Blue’s human often called him ‘old stoopid’, but Blue didn’t mind. He knew himself loved.

It was cold in the park, that day, and they were running to get home when Blue smelled a fun game happening in the woods.

He careered off, with his human swearing in his wake. 

“Blue, c’mere you eejit…”

But Blue was on the scent, and there was no stopping. When he saw the man and the girl rolling on the ground he jumped on the guy’s back barking happily. 

And that’s how big, daft Blue became the hero who caught the Central Park Rapist.

©️jj 2019

When a moon hits your eye and your teeth increase size
That’s a problem
When you burn in the sun like an over-fried bun
That’s a bitch
Skin will creep, and your eyes will weep, even in your sleep
And you’ll howl like a canine
And your nails will grow faster, than you know
While you’re still feeling fine
Scuzza me, but you see, back in old Transyll-V
That’s the undead

When you lay in the mud with a craving for blood
That’s a sure sign
When you eye up your mum have designs on your chums
That’s a blow
When you wake in a casket not breathing or dead, you will know
Scuzza me, but you see, back in old Transyll-V
That’s a vampire

©jj

The Working Title crew bring you the exclusive opportunity to enjoy more wisdom from the mysteriously enigmatic Madam Pendulica...

Aries 

This sign is a sucker for furry and cuddly, but not too keen on walkies. Aries has an affinity with long-haired cats and King Charles Spaniels.

Note: Do not ever take an Aries to an animal shelter. They will adopt the lot

Taurus

Perhaps surprisingly, given the lumbering nature of the sign, the ideal animal companion is something small and intensely portable. Give a bull a gerbil and they will be ecstatic.

Note: Do not expect a Taurus to put itself out for a pet that requires a lot of care and/or exercise.

Gemini

This sign swings both ways petwise. A Gemini will be happy with either a tarantula or a kitten. Nothing in between.

Note: The two-faced twins will deeply confuse dogs and are inimical to horses.

Cancer

The crab enjoys canine company of the large and drooling sort. Or goldfish.

Note: Good at dressage, especially all the going sideways bits.

Leo

What could the king of the jungle require as a pet? A Siamese cat? An elegant elkhound? An Arab steed? No. None of these. Leo gravitates towards beekeeping.

Note: Should your Leo require an indoor pet, stick insects are usefully easy to care for.

Virgo

Buy a Virgo a bunny rabbit and they will be happy forever. Or if they want a walking companion, the stars suggest a yellow Labrador – for preference one with attitude.

Note: Do not expect Virgo to deal with animal sexuality. They don’t.

Libra

The balanced nature of the Libran is made complete by pets that can be kept as pairs. Lovebirds are an obvious choice.

Note: Do not buy your Libra lover a tortoise. They will forget them during hibernation.

Scorpio

The snarkily poisonous nature of this sign is uniquely suited to the keeping of snakes, or parrots with a vocabulary of obscenities.

Note: Don’t buy a Scorpio a puppy, they will encourage it to bite people.

Sagittarius

The half-horse Sagittarius really bonds with horses, ponies, or hamsters.

Note: If a dog is needed, the Irish Wolfhound is nearly as big as a small pony.

Capricorn

Surprisingly, Capricorn does not get on with goats. They are best suited to being owned by scruffy terriers that fart a lot.

Note: Capricorn and cats is a combustible combination. There has not been a Capricorn born that won’t irritate cats enough to get their face ripped off.

Aquarius

Aquarians like fish. Both to eat and to look at. Feed them battered cod and buy then an indoor aquarium wherein they can watch brightly coloured swimmers.

Note: Aquarius will not tolerate any pet that wants to sleep with them. 

Pisces

Pisceans do not get on with fish. They are, on the other hand, deeply enamoured of guineapigs and whippets.

Note: Do not buy a Piscean a bunny rabbit. They will eat it.

Madame Pendulica predicts she will return...

She was the most mysterious woman of her generation. They called her La Belle Dame Sans Mercy, and fell at her feet like ninepins.

But nobody knew her real name and nobody guessed from whence she came. It was as if Venus had been born anew and floated into the city on an incoming tide.

