Uncanny Magazine - JanFeb2017

by Uncanny Magazine

  “I just—I have to make a love connection between two people. This week.”

  “That’s specific.”

  “My mother gave me an ultimatum. A century ago. To return to the family business, or lose everything.”

  “And it slipped your mind until now?”

  “Do you know how many novels were published in the 20th century? I was busy ! A century goes by way too fast. I blame automobiles and the Internet. And Evelyn Waugh. Mostly Evelyn Waugh.”

  This banter was the most fun Meg had made all night. “You made one love connection,” she pointed out. “Dee and Hercules looked very cozy as they left.”

  “That’s not love,” Cupid muttered. “That’s sex. They’ll have three amazing weeks together, and then he’ll cheat on her with one of his exes and she’ll end up having a public meltdown in the office, throwing her phone out of a window, and causing a fatal accident to a pedestrian below. Which is actually better than what happened with the last three women he hooked up with.”

  Meg stared at him for what felt like a very long minute. “You can see those consequences, and you didn’t stop them leaving together? Someone’s going to die .”

  “I can’t stop humans making terrible choices when sex is on the line. Also, Hercules is excellent in bed. Apparently. I wouldn’t know from personal experience.” Cupid looked shifty.

  Meg had made a decision. It felt better than any other decision she had made all year. “Come with me,” she said, catching hold of the strap of her handbag. “We’re going to go split those two up, and then we’re going to find some nice ordinary non–disastrous couple for you to match, to keep your mother happy. In return, you are going to stay the hell away from my love life for the next, oh I don’t know, century.”

  Cupid stood up, swaying slightly, which made sense since he had drunk three martinis for every one of hers. “You’re wonderful,” he said. “Are you sure you don’t want me to cupid you? There’s bound to be at least one gym bunny in this city who finds sarcasm a turn–on.”

  Meg had a momentary vision of what Cupid might possibly look like under the very tight T–shirt. “I’m good,” she said firmly. “Let’s go.”

  “I don’t know what the big deal is,” muttered Hercules later that evening, nursing a beer and a black eye in that order. “I didn’t cheat on you yet.”

  “Three weeks!” said Dee huffily. “You couldn’t be monogamous for a month ?”

  “A theoretical three weeks! You don’t know that would have happened. Cupid’s full of shit.”

  Dee turned her baby blues on Cupid. “Are you full of shit?”

  “Nope,” he said brightly. Meg thought he seemed remarkably cheerful about separating a couple instead of hooking them up. Perhaps this was the start of a new career for him? “Love stinks, but I always tell the truth about it.”

  “So who is my real future husband?” Dee asked, leaning in and fluttering her lashes. “Is he cute?”

  “No idea,” said Cupid, soaking up the blatant flirtation. “We changed the future tonight. It will take a while for fate to catch up.” He lowered his voice intimately. “Tonight, anything is possible.”

  Meg found herself grinding her teeth every time Dee touched Cupid’s hand. Oh, hell no.

  “Full. Of. Shit,” Hercules mouthed at her, over Cupid and Dee’s heads.

  “You know what your problem is?” Meg said to Cupid.

  He laid his head on the bar and sighed, but at least he was sighing in her direction again. “My friends are the worst,” he complained.

  “Your friends are the worst ,” she agreed, and patted his head. His hair was very soft under her fingertips.

  “Hey, I am sitting right here,” said Hercules.

  “Assuming that Dee hasn’t been entirely put off dating by tonight’s mess,” Meg went on. “Who is your least worst friend?”

  Cupid thought about it seriously. “Odysseus is solid. And he could do with a pick me up since that whole Circe–Penelope mess. Though I have to admit, they are way cuter together than in that timeline where they both ended up dating each other’s sons. You couldn’t make this shit up.”

  “I’m in, if this Odysseus isn’t a complete cheating jerkwad,” Dee volunteered. She had reined in the Cupid–flirting, almost as if she sensed Meg’s feelings and was being a good friend. Huh.

  “Well,” considered Cupid. “Not since the late 1700’s.”

  “Good enough for me,” said Dee.

  “We can double date,” Meg decided.

