Tag: short

Flash Pulp 102 – The Murder Plague: Harm's Return, Part 3 of 3

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode one hundred and two.

Flash Pulp

Tonight we present The Murder Plague: Harm’s Return Part 3 of 3
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp102.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)
(Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by Tom Vowler’s new collection “The Method and Other Stories”.

Sure, sacrificing one of your kidneys to keep a loved one alive would be a touching Christmas gift, but wouldn’t this award-winning selection of short tales just be easier?

Find it on Amazon, or find links to special editions and more at http://oldenoughnovel.blogspot.com/

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Harm has a discussion regarding the madness that seems to have descended upon his hometown of Mass Acres; a discussion which leads to further unpleasant realizations.

 

Flash Pulp 102 – The Murder Plague: Harm’s Return Part 3 of 3

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

It’s a rough go to take in the death of three people you knew, much less in the space of fifteen minutes. The sight of a familiar face, especially one that could still intake breath and feasibly even provide some explanation as to what had brought on such murderous intention in Catarina and the Hernandez family, left me considerably more eager for the company of the ivory-haired Doctor Henley than I’d ever been previously.

I did my best to pull myself together, then trotted across the road to his doorstep.

He let me in, then promptly returned to his viewing post.

The doctor’s house was orderly, his white faux-leather couch, and matching living room, spotless. Across the glass top of the coffee table lay a spread of outdated National Geographic magazines, and his beige walls were decorated with carefully generic landscape paintings.

It is hard to describe the feeling of suddenly finding myself in that apparently unchanged center of calm. It was something like stumbling from a war zone into a Zen Buddhist’s garden.

As I’ve mentioned, I knew few of my neighbours, but, in truth, Henley was likely the person in town I’d known the longest, as he was my own physician. Still, despite his intimacy with my intimates – or, likely, due to – I’d rarely spoken to him outside of the context of his office, which was also garnished with white faux-leather.

He began to fix me a drink as I entered, which I was too polite to refuse, having never told him about my need to refrain, and I shuffled aside a full-cover spread of the pyramids to make room to set it down.

It seemed little use dancing around the subject, so I began with the news I thought he’d find easiest to take.

“The Hernandezes are dead.”

He nodded, raising his own glass as if to salute them. After a moment he cocked an eyebrow at my abstention, then drank deeply. Finally, he spoke.

“It doesn’t surprise me much. I noticed your car’s been gone these last few days – you’ve been away?”

“Yes, I’ve been camping at the cabin.”

Since I’d been forced to depart my home, my mind had been grinding over the reason behind Catarina’s sudden betrayal. Part of my subconscious had become convinced that nuclear annihilation was imminent, and that she’d simply been conducting the ultimate work-related revenge fantasy. Certainly, if she had some concern about her pay, I’d have preferred she issue a complaint than attempt to lodge a chef’s knife in my ribcage. After finding the Hernandezes in their decomposing state, however, I was beginning to understand that some larger tragedy was in motion.

The doctor confirmed my fears.

“They named it Hitchcock’s disease,” said Henley, “although it’s really a virus. It lays dormant for a few weeks after infection, then begins to work at the survival instincts of the brain. The infected suffers paranoid delusions, and soon after believes the people around them are plotting their demise. They become convinced that the only way to prevent their own death is to murder the other fellow first.”

The doctor finished his glass, and, I must admit, I was mightily tempted to take up my own. He seemed to be watching me closely – I couldn’t blame him, considering.

“Is there no cure? No way to stop it?”

“Oh, yes,” he continued to speak as he left the room. “There is a vaccine. It’s a slow thing, and so civilized in a way. Usually the survivor tries to conceal their crime – the police of course being just another party attempting to do them in.”

He returned, setting a briefcase down on the the gathered faces of a group of aboriginals.

“It takes contact though – contact and opportunity. You can likely still safely order a pizza, if you don’t stop to chat with the delivery guy long enough to give him ideas. Even then, so long as you don’t provide him an opening, and don’t order from that location again, you can probably say your goodbyes and not be concerned.”

As he continued his narration, he pulled back his sleeves and extracted a pair of latex gloves from the interior of his case.

“Yet, if you’re brave enough to leave your window ajar in the evenings, you will hear the sound of shovel-work emanating from many darkened backyards.”

I asked him about the police.

“Well, there’s no television or Internet to deliver the news, but you don’t hear sirens too often either, so I suspect they’re all too busy murdering their families to deal with the public,” was his reply.

He held up a syringe and vial, then jabbed one into the other. Pulling out the painful end, he motioned for me to roll up my sleeve.

I did so.

He leaned over his working area, a thumb pressing at my forearm in search of a vein. He held the needle aloft.

I do not remember fully forming my reasoning, but my hand moved faster than my brain; I plucked the instrument from his fingers with the speed of a child snatching back its favourite toy from a sibling.

In a single motion, I righted the device and thrust it into his leg, fully depressing the plunger.

“I apologize,” I said immediately. “Consider it a game of trust, as I’ve never heard of a vaccine upon which you can overdose.”

He may have attempted to stand and reply, or he may have been attempting to retrieve some tool with which to beat me, whatever the case, he never made it upright. Instead he toppled sideways onto the milky expanse, and, after a moment, a line of bloody drool began to trickle from his gaping mouth.

I had learned the prime lesson of the murder plague: think, at all times, like a person who wishes to murder you.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm. The audio and text formats of Flash Pulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Flash Pulp 101 – The Murder Plague: Harm's Return, Part 2 of 3

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode one hundred and one.

Flash Pulp

Tonight we present The Murder Plague: Harm’s Return Part 2 of 3
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp101.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)
(Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by Tom Vowler’s new collection “The Method and Other Stories”.

An award-winning book of short tales that will make you cry with its tender moments – and by repeatedly punching you in the belly.

Find it on Amazon, or find links to special editions and more at http://oldenoughnovel.blogspot.com/

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Harm Carter attempts to locate a telephone with which to report a death by wine magnum.

