Tag: fantasy

Posted in Fiction, Published, Twisted fairytales

Doors: Part 2 of 2

Posted on by Shaily Agrawal

Author’s note: This is second and final installment of a Twisted Fairytale from my fifth short story compilation, Ugly: Twisted fairytales.

Tonight, on Halloween, we came to this village to collect the last tooth for the next five years. The next kid in line is just one year old, so it will be some time before he loses his teeth. All day long, Nui had been alternating between being lost, excited and jumpy. Every time I asked, she behaved too innocently. So, of course, I told her, “I won’t let you enter those magical doors. We have no idea where they lead and whether they let you return.”

Her reply was, “What doors?” Obviously, I never let her out of my sight all day.

When we finally reached this kid’s house, there was a storm outside. We entered the house through a crack in the window. I started the process of retrieving the tooth, while Nui stood guard at the windowsill. A newly acquired cat jumped on me. For a quarter of an hour, I hide inside a closet worried out of my head about this girl until I realised the truth. There was no way the cat could outwit her. She left before the cat came in…

…which means she entered one of the doors.

So, after I managed to dodge the cat, I now stand in front of all these doors, trying to guess which one she took and come up blank. Her spell‑phone is not reachable. I have called out her name several times but, I’m afraid, she can’t hear me. I have called her boyfriend to check if she had discussed the door that she’d prefer…But he’s as dumb as ever, “You let that vile cat eat her!” As if a cat could ever catch her. She would tie its hands and legs and roast it on a spit before it could blink. She’s my guard for that very reason—she’s a Fighter!

When I tell him about the magical doors, he comes up blank. Did she never talk to him about them? All he has to say is, “You are trying to frame her for breaking the magical rules!”

Seriously! I understand he disbelieves me, but does he even know her? She never follows rules. “I’m going after her. Do you want to join me? Together we can cover more doors.”

Suddenly, his voice changes, guarded, “We aren’t sure where those doors lead. It is too dangerous for us…”.

After a few seconds’ hesitation, he sounds braver, “Anyway, we aren’t sure that she took the doors at all. Even if she did, we don’t know which one. You just said, there are too many doors, right? What if she isn’t in the door either of us take? We’ll never find her that way. I guess, we should report her to the authorities. They will send a search party. Meanwhile, we should just wait here for her to return.”

“Come on! Authorities will wait for twenty‑four hours. That could be too late.”

“It’s probably already too late. She could already be de…” He could not complete his sentence though—because I hexed his spell‑phone to shove up his ass. He will stay busy with it until another Spellman creates a counter‑spell.

But now, he can’t help me. So, I have to take a wild guess at the door she took. In my mind, I picture her fighting fantastic creatures and living her dreams. I’m scared. I am no Fighter, just a Spellman who knows a few magic tricks. But I want to be by her side when she wins the world. Most of all, I just want to be with her. I can’t stand the thought of never seeing her smile again.

I have only one chance to guess the right door. There is no guarantee that once I am in, it will ever let me out. If I choose the wrong one, I might be stuck without her forever. The thought scares me even more. So, I try my hardest to guess.

I decide to guess the doors she’ll never take—she hates the red‑, purple‑ and yellow‑coloured doors. She finds them too girly. She’ll never take the green one—it’s too small. If she wants to break the rules, she’ll do something grand. This leaves the two huge blue doors. I approach the bigger one with burns and scratches the size of a dragon’s nails. My hands shake at the thought of facing whatever is on the other side…

She could be fighting it alone!

With that scary thought, I gather all my courage, wave my wand and pull the door with all my magic. The door wouldn’t budge. I can’t even create a crack to peep in and see if I can spot Nui anywhere. The thought of losing her forever is driving me crazy. I move in front of the next door to see if I can find her there.

But before I can do anything, a small crevice opens in the first door and Nui falls out. My heart jumps into my throat as I fly to her, worried that I am too late. But she pulls me in a bear hug instead! “What took you so long?”

“Well, you didn’t exactly leave a forwarding address. Did you?” I’m too relieved to care that I’m shouting at her.

Ideally, this is when she kicks me, but she just smiles and says, “I knew you’d know where to find me.”

I don’t want to be placated. But how could I not be? She’s fine and back, speaking of which, “Why did you come back out? You could have just pulled me in. Now I have to try opening the damned door again.”

