Ethereal Stories: Relentlessness (TW mourning)

Today I am posting a somewhat special text. I lost my grandfather earlier this week. He was a pillar for me so I had to do something to honor him. I hope you’ll like it.

From a very young age, with grandpa, we took part in many kite competitions. I will continue alone but he will always be in my heart.

I

Grandpa died last night. Dad and I drive towards Jørlunde, eyes moist. My father hits the steering wheel every time the traffic slows down, grumbling:
“What a jerk! What an idea he had to go up on the roof!
Images from my recent vacation come to mind: colorful kites tearing through the gray sky. I wipe my nose again with my soaked sleeve and shout silently: “ Grandpa ! Why ? »

Dad drops me off in front of his childhood home, a tall, five-story building that survived World War II. He asks me if he can leave me, the time to go “ do what is necessary ” for grandfather. I accept, of course, without realizing that for the first time I will be alone in this house where I have spent all my summers, as far back as I can remember.

As soon as I walked through the door, the smell of waxed wood brings a few tears to my eyes – I imagine my next vacation away from this soon to be lifeless place. In the living room, I linger over the photos placed on the sideboard: grandmother; grandfather and her, little piece of woman, hand in hand on the beach; my father on a racing bike; me, very young, all smiles in the middle of a huge sandcastle. I fix these images and engrave them in my memory.
Standing in front of the large library, I take the time to recognize the books that I have seen a thousand times near the armchair next to the fireplace. A book with a golden cover, which I had never spotted, caught my eye. I climb on a chair to grab it; the title surprises me: How to age well – not the kind of reading for this house. I open the manual, a feather falls. I pick it up, and notice the wet ink on its end. After a few seconds, I finally sit down in front of the thick wooden table to read these tips that will no longer apply to my grandpa.
All pages are blank. Not a single sign, not even a date, nothing. What good advice, congratulations! In rage, I take up the pen and almost engrave my recommendation to myself, on a random sheet: “ Do not walk on a slippery roof ! I slam the book shut and put it back in place before running upstairs to throw myself on my mattress.

Dad comes home a few hours later, dejected. Little talkative, we dine quickly then go up to bed to put an end to this cursed day. From my bed, I hear the wooden floor creak – my father is approaching. The creaks stop – short pause behind the door. He finally comes in, draws the curtains of my room and wishes me good night without looking at me.

II

The next morning, rays of light stream through the new shutters and wake me up. I hear my mother stirring the kitchen utensils down the hall. Strange sensations, feeling of having braked suddenly, that my memories collided with the walls of my skull. I slept at my house, not at my grandfather’s.
I tumble in pajamas in front of my mother, my eyes still glued, and ask her:

— Where is dad ?
— In the garden,” she replies.
I do not understand.
— And grandpa Michel?
— Grandpa, I don’t know. At his place, or at the beach, I imagine. Call him if you want.
I sit up abruptly, afraid my legs will wobble and let me fall.

At noon, I insist with my father throughout the meal: I want to eat at grandpa’s this evening. He gives in – the privilege of being an only son of an only son. My grandfather, always very happy to receive us, simmered his famous roast for us.
After dinner, while my parents are washing the dishes and tidying up the kitchen, I take out the cards to play belote. When I close the drawer of the sideboard where the photos are enthroned, I turn around and ask my grandpa a question, without thinking:
— Do you think of grandma sometimes?
— day. Not a day goes by that I don’t think of her.
— And are you talking to him?
— Nope. Not directly. I talk to myself, and since she is etched in my memory, she may hear me.
— What was the disease that took her away again?
— A hereditary filth, banal and sad, which left him no chance.
— Could we treat her today?
— Quite a question! I do not know. I do not believe. Do you have any funny ideas tonight, big boy… Shall we play?
My parents arrive at the same time.

Restless nights for two weeks, intense reflections, I think I know what happened, without obviously understanding. I alternate between fear and joy at having brought my grandfather back. I didn’t tell my parents. I often have a headache. Dead, not dead, that’s a lot of emotions.

Rainy Saturday, dark gray early afternoon. I’m trying to solve a puzzle when the phone rings. My mother picks up and wipes her hands on her apron. I see her become livid, she cries to me:
— Go get your father, quickly!

III

Grandfather died this morning in a car accident. Dad and I drive towards Jørlunde, eyes full of water, like the road. My father hits the steering wheel every time the red lights of the vehicles in front of us come on, grumbling:
— What a jerk! What an idea to drive in such weather!
Images of beaches, kites, roofs and feathers cross my mind. I blow my nose in the crook of my elbow, my head is spinning – want to vomit.

My father stops in front of grandpa’s house. He tells me that he will “do what is necessary” and that he will be back soon. Raining cats and dogs. I walk across the yard, go around the puddles, protected by my yellow raincoat.
I slam the door, drop my jacket on the tiled hallway, and rush into the living room. The golden book has not moved. I take it gently this time – I don’t want to damage it and make it unusable. I open it to a page drawn at random, and with the quill already inked, I write diligently: “ Do not drive in torrential rain ! “.

My father arrives a few hours later. I come to meet him in the hallway; we hold each other in our arms. We don’t experience the same emotions and he doesn’t know it. During dinner, I chatter a little more than the circumstances would require, but he notices nothing, haggard.

The next morning, my mother comes to drag me out of bed with the promise of hot pancakes. The sun pushes aside the curtain of clouds with vigor. With my mouth still full, I ask if we can eat at grandpa’s tonight; my mother replies that it is already planned.

In Jørlunde, when I set the table, I hear my father talking low, but with intensity, with my grandpa. I only catch snippets of the discussion: it’s about degeneracy and relentlessness – I don’t understand a thing.
The evening ends with a game of cards; my grandfather and I, with a smile on our lips, we beat my parents to the hilt.

Another week passes. I fell back to sleep. I feel like I have a super power. At times, that scares me.

Sunday noon, my father comes into my room with tears in his eyes. I can’t believe him when he tells me that grandpa fell off the roof. ” Still ? I want to say, biting my lip. Three accidents, including two falls from the roof in one month, that’s not possible. I curse all the gods I know, and get in the car towards Jørlunde.

My father drops me in front of the house and I run into the living room. When I take the magic book and open it, a postcard falls on the ground. The photo looks like an advertisement for Lake Filsø: a black and red kite crosses the azure sky. I recognize grandfather’s handwriting. He left me a note, very short: “Big boy, I know it’s difficult, but please let me go. I am very sick and I prefer to leave alive. I put my atoms back into play and I join grandma. I like you. Grandpa. »

Last night grandfather died for the last time.

The end

Jeg savner dig så meget bedstefar. Hvis jeg blev den kvinde, jeg er i dag på trods af mors fravær, er det takket være dig. Du vil altid være i mine tanker. Jeg elsker dig rigtig meget.

Take care of yourself and your loved ones, tell them you love them and see you soon!

Ethereal Stories: The last rays of the day

Today I just wanna wrote an horror story for changing a bit of what I wrote generaly. (There is no Blood and no Gore if you are triggered by this). It take me more time that I though but I hope it will please you.

The last rays of the day

It all started with an explosion. A flash of light, and a rain of brown dust. They told us not to panic. That these particles were harmless, and that we could go on living as if this extraordinary event had never happened. They were wrong.

I bend down to pick a new wildflower and bring it to my face before adding it to my bouquet. Mom will love it.

At first, no one really noticed the changes. People, stuck in their routine, blinded by their problems, had better things to do than be moved by the amazing growth of shrubs or the flowering of dying plants. Days gradually turned into weeks, and everyone forgot about the explosion, the light and the specks of dust. At least, until the animals start to change too.

