Having recently finished up a science-y degree, I am obviously well qualified to thoroughly and accurately discuss the cultural impact of fairy tales. Well, perhaps not. But perhaps my fresh memories of deep dives into the murky waters of f-ratios, geostrophic balance, sediment cores, and DNA cleaning have made me hungry for exploration in waters of a different sort.

In my hands I hold the world
A pot of gold I seek to find
My pathway: beams of sunlight, pearled
The rainbow’s end in light enshrined.

The night around me closes fast
Blue skies now deepen into black
I look up to the heavens, vast
For fear of unforeseen attack.

Look! Yonder, there a shadow road
To where it leads, I cannot say.
Dark silhouettes of creatures goad
A swifter flight by moonlit ray.

Kindle the flame,
Spark the fight.
Spread the wings
Of darkest night.
Tooth and claw,
Scaly might.
Swirled together,
Dark and light.

Sinuous strength,
Ice and fire.
Silent as death,
Beware his ire.
Come the flame,
Come times dire.
This black giant
Is the crier

Eyes of gold,
Spine-tipped tail.
As black as night
Is every scale.
Great broad wings
and blackest mail.
A shift of pinions
Creates a gale.

Ileuad pulled her mud stained cloak tighter around herself, trying not to wake Ewen. She shuddered in the cold, and cast a glance over to the other side of the cave. There Adaon lay, never to rise again. He was shrouded in his dark cloak in the very farthest corner of the cave.

Sioned was growing tired of the life she had chosen.

Wynne made it to the barracks of the keep. Warrior women jogged to and from the extensive and solid establishment. Marching girls with blonde braids swaying on their backs passed by her, their blue eyes gazing on her. They whispered behind their small, pale hands in the lilting yet hard language of Skuld. Wynne smiled and nodded to the squadron, who smirked shyly and went on their way.
She knocked on the barrack door, and a lady dressed in a soft buckskin tunic and palla answered.
“Úda’lugha?” she asked plainly.
“Gwceff,” answered Wynne as she entered.

Nóe ran down the hall.
He remembered last night as if it were a second ago. Every memory was vibrant as if it had just happened. Every single word, action, and gesture was crystal clear in his mind.
“Your brother is becoming quite destructive,” mused Lord Crofton, carelessly strolling across his throne room. “It’s become… peeving. And his dog, that mangy, rabid thing… that is a lot to take care of.” He stopped mid-step, then turned to Nóe. “Has he been this way for long?”

Death was never something to fear for herself, she knew. For all of her kind, the embrace of eternity had almost appealed.

There were so many, though, who depended upon her. She knew that this, too, was a hollow concern, for all things were taken into account. The moment her heart ceased to beat, her charges were out of her hands and into another’s. One just as capable, one just as worthy. The Hand would never choose one less than able to protect the sacred world. She herself had been honored, once she learned to accept its existence.

Edit: I wrote this to practice telling a story starting at the present and telling what happened in the past through the characters.
It also happens to be from a dream that I had a week or two ago. :) me and dreams...

Zenobia dragged out the ending of her story for two years. It took that long for her to trust the prince to kill her. During the first year, she simply gave him the knife with which to do it. In the meantime, Zenobia did languish, though not in the dungeon the prince set up for her. She daydreamed about that cold, dripping cell. It seemed preferable to the single stripe of shade she currently sat in against the warm sandstone wall.