Creative Ramblings

Beyond the Shadows

I've always had vague ideas and aspirations to write a fantasy story centered around fae, but could never find the time or energy to sit down and plot out the vast world that would need to go along with it. However, with the few notes I had written down, I created a very short version of what I imagined in the form of a short story for my creative writing class this year. Enjoy!

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"Zara?" Rivan asked, his voice still thick with sleep as he stepped outside his small stone cabin to spot his girlfriend pacing. "What are you doing up?"

Despite the cloak of shadows surrounding the island—casting their darkness onto the faeries who inhabited Idryn—the darkness surrounding them in that moment was true. The sun had yet to rise, but nevertheless, Zara's mind ran overtime.

"I can't—" She shook her head in aggravation, her pastel blue braids cutting through the chilled early-morning air as she came to an abrupt stop to face Rivan. "I can't stop thinking about yesterday. About the fae my grandmother killed in front of everyone."

Her grandmother—the Queen of Fae.

"She's done it before, Zara," Rivan said with sympathy. "And she'll do it again. All she needs is a reason."

"That's just it though, there shouldn't have been a reason!" Zara's words, delivered angrily, seemed to shock any remaining tiredness from Rivan. "He was one of her rank leaders; someone she had personally sent to spy on the humans. Someone to gather intel on the latest weapons and report back. Yet when he returned and told her the humans no longer seemed to pose a threat, she wouldn't hear of it. She made him appear to have been swayed—to be a liar and a traitor—manipulating everyone to see her way before cutting both his wings and his throat." Her eyes blazed. "It felt like she was getting rid of someone who had discovered something they weren't supposed to know."

Rivan let the words hang between them for a moment before replying. "So, what are you saying?"

Zara's hands clenched at her sides. "I need proof," she whispered desperately. "Something. Anything."

"Proof of what exactly?"

"Proof that she lied. That so many people lied. Proof that'll tell us what really happened all those years ago."

Which wasn't all that easy of a task.

When the war between the humans and the fae had been at its peak over one hundred years ago, Zara and Rivan had been young, and neither remembered much from the days before they'd settled into their eternal fae forms. Only what had been told to them.

That after a battle so vast, in which humans had managed to deface and destroy over half the fae population, those in power had been backed into a corner and forced to make the executive decision to retreat. Several soldiers had taken to the front lines; disposing of the fallen and wiping the minds of humans. Risking their lives to allow those who remained to escape. To flee to a barren wasteland tucked away from prying eyes—inside the deepest, darkest depths of the Bermuda Triangle where humans could not reach. Where every drop of power within the community was harnessed to grow food and build shelters; to construct a fully functioning civilization known as Idryn.

Or at least, so it was told.

Zara didn't know what to believe anymore.

But while her mind was being consumed by the endless possibilities of what could be the truth, both her and Rivan were immediately able to sense they were no longer alone. Pebbles rolling along the cobbled stones set their sense on high alert, and as they tuned their hearing into the sound, their pointed ears picked up on a soft set of footprints.