A short story
Kiley Kellermeyer
 
She woke, shivering, in the dark of the night.

Something, someone, had startled her. What? She rolled on to her side and listened, barely breathing, for the source of the noise. Dim moonbeams from outside were the only source of light in the room. She had inherited the large house, along with its many shadows and corners.

Creak. Her heart hammered in her chest.

Creak. Slowly, she slid her hand under her mattress and took hold of the tiny knife hidden there. It felt so insignificant.

Creak. She sat up and brought the knife over her head, yelped, and dropped the weapon with a metallic clang.

“Dad?”

“Good morning, Ali.”

“Is it morning?” She looked out the window.

“Technically.” He smiled and the corners of his eyes crinkled. “It’s still pretty early to be awake.”

“Then why did you wake me?” she asked, frowning. “And why did you sneak up on me? I thought you were a burglar.”

Her father shook his head and walked over to the window. The white light made him look even paler than usual, but he was as distinguished as ever. He always wore that fine suit, tailored to his build, those shiny leather shoes. At odds with his wardrobe was the tie he wore; one a much younger Ali had given him as a Christmas gift. She had no idea why he wore it – sentimental reasons, she supposed. His gray hair was neatly combed and his brown eyes twinkled as he watched her.

“I didn’t wake you up. You woke up on your own. You’re shivering.”

Ali swung her legs over the side of the bed and stood. “It’s cold in here. Unlike some people, I don’t sleep in my suit jacket.”

Her father laughed. “I haven’t been asleep, Ali. I was…working.”

“Like usual.” Ali walked to her dresser and pulled a sweatshirt from a pile on top. She worked it over her disheveled brown hair onto her body and watched her father, who watched her. “Did you need something?”

“Need? No, I didn’t need anything. I was checking on you.”

“Dad, I’m 30.”

“That doesn’t mean I can’t check on you. You’ll always be my daughter.”

Ali paused and stared at the floor. A sudden rush of emotion welled up inside of her and she turned away to hide it. “You can’t keep coming here like this. It’s not right.”

He sighed and walked toward her. “I know. I know, but I can’t help it.”

Ali started folding the pile of clothes on her dresser for something to do with her hands. “You have to stay away. You aren’t supposed to come here.”

He watched her pull a decimated tissue from the pocket of a sweater and chuckled. “Your mother always left those in her pockets, too, you know. I’m not sure how many times I went to work with the remains of departed Kleenex on my suits.” He looked down and seemed to find something to pick off his suit.

“Well, Mom also turned half our clothes pink more often than not,” Ali said, snorting. “At least I’m not that bad.”

“It’s a wonder I didn’t wear pink shirts to work every day. It would have been quite a fashion statement.”

They laughed for a moment, together, until Ali cleared her throat. “You should go.”

“I should,” he said, nodding. “I will. I only wanted to make sure you were ok.”

“Of course I’m ok. Why wouldn’t I be ok?”

He didn’t say anything. The twinkle in his eyes was gone, though.

“Dad, why wouldn’t I be ok?”

He pressed his eyes shut. He looked so old. “There was a burglar.”

“What?”

“You said you thought there was a burglar. There was.”

“Oh, God! Dad, where?” Ali spun around in a circle, goose bumps prickling her skin.

“Downstairs.”

“I have to call the cops. I have to—wait, did you say ‘was’?”

He nodded mournfully. For the first time, Ali noticed he seemed slightly less solid than before. Perhaps it was the fading moonlight and brightening sky behind him. “I just wanted to check on you,” he said with a sad smile. “So I came here, like I do sometimes.”

Ali frowned.

“I saw him in the living room. I watched him, and I knew that he was going to come upstairs to find you.” A smoldering, angry look came over her father’s face. Ali was sure he seemed too pale.
“So I made him leave.”

“You made him— ”

“Leave. He ran. He won’t come back.”

“Daddy...”

“And neither will I, sweetheart.”

