by Hugh Howey
Wouldn’t that be something? A place where she was safe from prying eyes, where she could live freely, never being held up for inspection and contempt by not only the rest of society, but some of her fellow artists as well?
Men! They were such fools. It seemed they were more motivated by what was in their pants than what talent ran through their veins. Still, she shouldn’t talk. Lord knew it was hard for her to turn down any man she found appealing. Well, men did it, why shouldn’t she? Men seemed to think women didn’t find any pleasure in the act itself, only in pleasing them. Simply further proof they were fools. Someday, some man would figure out that women enjoyed that certain pastime every bit as much as they—if the man cared enough to actually consider what felt good to women. When that day came, he would be very much in demand. Of that she was sure.
In the meantime, she kept sampling them, hoping to find one who actually lived up to the promise in his eyes, his arms, or his aura. So far, no luck. They were like day old bakery treats: nice to look at, but disappointing as hell when bitten into. Still, she’d keep trying. Perhaps she’d get lucky and discover one that could last more than a few minutes. They didn’t understand it felt as good to women as it did to them, but women wanted it to go on longer.
At least she had her painting. And the child within her. Would it be a boy or a girl? She hoped it would be a boy. Life would be so much easier as a male. Either way, she would teach the child to live life to the fullest, never answering to society. Maybe the child would even paint.
In several months she would add “Mother” to the list of names people called her. Suzanne Valadon: Mother. Artist. Model. Lover. Whore.
At least three of the five weren’t bad. Not bad at all.
Caddy Rowland
is author of the five book historical family saga The Gastien Series. This story begins in nineteenth century France. Gastien is a farm boy with dreams far bigger than a peasant has a right to. He leaves home to become a great artist and lover, but lacks education, money, or contacts. It’s a story about struggle, quest for power, abuse of power, and pursuing dreams.
The Gastien Series: Sometimes the “impossible” is possible, but the cost can be extremely high.
Caddy’s also authored a psychological thriller, There Was a House, a four novel saga of revenge and redemption. Six teenagers have been sex trafficked. They’re forced to work in a brothel where wealthy men satisfy their most vile sexual urges. The teenagers hang onto hope that one day they will be free, but escape isn’t good enough. Phoenix and Jamie head up a plan for total destruction of the despicable men who use them.
There Was a House Saga: They better be damn good. There will only be one chance.
Caddy has always been a nonconformist. She likes to push the proverbial envelope when it comes to characterization and world building. Heroes have warts; villains have soft spots. Main characters don’t always learn their lessons because all too often we don’t, either. There isn’t always a happy ending, but sometimes there is. Otherwise she’d be predictable.
Caddy Rowland: Novels showcasing the sublime joy and bitter tragedy of being human.
Caddy Rowland’s Blog
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Paranormal
Eternal Bounds
Monica La Porta
I always feel cold. I shouldn’t feel anything at all, but Fortune didn’t smile on me when alive, so why should I be lucky in death? Maybe the coldness, seeping through what is left of me, is a reminder of actions not taken and words not spoken. I wish I did speak and act then, and now I can’t. I would have died a better death.
She shivers when I am around, and she cries when she thinks I am not. “My love, are you here?”
I am. Always.
She wipes a tear, and reaches for the clasp securing her white tunica in place. The fabric caresses her body in soft waves and I am jealous of it. She hugs her chest, one hand flat over her heart. “I miss you.” She stands.
I follow her to the window opening to the fields. She looks for me. Out there, among the others. She knows I am no longer. Yet, every evening, when the first stars appear in the dark sky, and the workers intone the nightly chants of the vespers, she strains her eyes, hoping to recognize my shaved head bobbing alongside the other shaved heads.
I would never understand how she could identify me among a sea of humanity, all wearing the same rags, all raising their shackled arms at the same time, all singing with the same intonation in Egyptian, a language still foreign to her. Yet, she did.
“Remember the day I met you?” The hint of a smile tugs at her dry lips.
I nod. Once a respected member of the palatial court, I had been a nameless captive for the entirety of three days. One lost battle against the Roman army and my life as royalty was already a memory.
“Pater thought the library needed renovation, and I was there, hiding behind a column, curious about the new slaves.” She keeps looking outside at the darkness, and slowly rocks at the sound of the vespers.
My fair complexion and educated mannerism had been noticed by the prefect, who recruited me and others to work inside the house, a place I had known all my life as my own, now renamed Domus Petronia to honor the new owner. My shackles had been removed, and at first, the temporary relief of it had blinded me from seeing her. She had seen me first. Her eyes, the bluest shade of blue, the color of my beloved sea, had commanded my attention and I had forgotten to lower mine. Later, I received ten lashes for that indiscretion. I suffered the punishment with my eyes closed, seeing the auburn halo surrounding her oval face, wishing I could pass my fingers through her tightly coiled tresses and free them.
