The Year's Best Australian Fantasy and Horror 2010 (volume 1)

by Paul Haines

  “She’s a frigid little thing isn’t she, Tomaken?”

  “Bitter words spoil beauty,” I replied, watching Setseh and the Pasha’s two other wives approach. “You should bite your tongue before it curdles.”

  Setseh’s hair was streaked with grey, pulled back from her lined face in a loose horse-tail. As first wife, she had earned the silk scarves draped over her burgundy woollens, and poking out of the basket she carried. She had also earned her sharp tongue. Yarmaa and Dzhol walked two paces behind her; the twins had tinted their hair since I saw them last, it was now the hue of dried henna. The colour didn’t become them. The wives’ skirts flapped in the valley’s katabatic winds, unhindered by buckles or pride. Their soft cotton shirts gaped unrestrained, the effect too familiar to be tempting. They knew men lusted not for women they had already enjoyed, but for those who were yet unexplored. Even so, they regularly came down to Yangjugol, and strutted around the merchants as if they were still girls of eighteen.

  “And how will you be using your tongue today, Tomaken?” Setseh asked. She bent down and placed the basket near the snow leopards’ enclosure. “As warrior? Pauper? Supplicant?” She took strips of dried ox-meat out of the basket, slipped them through the bars as she spoke.

  I stepped away from the cage as the leopards wrestled over these morsels, their saliva flying in gobbets, their breath rank.

  “I approach our lord as a father,” I said. “And as a merchant.”

  Setseh hissed as Katla snatched a strip of meat out of the basket and began nibbling on it. She slapped the girl’s face and hands until they were red. Katla dropped the titbit, but continued to lick the salt from her fingers.

  “Are you an imbecile, girl? Stealing from the Pasha’s pride?” Yarmaa and Dzhol snorted as Katla’s brow furrowed in confusion. “Get this creature out of my sight!”

  I gathered Katla into my arms, more to steady myself than to comfort her. She didn’t seem disturbed in the least by Setseh’s anger. But the first wife’s disdain reassured me. The wives always turned vicious when the Pasha was ready to add to their number: Setseh had been unbearable when Yarmaa arrived; and the pair of them were fit to be tied when Dzhol followed her sister to Zhureem Ordon. Looking now at the flush in their weathered faces, I couldn’t help but think it was my Katla’s icy skin that infuriated them. So translucent, so bruisable, so different from their own brash colouring. Their hides had been worn tough with use, like well-ridden stallions. My Katla wasn’t yet broken in. She would be the Pasha’s youngest wife yet. The most tender. The most disconcerting.

  * * *

  “One condition,” I said, “and my little daughter will be yours.”

  The Pasha stood proudly in the fortress’s reception hall. A silk vest stretched over his thick robes, a mink hat topped his grey head. He stroked the wealthy expanse of his belly with jewel-encrusted fingers and stared out the window, surveying the lands his father had conquered. I was forced to speak to his back.

  “You may buy her now,” I informed him, “but you may not enjoy her until she has had her first bloods.” It was perhaps an arbitrary rule, but necessary. Prohibition makes all purchases more enticing, and I wanted to be sure the Pasha would bite. It would do none of us any good, seeing her ravished and left unbought. I could not take her home again.

  I bowed my head as I spoke, wrapped Katla in my finest embroidered cloak, fastened its toggles tight beneath her chin. My hand lingered there, enjoying her warmth after our cold trek up the mountain, until her unflinching green gaze made me shiver. The Pasha turned at that moment and caught the gesture. He stood with one eyebrow raised.

  Let him think I yearn for her, I thought. That this restriction springs from lust instead of fear. He can think what he likes. Just so long as he believes my act, and takes her. This creature will not be Tomaken’s heir.

  “Let me inspect the girl more closely,” he said.

  Never had a prospective bride approached the Pasha with such a sinuous gait. She hadn’t done it intentionally, of that I am sure; but if he hadn’t been interested before, my lord certainly was now. He appraised my Katla—by all accounts a chieftain’s daughter, a warrior’s daughter—as he would the treasures we men had won for him in the wars. Like porcelain or rice, leather saddlebags, or snow leopard tails like the three dangling limply on his banner above the hall’s great fireplace. But my Katla was more precious to him than cinnamon, than jade, than ivory.

