by R. L. Weeks
The prince has been preening the girl these last days for information. Giving her as much food and sweeties her little stomach can take. He’s been befriending her. She has given us nothing, but it is only a matter of time. She is a child who was living in a dark forsaken wood. The glitz and glamour surrounding the prince were enough to spark her interest. She already bestows smiles on the prince when he is distracted. She will give in rather soon.
Onyx returned as well after a day in splendid spirits. I have inquired why and he only charms me with a sly smile. Whatever his plans, I will like it. I stand to leave. The morrow is tax-day so before the competition I must make my rounds to collect.
“Where are you going Sheriff?” Phillip asks me.
“Long day ahead, I must rest.” I watch Onyx who has been dancing on the bar juggling three squirrels’ heads.
“Rest whence you are dead, there are ladies afoot.” Phillip nods towards the stairs where the night maidens wait for satchels to jingle.
I laugh, “I shall have to pass.”
Phillip only frowns.
“Good night.” I tell him and leave the tavern to bask in the cool evening. Hollow is in the stables, where I shall leave him. This is a night to walk. The brisk air feels nice on my scars. I watch the stars as I stroll. It’s all coming together. Once the hood is dead his men will flounder and scatter. I will use my unique abilities, with Onyx’s help, to bring complete bloody order to this town. My name will grow. The prince shall be dough for me to mold. I will request an army. An army of rangers to roam the lands hunting raiders, putting them to death. The lives Onyx and I will feed off will keep us reigning forever. I could feed off villagers, but true darkness can only thrive feeding on other darkness. Regular people bring us no lasting sustenance. We need to consume the evil to live forever.
At first, I believe I hear Onyx still walking and juggling behind me, before I remember Onyx doesn’t make sounds walking. I stop staring at stars. Onyx is in front of me, crushing his squirrel skulls into dust.
I stop, “If you force me to turn before announcing yourself, you’ll be dead before we get properly acquainted.” I warn my stalker.
“It’s me Sir-Sheriff.” Phillip says.
“Ah, Phillip.” I relax, “Shouldn’t you be making a maiden blush right now?” I joke turning, but something in the air causes my tension to return. Something is wrong.
“Do not trust him.” Onyx tells me. I nod at him letting him know I understand.
I keep pretenses up, “Tis a nice night for a walk home.”
Phillip catches up to me. “I’d heard differing stories of you, but it was your eyes that gave it away. So green, so… different.”
“What exactly are you saying?” I use my voice when speaking with subordinates.
“To think we’ve all been taking orders from a woman.” He laughs his eyes meeting mine. I have seen such looks before. He is no longer my guardsman, he is a beast. A man hunting a woman to conquer. I will not be hunted. This child is about to learn a violent lesson. “You don’t have to hide it from me. I am not bothered by your face.” His voice changes to a softer tone. He believes he has caught me with a simple compliment to my hideous demeanor.
“Onyx.” I whisper ever so slightly. Onyx obeys. He flows into me. Through him I can feel the bloodlust he has been seething with take hold. My body vibrates with it. I feel something else too, something that causes me pain I don’t understand. For once it stops me. I shake trying to hold Onyx’s rage back. “Phillip, you are a good guardsman.” I grit my teeth, Onyx is lashing against me inside wanting to devour this insipid man, “I shall heed you one warning to walk away from me and never speak of this again. If you do not you will not live through this night.” I focus Onyx’s feral rage into my face.
The color drains from Phillip’s skin, Onyx is sucking his life force against my will. I fear it too late to stop until he speaks, “Your eyes… the black.” He backs away scrambling his way towards the tavern. I worry if I should follow and finish him off. By sunrise though I’m sure he will either be too frightened or to confused by drink to know if what he saw was true. Either way I let him go. Onyx rages. I turn my ire onto him back throwing him out of me. He falls onto the ground.
“What have you done?” I snap at him speaking of another life force I felt inside him.
