She was known as The Ghost, the most fearsome poison assassin in Bido Kingdom. No one lives after she attacks. No one can buy her loyalty. No one can control her. No one knows her whereabouts. She comes and goes as she pleases, blowing in with the eastern wind and leaving with the northern storm. But before she was The Ghost, she was just Du Hongmo. An orphan picked up by a family of farmers that raised her until an unfortunate event killed her foster family. Pitiful, alone, and betrayed by humanity, she survived on the knowledge that the only person she could rely on is herself. Du Hongmo meets a Goryo. A vengeful ghost who ties her soul with Hongmo and teaches Hongmo everything she knows. "The world never wanted you. You have a cursed fate. The world brought you into this world unwanted and now the world wants to throw you away without even a chance to fight for yourself." The Goryo whispered into her ear. "Meeting me is your fate bringing us together. Du Hongmo, do you know what your name means? It means Poison Iris. And before I became a Goryo, I was a poison expert. I'll impart on to you my knowledge so you'll have a fighting chance in this cursed world. And in return, you'll feed me the souls of those you killed." Forced into an unwanted life and death contract with the Goryo, Hongmo strives to live a conscientious life while walking on a thin line of good and evil. On her journey to find herself and her place in the world, she will encounter the men who will stand beside her as she takes revenge on the man who lied, chased, and broke her.

Highest ranking: #26 in Science Fiction ; Felix wants to be a Guardian. A boy with a strange brain and a stranger heart, he has one week to prove himself worthy of protecting those he loves from the creatures that roam around Sector-33, all the while battling the demons inside his head and the confusion of his heart. Dear ____ , My therapist told me to start writing these letters. I don't understand the point of them, when I'm never going to put a stamp on them or write an address on them and send them off. And you're never going to read this, anyways. My life's just changed. And it's not because I've figured out that I'm gay. It's not even because my parents divorced and my Dad moved out. It's not because Sara got accepted into Uni. Tomorrow, I might never come back home. And even if my mission partner is the hottest guy in the world, I might not come back home. I don't want to die. I think my goldfish is judging me as I write this. He's always judging me. Love, Felix ________________________________________________________________________ This is my novella entry for the #BadassesMeetLGBT contest. Please vote if you liked it! ________________________________________________________________________ (c)sarahgaier2016 all graphics made by me total word count: 7,125 words

**A Blue Beard retelling** Based on Charles Perrault's fairytale, this YA Historical Fantasy short story set in Victorian England mixes romance, magic and mystery. After agreeing to an arranged marriage to escape her greedy relatives, 18-year-old heiress Amelia moves into her husband's manor determined to start a new life. But the gothic mansion's forbidding surroundings, the servants' strange demeanour and her husband's mysterious past soon awaken her suspicions. If Amelia truly wants to become the lady of the house, she'll have to discover what secrets lie beyond closed doors and unravel the mystery of the old house's forbidden room. But sometimes secrets are kept for a good reason... HIGHEST RANKING IN HISTORICAL FICTION # 44 Copyright © 2017. All works posted here are the property of EM Castellan. Please do not use without permission. Any duplication or reproduction of all or part of the work without explicit permission by the author is illegal. Cover artist: @seventhstar

Sarah, Lady Rothbury, enjoys an impromptu dance lesson with her grandchildren in the ballroom. When her beloved husband returns to Rothbury Hall they take a walk in the garden and reminisce about their life together. A short story in two parts.

This woman could have been a spy, a duchess and the lover of a young cameraman all at once. She was a conjurer of a thousand stories, each unique to every observer; the elusive face behind any tale you put to her. {Written 2013.}

Yan Da, the only princess of the fire tribe, had always been curious about the Ice Princes. She heard about them from her father, her brothers and her people but see never saw or met one. Filled with curiosity , she captured one when she had the chance. She took the youngest of them all, Prince Ying Kong Shi.

There is an intangible magic to the secret double-lives of strangers on trains. She spends her journeys gazing out at city lights outside the window of the train. He watches strangers on the seats around him. Two strangers living off the stories of strangers, with only one journey to find their own. {Written 2013.}

After a depressing rejection, botanist Carmen moves in with two lodgers: a mad astrophysicist, and what appears to be an inter-dimensional hell demon. It isn't the ideal trio, but they make it work. From accidentally dating racists, to defending their home against the friendly neighborhood Estonian mafioso, the lodgers bond to form an unlikely (and dysfunctional) family. [written in 2017]

Teenagers hide. They hide behind masks, facades that keep them safe. Masks that society approves of. But masks only hide who you truly are. [ #thepeopleofsociety ] © LuCaBeLLe

「 Can you teach me how to be happy? 」 Fujiwara Ao has been living the past nineteen years of his life in ease. Born with the ideal background and blessed with enough talent, that's what most of the people presume. In their eyes, he was simply nothing more but a rich, unsociable, and self-centered person. But what they don't know, however, is that the truth is farther than expected. In reality, Ao has been abandoned. Suffering from a personal tragedy that until now continues to haunt him, he was shunned by his family and left on his own. Ever since then, he learns to separate himself from others. As each day passes in a monotonous cycle, Ao finds no more warmth nor color to his world. Then one day, Hashimoto Rie enters his life. Stubborn, eccentric and enigmatic, Rie ends up pulling Ao to her side and urges him to see through an invisible kaleidoscope that alters his perception of the world entirely. And like that, everything has changed. But change... doesn't necessarily mean that it's always for the best. Or...? - - - - - • cell phone novel • #26 in general fiction ; #13 in short story • completed ; edited