2014 Campbellian Anthology

by Various

  Dendal picked up a pen from the desk and began twirling it through his fingers, which generally meant he was going to try to be artful. It rarely worked, precisely because of the way his magic was. Communication—and truth. “Oh, no particular reason. But are you?”

  “I don’t know. My niece—you know that’s who I’m looking for? I thought so. She’s down there, that’s what my gut is telling me. But there shouldn’t be anyone down there. Except corpses, anyway. And what about the synth? Even if she is down there, how do I get down there? And what the fuck am I going to find when I get there?”

  “Your gut? Tut-tut.” Dendal shook his head, as though at a small child. “Have you tried your magic?”

  “No.” A cautious one-word answer seemed best, before Dendal started banging on about my potential and how I was wasting it. Truth was, not only do I not like pain, I didn’t want to end up like Dendal, addicted to the magic, a slave to it, lost in my own head more often than not. I’ve had to pull him out of the black before, a thing I hate worse than using my magic, because it reminds me what I’m afraid of. And Dendal isn’t a bumbler in there—no, he’s big and bright in the darkness, and fucking powerful, and still the black is stronger than him. It rules him, I sometimes think.

  Worse, if I use my magic, if I let that black into me, let it pull me, I could be sent stark raving mad by it. It’s happened, quite often, before our brand of magic was banned. Pain magic—, and the mages who use it—, are far too unreliable. But at least it doesn’t poison anyone but the mages. Much.

  “It’s about time you started believing in more than your gut, Rojan.”

  “You know me, Dendal: I believe in cash, and that men aren’t made for monogamy, that there isn’t a woman alive I can’t get into bed if I try hard enough, and never cross the Ministry. Shit like that. I believe them like crazy.”

  “You have to believe that you’re better.”

  “I think my ego’s big enough, don’t you?

  Dendal pursed his lips. “At magic, Rojan. You never use it unless you have to, and not the way you were built to use it. You use cheap tricks and toys. You could be so good, if you just believed in it. You were made to use magic, and not just for playing about with.”

  I scowled at him, but he just grinned more. “No, I was made to be a bastard.”

  “It’s time to start using it. And if she’s in the ’Pit, I think I know how to get you down there. After that, you’ll be on your own, unless I can call in a favour or two.”

  The pen had stopped whirling and Dendal was watching me, no smile on his usually cheerful face. It wasn’t often he was both mentally present and serious, but when he was—when he was, I listened. Pain magic wasn’t the only kind he could conjure.

  I creaked to weary feet. “I’ll get the knife.”

  “You will not. For this, no cutting corners, pun intended. Not for your niece, Rojan. Not for family.”

  I wanted to say I had no family, as I had when I’d taken this share of the office and Dendal had pretended to believe me with a sly, knowing smile. Instead I sat back down and stared at him for a while, trying to gather the will to resist him and cut myself instead, but nothing and no one could defy Dendal in one of these moods. I’m not sure whether it was the sharp shine of his eyes, or the reproach behind them that got me every time. Namrat himself would have a hard time defying that.

  “Fine, fine,” I muttered and fished in my pocket for the picture of Amarie, something to focus the spell on. “Fucking fine.”

  “Daddy, look at me, I’m a princess.”

  Brought out into the light, the picture began its short loop. A fair-haired little princess waving to her daddy. The room around me began to fade away as I gathered myself. The lights dimmed in my eyes; Griswald’s smell no longer assaulted my nose; the rough fabric of the sofa no longer lumped under me when I shifted. The tiniest inklings of my magic, all I could use without an extra power source, without pain, tingled where the picture touched my fingers. Shit, I really did not want to do this.

  “Daddy, look at me.”

  I had to, for Perak, and for the boys we both once were.

  Down—she was down—and it was dark there. She was crying—awful, wrenching sobs for her father. For my brother. If I wanted to know more, if I wanted to help her out of there, I had to do it. I’d promised Perak. Fuck, I’d promised Ma too, to help Perak, keep him safe. A promise I’d failed in for too long.

