by R. T. Kaelin
I gave him a warm smile, though sadness filled my heart. “It means that no matter what happens to you in life, if you keep faith, don’t give up, and work hard, things can get better.”
My grandson nodded, understanding filling his gaze. He then looked up at me. “What did your father learn in the training camps?”
“Nothing. The government had filled us with lies. There were no training camps, only concentration camps.” I took a deep breath, trying to steady my emotions. “We didn’t know this at the time, of course, but the government was following a military strategy. They were gathering up all able-bodied males, thinking it would weaken our resolve, allowing them to win a war we did not know they were waging against us.”
“But everyone knows about the war, Grandpa.”
“Oh, sure. Now.” I touched a finger to his nose. “But at the time, all we had ever known was peace.”
Remembering when I was Abarron’s age, it pained me that his world was so different to the one I grew up in. Pulling him close, I gave him a hug before settling him back on my knee. “No more questions now, let me finish.”
I waited for him to nod before I continued. “Life was hard without my father, and as the months rolled by, things got worse. People disappeared in the night, never to be seen again. Food grew scarce. Soldiers began patrolling our village regularly. It was a terrifying time.
“One day, when the government felt they had enough advantage, they abandoned the charade of this being ‘for the betterment of all’. Soldiers forced every last one of us onto trains.
“We were taken to camps.” I shivered at the memory of the horrifying places. “They were nothing more than a collection of large, dirty buildings surrounded by high fences. My mother and sister were taken with the rest of the females to one camp, my grandfather and I to one that held males.”
I took a moment to steel myself for the words to come. “I will spare you many of the details, but some you must know. I want you to understand how horrible it was for us at the time. It is important that you remember what we went through. Do you understand?”
My grandson looked frightened, but he nodded.
“The camps were overcrowded, four or five of us for every bed available. We did not have clean water, except what little they gave us at meals. So, we could not bathe or wash clothes or bed linens. Each of the buildings smelled, and don’t even ask about where we use the bathroom.”
Abarron made a face, but he remained silent.
“My grandfather was old when we went in. I know now the only reason he lived as long as he did was due to his desire to keep me safe. However, life in the camps was terrible. Some of us died every day. One night my grandfather went to sleep and never woke up.”
I took a deep breath. The fact that such a wonderful soul died in such an awful place always brought me to tears. Nevertheless, I knew this was not the time to relive my own grief. “It was shortly after that when the war broke out.
“At first, nothing really changed for us. One miserable day rolled into the next. However, after about a year, rumors spread through the camp that things were going poorly for our captors.” I took a deep breath.
“That is when the killing started.”
I must have fallen quiet for too long for Abarron reached out and gripped my hand gently.
I gave him a smile. “Several of us were killed each day by the soldiers—most under the guise of breaking some rule or another. This went on for weeks. Things changed early one morning when soldiers barged into our building and opened fire. Young and old, they killed without remorse. I survived by sheer luck, having been at the back of a bed with several sleeping in front of me.”
I looked off into the flames dancing in the fireplace. “I am not sure how long I lay there, buried beneath the dead. Hours, I’m sure. I may have stayed there until I starved to death if I hadn’t heard voices outside. Voices speaking our language.
“Terrified, I crawled from my hiding spot and peeked outside. And you know what I saw?”
Abarron shook his head.
“Our people, Abarron. Our people, Dressed as soldiers, not prisoners.”
“They had come to rescue you!” My grandson’s voice squeaked again with excitement.
Nodding, I grinned. “Yes, they had.” My smile slipped some. “Unfortunately, there were very few of us to rescue.
“I—we—were taken to another camp. Cleaner by far, it was run by our kind. It was there I found out my mother and sister had not survived. I was alone—the last of our family.”
I sniffled, fighting back the tears I knew I would shed later that night. I reached out a hand and brushed it across the hard, green carapace of Abarron’s head.
My grandson laced his three green fingers in mine. “Grandpa, do you think the Earthlings will ever return?”
