Horosheen was aggravated at the news of her cousin-friend Garynine’s sudden disappearance but was more perplexed at her family forbidding her and Sagi to play in the woods even during day time.

 The dread of the demons was rampant earlier too, and so was their mischievous amusements, but morning was the welcome time for children to keep outdoors till dusk fell.

It was already inexplicable to her that people didn’t defend themselves against the night-creepers, and now their cowing to demons’ raucous hullabaloo, pushed her to sting out her repulsion against the demons of the woods.

“Cowardly I live and cowardly I die

As demons sly how I kick the stool bye!

In sleep I dread a vision and sigh

And awake I fear every vision passing by!

Yet meekly if I live, what need I not die

Lest I fight back amen to that cry!

Seeing Horo’s incendiary will at racking the specters of the dark and knowing what she aims to annihilate are beyond the strengths of creatures, her father Jogard sat her down to a dissuading conversation which instead further provoked her furies.

“What you seek is not for us to command.”

“And the dread we seek is not for us to demand!”

“Cowardice you decry is but aloofness of demon band.”

“Fie! Aloofness, when demons pop up right in our land!”

“To be a prey, Horo, is etched in our destiny hand.”

“And predator they became by some destiny wand!”

“Cowardice pays, while heroism shall remain bland.”

“Naturally rose the creepers, for glory none could command!”

“Horo, the dread we have to seek, we have to demand!”

“I shall turn the fates, and rip anew my destiny hand!”

It had been ten years since her father had eloped and she had had her first acquaintance of a demon, but it was only a week ago her bosom friend had fallen prey to the evil amusements of the creepers.

Young and resolute enough, she said her last goodnights to her asleep family and schemed of slaying her first demon.

“Come along the night is nigh

Sing along the mortal cry

Gong rings my lullaby

Sleep you creeper it’s time to die”

Horo reached the precipice of the woods beyond which lied the hordid nests of night-creepers. As she crossed the boundary, she understood there was no looking back now as the demons have her marked and would hunt her out if she hides back in her sheath.

While chasing through the labyrinthine thickets, Horo sensed a mysterious creature stalking her. She unafraid, called it out and to her surprise found a girl of her age, but armored rightly for the occasion, unlike her.

“Why a girl as you wandering in the deep?”

“Same reason I presume you’ll keep!’

“Attired I am to slay the evil sheep!”

“And tenacious I am to slay the creep!”

“What name marks the valor you keep?”

“Horosheen and what name your armors keep?”

“Natai, who now beckons you to tail the beep!”

Natai recounted to Horo her part of the revenge she owes the creepers and the beep that they must pursue is the toll of the Punjoah hill where the master demon slayer Higgaryne awaits her pupils.

There they will be heirs to Higgaryne’s experience of the demons and will be schooled to carry her warring campaign against demon’s sinister tyranny.

On the way to the hill, Horo met Sheenoroh who was battling a Gayiee massively huge in proportion to hers. The trio nailed the demon despite its demeaning attempts to escape their swords, and as were about to lunge their vengeful swords into its heart, a girl barged in and ended its last gasps. Her name was Quvlita, and unlike the trio what she lacked in strength she made up for that in vigilance. Each complemented each and Higgaryne capitulated on this lethal mix, to make these four the dreaded nemesis of demons.

“Horo you outshine to be a leader

Natai, you strike well to be a cavalier

Sheenoroh, you’ll chaperone the leader

And Quvlita blessed you’ll keep the cluster!”

Sagiccus and a young Horosheen were playing in a haunted wood, and couldn’t sense that their eloped father Jogard had taken refuge in the same forest after some demons extorted his mistress- Peturt.

It was said that the curse of their mother on him, incited the night-creepers to abduct her even before Jogard could cross the brink of his native city.

“Let us play till the day is gay,

And the moon’s at bay with its demon-lovers”

“Let us dance till there’s a chance,

The moon wouldn’t glance as we go clowning onwards”

Their father, Jogard heard them singing merrily and was at first hesitant to meet them but then took out his mask and disguised as a Matehon, he accosted them.

“Sagi and Horo, why upset a troubled demon?”

“Oh! The moon’s at bay still Matehon is awaken!”

“You pester my sleep, what else could happen?”

“We could go clowning onwards, Oh, demon!”

“You upset and then order a Matehon!”

Matehon, was a legendary child-lifting demon, who was always neglected and shunned by its peers due to its childlike naivety.

 To atone for this loss, he kidnapped children as its eternal companions, and had so far orphaned many a mothers. Jogard chose this masquerade so that he could purloin the gifts of his loins, while fleeing the city and luckily no one shall accuse him but shall blame Matehon, the demon.

Yet still Jogard was buying so much time to execute his stratagem, that night fell, and it was the babyish stench of the kids that the true Matehon woke up to act upon its destiny.

“In my woods I spy a child, no it’s twain!

