TIME AWASH WITH BLOOD-- Chapter One

“Shit,” said the lady Therazine.

The cow that laid at her feet had been dead for hours. Flies covered its rotting carcass, and dotted the wet stains that spread out from its body. Crows had already eaten the eyes from their sockets, jackals had already stripped the bones of all muscle and tendon. Some larger predator—likely the one that had killed the cow—had sundered its belly and devoured everything inside. The hot afternoon sun made its skin flake and peel like paint from an abandoned house. She had to hold a handkerchief to her nose to keep from gagging.

Hours. She’d seen enough corpses in her life to know that this body was alive and walking around before sunrise. Whatever creature was stalking her cattle was still in the area.

She looked up, and out into the distance. The savannah around her wasn’t enough to hide any animals sizable enough to kill her cow. Trees were spread far so as to cover the landscape, but thin so as not to create a canopy. Visibility was high on this cloudless day. If anything were out there, it was possible she could still find it. Perhaps to the rocky formations to the south, or maybe the mountains to the east (but she doubted whatever it was could have traveled that far in only a few hours). In any case, the creature would have to dwell nearby. It had been returning to her herd every day for the last week, killing a cow a day. At this rate her herd would be halved by the sunrise of the following day.

Her horse snorted behind her, drawing her focus away from the landscape and back to the moment at hand. Her herd was still in danger, and unless she did something it would remain so. She walked to back to her horse and pulled her rifle from the sling that hung from her saddle. Settling her eye to the rifle’s telescopic sight, she once again scanned the horizon. Fragile-looking brush and thin trees grew in her view, and the mountains became minutely closer. From north to south she scanned, and again from south to north. She saw nothing that she didn’t see every single day out here.

She lowered the rifle and sighed. Her horse resumed gnawing at the roughgrass. There were only a few hours of light left. She could either check out the rocks to the south and be back before supper, or she could begin an investigation of the mountains to the north and be stuck out in the dark with nothing but her horse and her rifle.

She mounted her horse and made for the rocks.

#

“Glaive cats?” Kohl said. “Are you sure?”

Therazine kneaded together potatoes and herbs in a bowl with her hands, her back to her husband. The ceramic of the bowl—which had been sitting high on the shelf above their counter—was cold to her touch. It reminded her that the warm days of summer were behind them, and that winter just around the bend. Soon it would arrive and strip the life-giving leaves from the trees in her orchard. It would drive her remaining cattle to the hills. It would shackle her family to their house in chains of cold.

“Glaive cats?” Kohl said again.

Therazine sighed. Kohl was never one to take her brooding silence as confirmation. No, he would keep repeating the same inquiry until she relented.

“Yes,” she said, not turning around to him. “Glaive cats.”

“But are you sure?” he said. “No one’s seen glaive cats on Lormian for years. The Minister says they died out.”

“Yes, I’m sure,” she said.

“Did you actually see one? A glaive cat? I mean, a live glaive cat?”

She rung the potatoes between her fingers. “No.”

“Well, then you can’t be sure, honey,” Kohl said. “Not if you didn’t see one.”

She stopped mixing the potatoes, only momentarily, but long enough to block out Kohl’s incessant noise and think. He wasn’t trying to provoke her, she knew. He was only trying to get a clear explanation to something that made no sense to him. He was merely being inquisitive, she told herself. He wasn’t trying to say that he thought she was wrong. She cleared her mind and thought of the cow’s corpse, of the jagged, long cut down its abdomen. She pictured the muscular head of a glaive cat, easily tearing through the cow’s flesh with its mandibular blade and spilling its entrails across the early morning savannah. Even if she’d never seen a glaive cat herself, she could recognize a would like that anywhere. Recognize the kind of weapon that caused it.

Therazine heard Kohl’s knife stop chopping the onions, far too soon for him to be finish with it.

“It was probably just jackals,” Kohl said. “Or dust worms.”

“Dust worms?” Therazine said. She unleashed some of the annoyance hiding behind the wall of her tongue. “You think dust worms could disembowel a fifteen-hundred pound cow?”

“Those little bastards get big,” Kohl said. “And fifteen-hundred pounds? Really? Come on. The biggest of our herd is twelve”

“No,” Therazine said. She dropped the bowl to the counter and turned around to him. “The biggest of our herd was one-thousand, six-hundred and forty pounds. But that cow was killed two days ago, its guts carved out like a damned pumpkin. Our next biggest—at fifteen-fifty— was cut down the very next damn day, Kohl. The biggest of our herd were targeted first, which is exactly how glaive cats hunt. I’ve seen the kills. I’ve followed the trails. I know what I’m talking about when I say they’re Aether-spawned glaive cats.”

She saw him staring at her as she started towards him, her hands balled into fists. He was not panicked as she approached, and in fact his eyes held a certain amount of glee. This made the anger in her mind burn bright.

“Glaive cats,” she said, stopping inches from him and holding a potato-lathered finger up to his face, “kill at dawn. They hunt systematically, slowly weakening the herd until it can be overwhelmed completely. They don’t live in the dirt and lay traps for prairie dogs like fucking dust worms.”

She was fuming, and she wanted nothing more than for him to fume back. To scream, to bring about conflict. Escalate this, dammit. Give me a reason.

Instead he simply smiled and touched a hand to her hip. For a moment that bright anger lingered, but as he grabbed her gooey hand and pulled her close she felt that anger dimming. She let out a huge breath which she didn’t even know she had been holding, and she let the tension out of her body. It was such a sudden transition, from rigid and lurid to at ease and calm. But she was used to it. It happened almost every evening after she rode home from the range.

“Alright,” Kohl said, his voice remaining placid and gentle. “It was glaive cats. You’d know better than I would.”

“Shut up,” she said softly.

“In fact, I’ll go tell the Minister right now. I’ll ride out to Nalak this evening and let him know that his administration is wrong, and that the glaive cats still roam these hills and threaten our very way of life.”

“Shut up.”

“Although,” Kohl said, “being the talentless big-city bookworm I am, I probably wouldn’t be able to ride a horse all the way out to Nalak. Hey, honey, which way is forward on those things, again?”

“Shut up,” she said, grabbing his face and smearing potatoes across his cheeks. He laughed and grabbed her hand, pushing it back into her own face and returning her the favor. Against everything that made her who she was, against every rule she had ever been taught, she laughed. She laughed, and he laughed with her. He pushed her, and she pushed him back. They grabbed each other and giggled and drew potatoes from their own faces and flung them at each other. She grabbed him and spun him around, shoving him back into the counter where she had been working. With a smile on his face, Kohl reached into the bowl of potatoes and grabbed a handful of the mash.

Therazine froze. “No. Kohl.” As soon as the words left her mouth, she cursed herself for them not being demanding and urgent enough. All thoughts of fun and games left her immediately, all thoughts of the argument about the glaive cats vanished. A dank fear bled into her heart as she imagined him hurling an entire fistful of potatoes across the kitchen.

Kohl lifted the potatoes high and prepared to throw them.

“No,” she shouted, delivering the level of severity she was striving for. She stood with her legs wide and her head hung.

Kohl froze, and his eyes widened. His arm hung in the air, his palm filled with potatoes.

