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[neculacycle]

Snuffler

He didn't want to believe, by revelation of his night terrors, that Snuffler had once been a man, transformed into that shaggy crawler by torture and neglect. Surely hardship could not have caused him to grow hair over his body and contort his limbs into animal proportions, nor turn a nose into a snout.

[neculacycle]

A Killer

Father Barrow trudged along, the wind at his back, the girl on his shoulders, picking blowing dandelion fluffs from the air. They passed an immaculate white wagon driven by a fat, rosy driver. Barrow nodded and the man nodded and pretty women in petticoats and sun hats riding in the wagon waved to them and laughed. The girl waved back madly and Barrow tipped his hat, almost smiling. They passed. Barrow reached for his pipe, grasping for it before remembering it was gone. He signed. Where he stood Barrow sank into the loam beneath him.

Someone ought to pack this dirt, he said.

I didn’t notice, father, said the girl.

Behind them came a squeak and a groan. Barrow turned, expecting to see someone from the white wagon but the white wagon was gone faster than any wagon had ever gone and another wagon bumped toward them drawn by a man made of dirt and rage. He spat as he passed Barrow and the girl. Ragged men sat in the wagon doing nothing and looking at nothing.

They’re going our way, father, said the girl. No one is ever going our way. Can we ride with them?

I don’t know.

The wagon stopped. A ruined man in the back coughed as the dirty driver struggled from his seat and waddled over to them with some spring in his step, one eye squinted in the sun. Need a ride?

The girl nodded and the dirty man nodded but Barrow signed.

Barrow sat astride a cruel, bald man, the girl at his side at the end of the seat. Heading to town? Barrow asked the bald man.

Nah, said the bald man. Out of this godforsaken country.

Where to?

Another country.

They camped. The woods surrounded them. The bald man tossed a whole squirming rabbit into a boiling pot and closed the lid. He looked up at the girl, grinned and shook the pot, imitating terrible screeching. Later the seven men and the girl ate rabbit.

The first man stood, burped and rubbed his huge belly. Well I’m full. Best be moving on then. No usin’ the road now, ganna be on my way up the mountain. And he was gone.

The second and third men stood, one skinny and the other fat. Us, too. No sense being on the road. We’re off down to yonder field.

The fire crackled. Finally the fourth man stood, his beard covering his face. Rather not say where I’m goin. And he was gone.

Later the fifth man left without a word, followed by the sixth, a frail, respectable man in priest’s robes. He hesitated. May the Lord forgive me for what I've done, for I've worn holy skins. I've walked through fire and come out alive with nothing to show. Good women speak my name on their deathbeds and I am their son’s keeper. He looked at the girl. His thin features twisted with delight. Then he left.

But the Seventh Man didn’t stand. He slipped off his hat and finally ate. The seventh man chewed and swallowed and took his time doing it.

You’ve lost your touch, old man. Those are dead men walking. He took out a flute and began a sad little song like the wind. He finished the song and contemplated the forest. Does the weight of murderers hold a blade heavier than innocence? You would think but it’s not so. He played his flute.

Enough, said Barrow. It scares the girl.

The seventh man took his lips from the flute. Oh, does it? I don’t think so,and he played on, the same sad little song.

When Barrow checked on her the girl seemed enveloped in her own world, playing with loose strings on her dress. The flute ceased.

I’ll show you, said the seventh man. Girl. Bring me that walking stick over there.

The girl, starved for something to do, made for the stick. Barrow would grab her but missed her dress. The girl nabbed the stick and skipped it over to the man who took it and smiled. Why thank you. How about you, old man? You could use something to lean on.

He tossed it to Barrow who threw out his arms to catch it but his body was thrust downward beneath it. Laid out prone Barrow struggled for breath, as if the stick crushed him.

Father! cried the girl and easily took the stick off him so Barrow could sit up. He gasped. The Seventh man walked over to them.

Only the very good or the very evil. Kariha Zukira is strict.

He kindly returned his stick to his person and sat on his rock. Where are you headed?

Barrow couldn’t speak so the girl said, To family.

To family?

Only...into town. No further, no sooner, said Barrow.

You wish to take that girl into town? The man chuckled, stood, and stepped into the woods. Oh ho. My good sir, I have seen many strange figures off in the distance. Many strange odds pass down this road. My eyes miss nothing. He pointed to his eye, circling round the campfire, and pointed to Barrow. But. There was one passing feeling. A breeze on the wind. Something not even Kariha Zukiri can touch.

He sat on his rock again, across the fire, holding the sword straight before him, and slowly unsheathed it. The blade shone in the fire light and as he revealed it the fire brightened. While the world around them darkened. And darker. And black. The man smiled.

And she hates that more than anything.

The girl stared through the fire and at the sword, distant and transfixed. Amazed and yet sickened. Barrow put his hand to her shoulder but she didn’t look away.

Enough, Barrow told the man.

The man's eyes pierced through the fire. He smiled wider. His eyes fell down to the girl. Beautiful, isn’t she?

Yes, said the girl.

She was forged in another time and place.

Above the canopy the moon was cut thinner, no stars behind it. An owl hooted far off and the canopy shook uneasily. The fire flickered and popped. Barrow felt ill, his face pale. He looked away from them, as though he might wretch. He strained his eyes. Please, no more.

The man started with hate. No more what?’ he spat. A pause. ‘No more what?

That poisonous metal. This poisonous night air. Oh…

So you feel it too. Zukira, the monster, revels in this darkness. In this dry wind. The air...the air is poison. The wind cries..eh…

The girl tugged at Barrow’s sleeve. Father? Are you quite alright?

No one move, said the man.

To Barrow the world was spinning. The wind, though not chill, whipped through his clothes. He stood. He staggered through the fire his face lit from beneath, embers tickling his chin. He entered the dark somehow. He spun, branches tugging his coat. All around he heard the man’s voice from a mile away, whispering into a rainstorm. Don’t move. Turn back.

Barrow felt for his gun. Was it always there in his hands? Had he taken it with him after all?

Useless, useless, said the voice.

Barrow waved the gun in an arc before his face, the light of the swinging lantern tracing a line. He fired, the bullet seemed to fire over and over, a thin, weak echo. The wind swallowed the bullet, or bullets.

The man stepped from behind a tree, trudging over the muddy grass, sword at his side. I said useless.

Barrow ducked away, tripping between two trees intent on squeezing him and stumbling into another found the man standing behind it.

Leave me alone with the girl? What a mistake. What a pitiful man, while you go tripping into another part of the forest.

Protect her. Oh, protect her.

Protect her? With this?

Anything. Keep her safe. With any goodness you have, please…

Protect her from what? From you? The wind?

A long, straight blade held against Barrow’s throat. The man’s face merged with the dark, nestled next to his own. She’s singing now, so hungry for blood. The blood of school girls and old men. The bloods of fools beyond the pale. She sings and I try to hold on. Look ahead. Look! The road is the same. The trees sway but the sky is sick. Sick in that it’s the same as it was. You won’t see it. But she knows. She’s so hungry to win this fight. Ah ha! It must take a saint to stay her!

Barrow broke from him. He bound into the forest, guided not by sight but a terrible, whining ring. The ring of metal. He burst into the campsite where the man stood over the girl, his blade dripping blood, ringing as if it just struck steel.

Barrow aimed his rifle at the swordsman.

The murderer gripped the dull blade edge; the ringing stopped. Confused, Barrow looked to the girl. She was safe, unharmed, only frightened. Just beyond the light an outline of boots dragged into the dark beyond.

How lucky you are, said the killer. The blood fell clean off the blade as he stowed it again. Sticking it in his belt, he made for the camp’s edge. Town is a ways yet. A far walk for old men and school girls. But who knows? You’ve made Kiriha and I believers.

A cackle, and he was in the forest, never to emerge again.

[neculacycle]

Cane-Reaping Sword

One crippling morning an old man hobbled from the city outskirts and up the grey mountain where a mist lingered thick and waxed with dawn. Folk gathered, laughed, delighted to spoil his fun. Young men, muscles corded and ready for war, bragged with travelling foot soldiers that they could reach the mountain peak, if such mad notions took them. They knew who lived on the mountain and what folly even great men in their prime had met in pursuit of lofty dreams to claim a weapon from heaven’s smith. All men, at some point, dream of being the strongest, and in that land the one on the mountain denied that dream to those willing to strive hardest.

What madness, they said. Does that old farmer need a sword? Maybe he’s rushing headlong toward a dream he’s had since childhood?

Rare in those days but not unheard of, men world over came to the base of the mountain to test their mettle against the warrior’s path. Though that town rested in the mountain’s shadow few dared climb to its jagged peak where the light of the forge had not been seen in many years. Even the King, who had come to power by sheer might and violence, shunned the mountain though secretly coveted its treasure. He thought, A man with enough ambition and men might drag that thing in chains down the mountain.

But such thoughts sent shivers through his soul.

Now a towering man stepped from the onlookers. He was bald like a monk and wore thick robes. He wagged a thick finger at the mockers.

Hopeless times when not a single strong man here offers to help this old timer up the mountain, whatever his reasons. Is that the case?

The onlookers, especially the proud young men, spat and cursed and insulted the monk under their breath. He’s crazy, they said and turned their backs.

Hmf, said the monk, taking the old man’s arm. Come along, master. All good roads are worth sharing.

Hmm? Are you from around here? Do you know what’s at the top?