“The day after, I looked for you, but I was told the whole crew had been moved to the outer fields. I ran there—” She laughs. “Junia was terrified, she didn’t want to leave the house. She was sure she would get in trouble for helping me. ‘Domina, you’ll have me killed, I swear!’” She wipes a tear that has escaped her lashes. “I was careful not to be seen sneaking around the slaves’ quarters.” She presses her palm deeper against her chest. “I didn’t return to the house until I found you.”
I was washing my wounded back in the river, and I stopped, aware I was being watched. I knew it was her and I slowly turned to confront her unabashed probing, but I wasn’t afraid. I loved her already. As I had worshipped the sun and the moon, I worshipped her, my Roman goddess. She walked toward the riverbank, uncaring that the hem of her toga was darkened by the Nile’s silt. I stepped back, tripping. This time, I remembered to lower my head.
“Look at me. Please,” she had whispered in Latin, one of the many languages I fluently spoke. One arm outstretched, the dainty fingers of her smooth hand reached out to my arm, once adorned with jewelry and now marred by bruises.
Her touch enslaved me more than the shackles I wore.
“I had never seen anyone as beautiful as you.” She blinks and then shrugs. “I couldn’t stop thinking of you, my only desire to have you in my arms. And when I stole that kiss from you, I thought I would faint.”
Day after day, she looks more and more fragile. And yet her beauty is still intact. I wish I could feel the softness of her lips on mine one more time. It would be worth dying again. When, one day, a few months later, the slave master caught me climbing the trellis to her room, I knew my time had come. Thankfully, she wasn’t there and never saw what happened to me. I was nothing more than spoil of war. Nobody realized I was gone but her.
Although, I never left her. Her love has anchored me by her side all this time.
She sighs and I know what will follow next. A sob. Then another. Then the servant girl, who is patiently waiting for the scene to unfold from her corner, will bring the milk of the poppy to calm the old domina as instructed by the medicus, the new family physician freshly arrived from Rome.
“I don’t need it, Junia.” The girls come and go, but she calls all of them Junia.
The servant has her orders and
gently guides her to the wooden lettiga, the narrow bed where she spends most of her time nowadays. She drinks from the proffered cup and the deep lines etched on her face relax, while she slips away to her dreams. But before she closes her already clouded eyes, she looks at me with that stare of hers that would make me breathless if I had any breath left, and she smiles.
“Soon, my Egyptian princess. Soon, I’ll be free to be with you.”
Monica La Porta
is an Italian who landed in Seattle several years ago. Despite popular feelings about the Northwest weather, she finds the mist and the rain the perfect conditions to write. Being a strong advocate of universal acceptance and against violence in any form and shape, she is also glad to have landed precisely in Washington State. She is the author of The Ginecean Chronicles, a dystopian/science fiction series set on the planet Ginecea where women rule over a race of enslaved men and heterosexual love is considered a sin. She has published the first four books in the series, The Priest, Pax in the Land of Women, Prince at War, and Marie’s Journey. She just released two new NA paranormal romances, Gaia, and Elios. She also wrote and illustrated a children’s book about the power of imagination, The Prince’s Day Out. Her published short, Linda of the Night, is a fairy tale love story celebrating inner beauty. The Lost Centurion, the first title in a new series, The Immortals, a paranormal saga set in Rome, has just been released. Stop by her blog to read about her miniatures, sculptures, paintings, and her beloved beagle, Nero. Sometimes, she also posts about her writing.
Monica La Porta’s Blog
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Horror — Paranormal
Coming Home
Sam Kates
Utter darkness. The type that only exists during power outages. If it wasn’t for the rattling of the street lamps as gusts buffeted their casings, audible even above the banshee yowl of the wind, he might have believed the lamps had never existed. He might have been in the Yorkshire moors, two centuries in the past, waiting for Cathy to come home.
Impressions of swirling black movement as leaves swept into the air. No lightning flash or thunder rumble, but rain and hail spattered the windows like a child throwing grit. The panes shook under the onslaught in their ancient putty casements, though held firm. The cottage had seen this – and worse – many times before.
He pulled back from the glass, his flickering reflection appearing wraith-like, obscuring the glimpses of exterior motion and making outside seem like the infinite blackness that moths seek on the far side of flames.
For a moment, he considered drawing shut the heavy velvet drapes that he hated and that he’d kept – she had chosen them – but stayed his hand. Something told him that he was heading towards a climax, and that it was near. They had grown more intense of late, the dreams…
Threshing, sweating dreams. He would come out of them in wild disarray, tongue thick, heart racing, convinced that she once more lay by his side. Only bringing an arm across to the cold, empty space told him otherwise. Still he could smell her perfume, though the scent faded with the dreams, growing insubstantial, a suggestion, like a breath on a lover’s neck.
He moved to the door rattling in its frame. The iron key was turned to the locked position. The gale would not prevail. Rivulets of rain ran down the rippled glass panel, making it more opaque, masking further the spiralling leaves to little more than shadowy hints.
The candle light flickered and he turned towards it. The flame guttered, struggling to burn as if the air had grown thicker. Black smoke rose, pooling briefly like swarming flies beneath the weathered-oak beams, before dispersing in unfelt draughts.
