Tag: Clark

It’s a New Dawn

Glad you could join us for the next daybreak episode of Elliot’s Adventures. If you’re new here, you can catch up by returning to the beginning, and reading really fast…

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Photo credit: Sorin Petcluescu

While dawn raked its way through depleted clouds, Trevor returned to the Bower to find the Princess on the floor beside the Prince, his head cradled in her lap, her tears falling onto his face. The Knight’s heart dropped to his stomach.

He jumped when a hushed voice at his elbow said, “Sir?”

It was Miranda, pale and shivery, but on her feet and ready to work.

“Miss Miranda,” Trevor breathed. “Am I glad to see you. Are you really well enough to be up?”

“Yes, Sir,” she nodded, “I’m a mother. Now, if I might have those herbs? I’d like to start on the medicine and tea.”

Clark called out from across the room where he was playing with his sisters and brothers, “Knight Trevor! Did you see? My mama’s awake!”

“Yes, I did. That’s great news for all of us, Clark.”

Barry, carrying both babies in a sling he’d contrived for himself, took his brother Knight by the elbow and led him away from the Prince. Lowering his voice, Trevor asked, “Am I too late?”

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Rising to the Occasion

Glad you could join us for the next determined episode of Elliot’s Adventures. If you’re new here, you can catch up by returning to the beginning, and reading really fast…

Image credit: Elliot 269, Melvyn Yeo / Shutterstock / S.T. Ranscht

Barry wrung his hands. “What’s wrong, Princess? What should I do?”

“I think the baby’s stuck,” she gasped. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to pull it out.”

“Yer Elegance!”

“Look,” she panted, “I’m not feeling particularly elegant right now. I’m just an orphan from the Deep Woods, and I need a Knight’s help. I need you to do this.” Continue reading “Rising to the Occasion”

Doubt and Determination

Glad you could join us for the next doubtful episode of Elliot’s Adventures. If you’re new here, you can catch up by returning to the beginning, and reading really fast…

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Photo credit: Bill Beck

After removing the beast’s corpse from the Bower, Barry and Arturo returned from the honest dark of night covered with persistent rain. Arturo took Trevor’s place tending the Prince’s wound.

The Knight shook his head, whispering, “He’s hanging on by the tips of his tentacles. I’m not sure he’ll ever wake up.”

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Close Quarters

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Image credit: FreakingNews.com / Luis Morgado / Zong Ye Quek / S.T. Ranscht

A crash of lightning followed the shape into the bower. Miranda lay senseless beneath the invading mass of muscle and rage.

Colored spots before Elliot’s eyes throbbed in rhythm with his pounding head. He gritted his teeth against the agony in his side. Thinking only of shielding his daughter, he sank into cold, black emptiness. Cassandra’s voice called to him from far, far away.

“Elliot!” Her cry surged and expanded to a scream of desperate cramping lost in the thunder’s drumming.

The beast’s voice rumbled its own thunder. “Where is General’s Assassin?”

Arturo winced as he moved to stand between the Prince and the invader. Clark followed him.

“Mama!”

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New Arrival

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Image credit: Jose Amorin / O. Gargominy / Anthony Quek / S.T. Ranscht

“Ohh… help me!” Cassandra writhed on the mat, panting, sweat seeping from her forehead to drip with her tears onto the floor.

Arturo moved the cup from Elliot’s lips. “Do you need me over there?”

Miranda looked from the baby in her arms to the Princess, and turned back to place the infant next to the Prince. “No, Ambassador. The Prince needs you here. Clark? Are you all right?”

Clark peeked over Elliot’s shell. “Yes, Mama. Uncle Elliot needs me here, too.”

Elliot’s tentacles shook as he reached to pull his daughter close. His face ashen from blood loss, his voice was dry and shriveled. “Please…” he asked the midwife, “help her…”

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Delivery

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Image credit: rafflethazzle / S.T. Ranscht

Trevor lay face-up in the mud, peering through the deluge splattering in his eyes at the scaly, barbed creature holding him down.

