Lord of the Rings Fanatics Plaza

I have no idea how often I will update this, but I since Modig is gonna be one long giant work, I don't want to toss any other fic in there too.

Right now, I just have a couple of old LOTR-ish one shots/shorts from years past, but I'm also hoping to start doing some of the #VSS365 prompts on Twitter which I'll cross-post here.

It's been *at least* a decade since I wrote this, and I almost want to say it was a prompt from someone/somewhere on Old Plaza, but I really don't remember. I also revised and tightened it up from the original, because I didn't know how to do *subtle* back then. In the slightest.

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Heart of fire was an apt description for me, for the harsh blaze burning night and day within me, demanding to be fed. I feared it would never be satisfied, burning eternally, since that first kindling which made it so relentless.

The wood of Nimloth, the White Tree, was the first kindling in my grate. Despite the painful suffocation as Nimloth cracked and burned and spewed its stench throughout the land—a stench that never truly left the temple ever again—it awoke a hunger which would not be quenched by any wood.

But the pain of Nimloth was trifling compared to the second kindling.

She was so young; her blue eyes such a contrast to the flames, a mere echo of the agony and ecstasy I felt as I consumed her. My flames stole around her, caressing her golden hair and pale skin; her screams music and torture.

There were many, many more like her, each consumed with ravenous hunger and horrified pity, but human flesh was the only thing which came close to satisfying like Nimloth’s wood. The young ones were the worst. Every sacrifice contained terror, but in the children it was unfathomable.

I hated it. And yet I craved it. Each night I spent feasting on the innocent—and on the Faithful—and each morning cursing the Giver of Freedom.

An altar was supposed to be a holy thing.

Wow! That was a lot darker than I was expecting! That a brilliant piece of true flash fiction, and you said you couldn't write something so short! I love unconventional POVs, inanimate objects make great ones because we can get vastly different perspectives. I love that the altar is like a reluctant vampire, feeding off the energy and enjoying it, but at the same time hating themselves for enjoying it. Well done! Moar! MOAR!

Taeth, this is such a cool piece. So sinister! I hope you continue to share these - I enjoy how much can be packed into short pieces like this and love learning from how others accomplish characterization in so few words.

@Frostbite Thanks! That piece is actually how I bonded with one of my now best friends. We met at NaNoWriMo write-in and she mentioned her laptop was named Carmellon and I was like "... Sindarin?" and then a little while later I shared that piece with her and she was like "you are awesome and we need to talk more" LOL.

@Silmarë Thankies! Short fiction is such a challenge for me because I tend to be very wordy (which does somewhat go with the territory of writing epic fantasy) but I definitely want to improve at it.

Finally started up on writing very-short-stories on Twitter today. For those of you unfamiliar with it, it started a few years back. The official hashtag is #vss365, and there's a daily prompt word. Obviously, the limit is 280 characters including any hashtags you want to use.

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Rillaph hated nostalgic moments. A certain tea's aroma often plunged her back in time to when she was still noble, still courting Lapik. The noisy kitchen always rudely yanked her back, reminding her she now brewed the tea to serve to someone else.

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Context: this snippet is a glimpse into the mind of a character in my fantasy novella, The Path of Mercy. Rillaph is a young woman whose noble rank and inheritance were stolen, and she had to flee her country with her younger brother to save him from becoming a human sacrifice.

"Are they genuine?" the mage apprentice asks, running her fingers through the wooden bin of dragon scales, their multicolored iridescence catching and sparkling in the lamp light. "You've heard of Master Sangay. You know what he does when he discovers he's been conned."

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Not related to any other story I've written. Just what popped into my head with the prompt word.

Ouuuu I kinda love the idea of compressing a story into the fewest words possible, and yet conveying enough of it to rouse interest.

Your first piece was a pretty amazing point of view. It’s not easy to tread the “rim of the canyon” between opposite emotions in one character, but you’ve done it well. Even if it’s disturbing, lol.

And if the point of the second piece was to leave the reader hungering for more, the you’ve certainly done so! The more I read it, the more brilliant I realize it is. And fun!

@Bereth when you say 'first piece' do you mean Altar, or the very-short-story (nostalgic)? I'm assuming the very-short-story since you mention compressing a story into the fewest words possible. And thank you for the lovely compliments.

These Twitter prompts are so cool! Love that they are an exercise in concision, too - a more generous form of the 6-word story. I especially love what you came up with for "iridescence"!

Oooooh, I haven't been active on Twitter in years but I love daily prompts and snippets and micro stories. I'm partial to the dragon one because DRAGONS, but I'm predictable like that.

The altar one is hair-raising. What a fascinating POV to think of.

