Liquid Pain

Pain radiated through his body, beginning at the throat and soon wracking him head to toe with agony. He contorted and writhed, muscles spasming with near-bone-cracking force, and the only thing he dared spare the willpower to control was keeping the clay bottle of liquid pain at his lips. He wouldn't be charged with drinking less than every last drop.

The person watching him with a cruel smile had long ago forsaken human appearances. They wore only a collection of rags tied in place with rough knots or with mud daubed and let to harden. The cruel smile faded, swallow after swallow, into a mild boredom, and their eyes wandered around the dingy dungeon chamber of stone and mortar. He was drinking, his conviction was clear, so he held no more interest for his captor. Or they had never been interested, and the mask of cruelty was too tiring, or too boring, to continue wearing.

He came to, alone in the empty room, after something akin to a blackout, with only mist-shrouded memories of licking at the rim of the bottle, lest he be accused of leaving a single drop.

"I have your family," they had said. "Drink every drop, or they die after the worst pain they have ever experienced, each of them watching in turn until the youngest is last." These dry words, flavored with malice that has been used too many times like a destitute family's last teabag, gave him his conviction.

He went home, crawling until he could stumble, stumbling until he could run, arriving to a happy home disturbed only by his fear, his appearance. They had never been taken, never been threatened or in any danger. His partner gave him a note, delivered by anonymous messenger.

"Now you know how far you will go."

The Same Distance, the Same Direction

Howard looked at it again. "There's still a train in our living room."

Hugh shrugged without taking his eyes off the steam engine. "Rail accident?"

Howard looked down to where the train entered their home. "There's no rail near here." He could see two things at once in the same space: Their living room wall, intact and artfully decorated, and at least ten train cars trailing into the distance, at a concrete platform that occupied the same space as their teak floor. Or occupied different space, just the same distance away from them, and in the same direction.

"Is it... going to leave?" Hugh still stared.

"I mean, probably? It has a schedule to keep." Pause. "I kind of want to see what's on it."

"I.... It's a ghost train, or something, you can't just get on. You'll go to Hell, or... or somewhere else we don't believe in!"

"Or steam-powered Narnia."

"I absolutely forbid it." Hugh had pulled his eyes from the train for the first time and was staring at Howard.

"Forbid it?" Howard smiled a challenge at Hugh.

"Prohibit, veto, deny, countermand, negatively edict, I don't know, yes! Don't get on that train!"

Howard looked at the car ahead of him and over to where the engine belched steam in and not in their kitchen. He could almost hear a distant whistle.

"This doesn't just happen to people, Hughie," he said. "If this train leaves and I never know why, I will hate myself every day for not getting on."

"I would hate you every day for leaving."

"Then you're just gonna have to come with me." Howard hopped onto the metal lattice steps up into the train car and held a hand back to Hugh.

Hugh looked him deep in the eyes, fear plain on his face. "Dammit, if this doesn't take us to a magical adventure where neither of us gets hurt, I am going to be very angry."

"That's fair," Howard said. The train pulled away, and they waved goodbye to both the platform and their house, which had somehow—and briefly—occupied the same space.

With Twilight Behind the Hills

My thumb felt frostbitten, I'd held it out so long. I wasn't surprised. A big man, scruffy and unwashed? I wasn't a safe bet, especially with twilight disappearing behind the hills. I saw a flicker of light far down the road. Maybe my last chance.

A lot of things brought me to this moment. Some good choices, maybe more bad ones, and bad luck mixed with bad timing. I'll still swear up and down the Hudson that any other year, my business would've done just fine. But with the economy...

I kept my thumb out. No telling how far ahead the driver was looking. The lights looked colder than normal. Those new, blue-colored lights?

So maybe quitting my job was a bad idea. And telling my boss just how much he smelled may have burned a bridge. But how was I to know that the investments I liquidated for funds were about to leap in value?

The closer the lights got, the more I could see a wobble, like the driver was palsied. I took a step away from the road.

I tried a dozen jobs, anything that'd keep me afloat. They only wanted pliable teenagers and immigrants.

A carriage pulled up, transparent with a ghostly blue lanterns hanging from the front. The driver flickered like a bad special effect. He asked if I wanted a ride to the front. General Washington would take any body he could get, he said.

It wasn't like I had any other job offers.

A Morality Tale

To begin with, you are a prince, or a farmer's third son, or a young woman. You will come upon the test: a fairy pretending to need somebody's last bit of bread, or a challenge to do something impossible. You display your virtue, usually clever perpendicular thinking but possibly generosity, hard work, mercy, or piety, and earn the prize: a princess, kingdom, treasure, wish, or a combination of the above.

Here's the catch: you're flawed. The most important bit is when you overcome your flaw. You have to learn your lesson from it before it's too late. Did you fail the test but learn a valuable moral lesson? Then the lesson was the test, and overcoming your flaw was your virtue. Move ahead, collect your prize.

Maybe you discover your flaw later. You've passed the test and you're ready to collect your prize. Here is where your flaw rears its ugly head: pride, or greed, or ambition maybe. Despite passing the test, your prize recedes from your grasp. Only overcoming your flaw at this late stage—when it again becomes your real test—will get you what you seek.

But what if the story's over without finding your flaw? You've quested, tested, bested, and want to be rested. But without a flaw, then the story's not over... or yours is a morality tale, and it's about to make an example of you.

Embedded in the Stone

Veretta hopped off the cart first. The other fifteen year olds jockeyed for position behind her, but no one contested her right to be first. They hadn't moved until she stood, though she'd delayed in the hope that someone else would take the lead. So it had always been. Tall, dark of hair, a natural leader, her peers deferred to her almost by reflex. And after that, she couldn't let them down.

Youths from dozens of other carts hopped off and jostled into a semblance of order before a helmed and halberded guard. Behind him stood a courtyard and castle. In the center of the courtyard, a stone. And embedded in the stone, a sword. The sword.

Veretta tried to stay near the back, but the companions from her long cart ride pushed her to the front with them, chanting her name. The guard invited her forward. With a trembling lip, she stepped forward and took the hilt in both hands.

When the sword shifted, she froze. Had anyone seen? Their hushed silence told her no. Heart in her throat, she strained, body trembling with effort, but against only her own muscles, never the stone's grip on the blade. It felt like an hour before the guard told her she had to let go. He didn't notice the sword slide a millimeter back into place as she released it.

With a humble grin and shrug, Veretta slid back into place in the crowd, and quietly left while everyone else failed.