Ravenmar's Luck Runs Out

Ravenmar scanned the rapidly darkening sky. The Moon was not yet risen and tatters of grey clouds scudded overhead, driven by a biting Easterly wind. He gathered his heavy, woollen cloak around him and followed the track by the river. His destination was the village of Red Crest, just beyond the hill. With luck, he would make it before the gate closed for the night.

As he approached the bridge, he slowed. You could never be too careful around here as trolls were known to sneak down from the hills and use human structures for shelter. Trolls, while not necessarily evil, were spiteful and malicious creatures, given to tricking unwary travellers with their riddles and wicked magicks. Ravenmar loosened his sword in its scabbard, a precautionary measure, and stepped onto the crumbling stone of the bridge.

"Halt, who goes there?" came the squeaky voice, in heavily-accented Common Speech. A shadow hopped over the bridge's wall and resolved slowly into the short, stooped figure of a troll. It was around three feet tall, of scrawny build, but with a large, mis-shapen head, unevenly pointed ears, one of which looked like it had been bitten in two, and almond-shaped black eyes. Its skin was covered in greyish scales and it was dressed in a loincloth. Ravenmar took in all of this in an instant. His attention was occupied by the short spear which the troll held, aimed squarely at his chest.

"A weary traveller, bound for the village beyond the hill," Ravenmar replied.

"You lie!" spat the troll. "That village is in troll-country. Your kind are not welcome there."

Ravenmar spread his arms wide and looked around. "Since when has this been troll-country? The Earl gave you territories in the hills a decade ago."

"He gave us cold, damp caves, ruins of shacks and worked-out mines!" What followed was what Ravenmar judged to be a string of expletives in troll-tongue. "He tricked us, he did. One day soon, he will pay."

This was not typical trollish bluster, however. Something in the little beggar's stream of invective struck a chord in Ravenmar. "What do you mean, the Earl will pay?" His hand went to his sword hilt.

The troll brandished his spear and gutsily advanced a couple of paces. "Halt!" he screeched. "Keep your hands away from your weapon!" He emitted a shrill whistle.

Ravenmar felt a chill, like icy fingers, run down his spine. He was by no means a wizard but even he could sense when magick was at work. The concealing glamour, which had hidden a dozen trolls, was cancelled and Ravenmar found himself surrounded by wicked spear points.

He might be no wizard, and he was certainly no warrior: he could not fight a dozen armed trolls, not even this diminutive rabble. He raised his hands and the trolls searched him, relieving him of his sword, dagger, coins and food. They bound his hands behind his back and, at spear-point, marched him to the village.

Crazy Cat Lady

I'm back after a short break. This came to me late one night, just after the cat woke me up!

Why do they call me the Crazy Cat Lady? I'm not crazy. If you want crazy, I can introduce you to Lili!

Okay, I do have upwards of a dozen cats in my home. Or their home. Sometimes it seems I'm lodging with them, not the other way round. And let me be clear: they are just lodgers here. I don't own them. They come and go as they please and they don't stay forever. One morning I might wake up with ten cats or twelve or sometimes only three. Of course, Nature has been known to take Her course and a litter of the little darlings suddenly appears.

So, yes. I like cats. Love them to bits, really, even when they leave bits of mice or birds all over the living room floor. But does that make me crazy? I think not.

They speak to me, you see. Every purr, meow, hiss. Every ear-twitch or tail-flick, I can understand. Each disdainful look through slit-pupilled eyes, each lascivious roll-over for a tummy tickle, means something and I know what they are saying.

Before you think I'm mad, just remember that you were young once and couldn't pronounce a single word, let alone string together a sentence. You made your feelings known by crying, gurgling, vomitting or pooing. You made grasping gestures with chubby fingers, struggled to crawl when you wanted something just out of reach and cried more when you couldn't move. Now you take language and movement for granted to get what you want.

Cats have their own language and I understand it. I can't quite read catspeak yet, but I'm working on it. It's something to do with paw prints and how their claws make marks. What they're scratching also means something. The door, obviously, means they want out, or food, if it's a cupboard door. The curtains mean they want to climb. And if they shred the carpet, it means they need the litter tray and, more to the point, why hasn't the litter tray been cleaned? I know these things.