 

Flash Pulp 101 – The Murder Plague: Harm’s Return Part 2 of 3

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

I’ve never been much for fraternizing with the neighbours, but after spending over a decade in one location you can’t help but meet on occasion.

In truth, I rather liked the Hernandezes.

On a particularly chill night, two years previous to the evening of my return from the cabin, Mr Hernandez – George – had spotted my shivering form awaiting a locksmith to remedy the puzzle I’d presented myself by accidentally bolting my keys on the far side of the front door. He’d kindly invited me inside his own home, and, as he prepared a pot of coffee to resuscitate my partially frozen internals, I’d had a rather pleasant discussion with his wife, his daughter, and himself, regarding the vagaries of fly fishing. The trio were obsessive anglers, and even Velma, fifteen – who I, at first, thought might be simply providing a submissive echo of her parent’s enthusiasm – seemed to show a genuine interest in netting maximum fish flesh. I’ve long enjoyed the pleasures of others, and the more intense their mania, the more I take from it. Anyone with a ferocious regard for what occupies their free time is usually willing to provide a cheap education on the topic, and an understanding of all things is what I have a ferocious regard for.

By the time of the smith’s summons I felt as if I’d waded through the streams of Montana, and the Dakotas, myself.

The Murder PlagueI was not surprised, therefore, when, on my final visit, I found their door ajar and a bountiful supply of gear apparently on its way to, or from, some distant lake or river. I normally might have considered the disarray of the luggage and rods as unkempt, but my mind was largely occupied with the ugly fact that I’d recently laid Catarina, my now former chef, in her death bed by means of blunt trauma. As I clumped up the cobblestone walk in my hiking boots, I formulated how I would frame the discussion required to use their phone. In retrospect, I’m sure they would have let me use it readily, but in dire situations I find it helpful to let my mind grind over fine details, instead of circling the unalterable.

Having encountered no one to deliver my prepared speech to though, I found myself somewhat flustered as to how to proceed.

However, the predicament seemed dramatic enough to warrant my pushing onwards, although I announced my self-welcome liberally.

I attempted to strike a balance in my tone between friendly and I’ve-just-had-to-kill-someone.

“Hallo, Hernandezes!”

Night had again fallen, and the only lighting in the interior came spilling up from the half-spiral staircase which led from the basement, illuminating a long tract of pictures depicting smiling fish-slayers and their captured prey. Atop the photos, curving with the adjoining wall, ran a series of especially prized, but now retired, rods.

I’ve never been squeamish about the individual death of a bass, and my reaction was likely tempered by recent events, but I found it difficult to stare down so many suffocating fillets at once. Casting my eyes up the second half of the spiral, I came across what I, at first, thought was an optical illusion.

There appeared to be a man standing directly above me, but his shoes were slightly askew, as if he were on tip-toe.

“George?” I asked the hovering fellow.

I began striding up the steps.

It was obvious well before I reached landing that he was in no condition to talk; his face was black and bloated. It was also at that time that I realized the Hernandezes did not have a carpet running along the stairs, but that I was in fact tromping through a thick path of what I rather suspected was dried blood.

My legs found it quicker to finish the journey than to reverse, so I suddenly found myself on the second floor. Forcing my eyes into a closer inspection of George, I noted that he’d had several loops of high-test fishing line wrapped about his neck before apparently being pushed over the edge of the railing which overlooked the entryway below. The loose end was tied about a lighting sconce, which had pulled away from its upper-moorings under the weight.

I could not help but feel better illumination was necessary when dealing with the likelihood of an executioner lurking about, so I was forced to flip the sole switch that I could locate, the one which engaged the awry fixture.

Laying not five feet further down the short hallway was the body of Velma, a cracked oaken plaque with a sizable Marlin mounted across its front masking her face and the point of trauma which had disgorged so much of her cranial matter across the closest wall.

As I began to retrace my path, my eyes ran over the boning knife still held solidly in the girl’s right hand. My inspection had turned up no evidence of such a wound on the first body along my approach, and a hypothesis quickly began to form.

Given the scale of the operation, and the size of George, I could only guess that a third party was involved in the lynching, and that the unseen conspirator – the one who’d left their vitals pouring down the staircase – had, for whatever reason, soon after received the long end of Velma’s blade. The injured had likely then retaliated at the betrayal by clubbing the girl with the nearest heavy object, the wall ornament.

I suspected that the absent party was Mrs. Hernandez, and, further, as I could clearly see from over the edge of the hanged man’s perch that the descending trail lead deeper into the house and not towards the exit, I believed that she was likely still somewhere amongst the dark spaces of the first floor.

I had no interest in discovering if the wound had been fatal.

Watching not to slip on the flaking blanket of brown, as my feet plummeted down the stairs, I deserted the crime scene.

It was only after the door was firmly shut behind me, and the remnants of my breakfast disposed of in a professionally groomed array of rose bushes, that I noticed Doctor Henley, across the street, as he observed from the safety of his living room’s bay window.

He waved to me.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm. The audio and text formats of Flash Pulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Flash Pulp 099 – Mulligan Smith and The Temple Of Ortru, Part 1 of 1

Flash PulpWelcome to Flash Pulp, Episode Ninety-Nine.

Tonight we present Mulligan Smith and The Temple Of Ortru, Part 1 of 1
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp099.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

 

Have you ever wanted to stare longingly across the table at a beautiful re-creation of yourself?

The art of Mike Mongello can do that for you. Find out how at http://www.supermonge.com

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Private Investigator Mulligan Smith must plumb the depths of the The Temple Of Ortru, in search of truth for a desperate client.

 

Flash Pulp 099 – Mulligan Smith and The Temple Of Ortru, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Mulligan entered the room just in time to watch the huddled men moan over their companion’s death.

Three weeks earlier he’d met with the victim’s wife over a cup of mid-afternoon coffee. She’d worn a simple blue dress, with quite a bit of gold tucked about her neck, and she’d obviously taken care in arranging her graying hair into a simple, but prim, bun.

“I don’t want to bring it up to him, just… just in case.”