Picking him up, blankets and all, I walked over to the large window overlooking the countryside. Our binary suns had set and the second moon, Valitus, had just risen. It cast its reddish-yellow light down onto the fields of purple grass below. “I don’t know if they will return. And that is the reason you must never forget what they did to us, Abarron.” Turning my head, I locked eyes with my grandson. “For if the Earthlings do return, you must be ready. Which is why I have told you this story. And why you will tell it to your children and grandchildren, even after I am gone. For if our race ever forgets, history could repeat itself.”
“I wish the Earthlings had never come to our world.”
I gave him a sad smile. “Remember my grandfather’s words. In times of hardship, hope may be all you have. But with hope, all things are possible.”
“What do you mean?”
“It was in that second camp where I met your grandmother. Just think, after all the heartache and hardships I endured, I was able to find hope for a future. Someone to love. The possibility of a family.” I pulled Abarron close. “All that pain and tragedy led to me holding you tonight. As horrible as it all was, I would not trade the joy you have brought into my life for anything.”
*
Wrap
by Alex Bledsoe
She took the hot chocolate in trembling hands and sipped it through thin, pale lips. Sunset rays sliced through the screen door and illuminated the steam.
He wiped the sweat from his forehead. “Kinda strange. Hot chocolate in August. Glad I could find it. Mom usually don’t keep none ‘til winter.”
The woman nodded. She was slender, almost bony, and the bulky black shawl around her narrow shoulders emphasized this. “It is strange. I’m in goddamn Arkansas.” She laughed, but it became a shudder. “Could you move that fan, please?”
He turned the box fan so that it blew directly on him. The woman continued to shiver. He wished his parents hadn’t gone into town before he’d found this strange woman at the back door. “So can I, like, call someone for you?”
“No,” she said. “How old are you?”
“Twelve.”
“I’m really sorry you have to see this. I read somewhere that you always fall asleep before you freeze to death, so maybe it’ll be quiet, at least.”
“It’s over ninety degrees in here. You ain’t gonna freeze to death. You done got a fever, that’s all—”
The woman took his hand and pressed it to her cheek. He jumped: the skin on his palm stung as if he’d touched the dry ice his friends used at Halloween. “Does that feel like a fever? I’ll be dead in a few hours, frozen stiff. It’s inevitable. It’s…destiny.”
“We’ll get you to a hospital—”
“No,” she said firmly. “Sit down, listen, and always remember this. Your memory is all that’ll be left. You have to remember me.”
* *** *
The summer moon rose over the farmhouse, illuminating the turned fields with a light that now seemed cold despite the clinging humidity. The woman still sat huddled in the kitchen chair, wrapped in the black shawl, stiff as a frozen side of beef, frost glittering on her open eyes and lips. He assumed she was de
ad…
He slapped at a mosquito. When his parents returned, he’d have to explain this, and his dad would whip him with his belt. Or would he? A hole in a distant field, a stranger’s body, no sign of foul play…yeah. Definitely better than telling his dad.
He wasn’t afraid, merely overwhelmed. The woman’s story of what existed beneath the cold shadows, feeding on warm life only when invited, was too weird. Sometimes they sounded like aliens, sometimes like evil spirits. She said she’d invited them only last night, thousands of miles away where the Pacific shot white foam into the same moonlight. She’d spoken of riding the chill winds, at heights no warmth could reach, and how her own heat had been drawn in exchange for…something. It had been too much, finally. For her, and for him.
He carried the body to a distant corner of the cornfield, on a flat trailer behind the tractor. The rough, furrowed ground shattered the woman’s remains into a dozen hard, icy pieces. The head split in half, showing hints of a grotesque cross-section he did his best to avoid.
The woman’s clothes were as stiff as her body. Only the black shawl was unaffected. He kicked the pieces off the trailer into the hole, touching them as little as possible. The torso, still wrapped in the cloak, went last.
