stood there not wanting to back away.

“I did not know that you have been unhappy here” he said.

Her eyes were red. It seemed like she had been crying for a very long time.

“You can tell me” he whispered. “Tell me what is on your mind, I promise I will listen.”

“Chips is dead” she spluttered, and then let out a wail.


-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

Motherly Concern

Hannah-Mary then interrupted them.

At thirty-two the woman could have been mistaken for Mirabella’s sister … they appeared so alike, with the exception of a thickened waist and generous breast of her mother, they bore exactly the same countenance.

She put her arm around her beloved daughter.

“I promise to take care of him - he will not want while you are away.”

She also was saddened, but this was because she did not want her daughter to leave.

Monastical life is no life for a young girl, she had told her. But what if this husband would take the life from her? How could she be sure that he would treat her Mirabella well? She shuddered at the thought of relations, having only one dark memory where she was forced beyond her will.


- Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

Bear Friend

“Granoldi” she said, placing her bare hand gently on his nobbled paw, “I am to marry quite soon, and with this I needs-must go far away to make my home. My husband to be, lives seventy leagues from this town, and it is without choice I must take residence there beside him.”

She stopped as her eyes began to mist over. Mirabella deeply drew breath and began very sadly:

“This means my dearest friend, my darling brother, that I shall not be able to see you tomorrow, or the next, or the next after that. And I am beside myself in this. I do not want this to be our final greeting, or goodbye.”

He could tell that her mood was serious. His eyes had filmed over with white, and blended with his fur, and this being so, he could not read her face.

Mirabella herself had tanned skin and jet black hair. Both her features and frame were fine, and her tunic was of pale blue wool. Her cape was of the same cloth, and she took it off, to put over her bear-friend’s shoulders.

- Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

Bearly there

After Francesco’s passing Mirabella, now sixteen years of age, was visiting the Friar’s sanctuary to take presents to the elderly bear, who to everyone’s surprise was still walking the earth.

He had been feeble from the start, and because of his white hair and the crippling chains, his arthritis had caused him to be sore in the joints, and displaced unevenly throughout - everyone had assumed him to be aged many years before, when he had first arrived.

Even still, he must have now surpassed twenty they conjectured. Granoldi loved Mirabella before all others and the two shared memories of an earlier life of sunlit forests and carefree days. They sat in an un-awkward silence that was resplendent with this happy time of the past and the present, converging in each other’s company.

- Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

Spit & Vanish

The grey Weimaraner shuddered, his head fell to one side, and his tongue drooped out from his mouth. He was gone.

Puck put the lid onto the beaker with haste, and a fine blue mist seemed to be floating within the vessel.

“I don’t feel good about this” Francesco said flatly. He had been dreading this moment - and had carried the guilt of his father’s predicament for a very long time all told. He continued:

“How sure are you about what you have done?” He looked at the beaker … the blue light had dissipated and there was nothing much to be seen in there at all.

He took it out of Puck’s hands and gazed into it woefully.

“There’s nothing in here, is there?” he said, now stating the obvious.

“Nup, guess it didn’t work after all.” said Puck in agreement.

“Our one chance, and you lost him”, Francis said complainingly.

Puck put his hand on his shoulder. “Yep” he said awkwardly.


-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

Over the Hills & Far Away

"Quick, hand me that jar."

Francis looked up at Puck, and then to his side where he was pointing. There was a glass beaker with a chrome lid on a bottom shelf, near where he was holding Chips in his arms.

He reached over and took it and threw it up into Puck’s hands. Puck caught it, rapidly unwound its lid, and then spat a little spittle into it. He then placed a hand onto Anon, whose eyes were too heavy now to open, and he whispered in the old dog’s ear.

“We’ve got you buddy. We’ll figure this out, I promise you, this time, we will figure it out. Just go into the jar and we can transport you over the hills and far away.”

Francis eyed Puck with concern. He loved Anon and distrusted this idea. Especially upon hearing ‘over the hills and far away’ - what was that? Puck had not been himself of late. He said nothing.

“It's a fine expression” the Pookhah said, reading his thoughts with a little indignation.

“It sounds a bit loopy”, said Francesco, momentarily distracted.

“It's appropriate” said Puck - “where else is one to go?”

-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances

The Spirit is Swift

Usually, when a mortal departs his fleshly frame, he ascends up through the gates of death, and out into the cosmic spray. There, his etherial starry body takes the soul into the realms where he is best suited - up and away from the concerns of the earthly world and its impulses.

The spirit is swift, and knows the heavens intimately. For this is the natural home to all men's souls, and more natural than the life previously known.

Now this time became very much as it was before - all Pietro could contemplate, was that of finding his son who had run away, now so many years ago.

His spirit flew over the paddocks, and past the fruit fields, through to the mountains where the camp of Francis had grown to a castle community.

In a stone wall there, was a fountain trickling within, and beside, on a pedestal, was a bronze head that looked just like his beloved boy. He knew he had come to the right place.

Pietro’s spirit dashed through the vast corridors, searching within, sailed its way past the cells and vestibules, frantically seeking his son.

Pietro-Peter stopped back at the bronze, looking longingly at the face - to then notice an inscription beneath the piece that read:

Francesco di Pietro di Bernardone
~ 1181 - 1226.


-Gabriel Brunsdon, AZLANDER: NEVER ENDINGS: Second Chances