Dead North: Canadian Zombie Fiction

by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

  Our marriage falls into the divided tasks of man and wife – the tasks of survival. He carves a shelter for us from the ice – I seal any tear of our clothes with gut. I cook what we have brought and what we find but there is precious little of that. At night we fight the gnawing hunger by drawing what warmth we can from each other. But Dzagwa’a is a silent man given to murmuring feverishly in his sleep. He cries out, and I tell him I am nearby. I cannot tell if he is pleased with me, or if I am pleased with him. I like to think it is because we must only focus on surviving.

  Twenty days out our first dog dies. We find it frozen and half-eaten in the cold morning light. At night the black skies dance with the cold blue flames of the Great Fire People, surely a bad omen. I glance once more at my haunted man – his eyes are fading and becoming soulless.

  The twenty-first day out and the scraps of the dog carcass have already gone – fed to the other dogs to keep them moving, and fed to us in a weak broth. Then the second dog dies – again, some beast has crept into our camp and devoured most of it. The terrified whimpers of the other dogs are pitiful.

  Twenty-five days out and two more dogs die. The traplines have been mostly barren, and I know in my freezing heart I am joined to a bad luck man, and even when his arms entwine me each night they no longer offer warmth. He grows colder by the waning moon.

  Each night the Fire People’s flames mock us – “See, up here in the sky we are warm and down there your world turns to ice.” Our bellies are empty when we limp into an abandoned winter house with only two dogs left – the house where his last wife was taken by the widjigo. I shudder as the birch bark creaks and groans in the punishing wind. Daylight has abandoned us for good now, and we unpack our belongings in the twilight and the howling.

  When our last dogs are attacked and devoured, I scrape the remaining flesh off their bones and make the broth stretch for days. Then we are faced with two choices. One is to wait in the house until we die or until the widjigo comes hunting for us, or two, we walk near a camp of the Northerners which is by a river, and drill through the ice.

  If we are undetected, we can hope for fish, but if we’re caught we can pray for a quicker death. My husband chooses the latter, and I must follow him. The bitter nights are hard on him – even the scar on his face has grown angry and red. I like to think he is waging battle against the dark spirit that rides him for both our sakes, even if the bad luck man is married to a half ghost.

  We pick a frozen day so cold that when we spit, it freezes before it hits the ground. It is not good to travel on such a day. The trick is to walk fast, but the ice covers bog and this can be treacherous – to watch the shadows below the ice is wearing and we go too slowly as we hunger. My heart sinks when we pass the stone cairn – the Northerners’ warning not to trespass. Soon we spy moving black dots of the others ahead in the gloom, and almost too late we are forced to retreat, but not until we stumble on a trapline and take the rabbit.

  Our house awaits – a dark shadow of impending death in the pure white snow. How can the widjigo not be drawn here? We have stolen food from the traplines of the Northerners – they will search for us soon. I can only wish they find us before the widjigo. But we eat our stolen meat and we sleep and we wait. No dogs are left outside to die.

  A blizzard rages. The snow we have packed around our house and the furs we huddle inside each night can no longer keep us warm. For the first time in our marriage we have time to sit and speak with each other, but only the occasional hollow whisper escapes our lips. What is there to speak of, except the unspeakable? Perhaps death will find us first – will my father and mother await me? This is what I hope.

  A ragged groan whispers to me as the birch bark of our house shifts and buckles under heavy snow. I awaken from a troubled sleep as the hunger gnaws my belly. It is so cold. I shift to lie on my back and as I begin to drift, a weight presses down upon my chest and hips. I fear to open my eyes. I fear to breathe, thinking the hungry demon has stolen upon me. But I drink in the smell of sweat and skin and musk – the familiar scents of Dzagwa’a.

  I open my eyes in relief – only to stare into an emaciated face where my husband’s gums have pulled away from his teeth and the skin shrivels from his eyes – the eyes of madness. The scar on his face has opened, and the flesh surrounding it has turned grey.

  It is then I inhale another scent – the stench of death.

  In a lingering and languid grasp, his lover’s touch, his hands caress – but I do not trust those eyes. I’m wildly thinking there are worse things than a clean death. I remember Nokomis’s words: Widjigo can appear to be both strange and familiar, and with dread as thick as the frost that covers our land, I know my husband has been possessed.

  His hands draw up towards my face, his mouth opens as if his jaw has become unhinged and the smell of sweet rot makes me gag. I suddenly realize if his teeth sink into my flesh, even if he rips away my throat, my death will not be clean, so I reach for the leather belt between my shift and my furs.

  I draw out the spirit blade. I have intent only to force him back. Nevertheless, I am weak and my hand slashes wildly. The blade buries deep – I like to think my father’s hand guided it, but I am not sure this is so. The blood that seeps from my husband’s throat drives a hunger lust in me.

