The occasional observations of Carolyn Kephart, writer

Friday, December 07, 2007

Breathless

9:04 PM PST, December 7, 2007
The hammer fell at Sotheby's New York and the tiny Guennol Lioness (see my previous entry) sold for a whopping 57.2 million USD, the highest price ever paid for a sculpture in recorded history. Given her diminutive size, that's about 16.3 million an inch, and worth every nickel. The buyer's name is not yet disclosed, but I'm looking forward to finding out the identity of that modern-day Sardanapalus.
On to something less staggering, but just as breathtaking in its way.

Sir William Russell Flint seems to have spent his working life surrounded by beautiful women in pronounced states of undress. Even if watercolor was a less recent medium than it is, Flint would still be considered one of its greatest exponents today. His pictures shimmer, and no effect seems beyond his powers. I love the man. Here's just one reason out of hundreds why:

During the Italian Renaissance that this picture evokes with such cool deliberation, no artist would have thought of doing a portrait of his model. Models impersonated goddesses, the Virgin Mary or allegories, and the portrait, especially in profile, was reserved for ladies of social position who would never have dreamed of revealing so much flesh, nor probably could have possessed it to such a luscious degree. Flint did his best work after World War II, and this picture captures all the chic, slightly reticent elegance of Fifties England.

Flint seldom ever painted portraits, or men for that matter; he seems to have been an artistic pasha, serenely enjoying and depicting the lush carnality that filled his studio. Watercolor perfectly captures the evanescent, floating-world quality of the subject shown here -- the provoking contrast of flawless skin barely yet sumptuously clad, luminous blues and ivories, the regal pose and the delicately rendered, ironically ordinary face. Flint specialized in such offhand bravura, and all of his works never fail to temper the sensuous with just the right amount of distance. Lots of them can be found at this site.


 CK

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Wonder, Going Once...

11:25 PM PST, November 28, 2007


Ladies and gentlemen, define 'priceless.' I present the Guennol Lioness, to be auctioned at Sotheby's very soon (December 8) in what promises to be a paddle-waving frenzy of heavy hitters in the art world.

The Lioness has haunted my imagination ever since I first encountered her many years ago in a book about the art of the ancient Near East. I'll never forget how stunned I felt at the sight of those merciless elegant contours and juts, feral with a terrible touch of humanity; I know my gasp was audible. I'd thought her bigger--Ozymandian proportions would have worked perfectly--but even at three and a half inches tall she's massive. I'm almost glad she doesn't have legs, since they might have diminished her breathtaking force (historians have theorized that the limbs were made of precious metal and therefore stolen, leaving the remains intact and unvalued--yet another of fate's piquant ironies). Drilled into the back of her exquisitely savage skull are holes by which she could hang around the neck of some lucky purple-robed satrap.

Despite her admittedly cool resemblance to a video-game anthromonster, the Lioness had her birth in Babylonia at about the time the wheel was invented, five thousand years ago. The crown jewel of a dazzling private collection, she's expected to realize anywhere from 14 to 18 million dollars, which seems more than reasonable to me considering what too much junk fetches nowadays, and the proceeds will be donated to charity.

Is it any wonder I have hope for mankind, when it creates things like this? 


CK 

Friday, October 05, 2007

The Unicorn and the Cash Cow: A Fable

9:13 AM PDT, October 5, 2007

Since these comments of mine were received favorably on the Amazon.com fantasy discussion thread "CAPPING OFF THE LONG-RUNNING, UNREMITTING, OVERWORKED SERIES" (caps NOT mine), I will include them here, for diversion's sake. No particular author is singled out, my observations are strictly general, etc.:

Writer creates unicorn, who has many interesting adventures. Readers flock to marvel at this new and fascinating creature.

Unicorn, fattened by adulation, morphs into cash cow.

Cash cow begins meandering aimlessly, tolerated by the faithful but an irritation to those who believe the purpose of the cow is to be eaten, digested and done with, next unicorn please.

Cash cow continues to meander and becomes an irritation to the faithful, some of whom consider seeking another unicorn.

Unicorn is ultimately remembered only as a cash cow, save by a few of the remaining faithful who recall its glorious early days with a nostalgic sigh.

CK

Sunday, January 01, 2006

Short Fiction: REGENERATED

One of my early short stories, first published in Quantum Muse. Information about my other writing can be found here. Happy reading!


Cela always hoped she’d find Jorgen again someday…but was this really Jorgen?

Regenerated

No one ever really got to know a rashak, and Cela had never made an attempt. She patched them up and they paid her if they had money, giving exactly what her services were worth, neither more nor less. However much agony they might be in, they never showed it. Their flat wide-mouthed saurian faces remained stonily impassive even when the pain ebbed, and their gratitude was equally effusive.

Irksome though the rashaka were, Cela could not help being impressed by at least some their traits. True, they were almost pathologically inscrutable. Vowed to stern and unforgiving gods, they lived in continual self-denial. They had no written language, little if any spirit of inquiry, and more than a few disgusting habits. But none were better fighters, formed for war and the hunt, tireless in strength and highly resistant to wounds thanks to their massive, manlike physiques and scaly hide; their uncannily keen senses and formidable stamina were legendary. Their loyalty, when they chose to bestow it, was beyond question or reproach. They were also never violent unless goaded, a trait which was not generally known nor entirely believed by humankind, most of whom made every effort to avoid them. Cela's lack of prejudice was atypical, and thus she and Koth had met.

She had been out in the far hills one day, foraging for rare herbs and enjoying the last of hot high summer, when she discovered a rashak male finishing up a battle with a rout of drabbs, the vicious near-men who roamed that lawless part of the land. Stupid and weak, drabbs never hunted save in packs; yet for even four of them to consider themselves the match for a rashak was a foolish, fatal error. Still, by the time the last drabb fell, the rashak was covered in blood―the almost black blood of his race. As Cela watched, he dropped to his knees without a sound save a slight hiss, and shut his eyes, his head bent, his great shoulders drooping, his thick tapering tail motionlessly curled behind him. Cela realized that he was either calling on his gods for strength, or resigning himself to death. When she approached, he barely seemed to notice her, save for a momentary flaring of his nostril-slits that in a single breath determined that she was human and female―and a healer, from the aromatic herbs she carried. But then he drew another breath and caught it, and his shoulders straightened and his eyes opened very fast, fixing on hers. Startled by the stare, Cela controlled her dislike of his reptilian features, looking away as she reached for her satchel's clasp.

"I intend no harm. Permit me to aid you," she said to him, speaking the formal tongue that united all the rashak tribes. She knew only a few phrases, and spoke them badly―there were gutturals and clicks that she would never get right―but still he understood, and shook his head as he looked away.

"You should leave. Just go." He had replied in the common tongue, rasping and hoarse but almost without accent, quite as if that were his native language―unusual, since rashaka usually bothered to learn only the rudiments, and let gestures and grunts fill in for the rest.

"Payment isn't necessary," Cela said with a touch of impatience, knowing it could only be lack of money that made him refuse her help. Warriors of his kind spent every copper they had on their gear, and his was, she noted, of the highest quality, and rather more showy than rashaka tended to favor. She did not say more, since it would be a waste of words.

He hesitated yet again. "I need water. And food."

Cela was provided with both, and gave him what she had. As she set about healing him, he ate and drank with undisguised greed that made clear how long he had gone without, and why the drabbs had managed to inflict such damage. Taking a little jar of salve from her satchel, Cela anointed the rashak's lacerated skin―or rather his scaly hard hide, rough and cold under her fingers. Soon he was close to whole again, and his powers of regrowth would do the rest.

"Good work," he said, glancing at his arm, that had been cut to the bone. "I've seen few better."

"I thank my teachers," Cela replied, a little startled by the extravagance of the compliment.

His opaque eyes scanned her with an attention that rashaka seldom deigned to confer upon a mere human. "It hasn't made you rich."

Cela glanced down at her mannish near-rags with a shrug. It had been a very long time since she had cared about her looks, but to hear a rashak comment on them was...strange. "That salve costs a fortune to make," she said, staring at the now-empty little jar.

The information didn't seem to impress him. "I'm called Koth."

Rashaka never gave their names away lightly either, and at least initially used the first four of them. "Greetings, Koth," Cela replied, looking hard at him now.

"Greetings, Lady Celandra. And thank you." At her wide-eyed shock he gave the closest thing a rashak had to a smile. "You don't recognize me." Standing with only a little difficulty now, moving from corpse to corpse, with practiced brutality he wrenched off their long greasy scalps, which were worth money. One of the drabbs wore a jewel that had probably cost its original owner her life; this Koth appropriated with a hard tug, snapping the chain. For some time the rashak stared at the sunlit blue spark in his hard razor-nailed palm. "Take it," he finally rasped, holding the gem out to Cela. "You always said these were your favorites."

Cela's fingers closed around the jewel as her attention fixed on Koth's flat face, and its stare so widely spaced that it seemed to look clear past her.

"You used to tell me that my eyes were brighter," she replied, fighting to keep her voice calm.

He inclined his head in a way she remembered from someplace far, someplace deep in the past. "Yes. I said that."

She felt her grip on the gem loosen. "But―I had thought Transformation was a fraud."

