Author: Mertiya (AdmirableMonster)

I write queer fantasy stories.
Original Fiction, Post-apocalyptic New Mexico

A Love Like Water

Mertiya (AdmirableMonster)

Summary: Sheriff Solshemshesh and his sheriff-in-training Lekni try to stop a rash of violent deaths in the little desert town of Saplapelanka.

Rating: Teen and up

Warnings: Some violence

Notes: Genders: male, female, trine (third gender), quine (genderfluid).

Kimah was setting and the sun rising as Lekni set off at an exasperated trot southwards of Saplapelanka.  Someday, she thought, people would stop being idiots.  And someday, she would stop being the sheriff’s errand-runner and instead be able to delegate someone else to go lead those idiots back to the town.

She spotted the group before she’d gone three miles, squatting embarrassedly half-naked around a large campfire in the lee of a sand dune.  Lekni waved tiredly as she arrived.  “I did warn you,” she said irritably to the first of their group, a merchant named Peltlin, if she was remembering correctly. 

They scowled at her.  “The woman sounded like she knew what she was talkin’ about,” they muttered sulkily.

“Well, I’ve brought you shoes, blankets, and horses.  Courtesy of Sheriff Solshemshesh.  So you’ll be able to get back to town easily.”  She received a highly ungracious grunt that might have been a thanks and rolled her eyes.  “Do you need me to lead you back?”

“We’ll be fine,” Peltlin muttered.  A young woman patted their arm gently and gave Lekni a sudden smile.  “Don’t bother about my parent,” she said.  “They’re just frustrated at getting fooled.  Thank you for helpin’ us.”

Lekni felt her cheeks warm, like a fool.  “Let me know if there’s anythin’ else,” she mumbled, turning her horse back towards Saplapelanka.

She had plenty of time on the way back to curse the person who kept running this stupid con.  She could, she supposed, also have cursed Shem for constantly making her deal with it, but that seemed less fair.  After all, he was trying to train her to take his place someday, so she should be the one dealing with the routine annoyances.  And it wasn’t like he knew this was going to be happening.

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Poetry

silence

Mertiya (AdmirableMonster)

It’s never fun to not have words

Or when the words build up and build up in your chest like sobs

desperate to be let out like heavy wet stones

But you can’t because you’d hurt people

Because you believe you already have

and the voiceless words that soak and sink are your punishment

You stare and stare at the page, you can read but what good is it

Those words just fill up inside you and don’t come out

You swell painfully, your heart too heavy with all the words

It hurts and you have no outlet

It hurts and you feel that you need to be Doing

But there is nothing to be Done but wait

Wait and hope

That eventually

The words will flow again

Like ink, like blood

Original Fiction

The Story of Bragi and Iðunn

Mertiya (AdmirableMonster)

Rated: General

Summary: Before Bragi, the long-bearded god, came to Valhalla, he met a beautiful woman in a deep forest, who asked him to judge a contest between herself and her brothers.

A/N: This story is largely fanciful, based on a few tantalizing hints. First: the notion of a connection between Iðunn and the sons of Ivaldi is attested, and the description of the story of Kvasir is well-known. There have been previous suggestions of Bragi’s connection to Kvasir, but as far as I know, this is nothing more than speculation. I have made up most of this, though I have tried to make it sound Norse mythology-ish, at least.

Many thanks to kimikocha and Husband, for beta-ing!

For Bragi, first maker of poetry

When gods die, sometimes they return in new ways.  Kvasir was a god created from the spit of the Aesir and Vanir, or perhaps he was a man.  He was not an ordinary sort of fellow, at any rate, but he was murdered by two dwarfs who cut his throat to make mead from his blood and that was the end of his first story, or at least his part in it.  The story keeps going, and as he was a god of stories or of poetry or skaldishness, this shows you that he cannot have died the way a mortal might, to pass out of touch with this world.

In the rest of the story, it is told how Odin All-father made love to the giantess Gunnlod and stole the mead of Kvasir from Suttung her father to bring it back to the gods.  The mead of poetry was returned to them, but Kvasir himself returned in a different form, nine months later, when Gunnlod gave birth to Odin’s son Bragi, who is called first maker of poetry; and who could he be but another form of Kvasir, with a sobriquet like that?

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Augury Series, Original Fiction

Augury of Water

Mertiya (AdmirableMonster)

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Vicious fantasy violence, disease, drowning

Summary:  While Énna prepares to negotiate a treaty with the Aerie, Ryder tries to solve a set of mysterious drownings in the southern part of Bridehive.

A/N: Art by Zomburai.

Auguries Series

          I blinked my eyes open into watery sunlight, yawning and stretching, and reaching out blindly for Énna. My questing hand found a warm place between otherwise empty sheets, and I grumbled sadly beneath my breath. Gone again, and the sun was barely over the windowsill. He’d been working too hard, but then it wasn’t so surprising. In just a few weeks, the Monarch of the Aerie would be traveling to Bridehive to sign our treaty, and in the meantime, we were all trying to rebuild our hometown from the mess the Khar had made of it.

I was at loose ends. I’d been ordered to rest in the aftermath of my head injury, and it turned out I was not very good at it. I kept trying to sneak out and go to the library, at least, but the teachers were very serious that they meant mental rest, as well as physical. The headaches had faded almost five days ago, and at this point I was ready to stab something, just so that I could have a reason to do the purification rite. It would be better than lying in bed and staring at the ceiling.

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Original Fiction

Poison in the Blood

Mertiya (AdmirableMonster)

Rating: Teen and up

Warnings: Blood-drinking, disturbing imagery, general psychological/cosmic horror themes

Summary: A vampire receives an unusual invitation to reconnect with an old friend.

A/N: With thanks to Cyrus Eosphoros, lontradiction, and Zomburai.

For Camille

            I’ve been a vampire for about five years now. The whole thing happened when I was in my second year of uni, and it was a bit of a sordid tale, honestly. Blah blah, ex girlfriend, turned out to be a vampire, she turned me without my consent, I broke up with her, because, I mean, who does that, right?

Being a vampire is fine, don’t get me wrong. I mean, you tend to want to take a night job, because you’re draggy as hell during the day, and there’s the inevitable problem of finding a blood bank or getting really ridiculously good at catching pigeons, but all things considered, it’s not so bad. I certainly don’t mind the eternal youth aspect, although I’m lucky in that I never looked particularly young for my age, or I suspect by now I’d be getting really irritated. But I mean you have to ask. You can’t turn someone into a vampire without bloody well asking, Kate fucking McKay. I mean, I certainly wouldn’t. There was once—I got awfully close, I admit to that, and I thought I really would have to turn her without getting her consent, because the alternative—well, I’m getting ahead of myself. That’s really what the story is about. Not about Kate McKay and how she turned me, or our inevitable horrible breakup, or the part where she got staked two years later by some overeager first-years. Most of the story’s not even about me. It’s about my friend Evelyn Laura Montague the book worm and her Book.

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