Tesseracts Seventeen

by Colleen Anderson

  “Okay, fine,” Patrick said, falling back into the chair in front of Snyder’s desk. “I realize you need someone with more energy and ability to manifest. I understand that my time in playing these roles has passed. But you can’t just leave me like this.”

  Snyder shook his head. “Well I do have another role you might be suited for in which the current actor’s contract is coming to an end. It’s in a few months and is on the East coast of Canada.”

  Patrick sat up in the chair, immediately understanding the exact role Snyder was talking about.

  “You’re good,” Snyder conceded. “You already know what role I’m speaking about.”

  “A well-versed ghost always knows which contracts are coming open, which ones are tightly closed and which ones are likely the next they should be seeking out.”

  “We can at least depend on these solid constants.” Snyder bemused.

  “I’d have time to properly study the role and perform it to perfection.” Patrick said. “You know I could easily do it, even in my current state.”

  Snyder paused. “Well, as I said, I would like to hire you on. You are a world-renowned actor; the profile of this particular role does need a bit of a boost after some recent defamatory videos have been posted online about it. But, I’m not really—”

  “I’ll sign to this one permanently.”

  Snyder stared at him for a full two minutes. “Okay, it’s a deal.”

  He slid the contract across the desk.

  Patrick sat in the dark corner of the upper floor of St. Paul’s church in Halifax, Nova Scotia and carefully unfolded what he knew was the last contract he’d ever sign.

  The contract was between Ghostlife Experiences, hereinafter referred to as the producer, and Patrick Collins, hereinafter referred to as the ghost.

  Patrick skimmed through the appearance requirement, something he was perfectly capable of, and the fact that, unless he failed to inspire half a dozen different subjects per twelve-month period, this role was his until the end of time.

  He was enacting the role of a man whose silhouette was supposedly captured in the glass of the window during the Halifax explosion of 1917. The shadow was subtle and something he could easily pull off regardless of how many times the window was broken or replaced; and beyond that, there were no other requirements. No voices or noises, no chilling of the air, no appearance of spectres.

  Patrick sighed as he listened to a group of tourists on a downtown Halifax Ghost Walk approach from the nearby war memorial. He heard their excited voices as they clamored outside, saw the flash photography lighting up the room, and most particularly he relished in hearing a young male voice say, very distinctly. “Oh my God, there it is. I can see him, I can see him perfectly. How eerie.”

  Though it wasn’t as glamorous as some of his past roles, Patrick was at least secure in the knowledge he could play this one, without tire, forever.

  * * * * *

  Mark Leslie is the author of One Hand Screaming, I, Death and the non-fiction books Haunted Hamilton and Spooky Sudbury. He was born and grew up in Sudbury, Ontario and now resides in Hamilton with his wife and their son. Having fallen in love with storytelling (in particularly ghostly and “Twilight Zone” style tales) at an early age, Mark has assumed various roles within the publishing industry, all orbiting around the roles of bookseller and writer. If asked to define the roles he performs in the simplest of terms, Mark likes to use the term book nerd.

  Anywhere

  Alyxandra Harvey

  It wasn’t until the red birds spilled like wine across the sky that Tashi began to worry.

  At first only one bloodbird dipped low to catch insects in the last of the milkweed bursting their pods in the fields.

  Her pulse pounded sharply, like the crack of ice in the well on a winter morning. A single bloodbird could be explained in any matter of ways: weather, wind, a simple pause between here and there. After all, even bloodbirds had to rest and eat and do whatever it was birds did up inside the trees. Tashi knew the valleys well, had run over every inch of them, had lain down in sunshine, rain and once, bruising hail. And if she knew that single red bird just as well, no one else needed to know about it.

  So she stayed in the long golden grass, determined to ignore it. She wore a green dress, patterned with mud and berry juice and embroidered with burrs. She avoided the battle-brown her family preferred, even if it would have fared better against the messages left by mountain crag and grasslands. What was there to battle in the mountains anyway? Her brother Caius, her parents, her aunts, even her ancient grandmother, saw enemies everywhere. Tashi only saw the lengthening shadows, her herd of yaks eating wildflowers, and now, the bloodbirds.