  I can no longer be certain who the widjigo has possessed. How can I fight the dark spirit swelling inside my own head, taking over my lungs, my heart, and my gut? Once more, I slash with the silver knife, the tool from the spirit world. There is a bite mark on my arm, and I stab at it. The clean agony clears my head and drives the widjigo out. I drag my husband’s body from the house and leave it out back where the snow will shroud him.

  Admittedly, I lick the blood that has showered my skin. I like to think this is my husband’s gift.

  The blizzard rages for two more days and as soon as it lifts the Northerners come hunting for who had poached their traps. They discover me alone in the winter house, and I am willing to leave this world. But they back away.

  They call out in their terrified voices, and when there is a scream outside the house, I know they’ve discovered my husband, his flesh stripped away.

  ∆ ∆ ∆

  The ice on the river groans and trembles and cracks, but I see no point in returning to my summer village. Soon bog berries will cover the tundra. And the Northerners leave fish and seal and a fine delicacy of whale blubber inside the rock cairn – so I may reach it and scavengers cannot. They leave me this offering so I will not go hunt.

  I am no half ghost anymore.

  AUTHOR BIOGRAPHIES

  Chantal Boudreau is an accountant/author/illustrator who lives in Nova Scotia, Canada. She is a Horror Writers Association member, she writes and illustrates predominantly horror, dark fantasy and fantasy and has had several of her stories published in a variety of horror anthologies, in online journals and magazines and as stand-alone digital shorts. Fervor, her debut novel, a dystopian science fantasy tale, was released by May December Publications, followed by its sequels, Elevation and Transcendence. Magic University, the first in her fantasy series, Masters & Renegades, was followed by the sequel Casualties of War. She has also published a YA tribal dark fantasy trilogy, The Snowy Barrens Trilogy. Read more about her at www.chantellyb.wordpress.com

  Tessa J. Brown is a writer and performer based in, and inspired by, the City of Montreal.

  Richard Van Camp is a proud member of the Dogrib (Tlicho) Nation from Fort Smith, Northwest Territories. He has published a novel, The Lesser Blessed, which is now a feature film with First Generation Films; his collections of short fiction include Angel Wing Splash Pattern, The Moon of Letting Go and Other Stories, and Godless but Loyal to Heaven. He is the author of the three baby books Welcome Song for Baby: A Lullaby for Newborns, Nighty Night: A Bedtime Song for Babies and Little You, and he has two comic books out with the Healthy Aboriginal Network: Kiss Me Deadly and Path of the Warrior. You can visit Richard on Facebook, Twitter or at www.richard
vancamp.com

  Jacques L. Condor (Maka Tai Meh, his given First Nations tribal name) is a French-Canadian, Native American of the Abenaki-Mesquaki tribes. He has lived in major cities, small towns and bush villages in Alaska and the Pacific Northwest for fifty-plus years. In the 1980’s and 90’s he taught at schools, colleges, museums, and on reserves, about the culture, history and arts of his tribes; he held this position for twenty years in the Federal Government’s Indian Education Programs. Now 85, Condor writes short stories and novellas based on the legends and tales of both Natives and the “old-time” sourdoughs and pioneers he had collected over the decades. He has published five books on Alaska. Recently, his work appeared in five anthologies: Icefloes, Northwest Passages, A Cascadian Odyssey, Queer Dimensions, and Queer Gothic Tales.

  Kevin Cockle is an Alberta-based horror and dark-fantasy author, who draws nightmarish inspiration from the seemingly mundane realms of politics, economics, and science.  A regular contributor to On Spec Magazine, Kevin’s work has appeared in numerous anthologies, including the Tesseracts series; the Chilling Tales series; Evolve, and more.  In 2012, Kevin optioned a screenplay based on his story “Spawning Ground” for a movie now in pre-production.

  Carrie-Lea Côté from Calgary has stories in Fifty Shades of Decay, and Fur Planets “Roar Volume 5.” When not writing she spends her time sculpting, reading and wishing cheetahs were native to the plains of Alberta. Her Twitter is @cattpaws and her Goodreads account is Carrie-Lea Cote.

  Linda DeMeulemeester grew up listening to stories of the burial trees her grandfather had seen in British Columbia’s north during his visits to Haida Gwaii. The fog shrouded rainforest later served as inspiration for her award winning and bestselling spooky children’s series, Grim Hill, which has been translated into French, Spanish and Korean. Linda’s speculative short fiction has been published in zines and magazines ChiZine, Twilight Tales, Neo-opsis, Storyteller, and in anthologies Under the Needle’s Eye, Escape Clause and Wyrd Wravings. When she writes grown-up tales, they’re still spooky but are less inclined to have a happy ending…

  Brian Dolton is an Englishman, now transplanted to a small town in New Mexico. He’s travelled to more than thirty countries, and has ridden a camel in the Sahara, played volleyball on a sandbar in the middle of the Pacific, and stayed in a Buddhist monastery on a sacred mountain in Japan. When he’s not being distracted by work, travel, or cats, he writes.

