maltheniel

[maltheniel]

since its the last day of the midnights era - what are your top three songs from midnights, which music video is your favourite, and what's your favourite midnights performance on the tour?

#top two are absolutely bigger than the whole sky and the great war #which have both meant a lot to me since they came out #third I think would have to be mastermind #favorite music video would be anti-hero #especially for how it touched on body image issues #I haven't watched enough of the midnights part of the eras tour to have opinions #but yeah. I'm one day late but wanted to jump on this post

[maltheniel]

i made a roast tonight for the first time and it actually turned out really good

at 35 i'm finally a real adult y'all

#recipe for beef roast #recipe post #hoping to try this soon

[maltheniel]

The Burial of Ward Thornton

This is my entry for the 2023 @inklings-challenge! It's centered around the idea of burying the dead in a respectful way, both to the dead and to the living, and that what happens to our bodies after death still matters. It also wound up focusing on something that I think is central to all of the themes this year, and that is seeing the image of God, or the humanity, of the people others have deemed worthless. Thanks again for the chance to write this, and I hope you enjoy!

~~~

It all began, centered, and really ended around the burial of one vagrant man, the events at Charleston City Cemetery that any gravedigger there can now relate to you off the top of their heads.

But let’s call him more than just one vagrant man.  Let’s give him his name.  Once upon a time, after all, he had a mama; he had someone who loved him and named him Ward Thornton.  That’s the name marked on his gravestone now – just a worn-out bit of rock in a corner, but the name’s still visible, for all that it’s been a hundred years since he was buried.  The gravediggers take care of that.  They take care that all the names stay visible.

Because, after all, that’s the point of the whole story – that one life, one death, one body matters.  That it matters how we’re treated in death, not just in life.  That there can be something about the death and burial of one vagrant man that changes the way a whole group of gravediggers and their descendants think about their career.

So let’s tell the story again.  It’s not a story for everyone.  It’s a story of death, of graves, and of mysterious events that even now no one can explain.  It’s a story the gravediggers tell, because they deal with death and graves and the mysterious all the time.

But we all die, after all.  The grave is coming for each of us, isn’t that what they always say?  So maybe it’s a story for everyone, in the end.

Let’s go back and start where it all began.  Let’s start with the burial of the vagrant man named Ward Thornton.

Jared Myers hated working with Lloyd Webber.  For starters, Webber was the slowest of all the gravediggers and the most particular at the same time, which was a well and truly exasperating situation when you were a man like Jared who wanted to get the most done in any given day.  For a second thing, half the time he brought tuna sandwiches for lunch, and Jared hated the smell of tuna.  And to top it all off, when Jared had tried having a little conversation aside with Webber about the pace of his gravedigging – you know, friendly, man-to-man, just giving him some tips – Webber had looked him in the eyes and said, “I believe how we bury the dead matters.”

“Of course it matters,” Jared had said, laughing. “Why else would we be so particular about setting up the family memorials here if it didn’t?  But Webber, you’re usually burying the random people without much in the way of family or friends.  If nobody sees it, why does it matter if your corners aren’t the most perfectly dug?”

“I think it matters to the dead,” Lloyd Webber had said.  And Jared had dropped the subject then and there, because there was something about Webber’s tone and eyes that frankly terrified him.  Jared would never have said until that moment that there was anything to the old superstitions about gravediggers being a bit spooky or touched by another world, but . . .!

So Jared Myers hated working with Webber, both because doing so inevitably dragged down their rate of doing anything and because he was the slightest bit afraid of him.  For Jared, a job was a job; he had a mother and two little siblings that he had to support after their father died, and this was a job that made money.  For Webber, though, it seemed to be almost a religion.

It was just his luck, then, that they were both scheduled to work a slow Wednesday shift one rainy day in March.  It was not a day where they were going to be doing much work.  They had a big interment coming up on Friday to set up for – the entire list of attendees for the funeral were going to be coming, so they needed a nicely dug grave and a tent set up and all of that.  This was the kind of work that Jared didn’t mind putting time and effort into.  But they also had scheduled that the city was sending over a vagrant man who had been found dead on a park bench to be buried, since he had been identified but no one had claimed him or wanted to have a funeral for him.  That was the kind of thing that made Jared groan when he worked with Webber, because it was the kind of job that could be done in short order with minimal effort if he had been working with anyone else, but working with Webber would make it a whole production.

“Hey, Webber,” he said when they met up, “any chance we can get this city burial over with good and quickly and move on to all the things we have to do for Friday?”

Webber gave him a look that for some reason made his skin crawl.  “You can, Myers,” he said. “There’s nothing stopping you.”

Which meant that Webber was going to spend all day making the vagrant man’s grave as nice as the grave for the beloved grandma being buried on Friday.  Jared groaned internally but didn’t say anything further, because there wasn’t the slightest point.  Webber was Webber and nothing Jared said would make him change.

~~~

Thus it was that Jared Myers and Lloyd Webber were out in the constant March drizzle, meticulously digging a grave in a far-off corner of the cemetery for a man that no one cared about.  They had it mostly ready when the hearse pulled up to the front of the building with the casket.

It was the cheapest type of casket, just a wooden box nailed together.  The city officials handed it off carelessly, along with the necessary paperwork for the cemetery.

“You did identify his name?” Webber asked, paging through the paperwork.

“It should be in there,” the official undertaker told him.

Webber found it.  “Ward Thornton,” he read aloud.

“Alright, let’s get him in the ground,” Jared said impatiently, and moved things along.

It was when they were bringing the casket to the far corner of the graveyard that they stumbled on the slippery ground, and the lid of the casket slipped.  Jared shuddered without meaning to as the shifted lid gave them a glimpse of a thin, shriveled face with open jaw surrounded by gray hair.  When it came to dealing with the dead, he never minded arranging the caskets for the larger interments where everything was done decently and in order and there was family to care, but in the case of those where there was no one to care, there was something macabre about it, and he wanted nothing more than to get them in the grave as quickly as possible.

He moved to slam the lid of the casket shut, but Webber had beaten him to it and was shutting the lid carefully.  He hesitated before he closed it, however, and reaching into the casket, he closed the dead man’s half-open eyes.

“Sleep well, Ward,” he murmured quietly, and closed the lid.

The whole performance unnerved Jared.  “Why did you insist on finding the man’s name, anyway?” he demanded. “The grave’s going to be unmarked in all likelihood, so what does it matter?”

“It always matters,” Webber said, as they moved on toward the grave.

