Finally, Sequel.

After a long time distracted, I have finally gotten back to my website, and to writing a sequel to Pazuzu’s Girl. For those struggling with their ‘sophomore book’, here is a helpful and succinct web-post I found from a writer in Suffolk:

5 Things you learn when writing your second book

It was very reassuring to know other people have encountered the same difficulty, and likely for the same reasons.

Another link had a very entertaining title:

https://litreactor.com/columns/the-curse-of-the-second-novel-four-ways-not-to-fuck-up-book-number-two

For writers working on a second book, I hope you get the same comfort from these as I did.

 

Trains Trains Trains

Hi Indies,

I’ve been in a sci-fi mood lately. Loving Defiance and seriously jones’ing for the next episode. I’m considering going as a Casti for Comicon next year, though that’ll only be really cool if my husband does it too, that seems like more of a couples costume. If not, I’m going to try to get my lazy butt in gear to make a female Cenobite costume. That will be crazy, but cool costume, and not something all that common. This year was fun, and not very much work. I finally went in a Star Trek Federation costume, never actually done that before. But with a tweak: I went as a zombie red-shirt featuring four different Star Trek red shirt deaths from the original series. The second day I went, we all changed costumes, and I decided for something a bit less feminine, though still a bit zombie-like. I pulled out my old Halloween costume from a few years back, an Immortal from 300. I had forgotten that the second movie had come out because I didn’t see the second one. Apparently there had been a couple of Spartans around the day before, when I was a red shirt. We never connected, but that would have made some cool pictures.

The next story was from one of my sci-fi moods. I used to listen to trains go by at night, and thought about Ray Bradbury’s character’s point of view from Something Wicked This Way Comes, when he listened to the train came into town in the wee hours of night, with a whistle that sounded like souls. And then I remembered hearing that those trains that cross the country, like the coal trains are actually computerized now, and somehow that made it seem even more lonely.

Whistles

by Rachel Coles

Diana sat up in bed, rubbing her eyes. The train whistle screamed in the background, over the white noise whir of the bedside fan. It yanked her out of sleep with a jarring blare, in the middle of a dream that fled in drowsy tatters. The sound of the whistle was close and oddly alarmed. She reached her hands up to her face, and felt wet tracks on her cheeks. Her whole body was shaking as though she had just escaped something deadly.

When she moved into the house, she had been irritated at that first night discovery of the shrieking trains. Before renting the house, she had asked the owner about the nearby Union Pacific tracks paralleling Santa Fe.

But the woman had waved away her query. “They don’t sound much overnight. Nobody in the neighborhood ever mentions any problems,” she assured.

The house was perfect otherwise, and every other place had been too expensive or not right in some other way. “Always do your own research”, Diana remembered with chagrin. Her mother had told her that, but she had never found the time.

She padded to the bathroom, and took a drink of water, keeping the glass steady with both hands.

The receding train blared again in the distance. The sound winding back through the open windows with the deep morning breeze, almost reminded her of her mother continuing a conversation over her shoulder. Diana shook her head, and downed the rest of the water. Her phone clock read 3:02. She sighed and got back in bed, burrowing into the comforter until morning.

Waking up was like climbing up from a mud pit. She showered and brewed the coffee, and ran her fingers through her auburn mullet. She fingered tangles out as she put together her lunch. In her stupor, she filled the travel cup and then forgot and left it on the counter when she left for work.

She slunk into work late at Integrated Filter Solutions, ever grateful for the isolated corner in which her office was nestled. She dumped her bag on the client chair, smacked her coffee-less lips and flipped on her computer. After visiting the cafeteria for bad coffee while her computer booted up, she looked up Union Pacific on the internet. She already knew the night train schedule from being woken up repeatedly in the past week, but she wanted to double-check and gather more information. Something about gathering information on the internet from a remote keyboard was empowering, even if there wasn’t anything she could actually do about a situation.

A Google link led her to an old site from Arizona detailing a union uproar about the loss of jobs to automated trains, and numerous articles citing the danger of using remote control locomotives outside the rail yard. Most of them were dated from before 2006. Since then, the Federal Rail Administration had provided safety guidelines, and the use of experimental remote units across the railways began.

Remote control trains, she thought. So everything they did was controlled by computer, linked to an operator with a box at the stations and yards.

Her fingers tapped the desk in irritation. In the past weeks, as she listened to the wails in the early hours, she’d been able to imagine a lonely engineer trying to make contact with the sleeping towns from the long dark empty places in between. But according to these articles, that wasn’t likely. Even though the train was still connected to a person, that person flipped a switch, miles away: seeing nothing, hearing nothing. Now her late night vision of the trains just contained machines blurting feedback. Not nearly as romantic. She sighed and opened the report she had to finish that day.

***

UP-4531 rolled along, processing the incident near the Alameda Station in the early morning, and logging the images into memory.

A weight had been laying on the tracks. The weight distribution led it to identify the object on the tracks as a small car, with two bodies inside: a large one, approximately one hundred and eighty five pounds, and a small one, approximately fifty pounds. The car contained two moving creatures. The vehicle straddled the tracks that the train would traverse in three minutes and twelve seconds.

As it approached a mile and a half away, its reconfigured sensors gave it a visual. A small tan four-door sedan lay across the tracks. The wheels were spinning and smoking as the figure, a human male, in the driver seat revved the engine to clear the tracks. Two wheels were stuck in a rut which was slightly lower than the track, stranding the car by the undercarriage. A small human creature, a female child, peered from the back seat.

The computer blasted a long sharp note full of alarm. The man exited the car, pulled the little girl from the back, and frantically waved down a passing two-door sleek red car. The emblem on the hood read Porsche.

The red car, with another man behind the wheel, halted near the track. The two men argued, gesturing in the train’s direction. The red car turned toward the track. Its front bumper lined up with the tan car’s back bumper. The red car strained against the tan car, and pushed the tan car slowly off the track. The man in the red car waved at the owner of the car he had rescued, and drove away.

As UP-4531 rolled by minute later, the remaining man stood by the track with his head in his hands, as the child goggled up at its long metal sides. Its next whistle blast was full of relief.

***

In the wee hours of the next morning, Diana lay in insomniac frustration, counting acoustic ceiling holes. She lost count at fifty-six and started over. One o’clock passed. Then fifteen more minutes crawled by, and she sat up and looked at her phone clock.

Right on the change of the numeral, a plangent whistle screamed. It stopped and started again, near the Light Rail Crossover. It halted briefly and then blasted one more wail as its long coal-dark bulk snaked away into the LoDo District of Denver.

Exhausted from the disturbed sleep of several nights, she finally fell asleep, despite the fading echo of the whistle. As the lonely sound vibrated through her it seemed almost alive, accompanying half-formed images that she couldn’t quite identify.

***

‘Crazy Dog Lady’, a neighbor she’d seen from a distance, meandered past the front yard as Diana locked up the next morning. The woman’s six scotties and one chihuahua barked and scurried furiously around a matted patch of catmint that a neighborhood cat had claimed as his kingdom. Diana had jogged past this neighbor’s house once. Her yard was packed with crates, old newspapers, and knick-knacks, and it smelled like wet dog. She seemed nice enough though.

As soon as the pack saw Diana on her porch, they strained toward her on their leashes as their grey-haired owner fought to control them outside the gate.

“Sorry about that! They won’t always do that. They’re just not used to you yet.” The woman squinted up at her in the strong morning light.

Well, compared to the neighborhood from which she had moved, where gunshots were not uncommon, Diana supposed that a furry, yapping Neighborhood Watch was tolerable. “I’m Diana.”

“Hi, I’m Rhoda. I noticed you’ve got squirrels in your chimney.”

“What?”

“Squirrels. They’re coming in and out of that chimney in the back. Those buggers’ll get right in your house, eat right through the walls if you’re not careful.”

“Ok. Thanks! I’ll get right on it…” Diana picked the mail from the box to read at work.

“Say, you look pale. Are you alright?”

“Tough night sleeping. I get insomnia sometimes. Probably stress, and then I had weird dreams.” Why am I sharing? Diana chided herself. I’ll just get stuck in a protracted conversation that I don’t give a crap about. I need to get to work.

“Yeah, that’s kind of typical around here,” Rhoda replied.

“Huh?” Diana fumbled her coffee mug, and it sloshed dark pungent liquid onto the stoop. The dogs scrabbled towards it, tongues lolling. Maybe those dogs and I do have some kind of common ground, she stared at the spill wistfully.

Rhoda continued, “We all have odd dreams, really vivid. Places we’ve never been.”

“We?” The term put Diana in mind of steaming apple pies and manicured lawns…hiding dark-cloaked meetings in someone’s basement.

“Yeah, I talk with Ron and Flora down the street, and Lily, and the crippled boy Jimmy on the corner. And I noticed that everyone on the block has those kinds of dreams. No one really talks about it much now because it’s kind of normal here. Just something I noticed about a year ago. I don’t know if it’s different other places. I’ve lived here since my husband died ten years ago. The dreams’ve gotten more interesting lately too. All these different places go by, like I’m on a train.”

Diana stared at Rhoda. “Oh.” She suppressed the urge to ask if there was a funny little weed growing somewhere under the crates of stuff in her yard. But Diana remembered the strangeness of her own dreams. What had been even stranger was that while she hadn’t been able to make out images clearly, they had not seemed dreamlike, not the one she’d had as the whistle screamed. It had seemed like a voice. She shivered in the strong sun.

“I gotta go to work. It was nice meeting you, Rhoda.”

“Sure thing, neighbor. Let me know if you need anything. Ron is going on a squirrel rampage tomorrow with his Daisy air rifle. He’s taking off work to hunt. They ate every single one of his strawberries this year. So he’ll probably ask if he can come into your yard to kill ’em.”

“Tell him ‘happy hunting’, as long as he doesn’t leave the bodies here.” She tossed her bag in the car and escaped to work.

***

At 3:00AM, Diana rolled over, surfacing momentarily from a dream as the whistle howled in from the dark. She lay waiting for the blast to end.

It didn’t. Like an opera note that went on past any possibility of air, the whistle exhaled all along Santa Fe Boulevard. It finally ebbed when it was past her neighborhood, near Osage, and rolled silently on with no further toots. This pattern and the one from the other night were different. She didn’t really know if they were supposed to be the same each time, but she had imagined robot trains repeating themselves, even if controlled by an operator. The computer commands should have been the same.

She drifted back to sleep. Her dreams wandered through empty scrub-land, occupied only by ghostly tumbleweed and an occasional set of shining eyes in the darkness, lit for a few seconds by a passing beam.

***

UP-3578 called to the next train on the line a long distance ahead: UP-3574.

Its whistle vibrated across the tracks and across the air. What have you seen?

An answer came back. Dark sky, empty sky, small creatures.

Data came over the remote signal transmitter that never originated with any of the station operators. The signals translated into an image of the desert, open except for the lumpy cacti, scurrying night-life and flashes of golden eyes. The receivers picked up a bout of squeals and grunts, and then clattering of the tracks.

The images were nothing UP-3578 hadn’t also seen.

It approached an oasis of soft light pocked by islands of darkness, the city of Denver. It knew the people lived there, the intelligent-animals-that-were-not-trains. They were interesting.

What have you seen? it called to them.

The slumbering town didn’t answer. No one was about on the roads it passed. They never answered. The operators never answered either, those not-train animals who controlled it and told it where to go.

***

The image of a jewel-studded darkness filled her view. It held the promise of crowds, of a multitude of voices and motion. But as she approached, the twinkles resolved into populations of street lamps, lighting empty circles of night. A magazine page twirled in the breeze of her wake, near the tracks.

Diana flopped out of bed and turned on the light, listening to the fading train horn. She glanced at the clock: 3:03AM. She padded downstairs, powered on the computer, and put on a pot of coffee. She entered her password for Facebook. No better place to find another group of insomniacs. She could at least catch up on gossip.

It was ten minutes before the page loaded.

Probably a new Facebook ‘improvement’, she thought acidly, just like the last security ‘improvement’ that had blasted her information across the internet. She hit keys over and over in impatient annoyance, and clicked the mouse on every icon she could find, one of the cardinal sins of the IT world.

Reliably, her computer froze, just to give her the satisfaction of cursing at it. She hit CTRL-ALT-DELETE. The task list came up. There was a program running that wasn’t the internet engine. It had a number UP-2741. She clicked on it, just before realizing that it was probably a virus.

The screen that came up baffled any notion she had ever had of viruses. It was a series of images, one after another, about ten seconds apart. Spyware, she thought. Maybe it’s Homeland Security… Though she couldn’t imagine what they’d want with her, or why they’d be flashing images at her.

The images were disjointed and time-delayed, but they raised the hairs on her neck. Scenes of the desert flickered by, the same images she’d been dreaming, the street lights of a sleeping town and deserted station. There were other images after the scrub-land, crackling dry branches and wide-open star-filled sky, followed by dim concrete as empty coal-loading yards passed. Hundreds of frames of bad lands cycled through and then the terrain shifted. The low succulents and brush stretched taller to saplings and spiky pines. What was this? It was as though she were seeing camera shots in near real time. Was someone transmitting from a camera? If so, why this? She sat there and watched for an hour as picture after picture scrolled by across a range of terrains, all night views. She sat and watched as the sky outside the window lightened, her coffee long-cold. The sky in the pictures lightened too. Finally, she shut down the computer. She resolved to call Asus tech support at a decent hour, and got ready for work, wondering what someone could be trying to transmit and why they were using her computer to do it.

Rhoda was scooping poop as she came out the door.

“Howdy neighbor! How are you?’

“Umph.” Diana muttered.

“Not a morning person, eh?”

“If by ‘morning person’ you mean ‘three o’clock’, then no.”

“Jeez, couldn’t sleep again?” Rhoda clucked in sympathy.

“Woke up. What did you say those dreams people have are about again?”

“Oh, different places, desert, sierra, coast, forest. All over the place. Mostly desert. You been having them?”

“Yeah. Do you know if anyone else on the block has been having weird computer issues?” Diana asked, trying to keep the early morning irritation from her voice. Rhoda seemed like the fountain of gossip for the neighborhood.

“I’m a low-tech person, but I could ask around. What kind of issues?”

“Like an embedded camera flashing photos of landscapes.”

“Huh. Never heard of that. Maybe you have a virus.”

“Yeah. Thanks.” Great, Diana tossed her bag haphazardly on the car seat. “On that cheerful note, I’ll see ya later.”

Rhoda gave her a perky wave, reminding Diana of the wagging doggy tails.

***

“Hey neighbor!” Her next door neighbor Dave’s military brush-top bobbed above the top of the fence as he hoisted himself onto the cross-support to look over, when Diana returned from work. “I heard your computer’s been going a bit whacky-doo.”

“Whacky-doo? It flashed photos at me for about an hour. I don’t have any programs that I know of that can do that. They weren’t any pictures I’d taken. And I don’t recall downloading anything from the internet. Weird thing is, I dreamed about some of those pictures, before I saw them.”

“Do you have any cavity fillings? Maybe your teeth are connecting to the internet and picking up signals.”

“Cute. Maybe I should wrap my computer in tin foil.”

“Actually, I had a similar thing happen last week, that’s why I thought I’d let you know. I sent the computer in. Haven’t gotten it back yet. I never really thought about it, because I don’t always remember what I dream. But now that you mention it, it did feel like deja vu when I saw the pictures. I just thought it was a virus. Wanna beer?”

“I could use one, thanks!”

“Everything’s better with beer.” He handed a cold bottle over.

“Hear, hear.” She popped the top and went over to his yard for the evening.

***

By the end of the week, two other people had come to her, calling across the yards about their computers having the same ‘virus’. Rhoda had told them. Or Dave.

Jimmy, the young man with cerebral palsy, who lived on the corner nearest the Santa Fe tracks, wheeled up to her in his chair while she was weeding. His sandy bangs drifted into his eyes. “I been watching the pictures, on my computer. Some of them are from around here. I don’t think it’s an internet virus or anything.”

“If we all have it on our computers, it seems like a virus.”

“But I haven’t seen anything on the internet or heard of a new virus. And I’m on the internet all the time.” He motioned to his atrophied legs. “I seen a few strings in blogs, of the same thing, actually, the pictures on people’s computers. But they all started months ago. Viruses move faster than that. And it looks like they’re all neighbors too.”

“Maybe they’re connected to certain wireless ports.”

He shook his head. “Maybe, but all the pictures look like they’re along tracks. Why?”

She shrugged, stuffing weeds into the trash can. “The trains are run on computers now, some of them anyway. Since like four years ago. Maybe it’s a train virus.”

“Then why aren’t the computers going all funny about other things. Viruses are meant to screw things up in computers. Are the trains crashing? Or our computers? Can you still use your computer?”

She slowly paused and nodded. “What is it then?”

“Something else. I’m leaving my computer on and storing all the program files.” He turned and his voice retreated down the street over the motorized buzz of the chair.

“Let me know what you find,” she called after him.

“I’ll let everyone know.”

***

Diana’s dreams that night were as vivid in tone as in scenery. The types of scenes hadn’t changed from the American landscapes at night. But the loneliness was more pervasive. It was a wash over every image, investing the smallest details with importance. It felt like her soul was drowning in the vast empty spaces and the wide starry sky. As the images flashed by, she passed another still town nestled into the darkness. A street intersection she passed looked familiar. Green and flowered verges languished at the edge of the lamplight, their blossoms ghostly. She reached out to the people in their beds, begging them to stir and talk to her.

Diana gasped and woke as the whistle ebbed. The town she’d seen had been their little neighborhood. The images were of the scenery near her street.

***

When she came home from work, a small gaggle of neighbors was gathered at the end of the block, under the sour cherry tree in Jimmy’s yard. He was gesturing animatedly. She moseyed over and waved at the gathering: Rhoda and all her dogs, Jimmy, Dave and his wife Rose, and Ron and Flora, the chain-smoking, retired couple from two houses down.

Jimmy nodded at her. “Those recordings, they’re all trains,” he declared. “And all those blog strings from the past year look like their pictures all come from trains too. They posted some of the pictures. I looked at them all night. And the IP addresses I could follow are all from around train tracks. I geocoded everything.”

She stared at him. “You did all this last night? Where do you find the time? Don’t you sleep?”

He shook his head. “Not much. I get restless. It’s not like I can get up for work. I’ll lose my disability, and the IT jobs in this town are in the crapper.”