I rocked in cradle solo, now I’ll have twain!

Many I had, who now are bones of skeleton

For I live a century but not the children”

The true Matehon growled in anger seeing an ugly impersonation of it’s, and proceeded to quell it’s unchastely copy.

 But then it saw the charming tots it had wandered about in search of, and so its wrath was no more what it was meant to be. Exhilarated, it concealed itself in a semblance of a little child, seemingly lost in the wild wood.

“Alone have I wandered to find an egress…”

“Why! Now you have us, tell us your address!”

“I live in the jungle, it is my homely space.”

“With demons at night, the Gayies and Gleehades!”

“They wouldn’t possess me, despite quite a few.”

“They are lurking hither-thither to ail you.”

“Yet I’ll be safe, rather will have them rue!”

“Flee do they as if you’re an enchantress!”

“Well, Matehon, I am to end this long digress!”

The father Matehon trembled at this revelation, and seeing his children’s fate lying in a balance he pleaded for clemency. Matehon was in a mood to play, and offered him a task which if accomplished shall fulfill his plea.

The task was to become a Rasmanian demon, cut his vein, provoke the demons which abducted his mistress, and appease them when he had heftily cursed their grisly appearance and demon-blood.

“A demon shant clash with its kinsman demon, yet

My Rasmanian blood gurgles in my veins cut

To beckon the creepers who seized my Peturt

TUT! I’ll slay their gut, for being in a rut.

Hear me! Hide not in your horrid hut

Creepers out you jut for being a nut

My Rasmanian blood gurgles in my veins cut”

The demons listened to the excruciating insult of Matehon, and began scheming a ghastly revenge. In the meantime Jogard apologized to his children for the faults of his licentious make.

 The true Matehon was moved to pity for him but seeing it’s too late to make amends he remained mum and silently aware of their imminent doom. The demons flew down from the eerie darkness of the trees and with them they brought their queen, the mistress Peturt who had eloped with Jogard.

“Demons cry me their queen, as angels rail

The wood echoes what I chant as demons hail

Evil is my heart under this charming veil

Demons cry me their queen and angels wail.”

Jogard believed his one-time mistress shall unchain him from the ire of night-creepers, and seducingly he persuaded her for succor.

“Peturt, lay by me I wish to caress

Those brows, those lashes, those tresses

Slither shall I my hand on those curves

And glide I will furtively on your turfs.”

As he spoke of his love-lorn passions, the creepers were touched by the fresh light of dawning sun, and  the next moment they vanished in the air, still could hear Jogard singing his quatrain.

The invisible demons beckoned the queen to retreat for a morning sleep, but she remained impervious to their entreats. Seeing thus, they carved for her a man of nonpareil beauty, so that if they can’t achieve her then Jogard shouldn’t be able to gain her company once again.

 One glance at the man in shining hull, she embraced him and both left the scene arms in arms. Jogard was heartbroken, but he decided to return to his fidel wife, and start anew his stable life. Maheton didn’t wanting to wreck the serene mood, smothered his innate urge to seek a friend, and left to wandering alone in the wood.

“Let me play till the day is gay,

And the moon’s at bay with its demon-lovers”

“Let me dance till there’s a chance,

The moon wouldn’t glance as I go lonely onwards”

Rustartus was the demon of the auspicious skies of Hotubei mountain, whose structure was gravely disfigured in face of an ambush connived by Rustartus’s rival demons.

Hotubei had an unconvincing history of its origin which became the feud of contention between the sky demons, and they plotted to destroy it.  After that misfortune, Rustartus abandoned Hotubei but began a quest to fathom its origin and swore vengeance on its slayers.

“I’ll fly to the dead witch atop Mountake hill

With yaks, and roots for her rebirth pill

To make her wheel the answers mill

I’ll play her lyre atop Mountake Hill.”

As the sky-demon flew across the lands and seas, it came by the Hallow tribes, and witnessed the sadistic antics of a new demon, which though short in size was more ferocious and snarling than the earlier one-Garlantus.

Not finding its friend-Garlantus, the demon decided to make a search for it, fearing of any malady that must have struck its comrade. And soon Rustartus sensed its presence in the unbeckoning thicket of the wood, which hummed about with squeaking noises, dark and sly in its noxious make.

 Seeing Garlantus in a guise of a creature, with captives hanging from the trees, save one which it held in a loving embrace, Rustartus couldn’t help but dive in presto at the gathering.

“Garlantus, my friend what is with this ugly make?”

“Rustartus, you hardly came by I found another rake!”

“But why this disguise, why such an ugly make?”

“I didn’t wish to fend off my lovely rake!”

“It’s a creature, Garlantus not a demon in make.”

“Prove it, oh sky demon I’ll swim you around the lake!”

“Part with it, so shall I take it to test at Hill Mountake.”

“How far, how long, how now it’s racking to see you mistake!”