"It exists." His opaque gaze flicked. "Hard to find, costly to buy, and not easy to survive."

Cela remembered the rest of the hearsay, and spoke it dry-mouthed. "Nor is there any going back. It cannot be reversed."

His broad, thick-muscled shoulders barely shrugged, and he made no answer.

For a long time she could only stare at him, stunned by the change, trying and failing to find the man she had loved. "But Jorgen ... why?"

"The name is Koth." His thick-lidded eyes flashed coldly. "Human flesh is weak in too many ways. I knew I could be stronger. Much stronger."

Ah, but he was ugly―that toad's head with its recessive planes and mottled scales and wide, lipless mouth. Unable to make any form of reply, Cela turned her full attention to putting her healing items away, and finding a bit of leather lacing to hang the gem around her neck. After a very long silence Koth spoke again.

"This place isn't safe for you." Another hesitation. "You are alone."

Cela wanted to say that she had been alone since he had left her, that she never dreamed they would meet again; that she was overjoyed, furious, and appalled to the depths of her soul. But far too much had changed, and she merely nodded a reply. For Koth, it was enough.

Since that time on they had been together, and from a strictly survival viewpoint it worked very well. Koth put himself in continual danger, and Cela coped with the consequences, across endless reaches of lucrative terrain. Cela's memories merged into the present and momentarily fixed on Koth, who continued to sit in the meditative trance that prefaced every fight, communing with his adopted gods. She sighed, inwardly as always. Over the month they had spent together, she had realized hour by hour that whatever she once loved in Jorgen had burned to dust. The present moment found them in yet another breathtaking landscape they would only hunt in and hurry through, where in another time they would have lain down in the sweet grass and...she bit her lip lest the sigh escape her as she turned away again, locking her attention elsewhere until the murmur of Koth's reptilian blur startled her more than a scream.

"I'm sorry."

Her attention never wavered from the mists now hovering up from the meadow beneath their safe spur of rock. She was required to keep watch, sitting absolutely immobile, during Koth's period of meditation. Silence was also expected, but this time she had to reply, whispering through frozen lips.

"Sorry for what, Koth?"

She fought to keep her voice calm, and to quiet her heart that was beating all but audibly. What she had waited so long to hear might be on the point of being said.

He hissed faint irritated regret. "That dagger was a bargain. I should have bought it."

Cela's emotions silently collapsed within her. Focusing again on the lovely curling tendrils of opalescent mist in the gold-grassed, pond-dotted valley below them, she noted those spirals that were most likely to jet suddenly upward and twist themselves into translucent, delicate, appallingly murderous gloamrippers. Night was coming on and several of the monsters were now taking shape, elegantly slim and feral, seeking to feed on whatever they might find, with a ravenous preference for flesh. Once they were killed, which would take some time and considerable risk, their hearts would fetch a high price. Automatically Cela forgot how beautiful the creatures were.

"There," she whispered, barely indicating the now fully-formed 'rippers as she spoke. Koth stared where she pointed, blinked acknowledgment, then rose and made his soundless half-slithering way down the hill to the ponds without a single word or backward look.

***

Life was all about death, anymore.

"Seven hearts. Not bad."

To Koth's flat sibilant observation Cela nodded. Koth had been badly damaged during the fight―wounded almost to death, something Cela never really got used to despite its frequency. Nevertheless, she had yet again managed with all her skill to heal him, save this time for a missing part of his tail; but it would grow back within a few days and look the same as ever. The two were now camped and finishing the evening meal. Koth was feeding on some fish that might have been fresh a few days before, a chance find on the lake's margin. As Cela sat across from him prudently upwind, washing her dried rations down with lukewarm pond water and celebratory last swigs of sour wine, she once again reflected, too tired for rancor, on the luxury that used to be a regular part of her life, and how sweet that life had been once Jorgen had found his way into it. But all fires died eventually. They blazed, they devoured, they were satisfied and they died. What was left never looked anything close to what it had been in life.

"Cold?"

Koth was actually looking at her. He seldom did, unless it was to express the only emotion he seemed to possess in any degree, irritation. Usually they sat well apart from each other, and Koth's gaze focused someplace too distant for Cela to ever hope to find. His flat hooded eyes in his lizard face were unreadable, as always, but he threw a handful of branches on the fire and the flames leapt to warmer life.

"You were shivering. Can't have you catching a chill."

No, they could definitely not have that. If Cela fell sick, it would decrease her effectiveness. With a half-shrug of thanks she finished her meal, and then reassessed the days earnings with greater, less gain-related attention. Gloamripper hearts were like jewels; once taken from the body, they hardened and shone. Crowded in the palm of Cela's hand they shimmered within, changing color from green to dawn-orange to gold. She would have liked to keep one for its beauty, but that was out of the question; they were simply too valuable. Koth would insist on an even split of the proceeds of the sale, but Cela's wants were few and she would inevitably give Koth most of her share, which he would accept without protest, thanking her with his usual word or two.

Cela felt a small ironic smile lift her mouth-corners as she studied the shimmering little lumps, dead flesh animated by a semblance of life. Fires might blaze and die, but the light of the gems would never go out; they were in their own way immortal.

She heard Koth's voice, a warning rasp. "Don't lose them."

Without replying, she returned the hearts to the pouch, and the pouch to her inner pocket, and looked over to her companion, now re-settling into meditation. Watching him, knowing she could do so completely unnoticed, she permitted herself the futile indulgence of recalling the past.

It had been a very short time to her, that single year with Jorgen, so sweet it had seemed as if all of existence was light caught in a prism and refined to its purest. It had begun in the dead of winter, a spark floating amid the snowflakes. The wars had just ended, and he was a wounded hero; out of charity she had taken him into her house and made him well again. Everything about them seemed to balance: a lord's untimely widow, and the younger son of nobody; she studious and retiring, he brash and heedless, brimming with charm. It was only natural that she should fall deeply in love with him, and to her amazement he had seemed to reciprocate in full. Never during their seeming infinity of bliss had it ever occurred to Cela that she was part of Jorgen's life only as an hour is to a day, and that she might be for the moment noontide in all its warmth, but there had been a dawn before her, and sunset was to come, and then another day, with fresh pleasures and adventures. For her, time had stalled at a brilliant height, and the only things that changed were her emotions, that shifted from shock, to rage, to agony as Jorgen gradually sought fresh distractions, both carnal and combative. When he had suddenly become fascinated with the sternly ascetic way of the rashaka, Cela had almost been relieved. Never could she have envisaged how far he would take that admiration.

He at last left entirely, and time for Cela became a long weary walk down a blank corridor filled with fog. She had not been rich despite her rank, and the gifts she had heaped on Jorgen, garnering the less thanks the more she gave, had impoverished her. Forsaking the home that now seemed unbearably empty, she wandered as an itinerant healer, aiding and learning as she sought word of Jorgen. Although often in need, she never asked payment, accepting whatever was given no matter how small the amount; and unlike many healers she willingly helped all races, from human as she was, to rashak, which was far from that. Thus she and Jorgen had met again, only he wasn't Jorgen anymore. He was Koth, whose blood would run cold until the day he died.

Perhaps the thing she missed most was the laughter. During the time of fire, she and Jorgen had always joked, teased, traded wits, and so often their play had led to passion. Made bold by the drink, she decided to coax a spark. Reaching as his back was turned, she put her hand on Koth's shoulder, lightly moving up his neck. He no longer had ears, but she tickled the place one of them would have been, and called him a few of the hundred little names she had once used with him.

He shook her off instantly, his voice a snapped hiss. "Stop it."

The shock amazed her. The suddenness of it, the clear implication that if she ever tried anything like that again, all would be over between them...she moved back to her place, staring into the faltering fire, feeling her features stiffening to a mask as if she had thrust her face into the flames. Rashaka only mated in a once-yearly obedience to instinct, vent to vent. She'd been stupid yet again.

Wordlessly turning away, she began her usual preparations for sleep. She knew that as she undressed and washed and performed her other necessary tasks, Koth would be looking on with complete indifference if he bothered to look at all. Her beauty, which she had taken pains to revive for his sake, made no more impression on him than the sight of a corpse many days dead. "Good night," she said once she had lain down, her face to the stars, feeling the little sparks torment her eyes until they blurred.

Usually Koth replied more or less at once, with no particular interest, to Cela's words that always ended the day, but this time he was silent awhile before his voice hissed in its hoarse undertone.

"Celandra. Just because I do not choose to remember never means that I forget."

Had he struck her or said something tender, Cela could not have been more shocked; yet as almost always, Koth's flat black eyes held no emotion that she could read. The reflection of the campfire gleamed in them, but they had no light of their own. Once again, he was merely making a statement, and clearly neither wished nor expected an answer; and he got none.

Sleepless, Cela at last looked across the waning flames at the immobile form outlined by the darkness. Koth lay with his back to her, asleep on the bare stone, his rasping breath slow and regular. His big manlike body was perfectly muscled, its symmetries striking, and it would stay that way long past the limit of a human lifetime, its vigor undiminished. But what did Koth live for? The hunt and the kill and the loot; money and weaponry and the honing of his fighting skills. He had allies, but no friends, and no real kinship with his foster race. No beauty moved him, nor horror. He ate the most loathsome refuse and the rarest delicacies with equal indifference. It was not a life for a being fully human, with warm deep feelings and gifts to give the world, capacities for joy and wonder, and few years left to savor them. Since their reunion, she had followed Koth wherever he led, trying to find any trace of Jorgen; tonight she had given up the search. The night air's chill seemed to emanate from her soul, and she trembled in her meager blanket.

