Narrelle M. Harris's Blog, page 6

Narrelle M Harris on Natalie Conyer

The Only One in the World : “The Adventure of the Disappearing Village” by Natalie Conyer

Natalie is another with whom, like Jay Ganguly, I’ve shared a Table of Contents, this time in Scarlet Stiletto: The Ninth Cut (2017).   We found we had another touchpoint when Nat submitted her story set in Poland, as I’d lived in Krakow for a time in the 90s.

Nat’s story was surprising and charming, inspired not so much by the outré crime of the Conan Doyle stories but by Polish folklore of fabled Chelm and the archetype of the wise fool. Her fabulously cunning Chochem Holmlich reminded me a bit of Shakespeare’s Constable Dogberry (Much Ado About Nothing) whom Don Pedro swears is really “too cunning to be understood”.

It’s a deliciously playful approach to the theme, particularly with Dr Watinksy travelling to find out if the people of Chelm are as foolish as he’s heard and instead finding someone very clever indeed!

If you’re intrigued, take a look at Nat’s interview about her story on Clan Destine Press, where she answers three questions about writing her story – the most unexpected thing she learned while writing it, her favourite thing about writing it, and what is quintessentially Polish about her Holmes and Watson.

You can order The Only One in the World at Clan Destine Press right now.

More about Natalie:

Natalie loves crime so much she did a doctorate on the subject. (What, you don’t think she goes and commits crimes for research, do you? Do you?) Nat’s won awards for her short stories in the Sisters in Crime annual Scarlet Stiletto competition, and she was shortlisted for the Davitt Awards (Australia’s premier crime writing award for women) for her hard-boiled police procedural set in Cape Town, Present Tense (Clan Destine Press). The book then won the 2002 Ned Kelly Award for debut crime. Nat’s working on a sequel with the working title State Crime.

Flash Fiction: My Constant Heart

This week’s prompts came from AliAprhys, Hotaru Tomoe, Some Silly Ficcer, and Alexx on Fire. Thanks for the ideas! Follow me on Twitter to send me prompts for next week’s story!

My Constant Heart

Being a journalist had its up days, its down days, and its utterly weird days.

Kaylee Pirbright wasn’t entirely sure which one this was, yet.

Being assigned a puff piece on dating sites was annoying, for sure. Her thirty-something boss seemed to think being a single woman in her forties made Kaylee a natural fit for dating site articles. Apparently. A tick in the Down Day column.

Kaylee had created a persona for the research and posted a photograph of a small rock, painted pink. It was from her own collection of decorated rocks. The smooth, flat, grey stone wore its nautilus of pink swirls well, and its inscription in tiny lettering which followed the curling lines: walk the streets of this empty city alone and you will eventually find its centre – and yours. The ‘s’ of ‘yours’ was at the heart of the nautilus.

Usually, she left her little painted messages on stone in parks and gardens, on low brick walls and in the forks of trees, for random strangers to find. She’d kept this one, though. Something about it felt like a guiding force. A path. A map to somewhere important, if only she could discover the real world starting point. Posting the photograph of it had been a definite tick in the Up Day column.

Kaylee had chosen this dating site at not quite random. She’d stalked a lot of sites, a lot of chatrooms and social media discussion threads to find it. How she’d finally arrived at the site was a bit of a mystery, not as mysterious as the people who populated it. Her pink map stone was maybe the least weird avatar there. Most dating sites featured only  humans, and sometimes cats. This site – myconstantheart.com – featured painted stone, engraved bone, initials carved on individual shark teeth. Images of dragonfly wings, homespun yarn, moss, cloud formations, ink and iridescent feathers and translucent fish scales and trailing vines woven like hair into long green locks, shimmered on the profile pages. Things beautiful and terrible and both. Made things, broken things; things pure and singular.

Not a human face to be seen.

And that was a big tick in the Weird Day column.

Kaylee flinched in her seat as her My Constant Heart inbox pinged with a message. She clicked the link, dubious at such a swift response to such a paltry avatar and a profile that read “Hard boiled journo meets abandoner of arts. Seeks enlightenment or a supply of paintable rocks”.

