Briars & Vinegar: Eating the Roses, a story of fae-apoc post apoc for the Giraffe Call (@rix_Scaedu)

For rix_scaedu's prompt, combined with clare_dragonfly's prompt.

Fae Apoc has a landing page here.

After:
Briars and Vinegar (LJ)
Briars and Vinegar: Blood on the Snow (LJ)
Briars and Vinegar: For 100 Years (LJ)
Briars and Vinegar: Sharp and Bitter (LJ)


Something kept eating the rosebushes.
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Guarding the Church, a story of Fairy Town for the (January) Giraffe Call

For flofx"'s commissioned prompt, a continuation of Re-Blessing the Church.
Father Nehemiah wasn't entirely comfortable in the new church.

He had been told, by the kindly woman that cleaned the building, Mrs. Bao, that most priests didn't last long in her city (and that was how she put it: "You priests, you usually can't make it too long in my city. Don't worry your head about it when you find yourself having to leave.") As such, he was determined to, as the vernacular went, hack it.

The corpse-lamb was his first challenge, although not the strongest or worst he would face. The spirit of what he was told was a kirkevaren was quite visible to the naked eye, hovering around the freshly-blessed churchyard, apparently waiting for someone to die so it had something to protect once again.

While it waited, the kirkevaren had decided to guard everything else. The pews. The baptismal. The children in the nursery on Sunday. Sometimes it inserted itself into the stained glass window patterns for a while, another lamb in the wide field of them. It was, Father Nehemiah thought, bored.
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Wine of the Swan Maidens, a story for February's Giraffe Call

For avia's Prompt.

It was said that the swan maidens made the best wine.

It was said that the lovely women with the feathered cloaks, the red-heads with the blue eyes and the hard fingernails that were really claws, that they felt no pain.

And not only did they feel no pain, but they had the best feet for trampling the spiny grapes that grew in the highlands, the best hands, long-fingered and slender, for plucking the skins for the finest sweet wines, the strongest arms and backs for carrying the fruit and working the presses.

It was said, too, that the tears of a swan maiden were the sweetest additive you could put in the wine, that their faint saltiness was surpassed only by a single drop of their blood added to a keg, that their suffering transformed a vintage from ordinary to extraordinary as nothing else could.
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Giraffe Poll! Which JANUARY Story do you want to see continued?

The list of stories is here on LJ, here on DW.

If you do not have a DW account, please feel free to vote in the comments.

Please let me know if this is an inconvenience for you.

Poll #9740 January Continuation Poll!

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 6

View Respondents

What January Giraffe Story would you like a continuation of?

View Answers

Up from the Cracks ("The Cracks")
0 (0.0%)

These Walls Can Talk (Addergoole)
2 (33.3%)

When the Gods Attacked! (Fae Apoc)
1 (16.7%)

The Snow War
0 (0.0%)

Reblessing/Defending the Church (Fae Apoc)
1 (16.7%)

The Tuesday Map
1 (16.7%)

And Before That?
2 (33.3%)

Strange Neighbors (Fairy Town)
1 (16.7%)

The Beggars (Fairy Town)
1 (16.7%)

The Silver Road (Unicorn/Factory)
3 (50.0%)

Origins of Smokey Knoll (Dragons Next Door)
0 (0.0%)

The Exterminator (Dragons)
4 (66.7%)

Evolution (Shadow Rebellion)
0 (0.0%)

A Growing Plan (Planners)
1 (16.7%)

Road Map To ... (Reiassan)
1 (16.7%)

Lines of the City (Stranded)
2 (33.3%)

Midnight, Summer Solstice (Aunt Family)
1 (16.7%)

In the Jam (fae Apoc)
0 (0.0%)

Dark of the City (The Cracks)
0 (0.0%)

Rediscovering the City
0 (0.0%)