Marion reached down, past the stifling concrete and metal and stone of the city, calling up the power from her Mother. She ignored the scent of her sister’s blood. She had failed her, after all these years, despite having gotten her out of MacDonald School.
Marion began to change, her wounded leg tingling with forced healing. The man raced to the office door, boots clopping on the concrete. He wore dark blue coveralls and a fleece parka and stank of newsprint, ink and oil. Black fur was still erupting from her skin and her face stretching into a snout as she rose to meet him. His face blanched and he reeked of fear, but he grabbed her, and pushed her off-balance. They crashed through the office door. Marion bit his forearm in her massive carnassial teeth, crushing it with jaws that could crack a mammoth’s rib. He screamed and let go. But now the black dog was free.
Dire wolf and Rottweiler tumbled back out of the office, biting, ripping at each other. Marion easily outweighed her, her stocky limbs and neck powerful and sure; but the Rottweiler attacked in a mad frenzy.
Marion knew what she would do, even if it killed her. Her grandfather had said it might be possible, but the people who tried it usually died. But she had nothing left to lose, in this empty warehouse, cut off from her pack and what was left of her family. She would not let Miss Harrow grind her down.
Marion gripped the black dog’s upper foreleg in her teeth and sent her silent prayer down into the earth. O Mother, I ask you, as you changed me into this other body to do your work; to remove all that is other and evil from this creature. Let her be as she now is, and no more.
Marion felt the surge of power again, funnelling up through her body, pouring through her like a river of fire, consuming her; and through her jaws, raging on into the body of the beast that tore at her, working not a change so much as a subtraction, a rapid quenching of that other thing that strove for control of who Miss Harrow was, or whatever human part of her was left; the parasitic alien that had no place in a human body but worked so much evil once it gained entrance. Not a demon, but a disease. And through Marion, her Great Mother cleansed Miss Harrow of it, pursuing every vestige until, down to her last cell Miss Harrow was no longer anything other than what she seemed.
Miss Harrow stared back at Marion, whose fur was now white, then lowered her dark head and sank her tail between her legs. On some level, she understood, with her now permanently canine brain, what had happened. She would now grow old, and die, as the inarticulate beast she had tried to make Marion, her sister, and their friends at school feel they were. Marion wondered, as she towered over the pitiful black thing cowering before her, whether this was enough; whether she ought not to end it here herself. But she knew Miss Harrow, and to grow stupid and decrepit and eventually be put down like an animal, when the time came, was worse than a quick death.
The man had staggered to the door, cradling a dangling forearm and leaving warm spots of blood on the floor. With a sob he lurched out. Marion snapped her jaws at Miss Harrow, who whined and bolted into the frigid wind outside.
After many long minutes, Marion licked her sister’s face and neck clean and let out a long, mournful howl. She would need to change, dress, and carry away Jenny’s body; but for now, the night was deep and cold and dark, and she stood a sombre watch over her, singing a stricken song to the night. Ni chii mitch. My little sister.
Now she could do something even her grandfather could not. There were others like Miss Harrow out there, taking refuge in the dark corners of cement and steel and polluted, civilized life.
She was tired of hiding.
Soon, she would go hunting.
* * * * *
David Jón Fuller was born and raised in Winnipeg, Manitoba, where he now lives, but has also lived in Edmonton. He earned an honours degree in theatre at the University of Winnipeg and studied Icelandic for two years at the University of Iceland in Reykjavík.
He’s been the editor of North America’s oldest surviving ethnic newspaper, Lögberg-Heimskringla, and his fiction has been published in The Icelandic Canadian Magazine, Mythic Circle, The Harrow, and Alien Skin Magazine. He currently works as a copy editor for the Winnipeg Free Press.
Hereinafter Referred to as The Ghost
Mark Leslie
Patrick Collins waited for the burly young security guard to walk past. Though it had been over five hundred years since he needed to bother hiding in shadows or behind objects — he could, after all, fade in and out of the visible spectrum at will — it was still something he did mostly out of habit.
No, not just habit. Lately there was another reason.
But he didn’t want to think about that just now. There was a macabre task at hand.
Patrick grinned darkly. He knew that this guard, a William Blakely, had been with the museum less than three weeks. This was his first night shift and he had indeed heard the stories about this corridor being haunted. That set just the right atmosphere for what Patrick had planned.
As the security guard to Ottawa’s Museum of Nature approached the fourth floor walkway Patrick thought he sensed a subtle change in the man’s gait; as though he walked with a slight bit of caution, a feeling of trepidation.
This was always the best part.
The anticipatory adrenaline rush flooded him as he prepared his assault.
When the guard was beside him, Patrick stepped out of the shadows and willed himself partially visible and forced the temperature to drop several degrees— a hard trick. The effort left him with a haunting migraine— but the pain was worth it. Patrick was a pro — old world and old school — and he gave his all to every performance.
Though blood no longer flowed through Patrick’s veins, a definite life force did exist within his ectoplasmic body— and he felt a heightening pulse as he engaged in his ambush.
