#100StoryChallenge — No25 — The queen knew heads would likely roll after tonight. But she still walked into the throne room with her head held high, her crown perched in place as it had almost always been since she had been fourteen years old. If she thought back, she could still remember how heavy…

See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. — “Come on!” Wisteria tugged on her sister’s hand as she tried to drag her along in the dark. “You’re worse than a snail, Lily.” Lily almost stumbled over her own feet, the blindfold blocking out any hint of sight. “Why are we going out at midnight? Mother said nothing good…

#100StoryChallenge — No24 — Some whispered that the emperor had grown mad. His crimson throne, shaped like flames of war, had become tainted with the bloodshed of his political enemies. The world was changing outside his walled stronghold, and empires had fallen out of fashion long ago. Worse — the magic that had once…

Her eyes were full of shadows and secrets. — A few nights ago I saw Fallon Montgomery at the local gas station. It had been two weeks since my brother Curtis broke her heart, so I ducked down in the chip aisle as she took her two cans of Red Bull to the cashier. Her eyes were downcast, no…

#100StoryChallenge — No23 — The ghosts lingered long after the bodies had been cleared away. On a once-battlefield could stand dozens of men and women whose lives had been clipped away like stunted wings on birds. Through all these specters, the Wraith walked and passed her fingertips along the translucent membranes of those who…

Can anyone save her from herself? — Violette Seraphine would have told you that the only thing more than average about her was her name. When you’d point out something — like, say, her flyaway amber-gold hair — she’d lower her eyes and frown. Words rarely spilled from her lips because her mother had taught her that…

#100StoryChallenge — No22 — Her smile was as vicious as the slaughter of hatchlings at morn. But her dragon knights didn’t care. Their queen was the most ruthless of them all, having slain ten enemy soldiers in the days of the Purge. …

Always recognize who the real monster is. — Before Laeryna was thrown into the dragons’ pit, the courtesans sat on the edges of their seats to see how she might be torn limb from limb. Stoking King Halvare’s ire had seemed to earn her such novelty for the moment. …

#100StoryChallenge — No21 — Painted stars ran like a shower down her bare back. Her handmaidens had painstakingly drew each pointed star with their fingertips till she was a body of constellations. They said the gods would not look at her even once if she did not decorate herself as if she were a…