The monk grinned. I’ve heard rumours. But he can’t be as inhospitable as these people, tee hee!

~~~

Frost screamed agony against the old man’s skin. His walking stick stuck in the ice and snapped. His lungs burst with each breath but he pressed onward, along the winding ‘warrior’s path’, as it had been called since ancient times. The brittle road, no more than a four foot wide depression in the mountain, a channel which streams ran down in the spring thaw, filled up to the man’s knees with snow. Underfoot he tripped on frozen shapes; some stones, some the huddled remains whose strength failed before the top. The monk took him onto his back and trudged upward, undaunted.

No reason to quit! We’ll die here, or die above. Our futures are clear in my mind.

They stopped beneath a stone overhang, sheltered from the wind but not the cold. There was no wood to make fire and the old man shivered horribly. The monk gave him his cloak.

Hey, old man. It’s obvious we’re climbing the mountain for different reasons, unless I’m mistaken.

The old man said nothing. He was looking out over the clouds. The monk sipped from a flask.

I meant it when I said this is a road worth walking together. But when we reach the top, if the mountain smith only bend’s to one of us, that’s gonna have to be me. You can understand what I’ve given up to be here. Maybe you’ve had this dream longer than me, living right at the foot of the mountain your whole life. I can’t say why you’d suddenly go on the journey toward the end of your years. But I guess I felt inspired and want to see you reach the top.

I don’t have any dream, said the old man. I must do this, the same as anything in my life. No offense, but a man like you, with such big goals, doesn’t seem like a monk to me.

Obisu laughed. Well, you got me. I guess I don’t care about the appearance of being a monk but I walk a straight path to the top. What appearance do you think he took on?

Obisu meant the cross legged corpse frozen against the stone, their silent guest.

A fool, said the old man. Who didn’t believe the stories. Perhaps I’ll be no better in the end. A god of the forge lived within the grim mountain. Even in past times, folk did not pray to this god but revered him and sought to avoid his sight, as he was known only to bring malady and strange misfortune. None could say who his forge fired for and none could claim to have seen his work. In the sharpest winters, like this one, the mouth of his cave glowed. Now he is forgotten and soon will fade from the world and be replaced by another.

You missed your calling. You could be a storyteller.

When it was time to leave Obisu offered his back to the old man but the huddled fellow went on ahead. A blue skinned, snarling ogre stepped into their path, with heavy manacles around his wrists. He stamped his feet and held out a palm. Stop!

Obisu bowed. Do you work for the smith?

He forged me these manacles, said the ogre. So perhaps I should work for him.

Explains some of these bodies. How many make it past you?

A few when I sleep or through some trickery. I know who the smith will want to see. The old man may pass. You should turn back.

You're one to mention tricks. It's obvious the smith lets no one through. I won't fight until I see violence.

That is ideal. Where no violence begins conflict is useless. Come alone, old timer.

The old man passed by the ogre without trouble as if it were a pampered doorman. Obisu made to follow but the ogre held out an arm. Not you.

The monk ducked beneath it and found jagged nails digging into his elbow. He loosed a dagger against the fiend but the blade broke apart. The ogre opened its mouth to bite off Obisu’s head but with a lunge the monk hugged the ogre’s massive chest and pushed him over the mountain side. He tumbled and burst many times against the stones, leaving a red trail behind him. The wind picked up. Obisu wiped his eyes but the way ahead was lost to whiteness. His companion was gone. Hey, old timer! Wait up! He staggered on, determined to not be last.

The old man collapsed into the cave, a lonely chamber that no light shown from in years. He crawled, dragging himself along by handholds, stones and fallen warriors, stiff as statues. Some wore heavy armor, others silken pants tied at the waist. They all lay together in a patchwork, pristine in death. The old man’s frostbitten hands, rough from years of battle, and even more years of hard labor, felt nothing as they snapped and burst with the strain. At the precipice of a great obsidian wall he looked up. It was the anvil, too smooth to get purchase on, too tall to hoist himself up by.

He collapsed in time to see a man standing hunched at the cave mouth. It was Obisu, stepping gingerly over the bodies. Should have let me help, he said. This place is evil. I see corpses but no tools besides that terrible anvil. You don’t think he already left, do you?

Obisu stood at the anvil and waved his arms in strange, see-saw motions above his head. In the silence the old man half hoped the god was already passed on but his spine tingled and he knew himself to be a fool.

The god churned endlessly in darkness and succumbed. Above the mountain a flying meadowlark caught fire while whistles and relays telegraphed through space. When not unknowable the god was only what it needed to be. For he who made contact it was eyes when it needed to see, ears when it needed to hear, a mouth when it spoke, for a mortal could never know its totality.

Obisu, holding out his arms, said, Why not fade with an act of honour? Surely you can understand fate saved the worthy one for last?

Hmm? See my handiwork? How many spears do you count along the walls? This place...is a tomb. I forge in mockery of men’s hands, not in service to them.

An antique accent, like the old man’s grandmother, kind yet firm, the stoicism of harsher times. The old man closed his eyes to a deeper black and the cat god spoke.

I am the King of all martial, men said. I am the King of Battle and Hell. Forge me a King of Blades. When I refused they charged forth like scolded children. I have never known pity. None pray to me or dare invoke my name, for I hate the world below this mountain. But when you were born I touched you with my hatred so you would struggle and strain. Was there a legend in your land? Something like, Only the last shall know the first?

It’s one of our oldest and the gods must follow the old legends, however wicked their hearts, said the monk, and Omiru revealed himself. Hir robes fell away, revealing polished black armour which had been concealed by some illusion. A pointed helm sat on his head and jutting out were the King’s distinctive moustaches. This was the foreigner who had taken the throne in a coup, King Sigfried, the black knight. He pulled a jewelled broadsword from its sheath, its hilt jagged falcon’s wings.

I’ll kill you and really will be the last, said the sorcerer-king, holding the blade to the old man’s throat. The feline rose up. All of it, eyes, mouth, ears, body. The old man shut his eyes, unable to look upon the terrible form but Siegfried beheld it and his moustaches drooped and he screamed and held his sword out in both arms like it were new to him. The air left the room and with it the light, as if the cave had been blocked. The old man saw flashes, claws red with streaming blood slashing, metal, or something more fantastic, sparking from an arcing sword. A man’s voice cried strange words and purple nebula’s burst in the old man’s brain and with a great hiss all fell silent. The shadows receded and two clawed animal hands dragged a man’s remains into the dark. Then the mouth formed.

So much for the King and his legends. Where he’s from they pull swords from the earth every day. And you bear the marks of a footsoldier. I would curse the soul of he who struggled up the mountain. Why did you never come to me before?

The fanged mouth faded. Two slit eyes opened briefly and faded amidst tufted ears.

They pressed me into a miserable war, said the old man. There was no meaning to it and I lived. I’ll die next summer, whatever changes may come, and there will be no meaning to it. My son was pressed into a miserable war and I’m alone.

The tufted ears lingered and became a mouth. Men seek me for tools of war and what you receive would reflect that.

Aye, but you are our only god, terrible feline. A great lone smith in the dark of the mountain.

But where is your hatred? Where is the arrogance in your ridiculous request?

The old man opened his shirt, showing his bare chest. The cat laughed. Know this: I am fading from the memory of this world, in my own turn. And so my last act will be my first and only gift to one below the mountain. We desire. The world turns. As with man, as with god. Return here in seven days. Seven days. Be off. Go now.

When he returned in seven days the god came down from his place in the shadows of the cave. The old man’s arms swayed in a rhythm, that of solar flares bursting from a dying sun. Stars fell, though the old man could see none of them, or his story-made-steel. It spiralled and bounced off the stone floor. A nebula closed off and the cave froze over.

That, said the god, the space between its words howling, is a cane-reaping sword. It will cut with just a little skill and no effort.

I thank you, said the old man and took the sword and found it was a study thing to lean on descending the path.

We desire, said the cat. The world turns. As with man, as with god.

He hobbled to his farm and amidst his tall cane stalks drew the sword. Walking toward the cane he held out the sword and without a swing of his arm the cane fell. Men laughed and gossiped about who went out in the morning with a sword to attack his sugar cane. But he was happy all the while.

But the season ended and the old man weakened so even the sword could not fell that cane, for he could not raise it. True to its word the feline was no god of the harvest. The cane-reaping sword could reap and little else and it was still the old man’s work that killed him in the end. He thought, I prevailed where no man has before but I was still his fool in the end. At least I had no illusions.

His time had come and with no family and no one to even remember him he lay back in his chair in his hut and rested and each time he rested he did not know if he might rise again and that was how things were for a while. The sword sat against the wall in its corner and he sat in his chair.

As the old man reclined he dreamed of shanty seas, of curious clouds and fading faces, of the patter of children, of the cold of winter, of the darkness of mountains, of the turning of years. Only a knock roused him from what would be his loosening dream, a knock, persistent and strong, the knock of a young hand. The old man stood with great effort to answer the door. He crept across his old floor and, still half in the dream, he opened the door and slipped to the floor.

Old man! said Necula and rushed to his knees. Old man! Are you alright? But try as he might the old man was gone. Necula looked back through the door. This hut was far from anywhere. The smoke of a distant village rolled on through the grey afternoon and beyond that loomed a city wall. The city had been locked down, as if they were expecting a siege but the countryside was quiet. It did not seem well in the city so the boy moved on. Now he was starving and desperate.

Necula took the old man into his arms and carried him to a straw bed, as the hut was only the one room and laying him down Necula went to the chair and cradled his head in his hands. The miles he’d walked, he thought he’d be the one to die as he stepped through the door. He’d resorted to begging. Sometimes this worked and sometimes he was driven away. It mattered little. His trek would be endless, without direction.

Necula slept in the chair. When he awoke he walked to the village to tell someone of the old man but they drove him away with sticks and tossed stones and he retreated to the hut. He wrapped the old man in linen and buried him near the hut, beneath a tree and returned to the hut to think. The old man had some cheese and bread and Necula ate that. The hut felt cold, colder than the outside, colder than the mountain winds. He thought, Those bastards from that village will come here and think I murdered the old man, so I’d better be going. He sat in the old man’s chair, slumped to the side, a leg lazily spread out, another bent, and his temple perched against his knuckles, like he was some arrogant King. He sat and pondered and felt sorry for himself. His eyes darted to the floor when a black thing slipped out from somewhere and wandered about the hut.

Hungry, you old cat? asked Necula and the cat seemed to agree. Necula stood and went to the kitchen and though there’d been no food there before his pity for the rickety cat seemed to conjure some up and he gave the cat thin milk and crumbs. The cat drank and ate and it was very weary and aged. Necula watched it and then lay on the floor and drew his knees to his chest and weeped at last and the cat slept near him.

Necula had cried himself to sleep and when he awoke the old cat had passed on as well, just as the old man had, and Necula buried it too and went back inside and thought, Now I am truly alone. I feel it in this place. He caught sight of something in the corner, which he realised he’d thought was a broom or a rake in his peripheral vision. But, taking it in his hands, he thought, Oh, well, this is a sword, I think.

He drew it out and the blade shined, very new, if not simple. The sword was without flourish, a stick, really, without decoration or cross guard.

Must be from some old war, said Necula. He took care of it.

He sheathed it and thought, I’ll take this with me. I’ve never swung a sword but I’d feel better wandering with it than without it. Besides, it seems a strange thing to leave in a place so lonely.

[neculacycle]

A Beast

He’d never seen such a beast. It looked like a hyena, with black and white, scraggly fur. Ugly. He peered through the window, eyes narrow and full of dark caution. The animal scrounged about in the woods, biting the trees and scratching itself. It raised its head and sniffed the air. A woman burst from the woods, screaming. She ran circles in Necula's yard and the animal pursued her.

Somewhere between anger and curiosity, Necula found he was opening the door. The girl rushed inside and Necula slammed the door on the beast. It thunked against the wood and slobbered and groaned.

The girl threw herself over Necula's table and turned onto her back, panting like a wild animal. Her big eyes fell into his cold stare. He’s my brother, she said.

Necula went again to the window and peered out. The animal paced back and forth. Necula looked back at her but said nothing.

He doesn’t mean to hurt me, she said. He only wants you to follow him. To where, I don’t know, but when he looks into your eyes some of the animal leaves him and there’s a life behind those eyes and you follow him and do whatever he wants.

Necula smirked, and then looked very miserable. He opened the door but only a crack and at once the animal tried forcing his snout through. His eyes locked with Necula’s and did seem very human and alive, and the beast smiled and said, Hello. Necula pushed it back and shut the door and went for his sword but the young woman locked her hands over his hands. No! He hurts no one!

Necula shoved her away. What do I care?

I could make you care.

This is only sport.

You’re cruel!

Go back out there.

I won’t.

You won’t follow him?

She said nothing. Necula smirked. He went outside and slammed the door behind him. The young woman ran to the window and watched him walk out over the grass, under the trees. Her brother bounded and jumped and yipped. He spoke flatteries and encouragements to follow him. - he was playful, but like a predator stalking. Necula removed his sword and it was as though stars shone along the blade and in their light, he was cast in shadow. He held out the sword in a way a soldier might and the blade sparkled like a dying star.  Her brother called and came close, biting its jaws, but Necula was still. The animal whined, caught between fear and excitement.

