The Place of Stars and Bones Read online

  WALKING CARRION

  I split the skull of the first corpse to wrench itself free of the polje. My blade bit through fragile bone, shatt-ering its crown and sending its teeth in all directions. Down through spine and ribs my sword descended, bisecting the ambulatory collection of bones. When my blade came free the thing fell away from me, hacked in two. It struck the ground with a clatter, scattering its bones across the cracked surface of the plain. Into its place stepped three more walking heaps of carrion.

  I cut the legs from the nearest and, as it fell, used my momentum to split the second from shoulder to hip. I adjusted my stance, blade still in motion, and brought the third low with a blow to the neck. All three hit the polje in rapid succession, breaking to pieces as they fell. Before the bits of these spectral cadavers had skittered to a stop, I charged.

  ──────╥──────

  THE PLACE OF

  STARS AND BONES

  ──────╨──────

  G. OWEN WEARS

  Cover by Vladimir Rikowski

  Copy-editing by Sabrina Smith, Jessica Bellows & Greta Knievel

  Copyright © 2017 G. Owen Wears

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN-10: 154661002

  ISBN-13: 978-1546610021

  For Sabrina

  CONTENTS

  One

  ……………….

  1

  Two

  ……………….

  14

  Three

  ……………….

  32

  Four

  ……………….

  46

  Five

  ……………….

  64

  Six

  ……………….

  80

  Seven

  ……………….

  103

  Eight

  ……………….

  113

  foreward

  The summer of 2014 saw me unemployed and very, very sweaty. The job I had been working for the past four years, converting printed comics into ebooks, had come to a sudden end. Turns out the company was completely insolvent. The owners were unable to rectify the mess they had made of the company’s finances and all save a few of us little guys were kick-ed to the curb with no hint of severance. The only benefit that my separation from gainful employment provided was a third-hand MacBook, an iPad, and heaps of free time. Free time that I spent desperately searching for a new job in the mornings, then during the afternoons trying desperately to pull myself out of the crippling depression losing one’s livelihood brings on. I managed this by sitting at the kitchen table and banging out the fantasy you hold in your hands.

  Now, many people say that summers in Colorado are better than in other states. “It’s a dry heat” gets tossed around a lot. I’ve been to Texas in June. I’ve also spent time in California, Connecticut, Maryland, Ohio, and Pennsylvania in the summer as well. While it’s true these places have more humidity, they are not a mile closer to the sun. Here, the lack of atmosphere allows our parent star to cook the hell out of the Rockies. It gets warm, believe you me. Since the air conditioner in the townhouse I was renting at the time was situated in the kitchen, I spent those swel-tering summer afternoons parked in front of it with the aforementioned MacBook in front of me. Since the computer was there, and it was on, I decided I would write something.

  Usually when I begin a story I already have a good portion of the narrative worked out in my head. This is something I must to do in order to avoid writer’s block. If I have a good opening for the story but no end, or a good end but no beginning, I tend to stall out. I waste time and the story sits and collects digital dust. With “The Place of Stars and Bones” the story developed as I wrote it. Unusual

  After having lunch and watching something on Netflix to help shake off the cloying feeling of despair that comes with being broke, I would start typing. The image of a man walking north over an endless plain under alien stars was the only thing I had to go on. Everything that befell the character after that was as much a surprise to me as it was to him. How the story would end was anyone’s guess.

  After weeks of writing I discovered that my poor protagonist was going precisely nowhere. He was doomed to wander forever in this lifeless place of stars and bones. I let the story drop, as I am wont to do. I went back to writing and revising several pieces intended for what, at the time, was to be a genre mag-azine entitled “Ferus Confectura.” The name was later changed to “Exterus” and this modest collection of stories was published as an anthology through Am-azon. It wasn’t until months later, after I had finally found a job, that I realized my story of a lone wan-derer wasn’t without an ending after all.

  I had been picking at this manuscript thinking all the time that it was a straightforward adventure story. Though I’m sure some might argue that this story is far less adventuresome and far more atmospheric than anything else. Well, eventually I came to the real-ization that “The Place of Stars and Bones” was not a straightforward adventure, but rather an allegory.

  Ye gods, what a horrible cliché.

  Well, cliché or no, this realization allowed me to take up the manuscript again and finish it. The whole process took several more weeks of chipping away here and there, but by the end of 2014 the book was finally done. Or so I thought.

  I passed out copies to my good friends Jessica Bellows, Greta Knievel, and Yury Arkadian. Jessica made some very pointed critiques. Greta echoed her sentiments suggesting I make some of the very same changes. Grudgingly, I eventually took their advice to heart. This meant going back yet again and re-writing several sections. I added a bit more material including a past for the unnamed protagonist. Without a back story for our titular hero it was generally agreed that his struggle amounted to a whole lot of not a lot. It took me a while to warm to this idea, but I got there in the end.

  Yury, on the other hand, liked the story just fine. He was the first to suggest the similarities between it and some of Lovecraft’s works. I’ve heard it a few times since, though I would be inclined to say it bears more of a resemblance to David Lindsay’s “A Voyage to Arcturus.” Please note, however, I didn’t manage to choke down that particular novel until 2017.