“I think it’s a pretty extreme thing to imply your husband is in a cult, if you don’t mind me saying so.” Mulligan had taken a long sip from his cup after his response, paying as much attention to her body language as he’d paid to her story. Once, a few years earlier, he’d spent six days chasing ghosts for a man who’d claimed he was being threatened. It had taken his third visit to the client to realize the problem: that the only thing harassing him was a head full of bad wiring.

He’d only charged the man half his usual fees.

Still, the housewife didn’t seem crazy, just a little neurotic.

“I’ve heard him talking on his phone about.. things,” Mrs. Tuttle had replied.

“What kinds of things?” He’d taken up his phone, his thumb prepared to enter notes on anything that might be of use.

“Something about demon lords? Something about the Temple Of Ortru?” Her hand had shook as she’d picked up her mug. “He laughed a lot, and it sounded so vicious, so unlike him.”

“Has he been away from the home more often recently?”

“Well – he’s always spent Thursday night at O’Neil’s, downtown, but a few months ago things changed. He never told me he altered his plans or anything, and sometimes he’d still mention a story he’d heard from his drinking buddies, but his breath didn’t smell as beery as usual, and if I asked anything more about what happened, he’d just sort of change the subject. Now he just never mentions it at all.”

Mulligan had accepted the case, but he’d assumed that the truth of the matter was much more likely to involve the husband having an affair, while his wife utilized her overactive imagination to maintain her denial.

With that idea in mind, it was with some surprise that he’d noted Tuttle’s behaviour as the man was leaving his home on the following Thursday.

As the wayfaring husband, still wearing the suit he’d returned from work in, said his goodbyes, and exited the front door, he’d taken a moment to ensure his wife hadn’t decided to approach a window to see him off, then ducked into the house’s garage.

A moment later, he’d exited with a knapsack appearing thoroughly out of place strapped across his jacketed shoulders, and gotten into his cream coloured Cadillac.

Mulligan’s first attempt at tailing Tuttle had been a bust; he’d gotten hung up at a red light and was forced to watch his quarry turn a corner in the distance and disappear.

The second week had been much more successful, however, and the PI had happily jotted down the banquet of information represented by the license plates gathered in the driveway of the bungalow at which the chase had ended. What is kept private in the real world is often embraced online, and, via some favours and Google, Smith was quickly able to come to solid conclusions regarding his client’s husband’s evasiveness.

On the third week, after the caddy was safely empty an hour, and the entire cast of Mulligan’s previous visit had long entered the house, the detective had scooped his blue slurpee from the Tercel’s driver-side cup-holder and approached the door.

After a brief explanation, the squat, black-haired woman who’d answered his knock had shown him down a short hall at the rear of the house.

They’d found the men gathered there, their eyes afire with intensity and sweat on their brow.

“I was murdered! Bloody warlock.” said Tuttle, muttering from the far corner.

Mulligan noisily sucked at the remnants of his cup’s offerings, drawing the attention of the crowd.

He tipped his straw towards his prey.

“I’m not the kind of fellow to judge a grown man for playing Dungeons and Dragons, but, I think your wife has a right to know.”

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm. The audio and text formats of Flash Pulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Flash Pulp 098 – Up From The Depths: a Blackhall Tale, Part 1 of 1

Flash PulpWelcome to Flash Pulp, Episode Ninety-Eight.

Tonight we present Up From The Depths: a Blackhall Tale, Part 1 of 1
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp098.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by the art of Michael Mongello

Have you always wanted a scantily clad Star Wars character hanging around your office?

Now you can have multiple!

Find those, as well as many other prints to purchase, at http://www.supermonge.com

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Thomas Blackhall, master frontiersman and student of the occult arts, encounters a town of shambling monstrosities.

Flash Pulp 098 – Up From The Depths: a Blackhall Tale, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

The summer previous to his final migration westward, Thomas received word that his assistance was required at a mining operation in the sparsely populated northern stretch of Lower Canada.

The man who sought him out had heard of his reputation as it slipped from ale-heavy mouth to whiskey-sodden ear, and his distrust of the nature of Blackhall’s business was obvious as he made his request.

“You’ve dealt with the other-worldly before?” was the man’s abrupt opening.

It wasn’t his habit to answer the question openly, but the sling which held the interrogator’s right arm had piqued Thomas’ interest.

“On occasion.”

“I’ve been to the church, and they have no interest in what I have to say.” As the man spoke, his animated gestures sent gushes of barley brew to the inn’s floor. “It’s hell they opened in that mine to the north, and I expect someone better close it before it tears the world asunder.”

“It’s my understanding that it takes something more than a shovel to reach the devil’s playground,” replied Thomas, “but, first, might I inquire as to your name?”

“I apologize. My name is Teasdale, but the Englishman is what they called me these last ten months. Not so much based on my port of departure, but because I was the only anglo on a site full of francos.”

“What leads you to believe a group of earth diggers has opened the maw of the nether realm?”

“Until recently I was camp cook at a small iron operation to the north. Two dozen men and a whip cracker of a foreman. We were working a fresh shaft when I was sent southwards to gather the groceries, but upon my return I found the site in chaos. The tents and shanties had been knocked about as if hit by a storm, and the boys -” the grip which held his mug of lager began to tremble. “The fellas were on hand, but they were not the men I knew when I left.”

“What difference did you notice?” asked Blackhall.

“When I first arrived I saw a few of them wandering about, almost as if in a trance. It was only once I’d gotten closer that I noticed their stuttering walks and contorted faces. They – their limbs were muck covered, and as they approached a groaning gibberish emanated from their mouths.”

Teasdale smacked his dry mouth, then quickly wet it from his cup.

He continued.

“I’d no sooner stepped into his sight than I was rushed by Old Tim Steiner, a man I’ve passed many hours with over cards. It was he who chased me from the parcel, and it was during that flight in which I stumbled. A bad break, and still I made the travel in record time, even though I only thought to lighten my load of the provisions upon the second day.”