“Before long, it will be in your limbs, I labor for you sake!”

“And for you labor if I am wrong, you flake it, you flake!”

Rustartus was brimming with ecstasy to have so easily arranged a sacrificial victim for the dead witch. The ritual was to have the victim play the lyre in order to awaken witch’s wicked beast so that as it feasts on the sacrifice, the demon could demand his answers from her and depart before her 10-legged friend decides to have a second round.

As Rustartus, soared up in the sky, with its feet clinching Vencur, it was unaware of being stalked by the demon-slayer-Horoshene.

“And begins it again my odyssey

To slay, and be away from family!

Two coins in my sack, then will I flee

But I have none, begin the odyssey!”

Horosheen shot at its heart with her bow, and as the arrow struck it, the demon sailed down seven paces away from her.

Vencur was slightly wounded but his miseries came in battalions when seeing Vanilile’s mother in front of him, he paced backwards into a quagmire which sunk him faster than help could arrive.

The demon before disavowing its life spoke its dying wish to Horoshene, who hearkened at its every tenor and with unexplained pity for it decided to avenge its Hill’s fall.

“I have slain it but shall avenge its home

Its wish I’ll make but not its burial dome

Nay, I’ll slay even the witch and her loam

A witch’s a creature and demon-play not her home!”

Horosheen was infuriated at the creatures that would put on the mask of evil, to incite dread in others and seek company of bonafide demons. On reaching Mountake Hill, she made her huntswoman play the lyre, knowing she could handle and rather fiddle with the beast with masterly ease.

The beast had an exotic make with its skin soft and blushed with scarlet red hues, and its limbs streamlined with undulating movements. Horosheen wondered how such a frail and fragile thing of beauty be any source of harm to the sacrificial victims.

But then she realized that it’s the beauty of the beast which hypnotized its prey to be still as long as it has gobbled its meal to death. Seeing Natai numb, the demon-slayer drew out her sword to butcher the thing, but before she could take any action two more beasts crawled out and advanced musically towards her and her page.

“I stand stunned, dash my sword!

Pierce its heart, obey thy lord!

Tonight death shant toll its chord!

I die weak, dash my sword!”

 As the beast approached close to the page, the far extremity of the cave suddenly got lit with light which broke out through a peephole, carved in the shape of a case with three corners.

A colossal beast emerged from it, and taking in a vengeful whiff of air, it advanced ominously at the beasts and battered each with one mighty blow.

The page saw Valirique of Naztac appearing from the aperture, who began to tread towards her with a smile in his eyes. He offered a proposal hearing which a tremor ran down Quvlita’s spine, and she looked helplessly at her lady.

But Quvlita had to comply, and retreated with him into the asylum of light shining in the dark. The next moment the hole was closed, and so faded the blinding light turning the cave back to its tantalizing, mysterious darkness.

Horosheen was again able to move but she feared what Valirique might desire from her page and in pursuit of Quvlita she lashed at the end of the cave.

“I let you live not love

You saved to steal my dove

Iron clinks in my velvet glove

I let you live not love.”

Just as Horosheen was bleakly digging her way into the cave, the dead witch rose and enquired of their pretext to resurrect her.

“I died in hundred decades of yore!”

“Wake sleeping witch, wake your lore!”

“Askance you look at my ancient lore?”

“You’re a creature not a demon of yore!”

“I died in hundred decades of yore!”

“Then explain demon witch this bloody gore!”

“Beasts, my sleeping pills, they die sour!”

“Not if they had died by my razor oar!

“Slain not by you, I shall hide my lore!”

“Call them hither, who killed your bore!”

“Appear then demon of light at my floor!”

“Call them hither, who killed your bore!”

At demon-witch’s command, Valirique and his beast manifested before it, and with them stood the happy page, with tears moistened in her eyes to see her lady again. Horo learnt that Valirique was himself a demon, and intended to transform her page into one. All this while they had waited for this chance to steal her page and be done with their wild fantasy. Horo didn’t wish to slay them for their sly intentions but seeing Valirique’s impudent hold of her page, she was enraged.

Horosheen and her huntswoman at once stroke their swords into their hearts, and as they bled the lady took out her glove, and laid a fist on Valirique’s blood-gushing face.

They coerced the witch to disclose the origin of the Hotubei Mountain, if it intends to live and not become a part of the fresh carcasses lying around. With the details sought out, all three demon-slayers, along with the witch made their way to Hotubei to settle a matter they had promised a sky-demon.

Vanilile screamed to her captor of the evil she senses in the hut where to who arrives with vice departs to the purging fires of the pit. Her captor ignored her apprehensive warnings and took to yet another goblet of wine while waiting for his accomplices to arrive.

“Fear not what creeps nightly

We sly in day and labor soundly

Who the demons wish to bully

Play in sun and creep not nightly”

The captor- Vencur waited at length but finding the night falling, he deserted the girl under the decrepit hut, and disappeared in the thicket of the wood.

