Humi Procumbere

     The rapidity of his blinking good eye did not change the specter before him, though he varied the rate. So many...blink...so many bodies...blink, blink...all those little kids...blink-blink-blink...all those wretched birds...long, slow blink...all those...fires...no blink, just a closed eye. He weaved as he toiled with the infinity of experiences that he’d suddenly become privy to when Iphi—that stupid bird, that phoenix—bit him. Nothing. Not one single scrap of her enlightenment existed to help him rationalize the Burning Grounds. “Why?” he croaked.

Ad Libitum

     “Where did you learn to play?” Kent ‘the Bard’ Wheelock asked the old woman sitting across from him.

She looked up slyly, a slight smile slipping along her lips. “One does not become Archeireus et Celatrix Ministrae without learning a number of strategy games.”

     “Don’t become the Bard without it neither,” he muttered.

     Sizing him up, her grin faded, “oh, I do say.” She nodded sympathetically as she pushed her queen-side bishop into play.

     “A little premature, no?” he asked as he threatened the bishop with a pawn.