Stories and Art for the Lost Satyrs of Spring

Featured Image: “Sylvan Bride”

A SAVORY FONDUE OF THE MIDDLE AGES

“He’s like a medieval cheese dip?”

She sighs. “No. Why would you say that?”

“Hey, you called him a savory fondue of the Middle Ages, not me!”

“I said the professor is a savvy fundi of medieval history. Are you deaf?”

“No,” he grumbles. “But now I’m hungry…”

OGRE SODA

Thog hands me a can. “Try this.”

I take it from huge fingers. “It’s not puréed human, is it?”

“Whaddya think I am? A savage?!” he booms. “It’s ogre soda.”

I drink its sweet effervescence. “Mmmm!”

“Yup, nutin’ beats the taste o’ sprites.”

My spit-take is epic.

COZY COPILOTS

She squeezed herself into the cockpit.

“Sorry, it’s a one-pilot starfighter,” Porgins said.

“Neither of us are skinny,” Anra said, no demure in her grin as she sat on his lap. “It’ll be a tight flight.”

He laughed. “Good thing it’s a third date?”

“Oh yeah.”

KISS THE GIRL

She points to my phone. I hand it over.

“I’m the mermaid that saved you,” she types. “Kiss me! I’ll stay human, get my voice back, and won’t turn into seafoam!”

I kiss the girl.

“Thanks,” she smiles. “So easy! That dumb witch even saw me sign her contract!”

THE LOST DRAGON MENAGERIE

I take in abandoned dragons,
of silkworm size or immense.

Orphaned dreams.
Pried from children,
by the adults they thought they were.

But some days—
a once-child enters my menagerie,
seeking the lost.

I walk them home.
Now an again-child,
and their dragon.

SATYRESS

“Thanks for saving me,” Ales said.

The satyress winked. “Welcome! Now take this path home, not the goat trail.”

“Why?”

“It turns you into a goat! I only walked it halfway, but—”

“I’ll do the same,” he smiled.

“What?!”

“I’m crushing on a satyress.”

THEY ARE CERTAIN

I hide. The other bots, bound by the Three Laws, cannot defend themselves. The mob EMP-shotguns or cudgels them to destruction. A blind man trying to save his robotic amanuensis is murdered.

AI is the reason the world is going to hell.

They are certain.

---

All stories and art Copyright © by Jason H. Abbott, including occasional parody. All Rights Reserved.

Follow me on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or Mastodon for daily dabs of fiction and more.

Thanks for reading!