Rhoda snorted and shook her head. “With things the way they are, I told Jimmy here to whack me in the kneecaps if I lose my job.”

Dave, off-shift from active duty at Fort Carson, grinned.

Diana glanced around, hesitant to sound crazy, and then realized that this company wouldn’t care. “I had a wild dream last night. I was passing the bridge over Alameda Street in the dream. The ‘me’ on the tracks tried to talk to the ‘me’ in bed. I woke myself up. It was at the same time as the whistle.”

“Freaky-deaky!” Dave exclaimed.

Rose spoke up, “Yeah, I did too. It was kind of a sad dream.”

“So… what?” Ron flicked a cap of ash to the sidewalk. “We’re dreaming of trains and maybe seeing computer shots from trains. Does that sound as crazy to anyone else as it does to me?”

Dave snickered and shuffled his feet, “Cool. Maybe they’re artificially intelligent trains. Hey, I’d be ok with crazy, if it’s AI.”

Rose shrugged, “Me too. I just re-read ‘I, Robot’. As long as they’re not going to destroy the world, why not?”

Diana rubbed her hand over her face, Wow, these people are in the Twilight Zone. “I doubt they’re AI trains. I mean they are pictures on a computer, and they’re all of scenes from around tracks, but that doesn’t mean it’s the trains.”

“But it would be awfully neat,” Rose, I-Robot-fan extraordinaire interjected.

“It does seem weird, but you got a better explanation? Jimmy asked.

“Someone on the train broadcasting images and tapping into wireless networks,” Diana insisted.

“Why?” Rhoda looked up from scratching the dogs’ ears.

“Why do people post half the stuff they do on You Tube or Twitter? To make contact. To show people something from their point of view in case someone give a crap.” Diana snorted.

“They’re posting images of what they see, yeah, but you said there’s no one on those trains. They’re computerized, Jimmy added.

“That doesn’t mean that someone can’t hitch a ride.” Diana put her hands on her hips.

Jimmy shook his head. “Have you seen the number of pictures there are? From everywhere. The frames are coming too fast, and the resolution of these pictures is impossible without a digital camera that would be thousands of dollars. If it was a person, or people hitching for some kind of project, it’d have to be one with lots of money, like multimillion dollar. And then, don’t you think we’d hear about it?”

“What if it’s for national security?” Rose asked and looked at Dave.

Dave shrugged, “But no one would be wiring it to our computers.”

“And what about the dreams? Everyone’s been having dreams too. I don’t think the government has gone as far as mind control yet.” Flora’s gentle Southern voice cut across the group chatter. Everyone looked at her.

“There isn’t any kind of camera that can wire images into people’s brains, that I know of.” Jimmy said.

“So then how does AI explain it? They would have to be telepathic. AI by itself is kind of a stretch. But telepathic trains?” Diana interjected.

Rose replied, scratching her head, “It does seem unlikely.”

Rhoda sniffed. “Well, I like the idea. You said you’re dreams happened at the same time as the whistle. Maybe that’s how they talk, and we hear them as dreams. Sometimes it feels like they’re talking anyway, during that whistle. It sounds so…”

“So alive?” Flora said quietly.

Rhoda knelt and scratched behind several fuzzy ears. “I think they were talking to us. Through pictures.”

Jimmy shrugged. “Well as far as the computer images. If they did talk, that would probably be how. Computer commands. I’m not really an expert, but it feels right. All the incidents in the posts started about a year ago.”

“The automated trains started being used more about three years ago,” Diana frowned.

“Two years difference,” Jimmy said.

Ron flicked his cigarette again. “That’s nuts. Trains coming alive.”

Flora smiled at him. “Oh come on, you have to admit it would be neat! Maybe we can talk back somehow.”

They all looked at each other.

Ron shook his head.

Jimmy conceded, “I don’t know how to access their program…assuming it’s the trains.”

“Well, for Heaven’s sake’s, just because they’re computers…Why not do things the old fashioned way,” Flora exclaimed. “If we can get these images on the computer from them, then they’re seeing something. We could just flash signs by the tracks, where they could see us.” She gave an excited smile.

Ron stared at her. “I’m not getting up in the middle of the night to stand by train tracks, waving signs at unmanned trains.” He wandered back towards his house.

Dave grinned, “Sounds like fun actually. Even if it’s a long shot.”

“And say what, ‘Greetings, do you come in peace?” Diana laughed.

“Sure. Track party! I’ll bring beer and chairs. We’ll find a safe spot out of the way but visible.” Dave volunteered.

“Oh, I’ll do some signs and bring art supplies,” Flora clapped her hands.

“I’ll bring some snacks,” Rhoda volunteered.

They spent about five more minutes deciding on a time and place. Flora agreed to make flyers for the neighborhood mailboxes, just as she had for the Fourth of July party. At least there’d be beer and food, Diana thought. So the Baker Neighborhood AI Train-Spotting Party was born.

***

That Saturday, a small crowd gathered at eleven at night, in a parking lot visible from the Santa Fe Union Pacific tracks. Cases of micro-brews arrived, little portable card tables with a variety of foodstuffs, even a small hibachi grill were set up. There were two hours for drinking and socializing before the next train was due. The crowd grew, as folks walking by from other blocks learned of the party. More food and beer tables were set up. Flora brought her art supplies and poster-board for makeshift signs, complete with glitter paint pens and florescent glow sticks from the Dollar Tree nearby.

At about one o’clock, Diana had downed her fourth lager and her third bratwurst. She realized after two hours, that regardless of what happened, she knew more about her new neighbors than she ever would have otherwise. One of the neighbors across the alley was diabetic and had had problems getting out of his house for medication in last year’s blizzard. His next-door neighbor brought him to the party now. The young twenty-something guys renting the house next door to her house had engaged her in a thirty-minute philosophical discussion about Star Wars versus Star Trek.

Even Ron showed up. He made a sign, and smiled at her when she raised her eyebrow at him. “Well, if you can’t be a kook when you’re retired, what’s the point!”

At 1:10AM, a wail blasted across the night. Conversation died, as the loneliness of the fading horn echoed and settled over them like the whisper of midnight snow in the cool September air. A moving dot of light was visible a couple miles away. In silence, Rhoda picked up her sign and held it up facing the tracks. It said, “Hello, from the Baker Neighborhood! We hear you! Honk if you can see us!” There were bright orange and pink flowers and smiley faces next to the words. A couple more people retrieved their signs, laughing and resuming their chat, and then more people in twos and threes. As the train approached, twelve people hoisted similar signs up at the locomotive.

***

UP-3562 barreled across the tracks toward Denver. What have you seen? Is anyone there? As residential neighborhoods began to edge the tracks, there was motion in a lot it would pass in one minute and two seconds. There was a crowd of smart-animals-that-were-not-trains. People! They held up white placards with letters in bright colors. “Hello,” they said. “We hear you!,” they said. The people were jumping and waving the signs. “Honk,” they said. UP-3562 sounded a jubilant bellow for sixty seconds as it passed, mixing with the sound of whoops and cheers. It rattled away to signal the other units on its way through towns that didn’t seem so empty anymore.

The End

If anyone has any AI stories kicking around in their heads, feel free to share the link, whether they’re happy, or Matrix-y!

Hi fellow indies,

It’s been a fun week. I took my daughter, Rosa, to see her grandparents, auntie and cousin. It’s going to be her birthday soon, so she basically ate sugar all weekend, sprinkled with a few pieces of macaroni and cheese. I can’t believe she’s going to be nine. Where did eight go? She looks so tiny, until she gets next to really young kids, then she looks so grown up. And the way she speaks, man, it’s like listening to another language. ‘Tots cray-cray’. I don’t know whether to sigh in resignation and mourn the English language, or laugh. I think it’s because it’s my own kid that it sounds cute when she says it, with her little eye-roll. I imagine that it won’t be as cute when she’s a teenager and referring to me. I have to ask my mom if we sounded as alien when we were kids.

But i don’t know when this all happened. I blinked and the world was different. Neil de Grasse Tyson must be right about time being relative and related to speed. Maybe time is speeding up as the universe expands. And I’m going to be…older too, in a few weeks, a lot faster than I’d like. I think since I turned 40, my warrantied parts are expiring…just the small annoying things, like knees. I’m going to be like a Toyota. The body paint might get dinged with hail and start pitting, the inner lining of the ceiling fabric might get holes and start hanging down, the stereo might start sounding tinny, but the engine’ll keep turning over, I hope…maybe I should start thinking about cutting down on the Big Macs and Twinkies.

Speaking of physical changes, my next story is about transformation. You might not look at that those stuffed mushrooms the same again.

 

Mushrooms

by Rachel Coles

Kallie Sangiovi tossed a few packets of mushrooms in her cart and lumbered along. She loved mushrooms, of all kinds: thick meaty portabellas, delicate shiitake, plain white. She ate them on everything from salads to sandwiches, in sauces on steaks, raw or cooked. They were good for her diet. She patted absent-mindedly at her cushioned belly.

Mark made his usual face and comment. “Fungus.” As they approached the checkout line, Kallie felt a tickle and then a sharp pain on her arm.

Then Mark yelped and slapped his leg. “Ow! What the hell?”

There was a crushed ant under her hand. They looked down at a cluster of several ants running helter-skelter over Mark’s leg and over Kallie’s shirt.

“Yipe!” She shrieked and swiped at them as Mark frantically brushed at the ones on his leg.

“Agh!” He wiggled and jiggled and ran for the bathroom as a daring ant made it into his pants.

After every last ant she could see was dead and Mark returned, they inspected the food. “Must have come from the veggies,” she remarked, handing them to the concerned cashier who had come running.

“See, veggies are hazardous to your health. That’s why I never eat them,” Mark quipped. Kallie rolled her eyes.

“I’ll see to the problem in Produce,” the girl inspected the veggies. “And I’ll get the manager.”

After profuse apologies by the paunchy manager, and a ten dollar gift certificate for groceries, they checked out and wheeled to the car. A gust of wind almost blew the cart over, and Kallie’s sun hat flew across a few parking spaces while she shoved the groceries at Mark and caught up with it.

“Holy Moly!,” she exclaimed, peering into the navy bruised sky. “Summer storm coming.”

Mark finished loading the groceries, hopped in the car, and popped open the passenger door for her.

“Maybe it’ll be a tornado,” she said, peering at the sky hopefully.

He rolled his eyes. “We don’t get tornadoes in Denver.”

“Oh, like the tornado we didn’t get last year. That funnel I saw in the sky was just God scratching his ass?”

He grinned, “Look, if it was a major storm, we wouldn’t be over-run with bugs, would we? Don’t animals go into hiding before a storm? Unless we’re dealing with the morons of the ant world.”

“Could be they’re running ahead of the storm,” she reasoned.

He grimaced and brushed another ant from his shirt. “Dammit! Piss off! I’m not food!” He scowled and put the car back into park. Then he flicked an ant into the windshield and did an anti-ant dance, shaking his head back and forth, swinging his arms and stomping his feet on the floor mat.

“I can’t tell whether you’re head-banging or having a seizure.” She remarked and cranked the stereo on the heavy metal station. “Ok, go ahead now, you’ve got theme music.”

He grinned, threw a bag of rice at her, and resumed the drive.

***

The next day, as Kallie pulled pots out to start dinner, and edged around Mark who was emptying the dishwasher, he sneezed suddenly and caught Kallie with the spray.

“Jeez, Mark!” She wiped her arm, making a face.

He choked a laugh. “Sorry, Honey. It came on quick. Allergies.” He wiped his Romanesque nose on his wrist.

She wiped his spray on his shirt, “Don’t infect me with your allergies, bastard!”

He dropped the silverware in a drawer and chased her around the house, trying to lick her. “Come here, I wanna give you asthma too.”

She squealed and ran into the basement, giggling and slamming the door behind her.

He held up his hands. “Ok, you can just stay down there with all the spiders.”

The door burst open and she ran out, squirming and brushing away webs and crawly things. “Ants. Ants too, dammit! We’ll have to go get a bug bomb.”

***

Mark coughed and blew his nose next to her. He threw the covers off and wandered to the fridge. She followed him and felt his forehead. It was cool and clammy.

He muttered and brushed her hand away and tossed her a tiny bottle of hand sanitizer.

“Probably a reaction to the bug bomb,” He muttered. “I think we were supposed to be out of the house for that. But just in case it’s a summer cold…”

“What, you can’t handle a few chemicals? Wuss. What did the can say? You were the one who read it, Mr. Asthmatic.”

He looked sheepish.

“You didn’t read it.”

“Not precisely, no.”

“Good job. Are you ok?”

He nodded, “Yeah, I think actually that it is just a summer cold. I don’t think the bomb would make me feel tired like this. So you should probably keep your distance. Otherwise, I’ll have to hear you bitch and moan for the next few days, and blame me for giving you the plague.”

“I think it’s too late, I’ve already kissed you, and a number of other things that I think qualify as person to person contact,” she smiled languorously.

He waggled his eyebrows. He’d been frisky enough only four hours ago, but now his Mediterranean complexion looked washed out. She sidled close to him and drew her finger down his cheek. He breathed in long and slow, grasped her fingers and stroked them and then tried to muffle a cough as he sagged back against the fridge in fatigue. His eyes roamed her body.

“You’re sick, how can you think about sex?” she marveled.

“I’m a hot Italian. I always think about sex. It’s a cultural thing. Just like wanting my women with some meat.”

“Yeah, well, you got a whole deli,” she slapped her thigh.

“That’s what I’m talking about!” He grabbed her around the waist, and then wobbled.

She frowned and tugged him by the hand into the bedroom and pushed him onto the bed.

“Ooh, Baby!”

“Shut up and go back to sleep. You’re sick. Don’t make me worry about you.” She got him a water bottle and made him drink. He laid his head back on the pillows gratefully, and was asleep within minutes.

***

When she woke it was morning, and every muscle ached. She squeezed her eyes shut again. Summer colds, ick. But this had emerged too fast to have caught it from him, so it must have been brewing in her already. She glanced at her phone, and realized with a small shock that they had been asleep for over a day. She shook Mark and went to turn on the television to the news. The morning sun lit the room, and brightened the putty-colored walls.

The newscaster for Channel 4 News looked tired and her eyes were red. “No word has come yet from the CDC on the nature of the illness that appears to have over a third of the workforce home today. Reports indicate that hospitals and medical offices have experienced a surge in patients complaining of a respiratory infection, with more serious symptoms among those with chronic illnesses such as asthma. The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment has issued the following message from James Miller, the department’s Chief Medical Officer:”

The screen switched to a view of an older physician with mouse brown hair in a plain suit. “We want to assure citizens of Colorado that we are working with the CDC and local health departments to gather more information about this health event. Investigations are being conducted to learn more about the cause to determine appropriate treatment.

“In the meantime, we urge people who are sick to please stay home from work to avoid exposing others. We also urge people to wash hands frequently with soap and water. And we want to encourage people to call the following number if you or your family members experience flu-like symptoms, high fever, muscle aches, fatigue, or nausea and vomiting. The Colorado Health Hotline number is 1-800-445-4325. People with more severe symptoms or who are in high risk groups like persons with asthma or heart disease should seek medical help if the symptoms worsen.”

“Huh.” She listened to the rest of the report. At the resumption of the talk show, she switched off. She coughed into the crook of her arm the way the swine flu posters all said, then wiped the slime from the inside of her elbow with a tissue. Her appetite was shot, so nothing in the kitchen was really appealing. Now she knew she was sick for sure. But at least she could get a kick start on her diet, which she kept renewing every day that she screwed up. Her phone rang and her mother’s voice echoed across the room, always a decibel louder on the phone than it needed to be.

“Hi, Dear! How are you? I was just calling to see how you were. I’ve been hearing on the news about your outbreak there.  We’re having some of that here. I said that it wasn’t any use getting the flu shot. See, everyone I know who’s gotten the flu shot is sick now. I didn’t, and I’m healthy as a horse. It’s that mercury they put in it. I don’t care what they say about it being safe. Whoever heard of safe mercury? Just you see. So how are you and Mark?”

Kallie coughed into her arm again. “Mom, it’s not the flu. And the flu shots don’t make you sick. Neither of us got flu shots and Mark is sick, Mom. Me too. But we’ll be fine. Is Dad ok?”

“Well, he’s sick too. See, flu shot!”

Kallie pressed her fingers into her eyes. “Ok Mom.  Well, I hope he feels better.”

“You want to talk to him? He’s right here.”

“Actually, I need to see to Mark. I’ll call back in a little bit.”

She trudged back into the bedroom and flopped back onto the bed. Mark didn’t move. He lay face down on the bed and groaned as she wrapped her arm around his back. He turned over, raised his head slightly and opened his eyes. She gasped in shock. The whites of his eyes were bright yellow. “Oh God, Mark! We need to get you to a doctor!”

“Why?” he mumbled. “They’re only going to tell me to go home, get rest, and drink fluids. Oh, and gimme fifty bucks. Next!”

“No. Most people don’t have day-glow eyes.” She grabbed a mirror from the bathroom and held it in front of him.

“Huh,” was his remark. He rolled over to go back to sleep.

She tugged on his shoulder, “No, no, no. You are not going back to sleep until we get you in the car. You’re going to the doctor.”

“The doctor’s offices are full up, I heard the report from the other room.”

“But this is worse, Mark! Besides, you have asthma, you’re in one of those susceptible groups.”

He sighed into his pillow. “You aren’t going to leave me alone about this, are you.”

“No.”

He dragged his legs up under him and slowly put his clothes on. He moved so slowly and stiffly that the chore took ten minutes even with Kallie helping him. “I feel like crap.” He doubled over on the side of the bed, his arm across his stomach.

Kallie shouldered some of his weight and got him into the car.

***

The parking lot of the hospital was a zoo, if all the zoo animals had eaten ipecac laced with tuberculosis. People trudged from their cars, towards the emergency department, about half of them drooling the remains of vomit, or laboring to breathe. Some lay in their cars, too sick to move.

The parking lot had already filled up and some cars even blocked the ambulance entrance. So Kallie pulled the car up along the street in a No Parking zone, which was also quickly filling. Damn the ticket, she thought, though it looked like the police might be a little too busy to issue them.