Ali leaned against the dresser. Her father was less solid. In fact, she thought she could see the approaching dawn through his Christmas tie. She had told him he shouldn’t come here. It wasn’t natural. But she was only kidding herself. She didn’t really want him to leave. “You can’t go. Not…not for good.”

“You were right, of course. You always were. It’s not right for me to come here. And I broke the rules this time. I can’t come back.”

“Forget the rules, Dad,” Ali snarled. “You always did before.”

“Not these rules.” He shrugged and smiled. He was so misty. What did that mean? He had never been misty before.

“I just wanted to check on you,” he repeated. “And you’re ok.”

Ali nodded. “I’m ok,” she said, tears pooling in her eyes. She dabbed at them with the piece of tissue she held. “Because of you.”

He was only a shape now, an idea of what her father might have been. “Goodbye, Ali.”

“Dad? Daddy?”
​
“You’ll always be my daughter.” 

A short story
By Kiley Kellermeyer

Author's Note: My writer's group (whom I love - always join a writer's group if you can!) recently took part in a writing prompt based on this spectacular piece of art by Ariel Burgess. The point was to tell a story in a limited amount of words (roughly 1000) that encompassed the scene painted by Ms. Burgess. It was difficult, and seriously fun. -Kiley
See more from Ariel on her website.

“You killed him.” It was the first time Avriel’s cellmate had spoken. The man’s voice was dry and raspy and thick with the local accent.

“Maybe.” Avriel watched the rain pound against the tiny window, drumbeats counting the final hours of her life. She looked out across the gleaming city, following a passing SkyCar with her eyes. She could see everything from her high cell in Verne Tower. It was a spectacular view, one most hoped never to see.  

“There’s no ‘maybe’ about it,” said the cellmate. He coughed a phlegmy cough. “Your armor is red. You killed him.”

“You know your primary colors. How clever you are.” Avriel narrowed her eyes. 

“Not clever, but not stupid. You wear the armor of an assassin from Simova. Someone really wanted Emperor Jensan dead. If you’d failed you wouldn’t be in here with me.”

Not clever, indeed. Avriel turned to appraise her cellmate. He was swathed in shadows, but in the light from the single window she could tell he was older than she, with sandy hair and tattered gray clothes. She had been locked in ramshackle brigs with other men and women. Most had heard only vague rumors of the “Scarlet Simovans.” Myths told by fools who know little of what they spoke of. “The Simovans’ red armor grows stronger each time it is bathed in the blood of an enemy,” they said. “The Simovans are trained from birth to love the sight of blood. They wear nothing but their armor, and never take it off, even to bathe.” 

Something about this man, however, made Avriel sure he was no mere pickpocket. “I’m here with you, and I am waiting to die,” Avriel said. “I would consider that failure.”

The cellmate coughed again. “But it must have felt good to kill him. The emperor was a merciless ruler, a cold-blooded killer of innocents.”

Avriel hated that notion. As if she could harbor personal grudges against such a vast array of people. She crossed her arms. “I did not take pleasure in it. It was a job I was hired to do.” 

“So you do not believe in your heart he deserved to die?”

Avriel cocked her head. “Most of us deserve to die. What I think of Jensan is of no consequence.” 

“I’m sure it is,” the cellmate said. “The emperor’s blood is on your hands. Do you not feel it there?”

Her temper snapped before she could stop it. “I don’t care for Jensan or his blood. All that matters is that he’s dead!” 

“Many have desired his death.” The man drew a rattling breath. “Jensan has been dead for a long time.”

Avriel eyed him again, studying him with the careful gaze of a trained Simovan assassin. “What of you? Did you desire his death?” she asked.

“I have no love for the emperor.”

Avriel folded her arms. “That is not what I asked.”

The cellmate shifted in his dark corner. His answer came as a growl. “I am glad to see him dead for what he has done.”