He glares black and cold as the stone for which he was named, “You’ll find out.” He snarls then flees into the night. I kick a rock in frustration.
“Oh, the surprise,” A male voice echoes from above me, “To discover my greatest foe is not a man, but none other than a woman!” Robin of the Hood laughs and jumps down in front of me.
Chapter 7
I pull my sword.
“Now, now,” The hood holds up his hands, “I dare say I do not wish to fight you again now that you are a woman.”
“Why not, it has never bothered me fighting one as inept as you.” I scan the darkness hoping Onyx comes back. I cannot call to him, he could be anywhere by now.
“You wound me. I think we can find reason with one another. You fight for king and crown to suppress its people. We can show you freedom and more power than ever before. Things have not gone too far, yet. Surely it was not you who napped my daughter and killed our dear Tuck.” He begins side walking in circles, laughter still in his eyes, the rest of his face covered as always. I follow never lowering my sword.
“Oh, but it was.” I confess happily. Such arrogant beings to doubt a woman capable of anything.
The same dark look from the other day crosses his face before it is brushed aside for merriment to fill him again. I know that look now, a true Moloc. I wonder if I look like food to him? “I should like to have her back.”
“Oh no, she is quite happy with her new keeper.”
He cocks his head, “Is that you?”
I laugh this time and swipe my sword at him. He moves out of the way, I hear the faintest chanting as he does so. His incantations are how he gains such speed and dexterity. How quaint. I only need to remove his tongue to keep him slow. I grin.
“You could always come to the competition on the morrow. She will be there.” I say.
“What competition is that?” He doesn’t know.
“There shall be a contest in archery. The winner wins the hand of your little maiden.”
He stops circling. “Hand?” I can see the wheels twist in his mind.
“In marriage.” I smile viciously at him. “She is to be married off-“
Before I can even finish my taunt, he pulls a dagger and attacks me. He is chanting again as our steel meets in the air. He pushes offensively and I allow him this, I almost laugh with glee at the rage in his eyes. An angry man is a stupid man and all he has brought is a dagger? I parry and block as he swings at me faster and faster.
“Do you have no decency woman?!” He yells, “She is but a child!” Our steel clangs and clatters and we fight circles in the street. He rages and slashes. I notice a falter, he drops his guard ever so slightly to the left when he pulls away. This is what I was waiting for.
As soon as the next clang of steel on steel happens, I twirl faster than any mortal man can move, thanks to Onyx feasting a little on Phillip. My sword stabs into his left shoulder without getting close enough for his dagger to stick me. He gasps and chants louder as he pushes me away. I feel his force and don’t try to fight back immediately. I will need Onyx to beat a Moloc.
“You are no maiden!” He cries at me, pouting like a spoiled little boy, as he breathes deeply through the pain in his shoulder. I watch the blood ooze and stain his green tunic.
“No, I’m not. You didn’t allow me to finish boy. Should no one worthy win the challenge, the prince himself has agreed to wed your darling daughter.”
The anger rises, even in the dead of night I watch his face fill with the blood of rage. “That will never happen.” Then he chants something else and jumps straight up and onto a rooftop. “You will regret this night, you- Sheriff with
a heart as foul as thy face!” He yells.
“Try me.” I laugh at him.
Chapter 8
I stand at the final house I am to visit for collections before the contest. My eyes shift in and out of focus staring at the black ribbon tied to the front gate. A sign of mourning within the home. The walk to the front door is long. I rap slowly, wanting it to be over, but not wanting to face what I see.
A girl answers, eyes rimmed in red. Don’t be true, I wish to myself. No force out there is looking out to grant my wishes though, it has been this way since I was a girl and my village was burned by raiders. The girl recognizes me, one tear sliding down her face. Behind her, belongings to the family are stacked, as if they plan to leave.
I swallow, “I am here to collect…” I trail off staring at the other children bustling about the house packing up, dressed all in black. None the child I wish to see. “Where is he?”