The tall grass scratches my calves. The wind whips through my hair and softens the sunburn on my weathered skin. But apart from this breeze which stirs the leaves and shakes the tops of the trees, all is calm. Accustomed to this supernatural silence, I barely remember that there was a time when I liked to listen to the chirping of birds, the barking of dogs, and even the hum of traffic on the main road. Now, only the sound of my breathing remains, and the creak of my footsteps sinking into the thick carpet of wild grass.

Neighborhood animals have become aggressive. Their owners no longer dared approach them. Then the birds started falling from the sky. One second they were flying gracefully through the clouds, the next they were lying crushed on the asphalt. Even my cat was different. He ran away from our company to hide in dark places, refused to eat and sometimes disappeared for days on end.

I plod along on the way home. I have crossed these fields and wandered in this forest so many times over the past few months that I could walk there with my eyes closed. My passages ended up forming a path in the thick vegetation, even if this tends to regain its rights now that my walks are becoming rarer. I find it increasingly difficult to walk, but I wanted to make this bouquet and choose the most beautiful flowers. Although not much else has mattered lately, I won’t give up trying to smile back at Mom. She suffered so much.

My cat is dead. We buried him under the chestnut tree, mum, Theo and me. At that time, Dad continued to go to work every morning, but we all knew that something was wrong. The gardens were fallow. The roots of the trees created wide cracks in the road, as if trying to come up to the surface. A sweetish scent of flowers and humus lingered in the air. The dogs were no longer barking. Scientists could not explain these phenomena. They began to invent outlandish theories that only fueled general terror. One after another, people packed their bags and left, leaving empty houses behind. We decided to stay. Here or elsewhere there was the same anxiety-provoking climate, and Theo was ill.

I have to stop to catch my breath, sitting on a stump in the undergrowth. The pain in my muscles is unbearable. My chest is burning. My tense fingers tremble around my bouquet. More than a few minutes. Only a few hundred yards, and I’ll be home. So I grit my teeth, swallow back the sticky tears that have started rolling down my cheeks, and push myself forward. One step after another.

The neighborhood has taken on the appearance of a ghost town. People hunkered down and locked themselves in their homes, with whatever food supplies they could find. An armed militia has taken to patrolling the streets, on the tree-torn pavement that once lined the road. Freed from their concrete cage, they blossomed to dizzying heights while humans walled themselves in alive, holed up in their basements. I heard gunshots. Dad stopped pretending that the world was round. Theo stopped leaving his bed.

Long cracks crisscross the asphalt. Scraps of cars lie along the rutted sidewalks, some half-swallowed by ravenous nature. In the abandoned alleys, I come across trunks with almost humanoid shapes. Their branches lean over me to greet me, but I can’t stop. Not yet.

They cut the electricity. At night, we gathered in Theo’s room, Mom hugged me while Dad whispered that everything was fine, the flame of our last candles casting shadows on his bloodless face. Nothing had been going well for a long time. Outside, a war has finally broken out. People were hungry. Those who could still move emerged from their burrows, armed with clubs, knives or guns, and began to fight. We had nothing left to eat and mom had caught the disease that was eating away at my brother, so dad resolved to join in the chaos. It was the last time I saw him, through the planks that barred the windows, his slender figure moving away in the darkness.

I absently scratch the scabs that cover my forearm. A thick, syrupy liquid flows from my wounds. My bones crack like twigs as soon as I begin to move. I’m close to home now. I’m going to find mum and Théo soon. They are waiting for me in the garden, as always. As I drag myself to the rusty gate, I repeat these words to myself over and over again, until they form a bulwark against the pain that blocks my breathing.

The streets have regained their calm. An abnormal, implacable calm, cut only by the whistling of the wind. The plants have invaded everything, and the bodies have disappeared, replaced by young shoots. The seasons have passed without my ever encountering any living beings. It didn’t matter, as long as I didn’t lose Theo and Mom. I learned how to manage to find food, and after a while I realized that my body no longer needed to eat to regain its strength. All I had to do was lie in the sun, my bare skin pressed against the earth, to be satiated. I lost track of time.

I collapse at the feet of Mom’s motionless silhouette. When I find the courage to stand up, the sun is already low on the horizon. I brush against his rough hand, slip my bouquet between his frozen fingers, sketch a smile that makes my cheeks crack. Then I sit down, my back glued to his statue-like legs, calm. Already, I feel the climbing weeds clinging to my body and the pain fading. I am ready to join them. Mom, Theo and all the others. I close my eyes, and the last tear coagulates before reaching my chin, a drop of amber with golden reflections under the last rays of the day.

Ethereal Stories: The thimble knight

I visited a theatrical costume museum recently, unfortunately the guide was a pretty boy but bearded, always from behind and we were in a group so I didn’t dare to mention that I was deaf. I didn’t understand anything but I had a good time staring at his posterior!
Seriously, I saw pretty old sewing boxes there. I never had the patience to learn sewing but I am always fascinated by the dexterity and meticulousness of the seamstresses and their attention to the smallest details. In short, these sewing boxes inspired me this little story which I hope you will like.

I

Naïa’s grandmother was a fortune-teller. She braided the threads of lives that she bound for eternity. She embroidered the frayed beards of the fabrics of fallen heroes. She sewed rosebuds on faded bodices and veiled taboos to patch up couples. His shop was famous. All the pains of the heart that the canton counted thronged there. And then, one fine morning, as spring was approaching, she died.

When she died, Naïa inherited her sewing box, a cherry wood box whose wood, polished by years of handling, was as soft as a castle banister. It must be said that the object was transmitted from grandmother to granddaughter for more than two hundred years.
When his mother gave it to him, she also handed him a cloth envelope, closed with an embroidered seal, but she specified:
“First take the time to observe what the box contains, Naïa. Your grandmother, by her gesture, designates you as heiress of the gift, but you must do your scales to begin. For that, you have to familiarize yourself with the tools, the materials, that you appropriate them, that you discipline them and when you can sew with your eyes closed an envelope similar to the one I am giving you, then you will be able to look at what ‘it contains. Not before. »
The tone was solemn, it called for no questions, no answers either.
Naïa took the envelope, put it aside and gently opened the box. This had five compartments: that of wool, cotton, silk and linen threads, that of braid and sequins, that of buttons and staples, that of pieces of fabric and that of pins, needles and hook guarded by a silver thimble.
For several weeks, Naïa scrupulously reviewed the contents of the box. She analyzed it, inventoried it, classified it. Finally, when she knew the box by heart, she got down to sewing.
She began with small jobs, the first of which was the making of a black, opaque headband, to learn how to sew blind. Gradually, she became more complex. She systematically did everything twice, once while watching, once blindfolded and, in case of error, started again and again.
She trained for two months before becoming interested in the envelope. Then, she listened to it patiently and tried to reproduce it by choosing her needle carefully. She copied it, several times, looking, applying herself. Finally, when she had acquired perfect control of her gesture, she adorned herself with her blindfold. She often pricked herself, but insisted. It was the embroidered seal that was the most difficult to achieve, but, at the end of June, the envelope was made, identical to that of her grandmother. So she opened the latter and found an enigmatic letter inside.

II

“Naiah,
The gift does not exist. In reality, none of us have ever actually possessed it. It comes from the thimble.
For him to reveal himself, you will have to choose a knight. To do this, follow these instructions:
First, go to the cemetery. Find a grave that holds a brave man, one of those who died in battle – no matter what war they were fighting. Do not choose a deserter, this one will never help you. Find out about his past. Choose a man who loved, without being afraid and without counting, as one throws oneself into an abyss, one needs a passionate being. Choose well, Naïa, you can’t go back, you can’t start again.
As soon as you have found the grave, dig the earth with your bare hands, collect the one that remains hanging under your fingernails and fill the thimble with it. Press well, nothing should fall out when you flip the dice. Filled flush. Water this soil with orange blossom, every morning, for a week, at a fixed time.
Then, slip the die into the envelope you just made. Seal it up, put it in the sewing box and wait to hear it wiggle. At this time, you will open it. »

Naïa went to the cemetery, she noted on a paper the names of the possible pretenders to the title of knight, she searched, in the archives of the city, their feats of arms, their history. She questioned the families, eliminated little by little those who were not suitable, then made up her mind.
She followed her grandmother’s instructions step by step and in the month of November, on the third precisely, the envelope was shaken. Thus was born the knight Lord Emeric of the thimble.