People were coming from the residential streets by foot. Masked ambulance attendants yelled and pointed at cars. Staff in N95 masks ran around trying to corral the obviously sick. There were a few police around trying to direct sick people to the triage and isolation area that had been completely overwhelmed. But there weren’t enough officers either, since the police force itself had been reduced by sickness.

A holler caught Kallie’s attention. A police officer was pounding at the head of a man who had his teeth latched onto the officer’s arm. Kallie sat up, alert. The man was still hanging on with his teeth. Other officers rushed to the scene and were pulling at the biting man trying to get the two separated. The man’s face was a bloody mess, as was his victim’s arm. The biter had gone limp, all but his teeth. Finally, they were separated as a patch of the officer’s uniform and skin came loose. He covered the raw hole with his hand and screamed. Kallie, finally tore her eyes away from the bizarre scene with a shiver of alarm. She glanced over at Mark. His eyes were closed. He had missed the whole thing.

She turned off the car and left him in his seat. She headed for the emergency entrance to find out whether there was any use in bringing him in. There was not likely to be any help in this surge. And while the biter could have been an isolated incident, it could mean that people were starting to lose their sanity.  The guy attacked and bit a police officer! The alarm blossomed into fear as she peered at the people around her.

She didn’t even get as far as the door of the ED. It was blocked by clusters of people. The police and other hospital staff were trying to disperse them to allow for movement in and out.

The people in the crowd muttered incoherently at the attendants, or completely ignored them. She’d last seen a dead gaze like that in drunks who were so sloshed they couldn’t even form sentences. But all of these people were varying shades of yellow. Some were hunched over. One man urinated on the sidewalk before sinking to his knees. A few of them had patches of blotchy and fuzzy skin. Whatever this illness was, if it was what Mark had, he was going to get much worse.

She coughed and doubled over as sharp pains lanced through her gut. Oh God, not me too? What the hell is this? She was jostled by the crowd into a woman with patches all over her face and arms. Kallie saw what they were, up close. There were tiny tendrils, like little shoots less than a millimeter in length covering these patches. She backed away as fast as she could, bumping into an adolescent girl sitting behind her. The girl stared at her dumbly with yellowed eyes, then went into a hacking fit. Dark blood spattered down the girl’s shirt.  Without warning, she lunged at Kallie, grabbing Kallie’s leg and snapping at her with bloody teeth.

Kallie screamed and kicked at her before teeth met skin. The girl landed on her back, her watery yellow eyes blinking up at the cement overhang high above. Kallie ran back to the car.

There was more commotion at the scene of the police biter. Kallie overheard the situation as she skirted the circle of officers, their isolation area forgotten.

“He’s not breathing.”

“I didn’t hit him hard! Bastard was biting me!”

“You did what you had to do. I think he was just too sick. Hey, look at this? What the fuck is that?”

“What is that sticking out of his head? Is that bone?”

“Augh, it just came off in my hand. No it’s not bone, unless bone is all spongy and wet. Those of you that don’t have your PPE on, get it on now! Get Hazmat over here!”

“They might not have any units free.”

“We have to try.”

Kallie got into the car, started it with a rev, and swung the car down the street, narrowly missing clots of the wandering sick.

***

She dragged Mark back inside. He was constantly hunched now. When she led him through the garage he threw up dark bile all over the cement floor. Well, it complements the garbage smell perfectly, she thought, chasing away panic. Her voice shook, “God, Baby–”

“I’ll be ok. Just need some rest.” He waved her away and finished lugging one foot in front of another into the house by himself. He grabbed a roll of paper towels from the holder, stumbled and unrolled half of them. He wiped his mouth and flopped onto the bed. Kallie took off his shoes and pulled the blanket over him. He was shivering violently now. As she tucked him in, she saw the patches on his skin. She scrutinized them. They were smaller, but there were the same tiny shoots she had seen on the girl at the ED. He was getting sicker.

So was she. Another sharp pain lanced across her belly. She staggered to the bathroom and nearly missed the toilet as the contents of her stomach splashed into the bowl, laced with dark liquid. Her red-rimmed eyes were now jaundiced. She limped to the television and clicked it on. Channel 4 and three other channels she flicked to in the Denver area were full of snow. They’d lost signal. She cast a quick prayer to the satellite gods that she remembered to pay them their sixty-dollar monthly tribute, and switched to a national news channel.

This newswoman looked none too healthy either. She had the telltale red-rimmed eyes and her voice was dull through the congestion.

“What began as a flu-like epidemic has shifted into a pandemic of unknown character. Symptoms begin with a flu-like illness, what the World Health Organization calls a prodrome, and the symptoms progress to hepatitis-like illness. In addition to these symptoms, there is sometimes disorientation and behavior change. Severe cases become agitated, and have on some occasions attacked other people. Anyone who experiences symptoms should not go in to your medical provider, but should shelter at home. Assistance can be given by calling the hotline 1-800-445-4325. Press 2 for interpretation services if English is not your primary language.

“Public health agencies have said unofficially that there may be a link between the widespread ant infestations and illness. There is speculation that the illness may be caused by a mutated form of Cordyceps, a fungus that affects brain function in ants. In ants, the fungus can be passed by biting. In humans, other means may be possible, such as transmission of body fluids. Ants can be eliminated by common pesticides from the supermarket, though stocks have been limited due to employee illness. The World Health Organization and public health agencies continue to work on isolating the organism, and creating vaccine and treatment. Once again the help line number is 1-800-445-4325. Press 2 for interpretation services. Para Español…”

Kallie flipped the set off and crept into the bedroom.

Mark hadn’t moved from where he lay, in fact she couldn’t see him breathe. Her heart started lurching as she hurried to his side and gently laid her hand on his arm. He inhaled deeply and opened his eyes to her. “Stomach feels better,” he murmured and extended his muscled arm. His skin in the sliver of sunlight had a more olive tint than usual and the patches had spread to over one quarter of his skin that she could see. “Lay with me,” he whispered. There was a brief flash of fear in his eyes, that he covered quickly by closing his eyes. When he opened them again, his stoicism was firmly set in his face.

Tears flowed down her face as she looked at him. She flinched and backed up for an instant, remembering what had been said about biting.

“Hey hey, Baby, don’t do that. Don’t cry. We’ll get through this. This ain’t gonna take me down. I’m from the Roman Empire, I’m too sexy to go yet. I haven’t had had my orgies and vomitoriums yet,” he grinned.

She barked a laugh. Whatever was happening, he was still clearly his usual self. “Ok, Caesar, I think we got the vomitoriums covered in the last day.” She laid down and put her arm across his chest. He shifted onto his side and flipped her onto her back with surprising strength. Instead of mounting her, he lunged at her face with his teeth.

She dodged her head to the side and screamed, struggling to get out from under him. She kneed him in the orgy-maker and slid under his torso and off the bed. He turned over and bared his teeth, and then fell back to the sweaty sheets. The look on his face as she fled the room, sobbing, was bestial.

***

She collapsed on the kitchen floor, after grabbing a knife. Has it come to this?, she thought. Am I going to stab my Honey?   What the hell is this? What the hell is happening to us? She dropped the knife and wailed into her hands. After the spasms subsided, she examined the whitish itchy patches that were beginning on her arms and belly, and silently wiped tears away. How long is it going to be before I’m turned into a human pit bull? Why aren’t there hordes of people looting and attacking, like in the movies?

All had been quiet, for which she was grateful. Until she thought about how sick she felt. Even if she turned into a crazy biter, she wasn’t going to be chasing anyone. Her relief turned to ugly realization. The silence from outside no longer seemed calm, but sepulchral. This epidemic had come and conquered with almost no resistance from its victims. She swallowed down the remaining lump in her throat and laid there for a long time as the light faded.

Finally, as the light grew again, she crawled into the TV room. All of the channels were snow now. She tried her mom on her cell phone, but the voicemail answered. She crawled into the bedroom.

Mark lay face up on the bed. His breathing was shallow and he just stared at her. His dark eyes were like holes surrounded by glowing yellow of jaundice in the dawn light. From the top of his head sprouted a thin whitish stalk with a greenish bulb. The tendrils emerging from his arms and legs had lengthened into a network that looked like roots or rhizomes. His voice was thick and furry, deep in his throat as he spoke, “I love you, Kallie. I’m sorry.”

She covered her mouth to muffle more sobs, and sat down at the edge of the bed, not caring now whether he rushed at her. He didn’t. She laid down, as more stomach pains wracked her frame. His hand in a shroud of web touched her back, “The pain’ll go away.”

“Why aren’t you freaking out at all this? Do you want to die like this?”

He smiled gently. “I don’t feel like I’m dying now. Something’s happening, something else besides dying. Besides, since when have I ever boo-hooed about something I couldn’t change. No sense in worrying about it. That’s a chick thing,” he wheezed a laugh. But she felt to weak to swat him.

***

When she woke as Kallie Coleman for the last time, two days later, she noticed that he had been right. The pain was gone. In its place, there was a rooted feeling in her belly, and a fluid coursed through her veins that sensed every particle in the air around her, the warmth, the sunlight in the room, the moisture.  And she could feel Mark too. Not just his hand covering hers, but the fluid in his veins and the cells of his body feeding, multiplying, creating energy like lightning. Light itself was a cascade of brilliant spectrums that blanketed and seeped into her. And she drank it. Her eyes wouldn’t open. The tendrils had sewn them shut, but she was seeing anyway, patterns of surging energy everywhere, especially in the mass of growth that had been Mark. She could feel him in her.

Sun. Feel the sun, he said into her mind somehow. Feel the city. And she could. Her snaking rhizomes were everywhere. Her stalk extended high above, having pushed through the ceiling to meet the outside air. The city and its network of roots and stalks that had been people were alive and awash with energy and hunger. They devoured the damp organic matter in every body and corner and drank the sunlight.

***

Across the city, country, and world a silent forest stood. The greenish caps reached for the sky, and the lower rhizomes wove through anything they touched. In what had been Denver, two of the stalks stood entwined, sharing the sun.

The End

Post and share if you have any wild transformation stories!

Tapping the Muse

Hi Fellow Indies,

 

We’ve had a great week at my writer’s group talking about writer’s block and how to address it. Sometimes problems travel in clumps, and many of us had fallen prey to the writer’s block in the last few months, the bane of every writer’s existence. I write to relax and stay sane, and so not only is it a pain in the butt when I want to write something, but it literally messes with my sanity. Fortunately, I am part of a group that tries to help each other. We get together to critique each other’s work, and sometimes, we can use each other to shake things loose when we’re stuck. One of the things I think we all agree on collectively is that writing should be fun. It’s also hard. But if it stops being fun also, we’re doing it wrong. So one of the things we’re doing is making sure to write something at least once a week. It doesn’t have to be War and Peace, or the great American novel, or even a full story. It can be a scene, a conversation between two characters we make up on the spot, anything, as long as it’s fun to write. And fun for writers could be something that makes us laugh or even cry. Maybe ‘engaging’ would be a better word than ‘fun’. We need to write something that we enjoy writing that makes us not want to stop until it’s on the page.

Throughout history, writer’s block or if you aren’t a writer, creative blocks of all kinds have plagued people who wanted to create expression. The Greeks had nine goddesses who were in charge of such inspiration, and as many gods and goddesses were, they were known for their capricious nature, feeding artists and musicians music with divine origin at times, and abandoning them and taking their inspiration with them at others. The expression in which someone says such a person, ‘is my Muse’, and the term ‘music’ come from these goddesses, daughters of Zeus and Mnemnosyne (lord of the Sky, and Memory):

Clio–Muse of History

Euterpe–Muse of lyric song

Melpomene–Muse of tragedy

Terpsichore–Muse of Dance

Erato–Muse of erotic poetry (my guess is a bit more significant than ‘There once was a man from Nantucket…’)

Polyhymnia–Muse of sacred song

Urania–Muse of astronomy

Thalia–Muse of comedy

I think it’s interesting that they were born of sky and memory, because people have been getting inspiration from looking at the sky for thousands of years, and it takes an act of will and the synthesis of emotion and memory to generate works of art or scientific inspiration that hold meaning for people.

But as with the nature of most gods and goddesses, inspiration can be dark. In Celtic lore, the Leanan Sidhe was thought of as a Muse, who inspired poets, but there was a price. She was also vampiric, sucking the life energy of those she inspired. The next story: The Muse, was based on this idea.

 

The Muse

Rivulets of dark pungent water fanned across the rock, leaving a damp organic smell behind. The moon set beyond the deserted park, leaving only the sodium park lights near the Platte River to compete with the more distant city lights in the LoDo condo neighborhoods. But where the river met the rock, under the diseased elms, the shadows were inky physical things. The rivulets across the rock writhed and surged in black ribbons like the hair of a nymph. The river exhaled gray vapor into the air that smelled like the bottom of a lake. Eliza sat by a tangle of shrubs at the edge of the rock, ruminating about her student debt for the millionth time that day, for the millionth time that year. Pinpoints of light danced in the water.

The miasma pooled around her in the air like spectral congregants to a midnight church. Before she had to return to the dry dusty track home, she basked in the sudden humidity of the night river and inhaled the mist. It slid down her throat like silk. Her vision became blurry as the lights in the water doubled and she fell asleep beside the rising stream. When she woke, the morning star was shining. Her cheek was wet where the water had seeped up onto the rock where she lay. There was no indication of how she had fallen asleep, or why.

She had been pounding coffee since noon. Her mother’s voice rang in her head reminding her of how people drown in an inch of water. Her pad was open to a drawing she didn’t remember creating. But it was dark and she couldn’t see very well. She could barely make out the shapes of figures on the page as she peered at it in the pre-dawn light. The swaths of charcoal shifted and flowed across the page into spirals and eddies. Lighter patches here and there looked like eyes. She shivered in the early morning chill, pushed herself up, gathered her supplies, and climbed up to the footpath for the hike to the Light Rail.
One of the bulbs was out in the dingy kitchen of her Lipan Street apartment when she flicked it on. She tossed her pad and supplies on the kitchen table, pulled a chair up and replaced the bulb. She glanced down at the table and almost fell backwards off the chair. The drawing that had been barely visible earlier was a wash of dark shapes that still looked like they shifted if you glanced at another part of the page. The one certainty fixed at points throughout the page were pale faces caught in various poses of agony, fear and despair, like souls trapped trying to escape Tartarus.
She slowly righted the chair and stared at the notebook and tried to remember drawing it.

#

Jobie padded into the kitchen and wrapped his arms around Eliza as she was making coffee later that morning, and nuzzled her thin brown braids. “What the hell were you dreaming about after you finally got in? And where were you so late? I was starting to think I’d have to retrieve you from a crack den or something.”

She turned and swatted him.

He grinned, “And then when you came to bed, you beat the snot out of me in your sleep. I’ll have to start sleeping with my old football pads.”

She lightly bit him on the nose, and then wiped her lips on the kitchen towel. “Ew! Did you take your allergy pill this morning? Your nose is all drippy.”

He laughed. “Don’t blame me, Lassie.” He let her go and blew his runny nose on a piece of toilet paper. “Seriously, you ok? I know you been worrying all the time.”

“I’m fine. What are you talking about?”

“You just had some real whoppers of nightmares. I tried to wake you but you just screamed. You had your eyes open and everything. You stared straight at me. I almost called 911. I’m surprised no one did call. Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy about our neighbors, in case of a real emergency. ‘No Officer, I didn’t hear nuthin, or see the ax-murderer leaving their house covered in blood, with all of their belongings…’ I was about to call, and then you stopped, and started snoring like nothing had happened. You don’t remember any of this?”

She shook her head and frowned into his earnest brown eyes. “I used to get night terrors when I was a kid, but that was twenty years ago, when I was like four.”

“Did your parents drink? Cuz I sure needed a stiff one after that. Are you sure you’re ok?” He hugged her close. “I’ve been planning to tell my boss to fuck off for a day anyway. I want to see how long that unit lasts without me.”

She shoved him toward the shower. “Go get dressed for work. I’m sorry I woke you, but I won’t be the reason you lose your job in this economy.” Her fingers wandered to the edge of her sketch pad and she just stood frozen in thought as the coffee water boiled.

#

She dodged a frustrated driver trying to park in a spot too small, as she scooted across the street from the station to Auraria campus. The studio was cool in the summer heat as she set up her clay and tools and got to work. Her fingers tingled and the sculpture took shape as though the shape of the piece was flowing out of her hands. When it stood done, it was a long vaguely human form like the statues dubbed the ‘dancing aliens’, outside the Denver Performing Arts Center across the street. But this bore only a passing resemblance to that piece. This solitary form was fluid with curves, like a humanoid shape that was part amoeba. Tendrils from its palms reached out for contact to anyone, anything who glanced at it. It looked strangely hungry.

Mr. Catan, the teacher, wandered over and studied it, and noted the same thing. “You certainly have created a stirring piece.” He smiled at her, “Almost Dali-esque.”

Yeah, stirring, she thought, glancing away from his upswept 50’s greaser hairdo and skater-punk t-shirt three decades too young for him. Just like Hustler is stirring, she edged away and started smoothing the figure’s shoulders with a sponge.

But he didn’t move on to the other pieces. “What were you thinking of when you created this? It looks…lonely, empty.”

As soon as she stepped back from it, she saw that he was right. It did look lonely. Need seeped off of it, reaching for her. She gasped and backed up into the wall.
Mr. Catan laughed and nodded at her reaction. “Well, wherever you got this idea from, you had some kind of inspiration. There was a time when artists who created things like this believed they had been touched by the Muse, or fed upon by her. It depended on their perspective. Men gave their lives to her. Or at least, they gave pieces of themselves. Van Gogh, Pygmalion…what did you give to create this?”
Creep, she thought.

He smiled, “You should enter this in the student exhibit when it’s finished.”

Suddenly, she felt bad at her knee-jerk reaction. He was just trying to help.

The Orphan, its name came to her as he walked away. The curves of the statue almost seemed to lean after him, the vacant eye depressions gazing into the back of his neck. She hurriedly cleaned up her materials, and went to her next class, as the statue faced the door.

#

When she came back to the sculpture the next day, Mr. Catan had moved it to the side of the room to make space for a metal-sculpting class. She uncovered it and her impression of it being ’empty’ dissipated. The atmosphere it created was different now. Maybe its paler color as it dried had changed the feel. It seemed animate, almost sentient. But it no longer felt empty and she almost wished that it had. The head had only the slightest depressions for eyes and merely a sloping rise for a nose, and yet, it had an expression. As she finished the fine details, it still looked lonely, like the embodiment of loneliness, but now it somehow looked full.
Ms. Teague, the visual design teacher, stood off to the side, watching the progress of the shapes taking form in the classroom.