He never hurt anyone! shouted the young woman.

Follow me! Follow me! said her brother.

The animal leaped at Necula, to bite or lick. The sword finally moved and cut and the animal dragged its torso into the woods, leaving its back half behind. The young woman screamed. Necula came inside; no blood clung to the sword. He put it on the table, unsheathed, and said, Now you have nothing to fear, I suppose.

Monster!

Necula chuckled. He ran his hand along the table, staring at nothing and entered the kitchen and leaned on the sink. The young woman had fallen to the floor, overcome with emotion. Necula watched the window. Where do you think he takes them? How do you know he’s hurt no one?

He couldnt…

Wouldn’t you like to know? he looked down to her, sprawled on the floor.

Together, they walked through the close, thin trees. Necula walked slowly, full of disinterest and contemplation. The young woman followed behind, fearing each shadow. They tracked him by the blood he spilled and the closer they came the more Necula’s smile curved at the edges.

The trees thinned out and they crossed over a river and found a clearing and Necula stopped and chuckled.

Here we are.

The young woman bit her nails and sucked in breath and whimpered. Necula scrunched up his features. The animal had died finally, a long trail of guts left behind in its wake. It had died right before a patch of rutabagas and turnips, a hoe gripped in its bloody mouth. He’d gone mad from the pain, it seemed, and wanted to turn out one last crop. Perhaps he’d forgotten his backside was gone, in the end?

Kiriha squirmed in its sheath. It was not happy, but Necula’s fury was greater. A dog farm?! he shouted. God damn this creature and god damn you!

He swiped the young woman with the back of his hand, sending her reeling. He dropped the sword and jumped on her and bore his teeth and struggled with her. He meant to kill her with his own hands but she scratched him and escaped. The woods swallowed her so wholly no man or beast could find her now.

The sword laughed, a slashing noise, an awkward noise, because Kiriha felt it too. Necula grit his teeth and said to the sword, Oh, I’ll show you what I’ll do.

And he pulled up all the crops and squashed them and ruined the ground and made sure nothing remained of the garden but lumps of rotting vegetables. He left the sword there in the cold night.

Go on and shiver and have your metal turn to ice, for all I care. Maybe I’ll be back in the morning. Maybe some poor wandering boy will pick you up and take you places.

He was feeling terrible after that and dark in spirit. He walked and walked, till a light snow fell around him and he came upon an old cemetery. The gravestones bore nonsense for names. Necula sat down on a gravestone and grunted and rolled himself a cigarette. Snow fell and he pouted.

Back home, it was very late, or very early. A gang of old ladies came to call on him, who must have thought it very early. By now, Necula had been walking all night and was still poor spirits.

And what is this now? he said, opening the door.

Would you come to our gala? asked an old woman in a bonnet. We’ve asked all the neighbours.

How was I to know I had neighbours? Is this some joke? Go talk with the dead.

And he closed the door on them and left them out in the cold and went to bed.

The gala ended. The old women closed up and cleaned up and sat their achy bones down in the sitting room and all agreed on something important. That Necula should be done away with, they said. He’s killed dogs and ruined gardens and now this. Sending poor old women away from his door.

But how will we do it? asked one. He has his old, ugly sword.

I’m not afraid of his sword, said the oldest and grayest of them. Though she was the oldest, she was the newest to their group and sometimes said strange things or had strange gleams in her eyes. Leave it to me. The rest of you beat him with sticks after he’s down.

The grandmothers crept on house Necula, lighting his curtain ablaze. He staggered out into the snow, pistol firing off into the night. The old women thrashed him with their sticks and he blasted a few apart but did not have a bullet for each. They trounced him and the oldest whacked him in the nose with his sword.

Leave this behind? she asked.

So I did, said Necula.

You best be off, so some kinder folk can move in. Here, take your evil stick. We don’t want it, either.

Sword in hand again, he made to slash the old ladies apart, but the sword refused to draw. It trembled. Afraid of old bitties! What nonsense!

And so into the snow, without even his shoes, went Necula, dragging his sword behind him. The old ladies cackled and opened all his windows to air the place out.

[neculacycle]

Medicine Sword

It passed that Necula finally made good on his claim that he would be done with trouble forever and he tossed Kiriha, sheath and all, into a vast chasm that no one could say had a bottom and from there no odd fate might return her to him. She tumbled and spun many years, long past where the sun could shine. But Kiriha prevailed where other things might snap and wear down, for she was unbreakable, and so she fell till at last a skinny, ancient river with no name swallowed her and carried her along violently thought the deep places of the world, through beds of lava and crushing pressure, thrashed against jagged walls and tossed about in poison water. She wasted in the depths of a magma pool till it's eruption took her upward and spat her into the sky with so much soot and chaos she went down the mountain side in seas of lava that erased everything in their path. But lava cools and becomes like rock, and froze Kirihaa within its grasp for a summer and winter, a prisoner in a land of strange folk called Wastrals.

One day, Little Boy Fat decided to take a wander by the old mountain and fell upon the hilt of a sword, lodged into the old magma flows. Pull as he might with all his weight the magma wouldn't release her. But Fat had a way with words.

I sense something about this sword. I think she's a medicine sword, and those are quite rare, as I've only now invented them and only here found one. If you would give her over to me I'd do good in this world.

The mountain said, Well, Little Fat, you've never lied before. Don't tell anyone I did this, or they'd come all over to ask me things, but I'll do this for you.

And the magma cracked and the sword fell on its side. Fat took it up and waddled on his way just as fast as he might.

Fat said, If you didn't know, my medicine sword doesn't cut. It doesn't kill. I swing it about and I think it makes people feel better, like the notes of a guitar.

The drunk Battertint blinked one eye and the other. His stovepipe hat sank over his girlish face. I've seen things as helpless as you, in the wakes of wars and such.

Don't believe me? Here's some proof.

Here? Hold out your bottle.

He did. Fat swiped off the bottle’s bottom half with one cut, leaving only a hole and a cork clasped in Battertint's hand, which he eyed in slow shock.

Now, said fat, you have nothing to drink and nothing better to do than come along and help me. Can you argue that logic?

I couldn't even begin. Now I've lost everything.

Battertint stood on wobbly legs, wiped himself off, which somehow attracted more dust to his person, and stumbled off after Fat.

Where we off to, fat? I have times to keep.

Fat didn't see, but battertint slipped a drink from his coat pocket and went to work.

To find a great swordsman. You wouldn't know, because this is a medicine sword, but I took your hand off when I broke your bottle.

Battertint inspected his hand and indeed it was still attached, though his nails needed trimming, which the sword made like a ladies fingertips.

Hmm. I shouldn't encourage this but I heard rumours of such a person wandering the fields east of here. They say carrion birds follow this person about and one might think they've stumbled upon the remains of a warzone, but it's the work of one.

Atop a mound of rotting flesh and twisted faces stood a figure, it's back to them. Red thunderclouds rained blood in the distance and the sky about the figure turned grey and black. The figure turned its head to look back at them over it's shoulder and they saw as the clouds briefly parted and the sun hit the figure with heavens rays that she was the most pristine young woman either had ever seen, her eyes dark as night. If this was not a master swordsman no one was.

Come up here to me, she said. And so Fat and Battertint climbed the body mound and the young woman said, Now what would possess a person to do that?

Wield this for me, said fat, and held the sword out to her, which she took.

This old thing?

It's unwieldy.

No, it's very much not but this is no challenge for me, I am death's firstborn.

Then challenge yourself. This is a medicine sword, and he explained about those. The young woman pondered and said, My father will be most displeased, but I suppose life begets death. Very well.

They all climbed down the bodies and the swordswoman, who's name was Mokito, asked, What now, o great lord Fat?

Hmm. All these people. You killed them?

Yes', beamed Mokito, very proud.

Now, bring them all back.

No one can do that. Not even my pa.

You mean to say the best swordswoman, even with a medicine sword, couldn't do it?

Mokito looked at Batgertint, who shrugged. It makes enough sense, he said.

Mokito thought, then began swinging the sword into the bodies, and instead of cutting them up, wounds sealed back together one and then another popped back up, revitalised, and wandered off, quite confused but on the whole relieved.

O my pa will be furious, said Mokito. And Pastor Boothills.

Such a doter, said Battertint.

Along the trail, they met several warriors, each having travelled far to face the awful Mokito. Mokito passed them by with much alarm, looking back at them with a lover's longing. Lord fat wagged his finger.

If you wanna fight so much start thinking like a medicine warrior.

How obscene.

But she did face them, dodging around their blows, all three at once, and stabbed the shadows that lurked behind them, that wiggled and died in the grass, and they felt their bloodlust pass.

Battertint by now thought the business about being death's firstborn was a whole lot of hogwash. But he held his tongue on it, in case he was wrong. Fat swiped a bouquet's worth of flowers while they camped and bashfully thrust it under Mokito's powdered nose. The drunk snorted and ate beans from a can one by one. Mokito stuck the flowers in her hair knot.

You're a Warrior of Another Kind now, said Fat with religious zeal.

Out from the green over theres, a mile past the emerald oasis of the just behind came another village, this one host to plague. The people fell apart in the streets. The three proceeded with their shirts pulled up over their noses.

What's the little lord's plan for this? asked Battertint.

O plague, come on out and face the warrior of the new kind! he said. Mokito cackled. But there came a shuffling man in robes and sandals, who said his name was Plague.

See that? mumbled fat under his shirt. A medicine sword, held by death’s first born. Don't look so surprised, grandfather, it's only your death!

But plague put out his hands. How cruel. If I don't spread, I’ll die. Lord Fat, tell me I am different from a wildcat and you are different from a rabbit, and I'll name you Lord Fat of all the Lands.

Survival of the fittest then, said Mokito, brandishing the sword. She swung at plague, but he leaped up, raising his knees to his chest like a spry youth, and he hopped right into the sword and sang.

Plague sword, plague sword, lady death Fell them all with your last breath Never a father so beaming could be As the father of plague bearers, one two and three!

Get out, demanded Fat, and Mokito wagged the sword to no avail.

Not till I'm safe, said Plague. Bet your good health on it.

Then I'll make you a deal. Even Plague must respect that. I'll find you someplace else, but leave these folk alone now.

And so plague stepped out and shook Fat’s hand.

It's a deal brother, he said. But I'll say when I've found the right spot.

Now, with Plague travelling beside them Fat felt hardly like the leader of any medicine band. He felt lower than dirt. Plague said, Dungeon Wheels will be coming along this way.

The terror of the Wastrals, said Mokito. She was half Wastral after all. Fat. With this sword I could probably fell the Dungeon Wheels from here.

Tears welled in Fat’s eyes. Before he could speak:

Get me in there, said Plague, and I’ll cause all manner of coughs and groans among the tower minions. That'll make life easier around here a long while.

Fat scratched his blonde curls. Coughs and groans sound quite unhealthy. She is a medicine sword.

Fret not, Fat. Grunks and Snargs are too vile to die by plague but they'll be out sick a while.

And I'm the wielder, said Mokito, and a helluva a steal away-person, to boot. I'll climb up there and set Plague loose but tell not my father. He has business with the Dungeon Wheels.

They waited. Dungeon Wheels rolled along, it's highest rafters a topsy turvy sway as it braved the hills of the valley. All wastrels learned early to fear the rolling wood tower. Several unguarded stairways climbed up its wood walls, stopping at doors too high to fathom. From little square windows, the tower minions no doubt peered and plotted, animal brains scheming against the wastrels.

Mokito sprang out as the sun set, crossing the valley like a snake. Using a little grapple, she hooked onto a lower window and had scrambled inside before you could say be careful. Pigs and cows and other ugly crosses of things stalked the passage. Mokito clung to the shadows above, watching. Plague slipped out.

Oh he he! So much work to be done. It'll be ages before I've explored it all. But take me to the mess, where I can really do some damage.

Mokito smirked. She dropped down, rebounding off two waddling snargs and vaulted down the hall, never touching the ground. The blunt of the sword met two more grunks as she zigzagged between them. Nearing a turn in the hall, she halted her blazing advance with an arm and leg, and propelled herself off the wall behind her with the other leg.

Behind his door, Doogie polished his tusks and picked at his snout. A thwacking sounded through the door, like many feet rushing for dinner. He stood, braced the door with his big body, and was about to slide open the little window to see to the other side. If someone big and mean didn't guard the mess hall and kitchens, there'd be a riot of gluttony every day, and Dungeon Wheels would turn to famine and infighting in weeks, as the stores ran dry. Doogie thought himself the most important cog in the machine. It would take a small army of beasties to push him aside when he'd tightened his rock muscles. He did just that, slid open the window and blurted a squeaky groan that meant something like password. A sliver of his assuredness wavered when it seemed a small army was flying, not running, his way.

Several snargs crashed into the door, rocking its hinges, but whatever barred it held fast. Mokito followed like a javelin, her sandal meeting the door just as a lucky snout slid down the wood, and the door sagged inward, exploding violently in showers of wood. Mokito rode it to the floor and springboarded off, spinning into the mess in a crazy midair somersault, sending stacks of filthy dishes and chewed up scraps flying. She vaulted off a mountain of rotted apples and swung up into the dark rafters, as a dozen dozen hateful dungeon monsters collided amid the tables. Plague slipped from the sword.

Be well, said Mokito to plague. My father considers you a brother. I can't say what his business with the tower is, so tread how you will.

Farewell, Mokito. Remember you're as much Wastrel as your father’s daughter.

Plague skipped down and into the kitchens. Two guards spotted him and gave chase, and a madness went up in the tower as the alarms sounded. Mokito left as she came, repelling down the grapple and joined the others.

That's a lot of trouble for a day's work. Sorry, little Fat. Not sure how much medicine we've really done.

Much change came without cutting any folk to ribbons. I think we did well, for what it's worth.

