Jacq

-Sid

oops its dark

Flower by me.

Sara’s a stained glass artist. Life’s been a little bit rough lately with getting fired after the company she worked for was dismantled for being involved in nefarious dealings. Packing up her tools and supplies, Sara moved more into the city, trying to find a job, but the job market wasn’t having any of it. Lately, she’s had to resort to sleeping in open churches and hoping she wouldn’t get robbed… or worse.

Sara’s a stained glass artist. And she doesn’t have any food. She’ll sit on the corner of the street and offer paintings for some scraps or money. There doesn’t seem to be much interest in her sketches. Sketches are all she can offer with her current tools. Everyone assumes if you’re on the street, working your art, you must not be very good. Or else you’d be somewhere elsewhere. Not here without a roof over your head. Maybe she’ll catch her big break soon enough. Sara’s a stained glass artist.  And no one is hiring.

She may have been a member of the prestigious Black Jackals, but at her core, Allie was nothing more than your average thief. She’d just barely passed the initiation test — it was more thanks to a lucky break than her skills as a thief — and as a result, she was far from one of the more beloved members of the guild. In fact, just recently, she found herself on the shortlist of members who hadn’t paid their dues to the organization.

Well aware that spending too long on the list meant expulsion — and expulsion, she assumed, really meant execution or something, as she’d never met anyone who claimed to be a former Jackal — Allie was desperate. She needed a good haul; something more than the junk she usually found herself the proud new owner of. Something that would earn her more than a weary sigh and a handful of copper from the pawn shop man. She needed adventurers.

Luckily, Lostcastle was a popular stopover for many adventuring parties on their way to and from the nearby canyon. Most of them were loaded in comparison to the average schmuck, with their magical weapons and satchels full of gold and the like. If she could just lift maybe a purse or two off of one of them, she’d be set on her dues for months.

The tavern was busy. Loud and bustling and filled with folks showing off their scars and sharing drinks, armed with a variety of excellent looking equipment. At least three bards were playing — each a different tune, adding a sort of discordant background noise to the racket. The barkeeps were yelling orders back to the cooks around small talk; the waitstaff expertly weaving through the packed room as they delivered trays of fresh food and drink to the tables.

Allie felt super out of place. She was just a small wiry thing, common in every possible way. If she made a wrong move here — tried to reach into the wrong person’s bag or maybe even just looked too suspicious, any of these people could break her in half. There were mages and warriors and those awful bards and there was even some guy with a hawk perched on his shoulder off in the corner (and from the looks of it, that hawk had its own little dinner plate and even a tiny cup of ale). These people were the real deal.

With a hard swallow, she attempted to steel her nerves. Picking a target — a man in a colorful set of robes leaning his elbows on the bar — she pulled her hood over her head and slunk her way across the room, praying for another lucky break.

“This is a bar, right? How do you not even have Elvish perry?!” Tymand was somewhere between shouting and whining at the barkeeper now, leaning over the bar so that he could be heard over the din. The barkeeper had since turned away from him, wiping out a couple of flagons with a rag. All things considered, he’d been very patient with the brightly robed man’s increasingly ridiculous requests. What did he think this was, the Capitol? They didn’t get shipments of Goldentongue whiskey or Death’s head wine here. They had regular old ale, wine, and beer, and that was good enough for most adventurers.

Tymand huffed and lifted himself off the bar. He knew when he was being ignored — what terrible customer service. He didn’t believe for a second the ‘over 80 years of service’ garbage that was painted on the sign outside — this place would be out of business within the month if they kept treating their paying customers so poorly. He was going to ask the waitress for a comment card and he was going to leave such a complaint. That would show them.

The half-elf turned to head back to his party’s table, sure to turn just quickly enough to give his robes that perfect amount of flair as the air rippled through them. Hopefully it looked super pissy, too, and hopefully that awful barkeep saw it and just knew that the manager would be having words with him after his shift.

He was so caught up in his thoughts that he didn’t notice the girl until she hit the ground with a thump. This was not an uncommon occurrence; people really needed to watch where they were going. And more importantly, where he was going. With a roll of his eyes, he reached a hand to help her up, noting that she looked like absolute garbage. Who wore a hood indoors? And, ugh, more importantly, had her clothes ever been washed? He was almost tempted to flick her a gold coin so she could buy herself something that didn’t look like it was dragged out of a mass grave.

She was already moving to take his hand and uttering an inaudible thanks when he noticed a slight glimmer beneath her cloak. Squinting, his focus was drawn immediately to the obviously magical item she had tucked away there (how could a gutter creature like this have something even slightly magical on her? He bet he could offer her, like, two gold pieces for it and get it at a steal, and even then he would still be doing her a favor — she needed to work on her fashion before she worried about arcane artifacts).

