I Got Some Bad Muse For You
Copyright 2011
Michael Angel
ISBN: 978-1-61475-699-6
Includes a sneak preview
of Michael Angel’s
latest epic fantasy novel,
Shards – The Darkfell Saga.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except in the case of a reviewer, who may quote brief passages embodied in critical articles or in a review.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Also by Michael Angel
The Detective and the Unicorn
When a warlock from the magical world of the Morning Land murders Derek Ridder’s friend, the LAPD detective gets a new partner. Her name’s Tavia, and she’s a brash, driven unicorn filly. She identifies the killer as Sir William Teach, the one man she’s sworn to capture or kill. Together, Derek and Tavia must race to uncover Teach's plan to conquer both of their worlds.
Centaur of the Crime
Dayna Chrissie, the leading Crime Scene Analyst for the LAPD, finds herself transported to the magical kingdom of Andeluvia. She’s given three days to solve the king’s murder, before war breaks out between Andeluvia and the Centaur Kingdoms. The price of failure? A war that will kill millions and devastate both lands. Hope she works best under pressure.
The Adventures of Amanda Love
Con artist Amanda Love and her crew of loyal misfits take their traveling ‘pay to pray’ Salvation Show out to the backwater planets that dot fringe space. But her latest outing nearly becomes her last, when she’s attacked by mercenaries sent by the galaxy’s most corrupt company: Mal Corp. And Amanda discovers the secret that has attracted the attention of its ruthless CEO, Malco Trent.
See the full listing of Michael Angel’s works.
Table of Contents
Cover
I Got Some Bad Muse For You
Enter the World of Michael Angel
Shards – The Darkfell Saga
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Meet Michael Angel
I Got Some Bad Muse For You
Michael Angel
Author’s Note:
William Shakespeare is, without a doubt, the greatest playwright the world has ever known. A veritable industry of mystique has grown up around his person. Therefore, for those lovers of The Bard, who know all manner of trivia and accuracy about his life and times, please treat this story as humor only. A romp, perhaps, but a (mostly) clean and respectful one. Or as the great man himself might have said:
“Pardon, gentles all, that lowly spirits have dared, on these unworthy pages, to bring forth so great a subject: can this cockpit hold the very casques that did affright the air of Stratford-on-Avon? I ask to please admit us to this tale; to beg, your humble patience pray, gently to hear, kindly to judge, this story.”
* * *
“By God’s teeth, I will stripe that scurvy jackanape of a landlord’s back! I will cut all his two stones, and with them strike a set!”
And with a final expletive, young William Shakespeare snatched up the note asking – no, demanding – that the rent, already three months past due, be sent post-haste. He tore the note along its folds into quadrants, then eighths, and finished by flinging the scraps into the fireplace.
“But...but...” Bertram goggled at his master’s reaction. “T’was made clear that in a fortnight, we’ll be booted to the street like common tosspots...”
“Chide me not!” Shakespeare waved off his manservant’s objections. He made his way back through the disheveled confines of the drawing room. With a clatter, he kicked aside empty wine bottles and heaps of dirty plates - the assorted detritus of a past week’s meals, carelessly thrown aside after consumption.
He slumped moodily into the plush green velvet of his chair. He groped down at his side, searching, then came up with an open bottle of wine. Bertram’s skinny frame trembled with apprehension as his master guzzled the contents, the desperation of the drunk seeking release more than pleasure.
“But sir–”
“I said, chide – me – not!” Shakespeare roared. Red drops of liquid spattered his chin. “Get to thy quarters and let me imbibe in peace, scullion!”
To punctuate the point, the bard flung his bottle. It shattered on the wall, sending Bertram flying up the stairs in a whimpering panic. Shakespeare watched, abruptly dumbstruck by his own fury. He grabbed one hand in the other, fiercely, as if trying to prevent it from doing more harm. A sob escaped his lips, a sound made part in misery, part in anger.
A knock at the door.
The anger won out over the misery, but just barely. His head throbbed and the taste of wine in his mouth had gone musty, grainy.
“Be off!” he called. “Nothing in Christendom will see me do business this evening. Vanish like hailstones, go!”
With a teeth-clenching bang!, the door swung open. A cloud of dust enveloped the small room. Shakespeare coughed into the back of his hand and got woozily to his feet. A husky woman’s voice echoed in his ears.
“Yeah, that’s not going to happen.”
Shakespeare stared as the woman stepped through the doorway and into his house, unannounced and without preamble. He noted all of the elements of theatrical Greek costume in her dress. Golden sandals, a carefully arrayed toga the color of elephant tusk and trimmed in purple. Her arms, bare to the shoulder, were smooth, lean, and surprisingly muscular.
The woman’s long hair, shaded like strong tea, had been braided and pulled back sharply behind her head, revealing cheekbones and a jaw that jutted in a way that brooked no argument. Her coal-black eyes radiated a playful dangerousness.