Finally, she had told herself the truth. Tomorrow, after she and Koth returned to the settlement and sold the gloamripper hearts, she would quietly depart and find her way back to the city she had called her home. He would perhaps search for her a day or so, maybe even make inquiries, but that would be the extent of his concern. They would never see each other again.

Reaching for the pouch that held the gloamripper hearts, Cela once again poured them into her palm and watched their shifting exquisite glow. Returning the hearts to the pouch all save one, she leaned to the fire and dropped it into the center of the blaze, as a sacrifice to several gods who so far had ignored her. Never before had she been so rash and wasteful, but she was at last beyond caring. Then she quietly got up and circled the waning flames that separated her from Koth, lying down next to him as close as she dared, studying the rise and fall of his broad muscle-laden shoulders and back in the last of the light.

"Goodbye, Jorgen," she whispered soundlessly. Emotions of every kind mixed within her, canceling each other out, forming a flat, numb weariness. Lightly she ran her hand over his unconscious outline, tracing but not daring to touch...

With a movement too fast to even startle her, Koth rolled over and caught her in his arms. He was still asleep, his eyes shut, but his breath came fast. He clutched her body to his, grinding her tender flesh against his stone-sharp scales.

All he wanted was her warmth. She knew that, and she gave him what she had, fighting not to shiver as he drained her heat and made it his. The only thing that mattered was that she was in his embrace for the first time since he had left her as a human. Jorgen may have become Koth, but when Cela shut her eyes and willed away the pain she felt herself transmogrified, returned to a joy thought forever lost; and as she thrilled with the heat of remembrance, Koth wrapped her ever closer, exactly as Jorgen had once done with his goddess, his adored, his diamond star.

I will leave you, she thought. But not yet, for reasons he chose not to remember. Turning her head, she took a last look at the ashes of the fire where the gloamripper heart gleamed and shimmered like the miracle it was, and fell asleep.

END


Copyright © 2010 by Carolyn Kephart

First published in Quantum Muse


Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.


Other stories on this blog:

The Kind Gods https://carolynkephart.blogspot.com/2022/01/short-fiction-kind-gods.html
Last Laughter   https://carolynkephart.blogspot.com/2022/01/short-fiction-last-laughter.html
Everafter Acres  https://carolynkephart.blogspot.com/2022/01/short-fiction-everafter-acres.html
Regenerated  https://carolynkephart.blogspot.com/2022/01/short-fiction-regenerated.html

Visit the author's website at carolynkephart.com 
for first chapters of her books and more.


Carolyn Kephart's publications:

Wysard and Lord Brother, Parts One and Two of the Ryel Saga duology, acclaimed epic fantasy
The Ryel Saga: A Tale of Love and Magic, combining the duology in a single volume
Queen of Time, contemporary magic realism that takes the Faust legend in new directions
At the Core of the Happy Apple: A Mystery Solved, an essay on the inner workings of the popular 1970s Fisher Price wobble toy
PenTangle: Five Pointed Fables, a collection of short stories previously published in ezines

Short Fiction: THE KIND GODS

One of my early short fantasy works, first published in Bewildering Stories. 
(Information about my other writing can be found here. Happy reading!)

 Did the old gods really die?
A warrior seeks answers at the burial-mound of his greatest enemy.

The Kind Gods

They rode light, for these had long been times of peace, yet still they rode armed from old habit, in steel-studded leather many times mended, battered greaves over scuffed boots, vambraces scored from years of sword-blows. Still, the metal gleamed, and the tough hide was supple, and from a distance they seemed young men, straight and easy in the saddle. Only a closer look would note their greyed hair, and faces as weathered as their gear.

Emerging from the forest, the four soldiers entered a wide field where tall pale grasses glowed in the crisp light of a fine fall afternoon. In the midst of the field rose an abrupt little hill, their destination. They had been friends since boyhood, and later comrades in war, always ready with a jest to lighten harsh odds or to add more merriment to a victory; but their mood this day was quiet. One of them began a song that the others joined in, and its cadences meshed with the jingling of harness, the clinking of steel, the grass-softened thud of cantering hooves―not a full-throated war-cry, but the kind of ballad sung after a battle around embered fires of quiet camps, meant to soothe wounds and weariness and sorrow.

They halted at the foot of the hillock, and the leader of the company dismounted with grace only a little stiff, moving with just a hint of a limp as he began to climb the slight slope. His companions hastened to aid him, but he waved away their help. For a moment he was silent, looking from one comrade’s face to the next; and then he smiled faintly as he turned to gaze around him at the field, ending at the mound’s rise. “Rest awhile. I won’t be long.”

He turned and went alone upward, his breath laboring harder with every step he took. When he at last reached the summit, he removed his helm as he slowly fell to his knees, his chest heaving awhile before he ungloved to caress the grass with a battle-scarred hand.

I told you I’d return,” he said, and his damp gray braids brushed the grass as he bowed his head in greeting. “I didn’t think it’d take me thirty years. Remember when all this field was flat? Perfect for a fight it was. Many an arrowhead and blade-shard they struck that wrought this mound at my order, for your sake.”

He lifted his eyes and squinted far, over the wide meadow and into the past. Memory made him grimace, sharpening his face’s lines and seams, as his fingers slid over a deep crease in his brow. “It was almost me under this earth, not you. I’ve never fought that hard before or since. The bards still sing of you and me, when the priests aren’t around to stop them.”

He took a flask from his belt, removed its stopper and lifted it to the sun now slipping down toward the trees, murmuring words of ancient prayer. Then he poured a drop of its contents on the ground.

Here. Drink with me. It can’t harm you.”

His thoughts drifted to the day of that battle, when he and all his friends were alive and young and strong, fighting to the death for a world in peril. Slitting his eyes against the keen radiance of the cloudless sunset, he again saw the field’s tall grasses trampled into blood-muck, churning and darkening with battle, heard the stray sweet birdsongs twisted into clamors and yells. Again he heard the shouts, and the clash of swords. His heart raced, awakening his body’s sickness, and he clenched his teeth to quiet a groan of pain lest his men hear. A slight sip of the flask eased him, and he was able to speak again, although haltingly.

I don’t have long. I’m rotting inside. My sons wish me gone, and I’m going—but I’m dreading it. In my prime I never feared dying, but it’s different now. There’s a new god now since you and I fought, that’s killed off all the ones you and I knew. There’s a new heaven too, but no one fights or drinks there; all they do is sing. The new hell’s all torture, and that’s where most people end up, it seems. Not much to look forward to, either way.”

He sighed, and murmured an oath now obsolete. “It’s a better world now, but I don’t belong in it. You were lucky, to die while the old gods still lived. I’ve broken all of the new god’s laws in my time, and I won’t be up in the clouds howling hymns, oh no. I’ll be deep in what those smooth-faced priests call the Pit, frying in flames. And you’ll never get your revenge…”

As he said those last words a long fierce growl of thunder seemed to make indignant answer, strange in a cool autumn sky without a single cloud. The thane blinked, for though the potion in the flask was strong, he knew he hadn’t taken enough of it to mislead his senses. After a long moment he put his hand to the ground again as if testing for a heartbeat, his scarred fingers trembling.

Did they die indeed, the old gods?” he whispered. “Tell me.”

Something lightly tapped his shoulder as soon as he spoke, and he looked around to find a fallen leaf in the grass, red as blood, shaped like a spear-head. No wind had blown it there. He took it up by the stem, and it quivered in his fingers as his heartbeat quickened until he barely had breath to speak again.

I’ve missed you,” he whispered, his eyes on the last of the sun now vanishing amid the grasses. “I’ve missed the world we had. The gods that forgave us…”

All the wounds he had known in all his life seemed to ache anew, and he shivered. But then the sharp air of the oncoming night seemed to warm around him, and some unseen presence bade him turn around. There in the deep blue of the cloudless sky he saw the full moon rising like a great shield of gold, dented by countless blows; and he understood.

A long while he watched the radiant orb as he listened to the voices of his friends, who waited for him at the foot of the mound.

Soon, lads,” he whispered. “Soon.” And he lifted high the silver flask in honor of his buried enemy before drinking it empty.

***

As night came on, the old warrior’s lieutenant climbed the barrow, and found his lord lying as if asleep. Seeking a pulse, he found none; and taking up the flask he scented what it had held, and nodded in resignation. He called the others to the mound’s top, and they came with lighted torches to bear witness to the thane’s passing.

The new god was kind to him,” one of them said at last, who had been his lord’s messenger during the wars. “A quiet death, without suffering. He deserved it.”

The lieutenant gently placed the red leaf on the thane’s unbreathing breast, and spoke in a voice unsteadied by sorrow, and by anger too. “No. He should have died fighting sword against sword with he that lies below, while he was young. While the old gods yet lived.”

The thane’s standard-bearer bowed his head in assent, and his reply was bitter. “We all should have.”

