draliman on life

Here is my contribution to Laura’s Literary Lion prompt. I had one for last week (“water”) but it was complete pants quite frankly, and I didn’t have time to make it less pants :-).

This week’s prompt word, kindly supplied by the Literary Lion, is “dance”.

The picture I have used was taken from The Guardian, but the same picture was on multiple websites so it’s likely a publicity shot (from “Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell”) and owned by the BBC.

Mirabelle whirled amongst the dancers, her feet a blur. Her head swam and her heart pounded as she swirled around and around the Hall.

The Lord had wooed her, told her she was pretty and invited her to the Hall. For a poor peasant girl, this was a dream come true!

No longer.

The Lord of the Dance watched the mass of unwilling dancers with an appraising eye. As one flagged, he moved in and touched their shoulder. A moment of agonising pain and then, magically revitalised, they would dance renewed. But each time, the renewal faded more quickly. Mirabelle had witnessed the end of the cycle – a girl spasming, helpless on the floor, froth pouring from her mouth. The Lord, uncaring, stepping over to snap her neck.

This would be Mirabelle’s fate – already she had danced… two weeks? Three? How was she to keep time in this nightmare? As she whirled, she longed for death, an end to this travesty of joyful dance. She no longer cared, just wanted this to end.

Garett, concealed on the balcony above, watched the dance, horror reflected in his eyes. He’d long suspected that the Lord of the Dance was of the Elder Folk. He’d known The Lord was cruel, but this?

It was too late for his beloved. He’d watched the Lord snap his darling Jenna’s neck when he had no more use for her.

She would be the last, he determined. Holding the Medallion of Akros in one hand and raising the other above his head, he drew a deep breath, ran over the spell one last time, and began to chant.

Here is my contribution to Laura’s Literary Lion challenge, which has a 400 word maximum. This week the Literary Lion has supplied the prompt word “time”.

I had lots of ideas for this week and finally went for the maddest one :-).

Flowering thyme – image from Wikimedia Commons, attributed to user “Greenmars”

“Thyme. A king among herbs.”

This was the opening line of the presentation given at the Twelfth Annual Conference of Advanced Physics, Manchester by Professor Grint Bigglesworth.

Bigglesworth, a man so convinced of his own infallibility that “mistakes” were something which happened to other people. A man who, in his youth, had developed a theory which had made him impossible to ignore, much as everyone wanted to.

An appreciative laugh rippled through the audience. Biggleworth was slightly confused – he’d decided not to start with the standard opening joke – but carried on unperturbed.

“Used by the ancient Egyptians for embalming and by the Greeks as incense, today we use it…” he continued.

Had he taken a moment to think, he might have wondered why his allotted topic at a conference of advanced physics was a discourse on a small green plant. Had he looked at the faces of his audience (all inferior to him, as he believed), he might have noticed the grins of embarrassment. the nervous fidgeting. Had he insisted on a written copy of his invitation to speak, he might have noticed the spelling of the word “time”.

However, he did none of these things. And thus he continued extolling the virtues of thymus vulgaris for a full hour and thirty minutes.

He was instantly ruined. No-one would return his calls. No journal would accept his submissions. His university finally had an excuse to be rid of him.

And so on that day, a self-important blowhard was forever removed from the invitation list of every major scientific conference in the world. On that day, a self-righteous narcissist with all the social graces of a cucumber was denied access to all public forums. On that day, an annoyingly persistent serial letter-writer was permanently barred from publication in any respectable (and many less respectable) scientific publications, magazines and newspapers.

Was it an honest mistake, an insidious conspiracy or rampant stupidity that brought him to this? Do we care? Let us just sit, close our eyes, take a cup of tea and a chocolate biscuit perhaps, and be thankful.