“Kohl,” Therazine said, her voice low and enunciated. “Do not throw those.”

A faint smile rose again at the corner of his mouth, and she realized with irritation that he still thought they were playing.

“I wasn’t gonna,” he said coyly, raising his arm higher.

“No, Kohl,” she said. “Do. Not. Throw those. Don’t so be so careless as to waste food—good food, that your children need—in such a stupid way.”

She saw Kohl’s expression shift, and she knew what he was thinking about. He was thinking of the work it took to cultivate those few potatoes, and how the winter would prevent them from harvesting any more for many months. She could almost the joy and carelessness drain from his face as he remembered the previous winter, and the sickness that overcame them in the depths of the cold. He lowered his hand slowly, and she breathed a sigh of relief.

“We can’t afford to,” she said, and her voice was firm and lecturing, even though she hadn’t meant it to be. She knew that would hit Kohl hardest.

He uncoiled his fingers and let the clenched ball of mashed potatoes settle back into the cold ceramic bowl. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t… I… You’re right. We can’t afford to. I’m sorry, Thera.”

Therazine found herself embattled with conflicting emotions. She’d proven how right she was, which she wanted to shout into his childish face. So much of her felt that that was what mattered: that she’d won. But she also she knew how much he knew she was right, and how much he wished he’d seen that earlier, and how little either of their emotions and desires mattered when the reality of their life was brought to light. If they couldn’t solve the crisis with their cattle, if they couldn’t afford food through the winter, then they’d end up longing for the days when petulant argument seemed important.

She watched him as he stood there, slumping against the counter with his hand in a bowl of potatoes that was only a quarter full. Then she did something that she wouldn’t have done years ago, that she’d never done to anyone in those decades before she met Kohl. She walked up to him and wrapped her arms around his ribs, and she rested her head against his chest. He hugged her back, and ran his hands slowly along her spine. They stood for a moment in the kitchen, silent except for the beating of their hearts.

In the adjoining room Therazine heard a chair scrape against the wooden floor.

“Kids need dinner,” Kohl said.

Therazine held onto him. “We can’t pay MonDozer with eleven head,” she said.

“That’s a problem for tomorrow.”

“It’s a problem for always. The MonDozers will expect payment whether or not we choose to think about it.”

“We’ve got the money,” Kohl said. “We got it in the bank.”

“We pay them that and we won’t survive the winter.”

“Hey,” Kohl said, placing a gentle finger under her chin and turning her face to his. In any other era of her life, she would have cut that finger off.

“We’ll be okay,” he said to her.

She looked at him for a breath, disbelieving, and then she nodded. She released him and turned back to the bowl and finished mixing the potatoes.

Kohl kissed her on the cheek. “We’ve got until the end of the season to pay them off,” he said. “Tomorrow you and Leshe will go find those glaive cats and wipe them out, and then our cattle will be safe and we’ll be fine.”

“What then?” She knew the answer to this question even before she asked it.

He pressed his cheek against hers and then kissed her again. “One step at a time, girl.”

She smiled, despite the logical inadequacy of his words. She grabbed four smaller ceramic bowls from a cupboard by her knees while Kohl removed a perfectly roasted lenfowl from the stove. It was a large bird, and its meat would last them a better part of the week. She closed her eyes and sniffed the air as he took it out. The scent of the bird filled her and lifted her off her feet, and she remembered yet another reason that she had fallen for the charming Kohl Morlo. No one had ever cooked for her the way he did. No one else had ever cooked for her at all.

In the other room she set the table while Kohl put the finishing touches on the lenfoul. Her two children sat patiently at the table, dressed in their night clothes and smiling as she set up the table. The oldest, whose name was Leshe, had a book sitting on the edge of the table.

“What did we say about books at the table?” Therazine said.

Leshe grabbed the book with both hands, but did not remove it. “Sorry, mama,” he said. “I was just reading it when Bren came and got me.”

“So why didn’t you leave it with you?”

“A’cuz he were readin’ outside, mama,” piped in the smaller child.

Therazine glanced at her youngest boy, and then back at Leshe. “Reading outside? Why not in your room?”

Leshe lifted the book to his chest. “I like reading under the sky.”

“Well, that’s all good and well, but that doesn’t change my opinion about books at the table. Put it away.”

“Yeah, put it ‘way,” said Bren to his older brother.

Leshe held the book close for a moment, seemingly hesitant to relinquish it. Therazine noticed this, and in curiosity she extended her hand to him, expecting him to fork it over. Instead, the boy bent over and placed the book at his feet. Therazine thought for an instant about demanding the book from her son, but then decided against it.

“We eatin’ the lenfoul you an’ Leshe shot, mama?” Bren said.

Therazine glanced at him and smiled. “That we are. Your father’s gone and cooked it up very nice. I hope you boys are hungry.”

“We always hungry, mama,” Bren said.

Therazine’s heart sunk, and she stared at Bren. Had he meant that the way it sounded? Or was it just childhood nonsense? For a very long moment she simply stared at her son, not knowing how to respond. Then Kohl came into the room with the carved up lenfould on a platter and everyone turned their attention to him.

“Here we are,” Kohl said, setting the tender portions of bird in the middle of the table. He paused and locked eyes with his boys. “Dig in.”

Bren grabbed two large handfuls of lenfoul and then immediately snagged the bowl of potatoes. Leshe followed, though at a calmer and more controlled pace than his ravenous brother. Therazine waited for bothe the boys to fill their plates, knowing that Kohl would do the same. Her and Leshe had been out in the bush for nearly a day before they bagged this bird. She knew this was likely the last one they’d all see until the following spring. She was not going to deny her children heaps of this rare and delectable bounty, even if it meant less for her.

Once Bren’s plate was stacked high with carved lenfoul, she reached for her own. She filled a glass with honey wine glanced to her husband. He followed her example and then poured his own. They smiled small and then each took a sip before picking up their forks.

“Wait,” Leshe said.

Therazine looked up, a hunk of lenfoul breast perched on the edge of her fork. Leshe hadn’t taken a knife to his bird yet. His hands were in his lap. She sat up.

“What is it, Leshe?” she said.

Leshe looked up bashfully. “I was… uh…”

“What’s the matter?” Therazine said.

“Nothing is the matter,” Leshe said. “I was just wondering if I could—Well, the boys at the abbey, we did this thing last week where we… uh…”

Therazine’s mind began to race. What was happening, right here? What could Leshe have to say that would stay his appetite? What had he done that he was admitting? What did the other boys do to him? She suddenly felt her blood beginning to boil, and that bright anger returned.

“What, Leshe?” she said, her voice resuming that gravely tone she’d used with Kohl earlier.

Leshe sat up straight and looked down at his plate. “I—I… It’s nothing, I just wanted to, maybe—”

“Spit it out, Leshe!” Bren said, who was literally spitting mouthfuls of lenfoul out. He started to giggle.

“Bren,” Therazine said, and Bren went quiet. She set her fork and knife down and turned completely to her oldest son. “Leshe, tell me what happened.”

“Nothing,” Leshe said. “I was just—I thought we could maybe say a prayer before we eat.” He glanced up at Bren who still had a mouthful of bird.

Therazine blinked. “What?” She leaned back and furrowed her brow. What? “No,” she said abruptly.