A long silence followed those words. But then youngest of the three, who had been the chief’s squire since boyhood and whose hair was not yet wholly gray, made a swift silencing gesture. “Wait. Listen.”

The noise came again: a faint rattling, very close.

A viper,” the lieutenant said, scanning the grass as he drew his dagger.

The standard-bearer shook his head. “No. It’s…under the ground.”

Each man froze, listening to the strange rippling clatter deep in the barrow, and the squire spoke again, barely a whisper. “Bones…”

It sounded like a skeleton slowing coming to life. The thane’s body lay motionless and silent, but the red leaf twitched as two muffled voices issued from deep within the mound, both of them taut and harsh with anger; both the voices of young men in the prime of their strength. Then the clash of edged steel mingled with the curses and taunts and yells, and the noise went on for the space of several breaths before ebbing into the darkness.

Slowly the thane’s men looked around at one another, at first in disbelief, then in wonder, then in joy. All that night they kept vigil with their lord, their eyes and weaponry glinting by moonlight and firelight as they recalled his deeds with glad laughter, and drank to the gods still among them.

***

The mound was opened in days to come, so that the old warrior might be laid to rest next to his enemy, as he had wished. The priests noted in their chronicles that within the crypt was found a trove of precious goods, and the remains of a tall well-shaped warrior clad in magnificent armor, his skull still covered with skeins of long yellow hair. But only the bards told of how all the treasures seemed disordered and scattered, and how the skeleton seemed to be rising, clutching its great sword two-handed as if parrying a hard slash, and how it seemed to grin in fierce delight.

The thane’s men restored the treasures to their places, and reverently arrayed the remains so they lay at rest once more. As they covered their lord’s body with a rich grave-cloth, they observed that his lips seemed to shape a smile at the last; and they smiled as well.

When the tomb was sealed once more, the priests of the new god placed a solemn curse upon the barrow and the land about it, and no one dared come near the place thereafter. In time, forest claimed the grass, and thicket grew to cover the grave; but old believers knew that ever afterward on the first full moon of autumn, one might hear the wild din of battle, buried deep beneath the thorn-clad mound.

End


Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2010 by Carolyn Kephart

First published in Bewildering Stories


With thanks to the musical group Fleet Foxes for their 2008 ‘Tiger Mountain Peasant Song,’ which inspired this story.

The cover design features a reconstruction of the Sutton Hoo burial mask, c. 600-700 CE.


Other stories on this blog:

Last Laughter  https://carolynkephart.blogspot.com/short-fiction-last-laughter.html
Everafter Acres  https://carolynkephart.blogspot.com/short-fiction-everafter-acres.html
Regenerated  https://carolynkephart.blogspot.com/short-fiction-regenerated.html
The Heart's Desire  https://carolynkephart.blogspot.com/short-fiction-hearts-desire.html

Visit the author's website at carolynkephart.com 
for first chapters of her books and more.


Carolyn Kephart's publications:

Wysard and Lord Brother, Parts One and Two of the Ryel Saga duology, acclaimed epic fantasy
The Ryel Saga: A Tale of Love and Magic, combining the duology in a single volume
Queen of Time, contemporary magic realism that takes the Faust legend in new directions
At the Core of the Happy Apple: A Mystery Solved, an essay on the inner workings of the popular 1970s Fisher Price wobble toy
PenTangle: Five Pointed Fables, a collection of short stories previously published in ezines


Short Fiction: LAST LAUGHTER

 One of my early short fantasy stories, first published in 
Silver Blade Fantasy Quarterly.
(Information about my other writing can be found here. Happy reading!)

A cautionary tale about a wicked court jester and his comeuppance. 

Last Laughter

He was a troublesome fool, whose unbridled tongue and vicious tricks went unchecked because they amused the King. Whenever his behavior became simply too appalling, the jester took care to re-ingratiate himself with all manner of silly japes and tumblings and blandishments, but it was well known that he wore a mail shirt under his motley to ward off vengeful stabs, and amulets to avert curses.

Keeping on the jester’s good side was a prudent measure in a court full of idlers constantly seeking to work mischief on one another out of simple ennui, forming little cells and circles of self-interest that continually jerked apart in loathing or merged in cooing accord, isolating and ostracizing. Amid these inimical orbs the jester bounced and skipped, prodding and tickling and puncturing as the whim took him. Although his magic was of the lowest kind, it was effective enough to be exceedingly troublesome and embarrassing, and the wiser spheres took care to roll well aside at his approach. Only the Thaumaturge Royal, who made it a point to be in a class by himself, looked upon the fool with icy indifference, and stood his ground immovably.

The Countess had always avoided the fool whenever possible, but that was becoming ever more difficult since her growing friendship with the King. She had been of the Queen’s retinue, chosen for her pleasant voice and tranquil manner to read aloud to Her Majesty during that lady’s last illness, and the two women had grown close thanks to their shared love of books and the harmony of their tastes. After the Queen’s untimely death, the Countess had only wished to retire to her lands and grieve, but the King persuaded her, or rather all but commanded her, to remain at court. He was a young man, good to look upon, active in all the sports befitting a gentleman, and of sound intelligence; but he was also wild and given to bad company, which had caused the Queen great chagrin. The King for all his faults had loved his mother dearly, and his sorrow and remorse were solaced by the Countess’s gentle conversation, which naturally soon turned to books.

The Countess was as reclusive as the King was riotous, but she genuinely admired him for many reasons, and knew that her esteem was reciprocated. Nevertheless, she was even more aware of the fool’s resentment, which inspired her with an emotion she was too proud to call fear. The fool enjoyed flaunting his power, and often hinted that he was the baseborn son of a great lord he chose not to name, which caused understandable uneasiness among some of the court. Others, the Countess among them, preferred to believe that the King had plucked him from the gutter. True, the fool had some polish, but it was a very thin gloss like the sheen on a fly; and like a fly he seemed to delight in annoying her.

“Sweet lady, in truth his majesty seems to like you perhaps too well,” he said to her one day as she sat reading in the park. She had heard him at her back, the combined jingling of bells and chain mail; had seen his cap’s spiky shadow fall over her book, darkening the sweet spring afternoon. He leapt uninvited on her quiet bench, squatting apishly, grinning witlessly; but his eyes sparkled more than was safe. “The court’s marked the way you and he constantly wander off alone to the library, where no one else ever goes and where I hear there’s a very large and comfortable couch.” As he said the last words, he suggestively dangled his bauble.

Although the implication disgusted her, the Countess kept her wonted calm, her face its habitual, unreadable mask save perhaps for a hint of flush. The jester’s position on the bench brought his exaggerated codpiece directly into her line of sight, and she had been keeping her eyes well averted. “You know as well as I, fool, that His Majesty’s wedding to the Princess is only two months away.”

She put a sharp contemptuous emphasis on his title, but he only shrugged, sending his bells bobbing. “True, true, but in the meantime people will talk, won’t they? They’re already talking, you know.”

“Let them say whatever they please,” the Countess replied, candidly and coolly meeting the jester’s glittering stare. “His Majesty and I converse about books, nothing more.”

The jester goggled, waggling his eyebrows luridly. “Books! Why, books are full of bad things, naughty things. That’s why I never read ‘em. Neither should you.” And with a swat of his bauble he knocked the volume from the Countess’ lap, sending it into the nearby pond.

Although the book had been valuable, it was not priceless, and keeping one’s temper was of far more worth at such a time as this. “His Majesty and I discuss literature,” the Countess said, very clearly enunciating the last word. “Literature, and history, and philosophy now and then.”

The fool gave a doltish gasp, eyes wide with terror transparently feigned. “Oh, but that’s far worse! He’ll think thoughts too big for his head, and they’ll crack his skull. Regicide’s a bad thing, sweet lady. Have a care.”

The Countess looked him straight in the eye, unblinking. “You’re not very amusing just now, fool.”

He grinned ear to ear, batting his lashes. “And you’re not very pretty, but you never are. The King likes my antics far more than he likes your books, sweet lady…your books or your looks.”

Stung by the insult, the Countess recoiled. “His Majesty’s taste in reading is far more choice than your jests,” she said through set lips.

The fool’s eyes narrowed. They were an odd toad-color, greenish gray. “He never liked reading until you caught his eye. How did you manage it, I wonder?” His gaze slitted as his head tilted. “Were you using magic, Countess? I’d never have dreamt it of you.”

Almost everyone in the court studied magic, but very few had any proficiency, and what little they knew was confined to practical jokes more or less tasteless. Serious Art was the province of the Thaumaturge Royal, who deeply resented any infringement on his expertise. Besides, using magic to influence the mind of the King was a capital offense, and the very idea made the Countess feel cold despite the day’s warmth. Could this trifling, spiteful creature actually imagine…actually intend…

The fool could read masks as well as faces, and gave a silly little simper as he shrugged disarmingly. “Oh, now, now. No harm meant. I’m only an idiot, after all. Right?” During the silence that followed, he sat properly on the bench and removed his cap, flicking at the bells, watching them jiggle.

The Countess studied him more closely than she had ever wished to before. This was the first time she had ever seen him in a sober mood, let alone without his fool’s cap. Far from being laughably malformed, he was slender and well-shaped, of lithe middle height that made his frequent acrobatics effortless. Nor was he comically hideous, as was the general rule for his kind; indeed, one might be disposed to call his sharp mobile features good-looking, save for the indelible marks of constant debauchery and the unrelenting strain of having to always amuse. His tousled sandy hair made him seem boyish; in truth, he was barely thirty, the same age as the King.