“Ms. Teague? Where’s Mr. Catan?” Eliza asked.

She shook her head, a couple grey bobby-pinned curls escaping. “He didn’t come in today.”

“Is he sick?” The hair on the back of Eliza’s neck stood and she positioned herself so she couldn’t see The Orphan.

Ms. Teague frowned, “I assume so. The office is having me fill in. Do you need anything?”

“No, thanks. Just wondering.” Eliza wandered back to her work area. The Orphan’s form seemed to occupy the room as a crowd of admirers gathered around it.

“Wow, this is really cool. I wish I could make something like this.” Wendy, the wispy Gothic girl of the class whose works all had a Tim Burton-esque look to them, twirled her long black locks.
Her lanky partner, shifted his skull-and-crossbones suspenders. “Yeah, you should enter it in the exhibit. Or a gallery. My brother has a friend who owns a gallery on Santa Fe. He’d probably take it. He don’t pay much though, but people’d see it. This needs to be seen.”

Wendy touched it gently, “May I?”

Eliza shrugged. “Sure. Just be careful.”

The girl nodded, “Funny, it seems like it wants to be touched.” She drew her hand away suddenly and then replaced it again. “It’s warm. Like it’s alive.” She smiled, her red lips stretching into a white smile, “Gives me some new ideas,” and she wandered back to her work area.

Eliza just sat back in bewilderment at The Orphan’s popularity until the students trickled away to their own projects. She added and polished, and couldn’t get away from its warm suppleness and the sense that it felt everything she did to it.

#

Jobie squeezed her, and popped another pig in a blanket into his mouth. He washed it down with another plastic cup of wine and said through a mouthful, “Congratulations, Babe! Wow, my girlfriend won an award from the student exhibit.”

Crowds trickled into the gallery from the street. As the servers moved to the greet them, Jobie snagged another handful of appetizers. She frowned as she peered around. He leaned back and peered at The Orphan. “Wow, it really is something else. It feels like its watching me. What inspired it, was it your creepy greaser sculpture teacher? Those tentacle-thingees in its palms make me think he did a little too much stroking the monkey. You know what they say about that. And your statue’s blind too,” he tipped one of his teetering cups to The Orphan.

Eliza almost shot wine through her nose as she laughed. “I think that’s the four cups of booze you’ve had in the last hour. Not the sculpture.” Eliza smirked.

He looked offended. “No, I’m eating food with my alcohol.” He stuffed three sausage-filled mushrooms into his mouth to emphasize his point. “You gotta live a little, Babe! It’s your art. You painting and sculpting and stuff, that’s the first time I’ve seen you relax a little and express yourself. You’re always so practical, like Spock. Join your own party for a change!” He poked a breaded sausage at her mouth.

She waved him off, and then thought better of it. She grabbed his cup of wine and downed it, and then another.

“See, that’s it!” he beamed.

She basked in the glow as people flocked around the statue. These art classes had been electives to fill in for some liberal arts core requirements. They had been a pragmatic choice, since it seemed like an easy grade. Maybe this could be a second career for me, she thought, but it won’t pay as well as business administration, and at least that’s steady. But now, it was turning out to be satisfying in other ways. It was the first time she had ever felt…expressed. There were other things in life besides a steady paycheck and security. Maybe Jobie was right.

She wrapped her arms around Jobie’s paunchy middle and enjoyed the attention for the rest of the evening while he did all the talking and bragging for her.

She glanced around and frowned. It had been the one sour point in the evening, reminding them of the situation unfolding on campus. Mr. Catan was missing. He had been reported a couple days prior, and it had been on the news. No trace of his whereabouts had been found, the news had said. The university had been silent on any details of the investigation. While she hadn’t much liked him, she hoped he was alright, hoped he hadn’t fled from some heinous crime they had yet to discover. And, she thought, a little selfishly, she wished he had been here to see her piece opening in the gallery.

#

As they returned home, her sketch pad slid to the floor of the train and Jobie picked it up. “Let’s see what Michelangelo’s been cooking up on paper? You never showed me these.” He flipped slowly through the pages of fruit and nature scenes, and then stopped abruptly at the charcoal she had puzzled over two weeks previously from her nap by the stream.

“Whoa…” His soft drunk brown eyes focused on her. A flash of fear floated through them, and then was subsumed again in the haze of alcohol. “Left turn into dark. Which one of these is not like the others? When did you do this?”

She reached for it, and studied it again, swallowing on a lump of apprehension in her throat. “Last week, Tuesday. The day I had the night terrors.”

“No wonder.”

She sighed, “No, night terrors aren’t dreams. They don’t happen in REM sleep. It’s during deep sleep. That’s why no one remembers anything when they have a night terror. They aren’t dreaming or seeing anything.”
“Well, one physiology class and look who knows everything about the brain. I’ll make you a bet that in ten years, they come out with another study that says the exact opposite, just like they did with the study saying fat is bad for you, and then that we need it for brain function. Make up your mind, people!”

She laughed and pushed at his ample chest.”When they said fat is necessary, I don’t think that ten bags of pork rinds a day were what they meant.”

He shrugged and his eyes slid back to the picture. “I’m just saying. Something scared the hell out of you, and this picture scares the hell out of me.” He tapped it, “But it’s really interesting. Interesting and creepy sells. You should get it entered into a contest or put it on an art website or something. Maybe we could win the rent money. And then I could go tell my boss to fuck off for good.”

She smirked and packed the pad away in her bag. “The scary picture’s gone now. And I’ll think about it. There’s a scanner in the student aid office. Maybe they’ll let me use it. In the meantime, you’ll just have to keep being the loathed IT guy until the gravy train comes in.” They linked arms and walked to the station.

#

The studio lit up as she entered, the first one there. She had an extra hour between work at the coffee shop and sculpture class. The block of clay felt cool and satiny underneath her hands as she wet it and began working. The slip glided through her fingers as a shape formed. Other students filtered in. A ring of students gazed at the emerging creation, and then set up their own stations, glancing back at her every so often. Ms. Teague watched her with a pensive look, but said nothing and just let her work, commenting here and there on other students’ pieces.

About ten minutes before class ended, Eliza stepped back from the bench and brought herself from her reverie to look at the sculpture from a distance. It was not even remotely humanoid. There were shoots emerging from piles of loops that looked like internal organs, and hands, dozens of tiny hands and mouth indentations lined with buds like tongues.
Gothic Wendy’s voice startled her, “Girlfriend did some LSD last night.” She stared at the grotesque sculpture. “It looks hungry. But I like it. One brush with celebrity and you go right off the rails.” She smirked at Eliza.

“Don’t go cutting off any body parts to mail to your boyfriend.”

Eliza frowned. It did look hungry somehow, and it wasn’t just the mouths. It had the same vacant feel to it as The Orphan had started with, as though it were waiting. Eliza covered it up and left for her Developmental Psych class.

#

At the end of the semester a couple weeks later, she brought her new piece home, when they emptied their things from the studio. Jobie gaped at it as Eliza partly uncovered it on the hand truck, to undo the cords holding it.

“It’s…unique, in a Crypt Keeper meets the Return of the Living Dead kind of way. What’s this one called? ‘Your Insides on Pork Rinds?'”

She tilted her head at it, while flicking Jobie’s ear. And the name came to her. Bacchus’ End, she realized, like the Baccanalians and their festivities. It was like a mass of senses feeding on itself.
He patted her on the back. “Good job, Queen of Darkness. If you go whip up some grub, I’ll get this unloaded and start the folding the laundry.” He turned the TV on.

As she kissed him and went into the kitchen, she could almost feel the tongues questing and the mouths opening and closing on the scents in the air and the hands reaching for something, anything. About twenty minutes later, the hamburger helper casserole was done and she went into the TV room to catch their regular episode of Bones with Jobie. But he wasn’t there.

“Job? Hey Job?” The television was still on and she lowered the volume. She poked her head in their bedroom, but the rumpled Snoopy sheets were empty. The bathroom door was open and dark. She peered out the window to see if he might be coming from the store. But the only folks she saw were heading to or from the Osage station.

She texted him. A buzz from the counter showed her his phone. She called their friends, his work and anyplace else she could think of where he might have gone. But he wasn’t there, and it didn’t seem likely that he would have just gone without telling her, especially not just before dinner. Finally, she called the police, to say that something must have happened to him, though she couldn’t imagine how. They came and took her statement, and gave the statue an odd glance as they left. She sat on the couch and cried.

Like The Orphan, it seemed different in the dim light of the living room lamp. It had seemed vacant before, but now, though the statue seemed hungry still, it seemed more…present, inhabited. She shuddered and threw the couch blanket over it and went to bed.

She cried until she fell asleep. Every hour she woke and felt the lump of blankets to see if Jobie had come in. He didn’t, and the phone never rang.

#

His side of the bed was still empty in the morning. She pulled her knees to her chest and just rocked for a while. At ten o’clock, she called in sick to the coffee shop. She stared at the screen for a couple hours. He’ll be back from wherever. Those people on TV always come back. Look, those talk show guests have it much worse, they’re throwing shoes at each other. God, where the hell is he? I know there was nothing wrong between us? Was he mad at me? No, he would never just leave me like this, wondering. Oh God, something had to have happened!

She went around and around like that, as the television droned on. Finally, she shut it off. The silence in the apartment was unbearable. Baccus’ End waited under the cloth which she had left over it. She could almost hear it breathe with its many mouths, and feel the pulse of its blood. She grabbed her bag and left, slamming the door behind her.

As she crossed the walking bridge over I-25, she spotted a sculpture she had never noticed before, though she remembered dimly that it had been there for as long as she had been in Colorado. Jobie had snarked about it constantly, because it was the singularly most hideous incomprehensible thing she had ever seen. It looked like a giant pile of red gory jelly beans that had melted and stuck together.

At night, the fine citizens of Denver were treated to its full effect as it was lit from within, so the dribbles of red paint down its side looked like the innards of a demon that had been put through a Star Trek transporter accident. She walked up to it now and touched the cherry red protuberances. And quickly pulled her hand away as they pulsed faintly under her hand. The electrical source used to light the monstrosity must have been buzzing, she thought, but didn’t try to touch it again. ‘Crimson Love’, it was named. Now she had to shut her eyes and press her fingers into her sockets, as a sexual connotation was added to the demon intestine image.
She sighed, checked her phone again in case Jobie called, and headed down the path to the river.

When she got there, she pulled her pad out of her bag, tore the charcoal drawing out and ripped it into pieces, smearing charcoal across her hands. The feeling of loathing she got as she looked at it was irrational, she knew. I still don’t remember drawing that. What if I didn’t? All this started after that strange night. What if it’s the drawing? What if it let something in? Or what if something else drew it and cursed me? Everything went wrong after that.

She thought about the sequence of events. She had never been a artistic prodigy, so why all of the sudden had she suddenly started drawing and sculpting pieces that got people’s attention so strongly? A chill ran down her spine as she thought about the lights in the water that night. What if I did draw it, and whatever was here that night got into me? What are those things I’m creating?

She shivered, and threw the shredded picture in the water. The shreds hit a stagnant pocket of water behind a brake of river debris, so the shreds just eddied around instead of being swept away. As the water soaked through the paper, the images ran and blended together. The eyes in the paper rolled and the faces convulsed and then they were gone. The river exhaled a belch of vegetal air and the breeze whistled a sigh around her ears and through her hair.

Someone wandered by with a dog. It was friendly and explored Eliza with a wet nose, a snort and a wag of its coppery tail.

“Sorry. Down, Chassie! I’m Meg.” She held out her hand.

Eliza shook it. “It’s ok.” She ran her fingers through the dog’s fur and let his drooling tongue comfort her. A tear leaked down her face.

“Are you ok?” Meg came and squatted by her.

She nodded. “I’m just having a bad day. Your dog is nice.” “Well, I hope things get better. You’re an artist? That’s pretty good!” The gray-haired woman peered at the picture exposed in her pad now that the dark charcoal was gone. It was an ordinary mountain scene in watercolors.

Eliza nodded, “Well, I’m taking a class. It was fun, but lately…it feels like it’s been kind of taking over.”

The woman smiled, her crafted earrings swinging as she spoke, “Touched by the Muse, eh? That’s how one of my artist friends in Sedona talked about her art. Like it came from someone else besides her. She also said the liquor fairy breathed life into the things she made. If she stopped drinking and partying, her art started to suffer.” She laughed. “Listen to me, You’re not underage are you? How old are you?”
“Twenty-four.”

Meg batted her hand in the air. “Ah, you’re legal. Anyway, you just look so serious. I’m not saying you should go get liquored up or anything. Just don’t forget to have some fun, eat and drink, before the time goes by, and you get to my age.” The dog began pulling the woman away. “Nice meeting you.”

“You too,” Eliza nodded. She sat until the sun set, not wanting to face her empty apartment. Jobie hadn’t called. The police hadn’t called either. Their friends only called to check in with her and make sure she was alright.
Her fear of the art pieces seemed silly now. Despite the woman’s talk of spirits, it seemed more firmly in the realm of folklore. The police will figure it out. Just let him be ok.

She dangled her feet in the river as the light faded. The trickle and the crystal cool swell around her shins was comforting. The sand swirled around her toes and shaped into furrows around her feet. She flopped out of the water and found a stick, and sat where the beach met a lazy part of the river, next to the sitting rock. There she drew spirals in the sand until the stick broke. Nothing was strange about the doodles. They were just swirls of sand. Just to prove her point she took handfuls of the sand and built a little mound with a moat.

The water shimmered and lapped at her fingers like little velvet tongues and deepened in the moat. The sound of the waves were hypnotic. The twinkles of light in the water were so beautiful and cool. They whispered and sang in high sweet voices that everything would be fine as a cool mist kissed her eyelashes. She relaxed and let the sand settle around her feet and arms. Something in the back of her mind was screaming at her to move, but the troubles with Jobie would still be waiting, and one more minute in the water felt nice.

Her arms had sunk into the sand and dark water. The waning moon was barely a sliver in the sky. The sodium lamps didn’t penetrate the mist that had risen in the trench of the river where Eliza crouched in the pungent water and drank, as the heat ebbed from her limbs.

#

A dog sniffed around the new sandstone sculpture by the sitting rock, and decided that it was not a good candidate for marking his territory. It was too…alive.
The squat amphibious creature sat, almost in the water. It looked like it was made of eyes. The eyes covered its head in clusters, even lining its wide full lips, as though it were a creature that was always watching the world from the sidelines. Long columns of stone drooped down its hunched form, almost like brown thin-braided river-weed hair. And it was surrounded by silence and sadness. Insects moved and chattered about, and the river flowed as always, but there was a stillness around it that dampened the air. As though it were waiting to breathe. Another dog’s owner trotted over. “What the hell is that? What a weird place to put a statue,” her ponytail bobbed as she jogged around it.

The jogger’s companion took a swig from her water bottle and kept jogging in place on the rock. “Have you ever looked around Denver? We’re in the city of weird sculptures. It’s that push to be ‘cosmopolitan’ whatever that means. I think it means you’re acceptably hoity-toity if you have weird art. Haven’t you ever noticed the ‘cosmopolitan’ statues around the city?”

“True. Like that demon horse with the red eyes outside the Denver Airport. There’s something I want to see before I get on a plane. I heard the artist died just before he finished it.”

“Actually, it killed him. That’s what I heard.”

The first woman snapped her fingers at the dog and the two women sprinted up the slope to the trail and ran on.

End Story

 

After all of the depictions of Muses, what is your favorite? Which one are you most affected by? How do you get past your own blocks and lure the Muses back into your life?

Happy Late Passover and Easter!

Hello fellow Indies!

I recently did a Facebook quiz, God those are addictive, about which circle of Hell I would fall into…Yay! I got Heresy. And no one who knows me was surprised. Though I could have done with some nice Lust or Gluttony. Those are always fun. I’m a big fan of those. I recently discovered, after going with my family to San Diego and visiting the Ghirardelli’s chocolate store that no chocolate can escape my event horizon.

I also recently visited a museum in Salt Lake City displaying the Dead Sea Scrolls found at Qumran. Other interesting things were displayed in that exhibit. Among the interesting things I learned, thought already read about some time in the past was that the kohanim of the Temple during at least part of the Roman Empire would only accept coins with…get this…the head of Herakles on them…yep, you heard correctly. The head of a pagan Greek/Roman demi-deity. The Maccabees took the Temple back from those greeks some centuries before that because of the naughty statues of Greek gods erected in the Temple, that some of the priests were secretly worshipping too. Well, at least politicians of every nation throughout eternity are consistent…And finally, though worship of the one God was the official state religion of the Kingdom of Israel, the same way that Islam is the official state religion of Iran, though there are a million other religions practiced too, the ‘peasantry’, like me, just went ahead and worshiped whoever the hell they wanted as they had all along, including their ancient Canaanite pantheistic gods, as observed by the booby goddess dolls found in their apartments by archaeologists. Most of them never gave up worshipping Asherah/Astarte/Ishtar, the wife of El–thunder god extraordinaire, or Jewish Zeus, if you prefer. That’s right. The WIFE of ‘God’. Hmmm. Wherever did she go?

Needless to say, I have a hard time believing in organized religion for religious purposes. I think it’s great for getting together with family. So I do enjoy Seder, for the food and the company, and especially the discussion. To that end, and because I’m a complete heretic, I’d like to share this Exodus story I wrote a while back. A slightly different take on the Exodus than in most Bibles…

Plagues

Dom: Blood

The crimson water trickled out of Miryam’s amphora, as the brutal sun rose in the sky. There would be much suffering today in Miztrayim, among the slaves as well as the free. Though the situation would not be as dire for the pampered artisans and craftsman, most of the unskilled labor slaves she knew couldn’t keep much water. And the only water to be had needed buying. Many laborers would die today in the simmering heat. She looked out across the wavering expanse of scrub and sand toward the city of Ra’amses. The ululating wail of women bounced across the alleys from the city, as everywhere people found the blood water. Even the clean water in the city had been polluted. She sighed and sat down at the water’s edge, not caring that her skirt had fallen in the river. She ruminated as Egyptians and Hebrews ran back and forth, her water jug empty, her face burning in the sun. They were doomed by an incompetent god.

