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Jethro Pili

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Aug, 2021

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150 Stories

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Kira Dawnseeker & The Bridge of Ten Thousand Steps

The first thing Kira Dawnseeker heard was the bells. Not the bells of the monastery. Not the bronze bells of the city gates. These were deeper. Slower. Wrong. Dong. The sound rolled through the mountains, shook loose pebbles from the cliffs, and vanished into the blackness behind her. Kira ran. Her boots struck stone. Her breath came in ragged bursts. The silver clasp at her throat had gone cold enough to burn her skin. Behind her, somewhere beyond the veil of pine and mist, came the scrape of thousands of feet. The Revenants were coming. Th...

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Bite, Type, Swallow, Repeat

At 11:43 in the morning, the Viking newsroom entered a state of emergency. No alarms sounded. No one shouted. Nobody ran through the halls carrying a stack of papers while screaming, “WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE!” There was simply a moment—a precise, almost imperceptible moment—when everyone at the Seabrook Viking realized that the deadline was no longer something in the future. It was here. The clock on the wall said 11:43. The front-page deadline was 2:00 p.m. The second edition had to be uploaded by 3:00. And the printer deadline was 3:30. Thr...

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Speak To Me, Friend

“I tell you they gather where the fog is thickest.” The old man lifted a trembling finger toward the harbor window. “Not rats. Not gulls. Not smugglers.” He smiled with the broken dignity of a man who had once expected respect. “The children with glass eyes.” The sailors laughed. The Chinese proprietor merely sighed and continued tending the brazier. Outside, London's East End vanished beneath a yellow fog that swallowed ships, warehouses, and men alike. Inside the opium den, no one believed Mr. Edwin Ashcombe. No one, perhaps, except me. I ...

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This Calls For Wisdom

The morning the world changed, Daniel Mercer did not fall to his knees. Everyone around him did. His apartment building echoed with screams. A mother pounded on the door across the hall, crying for a daughter who had simply...vanished. Cars crashed into storefronts. A city bus rolled through an intersection before colliding with a fountain because its driver was gone. Daniel watched everything unfold from the window of his tenth-floor apartment with his coffee still in his hand. "No," he muttered. "No, there has to be an explanation." There ...

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The Way of the Centurion

The hammering had never bothered Octavius Antonius Sulla before. Iron striking iron. Nails biting wood. The dull, wet sound when flesh surrendered. He had been a soldier of Rome for nearly twenty years. Germania. Judea. Syria. Egypt. Death was simply another order. Carry it out. Do not think. Do not remember. Yet now, years later, he still heard one hammer. Not all the others. Only one. He had stood on Golgotha beneath a blackened sky. Three condemned men. One Galilean. The Galilean had not cursed. That alone had unnerved him. Most men screa...

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The Case of the Dreaded Tiramipoo

There were many ways to lose credibility in front of one's friends. You could accidentally wave back at someone who wasn't waving at you. You could confidently tell your history professor that Napoleon lost at the Battle of Watergate. Or... You could stand in the middle of a crowded Italian bakery and loudly announce: "I don't eat tiramipoo." Silence. Utter. Silence. Every conversation stopped. The espresso machine hissed like it was embarrassed. A little old Italian grandmother looked up from her cannoli with the expression of someone who h...

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The Resistance

The world did not end with fire. It ended with empty clothes. The Resistance of the Saints Sam Ihle Samuel Ihle had spent fifteen years disproving everyone else's certainty. As an investigative journalist, certainty was dangerous. Politicians lied. Corporations lied. Witnesses lied. Sometimes even photographs lied. He had built an entire career on asking one question. "How do you know?" The newsroom smelled like burnt coffee and printer toner when it happened. One moment Michael Simmons was laughing over some ridiculous cat video. The next— ...