It was tiny: two legs of midnight blue wool, two arms of braided yellow cotton thread, black sequins instead of feet, others, gold, instead of hands and, for a helmet, a press stud; all emerging from his thimble armour. Barely out of the envelope, he seized the spear hook and proud of his new gleam, in a surprisingly thin voice, spoke to Naïa:

— Good day, lady, what can I do for you?
Naïa was surprised by the tone and the formula which contrasted with the sudden familiarity, but probably that was how a knight spoke. She was not disconcerted:
— Hello, Lord! I will call you Lord, it will be easier. In reality, I don’t know yet what you can do since I don’t yet know what you can do. What can you do ?

Lord then declaimed:
“I am the anti-heartbreaker
The Tailor of Woven Fates
The ardor mechanic
The healer of wounded loves! »

What lyricism, boastfulness! Naïa told herself that she had not chosen the most humble of knights…
“Perfect, Lord, but, in practice, how does it work?”

— I do not know, Naïa. By crowning me a knight of the thimble today, you awaken great powers that I have never before been confronted with. But do not be afraid, my dear, I nobly carry out the tasks, which with honor, they come to entrust to me.
— Okay… let me think.
— My devotion will be as it always was: flawless. No one can claim that in the past I fled before the slightest obstacle or that I refused to face…
— Shut up, Lord, please! I said, “Let me think”!
— Certainly, I consent to it, but when Lady Fortune unites, as here…
— Lord!
— Damn, but if…
— Stop!
— If it suits you.

Naïa had, until then, followed her grandmother’s instructions, but it was clear that she was coming to the end of her roadmap. Sitting in the workshop that had served as a shop, in front of her sewing box, associated with an elf hungry for archaic words of which the tomb had deprived her, Naïa began to doubt the relevance of her choice. She was proud of the hopes placed in her and wanted to prove herself worthy of them, but it had to be admitted that the situation was funny. She was going to have to discipline Lord whose verve exasperated her, but above all find how to use her “powers” to work for the happiness of all.

Naïa thinks that her knight needed a mission that would serve as a trial run to test his abilities. She knew that the Tellier sisters were angry, she told herself that reconciling them could constitute a first challenge whose consequences, in the event of failure, would be limited. However, she preferred to act in the shadows.
So she submitted the idea to Lord and waited for his instructions. This one, perhaps offended by the fact that she had molested him, was, this time, concise: it was necessary, to begin with, that she bring him back a few hairs from each of the Telliers. Naïa therefore waited, hidden in the thickets, in front of their home and as soon as they left, broke in, inquired about their brushes in the bathroom and took her loot there.
As soon as she returned to the workshop, she handed her treasure to Lord. He seized it religiously, settled down cross-legged on the table and began to weave. He metamorphosed thus concentrated. Naïa looked at him, fascinated. A ballet was a ballet, there was so much grace in his gestures. He worked in silence, skilfully mixing brown and blond hair with cotton and silk threads. When he was done, he handed Naïa a one-centimeter square that she detailed on the count. She then discovered, in the intertwining of fibers, a complex pattern of great finesse that looked like a cabalistic sign.
The next day at the market, the Tellier sisters laughed together in front of the fishmonger’s stall.
It was time to reopen the store.

III

Naïa saw a lot of people marching by as soon as trade resumed. The division of labor between her and Lord was simple. She received customers, served them tea, made them sit down and questioned them. Lord, hidden in the sewing box, was listening. Then they debriefed. Lord then drew up the list of what he needed, then, after Naïa had provided him with the necessary material, sat down on the table – like the very first time –, the open box at his side, and began his work. .
On the weekends, when the shop was closed, Lord gave Naïa sewing challenges and Naïa gladly played. Lord was still winning, but Naïa was constantly improving.
Years passed like this, many conflicts were settled, one would have thought that the region was a huge game of go where dark designs were followed by the return of white innocence. The reputation of the shop no longer stopped at the borders. So, six years after Lord and Naïa met, Ludmila entered the shop.
Naïa, barely arrived, had just opened the box to say hello to the knight when this beautiful sixty-something Russian entered. Dumbfounded by her beauty, Naïa did not have the reflex to close the box in time. The damage was done…

This woman was a doll with white hair and high cheekbones, rosy with the coolness of the air. In his intelligent eyes, of a blue “heart of a glacier illuminated by the sun”, there was a strange mixture of firmness and softness. Her clothes of splendid fabrics, from the dress to the coat, were only shimmering.
Naïa, captivated, welcomed him with deference, as one welcomes a princess… And Lord came out of his box declaiming:

— Madam, I have been looking for you for so many years.
That’s when it all went wrong… Ludmila pocketed the thimble with everything it contained and ran away.
Naïa could not catch up with her.

Despite her efforts to continue to treat pain, restore souls, quench sorrows, without Lord, Naïa could not repair everything. But she didn’t lose hope and bought a thimble…maybe the gift would come back.

Naïa died six months ago. Today, I managed to make, with my eyes closed, an envelope identical to the one she gave me. My mother told me her story. Tomorrow, I will go to the cemetery, I will look for a knight and then, we will see if the gift accepts to manifest itself again.

The End

Ethereal Stories: Rebirth

A personal version of my favorite Andersen tale. I hope you will like it.

Rebirth

I

I am different. I have always been. For my mother, it’s as if I were an extra-terrestrial. But having no place among those hanging around on a mound of dirt doesn’t seem so bad, when you have the whole sea as your home…
If I could properly redefine the terms myself, I would say that they were similar to each other; not that I was different. They were the ones who looked nothing like me; who had neither my ardor nor my boldness.

At the first rays of the sun across the big blue, you had to be up already, doing the healthy breaststrokes of the morning, in order to thank the day for having put an end to one more night; in our beliefs it meant that the end of the world was still far away.
In this precise order, you had to let the whales, huge and graceful, pass first. Then came the turn of sea turtles, accompanied by molluscs. Afterwards, in a rainbow torrent, a whole flock of diverse, multicolored fish rained down, some more cheerful than the others. And finally, the parade of mermaids, in well-ordered rows, from our coastal cave to the coral reef, without forgetting to always throw the first fin stroke from left to right. Always ! This, orchestrated with the most perfect harmony in the azure and salty blue of an awakening sea.
“Stand up straight on your tail! I heard my mother grumble every morning. “Brows up! All, without exception, gave themselves up with grace and zeal to this abominable morning masquerade. And to close the show, it took hours to harvest enough seaweed for the day’s meals. Aren’t they fed up? As soon as I reached puberty, I withdrew from these activities. My rebellious behavior had ended up driving a wedge first between my mother and me, then between the other mermaids and me. The difference was scary. They didn’t look like me, so they kicked me out.