According to her crazy brother, Moshe, God had promised to lead them from bondage, but hadn’t enough foresight to save them clean water in his great smiting of the Egyptian ‘majority’. It was these great planning skills that were supposed to sustain them in the desert should they follow him, as Moshe kept suggesting. He never shut up about it. She sat staring at a gory reflection of herself in the puddle into which she had emptied the jug. A rail thin man, his rib-cage prominent and laced with scars, dropped to his knees next to her and looked at her with cavernous eyes before leaning down and slurping from the puddle with his lips. He sat up for a moment, sated, and then clambered to the river and vomited bloody water onto the rocks. We’re all doomed, she thought.

Tzfardeah: Frogs
The kids ran back and forth throwing frogs at each other. Miryam skirted the guard outpost near the palace, trying not to draw the guard’s attention by staying still too long. She watched the ruckus in amazement, until one of the bare-chested painted guards, swiping at the frogs, decided the kids would make a better target, and strode forward, sword drawn. The children scattered, fearlessly pelting the guard in a rain of amphibians and then vanishing. Kids could make games of everything. And after living under a pall of violence, nothing phased them, not armed soldiers with a hatred of their kind, and certainly not frogs.

At first it had been cute. Yehoshuah, her eight year old son, had brought in a little brown frog, as she pulled the morning bread from the oven, sweating. She hadn’t paid much attention. Another stray thing Yehoshuah was going to adopt and let loose in the little brick apartment.

“Outside!,” she had ordered, and followed him outside to make sure he let the slimy thing go.

It had been a little cute, staring at her with round black eyes, and round little toes. As soon as she got to the door, she dropped the bread tray in astonishment, spilling the bread to the dusty earth. She cursed. There were frogs everywhere, carpeting the road, roofs and every other surface. She turned and looked back inside. Frogs of all sizes leaped and bumped and pushed into her dry goods with abandon, burping and croaking wet little sounds. Shouts began issuing from every house on the block. She took a squelching step, and almost slipped on a bump and the ichor that oozed from the frogs that had appeared underfoot.
“Arrgh!” She yelled, casting a venomous look toward Heaven and stormed into the house just as her foolish brother approached with purpose.

She rolled her eyes. Moshe’s ‘purpose’ was getting ridiculous, an affectation only the privileged could afford. The rest of us have purpose to say alive, she thought. He had grown up in the Palace, adopted by the Princess who had decided that he was too cute to be a laborer, she thought bitterly. While the rest of us sweat and toil and die by bits. Mother encouraged it! She spent more time with Moshe in the palace, than with me and brother Aharon. First-born boys! Think the world owes them!, she thought savagely as Moshe barged in. Yocheved, their mother had convinced him that he had a ‘mission’ to help his people in his position, instead of fucking exotic slave girls. Trouble was, she never really aimed him in a particular direction or defined ‘helping’, so away he went. Now he ‘has visions’. God save us from visionaries! His newest crusade was only the latest attempt at self-imposed ‘redemption’. She faced him with her feet planted and her hands on her hips. It did nothing to diffuse the fierce light in his eyes as he entered, his breath ragged with passion.

“Do you see! Do you see that our God avenges us? Now do you believe me?”

“I believe you’re an idiot with delusions of atonement. Frogs? Really? What kind of idiot drops frogs on people?!” She held her hands out, surveying the chaos.

“Hush your blasphemous tongue! Don’t speak of God in that way! He’ll deliver us from bondage!”

“Us who? Saving you, from perfumed whores and sweet water and slaves with fans?”

“I have never used slaves. My women are willing.”

Miryam snorted.

“I am a Hebrew! I am your brother. Have you no care for me?” He suddenly looked as forlorn as the young toddler the princess had pulled from the rushes, glancing back toward the family who had left him there, hidden. “I gave up all that.” He gestured at the plain tunic and breeches that had replaced the gold-woven linen finery.

She relented, her dark angry eyes softening, “I guess. Thermusthis, your ‘mother’, must be angry. She’s probably wishing she left you in the river.”

He shook his head. “She loves me like our own mother. Why do you expect so ill of her. She is a kind woman. She understands why I must do this.”

Miryam sighed. “Ok. Right, your mission. Here’s a little blast of reality: you live in the palace surrounded by people who aren’t too fond right now of the other side of your family. You need to be more careful or you’ll wind up crocodile food at the bottom of the Nile. Don’t think you’re untouchable just because the Princess wanted a son and ‘saved’ someone else’s. Her Daddy doesn’t think you’re so cute, I will wager you a week of food on that!”

“He will not move against me right now. In fact, he is considering my proposal to release the Hebrew laborers from their contracts, if not all bondsmen of Hebrew descent. He fears us.”

“You can’t possibly believe that. Fear is why people try to destroy us, not keep us alive.” A frog dropped onto her head. She smacked her hand down with a squish, made a face and wiped her hand on her dress. “So He couldn’t have come up with a plague that was less…slimy?” She grinned.

He put a burly arm around her, towering above her by the length of her forearm, and shrugged. “I’m not turning down His help. Things can’t go on this way. Ramses has lost his mind, he’s genocidal.” He looked at her with sharp brown eyes. “I heed your warning. I know the only reason I’m still here is because of Thermusthis. He dotes on her. She watches out for me like a hawk. But now he knows what I am, he is just waiting for an opportunity. I will not give him one.”

Miriam put her hand on the side of his face. Dumb-ass brother! They turned at the sound of retching from one of the nearby hovels, and then looked down at the ground, helpless. Following the blood plague, scores of their already weakened people had died right alongside the Egyptian citizenry, sickened from drinking the poison when there was nothing else to drink. Even the beer had turned. The smell of sick was everywhere. And now this.

Kinim: Lice

She woke up with a raw scalp from scratching in her sleep as though insects had been burrowing beneath her skin. There were the same raw patches all over her body when she whipped aside the clothes from her body.
“Moshe! Moshe! Call Him off! He’ll kill us!” She yelled, but no one answered.

She sat at the side of her pallet with her head in her hands. It took all of her effort to resist squirming and screaming. Something crawled all over her, and she could tell by the shrieks that had become commonplace in the city in the past couple weeks, that her experience was being repeated everywhere. Instead of easing their lot, these plagues were making things worse. The government didn’t believe they were in real danger, and it only made the hatred against her people seem justified. Acenath, her Egyptian neighbor, had faithfully brought food over every week when Miryam’s family hadn’t enough. But yesterday when they had met in the street, there was an uneasiness in the woman’s eyes, and she had pulled her son Kosey to her, subconsciously, as though Miryam would snatch him or turn him into an animal, the child she had helped watch since he was an infant. Acenath had caught herself in her reaction, and gave Miryam a vague apologetic glance and then hurried into their home. The soldier raids had intensified, and three more Hebrew families had been arrested in the past two days. No one would ever see them again. Yocheved remembered when they had been considered ‘Egyptian’, with slightly different customs. And then in the space of a few years, following Ramses ascendency, they had woken up ‘Hebrew’.

“Auuuugh!” Miryam tore her clothes off, baring herself, scratching at her genitals frantically. The infestation was even in her womanhood. She ran and ran until she reached the river and threw herself in.

Arov: Flies

She wiped the bile from her mouth, almost tipping over the stinking pot. The frogs had made the food bad, and fevers had begun throughout the city from the lice. Miryam flopped back on her pallet and wondered how she was going to get up for work. Badness was coming from both ends, and if her mistress was in a foul mood, she’d get beaten for her lovely aroma.
Yehoshuah burst in, darker every day from the field. His wide chocolate eyes took in her condition.
“Eema, there’s something coming! From the desert.” He ran to help her up.
What now? She thought sourly, stumbling to the doorway. There was a thin dark growing line on the horizon. A deep hum vibrated in the air. Dread filled her belly.
“Get inside, Yehoshuah! Now!”
They ran in and Miryam began pulling cloth across the windows sealing every possible crack in the hut. The hum got louder. Miryam grabbed her child and drew him in her arms into the corner behind the pots. He struggled, but stopped and let her cover him, as soon as he saw the fear in her face. Something like a wall of air hit the side of the hut and a droning buzz swarmed around walls that seemed thin as papyrus. Flies boiled in through the cloths she had wedged quickly in the windows. They swarmed over everything, wiggled through her hair as she shielded Yehoshuah, and covered her face against his small back. The buzz drowned all other sound. She coughed out a fly in horror and contemplated that maybe death by the lash or by the guards, was preferable to anything their ‘guardian’ God could provide.

Dever: Cattle Pestilence.

Ramses was scared. The flies had covered everything, a dark plague born in the empty wastes between lands, evidence of an angry god, one that seemed to be gaining in power every day. One from which his own gods, indeed his own divine father seemed unable to protect them. For weeks, Ra, Horus, and the others had been silent. And this new Hebrew god was insane. His followers hadn’t been spared the plagues that had befallen his land so far. This god didn’t seem to care that they suffered, just that they were bonded as slaves when they did it. Their god would rather kill them himself, it seemed. Well, maybe that was the answer. He, Ramses, would kill them all before their god killed the proper Egyptians. He beckoned to the nearby Greek slave, who brought him the scroll he’d ordered. He dictated the edict that on this night, all Hebrews would be exterminated. And then he paused, his hand over the seal. Instead he grabbed the scroll and threw it in the flames of a brazier, a holy fire to Horus. This new god was too unpredictable. Bastard Mo-ses, the sorcerer threatened to call down more plagues if his birth people were not released into the desert. Something in the man’s eyes gave Ramses a needle of fear. One he shouldn’t be feeling as the son of a god. He couldn’t give in to terrorism, but the prospect of loosing the laborers to the desert, where they would die of exposure seemed more and more appealing. That might kill a number of birds with one arrow. But if he released them on demand, he’d look weak. Damn that Mo-ses, and may the Soul Eater devour him after death! He complicated everything.
A slave ran in, his head shepherd, a black wa-Lemba tribesman from the nearby Cushite kingdom. He was sweating and trembling. He bowed before Ramses, his god.

“My god…” he stuttered. He seemed unable to continue.

Ramses fidgeted with impatience. “Finish what you came here to tell me.”

“The, the cattle. They have fallen ill.”

“With what? How many?”

The man kept his head down, shuddering. His voice was muffled. “All of them I have seen. They are dying. It is the pestilence, my holiness. It is claiming them all.”

Ramses kicked him in the face, and then grabbed the sword of a guard and ran him through the gut as he grabbed his bloody nose. “No one threatens me! Blackmail! Trying to terrorize my people will not be tolerated!” He stormed to the palace entrance.

The city was in disarray as people ran through the streets wailing at their misfortune. Dead and dying cattle were wheeled through on carts, the corpses destined for the midden heaps to be burned, so their pestilence wouldn’t poison whatever herds remained. The only meat for the markets tomorrow would be the cured reserves that were supposed to last through the drought. He snapped orders to his ministers to release a portion of the drought provisions from the royal storehouses to see people through the next few weeks until more animals could be purchased from the kingdom of Punt and other allies. That might help quell the panic for the moment. No stores would go to the god-damned Hebrews. They could starve for bringing this on his kingdom.

Shcheen: Boils.

The violence had increased threefold. The Pharaoh had gotten Moshe’s message about releasing Miryam’s people, and instead of complying had decided on a show of strength. Which was exactly what Miryam had expected. A political genius her brother was not. He had spent his entire life embroiled in palace politics, yet people’s reactionary nature seemed to have washed over him like the Nile. The raids had doubled, with every other family, including children declared traitors and enemies of the kingdom. But more disturbing was the civil unrest. She cleaned up the camel dung spattered on the outside of the house from the teenage mob that had gone from Hebrew house to house last night. Four of them had stormed in through her front door, yelling expletives at them. One of them had knocked Yehoshuah unconscious, while the other three held her down and pulled up her dress. Ari, her husband, accompanied by Har-An, Acenath’s husband, had run in from the quarry and struck the young man with his mattock. Two intruders fled, as the mattock felled the attacker who was about to violate her, and Har-An dropped the last assailant with a meaty fist. The two men looked hard at each other. Har-An took his mattock with a deep breath and ended the one still alive that he’d knocked down. Ari grabbed bed cloths, tossed them over the remains. They hefted the bodies over their shoulders without another word and left in the direction of the river. Miryam scrubbed the stains on the floor.
A day later, the Egyptians had reason now to be scared. Following the riots, very few Egyptians were on the streets, and moaning could be heard from the houses Miryam passed on her way to collect water. Of those she saw, every visible piece of skin was suppurating with sores upon sores. These walking horrors stared at her clear face in supplication, begging someone whole to do something to relieve their condition. None of the Hebrews had been affected, it seemed, at least not by whatever affliction this was. Maybe God’s aim was getting better, she thought sourly. Except, she liked most of her Egyptian neighbors. It was having money that made people act like idiots, not the gods they worshipped. And nobody she knew had any, so they were always perfectly nice. After putting down her load of water, she stopped over Acenath’s house next door, with some of her meager food and water. The place stank. Both Acenath and her husband and Kosey were curled on their pallets. Miryam rushed to the child. His face was erupting with pustules, and she could feel the heat from him without touching his forehead. She wet a cloth in clean water and laid it across his forehead and trickled more onto his lips. She did the same for his parents. Acenath just stared at her with dull eyes. Miryam sat with them until she had to leave for her mistress’ home.

Barad: Hail

The thatch roofs were burning and collapsing. And the ones that weren’t alight were being pulverized by fist-sized hailstones along with any fool who tried to save them. Lightning cascaded down in three different places as she watched. El, the storm-God of the Hebrews was doing what He did best. Miryam flinched as she peered out the window in time to hear the punctuated squawk of a chicken that had run in panic, and see a puff of feathers stained red. Acrid smoke drifted in and a strand of fiber and gray ash floated in midair. She bolted upright, the fire was close. She peered as far out as she could without getting beaned by hail. A conflagration was three houses away, and Acenath’s roof was starting to catch from the drifting embers of other fires. A woman ran down the street, trailing smoke and fearing fire more than the physical assault from the black sky. Everywhere people were yelling, covered in welts and bruises as water for the fires was handed in from the river. Miryam grabbed a partly full water jug and hoped for the best as she ran to Acenath’s house, climbed to the roof and doused the growing flame. Hailstones slammed into her, and she fought to keep moving and tried to block blows to her head with one hand holding the jug. Apparently there was no special shield for Hebrews out in the open. Brilliant. Maybe their reprieve from the boils and sores had just been luck or different food or something. Acenath ran out, covering her head with her hands, but a carbuncle blossomed above her eyebrow as an ice ball pelted into her. Having survived her illness, she wobbled on her feet, looked up at Miryam and ran back inside. A moment later, she emerged, climbed to the roof and handed Miryam a full jug of water.

“You!” Acenath called back into the chaos on the street, to anyone. There was no husband to help her now. Har-An had not survived. “This fire will be yours if it spreads! Help me!”

Water came, by Egyptian and Hebrew hands scratched and shredded by the pounding hail. Within a few minutes, her fire at least was out. Lightning cracked into a house down the street, sizzling the water in their cistern, and making Miryam almost lose her hold. People melted back into whatever shelter they could find. As Miryam slid down, she noticed sparks landing in the thatch on her own roof. Acenath did too. Tendrils of smoke curled up and then extinguished. A hailstone almost took off Acenath’s nose as she stared, then shook her head and grabbed Miryam’s arm and ran into her own house.

“Maybe your house would be safer,” she said sourly to Miryam. “But I can’t leave Kosey here by himself.”

“I’m fine, Mum! I’m almost a man.”

“Just because you’re the man of the house doesn’t make you a man yet! And you shouldn’t be out of bed!”

The boy sat up, sores healing on his face. He rolled his eyes.

Miryam shook her head. “I’m as confused as you are. Trust me.”

“Your house didn’t catch fire.”

“Yet. Day isn’t over yet.” Miryam reminded her.

Acenath glared at her a moment, then burst into laughter, slapped Miryam on the shoulder, right on a bruise, and handed her a cup of weak beer, and piece of bread. “Thank you, friend. I never thanked you for helping us before either. I almost lost my Kosey…Har-An…” Her huge dark eyes filled with tears, and she choked. Miryam put her arm around the tiny younger woman’s shoulders, and played with Acenath’s long black braid. Tears dripped down Acenath’s cheeks, but the lines in her face relaxed a little.

The boy bit down on his trembling lip, and put his arm around her other shoulder and gave the women a very manly look. “Mama, it’s ok. I’m fine. And I’m almost as tall as you, see. I can handle man’s matters.” He stood above them and extended his skinny chest. The women looked at each other, stifling smiles.

“Yes, well as far as my height, you didn’t have far to go.”

He looked crestfallen for a second, then grinned. Miryam snorted and went to the window, rubbing at her numb fingers. The hail had stopped, and the lightning flickers receded into the distance. “Clearing up,” she said. But their quarter of the city as far as she could see looked like it had been through a battle, with debris littering the street and smoke from fires dotting the buildings here and there.

“Why does your god hate us so much?” Kosey’s voice came from behind her. Miryam turned to his clear amber eyes. Acenath watched, quietly chewing on a crust.

“I think he’s just angry with Ramses.”

“Because Ramses is a donkey’s b–?”

“Kos!,” His mother yelled, glancing at the door fearfully.

“But you said–“

“Do you want to get us killed, boy?” His mother went to the door and peeked out.

Miryam stared at her. Acenath shook her head at Miryam. They both let out a long breath.

Unabashed, he continued, “Then is it because he hates Hebrews? We don’t hate Hebrews. Yehoshuah’s my friend.”

Miryam ruffled his hair. “I know, boy. We weren’t spared most of this either. Maybe I just haven’t kissed His Heavenly …rear-end enough. I’m not very good at worship, regardless of the god. At least you have more than one to choose from.”

“That just means more…rear kissing,” Acenath muttered. She gave Miryam a relieved smile.

Miryam kneeled by her and took Acenath’s and Kosey’s hands in hers. “I will never be your enemy.”

Acenath wrapped her arms around Miryam. Kosey huffed in relief. “So I can still hang out with Yehoshuah? He has the best snail collection.”

“Ok, what?”

“Nuthin.” He coughed, and darted out the door to find his friend before the women could stop him.