“Naah! They left without us. Anyway, I’m not sure I’m welcome anymore—I hit the doorman,” she shrugs. My brows rise up to my hairline, so she adds, “Well! I entered the door and was waiting for you in the lobby on the other side and heard you call my name. I shouted back but I guess you couldn’t hear me from the inside. Then I heard you call my guy. I was afraid he would want to come too, so I stayed quiet. I was cheering when you hexed him, when the doorman announced that we were leaving and the next flight would not be until Halloween next year.

So, I tried reopening the door to call you in, but he stopped me, quoting some guideline that the door mustn’t be opened from the inside. I could hear you trying to open the door with magic. You could have just pulled the handle, you know! I was worried that we’d leave you behind and the doorman still won’t let me open the door.

I decided it wasn’t worth it without you. So, I punched him and let myself out.” Blushing furiously, she entwined our fingers as we flew away to our next assignment.

Author’s note: To be continued…

If you would rather read it all together in the book, Ugly: Twisted fairytales is available for free download here: Link

Photo by Ranurte on Unsplash

Posted in Fiction, Published, Twisted fairytales

Doors: Part 1 of 2

Posted on by Shaily Agrawal

Author’s note: This is first installment of a Twisted Fairytale from my fifth short story compilation, Ugly: Twisted fairytales.

Not sure which one she took—there are too many doors on this wall. Ever since the day we found this little nook in this village a couple of years back, Nui had been burning with curiosity. We come here often to collect the occasional teeth from under the pillow and look at these doors, but not as often as Nui would like to. With people having fewer children, there are fewer teeth to collect.

Okay, just in case you are confused, we are tooth faeries. She is a four‑and‑a‑quarter‑inch Fighter and I am a five‑inch Spellman. We are a team and we collect teeth together. Why?

Because, to pry out broken teeth from under the pillow, I have to cast the spells to prop up the child, move the pillow, place the coin and grab the tooth and then place the pillow and child back in place. (Not sure why they don’t just keep the tooth on the side‑table. It would be so convenient for us.) So, while I am using all my concentration for the spells, Nui stands guard to look out for any pet animals and keep them at bay.

Cats are especially nasty—stealthy, vicious and quick. Once, when my partner was out sick (a serious case of bird flu—her wings kept twitching like hummingbird’s and her voice sounded like a crow’s), a cat sneaked up on me. I found myself inside the cat’s stomach and it’s not a pretty sight. I had to tickle its intestine so that it would spit me out. Later, I had to shower for almost an hour to take off the muck from my hair. So, you get the drift…

So, all tooth fairies work in pairs to avoid such situations.

Between her and me, we have fifty‑seven villages to cover. You would think that we would be dying of overwork. But children are getting so rare now that there aren’t enough teeth to go around. In fact, most of the tooth fairies are forced to take up smithery or animal‑guard roles for smaller beings, like rats (desperate times!). Most of the teeth forges are now going out of commission too.

For any novices out there, teeth forges are where new human teeth are forged on order. Every end of the day, we submit the acquired teeth at the teeth forge. The teeth smith takes the measurements and DNA print and then forges new teeth to replace the old ones. The old teeth are recycled, of course. A delivery elf, then, submits the new teeth to the Great Guy on the seventh cloud to be dispersed as needed. All that is beyond our job role, of course.

Anyway, Nui and I are best friends, even though it is rather difficult. She has an adventurous spirit and a knack for getting into dangerous situations—like the day she decided to adopt a lost pup. He’s a Great Dane who loves catching anything that flies too close. It took us a couple of weeks and several trips to its stomach before it learnt not to catch faeries.

Her boyfriend—another Fighter fairy—doesn’t approve of the Dane. On second thought, he doesn’t approve of me either. He thinks I’m hitting on her. Initially, I told him, “Mate, I gave up on the day we became partners 93 years back.”

I had made a move on her on the first day at work and she gave me a black eye. Ever since then, I’ve stuck to being friends. But I keep that piece of information to myself. No need to humiliate myself when he doesn’t believe me anyway.

Well, his loss! Every now and then, he tells her to dump me, and she gives him the black eye instead.