At the first shovel-load of earth, something stirred in the hole. An icy wind almost froze the sweat on his face then a dark flapping shape shot into the sky and flitted across the moon. He knew it was the shawl, or what had seemed to be a shawl.
The night was not cold. But now he stared into the sky, and shivered.
*
The Gift of the Dragons
~ A Blue Kingdoms Story ~
by Stephen D. Sullivan
Dedicated to disaster victims and survivors everywhere.
Captain Ali al Shahar eyed the golden trinket in the girl’s hand. “So, Princess,” he said, “why is this bauble so important to you?”
Princess Makachiko Sunrii averted her brown eyes from the captain and adjusted her carefully fitted silk garments. “It’s been in my family a long time,” she said. “I didn’t want to see it lost.”
The captain shook his head. “That may be your story, but I’m not buying it,” he said. “Even with the pirate ship burning, and cutthroats all around you, you were more concerned with rescuing that necklace than with saving yourself. Why?”
Kor dar-Bek, the Starcutter’s first mate, nodded. The half-ogre’s huge frame completely filled the cabin door blocking the afternoon sunlight; his brutish countenance made the nod seem vaguely sinister.
Makachiko frowned. “It’s really none of your business, Captain,” she said. “You may have rescued me from my captors, but neither I nor my family owes you any explanations.”
“True enough,” Ali said. “All I was promised for your return was a fat reward. However,” he continued, his hazel eyes growing cold, “I am captain of the Starcutter, and anything that may imperil my ship or crew concerns me. Rescuing you from the Purple Tern Brigands was dangerous. Taking you home, even with the pirates defeated, will be more dangerous still. Everything aboard this ship concerns me, including that necklace.”
“What the captain is saying,” Kor explained, “is that you either come clean about that trinket, or you practice up on your swimming.” The half-ogre’s eyes gleamed poison-green, and a wide grin cracked his gnarled face. He bowed slightly and added, “Yer highness.”
The princess looked alarmed, too alarmed, really, for one of her breeding. She glanced hopefully from the captain to the half-ogre and then back, pleading with her deep brown eyes.
Princess Makachiko’s looks were enough to sway the mind of nearly any man. She was round in the right places and slender in the rest. Her dark hair cascaded over her bare shoulders. Her silken clothes, rescued from the pirates, clung lovingly to her figure, and revealed much of her tanned skin. “Captain,” she said, “please…”
Ali folded his arms across his chest and gazed sternly at her.
“Give it up, girl,” the half-ogre said, laughing. “You’ll never win a battle of will against the captain!”
Makachiko sighed. “Very well,” she said. “It seems I have no choice but to tell you.”
She held the necklace out so that the captain and the half-ogre could see it better. The medallion glittered enticingly in the sunlight leaking through the cabin’s starboard porthole. The necklace looked like a tiny silver dragon. Its bejeweled form dangled from the end of the stout chain twined through the princess’ slender fingers. The dragon’s body curved into a sinuous “S,” and its blue gemstone eyes gleamed. It almost looked alive.
“This bauble, as you’ve called it,” Makachiko said, “was given to my father by the dragon queen Argentia Lumus—for services rendered during the recent Wizard War.”
Ali arched one dark eyebrow and studied the necklace carefully. “So you’re saying its value is more sentimental than monetary,” he said. “Somehow, I don’t buy that.”
Kor moved forward, ducking to keep his head from brushing the cabin’s top timbers. He laughed. “The captain’s heard enough fish stories to last his lifetime!”
Makachiko’s face reddened. “This necklace is a gift from the dragons. Its price is beyond measure!”
Ali’s eyes narrowed. “Why?”
“The dragon lady gave it the power to summon her people to my family’s aid!” the princess replied.
Kor dar-Bek frowned. “That’s a lot of fish-oil, too, Captain,” he said. “If the trinket has that kind of power, why didn’t she have the dragons save her ship from the Purple Tern Brigands? Or rescue her from their brig? For that matter, why doesn’t she call them now to ferry her back to Sunrii Isle and save us the trouble?”