  Though I was pleased to hear there was an echo of Lovecraft in one of my stories I certainly hope it’s no more than that. I have no desire to be another Lovecraft clone. With any luck I’ve managed to create something at least marginally unique, something that can be interpreted differently by each individual rea-der. Allegory is useful that way.

  Personally, I’m just grateful that the summer I spent without a job, sitting alone in my kitchen dripp-ing with perspiration, resulted in something tangible; something that saw me through a difficult time in my life. Hopefully others will enjoy following the foot-steps of my nameless hero as much as I did.

  G. Owen Wears

  26 April 2017

  ──╥──

  one

  ──╨──

  Before the alien stars and the endless repetition of my own footfalls there is nothing. The wind, the steady beat of my heart, the distant points of light in the black vastness of the sky are all that I can remember.

  Beneath the heels of my boots the karstic plain split and crackled. With each step the crunch of the dissolved limestone was gathered by the wind and rolled away over that flat, endless expanse. Drawing to a halt I stood and listened as the last of my foot-falls disappeared into the darkness. Beyond the rush of the wind I could hear nothing. I closed my eyes and raised my head. I stood that way for a moment, breathing steadily. When I again opened my eyes I inhaled sharply.

  The stars tha
t hung suspended overhead washed the plain in pale ghost-light that seemed to shift and move as if of its own accord. They winked and shim-mered, the dense band of far off suns arching from horizon to horizon. Slowly I traced the length of that great bow; the vast, stellar landscape that was incal-culably distant yet seemingly so close I could reach out and touch it.

  I continued to stare skyward until the biting wind that had dogged me this long night again began to tug at my cloak. I pulled the thick wool closer about my shoulders and lowered my eyes.

  Another gust pushed at my back, seeming to exhort me to move onwards. Instead of heeding its urging I turned about and scrutinized the line of my footprints. They led off into the darkness, straight as an arrow across the interminably flat expanse of the plain. Again the wind shoved me with an unseen hand. Turning about I hunched my back and once again set about putting one foot before the other. Above me the stars shone down, aloof and vastly remote. They spun slowly, uncaring as to what might be stumbling along beneath their brilliance. Still, their presence was comforting. By their light I was able to navigate the polje as I crossed south to north.

  I could not recall how long I had journeyed by night, nor if I had walked by day, though I must have, at some point, moved in the light. They are like two sides of the same coin, night and day, one inexorably following the other. Still, I had no memory of what a day in this place might be like. Was it as conversely hot as the night was cold? Or was day just as frigid? I could trace the progress of the stars as they spun overhead so, eventually, there must be a dawn. What world could spin endlessly through night? No, the sun would have to rise. But when it did, what would the dawn bring?

  I put these thoughts from my mind and continued on. Whether dawn came or not was beyond my control. I knew that I must go north, and so north I went. This was a certainty even if the night lasted for millennia. As dull as my passage was I knew this to be my only course. The pull of the north was as perpet-ual as the progress of the stars overhead.

  As I walked my armor clanked softly, the sword at my side swinging forward and back with each mea-sured step. At my other hip the canteen slung at my belt felt half full, though I could not remember hav-ing drunk from it. Thirst did not vex me; neither did hunger. I found this odd, but was thankful for it. My provisions were scarce and the need to eat and drink would only hinder my progress.

  Step followed step, the narrow band of my tracks running out behind me. Despite this visual record of my progress, at times it seemed as though I were standing still. The featurelessness of my surroundings disconcerted me. The thought that I was making no headway at all gnawed at the back of my mind. Was I, perhaps, taking the same single step over and over again while above me the stars cycled by? I suppose that, in this alien place, such a thing might be poss-ible. I carried on regardless, putting from my mind the prospect of an endless series of footfalls that took me nowhere.

  At first the rider appeared as no more than a small white speck hovering just above the line of the hor-izon. As it moved closer I found that I was oddly relieved to see this distant shape. Its increasing size reassured me that I was not simply marching in place. Perhaps I should have been disconcerted, wary of this far flung apparition, but for lack of any better options I kept my pace. Soon that far distant speck began to coalesce into a recognizable shape.

  By the shifting light of the stars I could just make out the image of a horse and rider approaching thro-ugh the wavering haze that clung to the horizon. Both rider and mount were as pale as the surface of the plain, their skin seeming to glow beneath the star-light. At this distance their progress appeared almost languid as though beast and master moved through a dense, viscous fluid. To my ears there came no crash of hooves, no rattle of tack or saddle. There was only silence and that strange liquid gallop.

  As the rider drew nearer I again drew to a halt and stood with the wind shoving at my back. The thought that perhaps the horse and rider were drawn as inex-orably south as I was drawn north passed through my mind. This conclusion seemed, at first, logical eno-ugh. However, their course appeared set to intercept mine. As the moments slipped by I thought it increa-singly unlikely that I had encountered another pilgrim like myself. With this revelation needling me I waited for the pair to approach. When they had come near enough for my eyes to make them out fully I wished that I was again alone on the plain.