Nui is the reason for being a tooth fairy worth it—it gives us an excuse to stick together all day. I think the Great Guy on the seventh cloud knows about it too and, hence, he hasn’t changed our pairing in all these 93 years—a rarity in our field.

That’s why, I let her drag me to look at these doors every time we’re in the village. They are inside an old building that belonged to a bunch of humans named ‘Karpenters’ once upon a time. They used to build things out of wood here. But a couple of decades ago, when a fire crashed a couple of walls and the roof, they deserted the place. Now, they say the place is haunted and no one visits it anymore, which suits us just fine. Every time we have an assignment in this village, we sit here for hours and look at these magical wooden doors.

How are we so sure they are magical?

Well, why would anyone place so many doors on the same wall, unless they all lead to different places? Deductive reasoning, you see.

Also, they are all different colours and sizes—some of them too small for grown up humans—and all of them are well‑worn. Some of them have claw marks all over them (Werewolves?) while one looks severely burnt (Dragons?). Nui loves to contemplate about where each door would lead us. Many times, she has asked me to come with her so that we could enter them together. I’m curious too but not crazy enough to try. With magic, you could never be sure where they would take us.

Author’s note: To be continued…

If you would rather read it all together in the book, Ugly: Twisted fairytales is available for free download here: Link

Photo by Ranurte on Unsplash

Posted in Fiction, Published, Twisted fairytales

Barred

Posted on by Shaily Agrawal

Author’s note: This is a Twisted Fairytale from my fifth short story compilation, Ugly: Twisted Fairytales.

I stand staring at the bull’s head that guards the door for almost a minute before it acknowledges me, “You are not welcome here. You do not buy drinks or food. You do not pay. You just occupy a table to stare at the barmaid. So, I’ve been instructed to keep you out.” With those words, it goes silent and begins chewing the non‑existent cud—an old habit that is hard to die even after being mounted on a wall for centuries.

I’m rather crushed. I’ve been a regular for almost 56 years, and nobody has ever said a thing. It is the biggest bar on this side of the world. There are more tables than I can count. It’s not like my occupying a table would hurt their business…

I love the place.

It’s ancient in the literal sense of the word. It was probably built before the first human (What’s‑his‑name again?) was born. Anyone who ever sat with the owner for two minutes would know that his great‑great‑great‑grandfather had paid Irish pixies in emeralds for the intricate woodwork cabinets that hold hundreds of crystal bottles of finest witch‑brewed potions from around the underworld. The rustic urn sitting quietly on the side holds never‑ending fires from the depth of Tartarus as a payment by an escaping titan. The chiller next to the sea‑side window contains glacier ice from the Arctic Sea—investment by a mermaid who holds ten percent interest in the establishment. The colourful murals across the walls speak of the beauty across realms. Portraits of banshees, goblins, dwarves, ogres, trolls, will‑o’‑wisps and fairies adorn the bar walls. And the bewitched guardian bull’s head was a gift from my forefathers for harbouring and feeding numerous wizarding families like mine during witch trials.

*****

But that is not why I love this place so much that I have visited it every evening of my life, except the last month.

I look longingly through the window at the barmaid—my Luni, as I like to call her in my mind. I’m careful not call her that in the face though; she’s not the lovey‑dovey kind. It’s her first day at work after a month’s leave. How I miss her…

I sigh. She’s the prettiest ogress ever; and she looks even prettier when she mixes potions—her luscious grey lips pinched together tight in extreme concentration as she focuses on the exact quantities of the ingredients. Even one extra pinch of the volcanic ash can burn down the ancient wooden bar table; a drop of elixir less and the drink would become poison. She walks a tight rope all day, I’d say, but she never complains.

Hades! How I miss being inside the bar. I look at the guardian bull’s head again as he continues to ignore me. I know it is pointless to force my way in. Nobody can cross the threshold without its permission. My ancestors ensured that. Of course, I can watch her through the window from here too. But she is even prettier up close. Her skin is the colour of fresh cut grass; a sweet little pug nose is set between large onyx eyes that pull me in.

I love her!

Of course, my mother doesn’t approve. According to her, “What you need is a witch who can set her own cauldron and brew her own love potion; not someone who mixes readymade potions from the market. And she should be light enough to ride the broom with grace and not weigh it down!”