Before Avriel could answer, a door opened in the distance. Loud footsteps hammered on the metal floor. The cell door opened to reveal four guards in bulky armor, hovering SkySpheres radiating dim light around them. The lights on the prison ward of Verne were never turned on. Prisoners were kept always in the hopeless dark. 

The bulkiest of the guards strode toward Avriel. “Simovan, you are scheduled to die via lethal injection. Should you attempt any violence, I am authorized to kill you by any means necessary.” He smiled a crooked smile just visible behind his visor as he reached for Avriel’s arms.

Her cellmate stood. “Taking my company away, are you?” 

“We’ll have a new roomie for you soon enough, Jo,” the guard said. 

Avriel was suddenly curious how long her cellmate had been there. 

“Just too bad is all. Don’t you want to know who sent her? She just told me.” Avriel glanced at Jo and he nodded slightly. “It was the Emperor’s Second. Shouldn’t you tell someone?”

The guard hesitated for a fraction of a moment. It was all Avriel needed. 

She grabbed hold of his wrist and yanked him forward, shattering his visor upon the leg of her spectacular red armor. She brought her knee up into his nose to similar effect, then grabbed his gun from its holster. Before the three guards outside could react, Avriel narrowed her eyes and took three shots into the hall. Jo yelped as each of the SkySpheres shattered, plunging the cell back into relative darkness. Avriel shoved the injured guard into the others as they reached for their weapons. He bowled over two of them and they went down in a heap. 

“D-drop your weapon!” cried the remaining guard. Avriel turned her grimace and gun on him. In that second, she could see him take in her red armor; remember all the horrific tales of Simovans he’d heard as a child. He backed up and tripped on the others as they were attempting to stand. 

“Come!” Avriel yelled at Jo as she stepped over the flailing bodies. Pathetic, she thought as they hurried from the cell. They didn’t even try.


Avriel knew some of the tower’s layout; however, Jo surprised her with his knowledge of the inner-workings and led her through a labyrinth of stairwells and service platforms, alarms blaring around them. As they ran past a darkened supply room, they grabbed a pair of servant’s cloaks from the wall. “The red armor is useful in many ways, but camouflage is not one of them,” Avriel said as she pulled the cowl over her head. “Let’s go.”

After a day in the dark, damp cell, the city streets felt cool and alive. The rain had slackened. A fine mist shrouded the air and reflected the yellow headlights of the SkyCars. “The city is not safe for either of us. Follow me.”

Jo remained where he was, gaping stupidly into the night sky. “Ten years. I haven’t felt wind or rain for ten years.” He took a deep breath that sent him into a coughing fit.

Avriel watched him a moment longer. “You helped me, so I will help you. The city border isn’t far. Follow me,” she said again, and hurried into the disused backstreets. The man did not follow her immediately, but she had little doubt he would. Ten years…he has nowhere else to go.  

Stepping lightly over puddles, Avriel slipped around a corner and waited. She heard him splashing through the water before she saw him. As Jo came into view she darted from her hiding place and pinned him against a wall. 
He did not struggle.

“Who are you?” Avriel asked, hand against his throat. “Really. And do not say ‘Jo.’”

“That is what the guards came to call me. They did not know my real name. None were there when I was imprisoned ten years ago.”

“What were you called ten years ago?”

He looked up at the sky, then back into her eyes and said, “Jensan.” 

Avriel knew when a man was lying. This one at least thought he was telling the truth. She stepped away and studied him. 

“I held limited audiences,” he said. “I ruled from consoles and gave orders through ambassadors. It was a good system. I did not account for the fact that few knew my true nature.”

Avriel thought back to what she knew of the terrible reign of Jensan. They said he was a good man gone mad with power, a fine ruler turned tragically terrible. They said it happened ten years ago. “Someone took your place,” Avriel whispered. “And no one knew.”

“I knew.” 

“You are Emperor Jensan.”

“You killed the emperor three days past. The man called Jensan died in that cell.”