Leshe’s face immediately turned beat red and his eyes shot down to his plate.

“No,” Therazine said. She scoffed. “Of course not.”

“Thera,” Kohl said.

Therazine ignored him. “Who would you—What would you pray for?”

Leshe spoke quietly. “Well, I just, I had a… the boys at the abbey and I—”

“No,” Therazine said, her voice rising. “No, we will not say a prayer. Not now, not ever.”

“Thera,” Kohl said again.

“Is this what they’re teaching you at that abbey?” Therazine said. “Are they teaching you that we should pray? This is not what we—Kohl, this is not what we send him there for. This isn’t—” He chair scraped against the wooden floor. “Leshe, you do not say prayers here. Do you hear me? None of us do. Now don’t you go and—”

“Thera,” Kohl said loudly.

Therazine shut her mouth and looked down at her husband. He had not shouted her name. He was not angry. But she realized now that she had stood up. She looked over at her oldest son, whose face was red as the sunset and who was shaking ever so slightly. Bren, meanwhile, was quiet as the grave and had sunken down into his chair below the table. She realized that she had stood up to yell at her child.

“Thera, sit down, please,” Kohl said.

Quietly Therazine lowered herself into her chair, all the while keeping her eyes on Leshe. The boy didn’t return her gaze

“Thera,” Kohl said to her, placing both his hands on her forearm. “Listen to me. Hey. Look.”

She looked over at her husband and saw that same tranquilizing expression that he had before.

“Listen to me,” he said. “You’re right. We don’t send him to the abbey to learn prayer.”

“Damn right we—”

“Listen to me,” Kohl said.

Therazine pursed her lips and bit her tongue. She hated when Kohl was the rational one.

“We send him to the abbey,” Kohl said, “to learn. And that’s it. He’s there because we want him to experience the world and grow. We want him to develop his own thoughts and his own way of viewing the world. We talked about this. Do we agree on that?”

Therazine nodded.

“What he learns, what he absorbs, is entirely dependent on him,” Kohl said. “We teach him what we know, and the abbey teaches him what they know. We can’t tell him what he can or can’t learn. That’s his choice. He is the only one who can piece all that and this together and make his own truth.”

Therazine knew he was wrong. At the abbey they knew how to mold and manipulate young minds into whatever they wanted. They had training to do so. They had books to show Leshe, and eloquent words with which they could form seemingly impregnable points of view. She was only a mother, with only her life experience to give him. In the war for her son’s conscience, she was facing an army that was significantly better armed.

But she could never convince Kohl of that. Kohl had gone to an abbey himself as a child, and he saw himself as much better for it. She’d never convince him that she could do a better job educating her child than the scholarly monks in Nalak.

It ate at her inside, but she relented. She’d let Kohl and his precious abbey win this battle, but tomorrow she’d take Leshe out to hunt the glaive cats, and she’d have all day to mend her boy’s wounded mind.

She leaned back into her chair, and Kohl patted her on the arm. He smiled, and then turned to the table.

“What prayer were you thinking of, Leshe?”

Leshe looked up at his mother. Therazine said nothing.

“I learned… There’s one from Canon and History that I learned,” Leshe said.

Kohl nodded. “I remember that series. Let’s hear it, son. Lead us.”

Therazine winced at the way Kohl said ‘lead us.’ He stressed the first syllable, as if a command. She knew he didn’t mean it in the way it sounded. It was just an artifact from another time. She had plenty of her own.

Leshe picked up the blue book from the floor and opened it on the table in front of him. He flipped through pages and the ran his finger along the same line a few times before speaking.

“Stay far, dark Aether,” Leshe read. “Come not to this house of order and peace. Sully not our doorstep with your Pale Light, and touch not our walls with your claws of ice. Tread not beyond the threshold which bars you from the Real, and keep your jackal’s eyes from the warmth that beats within our breasts. Should we pass in the quiet of sleep or the violence of day, you shall not sunder the silk which ties our spirits to the Real. Stay far, dark Aether, and come not upon those who dwell in this house, lest you bring upon yourself the wrath of Man. By faith I am strong. Soru.”

“Soru,” Kohl echoed.

Leshe looked up slowly, not to Kohl, but to his mother. Therazine said nothing, and merely began eating.

A knock on the door.

Therazine’s eyes snapped open, and her left hand immediately shot to her thigh. It was a reflex, another artifact from a time long gone.

“I wonder who that could be,” Kohl said. “This far out and this late at night.”

Therazine let her hands unclench. She wiped her mouth and set her fork down, standing up. “I’ll go check. Please excuse me.”

“Maybe its the Minister,” Kohl called after her as she left the room. “Maybe he heard about our magical glaive cats already.”

She smiled slightly as she stepped into the entryway, but as she approached the front door any feelings of joy and ease vanished into the fog of an ancient, deep-seated fear. That fear of what—or who—might be waiting beyond a shut door, or lurking in the rafters with a knife, or hiding in the sewers with parasitic madness burning away at their brain. Behind this door was uncertainty, and with uncertainty came danger. How many doorways had she stepped through in her life with this sort of cautious fear filling her mind? How many times had that paranoia saved her life?

She hesitated at the door for a moment, her hand hovering over the doorknob as she thrice scanned her surroundings. The hallway behind her hooked sharply, which could provide her quick and ample cover. A coatrack was to her left—a suitable makeshift club. She could, with a quick swipe, douse the electric lights in her entryway, plunging her and whatever was beyond the door into darkness. The nearest gun, though, was in the closet to her right, and that closet door was closed. The split-second it would take to open that door could cost her her life.

The knock on the door came again, right in front of her face. She held her breath in an effort to mask her presence, and then she twisted the handle of the closet door and let it swing slightly ajar. The rifle was leaned up against the door jam. She let her eyes settle on it, let them find the gun’s trigger. Then she breathed out and opened the door to her home.

A man stood on her porch. He was tall, easily a head taller than her. He was clothed in a fine hatch mark suit with its collar and cuffs extended in the fashion of the elite of Celadin. A curious mustache pulled itself away from his nose and lips, in a style that Therazine also didn’t recognize. His long hair was greased back over his head, and as soon as she opened the door he smiled, exposing the perfect teeth of a politician.

She kept her right arm behind the door, within reach of the rifle.

“What do you want?” she said.

“Good evening,” the man said. “I’m wishing to speak with… Apologies, ma’am, may I ask your name?”

“What are you doing at my home?”

“Ah, excuse me, ma’am,” the man said. “I’ve come traveled very far and I must have lost my manners somewhere along the way.” He extended a hand. “My name is Veelus Arkide. I represent a Mr. K from Celedin. And you are?”

She let his hand hang in the air between them. After a moment he cleared his throat let his hand fall back to his side.

“What do you want from us?” she said.

The man raised his eyebrows as if to say ‘well I never,’ but then continued to speak politely. “I’ve come with a job offer for Ms. Therazine. Am I by chance speaking to her?”

Therazine’s felt her chest tighten. She grabbed the barrel of the rifle in her right hand, but kept it behind the door.

“I don’t take jobs anymore,” she said.

The man twitched his nose and smiled wide. “Ms. Therazine, it is a pleasure to finally meet you in the flesh—”

“It’s Mrs. Morlo,” Therazine said.