The girl falls sobbing. Behind her, her mother lifts her daughter and ushers her away. “I have your taxes Sheriff, though it will be the last. We plan to travel south, we have lost one of our…” She stops to dap a cloth at her eye.
Every feeling leaves my body, “Who did you lose?”
“My son, Nicodemus. He was eating nuts and must have choked. All of the color left his face and he just fell over silently. He didn’t speak, but he was…” She stares off.
“I know.” I tell her. That was what I felt in Onyx, the life force from a living child, a child I had been fond of. I clear my throat from the strange sensation in it. “South you say, isn’t that through the Royal Forest?”
“Yes, we’ve heard the rumors. I put no stock in that. I have survived long enough to know what I’m doing.” She says harshly, then holds out a satchel. The same one I gave Nico- the dead boy, the last time I saw him.
I take it without word. I remember his light eyes, dark curls, the chubby hands. I place the satchel in my pocket, right next to the nut that resides there. They’re traveling through the Royal Forest, soon they will all be joining their lost one. I catch Onyx by the front post. He is using a burning stick to light the black ribbon aflame.
“Now it is just us again.” Onyx gives me a naughty smile.
“Yes, that it is.” I tell him holding onto my insides so it shan’t release feelings I might have had. Just like all the other times.
Chapter 9
“This is a grand turn out.” The Prince tells me, “What a brilliant idea. Don’t you think young one?” He pets the head of Marianne sitting next to him decked out in the finest of royal outfits. Her hair is silken now and curled. She is clean and sits silently eating sweeties. She just nods. She doesn’t seem disturbed to be here. The Prince seems more than fond of her now as she is of him.
The tournament is almost over and no sign of Robin of the Hood. Onyx wriggles inside me impatient. He climbed in before we got here as to be ready. He as excited to taste of lifeforce of a hooded Moloc as I am.
The newest contestant comes out. Fair hair and fuller in build than the poorly archers and Lords that went before him. He doesn’t even approach the line, he stands much further back shooting quicker than possible straight into each bullseye. He’s too good. I jump up, “It’s the Hood!” I yell. Hoodsmen scurry out of everywhere at once. A few guardsmen grab the Prince and Marianne spiriting them away. I jump out of the Prince’s box just as the rest of the guardsmen flood the field fighting Hoodsmen. I land in perfect time to have an arrow shot at my chest. I deftly knock it aside with my sword and run towards the hood. Without covering I see he is older than I had first imagined, though handsome.
Instead of fighting me like a man, he smiles and runs.
I chase. Onyx gives me the speed I need with our combined strengths. He may be a Moloc, but he has no idea what I am. He jumps up to rooftops, I jump too. He hangs and twirls from banister to banister, and I do too.
“Coward!” I yell as he keeps running. He leaps and flips onto the flat roofed stables. He turns, chanting. Around his neck I see one of those engraven skulls that I found hanging from the forest trees.
“Watch yourself, he carries shadows.” Onyx tells me from inside me. I see them too though. As the Hood chants black shadow swirl around him.
“Molocs.” I grumble as I land on the roof across from him. He doesn’t seem surprised I know of his kind, he just smiles. His throws his arms towards me, his shadows shoot my way, I roll to avoid them, but they follow, going right through me. As they do, I feel them taking all of my strength and power with them. How can this be? I watch as Onyx is pushed out of me, he slides across the ground held down by the shadows. Robin of the Hood only winks at Onyx before turning to me.
“You,” He sighs, “Are the greatest foe I fear I will ever face. Townspeople, guardsmen, all of them are no match for me and my merry kin. But you,” He lifts me to my feet holding me in place, “I will miss the challenge you gave me.”
“Release me, and I shall be the last foe you ever face.” I spit.
He laughs shaking his head, “I do find it hard to imagine a woman- and if I may, a boy,” He looks again at Onyx, “gave me so much trouble. Is he your son?”
I chance a glance at Onyx, he writhes and wriggles under the shadows weight, “No.” I say.