Vanilile pleaded him to untie her hands in case she has to protect herself, but Vencur fearing she might run off, left her such as she was.

The hut was nigh close to the gaping sea of Hallow tribes, who roamed the waters for adventure and livelihood. In one of these clans served a man who detested the wild lives of his people but barren of any resources had to carry along and oblige them.

“The loot doesn’t rouse my spirits

Nor the treasures deep in waters

Glory of pillaging dies with others

What remains is my dull spirits!”

This man, called Fiseus was assigned the duty to check on the prisoners captured by his tribe, and if they received his hospitality amicably, the prisoners were declared sane and painlessly poisoned to death otherwise they were fed as fodder to the demon of the sea-Garlantus for mere amusement of the tribe.

Fiseus being a man of mercy would stealthily help some of the prisoners escape to the island where he had built a hut for their shelter. The demon of the sea sniffed this clandestine business of Fiseus, and transforming itself into a prisoner, it followed others to the hut.

As they progressed in their way to the hut, Garlantus sensed a presence of an evil spirit, somewhere in the thicket of the bush.

It was Vencur, who oblivious of the developments outside was slumbering in his asylum of dead leaves and woody branches.

“What creature snores in the thicket?

And snores his heart of kindred wicked.

Alone he snores, ah! I’ll make a duet!

Together in the heart, in the heart of the thicket.”

Garlantus slid to Vencur’s side and slouched on a soft cushion of leaves, musing of his new-found friend. It believed Vencur will be friendlier than the other creatures of land it had befriended, and wouldn’t have to eat him like other of its infidel cronies.

 Sometime later, when the captor woke up, he almost broke with alarm seeing an unknown creature by his side.

“What creature roaches on my space?

And roaches his heart in my face!

Alone I roach, ah! A duet he makes!

Together in the heart, in the heart of my place.”

Without making any noise, he slipped out of the thicket and ran his way to the hut. To his surprise, he found Vanilile surrounded by five-six ragged people, as she yelled at them to keep distance.

Vencur barged in and brandishing his dagger howled at the bawdy gathering. Hearing his trepidation, the demon rose from its slumber and raced to the place where seeing the prisoners who had been its meal if they had not acted sane, it grew ravenous with rage.

But seeing Vencur alarmed with terror, it composed itself, and grabbing him as well the tribesmen, it galloped away into the thicket. Vanilile was horrified yet relieved of being alone rather than with the precarious company as before.

“My, what a captive am I

Seen haven’t I through my eye

The unseen nightmares, fie, fie!

My, what a captive am I”

As she pondered over the better left unseen events, Fiseus walked in with the amnesties he brought for the tribesmen.

Both saw each other, and saw each other’s gentle innocence, and before they could forge any more affection, the rest of the captors entered the scene.

“Vencur, are you?”

“Who? Who?”

“The captor of this lady in black hue.”

“Fiseus I am, but I don’t know you.”

“No business, then that’s your cue.”

“What! I desert this lady to you?”

“Tie him friends, tie him too!”

“Have you heard of Hallow, haven’t you?”

“Speak it again, I might whip you!”

“Hallow is my tribe, I whip you!”

“Take our bounty, give peace in lieu.”

“Leave we will into the sea blue”

Fiseus took Vanilile to his ship, and when he reached the place all he thought that never had any man being wretchedly foolish than him.

In trying to parade his tribe’s wealth and treasures, he brought her on the ship, not realizing how his people will take it and a servant which he is, how will he avert any tragedy befalling her?

“What Fiseus, what jewel is this?

Sane or insane, it needs a kiss

Now shall I sink in bliss,

Which voyages had me miss!”

But Fiseus quickly invented the story of Vanilile being a prisoner, who must be inspected the way it is recognized by the tribes and be dispelled accordingly. After nights and days of keeping up the appearances he declared her insane, after which as per the custom she was shoved in the waters.

Fiseus aided her to seek the island, and as they departed he could see a faint hand waving at him while the mist began flourishing around his ship.  Moments later, Vanilile retraced her steps back to her home, and away from the labyrinthine thickets she earlier loved to play in.

Valirique was alone in the cave hiding from the rampage of night-creepers who had possessed his village-Naztac, when refused they were of shelter from Horoshene. He could hear the cries of his people wailing at length to have mercy on their pitiable living and homes.

 It was by mid-night that the mighty demon-slayer Horosheen ended this unholy commotion, by butchering the demons some of whom fled from Naztac while some from life. The slayer’s page in the meanwhile also took refuge in the cave unbeknownst of the presence of Valirique, spying on her delicate make.

“By which skin are you knitted?

So fair, so frail and pitted

Those contours I see so gifted

Wish I could too touch it!”