Jared kept his thoughts to himself, but they were distinctly unmerciful ones about the number of people who had thrown their lives away who had to be fit into graveyards somehow.  Webber, with his uncanny investment in the dead – not just in the ceremonies around their death, but the dead bodies themselves – always brought out the worst in him.

~~~

They buried the vagrant man Ward carefully in his far-off grave, adjusting the cheap casket into the bottom of the grave and shoveling the dirt muddy with spring rain over the surface.  When they were done, Webber did what he always insisted on doing and knelt in the dirt for a few minutes, head bowed.  Jared stared up at the sky.  He went to church every Sunday, but he had never heard a prayer for the dead breathed in hallowed pews, and it made him uncomfortable, but he also respected religion enough to leave a man alone when he was praying.

“Alright,” he said with relief as Webber got up, “now can we –” Go get ready for that service Friday, was what he meant to say, but as he started it, the world began to swim around him in a way he was all too familiar with, and he changed to shouting, “Watch out!” instead.

A moment later, he felt Webber grip his arm, almost uncomfortably tight, and the world was spinning so fast that no individual object was visible.  But this spin wasn’t particularly long – by the time Jared was beginning to feel sick to his stomach, things were stabilizing again.

When the world became quite solid around them again, it was very similar to the world of before, except for a few key differences.  The sun was shining brightly, and instead of a newly dug grave at their feet, there was softly waving green grass.  They were still clearly in a graveyard, however, and the trees beyond them were similar, although younger than they had been thirty seconds before.

Webber regained his balance and stood up, letting go of Jared’s arm.  “Where are we?” he asked breathlessly.

“Same place we ever were,” Jared said, watching him keenly.  This had become familiar to him over the last years, but he didn’t know if it had ever happened to Webber.

Webber looked at him through narrowed eyes.  “Why does it look like we’ve traveled back to this place about five years ago?” he demanded.

“Probably because we have,” Jared said.  In spite of himself, he was rather enjoying watching someone else go through the process he had when the world first spun around him and spat him out sometime else.

“Okay,” Webber said softly, taking a deep breath. “Okay.”  Then he visibly pulled himself together and turned to look at Jared. “So you’ve done this before?”

He was taking this remarkably well, Jared thought enviously, and decided to start explaining the details.  “Come on, let’s walk a bit,” he said, setting off between the headstones.  “Yes, I’ve done this before.  Apparently there’s a decent number of people who time travel randomly to any era in the past or future, and no one knows for sure if it’s a genetic thing or what the factors selecting the people who do it are.  In any case, there’s a board of Time Travel Overseers who have studied the whole phenomena rather thoroughly.  So don’t think about trying to change the past, because that’s been done and never turns out well.  Nowadays, there’s a few of the TTOs who live in the time stream itself, and if anyone tries to change it, they’ll come popping out and make sure you can’t.”

Webber was following him among the gravestones, nodding along.  When Jared paused, he asked, “So do we eventually get back to our own time then?  I haven’t noticed you disappearing before.”

“Oh, I’ve missed a few work shifts because of it,” Jared said lightly. “But so far that seems to be a characteristic of the time stream – it will pick people up and dump them in the past or future, but eventually it seems to spit most everyone out back where they came from.  There’s a few TTOs who have gotten so caught up in studying the time stream that it sucks them in and they live in it now, but if you just have the normal condition of hopping around in time, it won’t do that to you.  So just keep your head down, don’t interact with the past or future too much, and you’re all good.”

At least, he hoped that was true.  That was what he’d been told, when he had a run-in with the Time Travel Overseers the first time he traveled, when he tried to prevent his father’s death.  Secretly, though, he had a nagging fear of being sucked into the time stream against his will and never let go.

“Is there anything we have to do to get home?” Webber asked.  They were nearing the entrance to the graveyard, with bricks a bit straighter than they were nowadays and a significantly less muddy road outside.

“Some people say there’s some particular thing you have to witness in either past or future before you get sent home, but I’ve never noticed that in all my trips,” Jared told him. “I’ve just wandered around and observed random events, and then eventually I wind up back in my present again.  It seems just as much time passes in your present as you spend sometime else, and you drop back in as if you’d never left.”

Webber nodded but was silent, and Jared’s curiosity overcame him. “Any reason you’re particularly intent on getting home?” he asked.

“My baby girl has a birthday party tonight, and I’d like to be there for it,” Webber said quietly.

Jared hadn’t even known Webber had a child at all, but he’d missed or nearly missed his little siblings’ events due to the time stream.  He nodded a little shamefacedly.  “Well, let’s hope the time stream spits us out in time for that then,” he said, and attempted an awkward pat of Webber’s shoulder.  But Webber gave him a little smile that seemed genuinely pleased, and Jared felt better in spite of himself.

They were strolling down one of the streets now, not hurrying, but passing through the crowds of a few years ago.  The sun was bright and pleasant after the digging in the rain of the present, and Jared tipped his face back and enjoyed it.

“Can we interact with the past then at all?” Webber asked quietly after a minute.

“Superficially it’s fine, like doing this,” Jared said.  “I usually stroll around and take a look for interest’s sake – it would be boring staring at the graveyard the whole time.  But I wouldn’t get into a detailed conversation with people – the time stream doesn’t seem to like that.”

Webber nodded and accepted that like he’d accepted everything in the last ten minutes.  Jared was getting quite envious of how calm he seemed to be.

There was a vagrant man stumbling down the street toward them, gray hair obscuring his face.  Jared picked up his pace; the last person he wanted to have a detailed encounter with was a vagrant.  But Webber slowed down.  Before Jared could hiss at him to hurry up, the vagrant man had stumbled up to him and held out his hands.

“Please, a penny?” he begged.

Webber hesitated, and Jared shook his head frantically at him.  Giving someone in the past money was definitely something that either the time travel overseers or the time stream itself might take amiss.

The man had apparently taken Webber’s hesitation for a sign of giving in, for he pressed his point.  “Please, sir,” he pleaded, “I’m old and I can no longer work, and there’s no one who cares to bury me when I’m gone.  Have pity?”

To Jared’s complete surprise, Webber smiled just a bit.  “I’m so sorry,” he said, sounding very genuine, “but I have no money I can give you.  I promise you this, however: you will be buried with dignity when the time comes.”

Jared couldn’t see the vagrant’s face, but his shoulders suddenly straightened and he stood a bit taller.  “Thank you, sir,” he said, very muffled, and passed on.

Webber came up to walk with Jared, an odd look on his face.  Jared gave him a look that was as incredulous as he felt.  “I can’t believe you, of all people, would be making false promises,” he said.

“That wasn’t a false promise,” Webber told him quietly.

“How in the world can you know that?” Jared demanded – and then it occurred to him. “You think he’s one of the people you’ve buried over the years?”

“You didn’t recognize him?” Lloyd Webber asked.  He lifted his eyes to Jared’s, and though clear, there was that hint of the otherworldly in his eyes that sent a shiver down Jared’s spine. “That was Ward Thornton.  That was the man we buried this morning.  It wasn’t an empty promise because I know I’ll bury him myself.”

Jared shivered uncomfortably.  “I don’t know if you should have told him that,” he said.  “The time stream is widely considered to be sacrosanct, and that was definitely something he should not have known.”

“I don’t care,” Webber said stubbornly, thrusting his hands deep in his pockets. “You didn’t see the look on his face when I said that.  It took a load he had been carrying for years off his back.  I’d violate the rules of the time stream to give someone that comfort any day.”

Webber would, too, and however much comfort Thornton may have gotten out of it, it was not comforting at all to Jared.  “Why would he care?” he muttered rebelliously.

“Because it’s part of being human to be cared for after death,” Webber said softly.

The next moment, before anything more could be said, the world began to spin around them again.  Webber clutched onto Jared’s arm again, and this time Jared put a hand up to hold him back.  Apparently they were going on this journey together, and he did not intend to let the time stream separate them.