She had to resist the urge to reach out and smooth his weedy hair. “Perhaps you’re not quite as bad as you seem.”

He nodded with a child’s righteous solemnity. “I can assure you I’m not.” But suddenly his eyes glittered again, and he winked. “Then again, I wouldn’t be too sure.” Pointing his bauble, he flicked at her skirt. “I do believe that’s a bug, your ladyship.”

She looked down, and gasped. Not only had he ripped a ruffle’s delicate lace, but red ants and cockroaches were crawling all over her gown. As the Countess leapt up and began frantically shaking them off, the fool jammed his cap back on his head and cartwheeled away, hooting and gibbering.

The next day when she went to the palace library at the appointed hour, the Countess was astonished to find the jester there, addressing the King in tones so low she could not make out a word. When they finally noticed her, the jester winked, smirked and gave a far too elaborate bow, while the King stared at her in a way that first confused her, then chilled her clear to the heart.

Ignoring the jester, she addressed his master. “Sire, is something amiss?”

To her question the King only motioned to the door. “Go. And let this be the last I see of you.”

She stared from he that she’d considered a friend to his grinning favorite, and lifted her chin, calm with rage. “Sire, what did this…this poisonous buffoon say to turn you against me? I demand to know.”

The King’s eyes were those of a complete, coldly furious stranger. “Demand? I’m not surprised you presume to issue orders. You’ve been using enchantment to gain my favor, and who knows how far you might have taken your trickery. Consider yourself under arrest. I’ve given order to the Thaumaturge to put you to the question—go to your apartments quietly, or I’ll have my guards drag you to the dungeons.”

Stunned with confused horror, the Countess remembered the many times they had conversed, she and the King, and how pleasant it had always been; how inquiring and engaging he had never failed to be. It had been one of the great joys of her life, the only thing that had made the court bearable. She clasped her hands, hard enough to bruise her fingers. “Sire, I have no skill in magic, none. I swear it! I…”

The King gave a disgusted shrug and turned his back on her, and the fool brayed with laughter. The Countess felt all her body go blank clear to the eyes, and when she could see once more she found she had fled the room and was leaning against the wall of the corridor, sliding downward, strengthless. But a sudden stalwart arm raised her upright, and she heard a calm, very distinct voice close to her ear, deep and steady.

“There, there. You have nothing to fear from me, Countess. I give you my word.”

She knew the voice, but it came as a shock almost as great as the one she’d just endured. Lifting her gaze from the speaker’s dashing black and silver garb that blended knight with mage, she stared into the cool dark eyes of the Thaumaturge Royal. She had always been on civil terms with this man, whose powers of the Art were the kingdom’s safeguard, but he moved in military circles and they seldom met. He was said to join wry humor with absolute ruthlessness. Putting her hopes on the former, she fought to answer. “Then you aren’t going to torture me?”

The question seemed to faintly shock him. “Countess, please. The very idea.” He motioned her to silence, and led her further down the corridor to a little windowed recess, offering her a chair that she sank into gratefully. He remained standing, and momentarily lifted a hand in an arcane warding gesture, ensuring private conversation before bending to continue. “The King and his fool were utterly unaware that I was present and heard everything.” He gave a discreet cough. “I was disguised as the gargoyle paperweight. Security reasons prohibit me from further disclosure, but the fool’s slanders were beyond preposterous.” The mage paused again, eyeing her keenly. “You’re too pale, Countess. Drink this.”

With a trembling hand she accepted the silver goblet that he materialized and offered, drank the delicious elixir it held, and felt blessed calm well outward from her newly-soothed spirit. “Then you don’t believe I used magic against His Majesty.”

The Thaumaturge barely disguised a snort. “Of course not. You’re incapable. That wasn’t meant as an insult, your ladyship; it’s just that you’re as clear as glass. I can read right into you, and I have to say it’s very entertaining.”

“Then you know I did nothing wrong,” she whispered. “We only talked of books.”

The mage again coughed discreetly. “I’m well aware of that, your ladyship, for often in the guise of the dragon inkwell I used to listen to your conversations.” At her shocked expression he again held up his hand. “Security reasons only, I assure you. I must say I was in constant suspense lest His Majesty dip a pen into me, but otherwise the experience was always delightful. I’ve never heard such good talk anywhere in this detestable place, and no one could possibly reproach either of you in any way regarding the subject matter.”

The Countess felt herself coloring hot at this admission despite her relief. “Perhaps your wondrous powers might have been better employed than by eavesdropping, my lord mage.”

The Thaumaturge was quite unmoved by the reproach. “I’d been biding my time, watching to see just how far the zany would go.” He took the silver cup from her hand, noting with satisfaction that it was empty before vanishing it. “He’s gone very far indeed, and has no intention of stopping. His ambitions are beyond his capacity, and they’ll be thwarted. I’ll make sure of it.”

With a helpless sigh the Countess turned to the window. Spring was in every bud, but all her heart was winter. “His Majesty wouldn’t listen to me. He didn’t care. Suddenly I was…nothing.”

At the Countess’s slow, numb phrases, the court mage hesitated a long moment. “I would do you any service possible, your ladyship. Believe that. But the jester, for all his cheap trickery and low sleights, possesses a greater power than any magic—the power to make the King believe that white is black. None of all my strength of Art can change that.” His lips quirked with rancor. “It’s rather trying, really.”

The Countess blinked at the tears stinging her eyes. “Then there is no help.”

The Thaumaturge lifted a steel-pauldroned shoulder, noiselessly. “As long as the jester holds sway, His Majesty will never again trust you. I strongly advise departing the court before you’re banished…or worse.” He hesitated as the Countess turned to him in shocked amazement, then spoke very quietly, his gaze steadily meeting hers. “You know you never really belonged here, your ladyship. Trust me, you’ll be far better off away. You and I have seldom conversed at any length, but I’ll take this opportunity to inform you that I enjoy books very much, and that my taste is quite probably better than His Majesty’s. Farewell.”

He clasped her cold hands for an instant, warming them with his Art; bent over them in soldierly respect, and then took his leave in a silent billowing of black. Only much later did the Countess observe that on one of her fingers was a splendid jeweled ring where none had been before.

She was no longer permitted access to the King after that, and the fool bounded away giggling whenever she approached him. Heeding the Thaumaturge’s advice, the Countess quietly retired to her peaceful manse deep in the country. Now and again she would receive messages from some of her acquaintance, recounting the jester’s ever more outrageous antics. When she learned that the King’s marriage to the princess had been broken off, the Countess did not need to ask who had instigated the rupture; and she gave the court little or no thought thereafter. She had learned to cherish her new life, there amid the quiet. Now and again she felt lonely, for she had no one now with whom to talk of books; but the King no longer figured in her feelings, save for the occasional random pang. She kept the Thaumaturge’s gift on her finger, and gazed upon it often.

One afternoon as she was taking a rest from her latest reading, leaning at her library window to admire her flourishing summer garden, her ring suddenly sparkled, and in another moment a letter materialized on the broad stone of the casement-sill—a square missive of rich black paper and pure silver ink, boldly and elegantly penned, and addressed to her. Astonished, she reached for it cautiously, examined it awhile, and then broke the seal with greatest care. The message, to her surprise and pleasure, was from the court mage.

“Most well-remembered and much-regretted ladyship:

“Forgive this intrusion upon your retreat, but I thought you might be diverted by an amusing occurrence yesternight involving the King’s fool. His Majesty’s favored companions were assembled at the drinking bout which ends every evening nowadays, whereat the jester, in that sportive fashion which endears him to so many, indecently mimicked several of the most notable ladies of the court, to shouts of merriment and approbation. Needless to say, the ladies in question were not present, but I joined the company in the guise of a tankard. I regret to divulge that the fool did not spare you in his mirth, and at one point remarked that the look on your face when the King scorned you in the library made him almost die laughing. I quivered with indignation, my emotion perhaps unsteadied by the strong ale that filled me to the brim; but I managed to control myself, and my outburst went unnoticed.

“Midnight sounded, the revels broke up, and the jester staggered back to his rooms, where he cast off his motley and his mail and went to bed, no sooner there than snoring. A little before dawn, however, he was awakened by a strange sensation, a scurrying underneath him like that of snakes, or rats. Startled, he attempted to rise, but the bed held him fast; and then the entire mattress came alive, all its feathers rustling with mischievous energy until they broke free and burst through the sheets, tickling the poor zany’s naked skin without mercy in every place imaginable and unmentionable.

“The bed continues to confine the fool, whose incessant laughter, now quite mirthless, gives him no chance to eat or drink or perform any other necessary action. At present he can barely speak, which some consider a blessing; but you can well imagine that matters are becoming urgent, not to mention by now somewhat noisome.

“The King is sifting the court for the perpetrator, and I have been called upon to put many to the question, which is certainly diverting in its way; but whoever conceived the spell seems disinclined to end it, and I am oddly unable to discover the wrongdoer. His Majesty asked me if you might be involved, and I rather curtly assured him to the contrary.