They watched Dungeon Wheels flee over and under the hill and found a nice spot for sandwiches. Fat and Batterint, who at last got into the spirit, planned their next adventure and passed out, their bellies full. Now, night is a paltry little affair in those parts, so imagine the shock of waking up to a terrible dark, the kind which swallows even a campfire as you desperately huddle over the flickers. Fat reached for the medicine sword, to banish the dark, but felt a braided hilt; Mokito stood near but they hardly saw her. The pale fire played awful tricks on her shape. She shushed Fat.

Its that sword.

But a medi-

Mokito tilted her head.

Make it stop, said Fat, eyes wet.

Ok. Hey!

Fat rolled up to the sword and hugged it to his chest. We did well, fer what its worth! Really, a sword must get bored with cutting all the time.

Yes, but she also despairs at the thought of going dull.

Mokito reached for the sword, but Fat held it back gently.

Even swords must choose their way, said Battertink, feeling clearer of mind. Let her go with Mokito now. No one can know her will better.

Lord cried, his rosy cheeks wet with tears, but tried looking brave as he handed over the sword.

Isn't this a good life, to live till you don't?

Mokito smiled. Her fury set the sky bleeding, but her smile lit the dark and raised one's heart.

She likes you. But she is the ocean. You are land.

He said his goodbyes. He hugged Kiriha, though she could say nothing.

Over the hills, a sparrow fell, screaming, said Battertint as Mokito shrank in the distance and Little Lord Fat waved them off wit his kerchief.

Mokito went many miles.

A woman could do much with a thing like you. I could rule the world with a little sword like you, and it would become a strange place. I could break the chains of the sun.

She smelled the blade.

Oh I see. Once people knew I had you, that would be all my life was about, and we can't have that. I do fine alone. I think I'm not your type?

She smiled.

What I'll do is attach a couple lanterns to you. I think the eastern fronts will take you far from here, and who knows?

Kiriha drifted on warm currents, till that land was beyond mountains and trees and the sunset.

Two fellows wearing big bucket hats trolled along, Scraggle with hands in pockets, Banjo strumming his namesake lazily, the same chord over and over. They were on the run again, or rather, the walk.

Ain't that the Master's sword up inna tree? asked Banjo.

Queer sight, innit? Scraggle climbed up, tossed the sword down and hopped after it. Boy'll be worried sick. Maybe he got work for us.

Yuh. Star crossed lovers. Les call on the Master an see if he’s still game.

[neculacycle]

A House

When Necula crawled out from his hole it was for good reason. The old ladies were abuzz about something and their clucking had woken him again. He couldn't think or sleep or die with all the ruckus.

What is it now, you old birds?' he asked, slinking over, still in his night rags (which were his day rags too).

Agatha poked her stick toward the house on the hill.

Someone moved into the old house without our knowing. We don't like that. And they won't answer when we knock. We don't like that, either. It's foul, is what it is.

What's foul?

The business on the hill.

What a lot of nonsense. Who are they?

We don't know, they said. They snuck in, same as you, but at least you were friendly once upon a time.

Necula scratched his head. Many thin strands fell. He watched the house a while with them.

It's shut tight, isn't it?

Like a fort.

Let me have a knock.

You knock better than us? Let's see it, mister Necula.

They approached the hill and traversed the little flowery path up. It was overgrown. Whoever was about wasn't playing gardener or host. Necula rapped, his boney knuckles making a good knocker, the old ladies had to agree. No knock came, but a curious thudding or banging somewhere deep inside, as if in response. Necula pulled on the handle. Locked.

Who gave them their key?

None of us. Must of taken the doors off and put new ones up. That's our guess.

What a lot of trouble. There's a window!

The window was quite high up. Even on his toes, the tall Necula couldn't see inside. There was no sill to hang from. Being light, he stood atop poor hunched Mary, who's hump was a perfect little hill. But the window proved shuttered from inside.

Maybe they were dead in there, they all murmured but smoke rose from the chimney above. It set them arguing. Necula had enough. He went to his hole and came back with a wicked little tool and made short work of the locked door. It swung open into a dusty antechamber. Sparse but for a wide love seat, it claimed two grandma's who's tolerance for excitement ran dry.

Necula led the survivors on, prowling like a jungle cat. The first floor, still furnished in the old relics of previous owners, smelled of salt water. Necula’s hairs stood on end.

Are we not land locked on all sides?

Last I checked, said Anne.

Claw marks and sand led up the stairs and into a closed bedroom, like corpses had dragged up from the sea. Necula inched the door open. Beneath a blue sheet, a lump lay in the great master bed. A big green snout stuck out. Hecula perched at the bedside.

Mind you, grandmothers, this is where old ladies and old masters get eaten, but let's have no more of this!

At "this", he tore up the sheets, a magician revealing his trick!

Necula would have scaled the walls had he claws. The crocodile burst from under the blue sheets, as if emerging from a murky river, leaping for him. Necula, feet balanced on the snapping jaws, teetered, threatening to fall into the maw. The fiery old bats kicked at the armored sides and the tail drove them back. Necula leaped and clutched onto the iron candelabra above. It threatened to tear loose from the weathered ceiling. He swung, gaining momentum with his legs, and let go! Lisa, most spry of the adventurers, caught Necula in her arms as the great iron mass fell. The terrible retile crushed beneath the ornament and lived no more.

Now you see why I kept a gun, you old buffoons!

Necula, on his own feet again, dusted himself.

Whose cupboard is it locked away in?

Mine, said Anne,'and I've tossed the key. This won't turn into that kind of neighborhood, if we all get eaten. But now it's coming together. I heard rumours from those nice minstrel boys out in the deep, of strange little folk about.

She went to the next door down, all acrust with barnacles, like an old ship's door.

Those minstrel boys are hop heads, said Necula under his breath. Anne tossed open the door, revealing a heated game of cards. Fish of all walks sat round the table, dealing and shuffling and playing close to the chest. They turned, throwing up their cards, astonished. Necula grabbed his sides and gave a belly laugh.

There's your plot, you hags. A fish parade. Get the coals burning.

I second your sentiments, Mr Necula. It's a fish fry, you little devils!

Wait! We're exiles, said the eel with a fatherly air and all the other fish nodded. We can't return to the sea. Please don't send us away.

Well. Any foes of the sea can't be all that bad' said Necula, more to the glowering women than the fish. Who's scales did you ruffle?

The Great White. We thought we'd sell him out to trophy hunters. But he escaped the net and we finned it out of town. Will you be nice to us?

These grannies are strict. Think you can attend their godforsaken potlucks without ending up on a plate?

We could bring gator!

No brotherly love. That's fish for you. Just stay out of my hole. You stink.

And that's right where he went, closing up behind him and praying for a long sojourn.

[neculacycle]

A Painting

Crimson smeared across white; snow fell about the valley, making high banks, burying autumn, threatening to spill into the veranda. Necula drew his instrument slowly, extracting every droplet of blood, beleaguered by the threat of any variation on perfection.

How would he complete the masterpiece with the fallen blanket laid out before him, his brush angry with red paint? A lone tree ablaze in winter? It seemed to him ugly, and the valley stood empty. A great calamity of lost men? None wanted for vistas of war as they longed for peace times.

In his regalia the emperors son strode through the snow undaunted, making for a hill unseen. At times he nearly fell below but always emerged like some sea creature. He stood upon the hill as he had in summer, a streak in the void, and stood vigil for omens beared alone.

Necula gashed a single streak, cutting the horizon, a shapeless tear in the hours of carefull strokes. So like the Prince, uncertain, here and gone.

[neculacycle]

The Trial of Master Necula

Unbroken summer. Wagons overturned and ransacked. Animal bodies filled the state before them, laid where they had died on the road, the smell like nightmares under the sun. The dutiful oxen, uncaring as the star he dragged, grazed and grew fat under the warmth of an endless day.  

Master North sounded like a blast bag, a whisper. Winter, still heavy in his chest, stayed with him into the new year. Even deadly summer couldn’t shake the cold from his bones. The horse cantered along and he slouched in the saddle, swaying like a tree in a breeze. They were close now to the chateau on the river. Master North let go of the bridle and slid, the world blackening before he hit the ground.

Someone roused him with precious water and led him like an animal beneath the shade of a thicket.

Kiriha Zukuri, said Master North from the depths of his delirium. She must not have it. She mustn't. Let the damn thing be sealed.

You speak madness, Master, said his apprentice.   See you even the drought around us? Nothing could be alive in this place.

Perhaps. Perhaps I died in my cave, or am still there, wracked with fever and fantasy. You might be a dream, said Master North, grinning a broken smile. But it was no madness. The last I saw of Necula he stood, his back to me, at the mouth of that cave. We’d had many travels together, many adventures. We were closer than lovers, but that ordeal was to be a bridge too far. He abandoned me, before he too fell under the spell of that she-demon, and for fraternising with bandit-demons, and a few other crimes of passion, I became an enemy to the Emperor, as I had been to his father.

Let me go in your stead, so you might avoid the rest of this shit hole. And I will bring him. And we’ll bring him bound and dying to the ocean for a beachfront trial and send him off on a wake ship, the kind that goes all the way out to sea, to a distant, thin shore where men burn.

But how will you do it? asked Master North, coughing terribly.

He only seems such a great terror when there’s some distance between the man and the act, as you taught me. That sword is a symbol. More likely is the coward to shoot me as I draw. See these charred men? They were not cut down but shot to death by rifle fire.

Around them were thugs, peasants and rebels, eyes pecked clean by carrion birds. Master North guzzled, his thirst insatiable.

Ah! The eunuch Chamberlain’s men were here, and Necula Horonsi. They raised these camps with haakbus. I’ve seen the ones mounted to the wagons that can bring a palace down. But we must flush him out first so he won’t escape. No chance to fight. No chance to draw Kiriha, if he can.

With great pain Master North drew up, helped by his pupil, and crawled atop his horse and they rode another few miles into the desolation. Now the trees were thin and it was very hot but they had a clear view into the great oxen’s field. It stood tall as several men, a beast but serene in its grazing, unburdened from its eternal work. Master North shook his head. Men tried harnessing the beast again but were gored when its mighty horns fell upon them.

Pitiful, said North. Men cannot end the summer. Greater persons must come and re-chain the sun. How tragic that Master Horonsi might have spent the rest of his miserly days in peace, had he not tried so desperate a plan, concocted, I’m sure, by his fat benefactor. They perhaps believed this endless summer would deter brigands and more importantly the Emperor’s soldiers from harassing the territory and absorbing it into the Empire. But in doing so he drew the ire of all men everywhere and that is why the Emperor must bring his man in, to save his own reputation. Elsewhere, such as your village, it is endless winter, or spring, when nothing will grow. Eventually they will bound the oxen again and the sun will stretch across the sky but that will not assuage the bad blood.

My whole family is dead because of this Necula and he never set foot in my village. I hate him.

All the world hates him and knows his name. See the dust storm behind us?  

Yes, we’ve been just ahead of the front for some time. That is no phenomenon but the pounding of a million million marchers all upon the chateau. Heh heh. What a famous man! But we will reach him first and to us goes the glory. Uh oh.

A swift river cut across the road where a bridge had been. Master North scanned the bank until he saw the tip of a raft hidden behind some reeds.

There.

They found the raft in good condition, tied off with some old rope but too small to fit them all.

Do you suppose it might fit the horses, should we ferry them one and then the other? asked Master North.

I’ll go first, Master. The apprentice boarded the raft, carefully leading his shaky horse beside him. He pulled them across, struggling against the current. But arriving safely on the opposite bank he secured his horse and made the trip back.

Come now, Master. I will take you across and then the horse.

Take the horse first.

The rope is weak. I don’t trust it. Please, come first.

The Master relented, letting his apprentice shoulder his weight onto the raft. As the boy pulled them across the Master let the spray hit his face.  

Stretch on forever, he said to the river. What? shouted the apprentice over the rushing water.

The Master sat and crossed his legs by the riverbank once the raft hit land. The boy was already taking the raft back across. The Master must have nodded and slept a moment because it seemed the boy was already halfway back across the river with his horse. He blinked and the horse was swept underwater and the boy screaming and thrashing against the current. Only a dream, thought the Master. But the screaming cut through the distance between Master North and the world.

Fury rouses a man like no medicine can. Master North shoved to his feet, curses thrashing from him. He cut the rope that led the raft and tossed it out to his apprentice with deft precision.

Catch a hold!

The apprentice took the rope and Master North heaved him to the shore with a younger man’s strength. For a moment, as the boy spat up water and grovelled in the dirt, Master North stood tall over him, returning to his former glory. But he soon wavered, finding the ground with his hands like a drunkard.

Are you well? Master? asked the apprentice, finding his own strength.

That tumble looked refreshing. Had it been me, I think I’d let it take me.

The apprentice allowed himself a smirk. Not when there’s work to be done. Come on, old man. Onto your horse.

Master North grunted, and beamed. Huh. The state of youth. Very well.

The boy walked and the old man mounted his horse again. Beyond a small treeline the chateau roof rose above the canopy. Approaching, the apprentice asked, How did you meet this Necula, Master?

Master Necula. He is still your better, even if our business is grim, and I’m tired of your loose mouth. We met during the war, when the Emperor was not yet an emperor. He was beautiful then, like a woman. But shut up now and concentrate. We’re at the gates.

No sentries received them as they approached the town. Only a lone boy passed them by. North motioned with his nose and the apprentice snatched the boy’s arm, who squirmed, frightened.

Stop when the Master North wishes to speak to you!

North rolled his eyes and leaned a bit toward the boy.

Tell whoever will listen Master North is here for Master Hornosi. That will be enough. Go.

A dark cloud formed in the east, over an endlessly scorched field. If there was life beneath that cloud, it rejoiced, and the dust gathered behind them.