“I’m coming home,” she’d murmured, her words mingling with her last breath so that he almost didn’t catch them. He waited in vain for her to draw another and replayed the whisper in his unfastening mind.
“I’m coming home…”
The rat-a-tat of rain stopped. The wind dropped. His breathing became shallow as the air thickened to molasses. It pressed down and against him like the embrace of some vast, squeezing beast. His eyes widened and he drew in a ragged breath. Held it. Whatever discordant symphony had been playing tonight, it had reached its crescendo.
For a heartbeat, silence.
Then:
Although the door and windows remained unbreached, a gust so violent it rocked him on his heels rushed past, extinguishing the candle light. Magazines lifted into the air, ornaments tipped. It swirled past him again and was gone, leaving him standing in darkness as complete as that which held sway outside.
Neck hair stiffened like bristles on a cat’s tail. A bead of sweat traced an icy path to the hollow of his back. Apprehension set like cement around him. Expectancy so dense he could almost reach out and poke it. When from behind him the sound of rattling resumed, he felt as though he was turning in slow motion.
The world outside had not yet exhaled. The street lamps stood still, the rain and hail didn’t fall. Yet something rattled. He knew what it was even before his eyes confirmed it.
The door.
Shaking in its frame, the worn brass knob twisting, but the lock held.
He moved forward, battling the oppressive atmosphere as though trying to walk through water, his mind a vortex of bewilderment, terror and something else, an emotion so alien of late that he would have struggled to name it if asked.
Hope.
He reached the door and stopped, staring at the stippled glass panel. A new sound: a low, guttural keening. Part of him – a dim, distant part – registered that the sound was coming from his throat. It wasn’t important.
A face looked back at him. A face so white that he could see it clearly, despite the opaque glass, despite the dark. Seeming to float in mid-air, startlingly pale in contrast to the dark clothes that covered the shoulders. Clothes he had picked out himself.
Funeral clothes.
Her name wasn’t Cathy, but she had come home.
Sam Kates
writes science fiction and dystopia (the Earth Haven series), horror (The Village of Lost Souls), short stories (Pond Life), and general fiction. During his forty-odd years on this planet, he has spent a lot of time dreaming of other worlds (fortunately for him, he has a very understanding family) and started committing those worlds to a hard drive in his early thirties. He has held a variety of jobs, from lawyer to barman, but has gained more satisfaction from working as a writer than from all the others combined; knowing that even one reader has been entertained by his stories is all the job satisfaction he needs. He lives in the U.K.
Sam Kate’s Website
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Paranormal — Romance
Purple Passion
Lanette Curington
Woodbine & Ward was nestled in the woods just outside of town, a well-worn dirt road and an antique wooden sign revealing the shop’s location. Although wiring and plumbing had been modernized, the building was over a hundred and fifty years old.
Honey Woodbine twirled a strand of her dark blonde hair around a finger as she inspected the love potion she’d just poured into a clear jar on the work kitchen table. The potion had turned out perfectly. The color was a light shade of lavender, and the barest trace of the scent of wild roses wafted from the jar.
The customer would return for the love potion soon. Honey had gotten a little behind in filling orders. Her friend and business partner, Quentin Ward, had been away a few weeks at a convention, but he was due back today. The co-owned shop had been in their families for generations. She was the only Woodbine left and Quentin the last of the Wards.
Before she could go to the freestanding jelly cabinet to get a decorative bottle to put the potion in, Quent arrived through the back door of the work kitchen. At the sight of him, she went warm all over and wondered how she’d ever get up the nerve to tell him how she felt.
While Quent was gone, Honey had come to realize how much he meant to her. They’d never
tried being a couple. They dated others, but neither of them had ever loved anyone else enough to even contemplate marriage. Her relationships were short-lived, drifting off into nothing, and Quent’s the same. Somewhere along the way she’d fallen for him, and only now recognized her feelings.
Quent dropped his bags on the floor and flashed her his familiar warm smile. “Honey, I’m home,” he said with a laugh.
She grinned at the old joke. “Welcome back. How was the convention?”
While he talked, leaning against the counter, she admired his tall, trim body. She’d never realized before that she loved how his gray eyes sparkled when he laughed and the way his large but slender hands waved in the air to emphasize a point.
The shop phone rang, and Honey went to the front room to answer it. She wrote down the order and returned to the kitchen. Quent met her at the door, drew her into his arms, and kissed her breathless. The kiss was everything she’d ever dreamed of and more.
Wide-eyed, she pulled away and tried to catch her breath. “What—?”
“Come to me, my little Honeysuckle, and let me taste your nectar once again,” he crooned, taking her back into his arms. “I’ve yearned for this moment. I don’t know why I never expressed my longing for you before now.”
His lips slanted over her mouth, his tongue slipping inside and dancing with hers. She trembled as hot desire coursed through her, turning her knees to putty. Honey gave in to all the feelings that had been pent up for so long. She raked her hands through his thick black hair and tugged him even closer. They bumped into the doorjamb and rolled along the wall until they collided with the side of the jelly cabinet, pinning her back to the wall.