Asimov's SF, April/May 2011
Page 26
"Well, little lady, I'd expect no less from Hezekiah.” The captain winked at my sailor. “A girl of your breeding and refinement is safe as houses with him.” Turning to Hezekiah, he added, “It's past time we were on our way, lad. I'm proud of you, I am, for your having found—helped Miss Smoot. She's quite the surprise, she is, and very different from the usual run of women your shipmates bring home."
"She is different!” Hezekiah blurted. “She's not the one I want for—"
Captain Whately's hand shot out and closed tightly on Hezekiah's arm. He must have had a grip like a bear-trap, judging from the way the poor boy winced. I didn't think it was possible for him to go any paler, but he did.
"Now, lad, not another word,” the captain said. His voice was jolly, but there was an odd, tense undertone to it as well, and an unnerving, penetrating look in his eyes, so black and beady it was like looking at a pair of oil-slick olives set in bread dough. “It's not mannerly to speak of a lady when you can speak to her.” With his right hand still on Hezekiah's arm, he touched the brim of his cap with his left a second time and gave me another lip-stretching smile. “Miss Smoot, I hope you'll find it in your heart to forgive us ill-bred sea dogs and permit us to escort you to your appointment."
"What appointment?” I asked, having forgot all about the poor, piano-lesson-deprived orphans.
Captain Whately didn't seem to notice my slip. He smiled on, and said: “Well, if you haven't got an appointment awaiting you, surely you must be going somewhere this fine evening. This isn't the sort of place where a lady of your obvious refinement would linger, now is it?” (Linger? No. Camp out most of the night, on the watch for paying customers? Yes.) “I hope you'll let Hezekiah and me see that you arrive where you're bound, all ship-shape and Bristol fashion."
"How considerate, how thoughtful, how very kind of you,” I burbled, meanwhile racking my brain to come up with a good excuse to shake these would-be knights in tuna-scented armor. “I do wish I could say yes, but my landlady is quite vigilant. If she saw me come home in the company of strange men, I'd be ruined. I'll just be on my way—” On my way, out the door, and around the block to another one of my fishing holes. I stood up and took a step toward the door.
"At least allow us to do something to clear accounts for Hezekiah's rude ways,” the captain said. “Let us buy you a drink."
That stopped me. “Oh, I couldn't,” I said, for appearances’ sake. I managed to sound truly regretful. (Easy enough to do, after one more glance at my latest, still-untouched boilermaker.)
The captain's beady eyes twinkled. “Not that sort of drink, miss. Nothing a refined young lady can't sip with propriety, I promise. I'll see if the barkeep can produce a cold ginger ale for you. I'd offer you something stronger—a glass of sherry, perhaps—but I'm sure you wouldn't—"
"Sherry would be swell,” I said eagerly. And then, realizing that Miss Timothea Smoot wouldn't use such language or such enthusiasm over the possibility of another snootful, however lah-di-dah the drink, I hastily mended my ways: “I mean, Mother always said that sherry is a tonic."
The captain finally let go of Hezekiah's arm. “Won't be a minute, miss.” He headed for the bar. No sooner was he away than my sailor boy grabbed me by the shoulders and whispered, “Get out of here. Get out now."
I slapped his hands aside and hissed back: “Not before I have one for the road."
"I'm not playing games with you, lass,” he replied fiercely. “I daren't defy my captain openly, so take my warning now. You're too good a woman to suffer what'll happen if I let the old man go through with his plans. He means you dreadful harm."
"How? By getting me drunk and taking advantage of my innocence?” I snorted. “If that's what he's after, he'll probably spend more on sherry than if he'd just hand over my usual fee. But don't you fret, I'm not going to stay for more than one drink with the old sea dog."
"You're probably right,” Hezekiah muttered, averting his gaze and stepping away from me just as Captain Whately returned with my drink.
I accepted the tiny glass from his hand with a murmur of thanks. Where in hell had the barkeep in this dive found such a dainty bit of bric-a-brac? That crystal thimble couldn't hold enough to give a mouse a buzz.
