Up until that fateful day, Oof Roothollow had been merely an exceptional glassblower. He created vials and flasks and baubles –the practical, the decorative–and Garna, the alchemist, had been one of his biggest customers. Now, after her mishap with a potion created to cure her eyesight that instead accidentally splashed him in the face, he was a bloomin’ Oracle.

Immediately, he could see possible futures reflected in every glass surface. From what folks were going to do, to what might happen, to where he might go in the next few years, to the condition of his home next week–all of it was there. All of it was probable.

How were negotiations going with the human village? Where was Emil? How would his friends fare in this battle?

Oof became obsessed with the images— because many of them contained his friends, dying at the hands of orcs, their homes crushed, their forest in flames–this time real flames.

One glass sphere in particular seemed to feel clearer, more detailed than others…and it showed a plan. Something to do. Something to try. In this glass ball, there was hope. He saw his friends winning this battle. He saw the orcs defeated. But he also saw frightening things. Lengths they might have to go to to win. He saw surprises.

The images were hopeful but seemed contradictory. Showing two paths at once: the orcs defeated and the orcs ultimately powerful. What did it mean?

They both fell and stood strong.

His friends both cheered in victory and stood agape in fright.

Both could not be inevitable.

How to get one over the other… Oof gazed in deep into the glass… every day. Every night. Every hour. To see the future. The future they needed. He needed to stretch out, in the heat of the images, a clear path to victory and safety.

Go to Chapter 24

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“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is an illustrated story by Jerome Stueart in 33 short flash fiction chapters. The story features D&D-inspired magic-using forest animals who fight to protect their homes. This story was at first a response to a prompt list created by Jenn Reese and Deva Fagan for an October Art Challenge in 2021. You can now read all 33 parts of the story, “Protect the Autumn Woods” with the search term, #AutumnWoods. “Protect the Autumn Woods!” Art Show at the Dayton Society of Artists (48 High Street, Dayton, OH) from November 1 — December 15 2024.

“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is adjacent to a larger show of amazing Dayton Artists, “Small, but Mighty.” Come see all of the art, any weekend, Friday 12-5, Saturday 12-5 to experience the art yourself.

Ordinarily the Contemplative Order of the Sacred Fuzz never received guests. But this time an exception was made for Brother Fenzel, a fellow follower of faith. While their two practices were not similar, they both cared for their communities. They both followed a higher calling.

He came to them asking for a favor and he relayed a threat to his community. He seemed anxious.

The bees, enrobed in their sacred fuzz, gathered round him to try and calm him.

He told them about an invading band of raiders coming through the woods.

Now, the contemplative order rarely saw anyone but each other. They needed the isolation to practice their rites, their prayers, their aerial mazes. So most invaders or wanderers or anyone else were far away from the mystics’ underground chapels. It was pre-ordained, part of their faith. They were asked by their deity to eschew the pathways of others. They were led to declare a vow of noninterference, a separation from the world. It was the only way to stay true to their faith.

So, when Brother Fenzel asked them to help, they were sympathetic. They understood that his community must be anxious. But, as he told them, they already had warriors and magic users so why should they–a small group of mystics lend their small support? Why should they get involved? They had vows of noninterference. With all likelihood, the orcs would leave the woods in a day–then the problem would be solved.

But no, the good Brother explained, the problem would come back and all their potential allies to stop the bigger threat would be gone. “We must join together as one community to save each other.”

The Sacred Fuzz mystics buzzed to each other for a few moments, considering the situation –and weighing the dangerous part their members were being asked to play—and decided unanimously that they would not participate.

The risks were too great to their Order and the risks of not participating were so low.

They wished the good brother well. But in the end their communities lived in two separate worlds. The mystics had found peace by leaving the world alone. Perhaps Brother Fenzel should encourage his community to do the same.

Go to Chapter 23

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“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is an illustrated story by Jerome Stueart in 33 short flash fiction chapters. The story features D&D-inspired magic-using forest animals who fight to protect their homes. This story was at first a response to a prompt list created by Jenn Reese and Deva Fagan for an October Art Challenge in 2021. You can now read all 33 parts of the story, “Protect the Autumn Woods” with the search term, #AutumnWoods. “Protect the Autumn Woods!” Art Show at the Dayton Society of Artists (48 High Street, Dayton, OH) from November 1 — December 15 2024.

“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is adjacent to a larger show of amazing Dayton Artists, “Small, but Mighty.” Come see all of the art, any weekend, Friday 12-5, Saturday 12-5 to experience the art yourself.

