Young Writers Society

Parts 1/2

Author's Note/Apology:

I have-eth this habit of not going on teh yws for months then popping back in and becoming a regular all over. Heh, sorry. So anyway, FINALLY, here's Part 3. Part 4 WILL be released soon. It WILLLLLLLLLL. Part 3 would've come a few days sooner, but of course, teh Final, Seventh, Book of Awesomeness came out, or, I should say, was born into this world, and a change was felt in the Force, and I had to read it all the first day, then spend several more days mourning. So anyway...

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Chapter 3: Miles

Miles, a thirteen year old with untidy brown hair, returned from room five, and asked her, "Who was that?" Aello looked at him, balanced the pros and cons in her mind, then decided to tell him the truth. "Ah-- a... rebel." Miles's eyes widened, and he quickly said, "So you shut the door on him, right?"

"I... no."

Miles became shocked, and replied angrily, "What on earth was that for?"

"I couldn't just... turn him away!"

"Oh, nooooo, I remembered, we WANT to get an appointment with the gallows! Sorry for forgetting!"

"Miles! He was Dynecus!"

Miles stopped, and stared at her suspiciously. He had been eight when Dynecus's visits had stopped, and Aello's father had died, so he remembered even less of the strange, middle-aged man than Aello did.

He eventually said "Dynecus? A rebel? Yeah right. He was a politician!" "A politician for a different side, it would seem." said Aello through gritted teeth.

"So for five bronze a night we're letting a potential threat to our livelihood in?"

"He gave me no choice! And he gave me more than our usual rate, you idiot. I wouldn't have settled for that." Aello decided not to mention that it had been Dynecus, not herself, who had been the one who insisted on paying more. She dug the three golden coins out of her pocket, polished them a bit with the hem of her shirt, then held them to the light of the lantern overhead, where they gleamed.

"Yeah... I guess that's a bit more than five bronze." Miles, caught off guard, reassumed a defensive manner. "Still, what would you expect from a rebel, hm? They like to pretend they're all noble and generous, while they endanger other people's lives for the 'greater good'. How d'ya think he got those? Probably he worked hard, laboring to reach his hand into someone's wallet."

"If they had a wallet in the first place they were too rich for their own good," Aello snapped at him, shoving the coins back in her pocket. "And I've had enough. It's me who'll lose the inn if anything happens, there's a place somewhere down the street you'd be able to get a job at, so just shut it. It's my fault, and unfortunately for me, my problem."

But Miles was no longer paying attention to Aello, rather, his eyes were focused on the whisk-like tool that was lying right where Dynecus had put it down, and Aello, like a fool, had left it, on the counter. Cursing herself, she said "This is nothing... piece of junk he gave me. Some sort of odd sculpture...", picking the offending object up.

"Yeah right... that's one of those new experiments, isn't it?"

"What?"

Miles moved toward her, and she took a step back, then too late she raised her hands above her head, Miles snatching it and beginning to examine it.

"Yeah... It's a spark tool!"

"A what?"

"It... you've never heard of them? No wonder you were duped into taking it... It's where you take lightning... No one really knows how they harvest it... but anyway, you take lightning, or anything like that, the sparks you make when you make fire work as well, any sparks or anything, and put it into... (he cracked it open, the casing now appearing to be two fitting parts) this (he indicated a little cylinder with two prongs, metal wire attached to both prongs, with the whisk protruding from the other side), and then when you press this switch, the sparks go through the wires and make the whisk spin, somehow."

He pressed it, and sure enough, the whisk started to spin, but Aello could see sparks dancing around each wire's connection with the prongs.

"It's all a very guarded secret, how they do it, Agaron supposedly killed to get it for himself."

"Amazing..." breathed Aello.

"...but I wouldn't want anything to do with it. It's messing with things that shouldn't be messed with. I deal with a lot of the people who stay here, they tell me things about what it DOES... that spinning thing... it can replace horse-run chariots, just attach to the wheels and they spin themselves. I actually saw one go by a while back." He shivered. "Looks like it's run by ghosts!"

The intervention of the spark-tool had eased the argument, and Aello sighed, and put it away in a drawer for the time being, sitting down in the cozy chair to rest and eat one of the warm buns. Miles went upstairs to bed, and the grandfather clock in the corner of the room rung twelve.

Aello felt uneasy at how quickly she had rushed to the defense of Dynecus in the previous argument with Miles. It was too late now, she supposed, to do anything, however, but wait, and see how the whole mess would sort itself out.

Her eyes drifted to a close...

Suddenly there was a knock at the door, and her eyes sprung open. She took a look through the window, and her suspicions were confirmed; it was Lord Fethron, with his men and horses, outside the door, knocking with his godforsaken hand.

He had been far too smug and ready to arrest when she had missed a coin or two in taxes, and she doubted it'd be anything short of a thousandfold worse when he thought she was housing rebels.

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Find out what happens... SOON! Yaaaaay! Critiques very welcome, and I think I'll repeat that promise: PART 4 WILL BE RELEASED AT THE MAGICAL DATE OF "SOON". I SWEAR IT.