Oh, well.
"To your health, gentlemen.” I raised the glass to my lips, intending to sip it demurely, but the dribble of amber liquid slipped down my throat in one swallow. It had been some time since I'd settled for sherry, so the taste was a pleasant surprise. I'd expected something mild—a mere whisper of alcohol—but instead I got a remarkably strong zing as the drink hit my belly, followed by a nice, warm, comfy feeling, and then—
And then, as my head began to tilt and my vision got jumpier than a frog on a griddle, and the pretty green and purple polka dots started dancing in front of my eyes just before the final fade, I realized something very important: Sherry was a lady's drink with a girl's name, and my little darling had a boyfriend hidden on the premises, a gent who went by the name of Mickey Finn.
* * * *
I don't know how long I was off in slumberland thanks to Captain Whately's cocktail. Too long, that's all I know. Long enough for the old nightmares to come creeping back, jumbled and jerky as a badly threaded filmstrip, but very much there:
My best friend being decked out for her “wedding,” led out past the titanic gates, bound to the flower-wreathed posts as the men danced for our god. Her screams echoing through my skull were bad, but not as bad as the moment when they stopped dead.
The time of peace, bought with her life, and the unstoppable passage of the year returning to the season of sacrifice. My father's grim face, telling me that when the ceremony next took place, I would be the chosen “bride."
The desperate, ever-racing days of practicing with the little knife I stole from one of our warriors, learning to handle it deftly enough to serve my plan. The moment when the village drums began to beat, and the men danced, pounding their chests, mimingour—their god, and the witch doctor's resounding voice outside our hut, declaring that itwas time to bring the “bride” to the altar.
They never knew—the chief, the witch doctor, my father—how cleverly I'd secured my stolen knife to the inside of my wrist under the thick circlet of jungle blossoms that were part of my adornments. Maybe if they hadn't been in such a hurry to scamper back behind the gates the instant they lashed my hands to the pillars of sacrifice, they'd have caught wise. Maybe then they might've taken the time to tie my feet as well as my arms, and see to it that the ropes were tight.
Maybe they would've done all that if I hadn't let out a shriek of bone-shattering shrillness and started screaming that I'd felt the ground shake, heard the trees rustle, groan and snap with the approach of something big, wailing that I saw him coming for me now, now, NOW! They didn't pause to ask questions; they raced back through the gates so fast, I think the chief's feathered headdress caught fire.
Oh, practice did make perfect: The perfect sleight-of-hand that let me work that knife from under my flowery bracelet and into my grip, even with ropes around my wrists! From the safety of our village's towering walls, everyone thought they were watching just another virgin sacrifice waiting for the inevitable, thrashing and screaming to beat the band. I was thrashing, all right! Thrashing to cover up the awkward business of sawing through the first noose from the inside out. Once that was done, all it took was a swift slash to cut my other wrist loose, and then—?
Then it was twenty-three skidoo, that's all, folks, and so long, suckers! I was free and off the platform of sacrifice before the first stroke of the great summoning gong could be sounded. I dove into the jungle and never looked back.
I knew none of our warriors would follow me. The yellow-bellied creeps wouldn't dare. All those years, all those sacrifices, and did anyone ever say, “Hey, you know what? How about if instead of wasting all of these virgins, we maybe make us a fleet of canoes, set sail, and the last guy left on shore torches the whole place? I mean, honestl
y, why do we stay here, up to our armpits in monsters? Maybe our spears and arrows can't kill them, but I haven't met the living thing that was fireproof. C'mon, it's worth a try. If it works, after things cool down we'll come back to a monster-free home and the world's biggest barbecue. If it doesn't, we keep paddling. There's got to be other islands out there. All that driftwood and junk down on the beach didn't just drop out from under a pterodactyl's ptushie. It had to come from elsewhere. So whaddaya say, show of hands, all in favor of a life without monsters?"