The man paused. “I’m sorry, I think I may have mis—”

“Thera?” Therazine heard Kohl’s voice behind her. “Who is it?” She felt him place his left hand on her shoulder, and then subtly and softly take the rifle from her right and place it back in the closet. The instant the gun left her fingers, Therazine felt a cold terror run down her spine.

“Kohl,” she whispered to him.

“Hello,” Kohl said, extending his hand to the man in the doorway. “Name’s Kohl. Kohl Morlo.”

Veelus Arkide opened his mouth as if to say something, and then shut it into a tight smile. “Mr. Morlo? You’ve taken a husband, Therazine? And his name?” He met Kohl’s hand and shook it vigorously. “Pleasure to meet you, Mr. Morlo. I am Veerus Arkide. I’ve traveled quite a long ways to speak with your lady here.”

“Oh really?” Kohl said, glancing down at Therazine. “Old friends?”

“Not such,” Arkide said. “We’ve never had the occasion to meet before. I’ve come purely on business.”

“Business?” Kohl said. “Do you work for the MonDozers?”

Therazine kept her eyes on the man in the suit. “Kohl, go back inside.”

“I know of no ‘MonDozer,’” Arkide said. “I’m inquiring about our lady’s particular skill set. You see, I—”

“Skill set?” Kohl said. “What?”

“Kohl,” Therazine said. “I need you to go back inside right now. See to the boys. I need to talk to this man alone.”

She met Kohl’s eyes and saw him resist. He was clearly perturbed by this strange man showing up at night, and he wanted to understand why. Kohl was every bit as protective and concerned with the safety of their family and their home as she was.

“I’ll just be a moment,” Therazine said.

Kohl looked about to say something, and then frowned. He looked up at Arkide.

“Okay. Nice to meet you, I guess.”

Kohl turned back into the house, and Therazine immediately retrieved the rifle and stepped out onto the porch with it. Veelus Arkide took a reflexive step back.

“This is the last time I’ll ask you,” Therazine said, flipping the wheel on the rifle’s receiver. The perpendicular clip chimed and locked into place, extending out of the left side of the rifle like a wing. “What do you want?”

“I’m offering you a job,” Arkide said.

“I said I don’t take jobs anymore.”

“Yes, so I’ve heard.” Arkide licked his dry lips. “You’re out of the business. But I was told by he who I represent to find you specifically, for he believes you are the only one who can do this job he wants. You were the best. He believes you still are.”

“No,” Therazine said. “I left that life behind me and I never looked back.”

“My employer hopes that you will look back. He is offering a very sizable payment for this job. I might add that I told him it was far too much, but he insisted that your skills would not come cheap.”

“I’m not that person anymore.”

Arkide chuckled slightly. “Oh, my dear Therazine. No amount of distance can erase the past. Especially not one as bloody as yours. You will always be that person.”

Therazine lifted the rifle to Arkide’s chest.

“Get off my property,” she demanded.

Arkide took a step back, and Therazine followed him.

“Are you playing straight?” he said. “You haven’t even heard my employer’s offer.”

“I don’t want your offer. I don’t want your job. All I want is you off of my land, now.” She jabbed him in the sternum, and Arkide stumbled back off the porch with a yelp. He looked up at her, simultaneously angry and afraid. She kept her left eye closed and her right looking down the barrel of her gun.

Arkide put up a hand and stood straight. “Have it your way, then.” He brushed himself off and turned away from her, heading in the direction of a stagecoach that Therazine only now noticed down her road. She kept the gun trained on him as he walked.

Arkide stopped and turned back. “Nine figures,” he called to her. “Enough to buy your own barren little world. No one in the Real could tell you what your business is.”

“Five,” Therazine called back.

“What?” Arkide said abruptly.

Therazine swallowed. “Four.”

Arkide suddenly resumed his gait towards the stagecoach. “Nine figures, ma’am.”

“Three.”

“If you should change your mind, find me in Celadin. Seek out a tavern called The Raven and The Cobbler. Don’t ask your Society about my contract. They are not involved.”

“Two.”

Arkide threw up his hands in some gesture that Therazine didn’t recognize, and then stepped into the stagecoach. Its door shut, and its twin horses took it off into the darkness.

Therazine kept her rifle up until she could no longer hear the clop of the horses’ hooves in the distance. Then she lowered it slowly, and listened to the sounds of the desert insects. The sky was cloudless, and full of stars. She looked up at these stars. These stars, which were so different from the stars that she remembered on Celedin. Celadin’s constellations were all gone: Great Ogadran didn’t race across the horizon in the winter; the Bloody Rat didn’t hold the North Star in its tiny paws; Churket and his Little Brother didn’t dance with each other by the light of the moon. Here on Lormian the stars were untraced, and bisected by a huge blanket of colors and and sparkles. It was the surest sign that she was truly on a different world.

Therazine the farmer lived on Lormian. Therazine the rancher, Therazine the landowner and wife. Therazine the mother.

On the world of Celadin, far in the forgotten land of the past, lived only Therazine the assassin.

Short Story- EATING PEOPLE

The official statement by the Malvorian government is that the harvesting of human spinal fluid is vital for both Malvorian health and the upward growth of the economy.

The Malvorians conquered the earth with ease. They were so evolved and so advanced that we never noticed our demise until it was too late. Our collapsing environment, our failing world economy, and constant war kept our attentions away from the invaders. Consumed with our own inner struggles, we failed to notice the unfathomable threat that slowly crept out of the shadows of space. It was quite the surprise to everyone when we woke up and noticed that our nations had become holding pens and our cities had become slaughterhouses.

The Malvorians took earth because of the real estate, but it wasn’t long before they became much more interested in the rich source of nutrition that lay within the human nervous system. Cerebrospinal fluid turned out to contain a high concentration of certain chemicals that the Malvorains valued immensely. It made them live longer, it encouraged their muscle growth, and—most importantly—it was delicious if spread over bread or congealed into milk.

Naturally, we were rounded up and contained within the walls of our cities until we’d reached the prime tapping age of 19, and then we were taken to facilities where they placed us on conveyer belts and then shoved thick needles into the bases of our skulls. The process was sudden, and mostly painless. After a few decades, however, the Malvorian elite began to discover more cost efficient and streamlined ways of harvesting human spinal fluid. At age 10 we were taken to the facilities, where we were kept in sterile stasis tubes until our spinal fluid was ripe. We were kept conscious during these intervening nine years, as they did not wish to tamper with the natural development of the nervous system throughout the teen years, and the lack of muscle movement kept our spines and brains undamaged and tender. Over the centuries Earth became the center for Malvorian economy and business, spearheaded by the ridiculously lucrative market of human cerebrospinal fluid.

But then a Malvorian woman calling herself an activist exposed the practices of the, quote, “Big Fluid Corporations” to the general public. For the first time, images of humans being grown in stasis tubes and having their brains siphoned of its juices were shown to the Malvorians at large. This bothered Malvorian society. They preferred not to think of where their Sweet Spinal Syrup came from, and to show children that their Fluid Pudding was processed by draining the skulls of animals was just monstrous. The public rallied behind the Malvorian activist, if for no other reason than to find a justification for their own consumption of the juicy fluids. Human tapping is inhumane, they accused. Human beings are living things, too, and just as sacred as Malvorians.

