A Mosaic of Stars: Short Stories From Other Worlds

by Andrew Knighton

  Probably not.

  Two minutes later they ran out of the building, smoke trailing behind them.

  “Fire!” Fred screamed at the red-coated sentries huddling against the sudden cold.

  “Fire!” Jean-Luc echoed, as the roof creaked and fell inward in a shower of sparks.

  Just for a moment, a tiny figured danced in the flames, then disappeared on the freezing wind.

  The djinn was gone, along with the evidence of their failure. Fred could only hope people believed it was an accident.

  The soldiers grabbed buckets of water in a futile attempt to quench the magically-powered flames. Fred turned to Jean-Luc.

  “Was this a good idea?” he asked.

  Jean-Luc shrugged.

  “Did you have a better one?”

  Fred shook his head and pulled his collar up around his ears, as around him the snow fell.

  The Gorgon's Gaze

  “You said there’d only be one gorgon!” Myrrine yelled as she fled down the torch lit tunnel, sandals slapping against the cold stone. Behind her, the sound of many slithering bodies pursued them through the darkness.

  “That’s what Herodotus told me.” Korinna’s armour glinted in the flickering light, mirrored shield flashing as the Amazon glanced back over her shoulder. A bag slapped against her leg, blood seeping from the severed head inside, a single strand of snake hair flapping about as it poked out the top. “Useless bloody historians.”

  They rounded the corner and saw Ampelios scratching his head as he tried to remember which of two tunnels they’d come down an hour before. The Spartan had the muscles of a bull, but sadly the brains to match.

  “Go left!” Korinna yelled just as Ampelios headed down the right-hand tunnel. “No! That’s the-“

  There was a sharp snap and a bellow of pain. Ampelios staggered back out of the tunnel, blood spurting from what remained of his left leg.

  “There’s a trap,” he said, dull-eyed as ever.

  “I know,” Korinna said. “We built it.”

  Ampelios fell to the floor, staring up at Myrrine as she rushed to his side.

  “Good thing we brought a physician, eh?” he said.

  “Good thing indeed.” Myrrine clamped Ampelios’s hands around the wound, getting him to staunch the blood flow as best he could. Any other man would have passed out by now, but then this was the way with Spartans. “We need to close this fast or you’ll die of blood loss.”

  She rummaged in her bag, looked up in frustration.

  “Where are my bandages?” she asked.

  “Used them to make the gorgon net,” Korinna replied, looking anxiously back down the tunnel.

  “What about my Vesuvian iron?” Myrrine asked. “It’s enchanted to cauterise wounds.”

  “Black rock the size of my fist?” Ampelios asked.

  “That’s right.”

  “Threw it at the gorgon.”

  Myrrine screamed. It wasn’t as cathartic as she’d hoped.

  “Why in Hades did you bring me,” she said, panic making her voice rise, “if you weren’t going to let me keep my tools?”

  “Thought we’d need a doctor if we got turned to stone,” Korinna said. “Hurry, they’re nearly here.”

  “Turned to stone?” Myrrine exclaimed. “I don’t know how to turn someone back from stone!”

  “What sort of doctor are you?”

  “The stupid sort, if I ever work with you again.”

  Ampelios was starting to look pale, his fingers loosening around the stump, letting out even more blood.

  The slithering of pursuit grew louder. Something flickered down the tunnel.

  “We have to move.” Korinna dragged Ampelios to his feet, thrust him towards Myrrine. “You help him run.”

  “But he’s twice my size!” Myrrine staggered beneath his weight, blood starting to soak the bottom of her toga.

  “Then you’ll have to run quickly.” Korinna shoved them towards the left hand tunnel, holding her shield up the way they had come. A moment later she turned and dashed after them. One of her feet clattered heavily against the ground.

  “What happened?” Myrrine asked.

  Glancing back, she saw that one of Korinna’s feet had turned stiff and grey, and the warrior was grimacing as she ran.

  “Foot’s stone,” Korinna said. “Must have just caught me with the gaze.”