@Tarawen - Thank you! I literally just had an image of someone's hand trailing through a bunch of loose dragon scales for that one. It was fun to expand it just a bit.

@Aerlinn - Dragons *are* pretty fantastic, and if I can get my butt in gear, I have a retelling of Hans Christian Anderson's The Little Match Girl story that I've nearly got finished, but with dragons. And Altar was so fascinating to write, too.


I'd really meant to keep up with the #vss365 stories, but someone submitted a string of math-based prompts the last several days and as a predominately fantasy writer it killed my muse instead of sparking it, ugh!

It defied logic. The way his touch seemed to sear from her skin all the way through to her soul; the way a kiss could make her stop and wait to be burned alive. It was foolish at best, dangerous at worst, and yet she couldn't find it in herself to stop. To pull away. She wasn't sure which would be worse--to lose herself, or to lose him. Surely, as illogical as it might seem, she could find a way to do neither. Somehow.

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Not going to bother posting this one on Twitter. Someone's been throwing up a slew of math-based prompt words and this is the first one in a week that I've actually been able to work with. The character count on this one is too long, but I can't be bothered to mess with it right now. I just needed to get the idea out before I lost it.

May or may not be inspired by Fraeth.

"Don't venture into the field between the forests," Mama always warned. "It's too open. There's nowhere to hide. Any old dragon might snatch you up." It was true. Just now, my barely-toddling brother wandered off when my head was turned and I didn't see him in time.

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I, uh... was not expecting it to go quite that dark.

"I hate complex spells," she hissed, dodging pieces of her home falling from the sky. The rare ingredients were often too expensive, atmospheric conditions too unstable, and her mind too finicky. She preferred intuitive magic. She was less likely to blow her house up.

Ha! I imagine her attempting to put her house back together afterwards and every time something in the spell goes comically wrong. Chimney in the floor, fireplace in the sink, all the furniture upsidedown.

But that poor boy.

@Aerlinn LOL, that would probably be the case with her house, yes. I'm sure the failed spelled left some reside that's just going to be impossible to work with long-term. (And now I'm envision some sort of Magical Hazardous Waste clean-up crew having to come in and demolish it all so she can just start fresh.)

And yeah... the 'field' prompt took a much darker turn than I expected.

I remembered I had a couple spooky-ish flash fics that I posted on my blog ages ago, and might as well share them here this month. If I was writing this today, it would definitely be different, but I'm too lazy to edit it right now.


Content warning: implied suicidial ideation.


“Will it work?”

“A’course it will. Ye know I’m the best potioner in town.”

Their eyes met, each surveying and trying to comprehend the mystery within the other. One set of eyes was blue, gaze steady, filled with both compassion and suspicion. The second set was brown and bloodshot, revealing nervousness as they flickered back and forth.

“I only let trusted folk ‘ave this, ye know.”

“I know. Don’t worry, I’m not murdering anyone with this.”

“Then wha’ are ye doing with it?”

“Finding peace.”

“Surely it ain’t tha’ bad.”

Brown eyes flashed. Blue eyes widened. The subject was not open for discussion.

Gold changed hands and the coins clinked in blue-eye’s fingers. Brown-eye’s left, but contemplation took priority over observation, and feet familiar with the street traversed the path without hesitation.


The potion weighed heavy in the sack. Death was not desired, necessarily, but in this case it seemed the only answer.

Death was nothing to be feared when one was already lifeless; hopefully it was simply the next step into eternal life. One had spoken of this potion, a potion which appeared to bring death to those unprepared, but now the only necessity was for the dreams to stop.

They were dreams of blood and breaking bones, filled with screams and frightened sobs. Dreams that were feared to be all too real when one awoke with sheets and sleep garments dripping with viscous fluids. It had happened every night for a moon now, and fear stayed the desire to light a lamp and see exactly what covered the bed.

The potion was not quite as heavy now. The small bottle rested in a palm, sunlight gently gleaming on the dark liquid as feet stepped from cobblestone to grass. The forest was only a few steps beyond. The cork was pulled from the bottle, and the liquid thrown back into the throat quickly.

The potioner had warned that it would burn.

I thought I should catch up on CoLP threads before NaNo kicks off *g* and realized I've missed a bunch of stuff. But this is my style of Halloween story! I'm not really one for true horror unless it's couched in a lot of something else, so this is a good amount of eerie.

I like the idea of "contemplation over observation" and the image of the potion being "thrown back into the throat" is a prefect contrast to the calm of his walk and the "sunlight gleaming gently". Thanks for sharing @Taethowen!

@Yávië I'm glad you enjoyed it! I'll get my second 'spooky' story up tomorrow or Saturday, probably. It's far more humorous than creepy, so it'll probably be just up your alley too.