As he was occupied by his muse, the end extremity of the cave suddenly got lit with light that broke out through a peephole, carved in the shape of a case with three corners. The page seeing such a spectacle drew out her sword, and advanced towards the silhouette of Valirique, doubting it to be a creeper.

“Come away from the dark, you thing

With gloom you have had your fling.

Lest my lance at you I sling

Come away from the dark, you thing!”

Valirique was about to make his move, when a colossal beast came at him from behind and clutched his head back through the hole. The page drew her lance at the beast and retrieved Valirique while severely wounding the beast as it retreated to its asylum in the light.

The next moment the hole was closed, and so faded the blinding light turning the cave back to its tantalizing, mysterious darkness. The page however succeeded in marking the hole’s position, for in their hid a demon which ought to be slain before it flips on the rampage.

She instructed Valirique to intimate her lady of these developments while on her level she’ll explore the hideout of the demon.

“In light it hides, where we stand bare

The grim night shall be its slammer

I dare it flash again its glare?

Whip I’ll it from a demon to a mare!”

The page, called as Quvlita, stroke at the hole with force and finesse till it gave way to a gush of light. Seeing her, Valirique darted back to Naztec, to inform the lady of such events while Quvlita stepped inside the other facet of the till now dark cave.

As she traversed the brightly lit ways of the cavern, she found something amiss and could sense the inescapable aura of the same light-creeper.

The paths were entwined over each other, akin the foliage of a dense tree and treading them was a precarious task. They had angel shaped statues flanked at both sides, with stud-link chains connecting each all along the way.

Quvlita holding at them strode forward while leaving a tell tale mark for her lady and in case she herself paces the same path over and over again. The grating hunch of that creeper following her every move, kept Quvlita on the alert and before she knew the path came to a dead end with her hanging in the air, gripping the chains and the only way out was retreat.

“Come away from the hiding, you thing,

With light you have had your fling.

Lest my lance at you I sling

Come away from the light, you thing!”

The beast, right then flung itself at the page, leaving seven paces of distance between it and her.

“You strike me as a combatant!”

“I’ll slay you demon in your tent!”

“But in you demon blood I scent”

“It’s my dagger reeking of demon scent!”

The light-demon seeing her flagrant rawness in the face of a demon blew at its clarion, and in a blink of an eye, three haggard, emaciated, demons emerged out of the brilliant light.

They were the infamous Gleehades, who were the first and last of the demon species who had escaped the predating clasp of Horoshene. Somehow they had taken refuge in the recesses of the cavern’s lit asylum, and seeing thus Quvlita trembled as she didn’t know the magic words that could slay these dagger-safe demons.

“Horoshene, was at our tail, how now

Her page is not with her sacred cow

Forlorn and feeble her page frets how

Her lady’s misdeeds we’ll make her plow?”

The Gleehades advanced menacingly at her, but at once the light-creeper halted the three demons to renounce their grudge. Quvlita was stupefied, and couldn’t gather why the light-creeper is risking its life for hers, for in fact she had come all the way here to slay it!

“By which skin are you knitted?

So fair, so frail and pitted

Those contours I see so gifted

Wish I could too touch it!”

Quvlita couldn’t believe that the light-creeper was harboring tender affections for her, which for her at first was lovely but then ghastly uncanny.

Just then, Horosheen appeared and thundered out the magic words in presto, hearing which the Gleehades finally fled their physical make to the pit. But she didn’t hurt the creeper, and along with the page they retraced their steps back to the dark side of the cavern. 

Valirique was standing attendance, and as Horosheen and her page escaped through the lit cavern, the creeper closed the peephole till all was dark. 

“Left you my lady the demon of light?”

“Saved it not you from Gleehades’s blight!”

“But harm others, save me, he still might?”

“It shant, Valirique says, not this demon of light!”

Denroh was a fledging sculptor, but being the only one in his village, his art was much in demand. His carved statuettes of demon forms were his source of livelihood and their fame began to seep into the inaccessible caverns of creepers as well. He would often saunter alone in the woods to seek various tools for his profession and without a dread for the night-creepers would outstay the dawning dusk.

“Take shape, as I cut and chisel

Sculpt shall I a stone to a devil

With fine rasps in sun and drizzle

 Before a drip of patina, I’ll chisel!”

It was going well for days at end and sooner he was approached by merchants who wished to sell his sculptures beyond the seas. Denroh became a name to reckon with but his demon figurines though favored far and wide didn’t invite appreciation from Horoshene- the renowned demon slayer.

“Fathom this, Denroh, demons you draw.”

“Fathom this Horo, sculptures can’t gnaw!”

“Drawn they are, and nearer they draw.”

“Days have elapsed, none came to gnaw!”

“Some in the market at night I saw.”

“Looted they or cursed me for a flaw?”

“Denroh tonight is the last straw…”

“I’ll be tortured, is that your vision saw!”

 “Perchance in peril then my name you caw!”

“Better you I draw than a name I caw.”