Yeah, she wasn’t taking this assignment too seriously. She took few of them seriously these days, even the serious ones, which might be why she’d ended up on the Online Dating assignment at all.

The message in her inbox was only marginally cryptic.

Kaylee. I am Joolbox (not my real name). I am a collector of Found Objects. I can supply more pebbles. Enlightenment less certain. Want to meet?

Joolbox’s avatar was, to Kaylee’s astonishment, one of her pebble paintings which she had gifted to the world. She’s used the natural grooves on the palm-sized stone to paint the image of a sleeping dinosaur, its tail curled over its body, the knobs of its spine ending at the bump of its head.

Kaylee replied at once.

Hi Joolbox. Your avatar is a stone I painted a few years ago! The more pebble canvasses you have for me to use, the happier I am! Love to meet you! When/where?

An almost instantaneous ping reply led to a volley of exchanges.

Now. Here.

Here where?

Here now.

Where?

Nowhere.

Now?

Now here. Nowhere. Now. No. W…

The ticks in the weird column were getting broader, brighter, and more enticing. Kaylee couldn’t articulate it in the slightest. Jumbled words that should have been infuriating simply shone with simple joy. A beacon of simplicity. Now and here. Here and now. Nowhere. Here. No.

W.

Weird.

Kaylee followed the empty city of this conversational street on instinct, seeking the centre of the puzzle. Seeking the centre of herself, who could not be found in this office, in this job, this life, with its poverty of spirit and scope, its abuse of privilege and power. Her constant heart had never lived here at all.

The centre of herself was painted on stones and scattered around this city. The edges and the spokes of it. The valleys and hills of it. In  lines and curves and undulations, from edge to edge, along every radius, leading to the inevitable centre

How?

Say yes.

Yes.

I’m coming. Meet me.

Kaylee rose. She put her hand in her pocket and drew out the pink map stone which she’d left by her bed this morning, and here it was in her pocket.

Kaylee took up a notepad. I quit, she wrote on it. She wrote it in a spiral. I quit I quit I quit I quit.

She placed the notepad across her keyboard. She lifted the stone to her lips. She kissed the painted nautilus, at its very centre, where her own centre lived. Her constant heart.

And away she went.

Now. Here.

Nowhere.

Everywhere.

Narrelle M Harris on Greg Herren

The Only One in the World : “The Affair of the Purloined Rentboy” by Greg Herren

Clan Destine Press’s publisher, Lindy Cameron, put me onto Greg Herren and JM Redmann in New Orleans, so we ended up with two stories from that city set in different times and with very different moods and themes to top and tail the anthology.

I love the voice of his American John Watson, who echoes the Bohemian timbre of Conan Doyle’s original, but who is definitely a man of his own time and place. I found his descriptions of the river and its docks incredibly evocative. Greg says in his Clan Destine Press interview that he hadn’t really written anything “historical” before, but his 1920s New Orleans really comes alive.

The Affair of the Purloined Rent Boy has some lovely touch points with canon, including the little bet that Holmes makes with Watson. The presence of the theatrical demimonde feels very much in the spirit of Conan Doyle too, though the subject matter is not something Doyle could have written about so openly in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The smattering of personal history for both men is so engaging, too.

If you’re intrigued, take a look at Greg’s interview about his story on Clan Destine Press, where he answers three questions about writing his story – the most unexpected thing he learned while writing it, his favourite thing about writing it, and what is quintessentially American (or New Orlean) about his Holmes and Watson.

You can order The Only One in the World at Clan Destine Press right now.

More about Greg:

Greg has been a busy man! An award-winning author of more than 30 novels, he’s also edited over 20 anthologies and published over fifty short stories and essays. He’s even dabbled in journalism. (He claims he never says no to anyone who offers him money to write.) Greg lives in New Orleans with his partner of 25 years and a needy cat. He is also currently the Executive Vice President of Mystery Writers of America.

Narrelle M Harris on Atlin Merrick

The Only One in the World : “S.H.E.R.L.O.C.K.” by Atlin Merrick

I loved Atlin’s writing in the Sherlock Holmes realm before we ever met, and when she pitched her idea of a ‘global’ Holmes story for The Only One in the World I knew it would be a beautiful fit for the theme.