The Malvorian government refused to budge on the subject of harvesting. It was the right of Malvorian businesses to harvest their product however they deemed best. To deny them that would be an affront to the Malvorian constitution. Furthermore, human beings were just animals. They only had four lobes in their brains, and they couldn’t even perceive the fourth dimension. They saw time as linear, for godsake. To argue that humans deserved the same rights as the highly evolved Malvorians was absolutely ludicrous.

The Big Spinal Corporations argued that natural selection had favored the Malvorians, and that the only reason for humanity’s continued existence was because of industrial spinal tapping. Would these so-called “human-rights activists” really be in favor of the complete cessation of HSF harvesting, thus ensuring the extinction of the human race?

Tensions rose and the Malvorian political climate turned hostile. Petitions were signed, businesses were boycotted, and tapping centers were burned down and their confused, underdeveloped human stock were freed into a world that no longer supported them. Eventually the activists won out public support after the release of a documentary entitled “Eating People” was produced. The Malvorian government had no choice but to enact strict regulations on the treatment of live human stock and the harvesting of HSF. For a few years the Big Spinal Corporations were deeply financially wounded, but eventually they were able to adapt to the new trends and reform their slaughterhouses and tapping centers into once again profitable businesses.

We no longer live in stasis tubes for ten years of our lives. We are given twenty-five square feet of mobile environment per individual (the metrics that Malvorian biologists determined humans need to thrive), and we are granted a two by three window that looks directly into the sky, thus calming our natural urge to roam and breath the air. We are no longer fed the ground up, fluid-drained corpses of others of our species as nourishment. We are fed rich grains and pesticide-free plant matter. Our teeth and hands are still removed from us at birth, of course, as that is for our own safety. Humans have the strange tendency to lean towards the suicidal in captivity. And, most importantly, the Malvorian activists can sleep soundly at night knowing that they made a difference, and feel vindicated and proud when they wake at night for a midnight snack of environmentally-conscious, humanely grown human spinal fluid.

SONS OF SINNERS Excerpt

This is a bit of my novel I was editing today, and I really liked how it came out. The interaction between Josh and Galen feels really real to me here. Id like to bring out more of this in the rest of my book.

Fourteen

“Christ,” Galen said. He bit down on the tough leather of his belt and closed his eyes.

Joshua held held the bloody bullet between his fingers. He regarded it briefly and then tossed it aside, focusing on closing up the coin sized tear in Galen’s shoulder.

Galen felt the tug on his flesh as the needle and thread burrowed through again and again. It was hot and unceasing. He wanted to lash out, to strike Joshua away. But he knew to just bite the belt and endure it. They’d done this before.

When at last he felt the final tug he opened his eyes again. Joshua was kneeling over him, sweating, his hands caked in blood.

“All done,” the boy said.

Galen panted. “All better?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“But it’ll hold me.”

Joshua nodded. “Until we get out of here, yeah. You’ll need someone professional to look at it, though.”

Galen sighed and let his head rest against the hard earth of the salt flats. The sun was as unrelenting as it had been yesterday. Had he expected it to change? No. Not really. But he’d hoped it would.

He felt Joshua’s fingers on his collar bone. He tilted his head up and saw the boy pulling his already open shirt farther off his chest. Joshua was looking at Galen’s pale flesh. More accurately, he was looking at the demon tattoo.

Galen batted his hand away. “Stop it,” he said.

Joshua looked him in the eyes. “Does it still hurt?”

“I just got shot. Course it still hurts.”

“No,” Joshua said, looking at the black wheel on Galen’s chest. “The mark.”

Galen sat up, a motion his body was not happy with. He grunted in exasperation, panted for a moment, and then looked over at Joshua. The boy was still kneeling next to him, and their faces were only inches apart.

“What have I said about talking about that?” Galen said.

“But I thought—considering what we just… with the angel, I mean. Shouldn’t you tell me now?”

“No,” Galen said. There wasn’t even a trace of playfulness in his voice.

Joshua blinked and leaned away from Galen’s rancid breath. “But I just—”

“You have an angel inside of you, Josh. That’s what you believe. And if that’s true, then I’m even farther from telling you what this is. Just drop it.”

“But—”

“Josh,” Galen said. He put a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Thank you for patching me up. Now I don’t wanna waste no more breath speaking about things that shouldn’t be spoken of. We got no water and even less food. You follow me?”

Joshua stared at him for a moment, and then he sighed and nodded his head. “Okay.”

Stagnancy

Been having a lot of trouble writing lately. I'd like to say it's because I've been so busy with work and things, but that doesn't really feel like a valid excuse when I've had plenty of time to dick around on the internet and play video games. In actuality I've just not been pushing myself as hard lately, for whatever reason. It could be because I'm just growing weary of editing my book; I've been doing so for about nine months now, and-- if I'm going to be honest-- it hasn't really improved from the first draft since then. I mean, it has, but the changes are so small when compared with what I've still got to  fix or improve. I've grown so much as a writer since my rough draft, and every time I look at my book I see things that I really need to change. And that list keeps growing the more I learn. Will I ever be happy with it?

Short Story- PRETTY LITTLE GIRL

The little girl in the mirror was almost pretty enough, except for her shoulder. Her eyes were bright and piercing, her hair was done up in the way it was supposed to be (Mother insisted that she practice putting it up twice a day), and her skin was flawless. Well, almost flawless, if it weren’t for the scaly thing on her shoulder. She’d first noticed it yesterday after lunch—a little grey thing that jumped out at her when she removed her dress. At first she thought it was a smudge of makeup, or just lint from her freshly cleaned clothes. But it didn’t come off when she rubbed it. It moved with her skin, like sea foam. It was rough and cold to the touch.

Now looking at her reflection in the mirror, examining it carefully, she saw it was bigger than yesterday. It had grown to the size of a quarter. She bent over the sink and leaned her shoulder in closer to the mirror. It pushed out of her skin just to the right of her collarbone, where the muscles of the chest and shoulder met. It looked to her kind of like a scab, only a little greyer and perfectly round. And, unlike a scab, its edges weren’t the soothing pink of scar tissue. The skin was an angry, puffy red, curling around the edges of the thing as if in protest to its presence.

It made her feel sick looking at it. She got off the sink and slipped her dress back on, making sure the elegant yoke of it was covering her shoulder. It had to be. Mother would not be happy if she were to find out that she had any blemishes.

#

When she got downstairs she found Mother sitting at the kitchen counter. She was watching the small white TV that stood at the end of the granite countertop, a lit cigarette dangling from her lips.

“Good morning, Susan,” Mother said without looking up from the story on the screen. She nodded towards a plate on the counter. The plate had nothing but half a hardboiled egg.

Susan walked up to the counter and got onto a stool, being careful to fold her dress under her legs so it wouldn’t crease. She regarded the plate skeptically. “Breakfast?” she said.

“That’s all you need,” Mother said, her eyes still on the silent TV. “Can’t let you be getting fat so close to the big day.” She looked up, and her eyes filled with that biting disgust that Susan had gotten so used to seeing first thing in the morning. It was normal, but it still filled Susan with such shame.