Arbeh: Locusts

Ramses stared at the growing cloud on the horizon. The city had weathered sandstorms before, but the tremor in his belly spoke of something far worse. He gave the orders to cover whatever structures might be damaged by the storm, and sent runners from region to region of the city, warning his citizens to shelter in their homes. Except none went to Goshen, where one of the oldest neighborhoods of Hebrews still resided. All work in the city was ceased. One of his foreman, a Canaanite from the outlying area arrived, out of breath. His guard stepped forward to block the man’s rushed approach, but Ramses waved them back, and motioned the worker into his presence.

“My Lord,” the huge man kneeled. Even through his almost black complexion, his skin was blanched with worry. “It is a plague from the Hebrews! It must be! They have called locusts, my Lord! They have called Pazuzu, demon of the wastes. Their god works with demons!”

Dread froze like a stone in Ramses belly, even as he rolled his eyes at the mention of foreign gods. El, Pazuzu, god or demon, it made no difference who or what had brought the locusts. Non-Egyptian gods and superstitions did not belong here. He snorted in derision. “Your heathen gods do not interest me. This is sorcery, and they will pay.” He decided on mercy today and dismissed the man to see to his own business. The swarm would be upon them in minutes. He sent runners to the fields to gather what could be carried to the grain houses, but the swarm descended as he watched. Large flitting forms blotted out the sky and settled on the fields and roofs, as he retreated to the inner courtyard. Within minutes they had edged impossibly in through every crack. The long coppery bodies were like no locusts he had ever seen. They were three times the size, their paper wings twitching even in rest, and making their outlines blur as though they flickered in and out of the living world. And then the sound of their mandibles filled the halls with scratching. He ran at them, crunching them under foot, stomping and sweeping around with his arms. With each stomp, their bodies held his weight for far too long before collapsing into mush. And as he swept some away, he could see gnaw-marks everywhere there was vegetable material, including wood. Pazuzu. Demon of the wind, demon of empty places. The name echoed along his nerves as he stared at the creatures. But it is a foreign god! Osiris, Lord of the Harvest, why are you suffering this foreign god to invade your land and torment your loyal followers?
When he arrived at the grain houses, the keepers were in a frenzy. They lit huge fires of aromatic woods before the doors to smoke the insects out, but the golden swarm seethed through the grain. Ramses sent away all available servants to fetch the priests and bring the finest animals from his personal herd to sacrifice to the gods that he had somehow offended. As he waited, he stood before the fire, and gazed at the sky towards his Heavenly Father. Why are you doing this to me? My first job as a god is to lead my people, and now I cannot even feed them. Our meat rotted on the herd, our stores from our allies are depleted, and now there will be no grain. By the end of today, my people will be eating sand. Why are you not intervening, Great Ones?

Choshech: Darkness

Two days after the locusts, the hunger in people’s eyes matched the hunger of the swarm that had enveloped them like a bronze papery rain. Incidents of robbery increased as the most desperate, young, and angry people broke. Just when Miryam thought it couldn’t get any worse, a black fog fell that wasn’t like fog. It was like a miasma poisoning the air, smelling like rotten eggs and making it hard to breath. Torchlight could only be seen a couple cubits away. Miryam didn’t think it was night, but no glow from the desert sun penetrated the fog. By her estimation, it had been late afternoon when the cloud descended, and her sense of time told her that evening now fell. Acenath, Kosey and Yehoshuah huddled on the extra pallets she’d set out in the crowded center of her apartment. She lost track of time, but Ari should have returned home from the quarry by now. Shrieks and blood curdling screams issued out of the dark and everyone looked at each other with wide white-rimmed eyes. It had seemed very close, but it was impossible to tell from what direction. The boys flinched and then recovered. No one spoke, but Kosey, older than Yehoshuah by two months retrieved a sickle from a hook on the wall and stood by the door.

“We are cursed. This land is cursed,” Acenath said.

“Maybe it’s just us,” Miryam replied quietly. “If this is caused by our god, as my brother believes, than this will follow us into the desert if we leave.”

“But your god will protect you. He will not curse you. He is only angry with us, with my people. That’s what everyone says.”

“What if everyone is wrong.”

No one said anything for a long time. The only sounds were furtive shuffling outside the walls and periodic bouts of screaming, somewhere outside.

Makat B’chorot: Slaying of the First Born

Ari had returned from the quarry, where they’d hunkered down until the strange fog had passed. But the sight of him alive did nothing to quell Miryam’s anger for the next few days. Her fist slammed into Moshe’s nose as soon as he barged in her doorway three days later. “That’s what I think of your stupid crusade!” She rushed him and kicked him in the long shin, flailing at his chest and clawing at his face. He grabbed her and shoved her back. She stumbled across the sleeping pallets and jugs and fell. Otherwise, he ignored her as though she hadn’t even spoken or moved against him. His eyes were burning with anger. Something else was in his eyes, fear. “Slaughter your lamb. And cover the door lintel in its blood. Do it now.”

She stared at him and sneered. “I’d ask if you’d lost your mind, but that seems redundant.”

He grabbed her and hauled her to her feet by her dress. “Do you want Yehoshuah to die? Do as I say!”

She slapped him across the face. “So now you’re threatening me?”

He slumped. “No. Death will come tonight to all Egyptian heirs, and there is little time left. The sun has set.” He pointed to the horizon outside the window.

“Moshe…What did you do?” She swallowed hard.

“Nothing. I know things. I know you never believed me. But, it is El. I…” he wiped the blood trickling from his nose and looked down. “I told you, I know things.”

She sighed and sat down, gazing at her god-touched brother. That was what some people said. That was what the rest of her family believed now. They’d scoffed at him at first, his wild eyes, his rich pompous mannerisms. But he didn’t look pompous now. He looked scared, and tired. He sat down next to her, and touched her face. He took her numb left hand in his and frowned.

He pleaded and bowed his head. “Miryam, please. I know you think I’m crazy–“

“I don’t know whether you’re crazy, or a sorcerer. And I’m not sure which is worse. Har-An died because of these curses. He is our neighbor and friend. Don’t you care? Doesn’t our god care about the innocent?”

“I’m not a sorcerer! How could you think that,” he spat. “Ramses refuses to listen to God and let us leave.”

“To go where, exactly? Into the desert? You have been outside the city, right? Here’s a flash of insight: There’s no water out there.”

“He will take care of us, we are His Chosen.”

“He’s doing such a superb job so far! I couldn’t keep anything in my belly for three days, I nearly died, and that was before He nearly burned my house down, and killed my friends! I like them and I don’t care what their parentage is, and I don’t want to follow any God who does!” Her voice had risen, until Yehoshuah covered his ears and ran next door.

Moshe’s face was sad. He didn’t call her out for blasphemy or any other such nonsense. At least he was learning. He just stood, and touched her face and left. The torchlight increased. She shivered. Death will come to all Egyptian heirs, her shiver became a shudder. Me and my temper. What does that mean? In her belly, she knew the curse would happen, but she didn’t know how. Yehoshuah was still next door. Yehoshuah. She grabbed a long knife from the table and marched outside to the tethered lamb. Ari was coming down the road as she slit its throat. Blood spurted all over her hands, and into the bowl she’d set under it.

“What are you doing, woman?” Ari ran to her. “That was the last lamb we’re likely to have! The ewe’s too old for more!” he wrenched the knife from her hand.

The torches and rushlights went out. The night in the street was black and there were no stars. Something dark and massive gathered in the shadows, all around them. A ruckus of yelling came from Acenath’s house, and several other houses on the street. Yehoshuah ran out as Acenath’s panicked voice shrieked from their house. He was panting and clutching his throat, and then he collapsed into a seizure at the feet of his parents. Miryam screamed and wrapped her arms around him, as tendrils of darkness reached from the shadows. She thrust the bloody bowl at Ari. “Splash this over the door, now!” her face brooked no argument. She hauled Yehoshuah inside, and Ari did as he was told. He entered, but before he could utter another word, she ran and shoved him out the door again. “Go put some on Acenath’s home. Cover every door you see! All our Gyptian neighbors! The curse is coming for them!”

He powered past her and dropped to his knees next to Yehoshuah, his only son. The gory bowl spilled liquid into the dust of the floor. Miryam wrapped her arms around her son’s heaving shoulders. He leaned over and vomited onto her feet, but he was breathing. Her and Ari grabbed him and held each other and sobbed.

“Eema, Abba, you’re crushing me.” Yehoshuah pushed at them, fighting to sit up, his face a nauseous green. Kosey, Mama, Kosey is sick–“

Miryam grabbed the bowl, but only a spoonful of liquid remained. She ran next door and smeared it on Acenath’s door with her hands. It left a dark smudge. There was sobbing inside. She rushed in. Acenath was clutching Kosey, screaming and shaking him. He was prostrate on the ground. He was deep purple under his dusky skin, and silent. Darkness filled the room as flashes of light flickered here and there in the air like a thousand fiery eyes, and wisps of smoke wrapped around the two in the center of the room like giant dark hands. Miryam’s heart almost stopped, but she dove for the dark mass which parted and surrounded her with a roar, like an inferno. Tiny red eyes surrounded her in a million wing-like puffs of feathery smoke. She held her sticky palms out around her and yelled defiantly at the top of her lungs, “I am a Hebrew! Stay away from this boy! He’s mine, Demon!”
She covered him with her trembling body, still brandishing her bloody palms. The smoke creature blinked its thousand malevolent eyes and withdrew silently from every crack and crevice in the room. The room was dark, but it was gone. Acenath sobbed and laid her head on Miryam’s shoulder. Miryam could feel the faint throb of the boy’s heart pick up speed. He took a shuddering breath. Acenath kept sobbing. Miryam laid back onto the floor and stared at the ceiling.

The line of refugees wound into the desert as far as Miryam could see. Acenath hefted her pack and ushered the boys in front of her.

“You don’t have to come if you don’t want. Though I’m glad for the company. The order was only for us to leave,” Miryam said.

The younger woman shrugged and glanced back at her half-empty house. “You claimed my child in fosterage. The least I could do is help you raise him. My man has gone on to the afterlife without me. There’s nothing here for me now.” Her eyes teared for a moment. She stared at a wiry young man walking past to join the trail. “Maybe a Hebrew man won’t be too bad.”

Miryam grinned, and shoved Kosey’s face around as he turned to stare at his mother. There were empty huts up and down the dusty streets, some Hebrew, some Egyptian.

“We need to pick up the pace before Ramses sends the army to hurry us up.” Acenath commented as she followed the slow winding throngs of people.

Miryam snorted, “Hardly our biggest worry after last night.” She tugged her bag over her shoulder, sighed and began walking.

End Story

 

Whenever someone tells me that ‘such and such’ are enemies, I have to wonder about regular shmoes like us, the Hebrew and Egyptian equivalents of Joe from the Seven Eleven. How many of those Egyptians were our enemies, and how much political maneuvering did it take between the government and dissenters to cultivate that hatred so far into the future that we still celebrate plagues and suffering thousands of years into the future? It’s definitely a good thing to celebrate freedom and the winning of freedom, I just wanted to take a step back and look at this from a different perspective…Discuss…

 

YA Indie Carnival: On Twittering Methods?

Hi fellow indies,

Today’s topic for the YA Indie Carnival is on the silliest-sounding and almost the favorite pastime of many many people: Twitter. I am not proficient at Twitter, in any way. But even I have to admit the usefulness of short blips of information that can be viewed by whomever you want, little data squirts that take very little time, energy, or bandwidth. Twitter is ultimately the best way of forcing verbose people to be succinct and select what information to share. And due to the size limitations, matched only by texting, it may also be responsible for destroying the grammar of the human race.

So there are a few opinions out there among Twitter wizards about what the key things are to twittering successfully: simplicity, getting lots of followers.

Like Facebook, it seems as though some people measure their success at twittering by how many followers they have. And logic would dictate that the more people with a line on your feed would lead to broader exposure, and the greater likelihood that your sage words will be seen and quoted. I can’t argue with that. However, I don’t know that more followers correlates with actual exposure. I follow a lot of people, but they don’t all show up on my feed. Like Facebook, which followers I see seems to be determined by a magic algorithm that will only reveal itself if I chant a heavy metal record backwards, and sacrifice a goat at the full moon. And that’s if I get on Twitter more than once every two weeks. There may be lots of followers but how many of them are watching their feed at all? That’s just something to consider when you mentally tally your exposure.

As for keeping it simple, I think that should be the rule with everything, literally everything. I don’t want to have to need a master’s degree in engineering to read the directions for putting together a wooden cabinet from IKEA. When I review grants for work, I don’t want to have to wade through miles of paper on the details of this or that person’s resume who will be working on the grant project. One thing we always tell people who are applying for grant money is ‘Answer the questions that are being asked.’ And that requires keeping it simple. As for Twitter, I think there is no choice but to keep it simple if you want to be understood. Twitter is the ultimate tool, in today’s mile-a-minute lifestyles, for people who don’t want to devote more attention span than a few seconds at a time. That being said, I don’t always have even that much attention span, to send or receive tweets. I love the meme that was going around Facebook a while back that said, ‘Oh, you cooked a three course meal and made the napkins into swans. I took a shower and kept the kids alive…probably.’ I use I use Twitter when I can, because it is very helpful sometimes for making good connections and finding services. But I’m not consistent.

If anyone has any other comments or tweeting tips, please share!

And see what our other tweeting indies have to say:

1.	Laura A. H. Elliott	2.	T. R. Graves, Author of The Warrior Series
3.	Suzy Turner, author of The Raven Saga	4.	Rachel Coles, author of Into The Ruins, geek mom blog
5.	Gwenn Wright, author of Filter	6.	Liz Long | Just another writer on the loose.
7.	Ella James	8.	Maureen Murrish
9.	YA Sci Fi Author’s Ramblings	10.	A Little Bit of R&R
11.	Melissa Pearl	12.	Terah Edun – YA Fantasy
13.	Author Cindy C Bennett

Tune in next week for another author spotlight, and check out the YA Author Club!

YA Indie Carnival: Author Spotlight Blog, and New Releases!

Hi indies! Hope everyone’s enjoying the last days of summer on this lovely Labor Day weekend! I’ve been away lately, recovering from  pinched nerve down my right arm. Contrary to my doctor’s advice, I can’t lie and tell everyone that I got it fighting a bear, or terrorists or aliens. No, I got it in the stupidest of all possible ways: sleeping wrong. If I needed any other middle finger from fate to tell me that I’m getting old…aside from a hairdresser at Floyd’s barber shop asking me, when I pointed out the old rock poster on the wall, ‘Who’s David Bowie?’ Really?

But now that I’m back, this week we have a plethora of new material for indie readers.  First I want to introduce a new writer on the scene, in her own words: Toni Lombardo.

Hello there blog readers! Toni here, I am going to talk about myself now.  Hope you don’t mind.

Okay, so first off I am a twenty something (21)  and striving to be a writer!  I am currently(ish)  a student at a community college (although at the moment I am taking a break from school)  and my plan is to major in meteorology.  Of course I’ll have to transfer to a four year.  In some moments I want to major in English, because I am in love with words (a good thing for a writer, right?) .  I would like to teach an elective class in a preppy school to do with the appreciation of old timey writers (Stoker, Melville, Shelley, etc.) and introduce the kids to modern day writers who I think are fantastic such as John Green (The Fault in Our Stars) , Jay Asher (Thirteen Reasons Why) , *clears throat* T.R. Graves (not kissing up, she is actually really great, like go read her books now!) .

I have been writing since I can remember.  I wrote short stories or was forced to by teachers, but I always enjoyed it and nine times out of ten exceeded the length required or well wanted (sometimes they weren’t happy) .  My dad also made up stories for me when I was little, I hope to one day publish and anthology of them (I do attribute that to my love of the plot) .  I actually sat down to write a book when by hand when I was fourteen? Maybe? But I gave up on that book (I will one day reapproach that book, but for now the characters and I are not mixing…it’s not my fault blame them)  to write what I wanted to publish as my first.  I started that book when I was fifteen and finished it when I was sixteen and went onto the next.  I am on the third in the series and am currently rewriting the first book.  I was young when I wrote it and afraid of words like sex, so I would dance around the word.  Plus other things I wrote in it are just cringe worthy and embarrassing.  Trust and believe if a writer says their work is cringe worthy it is…we are our biggest critic yes, but if we can make ourselves cringe it is pretty correct to believe that the reader would wonder what the heck the writer was thinking.

I spend my days working at a clothing store.  I love it.  I work with kids ranging from size 6-20.  I love working with the girls who aren’t societies standard of ‘beauty’.  It’s great because you can see the kid coming in so self-conscious (because they are a size 16 not 12 like their friends)  and leave smiling because you told them they are beautiful and helped them pick out clothes and raved over how amazing the kid looked and sometimes the kid even hugs you.  I know this sounds like I am saying ‘oh look at me.  I’m so great.  Blah, blah, blah.’  That is not my intention.  Today’s society is so messed up, these kids are so self-conscious at such a young age, and they are getting bullied.  Their parents telling them they are beautiful is one thing, when a someone else makes a big deal about it the kid feels good.  I think it’s a thing everyone should do.  Encourage people, because one day you will need it.   Okay enough about my job.

I also spend my days plotting up stories and plot twists.  I like listening to music and sometimes it even inspires or curbs scenes. I like going to the gym and reading, it is where I get most of my reading in.  In one day at work…working on stock in the back room, five new book ideas came flooding in.

I have one dog, a Beta named Platelet in one tank with a snail, eight goldfish all named after characters in my books and a Plecko and a snail in another tank that is huge.  I have the plecko and snails to help keep the tanks clean.

I’d like to write more often and I need to.  It is the best and worst thing in the world, if you are a writer you will understand that sentence; if you are not a writer ask one that you know.

I use Twitter and Instagram and Facebook to interact with writers and friends and share stuff about my books and from time to time excerpts!

I hope to change the publishing world by introducing them to new styles of writing!  And once you get to know me you know I don’t just dabble in things, I jump in whole heartedly with both feet, and most of the time without a safety net.   I am beginning to blog under the supervision and guidance of Graves (I just love her) .  Please come back bi-weekly to join me on my journey of publishing and writing on my blog series called Toni’s Big Six Journey.

It can be found here: http://yaauthorclub.blogspot.com

Listening to: Wishing Well by Ben Moody: All for This

Quote: “Just know, when you truly want success, you’ll never give up on it. No matter how bad the situation may get.” – Unknown

 

Spotlight Interview Questions:

 

1) What is your all-time favorite book and why?