Shakespeare shuddered as she took in his slight frame, rumpled broad collared shirt and wine-droplet spattered collarless jacket. Her gaze pinned him in his place as an insect to a glass pane.
“You’re Gulielmus Johannes Shakespeare?”
He scowled. The temper flared anew. “My thrice-damned birth name, that’s the truth of the matter. I’d buried it good in a lockbox! How did you find–”
“I have my sources,” the woman shrugged. “So I’m in the right spot, at least. Now I can get to work.”
“Work? Weed this wormwood from your brain, woman. There’s no ‘work’ to be had–”
“There sure as Hades is.” The woman cast her eyes about the confines of the room, from the smoky fireplace to the dilapidated furnishings and heaps of grimy cutlery. Her nose wrinkled at the scent of wood smoke, spilled wine, and stale food. But ultimately, her glance fell upon the waist-high pile of crumpled parchment that lay next to Shakespeare’s writing table.
She let out a weary sigh.
“And from the looks of it, I have my
work cut out for me. Us, I mean.”
Shakespeare blinked. For once in the bard’s life, he remained (however temporary the state) speechless. To his astonishment, the woman simply waved her hand in midair and the front door swung shut with an authoritative slam. Then she paused, as if trying to recall something half-remembered.
“Ah, yeah. I almost forgot.” She made a curtsey, the motion brusque and unpracticed. “Introductions. I’m new at that part. The name is Callidora, and I’m your muse.”
Shakespeare gaped at her. “My...muse?”
“Got it in one. You’re a quick study. I like that.”
“Your tongue is strange, your bite is sharp,” Shakespeare observed. “E’en if I took leave of my reason and entertained your claim, you cannot be my muse.”
“Oh?”
“I say not!” Shakespeare raised his chin, his expression misty-eyed. “For my muse is a willowy thing, a gentle creature of alabaster. One who would ascend the brightest heaven of invention at my side.”
He exhaled sadly, theatrically. Callidora crossed her arms, a thundercloud of a frown on her face.
“Yeah. Well. That’s bad luck for you, Will. And I hope you don’t mind me calling you ‘Will’, since you and I are going to be working together.”
“But...but...my willow of alabaster–”
Callidora made a rude noise. “You’re thinking of my sister, Calliope. The muse of epic poetry and plays.”
“Then be off! For I wish the entire kingdom for my stage, and veritable princes to act.”
“That’s the second time you’ve told me to ‘be off’,” Callidora said, her voice stern. She pushed her way through the room’s debris to stand in front of Shakespeare, hands on her finely toned hips. “Well, guess what. Calliope’s come down with a terrible case of writer’s cramp. Olympus was out of muses for ‘Merry Olde England’. So you got me. I’m the muse of boxing.”
“Your point is a dullard’s one. I’m of the opinion there is little use, and less utility in our converse.”
“And I’m not here to ask your ‘opinion’ Will.” Callidora jabbed her finger into Shakespeare’s chest, a hot point of emphasis as she continued. “I’ll be back tomorrow night. Clean this place up. I’d call it a pigsty, but the pigs would sue me for slander. And have your three latest works to show me.”
Shakespeare’s voice gritted back at her.
“Ply your witchcraft upon a dryer fool. I'll suffer no more of you.”
“Okay,” Callidora replied, as she rolled up the sleeves of her toga, “You want to do this the hard way? We’ll do this the hard way.”
And with that, she reached forward, grabbed Shakespeare by the shoulders, and effortlessly lifted him into the air.
“S’wounds!” Shakespeare breathed, “What magic is this? Before all that is holy, return me to earth’s bosom!”
“Oh, don’t you worry about that,” Callidora said. “I plan to.”
* * *
As the sun rose next morning, the sound of the local rooster’s crowing was loud enough to wake most of the Shakespeare’s immediate neighbors.
It was not, however, quite loud enough to drown out Shakespeare’s stream of invective. Said stream was amplified handsomely by the stone cylinder that stretched upward around him. Hearing movement and voices, he redoubled his efforts until he saw Bertram’s visage against the circle of light above.
“Sir? Would that be you?”
Shakespeare’s voice rung with the echo of his voice off the stone. “Of course it is me, you oafish malcontent!”
“But...what are you doing down the well?”
A rueful laugh from below. The splash of fists pounding futilely at the water. “Perhaps my complexion was too waxen, and I wished a fix! Now fetch a rope, before my countenance gains a most fiery and terrible aspect.”
Bertram did as instructed. Twenty minutes later, a gasping Shakespeare clambered out of the well and collapsed at its side. Clothes sodden and dripping, he pressed his cheek to the cool stone surface, coughed, and regarded his manservant.
“Perhaps my misadventure of the evening has cooled my heart. I owe you thanks, Bertram.”
“I only wish to serve,” Bertram said, smiling faintly, hopefully.
“Then know that I am not angry, but my stomach hungers for knowledge more than bread: why did you not come to me last night?”
“You mean when you fell into the well, sir? I dare say no one could have heard you, as this spot is much removed from the house–”
“No...why did you not come to my assistance before? When I had words with the trollop whose worthy arms did bear me aloft and steal my dignity?”