~~~

When the world stilled around them again, Webber gave Jared a thoughtful look.  “Some people say the time stream whisks you on once you’ve had a significant encounter?” he said.

“Yes,” Jared admitted.  He could read well enough what Webber was driving at.  There had been something in the way the vagrant – Thornton – had straightened to haunt even him.

“Are we home then?” Webber asked, glancing around the street.  It was less busy now than it had been a few minutes ago.

“No,” Jared said, after a minute of looking around.  He recognized a storefront that wasn’t there in the present day, but that he had seen on a previous trip.  “We’re in the future.”

Webber looked slightly lost, and at this point Jared was wanting to ask him some questions.  “Let’s go back to the cemetery,” he said.

They wove their way through streets both more worn and more gaudy than in their present day back to the cemetery.  When they had walked through the gate, passing under an arch that was new since their time, Webber immediately took off toward the back corner where they had been working that morning; Jared tagged after him.

When they got there, the trees were taller than they were in the present; the sun was still shining, although there were clouds scudding over its surface, and the grave they had dug was grown over with green grass.  There was, however, a small headstone in place with Ward Thornton’s name on it, and the biggest difference was that there was a well-dressed woman standing in front of the stone, looking at it.  She turned at the sound of their footsteps and raised an eyebrow at them.

Jared faltered and hissed a warning, but it was too late – Webber had already gone forward.  “Hello,” he said politely, holding out his hand.  “My name’s Lloyd Webber, and I work here.  Could I ask what brought you here?”

“Maura Larsen,” she said, shaking his hand. “I’m so glad to meet someone who works here, because I have questions.  I just discovered that I’m the granddaughter of the man buried here.  I found his picture and his name in my grandmother’s things recently.  I don’t think he lived a very long or very happy life, but I wanted to ask if you knew anything about him here?”

“Not much, ma’am,” Webber admitted. “I think he was just handed over to us by the city, when they were unable to contact his family.  But I can promise you that he was buried with all the dignity we could give him.”

Some of the tightness by Maura Larsen’s eyes loosened, and she smiled a small smile.  “That is a comfort,” she said.  She paused and looked back at the headstone.  “You won’t mind if I come and visit him every so often?” she asked. “I don’t know everything that happened to him in life, but it feels wrong to completely abandon him in death.”

“Of course you’re always welcome,” Webber said.  He hesitated before adding softly, “I think that would mean something to him too.”  He nodded at the grave.

“Thank you,” was all Maura said, but her eyes were bright, either with hope or with tears.  She gave the grave a little nod, then nodded to the two of them and swept past them toward the gate.

Webber hesitated when she was gone, then sat down on the grass near the grave.  Jared shook his head and came to join him.

“You really can’t stop yourself from interacting with people, can you?” he asked.

“We’re not supposed to interact?” Webber asked, looking up from his contemplation of the gravestone.  “We’d nearly have to be invisible not to.”

Jared shrugged.  “To be honest, there’s multiple theories about that,” he admitted. “Some of the time travel scholars say we shouldn’t interact with anyone ever, whereas others think the whole occurrence of time travel itself means that the timeline is inevitably messy and includes all the interactions between different times.”

“And what do you think?” Webber asked, looking right at Jared.

Jared squirmed a little under his gaze.  “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I’ve always tried to avoid talking to people as much as possible.”

Webber shrugged and looked back at the grave.  “Well, there’s some ways I can’t help time travel affecting me,” he said.  When Jared made an inquiring noise, he went on, “I was always intending to get a simple headstone for Ward Thornton’s grave, but now that I know what it looks like, I know what I order when I get back to my time.”

Jared couldn’t disagree with him.  He hesitated, studying the headstone for a moment, then gave in to the generous impulse rising in him.  “When you go to get it,” he said, “bring me along.  I’ll split the cost with you.”

Lloyd Webber looked up at him with wide eyes.  “Why do you care?” he asked. “I never thought you really did.”

“Why do you care so much?” Jared shot back at him.

Webber turned and stared down at the grass.  After several moments, he said very quietly, “My grandmother all but raised me when I was young, because my mother had to work.  She passed away in her sleep one day.  I stayed by her side until my mother came home so she wouldn’t be alone.”

“I’m sorry,” Jared said softly.  The way Lloyd talked, it was as if they were treading on holy ground.

Lloyd shrugged and otherwise ignored him.  “I don’t think the dead are unaffected by how we treat their bodies,” he said. “The pastors only talk about our souls and what happens to them after death, and that we ought to be happy that they’re free of pain and sorrow.  Maybe they are, I don’t know.  But I don’t think it was just a childish impulse that made me think my grandma would know she was alone if I didn’t sit by her after she died.”

Jared sat silent for a moment, putting that together with Lloyd Webber’s unfailing dedication to burying the bodies of the most forgotten people with dignity, with the way Ward Thornton’s shoulders had straightened when he knew he would be cared for after he died, with the way Maura had treated finding the grave that could so easily have gone unmarked.  Before he could find words for any of it, however, the world started to spin around them.

Webber startled and reached out toward Jared, who instinctively grabbed his arm back.  He expected that they would be spun out within a few moments, hopefully back within the rainy March they came from by Thornton’s newly turned grave.  Then Lloyd could go and be there for his child’s birthday party, and Jared would even consider saying a prayer over the grave before he went his way too.

That didn’t happen.

~~~

Instead, when the world around them stopped spinning after the longest time Jared had ever known it to keep going, they were in a completely unfamiliar place.  They weren’t in the corner of the graveyard at any recognizable period of time; as a matter of fact, they weren’t anywhere that looked like Earth at all.  They were surrounded by a swirling, endless cloud of gray and silver, whipping around them and extending endlessly in every direction.

Webber clutched tighter to Jared’s arm.  “Where are we?” he asked, and his voice was shaking.

Jared wanted to say he knew, but he was as scared as Lloyd.  “I don’t know,” he said, but he was terrified that this was the time stream, that they had been caught up in it and could never go home.

Through the shifting, endless mists, a figure began to appear ahead of them.  It slowly took on a distinctly human form, but its features were still obscured in the blurry cloud of mist.  Lloyd clutched tighter at Jared’s arm and said nothing.  Jared had to swallow twice before he could call out in a shaking voice, “Hello?”

“Thank you,” the figure said.  It was a man’s voice, raspy like a smoker’s and on the one hand very human, but it also echoed around the space and seemed to bounce off every spray of mist in a way Jared’s voice hadn’t.

It was Lloyd who found his voice this time.  “For what?” he faltered.

“For burying me and treating me kindly in the burial,” the figure answered.  “What?” it went on, when they were both speechless. “You don’t recognize me?  But I suppose you wouldn’t until I’m reunited with my body.  I’m Ward Thornton.”

“Oh,” Lloyd gasped out, and then, since he could apparently find words in moments that Jared couldn’t, he added, “I – I hope you’re better now.”

“I will be someday,” the figure of Ward answered. “And that has a lot to do with you.  The way you cared for my body in death was the first thing to give me hope to take on the afterlife.”

“You’re welcome,” Lloyd whispered.  But even as he said it the figure was fading away into the mists, and the mists were beginning to whirl around them.