The envoy to the humans did not start off well, but it got better.

Someone smarter than everyone else had underestimated the sheer fright a dapper hare with a cane, a buff skunk, and a magpie who spoke Human might be.

They walked right into the little village and the humans scattered back into their buildings. And not all the Hellos and Don’t Be Afraids and We’ve Come to Warn Yous would bring them out again.

It was up to Able to bridge the uncanny valley.

He looked around and gathered a few hastily dropped items and began juggling and balancing them, sometimes ten objects high. He whistled while he did it. Carlotta picked up on his cues and began singing. Sir Asa stood dumbfounded.

Able, admittedly, came from the Southern Woods. He had two brothers, Ready and Willing, who both followed the family tradition of security and protection. Able had a bit of wanderlust and found himself at several subsequent taverns playing bouncer. But also training as a fighter and as an acrobat at a small monastery. He got bored just doing the same things. He could entertain you or flip you in the air if he wanted.

His tricks caught the eye of children in the human village and sensing that the envoy meant no harm, the humans slowly came out to see the great acrobat and juggler skunk. Soon humans were clapping for him. And he kept making it more and more challenging —to build the crowd up to care if he could do it or not.

Acrobats and jugglers are good at building empathy, you know? You care if they can do it. You are with them in the balance. You are with them in the scary moments.

Sir Asa found the perfect opening to talk with them–and because of Carlotta’s brilliant ability to reflect regional accent and dialect, she made Asa’s words sound compelling and familiar.

And Able, when he saw the children balancing tea cups on their heads, knew he had done his job well, and he quietly taught them to juggle as the adults talked about orcs and danger and strategy, the concepts remaining a little over the children’s heads, flying quickly, much less entertaining than a salt shaker perilously balanced on a wooden spoon.

Go to Chapter 22

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“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is an illustrated story by Jerome Stueart in 33 short flash fiction chapters. The story features D&D-inspired magic-using forest animals who fight to protect their homes. This story was at first a response to a prompt list created by Jenn Reese and Deva Fagan for an October Art Challenge in 2021. You can now read all 33 parts of the story, “Protect the Autumn Woods” with the search term, #AutumnWoods. “Protect the Autumn Woods!” Art Show at the Dayton Society of Artists (48 High Street, Dayton, OH) from November 1 — December 15 2024.

“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is adjacent to a larger show of amazing Dayton Artists, “Small, but Mighty.” Come see all of the art, any weekend, Friday 12-5, Saturday 12-5 to experience the art yourself.

Sir Asa Thornhidden was not used to company. He lived alone, and liked it. He didn’t like the constant chatter of his two companions on this journey east.

He was chosen to go on this mission–to make contact with the human settlement– because he was a very skilled diplomat. Carlotta was chosen to translate into Human everything he said. Able, dear gods, was just extra muscle, in case they got into trouble. Asa had muscle too, taut and sinewy, but he still had it.

Able’s voice tonight vibrated Asa’s ears very weirdly, such a very strong accent. Something southern and annoying. He’d never noticed it before.

Tonight he wanted them both to be quiet. But he didn’t stop them from chattering. And they did– about Able’s favorite games, tasty recipes, and Carlotta’s most striking impressions. She was good with voices. She did a very funny Ramsaur impression.

“I feel like being alone,” she said in a very bad Sir Asa voice.

He smiled to hide his annoyance.

He felt the weight of the mission on his own head. Able couldn’t do it. Carlotta just translated what she was told to. He alone must negotiate with an unpredictable group of humans who had probably never seen animals like them, or even knew what magic was. They were going to be primitive.

Able did backflips as Carlotta laughed. Three of them in a row. Sir Asa would be impressed if acrobatics were being called for. How about a nimble mind? Someone good with words? That mental dexterity mattered more now.

Who’s to say that the humans wouldn’t be as frightened of them as they would be of orcs? How do you calmly discuss a major threat to a people who might be too frightened to listen to you?

They had no choice though. A hare, a skunk, a magpie–they might be familiar enough to the humans to let them believe what Asa had to say. But would they take the threat seriously? Would they help?

Go to Chapter 21

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“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is an illustrated story by Jerome Stueart in 33 short flash fiction chapters. The story features D&D-inspired magic-using forest animals who fight to protect their homes. This story was at first a response to a prompt list created by Jenn Reese and Deva Fagan for an October Art Challenge in 2021. You can now read all 33 parts of the story, “Protect the Autumn Woods” with the search term, #AutumnWoods. “Protect the Autumn Woods!” Art Show at the Dayton Society of Artists (48 High Street, Dayton, OH) from November 1 — December 15 2024.

