this is a collection of unpolished, imperfect, messy snippets either from writing exercises or unfinished stories. I’m putting these here to document my progress as a writer, and to remind myself that writing is writing is writing — even if its not perfect.
finding fate
The outskirts village is a place where the Empire’s stories have no hold. The village’s apothecary apprentice turned accidental motivational speaker has to reconcile what it means to deal in fate when the Emperor’s youngest prince comes to visit.
residue
An undertaker shows her new prodigy the ropes, in a world where humanity has stopped aging, has ceased natural death.
amaranth
“Immortality was her father’s greatest work. His second best was May. Now, at the end of time, there is only the two of them left.”
ta-two
“Cherry held out her hand, and he took it. She blew on them gently, as if to warm them from the cold. His steady warmth, maintained by the machinery within him, melted the snow around them. “
the well of moons and souls
“Darkness surrounds me, so thick it clogs the senses – filling the lungs, smothering sight – and each swallow brings with it a plume of silver and rust. It is the smell of time, of things long dead.”
ochre waters
“Heat bore down on our colony as fingers to a bruise, and it manifested as stickiness under my arms, barren dirt in the land—as though our bodies were forced to suck moisture from the earth to keep them whole.”
ashes from the sea
“Your third touch is final: the magic of threes spinning gold and translucent in the sky.”
stars at dusk
“…they curse when their bodies sink into the lake’s depths as teeth into apple skin, flesh, core as though death has let loose a spirit on the water’s surface.”
this morning, the sun appeared to rise in the west…
“In the expanse of the Stone Sea, where hulls scraped against granite and crunched glass, silence and stillness meant you were stuck. Trapped in waves built from rock. If you were lucky, death would come first.”
forest, ghost, cotton candy
“Blessing was a little town, with little houses, filled by little, lost children.”
Gold
“There was no warning, just a sudden whoosh of wind and the curtain before them turned to gray ash. The god was there. There—but not. What was once beautiful and divine, turned corrupt and terrible. Its foul mouth gaped open, unhinged at the jaw. Eyes a sickly gold. From its fingertips, dripped something foul and milky white, and each fat drop hissed as it landed on the marble. It reached for them.”
papercut
“Still, I paid it no mind, only stared at the way my mother’s fingers toyed with each sheet, fingering its edges until blood welled up from her fingertips, only to be stripped, one my one, neatly into the fire.”