Flash Fiction / writing prompts

Do you believe in faeries? ~ episode 20

Chris Hall57 Comments
Illustration from the Rose Fyleman Fairy Book

Previously

The window frame gave way and Mr Eyre burst through the opening: ‘Stop!’ his voice echoed around the almost-empty room; Bryony clambered after him and scurried over to join her sister, who was crouching behind the throne, wearing an expression of pained concentration.

Before Bryony could say anything, Bethany popped her head up from behind the throne and fired a stream of incomprehensible utterances at the tottering trio of arm-waving owlets; a moment later they crumpled like string-severed puppets and three white mice scuttled away into the shadows.

A low murmur accompanied what the two girls and their tutor initially took to be an optical illusion, as a shadowy figure started to assemble itself from the dancing dust motes, disturbed by the breeze from the breeched window; slowly, eyes and mouth materialised within a moon-shaped face. ‘Thank you,’ it beamed at Bethany, ‘your charm worked – you overcame those evil imps who impersonated me and tried to kill me; fortunately they couldn’t find me, even after taking my poor palace apart.’

The figure solidified into a regal, golden-robed individual, who retrieved the discarded crown and placed it on its head. ‘There is one, only one Owl-King, and I am he!’

/….to be continued.

Written in response to two challenges:

Di of Pensitivity 101’s Wednesday’s Three Things Challenge: MICE, NEON, OPTICAL
Denise Farley of GirlieOnTheEdge’s Sunday’s Six Sentence Story Word Prompt: EXPRESS

Bryony, Bethany and Mr Eyre first appeared in my historical fantasy fiction novel, Following the Green Rabbit. They’ve been begging to go on another adventure and now they’ve got their wish!
The novel is now also available as an audiobook – free on Audible with a 30 day trial.

MORE SIX SENTENCE STORIES HERE!

57 thoughts on “Do you believe in faeries? ~ episode 20”

  5. ‘The dancing dust motes disturbed by the breeze…’ Beautiful, Chris. And ‘string-severed puppets’ – I love that. And an unexpected twist too. Revising my opinion of the Owl King – or am I?

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  9. Wow, now that was a nice conclusion 🙂. I’ve also got something else to mention, which you may know about. You’re posts aren’t turning up in my reader anymore. The only reason I knew I’d missed this much anticipated episode was because I received my email notification 😣

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    • Thanks, Deb 🙂 I wonder why my posts might disappear from your reader, although I did post this one a day late. I usually post the SSS on Wed at 4pm (SA time), but this didn’t go out until after 5pm on Thursday. Another possibility is that WP dropped your ‘Follow’ designation for me – I know this has happened to a couple of folk and I had to follow them again. Hope you ‘find me’ again!

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  12. nice energy in the opening lines and relief and more energy from the reveal…
    I’m with jenne on the line: “…string-severed puppets*

    * like, how could you read that and not see the image of collapsing arms, legs and torsi**
    ** plural of torso? ;o

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    • *( Hey Clark, just letting you know that I’ve been roaming around your blog but I am unable to post a comment ; I get the msg :API calls are disabled for this blog…)

      Thanks Chris and sorry for the interruption.

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          • this ‘Up’ ‘Date’ you speak of… this is important? lol

            from the Doctrine ‘there is no case of authority being invested in a person, institution or any (other) agency to designate or otherwise identify another person’s predominant worldview….’
            that said (lol) we’re totally confident that you will be able to enjoy our little personality theory without the need for interpretation… but once comments re-enabled, will look forward to comments, input, wisecracks et al

            Hey! Chris… sorry to hog the ‘party line’*

            * no, if you think 900#, 1980s party line, you are one (or two) generations short of the one we were referencing… don’t feel bad

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            • On the contrary… chat away! The only party line I’ve experienced was the ‘listeners on the line’ when I lived in a house with a Libyan landlord (also back in the 80s).

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