“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is adjacent to a larger show of amazing Dayton Artists, “Small, but Mighty.” Come see all of the art, any weekend, Friday 12-5, Saturday 12-5 to experience the art yourself.

Bedoulia Fairborne, Old Biddy to those of the Autumn Woods, was the current archivist and historian of the area, the daughter of Mother Dahlia, who was the daughter of Dearest, and on back for several generations of owls who kept the history preserved and written and cataloged for study and understanding of current events. Biddy had no offspring to carry on the good work, but she had a great staff (and isn’t that just as good!?)

Three flying squirrels kept everything carefully organized. Without Oakwall, Summerpond, and Firefly, Biddy would have had a very difficult time keeping the whole endeavor going. She had lost most of her eyesight, and had trouble ripping things with her beak and talons–very little strength for that.

She was lucky that her dear squirrels tenderized her food for her. (What she didn’t know is that the squirrels had completely taken over her dietary regimen and substituted artfully created veggie-mice made of chickpeas, walnuts, blackbeans, and spices all molded into the shapes of dead mice–easier for her to digest, for her to chew, and so much safer for the squirrels. “Job security and safety had to come first,” Oakwall whispered.)

Dame Brigitt had come to the Owl to join Emil in asking Biddy for information on the orcs, but the squirrels said Emil had never come. He was supposed to have been here by now. Ramsaur said Emil was going to free a wolf that had been held captive by the orcs. Could Emil have been attacked or taken by the orcs?

Biddy told her that the orcs weren’t the real threat to the Autumn Woods.

“They’re just passing through. You don’t think we are their main purpose do you? You must have seen their trails of destruction across the valley, Brigitt. What is a tiny community of furry creatures to them?” Biddy clucked at her.

The squirrels followed her lead and clucked and shook their heads at Brigitt.

“We are nothing,” Biddy went on. “Oh, they might eat us for a snack. But I’ve been watching their patterns. I know they’re at war. And I know the humans of the great cities to the west and the east lost that war. Already. Done. Only the human cities of the South remain. Now the orcs are going from village to village wiping out the humans. This is a much bigger problem than the woods.”

She lifted a wing to point to bookshelves full of red-bound books. “I’ve been watching this war. The whole bloody thing. (And what she meant was that they, the four of them had been watching). I’ve been recording the nations of humans and orcs for some time. And the bigger picture is that all of us will eventually be destroyed by this great orc army. These orcs in the autumn woods–this is a small raiding band. To clear the valley.” She blinked once and closed her eyes. “You cannot push the orcs out of the woods. You must keep them here. You must fight them yourselves. We have the largest group of magic users in the valley. All come here to retire, to find a more peaceful life. Yes yes yes. All well and good. But now, if we don’t fight them, and they destroy all the people large enough to fight them, then we will have no allies to defeat the larger army.”

Dame Brigitt threw her hands into the air. “Why didn’t you tell anyone? If you knew this was happening?”

The Owl ruffled her feathers making herself twice her natural size.

The squirrels clucked and clucked.

Biddy may not have her eyesight or her talon strength but making her angry was not a good idea. “The opportunity for us to do something just. presented. itself: the orcs entering the woods, you returning from a quest, Xini revealing she still had the cursed crown, and now a Champion has been chosen by the spirit of the Woods.”

How did she know about Thimble?

“All of these signs point to us doing something and not passing this problem onto others. It would be easier to give the orcs a way out of the woods. But it would be more beneficial to keep them here indefinitely. In whatever way that had to be. And then you must find a way to defeat the larger army that will come.”

Larger army? The Autumn Woodland community fighting this band of orcs–by themselves? “Not by themselves. You must contact the nearest human village to the East, and you must make allies. If you don’t, you doom them, and eventually all of us, to having nothing left at all. Go now. Take my good squirrel staff with you.”

She looked at them each with deep care and myopia.

“Old Biddy will be fine. I know where you keep the mice,” she winked.

Go to Chapter 20

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“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is an illustrated story by Jerome Stueart in 33 short flash fiction chapters. The story features D&D-inspired magic-using forest animals who fight to protect their homes. This story was at first a response to a prompt list created by Jenn Reese and Deva Fagan for an October Art Challenge in 2021. You can now read all 33 parts of the story, “Protect the Autumn Woods” with the search term, #AutumnWoods. “Protect the Autumn Woods!” Art Show at the Dayton Society of Artists (48 High Street, Dayton, OH) from November 1 — December 15 2024.