“Christ, what did you do to your hair?”

Susan’s hands immediately flew to her head and she felt the lock that had fallen free. “I—It must have been when I put on—“

“When you put on your dress?” Mother sighed. “You always put on your dress before doing your hair. Never… Christ, look at this mess.” She stood up and walked around the counter. She began to run her spidery fingers over Susan’s scalp. “Look at this. Imagine if this had happened Thursday. What then? Imagine if I’d left you backstage, and then you went to take a piss or something before the show. Look what you’d have done.”

Susan sat very still and let Mother do her work. The cigarette smoke stung her eyes and made her nostrils flare, but she dared not move.

Mother dropped her hands away and put them on her knees. “There we go. All better.” She looked over Susan’s face. “Now who’s a pretty little girl?”

“I am, Mother,” Susan said.

“That’s right,” Mother said. She patted Susan’s knee and then stood up, taking the cigarette out of her mouth to blow a cloud into the kitchen ceiling. “I saw Barbara Shilling this morning.”

Susan said nothing and waited Mother to finish.

“She had Kendra with her.” Mother sat back on the stool and looked across at Susan. “Dressed like a little slut. I’m talking wire thin shoulder straps and four-inch heels. Four-inch heels! Can you believe that? Four-inch heels on a ten year old. Jesus. And this was just what Barbara had her wearing for walking around town. I can only imagine what sort of slutwear she has in store for Thursday.”

Susan picked up her fork and touched the egg half on her plate. As she moved her arm, she felt the unmistakable lump of the thing on her shoulder. She’d forgotten about it for a moment, and a spike of fear shot into her heart as she remembered it. Should she tell Mother?

“Really, I don’t know what the fuck Barbara’s thinking,” Mother said. “None of them know what this is all about. They think you can just win the judges with sex appeal, like their daughters are goddamn streetwalkers. But no, it’s about elegance. It’s about beauty. Refinement. Not sex.” She leaned over the counter and touched Susan’s chin. “But you understand, Susan. You’ll win. And why is that?”

She met Mother’s eyes. They were dark and fierce; caring in a way that seemed real but Susan always felt was probably not. But most of all they were old.

“Because I’m a pretty little girl,” Susan said.

Mother smiled thinly. “That’s right.” She went back to following the silent lips of the people on the television.

Susan stabbed the egg with her fork and lifted it up. The skin of the egg was off-white, almost a light grey. It reminded her of that thing which sat imbedded into the valley between the muscles of her neck and the muscles of her shoulder.

She set the egg back down.

“Eat it,” Mother said. “I can’t have you getting too thin, either.”

Susan nodded, but could not bring herself to touch her tongue to the egg. She picked it up again and held it in front of her, deciding that that was a fair compromise. The more she looked at the egg, the more she thought of the thing on her shoulder. And the more frightened she became. It was hard like wood, and she could feel a slight numbness around where it sat in her skin. She desperately wanted to bring Mother’s attention to it. But she knew that would not be wise.

Pretty little girls are blemish-free.

#

Susan felt a wet thud on her upper back. It wasn’t enough to make her stumble, but definitely enough to make her notice. She pivoted on the sidewalk, holding her books close to her chest. A clump of dirt and grass lay on the concrete behind her. She gasped sharply and nearly dropped her books as she reached a hand to swipe off the dirt on her back.

She looked up when she heard a boy’s laughter. Another dirt clod flew by her, disintegrating as it tumbled across the concrete. The boy had come from behind a tree in the nearest yard. He skipped towards her now, smiling broadly and patting his hands together to get the dirt off them.

Susan scrunched her face up angrily. “Bobby Marlow!”

The boy stopped as he reached her, bouncing up and down. He was a few inches taller than her. “Morning, Suze,” he said.

“Don’t ‘morning’ me,” Susan said, summoning her best Mother’s voice. “What’s wrong with you? The pageant’s in two days. What if you’d gotten your dirty dirt in my hair?”

“Oh no!” Bobby threw up his hands and then began giggling. “What ever would you do then? Not your hair!”

“It takes hours to do my hair right,” Susan said. Her blood was boiling. She felt like crying. She didn’t know why. Bobby was just being Bobby, after all. “This is why Mother says not to play with you.”

“Your mother says that because she’s a mean old witch.” Bobby reached out a hand to her. She flinched, but didn’t stop him. He patted the dirt off her back and then smiled again. “What’s with the sweater, Suze? It’s like a million degrees out.”

The sweater must have looked very odd, Susan realized. And she was sweating underneath it. But when she’d woken that morning and looked in the mirror, the thing on her shoulder had grown to the size of a golf ball. Also like a golf ball, it was now pocked with dozens of small indentations—little shallow holes with jagged edges that were bisected by squiggly lines, like barnacles. The entirety of the thing was rougher and more developed. When she chanced to touch it, it didn’t move on her skin like it had yesterday. It stayed firm on that point between her shoulder and neck. Anchored. Most terrible of all, it protruded enough out of her skin for it to show under all of her dresses and blouses. Everyone would see it if she didn’t hide it. The sweater was her only option.

“I’m cold,” she said.

“You’re a liar,” Bobby blurted out. “Is this a thing that your mom’s doing? Is she making you wear this?”

In truth, Mother had objected heavily to the sweater. She didn’t want any of the other girls at school thinking that her Pretty Little Girl had anything to hide. So Susan had worn it over her shoulders like a scarf, a gesture that Mother described as “classy.” She immediately donned it proper upon leaving the house.

“Mother doesn’t like it,” she said.

Bobby’s expression changed a bit, but remained mirthful. “Well I think it looks pretty,” he said.

Susan blushed, and was surprised to find herself smiling a bit. She was glad that Bobby had caught up to her. She really did like him, even if he was what Mother called “a dirty little shit.”

“Will you carry my books for me?” she asked.

Bobby, still smiling, took them from her. They continued along the sidewalk. The lack of books was freeing to Susan, but the sun’s heat was plenty heavy. She really wished she had kept the sweater as a scarf. Too late to change it now, though, with Bobby right there.

“I went to show my brother that weird flower,” Bobby said.

Susan’s heart sunk. She stayed quiet.

“It wasn’t there anymore,” Bobby continued. “Really weird. The ground was all black where it was. Like it got burned up or something.”

“Maybe it flew away,” Susan said quietly. She expected Bobby to reject this notion as ridiculous, but he only nodded.

“Maybe,” he said. “Does it still hurt? Where you touched it?”

She felt the firm presence of the thing on her shoulder.

“I didn’t touch it,” she said.

“I saw you touch it.”

“No,” she said. “I fell on it. Remember? I fell and it touched me. Why would I touch a gross thing like that?”

Bobby shrugged. “I don’t know. All I know is I came over that hill after I heard you screaming and you were pointing at that weird flower like it bit you.”

“Well I’m fine,” she said. “Nothing’s wrong with me.”

“I didn’t say anything’s wrong with you, Suze.”

“I said I’m fine!” She could hear Mother’s voice in her head, shrill and angry. Just look at your skin! What did you do? Just look at it! You touched what? You were out playing with WHO?

Bobby held up a hand. “Okay! You’re okay. Cheese and rice.”

“And it wasn’t a flower. Flowers don’t move.”