His damaged arm seemed to have little slowed his off-hand’s drinking.

Thomas raised an eyebrow.

“You doubt me, sir?” the former kitchen-master asked. “I do not make my assumptions in haste. There was no recognition in the eyes of Steiner – nor in any of the others which I noted as they gathered at Old Tim’s gibberish calls. If you’d but seen his ragged march or distorted countenance, you’d have no room for skepticism.” He spit on the floor. “Demon possessed, the bloody lot of them.”

* * *

So it was, after eight day’s rugged journey, that Blackhall found himself set high in a birch, observing the a cluster of men as they rummaged about the remnants of the camp’s structures. As he watched, a filth-encrusted man, of some girth, tottered towards the shattered lumber of a former shed, shoving aside the smaller man who’d long been hunkered there listlessly stirring the rubble.

Across a branch adjoining his perch, Thomas had carefully laid out the tools necessary to sustain fire if his Baker rifle became the only option. He had yet to cock his weapon.

At the crossing of dirt paths that would have constituted the site’s major intersection, a pair of legs lay unmoving, partially obscured behind a cold pile of cinders.

As he shifted his weight for a better vantage point, the tree limb beneath his left boot groaned and gave way. Although quick footwork saved him from any peril, the snapping did not go unheeded by the shambling men below.

The nearest, possibly Old Tim himself, speared Blackhall with a finger, then began to stagger in his direction.

His enthusiastic tones roused all surrounding, and shortly Thomas’ roost was encircled by a cluster of men – some with still bloody wounds, but all ensconced in grime – and yet the frontiersman did not put his rifle to bare upon them, nor unsheathe the silver-bladed sabre which was his usual retort to circumstances of the supernatural.

He understood now why Teasdale had felt such fear at their nearing; their manner seemed not like that of sane men, instead it was as if their higher faculties had suffered grievously.

It was then that he realized many in the group were, in low and mangled french, requesting assistance.

Slinging his rifle, Blackhall descended. Within moments he was distributing what rations remained in his pack.

* * *

By late afternoon,Thomas had begun to form a plan to rescue those of the men that he might. He could little guess what had happened in Teasdale’s absence, but he felt certain it was unlikely to be related to the preternatural.

In his review of the ruins, he found the still smoldering fire whose plume had helped him locate his destination, and yet now he was uncertain as to which, if any, of the mine’s survivors might have had the wits to light such a thing. They seemed docile enough once fed, but their speech was limited to even simpler phrases than Blackhall’s french would allow, and they held no answers as to what had transpired. What he had also found was a lack of food – what little might have been left after Teasdale’s departure was long consumed.

Although the bones of wild game scattered about did leave him to wonder.

* * *

Well before he was forced to implement his desperate plan, answers arrived at the freshly stoked fireside, in the form of a limping Francophone by the name of Joseph. He’d approached with a double handful of partridge, and as the entirety of the camp had gathered in a circle about the fire, he quickly cleaned and set the fowl to spit.

Later, as they all licked the bird fat from their fingers, the newcomer finally ceased the delighted prattle he’d maintained as he worked, and delved into a deeper explanation.

“I was Teasdale’s assistant, and out getting berries up the hill when it happened – trying to stretch supplies, you understand. There was a sound from the throat of the shaft, like a belch, and a smell as if a musty hell, and then I collapsed. I do not know how much time might have passed while I slept, but it was dark when I rose. Everyone else had been closer than I, and most of them were still scattered about the ground. When my head was clear enough, I went down to find whoever I could.”

The storyteller paused in his tale, the idiot faces of his compatriots eager for him to continue the story they could little understand.

“After they all woke up, I realized how they were. Who knows how long they were breathing the released vapour – it crippled their minds. I knew it was up to me to get them south, so I went hunting, to find enough meat to carry us. Although the first day I came back I managed to keep them together, on the second one of them went searching in the buildings, with a flaming branch to act as a torch. He burnt down part of the bunks, and when I saw how black the smoke was, I came. I managed to get most of them, all except Pascal, away from the dynamite hut before it was too late.”

Thomas passed across his canteen, freshly filled at the nearby river, and Joseph drank heartily before continuing.

“I was trying to reach him when it exploded. That’s how my leg was crippled, a condition which has made it impossible for us to make our escape. At least the blast put out the flames.”

The conversation waned for a time before Blackhall ended the hush.

“Tomorrow I will do the hunting – after I have a looked over your trauma.”

Within the fire, a knot popped, throwing sparks against the night sky.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm. The audio and text formats of Flash Pulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Flash Pulp 097 – Ruby Departed: Crash, Part 1 of 1

Flash Pulp
Welcome to Flash Pulp, Episode Ninety-Seven.

Tonight we present Ruby Departed: Crash, Part 1 of 1
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp097.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by the art of www.SuperMonge.com

Have you ever seen jungle vixens fighting the evils of the lord of the undead, Dracula?

Well, now you can.

Find Monge’s work, as well as prints to purchase, at http://www.supermonge.com

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Ruby relates a short tale of love and loss.

Flash Pulp 097 – Ruby Departed: Crash, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Ruby Departed: Crash

Ruby Departed: Crash

Ruby Departed: Crash

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm. The audio and text formats of Flash Pulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Flash Pulp 095 – Muck: a Blackhall Tale, Part 1 of 1

Flash PulpWelcome to Flash Pulp, Episode Ninety-Five.

Tonight we present Muck: a Blackhall Tale, Part 1 of 1

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp095.mp3]

Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

This week’s episodes are brought to you by Ella’s Words.

Find the poetess’ work here.

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight we present a brief interlude in Thomas Blackhall’s river travels.

Flash Pulp 095 – Muck: a Blackhall Tale, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

Blackhall and his companion, Marco the voyageur, had been paddling and portaging for fifteen days, and, while Thomas had enjoyed much of the Frenchman’s conversation, his patience for the corn whiskey jug that seemed perpetually on hand was growing thin.