Now I'm sitting in the middle of the garden, surrounded by cats, watching intently as they prowl around, sun themselves, walk along the fence, or sit and wash, looking like furry pretzels. I wish I was that flexible. Some simply watch the world go by with that infinite patience that makes them look like they're planning world domination.

School kids walk past the garden, laughing and joking when they see the "crazy cat lady". Let them laugh. I don't care.

Until one of the little thugs throws a pebble at one of my darlings. Then I get crazy. As the grey and black feline jumps down from the fence, the pebble soaring over its head, I spring into action. I leap from the lawn, hissing, yowling and screaming at the little brat. He and his friends blanche at my fury. My words aren't clear to them, but to the cats it's perfect sense: "Get out of here you little bastards!"

I can feel the perfect "cat-ness" of the moment. I am transformed, not into a cuddly, soft, furry moggy, but into the fierce warrior lioness of ancient times. I roar, bare my claws and let the light gleam from my fangs. The kids flee, calling me names as they run. Their insults patter off my fur like raindrops; sticks and stones and all that. I watch until they have run out of sight but I can still smell them, and their fear, on the breeze.

My darlings come to me. I comfort them, tell them the nasty humans have gone, that they have nothing to fear. They cuddle up against my belly or climb along my back. Their purrs comfort me after that unseemly outburst. I will protect them.

Am I crazy? Perhaps. Am I a cat? Most certainly. Am I a lady? Only when the mood takes me. My name is Bast, warrior and protector through the Ages.

A Rainy Day

It was her birthday, that day we walked in the park. Tipping down rain soaked us to the skin, driven by a biting wind which turned our umbrella inside out. We left the yellow and blue striped brolly in a rubbish bin, flapping in the wind like some drunken dragonfly.

Fortunately, the 'summer season', if it could be called that, had started about a week ago, and the park's cafe was open, having been shuttered during the depths of winter. We ran the last few yards, splashing through inch-deep puddles, their surfaces bouncing chaotically with the falling rain. The cafe's wooden-framed door was mostly glass, showing stickers of the range of drinks and snacks served here: all the big names and half a dozen less-famous brands.

What we wanted, however, was coffee and this cafe made the best in town. This was not some wild fancy: it was based on solid research. Together, we had toured every coffee shop in town, from the multinational franchises, through small 'Mum and Dad' operations, to the greasy spoons at the train and bus stations. Some places had been pretty good but none of them compared to The Liaison Cafe. We laughed about that: just when you needed a little TLC, there was The Liaison Cafe. We'd missed coming here over the winter.

She went to the Ladies' to tidy up. Very appearance conscious, my girl, the slightest hair out of place, or smudge on her lipstick, would send her running for the nearest mirror. At times, this could be a very infuriating habit, particularly if we were running late and she was correcting a very minor fault in her make-up. I told her that she was beautiful, no matter what imperfections she thought she could see.

I dumped my soaking jacket at our favourite table and walked to the counter. Kate, the assistant manager, looked up from her celebrity lifestyle magazine and gave me a somewhat tired smile. It had obviously been a long shift for the old dear.

"What can I get you, sweet?" she asked, as if she needed to know. The order was always the same. Two large cappuccinos, one with a double-shot of espresso (hers, not mine), almond biscotti on the side, and two fingers of dark chocolate.

"And a slice of the Black Forest gateau, please," I added. It was, after all, her birthday. I hadn't brought candles, so made do with a silk rose I had stuffed hastily into my jacket pocket. It was slightly crumpled but, I reasoned, it's the thought that counts.

I sat at our favourite table and waited for her. And waited. And waited.

"She's not coming back, you know," said Kate from behind.

I turned to her, tears streaming down my face. She had passed away a year ago to the day, on what should have been her thirtieth birthday.

"She doesn't need to come back," I replied through barely restrained sobs. "She's always here." I pointed to my heart and cried.

Space Rescue

Space Rescue

This piece is inspired by the story 'Eleven Pipers', written by yours truly, in the book 'Twelve Days', available through Amazon. It forms part of the background to the war between humans and Nisalans.

