Dante’s Second Circle of Hell and #MeToo (Story)

Devil sat with his accountant, his knit brows and balled fists clearly giving away his anxious state of mind.

“Why aren’t they enrolling anymore?” he hissed, his long tongue flicked out like a snake’s, to wet his parched lips.

He had been noticing a steady drop in the number of people who registered themselves for the lust workshops they would organize to tempt the future entrants.

These promotional activities were the hallmark of hell, quite the opposite of what heaven did – they screened people to provide or deny entry in heaven. It was easier for God as everyone wanted to get there anyway. Fortunately, being god-fearing and remaining forever righteous was a lot more difficult than giving in to temptations, or hell would have lost its significance a long time ago. Hell wasn’t a place that people would throng to get in, and this was why they had to run these temptation workshops 24×7, all 365 days a year.

Be Careful What you Wish For – Cumaean Sibyl & Apollo (Story)

The boy was here again and today he had brought his friends along.

“Wait,” he held out a hand to stop his friends from rushing in and spoiling his show. The other kids stopped. They were agog with curiosity.

She knew why. They were here to witness the empty basket speak. It was a game that had gone on for almost three hundred years, and she, who knew everything, didn’t know when it would end. Oh…the games they played with her…they ravaged whatever remained of her pride. Her pride? Oh, how she hated her pride, for it was her pride that had brought her to this.

The boy approached the basket gingerly, ready to pull back if the basket sprung to life and pounced upon him. After all, If it could talk, it could attack too.

“What do you want?” he asked, like he expected the basket to answer. But he was right. Sibyl was bound to answer every question she was asked, and she was bound to answer it truthfully. So was her destiny for she was the prophetess and the seer. She was Sibyl.

“Death,” she croaked. Her voice was the only part of her that hadn’t aged. It still was the smooth, sweet voice of a seventeen-year-old.

The Siren & the Banshee (Story)

“You can’t,” said the hag.

She wore a dirty green robe with a hood that obscured her forehead and eyes. Her hooked nose with its bulbous tip overhung her cavernous mouth, shivering ever so slightly when she spoke.

“I can,” replied the young woman who unlike the hag wore nothing. Her skin glistened reflecting the golden rays of the evening sun. Her hair that shimmered with a light of its own, shed an ethereal glow upon her face, lighting up her sea green eyes and making the tint of her soft lush lips look richer. Her body was cast in alabaster and molded to perfection, but it moved with the fluidity of music, of water, of air…

Cracked Mirrors and The Grim Reaper (Story)

The soft breeze of the night transformed itself into a gale and rushed ahead to open the windows of the house for her. Mirrors cracked, curtains bellowed, hitting a vase somewhere in the house and crashing it to the floor.

It’s odd that my calm and serene presence should be announced with such violence, she thought.

Inside the house, in his bedroom, he slept on his side of the bed, undisturbed by the violent storm that raged outside. The other side of the bed was empty. A wave of guilt washed over her. She had been here before and she was the reason why he slept alone.

He lay supine, alone and in peace. She stood next to his bed,