II

I liked it better in my corner of the sea, waving my massive tail softly, my beautiful brush set with precious stones in my hands, languidly combing my abundant hair. I had found a secluded, deep space not far from the reef where I could snuggle up in the hold of an old ship that had sunk. He was massive. Wonderful. He bore his name well; “La Santa Ma…” printed on its side. The Santa Madonna? Santa Marianna? Santa Maria…? That was all that was legible; “La Santa Ma”… The rest had been erased, and destroyed. I wonder what hair-raising adventure this boat has had… At its prow stood a magnificent woman’s trunk; she had a haughty bearing, her arm firmly raised, and her hair frozen in the direction of the wind. Sometimes I tried to talk to her, to find out her story, but she kept the secret of her eternity to herself, her gaze lost in the distance.
Time crashed heavily like waves as I hid in this haven. I contented myself with swallowing what fell under my fins; small crustaceans, worms, sometimes even shrimp hidden here and there in the hold of the boat. But no algae. I could no longer bear this vegetal taste which marked in bitter letters the dreary and monotonous existence of a siren. There had to be something more than just existing. And one night, I discovered it.
The Big Blue had fallen into a deep sleep that night. Inky night on land, and under sea. Only the distant glow of a timid moon glided over the almost motionless surface of the water; grain of light in my salty night.

III

Not a single small fish in sight. Everything was sleeping. Except those above….
Suddenly I felt a call. From the top. He was powerful. Like a punch to the heart. He was almost overpowering my own will. I perceived moreover, a metallic scent, delicious, new, that I did not know. I soared towards that call, cutting through the sea. I carefully stuck my head out of the water, dazzled by mysterious hymns emitted to the tribal sound of the drum, by a crowd of restless earthlings dressed in white. One of them saw me and exclaimed:

— There it is…the water spirit! She heard us!

Saying this, he grabbed an empty conch shell and began to blow with all his might. A bewitching sound made me shiver and prompted me to reveal myself then in full to them, erect on my large shimmering emerald tail, garlands of pearls at my belt. They were much smaller than in my memories, these earthlings. Dead silence. They all knelt down. Except one, waist deep in water, who seemed to implore me with a whimper. He was restrained by heavy chains. Looking at him I understood that he had been beaten. The metallic smell became stronger, more insistent, so I approached him, looking for the source of this intoxicating aroma that had pulled me out of my hole. Staring at his dripping wrist, I then discovered that red, throbbing elixir tickling my gills from the depths.

— What is your name, spirit?! I was shouted
— I am Simbi, I answered.
— Accept our sacrifice, mistress of the waters, and give us back the rain!

How? ‘Or’ What ? I was just a simple mermaid. What power did I have over nature to the point of extracting the rain from it alone?
I had never touched a hair of an earthling; but by the time I came to my senses, there was nothing left but chains reddened by the feast I had just enjoyed. I had crunched many times, while an explosion of new flavors made me vibrate from my claws to the tip of my cock. I cheerfully licked my fingers, my arms, my lips. I wanted more, I wanted more…I approached the shore, beckoning the other earthlings to join me in the scarlet water…
A flash of lightning streaked across the sky. And the clouds began to cry, the birth of a sea monster…

The End

Ethereal Stories: Of Ice and Swords

I found old fantasy books at a flea market and I had a strong desire to write some. I started a notebook with lots of little ideas that I think could make a good story, if one day I take the time to develop it all. In the meantime, here is something to give you a glimpse of a very small part of the universe in question.

Of Ice and Swords

I

Lyra put down her cold beer, sighing in relief. This truce in the fighting was a real happiness. Legs stretched under the small table ravaged by generations of drunks, she leaned on the back of the chair and savored the ambiance of the tavern. She always missed that warm hubbub when she went on a mission.

— Hey babe, would you like a…

The young woman suddenly raised her head and stared at the giant who had dared to disturb her tasting. He swallowed, cut short in his bluster. Behind him, his comrades were exchanging hearty laughs. Deceived by the slenderness of the leather-clad figure, they did not know what was hidden under the loose hood of the warmage, and had thought they could have fun at her expense. A common mistake.
Lyra tilted her head and raised her eyebrows, daring her troublemaker to add a single word. His icy eye sparkled, and the man stepped back, muttering:

— Sorry, I don’t… sorry.

He turned around, his neck stiff and his shoulders tense, then rejoined his comrades with a jerky step, containing his desire to flee as fast as he could to avoid losing face. He was greeted with a string of surprised questions, which he waved aside, before grabbing a glass and downing it.
Lyra allowed herself a small smirk, and went back to tasting her beer. She pouted when she noticed that the liquid had cooled in the meantime. She reached out with her right index finger, brushed the rim of the mug and watched the frost delicately settle there, then tasted again. It was much better.
A new shadow invades his bubble of tranquility. She smelled of rancid sweat.

— I’m sorry, my Lady, but I… A thousand pardons, but we’d be more comfortable if you avoided using magic here.
— I only chilled that donkey piss you sell like beer.

Lyra’s voice, low and steady, made the innkeeper sweat even more. His bald head began to glow.

— I don’t…yes, of course, but you make my customers nervous, and they…
— Good. I am leaving.

The spell was broken anyway.
The forty-year-old nearly fainted with relief. He stepped back hastily when the young woman got up, and returned to the relative shelter of her counter to resume polishing her glasses. Lyra took a few steps toward the door, then spun around sharply, her hand on the hilt of her shortsword, feeling someone tug on her cloak.

II

A little girl was staring at her, her brown braids all tangled, her nose encrusted with snot. She must have been what, five years old? Six, no more.

— Ma’am, can I come with you?

Lyra smiled, slipped her gun back into its sheath, and looked around for the mother. His gaze only caught terrified faces, which annoyed him to no end. Why, she was not going to eat the kid!

— Say, can I come? I too want to become a war mage!
— Really, baby? Do you want to live in the cold and the mud, be constantly hungry and thirsty, see all your friends die?

The girl’s eyes widened; this description must not match the stories she had heard.
Lyra suddenly wanted to please him, perhaps because she was determined to enjoy her few days off. She reached out and molded a tiny fragment of her power. An ice unicorn appeared on his palm. The mage offered it to the kid, whose face lit up, and took the opportunity to remove her cape from the sticky little hands. Her tranquility regained, she crossed the door of the tavern with a light step, and joined her horse tied to the terrace. The animal, immaculately white, snorts when he sees her come out, tinkling all the buckles of his pale blue harness. She freed him and straddled him lightly, immediately galloping him into the night. Now that she had betrayed her identity, she wanted to get away from this town before the rumor of her passing spread. So close to the border, the village must have been home to a veritable nest of spies.

III

The moon found Lyra still on horseback, and flashed armor in front of Raven’s Bridge. The mage tugged at the reins cursingly, stopping her mount in its tracks. She spun around in the saddle, and saw more soldiers spring up behind her. Trapped! They had been damn quick on that one.
She muttered a few bits of ancient language and a shell of ice covered her like a breastplate. Just in time. An arrow bounces off his left shoulder. The men fanned out to surround him. One of them stood in front of her, and held out a skeletal hand, which clothed itself in flames. Lyra grimaced. War Mage versus War Mage. A nice part of pleasure in perspective.

The wizard’s fire coalesced into an incendiary projectile. When he came face to face, Lyra countered the attack with a wave of ice, but could not dodge the simultaneous charge of the soldiers, who threw her to the ground, causing her steed to flee. She fell heavily on the stones of the path, biting her tongue at the same time, and distributed a whole series of spears of ice around her to buy time to get up. She jumped to her feet, and ducked immediately to avoid another incendiary projectile. He crashed into an enemy soldier and turned him into a human torch. Without worrying about the unpleasant smell of tallow, Lyra charged again: she froze the ground under the feet of the foot soldiers, and drew her short sword. She had time to pierce two unbalanced men, before having to dodge a bluish flame, which grilled an additional assailant and warmed the earth. The others took off.

After several passes, Lyra frowned. The incessant attacks prevented him from concentrating, and therefore from casting powerful spells. Even though they got in each other’s way, the alliance of wizard and soldiers was formidable; she couldn’t do both at the same time. She countered several sword thrusts with an ice shield, which the fire mage immediately melted. A blade slashed the sorceress’ forearm, another brushed her cheek. Good ! It was time to step up a gear.