  Cupid gave her a searing look that made her shiver all the way down to her toes. “Really?”

  “Sure,” she said, though it was hard to pretend to be casual when you had All That zeroing in on you. “I want to see how it turns out. Plus, you talk a good game about love and romance. Show me what you’ve got.”

  Cupid’s bright green eyes lit up. “I will spoil you so thoroughly with romance, the sky itself will be jealous.”

  Meg forgot to breathe for a moment.

  “You are literally texting your ex right now,” Dee complained loudly. “This is why no one wants to date you.”

  “What?” Hercules shot back. “I’m bored and no one is making out with me. Seems like a waste.”

  “…And so we have plans tonight,” Meg completed in triumph.

  Her mother, looking weary, removed her glasses and then put them on again. “With this Cupid person.”

  “Not this person. Actual Cupid! Which I know because of my…”

  “Remarkably useful Comparative Mythology degree, yes, dear. I do take your point.”

  “It’s amazing how deftly you acknowledge I was right without actually saying the words,” Meg complained.

  Her mother let out a deep sigh. “Did it ever occur to you, my darling, that I might have had other reasons for preferring you to stay ignorant of certain mythological realities?”

  Meg’s mouthful of tea went cold instantly, and she spat it back into her cup. “Excuse me, now?”

  “A little knowledge can be very dangerous.”

  “Oh god,” Meg moaned. “Literally oh god. You’re one of them. I knew this would happen. Are you Aphrodite? Did I spend an hour last night with my tongue down the throat of my brother?”

  “Please, that wench wishes she was me,” snapped her mother. “We’re not connected to that trashy Greek soap opera.”

  “What about the Romans?” Meg wasn’t sure if Cupid counted as Roman, Greek or both, and what even was her life, that this was of practical concern?

  “We’re not the toga brigade, either. Oh dear. I suppose you had to find out sooner or later…”

  “…And that’s how I found out that my parents are Isis and Osiris,” Meg summed up. “Have you seen the list of things that Isis is goddess of? Health, marriage, magic, the dead, oh and wisdom . So that’s me giving up on winning an argument with her ever again. It was nice while it lasted.”

  “You know,” said Cupid. “It’s amazing how few women keep talking about their mother when I’ve removed this many clothes. My mother, yes, no one ever shuts up about my mother during sex, I’m used to that, it’s all ‘Venus in heaven!’ this and ‘By Aphrodite’s toes!’ that, but I draw the line at other people’s mothers.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Meg. “Was I not giving you enough attention? Is my major life crisis interrupting your boner?”

  “Fine,” said Cupid, and took his hand out of her knickers. “Mood officially lost, we’ll come back to that later. Meg, believe me, this is not a life crisis. Having gods for parents is no big deal.”

  “I thought they were librarians,” she wailed.

  “They probably are librarians. God business doesn’t pay that well in the 21st century. Now, do you want me to go down on you before we endure this double date from hell or not?”

  “Why is it going to be a double date from hell?” Meg asked suspiciously. “You said Odysseus and Dee would be great together.”

  Cupid gave a small moan of frustration, and put
his T–shirt back on. “Because,” he said, leaning across couch to kiss her lightly on the cheek. “I’m not all that interested in spending the evening watching people who are not us flirt and connect, when we’ve got all this going on right here. Hence. Hell.”

  “Oh,” said Meg, kissing him back. “You really are—” kiss “—a half–hearted—” kiss “—love god.”

  “Yeah,” said Cupid. “But my tongue is in the right place.”

  Before she could say “Don’t you mean heart?” he demonstrated quite thoroughly that he meant exactly what he said.

  ( Editors’ Note: “Some Cupids Kill With Arrows” is read by Erika Ensign on the Uncanny Magazine Podcast, Episode 14B.)

  © 2017 by Tansy Rayner Roberts

  * * *

  Tansy Rayner Roberts is the author of the Mocklore Chronicles , the Creature Court trilogy, and Musketeer Space . She podcasts on Galactic Suburbia, Verity! and recently started her own fiction serial podcast, Sheep Might Fly . Her most recent superhero short story, “Kid Dark Against the Machine,” appeared at The Book Smugglers , and she is currently rereading the 1987–96 era of the Justice League on her blog at tansyrr.com .

