Borrowed Strength, Page 4

  We were without choice but to obey. We pitied the boy, perhaps, but if he carried a plague - as indeed he must have - any show of mercy might have doomed us. We fired the cannon as soon as he came within range.

  At nightfall we burned the flotsam brought in by the tide. There was no sign of the boy's body. With luck the current carried it away, to be eaten by the fish.

  Sula woke with fever this morning, sweating in rivers, and he would not open his eyes. He begged for a blindfold; we gave one to him.

  Sula's skin has sprouted lesions like those of the boy in the boat. We placed him under quarantine, though we cannot think how any infection might have reached him. The doctor can do but little: we are in greatest need of supplies.

  The doctor fled two days ago, without a word to any of us.

  Where he went, and why, we can only guess. Our island is small enough, but there has been no sign of him. Either he is hiding in the forest or he has drowned himself; but what reason has he to do either?

  We dare not enter Sula's cabin. Without the doctor's aid, without food or medicine, he has scant hope of recovery: and perhaps it would be merciful to kill him, but we dare not risk infection.

  There have been sounds from Sula's cabin, loud and terrible, impossible to ignore. He cries and moans with his pain, but sometimes his cries turn to wailing, and sometimes his wails turn to snarls and growls: it is as though there were a beast in his cabin, clawing at the walls with the effort to escape. We cannot walk past without shuddering. The fever must have turned him to madness; but what more can we do but to keep him confined?

  There are those who say we ought to burn his cabin: it would be the safest and most merciful course. But we do not quite dare. He may yet recover; there is no reason to suspect infection from the mainland. The boy in the boat never reached us.

  The sounds have stopped.

  In the silence, we whispered and wondered. Is he dead then? Has he recovered? He would not respond to our knocks, and we dared not open the door.

  We cannot retrieve his body. We dare not risk infection, and the stench from his cabin is nigh unbearable. If he does not respond to our knocks within three days, we shall burn it to the ground: that is all the pyre he will have. We will say the rites over his ashes.

  Three days have passed with no answer from Sula; we had no choice but to believe him dead. When night fell we went to set his cabin alight.

  We saw his door standing open, and the cabin empty. He has left his quarantine.

  Beside the door we saw his blindfold, abandoned.

  Help me. I saw Sula. In the dark of the trees, too dark to see - too dark to see - hidden there among the trees, hidden in the darkness - I saw his eyes.

  Gina Star's Debut

  Challenge #12: write a story based on the musical or videographic output of David Bowie, featuring a cross-dressing, transgender, or androgynous character; it must begin with a hook and end with a twist.

  All I can say is this closet's getting cramped. Coathooks in my face. Sequins and gauze so thick it's hard to breathe. Can't even sit down for all the fancy shoes.

  No more of this: I'm coming out today. I'm stepping through that door, glitter, sequins and all.

  I hit up my buddy Richard, all dolled up. He looks up, looks again, rubs his eyes, looks one more time. "What the fuck?" he says.

  "Yo." I feel like I'm floating. All that time canned up in the closet, now Gina Star has her turn to shine.

  "Seriously, man, what the fuck?"

  "This," I say, gesturing up and down all six feet two of gorgeous wonderment, "is Gina Star."

  "You're wearing a dress," says Richard.

  "Yeah."

  "With sequins."

  "Yeah."

  "And high heels. Also with sequins."

  "Yeah."

  "And lipstick. Are those sequins on your lips? Seriously?"

  "You're seeing 20/20 today."

  He puts a hand over his eyes. I guess all the sequins might be blinding him. "What's Gina Star?" he asks.

  "Gina Star is me," I say. "Just prettier. You gotta admit I look a lot better this way."

  He peers at me from between his fingers and groans.

  Then suddenly he snaps his eyes open and leans forward, staring at me hard. "Hey," he says. "Where'd you get that shirt?"

  I guess I shouldn't have come out to him wearing one of his wife's.

  The Earth-Queen's Sorrow

  The earth-queen's son was born in springtime, and his birth was heralded with crocuses and fresh green and a splendor of sunlight. Through summertime he grew, golden and beautiful, dearer to her than the wind itself.

  Then autumn came, and the leaves ran red with his blood. He fell, and withered, an empty husk of brown.

  Winter came: in her sorrow, the earth-queen swept the world with white. Snow would be his shroud and his finery. The chill in the air would mirror the cold emptiness in her heart. Ice would cover her lakes and rivers and the wounds of her soul; and her frozen tears would fall from the heavens as tiny flakes of crystal.

  The winter drew on, and many died under the cold weight of the earth-queen's sorrow. At last the people chose a hero to go to her, to beg for mercy.

  They fitted her with fatted leather boots, with a thick leather vest, with fur-lined gloves and a fur-lined cloak. "You go into the heart of winter," they told her. "Give no quarter to the cold." And thus clothed in warmth she went out, into the woods of winter, into the white world of ice and snow.

  And cold it was; but the hero was warm, there in her cloak and her gloves and her vest and her boots.

  At last she came upon the earth-queen, who sat weeping in a garden of frozen flowers. "My lady," she said, wanting to ask the earth-queen's mercy; but she was moved by her tears, and asked instead: "Why do you weep?"