  “I didn’t think that was how-”

  “Well it is,” Korinna snapped. “Now keep running, or Ampelios won’t be the only one dying.”

  They ran on up the tunnels, but the one-legged Ampelios was slowing them down, the more so because he was bent over, futilely trying to stem the bleeding. Myrrine glanced from him to Korinna. Inspiration struck. It was a desperate, probably futile sort of inspiration, but it was all she had.

  “Give me the head,” she said.

  “Oh yes,” Korinna snapped. “Let’s turn someone else to stone, maybe lose the head too and miss out on the bounty.”

  Myrrine could hardly fight Korinna for what she needed, and she could still hear the gorgons approaching. In desperation she swung around, hurling Ampelios at the Amazon. Korinna’s sword clattered to the ground as she grabbed him with both hands.

  Desperation lending her speed, Myrrine snatched up the sword and sliced open the bottom of the bag. She grabbed the gorgon’s head as it fell out, averting its gaze before it could hit her, then directing it onto Ampelios’s ruined leg. The air tingled with power, and the stump stopped bleeding as it turned stone grey. He pulled his hands from it and stood up straight, leaning on the more secure support of Korinna.

  Myrrine thrust the head into her empty medical bag. At least that was good for something.

  “Come on!” she yelled. “Now we can really run.”

  Lady Joanna's Guests

  Lady Joanna thought of herself as well-mannered, but there were times when the world tested her patience. Sending her servants to join Queen Mary’s army at Framlingham had been the just act of a woman aiding her friend, even if it meant having to dress herself. The possibility of raids from the pretender Jane’s supporters instilled fear in her, but pride that they might consider her a worthy target. Discovering that she had been sold a useless mummy, powdered fragments of its wrapping providing no power for her visions, no way to tell how the struggle went? That was beyond the pale.

  “A pox on Simon of Ipswich,” she muttered as she reached inside the upright sarcophagus. She should have known that a man that obnoxious would sell false goods.

  Scraping pieces of mummia from the wrappings into her mortar, she ground them, tipped them into wine and downed the gritty, bitter results. But no vision came as it had in the past.

  A noise made her spin around, eyes wide and staring at the mummy. Something was amiss, but what?

  That noise again, a low groaning. Then the mummy’s arms rose, and it stepped slowly out of the sarcophagus, bandaged feet thumping on the tiled floor.

  Joanna’s heart pounded – this was not how a corpse was meant to behave. But she was determined not to let her fear show. She straightened her shoulders and looked the creature in the eye.

  “I don’t know what you are playing at.” She waved a finger in its face. “But I am having none of it. Your time of moving around has passed. Get back in your coffin so that I can take more mummia.”

  Taking another step forward, the mummy reached out toward her.

  “I said back.” Glaring did no good.

  Joanna was all out of gentlewomanly options, but then serving her own breakfast had been an ungentlewomanly act. The line had been crossed, and there was no sense worrying about it now. Placing both hands on the mummy’s chest, she tried to push it back into the sarcophagus.

  “Back I tell you!” It was no good. The creature was far stronger than her, and completely unmoved by the assault.

  The thunder of hooves and rattle of gravel announced new arrivals at the house. Rushing to the window, Joanna peered out through the leaded pains.
Four ruffians were dismounting and making for her door, swords drawn.

  “I will deal with you later,” she said to the mummy as she tried frantically to plan her next step. Could she flee? Probably not, without the stable boy to saddle her horse. Could she fight? She had never used a sword, but how difficult could it be? Except that there were no swords in the dining hall, and the men’s footsteps were already coming close.

  The door burst open and the ruffians stomped inside, leaving muddy footprints all over her floor.

  “You’re to come with us.” Their leader walked past the stationary mummy and straight toward her.

  “Most of this stuff, too.” Another of them started grabbing silverware off the sideboard.

  “I will not.” Joanna folded her arms and prepared to argue, but two of the men grabbed hold of her. “Unhand me at once!”

  “Not a chance.” The leader’s laughter was as ugly and brutish as he was.