  * * *

  The Unknown God

  Ann Leckie | 7041 words

  Aworo, Lord of Horses, god of the Western plains, walked into the marketplace in Kalub in the third hour of the morning. It was early summer, and at this hour the sun was warm and comfortable. Pens of livestock and slaves, rickety stalls, rows of fish staring blankly, baskets of fruit, orange and red and purple, clay jars of wine and beer, surrounded a fountain twenty feet across. The water came from the Nalendar, the river a short walk to the east, the supreme god of the city, the one being Aworo didn’t want to meet right now.

  Down the street was the gilded roof of the temple of the god Smerdis, who Aworo did want to meet. But he was tired, and hungry and thirsty.

  Perched on the lip of the fountain was a wide, shallow bowl and in it sat a large, gray–green frog. “Aworo!” the frog croaked. “You bastard! I thought you’d gone back to the plains! Does the Nalendar know you’re here?” Aworo shrugged, and the frog asked, “Where have you been? You look awful, and you smell worse.”

  “Out in the hills, to the west.” Aworo scooped up water and drank from his hands, and then, “With atheists,” he confessed.

  “Atheists!” The frog gaped. “You?”

  “I didn’t say I was an atheist. I’ve just been living with them.” He leaned against the stone edge. “Do you know what they believe?”

  “All sorts of things,” the frog said, “some of them less sane than others. I had one tell me right to my face that I wasn’t real.”

  “These particular atheists,” said Aworo, “believe that this world is a fake. A copy of the real one. They say the real one is pure mind and perfect, incapable of change. Which is how they know the difference.”

  “Oh,” croaked the frog. “And that’s why they camp in the hills, eating grass and never bathing?”

  “They don’t eat grass. They meditate on Truth.” Truth was changeless, single, distant from this world. Above the noise and clamor of the market, past it, the roof of the temple of Smerdis shone in the sunlight. When he’d last been in Kalub, a year before, he’d paid no attention to Smerdis’ cult.

  “Meditate, eh?” asked the frog. “Not the most reliable way to determine the truth, in my experience. How’s it been working for you?”

  “I don’t know yet.” The frog honked derisively. “Look,” Aworo said, determined to change the subject. “I want some cash, but I don’t want to ask the Nalendar for it.”

  “I wouldn’t either, if I were you,” said the frog. “You’ve got some nerve just setting foot in Kalub. You seduced one of her best fraud investigators!”

  Aworo had thought he was master of himself, until he’d met Saest. He’d never felt such an exquisite, breath–catching feeling before. Marry me , he’d said to her that night on the river’s edge, and why not? He was living a man’s life. There was no reason he shouldn’t marry.

  He was incredulous at her refusal, and then furious. Can’t leave the Nalendar? Have it your way! Turn away from the river and die! And he’d felt it go out of him, the power that would make his words the truth, and horrified at himself, he’d turned and run, and left Saest to her fate.

  Even a year later he didn’t want to think about it. He pulled his seal up out of his dirty tunic. “Do you know who’ll take a voucher? Without tossing me out the door?”

  “Not me,” said the frog. “I can’t afford to make the river angry at me.”

  A year ago the frog had made a small but sufficient living fishing lost objects out of wells and ponds in exchange for prayers, but it hadn’t had any money. “You? Got a new line of work?”

  The frog puffed proudly. “Have I! I remove wrinkles and moisturize skin. It’s very minor work, really, just a little tweaking of muscles and skin cells. I don’t know why more gods aren’t doing it, it keeps me in prayers. And sacrifices! I never got many sacrifices before.”

  “Where does the money come from?”

  “I have a boy,” said the frog. “He makes up a sort of lotion and sells it. And look here.” The frog leaned aside. On the bottom of the bowl were several coins. “People just toss them in now and then! I’m telling you, I should have thought of this years ago. I have an account at the temple of the Nalendar. I’m saving up, going to have a little shrine built if I can get enough together.”

  Aworo eyed the coins, calculating. “If you’ve got a tablet, I can seal a draft for the coppers you’ve got there. I’ve got enough in my account to cover it.”