“Fathom this, Denroh, my name you caw!”

“Fathom this Horo, sculptures I draw!”

It was two nights since Horosheen had been gone, and finding peace still prevailing Denroh persevered in his art.

As he was concluding his work for the day, unbeknownst to his rose-tinted intuition, a ghastly demon, effusing with slime stormed in.

“Make my make in stone

Miles have I flown

Here I am to drone

Make my make in stone!”

Denroh in heart laughed at Horosheen for being so mistrustful of demons who just wished to be carved and immortalized in his statues. He acceded to fulfill demon’s fancy if it shant wait on him, but appear only when his work is accomplished.

The demon agreed to his condition and suggested if its carving looks magnificent then he shall have Denroh sculpt one for its brother-Kacaree. But if the sculpture is ghastly or abhorrently fictional or not completed before stipulated date then Denroh shall have to become its meal.

“Many contours I scythed, why

This one shant make me sigh

In a blink I shall have it lie

In the woods where demons sly!”

Denroh finished the statue before the agreed time but he was sunk in the thought of whether to inform Horosheen or offer the statue without question.

 The idea of selling his prized opus without a prize or without an audience irked his pride, but then he thought he might persuade the demon to think about conferring a reward.

He waited for the day to arrive, and when the time came, the demon appeared with Kacaree to claim its carving.

“Made well, Denroh but is it sturdy?”

“Figurines, demon are frail not burly!”

“Am I frail, is that you show me?”

“Statues, demon cannot be a true copy!”

“Slit it, slit all, it’s a sham Kacaree!”

“No! Statues cannot be a true copy!”

“All a pretence, conned you haven’t me!”

“You realize not, not a true copy!”

“Be quiet with protest, now its penalty!”

“No! No! No! It’s a wicked trickery!”

The demons hurled Denroh’s statues helter-skelter and paid no notice to his earnest wailing. He had forgotten the warning call Horosheen had told him to cry whenever at ugliest odds he’ll be with the night-creepers.

As the demons rampaged around his happy isle of art, Denroh gloomily awaited his looming sentence. In a moment of late epiphany, he realized the demons were just cooking an excuse to eat him, and all the way had schemed to wreck apart his years of labor.

They took him to their nest and tied him to a contraption which appeared like a char grill. The demon left to find some garnishing for the feast while Kacaree stayed behind to rake the fire.

 “I hid it before, now I tell you!”

“Your dying words? Keep it with you!”

“The statue is alive, now I tell you!”

“Seeing death flare, Denroh you gabble goo!”

“It’s the art, Kacaree, of forbidden voodoo!”

“Then out with it, else slay I’ll you!”

“Untie my hands! A sleight of hand is due!”

Just when Kacaree was unknotting Denroh, the demon appeared startled at the ongoing scene.

“Freeing it, and fleeing with it, are you?”

“Am untying his hands, A sleight of hand is due.”

“Wished you to feast it, how you gabble goo!”

““It’s the art, demon, of forbidden voodoo!”

“Then out with it, else slay I’ll both of you!”

“Untie I his hands! A sleight of hand is due!”

Denroh could sense from the bitter rancor, the growing suspicions of the demon against its brother Kacaree. Capitalizing on the situation, he carried on in his pursuit to free himself from his present quandary…

“Behold! To ape toe to skull

The statue begs a model

Carved on its frail hull

Is the demon as a model.”

Denroh quite eloquently convinced the demon to relinquish its soul to the statue if it wishes the carving to ape it as a sturdy and a burly creeper.

The figurine being a copy of the demon, only the demon hence could serve as a model in order to bring the chiseled stone alive.

“Take it, take it, a spectacle I beseech

Make it, make it, sturdy as I screech

Fake it, fake it, a sculptor I’ll leech

Take it, take it, a spectacle I beseech”

As the soul left the demon’s body, Denroh with all his might and quickness of hand, battered the statue to broken stones, leaving behind the corpse of the demon, a soulful statue and a raging brother.

But Denroh wasn’t concerned of the consequences, for he had had his vengeance against the demon that ruined his precious works of art.

 Kacaree stood flabbergasted and before it could turn into a raging ball of inferno, an arrow slit through its heart and slid it right to the bark of tree where an inscription said:

“Demons are blind”

Denroh looked aghast at the slain Kacaree, and turned around to see who the death blesser is, and to his happy heart it was Horoshene.

“Laud I you, Denroh, indeed an artful artist!’

“I didn’t caw, yet Kacaree has the mark of your fist!”

“Knew I you weren’t of demons abreast!”

“Since how long have I been in your arrest?”

“Since saw I your screech not caw in the forest!”

“Blessed I am, you about me were abreast!”

“Still, Laud I you, Denroh, indeed an artful artist!”

Horosheen saw a nightmare, and woke up in fright as beads of rain stroke at her hut of hay and stones. Sheenoroh, her chaperone was by her side, sleeping as the day had been a tiring quest with Horosheen slaying the dozen demons that crept at night.