  The horse was hairless, its face angular, its limbs lanky and bizarre in their nakedness. There was no mane along its neck, no tail at its haunches. Its only distinguishing features were crudely painted symbols and a series of concentric bands that ran the length of its neck, back, flanks, legs. Its eyes were a featureless black. Even at this distance it seemed to me that the animal harbored a vicious sort of intelligence; a barely contained enmity radiating from the limpid pools of its eyes.

  Atop this pale horse there sat a woman who was as naked, as hairless, and as without color as her mount. She was tall and thin, her arms, legs, and torso sinewy and muscular. Her features were angular and sharp, neither attractive nor grotesque. The ears that protruded from the sides of her head were tapered and long, curving upwards away from her skull. The Rider’s eyes were as black as those of her mount and just as full of hate. Around them was smudged a dark pigment that gave her face a vacuous, haunted look. The same pigment ringed her arms and legs in alter-nating solid and dashed lines. Similar markings cross-ed her torso, running from her shoulders to her navel, and over her small breasts. In her right hand she bore a length of bone, a femur in which was set jagged shards of obsidian that caught and refracted the star-light in tiny splinters.

  Upon seeing this strange weapon grasped at such a ready angle I swept back my cloak and loosed my sword in its scabbard. I moved my right foot back, bracing myself, and set my left side towards the on-coming horse and rider. In this stance the wind gath-ered my cloak, causing it to stream out before me. I wrapped it about my left arm lest it impede my draw.

  Such actions gave me pause. They were familiar, preparations I had repeated hundreds of times on hundreds of battlefields. Despite this feeling of famil-iarity I experienced a brief moment of vexation be-fore I was compelled to brush it aside and refocus my attentions on the approaching figure.

  She bent low over the back of her mount, clinging with strong thighs as the animal charged. We studied each other, the Rider and I, as she closed the distance between us. Her dark eyes scanned my stance, the weapon at my side. I know not what thoughts went through her mind, but my own turned to countering her charge and surviving her initial assault.

  Though she bore down on me as if I were an enemy I could not for the life of me decipher why. Given the choice, I would much rather have met as friends. Perhaps then she could have told me about this place, this vast expanse of nothing, and why I was here. Conversely, The Rider appeared to have a very good idea of where we were and what it was she intended to do with me.

  With a whisper of steel on leather, I drew.

  With sword in hand I waited, counting the steps of the glabrous steed. I caught its rhythm, matched my timing to its gait.

  When the Rider struck I was surprised to feel not the usual surge of adrenaline at meeting a cavalry charge, but instead a profound sense of relief. No matter how hostile, here was a physical presence, a living being. Amongst all this emptiness I found that oddly inspiriting.

  The Rider made to pass me on her right, no doubt wanting to cut me down with a single upward swipe of her studded club. A simple and direct assault, one that I countered by darting before the oncoming ho-rse and hacking down towards the Rider’s unguarded left side. Instead of my blade meeting with flesh and bone it was turned aside amidst a shower of obsidian shards. With impossible speed the pale Rider had ma-neuvered her weapon across her body to deflect my counterstrike. I was driven backwards by the force of the unexpected blow, kicking up chunks of the polje.

  Regaining my footing I turned to face the Rider as she wheeled about. Her blinding display of speed and agility had take
n me by surprise, but would not do so a second time. I reset my stance as the Rider put her heels to the horse’s flanks and again came at me.

  Even as she charged I was struck by the notion that this was not something new, that I had met cav-alry before, skewering soldiers and beasts alike with pike or pole-axe. Images of animals and men broken against a forest of pointed shafts flickered before my mind’s eye. The images sent an-other jolt down my spine. I tried to force them from me, to concentrate on the exchange at hand.

  The familiar feel of this exchange notwithstand-ing, never had I encountered anything like the woman that bore down upon me. I was alone, on foot, and beset by a foe I knew nothing about. I could counter her advance only so many times before I was worn down, depleted. She had the advantage of the horse and room in which to maneuver. Despite her advan-tage out here, in the open, what else could I do but stand and fight?

  The Rider bent low over the back of her horse. Her club, with its inlay of volcanic glass, was held out behind her. A wry smile creased her thin lips. Who-ever she was, whatever she was, she seemed to be enjoying our duel.

  As the Rider made her second pass I opted for another feint instead of a head-on confrontation. To take her charge directly would almost certainly mean death or maiming.

  I ducked.

  Obsidian and bone passed over my head with a rush of air. I remained in a crouch until the haunches of the apparitional steed had gone by, then turned to face its retreating backside. The Rider pulled up vic-iously, causing her mount to skitter and jump. The hairless beast reared, its passenger holding to its sides despite the lack of saddle and stirrups.

  As the horse danced back into place the Rider sne-ered and locked her kohl black eyes upon my own. In a voice that seemed to reverberate as though echoing from the walls of an immense tomb she said through clenched teeth, “Coward.”