  Good girl, I thought. I was forced to look out the window, beyond the Pasha’s bulk. The price I got would be lower if my lord saw me smile.

  The forest was a dark smudge at the edge of my vision, sketched beyond the vast valley aproning out before us. Its dense foliage and closely-packed trees harboured my clan, kept them hidden in the empire’s margins. I yearned to be back with them, for this deal to be done. The clan could use the profit Katla’s body would gain for us. And Astrith and I could use some peace.

  My lord wanted to keep Katla out of any other man’s reach, to balance her firmly on the tip of his tower. I knew this the moment his eyes widened at the sight of her. His coffers were full; his bed empty. He had no use for haggard wives.

  So he agreed to my condition.

  * * *

  Flurries of snow fell, carried dusk in their wake, as I placed the heavy purse in my saddlebag. The horse was restless, eager to be on the road and away from the mountain’s chill climate. I planned to ride through the night, taking rest only when I couldn’t avoid it. The summer snows wouldn’t last, but their arrival was a harbinger of worse times to come. I was anxious to be on my way; to be back in Astrith’s stifling caravan, with her arms and legs wrapped around me. Perhaps there was time yet, to earn a child. To replace Katla. To forget her.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something?”

  Setseh’s voice was shrill. Her hand was gripped tightly around the neck of Katla’s cloak. She dragged the girl behind her, toward me.

  “You do us no favours, Tomaken. Leaving such trash behind.”

  She pushed the girl in the back, knocked her to the ground at my feet. “Take her. Or else let the Meito take you.”

  I bent to help Katla stand; took a pinch of earth between my fingertips and scattered it to the winds to counteract the first wife’s curse. “I wouldn’t let your husband hear such profanity,” I said, brushing Katla off. “You of all people should know what the Meito do to those who curse the Pasha’s wife.”

  Yarmaa and Dzhol looked at each other, then at Setseh. As one, the three women approached my Katla, began fussing with her hair, straightening her cloak, smoothing the thin shift she wore beneath it.

  “It is done then, is it?”

  I nodded and mounted my horse. The sky was growing increasingly dark. I prayed the storm would hold until I was well beyond the Pasha’s territory.

  Setseh pulled Katla close, placed a gloved hand on her shoulder. She kept her gaze locked on mine and said, “Well, well, little wife. Be sure you lie still when our husband comes to you, else you will feel the pain of his knife.”

  “A knife in your heart,” Yarmaa said, undoing and taking the girl’s cloak, poking her slight chest. “To accompany the plunge of his shaft down below.” Dzhol smiled, and giggled. Third wives are of little use for much else.

  In this way the women tried to taunt me, as if I were a true father. As if I cared what happened to Katla, as if I cared that they threatened her. I was glad to be rid of her, glad to avoid seeing her grow any older. Katla, too, seemed undisturbed. A hint of pink tipped her nose, the ends of her fingers. She held her head high while the women hissed and cooed in her ears. She was rose-coloured, but not afraid.

  The wives were oblivious to the sound of the Pasha’s stately footsteps crunching down the road to Yangjugol. His pace was not hurried but not slow. He descended from Zhureem Ordon with controlled anticipation. Katla watched silently as her new husband slapped his first wife, then tossed her aside like gnawed bones. She did not flinch when Setseh’s head clashed ag
ainst metal bars, nor when Yarmaa and Dzhol began whimpering. She blinked when his voice boomed across the valley, announcing his claim. Declaring her his property, his wife.

  A puff of relief escaped my lips, dispersed into the twilight.

  She was his. No longer my Katla, no longer my concern. His.

  The bitter rattle of iron on metal told me I was mistaken to relax so soon. I steered my mount around, just in time to see Setseh throwing open the door to the snow leopards’ cage. There was no time for her to scurry out of the way before they sprang; the gleam in her eye revealed that safety came second to her revenge. One leopard wrapped its teeth around the first wife’s throat, silencing her venomous words. Years of captivity hadn’t slowed the Pasha’s pets in the least. Their movements were lithe and swift.