As if my Luni is heavy! In fact, she’s not as tall or curvy as other ogresses. Her petite frame barely reaches 8 feet and she’s well below the normal 500+ pounds. And she’s not a hare‑brained husband‑hunter. She always held her own without a man in her life.

*****

She looks up at the window, sees me and looks away smiling her secret smile. Suddenly, the truth dawns upon me—she’s the one who forbade me from entering. Now, I wasn’t taking any of that. So, I look back at the bull’s head. “I think, there’s a slight misunderstanding. The owner never had any problems with me before. Why would he forbid my entrance now?”

“He didn’t. The barmaid did.”

Ah, so I’m right. “Would you please ask her exactly why she forbade me from entering the bar?”

The bull’s head disappears from the mount behind him. I know from 56 years of experience that he has reappeared on the empty mount inside the bar directly behind this wall. He will announce the question. Once he has the answer, he’ll reappear outside. So, I wait patiently.

Soon, my patience is rewarded with an answer, “She said that you distract her. So, you are bad for business.”

“And how exactly do I distract her? I barely speak at the bar.”

The bull’s head rolls its eyes and disappears again. As he announces the question, I can see the customers stirring, looking at me through the windows, trying to understand the cause of the confusion. The cyclops winks at me—

Or maybe, she was just blinking. With only one eye on her head, I can’t be sure, of course. The server elf gives me a meaningful smile and continues serving her table. The owner, a troll twice my size, gives me a thumbs‑up and goes back to his ledger.

The bull’s head reappears after some seconds. “You ogle at her from the table. It makes her itchy.”

“And how is that bad for business?”

The head gives a look of exasperation. It disappears with a dramatic sigh and reappears after some seconds with the reply.

“If she’s itchy, she gets distracted. What if she mixed the wrong potions? It would burn down the bar. She said that the bar table has enough scorch marks as a proof.”

“Well, I have been ogling at her for 56 years now. Could you please ask her what changed all of a sudden? Did she meet someone special during her month-long leave?”

The bull’s head is now close to tears, as expected. It disappears with exaggerated slowness and returns with a reply almost unwillingly. It probably knows that this one wouldn’t be the last, “She says, you know already.”

Of course, I do. She spent the leave with me. That’s why I miss her so fiercely. “Please ask her what she does not like—the ogling from the table or the ogling from the table? I mean, even if I stay out, I can ogle at her from the window too. Is it okay if I ogle at her from this distance?”

The dwarf on table 45 is now laughing so hard that he is in the danger of spilling his tarantula juice all over himself and his oracle date has napkins ready for the impending future.

If it wasn’t mounted, the bull would have gored me with its horns. Nose flaring with frustration, it snarled, “Look! I think, you two have mistaken me for a postal pigeon. I’m pretty tired with all this hanging around and I’m too old to be stuck between a newly married couple returning from honeymoon. Why don’t you sort this out with your wife directly?”

As expected, with those words, the door unlatches itself and hangs open so that I can enter. The pretty barmaid gives me her naughtiest smile as I take a table close to the bar a little later than usual and go back to gazing at my Luni.

END

Author’s note: If you would rather read it all together in the book, Ugly: Twisted fairytales is available for free download here: Link

Photo by Kathya Meza on Unsplash

Posted in Random Thoughts, Published

Fifth Book | Ugly: Twisted Fairytales

Posted on by Shaily Agrawal

Hi Everyone,

I have published my fifth book, Ugly: Twisted fairytales. It is a compilation of fairytales with imperfect toads, witchy mothers, fighter fairies and mounted bull’s head that still chew the cud.

Some of them are Grimms’ offshoot. Others are original.

Genre: Fiction, Fantasy, Fairytales

I will post the individual stories right here on my blog. But if you are interested in the book itself, the PDF is available for free download here: Free Books by Shaily

Go ahead and enjoy!

Posted in Fiction, Published

Broken: Part 3

Posted on by Shaily Agrawal

Author’s note: This is third installment of a short story from my latest book: The Bracelet and the other short stories. You can find the other parts here: Broken: Part 1 and Broken: Part 2.

On the morning of the fourth day, I gathered wildflowers that grew within the temple yard. A tiger was manning the boundary. It gave me hope that my ‘friends’ wouldn’t be able to come tomorrow, and I wouldn’t have to go back. I could stay here forever, seeing her every day. I held the flowers lovingly in my arms until she came, afraid to put them down lest they’d get dirty.

