To celebrate the release of The Violent Fae, the closing chapter of the Ordshaw series’ The Sunken City Trilogy, Phil Williams is sharing 12 short stories from the city of Ordshaw. The Ordshaw Vignettes are tiny insights into the UK’s worst-behaved city, each with a self-contained mystery.
You can read today’s story below. For the full collection, visit all the wonderful blogs in the tour.
About Ordshaw and The Violent Fae
The Ordshaw series are urban fantasy thrillers set in a modern UK city with more than a few terrible secrets. The Violent Fae completes a story that began with Under Ordshaw and its sequel Blue Angel – following poker player Pax Kuranes’ journey into the Ordshaw underworld. Over the space of one week, Pax unravels mysteries that warp reality and threaten the entire city.
The Violent Fae will be available from Amazon on Kindle and in paperback on November 5, 2019.
If these vignettes are your first foray in Ordshaw, you’re in luck, because Under Ordshaw is currently on sale for just $0.99 in the US and £0.99 in the UK.
The Composer
Ophelia screamed at the piano.
More precisely, the manuscript paper on top. Her clawed hands reached, ready to rip it apart and burn the insulting shreds. But she put up a barrier, didn’t attack, and released the energy into harsh thumps against the keys, creating angry, injured notes.
But she had this yesterday. She hadn’t imagined it. Why did the tune sound so bad today?
Ophelia tore her gaze from the offending work to the offending Tempranillo, one and a half empty bottles on the mantle above the fire. Whatever she created under that influence was gone. Not for the first bloody time. But this time she was sure the composition had worked. She had played through five times – wine be damned – even – yes – she raced to the dining table, swept up her phone – even recorded it this time.
She flicked through the files, flicked through again.
“No, no – no!” she screeched, tossed the phone and immediately regretted it. It landed on the shag rug, bounced and was still. Undamaged, thank heavens. The outburst gave her pause. Think rationally.
Heavens that’s what Donald would say, be rational, stop hiding behind the cliche of a drunken artist. No, this was not the drink’s fault. She had composed something special, had recorded it, had played it well. The notes were different this morning. The file had been deleted. She rushed to the piano, snatched the composition and looked closer. There were eraser smudges, always smudges, but look, how many – this was not her doing.
“Who are you?” Ophelia held the paper up in clenching fists, demanding answers of the room, the ceiling, the air itself. “Why are you doing this to me?”
The fire’s crackle was her only answer.
She tore the paper in two and punched the pieces down. They turned limply in the air and Ophelia’s failure in thwarting paper drew another anguished sound. She stamped in a circle, pointing at the piano. “You cannot take this from me! You will not! Three times, I created something great! Three times you’ve denied it, and there will not be a fourth!”
She stopped, breathing heavily.
Stop drinking, Donald had said, won’t you just try?
I’ll stop, of course I’ll stop, she spat it back in his face, just as soon as my days aren’t spent whoring concert hall talent to cheap TV producers. How else could she bear this battle, not against inspiration or alcohol or even her memory. Some greater force conspired her failure. She said, “I will compose yet, damn you! They will play me in Morricone Hall; I am not some Einaudi stuck in functional loops – you will not trap me!”
But she stopped again. Making a fool of herself. To be compared to Einaudi would be an honour, for the tripe she conceived.
With her head low, Ophelia crossed back to the piano and sat. She stared at the next sheet of soiled manuscript paper, also no good, not the work she’d done. Ignoring it, she simply played, letting her fingers work. She closed her eyes, trying to feel it, but in mere moments her frustration piqued. A finger slipped and the melody skipped – useless – clumsy crap! Ophelia thumped the piano again and slumped. Fought a sob. A malicious sprite, she was sure, was teasing her with this Sisyphean plot, watching her compose drunk, removing the evidence before she sobered.
I will not hear it, Donald had told her, when she tried to play over the phone. Call me when you’re serious, when you’ve kicked the bottle.
Only she never did.
“Damn you,” she whispered. “Damn you, why do this to me.”
And finally the world answered.
A tiny snigger. No, two. Laughter in the rafters. Ophelia spun searching the ceiling, but saw nothing there. The tiny sound was gone. Its originators unseen. The muse mocked her. But it was real. Ophelia stared.
No one would ever believe her. But she could be so much more.
Trembling, she left the piano and crossed back towards the fire. The bottle. Only the bottle made it tolerable.
Previous Story
For more Ordshaw shorts, you can check out yesterday’s story, The Family, on RockStarlit Book Asylum. The next story will be The Gang, available now on Fantasy Book Review.
Links:
- The Violent Fae Goodreads
- The Violent Fae UK
- The Violent Fae US
- Under Ordshaw Goodreads
- Under Ordshaw UK
- Under Ordshaw US
- Blue Angel Goodreads
- Blue Angel UK
- Blue Angel US
Find Phil Williams: https://www.phil-williams.co.uk