Fae Walk

I took a walk with the fae last night,
Not a moment past midnight,
They stole me away,
Upon sorcerous wing,
To play in their viridian realms,
A rabbit hole in my dreams,
A place akin to madness,
Enchanting in its wrongness,

Passing sylphic springs and gingerbread cottages,
The path was like a forest unrestrained,
Ferns and oaks and elementals,
Brambles and Seelie and redcaps,
Unseen by mortals,
Where all kinds of impossible things reside,
Somehow greener than green,
More wild than any notion of nature,

It left an imprint on my mind,
A gift from fairies,
Perhaps a key to visit again,
And even as I awaken,
The dreaming remains,
And my footprints grow ivy and fungi.

Aurora

We’re taught that sorcery died out,
That all of the sorcerers burned,
But if you travel to the isolated places,
Those hyperborean ice fields and glaciers,
Away from the urban funk,
And look to the sky,

There you’ll see the most mystical of sights,
A sky bound phenomenon of green veins,
A jade dragon over the peaks,
A stroke of intangible mana,
As if conjured by some Nordic witch,
Nothing of man could compare,

And so,
This aurora casts a spell upon us,
A gift of sight mystic,
And if such an ensorcelling wonder exists,
What other spectacles may hide out there?
Magic is very much alive,

The sky tells us so.

October Cometh

It’s almost October,
The most glorious time of the year,
Or the most frightful,
When sun lotion gives way to autumn spice,
And lady lunar flaunts her totality,

The mercury descends,
As the sky attains a new palette,
The trees follow suit and shiver,
Quaking as the spectres begin to rise,
Coalescing in their nightly revels,

To us freaks it is a clarion call,
A call to arms,
When witches and bloodsuckers suit up,
The wisps prance through the pines,
And this Harlequin paints his grin anew,

For finally Samhain is upon us.

Bury Yesterday

Some are pursued by spirits,
Corpses of a hundred yesterdays,
Ectoplasmic bindings,
Every past hurt or teardrop,
Every bugbear and tribulation,
Lessons that stuck around too long,
This reminiscence does you no good,

So the best recourse,
Is to bury it,
Slay it and put it in the ground,
Stuff it in a pine box,
Exorcise that spectre,
Forget it,
Let that shovel be your survivor,

If you don’t bury the past,
Six feet deep in salted earth,
You’ll always be haunted by ghosts.

Darklings

Be careful roving in the pitch black,
You may not be alone,
There are things otherworldly within it,
Shadow given life,
The darklings,

Sunless imitations of men and women,
Never in focus,
But always staring,
Through intermittent ivory fireflies,
Hiding from your gas lamp,

They may mean no harm,
Be they ghosts or demons or fiction,
But when you can’t perceive their presence,
Their approach,
Would you take the chance?

Wind Wraith

On this night of nights,
The breeze is your only companion,
And it doesn’t mean well,
The aether hereabouts has a will of its own,
You feel a presence I’m sure,
A whisper on the wind,
Seething at the company of living souls,
You’re an unwelcome draught,
An intrusion into the night,

It rides about on the air cackling,
It’s a ghost,
A revenant,
A wraith,
It regards you with gelid eyes,
It moves in a gusty rave of enmity,
A hatred demonstrated on the raised pressure,
Its claws are the chills upon your shoulder,
And this spectre seeks to blow you away,

And it will.

Fear The Dark

Man has forgotten what resides in the darkness,
The creatures and anomalies of the night,
Why our ancestors truly brought about light,
Why they huddled as shadows raved around them,
And shuddered at each dire shriek,

Young ones still shiver at night,
They say children are the most intuitive of souls,
Receptive to things adults no longer see,
Things in the closet and under the bed,
The stink of the supernatural,

In truth those things never left,
They still hunger for gore and skin,
Fangs and talons and maws agape,
Heed your progeny,
We would do well to remember the fear.

Spectre Of Not Enough

I’m a ghost,
But not of an afterlife,
I’m not dead,
Just not entirely here,
A hollow spirit,
I gave myself out too much,
Charity for too many hearts,
There was no blood left for me,

Each call for help,
Became a funeral invitation for me,
Burying more of myself,
I lost my form,
I wasn’t enough,
No more flesh,
Wasn’t enough to give,
It hollowed me out,

So now I float about an old house,
I wail in the twilight,
Gasping stridor in the black,
But I’m not here to startle,
Just to wallow in my own eulogy,
Ectoplasmic gibberish,
Among guttering candles,
And black cats,

Not enough,
Not,
Enough.