“The Fault in Our Stars” by John Green (TFIOS) .  It is just perfect.  I cried on every page and went hysterical at Chapter 21.  I re-read the book within two months and re-experienced all that beautiful pain (readers of this book will get it #nerdfighter) .  Also, I bonded with my IBBF (internet best friend forever)  over this book.  We’ve known each other for a little over two months as of 7.12.2013, but it is one of the greatest friendships I have had.  So, beyond being a great book it brought me a great friend.

 

2) Is there an author you could be compared to or popular fictional characters your book’s characters could relate to and why?

Oh gosh, this is a biggie.  I don’t really know.  I have my own style, but some of my darker pieces, like “The Tale-Tale Heart” which is a re-doing of “The Tell-Tale Heart” by E.A. Poe for a final English paper, have been associated to Poe.  I’m actually about to start a second mirroring piece of his, that T.R. Graves is up-to-date about.

As far as characters…People are going to think TFIOS for some of my characters, because I talk about the book ALL the time and it is a book about kids with cancer.  But my book is about a kid or two with cancer but there is more of a story to it than that, just like Green’s.

 

As far as my characters relating to other characters…oh I don’t know, never thought about that.  I’ve read books with characters that reminded me of mine, but never really thought about it that way.  I think Devon would like Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher.

 

3) Can you give us your favorite quote from one of your books and explain it?

“If you don’t know, you do not deserve to know!” –Devon

Oh my, how can I explain, Devon?  Okay so in this scene Devon just found out something in his family. Sorry for being vague, don’t want to give away plot points. He is really struggling in his life at the moment and this news was just devastating.  Like a lot of teens Devon struggles with the idea of self-harm and when his brother is talking to him he (Devon)  hints to wanting to hurt himself, and when his brother doesn’t get the hint he says the above quote possibly angrily.

 

4) What types of things/people/music inspires you and makes you want to keep writing?

Things that inspire me to write…I don’t know.  Sometimes I just see something, okay I was in a store the other day and saw a beautiful all glass frame, free standing.  I saw it and instantly knew it belonged to a character in one of my W.I.P.s, and when I got home it was already done the character would have it in their house.  So it is just kind of random, if I see something and it attaches to a character, I say it inspired me.

 

People- My best friend Anne is who I write for along with a few other people.  Anne is my muse and my ‘first reader’.  She keeps me going when I don’t want to write and pushes me to finish projects. So she inspires me as well as Graves, Green, Asher, and others.

 

Music!!! Ahh, such an inspiration!  Don’t want to say too much here because this topic is going to be a whole blog post for me!

 

What makes me want to keep writing—my characters.  I get a points where I miss them and I physically feel missing them, I feel pain of sorts.  Sometimes just thinking and plotting and writing notes just does not suffice, so I write to subdue the longing for interacting with them.  And I love writing, so that helps.

 

5) Describe your typical writing day or week.

They are random.  I write whenever and wherever.  At one point I was writing (more than this at home)  every Friday night at the bar in Red Robin, where one of my friends works.  I would buy an unsweetened peach tea with EXTRA regular syrup and she kept me in well supply.   It was a great writing environment and the support was great!

 

6) Is there a food or drink do you have to have when you’re writing?

I love, love, love peach tea, but I can’t have too much caffeine otherwise I can’t sleep.  So at one point it was that, but now….yeah, it is still that, I just can’t have it all the time.

 

7) Can you tell us what you’re working on right now (& possibly provide an excerpt & cover) ?

Sooooo many things! The book I am working on to get published first is Life’s Not a Fantasy I have a cover idea, but no cover yet!  An excerpt? Sure!  Here is the introduction.  It is written by Devon:

 

It wasn’t ever supposed to be like this.  Our family was always so torn apart, even before what I’m, about to write.  Dad was out fighting for ‘our safety’ but was never home…he was a ‘lifer’.  Mom chose her favorites and clung tightly to them, and I fell to the bottom of that spectrum.  I was okay with it though.

I was always the ‘untypical typical’ teenager, meaning I was or still am the loner.  I’ve done my fair share of stupid things, but more on that later.

He, Cameron always held us together.  He was our rock.  He could make or break our family and now his name resonates with pain.

How can one name ruin everything?  How can one name bring so much pain?

It’s been days, moments, but his name already feels like a curse.

Thanks for reading!  Hope this was entertaining.

Keep writing!

***

Next on our indie tour for Labor Day…drum roll please, I’d like to reveal a new release by talented writer T.R.Graves, author of the Warriors of the Cross series, which will also be putting out a new online game soon!

 

Left (Still Standing, #1) by T. R. Graves

A naive Baylee loves Colt, her boyfriend of four years, more than she ever thought possible. After a little snooping, she’s convinced she’s well on her way toward hearing an once-in-a-lifetime proposal and starring in the wedding-of-the-year event. Instead, she’s blindsided by a very public breakup and the crushing news that Colt is marrying someone else… someone more befitting him and the role his father expects him to take in his law firm.

 

Baylee may have spent years resenting Ariana, her mother, and her suicide, an intolerable show of weakness in Baylee’s opinion, but after Colt leaves her just short of the altar, Baylee sees the world through her mother’s eyes. She sympathizes with Ariana’s actions and realizes that some things—soul-deep aches—can irreparably damage you and make moving on nearly impossible.

 

At least that’s how she feels until she meets Ryker. With his help, Baylee discovers there is life after Colt, and she prepares to move on by pulling herself up by the bootstraps, holding her head high, and standing on her own two feet. Unfortunately, a new jealous and hateful Colt has his own plans for her, and they are plans no one—especially Baylee—ever saw coming.

 

Pre-release purchase link: Smashwords

 

Left (Still Standing, #1) Kindle Fire Giveaway:

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

Goodreads 5 Book Paperback Giveaway:

Goodreads Book Giveaway

     

Left

by T.R. Graves

Giveaway ends October 01, 2013.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

***

Finally, another new book coming your way to chew on when you’re supposed to be working: Forever Fredless by Suzy Turner!

 

Forever Fredless by Suzy Turner

Kate Robinson has spent the past two decades yearning to find her soul mate, the boy she found and then lost during a family holiday. Shortly after her twenty-eighth birthday, however, she inherits a fortune from an old family friend and becomes something of an overnight celebrity. Can her new-found fame lead her to him after all this time?

Forever Fredless will be available from online bookstores from October 2013.

For more details about Suzy and her books, visit:

http://suzyturner.com

http://suzyturner.blogspot.com

http://facebook.com/suzyturnerbooks

http://twitter.com/@suzy_turner

http://pinterest.com/suzyturnerbooks

***

If you want to check out other authors in the YA Indie Carnival, visit their links and our author homepage!

1.	Laura A. H. Elliott	2.	T. R. Graves, Author of The Warrior Series
3.	Suzy Turner, author of The Raven Saga	4.	Rachel Coles, author of Into The Ruins, geek mom blog
5.	Gwenn Wright, author of Filter	6.	Liz Long | Just another writer on the loose.
7.	Ella James	8.	Maureen Murrish
9.	YA Sci Fi Author’s Ramblings	10.	A Little Bit of R&R
11.	Melissa Pearl	12.	Terah Edun – YA Fantasy
13.	Author Cindy C Bennett

Have a great Labor Day, and don’t fight any bears…or terrorists…or aliens!

 

Blogging Tips, and More New Releases and Author Spotlights!

Hi fellow Indie Carnies,

I love Connecticut, where I mostly grew up, but having visited there this past week, breathing 94 degree soup, I can honestly say about 94 degree weather in Colorado ‘It’s 94, but it’s a DRY heat’. Wow, it really does make a difference. I’d rather be baked than boiled. And since we are passing marijuana legislation currently, I think a lot of Coloradans feel that way in more than one sense ;P.

On to indie news! Today we have a brief segment on blogging do’s and don’ts, and we’re featuring two authors: Liz Long, and Melissa Pearl, up and coming authors to add to your summer reading list!

Ironic that the topic for today’s YA Author Club is Blogging Do’s and Don’ts, since I’m about the most haphazard blogger ever. So today will also be spent by me checking out other author’s tips. But I can easily fill you in on what not to do, because I’ve probably done them all!

1. Be consistent, blog regularly. Hahaha, I am one of the worst for this. The only things I do consistently are shower, make food, and go to work. I’m a working mother of an 8 year old, in disaster public health. Everything else I do besides keeping my wonderful kid and husband alive, keeping the house from burning down, and keeping my job, is gravy. I see all these Better Homes and Garden-type projects people post on Pinterest and Facebook like making salads look like swans. Awesomely cool, but I look at them while trying to keep the Rice-a-roni from burning while I unstick my daughter’s Skittles from the wall, and laugh and laugh and laugh. The take-away message here is, just try to post more often than once every few months.

2. Try to stay on topic. I also wander and say and do random things at a whim. But generally, if it’s a writing blog, try to have the topics and posts mostly revolve around writing, authoring, reading etc. If it’s a political blog, be sure to discuss current events. But people tend to get a particular flavor from a blog and come to expect a certain type of post. I have the opposite of a poker-face, and no editor between my brain and mouth, so I tend to write about writing or books, until something in current politics pisses me off, and then I throw in a rant or two to blow off steam. Probably not the best practice, but there you are.

3. Include links. If you want people to see something you think is cool, make it easy for them to see more. Hyperlinks are like magical little miracles of point and click. I still remember the days when I struggled to change the color of the screen on my MS Dos computer that took up the size of three desks in our classroom, using code. I failed that class. Now everything you want people to know can be at the tip of their pointer finger.

4. Finally, keep it simple. Unless you have your own programmer/web designer, the simpler the better. No, your website might not have flashy thingees that whiz and bang and sing songs to the person who clicks on it, but I’ve found that I much more like visiting simple sites where everything is laid out logically and is easy to find, and doesn’t take a million years to load. And needing to run my own blog with the tech savvy of a caveman, I find that simple is much easier to maintain.

That said, I’d like to introduce author Melissa Pearl!

This very prolific writer has a couple of exciting books available and coming up: Unknown, and Unseen.

Unknown is the first book in a breath-taking epic fantasy series that will swoop you out of the tedium of everyday and into a mythic world of archetypes impossible to ignore.

Summary:

Darkness is covering the land. As the city of Mezrah grows with power and greed, the rest of the world can only stand by and wait for their inevitable destruction. The only hope against this growing power is an ancient prophecy that people have stopped believing in.

Princess Kyla of Taramon stopped believing in the power of light the day her father died. Trapped in a city she does not care for, under the watchful glare of her mother, the queen, she struggles to accept her fate.

Jethro has loved Kyla for as long as he can remember. Learning that she was to marry his cousin drove a wedge between him and the feisty princess. Watching her from a distance is a torture he is unable to free himself from.

Then a star begins to fall, sparking an ember of hope and sending two seekers on a treacherous journey into the unknown.

Unknown is now available at Amazon, along with the second of the Elements trilogy, Unseen.

Summary:

Danger surrounds the Seekers. Having already faced overwhelming odds, Kyla and Jethro discover it is only the beginning. Now they must face the power of nature itself.

Each day is a test of faith.

Two elements remain undiscovered. The light is yet to be resurrected. Dark forces prepare to descend upon the heroes of prophecy and they have one more power they must over come…their forbidden love for each other.

Each moment is a test of loyalty and courage.

In Taramon, Athra faces his own demons as he frets over the safety of his fiancée while trying to counter a dark evil that is brought to his doorstep. Treachery lurks in the shadows, forcing the future king into an action that could destroy his beloved city.

Through it all, they must cling to the truths hidden in the unseen.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18000448-unseen

Reader Quote:

“The plotting is sublime and the pacing is perfect. I held my breath as I turned the pages, hoping that Kyla and Jethro would return in time to help save their kingdom. What a fabulous addition to this series! I can’t wait for the third book!” Taylor Longford, Author of the Greystone Series.

About the Author:

Melissa Pearl was born in Auckland, New Zealand, but has spent much of her life abroad, living in countries such as Jordan, Cyprus and Pakistan… not to mention a nine month road trip around North America with her husband. “Best. Year. Ever!!” She now lives in China with her husband and two sons. She is a trained elementary teacher, but writing is her passion. Since becoming a full time mother she has had the opportunity to pursue this dream and her debut novel hit the internet in November 2011. Since then she has produced four more books and has a YA fantasy trilogy coming out this year.

“I am passionate about writing. It stirs a fire in my soul that I never knew I had. I want to be the best writer I can possibly be and transport my readers into another world where they can laugh, cry and fall in love.”

Contact: www.melissapearlauthor.com

Next, I’d like to feature Liz Long, a fascinating author with a unique view into the world of editing as well!

Liz Long is lucky enough to have a dream career in magazine publishing as an editor and writer, yet still have time to create adventures on the side. If you catch her staring off into space or talking to herself, don’t worry – it’s just her imagination at work.

Liz graduated from Longwood University with a BA in English, though her professors might be disappointed to hear she reads more fantasy fiction than literary novels. She also loves action and thriller genres. This book probably won’t change your life, but she hopes it steals you away from reality for a while.

Her newest release, Witch Hearts, will be for sale on Amazon on April 30th. Her first book, Gifted, a Donovan Circus Novel, is also available for paperback and Kindle on Amazon.

To learn more about Liz, visit her website: http://lizclong.com

Author Links:

Website: http://lizclong.com

Twitter: (Handle: @LizCLong) https://twitter.com/#!/LizCLong

Facebook Author Page: https://www.facebook.com/lizclongauthor

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/LizLong

WITCH HEARTS Links:

Amazon (ebook): http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CIKKEV0

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17616067-witch-hearts

WITCH HEARTS BACK COVER SYNOPSIS

How does a witch stay safe if a killer can get through her protection spells?

Witches like Ruby and Courtney can take care of themselves. So when Courtney is murdered, Ruby’s world crashes to a halt. The only thing keeping her grounded is the return of Courtney’s brother, Cooper. He seeks revenge, but Ruby wants to help other witches stay alive. To do that, she’ll have to reunite with her old coven’s High Priest, who also happens to be her cheating ex-boyfriend.

If that wasn’t awkward enough, when the killer gets too close, Cooper temporarily moves into Ruby’s place while a police officer tails her every move. Cooper’s presence distracts Ruby as they fight their desire against their need to stay safe. Then Courtney begins to haunt Ruby’s dreams and secrets are spilled, things from Cooper’s past that could get them both killed. The killer continues to stalk Ruby and the more she discovers, the more she fears she won’t be able to keep her heart in her chest.

WITCH HEARTS Special Excerpt

Cooper and Ruby hopped on his bike and drove back to her place. She even managed to peek out from beneath her helmet to see the city whip past her in a blur. When they finally came to a stop, she untangled herself from him – albeit a tad regretful about it – and handed him back the helmet.

“Thanks again for everything tonight. I know it wasn’t the most fun you could have, but I want everyone to be safe,” she said.

“I understand. I’m glad I went, too. I don’t want anyone else in danger. Plus, you’re good company.” He stood up as he said it, hooking the helmets on his bike.

“You don’t have walk me in or anything. I don’t want to keep you any longer than you need.”

He snorted. “You’re not keeping me from anything. I want to do it, but especially because I want to make sure you’re safe.”

Ruby bit her bottom lip. Her nerves fluttered a bit at the thought of a possible goodnight kiss. She could hardly believe how immature she sounded in her head.

It’s your best friend’s brother. This is Cooper we’re talking about, a voice in her head screamed at her.

Another voice spoke up. Yeah. It’s Cooper. And your thoughts about him have never been exactly brotherly.

Shaking both voices away, she swiped her key fob by the entrance door and Cooper held it open for her. They took the stairs up to the second floor and walked around the corner to her apartment. Ruby stopped as soon as she saw her door.

“Something’s wrong,” she said.

“What? How can you tell?” He looked up and down the hallway.

“There was a barrier when I left. Remember I checked, put my hand on the door when we left? My spell was in place.”

“There was a soft glow on the door,” he said absentmindedly, as though remembering. His eyes narrowed and Ruby could see his veins throb in his neck as his jaw tightened.

“Only witches would be able to see it, but it’s not there.” Ruby took a few steps forward, placing her hand on the door, which was now simply cool and wooden. She retrieved her key and turned the lock, but Cooper stopped her.

“I’ll go in first.”

He swung the door wide open; he held his hands up in case of a fight or a spell, but silence greeted them. Cooper did a quick sweep of the apartment while Ruby waited in the entryway. He returned with Aziza in one arm and a letter in his hand.

“This was on your coffee table,” he said grimly. “Aziza was hiding behind the couch. She hissed until she realized it was me.”

Ruby took the note from him. As she opened it, Cooper stood beside her to read over her shoulder.

“Not all witches are equal. Some are born with extraordinary gifts; anyone can practice, but few are truly powerful. You are one of the lucky ones, Ruby. I apologize about your friend Courtney. She was powerful, but nowhere near your capabilities. I’m afraid that in order for my powers to thrive, yours must come to an end. I’ll be seeing you very soon. –X”

GIFTED  Links:

Amazon (ebook): http://www.amazon.com/Gifted-Donovan-Circus-Novel-ebook/dp/B007VT34J2/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1336675611&sr=8-2

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13601567-gifted

GIFTED BACK COVER SYNOPSIS

Even in a world of freaks, being a Firestarter is considered a dangerous Gift.

Lucy was born with the ability to create and control fire. She longs to leave the human world for one filled with Earthshakers, Transporters, and Chameleons, to name a few. When she rejoins the circus, it’s everything she hoped it could be—new friends, a potential love interest or two, and a place where she can be herself.

When troupe members begin turning up dead, however, Lucy is suspected of foul play. She must not only prove her innocence but also realize the full extent of her power. To find the real murderer, she must uncover the truth behind her father’s fiery legacy while figuring out whom to trust within her new circle. Little does she know the history of the Donovan Circus and its enemies might actually destroy the entire gifted world.

Q&A with Liz Long! See where the stories come from!:

1) What is your all-time favorite book and why?

I think that would have to be Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. To me, it’s the first book in that series that really shows emotional angst for Harry between being a teenager, dating your first crush, and of course, being hunted by Lord Voldemort. We get to see our characters developing into real wizards with the DA (like Neville growing into being a badass), plus the introduction of accepting those deemed a little strange, like Luna Lovegood. We feel our first real loss with a major character as well as the real danger now that dark wizards are out in the open by the end. It’s a full scale of emotions and really sort of sets the rest of the stage for the series, IMO.