She was halfway to her feet when he caught at better glimpse at the item — a small, bejeweled scepter, similar to the one he used to cast—

With a gasp, he dropped her, quickly patting at his sides. Of course it wasn’t on his belt, because it was right there, on the girl. She shot him a sheepish grin as she saw the realization dawning on his face. When that realization turned to something very close to rage and he sputtered out a, “Th-thief!” at her, she rolled and scampered away from him, back towards the door. He lunged for her, fingers just brushing the heel of her boot before he crashed to the floor. By the time he scrambled back to his feet (taking just a moment to push his hair back out of his face), the girl was gone, the door left swinging in the breeze.

Tymand let out a shriek of frustration before chasing after her. As he dashed from the tavern in a blur of color, the man and woman who had been sharing a table with him before he decided to go off and berate the barkeeper exchanged a glance, rising from their seats.

By Chou

by [@Espurr]

To Nanami, the sunset was the best time to visit the ocean. At that time, all the people who came to visit the beach on the edge of her small tropical hometown had decided to pack up, taking all their loud, screaming children with them, and everything was quit. She was free to enjoy her home, the place she lived. She pushed her way through the plants on the shore to reach her favorite place: an isolated stretch of shoreline, with a large flat rock, perfect for leaving things on. She dropped her bag, walked to the end of the rock where the water was deep enough to not see the bottom, and jumped in. As she surfaced, the water bubbling around her, it lit up pink from the sun. She smiled, grabbing on to the edge of the rock, and as she rooted through her bag looking for a piece of melon to snack on, she enjoyed the feeling of floating in the ocean’s foam.

It’s a pirouetting cloud with enviously long eyelashes.

by Teatree

“Secret Sovereign”

In a kingdom of shadows, this flower blooms amongst the brambles, nested high above the others.  Gilded with gold, it seems it was born to be royalty.  Upon closer inspection, however, it looks like the sproutling’s life will not be as black and white as most would expect it to be.  Born in a place and time where their homeland is in ruins from corruption and vice, the light that it holds is of a precious commodity, in fact the last hope of its people.  From what the locals have said, the kingdom is bound for destruction, those with power having swept up everything for themselves and leaving the land barren.

Interestingly, a ragged note lies beneath the flower, written in faded lettering.  Judging by the lack of footprints left behind in the ashes, it must have been put there some time ago.  Whoever it was has not come back since.

“Sleep well, my secret sovereign, for the time will come where you must rise.”

by Knight

“Firebug”

Nima had a lot on her shoulders, that was for sure.  Living in San Francisco was hard enough balancing a job at the local pizzeria with her schoolwork, but of course, that wasn’t the end of the story.  Knowing her life, it had to be much more difficult - after all, she kind of had a secret.

She was half-Ifrit.

See, her father was a pure Ifrit, part of a noble clan known by many jinn.  At some point in time - for a reason he’s never told her - he made his way up to the surface from the underground ruins, disguised as a human, which is where he fell in love with her mother and had her.  By doing so, he also made her his successor, which means she is destined to become the next leader of the clan.  Might sound fun enough with all the magical powers involved, but throw in the fact that there’s training and the unfortunate side effect of her mortality, and things get much more complicated.

One thing’s for sure - Nima has a long path ahead of her.  But hey, no one said it would be easy, right?

by me!

A day at the beach is a beautiful thing,
The sun, the waves makes my heart want to sing!
Sand between my toes, smile on my face,
a day at the beach is my happy place.

Searching for seashells and hidden treasure,
there isn’t anything else I’d do for pleasure.
Making a sandcastle, mighty and proud,
the envy of beachgoers all around.

And when the day comes to a close,
And the sun sets as the soft wind blows.
We gather together to watch the sun set,
This is surely a day we will not forget.

Urua is a bold, and strong space pirate. He is the first mate to the captain. The captain is the brains of the outfit, and Urua is the brawny one. He is fiercely loyal and would lay down his life, almost gleefully for his captain. He runs a very tight ship and most of the crew are afraid of his wraith.
He is a large, dark blue creature with silvery lighter markings all over his body. He is tall with long, powerful limbs. His eyes are red. Urua wears armor designed to protect him against freeze rays and lasers. And he wields a powerful ray gun.

Urua was born into a family of rough and tumble extra terrestrials. His family was not very well off in the galaxy, and being the youngest meant that he had to fight twice as hard to get any attention. As soon as he was a teen, he left home, in search of something better. That’s when he had a run in with a band of space pirates. The first mate of the crew stood up for him, she said that she would take him in and train him to be the best pirate in all the galaxies, besides her of course. And fortunately, the captain agreed. Urua worked his way up from maintenance crew to being a well respected member of the crew. When the first mate took over and became captain, she made Urua, her trusted right hand the new first mate.