  Determination turned to nauseating fear in Joanna’s stomach. She had heard terrible things about what happened to women in times of civil war, even noblewomen.

  But the laughter was cut short as a bandaged hand descended onto the ruffian’s shoulder. He jumped six inches into the air and spun around, sword stretched out toward the mummy. It stumbled toward him with slow, steady steps, groaning once more.

  “Get back!” The man thrust his sword a few inches into the mummy’s chest, where it became stuck, not budging as he wrestled with the hilt.

  The man next to him screamed in terror, dropped a pair of candlesticks and ran from the house. His companions followed suit, the leader sticking around just long enough for the mummy to lunge at him again before he ran, pale and shaking, out onto the drive.

  They galloped away in a spray of gravel.

  “I’m sorry about that.” Lady Joanna placed one hand on the mummy’s chest, grabbed the protruding sword with the other, and gave it a twist. The blade quickly came free. “I would never normally allow such riffraff into my house, but these are trying times.”

  The mummy tilted its head, apparently looking down at the sword and then back to Joanna’s face. It raised a hand, and after a moment’s hesitation patted Joanna slowly on the shoulder.

  She sagged with relief, and then offered the mummy a smile.

  “Fine, I won’t keep scraping away your wrappings.” She poured a new goblet of wine, this time without any gritty additions. “I could do with some help around here anyway.” She took a sip, and a thought crossed her mind. “I don’t suppose you know how to prepare dinner, do you?”

  Holes Through the World

  Shivering despite layers of jumpers and a thermal jacket, Tod trudged on through the snow drift. Each step was a struggle, as if he was having to push holes through the world just so he could keep moving. But it would be worth it. The snow was deep enough, the conditions bleak enough to draw out his prey.

  This was the day he would finally photograph sasquatch, and prove Angleby’s magic monkey shaman theory was crap.

  Despite the cold he became giddy with excitement as he saw another set of ape-like paw prints. Just like before, three long strides and then nothing. How did it do that, hiding most of its trail so perfectly? Why then did it leave these tracks at all?

  Just one more mystery whose unravelling would make him famous. Let Angleby laugh at him then.

  Excitement turned to alarm as the snow gave way beneath him and he went tumbling into a ditch and landed with a crack.

  Rolling over, he realised with alarm that he’d broken his camera. The lens was smashed and the casing split open, letting in the same icy water that now seeping into his cloths. Cursing and sneezing, he staggered to his feet and pulled out his phone.

  “No signal,” the screen announced. Who cared about signal? What mattered was…

  Yes, the phone camera was working. He might still manage this.

  Stuffing the phone back in his pocket, Tod tried to climb out of the ditch. But the sides were slippery and steep. Every time he tried to grip them he just brought more snow down upon himself.

  The snow covering him was melting, little by little soaking through his clothes. He shivered. His arms and legs were going numb. The sky was turning an ominous grey.

  This was bad. His teeth chattered, toes tingled with pain. He looked up, hoping to see something he could grab hold of.

  Then he saw it. A magnificent beast, seven feet high and with long fur hanging around its wise, gentle face.

  Sasquatch was looking down at him.

  Tod’s heart raced. He didn’t want to look away, didn’t want to miss a moment of this. With cold-deadened fingers he fumbled the phone from his pocket. But as he held it up a wave of dizziness overcame him.

  He fell back in the ditch.

  The edges of his vision grew dark and the cold crept further in, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. He was just too sleepy.

  The snow crunched beside him, and he was lifted by a coarsely furred arm. The warmth and the earthy smell of the sasquatch’s body revived him just enough to look up as it reached out with its other arm. Tod knew he must be hallucinating, because the creature seemed to fold the snow-scattered landscape around itself, revealing something else beyond. Then it took three long strides and suddenly they were surrounded by warmth and sunlight.

  The sasquatch lowered Tod onto a beach of soft sand, peeled open his wet jacket and let the warmth in. Slowly, Tod felt warmth and life return to his body.