Bending his knees, muck squelching at his heels, the Knight jabbed the stinger into the belly hanging over his face while he thrust his hips up, flipping the attacker over his head. As he sprang to his feet, another electrifying bolt gleamed off each scale of the spiky creature scrambling to right himself. If they’d had fur, it would have been standing on end. Blood dripped from the fang’s gash.

For a heartbeat, their eyes locked. “What happens to me matters not,” the Knight’s foe declared. “We are many and we are here.” He lunged at Trevor and grabbed his arm, twisting till it popped, as he spun to slice across it with the barb at his elbow, tearing at muscle.

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Pushing It

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Image credit: Schnäggli / DP BotaNESIA / depositphotos / S.T. Ranscht

Lying in wait for the next contraction, Cassandra stretched her eyestalks to see around Miranda. “What’s wrong with my husband?” Miranda and Arturo exchanged looks, but neither answered. “Tell me.” The Princess bit back tears. “Why hasn’t he moved?”

Arturo touched her shoulder. “He’s still alive, Cassandra, but he’s very badly injured. The Assassin’s stinger went through his shell, into his body. He’s still bleeding.”

The Princess turned to Miranda. “You have to help him. Please,” she begged.

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Short on Time

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Photo credit: Elvis Kennedy

“But, Mother,” Andre implored, “what was I supposed to do? Samantha’s team wouldn’t leave her alone with us, and when she took us to the front, I watched her kill two wasps with a single move — like it was nothing.” He stared hard at her as if that would communicate the full horror of what he’d witnessed. “There’s no way I could have forced her to do anything.”

Covering her face, Queen Madalena tried not to begrudge her son the senseless deaths and injury his friends had suffered. She tried not to blame him for the head-strong willfulness of his sister, even as anger, disappointment, and remorse tried to tear her heart apart. Her silence lasted longer than she knew.

“Mother?” Andre pressed.

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Second Wave

Glad you could join us for the next awakening episode of Elliot’s Adventures. If you’re new here, you can catch up by returning to the beginning, and reading really fast…

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Image credit: nac-nud

Late afternoon scents of mint and lavender drifting from the cup Miranda held, resisted mixing with earthy undertones of rainy dirt and blood. The Bower’s mushrooms lit the raging storm’s false night, glinting green on tears Vernon wiped from his cheeks. Standing behind Arturo didn’t shield his heart from the sight of Cyrus sponging away the blood still flowing from the gash beneath the jagged breach in the Prince’s shell.

The Princess, unconscious at her husband’s side, stirred and moaned a growing growl. A glimmer touched the emptiness in Cassandra’s mind like a child’s hand warming a frozen rock. It grew into a vice grip forcing a web of cracks from its center, leaking her last waking memories into the once merciful oblivion: the Assassin falling at her foot… his bulging eye… his burbled dying breath… his legs scrabbling in the dirt… Arturo struggling to shove the spasming Stinger off him… throwing herself past them, trying to get to Elliot, falling instead into an abyss of nothingness that now squeezed her toward its surface, extruding her insides out.

The first contraction since her collapse flooded panic through her, straining her eyes open, heaving her lungs, and pushing her to her foot. Elliot! Where am I? The room began to spin.

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Motivation

Glad you could join us for the next motivational episode of Elliot’s Adventures. If you’re new here, you can catch up by returning to the beginning, and reading really fast…

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Image credit: iStock / S.T. Ranscht

Cassandra picked her way off the log, and hurried to outrun the approaching storm. The Bower was darker than night. Miranda must have covered the mushrooms so the children could sleep. Not wanting to wake them, Cassandra whispered, “Miranda?”

“Shh…” came a gentle caution from a shadowy corner. A Clark-sized giggle followed.

The Princess uncovered the light closest to the door. Clark grinned at her from the arms of a crouching, one-clawed Stinger. Miranda lay crumpled at his feet.

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