Tag: short fiction

Day #12

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Hadder: Heather, heath

Cerberean: Of or pertaining to or resembling Cerberus

Bazaar: In the East an exchange marketplace or assemblage of shops where goods are exposed for sale

—–

‘You there, stop!’

The soldier cantered forward, his stallion blazing a brilliant white matched only by the sheen of his brass chest plate. Plumes of ceremonial feathers sprung from his tightly fitted helmet, blowing like hadder in the early morning breeze. Slipping from the horse’s back, he gave his sword handle a quick half-tug to make sure it wouldn’t stick if he needed it. A deep breath helped muster a vague air of authority; the soldier approached the front of the caravan.

Immediately, he saw the two men leaning into each other, exchanging quick, secret whispers. Both were of swarthy, middle-eastern appearance, their dark hair thick as gorse, both beards immaculately oiled. They seemed nervous, but after all these were treacherous times.

The war had not long ended and it was uncommon to see men of a darker hue so far from home. Rumors of kidnappings were already rife and to make things worse a high-ranking official’s wife – a spoil of war, beautiful and exotic – had gone missing the night before, meaning patrols had been doubled.

‘Where are you going my friends?’ called the soldier, his voice loud and crisp, a deeply sonorous birdsong.

He had been patrolling the border since daybreak, cerberean in his duty yet encountering no one amongst the trickling, sandy hours. Boredom and youth had dulled the soldier’s sense of duty. He’d stopped the Arabs because it was simply something to pass the time with.

The whispering ceased and the two men peered inquisitively at the soldier, his pale skin and tight crop of blond hair a brutal reminder that they were far from home.

‘Salaam, friend,’ called one of the men, older and with thick, heavyset eyebrows. His companion was younger and had greasy, sweaty skin. The older man continued, his tone sharp, ‘why do you stop us?’

The soldier was taken aback by such directness. ‘What brings you this way, so early in the morning?’

The younger Arab looked quickly at his companion, nervous, eager to move on. A light sheen glistened on his face, as though he were a reflection; the tight curls of his beard, dark and foreboding ripples. The older Arab dismissed his apparent concerns with a hard look of annoyance.

‘My friend, we are simple traders seeking to reach the bazaar at Damascus by nightfall. We are spice merchants. Nothing more, nothing less.’

Damascus? The soldier knew the journey well, having made it many times as a child. There was no way in hell these traders would ever reach Damascus by nightfall on this route. If they were even going to Damascus…

‘You have a long…journey ahead of you – I would hate for your goods to spoil… May I take stock of your wares?’

‘Of course,’ replied the Arab, his voice now perfumed and cloying, intoxicatingly sickly and sprinkled with a hint of knowing malice. ‘Please sink your teeth into our forbidden fruits…’

The solider didn’t like the man’s tone. Something was off. He pulled back the caravan’s curtains to reveal a dark skinned woman, beautiful and exotic, teeth bared, eyes fearful and dagger drawn.

She hissed just four words, ‘I’m not going back…’

Day #10

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Dotard: One whose mind is impaired by age

Overprize: To prize excessively to overvalue

Dugway: A way or road dug through a hill or sunk below the surface of the land

—

Let me tell you about my strangest memory.

I keep it hidden away under lock and key somewhere in the back of my mind. Sometimes I close my eyes and watch it play on the curtain of my eyelids, hazy and noir, flickering like an old fashioned movie. I’ve only ever shared it with a handful of people…and now you.

***

The playground of my childhood school was a tarmac savannah, wrinkly like skin that’s been in the bath for too long and scribbled with the sun-bleached Nazca lines that denoted symbolic football pitches. Down the far end, under a large tree whose awning provided respite from the sun, were the badlands – a small scrubby patch of grass and dirt bordered by a wooden fence. Etched into this boundary was a permanently locked gate that led to our sports fields, but as we were a small, poor school, these fields were just public parks that we invaded once a year for sports day, tiny legs pumping whilst carrying eggs on spoons. A humpty-dumpy dystopia.