  Gemma Files is a former film critic and teacher turned award-winning horror author, who is best known for her Hexslinger series (A Book of Tongues, A Rope of Thorns and A Tree of Bones). She has also published two collections of short work – Kissing Carrion, which takes its title from the story of the same name reprinted here, and The Worm in Every Heart – and two chapbooks of poetry. Recent work can be found in Beneath Ceaseless Skies, The Three-Lobed Burning Eye, Clockwork Phoenix 4 and The Grimscribe’s Puppets, a tribute to the work of Thomas Ligotti. She was born in England and raised in Toronto, where she lives with her family, and is hard at work on her fourth novel.

  Ada Hoffmann finds writing much more satisfying than actually talking to people. Her work has appeared in Strange Horizons, AE, and Imaginarium 2012: The Best Canadian Speculative Writing. She also blogs about autism in SF at http://ada-hoffmann.livejournal.com/

  Tyler Keevil was born in Edmonton and grew up in Vancouver, Canada. His speculative fiction has appeared in a wide range of magazines and anthologies, including Black Static, Interzone, Leading Edge, Neo-Opsis, and On Spec. In 2010 Parthian Books released his debut novel, Fireball, which was longlisted for Wales Book of the Year, shortlisted for the Guardian Not the Booker prize, and received the Media Wales People’s Prize 2011. His next novel, The Drive, was published this summer. He currently lives in Mid Wales with his wife and son.

  Claude Lalumière is the author of two books: the collection Objects of Worship and the mosaic novella The Door to Lost Pages. He has edited or co-edited twelve anthologies, including three being released in 2013: Masked Mosaic: Canadian Super Stories (co-edited with Camille Alexa), Bibliotheca Fantastica (co-edited with Don Pizarro), and Super Stories of Heroes & Villains. With Rupert Bottenberg, Claude is the co-creator of the multimedia cryptomythology project Lost Myths. www.lostmyths.net and www.lostmyths.net/claude

  Michael Matheson is a Toronto writer, editor, and book reviewer. An editorial assistant with ChiZine Publications, and a submissions editor with Apex Magazine, his reviews have appeared in Chiaroscuro Magazine, Innsmouth Free Press, and the Globe and Mail. More of his fiction can be found in, among other places, the anthologies Chilling Tales 2, Future Lovecraft, Mark of the Beast, and One Buck Horror Vol. 6.

  Jamie Mason is a Canadian sci-fi/fantasy writer whose short stories have appeared in On Spec, Abyss & Apex and the Canadian Science Fiction Review. His novel ECHO was published in June 2011 by Drollerie Press. He lives on Vancouver Island. Learn more at www.jamiescribbles.com

  Ursula Pflug is author of the novel Green Music and the story collection After the Fires. Her new collection, Harvesting the Moon, is forthcoming in 2013. A new novel, The Alphabet Stones, is also due in 2013.  Pflug is editing They Have To Take You In, a forthcoming Hidden Brook Press anthology fundraiser for The Dana Fund. Currently, she edits flash fiction for The Link, co-organizes the Cat Sass Reading Series and teaches at Loyalist College.

  Rhea Rose lives in Port Coquitlam, BC, and is originally from Etobicoke, Ontario. Her short stories and poetry have appeared in anthologies in both Canada and the United States. Her writing has been nominated for both the Rhysling Award for poetry and the Canadian Aurora award. Her most recent work has appeared in Masked Mosaic: Canadian Super Stories and Tesseracts 17.

  Simon Strantzas is the author of the critically acclaimed short story collections Beneath the Surface, Cold to the Touch, and Nightingale Songs, as well as the editor of Shadows Edge. His writing has appeared in The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror, and The Year’s Best Dark Fantasy & Horror, and has been nominated for the British Fantasy Award. He lives in Toronto, Canada, with his wife and an unyielding hunger for the flesh of the living. For more information, please visit www.strantzas.com.

  E. Catherine Tobler lives and writes in Colorado. Her fiction has appeared in Clarkesworld, Realms of Fantasy, and LCRW among others. She is a Sturgeon Award finalist, and the senior editor at Shimmer Magazine.

  Beth Wodzinski, publisher of Shimmer Magazine, really loves poutine, dinosaurs, cephalopods, and choose your own adventure stories. If you choose to follow her on twitter, she’s @bethwodzinski. If you prefer to read her blog, it’s at www.bethwodzinski.com

  Melissa Yuan-Innes is an emergency doctor, but she’s never sewed up a zombie – yet. She’s writes strange and funny stories, most of which can be tracked down through www.melissayuaninnes.net.

  “Escape” by Tessa J. Brown was originally published in Re-Vamp, 2011.

  “Rat Patrol” by Kevin Cockle was originally published in On Spec, 2005.

  “Kissing Carrion” by Gemma Files was originally published in Kissing Carrion, 2003.

  “On the Wings of This Prayer” by Richard Van Camp was originally published in Godless but Loyal to Heaven, 2012.

  “Waiting for Jenny Rex” by Melissa Yuan-Ines was originally published in Full Unit Hookup, 2003.

  All other stories are original to this anthology.