big bamboo

The Other Slipper

2009-11-27T09:25:00.000-08:00

This story was one of Ashley's favorites. The editor of Sein und Werden also liked it enough to contact me a few months after initially rejecting it, asking if it was still available for her fairy tale themed issue.

The Grand Duke sat in the drawing room of the chateau, pretending to doze, while the hideous Tremayne daughters grackled like gulls over a crust of bread. The lovely young maiden he’d expected to find at this house hadn’t arrived, and he’d begun to suspect Lady Tremayne of hiding her. Not that he would dare accuse the minor noblewoman of anything so uncouth as kidnapping. Still, he suspected that she suspected he suspected her. Even so, he didn’t allow his mounting nervousness to show, instead feigning a regal ennui, while all the while his insides drew up like a tax collector’s purse.

To give himself breathing room, he had already read the entire proclamation, though that certainly wasn’t necessary, and now he was allowing the daughters all the time in the world to try to squeeze their enormous flapping feet into the tiny slipper. He was rapidly losing hope that the girl he’d come to find would ever show. This didn’t change the fact that he simply couldn’t leave without her – it was more than his life was worth.

Lady Tremayne stood nearby, smiling obsequiously and watching him narrowly. The daughters fought like baboons over the shoe, while the Grand Duke nodded and made snoring sounds in the armchair. What would he do if she didn’t show? He’d be ruined. Exiled! Or worse!

“Drusilla dear, give Anastasia a chance,” Lady Tremayne said in her soft, oily voice.

“But she’s already had her chance! Now it’s my turn!” Mme. Drusilla screeched like a fishwife.

“Quietly, girls,” Lady Tremayne admonished. “You’ll wake His Grace.”

Finally, one of the girls nearly broke the precious slipper, causing the Grand Duke to leap out of the chair in alarm. And so, of course, he could no longer pretend to be asleep. He reluctantly prepared to depart. Hobbs the footman rushed to open the door for him. Once beyond that portal, all his careful plans would come crashing down. He felt the door was opening upon a prison cell rather than the bright morning air. He paused with his foot upon the threshold and turned.

“You are the only ladies in the household, I presume?” he asked hopelessly.

“There’s no one else, Your Grace,” Lady Tremayne responded smoothly.

He sighed in resignation. His failure would likely cost him his head. “Quite so. Good day,” he said, stalling a moment longer, searching the room one last time, praying she might be hiding behind a tattered tapestry. “Good Day,” he repeated and turned to go.

And then he heard her familiar lilting voice calling to him from the top of the stairs. “Your Grace! Your Grace! Wait!” she cried as she hurried down. “May I try it on?”

Masking his relief with a haughty demeanor, the Grand Duke strode toward the stair. Lady Tremayne looked aghast, but quickly recovered. “Oh, pay no attention to her. She’s only the scullery maid,” she said as she stepped into His Grace’s path.

“Madame, my orders were to interview every maiden!” the Duke said petulantly and pushed by her.

“Come my child,” he said to the lovely young girl now descending the stairs toward him. She was blond, angelic, barefoot and dressed in shameful rags. One glance at her dainty feet and tiny pink toes and he thought his heart would stop.

At a sign from the Grand Duke, Hobbs the footman rushed forward with the slipper. But Lady Tremayne, in a final act of desperation, cruelly stuck out her walking stick and tripped him as he passed. The slipper tumbled through the air and smashed into a thousand pieces on the marble floor at the foot of the stairs.

“Oh no!” the Duke cried, seeing all his plans smashed into as many tiny shards as the glass slipper. “The king! What will he say?”

Lady Tremayne smiled in grim satisfaction.

“But perhaps, if it would help…” the girl began.

“No, no! Nothing can help now,” the Duke wept as he picked up the fragments of the slipper and clutched them to his breast, almost forgetting himself in his grief. “Nothing!”

“But you see, I have the other slipper,” the girl said as she removed a tiny glass shoe from the pocket of her tattered apron.

The Grand Duke leaped to his feet, took the slipper from the maid’s hand, and guided it onto her tiny outstretched foot. It fit as though made for her. Lady Tremayne gasped in surprise. Mmes. Drusilla and Anastasia burst into anguished tears.

“Oh, no!” they wept. “Not her!”

The Grand Duke was saved! “Come with me, my child, at once,” he shouted joyfully. “Away, to the castle! The prince and the king await!”

Hobbs the footman took the slipper as the Duke lifted the barefoot young woman over the shards of the first broken slipper and danced with her to the door. The Tremayne girls cried like a pair of peacocks hanging upside-down while being beaten with buggy whips. Lady Tremayne clutched at her throat as though all the air had been sucked from the room.

The Duke set the beautiful young maid on her feet outside the door. She turned and looked back at her step mother and two step sisters. “Goodbye, Step Mother,” she said sweetly. “I shan’t ever forget you.”

Taking her by the hand, the Duke led her to his waiting carriage – a small, black four wheeler with a pair of restless white horses in silver harness. Hobbs rushed ahead to open the door for them, while the driver lifted the reins and smiled as though at some secret joke. The Duke and the maid climbed into the carriage. Hobbs handed the slipper to the Duke, closed the door, and climbed on behind. The driver cracked his whip and the carriage lurched into motion.

Cinderella looked back at the chateau where she’d spent her entire miserable life, and at the three people who had made her entire life so miserable. They stood at the door, the sisters loudly blaming each other and exchanging frightful thudding bare-knuckled blows. Lady Tremayne stared after Cinderella as though she suspected the girl of arranging the whole unlikely affair.

Cinderella sank back in the soft cushions of the carriage seat and propped her feet in the Duke’s lap. “Christ, I’m glad that’s over,” she sighed. “Do you know, the bitch actually locked me in the tall tower! I was sure she recognized me in that dress last night.”

“But that was a brilliant stroke, Cindy, pulling out the second slipper when the old bat tripped Hobbs and broke the first one. I could have murdered her then, I swear to God,” the Duke said as he massaged Cinderella’s dainty pink toes. “Hobbs really is a clumsy oaf. I shall have him hanged when we get home.”

Cinderella glanced around at the inside of the carriage, frowning. “Why are you riding around in this ratty old heap? Where is your carriage?”

“Still being repainted,” the Duke said. “We could hardly drive up in that white-and-gold monstrosity from last night. People might suspect our collusion.”

As the Grand Duke sat with Cinderella’s feet in his lap, he recalled the first time he’d seen her – barefoot and lovely, walking through the market with a new mop, a string of louts stumbling over their tongues behind her. She was enchanting to behold, even amidst such squalor. But more than her exquisite beauty, her dainty feet were what truly captured his heart and his imagination, the way the mud squeezed between her toes, the shapely curve of her ankle.

He’d ordered his coachman to follow her at a safe distance until they were well outside the village. On a lonely stretch of road leading up to her family chateau, they’d caught up to her. The Duke offered her a ride and she’d accepted with a shy smile. A perfect picture of innocence, childlike and pure, she’d climbed inside and sat down with the mop between her mud-spattered legs.

But she, of course, had seen through the Duke from the very beginning, taken the measure of him and guessed at his most secret desires. “Take me for a ride,” she’d said even before the carriage set off. “I don’t want to go home right away.”

“Won’t your mother be worried?” he’d asked.

“My mother is dead. I live with my Step Morther. But I don’t care. All she can do is beat me when I get home,” she’d said with a sigh. “She’ll do that no matter when I arrive.”

“Your step mother beats you, child?”

“Every day,” she’d said. “My step sisters, too. I wouldn’t mind so much, if only they were pretty. For you see, they make me undress first. My wicked step mother believes that sin is best driven out when the sinner stands naked as Eve beside the Tree of Knowledge with the fruit still upon her lips, ashamed and exposed.”

The Duke had sat up at this news, his mind whirling. He had rapped the roof of the carriage and shouted directions to the coachman.

They’d gone to the deer park behind the castle. The old king never hunted there anymore and the prince was away at school. And as Cinderella crouched there on all fours on the floor of his grand coach with her bedraggled skirt flung up over her back, she’d whispered huskily into his ear, “Oh Dooky Dooky, tish I’m tea.” And he’d gone mad, simply mad, promising her anything, everything within his power.

They planned the whole thing that night, right there in the coach in the middle of the deer park, surrounded by trees and rutting deer. Mostly, Cinderella had planned it, with here and there a suggestion from the Duke. The glass slippers, especially, had been her idea. But for the most part, she wasn’t sure how or even if the Duke could pull it off, not until last night when the dress and slippers arrived at the back door, with a note saying that a coach and four would pick her up after her step mother had departed.

“What are we going to tell everyone now?” the Duke asked as Cinderella dug her toes into his crotch. He squirmed with delight and lightly stroked her trim ankles.

“People are suckers for romance and magic,” she laughed. “We’ll tell them my fairy godmother visited me, fixed me up with the coach and four, footman, coachman, dress and slippers. That I had to leave the ball before the stroke of midnight because that’s when the magic spell would end. And that I lost a slipper as I fled.”

“They’ll never believe it,” the Duke said.

“Oh, but they will, Dooky dear. People love fairy tales, gobble them up by the bookload. Every scullery maid from here to Provence dreams of being carried away by a handsome prince. By tomorrow night, they’ll be singing my story throughout the kingdom – but only if you tell them, dear sweet Dooky of mine. You’re my fairy godmother.”

“Fairy godmother indeed!” the Duke laughed thoughtfully.

Digging her toes deeper into the Duke’s pants, Cinderella continued, “The king did as I expected, ordering you to find the maiden who wore the slipper and declaring that she would marry the prince. That was the whole point of my leaving the slipper behind.”

“I see it now, though at the time, I wondered why you insisted on glass slippers,” the Duke said.

“Glass slippers can’t be stretched. And who else in the kingdom has feet as small as mine?”

“Or as delicious?” the Duke groaned in delight. “Besides, the prince is simply mad about you, can’t live without you, he says. So you’re set.”

“That’s another thing that worried me, Dooky,” Cinderella said. This pet name of hers gave the Duke a wonderful tickly feeling inside. He pressed himself against her probing toes and she smiled. “How in heaven’s name did you know the prince would fall for me? Everything hinged on that, and to be honest, I had my doubts.”

“Well, you are a lovely girl, my child,” the Duke said a bit breathlessly. “But if I may be so bold, I happen to know that the prince and I share a… particular fancy,” he said.

Cinderella raised her foot and twinkled her pert, fleshy digits before the Duke’s nose. “These?” she giggled.

“Indeed!” the Duke sighed lustily. His tongue darted out and briefly probed between her toes. “That’s another reason why the glass slippers were so perfect. I knew as soon as the prince caught sight of your marvelous toes, he wouldn’t be able to resist.” He slurped her big toe into his mouth and sucked it greedily.

“Oh, those horrible slippers! I couldn’t get out of them soon enough. Let me tell you, it wasn’t easy dropping that slipper on the stair so it looked like an accident. I thought I was going to pull the damn thing off.” She extracted her toe from his mouth like a cork from a bottle, then returned her foot to his lap. He stiffened in his seat and bit his lower lip. His monocle dropped from his eye. “Even so, the Prince might have chosen another girl before I even arrived at the ball. There must be a hundred girls in the kingdom with small feet,” Cinderella said.

“Thankfully, yes, though none so tiny or so fine. I must confess, I resorted to magic, my love,” the Duke said shudderingly. “Before the ball, I slipped the prince a love potion infused with your pubic hair. Just to make doubly sure this would work.”

“Oh Dooky!” Cinderella shrieked. “I wondered what you wanted with that! I thought it was just another of your silly fancies.”

“I love it when you call me Dooky, Cindy,” the Duke sighed.

“And I love you, Dooky dear. Once more unto the breach, before I’m married? For old time’s sake?”

He nodded and rapped his knuckles on the roof of the carriage. “To the deer park!” he shouted.

Cinderella slipped out of her skirt, while the Duke unbuttoned his trousers. She untied her apron and flung it on the seat. The Duke leaned back to watch her while he fondled himself. She ripped her blouse apart so that the cheap buttons popped in every direction. One struck him on the monocle with a tiny tik.

“I won’t need that anymore,” she giggled and flung the tattered blouse out the window of the moving carriage.

“Put on the apron, my dear,” the Duke said. “It becomes you.”

She obliged with a sly smile, then resumed her seat across from him, settling her long blond hair so that it lay across her small, pert breasts. She picked up the glass slipper, considered it a moment, then hung it from his noble rod of office.

“It’s yours,” she said. “A gift from me to thee.”

“Thank you, my princess,” he sighed.

In the years to come, Princess Cinderella never forgot the Grand Duke and all he’d done for her. Neither did she forget her step mother, the Lady Tremayne, or the shrill harpies that were her step sisters, Drusilla and Anastasia. The story of her ill treatment at their hands had already spread far and wide by the time her honeymoon was over. But everyone was amazed at Cinderella’s generosity and kindness, for she always made sure that the Lady Tremayne and her two wretched daughters were invited to the very best parties and balls.

T’was not kindness that inspired Cinderella to place them at the top of her invitation list. Well she knew that Lady Tremayne had spent the last penny of her father’s fortune years ago and could ill afford the expensive dresses and jewelry required of those invited to the castles and chateaus of the kingdom’s nobles. Cinderella made sure that only a pittance of the allowance the king allotted to Lady Tremayne, as a royal cousin of the princess, ever found its way into her grasping claws. Instead, every Christmas she sent the lion’s share of Lady Tremayne’s allowance to the Grand Duke, wrapped up in a bundle along with a generous supply of her own soiled underwear. Mme. Drusilla and Mme. Anastasia grew ever more hideous as the unkind years passed, and they never married – Cindy made sure of that as well. And so at each party the three Tremayne women arrived wearing patched rags and paste jewels, and the entire kingdom thought Cinderella a saint for inviting them.

But Lady Tremayne knew, even if her idiot daughters didn’t, that Cinderella’s kindness was the cruelest punishment of all.

© 2007 Jeff Crook

Across World Bubbles - Le Grande Finale

2009-11-06T12:01:00.000-08:00

Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

"And that is exactly how it happened," Tasslehoff said as he leaned across the bar at The Inn of the Last Home in Solace. His very dear friend, Tanis Halfelven, smiled into his beard and tried very hard not to laugh out loud. But Caramon, another of Tas' dear friends, could not control himself. He roared right in the kender's indignant face.

"It's true, every bit of it!" Tas complained. "The Mouser's lightning bolt struck the iron rod and suddenly I found myself sliding across a cellar in the castle of Lord Gunthar uth Wistan. I crashed into a rack of crystal flagons. You should have seen the look on Wills the butler's face. I thought he was going to explode.

"So after I left Lord Gunthar's castle - he was very sorry to see me go, by the way - I made my way to Mount Nevermind and returned the boots of speeding to Delorianiusian, their gnomish inventor. Then I came straight home, only stopping once in Palanthas to visit Lady Crysania. She invited me to tea."

"I'm sure she did," Caramon snickered.

"And these boots," Tanis said. "The gnomes invented them and they actually worked?"

"Not exactly," Tas said with a slight blush. "It was probably my fault, but I was supposed to be able to travel at the speed of sound. I always wanted to hear what I sounded like, so I thought I could say something, then rush around in front of it to see how it sounded. And I actually did get to hear my own voice - in Ninguable's cave, only I think the rocks did something to my voice because my voice is really much deeper than that. Isn't it? Anyway, the boots needed an additional boost of energy to work and that's why I had to get struck by lightning and how I ended up in Lankhmar adventuring with Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser."

Le Finis

Across World Bubbles - Pt 8

2009-11-06T11:46:00.000-08:00

Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

By a slim shaft of light shining from the black lantern at his knees, Mouser examined the run sent to him by his wizardly mentor, Sheelba of the Eyeless Face. Although he prided himself on his sorcerous skills, the Mouser hadn't the first clue what spell reading the rune might unleash. That it must be a spell of tremendous might and power, he had no doubt, else Sheelba wouldn't have bothered him with it.

He only paused for a moment to wonder about Ninguable's vague warning against it. These two archmagi, Ninguable and Sheelba, were great and ancient enemies in all things magical, insanely jealous and suspicious of one another, and forever trying to out do the other in the placing of impossible geas and quest burdens upon Fafhrd and himself. He knew the wisdom of never ignoring one of Ning's warnings, particularly since a maddening premonition of disaster had come upon him less than an hour ago. So strong was his premonition that he would almost have broken the rune tablet across his knee, were he not even more curious than frightened to try it out.

Hearing shouting voices and a cry of pain, the Mouser glanced around the chimney behind which he hid in time to see a peculiar line of fire streaking across the rooftop toward him. "Vile sorcery!" he hissed as he gripped his rune. "Best to battle sorcery with sorcery."

At the same time, he heard Fafhrd bellow, "Now, Mouser! Now!"

He threw open the grate on his black lantern and shone the shaft of light full on the magical tablet in his hand, and in a sonorous voice that made even his neck-hairs prickle, he intoned the rune inscribed thereon. It began to twist and flame, sparkle and bedazzle (a sure sign of progress), while in his mind he felt the compulsion to lift his hand and point to where he desired the thurmatalurgical blast to fall. So he pointed at the rapidly advancing line of mystical fire.

A flaming blue levinbolt erupted from the Mouser's fingertips, splintered across the dark and smoky sky, and converged upon its hapless target, illuminating for one horrific moment the startled face of the kender before it blasted him to smithereens.

Mouser stood aghast, the breeze of the blast blowing to him the acrid scent of scorched iron and burned hair. Moments later, Fafhrd slid to a stop beside him.

"I saw the blast, Mouser. Good work," his friend congratulated him. He glanced around for the kender and said, "But where's Tasslehoff?"

"I'm sorry, Fafhrd," Mouse sighed. "I've done it again, it seems."

Read the Grand Finale

Across World Bubbles - Pt 7

2009-11-06T11:20:00.000-08:00

Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

After what seemed an eternity, the black bag was ripped from Tasslehoff's head. He'd been trussed up and bound most cruelly, heaved and hauled by malicious hands, then force to lie in such an imprisoned state for hours upon a cold stone floor. Tasslehoff had nearly perished of boredom. Someone went through all his pouches without his helps, all the while asking him questions in a language who couldn't understand in the least.

For his part, he heaped upon their heads the blackest curses imaginabler, drawing deeply upon his vast repertoire of taunts, but they didn't understand a word he said, while the few insults he managed to sputter in his awkward pigeon Lankhmarese lacked the true power and creativity to produce the sort of results he desired. However, his shrill voice alone was enough to set the teeth of his captors on edged, so after the first hour they gagged him.

Now, he stood in an office, blinking in the light of a bank of black candles. The gag was cut from his mouth. Before him sat a man of ponderous girth and weighty jowls, who sucked gravy from his fingers as he considered the kender before him. His name was Dravis, and he was third sub-lieutenant in charge of riff-raff at the Thieves' Guild in Lankhmar. He'd never seen a kender before, but he had heard news of one, quite recently in fact. Tasslehoff would have been insulted to know he was riff-raff.

"Tell me again, Tasslehoff Burrfoot of Solace-on-Krynn," Dravis said in pigeon Lankhmarese. "What business have you with thouse two notorious freelancers, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser?"

"What do mean you?" Tas asked. "And how do from I'm where you know?"

"I know many things. It is my business to know them. I know, for example, that you carried upon your insignificant person a letter of introduction to those aforementioned scoundrels, penned by that sorcerous villain, Ninguable of the Seven Eyes. What exactly is your connection to him? Is the Grandmaster of Forgeries considering an assault upon the Guild?"

"Am I supposed to know how?" Tas asked. "Mouser the Gray Fafhrd and were going to home me find the way help, all is that!"

"Oh, come now. I think you know all too well. I heard about your little foray of freelance robbery from my Guild brothers in Ilthmar. From what hell did you crawl, you little thief, and what are your intentions here?"

"Thief!" Tasslehoff shrieked in his mother tongue. "Why you low-born, chicken-hearted, son of a goblin and a..."

"Aieeee!" Dravis screamed as he ducked under his desk. "Guards! The hell-spawned imp tries to cast his infernal spells upon me!" Four brawny thugs dashed into the room and snatched Tasslehoff up my his knees and elbows. "Take this monster to the roof and garotte him!"

Kicking, screaming, hurling curses and insults in a voice pitched to make dogs howl in agony, Trasslehoff was hauled down torch-lit passages and up narrow, steep stairs. He was still furious about being labeled a thief, and by a thief, no less! At the end of a long hall, the guards stopped, and one of them used a tall iron rod to push up a trap door in the ceiling. Another propped a ladder in the hole and a third climbed up on the roof while the fourth maintained his hold on the kender's topknot.

"Hurry up," said a muffled voice from above, so the guard began to climb, dragging Tasslehoff by his hair up the ladder. As he neared the top, a huge hand reached down, grasped Tas by the collar, and hauled him up. He was roughly deposited on his feet. Tas gasped at the giant figure towering over him, grimly silhouetted against the newly-risen gibbous moon.

"Ffrd!" he cried through his gag.

Fafhrd grinned as he kicked the trap door, smashing the guard across the head. They heard him tumble down the ladder with a great cry. The first guard who had gone up lay sprawled on the roof, his eyes rolled up in his head. Fafhrd quickly untied the giggling kender, ripping the ropes apart as easily as Caramon had ever done.

Suddenly, the trap door flew open again, shoved below by the iron rod. Swift as a bolt of lightning, Fafhrd snatched it from the guard's hands and smashed him in the teeth with it. He tossed the rod to Tas and jumped on top of the door to hold it down.

"See that tall chimney yonder," he said to Tas.

Tas looked and saw the one he indicated. "Yes, do I?" he said.

"You run that way as quick as you can, whilst I guard your retreat. Mouser's over there, and he'll cover us both with blasts of his sorcerous artillery.

"Thank you," Tas said as he gratefully shook the big Northerner's hand.

"My pleasure, little imp," Fafhrd answered. Two leaden missiles whistled agrily over their heads, and Fafhrd returned their fire with his long bow, even as the door beneath him began to thump and crack with the blows of many hammers.

A dagger-wielding thief crept from the shadows of a rooftop water tank. Perhaps he'd come up through some other hole, or perhaps he had been guarding another section of the roof. Tas swung the iron rod at his knees and was rewarded with a terrific roar of pain. Still gripping the rod, he ran toward the chimney where the Mouser waited. At the edge of the roof, another guard leapt into his path, but with a deft thrust of his pole he sent the poor fellow plummeting to the alley below. A clay sling bullet buzzed his topknot. He planted the pole at the roof's cornice and vaulted over the narrow gap, landing at a full run, blazing a trail in his magical boots across the next roof.

Read Part 8

Across World Bubbles - pt 6

2009-11-06T08:10:00.000-08:00

Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

After having separated to baffle pursuit, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser met in Dim Lane before the iron-reinforced curtained doorway of the Silver Eel, possibly an even more seedy tavern than the Lamprey. Fafhrd pushed aside the heavy drapery, admitting his compatriot into the close confines of the smoky common room. They took up their abode in an empty booth and ordered wine to slake their heroic thirsts.

After they had drunk, Fafhrd removed a scroll from his belt and laid it on the table before the Mouser. It was a most unusual scroll, crafted of some silvery scaly material, neither parchment nor metal. It reminded the Mouser of dragon skin. "I found this in my pocket," Fafhrd said.

The Mouser gingerly lifted the thing with two fingertips and unscrolled it. They leaned their heads together to read:

Greetings Gentle Son,

Let us suppose for a moment that you and your gray companion were lost in a strange world quite unlike those others you've visited, in that upon arriving there you knew nothing of it, neither its cities nor its languages, its peoples or its gods. And let us suppose that you met there a most kind and generous host who took you in and treated you as though you were his own beloved sons, and that this adoptive father happened to be the greatest wizard to ever have lived in any of the known or unknown worlds...

They scanned ahead a bit, then read...

Take care of this small wanderer from another world. Protect him with your very life, and as a great personal favor to me, help him find his way home - a world with the uncouth name of Krynn (please don't laugh). He is a greater weaver of preposterous lies and bald-faced forgeries than even your friend and accomplice, the Mouser Gray. But before you send him on his world-hopping way, the three of you might see to a small matter, that of a princess in Ool Hrusp who has gone astray and threatens to remain unmarried upon assuming the throne from her decrepit father: a sort of virgin queen, if such a thing can be imagined. Also, if it is not too much trouble...

The narrative continued for several more feet, detailing various impossible quests for the three to undertake, if they were in the neighborhood. The letter was signed with a seven-armed swastika, one of the many sigils used by Ninguable of the Seven Eyes. Also, there was a postscript, hastily penned:

P.S. Beware of Sheelba's rune!

"He must mean this," the Mouser said as he laid a small clay tablet on the table. One edge was caked with a gray and salty mud, and its upward face was carved with a queer rune. "I found it in my pocket, not unlike your scroll."

"Nimble little fellow," Fafhrd commented.

"So where do you suppose this Tasslehoof has gone?" Mouser wondered.

"Tasslehoff: two ef's and one oh. Ning's handwriting is atrocious. I suspect the creature was nabbed by those Guild bravos, thinking he was our accomplice." Fafhrd rubbed his head as though it ached him, then took another long pull of wine. As he thumped his cup to the table, he sighed, "I suppose we shall have to rescue him, lest Ning place a curse on us."

"Another foray against Thieves' Guild?" Mouser groaned.

"It would seem we are forever doomed to enter that accursed den," Fafhrd said.

Mouser thoughtfully tapped his teeth as he reread Ninguable's missive. "Perhaps after we've rescued him, we could take the chap straight home, bypassing all of Ning's quests. This Krynn sounds like an interesting place, though I don't quite understand what could be so wonderful about a dish of spiced potatoes."

"Different people, different customs. I wonder why Ninguable even bothered to mention it."

"Most likely to fire our curiosity. Flights of dragons in the sky, he says. Preposterous. It might be worth investigating, if only to debunk it," the Mouser said. "It's a wonder old Ning doesn't have a cave somewhere that leads to Krynn."

"He probably does. He just wants us to come to him before he tells us of it. Shall we hie ourselves to Thieves' Guild?" Fafhrd asked.

"If we must," Mouse said.

"Besides, the little thief has stolen my dagger."

"Mine, as well."

Read Part 7

Across World Bubbles, Pt 5

2009-11-05T13:49:00.000-08:00

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4

At the corner of Cash and Whore, in the city of Lankhmar, there stands a tavern seedier than most, known to its patrons as the Golden Lamprey. In nearby Plague Court, a shadow passed unnoticed in the dark and slipped up Bones Alley, skirted a drunk (or perhaps it was a corpse) and stopped outside the door of the aforementioned tavern. It dodged aside as a man in browned-iron cuirass staggered outside, cradling a jug of fortified wine and mumbling to himself.

Strangely, the drunkard appeared to sober instantly upon breathing the fog-shrouded night air. He unbent his back, whistled thrice like a shrieking night hawk, and darted down Bones Alley where his whistles had been answered by two hoots of an owl. After observing this odd assignation of bird imitators, the shadow ducked through the curtained doorway and revealed itself to be none other than Tasslehoff Burrfoot, though being unfamiliar with the kender race, at first no one paid him any mind.

The common room was thick with the smoke of a dozen different fires, be they candles or torches or strange, water-bubbling pipes smoked by dreamy-eyed men of the Eastern Lands. The air reeked with centuries of sour wine, sourer beer, and spilled blood. A dancing girl, clad in nought but a girdle of copper coins, sauntered past the kender, causing his eyes to start from his head (to think of Tika so dressed, or undressed). She gave his pouches an appraising glance as she fingered the tiny, razor-sharp blade secreted in her limited attire. A score of villains sat about the room in various stages of debauchery, from roaring to snoring. Tas scanned the room, finally spotting a pair of men closeted in a far corner booth almost hidden within the pall of smoke. They perfectly fit the description given to him by Ninguable of the Seven Eyes.

One was a big, strapping fellow with coppery-red hair and ominously bulging biceps. He wore a barbaric assortment of piecemeal armor, thick copper torcs on his arms, and a big, dangerous sword almost as long as the kender was tall. His companion in wine was a short, wiry chap clad entirely in gray, from his ratty gray boots to his mousy gray hood. At his side he wore the slimmest of rapiers, likewise sheathed in furry gray, and between pulls on a leathern jack of red wine, he fiddled with a needle-sharp dagger. Tasslehoff instantly recognize the twin expressions of monstrous boredom upon their faces - an affliction he soon hoped to remedy.

During his brief stay in Ilthmar, Tasslehoff had picked up a basic grasp of pigeon Lankhmarese, and so as he strode confidently across the room, he called out to the two heroes in the corner booth, "Ho, Fahrad! Hist, Mouser Gray! I've wizards mentorly from your greetings!"

But the objects of his greetings understood him well enough to know that their respective sorcerous grandfathers had need of them, probably to perform some impossible quest of derring-do which only they could do. This small, elfin creature with its bulging pouches, atrocious grammar and barbaric accent was obviously a demon conjured from some diminutive hell and sent to retrieve them.

Fafhrd broke for the front door while the Mouser dove for the back. Tasslehoff nearly split himself in two trying to chase them both. But the Mouser found his exit blocked by a crowd of club-wielding thugs, while Fafhrd escape was similarly stymied by a gang of sword-brandishing bravos.

"By Cat's Claw," swore the Mouser, "what have we done to earn the Guild's ire this time?"

"By Heartseeker, I know not, but they've employed the Slayer's Brotherhood to make us pay for it," Fafhrd replied.

Tasslehoff, with his limited understanding their language, was rather slow in responding. "By Rabbitslayer, take us not alive they will!" he cried. Before he could further declaim his warrior solidarity, the twain crushed him between them, as they took up familiar positions back-to-back and prepared to face the onslaught.

"Who the devil was that small chap, anyway?" Fafhrd asked as he drew his sword.

"Mog only knows," Mouser said as he brandished his own. "Some imp of Ninguable's sending, I deem. I don't see him anymore, but I feel his hands in my pockets."

"Likewise. He must have more arms than were first apparent." Now completely surrounded, their stalkers prepared to attack. "On guard, Gray One, they seem to have some grudge against us."

And so began one of the more terrific battles in recent Lankhmar history, during which those two most notable swordsmen, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, barely escaped with their lives. But they gave better than they were dealt, littering the floor with corpses and filling the night with screams. For some months afterwards there was a noticeable shortage of brawny cutthroats for hire, as well as a sharp drop in muggings, burglaries, and midnight robberies. As for our two heroes, an otherwise boring evening had taken an exciting, if mystifying turn.

For Ninguable's imp had vanished as quickly as he'd appeared.

Read Part 6

Across World Bubbles - Pt 4

2009-11-05T10:14:00.000-08:00

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

So it was the next day that Tasslehoff set off for fabulous Lankhmar, with specific instructions to avoid, at all costs, vile Ilthmar and its rat gods. Naturally, that is exactly where Tas went first, as he very much wanted to meet a rat god. He soon became embroiled in a scandalous adventure that is still denied in the most vehement language by the government of that ill-famed city.

After his escape from their attempt to sacrifice him to their shark gods - who were second only to their rat gods, Tasslehoff was once more on his way to fabulous Lankhmar. In his pouch he carried letters of introduction, delicately penned on a scroll of dragon skin, to the pair of heroes he was supposed to find. He crossed the Sinking Land, very much puzzled why it should bear such an extraordinary name, until it began to sink, much to his delight and consternation. Luckily, he still had on his magic boots and so was able to escape the demise suffered by Pharoah's army in another time and another world.

His boots brought him safely and speedily to the Causey Road through the Great Salt Marsh on a day when a brisk noreaster was blowing; the gale had all the huge salt spiders sailing through the air depending from their spiderwebbery parachutes. Tasslehoff ducked and dodged them as he walked, looking rather like a short, drunken sailor who hadn't got his land legs.

As he neared the Marsh Gate of the great city of Lankhmar, the sun had begun to set and the brisk noreaster had blown itself round to a sultry southwester. He found the road blocked by some poor peasant's hut that had been wrecked by the gale. It lay on its side in the middle of the road with its four stilts sticking up in the air, like some huge dead dog. Before it sat its wretched owner, grieving over his loss. So heavily robed and cowled was he that Tas could see neither his face nor his hands.

"I'm so sorry about your house," Tas commisserated. Now, Tas, being a stranger to this world, didn't know that nobody, but Nobody, lived in the Great and Extraordinarily Dangerous and Deadly Salt Marsh, except Sheelba of the Eyeless Face - the other greatest sorcerer in all Nehwon and bitter rival of Ninguable of the Seven Eyes. So he was completely unprepared for the rude response he received.

"What do you care?" barked a harsh voice from deep within the hood.

"Well, I..." Tas stammered. "Look, you, I was only trying to help!"

"You want to help? Give me a chicken foot, or get lost," the rude and strangely hooded creature shrieked.

"A chicken foot!" Tas exclaimed. "I have the very thing." He sat down in the middle of the muddy road and began to joyfully rummage through his pouches. All kinds of interesting new things had fallen into them, and what with the exciting misunderstanding back in Ilthmar and his harrowing escape from certain doom, he hadn't had time yet to go through them. With giggles of deltight, he pulled one oddity after another from his pouches, each one stranger than the next, and taking time (now that his voice had recovered) to explain in great detail the history and lineage of each new surprise to the ever-more-irritated archmage.

