A Drift of Quills for August 2020

We Quills are back again this month with some new flash fiction (FF) tales. This time around, I chose the pic that we used as our prompt. Here it is:

I didn’t know when I chose our prompt that I would be revisiting the past, but that’s what I’m going to do. You see, I decided to write once again about Calico Dew, a character I introduced in a previous FF story. (I believe Calico’s primary audience would be middle-graders.)

Calico is an official retriever of magic artifacts. Her dog, Sneaker, who travels with and assists her, is known to abscond with (and even eat!) small, shiny objects. Meanwhile, a witch, Rosita Brack, tries to outwit Calico at every opportunity. 

I decided I'd also make use of some rather well-known lines from some rather well-known works of others from the past. See if you can identify the lines, and if you can guess the identify of the character who first uttered the words in question. (Actually, I think they’ll be pretty obvious.) (Even my title suggests something that came before . . .) 

​And now, without further ado . . . (coming in at 970-980 words, or so) . . . 

Calico Dew and the Vial of Duplicate Sin
by Patricia Reding
Copyright Patricia Reding 2020

Calico held back a chuckle as a memory bubbled up of her younger brother, River, calling the local graveyard a “skeleton park,” but then she quickly grew serious again as she continued, tiptoeing her way through the Graveyard of the Devout.

Stopping occasionally to hide behind a marble statue or concrete monument, Calico kept her focus on the evil witch, Rosita Brack, just ahead. It was rumored that Rosita had stolen the Vial of Duplicate Sin. The Vial held a putrid green slimy syrup that, if ingested, would cause a person to repeat the wrongdoings of the last person to hold the Vial. Calico shuddered at the thought even as she patted her pocket. Inside it, nestled a dried leaf that looked distinctly like a fairy’s wing. Fairy Flickernoodles had given it to Calico, along with an instruction, when she sent her out to retrieve the Vial. “Chew on this in the event of an emergency,” she had said. Thus, Calico kept it close at all times.

​Sneaker remained at Calico’s heels—except when, like now, a shiny coin sitting atop a tombstone, distracted him. Fortunately, he didn’t usually disappear for long, but Calico couldn’t always trust him. Thus, she was relieved when, looking back, she found him loping her way. Once back at her side, he sniffed at her. Then the two looked ahead at the precise moment that Rosita entered a single-crypt mausoleum before them, leaving its door wide open behind her.

Sneaker growled low in his throat. 

Calico patted his head, then crept closer. Soon she heard Rosita from inside, in her high sing-song voice.

“Double, double toil and trouble; fire burn and cauldron bubble,” the witch chanted.

Smelling smoke, Calico inched even closer. Then she peeked inside.

Rosita stood, faced the other direction. Against the wall before her sat a shelf, and on it, jars of dried herbs, bottles of unrecognizable liquids, and numerous tattered, well-read, books. 

There! Calico spotted the Vial of Duplicate Sin. Now, to get to it . . .

On the concrete floor behind the witch, and nearer Calico, a cauldron hung over a fire that emitted a sooty black smoke that tickled Calico’s nose. She stifled a sneeze, crept inside, and then crouched low behind the crypt.

Rosita bustled about, picking up and then returning items from the shelves. When she found an ingredient she liked, she added a portion to a mortar. This she did several times before she opened the Vial. She poured a few teaspoons of the syrup into the mortar, resealed the bottle, and then set it back down. Once done, she grabbed the pestle and proceeded to grind the items together. All the while she hummed, unnervingly off-key. 

A quiet minute passed before, quite suddenly, Rosita stopped. She lifted her head and sniffed the air once, twice, thrice. Then she muttered something about a pretty dog, or so Calico thought. Still, the witch's voice was so low that she couldn’t be sure.

Rosita turned around and stepped nearer the fire. Holding a grimoire in one hand, and the mortar in the other, she slowly emptied its contents into the pot, as she read out loud:

Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg, and owlet's wing--
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

Calico held her breath, pondering how she might snatch the Vial and escape with it, when quite suddenly, Rosita cackled, “I’ll get you my pretty, and your little dog, too!” 

Rosita had spoken loud enough that Calico knew with certainty, that her presence was no longer a secret and so, believing it best to face trouble directly, she stood.

Rosita loosened a sorry substitute for a laugh. “Do come closer, my dear,” she whispered, crooking her finger.

Calico shook her head.

“Ahhh, but I’ve something here for you. Now, now, you needn’t fear me, child.”

Once more, Calico shook her head.

“No fear! No more fear!” the witch cried before grinning her wicked grin. Then, “I have been changed for good,” she said as she inched closer.

