Ink Stained and Spellbound: #minithology

By N.D. Gray, E. Prybylski, Heidi Moone and 3 more

What if, to do magic, all you needed was a drop of ink?

 

To protect one's self...
To save a friend...
To rescue loved ones...
To chart an unexpected path through life...

 

Student, mage, or witch, the characters in these stories all use ink in their magic, and they all have the same goal in mind: to draw a tomorrow that is better than today.

 

How would you ink the future?

 

Authors Heidi Moone, Leslie E. Heath, Roan Rosser, E. Prybylski, and N.D. Gray bring you five fantasy and science fiction stories about magical ink.

• Language: English
• Publisher: 3 Feathers Publishing
• Release date: Jul 30, 2022
• ISBN: 9781947344235

Book preview

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

STORY ONE–THE MAGIC IN THE DETAILS

STORY TWO—THE STOLEN

STORY THREE—INKED UP

STORY FOUR—CLEAN SWEEP

STORY FIVE—THE WAYS OF SPORE AND INK

COMING SOON

COPYRIGHT

INTRODUCTION

THERE IS SOMETHING MAGICAL ABOUT ink. Harvesting substances from the earth, crushing and grinding them into powder, adding water, or other fluids, until all is mixed and flows from the tip of a stick, feather, or pen.

Then before us, the empty page. Blank sheets of papyrus or parchment. Lined notebook paper. Our favorite journal smelling of possibilities.

The combination of the ink and the page is sheer magic. An opportunity to create new worlds with doodles, letters, or runes. Never before imagined realms birthed from the creator’s imagination and the elements all around us.

Our stories in this minithology are drenched in ink. From a spell inscribed in henna, to magical contracts writ in ink mixed from substances only found in other realms, to vials of ink bled from unearthly spores.

Each of our characters must write their own futures. Draw their own paths. They face intellectual challenges, over-powered spells, loss of loved ones, and certain death as they chart new and unexpected courses in their lives.

Settle into your favorite chair and prepare to be ink stained and spellbound.

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ND Gray

July 2022

Camp Verde, AZ

STORY ONE

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In her own words, Heidi Moone has become very fond of bottle-ink and fountain pens the last couple of years.  She uses her fountain pens for every day writing and loves the messy ritual doing so involves.

Her main character discovers the joys of messiness when it comes to magical ink creation. Along the way, she learns obstacles are but chances to rewrite the path of our life.

POLLY LISTENED TO THE NEW girl prattle on, and wondered how long she’d make it in the business.

So, the unicorns want to have something pretty, Alice explained, her blonde eyelashes fluttering with anxiety. They say they won’t agree to anything otherwise.

They can have an oral contract, for all the good it will do them, Polly shrugged. We can record that in a very pretty seashell, perhaps, and hold it for an agreed-upon term, but otherwise, their contract will be done in sepia ink, which you can tell them is the color of the rich earth they run on.

Oh, they were very insistent, Miss Polly, Alice frowned, looking at her hands a moment.

That’s why we give them two options, and make them choose one, Polly explained, the picture of patience. They do get a choice; they just don’t get to make up their own rules and the like. When it comes to a magical contract, the structure matters, Alice. Did you learn that in orientation?

Orientation, yes, I mean of course, Alice’s hands now fluttered a little, giving her an air of helplessness that wasn’t appealing in someone handling magical contracts at all. We have rules for reasons.

Polly could pretty much hear Malcolm’s voice saying those words. He’d run Alice’s orientation, and she knew Malcolm was a solid, seasoned person who’d trained many of the people in the Agreements, Accords, and Arbitration realm. The AAA service they provided the various supernatural and magical realms was the glue that prevented many conflicts from boiling up into reality-ending situations.

Nobody wanted that.

Excellent. I think the unicorns will accept a written contract in sepia ink, Polly decided. And we need that contract, because the unicorns are very intent on murdering all the humans in that particular realm, and the humans want to have what they describe as fair access to unicorn resources, which have, from the human perspective, miraculous healing abilities.

Alice nodded, having taken out a little notepad from her purse on which she began to scribble. Honestly. This was all in the casefile.

Normally, before the AAA formed, this would result in bloodshed, generational hatred, potentially involving other parties, or resulting in the complete eradication of one, both, or all of the disagreeing parties, Polly went on. Now, we can have mediated negotiations and come to terms that, while perhaps not entirely pleasing to both sides, allow for peace and a continuation through to the other side of this trying time.

The unicorns are not especially happy, Alice interjected, and Polly nodded.

From what I’ve heard, the hunters, or we should say former hunters, once they sign the contract, are also not happy, she explained. They will no longer have their former livelihood. Which, one might say, is a good thing, considering the high mortality rate involved for all parties.

I wouldn’t want to be a unicorn hunter, Alice mused.