“It didn’t move, Suze. You got scared, is all. It was just a weird flower and it stung you. No need to freak out.”

Susan heard the doubt and slight pity in Bobby’s voice, and she realized that that was what she had wanted from him. It was compassion, in a sense. More so than what she received from Mother. And it comforted her. After all, if Bobby Marlow said it was okay, then shit was okay.

#

“Susan!” Mother called. “Susan, what is taking you so damn long?”

“I’m almost ready,” Susan said. For a moment Mother’s fists stopped banging on the bedroom door, but seconds later they started up again.

“Susan, I swear to God, if you step out here and your blush isn’t properly—“

“I said I’m almost ready, Mother.”

Silence for a moment.

“Two minutes,” Mother said. “Two minutes and then I’m breaking the fucking door down.”

Susan listened for the sound of Mother’s receding footsteps, but she knew that she would be waiting right outside the door until the moment that Susan stepped through. Two years ago Mother would have never allowed her to prepare herself before a show. But she was ten years old now, and Susan supposed that granted her some level of agency. Perhaps Mother was realizing that she was old enough to take on responsibilities of her own now. More than likely, Susan knew, it was so she could tell all the other mothers that her Pretty Little Girl had prepared herself all on her own, like a refined lady. Even if she had been shouting instructions through the door.

In the back of her mind Susan thought about these things. At the forefront was the thing on her shoulder. Although to say it was on her shoulder was no longer completely true.

The thing had become her shoulder.

It had grown exponentially over the last night. The crusty grey mass stretched from her collarbone to her armpit, and then almost completely over her shoulder and onto her back. Red skin had peeled back and died, folding over itself at the edges of the thing like thin bark burning off wood. It was cemented deep into her body, she could feel it. Its knobby, barnacle-covered surface stuck out over an inch from her flesh.

Susan could not avoid looking at it in the mirror. Every time she would turn to apply her makeup or replace a loose strand of hair, her eyes would drift to the scabby thing. She didn’t want to; laying eyes on it made her stomach twist in disgust and fear. But a strange, morbid curiosity kept returning her eyes to it. She stared at it with an almost objective gaze, as if the thing wasn’t actually on her, but only on the girl in the mirror. It didn’t hurt, after all. It was still numb. The thing in the mirror certainly looked painful, but she felt nothing.

And if it didn’t hurt, it was probably fine. Just like Bobby had said. What did mother always tell her? Grin and bear it?

The dress that Mother had chosen for her to wear tonight covered only half the thing. So she had made a wardrobe change without Mother’s consent: A billowing, white ball gown with huge poofy shoulders. Ariel’s Wedding Gown, she called it. She put it on (a tricky task what with the rock-like thing on her shoulder) and looked at herself in the mirror. The thing was completely invisible.

When she stepped out into the hallway, Mother’s first reaction was a look of horror. For a moment Susan thought that her dress had slipped and Mother had at last discovered the thing, but then she noticed the way that Mother’s eyes went up and down her body, scanning the dress itself.

“What in the hell are you wearing?” Mother said. “We don’t have time for this! Where’s the other dress?”

The rising irritation in Mother’s voice was unhindered, and it almost boiled over into ineffable fury. She took a step closer, her brightly colored fingernails ready to tear Ariel’s gown apart and reveal the hideous barnacle-thing that lurked beneath.

“I thought it made me look more elegant,” Susan said.

Mother stopped. Her expression changed, and she looked Susan over. Clearly this notion intrigued her, but Susan could see that she was not completely sold.

“Not like those other sluts,” she said.

At this Mother smiled, and then immediately frowned. “You watch your mouth, young lady.” She gently touched the poof over Susan’s right shoulder, and for a moment that icy fear of discovery gripped Susan again.

“Elegant,” Mother said. “I believe you’re right, Susan. This will definitely set you apart. I just wish you’d discussed this with me first.” She flourished a hand. “But you’re becoming your own woman, making your own very fine decisions.”

Susan forced a smile, knowing that Mother was working on her speech for the other parents. See that ELEGANT look my Susan is sporting? Yeah, she chose that her self. My Pretty Little Girl is also my Pretty Fashionably-Minded Girl.

#

Mother licked two fingers and ran them over Susan’s scalp, no doubt taming some rogue lock. Susan stood still and waited for Mother to lick twice more before stopping and placing her hands on her knees.

Mother looked over her work and smiled. “Very pretty,” she said. “Very beautiful. Did you see Cindy Straub?”

Susan knew it didn’t matter whether she had or not.

“Rampage boots,” Mother said, scoffing exasperatedly. “Rampage boots. Can you fucking believe that? Why would they even design rampage boots for ten year olds?”

Susan remained perfectly still as Mother plucked at the poofy shoulders of the dress.

“This was the perfect choice, Susan. You’ll show them. Now, what are we going to do when we walk up to the judge?”

“Curtsy.”

“Curtsy,” Mother confirmed. “And then when he asks if you’d rather be pretty or smart?”

“Neither,” Susan said. And then in tandem they said, “I want to be exactly the way I am, because I am beautiful and clever and powerful, and I can do anything that I set my mind to. I don’t need to limit myself to ‘eithers’ and ‘ors’. If I strive to be all, then I will be all, because I am beauty manifest.”

Susan didn’t know what most of that meant, but she said it every year and every year she lost. They never changed their strategy, even though the other girls said something different every year. That was just the way these things go. Mother smiled and touched Susan’s chin gently, so as not to muss up her makeup.

“Good girl,” Mother said.

“Mrs. Franklin?” a man’s voice said from the other side of the dressing room door.

“Come on in,” Mother said.

The door creaked open and a tall bespectacled man poked in his head. “The pageant’s about to start. I have to ask you to get on out to the auditorium.”

Mother looked to Susan. “Who’s my Pretty Little Girl?”

“I am,” Susan said.

“Yes you are. You always will be.” Mother nodded and then stood up. She stepped by the man with a smile and then disappeared.

The tall man visibly relaxed after Mother left. He stepped completely into the dressing room. “Are you almost ready, Susan? We’re starting soon.”

“I am, Mr. Baker.” Susan smiled wide, showing a mouth full of almost perfectly white teeth. “I just need another second.”

“Of course. Just don’t take too long, now. We need all the girls up on stage for the start of the show.”

“I know.”

Mr. Baker nodded, and lingered in the room for another moment. When Susan smiled again he left.

Alone in the dressing room, Susan gently pulled down the poofy sleeve over her right shoulder. The thing reared its ugly head into the vanity mirror. It had begun to itch on the ride over, and during the talk with her mother it had started to sting. It wasn’t quite painful, but it was alarming all the same. She bent over the bottles and brushes and tweezers to get closer to the mirror, to inspect the bulging grey mass one more time before the show.

It was as it was that morning: Pocked like pumice and crudely imbedded in her flesh like a Halloween prosthetic.

One of the barnacles blinked.

She gasped and fell back from the vanity mirror, sending the stool skittering across the room. She turned fully to the thing, engaging it not through the mirror but directly with her eyes. Up close she could see the organic, sandy lines of its surface. Her heart raced, and she stared at the nearest barnacle-like structure.

The jagged line in its hole opened for a split second, and something wet gleamed within. Then it closed.