~~~

In the afternoon at his bathhouse on Daywater River, Lord Chamberlain honoured Necula Horonsi again. Both were bored country gentlemen and neighbors, beholden to the Emperor but too far into the frontier states to fear him or receive the help of his armies and so the Master had gone out in the summer during drought and famine and slew every villain in the state, to be done with trouble forever and now there was nothing to do but drink and fuck and meditate and sit about in the sun reading, as the savage summer turned laboriously into fall.

Contortionists splayed around Necula and he drank generously. He only smiled gently when the eunuchs and old princesses, gathered here from the wood-works, offered him praises. He never opened his eyes, even as the contortionists wrapped around him and caressed his face; he had learned the art of seeing through closed eyes. Some foreigner, a dirty madman who carried a flute, played and pranced about much to the Master’s satisfaction.

Lord Chamberlain sat closest to the Master, whose sword lay between them in its sheath. The old straight sword was unassuming, out of style – an antique of the old wars, and of slightly foreign design, auburn wooden handle and sheath, and lacking a cross guard. It was like the Master, who wore comfortable tatters that were fashionable a thousand miles away in some heathen country. But to find a match for that sword the Emperor sent armies to every stretch of the expanse in an endless march, united to home by an ever-growing line of messengers, and that was how the post and the imperialists came to be, or so a fat man with perfumed black locks was saying to a eunuch.  The Lord cleared his throat.

May I, oh Master?

May you lay your hands on that which severed the sun? Or so people would like to believe!

The Master nodded his approval, closing his eyes again. The sword was nothing without him, though he was nothing with the sword, such was the curse upon it, or himself, now. Children might play with it in the street, and they had on one occasion when some village hoodlums snuck into his house and spirited it away. The body blade, they must have thought in their youthful rapture, only to find it could not so much as nick the wood off a tree. This was not the curse but some peculiarity it had picked up years ago.

The Lord took up the straight sword and pulled it from its sheath. The metal cried out in his novice hand as it scraped the sides coming out.

Calm you, thought the master, you deserve no better for your troubles.

The Lord swung about in a clumsy display, prompting old queens and fops to dodge and crawl for cover in terror and joy, as if one errant chop might rend them in twain.

How can you let a man behave thus with it, said the Lord, drunk and brave, which so many men covet? Do you trust me so, old friend, to not have you bound on the spot and take for myself such a prize as I have in my hand? I see nothing in your hand, good Lord, said the Master.

All gasped. Even the contortionists broke from their fondling to stare at the Lord’s empty hand. The Master sat cross-legged still but the sword laid across his lap.

No man is so fast as I, ha ha ha! Besides, this sword is no more than a trophy for my enemies, all of whom are dead, and you are no enemy of mine, neighbour!

The bathhouse was overtaken with revelry.  

We have won the Master’s favour! cried a eunuch.

And it seems I yours! the Master laughed, and with this the Master prepared to leave and spoke briefly of his plans to meditate alone by the river, which he did not do, but went instead to a whore who lived alone with no parents outside the ten-foot wall around town.  

You come so often now, said the girl.

Would you turn me away?

Never, Master.

And so the Master took her and when he was finished with her he lingered in the filthy house.  

Can you write?

Some.   You will help me write out a message to the Emperor.

She sat at a crooked table with a feather and ink well he made available to her.

Tell him I will be there at the capitol in a week’s time to hear the case of Fabula Poronien myself and also to assuage his Glory’s paranoia of Lord Chamberlain’s so-called “rebellious intents”, which is a notion entirely preposterous to one who knows the Lord too well, and recreate this honorific when signing the name.

He showed her an old letter.

Can you not write? the girl asked mockingly. The Master’s head was high, eyes closed and hands clasped together, to affect a scholarly air.

Words are weapons, girl, and even one low as yourself should be able to defend home in some way. Consider me as a teacher. Perhaps an education will lift you from this squalor.

Then where would the old men and you go?

Write, girl.

Write what?

Write this: I, the Master Necula Horonsi, have been absent from the Emperor’s halls many such years and such, but this man you call a murderer and arsonist, who is a personal friend to me and such and so on, must not hang, and so on.

Write that exactly as you say?

Don’t be a stupid girl. Make it convincing.

And so suddenly the fates of men are in my hands.

As I said the pen is a weapon. Now hurry, a carriage waits for me, and a horse to take the letter ahead. Don't forget the part about his paranoia.

Master?

Yes, dear?

Do you think you I ought to mention the severed sun?

Why?

Would a lot of people not be disturned by that?

What a stupid girl. What an ungrateful girl. I am the only man who could have freed this backwater from constant harassment, and that is all I did, whatever the Emperor thinks of declarations of war and all that. They’ll bind the oxen again and no one will remember a few extra months of winter. Stranger things happen. But don’t write any of that. Ha ha ha! At worst the Emperor will give me a scolding in front of his court, to keep up appearances, and in the future…

He looked out over the blistered earth.

Stategists will write of me. You’ll see. You’re young.

~~~

A handmaid scampered between the Lord’s doormen and cried that bandits had stormed through the city gates and rode on horseback up the main thoroughfare, wreaking havoc and terror and taking hostage a monk.

They call for the Master Necula, she said, prostrating before him.

It seems you still have some enemies, Master, said the Lord. From outside, a band of townsfolk whooped together,

Master North! Master North! He is come! and a chaotic rush for houses, bushes and tall trees began, till the town had cleared out, save for a few white eyes peeking from the shadows.

But Necula had already left. A messenger went screaming from the Lord’s chambers, overtaking the wagon. Necula peaked from the window curtain.

What the hell is it now?

Bandits! Ah! They’ve come for us! For you.

I can’t well have been expected to slaughter every brigand in the state, despite what old dolts may like to boast. Raise a militia, if it’s not already done, and drive them out.

As the postman related, it was hoped that the Master would ride back in secret and ambush the invaders, who demanded his head. And he said, The invader is Master North.

All the more reason to flee! Driver! Post haste!

But the messenger remained, a hand upon the carriage door.

I am instructed to return with the Master at all costs to myself.

Fuck off, would you?

Then, the messenger’s eyes darted to the horse, full of panic and conspiracy, and he whipped a pistol from his pockets and shot the horse in the leg. The horse neighed and kicked and went wild and the driver crawled atop the carriage, folding his hands over his head. Fury overtook Necula.

You damn fool! He leaped from the carriage, drawing his sword and in a deft motion arched the blade for the messenger’s neck, who screamed like a child. But the blade stopped upon his skin, as if unable to penetrate.

How lucky you are, Kiriha's tantrum evidently remains. Fine then, I suppose I speak of being done with trouble forever but when I see you again I’ll have another means of killing you.

~~~

Master North stood in the square, adorned in funerary robes. Necula stepped through the village gates, sword at his side. Master North, seeing him, released the babbling priest from his grasp, who scurried off, kicking up dust.

So, some honour remains in you?

It would seem so. This village is a calm place. It has no place for brigands like you. And who is this? Your new toy?

The apprentice scowled. The North saw his apprentice fondle his sword and he placed a hand on the apprentice’s shoulder.

He wishes to have us kill each other, said Necula to the boy. He doesn’t care which of us dies now. He’ll plan for the survivor next. North has no respect for anyone.

For once you speak something other than bullshit. But you are mistaken about respect. The Emperor himself saved me from the demoness cavern, nursed me like a baby and pardoned me. In return, he asks only that I bring your head to him.

He craves Kiriha so badly?

More than Kiriha. You’ve gone too far, even for him, by breaking the chains of the sun. And this fat Lord here is well known for his desire to overthrow the ruling family. Your death is the opening gambit in some war yet to come.

What nonsense. I think you escaped your demon lover’s clutches and rushed here out of some misguided assumption I left you for dead.

Master North said nothing. He pointed to the east and warily, Necula looked over his shoulder. What was he to see? The city gates? A pretty blue sky, streaked by a creeping storm. But something felt unreal about the dust. He approached the wall, climbed to the guard’s catwalk and peered over the edge, focusing now. His blood ran cold. North gave a belly laugh.

Huh huh huh huh. Is the rumour true? Is Kiriha sealed? Did the bull’s chains dull her blade? You might need a good sword to fight back the coming hordes. Or you can come with me quietly, and I’ll sneak you back to the Emperor. At least then you won’t be pulled apart.