When she came, I all but jumped up. She placed the basket in the same place and looked at me. I meekly held out the flowers. She accepted them quietly with a smile that almost made me swoon. She turned to leave. I couldn’t hold back anymore. I might have to leave soon. How could I go without knowing her name? Or rather, how could I go at all?

“Please don’t go,” I begged her.

“Do you need anything else from me?” her voice was teasing.

“I…I don’t even know your name,” I blushed to the roots of my hair like a schoolboy.

“I thought you’ll never ask. People call me Kyarr,” she replied.

“Oh! I thought Kyarr was the deity here.”

She kept smiling.

“I…My ‘friends’ are due to return tomorrow. I was wondering…thinking that…I…Would you…” I couldn’t bring myself to say the words. What if she says no? What if she considers it an insult? I know nothing about her. She could be married. She looks young but people marry early in this part of the world.

Heck, even I’m married! What was I even thinking?

She waited for a few seconds. Then, probably realised I wasn’t going to finish. So, she simply said, “I know your friends come tomorrow morning. I guess, it is the last time we meet.” She was still smiling.

“Would you like to come with me?” I blurted out, then lost all the courage and looked at my feet.

“I can’t. I’m needed here. But thank you for asking.”

It hurt to see that there was no pain in her eyes. She was smiling as always while my own heart was ripping up in pieces. “Will you at least stay the night? I just want to look at you until I leave,” I knew I was transgressing some social boundary, but I couldn’t remember what…

“I can but you might not like how I look. That’s why I haven’t been staying here for the past three nights.”

I could hear the warning in her voice, but I was past caring now. If it was the last time I was looking at her, I didn’t care if a few hair came out of her bun as she slept. Now that I think of it, I can’t remember how she wore her hair—Was it a bun? Pig tails? Or did she leave them loose over her shoulders? She’d still be the only one I love.

“I insist.”

She shook her head, giving up, and sat on the stone throne on the pedestal. Then she gave me that smile that melted my knees…

…and turned to stone—a magnificent stone Tigress.

*****

My helpers returned the next day and told me the goat was still very much alive. I told them about Kyarr, but they didn’t believe me. They said Kyarr, the stone Tigress, has always been there on the pedestal. She was the temple deity.

They said the curse was turning me mad like all those before me.

*****

I would like to believe them and forget all about her, but how can I?

Even though I have returned home, my dreams are full of tiger calls, and my every waking moment is spent thinking about her. Somehow, her being a tigress makes no difference to me. She’s still the one I love.

Often, I see her walk away from me. I call her. I beg her to stop, but she just gives me a smile that would make me follow her anywhere. And then, she keeps walking until I can walk no more. Once I fall, I crawl behind her until I faint. And when I wake up, I find her gone.

My bleeding feet and knees don’t hurt. My heart bleeds knowing I’ll never see her again. I tried booking a flight to return to my Kyarr, but my wife—I can’t recall her name now—she won’t let me go. I think she’s jealous. Could you please make her understand, Doctor? You do believe me, don’t you?

The doctor looks up at me with eyes filled with pity. He stops the recorder and makes some notes in his pad. He signals a male nurse to escort me to my padded cell—my cage from where I can’t escape and walk until my feet hurt and crawl until my knees bleed…

End

Author’s note: You can find the free PDF version of my latest book: The Bracelet and the other short stories here: Link.

Photo by Mike Marrah on Unsplash

Posted in Fiction, Published

Broken: Part 2

Posted on by Shaily Agrawal

Author’s note: This is second installment of a short story from my latest book: The Bracelet and the other short stories. You can find the other parts here: Broken: Part 1 and Broken: Part 3.

I settled on the platform on the tree, hid behind the leaves with the gun in position and waited. It wasn’t long when the goat started bleating. A tiger walked in. I guess, it wasn’t hungry because it wasn’t stealthy. It just sniffed the goat, the goat bleated, and the tiger looked straight at the place I sat.

Somehow, it knew I was there.

I had a clear shot, but the intensity of its stare made my hands shake. I fired but missed.

That’s when all hell broke loose.

