Young Writers Society

Wanderer!
In your travelling, you have now reached the Crossroad. From here, five paths lead on, yet no need for you to pick one just now - for here right in front of you, a tavern stands, its doors always open, its light in the darkness inviting you in. Shall you join the others, perhaps just waiting for you inside?

The Below's Best Bed and Breakfast, more often than not referred to as TBBBB due to people's laziness and understandable lack of imagination when it comes to abbreviations, is a place where every soul is welcome, once they cross the line between Life and Beyond.

Have you just died, and are looking for comfort? Have you been a wandering soul for centuries, waiting for someone or perhaps getting grumpy but still secretly wanting to get a young mentee? Are you a demon with a Contract just fulfilled, or a guardian angel looking for a job in strange places? Are you a mortal, able to see the Below or for some reason in a short visit before you wake up or get saved at the very last moment by someone Above?

The possibilities, of course, are more than countless..just as are the paths this story can take you, once you walk through the door. Take a chance, take a break, and join all the others (mis)fortunate souls, exchange a few words or try the cookies, sleep a night or pick up a companion and move on, or basically do whatever you feel like doing.. but be wary, for your choices are still what shape your future, and one never knows what can happen next.

Glimmer





And so, now Glimmer was desperate enough to hunt for aeons-old praenatural killers in a god-forsaken bed and breakfast. She must have gone mad, at last.

She'd scoured the mortal world first: Glimmer had visited the bloodstained plains of the Twelve Kings, and stood below the colossal obsidian ruins of what had once been mankind's greatest and evilest construction. There she had seen the monoliths, the eerily beautiful figures sculpted into stone, and the altars, foul and radiating corruption, like carrion.

Then, she'd moved to the surrounding Forest, so old and so black that it hadn't even been given a name. Names were powerful, Glimmer knew, and in that forest, names had been whispered to her by the animals, the trees, the gurgling waters. The Dark Ones; The Silent; The Forsaken; The Kakodaimonos. Those who hunt in the dark.

Glimmer had traveled to the bleakest, grimmest corners of the mortal realms, truly an impressive wild goose chase -- to her amusement, or, perhaps, dismay, she'd even heard tales by the fireplace of her hunt. Granted, she was depicted as a devil, or a witch, an immortal aberration even, in hunt of the most ancient and most dangerous of all the magics. Usually, Glimmer noticed such stories were used to teach the children that venturing too far away from home wasn't a good idea.

Her lips curled upwards. She stared down into her glass, both hands around the cup. The still, dark liquid reminded her of the eyes of the sorcerer. They were burned into her mind. The eyes, dark and reptilian, and the voice, raspy, desert wind across her soul.

Subconsciously, Glimmer moved her hand to her left forearm, where, below her sleeve, twenty-two long scars marred her skin. Gods damn that fiend. Still, he'd been her only good lead so far. He'd shown her the book, had her flick through the pages. Oh, what she'd seen. There were times she wished she hadn't. Usually around the first hour of the day, when her clammy skin was beaded with sweat, and the nightmares woke her up.

It was because of the book she was here now, eyeing the soul cookies sitting in jars by the counter. It was actually ludicrously simple, now that Glimmer thought about it. Why hadn't she thought of coming here before? The TBBBB was as good as place as any to find information. Glimmer had never been here before, but she knew that many different kinds of... people, for want of a better word, came here. And she knew first-hand that the dead, not having much to do, turned to gossip as favorite pastime.

Now, looking at the assembled lot from beneath her cloak's hood, her opinion was confirmed. Most of the people sitting at the tables were shades -- they resembled humans, albeit a tad less substantial, and a lot less noisy. Glimmer preferred the realms of the dead mainly for this. Shades always conversed in polite silence. Perhaps it was the shock of actually being dead, but not. Glimmer's lips curled further.

She could also see others, however. Beings more powerful than shades. In corners, Glimmer could identify a few demons. Even though they were in human avatars, she could tell by their confident, arrogant posture. Even when sitting, demons were prideful creatures. She also saw a lich, a revenant and even a minor deity, probably one of the gods of the dead.

Glimmer brushed back a lock of her white-blond hair and went back to staring into the cup intently, as if it would reveal secrets to her. The sorcerer's book had not been so kind as to tell her who to go to.

After a few minutes, she felt someone -- or something -- move towards her.