“Sir?” Bertram’s face wrinkled in confusion. “I heard nothing from downstairs once I parted from you.”
Shakespeare was silent for a moment. He regarded Bertram carefully, but saw nothing but sincere puzzlement in the man’s face.
“Well met, then. Bertram, I need a brace of things from you.”
“You need but ask, sir.”
“First, I require a freshened doublet to replace my muddied wares. Second, bring me the village locksmith, along with his stoutest bolt and timbered door of oak. Third...” Shakespeare pursed his lips as he added, “Fetch me a scullery maid. For should the door not bar entry, I wish the threshold to be clean enough for her Majesty to share supper upon it.”
* * *
Night had fallen with a sudden, inky blackness. The fire burned low in the hearth, sending out sweet, smoky scents. Bertram, after his sixth yawn, had gone upstairs to turn in. All lay quiet, hushed.
Except for the nervous drumming of Shakespeare’s fingers against the near-empty sheet of parchment that lay before him. Ink dribbled from the quill of his pen as he dipped it repeatedly in the well. He unstoppered another bottle of wine and brought it to his lips just as the first hard knock came at the door.
Shaking and silent, he managed to put the bottle down without spilling more than a few drops. White-knuckled, he grasped the edge of his writing desk and watched as his new door vibrated under a trio of harder knocks.
A squeal of bending metal. Wide-eyed, Shakespeare sat frozen as the oak planks that made up the door shook violently and came off the brand new hinges. With a wrench, Callidora hefted the mass of wood, then gently set it to one side. She swiped her palms together, allowing dust and chips of wood to fall away as she came to stand before Shakespeare’s table.
“Not bad,” she said approvingly.
“Not bad?” Shakespeare swallowed, hard. “My tongue is rendered foolhardy to see how steel grows soft as a worm’s silk under your hands. T’was a fine portal as strong and resolute as the fastness of the greenest wood.”
“Huh? Oh, that. Really now. Nothing stops the inspiration of a true artist, certainly not a bolt lock and a few inches of oak. I meant, ‘not bad’ in the sense of cleaning. At least I don’t feel like I need a tetanus shot when I come here.”
“What manner of like is a ‘tetanus shot’?”
“Tough to explain, Will. Here, let me see what you’ve been working on–”
Shakespeare blanched. In one swift move, he stepped between Callidora and his parchments. She halted and her brows came together in an ominous knot.
“Oh, come on. Are you still ticked off that I pitched you into the well? I didn’t mean to hurt you. I just did it to prove a point.”
“The quality of your mercy is somewhat strained,” the bard said wryly. “Yet let me speak plain, my lady ‘Callidora’. Whilst I met the lesser of your charges, my heart was not in the trim for your prime request. Read, if you wish, and let your eyes meander o’er fields that yet lie fallow.”
Callidora reached out and plucked the sheaf of parchments from the table. As she read, her expression slid into a firm line. Jaw set, lips together like a crease of pink marble.
“This isn’t a play,” she said carefully, tightly leashing her anger. “This is a joke. ‘Friends, Romans, countryfellows, bend me an ear; come I now to toss dirt
upon the stiffen’d corpse of Caesar, not to speakest goodly about his doings.’.”
“It is but a work in progress. I have had it under many a revision for the past four, five turns of the seasons...”
Callidora shuffled the parchment sheets irritably. “Then this one lists titles. Dumb-sounding ones, at that. ‘A Midsummer Night’s Romp?’ ‘Meetest Thou Macbeth?’ ‘Romeo and Zelda’?”
“A mere listing of works, rantings of a fevered brain...”
“And the last parchment at the top...” she shot him a look. “All you did was sign your name. Five times. And you put three extra ‘e’s in the last one!”
“What knowest you of the troubles of the writer, the slave to artistic endeavor?” Shakespeare slapped the table’s surface angrily, making the wine bottles perched there jump with a clink. “You admit freely that prose is in your bloodline but not your blood! How can one help me, in such ignorance?”
“I know enough of your troubles, Will. I know you’re frustrated. You’re so far behind in the rent that you should be in debtor’s prison. Your first role at the theatre got ‘booed’ off the stage and flayed by the critics. That’s because you’re not in the right place yet. You’re not meant to be on the stage, but behind it.”
“Critics! What are they, but geese that bear the shapes of men! And by what base alchemy do you decide that I must forego the lights of the stage for the prison of the pen?”
“I? I speak of Destiny, and the Fates. Nice ladies, all of them.”
“Upon my life, I shall not accept this bargain! If that is to be my fate, then I shall fight it, for my character likens to unbreakable steel!”
“Careful there, Will. Don’t make us take the hard way again.”
“I know not your powers, woman, but I do quicken to the action of the tiger, with stiffened sinews, summoned up blood.” He raised his hands, clenched them menacingly. “For I am no stranger to the art of the fisticuff and the cudgel!”
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