The two had pulled the fat-bottomed canoe onto another in the series of muddy banks that demarcated their progress, and, at the emergence of his perennial annoyance, the frontiersman had offered to walk the brush that surrounded the little camp in search of meat that might be roasted.

He’d let himself range far while enjoying the familiar rustling of the wind through untouched forest, and he’d found a security in his surroundings that he’d missed afloat and fighting the fast moving river. Game was sparse, but he’d encountered a mass of huckleberries that had him regretting his lack of a larger container than his palms in which to transport them. It was as he was lost in this consideration, and as his hands pulled berries from shrub to mouth, that he noted a thick line of destruction running through the brush at the patch’s furthest end.

His first thought was that some great bear had trampled through in preparation for its hibernation, but a further consideration of the path left him with an uneasy feeling. It appeared as if some man or animal had moved through the area with little regard for what lay ahead of it: a pine which lay in its course had had its ankle-thick branches snapped at the base, and a great rut of dirt had been agitated in its wake.

Blackhall was swift in putting his Baker rifle into his grip, but it was his sabre, which he’d left at the fire’s edge, that he longed for. He made good time through the darkening woods, despite the fallen autumn leaves protesting loudly at each footfall.

Marco watched Thomas’ entrance into the camp with heavy eyelids, and welcomed the returned with a lift of his whiskey.

“I’ve some work ahead, and it might be dangerous,” said Blackhall, as he hefted his sword. “I’d like your help, but it seems you’ve done yourself under.”

The voyageur cursed the frontiersman, the bottle, the river, the campfire, and his bladder.

“I was drunker than this the night I rode a nag full tilt down the nine mile road, blindfolded.”

He staggered to his feet, his hand going to the buck knife he carried at his belt.

“Où?”

* * *

“It seems ridiculous, but it’s the golem of Prague. It was formed of clay and animated to defend its people from the cruelties of their time – or at least, that’s my best guess, from my readings.” Blackhall now regretted having roused his companion, but there was little he could do. He continued his explanation. “They say it eventually became too aggressive, and was locked in the attic of a synagogue.”

The trail had been simple enough to follow, as the towering form made no effort to alter its course for the sake of ease.

“It just sat there quietly?”

“It is a difficult thing to always hold a loaded pistol in your hand, day in and day out, and not find some need to fire it,” Blackhall replied. “Mayhaps it originally found its way here on some errand, or, feeling the pull that brings all of the world’s phantasms to this final emptiness in their end days, it somehow stowed away. It is impossible to tell. Neither can we say how long it has wandered these rugged lands with little purpose. I would guess that it has been quite some time.”

The thing watched them as they talked, standing as near the river’s edge as it might without risking its never-fired feet. While seeming nearly impervious, it had not moved through the land unscathed, and gouts of its arms and legs had been ripped away by its ill considered path.

“I think the monster wishes to bring an end to itself,” said the voyageur, puffing zealously on one of Thomas’ hand-rolled cigarettes.

Again, Blackhall wished he’d left the man alone with his drink.

“It understands it to be a sin to suicide,” he replied.

Never pausing for thought, the Frenchman moved to the figure and pressed his hands hard upon its shoulders, sending it tumbling backwards into the water.

He’d stumbled back to his jug well before Blackhall had finished watching the remains break up and wash down stream.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm. The audio and text formats of Flash Pulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Flash Pulp 094 – Aspect, Part 1 of 1

Flash PulpWelcome to Flash Pulp, Episode Ninety-Four.

Tonight we present Aspect, Part 1 of 1

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp094.mp3]

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This week’s episodes are brought to you by Ella’s Words.

Usually these ads are funny.

Find the poetess’ work here.

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight we present a suburban haunted house tale, in the classic style.

Flash Pulp 094 – Aspect, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

Mike watched as a lone blackbird wheeled below the clouds, riding winds too high to cool the boys roasting in the hot and sticky sun.

For the moment the other two eldest were focused on the youngest, which was a rarity.

“Miller was whispering it to a couple of people, and I heard it while I was on the swings,” said Joe-boy, Mike’s little brother. “The house between Anne Eaton’s and the place with the camping trailer in the driveway is haunted.”

“Ain’t no such friggin’ thing,” said Tucker, Mike’s best friend.

“Hey – I was in a haunted house once, things were flying at my head, my mom got like totally lifted off the ground and stuff, it was crazy!” replied Puggs. Mike could have done without the lanky fourth-grader hanging around, but whenever he opened the door to the outside world there he seemed to be, waiting on the sidewalk.

“Yeah, right. When was that, before or after you and your uncle supposedly caught a UFO on tape?” Tucker had considerably less patience for the braggart.

“Hey, you know I’d love to show you the tape, but my stupid sister recorded over it with a bunch of iCarly episodes.”

“Whatever.”

Mike ceased listlessly spinning his bike pedal backwards.

“Have you got a better suggestion?”

Tucker shrugged. It was at least another hour before lunch.

* * *

The place on the left had opted for paving stones in the driveway and the place on the right had decided the windows overlooking the garage from the second floor would be round instead of square – otherwise, the trio of houses, as could be said about every home in the Whispering Pines suburb, were identical.

Still, the pulled curtains and dying potted flowers that fronted the reputedly haunted residence were enough to stifle Tucker’s skepticism.

“My Dad says he hasn’t seen the guy who owns the place since he moved in,” said Puggs.

“Your Dad says he killed nearly two-hundred people in the Persian Gulf,” replied Tucker.

“He’s gonna show me his ear-necklace when I’m old enough.”

Mike ducked his head back and forth to check the road for elders, then dropped his bike onto the lawn and approached the shining expanse of glass surrounding the front door. The others followed.

Except for a single chair, slightly askew, the entry hall was empty. None of the boys could identify anything further in the dimly-lit space beyond.

“Maybe the guy moved in, then got so depressed about living here that he hung himself,” offered Puggs.

“There’s no one in there. He’s probably at work,” replied Tucker. Despite his bravado, the boy was no longer peering into the darkness.

“Yeah? If you’re so sure, why don’t you go in and check?”