Avriel weighed her options, her creed. Somewhere in the near distance sirens wailed, people shouted. What to do?

The man’s eyes glittered in the moonlight. “Are you going to kill me? Fulfill your contract?”

Avriel knew what she should do, of course. What the creed demanded of her. But a bad man was dead, and a good one lived. Yet the creed required… 

“The emperor is dead,” Avriel said. “My job is complete.” 

She pulled her hood tight around her head and swept off into the alley, heedless of the puddles and the fallen ruler following in her wake.

A short story
By Kiley Kellermeyer

The city burned, fire lighting up the night sky.

“Oops.” Junius stared at the pillar of smoke drifting skyward, an orange glow reflected on his wrinkled face and singed, bushy white beard.  He looked simultaneously guilty and amused.

“Oops?” Irving rounded on the man at his side. “You say ‘oops!’ when you drop a mug of ale. You have just burnt down the capitol. That is rather more than ‘oops!’”

“Don’t raise your voice with me,” Junius said, a grin spreading across his face. “I’m your teacher!”

Irving scowled, narrowing his blue eyes, and paced on the hilltop overlooking the city. Were the guards coming for them? Had sentry horses just galloped through the gates? No, it was just more refugees. He looked at the scorched robes he wore and took a breath. He supposed he should be grateful to Junius. But he was finding that difficult as he looked back on the evening. Very difficult, indeed…

Irving ran through the bustling city, one hand clutching his aching side, the other a large, red gemstone. 

“Come back here, scum!” yelled a voice from behind. “You’ll be sorry when we catch you.”

Irving plunged through the crowd and on to the grounds of the Wizard’s Keep. Perhaps he could lose his pursuers here. He had to. That stone was his by right. He had plans for it and he--

“Oof!” Irving collided with someone and tumbled to the dirt. The red stone rolled out of his hand.

“Oh, hello, Irving.” Junius said from the ground where he’d fallen. “Out for a jog?”

“Junius?” Irving rubbed his head and gazed up at the tall towers of the Keep, sturdy in the slight breeze. “What are you doing here?” he asked in spite of himself.

“Delivering a letter.” Junius stood, brushed himself off, then bent down and picked up the red stone.

Irving opened his mouth to ask for it just as three beefy thugs skidded to a halt near the Keep. Irving sprang to his feet and closer to Junius, more to protect the stone than the older man. The goons glared at Irving and cracked their knuckles, then gradually became aware of Junius’s presence. 

“Hello, there,” Junius said amiably. “Are you friends of Irving’s’?” 

“Yeah,” said the thug leader. “Good friends, eh, Irv?”

“Quite,” Irving said. This, he felt, was going to end poorly.

"What’re you doing at the Keep with our stone, Irv? You don’t think the wizards would buy it, do you?”

“It…I…” Irving stared at the stone, thinking. He had to get rid of those thieves, and he had to get out of the city with the gemstone. However, it was looking like he might not even escape the Keep. “I have the joined the wizards as an apprentice.”

“I didn’t know—” started Junius, and Irving stamped on his foot. 

“I’m an apprentice,” Irving continued, “and Junius here is my teacher. Knows all there is to know about magic…ah, craft. Crafting. Magical crafts. Right, Junius?” He elbowed him in the stomach.

“Oh, oh. Right.” Junius puffed up his chest. “Of course I do. All there is to know.”

The thug leader eyed them suspiciously. “Oh, really? Where’re your wizard robes?”

Irving arched his brow. “I’m only an apprentice.”

“Then where are his robes?”

“Cleaners,” said Junius. “Potion stains are the worst, I don’t mind telling you!” 

“He does have the big white beard,” said one of the other thugs, pointing at Junius. “Don’t they all have big beards?”

The thugs seemed pacified on this point, but fixed their sights at the gem in Junius’s hand. Irving didn’t know why they wanted it. Well, he supposed it was because it was a precious gemstone. But he had won it fair and square. Mostly. 