A life without monsters . . . . That wasn't in the cards for me, not in that jungle, not on that island. The place was lousy with prehistoric horrors, but with my hard-won freedom, at least I wasn't going to be a sitting duck if I did run into them. Lucky thing that the odds slanted a little in my favor. I was small and I could be very easy to overlook, when I put my mind to it. The jungle was big, and it offered plenty of hiding places. As long as I could find things to eat without running into things that would eat me, my immediate future looked okay. I felt bad for whichever of my childhood playmates was going to be tapped to take my place on the altar, but that's horse races.
I don't know how long I could've gone on living like that. Good thing that ship full of crazy white men showed up so I never had to find out. My dream memories shifted to the face of the stoker who'd liked what I had to offer and stowed me away as his temporary bride. He was a big ape, but better than the real thing. (Who, by the way, filled the ship's hull with roars when he was awake and snores when he wasn't.)
The stoker's leering mug began to melt like wax in a frying pan, spreading out until it re-formed into a colossal face, dark, dangerous, inhuman, and locked up behind steel bars. In my drugged vision, once again I peered into his cage the way I'd done the day before we docked in New York. He was quiet, for once. At first I thought he was asleep, but then he opened one of those big, runny, red-rimmed eyes and gave me a look that came close to breaking my heart.
Close, until I thought of all the girls my tribe had offered to him. And for what? A full-grown human being wasn't even a mouthful to him. He could have ignored the sacrifice, but no; he had to be a pig. Now there he lay, betrayed by his own appetites, punished for taking his greed just one scrawny, white-skinned step too far.
I leaned my face against the bars. “Told you blonds were trouble,” I said.
"Told me what?"
The voice in my ear was a cool blast of briny air that blew away my fading dreams. I blinked off the last wisps and saw Hezekiah's anxious face, lit by the full moon and framed by the vast expanse of open ocean behind him. I opened my mouth to speak, but before I could get out a single word, I felt cold water rush over my feet and halfway up my shins. Splashes of spray struck my skirt, already plastered damply to my legs. Without stopping to think, I tried to pull the wet cloth away from my skin, and got a big surprise: I couldn't. My right hand was tied to a gleaming white stone pillar and Hezekiah was busy giving my left the same treatment.
"Not again,” I muttered.
"Huh?” Hezekiah paused in his task.
I tapped the right-hand pillar with one fingertip. “Sacrificial altar, right? Seen one, seen ‘em all."
"I tried to warn you,” Hezekiah said, his voice thick with sorrow. “It was my turn to find the sacrifice, but once I got to know you, I didn't want this to be your fate. Please, please forgive me."
He sounded sincere, and I believed him. At this point, why would he need to lie? “It's okay,” I said. “You're right, I should've listened to you. No hard feelings.” (Not for long, anyway.) I cocked my head. The breeze brought the sound of many voices raised in a weird invocation, a yowl in the key of gibberish. “The choir, right? My folks stuck to drums and dancing."
"You—your people worshipped the Great Old Ones, too?"
"Just the Hairy Big One.” Hezekiah's reaction was priceless, but I wasn't in the mood to enjoy it. “So this is why you were cozying up to me, huh? At least my tribe didn't go raiding the neighbors for god-fodder. We only used local talent."
"We—we can't.” For a sailor, Hezekiah was taking an awfully long time getting a few decent knots tied. “Most of our Innsmouth girls aren't—aren't fit for this honor."
"Look, if your god's on a virgins-only diet, I thought I made it perfectly clear that I'm not—"
"Diet?” Hezekiah's eyes bugged out even more than usual. “You mean your god ate the sacrifices?"
"Well, the official title they gave us was ‘bride,’ but I don't think every honeymoon ends with only one survivor. Of course, I've heard some rumors about how they do things in New Jersey, but—” I raised my eyebrows. “Your god doesn't?"