To the surprise of all, Mike tried the handle.

It was locked.

“Miller said he was walking by at night and saw red-glowing eyes upstairs, but when a car drove by, they disappeared.” Joe-boy retreated to the entrance’s step as he spoke.

Mike took another long moment to stare into into the shadows that crowded the lone chair.

“What if we try the magic window?”

The magic window was the name the boys had given a basement frame that had been consistently mis-installed throughout the neighbourhood; the locking mechanism rarely seated properly, and they occasionally used the defect to their advantage when they’d forgotten their home-keys.

The group rounded the side of the house.

“If I start running, its not a ghost, its ‘cause I heard an alarm beep. You run too.” The lead boy bit his lip, considering, then added: “Joe-boy, get on your bike.”

His brother required no convincing.

Standing at the edge of the small pit that was the window well, Mike had a notion, as he often did when he awoke in the middle of the night to use the bathroom, that if he let his legs descend, his ankles would be grasped by some long-nailed horror.

“Uh, I’m going to pull it open from up here, in case someone inside yells.”

Setting himself on his knees, he reached below. Using the friction of his greasy palm against the pane’s cool surface, he moved it first up, then over.

The pinky on his left hand, the hand he’d had pressed firmly against the window, disappeared in a roar surrounded by a halo of shattered glass.

Puggs wet himself.

Tucker stood in a stupor, his eyes wide, his arm extended towards the injury, uselessly.

Spotting the red running down Mike’s wrist, Joe-boy began to cry.

Bike forgotten, the injured youth began to run home, blood and tears leaving a trail behind him on the sidewalk. The others followed like a flock of starlings alighting from a tenuous perch.

* * *

Despite spending the majority of the remainder of the summer grounded and healing from his gunshot wound, Mike was greeted in the fall as a schoolyard hero: the boy who’d discovered the booby traps of the haunted grow-op.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm. The audio and text formats of Flash Pulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Flash Pulp 091 – The Elg Herra, Part 4 of 6

Welcome to Flash Pulp, Episode Ninety-One.

Flash PulpTonight we present The Elg Herra: A Blackhall Tale, Part 4 of 6
(Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3 – Part 4 – Part 5 – Part 6)
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp091.mp3]

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This week’s episodes are brought to you by MT Starkey Short Stories.

Putting the “and” back into Blood and Guts.

To find them, click here.

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Thomas and his companion, Marco, unexpectedly reach the end of their river journey.

Flash Pulp 091 – The Elg Herra, Part 4 of 6

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

Blackhall and the voyageur, Marco, were well west of the Athabasca when they made their final camp. Both men had settled into an hour long silence, comfortable and companionable, as their eyes turned to the stars, and it was under their own considerations that they fell to slumber. The journey had been favoured with a week’s worth of Summer warmth filling the late autumn days, and the travellers had agreed to rest under the open air to take advantage of the situation while they may.

Thomas awoke only in time to see two figures looming over Marco’s sleeping form – he’d drawn breath to let out a warning, but had been cut short by his own pair of captors. The seized mens’ hands were quickly bound, and they were left on their knees by the smoldering remnants of the fire as their supplies were rummaged through.

“Be quiet,” spoke the apparent leader, in certain English.

The rest of the discussion, however, was a roll of consonants that neither captive could decipher.

The intruders seemed to show some care in their investigation, until they came across a particular bundle of Blackhall’s. The searcher held high Ida’s silver blade, shouting excitedly for another named “Kol”. The conversation became hushed and sharp.

After a moment, the examinations ended abruptly, and the prisoners were roughly lifted to their feet to and prodded into the treeline.

Neither Marco nor Blackhall stood on height with their guards; the closest was the youngest, the nearly-blond boy who stood on the Frenchman’s right, and he was still half a head taller. Their bulky frames seemed incongruous for those who inhabited the area, and neither could Thomas make connection between the locale and their style of dress, as it was unlike any he’d seen in his journeys. The men wore woven shirts, but the rest of their attire was formed of leather; long coats, plucked from the trees as the group led their prisoners away from the camp, were worn over trim breeches cut with a wide hem at the leg.

As they marched, Thomas attempted to explain his possession of the dagger. He’d managed little more than “…regret to inform you that Princess Ida is no more,” before Kol told another, Hakon, to muzzle him with a length of rawhide, and to extend the same courtesy to Marco.

Twenty minutes attention to careful footing brought them into a second encampment.

Four tents, skins of some workmanship stretched taut by line and timber, stood at the corners of the clearing, and, at its center, a fire pit. Alongside the shelters, each tethered to a tree, stood four bull moose.

The beasts were adorned with saddles of a style which seemed closer, to Blackhall, to those worn by camels than those of horses. Ornate panels of leather hung from the seats, on which had been tooled scenes of battle victory, endless horizons, or, Thomas guessed, loved ones. The bull closest, which eyed the new arrivals with an impassive shake of his head, had had a panel damaged, apparently in combat.

As they reached the familiar surroundings, the cryptic discussion amongst the captors once again boiled over, and there was little Thomas could do but watch the match. Although he could make out no more than the emotions of the argument, he was at least able to deduce the names of the Moose Lords. Kol had a man named Hakon who seemed to hew closely to his own position, while the counter-point was provided by one named Asmund – who Thomas thought to have much the same brow and jaw as Ida – and his own quiet ally, Mord, the shortest of the giants.

English phrases began to creep into their speech, and Blackhall knew his scrutinies had not gone unnoticed. Soon the conversation had moved entirely to Thomas’ own tongue.

“Maybe it was in their mind that we all carry such finery as the princess’ blade – what if they have come to rob us?” suggested Hakon.

“Fine,” replied Kol. “To ensure we have met all possibilities of justice, we shall kill them twice.”

“Yes,” croaked Hakon, from behind a smile, “Once for bringing the hag upon us, and once for being thieves.”

“I have heard it said that the child-eater haunts the Prester’s farms as much as our own longhouses,” spoke Asmund.

“Little more than rumour – nothing would dare eat their ugly children,” Hakon replied.

