Rumor of Wings

by Alter S. Reiss

When the shore-men of the Liassen dockyards saw the blinded ship by the first gray light of dawn, they turned their eyes away, and put their backs to their work. When sailors saw that ship, the deep gouges and angry red paint where its eyes ought to be struck them harder. They blanched as they turned away, or they walked back from the docks, spitting twice over each shoulder. One old veteran, deep lines in his face from wind and spray, fell to his knees, and pledged two fine bullocks to the sea, should he survive his next voyage.

There were few sailors who believed that a ship’s eyes would see it through storm and past reefs, but there were fewer who would be
willing to sign aboard a ship whose eyes had been put out, and with red paint, no less. That was the way of sailors–they might have no faith in charms and good omens, but they had infinite belief in curses and foul omens. Whoever owned the ship with the blinded eyes would get no crew at all, even after the eyes were repainted, without some showy exorcism: A half dozen priests in heavy robes, with flute and cymbal, or perhaps some mountain holy man, or witch, or tamed demon.

It was all more or less as Alaneth had hoped, but she could not feel any great satisfaction as a handful of the shore-men were coaxed
aboard by one of the port officers, and set to lowering a length of sailcloth over the ship’s prow, to cover those blinded eyes, so that the other operations of Liassen’s harbor would not be so greatly affected. She was close, but she had been close before. It was too much to believe that this time her leads would prove genuine, that what she sought would not slip through her fingers again.

This week we’re back with a special episode collecting the winners of our recent flash fiction contest! A huge congratulations to our winners – we’re looking forward to hearing more stories from them!

3rd Prize:
“Georgina and the Basilisk,” by Leslianne Wilder
Read by LaShawn Wanak

Georgina has not moved the newspapers in years, only let them pile one on top of the other, showing assassinations and exploding towers, skinny white girls with fake breasts- probably singers or actresses, wars in countries she doesn’t know. She’s too old to bother learning names or places. Twice a day, the woman who is not a real nurse comes to Georgina’s house to empty Georgina’s catheter bag and paw through Georgina’s silverware. The non-nurse barely speaks English. She insists she’s tidying, but Georgina knows she’s picking for cash, jewelry, heirlooms. The agency won’t send someone different; they use words like “false reports” and threaten not to send anyone at all. When the non- nurse leaves, Georgina sits alone in the stale heat of the old house with the basilisk.

2nd Prize:
“The Bear,” by Taven Moore
Read by Christiana Ellis

“I haven’t seen the bear in months,” I lie.

My lips curve into the smile of a sane woman. A smile practiced in a mirror late at night. White teeth against red lips. Just the right amount of crinkle at the edges of my eyes.

1st Prize:
“Wuffle,” by Chantal Beaulne
Read by Nathaniel Lee

The wizard entered the barber shoppe the way most did – with great effort, feet planted on either side of the doorframe, and assisted by the barber’s two beefy arms. Resisting their combined labour was the wizard’s beard. It clung to a lamppost outside, whining like a devildog sensing his oncoming castration.

Dragonslayer

by Nathaniel Lee

Handel, the barman, tucked a pair of half-pennies into the pouch at his waist and turned to regard the boy as he approached.  The young man had the look of a servant of some kind, though he wore no livery or sigil.  Clean and healthy, at least, if a bit old for squiring or apprenticeship.

“Yuh?” Handel said by way of greeting.

The boy blinked pale green eyes at him, the color of mown grass.  “My master, Sir Timor, requires lodging for the night.  He begs a small room and four stalls in the barn.”  With a clink, the boy set down a golden sovereign on the bar.  Handel tried not to choke; the coin was enough to rent every room in the ramshackle two-story building.

“He has a fair… a fair few horses, eh?”  Handel’s voice was unsteady, but his hands made the coin disappear with barely a whisper of motion.

The boy shrugged.  “Don’t get too excited.  You’ll probably need the extra coin for the repairs.”  He headed for the door again.  “I’ll get him settled, and then I’ll come back for his meal.  Get some vegetables in it; I’m sick to death of meat.”

“Wait!” Handel had accommodated a fair few Knights and would-be Lords in his day, and this was not going according to the pattern.  “He’s staying in the barn?”

“It’s an oath.  Very important.”

The October Witch

by Francesca Forrest

“Need a lift?” It’s a woman in a pickup truck, maybe Josh’s age, maybe some years older, from the lines on her face. She’s probably been driving this truck since she was fifteen and hasn’t ever left these mountains.

“I’d appreciate it. Just back to the gas station would be great.”

The woman shakes her head. “It’ll be closed by the time we get there. My husband can drop you back in town tomorrow morning—assuming he gets back home tonight; otherwise I will. I’m Audra.” She offers a hand.

“I’m Josh. Pleased to meet you. And thanks.” He climbs in the truck. Audra tells him she works in town at the supermarket and that her husband is a lineman who’s been busy these past two days, restoring power after that amazing thunderstorm (the one that washed out the road where Josh’s car now sits). When she hears that Josh is in a master’s program, studying folklore, she grins.

“Then you must’ve heard about the October witch. I’m surprised you got in the truck with me.”

“October witch? No, I think I missed that one,” says Josh, returning the grin, wondering whether Audra’s spinning a line or if this is a real folktale he’s about to hear. “I guess she comes out on Halloween? And maybe, what, grabs drivers off the road?”