At long last, at the bottom of the fourth pouch he discovered that which he sought. "One chicken's foot, slightly used," he said as he flourished the grisly relic before him. "I seem to remember there was a voodoo priest from tropic Klesh whose performance I was priveleged to witness in the bazaar in Ilthmar. For some strange reason, he couldn't understand a word I said, and this led to the most unfortunate..."

"Thank you very much," Sheelba snapped as he snatched the chicken's foot from Tasslehoff's grasp. The archmage shuffled over to his shattered hut and attached the foot to the base of the fifth - and broken - stilt. It grafted itself to the wood as if by magic. With a shudder of strange life, the entire hut scrambled to its chicken feet, much to Tasslehoff's delight. A ladder dropped down from the doorway and Sheelba ascended with a movement unnervingly spiderish, and there in the darkened doorway he sat, or squatted.

"You're welcome," Tas said. "And goodbye," he waved sadly as the hut strode off into the swamp. Before it had gone completely out of sight, it turned. Something sailed out and landed with a thump at Tasslehoff's feet. He picked it up and found that it was a clay tablet carved with a single, strange rune. Looking at it made his insides turn upside down, so he quickly looked away.

"Find the Gray Mouser," a scratchy voice called from the distance. "Likely he's drunk to the point of uselessness in a tavern called The Golden Lamprey. He'll be in the company of an equally useless sot name Fafhrd."

"But Ninguable has already sent me to find them," Tas said.

"Ha!" Sheelba laughed like a cracking stone. "Give him that rune; the Mouser, not Fafhrd. Tell him Sheelba sent it with very deepest regards and under no circumstances should he attempt to use it." He laughed again, briefly, with a sound like shattering glass. The hut turned and vanished into the thorn and seahawk trees which grew thick as weeds throughout the Great Salt Marsh.

Read Part 5, if you dare

Across World Bubbles - Pt 3

2009-11-05T08:22:00.000-08:00

Part 1

Part 2

Tasslehoff sat back and enjoyed the swirling lightshow of pale stars swirling in the darkness. Truly, they were lovely, forming all sorts of interesting constellations. Eventually they began to fade, until there were but seven faintly-greenish orbs which outlined the shape of an hourglass. This gave Tas quite a start and he stood up, ready to run if need be. "Raistlin?" he whispered, somewhat nervously.

"Come closer, my child," answered a sugary voice. The stars swam apart, forming a rough circle. "Allow me to ascertain what manner of creature you might be. What manner of creature might you be, anyway?"

"Tasslehoff Burrfoot," Tas said. He extended his hand toward the faint lights. "I'm a kender."

"A kender? A kender. Where have I heard that name before? Hmmm. I receive ever so many visitors. Tell me, kender, where are you from?"

"I'm from Kendermore," Tas said. One of the glowing stars moved ahead of the other six and examined his extended hand. Tas realized with a gulp that it was some sort of eye. "Lately of Solace?" he offered when the owner of the eye, or eyes, didn't answer. Finally, he said, "Krynn?"

Four more eyes shot and looked Tas up and down, topknot to toe, while a fifth peered suspiciously over the kender's shoulder. "Krynn, you say!" the septioccular creature chuckled. Tas heard a peculiar scratching noise which he imagined to be two or more thorny old hands rubbing together. "My goodness, aren't we a long way from home!"

"Are we?" Tas said. "Why, yes we are. I mean, I am. I think." He shoved his hand into his pocket and tried to be as casual as possible for a kender. "Where am I, by the way?"

"Where are you? Specifically, you are in the secret caverns of the greatest wizard who has ever lived - Ninguable of the Seven Eyes, whose splendiferous presence you now behold before you..."

"But I thought Fistandantalus... er, I mean Raistlin, was the greatest wizard who ever..." Tas began to say.

"Bah! A mere upstart. Pray do not interrupt. As I was saying, specifically, you are in my cave. Locally, you are east of Ilthmar. And generally, well, generally I must never tell you where you are. No, never," the darksome creature chuckled.

"Why not? I'm not in The Abyss again, am I?" Tas cried.

"The Abyss! Heavens, no. What would make you think such a thing? Are you quite sure you're not an adept?"

"No, I'm quite certain I am a kender, though I was a mouse once. That was the time I was in the Tower of High Sorcery. I would love to tell you..."

"That does sound interesting," Ninguable interrupted. "Perhaps some day you will have time to regale me with your unlikely tale. But first you must tell me about your being in The Abyss. I recall, you specifically said in The Abyss again. What did you mean by again? It is not often that one receives information from The Abyss - so few escape it," he cooed as he edged his ponderous bulk closer.

"Well, first I think I should start at the beginning," Tas said, realizing with sudden delight that here before him sat, or squatted, a person, or creature, or something anyway, who had never heard a single one of his stories. Ever!

"Please, the beginning is as good a place as any," Ninguable agreed as he edged even closer.

And so began one of the most unusual and unprecedented conversations that has ever taken place on, or in, any of the known worlds. Its proportions were epic, lasting one day and one night for each of Ninguable's seven eyes, and by the end of the seventh night, poor Tasslehoff's voice was little more than a hoarse croak. Incredibly, he had exhausted all of his stories, and for perhaps the first time in recorded history two of the most unlikely of events occured at precisely the same time - a kender stopped talking even though no one told him to, and Ninguable of the Seven Eyes, Gossiper of the Gods, found himself speechless. Tas slowly toppled onto his side and fell asleep.

Of course, this world of Nehwon (and many another) had gone to pot during those seven days without Ning's careful tinkering. He needed a hero or three to put things right. Before him snored one - namely, Tasslehoff Burrfoot of Krynn - and he knew just where he could acquire the other two.

Read Part 4

Across World Bubbles - Pt 2

2009-10-23T12:34:00.000-07:00

Read Part 1

The sun scorced the desert sands and the barren hills baked in the midday heat. A desert iguana, not unlike many another desert iguana in many another desert in many another world (yet somehow strangely different and unique), rested in the shade of a smallish boulder. It swivelled one of its eyes around to gaze in longing at a nearby cave which seemed to promise blessed coolth and dampness. At the same time, its other eye peered at a peculiar disturbance of the air beyond its shade-rock.

It was not quite a shimmering, though certainly it shimmered, or even really a shining, though bursts of light occassional shone through it. It was more a quivering of the air, a charged surging of potentialities, a throbbing, paper-thin aneurism upon the very membrane of space-time-reality. Suddenly, it exploded with howling gusts of wind, booming bowls thunder, stabbing spears of rain, and a small, screaming figure who dashed across the desert sand, up the hill, and into the cave without stopping. The rupture in space vanished with a pop like a cork from a bottle and all that remained to show that it had ever been was a wet patch of sand (already beginning to dry), a trail of smoke (already beginning to disperse), and the blackened, lightning-blasted corpse of the iguana (already being eyed by a circling vulture).

Tasslehoff Burrfoot, kender of Krynn, dropped his warped copper pole upon the stone floor of the dark cave. It took several minutes for his vision to clear, but finally he was able to see his hand before his face. And as interesting as that might have been at another time, there was before him and all around him a wonderful new cave, so he stood up, squeezed the water from his topknot, and chose a passage (of which there were dozens) to explore.

Soon he was hopelessly lost and infinitely happy. Everywhere he went, tiny glowing eyes peered at him from fissures in the floors, cracks in the walls, and recesses in the ceiling. All the while he heard an incessant series of skitterings and chitterings, shufflings and snufflings, and even an occassional flappering that brushed his pointed ears. Yet he never saw the source of these noises or the bodies of those whose eyes glowed so uncannily in the dark.

He tried to speak to them, but his voice would echo back to him from the strangest directions, and more than once he thought someone behind him had said, "I say, hello there!" only to realize it was his own voice returning like a gnomish rangaboom. In any case, whenever he spoke the eyes would only disappear, so he eventually stopped trying to communicate with them, despite the ten hundred questions banging around between his ears.

Even if he couldn't see the creatures of the cave, having them around made the place feel a little less lonely. It wasn't that he was scared, but he had begun to feel slightly uncomfortable, as though the floor had suddenly become too hot to walk on. So he began to trot, just to break the monotony of walking, not to mention warming his chilled, soaked limbs. He chose passages at random, turning this way and that, and soon his trot became a run and then his run a dash, until finally he fetched up with a headlong crash into a low-hanging stalactite that some careless person had left hanging in the way.

read part 3

Across World Bubbles - Dragonlance/Nehwon Crossover Fan Fiction

2009-10-23T10:13:00.000-07:00

Note to the lawyers . These characters are some of my very favoritist characters is all of fictiondom, and fifteen years ago I wrote a fun little story about them. This is FAN FICTION, so LEAVE ME AND BRITNEY SPEARS ALOOOOONNNEEE!

There was a storm brewing over the Kharolis Mountains, a storm such as no one in Solace had ever seen. Thundred rolled down the valleys like an army of rampaging giants and children cowered with their parents beneath their blankets. The wind roared and howled in the treetops like a dying dragon and huge waves surged across Crystalmir Lake to smash against the shore. Everyone in Solace was safely huddled in their homes -- everyone, that is, except Tasslehoff Burrfoot.

The storm crashed and banged against the sky, but Tasslehoff stood in the very teeth of it, high up the slope of a mountain overlooking the lake. His pouches flapped in the lashing wind. His ridiculous topknot snapped like a whip in the gale as he squinted his mischievous eyes against the rain and gazed at the raging heavens. On his small feet he wore a fantastic pair of boots - the seemed made of a thin, flexible metal and glowed with their own light. In his hand he held a rod of shining copper, at least twelve feet long and topped by a streaming copper wire.

Judging that the moment for his experiment had finally arrived, Tas checked the lacings of his peculiar boots, adjusted his pouches and settled them into their proper places, and smoothed his topnot against his neck. Lifting the copper rod before him as though bearing a flag in a parade, he began to run. Down the side of the mountain he flew, faster and faster, until his feet became a blur of light and fire began to leap from his footprints, leaving a trail of burning puddles behind him. No horse could have matched him, no coursing leopard, not even the fastest unicorn flying on magic hooves. He outpaced them all until, with a tremendous flash and a defeaning crash, a blazing bolt of lightning struck the copper rod and Tasslehoff Burrfoot vanished from this world of Krynn.

read part 2

Legally Dead - Dragonlance Fan Fiction

2009-09-29T09:19:00.000-07:00

Before I became a Dragonlance author, I was a Dragonlance fan fiction author. Back then, there weren't any websites for fan fiction and we carved all our stories on stone tablets, which I sent to Dragon magazine. None were ever published there, but one of my fan fiction stories was eventually published in a Dragonlance anthology. It was The Restoration and the anthology was Relics and Omens. But that's another story.

I wrote Legally Dead sometime in the early 90s, which was before Dragons of Summer Flame came out. The setting of the story is Solace, after Legends but before Summer Flame.

Mama always said no good would come of that marriage, but some people wondered what business was it of hers anyway? Mama always had something to say about everything and everybody, whether they wanted to hear it or not, and it got so that people just quit listening to her and started shunning her. But she sure hit the goblin on the head about that Widow Burrfoot.

People called her Widow Burrfoot long before Uncle Tas was declared legally dead. You may have heard of Tasslehoff Burrfoot. From what he says, he saved Krynn from almost certain destruction at least five times, been to the Abyss and met the Queen of Darkness, seen the Kingpriest of Istar, and was close personal friends with Paladine. He wasn't my real uncle, as he was a kender, but Mama said he might as well have been my uncle as I seemed half kender anyway, because I was always losing what I needed and finding what I didn't. My pants had big pockets in those days and they were always full of useless junk.

Anyway, this Widow Burrfoot caused no end of talk around Solace. Mama said she behaved like a harlotous old gully dwarf, always running around on poor old Uncle Tas and him just sitting there taking it like a whipped dog. What he was thinking marrying a full grown human woman - that's what everybody wanted to know.

And boy was she ever full grown! She had half the men in Solace falling over their chins that day as she rode into town on the back of that horse, with Uncle Tas leading it by the halter and grinning like the goblin that drank the grog. But the widow (she wasn't a widow yet) just sat in her saddle scowling down her nose as though she didn't like the looks of Solace at all.

She was from Haven, and that's where Uncle Tas had met and married her. He always said he clearly remembered the first part, but not so much the second. He said that in Haven she had been a debutante in the hoidy-toidy, whatever that is. Mama said it meant she earned her keep by handing out towels to people after they visited the outhouse, like what you see at the finer inns in Palanthas.

I remember that first day like it was my Day of Life Gift. Mama and me were walking home from the market, me with a basket full of vegetables and Mama with a mouth full of nonsense, when we met them on the road from Haven. The widow wore these long white gloves that came up to her arm pits and a tall wizard cap with a bit of somebody's drapes hanging off the point. I suppose that was her hoidy-toidy uniform. Mama just looked at her and said there was no accounting for what a kender might bring home.

Uncle Tas had retired from the adventuring lifestyle and had opened this shop that he called Burrfoot's Museum of Krynn, where he kept some of the strangest and most wonderful things you ever laid eyes on. People would come all the way from Palanthas just to browse. Uncle Tas did business like a kender. If you found something you liked in his shop, you could take it, provided you left something behind.

One time I caught this old muddy boot while I was fishing in Crystalmir Lake. Uncle Tas wanted that boot, because he thought it might have been the boot that Flint Fireforge had lost that night they were escaping Fewmaster Toede and his toadies. He traded me a magic ring for it, a ring he said could turn you into a mouse. It was a most special shop that way, chock full of stuff you never would have thought of, and Uncle Tas had a knack for discovering the fascinating history of anything you might bring in.

But sometimes people didn't have anything to trade, so they would buy what they wanted. Pretty soon, Uncle Tas had become one of the richest people in Solace. Of course, him being a kender he didn't have much use for money except to buy presents for his friends or rounds of ale at the inn. He also donated a good bit of money to the Shrine of the Hat in Haven, which is where he met his wife. The kender had shrines to Paladine all over the place. There was the Shrine of the Feather and the Shrine of the Golden Span and of course they had the Shrine of the Fireball, until it blew up. But for all the money he gave away, Uncle Tas couldn't help making more. His shop was always full of customers, like gully dwarves in slop jar, Uncle Tas would say.

When he had about as much money as he could stand, Uncle Tas decided to take a vacation to Mt. Nevermind, where the gnomes live, so as to get some peace and quiet. I think he just wanted to get away from his wife, as she had started to run around with every sort of ruffian and scoundrel you care to name. He didn't take her with him, that was for sure. Maybe she didn't want to go, and I can't blame her, from what I've heard of Mt. Nevermind.

The widow stayed on minding the shop. You couldn't trade things anymore and all she wanted was money and lots of it, and she even tried to make me give back my magic mouse ring. I don't have to tell you, business slacked off pretty darn quick. After about a year, she closed up the shop and moved back with her family in Haven, 'to wait for Tasslehoff' she said. But he never showed up.

Part 2
© 2009 Jeff Crook

Legally Dead - Part Four

2009-09-29T09:07:00.000-07:00

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

"Uncle Tas!" I shouted. "What are you doing here?"

And do you know what he said? He said, "EEEEEEAAAAAWWWWWWW!" I just about messed my britches. I yanked off those spectacles and there before me stood that mule that had busted up the auction.

"You wait right here," I said to him. "I'll go get somebody. I'll find Palin. He'll know what to do. They're selling all your stuff on account of you're dead and all."

I found Palin up near the front. They were getting ready to start the bidding on the magical stuff. I pulled on the hem of his wizard's robe.

"What is it, Ruell?" he said.

"Come on. I need to show you something," I said.

"Can't it wait? I want to bid on a wand."

"No, come on," I said. I tugged and pulled until he finally gave up and followed me. He was a lot older than me and he was a wizard, but he was still young enough to listen to a kid and not turn him into a frog or something. I took him over to the tree where Uncle Tas was tied up. "There," I said.

Palin took one at the mule and said, "Reull," in the most disappointed voice I've ever heard come out of a person's mouth who was not my Mama.

"Here, look at him through these spectacles," I said. He heaved out a big, heavy sigh and took the spectacles and held them up to his eyes. Then he dropped them, he was so surprised.

Uncle Tas said, "EEEEEEEAAAAAAWWWWWWW!" and commenced to bucking and kicking.

"It's a good thing I've got the right spell memorized," Palin said. He pushed back his sleeves and went to work. Magic has always been a wonder to me, and seeing him cast that spell just about stood my hair on end. But when he was done and the smoke had cleared, there stood Uncle Tas with a rope around his neck and a bit in his mouth. He spit the bit out on the ground.

"Can you speak?" Palin asked him.

"I'm almost afraid to try," Uncle Tas said.

Well, I can't begin to describe the uproar when Uncle Tas pushed his way through the crowd, jumped up on a table, and snatched a magic bowl his widow's hand. Caramon Majere took one look at him and fainted dead away. The Widow Burrfoot screamed, grabbed the till, and ran off. That gnome, he just kept right on auctioneering like nothing had happened and they had to pull him down and stuff a rag in his mouth just to shut him up.

Seems when Uncle Tas had set out for Mt. Nevermind, he met up with a wizard just outside of Solace. He said he should have been suspicious from the start, because the wizard actually acted like he needed a traveling companion. Uncle Tas said there was something about him that seemed familiar, but he couldn't 'put the beard on the dwarf' and every time he tried he got a headache and a compulsion to think of something else.

They made camp that night and went to sleep by the fire, and when Uncle Tas woke up the next morning he was a mule. The wizard put a stall on his head and led him to the nearest farm, where he traded him for a bag of apples and a rusty bucket with a hole in it.

"And never have I spent a more miserable three years," Uncle Tas said. "After you've pulled a plow in the hot sun all day long, a mule isn't quite as grand a thing to be as you might imagine."

The Widow Burrfoot had hired the wizard to charm Tas into marrying her and then to get rid of him so she could sell his stuff. Though nobody remembered it, she had visited Solace about six months before and seen the musuem and how valuable it was and how Uncle Tas was practically giving his things away. After she took over, business got so bad (because she was such a greedy skinflint) she decided to auction it off instead, but to do that she had to wait three years to declare her husband legally dead and take full control of his estate.

A lot of folks wanted to know if they had to return the stuff they had bought, but Uncle Tas was only too glad to get rid of it, as it freed up space in his museum for the acquiring of new things. He let me keep those magic spectacles. Nobody ever saw the Widow Burrfoot again, and three years to the day of the auction, Uncle Tas had her declared legally dead.

© 2009 Jeff Crook

Disclaimer - This story is not part of the official Dragonlance canon and was never intended to be so. It is fan fiction. The author has not been contracted or compensated for writing it. Yadda, yadda, yaday.

Legally Dead - Part Three

2009-09-29T08:28:00.000-07:00

Read Part 1

Read Part 2

It just about broke my heart seeing that "harlotous old gully dwarf," as Mama called her, setting up for the auction. All sorts of strangers were coming and going, and where they came from was anybody's guess. The Widow had to have been given notice of the auction weeks earlier, but the trial was only the day before. The evening after the trial, me and some of the other kids in town had our own little memorial service out behind the museum. We talked about Uncle Tas and all the things he had given us and tried to remember all his best stories. Inside the museum, the Widow and her out of town friends were throwing a party you could hear all the way to Crystalmir Lake. Some of the older folk in town came by to shake their heads and suck their teeth, but Tanis Halfelven noticed us sitting in the trees in the dark and he came over and sat down with us. I showed him my magic mouse ring, and he told us stories about Uncle Tas that we had never heard before.

But we just couldn't get over it, Uncle Tas being dead and all, and the Widow about to sell off all his things. It was enough to make a person misdoubt the whole human race. I wished I was a half elf, too, and I told him so. Tanis just smiled. He was a great comfort to us.

The morning of the auction was sunny and breezy. They had set out all of the stuff from the museum on tables on the lawn and everything had been marked and tagged with a number. There was a list of all the numbers and what items they went with, and the items were divided up according to nature and value: art, jewelry, magic, and so on. She was even selling all the most worthless junk, the chicken feathers and bits of twine and river pebbles, which was what Uncle Tas had always loved best.

In addition to the strangers, there were people from all over, more even than were at the trial, and there were horses and mules and wagons clogging up the lanes, and the folks were browsing through all the things and talking about Uncle Tas. I wandered around, looking at this and that and trying not to cry. The Widow had her a whole throng of security men with ropes and cudgels securing the perimeter to keep the kender away. I could feel their eyes on me the whole time.

Just about the time they were ready to begin, a mule broke his harness and got in among the tables. He knocked everything over and kicked and bawled, the Widow screamed like you wouldn't believe, and her security men jumped all over it wailing away with their cudgels until the farmer showed up to claim his animal. The Widow threatened to sue him for damaged goods. The farmer led the poor beast away and tied it to a tree, but by this time it was already noon and they still had to set up the tables and straighten everything out, so everybody went home to find some lunch. Mama brought onion and apple sandwiches.

I sat on the grass and ate my sandwich and watched them sort through the mess. Then I walked around and looked at the tables the mule had missed. There was one table that big piles of junk piled into crates with a single tag on them. The gnome saw me fingering the merchandice and came over to make sure I wasn't stealing anything. I asked what this stuff was and started rattling off like an avalanche until I clapped a hand over his mouth and asked him to slow down.

So he said it again, real slow and deliberate, like he thought I was thick in the head. "These items are being auctioned by lot," he said. "What you see is what you get so you can pick through it's junk mostly but as this is a kender estate there might be a rare treasure tucked away in all this so we call it a grab bag even though its a bag not a box." She showed me a few things and kept talking, mostly about himself.

He was from Mt. Nevermind, so I asked if he had ever met Uncle Tas.

And he was off and running again. "NoIdidnotbutitispossiblehecouldhave..."

I put my hand on his mouth again. "He would have been there three years ago," I said.

"ReallyIthinkIwouldhaveheardaboutthevisitofaherolikeTasslehoffBurrfootyouseeIamontheWelcomingCommittee..."

"He must not have made it," I interrupted.

"QuitepossiblethedangersoftheroadaremanyinfactIwasmyselfaccostedbyagangofruffianswhosoughtto..."

I wandered away and left him talking. Once a gnome got going like that, he no longer cared if anybody was listening. I rummaged through the items on several more tables until I came across a true treasure stuffed into an old pillow case. It was one of Uncle Tas' pouches, and it still had stuff in it! I wanted it like I've never wanted anything in my life, so I looked around until I found the Widow Burrfoot. She was setting up a table of magic items.

"Mrs. Burrfoot?"

"What?" she shouted, then she saw it was only me. She ran her hand through her hair and sighed as though at the tattered end of her last nerve. "What do you want, boy? Just look at all this stuff? How could one person have accumulated so much stuff?"

"He was special," I said. I held up the pouch I had found. "Can I trade you for this?"

"Sorry, no trades," she said. "Coin of the realm only, and beside, this is an auction, not a trading post. You'll have to bid on that if you want it."

"But it came from a grab bag," I said. "I don't want the rest of the stuff, just this pouch."

She rolled her eyes and sucked her teeth. "What have you got to trade?" she said.

"I'll trade you my magic ring that you've been wanting," I said. Her eyes lit up and I knew I had her.

I took my new old pouch and sat under a tree. Folks started heading back to the auction. I saw Palin Majere pass with his father and mother. Me and Palin were third cousins on my father's side. Poor old Caramon, he was taking things mighty hard. Him and Uncle Tas were about as good a friends as can be, they'd been through so much together. His nose was red and his eyes were swollen and Aunt Tika led him by the elbow as though he couldn't see where he was going. Things just wouldn't be the same around Solace without Uncle Tas. That was for sure.

You wouldn't believe the history that was in that pouch. There was a map of some rooms that was labeled Pax Tharkas. There was some writing on it that said Here is where Tanis found the sword of Kith-Kanan and I almost got eaten by a giant slug. That was fun! On another part of the map it said Here is where Fizban died. That wasn't fun. And next to it, in a darker ink, it said No he didn't!

The auction started and everybody finally realized why the Widow Burrfoot brought that gnome. He was the auctioneer. If ever there was a job suited for a gnome, that was it. I wish you could have heard him go.

I found all sorts of other maps. One was of part of Thorbardin and one was of Tarsis when it was beside the sea, back before the Cataclysm, which meant it was really old. Down in the bottom of the pouch I found an old piece of parchment rolled up around something. I unrolled it and saw that it was a page torn from a book, but the writing was so faded you couldn't read it. It had been wrapped around a pair of wire-frame spectacles. I put them on to see what they looked like, and all of a sudden I could read the writing on that old torn page. It was all about good dragons and looked like it had just been written.

Boy, wouldn't the Widow be kicking herself if she found out she traded a pair of magic spectacles for a dumb old magic ring that turns you into a mouse. I left them on my nose and walked around town to see what else I could see through them. For the most part everything looked just the same as it always had - the same trees, the same houses, same roads and shops. A few of the signs over the shops had other writing on them, which I guessed were the old names of places that had been painted over or weathered away. All in all, it was pretty boring and the spectacles, being so strong, were starting to give me a headache. Still, I thought, there might be something interesting at the auction, so I headed that way.

The place was pretty crowded and the auction was going good. You couldn't hardly find a way through all the wagons and mules and horses. The lawn was crowded, but there was also a good-sized crowd of kender sitting together off to the side, surrounded by security men. Off to the other side, there was a lone kender tied to a tree, and I figured they had caught him walking away with something valuable. He looked so miserable sitting there, without his pouches and a rope around his neck, I went over to see who it was.

When I saw his face, I just about fell over. It was Uncle Tas!

Part 4

© 2009 Jeff Crook

Legally Dead - Part Two

2009-09-28T14:26:00.000-07:00

Read Part 1

The Widow Burrfoot showed up back in town three years to the day after Uncle Tas disappeared. She had a lawyer with her this time, a little spindly chap with a cough like somebody chiseling out a tomb. And she had a priestess of Gilean to judge the law, and she also had a gnome with her, but couldn't nobody see what he was for. The priestess posted a notice at the Inn of the Last Home, stating that a hearing would be held in three days, where it would be determined whether Tasslehoff Burrfoot, a resident of Solace, could be declared legally dead.

Now, when a man, dwarf or elf has gone missing for three years, he can be declared legally dead, but nobody knew for certain how long you had to give a kender, even an old one like Uncle Tas. Mama said that sometimes older kender go through a second childhood, and with it comes a second wanderlust, in which they feel compelled to return to all the places they saw in their first wanderlust and see how things have changed. Mama had a tremendous store of such wisdom, but I don't whether she was right because, as I have said before, half the time she didn't know what she was talking. It was hard to tell when to believe her because she was just as sure she was right whether she was right as rain or as far from the truth as the other side of the world.

People came from far and wide to hear the trial, because Uncle Tas was an original Hero of the Lance and they knew all his friends would be there. There were so many that the inn filled up and they had to move the court outside. It was a wonderful autumn day, as cool as you could want, with woodsmoke in the air and the smell of mulled cider barrels wafting through the trees. Days like this always reminded me of Uncle Tas. You'd find him sitting on a beer barrel under the tree beside his museum, telling stories of his adventures.

The judge opened her book, took up her pen and began to write. As she wrote, she called for any witnesses who could offer proof that Tasslehoff Burrfoot was still alive. Mama stood right up and told her theory of the second wanderlust. She said she never had much use for kender, but she hated to see one "wrongfully done in by the law." The Widow Burrfoot only scowled from her chair, but the judge copied it all down.

As Mama finished her explanation, the judge looked up from her book and said, "Do you mean to tell me this Tasslehoff Burrfoot is a kender?"

"Ain't you never heard of him?" I shouted from my seat at the back.

"Well, this does shed new light on the matter," the judge said. She turned to the Widow. "Mrs. Burrfoot, you failed to mention that your husband is a kender."

"I didn't think it mattered," the Widow said.

"I'm afraid it does. You see, there is no legal precedent for declaring a kender legally dead. There has never been any pressing need, as the estate of a kender is rarely disputed." The judge scratched her head and flipped through a few musty law tomes she had brought with her.

The Widow's lawyer stood up and cleared his throat. "May it please Your Honor," he said, "there is one case mentioned in the Chronicles of Astinus which, I am sure, has merely slipped your mind and would have occured to you at any moment." The Chronicles of Astinus was only the most holy work of the priesthood of Gilean, so I imagine the judge was not a little embarrased to be reminded by a lawyer of something written in her own book.

"Ah yes," she said. "I had forgotten. Please, do me the honor of reading the case for the record." She resumed writing.

The lawyer smiled and cleared his throat again. "It was a criminal case, not a civil dispute. It seems that a certain kender was accused of burglary..." At this, a roar of protest went up from the kender in the audience. The judge gave them a stern look and they quieted down. The lawyer continued, "This kender's defense was that he had been lost, wandering as he put it, for over three years, and since the statute had expired, he should have been declared legally dead. And if he were legally dead, then he could hardly have committed the crime in question. The case was resolved when the kender managed to have himself declared dead through another court."

"That would be Uncle Trapspringer," said a kender in the front row.

"Given this information, I believe the statue should be applied equally for all -- man, elf and kender alike," the judge said. "So unless anyone can come forward and offer evidence that Tasslehoff Burrfoot is still alive, I will be forced to rule in favor of Mrs. Burrfoot."

No one said a word, not even Uncle Tas' friends. The entire assembly was completely quiet, except for a mule somewhere that started braying like the trumpet of doom. It was as though we were witnessing Uncle Tas' death, right before our eyes. He had been, for so many of the people of Solace, especially us kids, such a huge part of our lives, and now a stranger was about to bring an end to all that. It was as though an age of the world was about to pass away.

The judge closed her book and put away her pen. "Mrs. Burrfoot, I regret to inform you that your husband is dead," she said.

The Widow Burrfoot stood up and faced the silent, stunned assembly. She said, "Tomorrow there will be a public auction on the lawn before my late husband's Museum of Krynn. You may begin viewing the objects for sale at sunrise. The bidding will begin at noon."

"Doweworknow?" her gnome asked.

"Yes," she said.

Part 3

© 2009 Jeff Crook

Adam's Hot Dogs at the End of the World

2009-03-20T11:39:00.000-07:00

In celebration of Extraterrestrial Abduction Day, I decided to post this story. It was rejected by Baen's Universe and Strange Horizons before being picked up by Nature magazine, and ultimately, for inclusion in the Futures from Nature anthology alongside stories by such giants as Arthur C. Clarke, Frederick Pohl, Michael Moorcock, Greg Bear, and many others.

It was published in Nature under the title Hot Dogs at the End of the World, but in the anthology the original title was restored.

Adam considered the sky. It wasn’t even blue anymore, just a sort of washed-out gray. The tall pale man opposite him thoughtfully chewed a bite of hotdog, the bitten remainder of which he held about mid-chest, just slightly above Adam’s head. Adam noticed a spot of yellow mustard on the man’s red tie. His suit was black, as were the sunglasses resting on top of his wavy blond hair. His almost-colorless blue eyes remained fixed in an unblinking stare that Adam still found somewhat unsettling.

“What you say is true,” Adam continued, “but the conflict between theology and interstellar travel isn’t just with the book of Genesis. There’s Revelations to consider. Of course, Norse mythology also includes an end-times myth, Ragnarok and all that, but there are so few Oden worshippers these days, it seems pointless to include them.”

“Entirely,” the Nordic-looking man mumbled around his hotdog.

“Uh… entirely what?” Adam asked.

“Pointless,” the man said. Adam noticed that the spot of yellow mustard had disappeared from the man’s tie.

“Wonderful technology,” Adam muttered before continuing. “But as you know, UFO researchers always assumed that the government actively concealed the existence of extraterrestrials to protect the church, referring of course to the question raised by Genesis – if there are extraterrestrial civilizations, why aren’t they mentioned in Genesis? The Brookings Institute is supposed to have done the original sociological study that has guided disclosure policy since the middle of the last century.”

“That’s true,” the Nordic man said.

“It is? Oh, yes, but in my opinion the answer to the Genesis question wouldn’t bring down the church, would it? One could always argue that Genesis never says aliens don’t exist, either.”

“Obviously,” the Nordic man said. He finished his hotdog. Adam removed another one from the grill, bunned it, squirted a line of mustard down its pink and char-blackened length, and handed it over the grill to his guest.

“Obviously. So the real sticking point is Revelations,” Adam said. “Do you want a beer or something?”

“Yes,” the Nordic man said. Adam opened a longneck using the bottle-opener feature on his grill spatula. A shadow of a smile twitched the corners of the tall man’s narrow mouth. “That’s a useful device,” he said as Adam handed him the beer.

“So, as I was saying, Revelations and all the other Armageddon philosophies,” Adam continued. “I mean, if there are other worlds out there where a man… being… whatever… can be born, live and die without ever setting foot on earth, that kind of pulls the end-timers’ teeth, doesn’t it? Without an end-times in which sinners are judged and the righteous rewarded, western religion becomes rather pointless. God destroys the world – big deal. Sure, a few billion people die, but in the big picture, it’s a minor occurrence. Planets explode every day, am I right? Whole star systems go nova, trillions of intelligent life forms wiped out in the twinkling of an eye no matter how moral or immoral they are or were. It’s physics, and a lack of sufficiently advanced technology to detect the impending Armageddon and-or to escape it by fleeing their doomed planet.”

The Nordic man ate his hotdog and drank his beer without blinking. Adam noticed that the man’s bottom lip (which was somewhat fuller than his almost-fleshless upper lip) tended to get sucked into the neck of the bottle when he drank, making a comical squeaking noise when he pulled it out.

