The old wizard pulled his hood back and turned to close the mighty hardwood door behind him. The wood was smooth where he placed his hand for more than one hundred winters. When the door closed, its locking bolt slid into place with an audible click. D'Mari took the stairs two at a time as she bounded for her teacher and locked him in a great hug.
"It is good to have you back," she said.
"It is good to be back, my child" the wizard replied.
"I have not been a child for three winters, old man," D'Mari said, rising up on her toes, a smile on her lightly tanned face. Nearing her fourteenth winter, D'Mari was determined to reach First Pillar before her fifteenth and be the youngest in the kingdom to do so.
"Unless you have found some magic I am not aware of," Bob was saying as he was startled by a loud rap on the door. It was loud enough to echo up the stairwell and beyond. Immediately, the doors wards and spells sprung to life, magically sealing the portal and preparing itself to withstand the greatest of assaults.
"Bob , I have need of your wisdom and advice on an urgent matter," a voice called from beyond the door. "A messenger's horse has returned without its rider and there's an arrow protruding from its left hindquarter. It was followed thereafter by a carriage, two horses, no riders or passengers. Please, " the caller begged, "we need audience."
D'Mari glanced at her teacher, caught his slight nod, then placed her palm on the dark, wooden door, still rough in her chosen spot. She wiggled her toes inside her soft leather boots, taking comfort in the presence of a smooth, copper ring on her second toe. "Vren," she intoned softly and the wards dissipated and the locking bolt slid back into...
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... runes came to life. It was the last thing D'Mari saw as darkness settled in.
Garlen cleared the dishes from his small dinner table as he did each night around sundown. His wife, Laneigh, placed a a kettle of water on the kitchen wood stove for happil tea. The four room cottage had a small kitchen, comfortable living room with a small fireplace, a sleeping room and a locked storage space. Garlen built the home while they stayed with the innkeeper some twenty winters ago. After this, Garlen renovated the old mill and, after two years of effort, returned it to its former glory. Local growers of wheat, barley, and stirgegrass celebrated its return with a feast for the small hamlet, no longer did they have to grind by hand or travel twenty leagues to reach the nearest mill.
"Have some tea, my dear," Laneigh said to her husband, handing him a small cup.
There was another knock, and another. The old woman with a sudden wrench broke free and ran from the room. Her husband followed to the landing, and called after her appealingly as she hurried downstairs. He heard the chain rattle back and the bottom bolt drawn slowly and stiffly from the socket. Then the old woman's voice, strained and panting.
cold, harsh, wintry days, when my brothers and sister and I trudged home from school burdened down by the silence and frigidity of our long trek from the main road, down the hill to our shabby-looking house. More rundown than any of our classmates’ houses. In winter my mother’s riotous flowers would be absent, and the shack stood revealed for what it was. A gray, decaying...
The Pilgrims found themselves in a harsh new environment. In the middle of winter, they slowly built a settlement at the site of an abandoned Pawtuxet Indian village. Not used to hunting or fishing, they struggled to find food. Many were starving. The future looked bleak.
The Story begins with a description of the house. The house in itself is a symbol of isolation women faced in the nineteenth-century. The protagonist describes the house as isolated and miles away from the village, but also described as “the most beautiful place” (Gilman 217). During the nineteenth-century, women were in a sense isolated from society, just like the house. The role of the women was to stay home and tend to the
From the beginning of the story the village is described in a dull and bland manner. The village was described to be made up of only twen...
It was rare for man and woman to be equal in the days of Eliza Washburn. Being ten years of age she would perform all the activities an average housewife would perform. At 6 o’clock every morning Eliza and her mother would wake up and cook a meal for her father Charles and three brothers James who was six, William nine, and John fifteen. Her father would wake up expecting the meal to be hot and ready the minute he woke up. Her brothers would wake up soon after to devour the rest of the meal they prepared. Her mother Mary would stay home all day cleaning clothes in a bin and preparing food. Everyday they would go pick the ripe vegetables out of their garden cut them into thin slices and set them out to dry, this took up most of the women’s day.
as a small farm, belonging to a very plain widow and her two daughters. The
I was part of a cult. Actually, that’s not entirely true because my parents were the only ones who took it all seriously. What’s more, the cult never really thought of me as a good member. They did not take me under their much needed wing of compassion and longing. Why? Because, I never acted in the way that they saw fit. So much so that I was eventually expelled from their schools, ostracized from the community, and basically blacklisted.
“I’m not sure but I don’t want to stick around to find out!” Yelled Kelvin as he ran for the door, but instead of the door only hanging by one hinge like before, it was now bolted down and there was no way to
At the same time, another claw to match drew her all the way into the room, and the next moment the door closed behind her” (123) implying the possessive nature of the first old lady. The room was tiny with a lot of furniture and “the room smelled wet even the bare floor” (123), a smell of dampness and decay permeated through the air. The window shade was down, it was dark and the only door was now shut for Marian. Although the room was full of furniture the place and the inmates were stripped of any life that Marian was acquainted with and was like the bare
The American prairie in the 1800’s was home to many homesteading families. There were also some challenges and limits to some of the people living during that time. In fact, the grass could grow up to 6 feet tall! Mothers would worry about losing their children in the tall grass. The men, women, and children all had different roles in the house. Men would fight, woman would run the house, and the children would help out, go to school, and more importantly, play.
spacious farm house with plenty of beds and a fireplace to keep them warm in the winter. Society norms forced them to take on the few wo...
Annie’s mother and father, along with many Irish men and women at the time, struggled to make a healthy living in this country that they loved so dearly. Her father would go out searching for work to keep their growing family fed and clothed with a roof over their head (Lownsberry). Unfortunately, more often than not, the Moore family, along with many others, went hungry.
As soon as the county attorney, the sheriff, his wife and Mr. and Mrs. Hale walk into the Wrights house there is a clear division of power between the men and the women. The men walked in with harsh faces ready to get the job done, while the women plan on just sitting in the kitchen by the fire so that they can stay warm. The men surpass the kitchen on the way to the bedroom which is where Mr. Hale found Mr. Wrights dead body. The sheriff even made a comment saying: “Nothing here but kitchen things” (1414). While he was disrespectfully kicking around pots and pans and making comments criticizing Mrs. Wrights housekeeping sills. These remarks set the stage for the rest of the story and introduce to the readers the roles that women in society at this time were supposed to live by.
The setting is realistic and presents a vivid picture of the 19th century New England farmhouse. The story takes place in three days and is structured according to seasons (summer, autumn, spring) over a period of three years. Of unity of action, time and place, only the action is patterned after Greek tragedy.