Who is coming for me?

All of them.

"Who is that?"

Everyone is coming. But rest assured, I'll bring you away from them, to the place you least want to die. Where even the old man can't reach you.

Why don’t you come find out if her blade is dull?

Master North’s eyes bulged. His cheeks puffed and with no prompting he and his apprentice, atop their horses, broke for Necula. They rode around him, darting in circles with their horses, taking swipes with their sheaths.

Draw your sword and we will draw ours! said Master North. They made rounds and pelted Necula till he fell. With a stroke of terrible speed Necula broke the legs of an oncoming horse with his sheath, sending it and Master North toppling and Necula came down upon Master North with fury. But his foe was already on his knees to meet him.

They faced each other down, Necula stood before Master North.

So, it is true - you cannot draw, said North. Is some curse upon you?

Necula did not speak. His hand rested on his hilt now. North stepped forward, also ready to strike.    We shall see.

North drew, his blue black blade shining in the sun. It fell upon Necula, who raised his sword, still sheathed, and the blade could do nothing to even the wood, as Kiriha was another kind of sword.

Ha! North swung again. Is this your training sword?

But Necula parried a blow and kicked North between the legs, bringing North to a knee. North vomited. The apprentice could handle no more. He kicked his horse and burst with fury toward Necula. Master North, still downed, at once raised a hand to halt the apprentice but at that same time Necula produced a single shot pistol and blasted the boy from his mount; the horse ran on past Necula and the boy lay in the dirt.

North groaned and stood. You filth.

I’ll fight like a fool, with sword and honour and all such nonsense, for you. But don’t expect the same for your worthless apprentice. North, his heart cracking and crunching, coughed as he fell upon Necula with many savage downward cuts. He kicked Necula in the chest, and knocked him out with a swipe to the head, and that was all for the fight. North breathed hard, choked on spit.

Sad. Very sad. You abandoned your training years ago.

He picked up Necula and threw him over the horse, after catching it, and rode for the coast. He did not stop for the boy. He’d already forgotten him.

~~~

The ocean judge lived under a giant rock, behind a dune. Torches burned around his rock and made a path up into the grass. By now a procession of onlookers had grown behind the posse and their prison wagon, made up of mourners and dissidents, accusers and haters alike, and all their spears and jackknives, too, clanging and scraping on belts, but with too much clamour to tell any camps apart. These folk Master North gathered from here and there, to bear witness. They were not hard to find. North had no intentions of spiriting Necula to the Emperor. Instead he met with the hordes and they took Necula to the sea.

Hunched and stiff, the ocean judge crawled out from his rock and led the procession to the shore, where he climbed atop a large dune.

Who stands accused, and who stands to accuse? he asked.

Necula Horosi stands accused, said Master North, And I, the Master North, accuse him.

And why do you seek the judgement of the ocean court?

For justice no empire can offer.

The accusation?

Genocides, and severing the chains of the sun.

No man can do such a thing.

Master North took the straight sword to the ocean judge, keeling as he held it up in offering. The ocean judge accepted it with great slowness, turning it around and feeling it with shaking, cracked hands. He unsheathed it, only enough for a sliver of steel to show, and shook his head. His sightless, empty eyes searched the crowd, as if to find the sword’s owner, his mouth agape.

Bring him before me. Bring him here.

Master North shoved Necula forward. To your knees. Get down.

Enough, said the ocean judge. What do you say for yourself?

Do we blame a weapon for the crimes of its wielder? said Necula.

Did your hands hold the sword as it cut free the sun?

Necula squinted against the sun. He said nothing. Master North stomped up beside him.

This is useless. He will not condemn himself to the thin shore. Ask him of the countless men and women whose blood pools in the forests and he’ll laugh you off. That will be his guilt.

That is beyond the concern of this court. Step away, step away, said the ocean judge.

Master North scowled but obeyed.

Answer me truthfully, continued the ocean judge. Who made this? He held out the sword.

I can’t say, said Necula.

You found this?

Long ago.

You are unaware of the terrible weight upon it?

It feels as any sword does.

Because you are balanced with it. Your feet sink into my shore like the ancient bedrock sunken beneath us. There can be no doubt.

The hunched figure eased his way down the dune.

What doubt? said Necula. Where are you going? I haven’t spoken my part.

The judge touched Necula’s shoulder as he passed, wreaking fish. You’ve already betrayed yourself.

What? This is insanity! Old man!

He goes for a conch shell, said Master North. To call a wake ship.

Curse all you madmen, said Necula, and he ran past Master North, following the judge. But seaweed reached from the ocean and dragged him by his ankles back to the mound. At the conch shell’s call, a ship grew steadily on the horizon, till it was only a half mile off. A rowboat embarked from the main ship, being carried along and rocked by the tide. The rowers didn’t come to shore. Instead, the seaweed clamped Necula and his sword together, carrying him feet first into the water. Necula saw the sun shining through the water’s surface, as his lungs filled and burned.

~~~

Won’t you turn back to shore, old man? said the shaven man. Eh? Let these seas carry us never-more, old man. Come then, old friend, let us be back to the shore.

I said, I’ll hear none of it, said the bearded man.   Aren’t you black of mood tonight, then? What devil is chasing us? No, no, my friend. I have no intention of dying on land. Not with you.

My bones are old and tired. I am older and more tired than the ship. I cannot recognize her creaks and groans anymore, she doesn’t sound the way she used to.

That’s what happens when you replace so many parts. I think the mast was the last to go, you old fool, it’s not the same ship. It’s gone and given you the spooks. I ain’t ready to die yet. You’re entirely senile and don’t know it.

No, no. Let us return to shore.

Yes! Let us return to shore! said the Master where he knelt, tied to the mast. He had been watching the two old men bicker back and forth, hacking and wheezing into the rain. His eyes darted between the men as they spoke, straining to make out words in the onslaught.

What!? hollered the bearded man over the rain.

Let us return to shore!

If I didn’t know better I’d say you had some stake in the matter!

The bearded man wheezed a long, wet, painful wheeze and cackled. His boots drummed on the deck as he limped away, followed by the shaven man.

I will not burn on that distant shore, said the Master, head bowed. I will not burn in your pyres.

What's that you say, stranger? asked the bearded man. I think the time for wishful thinking is over.

I know him, I know him, cried the shaven man. This one's a butcher. This one's THE butcher.

Doesn't matter who he is now. The rain is something awful tonight, let's go below deck.

The two old men strode off.

You can't leave me like this! said the Master but they were already gone. The Master knelt in the rain. He thought of the weight of his crimes, and then began to laugh.

You fools. Can this ship carry the weight of two passengers so damned? So without forgiveness? Kiriha! Zukuri! We'll both drown, you fools! The souls of ten thousand, aboard one ship. I will not burn. I will not burn upon that distant shore! This wake ship will sink into the cruel sea!

In the store room, Kiriha lay against some rum barrels. A few talismans sat tossed around her, but that was the extent the wardens took with her captivity. Kiriha slept. So warm had been the summer following the unchaining of the bull, she sank into a great slumber and dreamed of dancing and swinging, and her blade was dull in its sheath. She wanted for nothing.

But the ship, damp, wet, smelly, noisy, creaked. She shared something of her master’s fear of the ocean. Though no sea could rust her blade she slowly awoke and felt the darkness. She feared resting at the bottom of the sea for all time. And then the criminals, in their desperation, called out to her. Or rather, their crimes called to her. They snuck into her dreams, making them nightmares, and thus Kiriha lashed out and drew the crimes from the criminals.

The hopeless prisoners in their cells rattled chains and moaned with hunger and thirst as the wardens bayed and laughed and drank and filled their mouths in view of the cells. But now shadows grew. Their hunger, unchecked, terrible, agony, their skin turned blue and they cried out, Help us! Let us free! Someone is in here with me!

But the wardens paid them no heed.

With the warden’s backs turned, their crimes burst from their chest and fraternised on the upper decks, eyes sunken and vile, grinning, scowling, cut throats flashing daggers, murdered whores, bloated, cannibal butchers, skin green and blue; they dined with the wardens, clinking forks and knives. A wicked, hateful band formed, blowing on pan flutes and banging on pipe organs. A hurdy gurdy played for a quartet of chanters, who threw their arms around each other's shoulders and formed a drunken line, singing an old, old sea shanty.

The prisoners recoiled back into their cells, their faces blue and contorted with terror. They put up their arms and turned away as if flames licked at their flesh.

And while their crimes grinned black and brandished knives the huddled prisoners in their cells took up a terrible wailing seaman's song, and Necula’s eyes widened and he screamed out at the song, his head back and open mouth catching rain. Two killers wandered onto the deck. They staggered and howled into the driving night. And then they found Necula. The one with a noose around his neck ran to the Master and fell to his knees before him.   Do you know who I am? he asked, pointing to himself. Do you? I was your squire, great Horoshi. He he, and this here, this man here your loyal war horse, ha ha ha ha!

If he’s here, he must have the body blade aboard, said the fatter of the two.

All in good time. First I want to do it again. I want to do it again!

He put his hands around the master's neck and squeezed. Necula felt the world spin, and the rain became less and less, till it passed right through him. He didn’t notice it stopped. Slowly, the rain took form again. The fat man and his companion rolled on the deck.

Let’s kill him and get on with it, said the fat one.

They were going to slit his throat when a man heavy with chains burst from below deck and tossed himself raving into the sea, which devoured him with fury.

What the hell has happened? asked the fat man.

The revelry spilled into the storage hold, where Kiriha Zukuri sat propped against rum barrels. Some criminals knew it and were filled with greed. The boat lurched and groaned. The wardens rushed in.

It’s sinking us, said the bearded one.

Throw it over! said the other.

You mad fools! said the first, struggling with a grave robber, Get back!

Awakened, the dead slipped from the sword’s sheath and lined the storage room. Kings and martyrs, children and murderers. The shadows fled with the wardens’ lamp light. Forgotten armies marched behind them in the mead hall, dead princes went to battle, an archbishop wailed. The body blade shrieked back. And Kiriha’ss crimes were a terrible snarling sea worm. The storage room floor sagged and collapsed and the monster fell into the mess hall, rocking the ship. Dragging her down toward the horrid sea.

The boat was heavy with the weight of crimes and was taking on water. a crack had formed in the floorboards; the old wood splintered and gave way and the sword went spiralling into the mess hall below, snapping a long table in half with sheer pressure and causing the ship to lurch and bob in the water. She heaved to and fro, struggling to stay afloat. Shadows danced in the mess hall, some from lanterns, and others of a darker hue casting off from the sword. The shadows of the tables and chairs shook violently, as if to avoid those jerking in the centre of the room, but they could not escape their sources and were overtaken by the latter.

On deck, the bearded man bellowed, Cast him off, or we'll overset and tumble in!

Armed with a cutlass, the shaven man hurried over and undid the Master's bindings, and before he could stand the old men were upon him, each taking an arm and dragging him toward the water. Are you mad? I'll drown in this cursed ocean, said the Master. There are rites. The rites of burial or the rites of the stake.

You should speak of rites, you and that damn body sword, said the shaven man. Below, the sea water lurched and reached up for the Master, spray stinging the faces of those onboard. The bearded man gripped the Master's arm and thrust him forward. The Master grabbed, found the old man's beard, and determined to take a final life, yanked the old man off his feet and into the ocean, which seemed to accept this with all the vengeance as though it were the Master himself falling in. The old man howled and gasped and howled again, and a wave rose up to smash him against the ship's hull and suck him below in one motion. Then the Master reached, but could not claim the second man, who was agape with terror. He was already whooping and cursing the air as the Master plummeted. He was surely to die now in this horrible, pitiful way. But a hand caught his wrist, and he dangled there. Looking up, he was the shaven man, his eyes heavy with tears.