Adam glanced at the cloudless gray sky, his voice rising as he tried not to laugh, “And since these end-times religions self-perpetuate by exerting control over their congregants by holding or withholding the metaphysical keys to heaven, take away the end times and what are they left with?”

“Where do you purchase these?” the Nordic man asked, gesturing with his beer to the half-eaten hotdog in his hand.

“I make them myself. Secret family recipe,” Adam said. “The beef is Kosher.”

“They are delicious,” the tall man said. “I’ll mention them to the Minister of Culture.”

Adam smiled. He felt his point had been made. The back door opened and a small, light-gray alien stepped outside. “Thanks, Adam,” the alien said with obvious relief. “I was about to bust.”

“Not a problem, Thraz. Did you remember to flush?” Adam asked.

“Oh. Sorry.” The alien blushed a deeper shade of gray and glanced at the Nordic man, who was still examining the uneaten remainder of his hotdog.

“Don’t worry. I’ll get it,” Adam said. “Your pee dissolved the toilet last time. Try explaining that to the plumber. You want another beer or something?”

“Thanks, no. I’m driving. Well, see you later,” the small alien said. He climbed into the metallic-green, lozenge-shaped spacecraft parked in Adam’s backyard. The Nordic man ate the last half of his hotdog in one bite, set the empty beer bottle on a fencepost, and climbed into the spacecraft without so much as saying goodbye. Adam was used to this. The tall ones seemed unemotional, but the little guys were friendly enough.

Adam waved goodbye as the door materialized and blended seamlessly with the hull of the ship. The craft rose silently to treetop level, then shot off toward the encroaching sea, leaving behind a rainbow arc that shimmered in the washed-out sky for a second or two before fading. Adam smiled and popped an olive into his mouth as the sound of waves reached his ears.

High tide again, and getting closer every day. So much for that covenant.

Yes, interstellar travel is a lovely way to escape the end of the world and all its moral obligations, Adam thought with a rising sense of hope and purpose.

© 2006 Jeff Crook

The Original Suicide Artist

2008-12-03T13:46:00.001-08:00

This story went through many rejections and revisions before finally finding a home in the final issue of Helix SF. One editor liked it because it has a reference to the Mau-Mau's. But he still didn't publish it. Finally it found a home at Helix, only to have Helix announce it's demise. The Helix SF website will soon be taken down, so here is my tale.

The only drawback to these business symposiums in Nairobi was that everybody played golf, despite the frequent thunderstorms and the constant threat of Neo-Mau-Mau attacks. Even though he hated golf, Jake was not a bad golfer. He just wished they wouldn't schedule these symposiums during the rainy season, except that during the dry season he would be forced to play even more golf. His natural athleticism, his sense of style, quiet demeanor, and soft, heavy eyelashes also made him attractive to other men. So when he awoke on his back on the golf course and found Farah, his Somali golfing partner, leaning over him, lips pursed, he wondered if he had been shot with a rohypnol dart again.

"You were struck by lightning, my friend," Farah said with relief. "Lie still. An ambulatory unit has already been dispatched from the Scottish hospital." Other than golf, Nairobi was a welcome escape. He had already purchased three intriguing books on yogic flying at the Hindu market.

The medics soon arrived — two grimly professional Finns on loan from the UN mission. One attached monitors to Jake's chest and forehead. The other asked his name. "Jake Horne. World Bank. My Identification Dossier is in the golf hover. There's no reason to take me to the hospital." He didn't like using up his medical coverage unless there was no other choice.

"He was struck by lightning," Farah explained, "as I prepared to putt for birdie."

"It must have been a near miss," Jake insisted calmly.

"Mr. Horne, you have second degree burns to your scalp," the medic said, "as well as superficial burns covering approximately twenty percent of your body. Your nose is severely burned, third degree or worse."

"My nose?" Jake crossed his eyes. His nose looked like the end of an exploded cigar. He tried to touch it, but the medic pushed his arm down. Jake peered at the Finn in his tight-fitting urban camo and powder-blue UN helmet. Strangely, the man's face was perfectly clear. "My glasses," he said. He wasn't wearing them, but he could see perfectly well without them. He couldn't remember a time when he didn't need glasses even to look at his watch.

"I'll call your hotel," Farah said as he hurried away.

"I'll be there for the eight-thirty suborbital!" Jake was worried his supervisor might think he was trying to extend the business conference into a real vacation.

As a strident beeping alarm began to sound, the UN medics shifted into rapid care mode, barking at one another in Finnish. One ripped open Jake's shirt, the other pressed the cold paddles of a cardiac defibrillator against his chest. "What's wrong?" Jake asked.

"Ah, it's this monitor. It's gone out again," the first medic declared with disgust.

"No, it hasn't," the second said as he set the paddles aside. He lifted a broken lead. "The wire's burned through."

"I assume that a pocket of gas…that is, a genetic defect of the cartilage…" the tall, thin WaKikuyu doctor tried to explain while maintaining his brilliant smile. "That is to say, a pocket of gas in the cartilage due to an unsuspected genetic defect must have exploded as a result of the lightning bolt coursing through your magnificent body. Plastic surgery will straighten your nose up in a jiffy. You are a remarkably lucky man."

Jake fingered the numb tatters of his nose, not feeling especially lucky. He might have been killed, in Nairobi of all places.

"Of course, your exquisite physical conditioning probably had more to do with saving your life than anything else, unless you are believing in karma," the doctor continued, smiling as he paced around the examination table. "I declare, you have the heart of a rhinoceros. Do you know that cloned rhinoceros horn is very good for the libido? I have an article from the University of Calcutta in my office, if you'd care to…"

"May I leave now?" Jake asked. "I have an eight-thirty."

"Yes, of course. The nurse will be here in a moment to bandage that nose, and you can be off. Good day." Obviously offended, the doctor strode out of the examination room like a Marabou stork.

The trip home was intolerable. Jake's reading light kept switching off and his laptop power supply was dead because he hadn't been able find a decent hydrogen recharge fitting at the hotel in Nairobi. Things there were still running on alternating current, after all. His podmates slept the entire two-hour trip, not that he relished the idea of conversation, and he was in a claustrophobic tizzy half the time because he'd been booked in Third World Passage by mistake. Then the subgrav descent gave him motion sickness.

As soon as he landed at the jump-port, he made an appointment with his health benefits advisor to see about his exploded nose. Then he took the Tube home, paying with Sub-Saharan hard currency that he had, by sheer chance, left in his luggage instead of crediting back to his account at the hotel before leaving. His credit pass had apparently been erased by the lightning strike, so without currency, he would've been stuck at the jump port. He arrived at his apartment, dropped his bags and shrugged out of his clothes, asleep almost before he reached the bed. The next morning he woke at 8:02, already late for work because his alarm clock had stopped during the night.

With a spare credit pass, he hit the Tube at 8:27, the gray bandage from the Scottish hospital still clinging to the end of his nose. He sat in his usual lemon yellow seat as the Tube whispered down the tunnel toward the river. At this time of day, the Tube was nearly empty. He was able to spread out, set his laptop on the seat next to him and cross his legs while he sipped Carb Condensate, careful not to dip his bandage in the steaming black liquid. He opened a newsfilm and switched off the vocals, as he preferred to do the reading himself. Only this time he was able to read without his glasses. He had decided not to mention the miracle of his restored vision to his health benefits advisor, as he didn't want to lose his vision coverage. It was an almost pleasant 85-second trip to the island, except for the annoying flickering of the light above his head. He didn't even have his usual Tube-collapsing panic. In fact, he felt rather marvelous, except for his nose, as he pondered his astonishing survival.

He sat in the Tube and looked out the window at the colored section markers flashing by his own reflection, and at the elaborate advertising graffiti painted on the tube walls. The graffiti used a style of commercial art called speed-stretch, meaning that it was painted in such a way that, when viewed at the speed of a moving Tube, it would appear as a normal image. Jake's first job had been selling speed-stretch advertising in the old sub-Atlantic Tube. Seen whole and motionless, a speed-stretch ad was an incomprehensible smudge of colors. All three advertising firms in the city made use of a technique first invented by suicide artists twenty years ago. The original suicide artists were the last surviving prisoners from the Eugenics Rebellion. They would sometimes escape to spray paint their agit-prop and die in the Tubes for the sake of their art, in the mistaken belief their altered genomes gave them supernatural powers, including immortality.

Jake gathered his things and stood by the door as the Tube hover-slipped toward Freedom Tower Station. He looked at his watch and saw that it was 8:27. He'd entered the Tube at 8:27. His watch had stopped, but he didn't know when. Maybe he was later to work than he thought. Maybe that was why the Tube was empty.

The interior lights winked out. He felt the hover-slip brakes release and watched the station, bright with lights and surprised faces waiting along the platform, strobe past the door.

Emergency mags clanged against the rails and the Tube juggered to a stop three hundred meters beyond the station. Jake collected himself from the wall and forced open the doors just as frightened transit workers rushed up, asking in Arabic if he was hurt.

"I'm late for work," Jake responded as he looked past them at the long dark walk through the tunnel back to the station.

Jake hurried into the empty Grand Lobby, pushing open the automatic doors that had failed to open automatically at his approach. Everyone was already at their desks. He hated being late to work, hated to walk past everyone looking at him. Now he would have to walk by them with his nose swaddled in dingy white African bandages that he hadn't had time to change, because he was late to work.

He hated riding in the elevator, but it would take him 23 minutes to climb the stairs. That was his best time, and he was already tired from his adventures. That would put him to work at… he glanced at the old fashioned dial clock above the elevator. Unbelievably, it had stopped at 8:53, but how long ago had 8:53 been? He hurried to the express elevator and pressed the up button. The doors slid open and he stepped inside.

As the doors closed, the elevator exploded.

The building was evacuated as they loaded Jake onto a hoverstretcher and slid him into the upper berth of the ambulatory unit. "I'm not dead?" he groaned in surprise as the aquamarine quarantine shield popped into place around him. The static charge lifted goosepimples on his arms.

The ambulatory hover took him to a State Security hospital, where he was placed in solitary confinement and denied access to newsfilms, books, even a window. After a few days under the care of robotic doctors, he was led, still a bit bruised, battered and scorched, into a cavernous room the size of a suborbital hangar. There he found all his possessions carefully laid out on the floor and meticulously tagged, including the things from his mother's old house in Pennsylvania which he rented to a pair of lesbian art students from Lisbon. He wore an orange jumpsuit that didn't fit him very well, and paper stockings on his feet. Atop a gray metal table lay everything he'd been carrying when he entered the elevator — his Carb Condensate thermos, a scorched and erased newsfilm, a tattered umbrella, his clothes (now nicely shredded), even the burned bandage from his nose. His laptop, however, was nowhere to be seen. He was alone in the echoing hangar with everything he owned. He walked through it, absently picked up a book by Hindu mystic Abdul ben Rajneesh and flipped through the pages while he wondered how he was going to get all his stuff home again. He didn't own a transport. He didn't need one in the city.

"Not much to see, is there, Mr. Horne?" said a voice behind him. A man entered through a security auto-door. Broad shoulders, dark suit, polished black shoes. Jake recognized him as the building manager from the World Bank Building.

"What's my stuff doing here?" Jake asked as the man approached.

"Evidence," the building manager said.

"Evidence? Of what?" Jake asked.

"Of the failed and miserable life of a failed suicide artist," the man said with a coy smile.

"A what? I have no idea what you're talking about, but I'm feeling OK now, and I can't afford this much hospitalization. May I leave?" Jake said.

"Don't you think two acts of terrorism are enough for one failed lifetime?" the building manager asked.

Jake started. "Two what?"

"The bomb in your laptop, sabotage to the hover-slip brakes of the Forbes Tube. Surely you aren't suggesting these were coincidences."

"Bomb! What bomb?"

"And look at your paltry number of material possessions. Are you sure you aren't an Anarcho-Republican?"

"I'm Cabalist-Hindu. I try to live simply," Jake protested.

"You are a dinosaur, Mr. Horne. An anachronism. The others of your kind have died out, in accordance with the natural order of things. Why are you still here?"

"Am I free to go, then?" Jake asked.

The agent picked up the scorched newsfilm and rolled it tightly in his massive fist as he stared hard at Jake. Jake wondered if he was preparing to hit him with it. "What were you doing in Nairobi?" the manager asked.

"I was representing my corporate clients at the Debt Relief Conference. Listen, I'm a patriot. I've never voted…"

"How did you injure your nose?" He pointed with the newsfilm at Jake's unbandaged nose.

"I was struck by lightning."

"On the nose?" The agent cleared his throat. "Answer me truthfully. Have you ever lain with a man?"

"What?" Jake asked, surprised by the sudden and bizarre segue.

"Have you ever lain with a man?" the building manager repeated, his tone Biblical.

"Not on purpose," Jake reluctantly answered.

"What do you mean, not on purpose?"

"I was darted," Jake said. "I am considered attractive. Or, I was until Nairobi. I doubt I'll be in any danger now with my nose like this." Jake paused, his eyes narrowing. "Oh, I see. That's what this is all about, isn't it?"

"What do you mean?"

"This is about me, isn't it? That's why you abducted me."

"I didn't abduct you, Mr. Horne," the building manager said. "You're being held as a material witness in connection to a terrorist plot. This is State Security."

"Yes, I've heard about State Security," Jake mumbled.

"Was Hugh Workling your cell leader?"

"My what?"

"Hugh Workling. The previous building manager. The man who planted the demolition charges at the World Bank. The whole building was rigged with explosives, and the control switch was located in your 73rd floor office. Don't try to deny it."

"In my office?" Jake asked. "Where in my office?"

"You tell me."

Jake thought for a moment. "Behind the new wall?"

The building manager nodded. "So how were you planning to cover the explosion? Drive a hovertruck bomb into the lobby? Remotely hijacked suborbital? You are the suicide artist of your cell. It was your job to push the button after it hit, take down the whole building with everyone in it, including you. We know this. You were among the first to promote speed-stretch advertising…"

"But you installed the new wall," Jake interrupted. "You moved me out of my office to repair the elevators and the elevators aren't even near my office. When I returned, your new wall was a meter closer to my desk."

"What are you trying to say, Mr. Horne? You'd better be careful what you say from this point forward."

"And you replaced Hugh Workling after he was killed."

"Mr. Horne, I think you had better not say anything at all. For your own good," the building manager said as he removed a small black pistol from the pocket of his dark suit. He aimed it at Jake's stomach.

"Where's my laptop?" Jake asked, looking at the gun.

"The bomb you planted in it blew it to smithereens."

"I didn't plant a bomb. What have you done with my laptop?"

The building manager pointed to a small pile of labeled bits of plastic and metal lying on the floor under the table. "There is the evidence, or what's left of it," he said. "Microscopic surface pitting proves there was a bomb in your laptop."

"You blew up my laptop!" Jake said.

"I won't warn you again, Mr. Horne."

"I'm not supposed to defend myself?" Jake asked.

"You are trying to confuse the matter of your guilt. The evidence against you has already been established. You are a suicide artist. There is no longer any question. We simply want to know the names of the other members of your cell."

"My cell? What cell?" Jake asked angrily.

The lights in the hangar winked out. "Stand where you are, Mr. Horne," the building manager said in the sudden darkness. "If you move, I'll be forced to shoot you."

A voice came through the air loud and echoing, like an announcer in a stadium. "We'll have the lights in a moment-ent-ent-ent. There is a problem with the video-oh-oh-oh… stand by-eye-eye-eye."

"So, Mr. Horne," the building manager said in the darkness. "Tell me about this darting."
Jake sighed. "There's nothing to tell, really. It happened in Beijing, at Disney: Forbidden City behind the Great Wall of China Hover-Coaster. I was in speed-stretch advertising then."

"Did you enjoy it?"

"Not really. It was a job."

"Not that. The other," the agent said. He shuffled closer. Jake smelled his heavy aftershave and the chemical odor of his synthetic clothing.

"The darting?"

"No. After."

"I don't remember it," Jake said. "I woke up in a maintenance shed, and there it was. Does this have anything to do with my case?"

"You don't have a case, Mr. Horne. Your case has already been closed. But I can help you. I can be your friend, Mr. Horne. You need a friend." Jake felt a warm hand caress the back of his neck. He didn't pull away. Then the hard muzzle of the pistol pressed against the inside of his left thigh.

"Why am I here?" Jake asked. He wasn't afraid. He was used to this. He just sighed, because nothing ever changed. Men were animals.

"Your purchases are minimal, your investments largely in low-risk/low-yield accounts, your debt load way below normal. When they picked you out of the lobby rubble, they found a blank credit pass in your pocket — obviously a forgery. It was broadcast to all Post-Times newsfilms within an hour. Maurice Dickerson wrote a story about you — mild-mannered office worker, little did his coworkers know he was the original suicide artist…"

"The what?"

"…of the art form known as speed stretch, nearly killed while spraying graffiti in the old subAtlantic years ago, suffered massive brain trauma, amnesia, finally rehabilitated and trained in commercial sales of the subversive art form he pioneered…"

"That's impossible," Jake said. "I'm not…"

"Completely rehabilitated, your betrayal broke the back of the radical Neo-Luddite movement of Eugenics War rebels you helped to found… or so everyone thought. Then you accidentally blow yourself up as part of a plot to bring down the World Bank building. Now you're dead. The whole world thinks so."

"This is crazy. Why are you telling me this?" Jake asked. At the far end of the hangar, a red exit sign glowed above a steel door. Next to the door, he saw a tiny green square of light, probably a keypad for a security lock. The building manager was clearly insane, but what he said made a strange sort of sense. It was like when he read his first book on yogic flying — it was all new, yet familiar, as though he had always known and was only being reminded. Something like past life regression, or reincarnation, or déjà vu, or maybe just an undigested bit of tofu.

"I want to be your friend, Mr. Horne. Jake. May I call you Jake?" His hand gently massaged the back of Jake's neck. Jake felt him move closer. "Don't worry. They can't record us with the lights off. And you do need a friend, Jake. You don't want to spend the rest of your life in a zero-G orbital brig, do you?"

"No," Jake said, even though his experiences in zero-G at the Atlantis GSOrb were the closest thing to yogic flying he'd ever experienced. He'd been saving for years so he could retire to the Atlantis GSOrb, which cost even more than living on the island.

"Of course you don't," the building manager—slash—state security agent mumbled into his ear as he leaned against him, pressing his hardness against Jake's hip. The medicinal odor of the man's aftershave made Jake gag. "They never turn off the lights in the brig, never activate the gravity. You'd be all alone. No one allowed to speak to you. It's limbo, no existence at all."

"I just want to go back to my job," Jake sighed.

"You can't go back to your…" the building manager's voice trailed off, dying in a grunt. His hand left Jake's neck. The lights at the far end of the hangar winked on.

A voice said over an intercom, echoing, "We'll have the others on in a moment-ent-ent-ent."
The building manager stepped away from Jake and sagged against the table of bomb evidence. Droplets of sweat formed a wet moustache across his chiseled, clean-shaven upper lip. He massaged his left arm, then began to unbutton his shirt, his face as white as his shirt. Pulling it open, he peeled a thin foil patch off the skin above his heart and tossed it aside. He opened his wallet, removed a similar patch, placed it over his heart and rubbed it vigorously to set the adhesive. Then he waited, obviously making an effort to breathe normally.

With a cry, he sank to one knee. "My pacemaker patch," he gasped, clutching at his left shoulder. His head sank slowly to the floor at Jake's feet. Jake saw him fumbling with his pistol.

"Are you dying?" Jake asked as he backed away.

"Don't…" the man groaned.

"Stay where you are-are-are-are!" the voice ordered over the loudspeaker. "Do not attempt to escape-ape-ape-ape." The building manager lifted the pistol in a wavering hand and pointed it at Jake.

Jake ran toward the far end of the hangar. As he approached the security door, the exit sign above it winked out. He pushed against the door. It was locked, but at his touch, the illuminated keypad next to the door went dark and the door's magnetic lock clanged open.

Outside, he spotted a huge white suborbital taxiing to its launch position, escorted by a swarm of black security hovers. Jake thought he might like to see it explode, and this thought frightened him more than all the State Security in the world. He was supposed to be a pacifist. He didn't even eat meat. He ran through the cold rain hissing across the tarmac, away from the suborbital and away from the lies, the betrayals, the mendacity and mediocrity of his eternal victimhood. His paper stockings quickly fell apart as he splashed through rain-dimpled puddles. The suborbital coasted to a stop at the end of the jump-port, its red and green lights flashing like buoys far out to sea.

One of the security hovers peeled off from the escort and flew toward Jake, its blue lights twitching in the slanting rain. A beam of white light shot out from underneath the vehicle as it passed overhead, pinning him like an insect. Jake lifted his hand to shade his eyes. "Stay where you are. Do not attempt to escape," it blared at him from a loudspeaker.

"Leave me alone!" Jake shouted back. The beam flickered and died. The blue lights stopped flashing, the roar of the hover engine slowed to a dying whine, the vehicle rolled over and nosed into the wet tarmac twenty meters away. Its tank of hydrogen fuel erupted in a white ball hot and bright as the sun, expanding and passing through and over Jake with a cleansing, healing fire.

His charred jumpsuit sloughed off his naked body in the slashing rain. His skin was pink and new as the day he was born, his hair ran down his face in gray tears of ash. "All I ever wanted was to be left alone," he said as he walked among the burning wreckage, each step lighter than the last. Flickering blue lights began to converge from every direction. He no longer cared. Exulting in his transfiguration, he kicked free of the earth as thunder ripped the sky big as God. The rain danced across the tarmac in gossamer sheets like fairy veils, and the hiss of the drops whispered his forgotten name.

The Monkey Skin Cloak

2008-10-31T13:14:00.000-07:00

This story was originally published in the Tattered Souls anthology (Cutting Block Press). It was inspired by several true accounts recorded in Peter Capstick's books about big game hunting in Africa. It is a period piece, set during an African safari in the early 1920s, so the language and attitudes (including racist and sexist attitudes) fit the era in which the story is told. However, it contains graphic descriptions of sex, rape and bestiality, and plenty of violence, blood, cannibalism, monstrous hermaphrodism, lycanthropism, and a generous bouquet of brains. So turn down the lights, curl up with a glass of Ripple, and enjoy...

She stood suddenly in the flare of our headlamps, eyes bulging in the dark oval of her dark face. Ndaro stood on the brakes, but she vanished with a surprised thud. The lorry slid to a teetering stop, throwing us back in our seats. The dust of our passage caught up to us, swirled briefly in a tawny cloud in the headlamps, then disappeared into the tall grass beside the road to Nairobi.
Our guide, Doc (Dr. Hugh Palmer), barked a question in Swahili to Ndaro. The old native shook his frosty head violently.

“Did we hit something?” Stanci asked, blinking sleepily as she sat up beside me. Doc leaped from the lorry, already running, stopping only to grab his .577 Westley Richards Double Express from the back of the lorry.

“A woman,” I said on my way out the door.

I found Doc forty yards down the road, kneeling over something in the dust. He pointed his rifle at the native woman’s prone body as though pointing with a stick at a dead snake. Moonlight reflected softly on her small breasts and the marble-smooth, bone-angular flesh of her exposed hips. A cloak of verdant monkey skins spread beneath her otherwise naked body, as composed as though she’d been laid out by an undertaker. A few anklets and bracelets of coiled copper wire and gaudy beads completed her costume.

“Dead,” he snarled as he stood. He slapped the dust from his trousers in disgust, then pushed the rifle and a pair of cigar-long cartridges into my hands. “Ndaro! Shadow!” he shouted to his gun bearer and tracker as he stomped away. Stanci stumbled past him, pushing her hair back from her face.

“Did you say we hit a woman?” she asked. I pointed with Doc’s big gun at the upturned, finely-boned face of the dead woman lying at my feet. Stanci paused, her breath catching, then eased around and slid up beside me, hooking her hand behind my left arm.

“What happened?” she whispered.

“That’s what I’d bloody well like to know,” Doc bellowed as his two servants approached. The old gun bearer, Ndaro, glared in horror at the woman lying in our dusty tracks, but Shadow, Doc’s tracker, only blinked at her for a moment before turning his inscrutable gaze to the night-dark bush lining the road.

“What happened? Did you fall asleep?” Doc demanded.

“No, Bwana,” the old native answered.

“Don’t lie to me!” Doc snarled.

“He’s telling the truth,” I said. “I saw the whole thing. There was no time to stop.” Ndaro nodded in agreement.

But there was something else, something I didn’t mention because I wasn’t exactly sure what I had seen. I had been half asleep myself, with a warm bottle of German beer between my knees and Stanci’s head resting on my thigh. But in that glaring instant before the woman went bump, I thought I saw a shadow dart almost from under the lorry and vanish into the tall grass beside the road.

“Why the devil was she walking down the middle of the road in the dead of night?” Doc shouted at no one in particular. “Couldn’t she hear us coming? Why didn’t she get out of the way?”

“Was she alone?” Stanci asked. Ndaro glanced quickly at her, and I knew then that he had seen the same thing as I. Stanci continued, “Aren’t there any villages near here?”

“There’s not another village for twenty miles,” Doc said.

“Maybe she was drunk,” I said.

“How bloody drunk do you have to be not to get out of the bloody road?” Doc roared.

Shadow said something in Swahili that made Doc cut short with a startled snort, and Ndaro laughed aloud, turning away in embarrassment, hands waving above his head.

“What did he say?” I asked.

Doc looked at Stanci and turned red. “I’d rather not say, if it’s all the same to you. These bloody savages...”

“Go on, old man. I’m older than I look, and I was raised with three brothers,” Stanci laughed. “No need to watch your language around me.”

“I’d rather not,” Doc repeated, shading a deeper, ruddier red, though he could not suppress an embarrassed guffaw. “Stinking bloody savages.”

Stanci pushed my elbow to move the muzzle of Doc’s big rifle out of the dead woman’s face. Kneeling beside the body, she sighed. “Look at her. She looks like a queen of Egypt.”

“She is a queen, Msabu,” Ndaro said softly. The old Kikuyu had a fear of dead bodies and looked terrified that Stanci might touch this one.

“Do you know her, Ndaro?” Stanci asked.

“No, Msabu,” the old man denied.

“Is she Masai?” I asked.

“She looks Somali to me,” Doc said. “Probably a prostitute, or some white bwana’s girl. It’s a long way from Nairobi, and the local savages couldn’t afford a girl like that, not even the chiefs. This little accident will cost me dearly, mark my words.”

A lone male lion suddenly coughed and groaned, miles away probably, but sounding damned close in the dark. I quickly chambered the two cartridges into Doc’s Westley Richards and passed the gun to him. He snapped the breach shut, while Shadow’s head swiveled round like a small ebony melon on the skinny pole of his neck, scanning the darkness. His earlobes hung in two loops almost to his shoulders, and he leaned on a long spear as he scratched the back of one leg with the other foot. A dark, oily cloth hung from a knot tied over one shoulder, revealing every muscle and sinew of his narrow chest and long, powerful arms. He was a remarkable individual, silent and savage, inscrutable as the dark continent itself. Not so long ago, he and his kin probably would have speared to death any white man who dared to cross these lands.

“What are we going to do with her?” Stanci asked.

“Leave her,” Ndaro said without hesitation.

“We can’t just leave her here, not with lions prowling about,” Stanci protested.

“And hyenas,” I added as a chorus of howls and whoops broke out behind us.

“Leave her with an offering of beer to appease her spirit,” Ndaro said.

“That’s how the natives handle these sorts of things around here,” Doc said noncommittally. We were all too aware that if the dead woman’s body were to succumb to Africa’s scavengers, it might save Doc a world of trouble with the authorities in Nairobi.

“It’s horrid. I won’t hear of it,” Stanci said. “You men pick her up. We have to do something with her. We can’t just leave her lying in the road. We should try to return her to her people.”

Ndaro refused to touch the body, and Doc didn’t press the matter, familiar as he was with the old Kikuyu’s superstitions. He passed the Westley Richards to Shadow and motioned me toward the woman’s legs while he knelt by her head. I bent and grasped the slim, narrow ankles. Grunting together, we lifted her between us, only to find her surprisingly light, no heavier than a child. What was more, her flesh had already grown cold, though it remained as supple as though still alive.

Stanci picked up the woman’s monkey skin cloak and followed Ndaro to the lorry, while Shadow walked behind us, watching the darkness, the big double-barreled rifle slung over one shoulder and his long spear clutched at the ready.

“What was it Shadow said back there that was so funny?” I asked Doc when Stanci was out of earshot.

“Nothing. Don’t worry about it. Just savages being savages,” Doc said.

“Come on now, old man. Stanci won’t hear,” I said.

“All right, Mr. Curious. Shadow said that before she stood up, this woman was making love to a hyena,” Doc scowled.

“That’s not what he said,” I said, smiling. “My KiSwaheli’s not so good, but I know all the curse words. He never said that.”

“Have it your way, old boy,” Doc shrugged. “He saw her fellating a hyena in the road. Does that make you any happier?”

Strangely, the image this conjured up failed to fill me with revulsion. More like curiosity, especially after what I had seen or thought I had seen darting away moments before we ran her down. I thought about telling Doc about it, but he seemed quite put off by the whole subject, and I didn’t want him to think I was crazy. Our safari was nearly over. In two weeks, we’d be aboard the steamship for America.

Doc walked backward, holding the dead woman beneath the shoulders, so that her eyes, frozen open in death but not yet glazed, stared straight at me with an almost knowing smile frozen on her face.

“Aren’t hyena hermaphrodites?” I asked.

“That’s a nice thing to talk about,” Doc said.

“Well, I heard...”

“From who?”

“Ndaro.”

Doc began to laugh. Stanci leaned out the open door of the lorry, a freshly-opened bottle of German beer foaming over her knuckles. “What’s so funny?” she asked.

“Ndaro’s been filling your old man’s head with stories of bloody Africa,” Doc answered, still laughing.

She looked at the bottle in her hands. “Ndaro says we should offer this beer to appease her spirit,” she said with just a touch of embarrassment.

“He’s been at you with his stories as well, eh? Save the beer for your old man.” Doc laughed as he nodded to me. “Let’s toss her on the roof with the trophies. It’s a couple of hours to our camp yet, and I’m none too willing to share a bench all that way with this fine lady, even if she is a queen.”

Together, Doc and I lifted the woman onto the lorry’s roof rack and laid her out beside the heads of the two buffalo we’d shot that afternoon. I dropped to the ground beside Stanci and took the open beer from her. We stared up at the figure lying on our roof, the dead woman’s proud, almost Semitic nose profiled against the stars. “Hadn’t you better tie her down?” Stanci asked.

“Don’t worry about her,” Doc answered as he climbed into the lorry beside Ndaro. The Kikuyu driver sat at the wheel once more, his face strangely passive. I noticed beads of sweat clinging to his balding pate. Doc laid the Express across his lap and propped his boots on the dash. “Let’s get going. It’ll be midnight before we get back to camp as it is.” I’d never known Doc to travel in a lorry with a loaded gun, but I decided not to say anything for fear of worrying my wife.

Stanci climbed into the back seat, still clutching the dead woman’s mantle of green monkey skins. “Throw that rag out,” I said as I slid in beside her. “It’s full of lice.”

“It isn’t!” she protested. “It’s clean. It doesn’t even smell. I’m keeping it. If we can’t find her village, we’ll bury her in it.”

“We don’t have time to look for her village,” I said.

Ndaro fired the engine and we lurched away, wheels spinning up the dust.

The night grew cold. During the day, the heat beat down on you like hammer, but at night it often became cold enough to see your breath. I sipped the beer as we drove through the dust, watching over Ndaro’s shoulder as the long tawny ribbon of the flint-dusty road uncoiled into the darkness before us. It was easy enough to forget that a dead woman lay above my head, with the hypnotic hiss of the wheels cleaving through the dust putting us all half to sleep. Doc’s 1919 Ford lorry ran like silk, the engine a barely-heard purr; he kept it in immaculate condition because he didn’t like to scare away game with the noise of motors. He was a fine hunter and safari guide, and he kept as good a camp as anyone could want. He rarely mistreated his servants, except when something had gone wrong, like tonight, and he always apologized later and made it up to them. They were loyal and trustworthy because of this; Ndaro had been with Doc for six seasons now, but Shadow had been his tracker for nearly fifteen years. The cook was considered one of the finest camp cooks in all of British East Africa. Doc set a magnificent table and provided the best wine, scotch, beer and cigars that could be had in that country.

We had gone a long way this day in search of buff, the last of the big five game animals on our license, and this was the last hunting day of our safari. Doc hadn’t liked the size of the buffalo in the country around our camp, but it was otherwise a fine spot for hunting all the best game in Africa – lion, elephant, most of the more interesting antelope, leopard, even rhino, though they were sometimes difficult to find, unless you didn’t want to find them.

Now, the drive back to our last night in base camp had been ruined by this accident, this killing of the queen of Egypt in the green monkey skin cloak who fellated hyena in the dark in the middle of the road. All the joy of the day’s hunt had drained out of me with her death, and the beer was doing nothing to replace it. It tasted like tin in my mouth. I was too tired and hungry to feel it.