  The scant crowd of merchants scattered with fear, several running without being chased. These men were not warriors: they fled like selfish children, saving themselves with no thought for their lord’s plight. The Pasha was left to confront a muscular leopard with no army to support him. My lord wielded nothing more than a belt, which he lashed about like a whip. He fought bravely, even when a second cat slinked up behind him and took a great swipe at his hamstrings. A trio of leopards sped toward me; my horse reared but did not unseat me. His nimble hooves danced around slashing paws, striking teeth. He edged us closer to Katla, away from the road. The Pasha now lay wounded at her side, his leg a mess of blood and ligaments. She paid him no attention. Great cats appeared and disappeared in the thinning crowd—she followed them with her eyes.

  Her gaze caught mine just as the leopard pounced. The sky twisted. The earth rushed up to meet me. My teeth crashed together, blood poured from my nose. I inhaled in sharp gasps. I looked at my horse, splayed on the ground, his back snapped. Saw my leg twisted in the stirrup, bent at an unnatural angle. I smelled the leopard’s stale breath before I felt its paws on my back. Without meaning to, I moaned. Death in battle is honourable; it should not be feared. But only shame can come from a death such as this.

  My head snapped up as I heard the soft tread of footsteps. Katla crouched down before me, placed her hand on my head, met the leopard’s gaze evenly. I felt the weight of his forelegs leave my back. He snorted, drew closer to the girl I had made. His pale eyes were a shade darker than Katla’s; his composure rivalled a king’s. A low growl rumbled from his soft, white throat. There was no threat of a roar from one such as him. It was merely a purr.

  She stroked my hair as the leopard coiled its long tail around her. Threaded it around her legs, beneath the thin cloth of her shift. His purrs intensified as he flicked his tail, in and out. Katla’s fingers spasmed, dug into my scalp—then went still for a moment. She draped her other arm around the thick fur of the great feline’s neck, then resumed gently patting my head. She licked the leopard’s cheek, the dark rosettes of his pelt round shadows beneath her wet tongue. Her gaze was fierce, unflinching, as she threw her leg over his back, pulled herself up, away from me. The chaos surrounding us seemed muted and unimportant. She looked down at her steed, then at me. It was the only time I’d see her smile.

  The tip of the leopard’s tail trailed behind them as they left the clearing together, streaking the snow with moist dirt instead of blood. I watched them blend into the forest, stealthy as only cats can be, blinking as tears filled my eyes.

  I could keep clouds at bay with a glance and a well-spoken word. I could outwit a Pasha and survive his snow leopards’ attacks. I would see love in my wife’s face until the end of my days and, Meitoshi willing, she would see the same. My clan would be strong with men; warriors and traders who would outlive and thrive without me. But only their names would be recorded in our people’s annals; their names and their children’s. Not mine. The bravest, the strongest, the wiliest clan-child would steal my title, gain control of our family. It was settled the moment Katla and her mate disappeared into the shadows. I knew then, as I had known from the moment I made her: no matter how mighty my deeds or how valiant, I would only ever be remembered as the master of dust and dirt.

  Feast Or Famine

  Gary Kemble

  Don never realised how good a cinder-block wall could taste.

  Another little tidbit for his front-page exclusive, or his book, if they ever got out of this. Rick, the photographer, was over by the bunker’s steel door, licking the puddle oozing underneath it. They’d tossed a coin to decide who got first go at the puddle. Rick won.

  The bastard.

  Don pressed his swollen tongue against the cool brick. All around them, they could hear the maddening gurgle of trickling water. He should have been thankful. Sikaram mountain, west of Kabul, was normally frozen solid in February, which would have meant no water trickling in under the doorway or down the walls. Without this unseasonable warmth, he would have been dead rather than just bitching about having to lick a wall.

  It was a fortnight since they left Azram in Abdul’s ancient Ford truck, on their way to an exclusive interview with one of Afghanistan’s most feared warlords. Abdul phoned them ten minutes before pulling up outside the fleapit hotel they were staying in. No-one knew where they were.