~~~

Jared had his eyes squeezed tight shut and could still feel Lloyd Webber’s death grip on his arm when he began to feel rain spattering on his cheeks.  Daring to open his eyes, he discovered that they were back where they had begun, back by the freshly turned grave they had just dug, with the March rain spattering down and the trees their normal shapes in the background.

“It’s okay,” he exclaimed, and then as the relief overwhelmed him he turned and shook Lloyd’s shoulders until the other man opened his eyes.  “It’s okay, it’s alright, we’re back in our time, you can go to your daughter’s birthday tonight!”

Lloyd took a moment to look around himself, still shaking a bit under Jared’s hands; then he drew a deep breath and stepped back.  “I never want to time travel again,” he said fervently.

Jared laughed and never cared that his laugh was trembling.  “We made it back,” he said.  He took one more look around to reassure himself that they were back in the right time, then stepped up to the grave.  The echoing thanks of the shadowy figure of the man had shaken him in a way nothing else on the trip could have, and though they must have been directed at Lloyd, he felt ashamed, now, that he would not have cared a few hours earlier to make sure that Ward Thornton was buried with dignity.  He took his shovel and made a few perhaps useless passes to smooth out the surface of the grave, promising himself internally to make sure the grass was kept as neatly clipped here as in the more visited parts of the cemetery.  Then, though he still felt awkward doing it, he knelt for a second and said a short prayer for Ward Thornton.

When he stood up, Lloyd was studiously not watching him, but he said softly, “I think that trip proved pretty well that there’s something to the theory that we’re meant to time travel to certain times.”

“It certainly proved something to me,” Jared admitted dryly. “Did it change anything for you?”

“I never knew if what I did mattered,” Lloyd said. “I thought it did, but I didn’t know.  Now I do.”

They stood for another moment beside the grave, then it was Lloyd who murmured, “About the funeral Friday,” and they started to walk off through the rainy cemetery together.

They were about halfway back to the main building when Jared said, “Remember, when you go to get the gravestone for Ward, I want to help with it.”

“You’re sure of that?” Lloyd asked, and when Jared glared at him, he added quickly, “I don’t want you to feel obligated.”

“I think the future has obligated me,” Jared said. “After all, we have to put the gravestone there for Maura Larsen to find.  And Ward Thornton deserves it, too.”