With only half the beer finished, I’d had enough. As I turned to pass the bottle back to Shadow, I saw something moving through the grass beside the road, just outside the light of our headlamps. I motioned for the electric torch. Shadow passed it up and I flicked it on, shining the beam out into the night. And in that flickering instant when the circle of light struck the racing grass, I saw a huge, hunched shape with a tawny, spotted hide galloping beside the lorry, keeping up with its speed, and less than five yards from the door. Then it was gone, angling off into the moonlit grassy plain, a titter of demonic laughter following it out of sight and hearing.

“That was a hyena!” I shouted.

“What’s that?” Doc asked, turning round in the seat.

“A hyena – biggest one I ever saw. It was running beside us.”

“Away from us, you mean. Probably we surprised him over his dinner by the road.”

I thought about this for a moment, realizing how much more sense it made than my own brief impression – that it was following us. “You’re probably right,” I said at last.

“Of course I am,” he said with a smile. He looked at my wife beside me. “Poor old Memsahib.”

I looked at her. She had fallen asleep again, the monkey skin tucked up under her chin. Her hair hung in strands of spun copper over her eyes, stirred occasionally by the dusty wind swirling through the open lorry. Her face, though ruddy and freckled from a month of African sun, still held something of its otherworldly porcelain beauty. Her lashes long and full rested upon her cheeks. Her lips, pale pink and moist, were parted, revealing the pearl tips of her teeth in the small, satisfied smile I knew and loved so well.

“Poor old Memsahib,” I agreed.

The whole camp turned out in celebration as we rolled off the road and into the short-cropped grass beneath the trees. Ndaro cut the engine and we glided to a stop on the soft, springy turf. They had kept a bright fire burning for our return, and we found the table set and hot baths ready. We climbed out of the lorry, stiff from the trip and the cold. Doc unloaded his gun and handed it to Ndaro, who glanced briefly at the roof of the lorry before disappearing among the shadows of the tents. Doc and I climbed up before the other servants reached us, to keep them from seeing the dead woman among the trophies. Stanci stood below us and refused to give up the green monkey skin cloak, clutching it tightly about her chin.

But we found the rack empty. The meat and trophies were still there, tied down in their bundles and matted with road dust. But the woman was gone. Doc looked at me and shrugged.

“She must have bounced off,” he said. “Ndaro!”

“He’s gone already,” I said.

“I told you to tie her down!” Stanci barked, stomping her foot. “Now we have to go back and look for her!”

“How far back do you think we should look, Mrs. Jackson?” Doc asked. “Ten miles? Twenty? We won’t find her, not with the hyena the way they have been around here since the war.”

“And don’t forget the lions and leopards,” I added. “Like as not, she’ll be long gone before we can turn around.”

“It’s a disgrace!” Stanci said. “Hugh, I think you did that on purpose.”

“Did what?” Doc asked innocently.

With a disgusted huff, she spun and stalked off to the tents, the monkey skin cloak billowing behind her. As she stormed through the press of servants, they glanced in wonder at her odd garment, before continuing on to help us unload the lorry.

Doc drew a sheath knife from his belt and began cutting through the cords holding our buffalo trophies. “Well, at least now I won’t have to pay some bloody bastard for killing his whore,” he said with a wink.

“Remind me never to invest money with you,” I said. “But what about Ndaro and Shadow? Aren’t you afraid they’ll talk, raise a fuss with the authorities in Nairobi?”

He grunted, lifted a head and passed it down to the waiting servants. “There’s no need to worry about Shadow. He’s still bloody African. Ndaro won’t talk for fear that someone will make him pay blood money for the woman. After all, he was driving, and it makes no difference to these bastards who is responsible, just so long as someone pays them their damned blood money.”

The servants crowded around the lorry now. I passed down a bundle of impala meat while Doc lifted the other buff trophy and swung it over the side, grunting and swearing at its weight.

“By the way, old man,” he said as he sat back on his heels. “It goes without saying, but I’d appreciate your not talking to anyone about what happened.”

“Sure, Doc,” I said, a little taken aback.

“I wouldn’t ask, but for the little Memsahib’s outraged sense of justice,” he explained.

“I understand,” I said. “I’ll talk to her. She’ll come around.”

“Thanks,” Doc said with genuine affection. He clapped his huge, scarred hand on my shoulder. “I wouldn’t ask otherwise. It just isn’t done, you know. But she seemed so put out by us bastards tonight.”

“I’ll talk to her, smooth things over. She’ll understand,” I said as I climbed down.

“Thanks, Yank,” he said as he scrubbed his palm across his lips and glanced worriedly at the darkness beyond our campfires.

She didn’t understand, of course, but after the first bottle of wine, Stanci seemed not to care so much. She finished her glass while still soaking in the canvas bath tub. I sat on a trunk beside the tub and polished off the bottle while she scrubbed. Then we changed places. She dressed while I bathed, then left me alone in the tent to dress while she hunted up another bottle.

The bath helped to wake me up and put a keen edge to my hunger, so that when I stepped out of our tent, the sight of the table laid for supper started the juices rushing into my mouth. There sat Doc, swirling a cup of the giant killer between his broad, scarred hands. Stanci stood across the table from him pouring herself a sundowner while a boy waited with water for mixing.

Before Doc stood a man in an oily leather toga, promising an interruption to our dinner. He was a local chieftain of some sort from one of the villages beyond the river, leaning on a stick decorated with bones and tufts of fur from God knows what animal. But he had a noble round skull on his bony neck and a voice that spoke with authority. As I approached, he was complaining to Doc at length in a language I couldn’t understand.

Doc did me the favor of translating without my even asking. “This fellow is a hetman of the local village,” he said while he passed me a tumbler of the giant killer. “He wants us to shoot some hippo meat for them tomorrow. He says they haven’t any meat and they prefer hippo.”

“Will we have time?” I asked, gratefully accepting a glass of scotch from Stanci. “When do you plan to break camp and pull out for Nairobi?”

“We won’t leave until the afternoon,” Doc answered. “If you want, we can pop down by the river after breakfast and see what’s swimming about.”

Stanci edged around the table and sank into a canvas-backed chair, sighing contentedly. The old witch doctor started and glared at her. She nestled down with her glass and propped her mosquito boots on the table. The witch doctor turned and began a new tirade, his voice shrieking to the heavens. For a moment, I wondered what the old fellow was going on about, shaking his stick and rattling his bones, but then I noticed him eyeing the monkey skin cloak wrapped around Stanci’s shoulders.

“Constance, why don’t you throw that thing away?” I asked as the old chieftain continued his dissertation. Doc nodded diplomatically the whole time. “It’s upsetting the native for some reason. Take it off, why don’t you?”

“It’s warm,” she said sullenly.

“It’s hideous,” I said. “We have blankets, if you’re cold.”

“What’s the matter with you? This is an authentic piece of Africa, as authentic as you can get. I think it’s beautiful,” she said, rising from her chair. She struck a regal pose, clutching the tattered edges of the cloak to her breast. “Don’t you think I look like an African queen?” she asked.

The old native paused and glared open mouthed, eyes nearly popping from his brown skull. One quivering hand reached out and touched Doc’s knee. The witch doctor bent close and whispered fiercely into Doc’s ear.

“You’re likely to catch an authentic African disease,” I said to Stanci. “Something you may not be able to cure.”

“Theo, you’re no fun,” she muttered sullenly as she sank into her chair. “You ought to try to live a little. Don’t be so cautious. Just for once, try to let a little adventure into our lives.”

“Adventure?” I exclaimed. “You’re the one who didn’t want to come to Africa. I practically had to drag you onto the boat.”

“So I was wrong. I love Africa now,” she said. “Did you want me to hate it?”

The old witch doctor grew louder and shook his stick at Doc. “What is he saying?” I asked.

“I’m not sure,” Doc answered. “It’s something about trouble with a pack of local hyena, but I’m not sure what it’s all about. I think he wants us to kill some hyena that have been sneaking into their village at night and carrying off children and drunks.”

“That means I’m safe,” Stanci laughed. “But you and Theo had better watch yourselves.”

Doc smiled at her. “That’s a good one. Have another and you’ll feel better.”

“I feel fine. I’m in fine spirits, thank you very much” she said.

“Who do you think is the child and who is the drunk?” Doc asked me.

“Both of you,” Stanci answered. “You’re both children and you’re both drunks, but I love you both. Hopefully soon.”

“She’s tight,” Doc said. He turned to Stanci. “Mrs. Jackson, I believe you are tight.”

“Quite,” she said with a smile. “Good of you to notice, Hugh. Ask me again later.”

The witch doctor shouted something and shook his stick.

“What did that bastard say?” Stanci asked. She seemed more put out than either of us by the witch doctor’s presence. She pouted prettily, but she seemed to be avoiding looking at the old man.

Doc frowned at her. “He wants to use his magic on our bullets,” he said. “He says our bullets are no good without his magic.”

“Tell him we’ll shoot his hippo without his help,” I said, more perturbed with Stanci that I was with the witch doctor. I’d seen her drunk before, but she had always been a nice drunk – a little tipsy and she was ready for the pillow. But then again, I’d never seen her drink scotch, and she was already pouring herself a second. And that on top of half a bottle of wine back in the tent, during our baths.

“It isn’t the hippo he’s worried about,” Doc said. “It’s Fisi, the hyena. He thinks our bullets are no good against him.”

“Has he seen those buff we shot? Has he seen our lion skins?” I asked. “What does he really want, Doc? What do you suppose is his game?”

Doc asked him diplomatically, and the old man answered. “He wants one cartridge from each of our big guns. Probably for the gunpowder to mix in his potions.”

This surprised me, as I thought he was only after baksheesh. Feeling more generous, I said, “Is that all? Tell Ndaro to give him one from my .375, unless he wants Msabu’s Winchester as well.”

“He says Msabu’s Winchester is our little gun and his magic can’t help it,” Doc said. The old man nodded as though he understood and agreed.

“Go on and give him what he wants,” I said, “so we can eat our supper in peace. I’m starving.”

Doc summoned Ndaro out of the shadows between the tents. The old gun bearer appeared, eyes wide in awe as he gazed at the wizened old chieftain. Doc told him what was wanted and Ndaro hurried off to fulfill the order. With a trembling hand and bowed head, he offered the bullets to the old man – one of my .375’s and one of Doc’s big No.2 Nitros. The witch doctor took them in his bony claw and stalked off into the African night, sticks and bones a-rattle. Ndaro watched him go, obviously shaken by his visit.

Read Part 2

The Monkey Skin Cloak Pt. 2

2008-10-31T13:08:00.000-07:00

With the old man gone, we pulled our seats up to the table and the servants gathered around to fill glasses and carve meat. As it was so late, Esa the cook hadn’t prepared a full meal. Instead, they had roasted meat from the day’s kill over the bright fire burning at the center of our camp. Esa served up roasted buffalo tenderloin carved into thick steaks that smoked in the chill night air, and slices of spicy Impala heart and kidneys cooked on forks held close to the fire’s embers. Hunks of brown bread and white cheese, and deep goblets of red Italian wine, completed the fare.

Doc, as usual, doled out the delicacies, splitting the kidneys between us while Esa heaped Stanci’s plate with tenderloin. He then reached for the heart. Stanci held up her plate, smiling at him.

“Do you want some of this?” Doc asked, eyebrows wrinkling his pink forehead in surprise.

“Please.”

“You never liked the sweetbreads before,” Doc said.

“I want to try them. That’s the heart, right? I’d like to try some before I leave Africa.” She seemed sober enough now. The firelight twinkled in her bright green eyes.

Doc forked a slice of Impala heart onto her plate. She settled back with a smile and picked up her fork and knife. She cut a piece and put it in her mouth, testing it, rolling it around her teeth before chewing. She smiled. “It’s good,” she said as she set to the meat and devoured it lustily.

Doc looked at me for a moment, then tucked in, knife sawing and fork clicking, while servants filled and refilled our goblets and the pile of hot smoking meat gradually diminished. Eventually, Doc sat back, tugging at his belt with a sigh. I had already finished, and he joined me in watching Stanci scrub her plate with a hunk of bread. She popped this into her mouth, then looked round the table for more while she chewed. She frowned when she saw there was nothing else to eat.
“Still hungry?” Doc asked her.

“No, I’m finished,” she answered with some disappointment. Doc nodded and the native servants quickly cleared the table. They brought Doc’s whiskey, two tumblers, and a box of cigars. Esa stood by with a flaming brand from the fire to light us up. Doc poured the first round, mixing the whiskey with water from a canteen. Then Stanci pushed her glass across the table to him and he filled hers as well, although I noticed he mixed hers with more water and less whiskey. I chose a cigar and lit it from Esa’s stick. He then lit Doc’s cigar. Stanci leaned back in her chair, wrapped in her monkey skin cloak, and watched us smoke.

“This is lovely,” she said. “Why is that you never truly appreciate a place until you are about to leave it?”

“One of the mysteries of life,” Doc sighed.

“We’ve had a wonderful time, Doc,” I said.

Stanci smiled prettily. “The night’s still young,” she said.

Doc yawned, stretching like a bear. “I hated to take you so far away from camp to get your buff, but there weren’t any around here worth shooting,” he said.

“It was fine. We got to see some of the country,” I said.

“And kill a native,” Stanci added with eyes twinkling in the firelight.

Doc frowned at me. “Still, the trip’s used up your last day here. Tomorrow you start for the coast. The lorry from Nairobi will be here in the afternoon.”

“We had a good time, didn’t we Stanci?” I asked.

“We most certainly did,” she answered, beaming happily over the rim of her scotch. “Africa is a marvelous place. I find that I have no desire to leave. I could live here forever, just like this, out in the bush under the stars with the lions and the hyenas and everything. So long as there is plenty of Hugh’s excellent scotch and Esa is doing the cooking. Is that why you stayed here, Hugh?”

“It was more the poor quality of the ivory hunting back in Blighty,” Doc answered. “But this place does get into your blood.”

“We didn’t see any snakes,” I said.

“Wrong time of year,” Doc answered with a nod.

“It isn’t at all like in the books. I half-expected to find that lions lived exclusively on hunters and their hapless wives, and that every elephant you came across had it in for white people. But the only real danger seems to be walking on the road at night,” Stanci said, still smiling charmingly.

“Mrs. Jackson is one of our bright comedic stars,” I said to Doc.

“She ought to write a book,” he replied bitterly.

“Oh, I intend to,” she said. “It will be a marvelous tale of murder and intrigue. I’ll call it, 'The Sleepy Driver and the Loose Rope.' Of course, I’ll have to use a pseudonym. And it’ll have to be a man’s name. But I’ll be sure not to use your real name, Hugh.”

Doc looked at me, his face splotchy red. “There’s no need for you two to be up for the hippo hunt. It’s a messy business, no real sport. Butchery, really.”

“Oh, butchery! I’d love to see some butchery, provided it’s done properly this time,” Stanci said with a fierce smile. Her teeth gleamed unusually red in the firelight.

“But it’s late, so I’d better be going on to bed,” Doc finished.

“That’s a wonderful idea,” Stanci said. “Why don’t we all just go to bed?”

“You two can stay up and enjoy your last night in camp, if you like,” Doc said, ignoring her. He stood and tucked his shirt into his pants.

“Well, good night then,” I said, rising. We shook hands vigorously. “Thanks. We’ve had a fine time.”

“And we’ll have fine times still,” Stanci said, laughing. “See you in a little while, Hugh. Wait up for me, darling.”

“In the morning,” he replied. “See you in the morning.” Without looking at her, he walked across the open, lighted area and ducked through the flap of his tent. A few moments later, the paraffin lamp inside his tent flickered and went out.

I turned to Stanci. She had risen from her seat and stood wrapped in her monkey skins, fingering the box of cigars still sitting on the table. “What was that all about?” I asked angrily.

“Nothing,” she said. “Just a little teasing. I didn’t want to hurt his feelings by not seeming interested in all the amenities offered by the Great White Hunter.”

“What’s got into you, Constance?”

“Nothing!” she protested. “Don’t worry your pretty head about me. I’m fine.” She flipped open the cigar box and removed a cigar. She held it up to her nose and sniffed.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“I thought I might try one. Last night in Africa, you know,” she said.

“You hate cigar smoke,” I said.

“It’s different when you’re the one doing the smoking,” she said as she eased around the table and stood beside my chair. She rested one hand on my shoulder, letting the tips of her fingers brush lightly across my ear. “That’s what you always tell me, darling. Besides, I wanted to dip it in my scotch, like old Doc does. Make room.”

“Room for what?”

“So I can sit.”

I scooted my chair back from the table and she settled herself in my lap, wrapping one arm around my neck, and crossing her legs. The green monkey skin cloak fell aside, revealing her pale white thigh, bare to the hip.

“Jesus Christ, Constance!” I exclaimed, glaring around at the camp to make sure the servants weren’t watching. Thankfully, we were alone. “Haven’t you had any clothes on this entire time?”

She smiled and bit the tip of her cigar. “Is this how you do it?” she asked.

“What’s the matter with you?”

“It’s only a cigar, Theo,” she said, the smile fading momentarily from her lips. Then she brightened again. “Let me light mine from yours.”

She took my cigar and held its burning end up to her unlit one. Gently, as though she had done this many times, she drew at her cigar, her cheeks drawing inward, eyelids drooping. The flame gradually caught, white smoke escaped from her lips, and she smiled and returned my cigar as she puffed contentedly at her own.

“A cigar is a fine thing,” she said at last, holding it at arms length to examine it. “I should have tried them before now. I should have done lots of things before now.”

“Like what?” I asked.

“We’ll have to come back next season, Theo. I’d like to hunt something next time, too, not just spend my time sitting around congratulating you chaps on your bravery. It must be marvelous to be a killer. I want to kill something big and marvelously dangerous.”

“You hunted,” I said. “You shot nearly every day.”

“Francolin and guinea fowl don’t count, dear. I’m talking about big game. I want to shoot a lion. Not elephant, because that’s just butchery. But a big shaggy-maned lion would be a grand thing to kill.”

“We’ll see,” I said. “It’s late. We should go to bed so we can get an early start tomorrow. I think I’d like to go with Doc on that hippo hunt.”

“And we must be sure to hire Doc when we come back. It wouldn’t be the same without Doc around, and lean beautiful Shadow, and old Ndaro. Funny old Ndaro.” She looked down at me, her green eyes glistening in the firelight. “What did Shadow say?”

“About what?”

“Back on the road. You asked Doc, didn’t you? What did Shadow say that made them all laugh?”

“It’s not something to talk about,” I said.

“Oh come on, Theo. It’s bloody Africa. I want the full experience. Don’t hide anything from me.”

“Very well, then. You asked for this. I hope it makes you sick. Shadow said that, just before we ran her over, the woman had been doing with a hyena what your mother told you never to do with me,” I said.

“What do you mean?” Stanci asked coyly.

“You know very well what I mean,” I answered.

“You mean this?” she asked as she slid out of my lap and onto her knees. Tossing aside her cigar, she placed her hands on my thighs and spread my legs apart. “You mean that beautiful woman was doing this to a hyena?” she asked. Her fingers toyed with the buttons of my trousers.

“Yes,” I said, my voice catching. “That’s what Shadow says he saw.”

“And do you believe him?” she asked. Her fingers splayed out, sliding down the inside of my thighs and coming to rest on my knees once more.

“I saw it, too.” I answered.

“Did it excite you?” Stanci whispered.

“No!” I said.

“Did you think she was beautiful?” she asked.

“For a native, yes.”

“What do you mean ‘for a native’?” Stanci said, rising imperiously. “She was a queen! If she were here now, where I am, would you stop her?”

“I don’t know,” I answered, but the look in her green eyes drew the words out of me. I couldn’t stop myself. “No,” I said. “I wouldn’t stop her.”

Stanci laughed hugely, throwing back her head and laughing at the stars. I feared the natives would hear her and come out to look. Then, looking sharply down and smiling wantonly, she shrugged out of the monkey skin cloak and let it fall about her feet. She stood before me, naked and pale as a virgin. “And am I as beautiful as she?” she asked.

“Yes,” I answered. All thoughts of the natives vanished from my mind. I no longer cared if they watched, or if Doc watched. I wanted them to watch. I wanted them to see Stanci’s pale, elfin body in all its glory beneath the gloriously swollen African moon.

She dropped to her knees once more. “And will you stop me?” she panted.

“No,” I groaned.

I didn’t remember going to bed at all, but I woke with two very clear impressions. The first was that a hyena was near, for I heard the echo of its cry. The second was of Stanci stirring under the blankets of our two-man cot. I thought for a moment that the hyena had disturbed her, until she threw one arm across my back. Her bare leg slid across my legs until she was almost on top of me, with me lying face down beneath her. She nestled her chin on my shoulder and her hair fell down over my cheek. Outside, the fire had burned low, and there was a wet sharpness in the air that spoke of dawn. A couple of hyena chortled from the direction of the river, swiftly building into a chorus of madhouse giggling.

Stanci settled more of her weight onto my body, then she grabbed my wrists and pinned them above my head.

“What are you doing?” I asked wearily.

“My turn,” she growled into my ear, answering both questions.

Sighing, I tried to turn over. Despite just being awakened, the hunger I heard in her voice didn’t fail to arouse me. But she held me down, purring excitedly at my struggles. “What’s the matter, Theo?” she asked.

“Let me go so I can turn over,” I said. “We can’t do it this way.”

“Yes we can,” she whispered.

“How?”

“Just relax.” Her voice had grown husky, guttural; her breath was hot and reeked with some unnamable odor. “This is something you should experience once in your lifetime, darling, just so you can know how it feels.”

“Constance, let me up. What are you doing?” I asked.

“Relax, darling,” she whispered. “Remember what you said to me that night in Springfield? It only... hurts... once...”

And then I felt it – a probing around my buttocks, a living thing seeking, pushing, finding. I convulsed, all the muscles of my body tightening as I fought to keep it out. I heard Constance sigh, yet it was not Constance. Her fingernails dug into the flesh of my wrists, but they were not her carefully manicured nails prone to breaking – they were hard as horn, stabbing, tearing. I pressed up, and her weight was like that of a dozen men. The blood pounded in my temples, my teeth ground together. I felt the thing press harder, more insistently, until it broke through the tightness and tore into me.

Crying out in pain, I twisted beneath her and fell back in the cot, ripping it out of me. She was surprised by my maneuver, but maintained her grip on my wrists. The move had nearly wrenched my arms from their sockets. For a moment, I looked into her face, and though it bore the outward physical features of the woman I had married, this was not my Constance. This was an animal. The dim firelight outside our tent shone in through the flap, kindling fires of animal lust in her green eyes. The smile that twisted her face was one of unquenchable hunger. I didn’t know her at all.

Doubling my legs to my chest, I thrust upward, flinging her off me. She crashed among the camp tables and trunks. In an instant, she was on her feet, glaring at me, and I rolled off the other side of the cot to put it between us. She was nude save for the cloak of monkey skins. Her lithe, pale body writhed lustfully as she crouched as though to spring at me. Her small pink nipples were tight and hard as acorns, her disheveled hair clung to her damp cheek, beads of sweat stood out on her chest and belly and thighs. But the firelight threw her shadow large and menacing against the inside of the tent, exaggerating the length of her arms and claw-like fingers and the size of her head.

And then she edged more fully into the light, revealing a huge, tumescent organ protruding from the fleshy lips of her labia. Its skin was crimson splashed with black, as big as the arm of a young girl. It looked like some alien root clutched between her thighs, only it was alive, throbbing, dribbling a thin strand of clear liquid.

With a bestial scream, she launched herself across the tent. I grabbed the cot and flung it in her face. A stream of insane gibberish spewed from her lips while she tried to claw through the cot. I shoved with all my strength, forcing her back. Screaming expletives and giggling hysterically, she tumbled over a trunk, and I pinned her to the sandy ground with the cot. She howled, writhing beneath me as she tried to claw her way free.

By that time, Doc had burst through the tent flap, a 12-guage double-barreled Greener held at the ready. Seeing me fighting for my life, he shouted, “What is it? Hyena?”

“It’s my wife!” I screamed back at him, just as she slithered out from under the cot. I retreated, but not before she was on her feet and at me again, clawing at my face and biting anything that came within reach of her snapping jaws. She sank her teeth into my ear, ripping off a sizable chunk. I howled in pain, ducking away from her as she shrieked with insane delight.

Doc stood in the tent flap, staring stupidly at us as though he didn’t quite believe what he was seeing. She turned and lunged at him, and only at the last instant did he throw up a hand to protect his naked throat. Steel-trap jaws snapped shut over three of his gnarled, callused, sun burned fingers, snapping the bones like so many matchsticks. Without thinking, he clubbed her across the forehead with the barrel of his shotgun, momentarily staggering her with a blow that would have knocked a grown man sprawling on the ground. But in two heartbeats, she was back at him. He swung again, but this time she caught the barrel with the flat of her palm. With superhuman strength, she wrenched it from his hands and sent it flying into a corner of the tent.

I dove, catching her around the knees and tumbling her to the ground. Growling, she twisted round and tore my back into hamburger with her nails. Doc caught her around the neck with his arm, but too slowly to avoid her flashing teeth – she gnawed at his forearm while her claws flailed at his head, seeking eyes, ears, any vulnerable point. He maintained his hold despite the mauling, and together we lifted her between us. She writhed and bucked, throwing us, two grown men, around the tent as though we were children.

But slowly, as we held her free of the ground, her struggles lessened until finally she lay still between us. She was barely panting, while we sucked air like two mountaineers. She gazed at us languidly while her hideous alien member stood throbbing with weird life and dribbling fluid from its tip.

“Do you like it?” she purred though barely-parted lips. “I want both of you I want one of you in my cunt and the other in my ass you fuckers.”

“Constance!” It amazed me that I could still be shocked.

“Suck me, Theo. I want you so badly I want to put it in your mouth,” she giggled insanely, yet mocking me with my own words. “It’s your duty Theo other wives do it I promise to pull out before I cum honey I won’t cum in your mouth.”

“Shut up!” I screamed hysterically.

“Go on you faggot you fucking queer,” she spit. “You know you want it you’ve just never had the balls to get your knees dirty I know who you want you want that...”

Doc mercifully clapped a hand over her mouth, wincing as her teeth sank into the heel of his palm. “Clearly she’s lost her mind,” he said, stating the obvious.

“Are you a real doc, Doc?” I asked.

He nodded. “There’s some morphine in the medical kit,” he said. Turning his head, he shouted for Ndaro.

“What’s wrong with her?” I asked.

“We’ll sedate her, then we can figure out what to do.”

In a few seconds, Ndaro appeared at the door wearing only a kikoy wrapped around his hips, but he had Doc’s big gun and a five-pack of cartridges in his hands. Thankfully, Doc blocked Ndaro’s view into the tent. The rest of the camp had been roused by the screams and were gathered around outside, but not too closely, just in case whatever it was we were fighting in here broke loose.

Doc spoke to Ndaro over his shoulder. “Go and bring the medkit. Hurry. But leave the bloody gun.”

After laying the gun on the ground just inside the tent, Ndaro vanished without a sound.

“Let’s see if we can set her down and get that... thing covered up before someone sees it,” Doc said. I nodded and checked to make sure there was room on the floor. I kicked aside a corner of the cot to clear a space, and we gingerly began to lower Stanci to the ground.

“Now, Mrs. Jackson,” Doc said softly, “we’re going to put you down. You have to be good and not fight us. Will you be a good girl?”

Her only response was to release her hold on the heel of his palm long enough to shift her head and bite his thumb. As we laid her on the ground, her back arched and she began to thrust her hips in the air rhythmically, gasping and moaning. I threw a blanket over her, but there was no hiding that hideously probing member. If anything, the blanket only made it seem larger and more prominent.

“You’re going to have to hide it,” Doc said.

“How?” I asked as I stared helplessly at the thing.

“Sit on her legs, then use your hands to press it against her belly.”

“I’m not touching it!” I exclaimed.

“You had better do something, Mr. Jackson. Ndaro will be here any second, and if the blacks catch sight of that thing...”

I glanced around for something, anything to lay across her to hide it, but there was nothing within reach and I dared not release my hold on her legs. I looked up and saw Ndaro crossing in front of the campfire, a big metal box swinging from one hand. Cringing, I reached out with both hands and grabbed hold of the thing near the tip.

Her bucking suddenly grew more violent as she thrust it up through my fist. She spit out Doc’s hand and loosed a long moan of pleasure. “Theo, oh God, Theo!” she cried. “Stroke it, Theo, yes!”

“Shut her up, will you?” I said as I shoved my knees into her thighs, forcing her hips to the ground. Leaning forward, I bent her thing until it lay against her stomach. She continued to squirm and moan until Doc managed to stuff a corner of the blanket into her mouth.

Ndaro entered the tent and squatted next to my wife. He laid the big metal medkit on the ground and opened it. Doc pointed to a compartment. “Morphine,” he said. Ndaro nodded once and set to work filling a bulb syringe. He had a surprisingly delicate and professional touch with what I assumed would have been unfamiliar medical equipment. Doc’s kit was surely one of the best in all of British East Africa, rivaling the stores of some American hospitals.

“Is Msabu hurt?” Ndaro asked as he handed the syringe to Doc.

“Yes. Now go and tell Esa to boil some water and tear up a sheet for bandages,” Doc ordered. “And send Shadow to me at once.”

“What’s the water and bandages for?” I asked when Ndaro had gone.

“To give them something to do,” Doc answered abruptly. He jabbed the needle into my wife’s arm and squeezed the bulb. Within seconds, I felt the wire-cable muscles of her legs relax. Her eyes rolled back, and she sighed as a hot, wet stain seeped through the blanket beneath my hands.

“Jesus!” I cried, recoiling from her. Her member rose up cobra-like, swaying menacingly, the stain in the blanket spreading. But otherwise, she lay still, breathing deeply and contentedly.
Doc looked at me sympathetically, taking note of my condition while ignoring his own injuries. “She took a sizeable chunk of your ear, old boy,” he said.

In the madness of the moment, I had forgotten. I clapped one hand to my head and felt the blood covering the side of my face and neck, clotting in my hair.

“Let me clean that up for you,” Doc said as he shifted across her prone body and sat down next to me. “I don’t see the other half lying anywhere. She must have swallowed it.”

This realization only added to my horror. My hands began to shake so badly that I doubt I could have lit a cigarette, had I one to smoke. I didn’t, but I badly wanted one at the moment.

“What the hell is wrong with her?” I asked as he set to work on my ear. “And what is that... thing?”

“I take you to mean she has not always had... it?” Doc asked diplomatically.

“Hell, no!” I exclaimed. “You think I would...”

The old hunter shrugged as he continued examining my ear. “I could sew this up for you if your missus hadn’t broken my fingers, but you’re going to need a new hairstyle. As for your wife, I don’t know what’s wrong with her. If I were a Catholic...” His voice trailed off into thoughtful silence.

Doc had cleaned off most the blood from my ear before Shadow made his appearance. Neither of us heard his approach. We looked up to find him standing in the door of the tent, his eyes wide as he gazed at my wife’s still-engorged member rising beneath the blanket.

“Christ!” I swore, lunging across her body in a pointless attempt to hide what he had already seen.

“Don’t worry,” Doc said. “I asked him here so he could see this.” He pulled the tracker deeper into the tent. Shadow entered reluctantly, his eyes flickered over us, acknowledging and appraising our wounds in one instant.

“Have you seen anything like this before, Shadow?” Doc asked.

After a moment’s consideration he nodded. “Fisi,” he said. “Hyena woman’s magic.” Though we had been in camp for a month, these were the first English words I’d ever heard him speak.

“What the devil is hyena woman’s magic?” I demanded.

“Msabu is filled with the spirit of this woman we killed tonight,” Shadow said. “This woman we killed is not a woman, she is a spirit of Fisi, the hyena people.”

“This is ridiculous!” I said, turning to Doc. “You don’t mean to tell me you believe this... this...?”

“You do not believe?” Shadow asked. His voice held a bitter accusation. “You sit here next to Msabu who is your wife, who this night has grown a prick like a hyena and has the strength of three men, and still you do not believe what I tell you?” He looked at Doc with undisguised contempt. “This white man is a fool.” He turned to leave.

“Wait,” Doc said while glaring at me.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “In my country, we’re taught not to believe in such things. To have it thrust upon you...”

“This magic is very bad even when you have known of it all your life,” he said.

“What can we do?” I asked. “Maybe we should send for that witch doctor.”

“He would not come,” Shadow said. “This camp is surrounded by the hyena people.”

Doc surged to his feet, snatching up his Westley Richards in his good hand. “You’ve seen them?” he cried.

“They wait in the tall grass outside camp. They wait for her to come and reclaim her spirit from Msabu,” Shadow said without moving.

“Show me,” Doc ordered.

“You cannot kill them,” the tracker said fatalistically. “Your bullets cannot harm them, for these bullets have no magic, only noise and fire, which the Fisi do not fear. And their queen commands them. If she commanded it, they would not shrink from God.”

“Well, what the devil are we supposed to do? Just sit here and wait for them to come and slaughter us while...” I began, but Shadow cut me off with a hiss. He nodded toward my wife.

She had sat up while we were talking. The blanket had dropped into her lap, revealing her small, firm white breasts and hiding her huge bestial organ in folds of gray cloth. Her head hung down, chin against her white breastbone, wet curls of copper-colored hair spilling over her closed eyes. But her lips moved, speaking in a barely audible whisper.