“Still…it could it be, Countess, that you have more magic within you than you’ve any idea, and that a simple word of yours might deliver the jester from his torment. I will be glad to discuss this possibility with you as soon as you wish—preferably in your manse’s library, which I hear is a very fine one.

“I hope you have kept well, Countess, and have now and again remembered kindly

“Your constant friend,

Cyril Dagleish Dacier,

Thaumaturge in Ordinary.

P.S.: You might at this time consider turning around and addressing a few words to the vase on your desk, which has taken the liberty of replacing its fading roses with fresh orchids.”


End


Visit the author's website at  carolynkephart.com for 
first chapters of her novels, reviews, and more.


Carolyn Kephart's publications:

Wysard  and  Lord Brother, Parts One and Two of the Ryel Saga duology, acclaimed  epic fantasy (available at Amazon)

The Ryel Saga: A Tale of Love and Magic, combining the duology in a single volume (available at Amazon)

Queen of Time, contemporary magic realism that takes the Faust legend in new  directions (available at Amazon)

At the Core of the Happy Apple: A Mystery Solved, an essay on the inner workings  of the popular 1970s Fisher Price wobble toy  (available at Amazon)

PenTangle: Five Pointed Fables, a collection of short stories previously published in  ezines (available at Smashwords and its associate vendors)









Short Fiction: EVERAFTER ACRES

One of my early short stories, first published in Luna Station Quarterly. 
Information about my other writing can be found here as well as at the bottom of the page. 
Happy reading! 

Everafter Acres


Happily ever after isn't always perfect, 
but dark knights can be illuminating.


Sir Peregrin was always good-humored, and even dour mornings with grudging dawns made him cheery. It was very trying.

As always, much too shortly after daybreak he strode to the window, flung aside the draperies, threw wide the casement and leaned out beaming as he drew a deep breath, thoroughly satisfied. “Zounds, verily ‘tis caliginous this day. Right lowering. What think you, my heart’s divinity?”

Lady Calantha stifled a groan as she sat up in the great four-poster bed, blearily regarded the gray world outside the diamond-patterned panes, and replied curtly in the vernacular.

For heaven’s sake, Grin, do close that.”

Her lord lapsed into the vernacular as well, but left the window open as he reveled in the view, blithely oblivious to his lady’s tone. “Dirtiest weather we’ve had for a while. Think I'll take a gallop around the north woods to check for griffins―they love this sort of murk. Wear that purple velvet thing of yours, won't you, m'dear?”

Calantha tried not to whimper as she huddled in the covers. “I’d really rather not ride all the way to the north woods on a day like this. And besides, my purple gown doesn't fit just now.” It hadn't fit for ages, but she wasn't about to let her lord know.

Peregrin laughed in his tryingly hearty way. “Blame the sweet wine and suckling pig at everyone’s feasts, m'dear. A good stirring rescue will give you some exercise."

Calantha shuddered as much at the notion of yet another rescue as she did at the misty chill invading the chamber, and somehow managed not to give the Reply Querulous, which would have reminded her lord that his armor had very recently been altered with roomy gussets to accommodate his expanding paunch. Instead, she regarded the back of Peregrin’s head, remembering the golden mane that had fallen just past his broad shoulders in days gone by. Now the shoulders stooped, and what little hair he had left was becoming as gray as…well, as her own. “Suckling pig’s such a fad lately. And feasting’s getting as tiresome as…” She almost said ‘tournaments,’ but managed to stop herself in time.

Peregrin didn’t notice. “Speaking of feasts, that reminds me―it’s our turn to give the next one.”

Wonderful.” Resignedly Calantha wrapped a shawl over her shift and joined her lord at the window, shutting the casement with a jerk that rattled the glass. With no enthusiasm she surveyed the view of bumpy little hills each with its own little castle, each castle neatly framed by the window’s diamond panes. Her listless gaze narrowed on one in the near distance, that was very showy in a sinister way, with attenuated towers pointed sharp as arrows, and black swans in its moat. “Sir Bors' accursed mastiff bayed me awake all night.”

Probably smelled a troll lurking around the walls. They’re pungent.” Peregrin seemed to muse, an unusual thing for him. “He’s a good fellow, is Bors. Bit of a standoffish loner, but he’ll never let you down in a fight.””

Calantha noted the pennons on the black castle’s towers―black pennons, each emblazoned with a red heart stuck full of arrows, all of them now hanging limply in the drizzle, to her admittedly snide satisfaction. “And he’s sworn champion to the fairest maiden in the land…who certainly puts him through his paces.”

Peregrin chuckled. “Can’t say I envy Bors his lot. I’ve heard Blanchefleur needs to be rescued at least three times a day or there’s no putting up with her. Speaking of which, we should get ready, don’t you think?”

Calantha sighed. “Grin, this is hardly the ideal weather for a lady of my years to be tied to a tree and fought over. Besides, you'll only rust your armor and catch a cold."

Her lord sighed too, but very briefly. “You never want to be rescued these days.” He suddenly looked perplexed, and contrite. “Am I doing anything wrong, my love? Would you like more excitement when it’s going on? More activity?”

No, no.” Calantha felt a twinge of guilt. “Your rescues are always perfect. I mean that.”

He actually believed her. “Good!” His still-brawny arm half-wrapped Calantha’s waist, giving rather too firm a squeeze. “Perhaps more girth there than in days of yore, but what of it? You’ll always be my queen. If you don't feel like being rescued, maybe you should write one of those ballad things, or get out your harp. You never play your harp anymore."

Calantha disliked her lord's fingers assessing her superfluity, and moved away. “I’m not in the mood, Grin. That accursed dog's barking again. Perhaps I'll take up archery."

Ah well, I'll ask Ubald and Knute to join me for a bit of hunting. Three knights against a griffin is decent odds.” Peregrin brightened, and beamed. “I'll bring you back its head. What do you say to that?”

Calantha suppressed a wince. “I never know what to do with griffin heads. They just sit around until I have to throw them out.” Realizing what she’d said, she felt a stab of regret. “I’m sorry, Grin. I don’t know what’s wrong with me lately.”

Peregrin had indeed looked disappointed, but as usual only momentarily. “You just need a visit to the wise woman, m’love. She'll give you a potion, or a philtre, or something that'll set you right.”

It took all of Calantha’s self-control to keep her expression sweet, and she only partially succeeded. “Elspeth is annoying lately, and won’t mind her manners. And I never like riding about in the woods. There’s always a monstrosity lurking.”

Well, but one of the lads will show up to save you. That you can count on.”

Oh, yes. That I can.”

Oblivious to his lady’s tired tone, Peregrin kissed her with his usual blend of gallantry and relish, and hastened off to set about his day. That most of his days were exactly the same never seemed to bother him.

Sir Bors' dog howled anew, making Calantha yearningly remember the lake-moated keep she had called home for so many contented years before it became too big to look after, and too isolated, and too damp. The attractions of Everafter Acres were, at the outset, obvious: new construction with modern conveniences, less dust-gathering square footage, no annoying apparitions, and safe walls that made private armies unnecessary. All of their friends had moved there. It was only later, as more years passed, that Calantha realized that castles were never meant to be built so close together, and these weren't very well made compared to the strongholds of yore. Moreover, far too many of them were garishly designed, with overdone crockets and crenellations and innumerable ornamental gargoyles.

But the real problem was that Everafter didn't include much Happily.

Later in the morning Calantha gifted her purple velvet to her maid, donned a new and blessedly roomy green replacement, pinned on a wimple, and gave order to have her palfrey brought round.Tying a bag to the saddle-horn, she set off to visit the wise woman.

As she rode through the woods that led to Dame Elspeth's cottage, Calantha kept a sharp eye on the the world around her. Stepping outside Everafter’s walls always meant adventure in all its life-threatening variety. A flash of golden light amid the mists accompanied by a slightly bawdy bit of song only put Calantha more on her guard.

In another moment Lady Blanchefleur rounded a bend, caroling the latest love-ditty as she cantered up on her smart little palfrey of dappled grey with trailing pastel ribbons in its mane. Calantha’s apprehension vanished, but her gloom darkened. Only an extreme effort produced the requisite appearance of glad welcome.

The two ladies reined in and greeted one another courteously in approved Everafter fashion, bending from the saddle to almost-kiss one another’s cheek, then inquiring as to the state of each other’s health with the requisite thees, thous, and forsooths, then lauding the beauty of the not especially praiseworthy day as a matter of form. Those prerequisites done, Blanchefleur dropped into the vernacular with evident relief.

There’s a troll lurking about,” she said, indicating the thickest part of the woods with a delicate diamonded forefinger. “Just thought I’d warn you.”

Thanks awfully,” Calantha replied. “I’ll keep an eye out.”

You’re on your way to Elspeth, I daresay. I just left her. That hag’s prices are absolutely criminal, but still…” Blanchefleur held up a little vial. “It'll keep the milk and roses in my hue or my money back. Care to try a drop? That shade of green is such a trying color, even for youthful years. Not to mention that wimples look so nunnish.”

Elspeth’s potions, Calantha had learned from long experience, were at their best insipid, and at their worst pernicious―rather like Blanchefleur. Declining with thanks a little strained, Calantha would have changed the subject, but Blanche beat her to it.

