Weird Tales, Volume 51

by Ann VanderMeer

  When she was done with telling, he was fast asleep.

  She held him in her arms and sang the songs that her own mother sang when she was a child, and she cried a little because she didn't know how to sooth the ache inside her heart.

  “If only we could stay like this forever,” she whispered. “There would be no need to say goodbye.”

  It was dark in the house when her husband came home. In the bedroom, the sheets of white paper were scattered around the bed like fallen leaves.

  “Ariel,” he whispered.

  He ran his fingers over the words.

  A breathe of wind fluttered the pages in his hands and from outside the window, a flame of light illuminated the dragons rising up from the page. He watched them tumble in graceful flight. Green-gold fire licked at the pages, curling the edges, turning them to ash.

  He watched as miniature cities rose and crumbled; stars stumbled and collided, warriors clashed in battle, the world fell from its axis, and righted itself again, and at the end of it, Ariel was there, staring at him, his eyes piercing beyond the shell of skin to the pain beneath.

  “Now, you must give birth to life,” Ariel said.

  Outside, the moon was a sliver of silver fire, and he saw the Wordeaters dancing on the pillows.

  “No need for fear,” Ariel said.

  He looked up at his son.

  And the Wordeaters were around him. They surrounded him with their smell of lilies and wild roses. They filled him with the scent of rich loam, the wild growing of trees and the harvesting of rice.

  Images burst to life on the back of his eyelids. Warriors sprouted wings and flew away like eagles, the earth split apart into a thousand splintered reflections of itself, and the stars floated down to earth to speak with the remnants of a lost generation.

  He lay there for a long time and when he opened his eyes he saw Ariel floating upward on the beams of the moon.

  “No,” he cried. He stood up, and tried to catch hold of his son. “Stay,” he pleaded.

  And he wept because his arms were not strong enough, and he felt his son slip away from his grasp until there was nothing left but a ray of moonlight across the cover of their bed.

  “He was never ours to keep,” his wife said.

  In the darkness, her pale skin shone like ivory, and her body was soft and yielding under the bedcovers.

  She turned her face away and he saw the glimmer of tears on her cheeks, and when he reached out his hand to touch her shoulder, he felt her shudder with grief.

  “I'm sorry,” he said.

  And he thought of how he had shut her out, of the days turned into weeks and months of not speaking.

  He looked at her and saw how sorrow had hollowed out her cheeks, and etched lines upon her face, and for the first time in a long time, he reached out his arms to her. “We could have another child.”

  They were walking together on the beach, squinting against the glare of sun shining on white- topped waves.

  “No,” she whispered.

  She looked out and thought of her son whom she had lost to the waves and to the moonlight, and of her husband who stood beside her.

  “There are so many stories in the world,” she said. “So many stories packed into books. So many words packed into libraries waiting to be tasted, and swallowed up by people like me.”

  “We'll make another child, if you want.”

  She looked at him and saw the sadness and the longing and the aching shyness that transformed him from the boy she'd fell in love with into this man with whom she had chosen to share her life.

  “Tell your stories,” she whispered. “Write your words and give them life. Let them be the child Ariel once was. Fill your tales with his laughter, with the color of his eyes, with the scent of his breath and the feel of his hand in my hair. Write your words. Bring him back to me.”

  She saw the look he gave her. Saw wonder wake up in his eyes, heard the catch of his breath, and felt the trill of his hand reaching out to touch hers.

  “Let it be our memorial,” she said.

  A breeze blew in from the sea, wrapping them in the warmth of its caress.

  “The breeze comes from far away India,” he said. “Where a little boy plays on a beach of black sand and the sun is a ball of red fire.”

  They walked on, and his words floated away on the breeze to where a little boy with silver hair sat singing a tuneless melody under the light of the setting sun.