“What the...” Doc swore quietly. “There’s enough morphine in her to down a rhino.” He knelt beside her and tilted his head to listen. A puzzled expression crossed his face. He leaned closer, almost touching her shoulder with his forehead. I tensed, waiting for her to spring on him.

“What’s she saying?” I asked.

Doc shook his head. “It doesn’t make any sense,” he said in a low voice. “It sounds like... it sounds like Fanagalo, but there isn’t a native speaker of Fanagalo within three hundred miles of here. I only know a smattering of the language.”

“Ndaro speaks this language, Bwana,” Shadow said.

Doc turned to the door of the tent and shouted into the firelit darkness. “Ndaro!” There was no answer. “Ndaro!”

“Yes, Bwana,” a frightened voice said some distance away. It sounded like it came from up in the air.

“Come here at once,” Doc said. “I need you.”

“I do not think so, Bwana,” Ndaro answered. “I do not think I can come to you.”

“And why not?”

“Because there is very large Fisi standing next to the tent.”

Read Part Three

The Monkey Skin Cloak Pt 3

2008-10-31T13:02:00.000-07:00

Shadow knelt quickly beside my wife, his head tilted to listen. After a few moments, he hissed, “This is not Fanagalo. It is the old language, the language of the ones who came before. She is calling to them.”

“Who?” I asked.

“The hyena woman’s people,” Shadow said. “They hear her. They have come.”

At the tracker’s words, Doc broke the breach of his gun, dumped a pair of asparagus-long brass cartridges into the twin chambers, and snapped it shut. Shadow looked at him and shook his head, then placed his fingers to his lips.

Outside, we heard a light footfall and a quiet scuffling, as if someone were searching for a way beneath the canvas wall of the tent. I snatched my .375 Holland and Holland Magnum from the floor and dug three of the big solids out of a box of cartridges I found beside the cot. I crammed them into the magazine as fast as my fingers could work, then slid the bolt back and fed one into the chamber. I took another handful of cartridges and laid them on top of a nearby trunk withiin easy reach. Meanwhile, Doc silently slid the safety catch on his own rifle and raised it to a ready position.

His eyes narrowed, and I noticed a sharp inward bulge in one wall of the canvas, outlining a huge, dog-like snout. Doc nodded at me, making sure that I had seen it, and then took aim. I held my breath, waiting for the cannon-like explosion from his huge .577, while my own gun shook in my hands.

But suddenly, he spun round, and the gun exploded as he staggered back. A huge, mottled hyena, its underbelly wet from the dew-soaked high grass outside the camp, lunged into the tent and clamped its teeth onto his right arm. For one stunned moment, I watched the thing chew his arm into hamburger while it tried to drag him from the tent. Then I raised my rifle and fired.

With a yelp, the creature released his arm and leaped backwards out of the tent. Doc collapsed beside my wife, who had not moved. I stepped to the doorway, working a fresh cartridge into the chamber, and fired at one of a pair of shadows I saw slinking near the fire. It rolled over and came up already moving in an ungainly, crouch-legged lope toward the tall grass at the edge of the camp. I fired again, rolling it over again, and this time it didn’t rise.

I turned and handed the rifle to Shadow, who was already passing Doc’s big gun to me. “Our bullets are no good against this magic, eh,” I laughed as I took the gun from him. Over his shoulder, I saw the canvas wall split as through cut by a knife, and a huge, misshapen head pushed through, fanged jowls slavering and rheumy yellow eyes burning like fire. I pushed the muzzle of Doc’s big gun against the side of its head and pulled the trigger.

The recoil of the weapon took me by surprise. I had never before fired such a massive gun. Its power was brutal. It was a wonder the trigger guard didn’t rip my finger off as the weapon bucked wildly from my hand. As it was, the recoiling barrel struck me a glancing blow across the side of my face. I fell to one knee, staggered, with the index finger of my right hand bending back at an unnatural angle, dislocated and broken. Of the hyena whose head I had surely obliterated, there was no sign. Not even any blood, just a clean, burnt-edge hole in the canvas about as big around as my thumb.

By this time, Doc had recovered somewhat. With Shadow’s help, he was able to make use of his Westley Richards. Propping the heavy double-barreled rifle on Shadow’s shoulder, he stood in the doorway of the tent, firing at anything that moved outside (and no doubt permanently deafening his tracker in the process), while shouting to the staff to stay in the trees if they didn’t want to be shot. When he had used up all his own cartridges, he switched to my .375, awkwardly pushing the bolt back with his undamaged off hand while his good arm hung at his side, sheeting thick red blood onto the sandy ground.

Eventually, I was able to stand and take the gun from him, but by that time, he had used up all my cartridges as well. I looked out into the open space of our camp and found it littered with low, dark humped shapes. The old man leaned against a table, his face deathly white from loss of blood, his whole body alive with nerves. Shadow knelt beside him, patiently wrapping his shredded arm in a sheet.

My wife had not moved throughout this deafening naval barrage, save to tilt her head heavenward. Her eyes were open but rolled back, revealing only the whites, while her lips continued to writhe in whispered chant. Shadow had noticed this as well, and we knew without his saying so that there were more Fisi out there in the dark, waiting for us.

“There’s only one thing for it, old boy,” Doc said in a quivering voice as Shadow lit a cigarette and placed it between Doc’s lips. I didn’t respond, dreading what he was about to say. He nodded to his tracker. I stepped between Shadow and my wife, eyeing the panga knife protruding from a fold in the native’s toga.

But Shadow turned, and still kneeling, began to draw a circle in the sandy, blood-soaked soil with his finger. “The hyena people are led by their queen and their magic is woman’s magic. But the lion people are led by a king, and they are the blood enemies of the hyena people. Lion magic is men’s magic,” Shadow said as he removed a pouch from beneath his greasy toga. “I am not a sorcerer like the old man from the village. There is nothing I can do against the magic of this monkey skin cloak. But the claws of the lion may give us some protection.”

“The cloak? Are you saying that ratty old fur is part of this?” I asked.

Shadow nodded, blinking his heavy lids. “I would not have let Msabu keep it,” he said.

“Why didn’t you say something, then?” I asked angrily.

“Would you have believed me?” he said.

“He’s got you there, old boy,” Doc laughed weakly.

“But what are you suggesting...”

Sensing my fear, Doc shook his head. “No, it’s not Msabu’s fault. The cloak’s the key – we’re going to have to destroy it. We’re going to have to give it to the fire.”

Shadow opened the bag he had taken from his toga. “This is men’s magic of my people. It has things to protect a man from the magic of women and from witches like this hyena queen,” he said as he upending the bag into the circle he had drawn in the soil. “There are lion’s claws and whiskers, hair of...” his voice ended in a hiss and he recoiled involuntarily, his eyes wide with awe.

Among the various oddments from his medicine bag lay two cartridges – one a .577 Nitro, the other a .375 Magnum. Both cartridges had been painted with weird, white and red geometric shapes, with a jagged green line like a lightning bolt running from blunt tip to brass firing pin. I saw nothing to fear from them, but Shadow seemed genuinely frightened, where I had never before seen him afraid of anything, not even of a charging lion.

I picked up the cartridges and looked at them. “This looks like one of mine, Doc. It’s my brand.” I handed the longer cartridge to him.

“This is one of mine. I can tell by the load. I have them specially ordered,” Doc said after examining it. “Shadow, did you take these?”

“No, Bwana,” the tracker answered fearfully. “I have never seen these cartridges before. I do not know how they came to be here.”

“Maybe that old sorcerer slipped them into your bag while you weren’t looking,” I said. “We did lend him a couple of cartridges tonight. Maybe...”

Doc looked at Shadow for a moment, then shook his head. “Let’s not look a gift horse in the mouth, eh?” He passed me the .375 and I fed it into the chamber of my gun. It fit reluctantly because of the native’s paint. Doc loaded his own weapon, then told Shadow to take the monkey skin cloak from my wife’s back. Still, she didn’t move.

“You stay here and cover me from the tent,” Doc said. “Protect her, and don’t let anything get to her.” I nodded. Doc looked at Shadow for a moment, unspoken words passing between them in the silent language that had grown through their years of shared danger.

Then, without a backward glance, they moved out into the camp. Shadow drew his panga knife and held it at the ready, while Doc covered the shadows with his Westley Richards. Because of his injuries, he was forced to carry the heavy gun left-handed, with the barrels clutched awkwardly in the crook of his mangled right arm. He would be lucky to get off a shot if something attacked, and it would be a miracle if he hit what he aimed at. He gripped the seedy green monkey skin cloak in his teeth, having no other hands to spare. Maybe it helped to keep his teeth from chattering.

They were halfway to the fire when it came. I saw a dark blur to my left, emerging swiftly from the tall grass at the edge of the camp. I swung my rifle up, but the thing moved with supernatural speed, crossing the clearing in three bounds. Though obviously a hyena, it was many times larger than the spotted hyena I had occasionally seen loping through the scrub miombo we had hunted for the past month. It was like some primordial hyena, man-tall at the shoulder, transported from an age when men hunted these plains with flint and bone and fire.

Doc turned, though the creature had made no sound that I could hear. But before he could fire, it bowled into him, flinging him across the clearing like a child struck by a careening lorry. With dizzying speed, the monster reversed direction and leaped at Shadow, who was even then raising his panga for a beheading slash. But even the native tracker, long trained in the hunt, was too slow to match the monster’s quickness. In lunged beneath his slashing blade and caught him by the throat. Blood spurted from Shadow’s lips as he cried sharply in surprise, then his scream was cut short as the monster’s teeth sheared through muscle, tendon and bone, severing his head in one rending crunch. Shadow’s body fell like a sack before it, his head still gripped in those awful fangs. With a quick toss, the hyena gulped it down, swallowing heavily. I saw the lump pass slowly down its throat. Then its yellow eyes locked on mine.

Slowly, I lifted the rifle to my shoulder. My mind screamed for speed, but my body seemed frozen, my arms like wood and the gun nightmarishly heavy. Closing one eye, I peered down the gun barrel at the dark form hurtling toward me, jaws agape, four ivory parentheses of death grouping a mottled pink tongue dripping with gore. The warthog ivory bead of the foresights danced like a moth across its snout, forehead, chest, never seeming to remain in the same place for longer than half a blink, until finally it settled like a roulette ball into the V of the rear sights. I aimed at the plunging, low-sloping head for a heartbeat, then dropped my aim a touch and squeezed the trigger. My dislocated and broken finger screamed with pain against the heavy pull. As the gun exploded, I closed my eyes, waiting for the blow that never fell.

At the sound of a stumbling step and a muttered curse, I opened my eyes. I found Doc, amazingly still alive, standing at the door of the tent, his big gun gripped by the end of the barrels and dragging the ground behind him. Between us lay, not a huge, primeval monster, but a man. And a white man, at that. He was naked as the day he was born, his broad, sun-burned back hairy as an ape’s. He lay on his stomach, head turned to the side and eyes glazing, one outstretched hand almost touching my foot. A grapefruit-sized hole between his shoulder blades quietly oozed blood into the sand.

Doc stood over him, shaking his head in amazement.

“What the hell is going on, Doc?” I asked, still not sure of what I was seeing. “Who is this, and how did he get here?”

“His name is Robert Bell-Warren, a good friend of mine. He was a bloody fine white hunter, one of the best, until he walked into the bush one night and was never seen again. His servants said he was bewitched, but the authorities in Nairobi didn’t believe it and hanged the lot of them for murder.” Doc shuffled around the body, his eyes never leaving it. “As for where he came from, you shot him, so you should know.”

“I shot a hyena,” I protested.

“I know that. I saw it with my own eyes. But where the hyena fell, there lies Robert Bell-Warren with a bullet hole in his chest big enough to stop an elephant. I don’t know how we are going to explain this. Likely, they’ll put us all away for good.” He moved past me into the tent, and after glancing for a moment at Stanci, who still sat entranced, he lowered himself onto our cot. Gritting his teeth against the pain of movement, he dragged his gun into his lap and checked the bore for obstructions.

I looked at the dead man’s body again, noticing a curious pattern of scars that covered his shoulders, arms, back, and neck. Also, someone had woven a fair quantity of colored beads and copper wire into his shaggy black hair and beard. The evenness of his sunburn showed that he had been living naked in the bush for quite some time. “I wonder if we don’t all need putting away,” I said. “This is insane. It can’t be real.”

“Bloody Africa, old boy,” Doc coughed wearily. He snapped shut the breach of his Westley Richards. “And there is still one thing to do,” he said.

I looked at my wife, who still sat naked on the floor of the tent, her head thrown back, eyes rolled up, lips muttering. “The cloak,” I finished for him.

Doc started to rise, his face blanching white with the effort. I put my hand on his shoulder. “This time you cover me, old boy,” I said.

He nodded wearily, settling back and resting the gun across his lap. I looked around the tent for some kind of weapon, a spear, anything. Finally, I saw the butt of Doc’s double-barreled Greener sticking out from under an overturned table. I snatched it up, checked the breech to make sure it was still loaded, and snapped it shut. Doc handed me a pair of triple-aught buckshot shells. “Choose your target,” he lectured slowly, as though each breath was a labor. “Don’t shoot from the hip. Pick a target and follow through. Make sure of your shot, and don’t shoot until you are sure. It’s better to be right than fast.”

“I know, old man,” I said. “I know all this from before.”

“You’ve only got four shots, so make them count,” he finished.

“And you’ve only got one,” I responded with a smile. “Don’t waste it. And for God’s sake, don’t miss.”

“I won’t,” he answered.

We looked at one another for an infinitely long moment, he sitting on the cot with his tattered, blood-soaked clothes, me standing there naked, an unfamiliar gun gripped in my sweating hands. He nodded once, his bloodshot eyes assuring me that I could do this.

I turned, facing the dark empty space between the tent and the dying fire. The false dawn was just beginning to gray the sky, but down here beneath the trees and the scrub hills of the African vlei, it was still as black as a mamba’s soulless eyes. I looked around and saw the trees filled with terrified Africans, all staring down in mute witness to the insane comedy playing out beneath them. Beyond the perimeter of the fire, there was no light, no green reflection of eyes, no shadow, only a true Stygian blackness of mythic dimensions, and a silence as though this were the only place in the world.

I leaned forward onto the balls of my naked feet and drifted out of the tent, covering the dozen yards to Shadow’s headless corpse in less than two heartbeats. I slowed, staring in fascinated awe at the body that only moments before had been electric with life. Now it was only so much meat for the jackals and ants. He didn’t look real. He looked like a scarecrow carved of mahogany that had lost its pumpkin head. And then I remembered that that pumpkin head had been swallowed whole by the white man now lying dead in my tent. I moved on.

Casting about, I soon located the monkey skin cloak where Doc had dropped it when he was attacked. It lay in the dust a few yards from the fire. I knelt quickly beside it, but now a strange revulsion to touch it came over me. That some simple inanimate object, sewn together from the flayed hides of a score or so verdant monkeys, should be the source of such horrors as I had witnessed, seemed not only impossible, but the very embodiment of nightmare-wrought madness. A queer impression that I might indeed be insane and hallucinating took hold of me and overcame all other considerations, denying even the truth of my own senses – the bodies littering the camp, the reek of blood and death, the coppery taste of fear flooding my mouth.

I looked at the cloak and said to myself, if I pick that thing up and fling it on the fire, it will be the last step into total madness. It’s only a tattered old cloak. This nightmare is not real, it is the product of heat stroke or malaria or some undigested bit of bloody Africa. If I accept this as reality, I will never escape it. So I refuse to accept it. I refuse to destroy this cloak, for if I do, I destroy myself with it.

I turned back to the tent.

Dark and beautiful as the clouds skimming before the moon, limned in silver, tinkling with bells, she stepped out of the tall grass beyond the tent like some black Aphrodite emerging from the foam. And indeed, the grass seemed to withdraw from around her like the surf. She writhed with life, like a flame given flesh yet retaining its insatiable destructive hunger. Her naked body glowed with lust, her small breasts, like two halves of a pear, glistened and swelled. I smelled the unrequited ache of her loins; her odor struck me like a thunderclap, dizzying my senses. I felt my own member swelling, hardening into a stone that would never be eased until it fleshed itself inside her like a hungry spear.

She crossed the space between us with nightmarish slowness. The swelling throb of desire became unbearable, a pain like being stretched on a rack – I felt I might come completely out of my skin. She seemed not to walk but to float in a lazy, wanton teasing dance. All the civilized restraints were stripped from me by her coiling movements. I wanted only to crush her to me, to impale her mercilessly, to eat of her flesh and feed her my own flesh, to take and take again, to obey an irresistible need, a profound and primal urge to spread my seed as far and wide as I could before swift death took me.

Finally, she twined her long, supple arms around my head and brushed my cheek with her full lips. She drew back from my sudden kisses, gazing at me with her dark, inscrutable eyes. Her hard nipples, like two halves of a walnut shell, pressed painfully into my chest. I sank to them, searching hungrily with my mouth, but she twisted her body away from my questing lips. The wiry furze of her loins brushed my swollen member, sending a jolt through me that weakened my legs, and slowly she sank before me, her lips brushing my shoulder, nipple, belly. Her fingers raked down the sensitive flesh of my ribs, raising deliciously painful welts. I felt her teeth sink into my swollen head, then scrape down the length of my member, tearing my flesh. I staggered in ecstasy, drawing free of her voracious mouth.

She stood up before me, rising imperiously, a look of triumph and lust on her face. Her bloodstained lips drew back in a ferocious smile of sharp, ivory fangs. She growled lustily as she swirled the monkey skin cloak up and over her shoulders, fastening it about her neck by two claw-like clasps.

Then she stepped toward me again, mouth parted hungrily. Her clawlike hands gripped my shoulders and her nails, hard as horn, dug into my skin. She pressed me down, down the length of her body, past the dark round flat of her belly, and my weakened legs buckled. I fell to my knees with my eyes locked on the curly, dew-speckled hair of her loins. The smell of her sex sang across the nerves, heightening my lust to almost unbearable levels.

I gazed up at her, wanting to witness her pleasure as I took her. For a moment, she smiled down at me, lips parted to reveal her dripping canines. Then, her face dissolved into a red and gray haze. Gore splashed across my upraised face. She jerked once and fell backward. I sat back in the dust, staring at the hyena thrashing out the last moments of its life before me, its head a mass of blood, brains, teeth and shattered bone. The echo of Doc’s gun rang in my ears. I turned, half dazed and blinking through the blood, to see my wife, pale and naked and alone before our tent. She dropped the heavy rifle and folded like a lifeless marionette to the ground.

Ndaro draped a blanket over my shoulders and pressed a tall glass of pure, pale Highland single malt into my fist. I sucked at it greedily, feeling the warm burn light me up from the inside out. Esa stirred up the fire and added sticks to get a blaze going, while the other camp staff dragged the bodies out into the tall grass. Although the sun had crawled less than a handspan above the red horizon, vultures already circled overhead.

Doc limped past me, dragging something. He flung it on the fire, and I smelled the sharp, bitter odor of burning fur.

He slumped heavily into a folding canvas chair that someone had set out for him. Ndaro poured him a large belt into a battered tin cup. Doc thanked him, then tossed it back with hardly a shiver. He dropped the empty cup to the ground.

Ndaro bent beside the old man and retrieved the cup, poured another round. He stood holding the cup, his malarial yellow eyes staring into the distance. “Msabu asks if we are leaving today,” he said. Then he drained the cup in a single gulp.

“Bloody hell yes,” Doc said. “You bastards had better get me to hospital before septicemia sets in, otherwise it’s going to be a long, smelly ride to Nairobi.”

“Tell her we are leaving soon. Tell her we are leaving now,” I said. The old gunbearer nodded, turned, and strode away, the bottle of whiskey clutched protectively to his chest.
“How is she?” Doc asked me.

“She seems fine,” I said.

“Does she remember anything?” he asked.

“She says she doesn’t remember a thing,” I answered.

Doc glanced away, looking out over the tall grass toward the river. After a few moments, he said, “But you don’t believe her, do you?”

I stared into the crystalline amber depths of my whiskey glass, no longer sure what I believed.

©2006-2008 Jeff Crook

Roid

2008-10-09T12:32:00.000-07:00

This story was originally published in Sol's Children by DAW Books. It is partially inspired by the work of Richard Hoagland, though much of the idea for the story and the alternate astronomy behind it was born long before I read any of Hoagland's theories.

Tubo starts awake in his gravi-chair, Earth impact alarm screeching. He has fallen asleep. Yawning, he aborts the autocorrect three seconds before burn initiation. He then fingers the controls, feels the Walter Scott awaken and move beneath him, the deep volcanic throbbing, a dragon stirring under the floor. The timer starts and he targets a trajectory in the naviscreen that will bring the ‘roid back to an orbital approach. He also keeps a close eye on stress indicators in the docking piles, for they weren’t built to withstand the repeated strain of these corrective burns. Walter Scott’s engines are among the most powerful machines ever built, powerful enough to rip the Walter Scott apart should a single docking pile fail. Each pile is sunk 500 meters into the ‘roid and fixed directly to the structural frame of the ship. If one pile were to break, the engines could rip the other pile out of the ship before Tubo could even react, leaving it imbedded in the ‘roid with the ship’s guts still attached and dangling, like a bee sting ripping out of the bee. Tubo remembers being stung by a bee; he has not been on Earth in 37 years. Three seconds have passed. He lifts his finger off the trigger. The engines power down and the ship shifts slowly back onto its support coils, gradually settling in the .1G pull of the ‘roid’s gravity. He checks fuel reserves, mentally calculates how much that one cost him, then glances at the naviscreen.

In the screen, Mars is a left parentheses in 12-point font, a bloody fingernail clipping, the old warrior god with his back turned. Earth hides behind Sol, that bright point of light to the left and a little lower than Mars. Below this, a long irregular gray tongue of carbonaceous chondrite stretches out into the uniform blackness of intrasolar space. Already, it has drifted .01 points back toward an impact trajectory.

At the bottom of the naviscreen, a small fossil is visible poking up out of the pockmarked meteoric stone. It looks like the flare of a hipbone. Other shadows suggest a skull, legs, possibly an arm, and part of a tail. Tubo has been looking at them long enough that the surprise has worn off. Now they are merely puzzling, and a little frightening. He noticed the bone as he swung around the backside of Jupiter and the shadows cast by the rising sun gradually resolved into these suggestive features.

Tug captain Tubo Prohng shifts his weight in the gravi-chair. His ‘roid is the size of Manhatten, a fat haul, but it is displaying some unusual gravitational potentials. Every hour or so, wakened by the Earth impact alarm, he makes small adjustments to its trajectory, but even these require the expenditure of vast amounts of fuel. And this eats away at his profit margin. Every three-second burst of the momentum engines of the Planetary Hauler Walter Scott burns 314,159 units of fuel. At current market price, that’s close to a million EUs. He keeps a close eye on the Belgrade fuel markets through a DeepSat node, but it usually depresses him beyond words. This one is going to cost him, but it is too late to withdraw. He could radio for help, but that would cost even more. It is his ‘roid. He captured it and steered it into Earth orbital approach.

Seventy-three years ago, amateur astronomer Maxwell Franck catalogued this unremarkable piece of rock and named it Delilah. Mr. Franck never explained why. According to modern science, which hasn’t changed much in the last hundred years, Delilah had been in a regular orbit within the Asteroid Belt near the Trojans Resonance for nearly ten billion years, until Tubo Prongh drove the docking piles of the Walter Scott into its stony heart, fired up his ungodly engines, and nudged her into a slingshot trajectory around Jupiter, some 337 days ago.

Between the hourly burns, Tubo Prohng has time to study and meditate and form his own inexact theories about the history of the solar system. But he has no time for sleep, nothing beyond these brief naps. He has not slept longer than an hour in 744 hours, and he cannot, not if he doesn’t want the Walter Scott’s navigational computers to initiate their own indelicate corrective burn and ruin his fortunes. The strange gravitational potentials working on Delilah have him puzzled, but he doesn’t care to think of them. If he wants to make a profit, there is nothing he can do except to keep firing up Walter Scott’s engines for brief nudging burns. He is not ashamed to admit that he is not the equal of gravity.

But this bone, this curious arc of hip shadow thrown across the bottom edge of his naviscreen, almost like an afterthought, an oh-by-the-way, a wrinkle in the rug over which he trips. There was life here once, even here where no life should be, life so long that it could lay down its bones and turn them to stone. Such thoughts people the 3º Kelvin shadows outside his ship with very real ghosts. Tubo Prongh has never been to Mars and seen its phantoms, though he has passed it seven times, and is approaching his eighth.

His grandfather could never have imagined such voyages. There was a gentle old white-whiskered man whose three great loves were pigs, children, and wives, in that order. He cared little for the world beyond the rice fields of his village. Tubo Prongh often thinks of his grandfather on these voyages to the Asteroid Belt, for he is fast approaching the age at which his grandfather died. But at eighty, his grandfather had been a beaming toothless monkey with one foot in the funeral pyre, while Tubo is still in the genetically-manipulated prime of his manhood. He has a boy at home, two years old, and a wife of twenty-three (the law still only allows him one of each). Tubo is wealthy and still considered handsome; he has all his original teeth. He has a 2,000 square meter geodwelling inside a rock in space above the dying Earth. He has a New Antilles bank account filled with digits.

Yet he cannot bear the clamoring of home life, the shrieking demands of wife and child. He prefers the dark empty spaces of his thoughts and his studies and meditations. He prefers the humming muscle of the Walter Scott, the Zen simplicity of its stark interiors juxtaposed with the extravagance of Io off his starboard bow passing into the shadow of Jupiter. He loves running the Kirkwood Gaps in search of asteroids of suitable mass and composition to sell to the military and habitat developers back in Earth orbit, like the whalers and ivory hunters of olden days. He likes his mercenary selfhood. Only he is alone, bleakly alone, on a ‘roid that won’t behave.

He leans forward in his seat and stares at the left edge of the screen. There is a boulder visible on the ‘roid’s horizon. He hasn’t noticed it before. It concerns him, because it might indicate the ‘roid is actually a conglomerate bound together by weak gravitational forces. This might explain the gravitational potentials he’s been fighting. But his initial geological survey indicated solidity with only minor faulting near an impact crater on the opposite side. He is sure the boulder wasn’t there before. It casts a rather long shadow across the surface, reaching almost to the ship. Tubo drags a navigational marker line across the screen so he can note any movement or change in either the object or its shadow after he performs the next correction. Then he calls up the Lisbon fuel markets on a com screen.

Tubo starts awake, Earth impact alarm screeching. It seems only a minute has passed. He reaches for the autocorrect abort button, but his hand pauses twenty centimeters above the board. The seconds continue to click down to burn initiation. Tubo stares at the naviscreen. The boulder has moved. Its shadow has reached the ship. It isn’t a boulder, it is a man-shape, bipedal, thick brachiated arms, large round head. Tubo blinks. His hand drops with .31 seconds to go.

Still watching it, he fingers forward the controls, the engines wake. Out on the ‘roid, the man-thing staggers, pauses, then starts to walk again, slowly, with the exaggerated movements of someone wearing gravitational boots. It is pulling something behind it on a type of travois. Its face is hidden in shadow. Tubo powers down the Walter Scott. He turns to the communications screen, pulls up a broad band com channel, initiates a scan.

A sound crackles low in the FM band range. The computer pauses to examine it, tunes, filters. A voice emerges into the empty air, speaking English “…inside the ship. Hello inside the ship are you reading me?”

Tubo waits a moment before touching the com. He takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly. He looks at his tongue in the reflection of a dark screen, grimacing. It occurs to him that he might be hallucinating, or insane, or asleep. He feels fine, just a little tired. He touches the com, but still he doesn’t speak. He lifts his finger without making a sound, unsure what to say.

“I heard that. Who are you? What’s that ship?” the voice says, a little out of breath. It is a male voice, English accent.

Tubo leans forward, trying to see closer into the navigational screen, to see a face. The head turns slightly as the figure stumbles. A glint of gold flashes where the face should be. tubo touches the com switch and says softly, blankly, “This is the Planetary Hauler Walter Scott.” He lifts his finger.

“Bloody wog. You sound like a bloody wog. Where are you from, woggy?”

Tubo touches the com, calmly, “Identify yourself.”

“Identify your fucking self.”

Tubo touches the com, repeats, “Please identify yourself.”

“Grover Nuttbalm, you wog bastard.”

Tubo laughs, fingers the com, “Please identify yourself.”

“My name is Grover Nuttbalm. Doctor Grover Nuttbalm. Look it up, wog.” He never pauses in his progress toward the ship. He is close enough now for Tubo to see what he is dragging on the travois – two small metallic canisters, flat, like old satellite battery casings. He wears an old-fashioned environment suit, once white but now dirty gray, patched, bulky, late 20th century NASA vintage, with a gold-visored helmet.

Tubo pulls up an archive search on the communications screen, enters NUTTBALM >ALT NUTTBAUM, GROVER, DR. It takes a few seconds for the information to arrive via the old NASA Deep Space Network. He reads it.

He reads it again.

Tubo touches the com. “Dr. Nuttbaum, it has been some time.”

“Not long enough, wog,” the figure responds as it disappears at the bottom of the nav-screen.

“I’m afraid there isn’t any way for you to get inside this ship, Dr. Nuttbaum,” Tugo says. “Not from where…” he pauses, his finger still on the com. It is impossible. Impossible for a man to survive this long along on an asteroid in an environment suit. “How…?”

“...survive?” the voice asks, laughing. It grunts, and he hears the gurgling of the environment suit through the com. “How did I survive? You’d like to know, wouldn’t you? Make yourself a fortune back on earth with my technologies, wouldn’t you? Fountain of youth, all that rot. To hell with you, capitalist pig.”

“How did you get all the way out here, Dr. Nuttbaum? We weren’t sending anything but robots out this far when you disappeared.”

Laughter over the com. There is a strange quality to the doctor’s laughter, even over the com. Tubo cannot identify it. He touches the com, his lips hang open, breathing the stale recycled air through his teeth. It is air that has been off Earth longer than he has. He has breathed it so many times now, it feels like a part him. A part of him that fills the entire ship, a part of him running like blood through the ducts to the recycling plant deep in the ship’s bowels. Suddenly, he feels something is wrong, an imbalance in his extended chi, a blockage of fiery yang.

Then an anchoring pile indicator flashes yellow. He removes his finger from the open com, and panting laughter again fills the small speaker. He punches up a ship diagnostic, initiates it, leans into the chair and without relaxing the sudden tensing of his back, waits, his brows furrowing over his dark eyes. While he waits, the anchoring pile indicator switches to red. The diagnostic returns with a volcanic stress reading deep in the pile’s bore chamber. Impossible. It is impossible. He reminds himself of this. He runs the diagnostic again. The ‘roid has been cold for ten billion years.

“You’d better pull out or you’ll lose it,” the doctor says over the com.

The indicator light winks red once more, then stays lit.

“What are you doing?” Tubo demands now. A warning appears on the nav screen. “You couldn’t cut through that pile, not even if you had a plasma saw.”

“Do you know how the pyramids were built?”

“The pyramids? What do the pyramids have to do with anything?” Tubo barks without touching the com. His fingers dance across the boards in front of him, pulling up stress projections, running simulations, calculating trajectories, fuel and engine readings. A geological window opens on his screen.

A shudder passes through the ship, rattling the little plastic container of dietary supplements sitting next to the naviscreen. “What was that?” Tubo asks no one. The geological window scrolls off a seismic recording of the event, showing epicenter and magnitude.

“I’ll bet you are wondering what the pyramids have to do with anything.”

Tubo slams the com with his fist. “Whatever it is you are doing, you had better stop. If you damage that pile, do you realize what will happen?”

But the doctor ignores him. “The pyramids have everything to do with everything. I’ll bet you think I’m suffering from paranoid delusions. Space madness, we used to call it.”

Another ‘roidquake shakes the Walter Scott, almost tossing Tubo from his gravi-chair. The geological window dutifully records the event. Meanwhile, stress indicators on the damaged pile reach critical, while the secondary pile is now showing non-fatal damage. A metallic groan echoes up through the ship. Tubo runs a repair schedule, inserts the mean estimate into his navigational calculations.

He sits slowly back in his chair, his eyes rising to the navigational screen. .5 outside safe orbital trajectory, and increasing. “Do you know what you’ve done?” he whispers. His fingers fumble along the buttons on the arm panel of his gravitational chair, thumbing through various monitoring cameras affixed to the ship’s hull. One shows him the intrasolar comdish hanging from a bent bracket. He clicks through several more images, finds the orbital antenna array. It looks operational, but its range is limited to .1 light minutes. Not powerful enough to call for help.

He leans forward and presses the com. “Do you know what you’ve done?” he asks softly.

“Do you know, no one has solved the mystery of how the pyramids were built. Oh, they think they know, simply because they know a way to do it. But there are always other ways.”

Tubo continues flipping through the monitoring cameras. He finds the port docking pile camera. A grainy gray image appears, showing the doctor in his suit sitting on a rock beside his travois. The two battery casings lie beside him. The pile is sheared almost in half, is guts spitting magnesium sparks. A spiderweb of fracture faults spread several dozen meters across the ground in all directions.

“Just because you have a solution that works doesn’t mean the mystery is solved.”

“Do you know what you’ve done!” Tubo screams.