Okay, this is more humorous than anything. About a decade ago, my then group of girlfriends would get together every week and watch The Bachelor or The Bachelorette, whichever rendition was airing at the time. Those shows are... really not my cup of tea, but I went to them to see my friends. And somewhere along the way, I got the genius idea to write... this.

Enjoy!

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The host smiled at me from across the set. “Are you excited, Alison?”

“Very excited!” I smiled back, but not too widely. It wouldn’t do for them to see the missing teeth.

“What kind of man are you hoping to meet through this experience?”

What did any zom- er, girl, come on this show for? I knew exactly why I was here, and it had my mouth-watering… but I probably shouldn’t tell him that.

“I’m looking for a man with good, strong brai-” Zombies might be physically slow, but whoever said we were stupid really had no idea what they were talking about. “Bravery. Good, strong bravery.”

That… could have gone better. Just because we were undead didn’t mean we had a lack of human feelings. I wanted to find love as well. I should have twisted that to sound normal.

But we zombies have one-track minds when it comes to brains – no pun intended. I didn’t really like the idea of eating brains, but I really had no choice. Unlike the vampires, we couldn’t substitute animals for humans. It had to be human brains, and adult zombies had to have them at least once every two weeks. Zombie children needed them more often.

Caught up in my thoughts, I missed what the host said next.

“I’m sorry, could you repeat that?”

The interview continued, and within an hour it was finished. The stage lights were very warm, and I needed to get into some cooler air quickly. It wouldn’t do to start smelling.


The evening passed by quickly – nerves will do that to you, but slowly because I needed nourishment – my body was starting to drag. Not quite literally – yet. My ankles felt weak, though, and I needed to sit down soon. Or eat. It was getting harder to think and control my brain appetite, as well.

I stood anxiously outside the ostentatious mansion, trying not to breathe too deeply; a rib had popped out of place earlier in the day. I was starting to become jittery, an obvious sign it was time for more brains, but I still had a few more hours to wait. My zombie status would be obvious if I were to devour the first person out of the limo.

I wouldn’t lie, though, I really just wanted to grab the first guy and make a – albeit slow – run for it. Patience, I thought to myself. There were just a few more minutes before the first limo pulled into the drive, and I took as deep a breath as I dared to steady myself.

My loose rib wasn’t the only reason I couldn’t breathe very deeply tonight. I’d decided to wear a red corset with a black skirt. The men would love the corset, but it would also hold my rib in place should it pop out again. I didn’t think spare ribs of any kind were on the menu tonight – for anyone besides me, at least.

It took me a few hours of applying mortician’s make-up earlier in the day to cover the discoloring on my shoulders and neck, but I thought I looked quite presentable now. I could have saved quite a bit of time if I’d had a shirt that looked good under the corset, but nothing looked right.

I heard the crunch of tires on gravel, and looked up to see the first limo pulling around the corner. It was time! Time for brains, time for hunks, and maybe time for love, though I wasn’t quite holding out for that yet. I was a zombie… I doubted many men would find me attractive when they found that out. Of course, they only found that out when I killed them, so I was literally killing my own prospects.

The bachelors started climbing out of the limo. The first was cute, with a sense of humor. The second not so cute, but charming. The third needed braces, but I realized I was being a bit hypocritical there. So the evening wore on, and then bachelor #17 stepped out of the limousine.

He moved more slowly than that others, but had obviously mastered his movements so that he looked deliberate and graceful. I had practiced for months after being turned into a zombie, and was just now only starting to look clumsy rather than undead. There was a slight bit of decay around his eyes, but he had done well covering most of the discolored skin in the same way she did – with mortician’s make-up. Our eyes met, and I couldn’t help the secretive, knowing smile that crept across my lips. He returned it with one of his own. This was going to turn into a wonderful evening after all.

His name was John. We are opposites in looks – I have blonde hair and green eyes; John has brown hair and brown eyes. We only chatted for a moment or two, but I am certain the evening was about to turn into something much more enjoyable than I originally planned.

The time passed even more slowly as the last six bachelors introduced themselves – they were obnoxious, although some of the ideas they came up with to try and impress me were very unique. What I want is already inside, though – both love and brains. I smiled and sighed with relief when the last bachelor finally went inside the mansion. I didn’t need the entire show with all of its drama and intrigue anymore. My choice is already inside, and so is dinner.

I moved slowly, yet with confidence as I walked up the short garden path and into the mansion. John was waiting for me in the foyer. Even though we just met, I had a feeling that we were going to hit it off very well. He held out his hand, I placed mine in it, and we walked into the party together.

No one heard the screams that night.