Atlin has a gift for reimagining how Sherlock Holmes and John Watson are fated to meet in every way, in every possible world (and has two books to prove it).  Of course she says it was her favourite thing about writing “S.H.E.R.L.O.C.K.” in her Clan Destine Press interview.

My favourite thing about “S.H.E.R.L.O.C.K.”, apart from that wonderful new meeting, were the supporting characters who are part of S.H.E.R.L.O.C.K.’s creation. Atlin’s supporting characters are always so well developed, and meeting people like Rose Ajang and Nguyen Minh Tai in the course of this story was a pleasure.

This is another story where delightful snippets of canon are folded into the story, including Sherlock’s notorious ‘limitations’ on his knowledge and even Sherlock’s predilection for making some of his own decisions about law and justice, when he sees fit.

If you’re intrigued, take a look at Atlin’s interview about her story on Clan Destine Press, where she answers three questions about writing her story – the most unexpected thing she learned while writing it, her favourite thing about writing it, and what is quintessentially ‘global’ about her Holmes and Watson.

You can order The Only One in the World at Clan Destine Press right now.

More about Atlin

Atlin has written two Sherlock Holmes books: The Day They Met, as Wendy C Fries, and The Night They Met, as Atlin Merrick. She also has an eye for a good story and is the Commissioning Editor of Clan Destine’s imprint, Improbable Press. IP publishes genre fiction: contemporary supernatural, adventure, and mystery. Atlin lives in Oregon by way of New York, Dublin and London. Atlin thinks coffee is pretty.

Narrelle M Harris on Jason Franks

The Only One in the World: “Sharaku Homura and the Heart of Iron” by Jason Franks

When Jason Franks submitted his story, “Sharaku Homura and the Heart of Iron”, to The Only One in the World, I knew we had a great book on our hands. He was one of the first writers I spoke to about the project, and from the start he understood what I wanted to achieve with it. His story absolutely nailed it – a Holmes and Watson shaped through the specific circumstances of the cultures in which they grew up, yet the line from Conan Doyle’s Holmes and Watson to Franks’ Homura and Wiznitz can be clearly seen.

It was clear, too, that his story reflected his personal experiences of both the South African and Japanese cultures that influence these characters, ensuring they were nuanced and whole and not, as he mentions in his Clan Destine Press interview, the Western stereotypes of those nationalities.

I love the respect his Homura and Wiznitz have for each other, and more than that, I love that in his story, their brief alliance allows them to learn from each other. We get to learn a few things too, as readers. “Sharaku Homura and the Heart of Iron” is a mystery, but while entertaining us, it also touches on ideas of privilege and responsibility in apartheid South Africa.

If you’re intrigued, take a look at Jason’s interview about his story on Clan Destine Press, where he answers three questions about writing his story – the most unexpected thing he learned while writing it, his favourite thing about writing it, and what is quintessentially Japanese/South African about his Holmes and Watson.

You can order The Only One in the World at Clan Destine Press right now.

More about Jason

Jason has written many books I’ve loved, including the fantastic rock and roll fantasy/horror, Bloody Waters and horror-comedy (not for the faint hearted) Faerie Apocalypse, as well as the Sixsmiths graphic novel series. His books have been shortlisted for various awards, including Aurealis, Ledger and Ditmar awards. Learn more at his website: www.jasonfranks.com

Narrelle M Harris on Lucy Sussex

The Only One in the World: “Mistress Islet and the General’s Son” by Lucy Sussex

I first spoke to Lucy Sussex about writing a New Zealand pakeha (non-Maori) Holmes for the anthology, but she had recently discovered a real woman from history named Anne Kidderminster, nee Holmes, who in the 17th century investigated her husband’s murder when the authorities failed her.

Lucy is a hell of a researcher as well as writer, and has done some fantastic work uncovering the facts and life of Mary Fortune, a gold-rush era Australian crime writer who pre-dates Conan Doyle. She has also written about Fergus Hume, whose book The Mystery of the Hansom Cab beat A Study in Scarlet to publication by a year (much to Doyle’s apparent irritation).  I knew whatever she wrote about Anne would have spot-on period research and an intriguing plot, and the result justifies my faith!