“Of course I know what I’ve done, you stupid wog. If you light up those beautiful momentum engines of yours without uncoupling from this rock, you’ll tear your ship apart. So unhook and leave. I haven’t compromised your safety unless you do something stupid. This is my home. You’ve no right to steal it.”

“This rock is headed into an impact trajectory with Earth!” Tubo cries shrilly.

“So how can we expect to solve the mysteries of space if we don’t even know how the pyramids were built?”

“Shut up about the pyramids, ok?” Tubo shouts. He keeps his finger on the com. “Just shut up. The pyramids aren’t important. I need to contact Earth and get help, or else this rock is going to destroy everything down there. Do you have radio equipment able to contact Earth?”

“Yes.”

“Great,” Tubo sighs. He punches up the undocking procedures and initiates them.

The doctor says, “I’ve been monitoring Earth broadcasts since I arrived here. I hear all about you bloody capitalists from your bloody capitalist media, twenty-four bloody hours a day. I don’t know how you stand it When the BBC went private, I knew it was time to leave Earth. I had more money than I knew what to do with selling back nuclear waste to the various space programs. The funny thing is, my family became wealthy leasing storage space for nuclear waste in the first place.”

With the remaining docking pile withdrawn, the Walter Scott rides lightly back on its support coils. A brief burst from two steering rockets is enough to lift it free of the .1G pull of the asteroid. The pocked surface of Delilah begins to draw away.

“Then, when I invented the momentum engine,” the doctor continues, “I intentionally used nuclear waste as its fuel. Thought it would make for a good way to get rid of the stuff, don’t you know, quit poisoning the earth. Instead, I created a market. Nuclear plants built everywhere just to produce waste, not even making electricity. I wanted to become a hermit. But there weren’t any mountains left that didn’t have an advertisement painted on their slopes with genetically-altered trees. So I came out here in a ship I financed myself, the first man to visit the Asteroid Belt, and I didn’t even get a write up in Science/Nature.”

As the Walter Scott continues to rise, Tubo switches through several cameras until he finds one pointed directly down. The doctor still sits in his environment suit beside the severed docking pile. He is already tiny, insignificant.

“You know, if early rockets had used fossil fuels instead of hydrogen and oxygen, we’d already be living among the stars. You might have been born under a different sun, wog. But capitalists can’t make money selling what can be had for the trouble of dipping your hand in the nearest ocean. That was the beauty of burning nuclear waste. It was a finite resource made suddenly valuable, and mostly in the possession of poor countries that had agreed to accept it from large industrialized countries for the sake of a little cash injected into their outmoded and uncompetitive economies. But there wasn’t enough to meet consumption demands, and now they’re destroying the earth, making it uninhabitable, just to make more of waste, so bastards like you can come out here and drag back asteroids for rich capitalists to build houses on safe and high above the clouds spewing from your reactors. You bastards have even used up your nuclear weapons making waste to burn. Now, militaries keep arsenals of asteroids ready to de-orbit and drop on whoever isn’t playing the game according to the rules. We’ve gone back to throwing stones at one another.”

Tubo thumbs the com. “How long will it take you to reach your communication equipment?” he asks.

“I can’t contact Earth,” the doctor answers.

“What do you mean? You said you have the equipment…” Tubo’s voice trails off.

“I do. I use it to melt water ice.”

Tubo sits stunned for a moment, his finger prodding at the com.

“I’m not going to call someone in to help you steal my home to make weapons for your capitalist military.”

“You’ve destroyed the Earth,” Tubo whispers. “You’ve done a million times worse that all the militaries in the world.”

“No I haven’t.”

“Yes, you have,” Tubo whispers. He thinks of the green fields of this grandfather’s farms, the pigs in the mud, the women young and supple and old and hoary, and a naked child standing in the doorway of the house. He is the child that he sees, a silvery streak running from his nostrils to his lip. He has been crying, wakened from a nap by a dream. This dream.

“No I haven’t,” the doctor taunts.

“Yes, you have,” Tubo insists.

“So what if I have? What possible difference could it make?”

“Everyone will die. By the time I reach com range, it will be too late to divert it. A dozen planetary haulers couldn’t divert it.”

“Do you know how the pyramids were built?”

“Shut up about the pyramids! Shut up about the pyramids. I don’t want to hear about no damn pyramids! All life on Earth will be destroyed.”

“When has all life on Earth ever been destroyed? You think you can destroy it with one asteroid? And yet you take it upon yourself to control the destiny of the entire world, all for a little profit?”

“It’s perfectly safe. It’s been done hundreds of times,” Tubo says.

“No it isn’t. Look at the situation you are in now.”

“You aren’t supposed to be here!” Tubo screams. He grasps the control, fires a steering series to turn the Walter Scott around and slow the ship’s ascent.

“Yet here I am. I could just as easily be a flu virus, or a faulty processor board, or a weak docking seal, and the same space rock would be hurtling along the same collision path and all life on Earth would be destroyed. You take for your own uses without consideration for the people who can’t get out of the way. The Earth deserves destroying if it allows capitalists like you to exist.”

“I’m just a small businessman, trying to make a living. I’m not a statecorp,” Tubo says. He punches up a trajectory projection, then begins running simulations. “You’ve no right to judge me, Doctor Nuttbaum. You don’t know me at all.”

“I’ve every right to judge you, wog. You tried to steal my home.”

“I didn’t know you were there.” He watches the simulations play out, with Earth impact the inevitable result each time.

“You think that just because it somebody’s name isn’t on it, you can take it? How does that make it yours?”

“Standard salvage law, Doctor. You know that.” He looks up at the naviscreen as the last simulation plays itself to an inevitable conclusion. The screen then snaps back to forward view, showing him the bloody fingernail paring of Mars. A thought occurs to him. He enters adjustments, then initiates a new series of simulations.

“The law of the jungle, you mean. The law of the scavenger. Finders keepers losers weepers, you mean.”

“Is that any less noble than intentionally steering a Manhatten-sized asteroid into an Earth impact?” Tubo asks, a grim smile spreading across his face as he watches the simulations play out.

“I haven’t done that, wog.”

“Yes, you have, Doctor.”

“No I haven’t.”

“Yes, you have,” Tubo says. He compares the results of the projections produced by the simulations to his available fuel supply. He then pulls up the stress specs of the Walter Scott’s spaceframe and hull.

“No I haven’t.”

“Look, Doctor Nuttbaum, I don’t have time to argue with you,” Tubo says. There is only one thing to be done. It isn’t to ram the ‘roid. That was his first idea, but the Walter Scott doesn’t have enough mass to counteract the ‘roid’s odd gravitational potentials. He grasps the controls and fires a steering sequence which takes him slowly across the sky of Delilah. In his screen, he sees the doctor stand up and watch him pass overhead.

“What are you doing, wog?” There is a note of concern in his voice.

“I’m going to push this rock into a Mars impact trajectory,” Tubo says calmly, victoriously.

There is a pause, then the doctor says gently, “What’s you name, captain?”

“Tubo Prohng.”

“You don’t have to do this, Tubo,” the doctor says. “How old are you? Are you married?”

But Tubo ignores him. “The force of the engines will probably crush the hull of this ship. But at least it can be done. There’s only a few small communities on Mars. The chances of an impact near one are negligible. It’s a chance I’m willing to take. To save Earth.”

Tubo steers the Walter Scott nose-first into a soft descent, aiming for a point three meters in diameter directly over the ‘roid’s adjusted estimated center of gravity. The push must be a direct push with the nose of the ship, as the remaining docking pile isn’t strong enough to withstand the force.

“Have you had your child yet?” the doctor asks. Tubo can no longer see him in his monitors. The doctor is beyond the ‘roid’s horizon, almost on the opposite side.

The blunt nose of the Walter Scott nuzzles up against Delilah with a scraping noise that echoes through the ship. She looks so close in his screens, Tubo feels like he could almost reach out and touch her.

“You don’t have to do this, Tubo,” the doctor says. He is running now, almost, if you could call running – a prolonged forward fall. Tubo cannot see him. But he can hear his voice in the com and know that he is running.

“Why not? Will it ruin your fun? You won’t get to die knowing you destroyed the world that you hate?” Tubo asks as he powers up the engines. The structural frame of the ship groans as the engines begin their inexorable push.

“Power back your engines, Tubo. Listen to me. This asteroid isn’t going impact Earth unless you keep trying to steer it into an Earth orbit. I came here to stop you, but I knew you wouldn’t stop unless I made you.”

“It’s too late. I don’t believe you,” Tubo says. “How can you possibly affect this ‘roid’s trajectory? You’re old momentum engines weren’t powerful enough.”

“Do you know how the pyramids were built?” the doctor asks. He is huffing into the com speaker of his helmet.

“I’m not listening to you anymore, Doctor. In a moment it will all be over, and you’ll be on your way to Mars,” Tubo says.

“You saw the fossil, didn’t you Tubo? You saw it. It was right there.”

Tubo pauses. The ship shudders throughout its frame, rattling. He hears bulkheads buckling. The air suddenly grows oven hot. “Yes,” he says.

“Haven’t you ever noticed the relatively low amount of crater density visible on most asteroids? You’ve been to the Belt a few times. Have you ever noticed it?” He is still running.

“Yes.” The ship lurches to starboard, and Tubo fights to keep the ship upright, its forces aligned in a vector which will guide the ‘roid into Mars impact.

“Planetary geology says that this is a result of an impact breaking the planetoid-body into smaller asteroid bodies, exposing surfaces to cratering relatively recently. But my analysis indicates a low amount of impact fracturing in this ‘roid’s crystalline substructures, while surface samples show that the surface of the ‘roid has only been exposed to sunlight for some 200,000 years. If you search planetary geology databases, you’ll find that most asteroid theory was formed and set in concrete a hundred years before the first visit by a craft capable of making a detailed analysis of an asteroid within the Belt.”

“So,” Tubo says, his teeth grinding. He is nearly blind from cryogases bursting from environmental systems. The nose of the ship is crushed, and his board is glowing with hull stress warnings. He blinks away the film to check the naviscreen and finds that the ‘roid is almost within a Mars impact trajectory.

“Listen to me!” the doctor shouts. He stops, gasping, bent over with his hands on his knees.
“Power down and listen for one moment! The 200,000 year old event, coinciding as it does with catastrophic changes in the Martian atmosphere and the emergence of modern homo sapiens on Earth, can only mean one thing. There was a fifth inner planet, and something had happened to it. Maybe it was some kind of catastrophic event, the planet exploding, but that really isn’t the way things happen in Nature. Likely it was something less spectacular if not less violent, a simple sheering of tidal forces as it passed through the Roche Limit of some large wandering body. There isn’t enough mass in the Asteroid Belt to form a planet because most of it was pulled away by whatever destroyed it.”

“Almost there,” Tubo hisses.

“The residents of that planet sent their children in escape pods to Earth, but those children arrived without their parent’s culture to guide them. They adopted the most advanced technology available on Earth – stone tools. But not all their knowledge was lost. Some passed it down. Some never forgot it. They built the pyramids, Tubo, using the same theories that allowed me to use the weak solar energy all the way out here to outmuscle your momentum engines. I discovered writings here on this asteroid, Tubo, writings that explain…”

In one wracking scream of metal, the Walter Scott’s three momentum engines tear through the ship’s superstructure in less than a microsecond and gouge their way sixty meters into Delilah before exploding. The now-hollow hull of the Walter Scott and a 200 hundred meter diameter of rock are blown free of the asteroid’s gravity. The pieces spray out into space, mingling, twinkling like fairy dust. Doctor Nuttbaum watches it a glittering arc appear above the ‘roid’s horizon, spreading and dissipating, a colorless rainbow, even as the shockwave passes beneath his feet, tossing him like chaff a dozen meters high. His gravity boots float him back to a surface jumbled and broken.

Delilah gradually returns to its original trajectory, a trajectory that will bring it past Earth and back into its original place in the Trojans Resonance, 12.3 Earth years from now.

©2002-08 Jeff Crook

Middenstead

2008-09-30T14:11:00.000-07:00

This story originally appeared in Game Trade Magazine, obviously during my Tolkien period. It was written for the Sovereign Stone setting.

Crockery tinkled on the shelf above the hearth, where a fire of dried dung smoldered beneath a dented copper pot. Pyhram’s knobby hand trembled as he set the spoon beside his plate and tried to swallow the food that had suddenly turned to clods in his mouth. A low grumble shuddered through the stone floor and walls of his small abode, slowly mounting to a growling thunder, like an approaching avalanche. Dust sifted past the thick, sooty beams that held up the low roof, sifted down onto his upturned soot-stained face.

He looked into the low coals of the dung fire, watched the gray smoke rising from it, and began whispering a chant under his breath. The smoke coiled about the cooking pot and began to glow with some inner light, hanging in the air and no longer pulled by the draft of the chimney. An image appeared in its midst – a fierce dwarven face, beard blowing in the wind. Pyhram’s breath caught, the chant died on his lips, and the image vanished as the smoke boiled up the flue, free of his spell. He blinked and sighed before pushing himself wearily to his feet.

The heavy wooden door creaked as he pulled it open by its leather cord. Outside, a late autumn sun slanted its golden rays into the combe were his farm lay. His homestead was cut into the steep slope of the hillside above a small natural grotto that served as his barn. A rail-and-stone pen meandered around the edges of a brown wallow, where a lone motherless calf bawled in fear at the sound of the approaching thunder. In the valley below, a crisp wind rippled through acres of tawny grain.

A half dozen hideously naked chickens, half through their molt, scratched in the dirt near the door. Pyhram looked at them in weary disgust. The wind blew the stink of their middens into his face, even as it carried to his nostrils the scent of the open steppe beyond the valley, the wild grasslands that were his birthright.

Still, the thunder grew, though the sky was a clean washed blue and the air as clear and bracing as springwater. He felt the thunder through the thick soles of his boots, felt it thrilling in his joints and bones, even as his stomach knotted in fear. A rusted axe hung from a roof beam protruding from the cut earth above the door. Pyhram took it down and examined its pitted edge. Little good it would do him when they came, but he could not help but fight to protect what was his, even though he hated this place, this prison, as he considered it, to the depths of his dwarven soul. The stink of the chickens brought the bile into his throat, but they were his chickens; the bleating of the motherless calf filled him with revulsion of its domesticated weakness, but it was his calf, and dearly bought as well.

They were coming, he knew, to steal his grain and slaughter his calf, to burn and loot and kill what they had left the year before and the year before that. They didn’t come every year, but they came often enough. He tried to save, to plant extra, to horde and hide so that there would be enough to give to them and still have something left over to last him through the long winter.

But this time, they had come early. The grain was still in the field, and when they found it unharvested, they would burn it. He hadn’t yet hidden the calf in the cave only he knew about, the calf that would provide his meat and leather for the winter. The wolves of the steppe had come early and caught him unprepared. He would have to fight this time. He had fought before and lost. There was nothing else to do – fight and die, or surrender and starve.

The haft of the axe felt good in his hands as he walked down the hillside to meet them. They were in the combe now. Though hidden by the folds of the land, he knew where they were - now passing the old sheepfold where blood still stained the mossgrown and lichen encrusted stones. He followed them with his mind’s eye, trying to count their numbers by the thunder of their hooves. There were too many, he knew. No infantry tactic would serve him now. He stopped at the far corner of his fields, where three heaps of gray stone stood like gateposts to his land.

They came. He saw them passing like ghosts through the dappled light beneath the old orchard, where the charred bones of his first house still stood and the trees had grown ruinous and wild. Down through the trees they came, riding hell bent over their horses’ necks, their beards flying in the wind of their speed. Short bows of horn and hide slapped against their backs as they galloped splashing down into the stream and across it. Their horses surged and heaved up the nearer bank, water spraying from their thrashing legs and manes. They rode up to him and stopped, looking down at him with his rusted axe and his feet planted solidly across the path. Iron caps were on their round heads and spears gleamed in their fists. Their half-wild horses stamped and pranced impatiently, fighting the bit, their hooves pounding the earth like hammer blows.

One of the dwarf riders shouted fiercely, his teeth gleaming in his beard, “Who are you? What is your name and your clan?”

“I am Pyhram,” he answered. “As for my clan, I have none. I am unhorsed.”

The rider laughed and slipped from the saddle, tossing the reins of his unruly horse to one of his companions. He approached Pyhram, a pair of savage, stone-gray eyes staring out from beneath a crag-like brow. It was the face he had seen in the fire.

“What would you have of me?” Pyhram asked, impatient under the dwarf’s appraising stare. Pyhram returned his gaze, noting the youth of this dwarf by the silkiness of his beard, yet also appreciating that the other dwarves, a score at least and some of them a century older, treated the young dwarf with respect. There was something disconcerting about the young dwarf’s features, some familiarity or remembrance that troubled Pyhram even as he tried to present a bold front. They had not attacked on sight. They had asked his name. Perhaps they would leave him alone, or so he hoped.

Suddenly, the younger dwarf laughed. “It’s true! We’ve found him!” he shouted, turning to his horsed companions. “This dwarf is my brother.”

Pyhram grabbed the young dwarf by the wrist and spun him around. He looked hard into his eyes, studied his features, recognized them as like his own, and denied the evidence of his own eyes, all in the same moment. “Who are you?” he snarled.

“I am Neram, your brother,” the younger dwarf said. “Likely, you don’t recognize me. I was but a lad when you left.”

Eyeing the other dwarves fearfully, Pyhram dragged the young dwarf some distance away. He whispered harshly under his breath, “You must not say that. I am unhorsed. I have no clan, no family, no brother. If you acknowledge me, they will cast you out as well.”

Pyhram turned to the other dwarves still sitting their horses beside the stream. He said loudly and a little too jovially, “Yes, he is mistaken. I am not his brother. I have no brother. An honest mistake.” The dwarves glanced at each other with puzzled expressions. Pyhram turned back to his young brother. “Now go.”

“I have a brother!” Neram shouted joyously, throwing his arms around old Pyhram and lifting him into the air.

“No!” Pyhram cried, struggling against the unwelcome embrace.

“It is true,” Neram continued, setting Pyhram on his feet. He took his older brother by the shoulders and held him firmly, looking deeply into his eyes. “Once, I did not have a brother. I remembered him, but it was forbidden to speak of him. I was beaten for mentioning his name, for he betrayed our clan by marrying against our father’s wishes, for marrying an unhorsed woman. But as our father lay dying by the fire, he regretted the curse he had laid upon his eldest son and grieved that he must die without seeing him once more, without hearing his voice, without being forgiven by the son he had wronged.”

Neram turned to the other dwarves. “The curse against my brother is lifted,” he pronounced. “Pyhram of the Bloodtooth clan lives. Hail your chieftain!” In response, they loosed a ferocious cheer, thrusting their spears wildly into the air as their horses stamped and neighed.

“What is this?” Pyhram asked in the confusion of noise.

“You are the eldest brother,” Neram shouted. “Our father became chieftain during the last wars, when the old chief died childless, the last of his family. Now, you are chieftain.”

“I cannot be chieftain,” Pyhram protested, still refusing to believe. “I am unhorsed.”

“Have you heard nothing that I said. Our father lifted his curse. You are unhorsed no longer,” Neram said, shaking his brother by the shoulder. “In truth, our father’s horse goes to you, the chieftain’s horse.”

As he said this, one of the riders led a roan-colored mare before them. She was a fine horse, steady, clean of limb and bone, calm and fearless as the setting sun, whose color she mirrored. On her face she bore a white blaze, the sign of a chieftain’s horse. She eyed Pyhram steadily for a moment, and then dipping her head, she nuzzled his beard. Pyhram lowered his forehead to hers, and closing his eyes he breathed in the warm peaty smell of the horse. His hands caressed her finely tooled and silvered harness and the silky forelock of her mane.

“The chieftain’s horse has claimed him,” Neram said ceremoniously. “Let no one doubt that my brother has returned.”

Pyhram lifted his head, tears streaming into his beard. “I do not understand,” he said. “What would you have of me?”

“You are our chieftain!” Neram exclaimed. “We are your warriors. Lead us. The time of riding is upon us, the villages and steadings to the south are ripe, their barns full of grain and their sheep bleating to be sheered!”

Pyhram looked around at his farm prison, the fields and the grotto barn and the smoke rising from the chimney of his house. “I… I cannot leave now,” he stammered. “There is the harvest, and…”

Neram laughed in thunderous merriment, and the other dwarves joined him. “You speak like a farmer, brother. So this place of yours is Middenstead, I have heard it named.”

“I did not name it so,” Pyhram answered darkly.

“Dung-home. The wind in your eyes will wash the memory of it from your heart,” Neram said jovially. “Yes, and the smell of fire burning field and farm will cleanse the stink of this place from your nostrils. You are a dwarf, a chieftain of dwarves, brother. Let us slaughter your livestock and make a feast of celebration. In the morning, we shall raze this place to the ground so that it may never haunt your dreams. Then you shall lead us to war and slaughter to the south, where they say the cattle are fat this year and the humans grown lazy and content from our wars with the elves of the north.”

Almost Pyhram could hear the ringing of axe on shield and the twang of bowstrings, the thunder of horses’ hooves over the hard-packed earth, the battle cries of his raiders. But as he did so, he also heard the screams of the dying, the crackle and whoosh of fire as a burning home collapses upon itself. He heard in his thoughts the weeping of a woman and the shrill terror of a child swept up in the tides of reckless battle. And as he did so, his eyes settled upon the three stone mounds marking the edge of his field. In the fading light of the day, he read the small inscription he had carved and placed on each.

“I cannot do this,” he said. “I cannot leave this place. I buried my wife and two sons here, after they were murdered by raiding dwarves.”

“They were not slain by the Bloodtooth clan, this much I swear. Our father would not allow his people to raid here,” Neram said defensively.

“It does not matter, my brother,” Pyhram sighed. “Can’t you see? I have lived too long unhorsed. I am the farmer who fears the time of the riding, the farmer whose family, whose sons were murdered by such raiders as you would have me now lead. How can I sweep down upon the sleeping village when I know I shall see in the faces of the dead the faces of my own sons? I have suffered too much from this to take part in it now.”

“Revenge, then!” Neram said fiercely. “Lead us against the clan who destroyed your family. Kill their sons and their wives to pay for the loss of your own. We will follow you, and gladly.” The other dwarves growled in agreement, their fists tightening around their spears.

“I don’t know who they were,” Pyhram said. “They come every year, and each year it is a different band. One blends into another. It was all so long ago.”

“Then lead us against them all. The Bloodtooth is the strongest clan on the steppes. Lead us against the other clans and we shall bring them under our dominion. This is our destiny, and you shall be our king. You shall have a dozen sons to replace the two you lost,” Neram pleaded.

Pyhram shook his head and pushed away the roan’s muzzle. “Brother, your words stir my blood like the wind in autumn, but my feet have been too long in this place. Beneath those stone mounds lies the better part of me. I am bereft, hollow and alone, waiting for death so that I may join with what I lost. I left the clan for love of the one who lies there. I cannot leave her now.”

Neram stepped back from his brother, his gray eyes pooled with unshed tears. “You truly are unhorsed,” he said in a voice thick with emotion. “But my father’s curse remains lifted. You are still my brother.” Saying this, he strode to his own horse and leaped into the saddle. He sawed angrily at the reins, the horse stamped the earth and tossed its head.

“This place, this Middenstead of my brother, lies under my protection now,” he said. “No riders will come here again, unless it is to trade or visit.”

“I thank you,” Pyhram answered.

“One other thing, brother. We need grain. Last year’s raids were unsuccessful, for the elves had fled before we came. That is why we raid south this year.”

Pyhram looked at his fields, still tall with tawny wheat. “I have no food fit for you,” he said. “No meat or bread, only roots and dried berries that I find in the wild fields.”

The other dwarves wrinkled their noses in disgust. To them, he was unhorsed once more.

“Very well. Good bye, farmer,” Neram snarled as he lashed his horse and dug his heels into its flanks. The riders dashed away, splashing across the stream. The chieftain’s horse stamped the ground and snorted, but she did not follow them, and they did not seem to notice or care that she remained with an unhorsed dwarf.

But as they mounted the bank into the ruined orchard, Neram paused and turned his mount. The others rode away, vanishing with thunder into the gathering darkness beneath the trees. When they had gone, Neram shouted across the babbling stream, “You may keep the horse, brother. She chose you and you are her chieftain now. But do not bow her noble neck beneath a plow or I will return and kill you.”

Pyhram lifted his hand in thanks. “Return with the next moon, if you have not already ridden south,” he said. “We shall slaughter the calf together.”Neram nodded once and turned his steed back toward the wooded slopes. As he rode into the orchard, the sun dropped behind the hill. In the chill evening darkness, Pyhram walked back to his house, followed closely by the stamping, shuffling tread of the mare. When he reached the grotto that served as his barn, he realized that he would need to enlarge it before winter, now that he had a horse to stable. But the prospect of this labor suddenly seemed pleasant to him, as nothing else had for a long, long time.

Long Pilgrimage Home Pt. 2

2008-09-10T08:56:00.000-07:00

(continued from Part 1)

Our journey across France was an adventure the likes of which I had only heard in stories. We lived as knights errant, begging for our bread whenever we came to a town, or going to the church for distribution of alms. Several times as we traveled through lonely places, we were accosted by robbers, but as we had no money, they let us go. Somehow, they never found Pete's sword wrapped in its blanket. Pete said God was protecting us, for they surely would have taken the sword if they had found it.

Pete had a most uncanny talent for picking out safe houses along the road. He could tell at a glance whether or not the people would be friendly to us. It was possible that he had learned a secret list of such places in the past, but how he knew which ones were still safe and which had been discovered, I never found out, and he wouldn't tell me. I suspected some kind of mark on the door, but I couldn't see it. The people we met in these houses seemed always to know that we were renegade Templars, for they called us 'Brother' when they spoke to us. In the poorer houses, we slept with the families all in one room, even with their goats and animals; it made me homesick for my old home in Albi. Other times, we slept in stables or barns, and one night we passed in an orchard.

Wherever we went, wherever we stayed, we learned what had been passing in the outside world after our arrests. We learned of the Hospitallers' taking of the isle of Rhodes as base from which to fight the Turks. Since their loss of Krak des Chevaliers, they had not had a home. In many places, we heard troubadours singing of the deeds of William Wallace, for his tale had grown quite popular. We gathered news of the Templars. It was said that some had escaped, and that when the king's men took the Temple in Paris, they found the treasury gone; some said it had been smuggled out a few days before the arrests. The entire Templar fleet at La Rochelle, the ships with which we had transported pilgrims to and from the Holy Land, had vanished without a trace! We learned that in Spain and England, Germany and Cyprus, the Order had been found innocent of the charge of heresy. Only in France, and in some of the papal provinces in Italy, were our brothers still being persecuted.

In one of the house where we stayed, we learned that a large group of knights was gathering in the forests around Lyons, but for what reason no one knew. Pete decided that we had better go there, for he suspected they were planning an attack of some sort on Vienne, as it was only twenty miles south of Lyons. He speculated that they might even be planning to kidnap the Pope. Pete knew that such a rash act must be stopped, and as we lay one night in a cave, he told me of his plan to go to Lyons to stop them. “If we attack the Holy Father,” he said with great passion, “our cause is lost forever. We must trust in the rule of Law.”

On the roof of the cave, someone had painted pictures of animals: bulls, horses, and strange beasts with long noses, which looked like elephants. "Who do you suppose painted these?" I asked Pete. "Romans?"

"Possibly. Hannibal had elephants in his army when he crossed the Alps," Pete answered. "Perhaps these were painted in remembrance of that event by people who witnessed it."

"The elephants had mighty tusks in those days," I commented, noticing the great sweeping curves of their ivory. "Have you ever seen an elephant?"

"There were many in Rome when I was there, but none so large as these, nor so shaggy."

A light dust hung above the road as we traveled, and wood smoke from the cooking fires curled among the treetops in the evening. Willy, the gray ass we had borrowed from our brother Templars, was as fine a mount as a poor crippled man could want; he was so patient and kind and had so sweet a disposition that I suspected him of being descended of that famous ass that had carried Our Lord in Jerusalem so long ago. However, Pete insisted on naming the poor beast Willy, after William de Nogaret, the king's counsellor and architect of our arrests. It was an insult to the ass, to be sure.

The summer was growing old. The leaves of the trees were turning to yellow and scarlet, and the slanting rays of the afternoon sun turned the white walls of the houses to gold. Out in the countryside, with the ripe fields and the long sinuous lines of the vineyards crawling across the hills, and the laughter and songs of the peasants in the evenings and the dirty faces of the children, I was reminded of home in Albi. It was years since I had seen my old village, and a great longing came into my heart to return there when this was done.

We found Lyons nervous and agitated, like a town on the frontier of war. Everyone, simply everyone, knew of the knights in the forests around town, and they knew that some bold action was being prepared. Wagonloads of supplies went out to the forests every day. But it was some time before we could get any information from anyone, not until they were absolutely convinced we were truly who we said we were. The people seemed to have developed a great affection for 'their knights', as they called them, and they didn't want anything bad to happen to them; they were protecting them from the spies of King Philip the Fair, the monarch they openly despised. At last, the elders of the town accepted us, and we were led out to the place where the leaders of the knights met. A small Italian boy was given to us as a guide, and as he rode on Willy with me, I noticed him continually looking at the ground to either side of us, as though he were following a track. So I asked him, "What are you doing?"

"I am looking for where you have hidden your feet, sir," he answered in his own language. I had some difficulty understanding him, for I had not spoken Italian since my youth.

"I have no feet," I said.

"Where you come from, does God not give the people feet?" he asked.

"God gave me feet," I told him, "but the king of France burned them off."

"The king of France is not a Christian," he said. Such was that people's hatred of Philip the Fair. He had annexed Lyons not very many years before.

After an hour or so, we entered a large tract of forest south of the city, not too far from the Rhone River. Just before we entered the forest, we could see a great bend of the river sweeping into the trees. The woods were most thick and darksome, for they were very old, a remnant of that same old forest where the Gauls fought the Romans, where Celt howled and werewolf prowled as they used to say, and which used to cover the whole of France and most of Europe. The boles of the trees were black and huge, and the branches overhead were woven into such a thick mat of leaves that little light reached the brown leafy mould below. The boy knew the path well, else we surely would have become lost. Willy grew nervous and switched his tail; his ears turned this way and that. Endless rows of dark trunks stretched down and away as we descended toward the river, and the path meandered between them. Soft furtive noises arose to either side of the path as we passed, and black squirrels scampered about in the canopy above us, shaking the leaves and dropping acorns onto the trail. One dropped into my lap, frightening me more than if it had been a snake. The forest was old, old, older than France, older than Christianity; it was as old as Noah and sprang up in the strange and mysterious time when few men knew God. I was terrified, but Pete only laughed at me. The boy seemed at home.

"Why are you afraid?" he asked me. "God's own knights live here, but nothing evil."

At last, the path began to rise as it climbed onto a last knoll or ridge before the land made its last descent to the river. The trees began to thin, sunlight peeked through the roof in spots, and the place became less dark and lonesome. We heard birds singing ahead as we climbed up toward the sun. Soon, we came upon an encampment of knights. Pete cried out and ran ahead, and the knights rose and turned to look. They wore red crosses.

"See," the boy said, pointing. "There are the Knights of God."

That night, a general chapter was held. They led us to the top of the hill where we found a clearing, a grassy knoll surrounded like a tonsured pate by a ring of huge ancient oaks. In the center of this high place there was a flat slab of blue stone as big as a bed; there they placed me and told Pete to sit beside me. At the head of the stone there was a narrow, diamond-shaped hole surrounded by crystals. One of the knights showed it to me, and he said that according to the local people, this was the stone where Arthur drew Excalibur. He told me that the place was called Arthur's Crown. Frankly, I thought the place looked more like an old druid's temple, and I shuddered to think of the pagan rituals that had been practiced there. Then Pete pointed out how similar in design the place was to the Temples in Paris and London. "Stand a cross on this slab," he said, "and you have almost exactly the standard Temple design."

Pete would have been the ranking member at the chapter had he been a true knight, and he was by far the oldest person there other than me. All the knights who had gathered were young, not one older than thirty. As they slowly filed past, each greeting me with a grave reverence which made me feel most uncomfortable, it occurred to me that, almost by design, the youth and vitality of the order had somehow avoided the arrests and tortures we were forced to endure. It seemed only those with the greatest experience and wisdom were chosen to undergo the trial, while the young men who would be the future of the order were set aside, protected, so that they could carry on.

And carry on they did. That night, three young men from Lyons begged to join the order and were accepted. When this was done, Pete stood and told of the papal inquiries and his plans to defend the Order before them. Each point of the accusations was discussed in full, and all in attendance were asked to tell whether they had seen or heard of any acts similar to the charges leveled against us: namely -- worshipping an idol in the shape of a head, revering Satan in the form of a black cat, lewd kissing of the grandmaster or preceptor - particularly on the anus or in virga virili - at any reception of new members, had anyone been required to deny Christ or God or the Virgin, spit on or trample the Cross, or been enjoined to commit sodomy by any member of the order. Everyone roundly denied all these charges. Then Pete told of deaths of brother Knights both by torture and by fire. He told of the burning of the fifty-four near the Porte de Saint Antoine, and at this there was much angry shouting, while others wept openly. I was then called to tell what had happened to me. I had little enough to say. My feet were burned off in a slow fire, and I was condemned to life imprisonment because I had not confessed. They cheered me so vigorously that I blushed; I thought my heart would burst with love for those good brave men.