Bob

It’s Ryan Sargent again, talking about his unlikely (and unwanted) companion. Who is it? What is it? How did Ryan meet this individual?

“Sometimes it may be unclear why I’m so certain the supernatural exists. I mean sure, I’ve seen plenty of weird and evil things. Getting proof of them is another matter entirely though. However, the ironic thing is i actually have proof in my very own home. Yes, i have something haunting my own home. I try to ignore the irony of that. I can’t prove something exists even though i technically live with it. I say haunting my home, but i really mean infesting my home. It wears a ginger wig, it eats nothing but peanut butter and it isn’t all that cooperative.

The damn thing won’t go away!

Thankfully it is sentient, it can speak. Surprisingly good English as it happens. It often interjects itself into my musings, usually unhelpfully. It tends to interrupt me equally as much. I wouldn’t consider it a hugely intelligent being, but for obvious reasons it does tend to have useful information on the supernatural. I’m not entirely sure what the being is. It doesn’t look like any demon I’ve ever seen, though it resembles the typical imp. It doesn’t appear to be dangerous. It doesn’t cause much trouble, it tends to just sit around eating.

It resembles a diminutive humanoid figure, with an insectoid face, complete with a bizarre amalgamation of a mouth. Both mammalian and insectoid. A grey, almost latex-like skin covers its body. It has 6 eyes, shining 3 different colors: red, green and blue. It’s wearing a ginger wig, i have no idea where it got that. Next door perhaps? I have no idea why it’s wearing it either, but it insists that i mustn’t touch it. It has long, slender arms with similarly slim fingers with small claws. On its shoulders it has a strange leafy material, in a sickly green colour. It has what appear to be crystals bursting from the leafy material. The group of crystals are dark greens and deep purples, with one large crystal that is jet black. I actually thought it was a lump of black steel at first. It appears to be able to float around at will. Telepathically perhaps? The most peculiar and interesting feature of this being is the intricate gold pocket watch that is chained to it’s wrist. Another of its acquisitions perhaps? It is resolute in the fact that the watch belongs to it though.

Chillingly, the being told me that the watch is counting down to the apocalypse. Now, i will be the first to admit that i am superstitious. I believe in the supernatural, the underworld and countless other planes of existence. But the apocalypse? I find that hard to believe. That would suggest that everything is predetermined. A thought i do not relish. But enough on that for now…

It calls itself Bbbolhugnith.  No, i don’t know how to pronounce it either. I’ve taken to calling it Bob. Far easier to say and the beast seems fairly disinterested in what i call it. Bob seems to be elusive in actually telling me who or what it is. I’ll admit i don’t even know if it’s a male or female. Perhaps gender is irrelevant to it. I haven’t been able to find any information on the beast and it’s not telling so i seem to be in limbo really. It lives in my house, ingesting copious amounts of peanut butter, occasionally helping me in a search for an obscure mythical beast. It seems to be able to easily evade any visitors. Either it’s a master at hiding or it has some power over magic.

How did i meet it? Well to be honest, it found me. I had just come back from a hunt in the northern cemetery with a small crystal fragment. I’d found it in the coven of cannibal witches I’d just managed to eliminate. No mean feat i assure you, but that’s a story for another time. I brought the deep, dark purple crystal home as i was certain it was something worth investigating further. I’m not sure it was the best idea now of course. That very same night, i get woken up to the sound of commotion in my kitchen. I burst in, pistol at hand, to see a small creature attaching the crystal to its back with one hand, and stuffing its gob with peanut butter with the other. It took one look at me and vanished into midair, leaving a pretty messed up kitchen. It never actually left. It’s still here. It seems to not mind me seeing it now. Why did it decide to stay here? Why did it run in the first place? What was the crystal? What the hell is with the peanut butter? I honestly have no idea, this creature is truly an enigma.