  I laid the picture on my knees and kept contact with the edge of one pinkie. The rest of that hand grabbed and twisted—and pain span through me, over me, picked up the residue of my magic and thrust in into my head. Stars pulsed and beat in time to my heart, dazzling me, pulling me into the whirl, and then I was there, with Amarie. Two hundred and… thirty… four feet below me. Yes. Four hundred and two feet to my east. I can tell which way north is, easy as spitting, which Dendal always says is spooky, and not part of my magic, since I don’t need to hurt myself to manage that part.

  My magic though, that’s something on top, the difference between knowing just by looking which way north is, and having a map drawn with all the details and fiddly lines on it. This time the map took me to a dark and airless chamber made of reconstituted stone, water dripping down the walls, the stench of synth everywhere. I tried to ignore the darkness around me, the pull of the magic, to go deeper, always deeper, lose myself in the black, be comforted by it, become it. You want me, you need me. A whimper cut through all that.

  Amarie huddled in a corner, a small angular shape folded in on itself. Two bright eyes, wide with terror, peeped over her scabby knees. Behind me, off in the darkness, something growled. Something big. The sound bounced off the walls and seemed to grow rather than diminish: a growl from beyond history to prickle the neck, pump fear-quickness to legs and say, “Here is something that wants to eat me.”

  I wasn’t even really there but I felt my eyes grow to mirror Amarie’s. She couldn’t see me, hear me, know I was there, but I crouched down beside her anyway. How could I not?

  “I’m coming. Hold on, because I’m coming to take you home, to your daddy. Just you hold on for Uncle Rojan.”

  She couldn’t hear me, couldn’t have, but her eyes flicked round as though she had and her whimpers subsided.

  Then I was back in the office, on my knees with Dendal holding me up. I threw up sour beer all over his shirt.

  See, this is why I don’t like other people relying on me, on responsibility. Because dislocating your own thumb to cast a spell really fucking hurts.

  Samantha Kymmell-Harvey became eligible for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer with the publication of “Cadence” in Waylines Magazine (Sep. 2013), edited by David Rees-Thomas and Darryl Knickrehm.

  Visit her website at samanthakymmell-harvey.blogspot.com.

  * * *

  Short Story: “Cadence” ••••

  CADENCE

  by Samantha Kymmell-Harvey

  First published in Waylines Magazine (Sep. 2013), edited by David Rees-Thomas and Darryl Knickrehm

  • • • •

  LASZLO TRIED to imagine the body laying before him as nothing but a carp. Or maybe a large sardine. Anything but a rusalka.

  He stuffed his hands into his pockets to hide their trembling as he approached the long, wooden table. In the flickering gaslight the rusalka’s skin was a translucent map of chartreuse veins, her pale eyes shone like green fire. His brother, Nikola, buckled straps around her arms and legs. Her webbed hands stretched sharp nails to claw him. Her mouth screamed, white teeth bared, tongue flexing. Luckily, Nik was prepared and wore earplugs to mute the siren’s deadly song. Laszlo, however, didn’t need them.

  You cannot ruin this surgery again, Nik used his hands to say in the sign language he and Laszlo had created.

  Laszlo nodded and unfolded his leather pouch of medical instruments. The scalpel felt light and cold in his grasp. He turned to his still thrashing rusalka. She was no different than the rest of her kind, a
vengeful water nymph who took pleasure in luring men to their death. Rusalki voices poisoned the minds of men, rendering them helpless to their will. For as long as sailors murdered the nymphs, they’d keep claiming their souls. But not my soul, thought Laszlo, placing a hand on his churning stomach as if to silence its protest.

  He filled a ceramic basin with water and set it on the operating table inches from her head. Gathering her mass of wet, silvery hair, Laszlo plunged it into the water. He didn’t want her dying just from dry hair. He’d learned that lesson after the first surgery.

  Laszlo selected a glass test tube from the rack on his bookshelf. Inside was a minute section of sea sponge wrapped in copper mesh. It was his newest model of vocal filter, designed to remove the poison from a rusalka’s voice.

  Is that the right filter? signed Nik.

  Laszlo huffed. Yes. What did Nik know of science? He directed the opera, not Laszlo’s treatment of rusalki.