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Not What You Were

The first time Jesus announced the pairings, the camp went silent. The Twelve had gathered beneath a cluster of olive trees just outside a Galilean village. Morning light painted the hills gold. Birds sang as if the world had never known hatred. "...Andrew with Philip." Andrew nodded. "James with John." The brothers grinned. "Thomas with Bartholomew." A shrug from Thomas. A smile from Bartholomew. Jesus continued until only two names remained. "Matthew..." The former tax collector looked up. "...and Simon son of Zebulun." Silence. Not Simon ...

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The Empty Room

The room was empty. Not merely vacant. Not abandoned. Empty. As still as the Empty Tomb. Detective Tristan Lyons stood motionless in the doorway, one boot resting on a twisted piece of steel that had once been part of the lock. Behind him, the remains of the double steel doors hung crookedly from their hinges after the Emergency Service Unit's hydraulic ram had persuaded them to surrender. The echo of the breach still lingered. Silence answered it. Detective Lance Shields slowly lowered his Glock. No use for it now. Or the vests they were we...

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Ananias

Father Galen Hadaway had always believed that the hardest lies to uncover were not the loud ones. The loud ones announced themselves with contradictions, impossible alibis, and nervous eyes. The dangerous lies wore innocence. Morning sunlight poured through the stained-glass windows of St. Augustine Parish, splashing crimson and sapphire across the marble floor as Father Galen finished counting the previous Sunday's collection with the parish secretary. He frowned. Again. "Three hundred and twenty dollars short," he murmured. Mrs. Alvarez ch...

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What You Have The Power To Do

The campfire had burned down to glowing coals. Above them, the stars stretched across the Gilboan sky in impossible numbers, unchallenged by city lights. Towering pines whispered with the wind, and somewhere deeper in the forest an owl called once before silence reclaimed the night. Jesse Carpenter leaned against a weathered log, turning a stick over the fire. Once, people had known him as the man who built bridges. Before that, simply another construction worker. Now... Now newspapers called him the Traveling Teacher. The title embarrassed ...

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Seal of Confession

TRIGGER/CONTENT WARNING: Mentions of euthanasia and murder. The confessional at St. Augustine's was never entirely silent. Old wood creaked. Candles hissed. The ancient building settled with tiny sighs that sounded almost like whispered prayers. Father Wayne McKnight had heard thousands of confessions over the years. Children confessing stolen candy. Teenagers confessing lies. Teachers confessing pride. Parents confessing neglect. Some came weeping. Some came numb. Some came because habit had carried them there long after faith had gone qui...

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Storm on the Sea of Galilee

The first clap of thunder rolled across the hills just before Compline. By the time the final Amen had faded from the little chapel, rain lashed against the stained-glass windows hard enough to make them rattle in their lead frames. Sister Magdalene Mary smiled despite herself. "It certainly has opinions tonight," she murmured. The elderly superior beside her chuckled. "The Lord sends rain to the just and the unjust alike. Tonight He appears to be especially generous." The sisters laughed softly before dispersing. For Sister Magdalene Mary, ...

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Close The Distance

Father Lance Lake had learned, in five years of priesthood, that the hardest confessions were rarely spoken aloud. They were carried in silence. They hid behind practiced smiles at the parish picnic, behind steady voices during Sunday homilies, behind the calm assurance of a priest who knew exactly which page the funeral rite was on without looking. Everyone believed Father Lance was unshakable. Everyone was wrong. The parish of Saint Michael's settled into quiet after the Wednesday evening Mass. The last candles burned low. Mrs. Donnelly wa...

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The Old Lie: Dulce Et Decorum Est

The rain came down in cold, slanting sheets, turning the cemetery paths into ribbons of black mud. The man standing among the graves did not bother with an umbrella. Water soaked the collar of his century-old greatcoat. It streamed from the brim of his campaign hat and dripped soundlessly from his fingertips. He neither shivered nor blinked. He had forgotten how. A meadowlark landed atop a granite headstone a few yards away, studied him for a moment, then flew off again. Animals always knew. He stepped closer to the monument. It was simple g...

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