  A fortnight since that terrifying ride up the winding road that snaked around Sikaram, in the foothills of the Himalayas. Countless buses had plunged off that very goat track while Allah was looking the other way.

  A fortnight since they followed Abdul down the two steps into the bunker, buried in the side of the mountain. Abdul promised to return with Marco, leader of the Afghan chapter of the Al-Aqsa Terror Brigades. The press pass hanging around Don’s neck hadn’t seemed like such a powerful amulet waiting in that bloodstained death room, with the green and white banner hanging on one wall, a video camera poised to capture some new atrocity. And the Butcher of Kabul was on his way, with his trademark cigar cutter and Desert Eagle pistol, both souvenired from a US General who strayed too close to the badlands. Suddenly, it had seemed insane trying to interview a man whose regard for human life stretched only as far as his warped interpretation of the Koran. This man had killed journalists—Don had seen the video.

  Now weak with hunger, Don would welcome him with open arms.

  Hold his hands out, laugh at the meaty snickety-snick of steel slicing through flesh, bone, and sinew. Gobble his own fingers with relish and praise Allah as he dropped to his knees and waited for the .44-calibre hollow-point. Death by bullet would be a blessing right now.

  After Abdul left, Don had tried the door—just out of interest— and it was definitely locked, secured with a heavy duty deadbolt.

  It was thirteen days since the avalanche hit and the power went out. They hid under the table, clutching each other, praying the snow would smash the bunker open but somehow leave them alive.

  For his part, Don knew what he’d do. Run back to Azrow, catch the next donkey back to Kabul, a white-knuckle DC-9 to Lahore, then home via London to Brisbane, where he’d appear on radio talk shows and start writing his memoirs: Afghanistan—A Coward’s Tale. If Rick still wanted the story, he could wait for Marco alone and do a photo spread. But Don didn’t think that would be the case. He figured, after all they’d gone through, he would be booking a donkey for two.

  The bunker held. The lights flickered out and the roof groaned under the weight of the snow—but it held. It was clearly a Grade-A insurgent hideout, endorsed by Osama bin Laden himself. The rumbling subsided, and in the darkness, in that moment of silence, Don thought he’d go insane. Then Rick screamed a string of expletives and Don knew they were still alive. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that.

  They stumbled around in the dark, looking for things they’d seen while the lights were still on. There were candles and matches, a big bag of road salt by the door, and a cheap transistor radio that broadcast nothing but static and the occasional burst of traditional Pakistani music. They lit a candle and stared at each other over the table, trying to make a joke of it all.

  It was twelve days since the last of their food�
��a half-melted Mars bar Rick had in his jacket pocket—disappeared. They tossed a coin to decide who got the first bite. And then when it was gone, Rick had to go and mention that Stephen King story—“Survivor Type”—the one where a doctor is trapped on a desert island and decides to eat himself. Good thing we’re not doctors, Don had joked. But it stayed with him. Plump, juicy flesh.

  They took turns kicking the steel door with their hiking boots.

  Each blow produced a low, solid thump. Maybe they would’ve had better luck before the avalanche when they were still strong.

  And then ten days of licking a wall, resting, and praying for someone to find them. Don’s stomach was a shrivelled sack. It didn’t even grumble any more. Don missed the grumbling. It was a sign he was still alive. He tried to focus on his wall, but his mind rebelled, sending him visions of thick, bloody steaks, French fries coated in chicken salt, and fat fingers, falling from Marco’s cigar cutter. He pushed the thought away but his mouth kept watering.

  He turned, slumped back against the wall, and watched Rick lapping up water. The table was covered in wax, the last candle burning down to the stub. The thought of being trapped in here in the dark would’ve terrified him a week ago. Now he was too frail for terror. Mild apprehension was the best he could muster.

  “Do you reckon he’s coming back?” Don said.

  Rick turned, face wet and shiny. He sat beside the door, all eyes and teeth. Concentration camp chic.

  “Why bother?”

  “Maybe he really wants to be in The Daily?” Don said, then laughed. A low chuckle, conserving energy.

  Rick went back to his puddle.