Hugh J. O'Donnell

I brushed aside the tent flap, and the odd but now familiar scent of the nomads’ mounts hit me. I had been living with them for over six month. I learned their language and their customs. I had earned the right to a mount of my own. But the beast had to accept me.
I reached up a palm, and one of the massive creatures bent its flat head to nuzzle it. The twenty-foot tall creature gazed down at me with luminous eyes.
I’d done it. Now all I had to figure out was how to get into the saddle.

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The pool at the oasis temple was only a few feet across, and its water was too salty to drink. Yet a canoe sat in the center, with its paddles tucked up as though prepared for a long journey.
“Why do we have a boat?” An acolyte asked, perplexed as he watched a group of pilgrims line up just to sit in the little wooden vessel for a few minutes. The priestess smiled and took him aside.
“The desert is vast, harsh, and unforgiving. We must learn its ways to survive. But here, we can begin to know the sea.”

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Yara lit the intense and began chanting, feeling foolish. She was sure the spell wouldn’t work, but she had to try.
When she opened her eyes, a translucent figure as insubstantial as the smoke stood before her.
“Mother,” she began, unsure of what to say.
“Yara?” The shade asked, taking in the grown woman before her.
“It’s me. I wanted you to know that I made it. I wanted you to know that I’m alright.”
The ghost started to become fuzzy, the spell already dissipating.
“I wanted you to know that I’m sorry,” the warrior said to the empty shrine.

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The river was widely considered to be completely unnavigable this time of year. The brutal temperatures and floating icebergs would be the doom of any normal river raft.
But when you absolutely needed to get something upriver, you called his team.
They were a crew of three. The pilot steered, and his dog pointed out the ice floes as they drifted into their path. The dragon sat on the roof and melted the icebergs with her fire breath before they got close.
He poled out onto the river, determined to deliver the little girl’s medicine before it was too late.

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The ghost hunter looked up at the property and then back down at the pictures on her phone, taken only a few days before.
“Yeah, dispatch. This place is definitely haunted.”
“Which site are you looking at? There are over dozen potential targets in the neighborhood.”
She looked up at the towering structure. It was a chaotic amalgamation of porches, windows, and pointed roofs. The rotting boards and sagging foundation of the house on the bottom shouldn’t have supported them all. She looked at the translucent glowing figures that surrounded the building. They hadn’t noticed her yet.
“Not anymore, dispatch.”

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The detective poured two shots and pounded one of them. The glass of honey mead seemed like a mug in her tiny fist. Her wings twitched as it went down.
“Listen up, Sweetheart,” she said to the girl sitting across from her. “Around here, there are just three rules: Never eat or drink anything. Never tell anyone your real name, and never make a promise you can’t keep.”
Candyfloss Pink, Faerie’s greatest private detective, looked the human girl up and down. Tonight she was going to break all the rules.
She reached across the table and drained the second glass.

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As the heroes pushed their way through the Fiend’s Fortress, they stumbled across a secret door and found themselves in a dinning room laid out for afternoon tea. A fresh pot steamed on the table, and a cart piled high with pastries waited nearby.
“This must be the break room,” the thief said and poured himself a cup.
“Let’s just make sure it isn’t poisoned,” the alchemist said, and sprinkled one of her powders onto the surface.
The cup rattled, then exploded in a geyser of purple smoke.
“Well?” The Warrior asked, his arms full of sandwiches. “Is it safe?”

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The warriors carved their base out of the side of the canyon, making a fortress impossible to breach.
They lived clinging to the cliff walls. They pulled fish from the swift waters and grew what crops they could in thin gardens that hugged the cliffside. They bided their time, safe from the reach of their enemies.
But just as the rocks below were worn away by water and shaped into graceful arches by the wind, they couldn’t help but be changed by their time in the canyon.
They had set their swords aside and picked up hammers and chisel instead.

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The gods divided the world into Civilization and The Wild: Order and Chaos. Humanity lived in the light, while the shadows swarmed with monstrous creatures who hated and cursed them for it.
The wizard contemplated the problem for many years. Danger and death were built into the world, but there had to be a better way.
The spell was his life’s work, taking decades to cast. He changed the fundamental nature of the world and transformed the monsters’ hate into love.
Unfortunately, while the spell worked after a fashion, the attacks continued. Monsters loved humans. They were their favorite food.

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There was a rumbling and shaking, and a figure began to emerge from the Fire Crystal. The stone emitted a gout of scarlet flame, and then a girl of made red, glittering ruby stood staring before them, an intense expression on her face.
The adventurers raised their weapons.
Then the girl blinked, and the fires guttered. She stared at them, uncomprehending.
“Where am I?” she asked.
The white mage clicked his tongue, reached into his pack, and pulled out a spare robe. He placed it around the girl’s shoulders.
They had expected a fight, but rescue was more his style.

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