  Rochita Loenen-Ruiz is a Filipina writer-mom living in The Netherlands. An incorrigible bookworm, she constantly seeks new ways to share her love for books and stories with those around her. She edits poetry for the online publication Haruah: Breath of Heaven, writes reviews and interviews for Munting Nayon (a Filipino-Dutch publication), and writes columns for Double-Edged Publishing. This story is dedicated to her eldest son who never fails to surprise her with his extensive vocabulary, his free-flying imagination, and his insatiable hunger for stories. You could say that he is responsible for the birth of “The Wordeaters.” Feel free to visit Rochita at http://rcloenen-ruiz.livejournal.com.

  * * *

  OUT OF SACRED WATER

  by Juraj Cervenák

  (translated from the Slovak by Daren Bakker)

  In Which the New Empire Will Face All the Wrath of the Old Magic

  “We found Urosh! We found him!”

  Prokuy nearly choked. He pushed aside his bowl of mushroom soup so abruptly that half of it spilled onto the compacted dirt floor. He carelessly wiped his mouth, leaving that part of the soup that was in his beard now on his hairy forearm. He snatched up his axe and quickly climbed up the short ladder rising from the zemlyanka.

  “Urosh has been found in the woods!”

  The sound of axe blows, reverberating throughout the vast hilly countryside despite the falling twilight, gradually began to lose its rhythm and faded away. The men laid their saws aside, sank their axes into the fallen timbers, let loose the reins of the draught horses and scurried back to camp. Prokuy looked up. A boy barely seventeen years old was dashing madly down the slope into the clearing full of smoldering piles of branches. Prokuy knew him well. Bushek was among the few brave souls who would dare enter the woods on the other side of the mountain in search of a lost companion.

  “Urosh has been found!” he bellowed from the top of his lungs.

  “Stop that shouting!” Prokuy cried out to him. “They can hear you all the way to the prince's fortress! You'll wake everybody!”

  Only it was already too late. Work was done for the day and the men were hurrying back to camp. Prokuy swore to himself. Another useless delay. Felling trees and floating them fifty leagues down the River Morava to the main fortress was going terribly slowly. Moymir, the newly-installed Moravian sovereign, was starting to get impatient. Immediately after ascending the throne, he decided to build a new, grand court with enlarged, stronger fortifications. He wanted it finished by winter, but here it was already autumn and the wood needed for constructing it was falling short. And Prokuy knew all too well who they were blaming for it.

  Bushek came to a wobbly stop and bent forward, his hands resting on his knees. He tried to catch his breath.

  “Speak,” Prokuy growled at him. He wanted to get the bad news out before it reached the ears of the woodcutters on their way.

  “Urosh . . .” the boy managed to get out. “In the woods . . .”

  “I already heard. What about him? Is he alive?”

  Bushek straightened up and looked into the foreman's eyes. He didn't have to say anything.

  “Just like before?” Prokuy asked, gnashing his teeth.

  The boy shook his head. “Much worse . . .”

  Prokuy instantly forgot his anger and started to be frightened. Without thinking he lifted his hand to his chest and touched the talisman he wore for protection, the figure of a dog carved out of lime wood. “Perun and Radhost, don't forsake us now . . .”

  The quickly gathering crowd of woodcutters started as
king, “What's happened? Where is Urosh? Is he dead?” Prokuy could actually feel the fear that was engulfing one man after the other as if one giant, dark cloud were forming.

  “Calm down,” he shouted over the growing uproar. “Nothing has happened! Go back to your work! I want to see another dozen logs on the bank before it's totally dark out!”

  The men started muttering and calling for more details. They knew that something bad had happened. They were afraid. Prokuy shouted once more for them to go about their business and turned to Bushek. “Take me there.”

  But they had hardly reached a dozen paces when an unexpected cry swept throughout the camp: “Riders!”

  The woodcutters fell silent and looked off towards the valley. At least two dozen men on horseback were racing up from the River Morava along the trail that ran between the zemlyankas and the tents stitched from cow and horsehide. Prokuy froze. He instantly recognized the cast bronze helmets and plated armor of the prince's retinue. They were being led by a man of about forty, wearing a pockmarked face and armor adorned with silver. This was Vlchan, Moymir's right-hand man, the leader of his personal entourage, the most feared warrior in the Moravian basin. Next to him rode a somewhat older, bearded man wearing a simple dark frock tied with ordinary rope. A large, shiny cross dangled around his neck. Prokuy clenched his teeth. The priests of this peculiar religion, which had moved Moymir to reject the true gods not too long ago and was now forcing all other Moravians to do the same, had inspired little love among the people.