The last sentence came out of him in an impulsive effort, but it made Lloyd smile at him – the small, slow smile that Jared had used to think was creepy and really didn’t anymore.  He clapped his hand on his friend’s shoulder, and they went in to the office together.

~~~

So that’s the story, the way the gravediggers at Charleston City Cemetery tell it.  Jared Myers, you see, told it to all his coworkers after it happened, and they all began to treat Lloyd Webber – and more importantly, the dead they buried – with more respect after that.  The story has been passed on and on through the generations; it’s the legend of the cemetery, and any gravedigger working there today can tell you it by heart.

Is it true?  Who knows?  What story is true when it’s been told for a hundred years and what story is legend?  That doesn’t matter, in the end.  What matters is what it means.  What matters is that generations of gravediggers have buried the ones who come to them with a little more care and respect, even the ones like Ward Thornton who didn’t have anyone to care how they were buried.  What matters is that every grave is marked and every name known.

What matters is that the story tells how the body of one Ward Thornton was buried made a difference to him.  And maybe it makes a difference to all of us, what happens to our bodies when the grave comes for us. Do we know that it does?  Of course not.  But the gravediggers of Charleston City Cemetery believe it does.  And maybe it doesn’t hurt to dig a grave with care, to bury a body with respect, to say a prayer for the dead, while we wait for the time when the body and soul once more become one.

#inklingschallenge #team tolkien #genre: time travel #theme: burial #story: complete

[maltheniel]

The Eagle and Child: Week Three

We're nearing the deadline of the Inklings Challenge! Time for another check-in. You're welcome to discuss anything you want about your story or the writing process, but some things you could consider sharing include:

How is the writing going?

Have your ideas changed over the course of the week?

Have any parts of your story or the brainstorming/writing process surprised you?

What has been the most enjoyable part of the writing process?

What has been the most difficult part of the writing process?

How are the themes fitting into your story?

Are there any writing habits/rituals that get you into the mood for writing? Any rewards that you've promised yourself for finishing?

Are you on track to finish by the deadline?

Any advice as we approach the final crunch?

Or anything else you care to discuss. As always, this is just for fun, so you can share as much or as little as you like. Thank you all so much for continuing on this writing journey with us. Have fun!

#the writing is coming along as of today #my idea hasn't changed -- I have a distinct idea of the scenes #And just need to get them written #hopefully they do carry the meaning that I mean for them to #most enjoyable part is seeing it come tpgether #together* #most difficult is just finding time and motivation to write #the theme is what my story is entirely centered around #do the work is not to make it too preachy #I've found good songs to write to #which helps #I should hopefully be done by Saturday #which I'm very pleased with!

[maltheniel]

The Eagle and Child: Opening Day

The Inklings Challenge has started! You’ve received your team assignment, the creative juices are flowing, and you’re either brimming with ideas or desperately trying to find some. Like the original Inklings, this Challenge needs a place to discuss writing, so roughly-weekly posts (named after the famed Inklings pub, of course) will give people a chance to talk about their progress through the Challenge.

On these opening days of the challenge, let’s discuss how it’s going. If you like, you can share things like:

Which team are you on?

Which genre are you considering tackling?

Is this similar to what you usually write?

Do you have a story idea yet? If so, care to share anything about it?

Which themes are you considering incorporating into your story?

Are any other story sparks–pictures, events, genre, themes, etc.–coming to mind as something you might want to use to inspire your story?

Are you excited? Nervous? Terrified? Confident? Some combination of new and exciting emotions?

Are there any ideas/types of stories that you'd like to see from the other teams? Care to share any ideas/suggestions/wish lists?

This is purely for fun, so share whatever you feel like sharing, or keep your secrets to yourself. However you feel like engaging.

Welcome to the Inklings Challenge! Have fun!

#inklingschallenge #I'm team tolkien which I'm really excited about #i'm going to do the time travel genre #which is not something i've ever written before #so this whole thing is new and exciting #i do have a story idea #and it revolves around two undertakers and the importance of burying the dead in a respectful way #both to the dead and to the living #that what happens to us after death still matters #so my theme is definitely bury the dead #this has honestly grown out of years of conversations about death with my family #so that's my main inspiration just now #i'm very excited to get to write this story #because it was the first thing that came to mind as soon as i saw the list of works of mercy as a possible option #i need the motivation to write it #but that's where the challenge is awesome for giving me that!

[maltheniel]

Team Tolkien 2023

Announcing the 2023 Inklings Challenge team assignments!

Members of Team Tolkien are challenged to write a science fiction or fantasy story within the Christian worldview that fits into one of these two genres:

Secondary World Fantasy: Stories that takes place in an imaginary realm that’s completely separate from our world

Time Travel: Stories exploring technology that allows travel through time

These genres are open to interpretation, and creativity is encouraged.You can use either or both of the prompts within your story, or if you’re feeling ambitious, you can write multiple stories.

Team Tolkien members are also asked to use at least one of the following seven Christian themes to inspire some part of their story.

Feed the hungry

Give drink to the thirsty

Clothe the naked

Shelter the homeless

Visit the sick

Visit the imprisoned

Bury the dead

Writers are challenged to complete and post their story to a tumblr blog by October 21, 2022, though they are encouraged to post earlier if they finish their story before that date. There is no maximum or minimum word limit. Writers who have not completed their stories before the deadline are encouraged to post whatever they have written by October 21st and post the remainder at a later date.

Posting the Stories

All stories will be reblogged and archived on the main Inklings Challenge blog. To assist with organization, writers should tag their posts as follows:

Mention the main Challenge blog @inklings-challenge somewhere within the body of the post (which will hopefully alert the Challenge blog).

Tag the story #inklingschallenge, to ensure it shows up in the Challenge tag, and make it more likely that the Challenge blog will find it.

Tag the team that the author is writing for: #team lewis, #team tolkien, or #team chesterton. 

Tag the genre the story falls under: #genre: portal fantasy, #genre: space travel, #genre: secondary world, #genre: time travel, #genre: intrusive fantasy, #genre: adventure

Tag any themes that were used within the story: #theme: food, #theme: drink, #theme: clothing, #theme: shelter, #theme: visit the sick, #theme: visit the imprisoned, #theme: burial

Tag the completion status of the story: #story: complete or #story: unfinished

Team Members

The writers assigned to Team Tolkien are:

@ablatheringblatherskite

@afairmaiden

@angedemystere

@as-dreamers-do

@atlantic-riona

@brievel

@caitriona-3

@catkin-morgs

@challenger2013

@christian-latte-anon

@clarythericebot

@dragonladyzarz

@dragonteaandfairyhoney

@enchanted-prose

@enjoliquej

@esters-notepad

@friendrat

@frominsidetheblanketfort

@gailyinthedark

@lady-merian

@lilflightlessbird731

@maltheniel

@mentallydatingahotcelebrity

@misscrazyfangirl321

@musicofthedaylight

@olyia-stories

@on-noon

@onewingedsparrow

@plainshobbit

@politicalmamaduck

@queenlucythevaliant

@rachellesedai

@reneethegreatandpowerful

@ripple-reader

@ru-tabega

@shakespearean-fish

@soulwindproductionsblog

@taleweaver-ramblings

@teabooksandsweets

Writing resources, including the Challenge overview, FAQ, writing prompts, and discussions of the genres are available at the Inklings Challenge Directory. Any writers with further questions can contact the Inklings Challenge blog for guidance.

Welcome to the Inklings Challenge, everyone! Now go forth and create!

#inklings challenge 2023 #team tolkien #I'm so happy about this!! #I was hoping for team tolkien or chesterton #so this is perfect #so far i know I want to do bury the dead #and I'm thinking maybe time travel too #so this should be totally new and fun!

[maltheniel]

I don't know how useful this is, but one of the first things I think of when I think of Christian poesm that I have loved is Hannah Hurnard's poems. She wrote a couple books, Hind's Feet on High Places and Mountains of Spices, that have lovely little poems embedded in them that expand on verses or spell out Christian ideas in a beautiful way. I can only find a couple of them by searching on the web, though, so I don't know how useful it is as a recommendation. (Unless you happen to have the books, which I highly recommend!)