Anyway, somewhere between the ages of seven and ten my friends and I became fascinated with digging. Not just digging for the sake of slinging dirt, but real open cast excavations – our hands carving out deep holes and dugways amongst the tiny patch of dirt tacked onto our playground. Myself, Will, Tom and probably others who I can’t quite remember now, presided over our feats of engineering like Pharaohs watching the assembly of pyramids.

Looking back, perhaps we overprized our accomplishments. One time the council came and filled in a crater we had carved under some public stairs, as though it were a crème egg with a concrete center. We wore this like a badge of honor. But I digress…

Eventually, we decided to move on and excavate a new area, somewhere different in the myriad of playgrounds we had at our disposal. To test ourselves we chose a hedgerow in the middle playground. The thick, tangled roots seemed a suitable challenge for experienced diggers such as ourselves, finger nails crusty with dirt, rocks scraping as though we had discovered the very first tools.

One afternoon however something strange happened. Among the roots we unearthed a small black box. Then another. And another. And so on, until we had a stack of these small black boxes, each the shape and size of something a necklace may be displayed in. We couldn’t open them. Then our teacher appeared and she was angry with us. Then the men dressed in black came and took all our boxes away.

***

The memory fades toward the end, tapering off like a stuttering candle. I’ve managed to cling to the key points, to treasure them, as I know what happened to us was very significant, but I don’t know why. All I know is, we never dug another hole again.

Like I said, I’ve only ever told this to a handful of people…and I’m too scared to ask whether those involved remember or not, for fear of what it means for me if they don’t. I’m scared that I will begin to question my memories, fearing that I’m just another adult dotard, imagining things just to seem more interesting.

So, I think I’ll just keep it under lock and key for now.

Day #9

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Platting: Plaited strips of bark, cane, straw etc. used for making hats or the like

Water soldier: A submerged aquatic plant with serrated, brittle leaves that break easily when handled.

Geophagist: One who eats earth as dirt clay chalk, etc.

—-

Her slight, nimble fingers danced over the wicker canes, threading the silvery strips of birch bark under and over, under and over. The action reminded Ahn-weh of the way she used to braid her daughter’s hair, under and over, under and over, then tied in a knot – perfection. It would not be long until she saw her again, at least this was what Ahn-weh hoped.

But could you really trust the words that slithered from the lips of man who had killed untold thousands and forced a young girl into marriage against her will?

Genghis. The word pounded like a metronome as Ahn-weh wove the pale grey platting, under and over, under and over, circling round in loop after loop. She was slowly nearing the end of her task now. Genghis. Under and over. Genghis. Under and over.

The warlord, the self-proclaimed God-King, had offered this token task to Ahn-weh at the behest of her daughter; a vain attempt by the young girl to have her mother spared.

He had grinned, stringing words to his tongue like arrows to a bow, ‘they say you are an artist Mother, then let us see how great you are. Craft me a crown fit for a God-King and I shall let you and your daughter live.’

Ahn-weh could still smell his fetid breath, sticky and thick with spilt blood, musky like oxen that spent all day chewing rotting cud.

So Ahn-weh worked. Genghis. She stripped the bark from birch trees until her nails were bloody and raw. Genghis. She tempered the thin bands of silver in the midday heat. Genghis. She wove the circlets under and over until the crown began to gain form. Genghis. A shimmering star fallen from Heaven to Earth. Genghis. The crown of a God-King.

But Ahn-weh knew it was a futile task. She knew that her daily rations were poisoned; of course He wouldn’t play fair. He had no intention of letting her live, or of finishing the crown, which would result in the death of her daughter too. A cruel God-King.

This was why, at the break of every dawn, Ahn-weh slipped past her snoring guard, slumped awkwardly in a drunken stupor. She crept down to the river, alert like a deer and aware of every single glinting red reflection rippling and flashing as fish plucked early morning insects from the water’s surface.

Pushing aside the water soldiers, their brittle leaves flaking away at the slightest touch, Ahn-weh dug deep amongst their roots, burying her hands in the dirt, under and over. The thick, wet clay that she cupped in her palms tasted peaty when she drank it.

It was unpleasant and thick, clogging her throat and making her gag, but it would slow the poison in her body, she knew this; Ahn-weh the geophagist knew this. And she clung to this as she wove the silver birch bark into a crown for a God-King, fingers nimbly working under and over, over and over.