You’re giving the next feast, aren’t you? I hope you’ll have suckling pig. I adore it.”

As Blanche launched into a rapturous litany of favorite dishes, Calantha inwardly bristled. It was bad enough that Blanche considered herself invited as a matter of course, but even worse that since she was single, with little more than a tower for a dwelling, she never had to endure the bother of providing food, drink, and minstrelsy for several score lords and ladies exceedingly fond of good cheer. As if that weren’t enough, Blanche gloried in the type of figure that always stayed a damsel’s no matter how much she ate, and hair that made gold seem detritus. Her blinding tresses fell in silken profusion to a waist almost impossibly slender, set off by a gown of watchet samite so perfectly fitting and obviously costly that it took one’s breath away. Although she was of fully the same years as Calantha, she was as beautiful as an angel in a missal.

I’m thinking of bringing hennins back in style,” she was saying.

Calantha, who had been too rapt with her own thoughts to pay much attention to whatever Blanche was saying, started at the mention of that hideous headgear, and reflected that Blanchefleur would look divinely fair even with her glorious locks scraped under a cone. The thought was infuriating. “It's quite a chilly day,” she all but snapped. “I fear you'll catch cold in that gown, my dear, although it is a shame to veil so faultless a bosom.”

Blanchefleur glanced down with complacent admiration at her snowy decollete, which was extreme almost to indecency. “Oh, I never feel the weather; no worries.” Contemplation of her temptingly rippable bodice seemed to inspire a change of thought. “By the way, there’s a new romance going the rounds. I’m next in line to read it, and you can have it after me if you like.”

There was always a love-manuscript written by some bard or other being passed about among the Everafter ladies. The stories could be relied upon to provide lubricious and horrific thrills right up to the inevitable happy ending, and were decorated with illuminations that spared the imagination any undue effort. By the time the book reached the last lady’s hands, it could be counted upon to be dog-eared, underlined, margin-scrawled and creatively stained, with most of the illustrations missing. Blanche was suspected to be a frequent offender in that regard.

Before Calantha could refuse her friend’s offer with the observation that romances were tedious and predictable and she hoped to never read another again in her life, Blanchefleur’s cerulean orbs gazed past her and became animated for the first time since the mention of food. “Why, there’s Bors!” And dealing Calantha a perfunctory wave of farewell, she dug an exquisitely spurred heel into her palfrey’s side, sending the horse prancing away into the deep woods, exactly in the opposite direction of the dark-armored knight just coming into sight down the path.

Calantha distinctly heard the knight grumble an oath and heave a resigned sigh, waiting a minute or so to give Blanche a good start before urging his war-horse into a gallop. As he thundered past Calantha he bowed from the saddle, and his eyes met hers an instant before giving a significant upward roll.

Having no time to react to Sir Bors’ atypical show of emotion, Calantha watched him crash through the woods until he was lost to sight. It was well known, or at least generally supposed, that Bors and Blanchefleur were paramours. Both were unmarried, which was far from usual in Everafter Acres, and although Blanche often alluded to her maiden status, people noticed that she always made herself scarce during unicorn sightings.

Moodily Calantha continued her ride, and soon reached the crazy little cottage that was Elspeth’s abode. As always, smoke spiraled from the crooked chimney of the thatched roof, and rumpled chickens scratched about the open door, from which issued a mildly revolting blend of odors and the high faint whine of senile crooning.

Lifting her skirts to clear it from the bare bird-fouled dirt of the cottage’s yard, Calantha lowered her head to enter the cramped little doorway, and greeted Elspeth with the civility due a seeress, making sure to keep her skirts elevated since the cottage floor was no cleaner than the trampled earth outside.

The blear-eyed crone barely looked up from the mess she was stirring at the hob of the hearth. “Bring me anything?”

The bag around the palfrey’s saddle-horn held not only a flask of wine, but rich delicacies. Elspeth had a sweet tooth―it was one of the few in her head―and she at once began munching marzipan between sips of malmsey. By now used to such wordless intervals interrupted only by stifled gulps and belches, Calantha examined the arcane oddments and pickled horrors on the room’s tables and shelves.

Elspeth wiped her mouth on the back of her veiny mottled hand and took a breather. “That Blanchefleur baggage was just here, craving a new potion for that pretty phiz of hers. Will ye be wanting the same, m’lady? I’ll have to brew it stronger and charge more, I warn ye.”

Calantha flinched. “No, thanks.”

A dye then, to get the gray out of your hair? You’d not need to hide it under a rag, then.”

Calantha pretended to ignore this allusion both to her faded tresses and her spotless, intricately-pleated headdress of finest lawn. “I’m past those sorts of things, Elspeth.” She set down the gnarled bit of dried mushroom, or perhaps mummy, that she’d been idly scrutinizing. “I just want something to…” She hesitated. To what? Give her the zest of her young days? Alleviate the tedium? Allow her to just…vanish? Tears began to gather in her eyes, and her sinuses became troublesome.

Elspeth regarded her with a piercing squint. “So. In the doleful dumps again, are we?”

Calantha sniffled agreement.

Life seems a bit tiresome, eh?”

More than a bit.” Calantha looked down at her waistline with renewed dismay. “I used to be as lissom as Blanchefleur.”

Lissomer. I remember.”

I thought I’d be young forever. How’d this happen, Elspeth?”

People forgot about you.”

That stung. “Clearly they didn’t forget about Blanche.”

That’s because she stayed single. It kept her interestin’. Well, there’s always drink to keep your wits addled and happy. If not, I’ve got this herb…”

No.” Calantha wiped her eyes with her flowing sleeve. “Maybe I’ll just wander into the woods and let a griffin eat me.”

Elspeth snorted at her client’s sullen tone, and helped herself to more of the rare malmsey with irritating liberality. “Go see how far it gets you.”

At those words, Calantha felt a strange jolt that took her away from herself a moment. “What?”

You heard me. I said try it.”

You want me to be eaten by a griffin?”

Can’t say as I care, but it won’t happen no matter how hard you try.” As Calantha stood astounded, Elspeth shook the marzipan-crumbs from her apron, which were instantly intercepted by some of the chickens. “And don’t stare so gormless. Do you honestly think being a wise woman is any fun around here?”

Calantha ignored the question. “Are you saying the monsters aren’t…real?”

Elspeth shrugged. “Oh, they’re real enough. But they won’t harm you. They can’t. They’re stocked like carp in a pond, and have about as much bite to ‘em.”

Calantha remembered the loud and violent but consistently harmless griffins of the north woods, and contrasted them with those of her long-past days as a damsel. The latter had been absolutely, universally lethal. In comparison, the former were little more deadly than Elspeth’s chickens. Her heart sank. “You always knew this?”

Yep.”

Who…stocks them?”

The management, I s’pose. Does it matter?”

But what made you tell me?” Calantha put a sharp emphasis on the last word.

Because no one ever complains, ‘cept for you. Reckon I got tired of it.”

You’re lying about the monsters, you…you hag.”

Elspeth only cackled. “Go back out to the woods and try to get yourself killed. Try your hardest. If you live, you owe me.”

For what?”

You’ll see.” Stretching in a gaping yawn, Elspeth dropped back in her frowsy cushioned chair, raising a faint cloud of dust. “Malmsey always makes me nappish.” In another moment she was snoring.

There was no point in waking her. Calantha stared down at the cryptic hag’s ravined wrinkles, sickle nose, and lipless mouth. Had Elspeth ever been young? Ever been lovely? No amount of imagination could envision her as other than she was. She had always been a part of Everafter, always the way she looked now, except at the present moment she was even uglier than usual.

Liar,” Calantha whispered. Resisting the urge to drop a nearby black beetle into the crone’s now wide-open snaggly jowls fully as revolting as an orc’s, she left the house, scattering chickens with the skirts of her gown as she made for her horse.

Riding homeward, Calantha thought with small joy of her maid now probably glorying in her mistress’ purple velvet; of how Blanchefleur’s eyes had gleamed avidly at the sight of Sir Bors; of her own lord Peregrin, and how handsome he had once been, and how delightful life had once been, full of love and peril. What was left, now that youth and beauty had fled? If the knights had nothing to conquer, and the ladies had no need to be rescued…what then? What would fill up the endless hours between now and forever, if nothing meant anything?

Dismally pensive, she let her mare find its way back to the castle, which it soon failed to do. After a time Calantha halted, looking around her. She was in the depths of a forest primeval, where rags of mist wraithed among the huge trunks and caught in the massive low-hanging boughs like cobwebs. No birds sang, but winds sighed through the boughs like resentful ghosts. It was the kind of place where something dreadful could occur at any instant.

Reliably, it did. A horrific creature slithered out of a narrow cave with a sinister rattling of scales, coiled itself on the path, reared its ghastly head, and showed all its teeth, of which it had several rows, in a ravenous grin.

Calantha’s horse promptly threw her, and galloped away. The monster seemed thrilled, and swayed its serpentine neck as its slit shimmering eyes stared its prey up and down.

Palfreys weren’t much larger than ponies, and the fall had been soft, onto a bank of moss. As Calantha picked herself up, her first instinct was to scream, but she remembered Elspeth’s revelation. Now would be the time to test it. Accordingly she stood her ground, trying not to tremble.

