Toothy Fables

By Trista K. Robichaud

The best stories have teeth. Author Trista K. Robichaud is no stranger to such fables. Join her through six weird and wonderful worlds of the bizarre. Some resemble the one outside our windows, distorted by a lens of the fantastic. Others are places of pure, shadow-drenched fantasy. Here, magic and steel vie against the onrushing darkness.

Attend a college party, where a roofied drink gives one young man the chance to play hero. This student has a lot to learn about the price for performing good deeds . . .

Meet sorceress Moonstone and swordswoman Tess, whose travels bring them in violent opposition with wizards and demons. When they come around, heads are guaranteed to roll . . .

Visit Hammerspike, a training ground for warriors from noble family houses, where a weapons master finds himself trapped between licentious youth and stolid duty. Sometimes, the best way out of a bad situation requires sinister methods . . .

Follow the beloved Dorothy, the Tin Woodsman, the Cowardly Lion, the Scarecrow, and Toto off the yellow brick road and into a place unlike any other found over the rainbow. Nothing can prepare you for what they will find in the Garden of Meat . . .

Beware, reader. These tales have teeth. They will latch on, worry you, and transport you to vistas nightmarish and dreamlike.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Twice Told Tales II
• Release date: Jun 28, 2016
• ISBN: 9781310979484

Book preview

Toothy Fables

By: Trista K. Robichaud

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

Anticipation first appeared in Necrotic Tissue; Blood Ties first appeared in Clash of Steel: Demon (Ed. Armand Rosamillia)

Fiction © 2016 by Trista K. Robichaud

Cover Design © 2016 by Twice Told Tales

Cover art © Ingaclemens | Dreamstime.com

Smashwords Edition

Published by Twice Told Tales

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author's rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

If you have any questions, please contact the publisher at [e-mail].

Table of Contents

Anticipation

Author's Note: Anticipation

Cottontail

Author's Note: Cottontail

A Wizard of Oz Interlude: The Garden of Meat

Author'sNote: Garden of Meat

Left Hand's Labors

Author's Note: Left Hand's Labors

Blood Ties

Author's Note: Blood Ties

Head Count

Author's Note: Head Count

About the Author

Anticipation

Estelle sat on her college bed and stared at the envelope in her hands, shaking. One bad party, and her two-faced sorority sisters had turned furtive and gossipy. The clinic was her last hope to explain a month’s nausea, joint pains, inexplicable sores, and dizzy spells. Estelle rubbed her belly and moaned. It was her first term at Prestige U. Something simpler? She attacked the envelope.

The doctors’ form letter mocked her with platitudes. It was true. She had a death sentence . . . Lupis ImmunoAcceleration Virus. Lycanthropy. The LIV. No!

Her parents were going to kill her.

Legally, even.

Author's Note: Anticipation

My husband has long been a fan of my writing despite my protests that I had simply too much to do. When he heard editor R. Scott McCoy was having a 100 word story challenge with a $25 prize for each, he wheedled me into writing one—because it was so short, he said, I could still do it. I succumbed. To be fair, he did promise that he would also send one in; much to my joy both stories were accepted.

As for ‘The LIV’, its genesis was simply that I wanted to convey a less common, more phantasmagoric twist to getting an HIV positive letter. The acronym was born because our housemate studied ‘the HIV’ for her doctoral dissertation. I liked the vision of a society who sought to exterminate such a disease by any means necessary, and my final play on words was born. I don’t often think of those, so I make sure to use them!

Cottontail

The ruffled elastic edge on pink and white cotton trapped Justin’s eyes, paralyzing his optic nerves. The cheering from the Homecoming football bonfire rally faded to white noise. Sherry squatted opposite him filling her cup from the dispenser on the picnic table, the harsh fluorescent lights beating down on the wide swath of skin between dark shirt and bright blue jeans. The cool autumn air became frigid; he pulsed with heat. Justin reached forward instinctively, supplying a steadying hand to Sherry’s. . . Shoulder! Justin caught himself just in time. Still, the tantalizing glimpse of her perfect, panty-clad butt burned his retinas as she stood.

Uh, thanks, Sherry said, and then she flashed a quick smile back at him. Her hair was lush and loose tonight, thick, gold highlighted black ringlets tumbling over her Oxford collar. Justin longed to touch them; to trace the outline of her long, Native American nose with his finger, to further part her scarlet lips with his thumb. He’d watched her, dreamed of her in Spanish II, had never been so close to her before. Alone with her before. Justin sucked in a breath. Say something, you idiot!

Nice evening, huh? plopped out, then Justin kicked himself. So much for Irish wit. . .

Yeah, uh, nice. Sherry made as if to dodge around him, heading back past the lighted parking lot to the darkened football field.

Hey, want to go for a walk later? Maybe? Traitor words spilled out of Justin as he kept talking, anything to keep Sherry’s eyes above his waistline.

Sherry paused, and looked again at Justin, eyes flicking over his loose black jeans and Metallica longsleeve. Nice of you, but I’m going to Trina’s party after this. Justin heard someone - probably Matt - light another bottle rocket from the Homecoming game bonfire. Its squeal and pop made them both jump. Justin, right? Yeah. Maybe I’ll see you at Trina’s? Sherry said, smiling. Her light brown eyes caught the light and held it, like drops of amber.

Justin bobbled like a loose doll. Yeah! See you, uh, there! She knows my name!

Sherry grinned and gave him a thumbs-up, then trotted back to her friends. She was soon lost in the shadowy crowd surrounding the homecoming high school bonfire, leaving Justin scrambling to find Matt and tell him the great news.



She laughed at his jokes!

Justin and Sherry sat on a low brick wall in Trina’s back yard, surrounded by loud, laughing people. The basso thump of some trip hop Justin never heard of echoed off the