In a few words, Lyra locked herself in a gangue of thick ice, which her enemies immediately began to break up. One second, two, three… the little iceberg exploded, but it had done its job: the young woman had been able to concentrate enough to shape a spell of greater amplitude. An arrow of ice left his palms and shot up into the clear sky. Its bell trajectory avoided the surprised infantrymen, who did not bother to eliminate it. They charged again, forcing Lyra to protect herself with a new shield, which the fire mage began to pound mercilessly. Lyra’s sword danced and bit into flesh, but it wouldn’t last long. There were still far too many of them.

Feeling his prey weaken, the enemy mage redoubled his efforts. With both hands outstretched, he showered Lyra with heavy projectile fire, forcing her to defend, defend again. He smiled and wiped his sleeve on his forehead. He opened his mouth to fashion a new spell… and collapsed face down, eyes bulging. A huge snow tiger, bursting out of the forest like a cataclysm of violence, left his back and finished him off with a well-placed claw. Lyra, taking advantage of the soldiers’ surprise, straightened up and modeled a volley of ice javelins. Now that they were no longer protected, the men were dropping like flies. One of them tried to run away, but in two leaps the beast was on top of him.

Epilogue

The young woman staggered and fell, kneeling in the earth soaked with vital fluids, dropping her sword. Covered in blood, exhausted, she forced her breath back to normal and felt her heart slow down, calm down. She lifted the spell that drained her remaining energy; the snow tiger once again became Yo’lbars, his placid steed, which immediately put its nose in the grass, indifferent to the surrounding scene of carnage.
Lyra surveyed the modest battlefield, and smiled. Eighteen to one. Not so bad for a first day off.

A few miles away, a tiny girl was dreaming of a magical battle and her lips, rustling in her sleep, practiced pronouncing the ancient spells. A tiny unicorn of ice adorned her frost-covered bedside table…

The end

Ethereal Stories: Witches.com

Today I post a text I wrote for an old project, making a short movie or a play with my sis and friends a few years ago. It never happened but one day maybe… Who knows?

Not being Spielberg and not having an unlimited budget, I wrote this story with several constraints. It needed a unity of location to avoid having to multiply decors and then a contemporary setting to avoid having too many costumes.
Good despite all that I hope that the story will be pleasant!

Witches.com

http://www.mirageboghandel.com

“Welcome, people of Sidh, to the supernatural site of the mirage boghandel bookshop, run by Christiana Spandemager* , licensed witch.
Here you will find all types of rare, exotic, forbidden, bewitched and other original books, available on demand or on order.
Proof of your belonging to the People of Below will be required for any purchase of an item of category 3 or higher.
If you wish to meet us, physically or esoterically, the contact tab will allow you to find our address in Copenhagen, as well as the signature of our psychic presence.
The bookstore and all its staff thank you for your visit. »

I

Well, that should do the trick. Anyway, it’s not like I got paid for this job. And then my mother can’t tell the difference between a bookstore’s website and a Facebook page, so good… That’s also why I was chosen.

Christiana, my mother, has run this bookstore since she was eighteen and she is very proud of it. The apple of his eye. Not like me. You should also know that, in the family, we have been witches from mother to daughter for more than thirty generations. In other words, a lot of time. And then there was me. A failure in the family tree, no doubt. For me, Eleanore, sixteen years old and all my teeth, witch’s daughter, witch’s granddaughter, etc. I inherited absolutely none of the family gifts. But really none, not the slightest talent for sorcery. I am unable to cast even a minor incantation or craft an itch charm. Not even a small potion of nothing at all. Still, any fool with a recipe and the right ingredients should be able to make a decent potion, but not me, no. Nothing.

I chuckle now, but it wasn’t easy at first. When it was realized that I did not have the slightest magic power, the disappointment was great. And if I got used to it fairly quickly, my mother did not. She just couldn’t accept that the daughter of the most powerful witch in Copenhagen, and probably this half of Denmark, could be an ordinary human without the slightest supernatural ability. She lived in denial for quite a while, trying more and more exotic incantations in an attempt to reveal my magical abilities. Of course, it didn’t work.

When she finally came to terms, she just decided that the rest of the world didn’t need to know who I was. Out of the question that the other inhabitants of Sidh learn that his daughter was a “disabled person”. This means that almost all of the People Below know nothing of my existence, with a few exceptions, such as Fatima or Alibert, whom I have known for a very long time.

Speaking of Fatima, here she comes to check that I’m not sabotaging the work out of resentment towards my mother. She walks through the door gracefully, tall, thin and imperious, her long hair flowing behind her. She smiles at me, sits down next to me, and casts a doubtful glance at my computer screen.

— The design isn’t too bad, but you should enlarge the font. What is the password to access the esoteric part of the site?
— Abracadabra.
“You’ve always had a deplorable sense of humor. Keep the presentation page, but change the background color, it’s too dull. What do you have to click on to get to the part reserved for Sidh?
— On the “m” of Mirage. It opens a page that asks you for the password, and if you give the right one, you get there. Besides, you and mom will have to distribute the flyers at the next black moon meeting, and tell the others to spread the word. Then, once on the site, you just have to choose from the items offered by my mother. I have classified them by subject and by dangerousness.
— Cool. So if I’m looking for the new “Handbook of Magical Deep Sea Plants”, I go first to “Botany” then to “Aquatic” and finally to “Level 2”, right?
— Exactly. There are also the dates and the authors, when they are known. And I’m almost done setting up the keyword search.

Fatima gives me a few more suggestions, before we abandon digital in favor of gossip. She always has an impressive number of juicy news under her belt, I sometimes wonder how she does it and if she isn’t using a little magic to collect all this information.

Fatima is my best friend and also the only one who belongs to the People of Sidh. She also descends from a very long line of wizards, dating back to a priest of the 9th dynasty of ancient Egypt, but her talents are the pride of her parents.
She was the one who had the idea for this website. In less than two days, she had managed to convince my mother that it would be excellent for business, she who until then had considered the internet an extension of Satan (not such a bad bugger, according to Mom, but very badly raised). The next day, I found myself mandated to create the bookstore’s website, with its hidden pages reserved for the People Below. My mother had made me understand that I had to do it well, and above all manage without her since technology and all its derivatives are a form of magic that remains completely hermetic.

II

A muffled scrape above our heads suddenly interrupts our conversation, followed by another. Fatima looks at me questioningly. I shrug, running a hand through my hair.

— It’s Alibert. Don’t worry, he moves furniture when he’s pissed off, and he’s had a really bad night.

Alibert is the vampire who lives in the attic. About four hundred years old, dainty, misanthropic, and completely outdated by the current century, it’s usually not a cumbersome roommate.
“Alibert?” Fatima asks with interest. What happens to him?

“He and my mom spent most of the night arguing loudly over one of Mom’s latest acquisitions. He ended up going to sulk, slamming the door to his room. It happens to him from time to time.
I understand my mistake when I see a glint light up in my friend’s eyes.
“A book by Christiana?” What kind of book?

— No idea, I say in a voice as neutral as possible.

But Fatima has already jumped out of her chair and is heading for the door.

— I want to see that ! Your mother isn’t coming home right away, is she? Come on, come on!

I personally think that this is a potential lot of problems, but I know from experience that when Fatima has an idea in her head, nothing can get her out of it, especially since my mother always has some pretty interesting stuff in store. So I get up with a sigh of resignation to follow her slowly down the stairs. The bookstore takes up the entire ground floor of the house we live in, filled with old, dusty books. Fatima doesn’t even glance at it. The real treasures are in the back room, where Mom keeps the goods for the Underpeople. Fatima starts rummaging everywhere.