“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is adjacent to a larger show of amazing Dayton Artists, “Small, but Mighty.” Come see all of the art, any weekend, Friday 12-5, Saturday 12-5 to experience the art yourself.

Still asleep, Thimble grasped the Sword of Goddard.

When he awoke, he would be speechless.

Excited at first, but realizing how suddenly important it was to know what to do.

Later he would show it to Stench, to Xini, to Fenestra, to Aunt Pokey. None of them would be able to tell him anything about it. Only that they had never seen it and who were they to cast doubt on a dream that delivers a sword.

Thimble had worked for Aunt Pokey, the seamstress, since he was young, which, most folks reminded him, was not that long ago. He was still very young.

He helped Aunt Pokey thread her needles.

Many times he would pre-thread them for her. He had precision. “You have a good eye,” she would tell him. And very tiny paws. “Tiny is very good.”

He knew that size did not matter in many areas– including being heroic. One of his heroes was Dame Brigitt, whom he shared one glorious afternoon with several months ago when she took him for a ride on Fade and he saw the wide world below him and how small the woods, his previous world, was.

They had had lunch on the top of a mountain!!

She had shown him some moves of a swordswielder, fighting an invisible foe. She was not much bigger than he was, only twice his size. And she was a great knight, a Paladin who had fought in many battles. He imagined one day fighting by her side in his own armor. Sometimes he wore Aunt Pokey’s thimble as a helmet, brandished a needle and fought giant menacing yarn balls. She filled him with hope.

As soon as he could, he would ask her about the Sword of Goddard. He would recount the snake, the heraldry of a coat of arms faded against a wall. She would know something. He was frightened a little. He only got one chance to use the magic and no time to practice or know what might happen when he spoke the words. How do you prepare for that? He would be called on to fight.

Now someone—the very Autumn Woods–had high expectations of him.

The sword felt heavier and heavier in his hands and he realized how unready he was to fight.

Shouldn’t someone else have the sword? He would offer it to Dame Brigitt. She would use it well.

But Dame Brigitt refused the sword, much to his fear. “I didn’t have the dream, Thimble. It came to you. This sword, this task, is yours. It must know that you are the right Champion of the Autumn Woods. Even if you don’t.”

She climbed up on Fade, but called down to him. “Don’t worry, brave hearted friend. I will give you more training. And you will not fight alone. The whole battle is not up to you alone, okay? There will be plenty battle for all of us if we don’t get the orcs out of the woods soon. Then everyone will have to be a Champion.”

Go to Chapter 19

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“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is an illustrated story by Jerome Stueart in 33 short flash fiction chapters. The story features D&D-inspired magic-using forest animals who fight to protect their homes. This story was at first a response to a prompt list created by Jenn Reese and Deva Fagan for an October Art Challenge in 2021. You can now read all 33 parts of the story, “Protect the Autumn Woods” with the search term, #AutumnWoods. “Protect the Autumn Woods!” Art Show at the Dayton Society of Artists (48 High Street, Dayton, OH) from November 1 — December 15 2024.

“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is adjacent to a larger show of amazing Dayton Artists, “Small, but Mighty.” Come see all of the art, any weekend, Friday 12-5, Saturday 12-5 to experience the art yourself.

After being a wandering bow-for-hire, Stench had finally settled down in the Autumn Woods. Mostly for Cassie, but he was surprised how much he really wanted to settle down for himself.

The life of a Ranger typically involved a lot of moving around, staying on your feet, working with dirty bands of thugs and adventurers crawling through ancient cities and dungeons in far off places.

Not a baaad life. No. It could be a great one! It was a great one. Just not a stable one. Not one that you fight to protect–as he did now.

Now he had a beautiful home with Cassie (fellow adventurer–they’d fought side-by-side in his last three quests!) and they were attempting a family, even. Not one of his bucket list items–but love makes you really excited about doing all sorts of new things. Now he had a home to protect, a life to protect that involved a future, and his neighbors were their new band of adventurers that needed saving and protecting. He’d fought orcs before–and he trusted that they had enough magic users and clever minds to get the orcs out of the woods.

They didn’t have a lot of tanks, a lot of muscle, though (though Cassie would bring down her hammer hard on them, he was sure), so taking on 30 orcs would not be prudent, or effective. But he kept his skills up anyway. In case there was battle.

