Way up in the American Northeast, just down from the uplands and down from upriver, was a town. It was at the foot of something that existed somewhere between ‘unpretentious mountain’ and ‘overambitious hill’, as if it had slid down the ski trail one frosty winter morning and nestled itself between the pine trees. In spring, it smelled more like flowers than almost any other town that most people will visit in their lives, and that was only the case because it was either that or the pigs.

Alderberg had two main exports: honey and pigs. The flowers were there for the bees, the pigs were there for their curly tails contributions to the culinary industry. The exports were of such high quality that Alderberg happily paid its taxes and had enough left to invest back into its community. For the people living there, life was cheap, healthy and simple. It was in every aspect a veritable land of oink and honey. 

The town of Alderberg had an exceedingly content population, moreso than most towns that have people in them. There were no old ladies grumbling about how things used to be better, no old men grumbling slightly racist remarks at each other, and no disenfranchised kids destroying fire hydrants for kicks. Almost everyone in Alderberg had found their passion, had found a calling, and had found ways to ventilate frustrations, feelings and fears. Communication in Alderberg was quick, honest and open, and the sun never went down on an argument where it could linger on a potluck instead. 

For years, the occasional intrepid researcher had gone over to Alderberg to figure out why this was. The obvious answer -- the infernal influence of some unknowable, incomprehensible eldritch master -- seemed to not be true. New England investigators would sleep near the shore, or in the dingiest hotel room they could find (which wasn’t very dingy at all) but any horrifying dreams, laden with images of impossible architecture, wouldn’t come. No phrases-not-meant-for-human-tongues or knowledge-not-meant-for-man-to-know revealed themselves. 

They considered other avenues, of course. Some kind of parasite, a mind-control worm or possibly the presence of plant-based pod people were both considered and sadly disproven. Happily cooperative, the small hospital provided cat-and-other scans that showed that the people of Alderberg were entirely human and entirely healthy (if some a little overweight, courtesy of the aforementioned oink, though nothing to worry about). 

So the researchers and investigators (and the occasional cryptozoologist) would come to the same depressing conclusion. The people in Alderberg were very happy because of their high quality of life (courtesy of the small city council), their dedication to their community, and their general altruism. Outsiders were always welcomed, and would either be unnerved at the general lack of ennui, or they ended up moving there. 

Tail between their legs, they went back to their various miskatonic institutions of higher learning and reported that there was nothing supernatural about the town of Alderberg. It was just… nice. 

They were, of course, dead wrong, and had been looking in the wrong place entirely. In their search through piles and piles of books and legends about the Atlantic Northeast, they had utterly failed to pay attention to the two women who owned and staffed the local library. 

The two women were unique creatures who, contrary to popular belief, did not prey on the sexual energy of men, nor did they wear out or drain their hapless victims. Instead, they fed on emotional energy, left behind when someone read a book and felt any kind of way about it. The more positive the emotion, the better the taste. Throughout history, many words and many names had existed for women like this, mostly of the demonic variety. However, they themselves preferred to keep things simple: They were Madeline and Evelyn. 

Unbeknownst to them, someone sat on a bus, some fourteen hours away still, looking for one of them. He had been a friend of hers for years before contact had suddenly and without word or warning been cut off, and he was concerned for someone who he, once upon a time, spoke to almost daily. Those feelings had been quiet, unspoken and complicated, but now, he’d decided that worrying was useless if he couldn’t put it to action. He’d bought a bus ticket, and was on his way to Alderberg. 

His name was Christopher. Two months ago, he had gotten the last message from his old friend. Quiet wasn’t uncommon between them. He himself had sometimes disappeared for a week or even longer. And it wasn’t that they had been exceedingly close, Christopher reminded himself. They talked about this and that, mostly their mutual dislike of their current situations. Once, years ago, they’d joked about both leaving their respective hometowns and meeting in the middle to rent an apartment together, but then life, finances, debt had gotten in the way and they’d started talking less and less. But they checked up on each other. Right up until they didn’t. Right up until his friend fell off the face of the earth, and he couldn’t help but wonder if they’d finally drifted apart too far. Or maybe he was just overreacting. But he had to make sure. Messages were left unresponded to and unread. He had to make sure his friend was okay, even if that meant confirming that his friend didn’t want him in his life. 

Maybe, a flicker of hope in Christopher’s mind said, maybe his friend was fine and happy and had just lost track of things. But he’d long since learned that hope was a dangerous thing to have. So he settled for making sure his friend was healthy and alive, at least. 

There was more to it than that, of course. There was the way his heart had leapt every time he used to get a message, the way he’d rolled out of bed when he heard the notification sound and rushed to his computer to answer at random points in the night, even if it was only to answer quietly, as if he was disinterested. He didn’t want to give off the wrong impression.

So Christopher had told his parents that he was taking a trip to see a friend and maybe something of the world that lurked outside of his county, and they’d given him the usual speeches about being safe and talking to strangers. His mother reminded him to dress warm, to eat plenty of vegetables and not to take drinks from strangers. His father reminded him not to trust city folk, and, in fact, to stay out of major urban centers altogether. Cities had his two least favourite kinds of people: criminals and cops. Christopher had smiled at both of them, made the various promises they’d demanded of him and accepted the thermos full of soup that his mother had shoved in his hands, and hopped on the first bus. That was almost two days ago now, and he was getting somewhat closer. The greyhound had slowed down somewhat as they got further up north, but he knew he’d be arriving some time the next day, probably around noon. 