  When she was still a babe in a nest of blankets, a red bird had come in through the open window and landed on her crib. Her father had wept. Her grandmother had spat on the floor rushes to keep away the evil spirits.

  The second time a red bird dared enter the house, her mother pinned it to the wall with the tip of her favorite dagger. Its skeleton was buried under the front step, as a warning. Years later, Tashi found one of its red feathers behind a wooden chest and she’d wept without knowing why. She burned the feather when she was stirring the goat stew. The fire had burned so hot the cauldron cracked and supper was lost to the flames and embers.

  When the flock of bloodbirds flew so low the beat of wings was like the growl of a feral dog, Tashi leapt to her feet. Red feathers floated amongst the last of the goldenrod pollen. Tashi threw a stone at the birds, breaking their pattern.

  And then she ran.

  She darted past the boulder where her grandfather had offered the smallest finger of his left hand to stop a drought, over the bridge where Caius had killed his first troll when he was seven, and between the birch trees stripped of their leaves to look like bone swords coming out of the ground. She cut through the herb garden, planted mostly with flowers to stem bloodflow and heal putrid wounds.

  Her family waited on the hilltop. Tashi felt the press of the bloodbirds behind her and knew a moment of relief. No one was better with a bow than her father and his sisters. The rain of arrows would scare the birds away. They’d bury all of their tiny bones under all the stones of the path to the front door as a warning to all the bloodbirds in all the kingdoms.

  But her father wasn’t holding his bow. Her mother did not throw her dagger. Her brother didn’t leap forward with his sword.

  They weren’t even wearing their brown battle leathers. Instead, her father and brother wore white tunics, a line of white painted down the centre of their faces. Her mother and her aunts wore the white veils of mourning, snapping in the wind like the surrender flags they would never fly. Her grandmother had painted the white eye on her brow to deflect the evil eye of the walking dead.

  To deflect Tashi, and offer her to the Riders without a fight.

  Her family always fought.

  Not today. Not with bloodbirds overhead, and the sound of hooves on the road.

  There were three Riders, nowhere near enough to offer a challenge to her family. They wore red-edged white cloaks, instantly recognizable, instantly feared.

  “I didn’t call the birds!” Tashi shouted, feeling just like the badger she’d once found with its leg trapped under a rock. She’d freed him but he’d still bitten her so savagely her grandmother had to sew the ragged wound closed with silk thread. She still had the scar.

  But when the bloodbirds landed in the grass in a circle around Tashi, her grandmother turned her back. Recognizing the sign, her family followed suit. They were already mourning her, the strange red-haired daughter who spent her days and nights on the roof of the world with mountain beasts.

  “You know the rules,” one of the Riders said. “The bloodbirds never lie.”

  They took Tashi to the catacombs.

  It wasn�
��t a proper house of the dead, just a valley between two mountains where luck-singers were sent to die, if they couldn’t be broken for the Sultana. She secured them in the catacombs so they couldn’t use their magic against her, and if one showed particular promise she had them brought to the palace for training. For some luck-singers, the promise of luxury and wealth was enough to make them forget their days in the catacombs, was even enough to have them return to feed the magic wards which kept the other luck-singers trapped inside.

  Tashi saw the first of the bone fields scattered among the rocks, then a pile of femurs turned into torches, and finger bones curled into lanterns. Finally, they came to the actual bodies sprawled in the dust. One was a boy, still unbearded, and bristling with the arrows of the sentinels. He, like the other corpses, faced away from the catacombs. No one ever escaped.

  The Riders led Tashi to a canvas tent where she was ordered to put on a red dress. All of the luck-singers could be easily identified in red. Everything else was taken from her, except for her embroidered apron and her distinctive hair, which fell to her waist because everyone in the village was too afraid to cut it. Red hair became powerful magic in the wrong hands.