  With it came an awareness of how terribly close to death he had come.

  “Thank you.” He looked up at the sasquatch, which grunted and nodded its head.

  Something cold and hard still sat in Tod’s hand. He lifted the phone and pointed the camera at the sasquatch. It covered its head with its arms, wailing in distress, but made no move to leave him.

  Tod lowered the phone. Who cared about reputation compared with what this magnificent creature had done for him? It wasn’t like he could prove Angleby’s magic ape theory wrong. Not honestly, after what he’d seen.

  He rose and put an arm around the sasquatch.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “Didn’t mean to upset you. Could we maybe have a selfie, here on the beach, just for me?”

  The sasquatch nodded, smiled and pointed a finger at itself.

  “You want a copy too?” Tod shrugged. “OK then.”

  It wasn’t like he could share the picture with anyone else. Sasquatch on a beach – who’d ever believe that?

  A Pinch of Sorrow

  The funeral left Steve feeling hollow. Not grief stricken and lonely like his father. Not laughing at happy memories like his mother had wanted. Just empty, like his heart had been eaten away by her cancer. He longed to cry or laugh or do anything that made this feel real, that made it seem like this moment would pass. But there was nothing.

  As soon as he could he ducked out of the church hall, past the trays of limp sandwiches and his cousins smoking by the door. He nodded acceptance of their condolences, climbed into his four-by-four and drove.

  He travelled in silence. No radio. No CDs. Just the rumble of the engine. He wasn’t going to the office – his mother had always said he spent too much time there. And he couldn’t face his own house, still half-empty a year after Jen left.

  Instead he found himself in front of his parents’ house. He parked and walked inside on autopilot, found himself standing in the kitchen, kettle in hand, halfway through making a cup of tea he didn’t want. His eyes were caught by the cookery books beneath the window. The largest and most battered was an old hardback notebook, the one his mother had inherited from his grandmother and that she had kept adding to over the years. The one she had said should be passed down to him.

  He pulled out the notebook, fingered its brown-edged pages that smelled of flour and spices, hoping it might stir up his feelings. The recipes were full of his mother’s little jokes.

  ‘Add a teaspoon of joy.’

  ‘Mix with two measures of love.’
r />   ‘Just a pinch of sorrow.’

  But though every recipe contained an emotion, still nothing stirred in Steve’s heart.

  He stopped at a fruit cake, one she had made every Easter. She only went to church at Christmas, but something about Easter had mattered to her. When he left home Steve had copied out that recipe so that he wouldn’t miss his mother’s Easter cake. Though it never tasted quite right it was a reminder of her love.

  He needed that reminder now.

  He rummaged through the cupboards for sultanas and flour, beat eggs, stirred it all together.

  But the dough still didn’t taste right.

  He ran down the ingredients again. One line caught his eye.

  ‘A pinch of sorrow.’

  She had always treated those parts so seriously, and he had always ignored them as a strange little joke. But today of all days he wanted to respect her. So he felt inside himself, found the small pinch of sorrow that was all he could feel, and imagined adding it to the mix as he stirred.

  Still nothing. He knew it even before he dipped his finger in the thick batter. The whole thing was just another hollow gesture, like the party at the church, like watching her coffin go into the ground.

  He suddenly felt foolish, stood here with a bowl of cake mix when he should be mourning. Why couldn’t he even cry?

  Filled with frustration he flung the bowl at the wall. It shattered, spattering the paintwork with sticky blobs, shards of glass tumbling to the floor. He sank down onto cold tiles, staring at the mess.

  As if released from the ruins of the bowl, a memory came back to him. Squatting on this same floor when he was young, made to sit quietly after fighting with his sister, he had watched every movement his mother made. As his own anger passed he somehow knew that, even when she told him off, his mother still loved him. He watched her as she made that cake. Weighing out sugar, sifting flour, adding raisins. Even the gesture she had made when she came to the pinch of sorrow, like twisting a dial in the air. The same sign his grandma made for good luck or to curse the neighbour’s cat.