Then we heard more of what had been passing in the world. We learned of the escapes of brothers from France and of the trials in other countries. In Germany, a trial was held at which the preceptor of Metz, Hugo von Grumbach, appeared suddenly in full armor, backed by twenty knights, and demanded the right to trial by combat to defend the Order. As neither the archbishop nor anyone else was prepared to accept the challenge, the Order was absolved of all charges. We also learned of places where Templars were not only accepted, they were welcomed and even eagerly sought: in Aragon, Castille, and Portugal knights were needed to fight the Moors; in Germany some had joined the Teutonic Knights, others joined the Hospitallers at Rhodes and in other countries; but the most promising place seemed to be Scotland, where Robert Bruce was seeking knights to help him in his fight against England. Robert was excommunicate, so his lands were considered the safest place for other excommunicates, such as ourselves.

Some of the men were in favor of leaving France entire, and most of these seemed eager to sail for Scotland right away. But the vast majority were all for a repeat of Hugo von Grumbach's success at Metz; they wanted to march into Vienne in force and demand justice from the Pope, and if his holiness refused, they would take him captive. The knights' representatives at the chapter reckoned there to be between fifteen hundred and two thousand knights scattered around Lyons, more than enough to take the city of Vienne and all its dignitaries and hold them until the charges against the Order were dropped, our brothers still in prison released, our leaders returned, and our lands and treasures restored. According to our spies, twenty cardinals, four patriarches, and over a hundred bishops and archbishops were already in Vienne, awaiting the beginning of the Council on the morrow. For fighting men trained in a long tradition of capture and ransom, this seemed too rich a prize to pass up.

Only by drawing upon the deepest reserves of his persuasive powers did Pete manage to forestall their designs. For two days and nights, the general chapter dragged on and on in endless argument, until word reached us that the representatives of the Council in Vienne had called for defenders of the order to appear, with full guarantees of protection. This finally swayed them to pursue the cautious course advocated by Pete. In the end, it was decided that seven should go to Vienne, but they should be fully armed. Pete, of course, wanted to be one of the seven, but this only started them arguing again. In the meanwhile, I was to be sent ahead, and there they would call me as a witness if they needed me, once they arrived.

I truly did not wish to be separated from Pete. We had been through so much together, but they rushed me away, and I never got to say good-bye to him. I saw him briefly through the trees across the camp as I was leaving; he held up his hand in token of farewell, and though he did not call out to me, our eyes touched and there was a cord passed between us that all the leagues and all the years would never cut. Then the trees closed round me and I thought I would never see him again.

They gave to me a mute from Macon named Reynauld to guide me to Vienne. Once again, I rode upon Willy, while Reynauld walked beside me. Reynauld was a big strapping fellow with a shock of black hair as thick as a horse brush. He liked for me to tell him stories from the Bible, so I told him the tale of Samson because I thought he might like it. It took us a day and a half to travel to Vienne, and the closer we got the more people we met on the road. Knights, pilgrims, and peasants, lords and ladies and their entourages, troubadours, jugglers and their trained animals, merchants, traders, thieves, and highwaymen, all crowded the way, jostling for a place in the tiny city by the Rhone.

Vienne was too small for the Council. The people were packed in like birds in a pie, and the people of Vienne were starving. Pope Clement V could not have chosen a worse place. Demand sent prices soaring. By the time I arrived, there was not a bed to be had in the entire city. A loaf of bread coast three day's wages for some. But inside the palaces, they ate lark's tongues and Flemish toast with cotignac of Orleans.

Each morning, Reynauld set me near the gates of the city. While I begged for alms and displayed my poor legs to the public, he scoured the city for news, and each night he returned and wrote for me what he had discovered. Someone had taught Reynauld to read and write Latin, and he did it very well, but he had little enough to tell. There was no news from Lyons. No one knew when the knights would arrive. Luckily, news of the gathering of the Templars in Lyons had not reached the church officials in Vienne. In the meanwhile, in those two days my begging only earned us one silver denier, and we were forced to sell poor Willy just to buy bread.

Finally, on the morning of the third day, not long after he left me by the gate, Reynauld returned with a letter. It read:

Brother,
The knights will arrive this afternoon. Be ready. Reynauld has a letter of passage which will get you into the Council chambers.

And it was signed only with a cross.

The guards at the doors were reluctant to allow us inside, despite the letter of passage which Reynauld showed them. In the end, they did let us go; I suppose they thought I might be some sort of holy man, a hermit from Italy perhaps, like venerable old Celestine who was made Pope against his will (I prayed I would not share his fate). Inside, there was a sea of red such as I had never before witnessed. Cardinals, bishops, archbishops, and abbots thronged the floor thick as fleas on a dead bear. At the far end of the chamber, another table was set up on a dais, and sitting in a golden throne at this board was none other than Pope Clement, a small balding man with a weak chin and narrow lips, a long Norman nose and an angry wrinkled brow. He waved off nearly everyone who approached him. He looked to be in pain, for he habitually rubbed his stomach beneath his vestments.

A meal was just beginning as we entered. Long tables were set up along either wall, with a great open space between, where servants bustled about with laden trays and goblets of gold and silver brimming with wine. In the center of this space was a great table piled high with food of every sort imaginable; it seemed ready to break at any moment. In the center of the table was a great white swan, with two peacocks in full feather to either side, all in a great nest of green herbs. At either end of this banquet table were two great huge pies, each with gradually smaller pies piled atop it, all wrapped in red cloth, forming a sort of miter. The largest of these pies each contained a whole roe-deer, a whole goose, a capon, seven chickens, ten young pigeons, fourteen starlings, and three rabbits, flavored with two pounds of bacon, two dozen hard-boiled eggs, saffron, cloves, and cinnamon. Large tranchoirs of bread were passed round to all and sundry, even myself. We had no seat at table, but Reynauld and I found a place near wall. And although we received none of the main course from the table, we were given slices of roast boar and plenty of salt, and a rich gravy was poured over our bread.

When the repast was complete, the Council began where it had left off, first with another call for defenders of the Temple to come forward, and then with discussions about arranging a new Crusade. Other than the Pope, no one seemed very enthusiastic about the prospects of retaking the Holy Land. While Clement harangued them in his high thin voice, most of those gathered ignored him completely. They carried on with their own petty conversations, complaining about their accommodations, arguing about matters of rank and hierarchy, discussing the possibility of various hunts in neighboring provinces, but no one seemed to hear a word the Pope said.

This continued for more than an hour. Gradually, conversations tapered off to an uneasy silence, and people began to watch the door, but the Pope continued unabated. Finally, even he stammered to a stop, and he stood up. "Guards, what is going on out there?" he asked.

Outside in the courtyard, there seemed to be some sort of a fight. I heard a lot of violent shouting, and the clatter of hooves and angry snorting of horses. One of the guards approached the doors, but as he laid his hand on the bar to open them, the doors burst wide. In clattered seven Knights Templar upon their horses fully armored, resplendent snowy white mantles glorious as the sun, radiant crosses of scarlet glowing upon their shoulders. Tears welled up in my eyes at their beauty. With hands upon hilts and visors lowered, they rode in standard wedge formation into the center of the chamber. Pope Clement called for his guards and cowered behind his throne, and armed men with pikes and halberds rushed between the knights and the pontiff, blocking the way with a wall of sharp steel. The knights cantered to a stop.

"We have come to defend the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and the Temple of Solomon," one of the knights shouted to the silent assembly. Because they all wore their bascinets with visors lowered, it was impossible to tell which knight spoke, but to my ears he sounded much like Peter de Boulogne. The second knight from the back on the right seemed smaller than the others, and he rode his horse more awkwardly than the rest.

"We represent a force of two thousand knights encamped in the forests around Lyons," the knight continued. This news set up ripples of astonished murmuring which circled the chamber. Pope Clement paled.

"We have come to prove the innocence of the Knights of the Temple and to free our leaders and brothers held in the prisons of the king of France and elsewhere. May we speak?" the knight asked.

"Arrest them!" was the pope's answer.

This caused a tremendous uproar. The knights drew their swords. The papal council had guaranteed the safety of any who wished to defend the order. "They must be allowed to speak!" one of the cardinals shouted. But at a gesture from the pope, guards rushed in behind the knights and barred the doors.

"Your holiness," shouted the Bishop of Bayeux, who had been part of the council ordered to conduct the investigation in France and whose work was thwarted by the Archbishop of Sens when he ordered the burning of the fifty-four. "You Holiness, how can we expect to discover the truth in this matter if those who would defend the Templars are too afraid to step forward and speak? We have granted them safe passage, and now you would revoke it?"

"The question of their guilt has been answered," the Pope said. "Arrest them. We will recess until tomorrow." He then fled the room, shouting as he went, "Double the guard, and post watches on the road to Lyons!"

Two hundred years of glorious Templar history ended with the flight of the pope from the chamber. Our brothers did not fight, of course; even then, they could not bring themselves to raise their weapons against their fellow Christians, for at Peter’s urging, they still hoped to save the Order from oblivion. But it was too late. I realized the Pope had never meant to allow us defend ourselves. The Order had died on 13 October, 1307, but it had taken this long for the blood to stop flowing. They took my brothers away, including Pete, but they dared not try to take their arms from them; this much, at least, we gained. The room eventually cleared, and Reynauld and I were left alone with the scraps of food and the silence. A hollow place opened inside me, a cold place in my belly; I felt like I had drunk a bottle of vinegar. "Hold my hand, Reynauld," I said. "I feel like I might come apart." But he grabbed me and held me close in his arms, and his body shook with sobs, though he made no sound.

We slept the night in Vienne, finding accommodations in a loft. Below us, a merchant spent most of the hours of darkness cavorting with a half dozen lewd women that his filthy silver had purchased. God’s will was worked though, for when we woke that morning, we found him murdered and his women disappeared.

Reynauld carried me out of Vienne on his back like a cross, and though I begged him not to, he would not set me down until he had transported me across the mountains and all the way to Albi. I found my home much as I had left it, and after shaving my beard, I took a job with the bishop who lived nearby. Reynauld remained as my servant until the end of his days. And the king’s soldiers never found me, as I had the bishop’s protection.

But a few days after I arrived in Albi, I had a visitor. I found him at my window as I was preparing for bed. By my bones, I was glad to see him alive!

Pete told me that Clement had recessed the Council until April of the next year. He and the other knights were never allowed to speak in defense of the Order, but they did manage to escape one night. The king sent an army to Lyons, but they found the forests empty and the residents apparently ignorant of the supposed Templars in the forest.

Bernard would not tell me where he was going. “It is best you remain ignorant, Brother,” he said, taking my hand for the last time. “They’ve already burned up the better part of you. I’d like to leave knowing the rest was safe.”

©1998-2008 Jeff Crook

Long Pilgrimage Home Pt. 1

2008-09-09T14:13:00.000-07:00

Here is the first part of a long story originally published in Paradox. It was first written as an assignment for a historical fiction class at the University of Memphis. The main characters, Peter de Boulogne and Bernard de Vaho, were historical figures of the period, though their adventure perhaps was not.

I heard Pete rise beside me in the darkness. "Pray with me Bernie," he said. At first I didn’t know why. We always said our prayers as best we could, guessing the times, but there was no way either of us could know if it was matins, prime, terce, meridiem, or any other hour of prayer, and it seemed to me we had just finished saying our paternosters; I could still taste the moldy bread we'd had for dinner. No sunlight reached our dismal subterranean chamber, buried as it was deep beneath a crossroads in Paris, with a roof so low there was not even enough room to stand up, provided one had strength to stand at all. But perhaps Pete’s ears were keener than mine, for he heard them coming long before I. "Pray with me Bernie," he said familiarly. I suppose he expected to be taken away and burned like the others, and he wanted to prepare his soul.

A door somewhere wailed on its hinges, a brazen trumpet blast, a single note rising, quavering, like the call of last judgment. Golden spears of light groped through the grate in the door, awakening a sighing groan from the bodies lying around us and revealing them in all their naked angular shadows, their acute limbs, their bulbous stubbled heads nodding atop their necks and their gaunt bearded faces blinking in the new light. "Oh my God I am heartily sorry for having failed you..." Pete began. He prayed with eyes wide and head unbowed, his fists at his sides, trembling.

The light stopped outside the door, illuminating the dungeon like the sun through a rent in dark clouds. A key rattled in the lock. The bodies animated around us and crawled away from the door as best they could and as far as their irons would allow. The bolt shot with a bang; the door opened. Torchlight filled the hall outside.

Our gaoler lurched through the door as though pushed from behind. He fell at Pete's feet. In the hall two men stood, swords drawn. They wore white surcoats, white as the snow on Plomb de Cantal on Christmas Eve, with scarlet crosses stitched at the right shoulder, and beautiful unkempt beards, one copper-red and one graying-black, poking angrily from their mail coifs.

"Peter de Boulogne and Bernard de Vaho!" Graybeard shouted. "Are they here?"

"I am Bernard de Vaho," I said, crawling forward into the circle of their torchlight.

Both men staggered back at the sight of me. Redbeard crossed himself. They took a moment to steel themselves. Finally, Graybeard said, "We're here to rescue you. Where is Brother Peter?"

Pete still crouched in his chains, staring down at the gaoler who had not moved. But he looked up at the mention of his name. "That's him," I said. Redbeard ducked into the cell and grabbed Pete by the arm. "Come along, Brother. We must make haste," Redbeard said. He stooped and took the keys from the gaoler's belt and unlocked our chains. Graybeard stooped through the door and helped Pete into the hall, while Redbeard easily lifted me in his arms. The other men in our dungeon began to cry out, realizing that they were going to be left behind. Pete looked back at them, and I thought he was about to say something, but instead he turned and followed Graybeard. I thought my own heart would break, seeing our poor emaciated brothers straining at their chains, their beards wagging, their hands stretching out for us. I couldn't bear to look any longer. I hid my face behind Redbeard's shoulder.

They hurried us down the hall and up a flight of stairs past an open door. A guard lay on the floor beside the door, not dead but not sleeping, dazed perhaps, as though under a witch’s spell. Another lay in the chamber beyond. Pete stared at them in puzzlement as we hurried by. Redbeard cradled me like a child in his arms. I looked back over his shoulder at the guards. "What happened to those men?" I asked.

"No time to explain," he answered.

We ducked under a low arch and turned, entering another hall. At the end of the hall we could see another chamber, this one full of guards milling about, drinking and dicing and making a general friendly uproar. Our rescuers stopped about halfway down this hall. Graybeard searched the left-hand wall until he found a loose brick. He pried it loose with his dagger and pulled it out, then handed the brick to Pete. Brother Pete stared at it stupidly; he still had not got his wits about him. Graybeard then reached into the hole left by the brick, we heard a small click, and a low irregular section of the wall swung inward, revealing a secret passageway. Graybeard took the brick from Pete and replaced it in the wall. "Come on," he growled, dragging Pete into the tunnel. Redbeard followed, taking care not to knock my head as he pushed the secret door back into place with his shoulder.

The interior of the tunnel was black as an Egyptian night. I thought they would light a torch, but instead they hurried us along. Finally, Pete said something after his long unnatural silence. "Can you men see in here?" he asked.

"No," Graybeard answered. His voice was deep and growly, like that of a man long-used to shouting orders over the din of battle. "Hurry along and don't lose me. Put your hand on my shoulder, Brother," he said.

My back began to ache from being carried lack a sack. How those men found their way in the dark, I'll never know. At length, they stopped, and Redbeard set me on the ground. "Wait here," he said.

"Where are you going?" Pete asked in the darkness, for we still couldn't see. The air, which had been damp in the dungeon of the Temple, was much drier here, and the floor was clean and dry. Pete's voice echoed uncannily. There was no other sound. I hadn't heard the knights leave us, but they could not have been there any longer or we would have heard them breathing. It was as though they had vanished.

After a time, I asked Pete, "Do you think they were ghosts?"

He didn't answer.

"Mine seemed solid enough," I said. "Strong as an ox, he was."

Pete remained silent.

"Did you notice their antique armor?" I asked. Pete grunted, so I continued, "No one wears those mail coifs anymore, not with the new aventail bascinets."

Pete responded with continued silence.

"Perhaps they were from an outlying province, or even another country," I suggested. "Didn't their idiom seem odd to you?"

"Perhaps they were from Scotland," I concluded when Pete didn't answer. I couldn't just sit there in the dark and wait for God-knows-what.

"Why do you think they rescued us?" I asked.

"Please be quiet, Brother Bernard," Pete said, dropping his old familiarity now that we had apparently escaped the dungeon in which we had become fast friends, despite the vast differences between us. Pete had been the procurator of the Temple at the Roman Court, whereas I was but a simple priest of the Knights Templar. But who could tell the difference between us now in the gloom, except perhaps by the variances in our speech? "I am trying to think," he said.

"Sorry Pete," I said.

After a while, I said, "Do you suppose they killed those guards? Those were Christian men, after all, even if they were our jailers." I whispered a paternoster for their souls, just in case. While I prayed, I noticed a gray light beginning to filter down from somewhere high above. The light touched here and there a form in the darkness around us. One figure in particular took shape in the light, that of a woman standing with arms outstretched, palms toward heaven.

"Mary!" Pete whispered in awe and reverence as he looked up and saw her before him. Music floated down from above, the sweet resonance of a boy's choir. Tears sprang up in my eyes and rolled down my cheeks. Pete fell to his knees and I rose to mine, while the light grew, illuminating the other figures. Two knights stood to either side of the figure of Mary, while all around us lay other knights, some with legs crossed to signify service in the Holy Land. And I realized quite suddenly, and not without a touch of regret, that this was not a miracle, but a tomb.

Looking up, I saw a small grate in the ceiling high above, through which the light filtered, flickering intermittently now. Robed figures passed at regular intervals above, the singers whose voices resounded hollowly in our chamber, passing in procession, their sandled feet stepping on the iron grate, their robes whispering over it. No one looked down, nor could they have seen anything, I imagine, if they had.

I crawled over to Pete and touched his arm. He looked up, blinking back tears. "Now I know why," he said.

"Why what?" I asked.

"Why we were rescued. In nine months time in the city of Vienne, the pope will hold a council to decide the fate of the Temple. That is why I was imprisoned, to keep me from the council. But now, I will go there to defend the order before the Holy Father, and you will go with me," he said.

"Me? Go before the Holy Father and all! I wouldn't know what to say!"

"You don't have to say anything, brother. Just show him the stumps where your feet were burned off by the torturers. Show him the little bag they gave you to put your blackened bones in. You are greater testimony of our innocence than any poor words of mine, for despite your agony, you never confessed. Not like so many others," he said. His lip trembled. "Not like me."

I stroked the leather bag that hung around my neck, fingering the bones contained within it. It always seemed strange to take them out and look at them and to think they had once been inside my body, that I had once stood on them to say paternosters and walked on them from Albi to Rome on pilgrimage. In a way, they were like my children, those little bones that fell out of my flesh. And it comforted me to touch them, for they reminded me of what I had endured, and remembering it, I knew I could endure anything.

"God gives to each man a certain talent," I said to comfort Pete. "To me, He gave the strength to endure. To you, He gave the talent of oratory, to argue Law both secular and ecclesiastical, and to persuade people with your arguments. My talent might have saved my life, but your talent might save us all."

"We will go to Vienne, you and I," he said, smiling. He looked around. "If we can ever get out of here," he sighed.

Indeed, other than the grate high above, there didn't appear to be any exits from the tomb. We both wondered where our two knights had gone. Pete searched all around the walls for any sign of a secret entrance, while I crawled along the floor testing for trap doors. Near the base of the statue of Mary, I did find a loose stone with a plain, unadorned sword carved into it, but it proved to be a crypt containing the moldering remains of some poor knight long dead.

Pete, however, seemed very excited by the find, and he took the opportunity to cross the knight's leg bones beneath his skull, which the original builders of the tomb had neglected to do. Then he replaced the slab, only realizing afterwards that he had forgotten to return the knight's sword, but when he tried to move the slab again, it wouldn't budge. Pete awkwardly lifted the sword and turned to me as though to ask a question, but then his eyes froze in amazement and horror upon a point above my head. I turned to look, but I saw only the statue of one of the knights.

"Look Bernard," Pete whispered. "It's the red-bearded knight who rescued us."

There was a resemblance, to be sure, but from my angle on the floor, I couldn't see how Pete could be so sure.

"And here's the gray bearded knight," he continued, pointing to the other statue.

He stooped down to peer at the carving on the statue's base. "Saint Michael," he announced. I looked at the other one and found the words 'Saint George' chiseled into it. "Our rescuers men were St. Michael and St. George!" Pete exclaimed. "Don't you see it? How else could they have got past those guards, and how else could they have brought us here? They brought us here for a reason, so I could find this sword. I am to be the defender of the order. I have been chosen!"

"But Pete, you can't wield a sword. You're a priest," I said.

"Not anymore," he announced. "Don't you see? I've been knighted by St. George himself." He fell to his knees before the statue of the Blessed Virgin and crossed himself.

"But Pete," I said, "it's not proper. What about the Rule? You haven't been through any of the training. You're supposed to spend a night in fasting and prayer, and then be absolved by a priest. Then there's no grandmaster here to accept you, not even a preceptor, and certainly no witnesses."

"Forget the Rule!" he said excitedly. "What higher power do you want? You can absolve me, and as for witnesses, look around you. Here are dozens of witnesses, dozens of men more worthy than you or I to defend the order." He hefted the sword and swung it clumsily above his head. He looked like a overgrown boy playing at being a knight.

That first day in the tomb passed quickly. We were both so emotionally exhausted after our unexpected rescue that we fell asleep not long after Pete's finding of the sword. Pete dozed off first, lying by the feet of the Blessed Virgin and clutching the sword to his chest, while I succumbed not long after. When I awoke, they were saying the evening mass in the chapel above us. Pete paced the perimeter of the tomb.

Sometime after midnight mass, when everything had grown quiet and dark, a flickering yellow light appeared above us and stopped at the grate. Pete crouched behind the statue of the Blessed Virgin, while I crawled into the shadow cast by Saint George. We saw a dark figure kneel by the grate and open it. The figure then dropped several objects into the tomb, one of which bounced over and landed between my legs. I held my breath. Then the figure replaced the grate without saying a word and walked away, taking the light with him.

Pete and I searched the floor until we found the stranger's offering; they were two loaves of Gonesse bread, two skins of water and one of wine, and half a round Auvergne cheese. With much rejoicing, we devoured the heaven-sent meal. The bread was fresh and fragrant, the cheese mild, good solid food the likes of which I had not tasted in months. We saved some of the bread and wine and had our own little thanksgiving mass down there in the dark. It was pleasant and comforting to know we had a benefactor looking out for us up above, but after the mass Pete began to wonder aloud when they would get us out of the tomb. I enjoined him to whisper, as someone might hear us. He did, but not without much grumbling.

Every night it was the same. As regular as manna from heaven, our silent benefactor dropped to us food which could survive the fall, mainly breads and cheeses of varying sorts, and fresh skins of wine and water. Sometimes, a basket was lowered in which there was some sort of cooked meat (for which we were especially grateful) and some fruit or nuts as were in season. Into the basket we piled the empty wineskins and the rinds of the cheeses. On several occasions, Pete tried to speak to our midnight grocer, but only once did the man respond. "Soon," he said when asked when we would get out. "Be patient." We never saw his face, only the silhouette of his round head against the candlelight.

Our greatest problem, it seemed, would be the disposal of our bodily fluids. If we were to remain long in our crypt, it seemed the inevitable accumulation of nightsoil must surely draw attention to us by the very smell. This problem was solved, however, when Pete found a small hole in the floor near a wall which must have let into a sewer or ancient latrine, because as long as we used it (and we were down there for some time), it never filled. It was so efficient, in fact, that Pete suspected it to be of Roman origin.

Otherwise, it was not unpleasant living in the tomb. We listened to the masses and prayers and cantatas. It was mighty comforting and pleasant and regular, the very thing which first drew me to the church. There was something altogether peaceful about it, despite our being confined in a tomb. The activities of the church went on in perfect regularity above us, oblivious to us, yet benefiting us at the same time, for without that noise and bustle and life passing just overhead, we must surely have gone mad. I knew then what it must be like to die an excommunicate, buried in unhallowed ground, and I wanted more than ever to be interred within a church. In fact, I wanted that more than anything else. "How pleasant it must be to be buried here," I said one day to Pete. He gave me a horrified look.

If it were not for Brother Peter, I could easily have remained in that place. Poor Pete, he frothed at the bit. He wanted to be moving and doing, he wanted out, and he was miserable. For the first few weeks, he occupied himself with organizing the defense he would present on behalf of the Temple. He mentally rehearsed each point, then played his own devil's advocate and attacked each point to find its weaknesses, until he was sure each was solid and foolproof. But the difficulty of this task soon overwhelmed him. There were too many charges to defend against for him to mentally prepare himself without the assistance of notes, memoranda, and books of law. Each night, he begged our benefactor for pen, ink, and paper, candles, books, and news of the outside world, but none was ever delivered.

Inactivity galled him mightily. He was not used to waiting. His whole life he had been in the thick of things. Pete had gone to Outremer soon after joining the Order of Poor Knights. He was soon promoted to secretary to the treasurer Tibald de Gaudin and was with him at the fall of Acre. Together with some others, they fled with the Temple's treasure to the Castle of the Sea. There, Tibald de Gaudin learned of his being elected the new grandmaster, and he sailed to Cyprus with the treasure. Pete stayed behind. When it seemed certain that the Castle of the Sea must fall to Emir Shujai's forces, he fled to Tortosa, and then again to Castle Pilgrim when Tortosa was abandoned. Finally, he sailed to Cyprus with the last shipload of Christians to leave the Holy Land.

Brother Peter de Boulogne won renown for his bravery despite his only being a priest, and high praise for his talent for organization during the four evacuations of which he took part. He was sent to Rome to be the procurator for the Temple, to defend it and represent it in matters of law before the Holy See, and to press in all quarters for the declaration of a new crusade.

Diverting Pete was a Herculean task. My mind was no match for his, so I couldn't occupy him with discussions of law or theology. I was but an ignorant parish clerk before the arrests. Sometimes, I got him to tell me of his adventures in Outremer, and this entertained us both for a while. I was thankful we could hear the prayers and could join in with them, so we spent quite a bit of our time performing the rites required of us as men of the cloth. Pete admitted he had never been a very strict observer of the hours of prayer. He had joined the Temple for the excitement it offered, while I had joined because I was too stupid and slow to become a Dominican.

One afternoon, while playing a game of aspik with my ankle bones (we were wagering paternosters to be said by the loser), I asked Pete if he had ever thought it would last this long.

"No," he answered. "And I cannot understand it. Why would God rescue us, then leave us down here in this miserable tomb to rot? It would almost be better if He had left us in the dungeon. At least there we could have kept up with what is going on outside, and I might have a chance to persuade them to let me speak to the Archbishop."

"You complain like the Israelites at the shore of the Red Sea," I said. "God will not let Pharaoh catch us again, not after delivering us from Egypt. But I was not talking about being in this place. I was talking about the suppression of the Order. Did you ever think it would last this long?" It had been over four years since the arrests on 13 October, 1307, a Black Friday if ever there was one.

"Never," Pete said. "Never could I have imagined it possible. I am only glad. . ." his voice trailed off as he looked at me.

"Glad of what?" I asked.

"Nothing. I am forbidden to say."

There it was, the abominable Temple secrecy which had got us into so much trouble in the first place. Pete immediately changed the subject by asking me, "How did you survive the first few days?"

"The torture, you mean? I don't know. I suppose I remembered the words of my grandfather. He was a Cathar."

Pete gasped in astonishment, but I continued. "He said that a man can endure any pain if his faith is strong. That was just before they burned him. My parents, of course, did not believe as strongly as he, for they admitted to heresy at the merest threat of torture and were absolved after penance. Grandpa was sorely ashamed of them before he died. That's when he told me to be strong.

"So I couldn't admit to heresy, not when I knew of no heresy within the temple. To falsely admit heresy is as grave a danger to one's soul as to falsely deny it. And so, when the torture began, I put my faith in God that He wouldn't let me die with sin staining my soul, and He didn't."

"I wish I had your faith, brother," Pete said. "I put my faith in a man, the Pope, and so far he has failed us. I never believed the Holy Father could let this happen to us. I will tell you a thing now brother that very few know, and I know because of what you've been through that you will never tell anyone. We knew of the arrests beforehand. The grandmaster knew of the plans of the king of France, but he believed the Pope would vindicate us. But that is where we failed, for we underestimated the power of Philip the Fair, and we trusted too greatly in the benevolence of Clement V."

"I suspected as much," I said. "Word came to us a few days before to tighten security and let no secrets slip. And the night before, our preceptor ordered several brothers to take a store of weapons and armor and hide them in the forest."

Pete nodded. "So it was in many places," he said. "Jacques de Molay told us that the Holy Father would have us released within a month at most. How foolish we were! If only we had pooled our strength instead of dispersing it, they never would have taken us. France would have been ours, once the authority of the king had been successfully challenged. The people would have risen behind us. We could have thrown off the oppressive regime of Philip the Fair and set up a truly Christian kingdom, ruled by Christian men. Other countries would have flocked to our standard, other kings would have paid tribute and become our vassals or been overthrown. A new and true Holy Roman Empire would have arisen under the Templar cross, first in Europe, then across the world."

Pete looked at me then and smiled. "Pipe dreams," he said and shrugged.

I rolled the bones and scored a point. "That's another paternoster for you, brother," I said. I passed them to him and he took them, but he didn't roll. He held my bones in his hand and looked long at them. His eyes glistened with moisture. "There wasn't supposed to be any torture," he whispered.

He set my bones on the floor and turned away.

It was easy to count the days as they passed. I could tell the progress of the year by the services performed in the cathedral above us. The year crept by, and each day Pete grew more and more anxious. The date for the Council of Vienne was fast approaching and still no one came for us or even sent word. One grows weary even of peace after a while.

Finally, the night came when a basket was lowered to us, but in it there was only a swath of heavy cloth. Pete wrapped the cloth around my waist and tied it to the rope, and then I was lifted into the air. I ascended in surges, rising, stopping, rising again, without a sound. Below me, Pete watched with upturned face, and I waved to him until I could no longer see him. At the top, strong arms lifted me into a long dark cathedral and laid me on the stone flags. Four men, all robed in black and with hoods drawn up to hide their faces, greeted me with silence. They lowered the rope again and soon Pete stood beside me. He had brought his sword with him. "What is going on? Why haven't we ..." Pete began, but one of the men placed a long thin finger over Pete's lips, enjoining him to silence. Then he lifted me in his arms and motioned that Pete follow.

They took us into the street where, just outside the door, a cart waited. They laid me in the back of the cart and covered me with a blanket. Three of the men vanished into the night as silent as ghosts, while the fourth mounted to the seat of the cart and motioned that Pete should join him. He gave Pete a black robe to cover himself. "If we are stopped," he said, "keep your head covered and say nothing. The king's men have descriptions of you both. That is why we couldn't get you out until now." He turned and spoke over his shoulder to me. "If anyone comes near the back of the cart, keep hidden and say that you are a leper. That is our plan to get out of the city." With that, he whipped up the horses and we set out.

I did as I was told and hid beneath my blanket. It smelled of sweaty horses, an old familiar smell that I thought I had forgotten. It was comforting and warm and not altogether unpleasant. But the cart bounced most violently, and the ride was truly frightful, for I was ever in a terror that we would be stopped and discovered. I heard Pete try to ask questions of our rescuer, but the cart shook the words out of him so that he couldn't even speak.

After what seemed a very long time, long enough to cross France I thought, the cart rolled to a stop, and I heard men speaking. I crawled deeper into my blanket, if that were possible, and called out in weak voice, "Leper! Leper! Stand away!"

But a man tore the blanket from me. He wore a war helm with a long Norman nasal, and I thought we were caught. Instead, he smiled and greeted me, "Well met, Brother Bernard," and he lifted me in his arms and carried me through a gate and across a garden and into a small cottage. As I looked back, I saw the cart turning in the road and heading back toward Paris.

I found Pete already inside the cottage, sitting at a table and slurping at a bowl of stew and sopping up the juices with big hunks of brown bread. In the center of the table stood a large stone bowl of wine, and there were cups of turned wood to drink from, and a huge wedge of white cheese on a wooden plate from which another man was cutting slices and passing them around the table for the other men. In all, there were six men around the table, and there was a fine unwashed soldierly smell of leather and sweat.

"We leave at dawn," one of the men said to Pete.

Pete looked up from his bowl, his cheeks stuffed with bread. He swallowed. "To where?" he asked.

"South, through Aragon, to Portugal, then sail to Scotland."

Pete shook his head. "I have to get to Vienne," he said. He pointed at me with a crust of bread. "Brother Bernard and I have to see the Pope." While he said this, I was placed in a chair at the end of the table and a bowl of stew was slid before me. I looked around for the bread.

The men at the table began to mumble to one another. Several shook their heads. An argument commenced between Pete and the others, beards wagged, and there was much pointing and shaking of hunks of bread and sloshing of cups of wine; they used whatever was handy to emphasize their words. Gesticulating hands fluttered over the table like a gathering of butterflies over a field of clover. The stew was a galimafre, fragrant with cinnamon and ginger, and most invigorating, and the wine was Beaune from Burgundy. The bread, however, left something to be desired, for it was simple knight's bread and rather coarse. Still, one should not complain.