Calico backed away, turned to her right, and then circled around the crypt, all the while keeping her focus on the evil witch. Soon, she stood near the shelf of potions and ingredients. For a second, she allowed herself to glance at them. There, just as she’d seen previously, sat the Vial. She grabbed it.

With a shrill and piercing scream, Rosita charged, but before she could reach Calico, Sneaker snapped at the witch, grabbing her skirt. He shook his head and growled, even as Calico rushed to the door.

​“Sneaker!” she cried, the moment she reached its threshold. “Sneaker! Come!”

After loosening his hold on the evil witch, Sneaker ran to Calico. The moment he was close enough, and with the witch approaching from behind, Calico stepped out and grabbed Sneaker's collar. Then she put the leaf that Fairy Flickernoodles had given her in her mouth, and chewed. 

In a second—and must to her surprise—Calico took to the air. 

Shortly, she arrived back home. When her feet came to rest on the ground once more, she looked up. 

“Fairy Flickernoodles!” she cried. “It worked! The leaf! I don’t know how, but I— I—” She stopped short, unable to find the right words. 

She fairy chuckled. Then, “Everyone deserves a chance to fly,” she said.

​“But it was amazing! That leaf was . . . like magic!” 

“Oh, the leaf was just to give you courage, my dear. Indeed, it had no power whatsoever.”

“But— But, I flew!”

​Once more the fairy laughed. “You’ve always had the power, my dear. You just had to learn it for yourself.”

Did you identify the portions from works from the past? Here they are:

1. “Double, double toil and trouble; fire burn and cauldron bubble.”
The Three Witches from The Tragedy of Macbeth, William Shakespeare, Scene I.

​2. “I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little dog, too!”
The Wicked Witch of the West, from The Wizard of Oz.

3. “Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg, and owlet's wing--
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.”
Second Witch from The Tragedy of Macbeth, William Shakespeare, Scene I.

4. “I have been changed for good.”
Sung by both Elphaba and Galinda in “For Good,” from the Broadway musical, Wicked.

5. “Everyone deserves a chance to fly,”
Elphaba sings this in “Defying Gravity,” from the Broadway musical, Wicked

6. “You’ve always had the power, my dear. You just had to learn it for yourself.”
The Good Witch of the North from The Wizard of Oz.

I do hope you enjoyed that. 

And now Robin Lythgoe, author of As the Crow Flies, has a tale for us all. Take it away, Robin!

Title
by Robin Lythgoe
Copyright Robin Lythgoe 2020

Smoke and the stink of rotten eggs shrouded the Issves te Ergint encampment. Thin, powdery ash drifted in eddies, settling over buildings, camp tents, wagons, hitching posts. Men… Despite the season, soldiers wore scarves over their faces, wet to stifle the fumes and poison. Ergint jidoma, the natives called it. Live silver. Invaluable to the rich and powerful; death to those forced to extract the stuff from the bowels of the earth.

​Heat challenged winter’s bitter cold as the nearby mining town died in fierce shades of red, orange, bronze. Mostly red. It was foolish to set fire to wood permeated with poisonous dust. Or so the Dog thought as he strode between rows of gray- and vermilion-streaked canvas…

Be sure to follow the link for the rest of Robin's story.

Finally, let's hear what P.S. Broaddus, author of A Hero's Curse, has for us. We're waiting anxiously, Parker.

Stoppering Death
by P.S. Broaddus
Copyright P.S. Broaddus 2020

You would be forgiven for thinking you had stumbled into an apothecary. Or an herbalist's shop. It was actually a dead man's home. If you could call it a home.

​A single room occupied the back of the junk and trinket shop, "Treasures and Troves," where the proprietor, Janey Muld, allowed, (or had allowed until very recently), Thadeous "Gutrot" Flynnder to live, in exchange for some small rent payment, (more often forgotten by both than not).

"Gutrot" Flynnder made a meager living doling out herbs, medicines and cures for everything from warts to the more severe and deadly cases of "blueface." He never set a price. Whatever the widow, or tramp, or jobless father from the Wayfair could afford. Which was often nothing. His remedies, unlike his finances, often hit the mark. This might have surprised anyone who cared to take notice, but hardly anyone except the hopeless even knew "Gutrot" Flynnder's name, much less where he could be found.

Hardly anyone.

Which means, almost no-one.

Which really means, someone.

​Find more here.

Once again, be sure to follow the link for the rest of Parker's story.

Well, thank you so much for stopping by. Please do again. In the meantime, we'd love to hear what you think, or even to take a look at your flash fiction tales.

​Until next time!