What Horo saw in her dream, she didn’t disclose as they ventured out for yet another excursion in the woods. Natai her companion was an expert huntswoman, and could sniff out the trail of any macabre vermin, her lady desired to prey on. And lady’s page was prompt in keeping pace with their hunting expedition that ran day and night at end.

But the lady’s chaperon though being her obedient escort, had evil in her heart and intrigues in her head.

“Slouch as I closer to her bed

Eyes mine so devilish see red

To see me sad hers always bled

Not knowing mine often saw red!”

What provoked such evil was her lady’s slaughter of a night-creeper who apparently had once saved Sheenoroh’s life from the blood-lust of other demons. The night-creepers were the demons, of many varied species and traits yet all lived in unity to ward off the creatures-humans. Sheenoroh was taken aback at the sudden kindness of the night creeper, and vowed to keep a soft spot for this humanly demon.

She never let loose this secret as it wouldn’t have meant anything to her lady, perhaps for she believed there can be no bonhomie between the hammer and anvil. But that day seeing the demon dying at the hands of Horoshene, while begging for help from her, she almost had a change of heart to protect the demons.

 “In your mind I sow weeds

On which Vollard, the beast feeds.

You shall dread when he heeds

A demon-slayer who now keels!”

Vollard was a devil which once provoked in a nightmare leeches out one’s courage till the victim succumbs to death-in-life. It may be a figment, but its presence in someone’s sleep wrecks his convictions hence making the dreamer vulnerable to a life which one lives with unspoken torments of horror. Sheeoroh had infected her lady’s mind with the beast’s potion to reap her revenge at last. Horosheen and her admirers weren’t oblivious of Vollard’s tricks but to save their lady they knew of no remedy.

 “Ails she not awake that in sleep

Must the demons creep?

Wrongs she not any that in justice

Must the angels fleece?”

Natai, the huntswoman began to question the demons for a remedy in lieu of their lives eschewed from further hunt.  Mumpadi, the liege of the golden slime of woods, offered the remedy if it could see Horosheen in flesh.

“Writhes she in pain,

In the sun and rain

Or does she feign

To act insane?

Seeing what it had always dreamt, Horo in pain, Mumpadi unveiled the remedy which though fortunate was not an effortless task to undergo in dearth of time.

Natai, asked lady’s page to aid her, and she agreed gladly but Natai couldn’t gather why her lady’s chaperon refused almost bluntly to offer any assistance from her end. But the impending task was too precariously looming in front her eyes, she restrained her suspicions and with an adventurous heart sailed to the land of Gayies. The lady’s page appointed some villagers to keep guard on her lady for in sleep even the immortals are close to death.

“Legends have it

That ghosts who fail to grasp it

That destined they are to pit,

Wander awhile while fire-lit.”

Gayies were delusional demons which burnt in fire as long as their hunger for living clouded their faith in destiny. And once they realized their fate is to suffer in the other realm of the world, Gayies would escape the mortal body to reach the pit.  Natai still on her ship could see from a distance the burning specters of Gayies which akin a moth burn in light and then escape their bodies to brighten the pit forever. 

Mumpadi had instructed Natai to beg for the remedy when the Gayies are afire, and not to outstay the welcome as once the body is burnt to ash, the Gayies can extort the soul of one not of its kind, to go to the pit in its place.

Natai embarked on the land, and set the page to signal the approach of any mischievous Gayiee, having wicked intentions.

“I approach you, oh sage Gayiee!”

“Wait awhile and set me free…”

“I, Natai, seek you for a remedy.”

“I hath naught till you are me.”

“Wait I will if you hear my plea.”

“Then out with your misery!”

“Vollard, the beast seeks my lady.”

“Who sent you here poor Natai?”

“The unforeseen savior, Mumpadi!”

“An iron key shall then it be…”

“A key to unlock the remedy!”

“Now wait awhile to set me free!”

““I retreat now, oh sage Gayiee!”

“I burn a fool, be gone with your remedy?”

Natai left the island, witnessing in dismay the thousands of Gayies burning to the cinder, and departing for a place kindling with more blazes and more infernos. The key had an inscription engraved on its body which Natai remembered was an elegy she often heard when her lady had slain a demon.

And this elegy she thought shall be the funeral song for the beast Vollard, who provoked by some vile creature haunts the quiet sleep of her lady, Horoshene.

The elegy read as…

“Aye, I die but you still breathe

Why you sigh when I am freed

Lament not I’ll be here to lead

When in hands of Horo you’ll bleed!”

Natai took the key to her lady’s room, and in the most ceremoniously befitting manner, she turned it on her lady’s temple to complete one circle. Just when the page was on the threshold of chanting the requiem, Sheenoroh barged in, with a dagger in her hand which was lit with blood.  Natai plucked out her sword and in one fell swoop lunged it in the heart of the murderous chaperon who advanced viciously towards the sleeping Horoshene. Before she breathed out her last gasps, the chaperon narrated to Natai the reason for her wicked vengeance against her lady.