I was just settling back and enjoying a few sweet cakes which had just been brought to the table by a most delightful young serving girl, when the discussion finally reached its climax. Pete was determined to go to Vienne, and nothing they could say or do would change his mind. Finally, he stood and shook his spoon at them. "Our rescue from the dungeon was a miracle, brothers," he said.

"How can you say that?" one man asked. "Didn't we send the men to rescue you, as we've said before."

"Where are these brothers, then?" Pete asked. "Where is this Michael de Macon and this George of Kent, these brothers you sent to rescue me?"

"We do not know," the man mumbled. "They have disappeared."

"And why did they rescue Brother Bernard here? By your own admission, you told them to rescue me. You said nothing of Brother Bernard."

No one answered him.

"Have I not held the thorns of Christ's crown in my own hands and seen them flower? Am I not qualified to proclaim a miracle? I say to you, our deliverance from the dungeon was divinely ordained. Saint Michael and Saint George rescued us, and it was God's might that struck down the guards and opened the way."

"Why then did He not sweep you from Paris entire?" asked one of the men, a German by his speech. He had not spoken before. He was the youngest of the bunch, and somewhat shy among his elders.

Old Pete glowered at him until the poor fellow was forced to look away.

The leader of these knights, a brazen Scot if ever there was one, stood. "Don't you browbeat the lad, Brother Peter," he said. "Just you up and answer his question."

"All right, then. God took us to the tomb to make me a knight and to teach me patience," Pete said.

"A knight!" Several men laughed.

"That's right. I was knighted by Saint George himself, by his own hand, with this sword." He drew out the ancient blade from beneath the black robe he wore.

I opened my mouth to protest, but Pete shot me such a look as what froze the words in my throat. However, the Scot turned to me and asked, "Is this true, Brother? Did you witness this thing?" I shrugged, unable to speak, for Pete was staring at me.

"Brother Bernard was not allowed to see my transfiguration before Saint George," Pete explained, coming to my rescue. "He only saw the saint as a stone statue, and he did not hear St. George direct me to present our case before the Pope. But I know in my heart that I am a knight."

"But you are a priest. You have taken a vow to shed no blood," the Scot said.

"I have renounced my vow. I am now a knight, the same as you, better than you, for I have been to Outremer. Who else here can say the same?"

When no one answered, Pete crossed his arms. "Very well then, it is decided. We are going to Vienne. You men can go where you like. We thank you for rescuing us from Paris and for the hospitality of your table, but you cannot keep us from our quest."

"But we have orders to take you to Scotland," the Scot grumbled as he sat down. "What Robert the Bruce will say, I just don't know."

As the table was cleared and the candles extinguished, the knights dispersed to their beds in the loft. Pete and I were invited to sleep by the fire, as they had no other beds, and so blankets were brought. I rolled up in mine as close to the fire as I could, but Pete lay well back in the shadows, and I could see his eyes glittering in the red light. Soon, rattling snores shook the floor of the loft above. Pete rose and crept over to the fire. "Come, Brother Bernard," he whispered as he lifted me in my blanket.

"We are not staying?" I asked.

"No. They intend to kidnap us and take us to Scotland, despite what I told them. They think I can't read their hand signals, but it was plain enough to see if you know what to look for."

He eased open the door and, lifting me in his arms, we slipped outside. Dew lay heavy on the grass, and the trees were silver in the moonlight. Across the way, a low stable was built into the hillside. Thither we crept like a strange pair of assassins. Pete took a gray ass and set me on it. He then wrapped his sword in an old blanket and tied it behind me, and he took a stick to walk with. Then we set out, following the road toward the rising sun.

******
Part 2

©1998-2008 Jeff Crook

Hocus Potus

2008-09-09T08:04:00.000-07:00

A drabble, never before published. Be sure and read the Kafka story, too. It's one you've probably never read before.

…they have dug their teeth in deep and must first let their jaws open gradually.
- “Jackals and Arabs” by Franz Kafka

The President of the United States was not a well-traveled man before his ascension to throne of the White House. But as a young man still in his cups, he undertook a journey as a guest of the Bin Laden family; this was many years before their infamous falling out. While pirating around the Arabian desert with his friends, the future president paused to relieve himself at a well. And there he chanced to meet a curious old jackal, who told him a curious old tale, and from whom he accepted as a gift a rusty pair of sewing scissors.

Like I Said

2008-09-08T18:33:00.001-07:00

Ixnay on the Agonlancedray. The man has spoken. Or in this case, the woman.

A Vow of Celibacy

2008-09-08T12:27:00.000-07:00

Here's an old story for you. First composed around 1997, it went through numerous revisions and readings before finally being published in the Tales of Fantasy anthology. It is one of my original tales of Korr stories, along with I Dreamed of Griffons in Flight (Black Dragon, White Dragon), In the Shadow of the Dragon's Wing (Mallorn), and Escape from the Heart of Djar (Kings of the Night II). At first glance it is a romantic fantasy, written before romantic fantasy became all the rage, but it's not. Oh, definitely not.

"A Vow of Celibacy"

Sometimes Amia liked to pretend she was in a play, standing by the darkened window sighing for her lover. If any of the servants were to awaken and see her standing by the open window, she hoped they would think she was only pining for her lover – Bonn, a ranger for the Papas family, the breeders of horses whose estate bordered that of her master, Jan Capera. She had kept her affair with the handsome ranger so secret that everyone in the household knew.

A crunch on the gravel footpath outside her window startled her. She ducked behind the curtain, fearing her master might be out on one his prowls. Then a voice softly whispered her name, "Amia! Amia!" and she knew it was Bonn. Even so, she hesitated a moment and listened to his moment of fear. "Amia, please!"

As she picked up her bag and stepped from behind the curtain, she heard his breath catch, and then he sighed as he stepped from the rose bushes. Amia buried herself in his arms and smothered his unshaved cheeks with urgent and noisy kisses. He quieted her lips with his own, and then whispered, his breath on her eyelids, "Be quiet. You’ll wake the entire house."

"I don’t care," she whispered. "Let them hear. I love you and I don’t care who knows."

"Don't be silly," he said. "Have you got your bag? Good, let’s go then." He took her bag and her hand and led her away from the house, through the low trees casting their moonlight shadows across the lawn, and down through a well-ordered garden with its gravel paths and stone benches and pale white naked statues gesturing in the night, and through another ring of trees beyond which a low stone fence ran beside the path from the house up to the main road to Tarrasq. Bonn lifted Amia over the fence and then passed her bag over before following her.

The silver-blond hills rose to either side of the path as they walked, and the air grew chill as the dew settled on the grass. The sides of the hills were darkly speckled with wild olive trees, but the summits were rocky and barren except for a few straggling pines and clumps of thorny vines, lit by the broad starry night sky and a silvery moon one night past full. Soon, they came to a whitewashed bridge arching over a stony creek. They stopped for a moment to rest and then to kiss breathlessly, fiercely for a few moments, hearts hammering together.

"Where did you hide your horse?" Amia asked between kisses.

"I don’t own a horse," he answered as he sought her lips again.

"But the Papas' have hundreds of horses," she said.

"That’s stealing," Bonn answered, stepping back from her. "I’ll not steal from them. They’re good people."

"But they’re rich," she said. "And we have nothing. And we have a long way to go. It would have been easier to ride."

"It’s not so far," Bonn said. "My mother's house is just beyond the Papas' estate." He took her hand and they started up the path toward the road.

After a while, Amia asked, "How do you expect to become a knight if you have no horse?"

Bonn sighed. "Why do you want me to steal a horse? The Papas are good people. If I stole one of their horses, I couldn’t go back to work for them, and then how would I support you? I still plan to work for them, you know. Just because I’ve stolen you away from the Caperas doesn’t mean I can’t continue working for the Papas."

"I just thought you needed a horse to become a knight," she said.

"A knight doesn't use his own horse," he answered. "The horses are provided by Temple contractors, breeders like the Papas."

"Couldn't you have borrowed a horse and brought it back in the morning?”

Bonn stopped. “What’s wrong with you, Amia?” he asked.

“My feet hurt," she said.

"Where are your shoes?"

"I didn't wear them. I hate wearing shoes. The Old Woman makes us wear shoes even in the summer, even inside the house," she said.

"You should’ve worn your shoes tonight, at least," Bonn said. "Where we’re going, you’ll need them."

Soon, the path bent to the south, and there it met the road that ran down to Tarrasq. Amia hid in the bushes beside the path while Bonn walked out onto the road to make certain no one was about.

Amia watched him, anxiously wondering what would happen if he were seen. What would people think of this handsome young ranger appearing from the drive of the Capera estate so late at night? Perhaps they would assume he had been visiting some young servant girl, and that he was returning home to crawl into bed before sunrise, before his master caught him. Maybe they would think he did this sort of thing all the time, that he knew girls on all the estates in the area, and that he visited each girl regularly and in turn. Handsome young men like Bonn had many girls, and quite often the girls knew nothing of each other, each believing that she alone possessed the love of her man. Such men must think their lovers little better than cheap whores whose pleasures could be bought for a bottle of wine or a cheap, flashy trinket from the bazaars in Tarrasq. She wondered if Bonn thought of her in such a way. When she saw him motion for her to cross the road, she shook her head.

"The road’s clear," he hissed.

"No!" she said.

"What are you doing?"

"Do you truly love me, Bonn?" she asked.

"Of course I love you!" he answered. "Would I be here if I didn't?"

But Amia believed she could almost hear him saying that to every girl. "I don’t believe you!" she hissed. He was luring her away to have his way with her, and when he was done, he would take her back to her master’s house.

"Amia, please!" Bonn cried. He crossed the road and crawled into the bushes with her, but she drew away from him.

"What’s wrong with you? I love you. You must believe me."

"Yes, but do you love me truly?" she asked.

"What can I do to prove my love to you? Why must you do this?" he pleaded. Suddenly, he turned, shushing her when she tried to answer. "A carriage! Someone’s coming from the house!" he cried as he grabbed her by the arm and tried to drag her from beneath the bush.
Amia struggled against him. "No, no, I won't go with you," she said. "Not unless you truly love me."

"If they catch us, they’ll take you back to the house and we can never be married," Bonn said. Now they could hear the jingle of harness and the rumbling of the carriage's wheels on the road.
"Married?" Amia asked.

"Yes, of course! Why did you think I would steal you away, if not to marry you?"

Amia wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed his face furiously.

"There's no time now, and I can't carry you. Run for those trees," he directed, pointing to a dark clump in the meadow across the road. He pushed Amia ahead. The carriage was almost upon them.

Amia dashed across the road, ignoring the injury the stones inflicted upon her naked feet. She clambered over the opposite fence and sprinted across the meadow. Bonn quickly overtook her, grabbing her hand in passing to drag her along. They dove into the safety of the trees just as the carriage rounded the bend and swung onto the road.

Bonn peered out through the trees at the carriage. "It’s Jan Capera," he said. "He’s heading toward the Papas' estate." He looked out through the trees at the road, and then he turned and looked across the rolling hills of the Papas’ estate, which he had planned to cross but could no longer risk trying. They would search for Amia there first. He knew of but two other ways to reach his destination. The first was the road to Tarrasq, but the morning would catch them still on the road before they reached the safety of his mother’s house. The only other option was to cross the Capera estate. This distance was considerably shorter, but it involved crossing the hills where bull dragonettes were pastured. This time of year, dragonettes were spread out all over the range, and they were a danger he did not wish to face, not with Amia in tow. He was not afraid of them, but he was afraid for her. But he realized that he had no other choice, considering his prospects of escaping with the girl he loved. Were they caught, Amia would be returned to the Capera's house, while he would be flogged if he were lucky, or possibly even imprisoned for theft. The Caperas were a powerful family who provided dragonettes for the ritual battles at the religious festivals in Tarrasq. They had the ear of the church, and the law of the church was the law of the land. Jan Capera was a deacon of the Temple at Tarrasq, a trainer of the monks who battle the dragonettes to gain the gods’ favor for the year. He was only a ranger, not a monk, though he hoped to fight dragonettes in the temple someday as a knight-servant of a monk.

At last, Bonn made up his mind. Since it would be the least likely place to search for Amia, he would risk crossing the Capera estate. He took her by the hand and kissed it gently, and then he helped her to rise and led her from beneath the copse. The moon was low and the night grew dark. He turned west and steered by the setting moon, paralleling the road for a time before it bent away northward to climb the hills surrounding the Bay of Tarrasq. At the point where the road turned north, they came to a wooden fence, which they climbed, reentering the Capera estate. Bonn turned south then, and following the line of the fence uphill, they soon reached a stable where dragonettes were housed during the winter.

The stable was long and narrow, with a wide door at either end and large sturdy cages along both sides of the passage. At the far end, the passage opened into a small training ring with a stout wooden fence and a raised platform behind it so that people could see over. Inside the ring, young monks, called dragonnes, were trained to fight dragonettes – a type of dragon that were wingless until full adulthood. The monks trained first on hatchlings, then on immature bull dragonettes, and finally on fully grown bulls just beginning their wing molt. Only the most perfect bulls were sent to the Temple in Tarrasq, those of perfect eye and horn and muscle and scale, and only those of absolutely pure courage and nobility – those who, when winged, would become true terrors if left to themselves.

Bonn led Amia into the stable. They cautiously walked its length, checking all the cages, finding them empty. The cages still smelled of the dragonettes, a pithy odor like crushed heather and hay. Near the entrance, they found a small tack room where harnesses were hung from the ceiling and saddles sat on racks along the walls. Here, Bonn found a short lance and fighting cape which must have belonged to one of the fighting monks trained by Jan Capera. Bonn draped the cape over his arm and hefted the lance. Amia stood in the doorway of the stable, looking away toward the Papas’ manor across the valley. The portico glowed with torchlight, and in it they could see two men sitting in chairs beside a table. "There’s my master," Amia said. "And yours. Do you think they can see us?"

"I don’t think so. The moon is behind the hill," Bonn answered.

Amia turned and saw Bonn with the fighting cape draped dramatically over his arm. "You would make a beautiful dragonne," she sighed, marveling at his lithe muscular body and the trim aesthetic line he cut with the cape and the short-lance.

"Ah, but the monks are sworn to celibacy," Bonn said. He grasped her around the waist and pulled her body against his. "We knights take no such vow."

The moon set behind the hills. Bonn and Amia rested in the stable until the first light of the sun grayed the eastern sky. The sky was the same color as the fog-wreathed ground, and it seemed as though there was no horizon, no separation between the heavens and the land. Westward, the hills remained shrouded in darkness, so they waited a little longer until the misty valleys were visible between themselves and the hill where Bonn's mother lived. Bonn had hoped to see her house, but the air above the valley was too thick to see so far.

Setting out, they crossed through the fenced lots where the bull dragonettes were herded and divided before being sent off to Tarrasq. The fences were tall but they were easy to climb, so Bonn didn’t need to help Amia. She was a peasant girl, and although she had served in the Capera house for three years now, she hadn’t forgotten the ways of the farm nor how to carry herself over rugged country. Still, she began to regret having not worn any shoes, especially since Bonn hadn’t found a spare pair of boots in the stable.

As Amia clambered over one of the taller fences, Bonn sat atop the fence post and looked back toward the Papas’ manor house. For some time now, he thought he had been hearing the barking of dogs, but he had said nothing yet because he didn't want to frighten Amia. But now his fears were confirmed. As Amia topped the fence, she looked at Bonn and saw the concern in his eyes, and then she heard the dogs.

"Do you think..." she began to ask, but at that moment the distant hills across the valley rang with the strident blasts of hunting horns. "They’re coming!" she cried.

"We can still escape, Amia," Bonn said. "It’s very dangerous, but I think we can make it. We will cross the pastures. I don’t think they will bring their dogs and horses there. So many people and animals would surely attract the attention of a bull. But two people alone, moving quickly and silently, might get across." Amia clutched his arm in terror, but whether it was fear of the dragonettes or fear of capture, he couldn't tell.

After a moment, she nodded and bit her lip. Bonn dropped to the ground on the other side of the fence, and Amia climbed down after him. Together, they moved off into the pasture. Bonn wore the fighting cape draped over his left arm while in his right hand he carried the short lance held at the ready. Although the lance was heavy, its foot-long head of polished steel was marvelously balanced by a flanged bronze weight at the butt.

Soon, they came to another fence. It ran southwest and for a while they followed it. On the other side of the fence, the grass grew waist-high in places, but it couldn’t hide the fresh piles of droppings lying here and there, still smoking in the morning air. The ground was hilly, and in many places outcroppings of granite boulders broke the scenery, surrounded by copses of evergreens in which a bull dragonette might have its lair.

They came to a place where the fence made a Y, forcing them either to cross over or turn back north, toward the dogs. Bonn climbed the fence, and Amia followed him. The terrain here was just as hilly, but there were fewer boulders and trees, while broad stretches of a kind of tall green weed, called peacock feathers, wavered in the morning breeze.

As they followed the line of the fence between two hills, Bonn noticed that the barking of the dogs had grown fainter. The sun climbed higher and began to burn away the mist. But between these two hills little of the morning breeze could reach them, and they felt the sun hot upon their cheeks. Their passage stirred up clouds of tiny biting flies, and in the bottom of the dell where a veritable forest of the tall wispy green peacock feathers grew, the ground was boggy and the flies more numerous and voracious.

When at last they reached the other side and began to ascend the next hill, they found that they had strayed somewhat from the line of the fence. As he turned back toward it, Bonn stopped. A large black dragonette stood on the opposite side of the fence, watching them intently. Lost in daydreams, Amia bumped into him. The sight of the dragonette stole the warmth from her body and the strength from her limbs.

The dragonette was enormous, its scales the color of iron. Its chest was like a great iron forge and its long serpentine neck was as thick as the beam of a temple roof. Twin ivory horns curved smoothly out from its narrow reptilian head, ending in honed points that glimmered white as snow. Filmy gray patches of smooth skin covered two humps rising from its back just behind either shoulder blade – these were its wing sacks, nearly ready to erupt. As it watched them, the great crest of crimson spines on the back of its neck slowly rose.

After what seemed hours to her, during which time it seemed neither they nor the bull moved even so much as to take a breath, Amia at last found her voice. "Bonn?" she whispered.

"A dragonette – nearly mature. He’s on the other side of the fence," he whispered. "As long as we stay on this side, we’re safe."

"I didn’t think they were so big," she said.

"Move very slowly," Bonn told her. "We will continue the way we were going. Don’t make any sudden movements."

They began to walk slowly, Amia behind Bonn. The dragonette followed them step for step, turning to parallel the fence while keeping them in sight. It seemed almost more curious about them than dangerous. But Bonn knew by the angry clatter of its erect spines that the dragonette meant to kill them if it found itself on the same side of the fence as they. It was a creature bred from dragon stock to fight and die in the temple. Because it was immature, its teeth were underdeveloped, and its fiery breath had not yet begun to burn, but it could still use its claws to kill. But by far, a dragonette bred for the sacrificial battles in the Temple preferred to kill with its horns – twin scimitars of ivory each as long as a man is tall.

Suddenly, the dragonette darted away, loping sinuously along the line of the fence. Amia collapsed against Bonn’s back. "He’s leaving," she sighed in relief. But Bonn stiffened. He didn’t believe for a moment that the dragonette would let them pass. He waited to see where the monster would go, and to his dismay he saw an open gate in the fence at the top of the hill.
He spun and grabbed Amia by the wrist. "Run!" he shouted. "Go!" He shoved her toward the fence. She stumbled away from him, confused.

Bonn looked up the hill and then back at Amia. He slapped at her with the cape. "Go, you stupid girl! Run!" He stepped toward her, swinging the cape again. She turned and fled.

As the dragonette reached the open gate, it spotted Amia fleeing toward the fence. Its neck spines flattened as it swept down the hill. She glanced over her shoulder and saw it coming fast, and she screamed as she realized that she could never reach the fence before the dragonette overtook her.

Bonn dashed between her and the creature, flapping the cape and crying, "Ha! Hey! Hey!" The bull caught the movement of the cape and turned. Bonn spread the broad cloth-of-gold cape over the shaft of the lance and skipped backwards, away from the fence and into the pasture to draw the bull away from Amia. He circled to his left, while the dragonette followed him, closing rapidly, following the lure of the cloth until it was close enough to stab at the trailing edge of the cape with its horns. It swiped repeatedly with the right horn, gouging crescents in the dust, until Bonn closed the final arc of the circle and whipped the cape from beneath the dragonette's nose. It froze in place, its claws planted in the ground, facing away from Amia. Bonn looked beyond the long snaking black body of the monster and saw Amia standing at the fence with one foot on the lowest wooden rail, staring at him in saucer-eyed horror.

Bonn took a step to his left and the dragonette swiveled its head, rattled its neck spines. He took another step to the side, and then one step back. The dragonette lowered its head and sniffed the ground, its two horns like the trunks of small trees nodding in the wind. "I must wear him out," Bonn thought numbly. "I must make him wear out the muscles of his neck so that I can go in past his horns and put the lance into his heart." He took another step back.

"I have attended eleven ceremonies since I came of age. I have seen sixty six bull dragonettes killed in the Temple. Sixty six is a holy number. The gods are with me. I know how to do it. It is only a matter of doing."

He took another step back and the dragonette lifted its head, narrow black nostril’s flaring, spines flattening along its back. "To tire him, I must pass him with the cape. I must wear him out with the cape, force him to charge it rather than me. To make him charge, I should incite him with the cape." He flipped the cape and stomped his foot.

The dragonette's eyes narrowed and its head dipped and it came more quickly than Bonn imagined anything could possibly move, its speed concealed by its fluid grace, like dark water pouring over a dam. He tried to pass the dragonette beneath the cape by swinging it wide with the whole length of the lance, stretching out on his toes, bending over the horn that swept beneath his outstretched arm.

But the dragonette ignored the cape and lifted its head, and the right horn entered as smoothly as an oiled sword into the soft flesh below the lowest rib on the left side of Bonn's chest. It slid past his spine and out his shoulder until the mass of the dragonette's head slammed into his chest, lifting him and tossing him over its back. He seemed to float slowly through the air, slowly enough for him to relax before he landed behind the creature’s snaking tail. It wound upon itself and turned, hissing, head lowered again. Bonn lay still and watched the bull, in its eagerness to kill him, stab blindly at his body, flinging gouts of dust and only hitting him once in the palm of the right hand. Then he heard Amia scream, and the dragonette was gone from him, its long body passed over him like a swift black cloud. He heard her scream again, and he felt the earth tremble beneath his body, and at the same time he heard horns blowing and dogs barking wildly.
The dragonette met Amia as she ran to Bonn. She bowed over its lowered horn and embraced its scaly head, and it lifted her and carried her for several yards before tossing her aside. She fell on her stomach, her mouth full of dust. Then it gored her through the back again and again until the hounds arrived to drive it away from her body. Neck spines rattling angrily, it lashed out with its horns and claws and tail at the boiling mass of dogs, but they dodged and leaped, yapping noisily and biting.

The servants of Eldron Papas drove the dragonette out of the pasture before killing it with their boar lances. Jan Capera and Eldron Papas sat their horses near Bonn’s body, his eyes open and hazy with dust, flies already landing around his open mouth. Amia lay nearby, face down, her hair trampled into the dust, and four wet dusty holes on the back of her nightdress. Their morning boar hunt had been interrupted when from a distance they saw the young ranger and the servant girl climb the fence into a pasture that Jan Capera knew contained a bull dragonette on the verge of wing molt. They rode as swiftly as their horses could carry them, but the numerous fences slowed them and they arrived too late to do anything but sit their horses near the bodies and watch their servants slaughter the dragonette in the field.

"He would have made a fine dragonne," Jan commented as he looked at the body of the young man. "Did you see the way he brought the bull away from the girl and fixed it in place?"

"I’ve heard that he wanted to become a knight-servant," Eldron said. "But he was a poor horseman. I wouldn’t let him ruin my horses with his careless riding."

"He would have made a fine dragonne, I think," Jan repeated. "Look at his body. He has the body of a dragonne. He had grace and courage, but without proper training he couldn’t have anticipated the speed of the bull. He might have done well. But he let a girl ruin him. That's why the Temple requires the monks to take a vow of celibacy, to keep them from being killed so often in the ring. Many young men cannot understand this."

©2007-2008 Jeff Crook

Intermission Between the Opening of the Sixth and Seventh Seals

2008-09-05T14:53:00.000-07:00

As the Day of Judgment drew nigh, about three in the afternoon Eastern Standard Time, the President of the United States rang up the Pope on the white princess Holy Hotline phone in the Oval Office. “Yes, I am aware what time it is,” the President said petulantly. “Do you even know what’s happening? When was the last time you looked out your window? The sky is like sackcloth, for God’s sake.

“Sorry, Your Holiness. It’s a figure of speech. Just go to your window and look at the moon.

“What do you mean you can’t see the moon? I can see it right now. It’s like blood! Look at it, man!

“I know you’re in Rome. Don’t you have the moon in Rome?”

“Look,” the President sighed. “The reason I’m calling is about the Army of Light, see...

“Well, I think I should...

“Yes, me. I’m the commander in chief of the United States of America, leader of the free world. I get to command the Army of Light, not you. You’re just a pope. No offense, but you have no military experience.

“Yes, I do. That doesn’t count. Look, we’re winning that. We will. OK? See, I called to offer you a position as a general in the Air Force.

“No, not the whole Air Force. We’ve already got somebody for that. Former CEO of Exxon, if you must know. So I have a position open for a brigadier general, stationed in Alaska.

“Alaska. Brigadier. B-R-I-G--- I-D-- Look, it’s a type of general. What do you want? It’s not like you’re Billy Graham or somebody.

“Yes, I know he’s dead. I’m trying to reach out to you, see. It’s a good command, plenty of medal potential but still a nice safe distance from the valley of Megiddo. Let’s face it, you’re not getting any younger, Pops.

“Fine. Be that way,” the President snipped. “Have fun commanding the Army of Darkness, ‘Your Holiness’.” He hung up.

“Dick!” the President snarled.

“Yes, Mr. President.”

“How did that guy get to be pope, anyway?”

“He was elected.”

“Elected?”

“Yes sir.”

“Well, I didn’t vote for him.”

“Of course you didn’t, Mr. President.”

© 2006-2008 Jeff Crook

Originally published at Bewildering Stories

Harvest My Heart

2008-09-04T09:49:00.000-07:00

There’s nothing to do. It’s like elementary school, our own titanic bodies for entertainment, see who can gross out the other guy, make the girls throw up. I got organs sticking out, special pajamas made from bed sheets to fit me. I’m as big as a house. I can’t put my hands together. I get my nurse to hold books for me to read, and then I fart like a horse. She laughs, the sick Welsh bitch. I call her Nurse Cynnt.

Twice a day, I unzip my belly and take out my extra large intestine so the nurses can wash and measure it. With two stomachs and two large intestines, you could power all Cardiff with the methane that comes out of me. When you have another heart growing inside you and you feel that animal rush as it starts to beat on its own, a meaty Dionysus in your Olympian thigh, it takes three orderlies to get you back into your cell. With three kidneys, your blood is like pure mountain spring water and everything smells new. But an extra liver will give you breath like a hydra.

When the virus mutated and stopped responding to suppression drugs, they realized that we, the last uninfected people in the world, were too valuable a source for regenerated organs to risk infection through unregulated copulation. They collected us up, some at gunpoint, weeding us out from the poor and doomed to die. To keep us from going like bonobos at one another, they gave us an experimental drug meant to castrate us psychologically, a juicy hormonal cocktail to suppress our most natural and unnatural urges. Only it was experimental, and the experiment failed. Gonads dissolved. Ovaries hardened and dropped out like little shriveled raisins left under the cushions of a couch for a couple of decades.

Somebody lost his job over that one.

But they do feed us here, Lord Jesus yes. 4500 calories a day. Prenatal vitamins out the wazoo. This is the Atlas Ward, reads the little sign on the door. Disease-Free. Quarantine. No Admittance. We abide in the land of milk and honey, growing organs for all the rich fucks who can’t grow their own because the buttload of hormones and immuno-suppressants it takes to grow a spare heart bungs up the old T-Cell count. I only wish they would connect my extra eyes, but they say the additional perspectives would drive me starkers. British pricks, I hate the way they talk. British prick doctors. Brill! Mind the nurses, Mr. Zagreus, and they’ll let you dress yourself tomorrow.

Nurse Cynnt wants to have my baby but I tell her there isn’t much call for babies since Christ returned. That’s the joke around the ward. We laugh at crap like that because we live in a converted mosque. We call it the Mosque of the Red Death. It makes her cry. They say she has an excitable nature, hot Welsh blood and all that, and an Eve complex big enough to entertain the old royal navy. She wants to be the mother of a new humanity. She wants to have my baby before she dies, a tragicomic Welsh martyr. Half the time I can’t understand what the fuck she’s saying. “Vowels, vowels!” I shout at her. “Here’s $250. Buy an A from Pat!” She thinks I’m funny even as she wipes away a tear. She can’t do the currency conversion in her head.

Every day when she bathes me, she checks my sack for nodules – such a foolish hope it is she clings to. Each night she prays fervently at my bedside. She’s very devout as she tries to illicit my arousal. Leave me out of your prayers, I tell her. I have no faith in man, God or fate. I want no miracles. Let the world die, I say. I lost my faith when they unleashed the virus to end the war; it worked, just not like they expected.

My faith dissolved with my testes. It shriveled when they took me away from my life and locked me up. They cut out my faith each time they cut out my heart.

The world is finally dying, thank God. Babies are born with the disease, and the poor ones die too young to keep the world limping along. Our organs help a few rich old fucks stay alive a few more years as the disease eats away at their own organs. I’ve been here so long, there must be seven or eight of me walking around by now, going to parties and pretending the world hasn’t already ended.

One day, Nurse Cynnt got permission from the hospital to take me on a field trip. That’s how much the population has declined. There’s no longer any real danger of infection, and the war was over a long time ago. They keep us locked up so we won’t run away. There’s still enough people in the world to make us valuable.

The streets of Cardiff were empty, the shops empty, not even a Bobby on the corner. They had turned off the traffic lights. There were weeds growing in the cracks of the streets. The last residents had drifted into the oldest part of the city around Cardiff Castle, Nurse Cynnt told me, and we stayed well away from there because there was no telling what they might do if they caught us. Strip the ambulance for parts, most likely, though cannibalism was a distinct possibility.

Nurse Cynnt drove the ambulance, siren screaming, from the military hospital all the way down to the seaside, me riding in the back in a Kevlar sling hung from the roof to support my weight. It was Bank Holiday. The tide had gone out and she drove the ambulance down onto the wet, hard sand. She opened the back door and I sat there, swinging, watching the waves retreat down the beach and smelling the rot coming off the bay. There were some kids there roasting a dog and some seaweed over a driftwood fire. Nurse Cynnt was afraid of them at first. They had the disease, all thin and wasted with great brown blotches on their skin, poor things. But when they got a load of me, they ran for it, leaving behind their dog. I wanted to try it, as I’d never eaten dog before, but Cyntt wouldn’t fetch it for me even when I asked nicely, and I couldn’t move from the back of the ambulance. I was helpless without her and only at that moment realized it. She could do anything. I wondered what would happen when the sea came in. Would it reach the ambulance?

The sun was near to setting. The sea was gray as a hospital sheet. Nurse Cynnt began to feel religious.

“It’s like we’re the last two people in the world,” she said, speaking English for once. She removed her nurse’s uniform and shoes and walked down to the surf. She didn’t play or swim. She just sat there like a patient in a sitz tub, the cold, foamy sea lapping about her blue ribs. The wind blew in gusts up the beach, rocking the ambulance and swaying me in my sling. She removed her bra and panties and let the sea wash them away.

The sun finally set on that cold and miserable afternoon. Nurse Cynnt returned to the ambulance and stood outside, toweling off her black hair. Water streamed from her matted pubes. Her nipples contracted to tiny brown pencil erasers. Scabby sores cratered her back and hips. She tore a stick of cinnamon gum in half and shared it with me like a child.

“We’re not people,” I said.

She climbed into the back and pleasured herself on me. I couldn’t stop her and didn’t want to try. She swung on me like a jungle gym. Out on the dark beach, the dog began to burn.

“I wish I could be with you,” I said to her in the midst of her throes.

It shattered her into tiny pieces. She thought I finally loved her, despite my handicap, but all I really wanted was to catch her disease and die.

Half of us are gone already. I’m the youngest and the strongest. I am a field to be plowed until the plowman dies. When I’m finally gone, the roaches will fashion a new world from my skull.

©2007-2008 Jeff Crook

Originally published at Pindeldyboz.com, this version is slightly revised.

It Ties the Room Together

2008-09-03T20:27:00.001-07:00

I could try to resell it. Or I could give it away. So I'm going to give it away.

Free love rools.

What you won't find here - my Dragonlance stories. Why? Because I don't own them. That's how the man works. Hasbro (the man) owns those stories because Hasbro owns Wizards of the Coast and Wizards owns Dragonlance. So Dragonlance stories won't be appearing here. But everything else, hopefully, eventually will. You didn't want to read my Dragonlance stories, anyway.

Did you?

Ok, I'll ask, but don't hold your breath, Donny.