“I want to be in the battle,” said Thimble from his pocket.

Thimble was a small mouse neighbor who worked for a local tailor, keeping Stench company at the shooting range.

“My tiny friend,” Stench said, adding, “with the very big heart. You have plenty of people who will protect you from the orcs, and you are well looked-after. You don’t need to do the fighting.”

But the mouse was insistent, claiming that he had practiced with one of Aunt Pokey’s needles–and that he was ready to stab an orc in the eye.

Stench didn’t doubt that. But he also didn’t underestimate the sheer crushing power of an orc, let alone 30 of them.

“You need to stay out of sight. Remember we talked about that. Head up, but hunkered down.”

The mouse sighed, “When will it be time for me to hunker up?”

The raccoon shot an arrow through three apples balanced on three stumps. “When the villains are more your size, I’m sure you’ll come through with a needle, and do mega damage!”

The mouse yelled, “MEGADAMAGE!”

But it was still such a small squeak.

How do you convince folks to understand their worth is not tied to their ability to help? That maybe just existing was what they contributed to life and happiness.

Protectors needed something to protect. And the protected did more to hold together a community than they could wielding a sword to slice an enemy.

“Cassie said I could fight,” Thimble said.

“No, she didn’t. Cassie agrees with me.”

The mouse sighed.

Stench hoped, for Thimble’s sake, that he could learn to use the skills he had, the body he had, the size he had, and be happy with what he could offer his neighbors.

“Not everyone has to wield a bow to be a hero,” Stench said, rubbing the top of Thimble’s head with a finger.

Thimble reached out and climbed on his finger. “That’s what heroes say,” he said. “And then they go out and save people.”

The mouse wanted to have a snooze in a tree hollow now, and so Stench placed him down inside the nearest tree opening.

“I’m going to practice a little longer. Then I’ll take you back to the village.” He looked at the little shallow hollow in the tree. “Be careful,” Stench told him. “The tree looks ominous.”

The mouse didn’t even turn around to laugh at his joke.

Stench thought, you do more to encourage me, little friend, to stay alive, to be strong, to be the hero I need to be, than a hundred quests. That is your power. He hoped one day Thimble would understand.

Go to Chapter 17

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“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is an illustrated story by Jerome Stueart in 33 short flash fiction chapters. The story features D&D-inspired magic-using forest animals who fight to protect their homes. This story was at first a response to a prompt list created by Jenn Reese and Deva Fagan for an October Art Challenge in 2021. You can now read all 33 parts of the story, “Protect the Autumn Woods” with the search term, #AutumnWoods. “Protect the Autumn Woods!” Art Show at the Dayton Society of Artists (48 High Street, Dayton, OH) from November 1 — December 15 2024.

“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is adjacent to a larger show of amazing Dayton Artists, “Small, but Mighty.” Come see all of the art, any weekend, Friday 12-5, Saturday 12-5 to experience the art yourself.

Tourmaline loved the sound of her own voice, and others did too.

She wrote songs about lost love, about pain, about loneliness, about flying the world without being able to see it well.

The songs resonated with her audience. They too had been hurt. They too had been in pain, or lonely. Some of them wished they hadn’t seen what they had seen in the wide world.

In the early morning hours, right as she was about to sleep, she’d play a lullaby to her friends and audience in the autumn woods.

Now sometimes that was a song that was a little too loud and angry for their mornings, but it did bring them to their feet, and they would shout the chorus back at her, whatever it was.

Sometimes, though, it was a perfect little wistful ballad about the night disappearing, and she made some of them weep.

She was powerful, in her own right–maybe as powerful as Xini, or Fenestra.

She wasn’t sure if there was a true comparison, but when emotions were called for, she could bring them out with a song. She could give you courage. She could make you face the sunlight head on, and not be blinded. She could give you solace–wrap your guilt, or shame, or emotional pain in a warm dark fuzzy blanket of peace.

Tonight, she was working on a Battlesong. Something stirring. Something to get everyone ready just in case they failed to get the orcs out of the woods. It was going to have a power key change, which she was figuring out the chords for. Something that would make them fight for everything, and give them strength, and protect them from being disheartened.

Her music was magic—and it worked on the heart.

She sang a few words to herself, hanging upside down as she did in the waning hours of twilight before the sun burned away the misty fogs.

