Fiction — The MagicLand Chronicles
The Fires of Easterly
Little did we know that beneath the glow of the continuously burning Easterly fires was a city of magic.
Some say it’s been two hundred years since the Third Eradication.
I don’t know. How would I? I don’t keep a calendar. I don’t have a way to tell time aside from the sun’s location against the burnt trees. I can tell you the day, the month, the time of year. But I can’t tell you what year. I don’t know anybody else who knows, either. If it mattered, I suppose somebody would start keeping track.
When I see the glows in the Easterly realm, I wonder if a firestarter like me gassed up some old industrial waste and created a fire that will never end. And then I wonder whether they did it on purpose, or if it was an accident.
Roquanna teases me by lifting her skirt to her torso, then scampers out of our filthy abode. What a tart she is.
I want to paint my fingernails before I start my ritual. A ritual before the ritual. One I always want to initiate before I begin the incantations, but this time the urge is stronger than usual.
I can use black dye Roquanna makes from rusty metal objects like nails and clasps she finds in the…
