Sunday Serial: 240 x 70 25. The Men in Red 13 January 2019 by Gill James, ruby wine

 Introduction

This collection is a collection of seventy stories, each 240 words. They were inspired by the first picture seen on my Twitter feed on a given day. 

25. The Men in Red 13 January 2019 

 The great door swung open at last and he was allowed in. Their red robes, made of thick woven wool, were finer that he'd ever imagined. The men in the front row were kneeling and had their arms crossed over their chests. They all wore masks. Now he could recognise no individual.

A man wearing a slightly different mask held up his hand up in greeting. "Welcome Jason of Wellington. Are you ready for the interrogation?"

Jason nodded. Would he get the answers right? So much depended on it.

"Where is the best source of gold?" asked a man on his right.

"It comes from the soil. It grows in the fields and in nature."

The man bowed and stepped back.

Now someone came from his left. "What is the order of priority?"

"The universe, the planet, the immediate community, friends and family and last of all self. Though we need also to look after the self so it can make its contribution  to the world."

This man also bowed and stepped aside.

"What is the first principle?" asked the man with the strange mask.

"That God is love and love conquers all."

All of men now stood up and cheered. As the cheering subsided the man in the strange mask stepped forward. "Jason of Wellington, you have answered wisely.  We welcome you to the Red Order and the Freedom of the Universe. 

Second later other Red Knights helped him to dress. The clothes felt odd at first but it had been easy to give answer the key questions. Now he would be able to find out what they were really all about.   

About the author

Gill James is published by The Red Telephone, Butterfly and Chapeltown.  

She edits CafeLit and writes for the online community news magazine: Talking About My Generation.

She teaches Creative Writing and has an MA in Writing for Children and PhD in Creative and Critical Writing.    

http://www.gilljameswriter.com  

https://www.amazon.co.uk/-/e/B001KMQRKE

https://twitter.com/GillJames

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Palvine Part 16

by  Mitzi Danielson-Kaslik

ruby wine 

Sylvester played the piano for the next hour or so. I wondered what thoughts must be going through his mind. I wondered how he felt. And most of all I wondered if he loved Camille. I looked at him for a time. He was a man who let nothing on. It scared me to think he didn’t tell me thing, for – if truth be told – what did I really know about him? 

Nothing.

We truly knew nothing about each other. He suddenly stopped playing piano and whispered to me that he wanted me. Whom else did he want? I tried to wipe all such thoughts from my mind but it did not work. We kissed gently that night and I wondered how I would sleep tonight. As we kissed deeper and deeper and more and more passionately, he took off his shirt and one thing led to another. 

It felt different. Somehow, on the night of the 3rd of November, Sylvester Spence Palvine made love to me far more gently and sensitively. I wondered if that was Camille’s influence. After, we walked together – hand in hand – to the window and looked out over the streets. It was still outside. Too still. Perhaps it was the chilled feel of the first whispers of winter in the air or perhaps it was something else. Something darker -darker than the coldest winter. 

I turned to Sylvester and watched him out of the corner of my eye as he looked out of the city – his home. It was then that I found myself reminded of who he was. He was the man I had first heard of in Rita’s cream room in the Lilac House; he was the name I first learnt in the same breath as murder. In my eyes only a year ago, he was a murderer. I was making love with a murderer. And I didn’t mind. 

It was then that I took a moment to wonder what had happened to them. What had happened to Rita; had she stayed in the Lilac House? Had she been arrested? Did anyone else even know thatshe was the one who killed Miles, Clara and kidnapped a child. I thought for a moment – I didn’t even know what the child’s name was.