He was slowly dozing off in the back of the bus, closest to the last functioning heating unit, and tightened his coat around him. It wasn’t that cold but he simply wasn’t used to it. The climate up here was significantly cooler than what he’d been used to. He pulled his wool hat -- another gift from mom -- down over his eyes and dozed off against the window. 

Because he was asleep, he missed the streak of red that flashed past the bus. It was a sports car, although the woman driving it had no idea what brand, what make, what model, nor did she care. She cared only that it went fast, and that the hood could come down. She didn’t care for listening to music, to the radio, to talk shows. The roar of the engine and the road were more than enough, her black hair and long red scarf whipping in the wind. She knew where she was going, she’d driven down this road plenty of times, once upon a time. But it had been too long, and she was here to make up for lost time. She adjusted her sunglasses, grinned bare teeth that were just a little too sharp, and floored it, on her way to Alderberg to meet an old lover. 

She had traveled around the world longer and with more gusto than almost anyone alive (and anyone dead, for that matter) but even someone like that had a few places they liked going back to. Not so much home as a place to roost. Someplace -- someone -- to come back to when the traveling and the world got a bit too much or a bit too little. 

Her name was Rama, she was the oldest living creature that she was aware of. Rama wasn’t cruel, as such, but she had, over the years, decades, centuries, developed something of a callous streak. Not to say that she was a bad person, far from it. But seeing people as something more than a fleeting little experience could take effort, and it was effort she didn’t always expend. Which was, of course, why she made for a very good journalist. She was good at putting in just enough leg work to tell a human interest story in a warzone somewhere in the middle of nowhere that swayed hearts and minds one way or another, only to move on quickly before she got really invested. She was also a darn good photographer, a terrible dancer, and a terrible flirt. 

Rama was on her way to see Madeline, her old flame, the one person who had almost -- but not quite -- managed to get her to settle down, once upon a time. She wasn’t looking to do so now, Rama told herself, but she did miss those times they’d spent together, and maybe more could be spent together now. She figured a surprise visit was in order. She accelerated just a little more, cutting off a small man in a large truck, and grinned to herself as she felt his frustration and his anger, balled up in a delightfully violent fantasy, and downed like an energy drink. She still had a long drive ahead of her, and she wanted to be fresh and juicy by the time she arrived. She hadn’t seen Madeline in decades, and she assumed the other woman would be just as excited to see her as Rama was going to pretend she wasn’t. 

Madeline wasn’t very excited to see Rama. In fact, she hadn’t thought about Rama in months. The reason for this was incredibly simple and incredibly complicated. It was simple because the reason, the answer, was Evelyn. The reason was complicated because Evelyn, and Madeline’s feelings for her, were complicated, but wonderful, powerful, and all-encompassing. They had recently moved in together, and Madeline had taken her time to carve out a space in her little house so that Evelyn could have a corner that was all her own. It had been a struggle to get everything cleaned up, and there was still a lot of stuff in boxes -- Madeline’s stuff, that is to say. Evelyn had almost no stuff, except for an old laptop whose battery had died over a month ago, and a small stuffed frog. 

The other reason that moving Evelyn in had been taking so long was that they kept getting distracted, usually by making out -- or something more involved -- halfway through even the simplest tasks, and they would end up losing hours upon hours upon each other, and then just sort of gave up for that day. 

During the day, Evelyn would help out in the library, Madeline’s pride and joy, and she was darn good at it. She had taken to librarianizing like a bee to honey, and even though the people of Alderberg had no idea where she’d come from, they’d happily accepted her as part of the local ecosystem and hadn’t asked too many questions. And both of them did so love the library, every book a little repository of residual emotions from its last reader, which they could feed off whenever they needed to. Not that they really needed to.

At night, they fed off the many, many emotions they felt for each other, and made sure to elicit more before falling asleep in each other’s arms with satisfied smiles and interlocking horns. They were very happy and content and completely unaware of just how complicated their lives were about to get. Again.

Elamimax

And they're going to get very weird and very complicated. :D

There are 3 more chapters already finished for Patrons , as well as some other things I'm working on. As time progresses until the story is finished, there will always be things on there that haven't be released yet, so please consider it. Also, if you like this story and liked the original, consider purchasing it (cheaply) as an eBook, so you can read it on your e-reader of choice anytime, anywhere, and making it so I can keep doing this professionally :) 

I'm also working on a new story, called "We're Not So Different, You and I". It's a Sci-Fi Fantasy Romance. When I hit 30 chapters or the end (whichever comes first), I'll start publishing it on Scribble. The first 15 chapters are already available for Patrons. 

I also want to point people at the discord server of the ever-prolific QuietValerie (right here) where you can find her wonderful stories, like Ryn of Avonside, Falling Over and The Trouble With Horns, as well as other authors' works, and talk about them with fellow fans, and even the authors themselves! I heartily recommend joining it and reading their works! (Also check out Walls of Anamoor. It's rad as heck.) 

Thanks again for reading, and I'll see you all in the next one. 

<3