  The Riders left her to the sentinels, who used their spear tips, wrapped in blue thread for protection, to prod her toward the top of the stone stairs. The sun was just behind the mountain on her left, leaving cold blue shadows and the flicker of bone torches in the dark ravine. There were bloodbirds everywhere, perched on stunted leafless trees, on outcroppings, on ledges. They lived here, drawn to the scent of magic, to the luck-singers, to her. The catacombs were bigger than she had imagined, a warren of tunnels and burrows carved by rain and human hand. There were gods etched here and there, but she did not know their names. The ravine floor was overgrown with grasses, trumpet flowers and ferns. Come winter, it would be coated with ice; come spring, the water would gallop like wild oxen. She saw bamboo bridges, rope ladders dangling from ledges, more bone lanterns, and eyes, too many eyes.

  The catacombs were wild with ghosts, demons and men who thought they were bears. She had no weapons, despite her family name, and no luck of her own, despite what the bloodbirds claimed. She still didn’t understand why they had come for her. Surely, if she was a luck-singer, she would have known it?

  The luck-singers came out of the undergrowth as she tried to make sense of her situation. Thier red dresses and tunics were tattered and mended with bits of blankets and the rough burlap of potato and onion sacks, and furs. They wore bones and river stones for jewelry.

  Tashi froze, assessing her chances of escape, with only mountain at her back. Footsteps sounded, and in the near distance, a drum.

  “A little mountain girl.” A luck-singer with blackened teeth spat on the ground. “Hardly sport.”

  Tashi didn’t say anything. Disowned or not, she was born into a warrior family. She knew more about pain and the ways to break a body open than anyone who relied on magic. And she knew not give away her strengths. Let them think her small and rustic.

  “I’ll take that apron,” his companion barked, reaching for her. “Me wife will like it.”

  Tashi waited until the last moment before dropping low. She rolled, tossing him into the first luck-singer, knocking them both off their feet. She popped back up on the other side and launched into a run. One of the women grabbed her braid, yanking her back. When the woman’s fingers clamped on the back of Tashi’s neck, magic seared her, blisters forming instantly. She jerked back, grinding her teeth. She didn’t cry out; her grandmother had never allowed any sound of pain, even when she’d been sewing the badger bite with a silver needle.

  “Oi, you’ll leave her be.” Another luck-singer approached from the other end of the ravine. “No blasted circle tonight.”

  He wore bear pelts and his eyes were pale blue in a face the color of toasted hazelnuts. Scars patterned his arms and along his left cheekbone. He carried nothing but one of those macabre lanterns.

  Still, the woman released Tashi, snarling. “Declan, always taking in the strays. One of them will bite you one day, and I’ll use your bones to make a basket for my bread.” To Tashi’s surprise, the other luck-singer backed off. They disappeared into the shadows, muttering. The drumbeat stopped abruptly. Hisses of disappointment came from the caves nearby.

  “Bleedin’ vultures.” Declan looked disgusted. “They wanted a luck circle tonight.”

  She’d never seen anyone so tall or wide at the shoulders as Declan. Suddenly, the stories of bear-men seemed entirely plausible. “What’s that?” She asked.

  “When a new luck-singer fights one of the catacomb champions. No weapons, luck only.” He eyed her curiously. From this proximity she could see that he was her age, or even a little younger. “How strong is your luck, then?”

  She swallowed. “Strong enough.”

  He smirked. “You don’t know yet. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Most of us didn’t know we had magic either before we were taken. Why do you think the Riders snatch us away as soon as the bloodbirds find us? They want us locked away before we can fight back.”

  “Why did you stop the others?” She asked cautiously. She was grateful, but she’d been raised by a family mad for war. They started fights as often as they ended them, and always for their own purposes.

  “A dream told me to climb down here tonight. And you have calla lilies stitched on your apron. I’d not let the vultures take you.”

  She blinked. It didn’t seem like a particularly good reason to risk one’s life for a stranger. Even in a mad crevice in the earth filled with the bones of witches.