  "My son has died," said the earth-queen, who was pale with sorrow.

  "The world suffers with you," said the hero. "We cannot bear this cold."

  "Nor can I bear this cold in my heart. But he will not return to me."

  And though the hero had been ready to do battle with words or with blades, if she could so bring the earth-queen to reason, she fought instead with kindness. She laid her cloak around the earth-queen's shoulders and a hand on her arm.

  "No," she said. "He will not return." And she held the earth-queen close as she wept, and gave what comfort she could, though all around them the snow raged in storms.

  "Take my warmth, my lady," she said. "Take the warmth of my heart."

  And the storm abated, in time, and the earth-queen's tears stayed. A wan smile lit her face, and a wan sun peered through the veil of clouds.

  And there in the snow, in between the frozen flowers, the hero could see a new shoot of green.

  To Skirt Destiny

  The first messenger was an old woman wrapped in patchwork skirts and shawls, with eyes so milky that she must have been nearly blind. Seth had seen her before. She'd always carried so many bags with her that he thought they must be all she owned.

  She dropped something that day. A small parcel, wrapped in brown. He picked it up and ran after her; she took it from him, and took both his hands in her withered old claws, and stared at him with her milky eyes. "You'll do what's right," she said.

  He shivered, but before he could speak she had moved on, leaving only the soft swishing sound of bags and skirts. A yellowed envelope slipped out of one of her bags, and he picked it up and scrambled after her through the crowd - but she was gone, and her flock of bags with her.

  He took it home, and kept it for three weeks without seeing her again. Curiosity overcame him at last, and he slit the envelope open.

  Inside was a letter, handwritten and blotched with spilled ink. It addressed him by name. It told him he was the heir of a forgotten kingdom, just beyond the corners of the world. It told him that his people had need of him, that he must take up the sacred blade and bring the false king to justice. Enclosed was the sacred blade itself: a miniature sword cast in pewte
r, hanging on a necklace-chain.

  Seth shivered, not because he thought that any of it was true but because he hadn't thought of the milky-eyed old woman as a lunatic, particularly not one whose fanaticism hinged on him. She must have been planning this trick for quite some time. He wondered how she had found out his name.

  He had no more thoughts of returning the envelope; instead he burned it, together with the letter. He didn't want it to be found, not with his name on it. He kept the sword in his pocket: it seemed like a waste to throw it away.

  The second messenger was a girl his own age, a hitchhiker dressed like a rock star. Between her flashy jewelry and her studded black belt he didn't notice the sunglasses, even though it was getting dark, even though she never took them off.

  She gave him step-by-step instructions around a mouthful of gum. "Turn left here." "Next right after this one." He felt like he was going in circles, but didn't dare to ask her if there wasn't a more direct route. Seth tended to assume the best of people.

  "We're here," she said, and he stopped beside an overgrown lilac. There was something odd about the area, though he couldn't put his finger on it.

  "Aren't you coming?"

  He blinked and stepped out of the car, acting automatically. It wasn't until she grabbed his hand and started to pull him behind the lilac bush that he hesitated.

  "Come on," she said. "You've got the sword, right?"

  He pulled back; she still had hold of his hand, and at the movement her arm clipped her glasses and knocked them to the ground. For the first time he could see her eyes, white and milky as though she were blind.

  He panicked, freed his arm, ran back to his car. The drive was a blur: he was surprised to realize, half an hour later, that he'd somehow made it home.

  The third messenger was a cat. His neighbor's long-haired tabby, he thought, until it came up to him and pawed at his legs, and he looked down to eyes as white as marble. He nearly kicked it. Instead he ran through the door and shut it quickly, before the thing could come in after him.

  The fourth was a pigeon, which sat outside his window and looked in at him. He lobbed his socks in its direction, and a pen, and a pillow, but it didn't fly away. It shadowed him from behind the glass, staring at him with milky white eyes.

  Alone in the basement, where there were no windows, he took the sword necklace from his pocket. He wrapped the chain around his hand and touched its hilt with his fingers. There was a flash of light: suddenly he was holding a full-sized sword, steel instead of pewter, with a razor edge and an impressive gem set in its hilt in lieu of a cheap rhinestone. His hand was chained to its hilt.

  He loosened his grip, and it became a pewter trinket once more.

  Shaken, he returned to his room and shoved the necklace into a drawer, behind a pile of cough drops and toffees, where he wouldn't have to look at it again. The pigeon watched him and then flew away.

  The fifth messenger was a woman working at the coffee shop nearby. She brought his drink to his table and slid down into the seat across from him as she handed it over. He glanced up to thank her - and froze, seeing her blank white eyes.

  "Drink," she said, propping her elbows on the table and her chin on her steepled hands. He took a cautious sip.

  "We are waiting for you," she said. "We need you, Seth."

  He took another swallow, burning his throat. "I'm not a hero," he said.

  "You must be. We need you."

  He finished his coffee under her white stare, and left without saying another word.

  He went home. He took the sword out of the drawer, holding it in his hand - wrapped in its chain - as he went back outside, and began to walk aimlessly along the street.

