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The green hills and golden farmlands of Queensdale filled Gus’ morning with a familiar edge of adventure; now his recent travelling, before his imaginings in childhood.  Gus placed the memories of homely comforts at the front of his mind.  Although a sense of boding snaked through them.      Gus tightened a strap on his backpack as he listened to the conversation between a Seraph and another man.  He began loosening it as the talks of centaurs arose, where tribal names and distant places mentioned, were of which he recalled but meant something different to him now.  They were no longer history an

The night was dark, the fire out, and Gus awake.  Pain from his arm distracted him from the dull thuds and crisp scraping sounds that had woken him, but as they continued, Gus began to picture more from his hearing than his eyes ever could within the black.  What he saw was an ettin.      Gus felt around until he found the cornered part of the cart he sheltered under.  He shuffled on his belly and wedged his legs into the tightness of a small section, before taking fistfuls of hay to stuff about himself.  He lay silently.  In silence.  He fell asleep.   Gus woke to the prickling of dam

No wind.  No sound.  No soft green ground… Nothing faded in.  Nor did it abruptly start.  It is as it always was.  Something from nothing.  Falling downwards.  What comes up, must surly come back down again?      Gus Windbourne felt as though he wasn’t falling at all, but knew he was.  Knowing how he knew would not have made sense to you or I, but he did know.  And didn’t regard it as much anyway.  Opposite him, stone-faced, a rock elemental sat with legs crossed, watching him with unmoveable eyes.  Gus mouthed something invisible, soundless, looking upwards as though his words had been left behind.  He then spoke into

Gus' face dropped.  A man brushed passed him hurriedly towards the huddled villagers, and Gus turned.  The huge gate behind him stood ridged; closed.  The heat from the rooftop fire slowly thawed a chill down his spine, to bring Gus away from stillness.  He followed after the man and the villagers, who bundled down the central road between the houses.  There they were confronted, within a leaping bound, from the hoofed and tailed menace of a centaur warrior, who slid in one brief uncontrolled collision of legs as it landed in front of them.  Recovering, it raised a bow above its plate armour, snorting fiercely.     The man drew his arms wi

The Chapter of the Unwritten 4 A reflective examination of the rooftops, walls, cracks and wear of the city's streets was how Gus spent an hour of his morning.  A morning that cursorily coiled away as the afternoon sprung into it.  Grey deepened in the sky and the wind blew rain to his face.  He looked for the sun briefly before glancing in the direction of his mother's home.  Within his belly, he felt the groggy remains of his drinking the night before.  It had kept him from breakfast, but with an understanding of the journey ahead, Gus followed the nearby smells of baked bread, imagining someplace warm and dry. Drops fell from a canopy a

3 Gus' lips shortened across rosy cheeks as his eyes took a squint of sunlight from the blue above.  He hiccupped comically.  Leaving the district, his feet ached a rosiness of themselves, and he knew that his recent days of rest had given them renewed feeling.         Continuing through the city, he came to a guard box, and passed it with a genial straightening.  The Seraph guard wasn't looking at passers-by, but was sleepily within thought.     With a leg slung over the side, Gus seated on the large high walkway over-looking the Weston Commons, where he waited, occasionally peering up at the sun or looking down into its shadows.

2 Festivities from the main streets echoed far into the smaller walkways within Divinty's Reach. Bunting draped over housings and shops that lined the streets, and confetti littered into the walkways beyond. A mother opened a heavy door before her son had any chance to reach its knocker; Gus spread his arms as Mother entered the doorway, before allowing them to fall, slapping at his side. He smiled broadly, and they met each other tightly. Patting Gus a number of times across his back, the mother laughed heartedly, "Welcome home son!" "Has been an adventurous three months, Ma." "Hungry?" Mother gestured inside proudly. "Thirsty," replie

1 The Coming Home Chapter The wrapping crumpled at the edges and it was obvious to him that something soft was folded inside.  He grinned, shaking his head.  Turning over a ticket tied to the package, the grin faded a little as eyes fell over a scribbled message, and thoughts gazed into past crumples where grins were less… ... "Pus!  Give that to me," insisted a fat bully between spittle and clenched teeth; his two oafs protruding behind him, sniggering at the intimidated bent figure sat in the shadows of this alleyway.        Bully shot out a fist into the figure and it splayed its body.  With a tremble, the figure spoke a solidar