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The Giving and the Taking
The underbelly of the city swallowed all, sounds and light alike. There was nothing down there with them except darkness. Darkness, and the distant, murmuring, maddening echo of running water that came streaming down from some hidden nook in the monumental structures up above. It muted the sounds of all footsteps, friendly and unfriendly alike.
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Exhaling
They often said that in battle, everything becomes a blur. For Giendei, it was the opposite: every movement and intake of breath stood out with perfect clarity, every small thing thrown into sharper focus.
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Gold of the Marshes
One could see the treeline ending even from afar. Little by little spruces were replaced by pines, under which grew small, sad-looking birch saplings. They hadn’t been walking for long when the woods suddenly grew sparse and led them to a small hill. From the top of the hill opened a view to a large marsh. The occasional beam of sunlight reflected from the dark ponds as the clouds broke apart momentarily, blinding the travellers’ eyes.
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Maisy
Zsiga had always wanted a puppy growing up. It wasn’t that anyone in the house was allergic, it was just that his parents had never liked animals much, and no matter how he begged they didn’t let him have so much as a goldfish. Perhaps it had been for the best, he now thought. He wasn’t sure he should be responsible for any living being other than himself.
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Dust and Smoke
The building itself shook from the sheer power of the explosion. Dust, smoke. People screaming, running. Magic ricocheted off the walls, adding to the chaos. Béla’s head whipped around, wand gripped in his hand. His eyes found Zsiga through a curtain of haze just as a second explosion rent the world apart.
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Phonecall
His jeans were soaked to the knee as he marched down Oxford Street. London was extra miserable when it rained, at least in Zsiga’s opinion, and his mood wasn’t improved by the fact that Carl only picked up after the seventh or eighth ring.
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The Seer and the Seeing
Sleep was reluctant to come that night. Sofia tossed and turned, which was unusual; she was a heavy sleeper and usually needed to do little more than close her eyes to drift off, but tonight she felt uneasy.
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Moving Day
Zsiga carried in another box and laid it down on the bed, next to the others. His old bedroom was a mess. He had never properly moved out, not consciously, but after dividing his time between the Atrium office and Carl’s London flat in the past years his things had simply drifted off into new locations. Now that he had returned to the old house he found his room more or less the way he’d left it.
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Heart of Glass
The caverns sung. Heat and fumes rising from the deep left the air blurry, and the rapidly changing temperatures made the stalactites growing from the ceiling hum and chime. Between crystal stalagmites big and small walked an elf, and she was the last elf in the world.
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Tomb: chapters 1-3
The air flashed white with a deafening crack and Theodius collapsed as if he were nothing but a marionette whose strings had been ripped off their supports. Only the shallow pool softened his fall. His blood dyed the water pink in an instant.