As a way to foster creativity, I've started adding a poem to the weekly newsletter our church sends out. This is great in theory, but in practice, since I am not really a poetry reader, it means a lot of scrambling each week to try to find something that is A) meaningful; B) short enough to fit in the introductory paragraph without it causing most readers to glaze over and skip to the end (alas, no Desdichado on that account, though I have been tempted to split it by verse and share one portion a week until we've had the entire thing, but I think that might dilute its effect too much); and C) something that is generally uplifting and encouraging in a way acceptable to most of our church folk as well as rich in meaning (I know, I'm asking a lot).

So far I've done a few Psalms and a couple of passages from Isaiah, as well one poem each by Luci Shaw, Malcolm Guite, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Mary Oliver, and Wendell Berry.

Tumblr users who are more widely read in poetry than I, any recommendations for who else I should be looking into? Or are there any poetry anthologies I could purchase to help me in my quest?

#writing #of sorts #her poems have helped me think through things #which is why I love them #if you want I could probably send you some pictures of them/the links to the poems I could find on the web #the books are in the vein of Pilgrims Progress but very much from a woman's perspective #and very real -- not sugar-coated at all #there's a lot of truth in them for me to still try to face #anyway -- that was my first thought for poetry that someone else hadn't already said!

[maltheniel]

It's time to start thinking about this year's Inkling's Challenge. There are a few things to address before I make anything official, and I'd like to bounce it off of you guys first.

Interest

Is anyone interested in doing this?

Themes

As in previous years, I'd like to have a list of seven Christian themes for writers to choose from to inspire their stories. This encourages people to think about the Christian element, and provides some guidance without being too rigid. I got the impression that last year's images worked better for people than the previous year's list of Christian concepts. I'm trying to figure out which direction to take with this year's list.

Options include:

Keeping last year's imagery list. Makes it easy for me, but I would like to shake things up to give each year's Challenge a unique feel.

Coming up with a list of new images. My first thought is images that have been applied to God (shepherd, father, king, bridegroom, servant, etc), though that may be too narrow and limit people to stories involving blatant Christ figures. At the moment, I can't think of anything else that goes beyond the major Christian images in last year's list.

Coming up with a new list of more abstract Christian themes. Virtues? Gifts of the Spirit? Books or Sections of the Bible?

I'm open to any ideas that anyone might have because I'm stumped.

Team Chesterton's Technology Category

Each team in the Inklings Challenge gets a fantasy and science fiction genre assigned to it. The split has been pretty even with stories written for Team Lewis and Team Tolkien, but after two years, we've yet to have a single story written for the Technology genre of Team Chesterton. This suggests there's a major problem with the concept, so I should probably switch it up.

The best solution depends on what exactly the problem is. Is the category too broad? Does the title make it seem too technical--like you have to be an expert in technology and write about it realistically? Does it not have a genre attached to it that inspires stories? "Space travel" and "time travel" both suggest going places, which naturally sparks stories. And they evoke certain not-necessarily-hard-sci-fi genres.

There is a possibility that it's chance--maybe Intrusive Fantasy, with its urban fantasy and fairy tale possibilities, is just too appealing to this crowd in comparison to any sci fi genre. But to have no stories in the genre (with Team Chesterton always sparking the fewest stories) suggests a deeper problem.

How to fix it?

Options include:

Choose a category name related to travel like the other two are. There are lots of stories you could tell based on air, land, and sea travel that still involve sci-fi technology (and the concept matches things included in Chesterton's work). But what to call it? "Earth-based travel"?

Choose a certain type of technology to focus on. Say, Biological Technology. Or Robots. This may have some of the same too-technical-sounding problems of the Technology category.

Choose a technology-related subgenre, like Cyberpunk or Steampunk. (Or all the -punks if I could figure out a decent term for it). This still fits Chesterton's work, but may be too limiting or may still not draw writers--after all, these were always options under the original genre category, and no one wrote any.

Any feedback in this area would help.

#I am absolutely interested in doing this again! #this is something I've been looking forward to #both the themes and the imagery were things that I really enjoyed working into my stories #so repeating the themes would be fine with me #or something like fruits of the Spirit could work too #although that might make it a bit too broad? I don't know #as far as Chesterton goes #I've never wound up in that category #but redefining the second genre to travel or something punk or investigations (as mentioned in the notes) #could work #for me at least I tend to lean more fantasy or soft sci-fi than hard sci-fi #and technology does feel harder to fit into one of those genres #so if other writers are like me that might have something to do with it? #so changing the focus of the genre to something like travel might help thay #that* #I don't know -- just throwing out thoughts #but I love this challenge so much and can't wait to write for it this year!

[maltheniel]

🦀🦀🦀

Reblog if you're comfortable receiving crabs on Crab Day (July 29th) so all your beloved followers know who they can comfortably crab on crab day (July 29th) without feeling nervous about crabbing someone 9n Crab Day (July 29th).

🦀🦀🦀

#crab day #I love how weird and wonderful this site can be #I will be trying to participate #at least in crab week if not crab day

[maltheniel]

@queenlucythevaliant, I don't know if you've seen this before or not, but it looks like it would line up with your dinosaur interests. 😊

Short post of paleontologists absolutely slaying photo shoots with their discoveries. Please add more such images if you have them.

#for a friend #dinosaurs #scientists having fun

[maltheniel]

Hi! List five things that make you happy; then, if you'd like to, put this in the ask box of the last ten people who reblogged something from you and spread some positivity ✨💙🌺

Hey! Thanks very much for the ask. 😊

Five things making me happy:

I'm getting married in a week!! Still can't believe it's finally about to happen, and I'm so excited about it.

It's been so nice having my brother home from college this summer and reconnecting and sharing with him.

Where I live got a lot of rain this spring, and all the wildflowers that have come out in response are lovely! Not every year has lovely wildflowers like this one.

Random, but one of my favorite fanfiction authors, @audreycritter, has been posting a new work recently, and I've been devouring it as it comes out because it's so good!

Can I say getting married again? It's the biggest thing absorbing me and making me very happy just now. 😊

That's my list! I don't know if I'll have time to ask people, so if anyone wants to consider this an ask to fill this out, you're very welcome to.

#personal #asked and answered #don't know what else to tag this #except again that I can't wait to be married!

[maltheniel]

Ohhh, this is beautiful!  Thank you so much for the drawing and the poem.  I have loved weeping willows ever since I was very young, so seeing a dryad of a weeping willow is perfect!  The poem is so evocative, and I love the imagery of the dryad bending over the ghost of her lost love in the stream -- it’s heartrending and lovely.  Thank you so much!

For the drawing prompts -- a dryad if you would like? (Also I just recently remembered to follow you, but I've been reading your posts for quite a while, and as someone who is about to move countries to marry the man I love I've sympathized a lot with your thoughts/what you've written has helped me. So thank you. :))

Why the Willow Weeps

I saw a lady fair and brown Beside a silver stream And though indeed she wore no gown She lacked no dignity

Willow-wail, willow-wail She cried under the green Of summer’s newest branches As she wept and keened

My lady, my lady What sorrow can it be? My love, my love, he rode to war And now is lost to me.

#yeah -- marrying and moving elsewhere definitely isn't a small thing! #and i definitely agree that it would be harder without knowing it was going to happen ahead of time -- #i've had quite a while to reckon with the challenges and come to terms with it #i can only imagine what it would have been like for you! #but reading what you've written has helped me to reckon with the fact that it will be hard #but it can and will also be worthwhile #and that God is with us wherever we go #which is helpful! #this is beautiful

[maltheniel]

Yeah, that makes sense! It would definitely be a bit of a different experience to read knowing the twist, but it's still good that way.

I have watched the 1982 film and absolutely adore it! The way they portrayed the reconciliation between Percy and Marguerite there lives in my brain rent-free all the time. I love Armand in the movie and the way everything plays out, so I should definitely read Eldarado sometime! Good to hear you enjoyed it. :)

