The lovely thing about the island was that one could go about doing whatever one wanted unregarded. Within limits, of course. The Marquis de Carabas would not, for instance, go about murdering people. For one, he didn't particularly dislike anyone here enough to kill them, and for another, it would draw unneeded attention to him, not to mention ( Read more... )

In the absence of feeling my life was in order, I turned (as I always had) to wearing out my body til I felt comfortable in my own skin again. Though I had to own I'd been nothing short of morose for weeks, I was reaching the point where I couldn't indulge my depression any longer; indulgence was beginning to feel quite similar to self-pity, which ( Read more... )

The Marquis de Carabas was, in some ways, a simple creature. But he was also, in most other ways, an extremely complicated one. He required only food, water, and sleep to sustain him physically, but mentally, he required a whole lot more than that. Simple card-tricks were for amateurs; he had always been meant for greater things, this much he knew ( Read more... )

Evey had been on the island for over two years and in that time life had settled into a quiet, mostly peaceful routine, complete with acting and a boyfriend, though she would admit that Marcus was still quite fidgety sometimes.  He didn't feel as though he had a purpose here, and Evey could certainly understand a fit of fidgets about that.   Other ( Read more... )

There was no reason to visit Vera Misham once her verdict had been declared. No, he didn’t know what she must be feeling, but he could guess. Any half-decent ex-attorney would save a little girl the embarrassment of admitting she’d had an unwitting hand in ruining his life. She was a good kid, after all. And all’s well that ends well, right? ( Read more... )

Charlie was sitting on the steps up to the compound with her feet in the sun and her head out of it, folding paper. She'd gotten out of the habit of origami since Hiro had gone, and her fingers felt thick and clumsy as she made the precise folds. She'd found a pattern in one of her books for origami dolls and she thought that she'd try and make ( Read more... )

In truth, Inara preferred to spend more of her time at her home by the waterfall or wandering the beach than cooped up in the Compound. The comforts of air conditioning and the like aside, it seemed like a waste to pass so many hours indoors when the weather and the island itself were hěn měi lì. If she were to be stuck in this place, she meant to ( Read more... )

A sober(ish) Ford Prefect was an unhappy Ford Prefect. The fact had been stated before, but now it was being proven. He grumbled. He bitched. He moaned. He kept peeking into his empty bottle of Ol’ Janx Spirit when he hoped it wasn’t paying attention, but it had thus far failed to refill itself ( Read more... )

Eostre's tree was not her tree anymore.

The girls were napping, and Eostre was standing outside of the house, with her hands on her hips, looking up at something which was not the World Tree at all. Ysddragil was slender, for a tree of its size, and it grew through the middle of all of the worlds. Eostre had seen this tree before, its bark brown ( Read more... )

More days, more doldrums ( Read more... )