  The riders rode up to the enclosure in front of Prokuy's zemlyanka. The woodcutters quickly drew back before the approach of the horses. As soon as the warriors formed ranks on both sides, Prokuy noticed another man holding back on a sturdy black stallion. He was unusually tall, bony, and dressed all in black. His raven black hair contrasted sharply with the deathly pale look of his face, which bore a hideous scar made by a deep gash. His black eyes cast an eerie look on everything around him, as if they were capable of penetrating a man's flesh and looking to the bottom of his soul. Prokuy immediately knew this was a wizard and the monstrous black wolf that obediently trotted next to the black horse easily confirmed the suspicion. Only a sorcerer could tame such a wild beast. The foreman's entire body broke out into such a case of goose pimples that he could have easily sanded a piece of oak with his skin.

  “You are the foreman?”

  Prokuy looked back towards the head of the party. There wasn't a trace of friendliness in Vlchan's eyes. Quite the opposite. They radiated malice and arrogance.

  “Yes, sir. I am Prokuy.”

  Vlchan sat forward in his saddle. “Prince Moymir isn't satisfied at all with the rate of construction. And the reason for it is the raftsmen have little wood to float down the Morava.”

  Prokuy swallowed dryly. “It isn't our fault, sir. Evil things are happening. The men are afraid . . .”

  “I heard. Moymir was told that one of your men was found dead in the woods, his body mutilated.”

  “Two men, sir,” Prokuy corrected him. “Last night another one disappeared. He was found not too long ago and his body is said to be in a worse state than the first one.”

  “So then, there have been two heinous murders?” the man with the cross suddenly cried out and sat up in his saddle. “Surely some godless creature in the woods has done it!”

  “Undoubtedly,” Vlchan nodded. “And that's why we're here. Moymir has instructed us to remove whatever is holding up the swift clear cutting of trees for his fortress. It's time to put an end to these accursed witches.”

  “Rusalkas,” a calm but bone-chilling voice corrected him. “They are water nymphs.”

  All heads turned towards the wizard. The tall, thin man had been following the conversation with a blank look on his face. The black wolf sat on the ground next to him and pricked up its ears as if it understood every word.

  “Witches, fairies, nymphs, it doesn't matter?!” a voice called out into the subdued silence. “They're all heathens. Odious, bloodthirsty vermin that must be exterminated!”

  “On that we are agreed, Bolerad,” Vlchan frowned. “We shall enter their lairs and slay them once and for all. Who can lead us to the place where the last man murdered was found?”

  Prokuy looked at Bushek.

  “I can, sir,” the boy spoke up sheepishly.

  “Good. Then I want to see the body.”

  “The dead man is still there, sir,” said Bushek almost in a whisper. “Nobody has dared touch the remains.”

  After everyone rushed up into the clearing, Prokuy prayed in his soul for his gods to perform some miracle and transport him to the other end of the world.

  “Jesus Christ and all the saints in heaven,” Bolerad groaned and clenched his teeth, the veins on his ears protruding out. Even in the flickering light of the torches, everyone could see how pale he was.

  Bushek had led them across the ridge and into the valley on the opposite side of the hill. At the bottom was the creek that flowed around the mountain and fed the Morava. By the time they got there, it was already dark. The moment they cleared the underbrush on the bank, they saw the horror on the opposite side of the stream.

  Several of the warriors forgot their recent baptism in the waters of the Morava and invoked the names of the old gods in whispers. At first Bolerad resisted the temptation, but he swiftly turned away and began vomiting violently. Vlchan grimaced in disgust at the site on the opposite bank and without thinking reached for the hilt of his sword hanging at his side.

  “The poor fellow must have died an unbearable agony,” he let slip out.

  “I don't think so,” the black-haired wizard demurred. He moved to the front of the group and nimbly jumped over the creek. His cloak flapped behind him like large wings, making him look for an instance like a large, overgrown raven. The wolf followed him.

