Monday Mixer: To Protect

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This is for The Latinum Vault’s Monday Mixer. Write a piece in exactly 150 words using at least three of the prompt words, a place, a thing and an adjective. I’ve decided not to shoehorn all nine words in today, there really was no place for patisserie for example, but I am incorporating six, so could still go for Overachiever!

Photograph and dragon painting by Lisa Shambrook (Please do not use)
It was against the backdrop of early morning mist that he stood firm, aware that far off over the horizon battle was on its way.  The rill outside his cave rushed down the hillside into the querulous river, and sunlight’s dancing diamonds on the surface matched the adrenalin surging through his taut muscles. He watched the sunrise and listened intently to the water’s gushing symphony. He dipped his head to drink and felt the water’s intrinsic energy intensify his own. He was on home territory and the bellicose fire dragon would have to fight long and hard.  
He dug his claws into the rock, grinding the stone like a pestle as he waited. He would protect what was his, with his life if necessary, and his mind wandered for a moment, recalling the cherished egg, hidden like a precious marbled cabochon deep within his cavern, beneath his mate’s warm belly. 
(150 Words)
Find Monday Mixer here, and look at the rest of the entries!

55 Words #44: Padlock

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Photo Source: 55 Words: Jezri’s Nightmares
She’d been alone for so long she’d forgotten what it meant to be two. She clasped his hand and trembled. 
He tilted her face to his, traced the lines of her life with his finger and pressed his lips to hers. This simple gesture unlocked inhibitions and allowed her rusty self-confidence to begin to flourish.
(55 Words)
Written for Lisa McCourt Hollar’s 55 Word Challenge, 
go read the rest of the entries…

Family Photoshoot – Steampunk

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We like to be different and we like our family portraits to be memorable! They used to be stressful as I desperately tried to get everyone in shot, smiling, still and happy – now we all get involved and make it fun!
We’ve gone for unusual locations like disused railway tracks or a bluebell wood, but never tried dressing up for them, so last year we planned a Steampunk shoot. It was great fun procuring clothes (we were already half-way there style-wise) jewellery and props, and the children delighted in the weaponry (though the swords and daggers are not ours).
Our location was my parent’s old barn and New Year’s Day was blessed with rare, golden sunshine amid our rainy Winter. It was, admittedly, very, very cold and by the end I could not feel my fingers, but we had lots of fun!

All photographs within this post are copyright and
belong to Lisa Shambrook (Please do not use)
Textures used on these photos are Sulfur and Softened Faux

55 Words #43: Tracks

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The delay caused numerous reactions ranging from an irritating tapping of five-inch-heels and drumming fingers to frustrated glances at watches, long sighs and frequent calls home, but by far the most disturbing reaction was from the driver, who after the sickening impact, vacated his cab and walked directly in front of the 5.47 from Paddington.

(55 Words)

Written for Lisa McCourt Hollar’s 55 Word Challenge.
This one’s a bit dark, but hey that’s how the picture grabbed me…
go read the others on the above link… 

Monday Mixer: Like Magwitch

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This is for The Latinum Vault’s Monday Mixer. Write a piece in exactly 150 words using at least three of the prompt words. I chose to try and use all nine words!
Photo by Lisa Shambrook (Please do not use without permission)

He stared across the desolate fenland, a barren expanse stretching from the mortuary to the distant shrouded hills. Like Magwitch, Henry’s lip sneered at his sodden feet, he should’ve thieved the sedulous attendant’s overshoes as well as his mackintosh, egalitarian, he was not. The cottage emerged from behind the damp, coiling mists, an oasis in his fraught mind, and he wiped his forehead with a crimson bandana discovered in the stolen coat’s pocket. Rain teemed endlessly and he sought protection from the unsavoury elements.
His foot kicked the cloche as he raced across the garden and cursed as glass shattered across the path, so much for a quiet entrance. He burst through the unlocked door.
She stood wide-eyed and open mouthed at the dripping man before her.
“Had a really bad day at work sweetie!” he began suddenly loquacious after the silence of the moor, “Car broke down…then it rained…”

(150 Words)

Take a look at the rest…

Five Sentence Fiction: Forgotten

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“So let me tell you about last night, there I was all curled up cosy, head beneath the duvet, heavy breathing, not for any sordid reason mind, just to warm up the icy bed…and my mind began to wander. That half hour, you know the one, before sleep overcomes consciousness, is precious and thoughts of all kinds swim in the murky depths of my brain. No point letting the day’s events wallow, don’t need to rehash that which I can’t change, so I think, I muse, I ruminate – the cogs turn and the gears jump and my imagination escapes with me…
So last night, just before succumbing to slumber, I had the mother of all ideas, the biggest twist and the most amazing denouement in all of history – the best ever best-seller planned out in the utmost detail, right there in my head!
Now I sit with the humming of my laptop heckling me and an illumined blank page scorning my brain as I delve deep inside in vain…and my novel, my best-seller, my way out of here, in the bright light of day – is all but forgotten…”

Written, tongue-in-cheek for Lillie McFerrin’s Five Sentence Fiction check out the other writers in this week’s prompt: Forgotten.