— No chance that it is already referenced on the site?
— No, I haven’t had time to register this week’s arrivals yet.
Leaning against the door frame, I watch her move in all directions.
— Ah! she exclaims suddenly, straightening up, a big book with a cracked leather binding in her hands. That must be it.

She gently puts down the old grimoire, which must weigh a dead donkey given its size, then dusts it gently with her sleeve.
“So let’s see what we have here…
The cover is faded black, with a huge moonstone embedded in it and no visible title. Fatima tries to open it, without success despite her best efforts. She frowns, pouts, then whispers an incantation close to the crevices of the old leather. Nothing to do, the book remains stubbornly closed.

— Very well, sir is difficult. So we have to get down to business.

She spreads her arms to either side of her body, and begins to whisper words of power. Her beautiful black eyes turn milky white, her hair stands on end, forming a dark halo around her, her feet rise a few centimeters off the ground. It would be very impressive if I hadn’t already seen it done a thousand times. So I just shove my hands in my pockets, munching gum with a scowl.
Suddenly, the book begins to emit a slight hiss, which intensifies little by little. Then, with a hiss of rusty hinge and a vaguely eerie glow, it slowly opens, its pages scrolling by one after another. Then, in a cloud of dust, a flash of red light escapes from the book and flies towards the door of the shop, overturning all the books that are in its path.

For quite a long time, we said nothing, Fatima’s surprised eyes fixed on the grimoire, and my eyes scanning the mess in my mother’s bookshelves with a bored air.

— Well, decides to say my friend, what was that?
— No idea, you’re the witch. And I also want to tell you that it’s also you who will put away this mess before mom comes back.

Fatima gives me an annoyed look before leaning over the book. She mumbles, then winces.

— I can not read this thing, come here!

I approach cautiously and lay my eyes on the cryptic texts spread out before us.

— Don’t know.
I speak ancient Egyptian, ancient Greek, and Sumerian, but it’s not one of those languages. And you ?
— I did Latin and Aramaic, my mother insisted, but that’s not it either.

It was then that, coming from the depths of the earth, a dull rumble was heard, immediately followed by what sounded like an earthquake. The floor begins to vibrate, the walls to shake, the furniture to move and the books to tumble. I find myself with my buttocks on the ground, my coccyx in pain, Fatima’s knee in my ribs. Then everything stops.
I get up, help my friend to do the same, then we look at each other for a moment with the same thought: what the fuck?

III

— Uh, Fatima?
— Yes I know. You think that…
— “Does that have anything to do with the lightning bolt earlier?” Yes.
— Yeah, that’s what I thought too. Alright, so what do we do?

Our eyes are at the same time on the old book.

— The question is knowing what exactly we released.
— But we understand nothing of what is marked.
— Yes, it is a problem.

Our eyes meet again, then we smile at the same time.

— “Alibert!”

Fatima grabs the collection, slips it under her arm, then follows me down the narrow, dark stairwell toward the attic. I climb the stairs four by four, grab the ladder that goes under the eaves and drum at the hatch. It opens abruptly, revealing the aristocratic and upset face of Alibert.

— What, what is it? You don’t wake people up at such an hour! First that tremor out of nowhere, and now this. It is still daylight.
— I’m sorry Alibert, but it’s an emergency. We need a linguist.

I see a glint of interest light up in his tawny eyes. The vampire has used his immortality to learn every language, living or dead, he knows of.

After a period of reflection almost long enough to be vexing, he ends up stepping aside slowly to let us enter his lair, then stretches out his hands to greedily grab the book Fatima presents to him.

—Ah! he exclaims triumphantly, laying his eyes on it. I knew that one would be a problem, I said so. A magic lock of such power after all this time…

He places it on an antique lectern and opens it reverently, gently stroking the cover with his long, slender fingers.

— Yes, he mutters, an old book, very old, a lot of power locked in there…
He continues his merry-go-round for a moment, then begins to decipher.
— “So, reiker, no, erek… utar, hmm, that word, maybe alum?” Hmmm…

Fatima and I are not moving, waiting for his verdict.

— It’s a Bad Norse translation of a very old and almost forgotten dialect. A little gem. Wait, I’m trying to understand. Memory…bad…jail?

Suddenly, he throws his head back with a small cry of a wounded animal, before turning to us, his eyes wide with terror.

— When…when you opened this book, did anything unusual happen?

My friend and I exchange an embarrassed look.

— “It’s possible,” I said cautiously.

The vampire starts shaking all over, which normally only happens when he discovers a stain on one of his Armani shirts.

— My God, he says in a low voice (which is the equivalent of an apocalyptic swearword with him), ‘the earthquake, I didn’t imagine it, was it? I believe that you have just condemned Copenhagen.
—Sorry ?

IV

Fatima doesn’t seem to find it funny, her lips pursed in a thin line, her fingers clenched as if she were about to strangle Alibert. I place a soothing hand on his arm before glaring at the vampire.

— Would you care to explain to us what exactly it is all about?

He drops into a Louis XIV armchair with a dramatic expression and puts a tearful wrist to his forehead, like the diva he is. His attitude is starting to piss me off, so I plant my hands on my hips, stand my full height above him, and put on my sternest face.

— Alibert, you’re going to tell us what you know, or I’ll tell Mama that it was you who encouraged us to open the book.

His shocked look is comical. My mother scares the crap out of him.

— You wouldn’t do that!
— Are you sure ?

Silence. I raise an eyebrow.

— Very well very well ! I was going to tell you about it, anyway. You know, of course, about the monster that sleeps under the foundations of the city?

Fatima nods knowingly as I open my mouth in disbelief. Eh ? But I am absolutely not aware of such a thing! What is this story ?
They explain to me. Apparently everyone in Sidh (apart from me) knows that the bases in Copenhagen were built to imprison a sleeping monster, which my mother obviously didn’t see fit to tell me. What kind of monster? No idea. Why is he imprisoned? No idea either. How was he asleep? Always nothing. It has been there for more than two thousand years, without moving, so long in fact that no one cares about it anymore, as if it were just part of folklore. In short, we are no further ahead.
“What has to do with the flash that escaped from the book?”
Alibert clears his throat, which does not conform to the character.
“Well, it seems that this book served as a container for a wake-up spell designed specifically for the monster in question.

— It’s annoying.
— Yes indeed.
— So the earthquake just now?
— Probably the monster that was starting to wake up.
— So it’s not over?
— I do not think so. From what is written here, we have about twenty-four hours to put him back to sleep before he breaks free from his prison and destroys Copenhagen.
— Okay, it’s doable. How do we put him back to sleep?
— I don’t know, there’s nothing marked about it. It just says “see the Sayings of the mage Hreidmar” or something like that.
— Oh.

V

New silence. We all look each other in the eye, not really knowing what to do. Then suddenly, enlightenment. I rush to the hatch to reach my room on the floor below, and come back with my laptop. Alibert doesn’t have one, he doesn’t even have a telephone, since he pretends not to know of the existence of any technology dating from after the 17th century. Note, however, that this aversion to the modern does not extend to clothing.
My two companions throw me looks of incomprehension.

—The catalog !

Fatima understands where I’m coming from, but Alibert continues to stare at me in bewilderment. I explain:

— I’ve almost finished cataloging Mom’s books on the site. If the solution exists, it must be somewhere in there.

I log on and start browsing the bookstore’s website, encouraged by Fatima’s suggestions.

— Look at “monsters”. No ? “Copenhagen” perhaps? “Spell Release”?

Minutes pass, our search is still fruitless and Alibert begins to question my genius idea with mocking remarks.

