Historical
The Worsley Family Locket: Chapter 3 - Arthur and Clarence
It is not possible to explain what occurred next, without speaking about your more senior siblings. How your eldest brother Clarence carried himself, was the epitome of the household’s ever-lasting cruelty and neglect. Aged just 13 when I first encountered him, he lambasted my beggared condition and inferior status with eloquence beyond his years. Irresolutely an intelligent boy, but one who utilised his perceptiveness and quick-thinking with callous intent. A disdainful slug of a whelp, on the very brink of blossoming into a vile moth that was drawn toward opportunities to torture and belittle like flickering candlelight. I was victimised relentlessly by the child, who seemed to claim a wilful disliking to me from the very moment he encountered me. He taunted me for my work, stole my possessions which only rarely returned to me destroyed and even physically struck me when his loathing was made its most bold. The women of the manor he treated with similar disregard. His younger sisters Ida and Helen were positively terrified of him. Yet Lady Ethel, before she came to know the locket with such lamentable affinity, remained smitten. He was, after all, the first child she’d birthed. Regrettably however, those affections had never been mutual. Clarence only behaved with any civility around his father, though even this was demonstrably lacking in sentiment. He had eyes only for his father’s capacity for prosperity and influence, and declared a divine right to a share in his prestige, though to my eyes it was utterly unearned whenever he received it. A dreadful young swine through and through, but one with a certain ruthlessness that had already sniffed the alluring scent of ascendancy; traits that often collude to put a rotten fruit at the forefront of the grocer’s stalls.
By Matthew Curtis3 years ago in Fiction
The Jenny
The forest canopy, pierced by strobes of moonlight, illuminated Teddy's path as he escaped his prison of three years. Most wouldn't think of the estate as a jail from afar with the mansion's nineteenth-century Georgian columned porch, stonewall, manicured lawn, and trimmed hedges. A well-appointed sign at the end of the long gravel driveway read, Boys Home of Americus.
By J. S. Wade3 years ago in Fiction
SUMMARY OF GEORGE V: NEVER A DULL MOMENT
From one of the most renowned and accomplished historians of the British monarchy, here is a colorful, intimately researched history of a long-overlooked king who rebuilt the Crown in the wake of World War I and whose marriage to the royal Queen Mary was an epic union
By praise john3 years ago in Fiction
The Yellow Hibiscus Chapter 20
"He's one of us." I swayed back to Mr. Willoby, vitriol dripping from every word. "How did the fire start?" I questioned again. Shifting my gaze quickly from Willoby to Special Agent Wells, searching for any hidden agenda between them. I was hoping too that they couldn't sense my increased pulse. The memory of Juan and the fire the diamond in my possession had started were rupturing something inside me.
By Annelise Lords 3 years ago in Fiction
A Fresh Start
Living in the year 1819 meant only one thing for a large segment of the population—poverty, and despair. There were no government subsistence programs, unemployment checks, or homeless shelters. During this time in our history, the country was in the middle of a severe depression and everyone had to fend for themselves. It was certainly not a good time to be a ten-year-old boy abandoned by his parents and living in the streets of Boston. That, however, was the situation young Raymond was in. Added to his problems was that he was born with a club foot.
By Mark Gagnon3 years ago in Fiction
Orange Gulper
Orange Gulper oozed slightly up from the bottom of the pond, glancing up from the glinting moon-lit, murky water, and gulped soundlessly at the fat, orange fish flirting about the surface. The lily pads and lotus blooms kissed the goldfish and their swishing, colorful tails.
By Melissa Ingoldsby3 years ago in Fiction
The Severed Knot
Those who knew a thing or two about the English Civil War acknowledged that the Battle of Blundell's Edge was a turning point for the Parliamentarians. What was not suspected was that the previous night of Royalist debauchery at nearby Higley Court was a contributing factor. Higley Court had burned down immediately afterwards so the world didn’t know the truth. Only Gerald Higgs did. Or thought he did …but had made it his life's work to find out.
By Malcolm Twigg3 years ago in Fiction
Ame's Choice
Ame held her father’s hand tightly as she dropped from a large stone, landing with both feet in the mud below. They had come so far, and she didn’t know where they were going or why they had to leave home, but she had no choice but to hold her father’s hand and follow him. It was dark and cold. She wore simple, black clothes made of cotton, with no embroidery or patterns whatsoever. Her father next to her wore the same, with a shawl and a round hat made of straw. They would never have worn these sorts of things before tonight. Before tonight, they would have been riding horses, surrounded by guards and servants, but here they were, trudging through the forest outside the castle, alone.
By Jason Sultana3 years ago in Fiction
The Long, Slow March of Time
She opened her eyes on yet another day. Instinctively, she reached across the bed, feeling for that which she knew wouldn't be there. It had been well over a year now, since the death of her husband, and she missed him more terribly that she ever thought possible. It was almost a grim ritual that she still reached for him every morning, even though she knew that the bed was empty apart from herself.
By Luke Foster3 years ago in Fiction