For twenty years she moved from billionaire to billionaire, fulfilling their needs while quietly feathering her own nest.

Then one day she was gone. Back to the village whose houses scrambled down to the sea. And to the man who had waited all those years…

©️jj 2019

This is the opening of Bolded Hearts, a fantasy short by Jane Jago.

The fog came down suddenly: sleek and white and thick and cold. It felt like being draped in a clammy cobweb, and it became impossible to hear one’s own footsteps on the grassy pathway. If it wasn’t for the feel of the warm fur of the great dog who paced majestically at her side Amal would perhaps have been afraid. But she had walked worse than this with Chin-Cha as companion and protector. She wove her fingers into his great ruff of grey and silver hair, leaning on his strong presence as she had been able to do for so many years. Chin-Cha, she thought, the love of my life and my biggest single regret. She knew that the great dog now pacing at her side was a shape changer trapped in his present form by a powerful bear witch, who had then ensorcelled him to the service of a six-year-old girl. That child had grown up to be Amal the healer and witch-woman. A woman who loved her protector with every fibre of her being but would rather die than burden him with the knowledge of that love.
As the fog grew even denser, a voice spoke in her ear, it was woody and breathy, and sounded like a poorly tuned wind instrument.
“People ahead. Hiding. Ill intentioned. Those who have been hunting you since harvest moon Yuri thinks.”
Yuri was a frost imp and trusted friend. Amal put up a hand as if to touch him, and he blew on her fingers. Surprising warmth.
“How many?”
“I will see” and the sense of his presence was gone.

Chin-Cha pressed himself against her leg, silently urging her off the path. She allowed herself to be guided to the rough trunk of a big tree. He pushed her thigh with his nose, indicating that she should climb. Doing as she was bid Amal soon found herself on a wide branch beside a sheltering hole in the trunk. Wrapping herself in the blanket from her pack she crept into the very heart of the tree. She could no longer see her companion, but had the reassurance of his spirit as he hunkered down in the brownish bracken. Then he was coming towards her. Fast. She felt him bunch his muscles and erupted out onto her branch. He made a prodigious leap and she grasped his harness to steady him. They both crawled into the tree cave and huddled together for warmth and comfort.

It was not long before Amal got the sense of Yuri’s presence. She was about to speak when a small icy hand was placed on her lips.
“They are here” the woody windy little voice whispered, seeming to come from right inside her head. “Be still and silent and listen.”

At first Amal heard nothing, then she made out the sound of laboured breathing. There was a noise as if a heavy boot hit flesh.
“Where is the woman, tracker?” a harsh voice demanded.
“She came this way. She can’t be far. But I can no longer feel her presence. It must be the fog.”
“You had better not be lying to me. Gopal get the hounds. They will track her dog, and the old woman said that once we kill it the witch woman will lose her magic.”

You can keep reading here…

 

Ruffryd married Marianna for political expediency, then rode off to war and more or less forgot her. He came home occasionally, between campaigns, to find his home well run – plus a couple of unexplainable children.

But he asked no awkward questions.

In the summer of his fortieth year he was captured by the veiled ones, who put out his eyes before sending him back to his royal master.

The king sent him home with a drunkard and an idiot to smooth his passage.

But they got there, and Marianna read to him every night of the rest of his life. 

©️jj 2019

The midnight bus across town. Nobody’s idea of fun. But beggars can’t be choosers and without her job Louise would have been a literal beggar as well as a metaphorical one. Accordingly, five nights a week found her crouched in a corner of the upper deck making herself as small and inconspicuous as possible.

Fridays were the worst. At the end of the week it was all an exhausted Louise could do to endure the scent of vomit and the sting of routine abuse from drunks and tired whores.

This particular Friday, the bus was full to groaning and she was squashed in next to a huge woman with pendulous breasts and galloping halitosis. Five youths in hoodies erupted up the stairs brandishing knives. Louise’s companion screamed before throwing herself to the ground and rolling around as if in a fit. The would-be steamers stared
“Woss wrong wiv ‘er?”
One stepped in for a closer look and the jerking woman set her teeth in his calf, gnawing on him as if he were a chicken drumstick. He screamed and dropped his knife, too shocked to even kick out at her. His mates stared round-eyed.
“I’d watch that if I was you,” Louise ventured. “She probably has rabies.”
They turned and ran, falling over each other in their haste to be elsewhere.