“Asmund,” said Kol, now squatting beside the rising flame. “We were sent to split the flesh of the Prester’s people, and what I see before me is a thieving Prester assassin, likely paid to kill your sister and return this token to them as proof.”

It had taken time, but Blackhall had spent his efforts in dampening his rawhide, so as to find enough elasticity to expel the binding from his mouth. Hearing the passing of what might be his final opportunity to win his freedom, he made his gamble.

The gathered were startled when he spoke.

“Ah, so you were then the Princess’ brother? Ida spoke of your Uncle Myter, and his death on the river. If we are to die so far from home, I ask that you leave me here against these trees facing westward, so that I might face upon my missing wife, and so that, as your Uncle Myter with his birds, I might be some nourishment to the beasts of the woods who’ve so long maintained my own flesh.”

Asmund’s eyes grew wide.

“Kol, he speaks of my Uncle Myter; what knowledge would he have of such a drunk if not for the good graces of my sister? We owe it to ourselves and to the Earl to carry this man at least as far as the long houses.”

“We were not sent out as coddlers, we are meant to be at search for at least another dozen nights – you’d have us bring short our duty so as to extend the life of these lying perversions? They likely cut the tales-they-twist from your sister’s own tongue before her death at their hands.”

The heat in Asmund and Kol’s words seemed to have drawn them closer, and, with spittle on their lips, they shifted to the rough consonants of their language. It was a sharp exchange, and only a moment later Kol drew back a fist. His action was brought short by two words from Hakon.

A smile broke upon the aggressor’s face. He nodded.

“Fine then,” Asmund replied, once again returning to English, “a duel it is.”

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm. The audio and text formats of Flash Pulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Flash Pulp 089 – The Elg Herra, Part 2 of 6

Welcome to Flash Pulp, Episode Eighty-Nine.

Flash PulpTonight we present The Elg Herra: A Blackhall Tale, Part 2 of 6
(Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3 – Part 4 – Part 5 – Part 6)
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp089.mp3]

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This week’s episodes are brought to you by Mr Blog’s Tepid Ride

Putting the F-U back into fun.

Find it at http://bmj2k.wordpress.com

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Blackhall converses with an unexpected visitor.

Flash Pulp 089 – The Elg Herra, Part 2 of 6

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

Ida, Princess of the Moose Lords of the Northern Reaches, didn’t allow Blackhall time for an awkward assumption.

“I need to be leaving shortly, as Aalbert will realize I’ve slipped away once he’s conducted his own private business. Two months now I’ve been waylaid here, tending the needs of my addled husband as he wears thin the hospitality of our benefactors within Fort Jude.”

Blackhall eyed the woman and bit at his right thumb’s nail.

“It’s not that I’m unwilling to, but what makes you think I might be a man who can assist you? Whatever opinion I may hold of your husband, I’ve no interest in making a cuckold of him.”

The thoughts ran together as he spoke, uncomfortably greased by the Pastor’s wine, and underlined by the memory of his own Mairi’s warm flesh.

The Princess touched at the corner of her cloak, pulling it open to reveal his saber in her off hand.

“Neither do I. A blade of silver is little more use against a man than a sharpened stick – and a sword is a cumbersome thing to tote on long journeys through the wilderness.”

While he enjoyed the woman’s plain-speaking, he had little patience for the unrequested handling of his belongings.

“Aye, so I’ve a sentimental passion for a decorative piece – what of it?”

He reached out a hand to take the weapon from her. She gave it without resistance, and he could not help but relish the heat of her skin as it briefly encountered his fingers.

It was her own turn to give him a hard look.

“Decorative? That sabre is no more a piece to savour with the eye than I am. The hard use along its edge leads me to guess that it has seen the belly of more than one of the mist-folk, or I’m a child of the Prester.”

“A child of the Prester?”

“Apologies – a term of my people – an idiot.”

Passing his palm over the scruff of his chin, Blackhall attempted to wipe away the muddle brought on by his supper’s drinking.

“I might take you as many things, Princess, but an idiot is not one of them.”

“I’ll accept those words as kind, and ask you to now shut up your flapping gob and heed my own. I was sent eastward by the, uh, Earl of my people. There is a beast which comes skulking in the night to snatch up our most precious – we have long searched for a cure or constraint, but have fallen short. In our desperation, I have been set loose, in an attempt to locate a veiviser powerful enough to be of assistance. Despite being anchored here by the inaction of my husband, I believe I have found such a man, and would ask that you depart, with all haste, to the aid of my people.”

Although the woman’s face remained as impassive as if she’d been discussing the evening’s meal, Thomas noted the moisture that had gathered about her eyes.

“I shall consider your words.”

“I thank you.”

It was only then that he noticed the short dagger she’d held hard against her wrist in the hand which had moved to unfasten her cloak. He raised an eyebrow.

“It seemed to me you were a righteous man, but my father taught me well that it is a dangerous thing approach any who has dealings with mist-walkers empty handed.”

His attention caught on the silver vines entwining the short hilt, and the red gem set at the blade’s base – the dirk seemed forged of a single silver ingot by a master craftsman.

Ida tracked his gaze.

“This was fashioned long ago, before my people entered this land. It is my hope to one day return this weapon to the circle along the iron fires, so that it might be passed on to one of my own offspring.”

The dagger once again disappeared from sight, tucked amongst the soft warmth beneath her cloak.

With that she closed the distance between them, and briefly laid her hand upon his own.

She departed.

He spent several long moments at the window, watching her fox-fur trim float above the path and towards the triple-storied house that acted as the Commandant’s home, and her own lodging as she waited out her husbands hesitance to move on.

Sleep was long in finding the frontiersman.

* * *

Thomas’ body was in motion even before he’d realized what disturbance had brought him awake. As he stepped down from the porch-door, he pulled his greatcoat around his night clothes and hefted his Baker rifle.

He was not the only man to have sprung from his bed – the gravel lanes of the fort were alive with pounding feet and confused questions.