The wyrm―it was a wyrm―threw back its head, opened its maw to the maximum, and shrieked. The noise was truly blood-curdling, and normally Calantha would have screamed in her turn, running away as fast as her flowing skirts would allow. But she remembered what Elspeth had told her. Drawing a deep breath, she turned her back on the horror, closed her eyes and stood perfectly still, speaking between clenched teeth.

Go ahead. I dare you.”

She waited, her heart battering, for foul hot breath, then fleshy slime-tongued damp enveloping her head, and a neck-severing crunch. An interval of a dozen or so seconds elapsed, every one of them a drop of boiling oil, until Calantha heard the wyrm make a noise that sounded exactly like a confused and petulant whine before giving her a hard headbutt in the back. Furious, Calantha spun around and smacked its face, or rather the one spot that wasn’t either teeth, eye, or snout.

The wyrm’s glittering eyes blinked in what could only be amazement, and its spiny crest wilted as it turned about and slithered back to its den in a manner clearly nonplussed, without a backward glance.

Calantha looked on absolutely astounded, and then uttered an oath that no lady would use under any circumstances.

My sentiments more or less precisely.”

Turning toward that dry vernacular uttered not a stone's throw away, Calantha stared at the last person she expected to see. “Sir Bors, what are you doing here?”

The dark knight shrugged with a slight creaking of half-armor. “Thought you might need rescuing. Quite apparently you don’t.”

As always, Bors looked magnificent with an arresting touch of the sinister. His broad shoulders showed no signs of even beginning to bow, just as his waist had stayed as slim as a squire’s. His hair was long, still abundant, and raven, framing his swarthy hard features in an arresting way. He was so perfect that Calantha just stared at him for some moments, and of course he let her; and she couldn’t help but think, even in her jangled mental state, that dark knights seemed to have all the luck.

How long have you been watching?” she finally asked.

Just arrived,” Bors said. “Thought I heard a lady shrieking, but it turned out to be the wyrm.”

Shouldn’t you be rescuing Blanchefleur?”

Did that half an hour ago, from a troll.”

And was it terribly exciting?”

Bors' mouth quirked. “Not too.”

I believe you. It looks as if it didn’t put up much of a fight.”

You knew it wouldn’t.” He hesitated. “How’d you find out?”

Elspeth.” Calantha hesitated, too. “How'd you find out?””

I just felt it. Had for a long time.”

A long deep silence fell, and it was a relief when Bors looked away and spoke again. “Shall we be off? Nag’s getting restive.”

Bors’ horse was nearby, pawing the ground and snorting. As they approached the animal, Calantha noted a charming wreath of autumn leaves around its saddlebow.

How lovely. A gift from Blanchefleur?”

Bors shook his head in his moody way. “I made it for her to wear, but she didn’t want it. Said something about bugs and scratchiness and it not being her colors.”

Calantha took the wreath in her hands. Around a circlet of ivy, thickly-clustered leaves of red and orange and gold seemed to glow with inner fire in the dim light of the deep woods. The wreath was very skilfully wrought, and Calantha tried to imagine Bors creating it, selecting just the right mixture of colors and shapes set off so well by the vine’s deep green, his tough fingers bending the ivy with just enough force, careful not to break it. “Blanchefleur indeed seems best suited to roses and lilies,” she said, as graciously as possible; but she suddenly disliked that lady more than ever. “Here.” And she handed the circlet back.

I don’t want the thing. Keep it if you like.”

Oh, but I couldn’t…”

Bah.” Bors plucked the wreath from her hands, and in another moment Calantha was wearing it over her wimple.

Hold still,” Bors said, settling the circlet with care upon the fine white linen, then critically adjusting the leaves before moving back to inspect his work. “Hm. Very fine. You look like a prophetess.”

Calantha had never before received so much of Bors’ attention, and hardly knew what to do with it. “Too bad I don’t have a mirror.”

Here’s one,” Bors said, tapping his gleaming steel breastplate.

Calantha contemplated her reflection only a little distorted by the metal’s curve. “Bors, I can’t tell Peregrin about…what happened. It would kill him.”

Actually, it wouldn’t, which is worse.”

That thought made Calantha flinch within. “He really is perfect.”

Bors nodded. “A bit over-jovial perhaps, but no harm done.”

He’d probably think me very odd-looking just now.” Calantha watched the image in the breastplate give a wry reminiscent smile. “Wreaths are meant to be worn over tresses flowing loose, by slim young damsels. Not by―”

Oh, nonsense.” Bors frowned, then. “Blanche really should put her hair up.”

Now that you mention it, she’s thinking of bringing hennins back into style.”

Bors growled an underbreath imprecation against that conical mode, and reached for his horse’s halter. “How would you like to ride? Withers, crupper, or led?”

Calantha did a swift mental rejection of all three. “I’d rather we both walk.”

Hm. That’s different. Do you have the shoes for it?”

Flat and comfy. And you?”

The same. Well, let’s be off.”

It turned out to be a very enjoyable stroll, despite the dank gloom of the woods. Calantha had feared she and Bors would have little in common, but such wasn’t the case at all. Unlike any other knight Calantha had ever known, Bors wasn’t his own favorite subject of conversation, and the talk didn’t once stray to the good old days, which were usually just about the only topic in Everafter. No monstrosity whatsoever appeared to make itself troublesome, although now and then Calantha noticed an ogre stealing sheepishly behind a rock, or a chimera scuttling away abashed, or a spectre discreetly dissipating once sighted. Clearly word had gotten around.

The horse soon wandered off, taking its way back to Everafter. Relaxed in the quiet, Calantha and Bors stopped often to examine the mushrooms growing on fallen trunks and in shaded earth, and together they admired the symmetry of the delicate gills, and tried to give names to the indeterminate colors. They halted at a bend of a stream and watched a bullfrog swelling its croak, and further on gazed up at a great owl nearby on a branch staring back at them with its huge yellow eyes, and they both made hooting noises to get it to hoot back, which it did. At one point in their progress Bors tapped Calantha’s arm, alerting her to a little troop of deer crossing the path. And the more they walked together, and the more they saw and enjoyed, the more the sun came out, until all the leaves on the trees gleamed bright against the deep blue sky.

This is the first time I’ve ever really enjoyed the woods,” Calantha said as they passed through an especially radiant grove. “I was always too busy worrying about being attacked, or carried off, or both.”

I never really minded for a long time,” Bors replied. “It kept me busy. But now…”

Rounding an outcropping of rock, they found themselves looking out over the little castled hills of the community, and they sighed at the same time. At that very instant Bors’ mastiff began baying.

What a barker that beast is,” the dark knight said. “I never noticed before.”

Calantha stared. “Surely you jest. He’s the terror of the neighborhood.”

I’ll feed him to the manticore. How does that sound?”

You know the manticore won’t touch him.”

I suppose not. Well, I’ll find a muzzle.” Bors finally broke a longish silence. “Odd, life with no monsters.”

Good riddance.” Calantha gazed from one predictable set of towers to another. “It’s my turn to give the next feast. Everyone will expect suckling pig. Such a bother.”

I’ll show up uninvited, and we can dance.”

You’re always invited everywhere, but you never show up. And I didn’t know you danced.”

I do, and not sedately. Expect to be whirled.”

No easy task, I warn you.”

Bah. They don’t call me redoubtable for nothing.”

People will be shocked.”

Good.” Bors’ thoughts seemed to stray elsewhere. “I like mushrooms.”

With suckling pig?”

No, no. Those ones in the woods. I think I’ll try to draw them.”

I didn’t know you could draw.”

I can, rather tolerably. But monsters were never very inspiring.”Calantha felt the warmth of the bright leaves wreathing her brow. “I might ask you to illustrate the epic I’m planning to write. The notion just occurred to me as we were walking.”

Bors’ eyes widened a fraction. “Will it be about mushrooms?”

Well, they’ll figure in the plot.”

As heroes, or villains?”

Calantha laughed, and realized it’d been quite a long time since she’d really and truly done so. As they started on the little path through the field to Everafter’s gate, she couldn’t help a question of her own.

Speaking of drawing…why your sword?”

Bors swung his weapon’s gleaming blade in a martial salute. “For the look of the thing, as we make our entrance. Everyone will think I rescued you.”

They’ll be right. Which reminds me―I owe Elspeth a keg of malmsey.”

Bors smiled, something he seldom did; it was always a bit startling. “I can’t imagine mushrooms ever getting dull, can you?”

Calantha took his offered arm. “Even if they do, there’s always owls.”

Excellent.”

And they lived…well, you know.



End


Visit the author's website at  carolynkephart.com for first 
chapters of her novels, reviews, and more.


Carolyn Kephart's publications:

Wysard  and  Lord Brother, Parts One and Two of the Ryel Saga duology, acclaimed  epic fantasy (available at Amazon)
The Ryel Saga: A Tale of Love and Magic, combining the duology in a single volume (available at Amazon)
Queen of Time, contemporary magic realism that takes the Faust legend in new  directions (available at Amazon)
At the Core of the Happy Apple: A Mystery Solved, an essay on the inner workings  of the popular 1970s Fisher Price wobble toy  (available at Amazon)
PenTangle: Five Pointed Fables, a collection of short stories previously published in  ezines (available at Smashwords and its associate vendors)