She would have screamed if there hadn’t been a knock on the door right at that moment.

“Susan?” Mr. Baker’s voice came. “Miss Franklin?”

Susan heard him, but she could not find the courage to respond. She looked back at the thing. It was burning now, like a hot knife. She stared for what felt like an eternity, waiting for the barnacle to open again.

“Are you alright?”

The thing didn’t move. The stinging stopped.

“Susan?” Mr. Baker opened the door, shielding his eyes with a clipboard out of decency.

Susan yanked the poofy sleeve back over her shoulder. “I’m okay.”

Mr. Baker peaked from behind the clipboard, and lowered it completely when he saw Susan was fully dressed. He frowned. “Let’s go, Miss Franklin. All the other girls are already on stage.”

“Sorry,” Susan said, standing up hurriedly. Grin and bear it, she thought. Be a Pretty Little Girl.

#

Cindy Straub flipped her overly wound curls over her shoulders and cocked her hip too far to one side, lifting one of her rampage boots so that only the toe remained on the stage.

Susan squinted at the bright sequins that glittered off Cindy Straub’s dress. Tacky, she heard Mother say in her head. She looked out into the crowd to see if Mother agreed, but the all-seeing beam of the stage lights blinded her to the audience. She could imagine, however, the look of judgmental disgust on Mother’s face when Cindy Straub placed a gloved hand on that sequined teal hip.

“Now, Miss Straub,” Mr. Baker said, “which would you rather be: Pretty or smart?”

“Well,” Cindy Straub said, pitching her voice an octave deeper, “if I had to choose between being smart or pretty, I would rather be pretty. Being pretty is more than what our body says. ‘Pretty,’ for me, means cleanliness in body and spirit, pureness in heart and soul, and goodness in actions and deeds, and by helping out those who need it. By that definition of pretty, I think that being pretty is much more important than being smart.”

She finished with a flourish of her hand, and the dress sparkled. Everyone in the audience clapped wildly behind the curtain of light at the end of the stage. Everyone, Susan knew, except for one person.

“Thank you very much, Miss Straub,” Mr. Baker said. Cindy Straub blew him a kiss and then walked back to her place in the line. The other girls smiled at her and giggled, whispering about how pretty she was and how big of a crush Mr. Baker has on her. Susan watched them. All were dressed similarly to Cindy Straub, with shiny flashy dresses and extravagant accessories. These were the kinds of girls who wouldn’t talk with her at school. The kinds of girls who told the boys to stay away from her because she dressed weird and spoke weird and her Mother was weird and she was just weird all over.

On any other day, at any other pageant, Susan would have felt a sinking jealousy in her heart as the other girls congratulated Cindy on her miraculous performance. But right now all she felt was the burning in her shoulder. It had stopped for a few moments while she got on stage, but here, under the hot stare of the lights, it began its stinging again.

“Up next we have the lovely Miss Franklin,” Mr. Baker said. People applauded softly, inviting Susan to Mr. Baker’s side.

Susan had heard, but her feet wouldn’t move. The stinging had suddenly grown unbearably intense, and she closed her eyes and bit her lip. Her blood pounded in her ears.

“Miss Franklin?”

A hand from behind shoved her forward, accompanied by a barely audible ‘weirdo’. She stumbled out, very nearly tripping, but she caught herself and stood up straight by Mr. Baker’s side. The clapping started up again. A strand of hair hung before her eyes, and she could almost see Mother’s fingers twitching in eagerness to brush it out of her face.

The thing was throbbing now. She began to breath heavily.

“The lovely young Miss Franklin,” Mr. Baker said. He looked down to his clipboard and flipped a page before making a quick mark with his pen. “That’s a, uh, very unique dress you have, there.”

“It’s…” Susan heard a ringing in her ears. Her skin felt greasy, clammy. The thing was pulsating faster. “It’s… Ariel’s Wedding Gown,” she said.

The girls behind her giggled. Someone in the audience made a patronizing awww. Mr. Baker nodded and made another note.

“So, Miss Franklin,” he said. “Would you rather be pretty or smart?”

Susan breathed in rapidly, held her breath for a moment, and then breathed out. She repeated this twice more before trying to speak. “I… I’d neither… I’m… I want to be…” The muscles on her face began to twitch. Her shoulder was very warm now.

“I’m sorry?” Mr. Baker said. “Miss Franklin, you need to articulate your—“ He looked up from his notes. “Miss Franklin, are you alright? Susan?”

“I’m… clever and… and I’m power…“ Tears were beginning to form in Susan’s eyes. “I’m powerful. I’m… I’m a… beautiful—“

Mr. Baker screamed and threw up his clipboard as a spray of red blood erupted from Susan’s shoulder. She felt an incredible rip in her skin, and then heard the split of the fabric of her dress. She fell completely silent as six silvery tentacles tore from her shoulder and reached across her body. The scabrous thing pulled free of her flesh and screeched out of three mouths filled with razor teeth. She fell to her knees as the silver tentacles wrapped themselves around her face and neck. She saw the eyes of the thing—all five of them—buried in the barnacle structures of its exoskeleton. They were hungry.

The tentacles entwined head entirely and the thing descended onto her face. It began to bite and rend and feed, but Susan felt none of it. Her body gave up, collapsing onto the blood-streaked stage while the thing feasted on her.

She heard screams everywhere around her. She heard Mother’s scream above it all, high-pitched and full of primal despair. But Susan knew it was not for her safety that Mother screamed. Even as she died on the pageantry stage, she knew that her mother was in anguish because this terrible alien thing was destroying her Pretty Little Girl face.

Excuses!

So I don't have a short story for you today. Three in and I'm already failing my schedule.

But I have reasons! Or excuses, really, as they're not incredibly valid. But I think reasons sounds better, so I'm going to go with reasons. Even though I clearly wasn't confident in that enough to change the name of this post. In any case, here are some reasons that there is no short story today:

-I have been working a ton on my edits for SONS OF SINNERS. I've told some folks who I want to have as beta readers that I'm going to be getting my manuscript to them soon and that's ignited some spark in my brain so now I can't stop working on it. I'm going through my edits for probably the sixth or seventh time, and I'm still finding things that I want to change. Pretty soon I'm going to just have to brush off my hands and say "done! Done, that's it. Not gonna... Nope, just givin' it out, now. Yep." But for now my mind is still wrapped around working on it.

-It's been crazy nice outside and as a result my restaurant has been really busy. So I've been working a ton of hours a ton of days, which is a terrible excuse to not be writing. Reason. Terrible reason, I mean. Not excuse. An okay reason. Confidence. I don't see work slowing down any time soon, so I've just got to tweak my writing schedule so I stay consistent.

-I've been reading like a mad man lately. The kind of mad man who has gone mad because he reads too much. So rather than putting words to paper I've been reading words that someone else ha put to paper. So that's something good at least, right?

I could've vomited out a story in the time I had this afternoon just to make the deadline, but I didn't really want to do that. It was crazy nice outside, as I said, and when I got off work I walked down to the water with some whiskey and my dog and read a good book for five or six hours, which is something I don't regret at all. So that happened instead of writing today. I think that's fine.

tl;dr
I'll post a story sometime in a couple days. I have a few things running through my skull that I want to show you.