And then, he’s not laughing at all when the ground starts shaking again, not very hard, without violence, a bit like one of those sports machines supposed to help you lose weight. But it vibrates, undeniably. We exchange worried looks.
“Is that what I think it is?”
“The monster’s awakening?” Probably.

— Well, says Fatima, let’s try to deal with the problem in a logical way. Where are we most likely to find a spell capable of putting back to sleep a gigantic monster that has been imprisoned for millennia beneath Copenhagen?
— “The mage thingie perhaps?”
— “Hreidmar?” It’s not stupid. We should even have started there. Start the search!
— I Have Something: A Guide to Ancient Treatises on Magic, Section M.

Fatima and I rush downstairs, leaving Alibert in his attic, which he can’t leave as long as it’s light. We rush into the shelves of my mother’s shop, jostling the books that have already fallen to gain access to the M section. Each of us tackles one end of the section.

— I got it ! shouts Fatima after a few minutes.

She pulls a rather shabby book from the shelves and immediately opens it to find the passage she is looking for. She flips through the pages excitedly. Suddenly, I see her turn pale.

— What ? Fatima, what’s going on?

She hands me the gaping work. I read, after extrapolating the meaning of the text in Old Norse:

— The parchments of the Tales of the mage Hreidmar, containing in particular the runic sleep spell used to put to sleep in the entrails of købmandshavn** the very last argelot of the known world, were lost during the 13th century. No copy has ever been found. »

I look up at Fatima, who is looking at me with a look of despair.

— What shall we do now ? A silver buck is… This is very bad news.

I don’t answer, lost in thought, frowning, pursed lips. Indeed, the argelot, a kind of gigantic psychopathic vulture endowed with magical powers, is not really the kind of animal that we want to release in Copenhagen. For a long time, I think hard, in silence, facing the anxious expectation of my best friend.

— Fatima, your magic, how powerful is it?
— Very powerful, the most powerful in my family for ten generations. Almost as much as your mother, I would say.
— Well, then I think we can try something.
— What ?
— We’re going to do exactly like Hreidmar: we’re going to put the monster to sleep.
— But we do not have the spell!
— We don’t need it. I told you, we’re not going to put him back to sleep, we’re just going to put him to sleep. Now that we know what it is as a species, we can make one ourselves, a spell, we don’t need the mage’s.

VI

— I’m not very good at writing spells…
— Me, yes. You can’t imagine how many my mother made me invent hoping that it would awaken my gifts for magic. Sure, it didn’t work, but at least now I’ve got the concept under control.
— But it won’t work! I don’t mean to upset you, Eleanore, but your spells never work.
— They don’t work when I throw them. But if it’s you…
Little by little, I see Fatima’s eyes light up.
— It can work…

No more is needed. I immediately get to work, paper and pencil in hand, and half an hour later, I’m satisfied enough with my work to hand it to Fatima. Fortunately, moreover, because the vibrations of the ground have noticeably increased. My friend gives me a dubious look.

— Are you sure of yourself?
— Reasonably. Anyway, we have nothing else on hand.

Fatima nods, then begins, her voice full of power:

— That deep in the city of Copenhagen
The immortal argelot rests
And that on the forehead of the sleeping monster
Oblivion forever arises.

We wait a moment, anxious, but nothing happens. The ground continues to vibrate and the walls to shake. Fatima clears her throat.

— Well, maybe it’s time to call your mother.

I look at her in disbelief, my eyes wide like saucers.

— Are you crazy ? Do you realize she’s going to murder us?
— Eli, I don’t have too many solutions left.
— But I have not said my last word.

I recover my computer to continue my excavations on the site, more and more desperate. Finally, I breathe a sigh of relief. Searching for the word “sleepiness” came up with something. Occult lullabies, section F.
A few minutes later, we have the book. The ground vibrates so much that you have to hold on to the walls to avoid falling. Another long moment of laborious translation from Aramaic, then Fatima and I exchange a skeptical look.

— “To increase the power of a sleeping spell, link the power of words to that of music using the tune and lyrics of a children’s lullaby. Watches love it. »

Good, and bah since it is necessary. I set to work and ended up handing Fatima the piece of paper that, with a bit of luck, will save us all.

— So you’re going to have to sing it to the tune of “Twinkle little star”, that’s all I found in a hurry.

She lets out a sigh.

— Very well.

Again, she lets the power invade her, begins to levitate, rolls back her eyes, her hair stands on end. Then, in a sepulchral voice, she begins to hum
Fatima begins to shimmer with magic, as the invisible filaments that bind her to the world appear. Her voice rings out, as if the universe responds with a deep echo to the power of her words. The song seems to glide through the air, sink to the ground, then get absorbed and disappear. Then, the continuous shaking of the floor and the walls abruptly ceases.
The witch lands on her feet, looking exhausted. She turns to me, a slight smile on her lips.

— “I believe we succeeded. Your spell worked, Eleanore.

I smile at her too, then burst out laughing, before looking around the room and grimacing. The worst is not yet over.

— “We make a good team, you and I, after all. But now that we’ve saved the town, and possibly the world, the hardest part remains: cleaning up the shop before Mom gets home, and finding a really good lie to tell her to justify…well, everything. Ah, and I hope you have a Nostalgia potion or two on hand, because you’re going to have to bribe Alibert so that the truth about what happened today never comes out of the attic. We have to be able to establish with certainty that these earthquakes have nothing to do with us and that we know nothing about them. Because otherwise, I don’t think all the powers in the world will stop my mother from killing us.

The end

Notes:

* Spandemager: Spandemager is the name of the first woman burned for witchcraft in Denmark in 1543.
** Købmandshavn: Former name of Copenhagen which means “the port of traders”.

The Wheel of Time

On November 19, a series on Prime Video is released adapting a book series that I love: The Wheel of Time and I am both impatient and at the same time afraid of the result. On the other hand, I found The Witcher cheap on the trailers and I expected the worst but even if the series is mega cheap actually I liked it so hopefully the Wheel of Time will be cool it too.
In short, I love his books and this universe and I wanted to take this outing to tell you a little bit about it.
Do not see any sponsor on this article even if I didn’t say no, if Amazon wants to contact me … ^^ ’

Well in summary, The Wheel of Time what is it all about?

So The Wheel of Time by Jordan and Brandon Sanderson consists of 14 books, a prequel and an encyclopedia, not to mention the derivative products. So inevitably with more than 10,000 pages to read I cannot be exhaustive in a summary and then to avoid spoilers I will only give a hook to the story.

So begins this adventure:

Moiraine who is an Aes Sedai (a magician) and her champion Al’lan Mandragoran arrive in a small village in the province of the two rivers. The following night, the village is attacked by Trolllocs (monsters).
The monsters appear to be targeting 3 young villagers Rand, Mar and Perrin.
The 3 young people, accompanied by Moiraine, Al’lan and the minstrel Thom Merrilin try to escape the creatures of Dark One.

A beginning that looks terribly like a certain book by our dear Tolkien, it is normal and it is a homage totally assumed. The rest gets complicated and this is clearly the moment when the story gets exciting.

In bulk, we find:

A prophecy about the Reincarnated Dragon, a man who would be responsible for the downfall or rehabilitation of the world.
A catastrophe that took place 3000 years ago and ravaged half the world has made the practice of magic very frowned upon or even feared.
A world where men who practice magic gradually lose their sanity. Only women from Aes Sedai are allowed to practice. Part of this order is responsible for hunting down and killing men practicing magic.

Of course the characters evolve over the volumes and show themselves more and more worked and as in the work of JRR Martin, the politics and the interactions between the different characters take a considerable importance (while being less dark and can be read easily by a younger audience).

The wheel of time is also a journey. We discover lots of exotic places and cultures very different from each other, while being very rich.