Something about Home, something about branches blocking the sun, about the darkness winning and peace being restored again. She might have to rephrase that a bit—the sun for them was a positive happy symbol, but she knew the nights were in jeopardy as well as the days. And that Orcs were known to burn villages.

Isn’t that what Dame Brigitt had told them—the smoldering villages in their wake?

In Their Wake. Wake. Oh that had to be a key word…and she strummed that power chord hard, Wake, Wake. The Blaze is Almost On Us.

Sure enough, a few people came to their windows and shouted WAKE! WAKE! Oh Tourmaline was good. She was very good.

And the verses and the bridge and the chorus came like a cool breeze all around her, and she drafted that battlesong for another hour, till all she could do was whisper wake, wake, as she fell asleep.

Go to Chapter 16

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“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is an illustrated story by Jerome Stueart in 33 short flash fiction chapters. The story features D&D-inspired magic-using forest animals who fight to protect their homes. This story was at first a response to a prompt list created by Jenn Reese and Deva Fagan for an October Art Challenge in 2021. You can now read all 33 parts of the story, “Protect the Autumn Woods” with the search term, #AutumnWoods. “Protect the Autumn Woods!” Art Show at the Dayton Society of Artists (48 High Street, Dayton, OH) from November 1 — December 15 2024.

“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is adjacent to a larger show of amazing Dayton Artists, “Small, but Mighty.” Come see all of the art, any weekend, Friday 12-5, Saturday 12-5 to experience the art yourself.

Garna the Alchemist was overwhelmed.

She used to be much better at this. Failing eyesight, tremors, and just plain anxiety were not good ingredients for an effective potion maker. She’d retired years ago to settle in the autumn woods. She’d make an occasional love potion for a smitten young otter, or healing salves for burns.

She used to transform things. She’d transformed her pinions into hands to help her in her work. She didn’t need to fly anyway and it was little more than a hop. She’d transformed straw into yarn, apples into pears, river rocks into jewels. She’d been highly sought-after for her amethyst-making. (She could make it out of nearly anything!) But after awhile, she couldn’t quite get it right. Instead of amethyst, she made eggplant. Right color, at least. She retired while she still had some dignity.

But even the simple things had quirks. That young otter fell in love with a shovel; oh that took a bit of undoing. Yes. Those healing salves weren’t as powerful as before but she dared not make them too potent to make them poisonous. She could not distinguish some of her herbs anymore.

Just as her life had simmered down, orcs. Orcs.

Her friends needed her to create explosions and fireball potions. But too much and she might burn the woods down.

A little spell on her glasses perhaps. A little one. Something to help her see better.

The formula is in the potions book.

Salves for eyesight, strength for glasses, oh she needed to see better.

She fumbled around searching for dried winsome weed, and boiled some bitterroots, and read some incantations but her hands were shaking. She was near tears.

She was a little proud to ask for help, but she was close to shouting for it now. Then someone at her entrance spoke her name, “Garna,” and it startled her and she dropped the flask. But that figure, Oof, her glassblower, with the emergency shipment she’d requested, reached out so quickly, so carefully, to catch the glass flask she’d dropped not knowing how hot it was at the bottom, that he burned his fingers and tossed the flask back up into the air. The potion splashed him full on his face and neck and hands!

Nevertheless he grabbed the flask again on its way down –this time by its neck–and placed it on the floor. He pulled his paws in quickly and wiped his eyes! The potion covered his fur. He didn’t seem in pain though.

“I thought the flask was hot when I touched it but the water in it was so cool,” he said.

“It wasn’t water,” she told him.

He turned his face to her, and Oof had always been a noble looking rat, but now his eyes seemed to hold stars in them.

“Oof, are you okay?”

He sat down on the floor, his mouth falling open. “I can see the future.”

Go to Chapter 15

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“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is an illustrated story by Jerome Stueart in 33 short flash fiction chapters. The story features D&D-inspired magic-using forest animals who fight to protect their homes. This story was at first a response to a prompt list created by Jenn Reese and Deva Fagan for an October Art Challenge in 2021. You can now read all 33 parts of the story, “Protect the Autumn Woods” with the search term, #AutumnWoods. “Protect the Autumn Woods!” Art Show at the Dayton Society of Artists (48 High Street, Dayton, OH) from November 1 — December 15 2024.

“Protect the Autumn Woods!” is adjacent to a larger show of amazing Dayton Artists, “Small, but Mighty.” Come see all of the art, any weekend, Friday 12-5, Saturday 12-5 to experience the art yourself.