  Soon enough he came across a young girl, fair-haired and white-eyed, holding a pink balloon. She tugged at his shirt. "Come with me," she said.

  He knelt down beside her, placed the sword in her hand, and wrapped her fingers around it.

  "Take this," he said. "Take it and free your people."

  Final Wishes

  Challenge #13: write an epistolary story in response to a piece of flash fiction that was written by a fellow FFMer this month. One of your characters must be a ghost or already dead, one of your characters must have no name, and your story should feature at least one cat.

  (This story was inspired by "Then There Wasn't" by Ashe Thornbury.)

  First letter:

  Love, I have to tell you this. I know you won't believe me, because I don't believe it myself, but I have to tell you.

  Remember when we were both kids, wishing on stars? I remember our first night - we were lying on the hill staring up at the sky, and then we held hands and together we wished that we'd be together forever and marry and have a kid who could change the world, and we held hands and then - this hurts to write, I'm sorry, I miss you so much

  but, well -

  it came true, didn't it? We married. And you're still with me, more or less, even if I can't see you and all you can see is these bloody letters, and - and our little girl can change the world.

  She wished for a cat last night, love. I wish I could have told her no. We can't take care of one. But she didn't ask me, did she? She asked the stars.

  I can tell you which star she asked, too. The centerpiece of Orion's belt is missing. And in her room, I can't even walk, there's not any surface in there that's not covered in cats. Furry. Warm. Purring, or meowing, and there's not a litterbox or anything, and I wanted to take her out but she's staying there, she looked so happy, I can't tell her to stay away not when she's crying like that with happiness -

  I miss you so much. I wish you were here.

  Second letter:

  I had to be firm with her, love, just like you always were. I could never say no to her, you know that, but I told her - I explained about litterboxes and food and space and everything, and

  oh god

  I don't even... listen, I told her that because I thought it would be best and, you know, all these cats here - they need caring for - they're living things, they're alive and they don't - they deserve caring for, there's no way we could just get rid of them -

  so I don't know, maybe this is my fault but I was just trying to do what's best, for her and for these cats, you know?

  She did what I asked her, anyway. She's a good girl, love. You would be proud of her. There's a litterbox on every floor now, plenty of fresh sand, they're self-cleaning even. There's food and water. They're still going to grow half-feral, there's no way she (we) can keep that many cats socialized, but at least they're - taken care of.

  I said floors. The house is huge now, so the cats don't overcrowd. Trust a nine-year-old's imagination: it's full of towers and turrets and winding staircases, half castle and half pirate ship. You have to swing on ropes to get places. I would have loved this house when I was young, but it's - there's no way no one will notice this - and there are obvious spaces in the sky where stars are missing -

  I don't know if I can cope with this. I wish you were here.

  Third letter:

  Things are starting to break. I don't think reality can keep up with her wishes.

  She's got more ice cream than she could ever eat, except that she'll never get a bellyache again (or a cavity - I made sure of that, at least), and half the things I look at have got sparkling silver swirls on them, and I can't remember my name.

  I don't know if I have a name. I'm just -

  The cats have names. Crystal and Sparkle and Prissy and Teatime and Scarella - I have never doubted my parenting skills as much as when I learned what she named them. Their names keep floating through my mind. They're more real than my own.

  Half the sky is black now. The world outside the pirate castle house is going misty and faded. She said she was going to make everything fly tonight. I told her she'd better make sure the cats don't get sick or have trouble with the litterbox when they're flying, but I can't - I can't tell her not to. I tried. The words just died in my throat.

  and
I'm starting to be afraid of what will happen when she realizes she doesn't have to listen to me.

  maybe she already has.

  Fourth letter:

  Love, I'm sorry - I'm sorry - it's my fault, I shouldn't have let her see me crying -

  but she asked me what was wrong and I told her I missed you and she

  she

  she said she'd

  she said she'd bring you back, I'm so sorry, this shouldn't happen

  I mean I love you, so much, and I miss you, and I want nothing more, but there's

  there's fundamental reality stuff keeping you dead and I

  I just

  she's going to break everything

  and it will be my fault, because I wanted it, I wanted you back

  I'm so sorry

  I love you

  letter:

  Flight and Vengeance

  Challenge #14: write an urban fantasy or slipstream story of 666 words, beginning with an argument. The main character should be marginalized in some way, and your story should feature a monk or holy person.

  It began as an argument. A cruel argument, but - at first - just words. "I think you'd do it." "So what if I did?"

  It turned into a beating. They slammed Jeremy's head against the wall, kicked him, called him whore and demonspawn: the latter of which was as good as a death sentence in that part of town. Half an hour ago he'd been an ordinary kid (though not ordinary enough according to them, of course) - now he was a fugitive. There was no sense in hoping that the angels wouldn't hear.

  He uncurled and peeled himself up from the bloodstained dirt, and tottered off towards buildings and alleys and anyplace else he could find that wasn't open to the sky. There was no sense in going home now, either. He texted his dad: Im demonspawn now, pls run, stay safe. Then he turned his phone off and ditched it, because he couldn't afford the risk of being tracked.