I See the Sea

I see the sea,

the rolling waves

washing their briny, musty scent

upon the shore,

again and again.

And my ears hear this

lapping and panting;

stillness is in the

foothills.

Passion is in the sea,

I see.

Kid in Love

You’re in the trenches. You don’t know how you got there, you don’t know when they were built, and you don’t know what lies for you above them.

But there you are, kid, right in the trenches. You’re fighting and you’re fighting hard. It’s not just about shooting the other guy, killing some faceless enemy across the mud and barbed wire. It’s about staying alive in this filthy mire of shit and decay. It’s about being able to breathe the air that still blows gently in, fetid with death. It’s about being able to enjoy the peace and quiet for the thirty seconds that your hearing comes back and that next shell is waiting to whistle. It’s about being able to smile with your brothers as you taunt the enemy just by being alive.

It’s also about killing the enemy.

The enemy? Nameless, faceless , formless. It’s not quite boredom, it’s not quite yearning. It’s desperate and demanding, but phantasmagorical, intangible. It’s realizing that you had something you truly wanted, but you’ll never get it back. It’s feeling a breeze across the nape of your neck in a heat wave—long enough to make you notice, cold enough to make you want more, and wicked enough to leave you there.

The enemy is this void in your heart, in your chest, hidden behind a damask shroud, luring you in. Sucking and pulling at your very will power to give in.

But there you are kid, still fighting. It only ends one way: with you in a trench.

One way or another, kid.

The pine box will stain and warp, bathed in your mother’s tears as they lower you in. The damask shroud will be around you this time, spreading from the inside out.

It will get you. You fought the good fight, but you just can’t win.

So they say.

New update

Chapter Six of my story The Thief With Wings is here.

Check it out:

http://michaeltreadway.wordpress.com/2012/02/13/the-thief-with-wings-chapter-six/

Chapter Five is here!

Check out Chapter Five of my story, "The Thief With Wings"

http://michaeltreadway.wordpress.com/2012/02/03/the-thief-with-wings-chapter-five/

Shifting Blog

I have moved my short story "The Thief With Wings" from this blog to my blog at wordpress. Follow along with chapter four here!

http://michaeltreadway.wordpress.com/2012/01/27/the-thief-with-wings-chapter-four/

Plane-guins

Don't let the tricky title fool you: It's exactly what it sounds like.

On a recent flight on Southwest, I was lucky enough to ride home with the Sea World PR Crew and two penguins.

During my voyage home from seeing the Illustrious Annie Chen, I was routed through Denver International Airport. I had heard much about conspiracies, but didn't see many causes for concern in Concourse C, which is the crappiest of all concourses, to be sure, but I didn't feel like exploring. Maybe some other time I'll be sure to travel through Denver with a layover and check it out the supposed creepiness.

Anyhow, on the plane ride I took back from San Diego, I was accompanied by Magellanic penguins. Two of them, Pete & Penny, in fact. Although, those are cute monikers, as both of these birds were males.

After refreshments were served, Pete came out to visit us!

I sat in the front row between Booker, the PR guy for Sea World, and Jason, a penguin keeper there. Across the row was Jen, and 18-year veteran keeper and two kennels with the South American birds. I talked with them for a while about Sea World, the Park, and all sorts of things.

They were in Denver doing PR for Sea World at the local ice rink, the airport and a lot of places around Denver.

This was honestly a dream come true. As a kid, I wanted to be a Shamu trainer and fly on the Shamu plane. I wanted to fly on a plane with the penguins like the pictures at the Penguin Encounter at Sea World show.

I think this was better than flying on the Shamu plane.

Check out my youtube video here: http://youtu.be/nKX8Z2lGYjo

The Thief With Wings - Chapter Three

I run at the wall, push up and grab the windowsill. I dangle briefly. The rush of blood makes me feel the pain all over my body.

I pull myself in. There’s something strange about breaking into my own house.

Everything inside is turned over. What Solon said was true. There was some kind of struggle. I move silently through the chaos that was my kitchen and head to the rooms. I don’t call out in case someone is hiding inside.

If word has already gotten out to the black market, chances are one or two of them have already made their way here to glean from the rubble. Not to say there’s no honor amongst us, but some things are just business. Lucky for me, I don’t keep my stash here.

I make a round of the house. No one inside but me. I clean off a chair and sit down. Emotions deluge my mind. I weep when I think of Seth and Kyra. The three of us lived here. Live here.

There is no other Nyx plant to bargain for their lives. I know what I agreed to with Solon. It seems the only way to have a chance at saving them. I must bring down the New Guild. But I have no idea what my next move is. And how can I bring them down in two days?