Drownin's too good for you, demon, and he hurled the Master up like he were nothing. The Master landed hard on the gangplanks, sprawled on his stomach. Winded, he found some reserve of strength and ran. In terror. He bolted aimlessly to clear distance. Surely he was to die he had thought, and a calm had come over him, knowing he had bested, or ruined, the sailors. But now he was to answer for the crime. The ship sank another few feet.

He ran below deck, taking cramped corridors and trying doors until he fell into a hot, red room, where a great furnace was being tended to by a man too wide and tall to have fit through the door. The smell of sweet, diabolical cooking was sticky in the air.

Ya come to flavour my soup, head-tearer? What with the spices all tossed away? said the giant, and lumbered toward the Master. His stomach was round as the cauldron he tended. The master and the cook circled the cauldron, the cook reaching across the boiling stew to grab for the Master. With a kick the Master toppled the cauldron sending boiling water spilling over the cook, who bellowed in agony.

The Master entered a black room. Shadows had overtaken everything, plunging that part of the ship into another realm. Things bit at the Master's heels as he hurried across the darkness. Hidden pitfalls and rows of teeth were concealed in the blackness, all of which the Master had to avoid. In the middle of the hall, the damnable sword dragged the ship down still.

I'll toss you into the deepest ocean, you fiend! said the Master, and you can be worthless to everyone!

The sword said nothing. It was asleep.

We have to do something, or we'll all drown. Kiriha! Zukuri! Answer me!

At last, the sword awakened from her dream, and her nightmares drew back into herself.

Finished pouting? asked Necula. Now sharpen yourself, and fast, or we’ll drown.

He trudged through the ship, slashing apart the infestation of shades down to the last.

I see, you’re all too much of cowards to face your crimes, he said. You cling to the hope there’s some innocence left in you, some hope of salvation. Well, I have no such delusions. And I’ll save myself.

He felt the prisoners gathering around him. They followed him to the deck. The thin shore was a mile off, glowing red. Together they all climbed to the wheel, afraid and hopeless, both repelled by and drawn to the horizon. Necula struggled to turn the wheel away, though it fought him, relenting only when two strong men offered their hands. The ship slowly turned about.

That’s blood what will never come clean, said one of the strong men. A mark of the wardens.

Cast its body into the sea, said Necula, and I’ll wear its wretched blood as testament they aren’t the end of this world. I cut down most of your crimes. This sword drew them out as well. But it’s lure affected the sword and myself. Our crimes cannot be cut by this sword.

His eyes, emptier than before, seemed deep in the sockets. Had the haggard lines and age left his face? But in their place, ashy skin and dark depressions grew, and he was like a porcelain doll. The same tiredness, but one that brought no sleep.

You are not like me anymore, and you’d better clear off when we reach land.

[neculacycle]

Around the Bend

What a pitiful thing. Abandoned by your kin. There they are, a-swimming cross the pond. What a sickly thing, curled up and black as death. You're no swan. You're a dying thing.

Necula took up the bird and brought it from the riverbank to his hovel. He fed it the food the monks left for him. He'd no need for it. The swan did not die and did not live very much. It sat about with him in the hovel. It had nowhere to go.

Necula met the foreigner around the bend.

He wore a tall hat, a suit and carried a flower from another land, that had neither wilted nor faded. His eyes hid behind an awful little mask.

I tire of meetings like this, said Necula.

Charming. There's only so many roads for folks like you and I. When one is always on his way to do evil business.

Don't pull me into your nonsense.

My nonsense, sir! At least bald creeps don't leave grapes at my altar! By god, I've never lied to myself. I'll go straight to hell for all the whores I butchered back home. But by god, it felt good! It felt right! I lived truly.

They leave grapes because I'm a beggar.

No. No. No and no. You're the thing you meet along the road. As am I. Sir. Say pal. Weren't you a cop once? Me too.

You'd like to think you know a lot about me.

I read the papers wherever I go.

So Mr butcher. Who pays the toll for passing through this glade at dusk? Isn't that why you took a turn some bald lunatic warned you against? I'll bet you carved him up alright for even speaking to you. With that big knife in your pocket. You've had your hand over it the whole time. And me. I'm only a white haired fool without a stick to fend off foxes. But you know what they'll say in the village? They'll say that devil's sword got another one, and leave more useless junk at their altar. I'm sure you read plenty of newspapers back home, they gave you airs. But I think…I’ll see that trophy you carry about…resting with the other junk. Where it shall rot.

Ha; I don't kill everyone I meet- Only those who will truly enjoy suffering.

Then you're a lunatic too.

Perhaps.

What fool takes pleasure in killing? Or the lack there of it. Both gestures are means to an end, Aren't you hungry? You could rest in my hovel. I have a fat swan, plump for cooking.

I tell you sir we are one in the same.

Well we’ll never know, will we? If I met you or you met me around the bend. There's no justice in this world, only atoms changing forms. Or so another foreigner told me long ago. You pathetic thing. All your efforts in vain. Come around the bend with me.

He did, and as he crossed the threshold his clothes came undone and several barefoot murderers burst from the suit. Some ran off into the water, others into the woods. The suit crumpled in the mud.

[neculacycle]

A Hanging

Tell me at least where the right road leads, said Necula finally. Mr Rots danced nervously at his feet. Necula called him Mr Rots, for that's what the creature smelled of. He smelled worse than the body Necula stopped to ask directions of.

Fine, said the hanged man. It leads in a great dumb circle, all the way back here. Maybe you won't be hung, but it'll be all the same. Now cut me down so I can make a run for it before the old man gets here.

I don't like messing with foreigners ' affairs, said Necula. Mr Rots, stop rocking or you'll fall in the mire and no one will pull you out.

At least someone cares for me, then, said Mr Rots.

You don't want to be cared for by no one, said Necula.

You're both such idiots, said the corpse. Go be idiots elsewhere.

Fine, said Necula. I'm heading into town. The smell there seems to suit Mr Rots.

You'll see why soon enough, said the hanged man.

In town, they found dead horses and doors swinging in the wind. A few eyes peeked out from the dark, blinked, and moved to other windows.

Some kind of plague? said Necula.

Or war, said Mr Rots. Really it leaves the same effect. I hope for war. We'll pick the remains clean.

They tried boarding at a ruinous hotel. No one came to the counter so they went upstairs, finding the bedroom doors unlocked. Each chose his room and bunked for the night. Morning brought little more light than waxing twilight.

How I wish a whore were about, said Necula, feeling lonely after his rest. He walked about with his cane like a dandy.

Mr Rots, who Necula thought the sum of all vermin and pests, looked as though he'd tried grooming himself in the night. The effect was to make him more disgusting, because bow his fur shined with saliva.

Rots, how long do you plan on living? said Necula.

Well, I think I have another year, said Rots.

And you're content to spend that measly time like this?

In response, Rots threw to his back and rolled about in the dirt and filth. I have no airs, he said. And look there, down that alleyway. A female of the species in heat. I'll see you in a while. Rots made for the alley. A smell of such revulsion came from the direction Necula gagged and went the opposite way, wherever it might take him.

He found an uneven dock stretching into the mud. There was little to do but stand and he went back to the alley, as close as he dared. Mr Rots he said. Let's move on.

He's dead, said a voice like Mr Rots. I ate him and now must care for his young. For the lack of a pulsing red eyes, Necula would have thought Rots had popped out to greet him. So go away, said the thing. Stay away from the nest.

You are a stupid bunch, aren't you? Necula stepped down with his foot and with no more effort than taking a stride crushed the thing under his boot. Continuing on into the alley, his full weight upon it caused a bloody pop. He had no hopes of finding Rots. He held his breath and set fire to the wicked nest, built of straw aside a leaning outhouse.

[neculacycle]

Mary Gene of Fable

Mary Gene of Fable paddled along with her rover. Such was the water that day they needn't worry after capsizing. The boat held steady and the girl took off her hat. The men hiked down to the banks with their brushes to paint her as she passed by. Their jaded wives cursed her and hoped she'd sink. You couldn't sink that vessel, though, without a cannon borrowed from the army.

Hopeshed Town lived and died by Gene. A famous artist named Rockwell had tried capturing her and lost his mind. Now he only painted his walls. He had no imagination and it did him in in the end. Mary Gene saw life as a dream. It held as many borders as a dream. The stars never left her eyes.

One night a rustic juggler from the country snuck into the river and lay in the reeds till the boat drifted over him. His arms were quit long and reached all the way out the water and over the boat's sides. The rover awoke and barked out a warning. Mary, laid on her back, arms clutching flowers to her chest opened her eyes but those terrible arms hooked over her and dragged down the boat with a great splash.

Mary had never felt water except to drink and now it surrounded her. She hadn't thought about the water or anything in it. Mary Gene never knew fish or cold or wet. Her darlings, bundled so prettily, slipped into the murk and swam away. Mary couldn't swim so she sank to the bottom. The juggler lifted her up and into the sun. He carried her over his head and into the trees.

Give-ums our brother back, he said.

A brother lost is a brother lost, said Mary. What is a brother?

He's a fellow you've always known. He comes from your home.

I think Mary found herself boned but we shouldn't forget that little devil, the tireless companion. He'd kept Mary's company so long he'd forgotten what he was. But he know a bit of things beyond the boat. He sank his rotted teeth into the thief, who at once took ill and died. Mary fainted and sank again. She lay with her boat a long time, till it popped back up and went on its way.

The remains, when free for a time, became unrivaled horrors. Nothing lingered so dark as them.

[neculacycle]

Hobble and the Shadow

No one survived a tumble into the sea but the man in the stovepide had did. Everyone was paranoid now that something was afoot in the wharf. The fleet embarked, lead by the grand flagship, followed by the treasure ship and its junkers. And these were big, cold, cruel men, with no joy. They spent their lives above or near the ocean and death. They huddled in the uncaring rain, shuffling for fear of overturning into the depths.

The savage captain saw the foreigner slip on the rocks that fell off into the bay. The ocean raged where the man slipped and died again, the surface a mirror. It froze the captain's blood that the ocean ceased its toying so quickly. And the stranger emerged, crawling on hands and knees, soaked through but very much alive. The water spared him. Had feared him.

The captain shouted out across the wharf and they abandoned any man slow in boarding. A few drunkards still sat in the shacks on shore.

What? asked the first mate of the captain. The captain dipped into his nightcap and seemed calmer now that they were at sea. His dark quarters stunk of rotting wood and mold. A powerful aroma came from his bottle and a red steam escaped from inside. He poured a dark red liquor into a tumbler and drank, keeping the drink level as the ship rocked.

The captain was not drunk but stammered and seemed confused. He laughed and drank.

Bedtime stories, walking around. Disgusting. Something…black? In the sky?

He was looking at the first mate, as if expecting an answer.

Captain?

Ya know any children’s songs, Barns? Mmm?

I know a few, Captain.

All right then.

They went out to the deck. It was raining, always raining. Almost a good sign, thought the captain. It was no secret that the captain was a madman but his demand today was beyond the pale.

A rowing song, men, he said.

This ugly little tune became faster and more like a chant until it might have been a church on board the ship. All present resented this and the captain. There was talk. He'd seen no such thing as a man crawl from the ocean, that it was another quirk of his rotted mind. Hours later, when the rain picked up and then ceased so that the humidity was unbearable in the sun, no one cared.

The captain took sick, as he usually did. The ship doctor, wreaking of sweat and sea water, inspected him in his quarters. The captain laid out on a collapsed, damp couch.

I’m dying, he said. He often said this. It hurts. It hurts all over.