To his left, at the western end of the Commandants home, Blackhall spotted a clustered knot of lamps. He began to tread the stony pathway, barefoot.

As he approached he noted the figure of Aalbert Bijl silhouetted at the attic’s window, outlined by the shattered remnants of what little glass remained in the pane.

Thomas doubled his speed, shouldering his way through the gathered.

Lying at their feet was Ida, the Elg Herra Princess, her neck shattered, her glassy-eyes cast unblinkingly towards the night sky.

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm. The audio and text formats of Flash Pulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Flash Pulp 088 – The Elg Herra, Part 1 of 6

Welcome to Flash Pulp, Episode Eighty-Eight.

Flash PulpTonight we present The Elg Herra: A Blackhall Tale, Part 1 of 6
(Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3 – Part 4 – Part 5 – Part 6)
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp088.mp3]

Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

This week’s episodes are brought to you by Mr Blog’s Tepid Ride

The antidote for pop culture overload.

Find it at http://bmj2k.wordpress.com

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight we once again return to the primeval forests with frontiersman and student of the occult, Thomas Blackhall, as he finds himself in unexpected company.

Flash Pulp 088 – The Elg Herra, Part 1 of 6

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

When he’d arrived in the trade fort, he’d had little interest in the Pastor’s invitation to sup, but Blackhall was now beginning to take some satisfaction in the polite reply he’d felt obligated to make.

There were five gathered around the table – the pastor, a voyageur who referred to himself simply as Marco, a Mr. and Mrs. Bijl, and the frontiersman himself.

Mr. Aalbert Bijl was a quiet man, with an awkward smile and a tendency towards dampness at the collar, but it was Mrs. Bijl whom Blackhall had taken an interest in.

Marco was busy completing an ill considered story as Thomas mentally attempted to formulate his questions into polite conversation and not naked interrogation.

“Tabernac, poor guy didn’t know what hit him. He somehow managed to make it home despite the whisky, but he must have fallen asleep on the floor before he got a fire going. They found him the next day, half way to the wood pile. He’d pissed himself – pardon prêtre – while curled up in a ball on the floor, and his legs had frozen to his body.” The Frenchman smiled, taking a long sip of the Pastor’s wine. “You could see the yellow ice crystals on the floor of the shack, and a trail behind him where he’d pulled himself along.”

Aalbert kept his eyes locked on his food, and the Pastor seemed to have had his gift for oration temporarily dislodged – it was Ida, Mrs. Bijl, who attempted to calm the impropriety of the situation.

“To my people, when a man or woman dies in great discomfort, we enact the funeral rites in direct opposition to their terror; this friend of yours who froze in the night would likely be sent off in a great pyre. My, uh, uncle, he took too much drink as well, and fell into a fast moving river while attempting to retrieve his dinner. We laid him upon the great racks of the smoke room and dried him as if a large piece of jerky. Then we roped him to the roof of the longhouse to feed the birds – it was a joyful outcome, as Uncle Myter often dreamed of flying.”

Blackhall found his opportunity to interject.

“I take it you were born in this land, but you do not seem to have the aspect of any of the people of the longhouse whom I’ve encountered before. Is Ida your true name, or a name taken after your marriage?”

The woman’s eyes were blue, and her hair a sandy brown that hung at equal lengths on either side of her face, cut to follow the edges of her sharp jawline. There was an elegance about her countenance that seemed echoed in her assured movements, despite the fact that she sat a head taller than her husband.

The silent Mr. Bijl finally looked up from his little-touched plate. His wife was quick to answer.

“My name has always been Ida – my people do not have the custom of a second name as my husband has introduced to me, nor am I of the people of the…”

Mr Bijl threw down his napkin and abruptly pushed back his chair.

“Are you quite all right, sir?” The Pastor asked.

“All right!? How might I ever be all right with such a woman as this telling constant tales of her barbaric peoples? I was told I was marrying a princess! Princess! Fah – she has the mouth of a war-camp slattern. Not only that, but I have not slept in days! Her nocturnal wanderings are of constant disruption. My spirit aches for an uninterrupted slumber.”

“Nocturnal wanderings?” the voyageur asked from behind his cup.

“Each night I wake to find her stumbling about the room, or worse, her viking frame hulking over my night-bed, as if approaching doom!”

“Have you tried Valerian? Hard to find here, I suppose, what of Passion Flower?” Blackhall asked the ranting man’s wife.

“I have tried many cures, but none have worked. In my dreams there is a tapping, as my father often maintained as he sat by the iron fire and cast his thoughts into the flame. I can see his shadow even now, his walking stick beating a gentle rhythm, and in my sleep, I think I am searching him out. I mean poor Aalbert no harm.”

The Dutchman stood, a hooked hand carrying his wife to her feet as well.

“We make our apologies, but must now depart,” he told the gathered. The pastor moved to retrieve their coats.

The voyageur, now quite drunk on the Pastor’s hospitality, caught Blackhall’s eye.

“I have met her people, although only once. The Moose Lords of the Northern Reaches – they live far to the west. The Dutchman must have been a trailblazer indeed to have met their likes, but such a life is not always easy on a man’s disposition.”

The trader punctuated his statement with another long draught of wine.

* * *

After the sudden departure, Thomas had allowed himself more than his usual allotment of grapes. As he moved towards the lodgings he’d taken with the old man all in the fort knew as the Widower Dunstable, he found the heat of the drink a brace against the chill of the fall air.

He briefly considered extending his stroll to enjoy the night sky, but a rattling gust of leaves that blew across the lane forced him to draw tight his coat and reconsider. Marco’s dinner tale also briefly crossed his mind.

Within moments he found himself at the rear access to the small room; in truth not much more than an extremely well built rear porch that the gray fellow now had little use for. The interior was warm, and he was quick to strip off his greatcoat and hat in the dark.

Manipulating the choke of the small lamp the house master had left him, the shadows retreated to the deepest corners of the room.

Standing at its center, in a long fur cloak, was the princess, Ida.

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm. The audio and text formats of Flash Pulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.