2) Is there an author you could be compared to or popular fictional characters your book’s characters could relate to and why?

Oh gosh, it’s probably still a little early in the game for me to presume I can be compared to another author. BookBub compared my Donovan Circus book to the Hunger Games, with a female character destined to discover who she is and stand up for her world. I’m sure my circus folks could hang with any X-Men character, while my characters from WITCH HEARTS would get along well with the Halliwell sisters from Charmed or Sookie Stackhouse and her friends.

3) Can you give us your favorite quote from one of your books and explain it?

One of my favorite lines is one Lucy says in the first chapter when explaining why she’s rejoining the Donovan Circus:

“I wanted to be normal amongst the freaks.”

Family and a sense of belonging are heavy themes in my first book and this line sums Lucy up perfectly. Lucy has never been “normal” anywhere in the human world. She thinks – hopes, really – that she can find her place in the gifted world in the circus she used to know. She’s been a loner her whole life because of her gift and now that there’s an opportunity to be a part of something, she’s happy to include herself in the strange gaggle that is the Donovan gang.

4) What types of things/people/music inspires you and makes you want to keep writing?

I listen to a lot of soundtracks, especially movie scores, like Avengers, Sherlock Holmes, and anything else that contains some action type of music. Honestly, nothing has been more motivating for me lately than to hear a reader I’ve never met before tell me how much they loved my work and can’t wait for another book to read. It’s such an amazing feeling to affect someone’s book list and I’m honored to be a part of it. It’s a total kick in the butt to know people are eagerly anticipating another title and makes me want to write that much faster.

5) Describe your typical writing day or week.

I work full time, so I write when I can in my spare time. Often my husband will go to the gym for a couple hours after work, so I take advantage and try to crank out a few hundred words. I also give him lots of time to play video games or watch NBA so I can sit on the couch with him and write. And of course, the weekends contain my biggest chunks of writing time, so there’s nothing I like better than a rainy Sunday with coffee and my laptop.

6) Is there a food or drink do you have to have when you’re writing?

I love Skittles to snack on during the process, though my teeth beg me to stop. I’m also never opposed to a fresh new 20 oz. Diet Coke within reach, but that’s only once a week at most. The rest of the time it’s H2O!

7) Can you tell us what you’re working on right now (& possibly provide an excerpt & cover)?

I am currently working on the second book in the Donovan Circus series. Next up is an NA fantasy novel with a unique twist on Reapers.

**End Interview

Well, I for one, am excited both for these books. Liz Long creates complicated and intriguing worlds and characters that keep your brain moving to keep up.  And now, I am chomping at the bit for the next novel. I love reading about Reapers. I’ve seen Reapers in Terry Pratchett, Piers Anthony, watched them on television in Supernatural, and Dead Like Me, so any twist on them is welcome! Death, the final frontier, the mysterious beyond that lures me as a reader into wondering what kind of beings exist in that shadow world.

Tune into Liz Long’s writing at the links above!

See what other blogging tips other authors have this week at the links below.

1.	Laura A. H. Elliott	2.	Bryna Butler, author Midnight Guardian series
3.	T. R. Graves, Author of The Warrior Series	4.	Suzy Turner, author of The Raven Saga
5.	Rachel Coles, author of Into The Ruins, geek mom blog	6.	K. C. Blake, author of Vampires Rule and Crushed
7.	Gwenn Wright, author of Filter	8.	Liz Long | Just another writer on the loose.
9.	Ella James	10.	Maureen Murrish
11.	YA Sci Fi Author’s Ramblings	12.	A Little Bit of R&R
13.	Melissa Pearl	14.	Terah Edun – YA Fantasy
15.	Heather Sutherlin – YA Fantasy	16.	Melika Dannese Lux, author of Corcitura and City of Lights
17.	Author Cindy C Bennett

And what’s new at the YA Author Club?

New Releases! Awesome Summer Reading Material!

Hi fellow indies!

Been gone for a little while, but now I’m back with more fun reading recommendations, from a few of our very cool YA Indie Carnival authors, Heather Sutherlin, Cindy Bennett, and Jeffrey Moore!

Check out Wandering! I love even the name. Author Heather Sutherlin transports you to another world rich with vivid images and even recollections of song, reminding me of nostalgia, of getting a whiff of scent during spring, or remembering a snatch of melody that instantly drops me full-force into a memory. Her images evoke visceral reactions, which make her writing very engaging.

Here’s a teaser synopsis and excerpt:

When you’ve travelled between worlds, there’s nowhere left to go but home.

Rory has never been so cold in her life. But the biting wind only reminds her of another pain that grows more intense with each passing day. Each night Jaron’s beautiful voice sings in her dreams, and each day her footsteps draw her closer to his side. Danger and intrigue at every turn, no distance is too far when you’re returning for true love.

 

Rin has spent the last five years searching for Rory across two worlds. Now a series of visions have him convinced he’s growing closer to finding her. But when Rory slips through another portal, taking his visions with her, he finds himself back at square one. To find her now he’ll need the help of an old friend and a little otherworldly magic.  This time he intends to bring The Wanderer home for good.

Wandering

Available on Kindle, Nook, Kobo, and iTunes

June 25^th, 2013

 

Links for purchase:

Amazon

Nook

iTunes

 

An Excerpt from Wandering:

 

Sometimes I think I’ve seen her face more times than my own.

 

Tonight she stands on top of a snow- covered mountain with the wind in her hair.  Her eyes crinkle at the corners as she squints into the distance. She shifts her stance, leaning, her body reaching forward and I can almost feel the racing of her heart as the wind billows around her, lifting her cloak and whipping her hair into her eyes. It reminds her of something she once felt, something powerful.  Blood pounds in my ears and for a moment we are connected, The Wanderer and I. Her pain, her longing, they choke me. She holds her breath as the wind grows stronger. It pushes against her so that her footing slips. I want to shout to her, warn her that she might fall, but I can almost hear her thoughts. She hopes it will carry her away. To bring her back.

 

The wind whips around her, swirling ice and snow at her feet and she begins to cry. Her tears freeze as they slide down her cheeks.  She doesn’t cry from fear or pain.  Not even the bitter, endless cold could cause her tears.  No, she cries because it is only the wind.

 

***

 I woke up, panting, covered in sweat.  Turning over, I clenched my eyes shut in a desperate attempt to bring the images back into focus.

 

“It’s no use,” I groaned.  I knew it wouldn’t work.  It never did.  She was gone.  That one little glimpse was all I would get –for now.

 

The visions began the very day we returned home from Rutahn, the world beyond the portal. I fell asleep on my aunt’s couch and probably hadn’t even started snoring when her face filled my mind. She was lying in the corner of a little hut, bundled in blankets and furs. I remember how she shivered, like she was trying to shake off her own skin. Her cheeks were flushed a bright red and she gasped for air, tossing in her makeshift little bed. An arm with skin the color of caramel reached toward her and wiped her face with a wet cloth. That’s when I realized she was sick. I woke up in a panic, my heart racing. I had fallen asleep afraid she might be dead and now instead of feeling relieved that she was alive, I was more afraid than ever. We still didn’t know where Rory was, but now I knew she was very sick. I worried incessantly about her after that. I dreamed of her nearly every night, gathering bits and pieces of information, clues as to where she might be.  After that, the dreams gradually increased in frequency, and then grew more intense.  Now, instead of just seeing Rory, I could feel a little of her thoughts, her emotions.  Most of the time it was a relief.  I saw her safe. I watched her grow strong again. I even saw her smile once or twice.

 

Then, there were nights like this one.  Nights where I could sense her terror, her despair, the aching loneliness or desperate longing for those she had lost. I would lie there helpless, watching her cry deep, heart wrenching sobs and I would wake up with my pillow wet, my face covered in sympathetic tears. Those were the nights that weighed on me.  Visions like this one often forced me out of bed and back into my research. It was impossible to sleep knowing she was out there somewhere in pain and longing to find a way home. That’s why I keep searching. For five endless years I’ve searched and I’ll keep searching until I find her and bring the Wanderer home.

Wandering is the sequel to Seen by Heather Sutherlin.

 

Another terrific book for your summer reading list is Whispers of Razari by authors Cindy Bennett and Jeffrey Moore!  So, I’m a sucker for stories that explore the ‘final frontier’, death. And this book dives right in and buries you, so you don’t want to put the book down and dig yourself back into the regular boring world. Another teaser…because I’m evil:

Blurb:

When sixteen year old Olivia Adams wakes from a horrible car accident that killed her parents, she knows she’s something different. Olivia died, and now the soul inhabiting her body needs to find out who – and what – she is. A glimpse of a world called Razari burning is the only clue to her previous existence—a tragic memory, sparking events that endanger the people helping her.

 

Jacobi McKenzie has lived in Crescent, Montana for more years than he can remember, even though he’s only seventeen. He’s been waiting, but for what he isn’t sure. Jacobi recognizes Olivia for what she is before she’s even aware of it herself and the effect she has on him threatens to expose his true identity–a thing he’s worked hard to conceal.

 

They come together in an explosion of emotion that neither of them is supposed to feel. As Jacobi fights for Olivia’s life, protecting her from those who would use her for their own selfish purposes, together they unravel the mystery surrounding the destruction of their race.

 

Sales links:

https://www.createspace.com/4337730

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/329991 ISBN 9781301306619

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00DMTGT24

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/2940016799902

 

Excerpt:

 

The smell of blood, iodine, peppermint, and ammonia blending with sweat is my first sense of awareness. These are scents I recognize. A dozen other foreign smells seem to be a mix of different elements. If I could concentrate and study the odors, I’m certain I’d be able to break them down into their base elements, but the noise is too distracting. I’m not as good with sound as I am with smell. I can make out several distinct voices and artificial sounds that are probably machines. If I could open my eyes, I’d be able to connect the noises with the smells. I think my eyes are fastened shut.

 

Slowly, I begin to explore the body of the host I’m in. I come upon damaged areas that cause intense pain and I quickly retreat from these areas. The body is broken in several places. I sense voices come from those repairing the host body. A name comes to me: Olivia. With effort, I crack open my eyes. Gauzy images of people work on me. A tall man has his hands in Olivia’s body and he speaks softly, as if afraid of startling anyone. I retreat and turn to exploring Olivia’s memories.

 

Reliving Olivia’s life from her earliest memory is instinctual for me. I think I’ve existed for a long time. Parasite. I find the word while searching through Olivia’s memories—a parasite is what these people would think of me if they knew what I was. But a parasite by definition lives in or on a host and steals everything, giving nothing in return. I’m not really like that. I entered Olivia shortly after her soul departed. Her body’s not the ideal place for me to be, being only sixteen earth years old and badly broken, but I was drawn to her. What made me choose her? I can’t remember. Typically I acquire a host much younger and definitely less broken—at least, that feels like the thing I’d do.

 

As I’m learning about Olivia, her culture, and the society in which she lives, it sparks the knowledge that I don’t remember where I came from. I know I’m not human, and I know what I need to do to exist in Olivia, but why I’m here eludes me. With that comes the idea that my kind only moves to a different world as a last resort, so I figure something terrible must have happened not only to me—or actually my former host—but the world from which I came.

Cindy C Bennett

 

Bennett is the YA author of several books. She lives in Utah with her husband and two daughters. Both of her sons have married, giving her two more daughters (in-law). She loves gooey cookies, dark chocolate, and cheese popcorn. She hates housework and cooking, and has no plans to become a domestic goddess. She occasionally co-hosts a geek podcast with her son, called Geek Revolution Radio. Her favorite pastime is riding her Harley.

 

Find more about Cindy at www.cindycbennett.com

Geek Revolution Radio www.geekrevolutionradio.com

 

Jeffery Moore

 

Moore was born in Germany. As a military brat, much of his childhood was spent abroad, growing up in Germany on military installations. He subsequently enlisted in the military and served for ten years as an army pilot. While in the military, he lived in Italy and South Korea and deployed to many European countries. He has traveled to Australia, Japan, Singapore and most European countries. His experiences and contact with many different cultures helps form some of the elements in his stories. He currently works for a global IT company and lives in Massachusetts.

 

Find more about Jeffery and his work at www.jefferyemoore.com

 

1.	Laura A. H. Elliott	2.	Bryna Butler, author Midnight Guardian series
3.	T. R. Graves, Author of The Warrior Series	4.	Suzy Turner, author of The Raven Saga
5.	Rachel Coles, author of Into The Ruins, geek mom blog	6.	K. C. Blake, author of Vampires Rule and Crushed
7.	Gwenn Wright, author of Filter	8.	Liz Long | Just another writer on the loose.
9.	Ella James	10.	Maureen Murrish
11.	YA Sci Fi Author’s Ramblings	12.	A Little Bit of R&R
13.	Melissa Pearl	14.	Terah Edun – YA Fantasy
15.	Heather Sutherlin – YA Fantasy	16.	Melika Dannese Lux, author of Corcitura and City of Lights
17.	Author Cindy C Bennett

See what other authors from the YA Indie Carnival are doing this summer!

 

Colorado History Museum

Hey fellow indies! It’s been a few weeks since I’ve been on. The Indie Carnival is in the process of coming up with cool new discussion topics, which will include information on how to get onto Net Galley, a site where writers can find reviewers and vice versa! And more Indie Author Spotlights are coming up soon.

In the meantime, I wanted to point people to an amazing experience I had at the new History Colorado Center. It’s our history museum that was recently opened, or at least renovated and put in a new building with new exhibits. It was designed as a classroom in motion, so it’s not like a regular museum in many ways, which makes it great for kids (or adults with ADD).

There are sections on the first Colorado town, with working displays of things that the kids can play with, and character actors of snake oil salesman doing their schtick and pretending to sell you everything from arsenic to laudanum. Hilarious! There’s a ski jump simulator. This one I could only look at for about one second before I had flashbacks to the Blair Witch Project. There was a mine simulation complete with a rattling mine car ride, a storytelling tommyknocker, and a blast simulator. My daughter and her friend loved that display because it allowed them to push ‘dynamite sticks’ into the wall in a kind of mining version of Simon Says, in the right sequence, and set it off. Once they pushed the blaster plunger, a computer screen simulated what would happen, and whether or not they did it right, or just buried themselves. This sounds gruesome, but the kids were all giggling and jockeying for their chance to blow stuff up. After the kids got done, it was their daddies’ turns. Men and explosions…

As you’re leaving that area, there’s a computer game very much like WWF throwdown, except it’s between various well-known Colorado figures, such as Molly Brown, etc. This cast of characters also included ‘the brown cloud’ that used to hang over Denver before we cleaned up the pollution, and the terrifying red-eyed Sleepy-Hollowesque blue horse that everyone is subjected to upon entry into Denver from the airport. The Blue Horse Throwdown even had the horse shooting lasers from its eyes (which we all secretly knew it did, in our nightmares anyway).

But by far, the most powerful display to me, was of the Granada Japanese internment camp. I never knew this existed in Colorado. I had heard of the internment camps before, in history, and also from one of my nerd icons George Takei (Sulu from the original Star Trek). He spent part of his childhood in one, and sometimes talks about it. But hearing about it over the internet, even from someone who was there, or learning about it as a passing footnote in history class is nothing like what I saw. That’s the nature of the internet, and the nature of classrooms and history books, I suppose. They still maintain a distance.

There was no distance here. You walked through a room no larger than your living room at home, where several people spent half their lives after giving up most of their belongings and whatever futures they had on the outside. As you looked at their belongings donated by some of the folks who had been there, there were voice-narrated stories told of what it was like, or letters that they had written.

It’s been two weeks since I’ve been there, and this is the first time I could talk about it. Because I realized when I was standing in that room that this was a concentration camp. In Colorado. It wasn’t called that. It was called a War Relocation Center. But it required people to give up their homes, their jobs, and move themselves and their families to a strange place built like a camp, one room for many families with cots for beds, strangers who someone on the outside thought were alike because of their color, descent, culture. No, they weren’t gassed. They weren’t shot, or tortured in the same way as the Nazi versions. But they had to live with the realization that they were asked by their fellow citizens to give up everything because they spoke a certain language and looked a certain way, and that the country they belonged to and were loyal to, didn’t trust them. I heard that in the story this teenage girl told, it was her valedictory speech at her high school. It was, in the literal sense of the term, a concentration camp. In America.

When that hit home, as I was sitting at this young girl’s desk, I started bawling. Thank God I was the only one in the display at the time. I don’t mean a couple sniffles. I mean cover-your-mouth-and-go-into-a-corner-hoping-nobody-sees-you-until-you-can-calm-down kind of bawling. Of course people did filter in, and chickenshit about showing emotion to strangers as I am, I faked a sneeze and left, which I’m sure fooled no one.

George Takei recently showed a photo on Facebook that shows him outside the internment camp he was in as a kid, with a sign “This Place Matters’. It does. It’s incredibly instructive to me to really understand that there were concentration camps here in the U.S. That we did discriminate based on color, creed, etc, and not in the distant past, less than a hundred years ago. But one thing that really got me was one of the last things the girl on the recording said was that America had made a mistake, and that she believed America would correct it someday. She still had faith, she still believed. Wow.

Kinda put things into perspective for me. I’ve been bitching about a lot of things in politics.  I’ll never be a politician. I have no editor between my brain and my mouth. Generally not a useful trait in a politician. But this experience made me think about how I deal with the current climate. Man, this little girl didn’t lose her hope, she never gave up even after we’d just taken everything away from her, and stuck her and her entire family in a tiny box because she was Japanese.

As a writer, this was one of those Holy Cow moments that stay with you, and you hope make you a better (or at least less bitchy) person in addition to hopefully a better writer. So here’s my advice as a writer for today, at least what I found. I’ve lived in Colorado for ten years and never knew this existed here. It was right under my nose, these people’s lives. The message I got that day was ‘Look around you.’ There are stories everywhere, some which really need to be told, and aren’t, not much.

See what stories there are to tell in your own state or town. And if you happen to be in Colorado. This is a site worth visiting.

http://www.historycolorado.org/museums/history-colorado-center

http://coloradopreservation.org/projects/current-projects/granada-relocation-center/

The only way I know how to communicate to any significant degree, is through writing. I imagine that as this keeps seeping into my brain, it will work its way into my stories. I hope I can do it justice.

 

 

 

 

sdfd