"Er, no.” My poor sailor boy sounded even more embarrassed than when he'd learned about my profession. “Our girls—our girls really are his brides. It's how we've done it for generations. That's why we have to—to look farther afield for offerings. Some unbelievers may dare to call our dread lord C'thulhu a blasphemous abomination from beyond the stars, but he'd never marry a blood relative."
"So what he does is—?” Hezekiah nodded. “And tonight I'm the one he's going to—?” Hezekiah nodded again, looking miserable. “What happens after he's—?"
"He goes back to sleep."
"That figures. But what happens to me?"
"You will remain in Innsmouth, honored and maintained in a manner worthy of dread C'thulhu's accepted bride. Oh, Miss Smoot, I am so sorry you must endure this! I really am fond of you, and I do regret with all my heart that I've brought you to—"
"—a secure life where I'll be taken care of and never have to worry about where my next meal's coming from?” I laughed. “Sweetheart, if I'd known the details, I'd've given myself that Mickey Finn. I could kiss you. Maybe I will, once the honeymoon's over. Maybe more, if your dread lord whatzisname is a really sound sleeper."
"You're—you're not mad at me, Miss Smoot?"
"Not mad, not Smoot. But we can trade real names later. Now ship out, sailor boy; I'm a professional and I've got a job to do."
He looked doubtful, but he finally finished tying my left hand to its stone post and left me. I heard him sloshing through the shallows, back to the shore. The caterwauling congregation got louder and more frenzied. The silvered ocean began to churn and swell, ripples rising to become whitecaps, whitecaps turning into combers, until one huge surge of sea lifted itself to untold heights and for a moment, I was scared that all Hezekiah's yammer about gods and bridal sacrifices was just a big lie to comfort me right before I drowned. I held my breath, waiting for the great wave to break over me.
It never did. Instead of acting like a normal curler, it split down the middle and ran off to either side, revealing a monster than could have given my old nightmares a run for the money. Bat-winged and taloned, with what looked like an octopus bouquet for a mouth, the creature reared out of the depths and strode toward me with eldritch lust in his fiery eyes.
Eh. I'd seen worse.
And I'd done worse, in my day, to survive. If all those girls from old Captain Whately's burg could handle this C'thulhu chump, so could I. It wasn't like this was my first time as a “bride.” The sooner I got this over with, the sooner I'd be living on Easy Street, and the sooner I could see what happened when two people with buzz-saw bites tried kissing.
I like a challenge. Matter of fact, I kind of liked the challenge wading toward me right now. I gave him my most winning smile and spoke the words I'd been waiting all those years to say: “C'mere, ya big ape."
Like I said, I'm entitled to a few laughs.
Copyright © 2011 Esther M. Friesner
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Poetry: SEEKING OUT LOBE-FINNED TRUTHS by Robert Frazier
* * * *
* * * *
First move along the rough African coast
Where lava leaks like ink into the shallows
—
Sleep among the Comoro huts
Learn to hollow out an outrigger
—
Gather flat-sided stones for sinkers
—
Set off at night with a single lamp
To guide you across a pthalo-blue sea
—
Bait your hook with candy & let her plunge
Down fast & yank to release the stones
—
Your line drifts where the Forbidden One drifts
Where you drift as well
—
For though they called it the living fossil in 1938
Today you discover that the ultraconservative
—
Stretches of your genome the most unchanged
Sequences of nucleotides in your own DNA
—
Match most closely to that of the coelacanth
So distant a relative measured in geologic terms
—
Still kissing cousins in evolutionary time
—Robert Frazier
Copyright © 2011 Robert Frazier
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Short Story: THE FLOW AND DREAM by Jack Skillingstead
Since Jack Skillingstead's last appearance in Asimov's, his novel, Harbinger, and collection, Are You There and Other Stories, have been published and he's recently completed a second novel. All this activity may explain his paltry short story production. In July, he will be a guest speaker at Walter Jon Williams's Taos Toolbox. We're glad he found time in his hectic schedule to write this far future tale about a caretaker whose desperate attempt to protect humanity may actually condemn it unless he can learn how to go with . . .