I'm always down to talk about The Scarlet Pimpernel and its characters!! I love that book and the characters, especially Marguerite. (I read some of your LOtR posts recently and ran across your tags. :))

yesyesyes!! I've found a fellow Scarlet Pimpernel fan!! I love the book so much, it just has everything, secret identity shenanigans and passionate Yearning and fashion and romance and of course, Marguerite!! Have you read any of the sequels?

#books #the scarlet pimpernel

[maltheniel]

Same! I got to read the book right at the right time too, where I didn't figure out the identity mystery until right before the book reveals it and got to be completely shocked -- best twist experience I've had. And the Yearning! It's been a while since I've read it and I still vividly remember the bit where Marguerite goes into the house and Percy kneels down and kisses every place her feet touched. It's beautiful.

No, I haven't read the sequels yet, though I really should someday. Have you read them?

I'm always down to talk about The Scarlet Pimpernel and its characters!! I love that book and the characters, especially Marguerite. (I read some of your LOtR posts recently and ran across your tags. :))

yesyesyes!! I've found a fellow Scarlet Pimpernel fan!! I love the book so much, it just has everything, secret identity shenanigans and passionate Yearning and fashion and romance and of course, Marguerite!! Have you read any of the sequels?

#books #the scarlet pimpernel #always a fan of this book #and the 1982 film of it -- never over that either

[maltheniel]

So I was messing around with this picrew by Kuren and thinking about Lockwood and Co, as you do, and spent rather a while designing pics of the main trio. The fun thing I realized as I was doing it was that the books give vivid descriptions without ever getting bogged down in description, so it was really easy to select details specific to each character -- so I thought I'd share.

First, Lucy Carlyle. She mentions her practical bob cut several times, as well as her dark hair, and given all her comparisons to the "perfect" Holly I messed her hair up a bit. She mentions more than once wearing black leggings and a black skirt, as well as a jacket, so she has all of that here. She has a belt which has a canister of Greek Fire on one side and compartments for salt and silver Seals on the other. I gave her sturdy boots, and in one hand she carries the closest thing I could find for the Skull (just pretend the flicker of blue in her "ghost jar" is actually green). She's standing outside an ivy-laced house that she and her team are about to clear of a Visitor, with the ghost-lamps lighting up the sides of the picture.

Next, George Cubbins (just ignore that the face doesn't work particularly well for the next two). George honestly came together the quickest of the three -- the first thing I had in mind was his baggy jeans, and it went from there. So he gets baggy jeans, a comfortable sweater, and a loose, baggy jacket. He has a less elaborate belt but still one with space to store the essentials, and hair that looks like it has never seen a comb (ignore that I forgot to make it blond). Of course, he had his round glasses. Most importantly, he's in the middle of researching something -- he's got a book he's in the middle of reading, and he's about to sit down, have some tea and biscuits, and get to work. He's in his element in this environment! And I added the keys hanging at the top of the pic because it's George's research that gives the necessary clues/keys for Lockwood and Co's success.

Finally, Anthony Lockwood. The key here, of course, was finding something suitable for his ubiquitous coat. That done, the next step was to give him a slightly-too-tight suit underneath, which took several pieces to assemble (he should have a longer tie, but alas there was none). And I couldn't resist giving him a little pocket watch, fingerless gloves and top hat -- none of those are ever mentioned, but they would fit his aesthetic pretty well, I think. He has the flop of dark hair falling forward into his eyes. He also has a similar belt to Lucy with its canister of Greek Fire and pockets for other necessities like tea. But the most important thing for him (secondary to the coat) was to give him a rapier that he proudly holds in one hand. The only other thing he's missing is the smile that will always inspire Lucy to follow him anywhere. The background represents 35 Portland Row, his home that he gives to the others and eventually finds a family in. The shapes behind him are meant to be the gourds that his parents brought home that decorate the house, and the curtains are the closest thing I could find to represent the mysterious door. (Unfortunately there's no cat mentioned in the books, but who knows -- maybe they get one eventually?) I wish I could have put lavender flowers in his background, but that wasn't available.

Anyway, that's the little drawings I made! As I said, the fun of the the thing was realizing all the little character descriptions and details that I could capture! It's kindof inspired me to do some of the others or to actually try drawing them someday. 😊

#lockwood and co #my art of a sort #character details are fun #mostly these are based on the books not the show

[maltheniel]

This does have so many fun details to play around with! Here's one of me.

This picrew by Kuren has several new clothing, hair, and skin options! Maybe you can have fun with it too.

#the hair is too long and dark #but I had so much fun putting the style together! #I would totally wear this if I could #also the details of carrying a lantern-- as close as I could get to the Lady of the Lamp #and the books in the background-- #those are very much me #this was fun #this is beautiful

[maltheniel]

The Woodcutter and the Shepherdess

This is my fairy tale retelling for the @inklings-challenge Valentine’s Day challenge. It’s a retelling of a fairy tale that’s unfortunately apparently really obscure -- it’s called “Casperl and the Princess” and was written by Henry Bunner, and I read it in a folk and fairy tale collection. I can’t find anything about it on the web, but I’ll make a post about it in a few days to tell a bit more about the original tale, since it’s a fun story. I changed it by making the main two characters married from the outset, going with an idea @fictionadventurer proposed in an early post for this challenge to write a story where the characters are married and one of them has to rescue the other. I had a lot of fun with this -- hope you enjoy!

Once upon a time, long ago and far away, there was a woodcutter who loved a shepherdess.

He was the son of woodcutters three generations back; she was a foundling girl who had been taken in by the shepherd and shepherdess and loved as their own. They fell in love with each other as they came of age and were married in a little ceremony by the village priest. They lived comfortably in a little hut of their own; the woodcutter chopped wood for the neighborhood as his father and grandfather before him had, and the shepherdess kept the house and the sheep that her father had given her for a wedding present. And they were blissfully happy.

That is, until the day a sorcerer showed up in a cloud of black smoke and a swirl of his blood-red cloak. He caught the hand of the shepherdess in a vice-grip and proclaimed that she was the lost princess of the neighboring kingdom. The sorcerer had sworn revenge on the kingdom, and was determined to inflict his revenge on its princess now.

“But wait!” the shepherd cried. “She is no princess now. She is our daughter. We took her in out of the cold and cared for her as if she was my own daughter. You have no claim on her, for she is the shepherd’s daughter.”

“That matters not,” said the sorcerer. “She was born the daughter of a king, not a shepherd, and as the daughter of a king upon whom I swore revenge I will treat her.”

“But wait!” the woodcutter cried. “She is no princess, but my wife. You have no claim on her, for she and I have sworn our vows to each other. She is mine as I am hers.”

“That matters not,” said the sorcerer. “Before you swore your vows to marry her, I swore a vow to destroy her whole family, and that vow I will keep without regard to you.”

“But wait,” said the shepherd’s daughter herself, and she pulled her hand out of the sorcerer’s. “I am no princess, no king’s daughter. I grew up following the sheep on the hills for my father and mother, and I tend the gardens and hearthfire of my husband now and kiss him when he comes home. Your revenge will hurt no king, but only those who love me here.”

“That matters not,” said the sorcerer. “I swore my revenge, and it matters not to me who you call yourself or who I hurt by my revenge. I shall carry it out regardless of all of you.”

And with that he caught her hand again and disappeared in another swirl of black smoke. But before they vanished, the woodcutter sprang forward. “I will find you again,” he vowed to his wife. “Come what may, I swear it on my life.”

The next instant he stood there with the shepherd and shepherdess, alone in a clearing filled with thinning black smoke. The shepherd and shepherdess looked at each other with despairing eyes, but the woodcutter went home. He thrust his axe in his belt, filled a satchel with food his wife had made, and set out to find her again.

It took him a long time, because there was no lack of princesses in interesting situations and the princes and peasants vying for their hands. The woodcutter found princesses on glass hills and princesses who had never laughed in their lives, but nowhere could he find the princess who was his wife and who had grown up the shepherd’s daughter. He wandered far and near, and his clothing became torn and muddied, and the edge of his axe dull. But he never gave up, and never wavered in his determination to find his bride and bring her home.