Of course not, Polly agreed, absently tugging on the left cuff of her blouse, checking to ensure it was still immaculate and free of any stray stain or discoloration. Now, post-contract, they will become unicorn resource management people. In the event a unicorn has an end-of-life experience, the unicorns will perform their rituals, and a respectful representative of the resource management team will collect certain needful artifacts from the remains for use in their human world.

That is sort of, uh, what’s the word? Macabre, Alice sighed.

I find it much less macabre than the ‘limited hunt’ the unicorn hunters have been pushing for the entire negotiating cycle, Polly noted, resisting the urge to rub her throbbing temples. That negotiation had been an absolute nightmare, no pun intended.

And really, yes, it was less than optimal. The negotiating team had been trying to bring the unicorns to the point where they might have some herd representatives strategically placed for emergency healing, to forego any need for, well, mutilating the corpses of dead unicorns. The herd hadn’t wanted to go that far, believing the hunters would break the agreement and kill these volunteers.

This had been the best solution that could be agreed to by all sides. No more unicorn hunters. No more murdered unicorns.

Sepia ink, Alice was walking away, muttering, and Polly let her go. She had to finish the paperwork for the gnome war that had just been averted. They would need lampblack for the ink for that contract.

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OF COURSE, BY MID-AFTERNOON, THE office was, if not in, then on the verge of a state of affairs.

Mo had been writing an elaborate contract for the religious disagreement between two pantheons. It was elaborate because one pantheon had been meticulously subsuming the other pantheon for generations, and the first pantheon just wasn’t going to have it anymore.

I’ve taken all the red ink, he explained.

Polly laughed at him. It wasn’t appropriate, and certainly not something she would do normally in the office. Polly was not a laugher. She was neither a chuckler nor a giggler. She did not titter nervously.

But the idea that someone could ‘take all the ink’ was, well, absurd.

The AAA didn’t run out of ink. Writing binding magical contracts was the entire purpose of their orderly, regimented lives. Were they boring? Bureaucratic? Anal-retentive? Of course they were.

People with those qualities didn’t run out of anything. Let alone ink.

Mo’s face, rightfully, did not change. He was also not a person prone to random guffaws or merriment.

How have you taken all the red ink? She looked at him, having swallowed the unexpected outburst. Mo, that doesn’t make sense. I’ve been here, well, for decades. We don’t run out of ink. It’s like saying we don’t have paper.

Mo’s eyes shifted down to look at the document he was in the process of writing. He would write a copy for each of the warring parties (there were seven tribes), and then two copies for the office records; one stored on-site, and another off-site, in case of an emergency.

Their realm had never lost a magical agreement of any time, either written, orally recorded, or (just a few times) composed using far stranger methodologies. When you were doing magical contracts for some of the spookier realms, things Got Weird Fast.

I just know I did a request with Ruby this morning and she was agitated, and wanted to know how much I needed. She told me to not be wasteful, as they were still waiting on a resupply.

Polly pressed her lips together, thinking furiously. This was more than unfortunate. This was potentially disastrous.

Emma hasn’t done the ordering? That’s not like her, she said, and Mo shrugged.

I have enough for my project, and the next thing I’m doing is only going to need sepia, so it’s not my problem, he said. I filed for a restocking—had to look up the process, might I say, so you can imagine how unusual it is. I just thought you ought to know.

And that was the end of that. Polly went and checked. Emma had been aware, yes. She was in the office sorting out assignments for the new arrivals, and she looked tired as she looked up at Polly.

There’s an issue with the supplier, she explained. Ulysses has looked into it, but he said that he’s not able to reason with the supplier at all, and she’s told him not to come back.

She? Polly blinked, because really, the idea their ink was supplied by a singular source was odd. Well, doesn’t Noah usually handle it? Polly asked, and Emma and she paused while one of the new kids popped in, grabbed her assignments, and left, saying nothing at all to either of them.

Polly had higher hopes for that one than for Alice.

Noah’s on vacation, Emma said, and Polly just looked at her for a moment, like she’d just said ‘Noah is a hippopotamus’ or something.

There are vacations now? She honestly couldn’t remember taking one. Ever.

Emma pressed her lips together, and templed her hands, tapping her fingers together as she thought.

He’s taken an urgent leave, problems at home, she finally said with a shrug. Everyone’s got a life, Polly.

So, who’s going to get the order through? Will Gil do it, or Eve? Not even people Polly really interacted with, since they’d both been promoted ages ago. But the senior management on their special upper floor had to be good for something, right?

Do you need the ink? Emma blinked, her face very bland, suddenly.

I’m going to need a heap of it for a project next week, and at least two of the new kids are going to need it too, Emma nodded. Bad enough having to bring them up to speed without being disrupted. We have guarantees with getting our agreements done, Emma.

Then why don’t you give it a try? Emma suggested, waving her hand it a ‘there you go’ sort of way. You’re invested. With something like this, Noah always said it helps to be motivated.

Polly went back to her cubicle and looked