The ship doctor did nothing that didn’t involve sewing, sawing or pouring liquor. His main duty, though no one said it, was to put men out of their misery. That was why you called the ship doctor. Whether he saw himself this way was unknown. At most he humoured the captain, who was yet to die.

Exhaustion, captain. A few days of rest will clear it up. A few drinks.

But the captain wouldn’t be assuaged. He held a rag over his eyes.

I’m dying. I’m dying. Bring in my wife, and they did. She was a ragged woman, as ragged as the captain. She wore a filthy dress, opened at the top where her breasts hung out, engorged from cold seawater. She went first to his deck and took a chug of the nightcap before coming to his side.

I'm here, husband.

And my children, said the captain, and they came, three boys, the eldest wild, the middle mild, and the third a child.

We’re here, said his children. Do you die again, father? asked Necula.

Woman! called the captain. He clawed for his wife and she handed him his bottle as a habit. Taking it up he flung it as a missile to Necula but hit the youngest instead, who flipped onto his back. His nose gushed and the boys whooped. Their mother cursed and hurried the youngest from the room. She stopped in the doorway.

Put him down, doctor, put the bastard down! and was gone.

Boy, spoke the captain to neither in particular. Bring another from the cabinet.

Necula went for it and swigged and his brother swigged. Their father waited, hand outstretched till it felt glass. He tried raising the bottle but lost his strength. The bottle fell, dark red tonic seeping through the carpeted planks. He was not drunk. He was wheezing. The coldness of the air had taken hold in him and he lay silent.

Pneumonia, said the doctor. Nothing to do but wait. Can you do that, Captain?

But the captain was far away, somewhere in the past. The children were children again, crying and whining in a nasty, static way. They ran about the ship, or the house - they were the same place to him. He wanted the children to shut up, they were making him nervous with their hollering. He mumbled, thinking he was telling them to quiet down. It came out as nonsense.

Delirious, said the doctor.

Come on close, boys, the Captain said after much babbling and they did. Necula rescued the bottle from the floor; half was gone.

Sit around me, said his father, and they did. Stop your crying and I’ll tell you a story. About Hobble and the Shadow. Hobble was a foreigner who carried an old throw-light yellow as the sun and wore a stovepipe hat, the kind what with mercery inside. He'd mad as they come cause of it. He hunts the shadow with his throw-light but can never catch it cause the shadow just gets longer. There’s no moral. Sometimes he comes and that's that.

He swore Hobble would board the ship, though they were miles from land.

By cover of mist they raised a seaside town, killing a count and burning his estate to the ground. He seemed the only tie the town had to an empire further inland, so the pirates issued taxes. To quell an uprising they repaired a thoroughfare running down town center, working in grave silence. The pirates crammed into a small tavern and drank till there was nothing more. It was not a merry revel. The victory was pyrrhic, since there was nothing of worth in town or the count’s estate. They had too many ships, too many men to subsist, but not enough ships, not enough men to challenge the empire beyond. With a clear morning they went back to sea.

The captain had recovered enough to walk the deck and shout orders. He was drunker and meaner than ever. He knew, with the speed of the ships and the taste of salt in his mouth that damnation lay upon them. Because Hobble was coming aboard they couldn't stop it.

His eldest son must have known because he disappeared when they made port again and never came back. To leave his mother’s tit was an omen, for he’d stayed with it all through his years. He bedded her because she was the only woman he knew, because she could stand no longer her son’s desperate eyes upon her and because he was bigger than his father and she let him ravage her with all his pent up desire till she was heaving and spent and her guts were busted and vision black, all suffered to spite her heart’s deepest hatred. Every night the young man came to his mother and his father knew and did nothing because the boy was strong and determined and vicious.

His youngest son must have known because he disappeared when they made port again. A slight child, no one thought much of him before or after his leaving. He’d not spoken a word his whole life. His brothers stole everything from him, even his words. They dangled him above the hungry sea. They told him all manner of ugly lies about the world. They beat him till he limped, till his untapped genius turned dull. An omen indeed, for such a coward to brave it on his own.

His wife and the first mate must have known because they went mad and broke the sacred Code together. The captain cut off the first mate’s head and sank his body to the bottom of the ocean, which took it with joyful fury. He sold his wife to the two worst men in the world who carted her away.

How about you, boy? he asked Necula in a dreary town. Are you soon to fly from us? From Hobble and the ruin he’s visited upon us.

There is no Hobble, father. Your sons left because we starve, because this life is heartless and worthless. Even that sweating rapist and the wimp. And pa, now you’re dying despite all my warnings. Don’t you see yourself?

I remember when you were little.

And Necula left his father and drove into the weird continent by his lonesome. Yet an image haunted him and always would. He looked back once at the black ships making their escape, his father somewhere on board. He glimpsed a figure standing on the deck. An odd shape atop its head was perhaps a tall, stovepipe hat, following behind the captain as he staggered toward the new first mate.

[neculacycle]

A Soldier

A dust cleared between them and only they stood on the road surrounded by swaying wheat and old droopy houses in the distance. It was not a place for meetings and best passed through quickly. Necula smiled at the comer who wore only a loincloth, a wooden chest guard and bent helmet. He held a bamboo shield and spear and his face looked dumb.

Hey, idiot, said Necula. The war is that way.

He thumbed over his shoulder.

Can't you understand me?

The peasant stare, stoic and unmoved. Necula thought it rude and simple.

What's that smug look? Know something I don't?

But the soldier only stared and stood impassively in the road so Necula shrugged and walked past him sparing him a savage grin and chuckling, his eyes full of venom. He was a few steps past the soldier when his skin crawled and he tasted death and swung his sword behind him. The soldier's body offered no resistance. The sword might have cut only air. But the body fell to pieces behind him.

What a stupid man, said Necula, and was shocked. Normally blood did not cling to his sword but also no blood spilled from the wound to the dirt. And the torso then animated, its arms stretching out and pulling the legs back up by the hips so the two parts came together and the soldier stood, his spear and shield collected in his hands. A smile crossed his thin lips.

Isn't that something? said Necula. Are you some road spirit? Kiriha doesn't like your taste. She's like you, you know?

The soldier rushed forward. Necula hardly avoided the spear tip. His sword slashed upward, cutting off the soldier's head. But as before he collected himself back together and so Necula hacked the soldier into many pieces and scattered the remains and buried some and was on his way but soon enough the soldier stood there in the road again. The soldier knelt on a rock by the roadside, leaning his spear in the dirt, and smirked.

I guess that settles it. Even a body blade can't kill me.

What would you know about that?

I've searched farther than sight can see for a way to die and always found disappointment. So I started killing and raping and torturing and loosing as much evil into this world as anyone could, in hopes the fates would reign down punishment on me. I thought, when I saw you and that body blade, my hopes had been answered. You’re known as a demon in between these lonely villages, in between wars.

I'm no pawn in anyone else's sad story. Why don't you just enjoy yourself?

The time for that passed years ago. Even the vilest of men couldn't enjoy life after what I've done.

What nonsense. What true and honest nonsense.

Yes. You look like death yourself. Like you've starved.

We don't need to eat much. Just enough to get by. Well, goodbye then. Good luck.

Now Necula walked on but heard footsteps behind him. After a mile he turned and said, Get lost. If you know what's good for you.

Bahahaha. Or what?

Necula grunted and walked on and the steps followed. He stopped, turned and said, Did you ever think maybe you've been sent as my punishment?

The soldier approached and pointed to a sagging house on the horizon with his spear.

Let's stop there for a while. Might be a cooking pot.

And he started for the little hut. Necula scowled. He looked east, he looked west but the road was empty and so he followed, his eyes tired and sulking.

Inside, Necula found an old chair and sat, deflating into his ragged clothes. He tossed his sword carelessly to the floor. The soldier found his cooking pot and had produced a few withered roots and tubers to go in it and soon the sound of boiling water echoed in the tiny room. The soldier sat in another chair, rested his spear, and sighed.

I died on the battlefield. I know I did. Near my neighbour’s house. He died too. No one came for me so after it was over and everyone had moved on I stood up and was in the world again. That's all I know.

Necula pinched the bridge of his nose, straining his eyes closed. He hadn't realised how awful he felt till sitting down. He regretted stopping.

It's the way of things.

The soldier leaned back and folded his fingers together, as if contemplating this. He sighed heavily.

I suppose I'll head to the next town. Kill everyone. Burn the temple. Maybe that will do something.

Why don't you go become the champion of some warlords? Maybe great deeds will earn you a noble death.

No. It hasn't been so. No one will ever come for me. What about you? Where are you headed?

Nowhere that matters.

How about you help me? Two killers are better than one. Maybe with that sword of yours we could cause some real trouble.

Why? I don't want to die.

Because I'll follow you forever, trying to kill you till I succeed. Which I will.

Necula was furious but his own hatred was nothing compared to the sword, who detested anyone she couldn't kill. Knowing she could do it was enough for her these days but they'd met their match here. Her blade glared with a faint light.

After eating they travelled on together. The village was grey and windy. Most everyone was inside. They stood in an empty street. Not even stray dogs were out. They must have all been hiding under the buildings like rats.

They knew you were coming, said Necula.

No, I've never been this way.

Necula saw it first. A furry thing, like a balled up cat, stood high above the buildings, upon many spindly legs ending in sandals and crooked toes. It was a nasoe, a kind of thing that happened when too many people's tragedies were tied together. Like rat tails, their fates become twisted and a nasoe is born to cause all manner of trouble.

Necula unsheathed the sword and hacked legs off the nasoe till it stood on only two wobbly legs and fell over. The sword pierced through the furry body and it deflated into bloody shadows and spirits rose out of it. Necula slashed these too and they became dust.

See that? said Necula. She can even kill spirits before they cross over. So you're hopeless. Even if I had killed you I would have cut your spirit too just for the fun of it.

The soldier stood against the sun, his eyes set on the long distance. He was picturesque.

Suppose I killed everyone in the world. Till there was only me. Then at least I would be no different from anyone else. I'd have the mountains. The rivers. Endless things.

You really are crazy.

Eh maybe. But I can try. I can start with you.

Their eyes met. Necula still held the sword unsheathed. His face was sunken and miserable. When he was done Necula had a thousand thousand wrappings of wax paper. Slivers of pitiful life squirmed weakly in them but could not escape. Some he fed to wild dogs, others he offered up to demons, the rest he carried and buried in lonely places. In a quiet glade, by a waterfall, he sat and rested. The sword shivered. He stroked it.

What was he, Kiriha? Don't think about it, songbird, it'll give you nightmares. Think of silly old men and school girls. Let me tell you a story of the terrible ocean.

[neculacycle]

Another Chance Meeting

One day Necula happened upon three impossible men dragging a monolith. Impossible in strength and destitution, as though they'd been bred for the purpose. Atop the construct rode a jester as fat as he was loud. He called down to his neighbor.

How fares you today, Necula? Skin and bones, pale-faced Necula and the dread stick. What wanton lust drives you?

The good morning shooed away, as something not meant to be. Necula stood to block their path.

I've grown sick of you.

I beg? said the bulging spirit.

To answer your question I fare poorly because I've tired of your presence. You pride yourselves on discovery, on ruining men's fortunes or making them. Meanwhile, you exist without the knowledge of fear. Well. How about I climb up there and cut you in half?

Wait. Don't come up here!

How many misdeeds did you make to become what you are? Of course you don't remember. But I can guess. Perhaps one. And me? Many years ago I gave up on right and wrong. But this cursed metal knows and feels light as a feather.

Awful light dripped from the sword. It disemboweled the gluttonous spirit, spilling gold from its innards. The strong men at once shriveled into waifs and crawled in the mud.