Background: The war between humans and the Nisalan aliens has been raging for centuries. No-one is sure exactly what started the war but it had something to do with the 'Offside Rule'. It is doubtful anyone on either side knows the origin of the obscure law. The Nisalans look like 1.5m tall, roughly cylindrical amoebae, with locomotory and manipulative appendages, and their internal organs can be seen roiling around in the bluish-greenish protoplasm.

*

Nisalan satellite station Rostov was parked in geosynchronous orbit over the third moon of the planet Quina, fourth planet in the Bellaset system. The moon itself, having no mineral resources or strategic value worth speaking of, had no name, other than its official Terran classification: Bellaset Four Gamma.

Ellis crept along the darkened, frost-coated corridor, lit sporadically by emergency lights and glow panels. The station was deserted, or so intel had indicated, but there were still combat droids and remote sentry guns to avoid. Hence her slow progess. The air would have frozen her lungs by now had it not been for the night-suit that clung to every contour of her body, feeding her body with oxygen scrubbed from the station's atmosphere and warmed to standard temperature.

Her communicator chirped quietly. The arrow on its screen changed direction slightly, indicating a path which followed the curve of the station's corridor. Ellis padded silently for a few more metres, the sounds of her footfalls masked by the night-suit. The communicator beeped, the arrow changed to an exclamation mark and Ellis realised he has reached her goal.

The door to the lab was, of course, locked, by triple-layered security systems and requiring two biometric inputs and a ten character hexadecimal passcode. She knew the code, that bit was easy. Terran Federation spies had gathered intel on the station, and the code, purchased at astronomical price, had been downloaded into her night-suit's on-board computer. The biometrics would be trickier but the aluminium flask hitched to her webbing contained what he needed.

The flask was below-zero and divided into two compartments. One contained an optical organ, of sorts, and the other a selection of manipulative cilia which served the Nisalans as fingers. The optical organ was slippery with congealed protoplasm and it took Ellis several attempts to free it from the flask and press it into the optical scanner. One light came on green. The cilia were trickier still. There were eight cilia and they had to be pressed against the scanner in the correct order. A laminated index card provided Ellis with the sequence. The second light glowed green. He had memorised the hex-code and typed ther into the panel. The third light came on and the door to the lab opened.

Like the rest of the deserted station, the lab was in darkness. Ellis didn't need much light. The goggles on her night-suit amplified available light and gave a greenish tinge to everything she saw.

The bio-cell, a coffin-sized prison capsule intended to keep the captive unconscious, alive and mentally 'accessible' (the thought chilled Ellis) to its interrogators, was wired into the centre of the room. Floating in the thick, yellow gunge was the target of ther rescue mission. A young man by the name of Darius Pugh, supposedly a high-level intelligence asset and double-agent working for both the Terrans and the Nisalans. Why she hadn't been ordered to simply shoot the traitor was a question above her pay grade.

She threw the lever that emptied the bio-cell, the ugly yellow fluid draining away to heaven-knew where with an even uglier sound. Once emptied, the capsule's hatch opened and, coughing, choking and vomiting, Darius Pugh fell forward out of his prison.

Ellis did not attempt to catch the agent, who fell and landed with a loud thump on the deckplates. Pugh groaned and Ellis took that as a good sign and hauled him to his feet. Wires that had allowed the Nisalans to probe his brain snapped or were pulled from his scalp, leaving angry red scars on his shaved head.

"Come with me," she ordered, as she almost dragged the agent to the door.

"Who are you?" he asked in a weak voice.

Ellis ignored the question. "I'm here to get you off this crate and back to civilisation."

"Why?"

"Beats me," she admitted. "You're a traitor. I'd just as happily shoot you," she added, chillingly, resting her hand on the butt of her trazer pistol, "but orders are orders."

Together, they staggered to the array of escape capsules on the port side of the station. "Get in," Ellis said.

"This is an escape pod," he protested. "It'll never get us back to a Terran zone."

"Leave that to me," Ellis said, as she forced Pugh into the capsule at gunpoint. Nisalan vessels were not built for Terran-standard body types, so Ellis rigged a cargo web across the capsule, tied the spy into the heavy duty straps and belted herself in. "Going down," she said, and kicked the release lever.