Right Turns

by Tim Pratt

We talked, in our tiny apartment, with the kitchen so small we couldn’t even pass each other on the way to the refrigerator, with our pipes that howled and clanked when we tried to turn on the hot water. I’d just gotten a promotion, and though it meant less teaching and more administrative work, there was also more money coming in. The housing market was good, for buyers. There were a lot of great places to choose from, but none we liked more than the labyrinth house.

“I don’t see the downside,” my husband said, leaning against me companionably in bed. “Really, the whole thing is just more space, square footage we’re not even paying for. The labyrinth could be extra storage, even.”

“What if there are bugs? Rats?”

“Then we brick up the entrance. Looks like it’s been done before, so we can do it again.”

We bought the house. We moved in. We didn’t go into the basement often, just to do laundry, and we didn’t go into the labyrinth at all. Not at first.

I’m not sure when my husband started his explorations. I didn’t find out for a while.

There are a lot of things from those first months I don’t remember.

The Devil and Tom Walker

by Washington Irving

It was late in the dusk of evening that Tom Walker reached the old fort, and he paused there for a while to rest himself. Any one but he would have felt unwilling to linger in this lonely melancholy place, for the common people had a bad opinion of it from the stories handed down from the time of the Indian wars; when it was asserted that the savages held incantations here and made sacrifices to the evil spirit. Tom Walker, however, was not a man to be troubled with any fears of the kind.

He reposed himself for some time on the trunk of a fallen hemlock, listening to the boding cry of the tree toad, and delving with his walking staff into a mound of black mould at his feet. As he turned up the soil unconsciously, his staff struck against something hard. He raked it out of the vegetable mould, and lo! a cloven skull with an Indian tomahawk buried deep in it, lay before him. The rust on the weapon showed the time that had elapsed since this death blow had been given. It was a dreary memento of the fierce struggle that had taken place in this last foothold of the Indian warriors.

“Humph!” said Tom Walker, as he gave the skull a kick to shake the dirt from it.

“Let that skull alone!” said a gruff voice.

Tom lifted up his eyes and beheld a great black man, seated directly opposite him on the stump of a tree. He was exceedingly surprised, having neither seen nor heard any one approach, and he was still more perplexed on observing, as well as the gathering gloom would permit, that the stranger was neither negro nor Indian. It is true, he was dressed in a rude, half Indian garb, and had a red belt or sash swathed round his body, but his face was neither black nor copper colour, but swarthy and dingy and begrimed with soot, as if he had been accustomed to toil among fires and forges. He had a shock of coarse black hair, that stood out from his head in all directions; and bore an axe on his shoulder.

He scowled for a moment at Tom with a pair of great red eyes.

Thorns

by Martha Wells

We reached the landing above the Hall.  Below, Electra’s husband, Mr. John Dearing, was personally receiving a guest, a young man in the act of handing his greatcoat to the butler.

There were no guests expected, and just before the dinner hour is not considered an appropriate time for casual calls, yet Dearing was greeting this presumptuous fellow as a prodigal son.

He was a striking figure. (The guest, I mean.  Dearing is a stout bewhiskered muskrat of a man, a fit mate for Electra.)  Blond curls, broad shoulders, a chiseled profile.  I felt a feather of unease travel down my spine; old instincts rousing, perhaps.  His garments, though somewhat the worse for travel at this rainy time of year, were of fashionable cut and fine cloth.

Frowning, Electra caught the attention of one of the footmen stationed at the bottom of the stairs, and called him up to her to ask, “Why, William, whoever is that?”

“Madame, they say it’s a foreign Duke, the son of the King of Armantia.”

“I see,” Electra dismissed the man and looked to me, her mild dove eyes vaguely troubled.  “Oh, dear.  A prince.”

The Phoenix on the Sword, featuring Conan the Barbarian

by Robert E. Howard

The room was large and ornate, with rich tapestries on the polished-panelled walls, deep rugs on the ivory floor, and with the lofty ceiling adorned with intricate carvings and silver scrollwork. Behind an ivory, gold-inlaid writing-table sat a man whose broad shoulders and sun-browned skin seemed out of place among those luxuriant surroundings. He seemed more a part of the sun and winds and high places of the outlands. His slightest movement spoke of steel-spring muscles knit to a keen brain with the co-ordination of a born fighting-man. There was nothing deliberate or measured about his actions. Either he was perfectly at rest—still as a bronze statue—or else he was in motion, not with the jerky quickness of over-tense nerves, but with a cat-like speed that blurred the sight which tried to follow him.

His garments were of rich fabric, but simply made. He wore no ring or ornaments, and his square-cut black mane was confined merely by a cloth-of-silver band about his head.

Now he laid down the golden stylus with which he had been laboriously scrawling on waxed papyrus, rested his chin on his fist, and fixed his smoldering blue eyes enviously on the man who stood before him. This person was occupied in his own affairs at the moment, for he was taking up the laces of his gold-chased armor, and abstractedly whistling—a rather unconventional performance, considering that he was in the presence of a king.

“Prospero,” said the man at the table, “these matters of statecraft weary me as all the fighting I have done never did.”

“All part of the game, Conan,” answered the dark-eyed Poitainian. “You are king—you must play the part.”