  “I’m looking for my Calla,” he continued. His expression went both dreamy and hungry.

  She backed up a step, scowling. “I’m no one’s flower.”

  He snorted. “As if I’d pluck you. I’ve my own love.”

  “Where is she then?”

  Sadness flickered across his face. It was jagged enough that she had to glance away. “She was taken by the Riders but I can’t find her anywhere.” His eyes speared her. “I had a dream a calla lily would lead me to her. And the calla embroidered on your apron is the first I’ve seen since I was brought here.”

  A dream wasn’t much to go on. The thought must have showed on her face because Declan added “My luck sends me truth-dreams.” He lifted the bone torch, the fire hissing. “So are you coming, not-a-flower?”

  She didn’t point out that in a valley built with the bones of the dead, his true love was probably here already. She followed him along the ledge, shivering. He misinterpreted her shiver. “Are you cold? Afraid of heights?”

  “No,” she replied, thinking of the time she’d had to chase a wandering yak taken to roaming at night to eat fresh snow.

  “Oh, well, you won’t die right away,” he added cheerfully. “If that’s what’s worrying you. They send us blankets and food, at least until you find your luck. They need to know what you can do and what anchors your magic to make it stronger so the Sultana can decide if she wants you.”

  “But how would she know?”

  “There are spies everywhere. Even here.”

  “And what’s your anchor?”

  He just shook his head. “You’ll get yourself killed asking questions like that.”

  The fading light changed the catacombs, sending violet fire through the veins of crystal in the rocks. The bloodbirds roosted on stunted trees. Strange lights in outlandish colors she’d never seen before flickered and were gone. Flute music floated towards them. Tashi felt just like she did that winter feast night when she’d drunk too much mulled wine. Her head swam pleasantly and warmth flowed to her toes. The air was soft. She could make herself wings of red feathers and fly away. Declan yanked her away. The lazy contentment faded the further she got from the music.

  “There’s magic everywhere here,” he explained. “It’s unpre
dictable, often unkind, and always stronger at dawn and dusk.

  As if to prove his point, an old woman wearing white furs and a headdress of clattering painted teeth leaned heavily on a wooden staff just ahead of them.

  “We’ve already been out here too long,” Declan said with a curse. “She’s the oldest luck-singer here. She came to the catacombs when she was eleven and survived.” Two snow leopards prowled in front of her, moonlight slanting over their spotted fur. They hissed, showing pointed teeth. Tashi froze, knowing exactly how much damage such a cat could do. “Don’t let them touch you,” Declan said, his voice tight.

  “I know,” she replied, just as tightly. To harm a snow leopard in any way was monstrous bad luck.

  “Not just that.” Declan shook his head, glancing at the rope ladders between them and the old woman. “Her teeth steal your luck away.”

  “I wasn’t planning on letting her bite me.”

  The old woman smiled and thumped her cane. Sharpened leopard, tiger, bear and wolf teeth hovered in the air in a perfect line. They were pointed like needles.

  “Oh.” Tashi swallowed. “Those teeth.” She moved slowly, keeping them carefully in view. They vibrated, ready to be released like poisoned arrows. “Good thing I don’t have any magic.”

  “Then they’ll drain your lifeforce, instead. But what she really wants is to steal my luck for seeing omens.” His huge hand closed over her shoulder and gave her a mighty push. “So climb!”

  The snow leopards streaked toward them, ears flattened against their skulls, They were deadly, beautiful and utterly untouchable. Tashi leapt as high as she could, avoiding a bite to the calf. She landed on a ledge of crumbling rock, clinging like a goat. Declan used a small shield the size of a plate to deflect the spelled teeth. They clattered to the ground, like a shaman’s rattle shivering through the silence.

  Tashi stretched and reached the rope, spinning wildly when she lost her footing. The ladder swung her back and forth as the leopards lunged for her again and again. Teeth whipped by her head, leaving marks on the rock. One sliced through a lock of her hair, singeing it. That small contact was enough to make her dizzy.