  “Be careful, sir,” Prokuy warned him. “This place is bewitched with nymph magic.”

  “Quiet, man!” Bolerad snapped at him. “Belief in pagan magic is blasphemy against God!”

  “Even if some kind of magic occurred here,” growled Vlchan, “it won't hurt him. He's a wizard, after all. Some people even say that the blood of the Chernobog, the god of darknees himself, flows through his veins.”

  Bolerad crossed himself so violently that it was nearly impossible to follow the movements of his hand. “We shouldn't have brought that heretic with us. It is desecration against God.”

  “He took it upon himself to join us,” Vlchan said, shrugging his shoulders. “He understands witchcraft. He can be useful to us.”

  “Who exactly is he?” Prokuy asked in muffled tones.

  “You haven't heard of Rogan, the sorcerer of the Temple of the Blood-Red Fire?” asked one of the warriors, turning to the foreman so he could undoubtedly take delight in Prokuy's expression. Of course, the name was familiar to him. Few people didn't know it. Inside, Prokuy scolded himself for being such a fool. Why didn't it occur to him earlier? The wolf, the sword forged from blackened metal jutting out from underneath a wizard's cloak . . .

  “It's just what I thought,” called out Rogan from the other side of the stream. “They were playing around with him after they killed him. He didn't suffer. They're not cruel. They only want to scare away intruders.”

  Urosh's head had been stuffed inside the hollow trunk of an old oak tree by the creek. Two sickening holes remained where his eyes had been gouged out, the blood around them still glimmering in the torchlight. His arms and legs were dangling from branches all about, the same as with his eyes, his ears and innards. His intestines had been bizarrely interwoven as if to create some kind of specific pattern. The empty trunk, with the ribs gleaming white from the torn flesh, lay under a tree.

  “The first victim was also mutilated?” the sorcerer asked.

  “No, this one is much worse,” said Prokuy, approaching the stream. “It's all getting worse. First there were only amulets hanging everywhere, like bewitched knots of animal innards and
the teeth and skulls of predators. There were howls in the night and flickering flashes of sorcery in the dark. But after we cut on, more frightening things started to happen. More and more of the men refused to cut down any more trees. Already a third of them have packed up and left. That is why the work has been going so slowly.”

  Rogan turned to look at him. Prokuy sensed that those two black eyes were sucking his brains right out of this skull. He hadn't been at all affected by the sight of the dismembered body, but now felt as if a large boulder had been placed in his gut.

  “They are defending themselves,” said the sorcerer. “These woods have belonged to the water nymphs since time immemorial. Their spirits are bound to the spirit of these woods. By cutting down their trees, you are robbing them of their life force.”

  “We realize that, Almighty One,” Prokuy nodded. “We have always been respectful to them. When we got the order to cut down their forest, we tried to appease them by making sacrifices, but . . .”

  “What?” Bolerad shouted. “You admit to servicing and worshiping pagan demons? You are condemning yourself to burning at the stake!”

  “We shall concern ourselves with that later,” said Vlchan, stemming another tide of priestly outrage. “Now is the time to deal with these creatures. I have enough men here to undertake an expedition against them. If I understand correctly, they are principally creatures of the night. They will offer less resistance during the day. We set out when it gets dark.”

  “Don't be rash, Vlchan,” warned the wizard, fixing his piercing look on him. “Things could turn out differently from what you imagine.”

  Vlchan bared his teeth. “They were the first to draw blood, remember that, Sorcerer. I cannot let them kill our people and go unpunished. What you say about us doing some wrong to them has no bearing here. To me, they are only beasts that have to be hunted down.”

  “You can think that way if you want, but remember, this beast will defend itself.”

  “I hope so. They will learn that an armored warrior won't be as easy a prey as a scruffy woodcutter. Back to camp!” With these words, Vlchan sharply turned and galloped off up the hill. The men-at-arms and Bolerad followed him. Only Prokuy, Bushek and two other woodcutters remained at the creek with the wizard