All of a sudden, sixteen tigers rushed out of the bushes around me, roaring and tearing at my tree. The tree was rather sturdy and impossible for an animal to climb but, in my bones, I knew it can’t last against so many tigers. I fired several rounds of bullets but, weirdly enough, they hit none of the sixteen.

Soon, I was out of ammunition.

After a few minutes—it felt like an eternity—of scratching away the tree bark, the tigers began to return to the shadows of the forest. But one of them remained stationed beneath the tree. I had a suspicion that he’s waiting for me to get drowsy and fall down. After a couple of hours, as the rush of adrenalin subsided, I started getting sleepy. Meanwhile, crazy as it sounds, another tiger had come in and relieved the first one from its ‘duty’, which means they were working as a team.

It was weird and scary in extreme. Three days from now, one of them would still be here, meaning that my help would never arrive.

I wondered whether the ‘help’ had reached home safely. I wondered when he will return. I had travelled across the world to be here, but now I couldn’t wait to return to my family. I clung to a branch fiercely and prayed to see my wife and daughter one more time.

*****

Dusk arrived and the last rays of light fell on a piece of metal shining on the top of the trees—the pinnacle of the ancient temple of Kyarr. The wise words returned to me: “If the situation gets out of hand…” Well, the situation was certainly out of hand. I couldn’t stay the night here. Maybe, the temple could offer a better shelter. I could hide in the inner sanctum and close the doors. Other people had survived there, hadn’t they?

There was no point waiting to die here. I would rather do something.

I couldn’t carry my baggage. It would slow me down. My guns were all useless without the bullets. So, I used them to create a diversion. I dropped my bag down first, threw my heavier gun as far as it would go in my opposite direction, and then my lighter gun ahead of it. In the end, I threw my skinning knife as far as it would go in the trees. The tiger took the bait and ran towards it.

I jumped down and dashed towards the temple. I didn’t hear any tigers behind me, but I didn’t stop to check too.

I reached the temple in one mad dash. It had no boundary so entering was rather easy. I ran inside the prayer hall and turned to close the doors. There were none.

“Don’t worry. They won’t hurt you here. You aren’t carrying weapons,” a pleasant female voice made me turn around. She was sitting on the stone throne on the pedestal.

“But I had shot several rounds at them a few hours back.”

“But you can’t anymore.” It wasn’t a question. She smiled dazzling me. “Please make yourself comfortable until your friends return for you. If you are hungry, you can have these fruits,” she pointed towards a basket at her feet. With those words, she left the room.

*****

I hid there for four nights until help arrived.

The first night, I could neither eat, nor sleep. Occasionally, I heard the tigers roar just outside the periphery of the temple. Not sure what kept them out though—the temple had no doors to close.

It wasn’t the fear that kept me up though. It was the woman—I kept thinking about her smile, her face, her grace, her voice…

*****

The next day stretched before me with nothing to do. My smartphone had stopped working the moment I had entered the deeper forest, as expected. Now the battery was dead as well. I tried missing my wife and daughter, but I couldn’t. All I thought about was ‘her’. I craved for her with the intensity of a man dying of thirst in the desert. But no matter how I tried, I could not recall the colour of her clothes. I had been so taken in by her face.

At dusk, she returned with a fruit basket. I think, she was wearing something orange. I can’t be too sure. All I could remember was her face and dazzling smile. She asked me if I was well. I wanted to say that I was dying to see her again. But all I could manage was a nod. She left the basket in the same place and left with the dazzling smile.

I wanted to stop her and ask her name. I wanted to ask her how she knew my language and about my friends; where she lived and why she returned only at dusk and only to deliver the basket; why she never said a prayer in the temple; and where was the deity anyway.

But the words stayed lodged firmly in my throat. All I could manage was to look like a thunderstruck tree.

The next two nights were spent pretty much the same way. I tried sleeping but kept dreaming of her. But as soon as I would lift my hand to touch her face, tiger roars would wake me up. I could hardly remember my wife’s name. Heck, I couldn’t remember my own name if I didn’t have my ID in my pocket. Both days, mornings were spent waiting for the dusk to arrive so that I could see her again; and evenings thinking of what I could have and should have said to her.

The roars didn’t bother me anymore. I might not even have noticed if the tigers had eaten me.

Author’s note: To be continued…

Photo by Mike Marrah on Unsplash