Visitors From The Past present
Everyday devilry, inspired by folklore and fantasy
Wind and rain, and water dripping from the ceiling into a basin. An old clock on the wall — stopped. Musicians wander the corridors: first they want matches, then tea, then they have lost a mug.
And one after another, soaked travellers knock at the door. An accountant with a thermos. A polite doctor. A forester worried about a hedgehog under the porch. A girl with wet hair. And a businessman who simply got off at the wrong station.
The Hostess greets each of them by name before they have introduced themselves. Her prices change from guest to guest. And the thunder, it seems, answers her.
No one has come to the Magpie’s Paw by chance. Before dawn, every one of them will have to work out why.
Portraits on the wall of the guest house. Stop in front of any one of them — and it will speak.
Skirt, cardigan, apron, hair pinned up. Her hands are never still — towels, cups, keys, firewood. The only one who knows from the start who everyone is, and why they have all ended up at the guest house tonight.
On first-name terms with Him who sends the thunder
An utterly ordinary woman with a big bag and a thermos. Keeps happening to know things she has no way of knowing — and desperately blames it on coincidence.
A witch of long standing
Big, gloomy, soaked through. Says his car broke down nearby. Hates towns, and is always listening to the forest. The most dangerous of them all — and the kindest.
A werewolf
Pleasant, well dressed, a little old-fashioned. Never misses a pulse, a skin tone, a drop of blood. At first, all of that is easily put down to his profession.
An upyr — a vampire
Sad, kind and beautiful. Her hair is somehow always wet, though she has been sitting by the fire for ages. She is always cold, and afraid of being alone.
A drowned girl — a rusalka
Practical and rational. Was travelling in a comfortable sleeper, got off at the wrong station and lost his way. No signal. Saw a light in the forest.
Human. The only one, it seems