  With the scalpel, Laszlo cut the netting from the rusalka’s face and neck. She then snapped her teeth, inflated her chest, and began to scream. Nik flinched, fearing her scream would force him to jump into the Danube, but the earplugs kept him deaf. Laszlo half-smiled to see his brother squirm. He then clamped a cotton mask over her mouth and nose. Her eyes widened as his steady hand administered the droplets of ether to the mask. After a moment, those eyes closed.

  Please let her live, Laszlo prayed as he inserted the filter onto the end of a metal rod and opened the rusalka’s mouth.

  She better live, signed Nik, if Hungary is to bow no more to an Austrian Emperor.

  • • •

  Laszlo sat on a wooden stool across from the table where the rusalka still slept, her long hair floating in the basin like strands of silver silk. Her chest rose and fell.

  Nik dipped her sharp nails in a bowl of wax like Laszlo had taught him to, adding a new layer as each one dried.

  When will she wake? he signed.

  When the ether is out of her blood.

  How soon will she sing again?

  Laszlo shrugged. You know we’ve never made it this far before. He leaned back in his chair. The newspaper clippings he’d hung crinkled as he leaned his head against the wall. They were his mementos of the day he became Black Turul.

  The Black Turul will be pleased, signed Nik. She will make the perfect assassin. With the filter, everyone will think she’s harmless.

  I hope the trap works, he signed. Laszlo’s heart sat like iron in his chest. Maybe his disgusting experiments would finally succeed. There was no doubt in his mind that the Emperor would pay his brother a visit. Nik’s recent accolades as the director of the National Hungarian Opera had been all over Buda-Pest’s papers. But none mentioned Laszlo, the crippled violin prodigy turned mad scientist who now hid in the opera’s basement experimenting on rusalki. He shivered, dispelling his self-contempt.

  Laszlo’s gaze fell upon his violin. It still sat propped up against his medical books. Laszlo remembered how it felt in his hands, how the bow would sing the notes to him. Laszlo ran a finger along the strings, wishing he could hear it once more.

  Nik tapped him on the shoulder and pointed at the rusalka. Her fingers flexed, feet wriggling too. The creature’s thin body jerked forward, still restrained. Wide, pale eyes trained on Laszlo. He quickly steadied the basin as her chaotic movements threatened to topple it. Then she parted her lips in song.

  Laszlo could feel the vibrations of her music pulsing through the water. In his mind, he heard her voice in the rhythms, such a pure tone, glistening and crisp like icicles. Laszlo’s grip tightened as if to touch her unearthly tones. His heart thumped like percussion to her forbidden song. It was beautiful.

  Nik suddenly drew him close in a hug.

  Success. Nik’s hands fluttered, nearly jumbling his signs. Her voice is harmless to the naked ear.

  Laszlo blinked, glancing from the rusalka to his brother. The room spun as the fog cleared from his mind. The surgery couldn’t have worked, not after what he had felt. But Nik seemed fine. In fact, he had already lit a celebratory cigarette.

  The rusalka closed her mouth, eyes wide. She knew what they’d done to her. Laszlo stared, watching her lips form rudimentary Hungarian.

  “My voice,” she mouthed, then screamed again.

  Laszlo gaped at her. The operation must have worked. Her voice had obviously changed.

  Get her ready for her debut, Nik signed quickly. We’ll re-open in a month. We have to earn our audience’s trust first.

  Laszlo signed, A month may be too soon. If she doesn’t sound perfect, then the Emperor will never come.

  She sounds beautiful to me. And I’m certain Franz Josef will think so too. It will be the last thought he has.

  Laszlo nodded, glancing at the rusalka. She knew not yet that Hungary’s freedom weighed on her infamous cadence.

  And when you remove the voice filter, it will not kill her or damage her voice? signed Nik.

  The procedure is safe. I assure you that the Emperor will plunge head first from the royal box as if leaping into the Danube.

  Nik grinned, his mouth opening in an inaudible laugh. He removed another cigarette from the brass case in his pocket. It smoldered between his thin, dry lips. Train her well, Lasz. We’re all depending on it.