Five Sentence Fiction: Inspire

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Photo By Lisa Shambrook www.flickr.com
She’d sailed the seven seas, single-handed, in a tin boat, thwarting pirates and sea monsters…and huge octopus, tentacled things.
She’d prepared banquets for lords and ladies, with the finest of menu’s written in glittering gold on the finest emerald paper, with cupcakes and chocolate dessert.
She had conquered the final frontier, flown amid the stars in the cockpit of her silver rocket, discovering new planets and greeting aliens in green.
She married Prince Charming and climbed the castle’s crumbling tower, and proclaimed her love and devotion to her loyal subjects below.
“Time’s up sweetie!” came the call, and her mother wandered up the garden path gathering teddies and dolls up into the old tin bath, chuckling at the soggy mud-pies sitting atop gold-glittered leaves,  and she called her daughter down from the tree, smiling at her tattered wings and the happy-tired grin on her face. 
Written for Lillie McFerrin’s Five Sentence Fiction 
Take a look at the other entries…

Flash! Friday: Looking for Life…

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Photo Source: shenandoahvalleywriters Flash! Friday

They were looking for life…but in all the wrong places. No atmosphere, no ocean, no luscious land, like I said, looking in the wrong place.
While they scoured the dry surface their bounding steps resonated through underground caverns, hidden valleys of green, crystalline ceilings and overlooked the most abundant prospect…life.

(50 Words)
@LastKrystallos

Written for Flash! Friday Week 6 with Rebekah Postupak and Shenandoah Valley Writers You can follow Rebekah on Twitter at @postupak.
Write a story for the prompt in only 50 words.

Thank You for Believing in Me

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Many bloggers are contemplative during January, looking back and looking forward…I want to use this post to say THANK YOU. 
Thank you to everyone who has supported my writing and my blog, and to all who’ve taken time to comment on my pages, or review my book!

This time last year I began getting to know some amazing writers and readers online: Blogs, Twitter and Facebook…and I’d like to share a post I wrote a year ago (before I knew many of you!). Thank you for believing in me!

The Future belongs to Those who Believe in the Beauty of their Dreams.

Eleanor Roosevelt had it exactly right…the future really does belong to those who believe in their dreams…

How many of us started out with huge dreams…the kind that stretched far, far beyond what we can see? How many of us played in the woods building forts and defending them from intruders and dragons, or by the ocean building sand castles and trenches? Were you so lost in books that you felt the Famous Five were your best friends? Did you skirt the local park with dark glasses searching for villains and opportunities to spy or use your magic super powers? Did you build Lego towns and fill them with adventure? Did you play ‘Pooh Sticks’ or race paper boats down the river? Did you draw fantastical pictures and wait at night for them to come alive? Were your stories so magical you slipped into them when you dreamed at night? Did you make mud pies and feed a family of dolls and teddy bears? Did you dream? Did you have dreams so strong you were sure you would achieve them?

I did…I knew exactly what I wanted as a child… I wanted to own horses, to spend my days galloping across mountains and valleys… I wanted to live by the ocean and swim in the sea every day… I wanted to write and see my stories published… I wanted to draw and paint and illustrate… Yes, I had dreams…

To be truthful, some were just childhood imaginings, fun, playtime. I was never going to live in the forest and defend my homestead from dragons…
I had ambition, as a child I wanted to write and draw, and I did, making books from A5 paper…I devoured Cicely Mary Barker’s ‘Flower Fairies’ and made up my own, stapling pages together and inventing rhymes to go with them. I bought tiny A6 notepads and wrote stories, lost in a world of my own. I drew, sitting on my bed with a sketch pad, my tongue protruding as I concentrated on my art, sketching for hours.

Images by Lisa Shambrook (Please do not use)

My dreams grew with aspirations and ideas as I got older, just as my art did. From the crude pencil drawings of a ten-year-old, to more sophistication at thirteen and more mature at nineteen. My dreams grew up…but not always in a good way. I became cynical and reserved in my dreams, trying to think of things that could actually happen, things that weren’t too lofty for me to achieve…and perhaps that’s just where I began to lose them…

I began to doubt myself, my ability and question the reality of the things I once wanted. Was I good enough to illustrate, or to write something that people, real people, would actually want to read? That doubt, along with the realities of life, leaving school, getting a job, getting married and having children, stopped me from pursuing those things I’d dreamed of all my childhood.

I don’t blame anyone, I just let life take over and my dreams faded like an old masterpiece hung on a wall that no one does more than glance at, left to saturate in the glare of every day sun.
I could have been more than the sum of what I am right now…that does make me sad…there is so much more I could have achieved. It was when I was thirty that I decided I could become more, that those old buried dreams deserved a second look. And I began to write.

Self-belief has taken a lot longer…however, slowly over the years those shattered dreams have come alive, my writing has fed my aspirations and words that I thought would never interest anyone have become the tool for rebuilding those dreams.

So, yes, it’s true I have never found myself dwelling in the woods defending my little wooden fort from all things evil, but those dragons I used to chase off in my imagination, now live on paper. I believe in them, I believe in me…and that’s where it all starts…the future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams…I intend to believe in mine.

Once again, thank you for believing in me!