On the other hand, the story is long, it is true, but it knows very well how to renew itself and at no time are you bored, you always want to know more and for my part I never let go of my reading than when I was exhausted.

If you liked mythology, it’s a nice puzzle to find from which one or another element of the story is taken, so many references have inspired the author, whether it is the Bible, Buddhism, the ‘Islam, Nordic or Asian myths …

Conclusion:

I wanted to tell you about this saga because for me and I don’t think I’m the only one, The Wheel of Time is one of the greatest literary sagas of all time and I weigh my words.
I have never seen such a level of detail in the creation of a fictional world. And the story is just as good as a Lord of the Rings. The only little flaw is that there are one or two annoying characters, but the story is fantastic.
So Amazon’s prime video series is super cool but please try to dig up the books, you won’t regret it.

Cinematographic and literary genres

I’ve been talking about films for a while now, but I’ve never written an article about genres as such, because I wasn’t really paying attention until then. I was told that such and such a film was part of such and such a genre and I said “Okey”!
I don’t like to put artistic works in cases, but we must recognize that certain films or books respect codes which are specific to their genre, and we will see why.

Why classify films by genre?

There are two ways to approach the question of gender:

Either we have the film and then we have the genre:

The director thinks he wants to make a film and then it’s up to the theaters, the producers, see the spectators to give it a genre.

George Mélies, in directing “Voyage dans la Lune”, didn’t think he was going to make a sci-fi movie, for good reason the genre didn’t exist yet.

Either we have the genre first and then we have the movie:

The director will say to himself, I am going to make an action film (for example) and create his film based on the genre

But which came first the chicken or the egg? What is the relationship between the egg, the chicken and science fiction?

I am deeply convinced that in the first place there were films and the more they were, the more we could see similarities appear, first borrowed from other art forms, until the appearance of similarities which were specific to them.

In 1903, “The great train robbery” was released, a film where cowboys steal a train in the American West.
In 1914, “Squaw Man” was released, a film about an English officer who was to marry an Indian in the American West.
In 1916, “Hell’s Hinges” tells the story of a cowboy who falls in love with an outlaw in the American West

From there, the audience thought, “It would still be handy if we had a name for all of our films with cowboys and Indians in the American West!” “
As for the producers, they say to themselves: “I would like to make a film with cowboys and Indians in the American West, but I would like to bring something else to it”
And you get the need to name: The Western.
The label is for the public to say, “I’ll be fine watching a Western.” “, So that the cinema can say:” We offer you a Western. “, But above all so that the directors can say to themselves” I want to do a Western. “
Genre cinema was born.

The genre film is a film in which the genre is creative. It is a film that will take into account the codes of a genre, to exploit them, to divert them, to satisfy or deceive the expectations of the viewer. Because when we talk about gender in the cinema, we are talking about the spectator’s expectations.

But how are genres defined? Well, it’s something very vague and often the same movie can have several genres. To make this article I used several criteria.

How to define a genre?

For me there are 4 elements that define the genre of a film:

The tone of the film
The themes of the film
The scenario (by its structure or concerning certain elements only)
The target of the film

Some people use the format of the film, but for me, it’s a mistake.

When you see the animated film category on certain sites, it makes as much sense to me as black and white films or silent films or even cinema scope films. It doesn’t ring a bell about the movie you’re going to watch.
A genre that brings together under the same label:

“The Emoji Movie”, “Akira”, “Persepolis” and “The Lord of the Ring” (1978)
It’s a label that is useless.

Among its four elements, some will have practically binding conditions, established rules that cannot be broken, but these are often very broad rules.
In the family genre, the only essential element is related to the tone, it must be accessible and viewable to children without bothering parents. Yes, it is fuzzy and arbitrary!

Why are “Maleficent” from 2014 and “Night at the Museum” Home movies and not “Pirates of the Caribbean” or “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” from 2014 are not?

In the Crime genre we have an imperative that falls within the scenario. There has to be one or more crimes, or criminality, and this crime, these crimes, this criminality has to be a big issue in the scenario.

The viewer, when going to see a family or crime genre film, has other expectations, but these are optional. It reveals codes of the genre.

Watching a crime film, I think police, charismatic villain, dark film that happens mostly at night, where the characters are lonely and a little disillusioned.

When people talk to me about family films, I think colorful film, light tone and happy ending, creepy antagonist but just right, brave protagonists.

But when you watch “Home Alone” or “The Mask” you realize that his films fall under the Crime genre and do not have at all that atmosphere that I imagine.

Much like “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part One” or “Coraline” doesn’t tick all the boxes I imagine when I am told a family movie, especially when it comes to the creepy antagonists but not too many!

But the four of them have in common that they respect The indispensable condition which allows them to belong to the family gender.

Finally last detail, the genres are obviously not waterproof. Nothing prevents a film from having a crime theme while including children in its audience:

Indeed a film can belong to several genres:
(Image coco de pixar) (genres: Fantasy, family, adventure, musical)

Ten of my favorite genres (not necessarily in order):

Small methodology point:

I use IMDB to provide me with a list of keywords to add them to a table to sort which appear the most and those that appear the least according to each genre.

Finally, I use Letterbox which organizes the films by genre while prioritizing the genres. Thus “Back to the Future” is classified first as a family film, then as an adventure film, then a comedy and finally as a science fiction film. So Back to the future will fit perfectly into the family genre but a little less than “Interstelllar” for science fiction or “The Big Lebowski” for comedy but still partly corresponds to it.
Finally not only will I tell you about 10 genres but in addition I will tell you about 5 subgenres for each of them.

I/ Historical Movies:

Expectations :

Tone: Serious
Theme: A historic event
Scenario: Depends on the event
Target: Rather adults

Most common keywords:

Based on true story
What happened in Epilogue
Politics
Based on real person
Epic
Husband Wife relationship
Based on book
Battle
Father Son relationship
World War II

Less common keywords:

Psychotronic film
Surprise ending
Cult film
Chase
Cell Phone
Supernatural Power
Kidnapping
Good versus Evil
Sequel
Falling from height

Description:

This is one of the easiest genres to catalog. The facts told must be based on real historical facts. The key word that comes up most often is “based on true history”, but the prerequisite is that it must be based on real historical facts.

In Robbert Eggers’s “The Witch,” is a historical film about colonists who were excommunicated in New England in the 1630s, to whom a whole lot of funny adventures happen. (A whole family dies in misery, resentment, fear and guilt.) But this story is totally fictional, these people never existed.

“Troy” is a historical film when we are not even sure that the Trojan War actually took place.

But his films take place in a context which is based on real historical facts. Conversely, being based on real events is not enough to make a film historic.

“The Social Network” is based on a true story, but is not a historical film. A historical film depicts a state of the world that is no longer today.

“A Beautiful Man”, is a biography of John Forbes Nash, is not tagged as a historical film as it is set between 1947 and 1994.

Whereas “Zero Dark Thirty” which tells the story of the hunt for Bin Laden is a historical film set between 2001 and 2011.
The difference is in the subject. “A Beautiful Man” might as well be set in another era. It is not the indirect portrait of a society, but only the story of a man.

Subgenres:

Biopic:

The Biopic may or may not belong to the historical genre. As the name suggests a biopic is a biography. The principle is simple, we tell the story of one or more people while more or less romanticizing their lives.

Peplum:

Docudrama:

A sub-genre that is close to documentary, while remaining a work of fiction.

War Movies:

War movies may not have the historical aspects of the conflicts in question, like Disney’s “Mulan” is a war movie without being a historical movie. Often war films are categorized as a genre in their own right.

Swashbuclers:

Genre responding to strict rules, his films must take place in the Middle Ages or the Renaissance, in which a courageous character, almost always male (pity) rebels, sword in hand often against authority. There is often a damsel in distress to save, seduce and / or protect.