  • • •

  Over the following weeks, the rusalka made some progress, learning some of Laszlo’s signing language. Often though, their sessions ended with her refusing to sing.

  As she sneered at him for the tenth time, lips curled, Laszlo turned away. He’d fail his brother, worse, he’d fail Hungary if she wouldn’t sing. Frustrated, Laszlo turned to his only comfort, one he had not touched in years, his violin. Eyes closed, Laszlo drew the bow over the strings. The rich vibrations of Hungary’s anthem had always soothed him. This time, unable to hear them, no comfort came.

  He realized, however, something about it calmed her. She’d stare at him as if entranced, sometimes even humming in harmony. Laszlo knew instantly this was how he could reach her.

  Laszlo entered the laboratory. The rusalka’s thin silver eyebrows furrowed as she bared her teeth. She sat in a chair in front of the operating table, hair soaking in the basin, claw-like hands bound by rope.

  I mean you no harm. Laszlo signed.

  She opened her mouth in song, thrashing against her restraints.

  Laszlo opened the wooden cabinet and retrieved his violin. Grasping the neck, a memory of his mother came to him. The memory of when she had given it to him.

  She taught him his first song on this violin. “Himnusz.” He couldn’t even read music yet. But she’d sing their country’s anthem, and he’d play it back. Together. It was their language. Their heritage. The last burning image from his previous life. He hoped now that this same violin could speak to the rusalka.

  He lifted the violin to his chin. It felt cool and smooth. He brought the bow across the strings, adjusting his angles as the vibrations necessitated. In his mind, he heard what his music sounded like, or used to, before he’d lost his hearing. The vibrations were colors. Graceful swirls of blue for the high notes, green jagged peaks for the flats, and red blooms for the robust melody.

  The rusalka’s eyes were wide ponds of green. Her posture relaxed against the chair, she watched him, her lips parted as if imitating the sound. She observed his every move, leaning in to soak up every note. Laszlo slowly approached her. She motioned to the violin.

  “What is it?”

  Laszlo strained to read her lips. He signed, Violin.

  The rusalka shook her head.

  Laszlo sighed. He’d have to try to talk. “Violin.” His tongue imitated the movement, as if he could still hear.

  “I’ve never heard it before,” she said. “It’s beautiful.”

  Laszlo smiled. “Laszlo.” He pointed to himself.

  “Cilka.”

  He tapped his throat and signed, Sing?

  The rusalka’s eyes narrowed. “It hurts.” She spoke slower t
his time. “What did you do to me?”

  Laszlo frowned. He’d never had to explain the surgery before. “I filt—” he paused. Words tripped on his tongue. “Filtered your voice.”

  She swiped a clawed hand at him. “Why?”

  Laszlo kept his distance. “For the opera.” He rolled up his sleeves and positioned the violin under his chin. “Try to sing now.”

  Her eyes trained on the black eagle tattooed on his forearm.

  “Black Turul.”

  He clearly read her lips. It was the same tattoo his brother had, as all freedom fighters had.

  “You butcher,” Cilka said.

  “Not me.” Laszlo pointed to the headline of the yellowing news page above his head: “Young violinist and brother escape bombing in Buda.”

  The Austrian soldiers came to our town in the night. A bomb fell through our roof. The explosion took my hearing. The shrapnel took my parents. The Black Turul found us, and because of them, we survived. But I don’t do their dirty work.

  Her lips moved slowly. “My family is also dead. The Emperor’s nets strangled them in the Danube.”

  A sour pang pulsed in his stomach. He too had killed her kind. But she could not be as innocent as she seemed, she was a rusalka after all.

  Little rivulets of water snaked around his shoes and he looked up to see Cilka standing beside him, her wet hair dripping down her burgundy linen dress. Her webbed hands were cold, soggy velvet encasing his fingers.

  She held out his violin, wax nails tapping the string. “You sing beautifully.”

  In the dim light, he could see the dark singe marks from the fire, the dents from when he threw it in frustration after not being able to hear. His heart ached as he took the instrument back.

  Hands. Cilka showed him, veiny palms outstretched.