“Oh, good.”
“What do you want Hood?” I ask him. He’s stalling. With him this close I try sucking his life force. Instead of life I am filled with sand and dust. I cough choking on the taint. He is not alive. My eyes widen.
“Nothing. You have done it all for me. Marianne has been working her magick on the Prince just as planned when you took her. He will wed her and before long, my kin and I will be taking over. You a blink in the memory of this place. I do think I shall let history think you a man so as not to sully my reputation. I just have one question my fairest Sheriff of them all.” His eyes bore into mine and I feel myself being drained. I am dying. I struggle and fight against it. No this cannot be!
“What?” I croak.
“How do I know thee?” He begins lowering me to the ground.
He lets go of me and I fall to my knees, “My village neighbored yours ten score years ago when the raiders came and killed my kin.” I look back at Onyx, he flickers now in and out of existence, “We called upon your kin, you denounced us.”
“Ah, I remember now. One more question, as I am a selfish being. What is your name? History will know you as Sheriff of Nottingham, slain by Robin of the Hood, but I want to know the truth.”
Too weak to deny him now, I fall, “My name…” I have nothing left. My eyes turn to my twin brother from birth, slain on the day the villagers came, his spirit brought back to me by the same dark magick that kept us alive for a hundred years. He flickers in and out, fear in his onyx eyes. His arm reaches out to me, “Jade.” He cries. My true name is the last word I hear before the world goes black, forever.
The End
Crystal Fever
By Dana Fraedrich
Beware the Pale Queen
Whispering her sweet poison
Heed not her death chant
She will tempt with words like love
And leave thee grave-cold
Bertie sat in her kitchen weeping so hard she thought her chest might cave in on itself. Her clockwork cat, Winder, twined around her legs, though she was barely aware of him. The only thing she could think of was Liam.
Liam, her best friend since forever. His usually warm eyes, the color of melted chocolate, had been pale as he spat insults at her.
“What are you good for anyway?” he’d said. “There’s nothing you do especially well.”
“I’m not strong enough to swing a hammer and repair things like you, true,” Bertie had said, “but—”
Liam hadn’t let her finish. In seventeen years of knowing each other—their entire lives—he’d never acted this way. What made it worse was that a little part of her believed his malignant words. He’d flung every secret fear she’d ever told him in her face. That was when s
he’d seen his tongue. It hadn’t gone fully black yet. Rather, grey had coated the fleshy pink as if covered with a layer of ash. His washed-out eyes would soon turn white like snow. When she’d touched him, his skin was cooler than normal. His blood had already begun to slow, turning to sludge in his veins as his heart slowly crystallized into a block of crimson ice.
Bertie had covered her ears as the sickness, Crystal Fever, drove Liam to propagate it. His words carried its germs, and in her panic she’d called for help. For Liam’s death, really, though she hadn’t meant to.
Sick people made sick people. Those with Crystal Fever were abandoned to the Winterwood.
Bertie choked on another sob as she remembered the hate in Liam’s eyes when they’d come to take him away. Nadia, Liam’s grandmother, sat next to her and wrapped a knitted shawl around her shoulders as Bertie replayed her memories.
“Hush now, petal,” Nadia said. “Don’t let the fever get you. You must be strong.”
Bertie held herself tighter. “But Liam...”
“Shhhh. It’s too late for our boy. We have to focus on us now.” As Nadia stroked the weeping girl’s dark hair away from her tawny skin and spoke words of stone, a stream of quiet agony ran beneath her voice. She brought over a blouse and showed the sleeve, which Bertie had embroidered for her. “See this flower, my love? You did that. It’s my favorite top, you know.”
The small embellishment, though nothing compared to what they saw traded in the market, was still fairly pretty. Nadia always washed and hung the piece with care. Where her other tops had stains around the collar and armpits, this one had been carefully preserved and worn to village celebrations. Embroidery was one of the many things Bertie did marginally well.