“The stone, Irv,” the leader said. “Give it to us.”

“I can’t. I was told to give it to Professor Junius here. It isn’t worth much money, you know. It’s only good for silly old spells and such. Nothing a regular person would want. I doubt it would even fetch two gold coins. Right, er, Professor?” He gave Junius a pleading look.

Junius nodded sagely and said, “Not worth a single copper!” Irving sighed, and then Junius spoke again. “Why, it is only a simple Fire Stone, I can tell by its hue. Good for things like heating furnaces. Starting fires. Spreading fires.” He appeared to be lost in thought. “Melting metals. Making weapons.”

As Junius spoke, Irving thought the thieves’ eyes turned even greedier, if that was possible. The stared hungrily at the stone and began to move toward the faux-mages. “Junius,” Irving whispered. “That’s enough about the—run!” 

The thugs leapt at them. Irving yanked the old man by his wrist and they bolted. Rounding a corner, Junius pointed at a wooden door. Irving flung it open and they stumbled inside, locking it behind them.  A torch burst to life. 

“A Fire Stone?” Irving glared at Junius. “A Fire Stone?”

“It seemed like a good idea at the time.” Junius shrugged boney shoulders. “Is this a wizard storage room? How fascinating!”

Indeed, crates and shelves were loaded with strange and impressive looking items. Brooms, staves, cauldrons, potions, empty bottles, books, robes and candles were illuminated in the torchlight. Irving did not care, though. He did not want to die in a closet. 

There was a loud bang on the door, followed by, “We know you’re in there, Irving. You and that wizard. When we get in there, you’ll be sorry you ran.”

And another voice, “But, he’s got that stone. What if he sets us on fire?”

Silence.

Junius grinned. “I’ve got an idea.” 

“Whatever it is, no.” 

“It will work.”

There was another bang on the door. “We aren’t scared of your fire, wizard. We’re breaking down this door.” 

Irving felt a sense of momentary dread sweep through him. Junius stared at him hopefully, and he finally gave in. “All right. What’s your plan?”

Several minutes later, the door was slightly splintered and Irving found himself wearing a set of robes that did not cover his ankles. Junius matched him. Both held staves alight with fire at the ends. Irving held several bottles of potion. “On the count of three,” he said. “One. Two. THREE!”

They burst from the room, robes flapping in the breeze, staves burning. The thugs at the door staggered away, looking stunned. 

 “Ala-tima-ca-lava!” Junius gibbered. It sounded impressive, so Irving repeated it. He threw his potion bottles into the air as Junius swung his staff. The fire collided with the potion and exploded, sending a blast at the thieves. 

“It’s the Fire Stone!” one of them shrieked. “He’s using it! Let’s get out of here!” And they scampered away like frightened children as the flames died down. Irving and Junius followed them around the corner to be sure they were gone.

Irving chuckled in spite of himself. That would teach them to mess with him. The gemstone was his now, they would leave him alone for sure. “Well done,” he said, clapping the other man on the back. “Now hand me the stone and we’ll get out of here.”

“I left it in the storage room,” Junius said. “My hands were full.”

Irving rolled his eyes and turned back to the room, then stopped. Thick, black smoke was pouring from the doorway.  “Junius! Something is burning in storage room.”

“It’s the Fire Stone!”

“You idiot, there’s no such thing as a Fire Stone!”

“Right,” he nodded. “Must be the torch I left by the crate of potions.”

"It could blow any moment! I’ve got to get the stone!” Before they could take two steps however, the room exploded. They ducked back around the corner as loud booms echoed and bits of debris rained down.

When Irving finally chanced a glance, long tongues of orange flame were reaching into the sky. The Keep was burning, the tiny storage room was destroyed, and the breeze carried the flames along the rooftop and toward the neighboring buildings.   

“We should go,” said Irving. “We should go right now.”

And so they did.