I can’t go to the black market. That much is clear. If Solon was keeping track of my moves, anyone there could be keeping track of my moves. I need direction.

I decide to go see Sambethe.

Sambethe is an oracle who operates at the end of Gryphon alley. She’s known to many, but getting a reading from her isn’t easy. She needs a relic of her quarry to prophesy. This severely limits the questions one can ask her. And her cost is steep. She often doesn’t want coin, but favors and promises. Sometimes the cost is too much.

I need to know where Seth and Kyra are. I have plenty of their possessions here, so the relic won’t be a problem. But I don’t know what the cost will be. Even if she can tell me where they are, what can I do?

I remember Kyra being taken away in chains. I shudder to think of Seth going the same way.

This is the first time I’ve had to think of what happened that morning and something doesn’t make sense. Why did the Captain open the box? He forced me to get the Nyx plant. Why would he open it in the sunlight? Wouldn’t he know that it would wither and die?

Then it dawns on me. The Captain was acting on orders. He didn’t want the plant for himself. Someone had hired him to retrieve it. He opened it to make sure that I had brought it. He didn’t know anything about the plant.

I stole it for someone else. Likely a member of the New Guild. But why couldn’t that person get it from the Healer himself. And if the Captain was acting on orders, why did he see to it personally and not just send his goons?

I am lost in thought when the front door swings open.

----------

I dive from the chair as a blade flies my direction and sticks into the wood where my back just was.

I roll into the closest door. Seth’s room. It’s a good thing he loves to play warrior. A couple of his wooden swords are scattered around. I grab one in my off hand. With my right I reach for his blanket.

I can hear something glass slip and shatter. I picture the mess in my head and know he’s stepped towards the oven. I wad the horse-skin blanket up and I peek around the doorway. Another blade flies my way and sticks into the jamb.

He’s hooded, so I don’t recognize him. But with how he’s fighting, I know he’s one of the thieves from the market. One of my rivals. He must not have been expecting me to be here or he wouldn’t have come through the front door.

“Ongredost, hear my prayer and give me strength,” I whisper. I take a deep breath.

I heave the balled up blanket at him as I come around the corner. It’s a heavy and cured and it opens as it flies toward him. Another blade thuds into it as I make my move. I sprint full speed behind the cover and ready the wooden blade with both hands.

As the horse skin falls I swing with all my might and connect with my attacker just above his right temple. The blow rattles my fingers and they sting. The hooded figure slumps to the ground.

I remove the hood and recognize Bruno, one of the thieves from the market. We specialized in similar jobs, so we were rivals. He’s unconscious and I leave him there after relieving him of his knives and coin purse.

It’s no longer safe to be here. I grab one of Kyra’s shawls and take Seth’s sword with me. I head off towards Gryphon alley to see Sambethe.

The Thief With Wings - Chapter Two

The King’s head was on a spike. The queen’s and the princesses’ heads were next to his. The pink of their tongues looked embers glowing in an ash-covered piece of coal.

Everyone was cheering.

I imagined all the times that the King stood in that balcony over the public square and spoke to us.

Now a severed head told his story. His graying skull wagged in the breeze as a crow pecked at his eye. A sentinel shooed it away.

I cheered right along with them.

----------

In Solon’s hand is a small golden locket, trimmed with small rubies and amethysts. My family has never been rich. That was the most expensive thing that I ever owned. An angel on a golden chain. My mother’s locket. I pawned it.

“I know who you are and the skills you possess,” Solon says. “I also know your priorities.”

After my parents died, I sold the locket to pay for food for my brother and Kyra. Before I began stealing. Before I had to steal.

My mind races. “But how,” I begin.

“Friend Hawk,” he says, shushing me with a finger in the air. “We have been watching you for some time now. I know your movements and your motives. You are the man we need for a special job.”

I gulp. My life deals in secrets. I have taken it for granted that I operated without anyone knowing. If Solon was watching me, what the guards must know!

“A job?" I ask. "What do you want?”

“It’s not what I want. It’s what we need. Everybody! What everybody needs!” Solon works himself up, stops and takes a deep breath. “We need you to recover the King’s crown and his scepter.”

“The crown and scepter? But why?” I ask.

“There is deep magic within those elements." Solon says. "If we are to right the kingdom, they need to be taken away from the New Guild. Think about it! What makes their rule so powerful? Just money? We have plenty of money, my associates and I, but we cannot control the will of men with it. Sure, we can buy pieces of a man’s loyalty, but we cannot rule based upon it. Neither can they. Not for as long as they have been ruling.”