  “I’m sure you do,” said the frog, “but like I said, I’m not going to risk angering the Nalendar. Unless you’ve come to clear up the mess you’ve made.”

  “How can I?” Aworo asked, bitter. “Some things can’t be undone.”

  “Well, it’s not like she’s dead!” exclaimed the frog, and then it croaked in surprise. “Did you think she was dead?”

  A strange feeling fluttered in Aworo’s stomach. He was afraid to try to name it. “Yes.”

  “Oho! So now the whole atheist business makes sense. You thought you’d killed her. But she’s not dead yet. The Nalendar took her to an island in the river. Didn’t think of that, did you? But if that’s not why you’re back, what are you doing here?”

  Aworo was suddenly embarrassed. “It’s… haven’t you ever wondered? If there was… more?” He didn’t mention the temple of Smerdis.

  “More?” asked the frog. “You mean like the perfect universe of your atheists? Or are you asking about what happens to humans after they die, or gods who tell big enough lies? Easy enough to find out, isn’t it? Just make a statement out loud, you’ll know soon enough if it’s not true!” It chuffed and rumbled a bit, amused at itself.

  The witticism was an old one. Aworo ignored it. “Sometimes, out in the hills, meditating, I’ve felt… something.”

  “The right sort of head injury will do that,” said the frog.

  It took Aworo a few moments to organize his thoughts, to be sure he didn’t say anything regrettable. “I notice you’re not saying straight out that there’s no such thing as fate, or a higher power, or an afterlife.”

  “That’s because I’m not an idiot,” said the frog. “Whatever my private suspicions, I don’t like gambling with those stakes. And neither do you, or you’d have tried it yourself by now. But enough of this. You’re scaring customers away. And I’ll only help you if it’s worth my while.” It puffed thoughtfully. “I’m not above currying favor with the river. I’ll give you cash in return for your draft if you say, right here and now, that you’ll remove the curse you put on Saest.”

  Aworo blinked. The strange feeling was back. He opened his mouth to say I don’t know if I can but his attention was arrested by the sound of his own name.

  Slightly around the circumference of the fountain, a man in a long green coat held the reins of a nicely gro
omed, spavined black horse. “Sired by one of the sacred stallions of Aworo, on the plains,” he was saying to another man. “But as you can see, these white markings here disqualified him—the stallions of Aworo must be without flaw! Which is how I got him so cheap.” That horse had never been sired by one of Aworo’s own, Aworo was certain. The other man, examining the horse, nodded sagely, impressed.

  Aworo narrowed his eyes, drew a breath to speak.

  “Temper!” warned the frog.

  “I need to raise the money right away,” the green–coated man was saying, “or I’d never part with him, let alone at this price.”

  The frog was right. Whatever Aworo said would be made true—or Aworo would regret it. Like all gods, he was circumspect from habit, but sometimes… Aworo took another breath. “He’s cheating you,” he said, loud enough for the green–coated man’s customer to hear. “That’s not one of Aworo’s horses, and it’s half–lame already.”

  The green–coated man gave Aworo a dubious look, took in the dirty tunic, the bare feet. “How do you know that, sir?”

  “I’m Aworo.”

  The customer gaped, and the green–coated man laughed. “Of course you are.” He caught his prospective buyer’s eye and made a gesture towards his forehead. The two men and the horse moved away from the fountain.

  “You,” Aworo began. A few words would strike the man dead, but Aworo wanted something more satisfying.

  “Lord of Horses!” croaked the frog, quietly. “Don’t say a word.”

  “He’s using my name .”

  “It’s not a good idea to speak without thinking, Aworo!” The frog scrabbled at the bottom of its bowl, agitated. “Look here, take the coppers, pay me back later. Get a bath and some clothes and finish your business with Saest!”

  A bath and a shave, and a visit to a second–hand clothes stall, made Aworo presentable enough to get a room in a decent guesthouse on the strength of his seal. After rolling it across a clay tablet and agreeing to the charges for room and food and drink, he sat down in the house’s common room to a bowl of fish stew and a stack of flat bread, and didn’t look up for a full twenty minutes.