Explosive bolts powered the escape capsule from the station and the little lifeboat began its freefall to Bellaset Four Gamma, where a Terran Federation insertion force was waiting.

The Woman From 3B

I promised elsewhere that I'd try to write a piece per day. This one is a little late but that's what deadlines are for :-)

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The smell emanating from 3B was not unpleasant. Somewhere between freshly picked vegetables, flowers and that earthy smell left after rain; petrichor, I think they call it. The odd thing was, the scent never dissipated, never weakened in any way. It hung around 3B, a permanent fixture, as if it was leaking through the walls.

I live in 3C, just across the hall. I'd seen the woman from 3B a few times through the little security lens in my own flat's door. In her twenties, I'd guess, she reminded me of an actress from one of those 'Magic School' movies. We on Floor 3 tended to be an insular bunch and kept ourselves to ourselves, unlike the weirdos on Floor 4, who always seemed to be visiting each other. I heard parties just about every weekend, emanating above my head, from 4C.

It had to happen one day, I suppose. I was, admittedly, a bit sloshed and was standing at my door fumbling with my keys. Feeling a little woozy, both from the beer and the ever-present scent from 3B, I was trying to fit the right key into the right keyhole when I heard her voice. It was soft, almost musical, and each syllable was perfectly pronounced.

"Don't suppose you could lend a hand, could you?"

I dropped my keys, cursed and turned. There she was. Or at least, I assumed it was the woman from 3B. I couldn't see her face, or indeed much of her, hidden as she was behind a dozen or more brightly-coloured shopping bags, each one with the logo of one of the city's big department stores. A bunch of shiny silver keys jingled invitingly from the little finger of her left hand.

"Yeah, yeah, of course, no problem," I rambled, as I picked up my own keys and reached for hers. She shuffled to one side and I unlocked her flat. I pushed open the door and immediately the scent from her flat ramped up several notches.

The woman edged past me into the small hall. I had the mirror image on the other side of the hall. Wobbling on one leg, she kicked open the living room door, bustled in and dropped all the bags on the sofa.

She turned to me, a slightly embarrassed look on her pale, delicate face. "A girl has to get new clothes every so often," she said.

"New clothes?" I asked. "It looks like you've bought a whole new wardrobe."

"Seasons change, fashions change," she explained. "I've lost count of how many times I've done this sort of thing."

Her current ensemble of mini-skirt, tight top, calf-high boots and a hair-do to match. I'm no fashion expert but, looking at her, it seemed she had just stepped out of the Sixties.

"Well, don't just stand there. Put the kettle on. I've got to see my babies."

Babies? I thought, as I stepped into the living room. It was then that I realised where 3B's curious, not unpleasant, smell was coming from. The living room was a jungle. The sofa was set in a clearing, of sorts, surrounded on all sides by greenery: palms, ferns, grasses, flowers of every shade, cacti. This was the the sort of vegetation I had only seen on nature documentaries. The smell of loamy soil came from dozens of grow-bags spread around the living room. My head was spinning from the heavily scented air: incense, joss-sticks and various illegal herbs.

"What a clever girl!" she said. "You caught one. Well done. Mama give you a treat."

I looked over, expecting some jungle cat to emerge from the foliage. Instead, she was talking to what looked like a Venus Fly-trap. I swear the thing belched! She reached for a small, green plastic watering can and filled the plant's pot with yellowish coloured water. If, indeed, it was actually water.

"Don't just stand there, looking like a lemon. Go and make the tea."

Whatever was in the air was weakening my will and her voice, her soft, dulcet tones, was guiding me, puppet-like, through the motions of making tea. The kitchen was much like the living room, overgrown with a bewildering array of plants. Was it just me, or were some of them looking at me with small, beady black eyes?

I found her lounging on the sofa. The shopping bags had gone, as had her Sixties fashion sense. Now, she was bang up to date, in a soft green sleeveless dress, sheer stockings, high heels and a hair-do straight from the salon. Her hair had grown six inches in as many minutes.

"Sit with me," she said, as she patted the cushion.

I did as I was told. I couldn't stop myself.

"I've been waiting a very long time to meet you, Adam. You can call me Lili."

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If you're interested in what Adam and Lili get up to next  (because let's face it, I have no idea!) let me know in the comments section.