It’s not really the kind of companion that i would of liked. Bob comes in handy, yes. But it is frustratingly evasive and refuses to give me any information on itself. Hell, i had to hit it with a random kitchen implement a few times for it to even give me its name. I honestly imagined a companion being more human. Not to mention taller. Well, beggars can’t be choosers i suppose. I think I’ll leave it here, it sounds like Bob is causing a ruckus again. Pretty sure i hear a cat screeching its head off. Bob is probably attempting to burn it again. I wanted a companion, not a pet…”

Showmanship

Ryan Sargent saw some pretty crazy things in the city of Ebonton recently. I know that seems to be a constant for him, but there you go. Has he been fooled by an amazingly clever stunt or has he truly witnessed the supernatural again? Let’s see what he has to say for himself…

“I don’t know why i try to enjoy myself. My leisure time always seems to end up sprouting questions about the supernatural somehow. Perhaps I’m cursed or something. I went to watch some theatre shows recently. The shows were amazing, as i expected. Full of amazing magician tricks and some pretty unbelievably dangerous stunts. One in particular was quite something to behold. An absolutely gorgeous young woman began the stunt by saying some strange words in an unknown language. This struck me as bizarre straight away.  Then she motioned to the stage crew to activate the machine at the other end of the stage. This machine was unlikely to pass any health and safety checks whatsoever. It was a series of rings a few feet apart that were held up on end, almost like a tunnel. The insides of the rings were quite clearly circular saws of some kind. The rings then began to move about independently of each other, creating a pretty hellish obstacle course for our young stunt woman.

What followed defied any rational explanation!

The stunt woman held her arms out to the side. Then, slowly but surely, the woman began to levitate slowly. The audience was dumbfounded of course! But i got that sinking feeling in my belly that i always got when something supernatural was nearby, call it a monster hunters intuition! The woman levitated about 3 feet off the floor and stopped. Then she said some more unearthly sounding words. She turned slowly towards the obstacle course of death, still in the air. In a matter of moments the woman had performed some form of elaborate spin and burst through the air, passing unharmed through the spinning blades. Dodging and spinning while moving through a tunnel of saws of death? The audience was amazed! My eyes narrowed. The woman touched down on the stage at the other end of the machine again. The show was over. What a stunt right? I believe it was something different.

I had to read up on this. Check out some legends of magicians and the like. I don’t believe that it was some clever trick. I’m certain of it, it was magic! Now I’ve seen a good number of monsters in my time, but humans with the ability to wield magical abilities? That’s a new one. Of course, its not much of a stretch. There have been stories of wizards, medicine-men and witches since the dawn of recorded history. Conveniently enough, i found a legend pertaining to the very area this city was built on. I won’t get into how i found this for professional reasons. The legends of the Showmen. Wizards who used their powers to wow and confound the populace. Sounds harmless enough right? Not so.

Magic is real. We all think that the stage magicians and puppeteers are merely entertainers, but beneath the veil of their mundane practices lies a wholly different truth. These cryptic denizens of the world refer to themselves as the ‘Showmen’. Their gift, though impressive and awe-inspiring, may be more rare than many of the other denizens of the unknown world. They call it ‘Showmanship’ or the ‘Power of Purple’. An ancient gift from the heavens, depths or the aether (who knows?). Given to a small number of people who were forced under oath by some unknown being to keep the art of Showmanship secret. They were, however, encouraged to train others in the ways of their art but were told to draw new initiates from the dispossessed or the homeless. Presumably so as not to arouse suspicion. The reason why this magic is to be kept a secret is, unsurprisingly, also a secret.

As the legend goes, the gift of Showmanship was given to approximately 20 people by an unknown yet unbelievably mighty and persuasive being. There are conflicting views on what exactly the being was. Was it a god (or THE God) that passed down the power? Could it of been some Demon? Satan? An Elemental? Others still say that there was some kind of fairy baron who wished to turn these humans into some kind of perfect entertainers for some obscure reasons. Another told of an imp who tried to take control of these people and somehow messed it up. There seem to be countless theories, each with contradicting ideas and evidence. In truth, nobody truly knows where Showmanship came from. Showmanship, by its very own nature, is hard to categorize. Showmen seem to be able do almost anything. From generating different colour lights to creating devastating flames, from levitation to  invisibility. It’s a scary thing to imagine in the wrong hands and yet there doesn’t seem to be any accounts of the power being used to harm. Perhaps that was another tenet of the original trainers. Perhaps it is simply used to entertain, to beguile, to confound.

It’s strange when i seem to find a new supernatural thing that appears to be completely harmless. I always expect to find some kind of horrific being that feasts upon human flesh. Or a creature that wants to turn humans into its slaves. Showmanship would be dangerous in the wrong hands true, but keeping it safe and confined to the theatre seems to be the very point. I don’t know what to think. I have to be missing something. I feel this particular aspect of the supernatural world needs further investigation, there are far too many blanks here. I’m certain to be missing something…”