The guard slowed as he passed Patrick, then shuddered and brought a hand up to rub his left shoulder as if to ward off a sudden chill.
Patrick’s anticipation mounted, waiting for Blakely to react to the quick flash of his white vaporous form.
But Blakely didn’t look. He simply massaged his shoulder and walked on, oblivious to Patrick’s performance. Patrick sighed inaudibly and watched Blakely walk on.
He had failed. Again.
“Damn!” he said, this time in a way that carried at a frequency Blakely could hear.
The guard snapped around at the sudden sound to find the corridor behind him completely empty.
“We would like to hire you on, but we have a few reservations about your last few performances.” Wendell Snyder sat behind the large oak desk in an oversized high-backed chair and Patrick felt small in his presence as the suit paused to carefully rescan the documents in front of him before continuing. “We see here from your records that you didn’t just retire but were in fact suspended from your last two roles for performing out of character.”
Patrick wrung his hands as he slowly faded in and out of the visible spectrum. He had long ago developed the nervous habit, only the fading wasn’t as fluid or controlled as it used to be— and came with something that reminded him of the persistent arthritic ache he’d last experienced in the few years before he’d died.
“Let’s take your role as the ghost of the Museum of Nature in Ottawa, for example. Your contract stated that you were to appear no more than once every six weeks but no less than twice in a sixth-month period. After your initial successful run in which you indeed caused a guard to quit his job, you not only failed to appear again to any other subjects, but your last appearance was completely out of character and in direct violation of your part.”
Snyder paused to run his finger down the copy of the contract in front of him, then read the text aloud. “The ghost will appear only in visible form and not create audible stimuli, neither vocal nor ambient noise.”
He continued to study the document without saying anything mor
e. As the seconds ticked on, Patrick felt compelled to fill the silence.
“Er, yes, that’s true. But it was just a bad run of luck. You can also see from my records how successful my career has been.” Despite the fact no mortal walking the earth had ever learned his name, he had played the roles of dozens of ghosts haunting historic locations around the globe. He was revered and a much-sought-after character actor by the spectres that made the ghostly world something to note, for mortals.
“You’re right,” Snyder said, looking up from the document and directly at Patrick, making him feel even more small and insignificant. “There is no disputing your worldly reputation and the distinguished roles that you not only played but elevated to a level that most other actors have yet to achieve.”
“My Queen Ann Boleyn, for example,” Patrick beamed. “When I first took that role, she was nothing other than a vague spectre. I carefully moulded that role into the stuff of legends.”
“How so?”
“I was not only the first actor to make Queen Anne Boleyn appear below the room where she spent her last night, walking in front of the London Tower chapel as well as toward the Thames River that ran alongside the tower…” At that point Patrick jumped out of his chair, and, expending a great deal of ectoplasmic energy, attempted to morph into the dead Queen he had previously emulated in London. “But I was also the first to have her appear to several subjects, walking with her head in her hand!”
A further bearing down on his energy came as Patrick focused more energy on becoming Boleyn. Glancing at a nearby mirror, he realized the futility of his attempt as he didn’t look like her at all, but more like a middle-aged homeless man in suffragette drag.
Snyder paid no notice to the spectacle before him and instead flipped through the papers, verifying the details. “Yes, I suppose you were.”
“I also set the ghostly standard of enacting multiple roles simultaneously, and carried the record for the longest run of playing not one, but five distinct ghosts at the Tower of London.”
Patrick initially planned to morph from Boleyn to the Countess of Salisbury, but his ability was too feeble, so he reverted back to normal.
“On alternating occasions, I portrayed Queen Anne Boleyn, but also issued forth the haunting screams of Catherine Howard, another of Henry the VIII’s wives, as well as Margaret, Countess of Salisbury. And my Raleigh was supreme,” he said, “but it was the role of the dual princes that surely secured the feather in my London Tower cap.”
He bowed low, but still dizzy from his failed attempt, Patrick took a step backwards lest he fall on his backside.
Snyder peered over the top of his glasses at Patrick. “There is no disputing those facts,” he said in a quiet voice.
“It was this grouping of performances that secured my place at the forefront of the field, stepping into significant roles for which Mervin Crenshaw, my mentor, became famous.”
Snyder quietly nodded his head.
“From that point on, I have been the most demanded character actor in circulation and have continued to gain success and respect the world over.
“There is no denying any of this,” Snyder said. “Your legacy is one of the reasons I agreed to meet with you and have you audition for this role. By merely hiring an actor of your calibre I would immediately be capturing attention.”
Patrick took a step to the side and almost fell into the chair, massaging his throbbing head. The ache from his attempted transformation had cost him dearly.
“However,” Snyder continued, “attention to detail is not the same as capturing the hearts and minds of mortals. It is critical for them to believe in the afterlife, for there to be continual yet fleeting evidence of ghosts presented to them.”
“My role as the man in grey still garners attention in Drury Lane.”
After a long and successful run at London Tower, Patrick had moved to establish the role of the Theatre Royal ghost, often seen at rehearsals taking a seat in the upper section of the theatre, or disappearing into walls.