I’m silenced. Something inside of me shudders at what I’ve just heard. Is there really something deeper at work?

“I can’t help you,” I say. “I have to find a way to save Kyra. I have to get home and take care of my brother.”

Solon looks down. “We tried to get to him before the guards did, but they have taken him as well. They left a note that I have here.”

Kyra's capture punched me in the stomach. This news of my brother kicks me while I am down.

The note reads: “Hawk, you failed to bring the Nyx plant in time. You will not fail this time. Bring it to the meeting place before dawn in three days, or they both will die.”

“When did you get this note?” I ask Solon.

“Yesterday,” he says. “But you know as well as I that the Nyx you stole from the healer of Dragon Plaza was the only one within a month’s journey of here.”

I can’t save my brother Seth or Kyra. My anger burns the words in my mouth before they reach my lips.

“There is a way to save them, yet,” Solon says. “Steal he crown and scepter for us. Then we can overthrow the very guards who have taken everything from you."

Kyra. Seth. My parents.

"Here, this belongs to you,” he says.

Solon hands me my mother’s locket. It’s cold to the touch. I remember my mother while I handle it. The simplicity of life back then. I remember her laugh, her spirit.

“Okay, Solon,” I say and squeeze the locket. “I’m in.”

The Thief With Wings - Chapter One

When the King was in charge, we had peace and order. Farmers, workers, warriors—all were under the ruling protection of the King. We paid him taxes and tributes. We gave him our oaths of fealty. But there was a strange disquiet.

After years of amassing gold and jewels, there were many who had wealth like the King. These merchants and nobles didn’t like that he had all the power and that they had none. They wanted the power for themselves. They hired people from within the city and without. They turned the guards into mercenaries. They broke and took away our ruler.

At first, it wasn’t so bad. To quiet the masses, the nobles and the merchants were feeding the hungry and poor. Everyone had enough. That had never happened under the King.

After the initial coup, there were no more public battles. There were only surreptitious skirmishes. Whispers passed of neighbors who supported the old ways and they disappeared in the night. No one was being killed in the streets. Yet slowly and silently the supporters of the crown were eliminated. The food in our bellies pacified us.

Then the handouts and perks began to dry up. Men from each of the guilds and professions met and gathered with these nobles and the merchants. They talked about equality and liberty. We were enflamed by the ideas.

All along no one saw the noose we were tying around our own necks.


----------


I wake up and the first thing I can feel is an acrid churning in my stomach. I sit upright and I’m dizzy. I want to vomit the contents of my stomach and start over again, but my body is uncooperative. My eyes adjust to the darkened space I’m in. I don’t know where I am.

“Please, friend, try and relax,” an unknown voice says.

“Who are you?” I ask.

“Just call me Solon,” he answers. “Now please, relax.”

A warm, damp cloth is draped across my forehead and I feel an instant cooling and relief.

“By Ongredost, what was that?” I ask.

“Brewed leaves of the Galene plant,” he replies.

My nausea subsides. It’s quickly replaced by sudden pains as I remember the image of Kyra against the rising sun, taken by the guards.

“What time is it, Solon?” I ask. I’m feeling good enough to stand. My caretaker eases me back to the resting place.

“You have been unconscious for more than a day,” he says and pauses. He must see the urgency and fear in my countenance. “She is long gone, my friend,” he says solemnly.

Chills run down my spine and tears swell. I squeeze my eyes shut until they are a desert once more.

“Then I must go after her,” I say.

“And where have they taken her then?” Solon asks. “The prison? The palace turned statehouse? The barracks to take advantage of her? You are lucky to be alive right now! You don’t even know where she is? What can you hope to do? If you make an appeal to the courts, it is certain death.”

Solon’s words rip through my resolve. I don’t know where she is. She could be anywhere. I was out of it for so long. I’ll reach out to my contacts. One of them will know.

“Friends of mine will surely know where she is,” I say. “I will find her.”

“The friends of yours in the underground?” Solon asks. “How do you think it is that the guards were turned on to you in the first place? How do you think it is that I knew where to find you?”

My mind roils from his words. I don’t want to believe him, but I know he must be right. If I was truly turned in by someone in the underground, then it’s a death sentence to the courts or anywhere else. And why does want to find me?

I’m not sure how long I’ve been silent for. Solon puts his arm on my shoulder.

“Friend Hawk, I’m sorry to be so harsh. But I need you alive. You’re the only one who can help me. I need a man with your talents.”

“And just what do you know about me?” I ask.

Solon smiles. He stands and walks out of the room. He reemerges with a small chest.

When he opens it, the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.