I met the eyes of the other girl and we fell into a pattern - one of us distracted the Witch whilst the other one hit it - but tiredness was setting in. She stumbled, briefly, and the Witch clipped the side of her head with her talons.

Her hairpin - her Soul Gem, I realized - shattered in a thousand pieces, motes of light falling to the ground. And when that happened her body crumpled like a puppet whose strings were cut.

I shouted wordlessly, and dove forwards to thrust my sword in the neck of the weakened Witch. She died and her barrier collapsed into a Grief Seed, the little black ovoid nestled in the snow, but her body was nowhere I could see.

Numb, I picked up the Seed, touching it to my Gem to draw the corruption out of it. It overflowed, pulsing dangerously in my hand, the Witch ready to hatch again.

The white form of Kiuubey, almost invisible amongst the snow, jumped down from the roof and paddled silently towards me. "You should give me the Grief Seed.", it projected. "It'll hatch in less than a day otherwise."

"What happened? Where is the other girl? What happened to her?"

"She died." it replied simply.

"How?! It was just her gem, she shouldn't..."

"Why do you think they are called *Soul* Gems, Francesca?" it asked, no emotion I could detect in his voice.

"I... I didn't... Why?!"

"Your bodies are so weak and frail - too weak and frail to survive an encounter with a Witch, even with magic. Thus, your soul is placed in a vessel - this way, you can even survive the death of your body."

I couldn't help it. I laughed. And when Kiuubey tilted its head and looked at me, asking me why, I laughed even more.

"Most girls are upset when they discover this.", it observed.

I just threw the filled Seed at it and turned, jumping away. I was basically a lich - with my own philactery and everything. And even if my unlife was dangerous, the flames of hope rekindled in my chest.

I now had a chance.

A chance - a chance for both of us, broken as we are - to be together forever.

Forever is a long time. And with magic, not even bringing those whose life was cut short was out of my reach.

And as I jumped from rooftop to rooftop, on a tiny, insignificant blue planet orbiting a small yellow star in a minuscule galaxy amongst billions, I started laughing again. And the universe trembled.

By Zero (@MalfunctioningTranshumanist)
[Read More: https://telegram.me/WritersClub/5752]

Dance beneath
Dance beneath the starsas you drink in the night.Let the thunder overtake youas lightening fills the sky.Feel the force of naturepenetrate your skin,spin with the worldas the magic sinks in.

~ Christy Ann Martine

Tags: #pensivepost
January 22, 2017 at 08:58PM

Cheat
The cheat always lies at the feet of the cheated.

~Italian Proverb

Tags: #pensivepost
January 22, 2017 at 09:30PM

The Vandalized Soul

Remember? Do you?
The verses of the Mahabharata,
Where Draupati begged to let her go,
Where being a wife of the Pandavas made her no different from the unmarried women.
Remember? Do you?
When inside 1 in 10 houses,
A little girl complains to her mum,
It hurts me in there Maa.
Remember? Do you?
The night,
When a girl lay all naked and battered on the road,
When a friend of her's was as helpless as the lost kid at the course.
Remember? do you?
The nights when people marched with candles in their hands,
The days when we witnessed protests.
Days after days,
Months after months,
Years after years,
Didn't you,
All of you, tried to build us?
The ones who were too small to understand,
The ones who were capable enough to understand,
And the ones who understood what all this actually meant.
From the cheap comments passed
To the guidelines to dress-up,
You filled our heads,
With the thoughts which were never meant to be there.
From all those sad old lines to the new generation trends,
You made us cautious yet scared.
While there were dreams to be accomplished,
And words that were unsaid,
Your efforts to build us,
Made us question our own existence.
With every tantrum and argument we throw,
We have something for you to know, you know,
Caging us won't do us any good,
While letting us live without the not so needed guidelines will do.
Set us free and cage the ones who needs so,
For the day you would realise,Is merely a hypothetical concept you would know.

by Anshula Nema

Tags: #post, #pensivepost
January 22, 2017 at 09:53PM

Chickens
Media

Tags: #post, #pensivepost
January 23, 2017 at 12:34AM

When Day Is Done

If the day is done,
if birds sing no more,
if the wind has flagged tired,
then draw the veil of darkness thick upon me,
even as thou hast wrapt the earth with the coverlet of sleepand tenderly closed the petals of the drooping lotus at dusk.

by Rabindranath Tagore

Tags: #post, #pensivepost
January 23, 2017 at 01:15PM

A New Leaf
 new leaf Shooting a smile tender and sweet,Shy of dust, dipped in mist,She waves and sways in morning breeze,I love to watch her graceful twist.
She grows swift with guts and grits,In burning sun and chilly wind,Bitten by insects and chewed by pests,Heedless to pain she coolly grinned.
Spreading wide behind the flower,Adding beauty to its charming mien.As the flower is plucked and smelt,She turns gray, no sap in vein.
She frills and falls near the root,Under the plant never to shoot,Consoling herself on dry heap below,As food for leaves smiling above.

Written By: Mohanchand

Tags: #post, #pensivepost
January 23, 2017 at 01:37PM

Poetry


 A poet fights for noble endsBefore the unjust he never bendsPoetry is rhythmic flow of intense feelings. Prosody and rhetoric provide tools for practicing poetry writing; but very fine feelings, emotions and sentiments can make a good poet. A person with noble heart can easily become a poet. The great poets are noble at heart, love humanity and nature. They try to evolve beauty in all beautiful and ugly looking things, through their language.Traditionalist, Modernist and Post-modernist are just classifications in Time. The stream of poetry is continuous.Indian poetry is enriched by great seers, saints, sages, devotees, thinkers and scholars from various walks of life. From Pre-Vedic, Upanishadic periods till the modern periods, forms have changed but soul of poetry remains the same, uniting the Indian Culture with Universal Culture, preaching Universal Love –“All those living on the earth are one family”“Vasudeva kutumbakam”

‘Poets are unacknowledged legislators of the world’ – P.B. Shelly In a mind filled with filth and quagmire good thoughts  bloom like lotus flowerand make it beautiful to the beholder                                           -   Mohanchand PatilHad one not taken birth on the earth,The life in universe should have been short of one’s experience.                                          -  Mohanchand PatilPoems fall in heart and mindwafting in air up and downLike maple leaves land on ground
                                            - Mohanchand Patil

Written By: Mohanchand

Tags: #post, #pensivepost, #WritersClub
January 23, 2017 at 01:42PM

You went from being my drug to the reason I need them. January 24, 2017 at 05:44PM

Sonnet: I Thank You
I thank you, kind and best beloved friend,
With the same thanks one murmurs to a sister,
When, for some gentle favor, he hath kissed her,
Less for the gifts than for the love you send,Less for the flowers, than what the flowers convey;
If I, indeed, divine their meaning truly,
And not unto myself ascribe, unduly,
Things which you neither meant nor wished to say,
Oh! tell me, is the hope then all misplaced?
And am I flattered by my own affection?
But in your beauteous gift, methought I traced
Something above a short-lived predilection,
And which, for that I know no dearer name,
I designate as love, without love’s flame.

By Henry Timrod (1965)

Tags: #post, #pensivepost, #WritersClub
January 28, 2017 at 12:46PM