“You did create another smashing success there.”
“Actors are still playing off my original perfection of that role,” Patrick said. “Look at how well Marilyn Thompson is doing in her extremely long run at the Theatre Royal. She took my original preference for appearing more often in Shakespearean comedies and adapted it into favouring American Musicals. Humans have come to consider this ghost’s appearance as a lucky omen for the run of a play. And whenever she is interviewed about that, who does she cite as her main inspiration for that career decision?”
“Patrick Collins.”
“Exactly!” Patrick sat up as the throbbing began to finally subside. “I not only adapted and evolved roles, but I have inspired countless others to do so, on their own.”
“I am not disputing that. There is no denying your influence in this genre. As I said, it is your huge career successes in keeping vivid ghost stories among the mortals alive that led me to be willing to consider you. But you haven’t addressed the fact that you were suspended from your last two contracts.”
Patrick again jumped to his feet. “Do you understand the sheer versatility it took for me to pull off the guise of the Flying Dutchman?” Though tempted to demonstrate this, Patrick knew the energy required was something he had long ago lost. So instead of performing, he strutted back and forth in front of Snyder’s desk. “How many ghosts have you hired who were able to create the ghostly spectre of an entire shipping vessel off the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa?”
“I understand,”
“As I’m sure you know…” Patrick paced in a semi-circle behind the chair he had been sitting in. “That role isn’t performed very often, and, when done, it takes half a dozen actors to pull it off.”
“So I have heard,”
“Whereas I’d been the only actor to ever assume that role on my own.”
Of course, Patrick had come to realize that stretching himself in these ways, playing multiple ghosts at the same time and taking on forms that strayed dramatically from his natural one, like the ghost ship, all played a part in straining his resources, wearing his abilities, the life-force that gave him existence, more and more thin.
Where once it had been easy for him to become a headless ghost, now it was virtually impossible to do anything more than fade into the visible spectrum pretty much in a shape similar to his natural form of a middle-aged male.
He only realized, too late, that working himself in this fashion led to an exhaustion of his very being. Certainly, ghosts didn’t live by mortal structure, didn’t age, didn’t break down physically. Not completely. But by stretching himself beyond the limits of his immortal form, Patrick had significantly reduced his ability to transform. He could recover back to his normal ghostly form, but taking on other guises was finite.
Patrick turned his back to Snyder, facing the ornate wood-carved bookshelves across from the man’s desk while he spoke, punctuating his words with the dramatic stance. “I built my career upon pushing roles into new territories, into establishing new legends.”
“That was back in your earlier days,” Snyder sighed. “Back when you had the vigor, determination and sheer strength. You were great once. You must admit that you pretty much failed not just in the previous two contracts, but in the previous three from which you retired with not much ado at all.”
“But I’m Patrick Collins!” Patrick turned and thrust a thumb at his own chest. “I have played all the major roles; I have commanded the respect, fear and adoration of thousands.”
Snyder shrugged. “Have, did, was. I can’t hire you based on what you used to be able to pull off. I need a ghost to do something now, to allow a legend to continue to exist and even to evolve.
“Simply put, I have no reason to hire you over a dozen other young actors with great strength and agility who are vyin
g for this role. I’m going to have to say good night, Patrick.”
Patrick thought back to the mentor he had worked under and who had easily defined dozens of well-known ghosts in Scotland. Mervin Crenshaw. He had taken Patrick under his wing, taught him the subtle nuances to properly play a ghost— the research one could put into a character, the manner in which new elements could be introduced into a performance; and always, how to remain the stuff of legends.
It had only been after his role as the phantom faces on the floor of Belmez de la Maraleda in the village in Andalusia, Spain, where Crenshaw had strained himself beyond the point of no return, that the legend realized he had to retire from character acting and into another type of role.
“It’s getting to be too much,” Crenshaw had told Patrick. “In the same way I have evolved roles and performances over the years, I now need to evolve into a different type of acting. One that requires less exertion in my visible appearance. Being regarded for overtly dramatic roles is a drug, but, as good as that feels, it can never replenish the lifeforce drained to perform that role. And I have expended as much as I can. It’s time now for me to scale back. You’ll know too when your time has come.”
Crenshaw had opted into a virtual retirement contract of resurrecting a classic legend by bringing back the mystery of the moving coffins in the Chase Vault near Christ Church Parish on the island of Barbados. He never once needed to make a physical appearance to inspire fear and legends, and seemed happy enough.
Most who died moved on into an afterlife of quiet desperation, satisfied with watching the antics of those still strutting about on the mortal plain. It was only those like Patrick and his mentor who wanted more, who sought attention and fame in their ethereal existence, who trained themselves in order to haunt the living, to walk among the mortals, to cause them angst, but, more importantly, to subtly suggest to them that there were more things beyond the mortal coil than they currently understood. And, once having known the rush this brought, Patrick could not bear to go back to just being a normal dead spirit. That would be worse than fading completely into nothing.
Tesseracts Seventeen Page 11