“It will only work once,” the princess said icily.
The half-ogre scratched his stubbly chin. “Well, when your shipmates were being slaughtered might have been a good time to use it.”
“The pirates caught us by surprise,” the princess hissed. “And, besides, the necklace was immediately taken from me. Do you think I wouldn’t have saved my crew if I could have?”
The half-ogre shrugged. “From what I’ve seen of you so far, it’s hard to tell.”
“Enough,” Ali said. “Why the princess didn’t use the medallion’s magic—if it exists—is none of our concern.” His handsome face melted into a smile. “Besides, if she used it to fly home, how would we collect the reward for her rescue?” He balled up his fist and affectionately slugged the half-ogre in the left biceps.
Kor dar-Bek rubbed his bony head. “Well…if we get into another fix,” he said, “I hope her worship will be a bit more generous with her dragon-magic.”
Ali looked from the half-ogre to the princess. “Don’t worry,” he said reassuringly to her. “I’m sure we’ll have smooth sailing from now on.”
“I agree,” said a musical voice from the cabin door. “With their home base ablaze, the Purple Terns will be hard pressed to follow us. I saw no other Tern ships as I scouted the surrounding seas.” In the doorway stood Sarifa T’Liil, the Starcutter’s master-at-arms. The siren warrior folded her wings to duck through the cabin’s human-sized portal. “I have assessed the damage from the skirmish, Captain,” she concluded.
Ali nodded at the lightly-armored bird-woman. As usual, Sarifa appeared completely unfazed by the difficulties of the recent battle. Not one delicate red feather atop her head appeared out of place. “Go on,” he said.
“Many minor scrapes and bruises,” Sarifa reported. “Seven wounded, three severely—one may join his ancestors in the stars.”
“Who?” Ali asked.
“Old Tifek,” the siren replied.
Ali nodded grimly. “Is that Doran’s assessment?”
Sarifa nodded. “The physician’s Il-Siha training only extends so far. If you’ve any magic to spare, Captain, now would be the time to use it.” She looked at him hopefully.
Ali shook his head grimly. “I used all the ship’s blessing stones during the fight. I’m fresh out
of miracles—even minor ones.”
“Maybe her worship can help,” Kor said. He turned toward the princess, bumping his brow on the rafters as he did so.
“I can’t use the necklace for just one sailor,” Makachiko said. “I have to save it for important things.”
“Every life is important,” Ali reminded her.
“Things that are important to my family…to my kingdom,” Makachiko shot back. “The power of the medallion is not mine to throw away as I please. It belongs to the whole kingdom of Sunrii.”
Kor glared at the princess. “What’d I tell you, Captain?” the half-ogre said. “The highborn are always trouble.”
“It’s not that I don’t care,” the princess explained. “It’s just that I have to consider my responsibilities. If I wasted the dragons’ gift on one lone sailor… Well, what would the people of Sunrii say when the next typhoon struck?”
Ali looked from the princess to Sarifa. “Tell Doran to do what he can,” the captain told his master-at-arms.
The siren woman nodded curtly. She folded her red wings tightly against her back and turned to go. As she paused at the doorway, the sunlight silhouetted her lithe frame. To those inside the cabin, she looked for a moment like a fiery-winged angel—a messenger of light and darkness, bringing portents for mankind.
Suddenly, the ship lurched hard to its starboard side.
“Rogue wave!” Kor blurted.
The Starcutter swayed precariously before pitching upright again. Princess Makachiko tumbled unceremoniously to the floor, and Kor crashed to the deck as well. Ali grabbed onto a support post and barely avoided losing his feet.
Sarifa fell to her knees. A look of pain flashed across her pale face. She clasped her hands over her delicate ears and squeezed her eyes shut.
Kor regained his feet quickly and lumbered to the siren’s side. “Sarifa,” he said, his big eyes turning purple with concern, “are you hurt? What’s wrong?” The boat’s sudden listing had ended as quickly as it had begun.