The fat woman sat up and winked at Louise.
“Well done, love. I usually has to bite at least two…”

© jane Jago 2017

They bound her and threw her into one of their foul-smelling skin tents from where she heard the moment when the minstrel’s glorious voice broke under their torturer’s hands. She swore to have vengeance, as tears of rage and pity, streaked her dirty cheeks.

When they dragged her to her feet she thought herself about to die, but instead she was herded into another tent where a tattooed giant ordered them to unbind her.

He was arrogant, that would-be rapist, and she sunk her teeth into his jugular, dying her own death in a pool of his blood.

©️jj 2019

The gardener had been breeding roses for almost eighty years. He had always created the most beautiful of blooms. But now his hands were too twisted and his eyes too dim to do the delicate pollination. 

These days his students, who loved him, did the work.

It was June and the last rose he had made with his own hands was ready. He stood beside it smelling its perfume.

The queen’s majesty touched its petals gently.

“It’s beautiful, will you name it please?”

His old eyes filled with tears. “I shall call her Elsa May, for my dear departed wife.”

©️jj 2019

As he left the players’ camp the night sky was overcast, heavy with pregnant clouds. Before he had gone more than a few paces further, the snow was falling again. The dwelling he sought was in the grim, poverty-wracked, suburbs, pressed against the walls of Tabruth and nestled in the corner of a row of four lean-to shacks which shared a common bond of odour and ordure. In the dark and shrouded by snow, one could not see the extreme of poverty that they represented and could mistake the crude buildings for some semblance of reasonable shelter.
Someone had welcomed their livestock into the family rooms below so that they could keep warm for the night. Ignoring the sharp bark of a dog, Avilon spoke a single word to a figure watching from the shadows and then slipped into the hovel and found it lit badly by a thin-wicked oil lamp and heated poorly by an inadequate fire, fuelled by dried dung. Thus lived most of the free-folk of Temsevar – and thus thousands of the youngest and oldest would die each year during the long and relentless winter moons, of too much cold and too little food.
The smoky room contained three ponies as well as two of the three men who remained to Avilon from the six he had brought with him to Tabruth. They were playing dice by the leering light of the fire, but at his entrance, both had reached for the pistols they carried; his voice stopped them.
“Yanis, what are you doing still here?” he demanded, his voice cutting with anger. “You should be half way to Cressida by now.”
One of the two men stood up, looking uneasy.
“I sent Farran instead. He has family to look for back home. His wife is with child. I have no one to worry for me and -” his voice trailed into silence beneath the intense stare of his commander.
“Really?” Avilon contained his anger, but his voice sounded colder than the blizzard winds. “I don’t suppose it occurred to you I might have had a reason for wanting you to go and Farran to stay?”
Even in the poor light, he could see that Yanis had lost colour. “Farran knows the mountains – ”
“As well as you do?” Avilon provided, cutting across the other man like a whiplash. “Let us hope then that you know Tabruth as well as he – unlikely as he was born and raised here and you have never more than visited.”
Yanis was pinned to the spot by Avilon’s glare.
“I’m sorry – I –” he began.
“No. I am the one who is sorry,” Avilon told him, but with no sense of any apology. “Sorry I trusted you and sorry I made the mistake of expecting my orders to be obeyed. Now let’s see if you can obey this one – get out in the cold and relieve Col.”
The other man left wordlessly and Avilon crossed to the small ladder that separated the sleeping loft from the living area of the hovel. He had not slept in the last two days and saw little prospect of getting much sleep tonight, but if he was going to keep operating effectively he needed to snatch at least some rest. The rough blankets did not do much to abet the fire below in terms of generating warmth, but blocked out a little more of the ice-banked wind which was blowing through the loft as if the roof and walls did not exist. Forcing his mind into neutral and pulling his awareness from the biting cold, he took himself into a sleep state.

From Transgressor: Dues of Blood, a Fortune’s Fools book by E.M. Swift-Hook