“Take away my heart but sing

What bred this high treason?

I lived saved by a demon

Who died by her who I’d chaperon!”

The page sang the funeral song, and the lady woke up in a fleeting fright as beads of rain stroke at her hut of hay and stones.

As I was flipping through a magazine, I encountered with an advertisement from the store “Journeys”. This advertisement immediately caught my attention considering the other advertisements in the magazine were all very colourful, detailed, and bright. But as for the advertisement by Journeys, it had a simple and artist vibe to it. The way this ad expresses these artist and simple vibes are through the colours, photographs and quotes presented. I’ve noticed the main background is black with a photo of a white converse with little cartoons on it and another photograph of a woman smiling. The way the advertisers organized the lay out of this advertisement makes it seem very modern. The position of the camera is set at an angle since both photographs are taken from a viewpoint showing its side. The photographers may have done this to create a better contrast between the lighting and the person/object being photographed creating a more realistic feeling. The photograph of the woman smiling is telling the readers that this store will make you happy and the quality here can please anyone. The other photograph of a white converse with little cartoons on it represents the creativeness of their products. Usually the converses in many of the other shoe stores are in one basic colour, while Journeys’ have a wide variety. The quote “LIVE LIFE TO CREATE” states, you should be creative in life especially with the clothing and shoes you buy, and Journey’s provides that for you. In conclusion media messages –such as the Journeys’ ad- are all constructed by media makers who try to grab the readers’ attention through advertisements in order to make money.

I suspect that for most of us, setting out to do a dissertation is taking a trip into foreign territory. you’ve been on journeys before all that essay writing experience, but will this one be different?. thinking about however many thousands of words you have to write, suggests that this is likely to be a long trip.

some unique travellers tips i would like to share with you…

these were the result of my request for recipe’s for success, several students pointed out that there was no such thing but they all shared lots of helpful hints anyway. Their suggestions may help you through you dissertation, saving you time and energy…

“its difficult to give a one, two, three approach to success. each student is very much an individual”

“another used a journey metaphor’ to describe their experience; ‘for me, the result is not as important as the process.it is the same thing as saying that in a journey the important thing is no the destination but the trip itself.

Guidance which invites you to share students experiences of doing a dissertation. it has been written by students for students. please take notes, word of wisdom for students.

you will not find conventional academic wisdon of the kind offered by authors of study skills books.thier prescriptive advice tends to flow in one direction only, ie. from experienced totors to enexperienced students, known to be the confused.

this however is quite different, i will place a dialogue between students, an ‘insider’ approuch reflecting rough reality. One undergraduate’s comment illustrates clearlky the difference between conventional advice and the rather more unusual approuch: “the problem with books on ‘how to write a dissertation’ is that it sounds so cut and dried, polished, abc-whereas for me, everthing seemed muddled’.

the second participant in this dialogue, another undergraduate mentioned the following: “my own apprehentions when trying to write a dissertation for the first time were resolved, not through the expert guidance of tutors, but by my peers; we helped each other through the problems and we shared the good times when things went well”. in other words if sharing out experiences worked for them, it might just work for you.

Someone once said that little things reflect big things, and they were right. If you can enjoy the little things; I think you can be happy. Besides Jam, I think people should cook more. Cooking is another one of those heavily underestimated wonderful little things. And cooking is great because it brings people together. It’s also a healthy outlet. I mean you can be as messy of a cook as a paint slinging artist or you can be as cool and composed and precise as a readily polished professional connoisseur of fine foods. You can also be as creative as you want when it comes to food to. I mean there are endless food possibilities and no real food ‘don’ts’ to curtail your efforts of creating a hysterically impossible yet edibly contagious masterpiece.

I didn’t even start to mention how much healthier people would be if they actually prepared their own food either did I. Especially if they actually sat down and ate it! Now whoa, there’s an amazing concept! What, no dashboard dining? No, warmed up and repeatedly reheated, preservative, hydrogenated whatever filled, fat filled, fast food cheeseburgers?! Wow, how would the world turn you might ask. I know, you just get so used to it. But that’s why it’s good to be original and brilliant and break from the mold every now and then.

And I don’t mean in an original Wendy’s commercial moment either (you know the ones where there’s always some instantly enlightened guy to how dumb something actually is that everyone else is doing wherefore he immediately decides to have a Wendy’s Cheeseburger). No I mean in the true spirit of culinary artistry. Where actual creative energy and passion dwell over more than just the filling instant of the food, but over the actual taste and quality and beauty of food created lovingly and patiently just for you. Maybe even prepared by someone else special if your lucky enough (wink, wink). Hey, you could definitely use this article as your persuasion.