At last, he found a hill covered all over with dense thorns, with only one green path leading to the top. But on the path there were three obstacles. First there was a heavy door barring the path; then there was an enormous log fallen across the thin green line, and third there was a massive dragon curled around the mountain.

But on the top of the mountain there was a castle, and in the green yard in front of the castle there stood a princess staring down the hillside. And the moment the woodcutter caught a glimpse of her face his heart beat fast, because he recognized the princess for his missing wife.

Eagerly then he hurried to the foot of the hill. There he found two princes accompanied by their retinues turning away from the foot of the hill in discouragement. They laughed when they saw the woodcutter coming up in his shabby clothes.

“Are you going to make an attempt for the hand of the princess?” the first prince asked.

“Yes,” the woodcutter said simply.

“You will never get to her,” the prince said. “The door across the path is heavier than any man can move; no one can nudge it even the slightest bit ajar. The log across the path will grow in any direction; if you try to chop it, it will grow back faster than water could flow back into place, and nobody can climb over or under or around it.”

“What about the dragon?” the woodcutter asked coolly.

“The dragon is dangerous enough without growing,” the prince said coldly. “One breath from him and you would be blown away and never seen again!”

“And don’t get any ideas of climbing the mountain by some other way than the path,” said the second prince, whose clothing was sadly torn and shredded. “There is no other possible way up, and the thorns will tear you to pieces if you’re not careful.”

“In other words,” said the first prince, “you might as well turn away and go seek your adventure somewhere else. Especially as you are simply a poor woodcutter instead of a prince!”

“I thank you for your advice,” said the woodcutter. “But you see, the princess on the mountain is my wife, and come what may, I have promised to find her again.”

The princes clearly thought this was a joke, and laughing aloud at the woodcutter they rode off with all their people trailing after them. But the woodcutter went and stood at the foot of the hill and put his hand on the head of his trusty axe.

“I swore I would find you, come what may,” he said to the vision of his princess far above his head. “And after I have come all this way, I am not to be turned away by some obstacles of a sorcerer.”

So saying, he set off on the narrow green path until he came to the door across the path. He bent and put his shoulder to it and pushed with all his might. The door did not budge, staying stubbornly shut between its brick posts. But the woodcutter was not one to be easily discouraged, nor one to give up when he thought the going was difficult. He put his back to the door and braced himself, and he fought to open that door long after the time when an ordinary prince would have given up and turned back in despair. And at last he felt the door shift just a little beneath his shoulder.

The woodcutter gave an exclamation of joy and rested for a second to catch his breath. Then he threw all his effort into pushing the door open. It took him a long time, and in the end it only opened a crack, but that crack was enough, and the woodcutter squeezed his way through the door and stood panting, triumphant, on the other side.

“I’m coming, my lady,” he said firmly toward the top of the mountain, and set off up the narrow green path.

Next, of course, he came to the log that lay blocking the path, and it was the work of a few minutes to discover that he could not go over nor under nor around the log; it would merely grow faster than he could move and cut him off. But, this being established, the woodcutter looked at the log and took his axe from his belt – and smiled.

“You thought poorly, sorcerer, to put this obstacle in the path, when the princess is married to a woodcutter,” he said.

Then he lifted his axe and attacked the log with all his might, and the chips flew from beneath his blade. The log, of course, instantly grew back whenever he chopped it, like water running back when it has been swished aside, but the woodcutter did not hesitate nor slack in his task. He chopped away at the log over and over again, and at last, a very long time later, it became apparent that he had indeed whacked a dip into the log that was not filling back up.

The woodcutter did not dare to stop to appreciate this, for he felt sure that the moment he hesitated, the log would instantly be intact once again. So, although he was becoming very tired by this point, he went on chopping steadfastly at the log.

“I’m – coming, my – princess,” he murmured, between strokes to the log.

It took him a very long time to chop his way through the log, and all the while it felt as if for every stroke he made, the log grew back and made him take two more. But at last the log lay in two halves, and the ground around the woodcutter was covered in wood chips.

The woodcutter lowered his axe and immediately stepped through the gap, lest the log should get any ideas about growing back now. It remained in two pieces behind him, however, as he stood for a moment to catch his breath. He was very tired now, and there was still the dragon to face before he could get to the top of the mountain, and the only weapon he possessed was his rather dulled axe. But in spite of all this the woodcutter never thought for a second about turning back. He had defeated two of the obstacles in his way to the top of the mountain; he was not going to hesitate in the face of the third, dragon though it might be.

So the woodcutter caught his breath and shouldered his axe, the easier to use it when he needed it, and set off up the narrow green path to face the dragon.

He rounded a corner and saw the dragon curled around the entire mountain in its green and black glory. And the woodcutter drew a deep breath, swung his axe off his shoulder, and sprang forward to do battle with the last obstacle in the way to his princess.

The next instant he heard a voice once as familiar as his own cry, “Down! down!” and the dragon promptly shrunk from its enormous size to no taller than his hip.

“Heel!” the princess commanded, and the dragon immediately went and stood by her side as if he was simply one of her father’s sheepdogs.

The woodcutter stood there for a moment in utter disbelief, staring at the princess who had once been a shepherdess, who had once been his wife. She was dressed like a princess now, and he was in simple woodcutter’s clothes that had become more and more tattered over time. Unable to say anything, he sank to his knees before her.

She came toward him, stepping lightly over the grass. “Casperl,” she said very softly, touching his hair and running her fingers through it like she used to.

“Finola,” he whispered, looking up at her.

“You kept your promise,” she said, and finished with a laugh that turned into a sob.

“I’m still only a woodcutter, and you’re a princess now,” he said, half a fact and half a hesitation.

“You think that matters?” she demanded. “I’m your wife, and you overcame all the obstacles that no other could even budge to come back to me.” She held out her arms, and the next moment the woodcutter was in them in an instant.

It was a long while before either of them felt like saying anything more, and when they did draw back they kept their hands clasped between them. The dragon came hesitantly up to have his nose petted, and the woodcutter asked the princess how she had tamed it. She told him that they were both prisoners of the sorcerer, and she had befriended it in her loneliness.

“If any other prince had gotten past the first two obstacles, the dragon would have gotten rid of him,” she said. “I couldn’t leave the mountain, but I was waiting for you and you alone. And you came.”

The princess knew now where she was from, and as it lay in their way, the woodcutter and the princess went there first. The princess’s brother was king now, and had vanquished the sorcerer who had overthrown their father. He had been searching far and wide for his sister, so he was overjoyed when she came to him. He threw a celebration across the country that went on for a week.

But when that was finished, the woodcutter and the shepherdess went home together, and went back to the shepherd and his wife. They came running out of their home and clutched their daughter back to them, and the little celebration that was thrown in the village center was sweeter to the young couple than the great celebration the king had put on for them.

And at the end of it, the woodcutter and the shepherdess who was also a princess went back to their little hut. The woodcutter cut the wood for the neighborhood as his father and grandfather had before him, and came home eagerly every night to embrace his wife again. The shepherdess kept her sheep with the aid of the dragon, who slept on their hearth and learned quickly how to be a fire-breathing sheepdog. She kept the home and met her husband every night when he came home with a kiss.

Once upon a time, long ago and far away, there was a woodcutter that loved a shepherdess who was also a princess. They had the kind of love that waits for one another, the kind of love that will rest at nothing, no matter how impossible the obstacles, to be together again.

And they lived happily ever after.

#inklingschallenge #theme: eros #theme: agape #casperl and the princess #story: complete #my writing