If you’re intrigued, take a look at Lucy’s interview about her story on Clan Destine Press, where she answers three questions about writing her story – the most unexpected thing she learned while writing it, her favourite thing about writing it, and what is quintessentially 17th century English about her Holmes and Watson.

You can order The Only One in the World at Clan Destine Press right now.

More about Lucy

New Zealand born, Lucy has lived in Australia for years, writing books and winning awards. Her award-winning fiction includes The Scarlet Rider (1996, reprint Ticonderoga 2015) and five short story collections. She’s Fantastical, an anthology she edited, was shortlisted for the World Fantasy Award. Lucy is a well known researcher, particularly into the origins of crime writing, and her work on the topic includes early Australian crime writer Mary Fortune and her book, Women Writers and Detectives in the Nineteenth Century (2012), which examines the mothers of the mystery genre. Blockbuster: Fergus Hume and The Mystery of a Hansom Cab (Text) won the 2015 Victorian Community History Award and was shortlisted for the Ngaio Marsh Award.

Narrelle M Harris on Jack Fennell

The Only One in the World: “The Path of Truth.” by Jack Fennell

I was introduced to Jack Fennell at the Worldcon in Dublin in 2019 by Atlin Merrick, who had adored A Brilliant Void, a book of Irish science fiction by women which he’d compiled and edited. He hosted the Irish Ghost Stories panel at the convention, but by then I already knew I wanted him to submit something for the anthology. 

Jack understood the concept immediately and said at once that he wanted to play with Irish folktales. What he delivered was also a wonderful tale of shipwrecks, island culture, spookiness and insurance fraud!

I encouraged writers to rename Sherlock or John if required for the cultural context and was delighted that Sherlock became “Turlough Humes” (or more precisely, Tarlach Ua Thuama) for this adventure. (I’m not sure I’ll ever see Turlough from Dr Who the same way!)

One of my favourite aspects of The Path of Truth is, as Jack says, that the solution to this complex mystery could only come from the specific cultural context of this particular Sherlock Holmes.

If you’re intrigued, take a look at Jack’s interview about his story on Clan Destine Press, where he answers three questions about writing his story – the most unexpected thing he learned while writing it, his favourite thing about writing it, and what is quintessentially Irish about his Holmes and Watson.

You can order The Only One in the World at Clan Destine Press.

More about Jack:

Jack teaches at the University of Limerick in Ireland. He’s previously written short stories for Hell’s Empire (2019), Chronos (2018), and Silver Apples Magazine; edited short story collections A Brilliant Void (2018) and It Rose Up (2021) and published two books on Irish genre fiction – Irish Science Fiction (2014) and Rough Beasts (2019).

Follow Jack on Twitter

Narrelle M Harris on Jayantika Ganguly

The Only One in the World: “The Adventure of the Fated Homecoming” by Jayantika Ganguly

Although I haven’t met Jay in person, I’ve known of her work via other Holmesian anthologies and we’ve shared Table of Contents space in Sherlock Holmes: Adventures Beyond the Canon. Jay also edits Proceedings of the Pondicherry Lodge for the Sherlock Holmes Society of India (for which she is General Secretary too) so she was a natural choice to approach for her take on a Holmes and Watson with an Indian influence.

I loved her contemporary take on the characters’ famous first meeting at St Barts, with Sherlock Dasgupta conducting experiments and his subsequent deductions about Dr “Johnny” Wagh. I especially loved that Sherlock had been named after the original, historical Sherlock Holmes, who was a real person in this universe. Like so many of the authors, Jay has woven in delightful canon references while still making the story her own.

Sherlock Dasgupta’s brother is not Mycroft in this story, but named after a different famous individual, as she explains in her interview at Clan Destine Press. That whole interview is great fun for the background she gives on how she brought the characters into her home country.

If you’re intrigued, take a look at Jay’s interview about her story on Clan Destine Press, where she answers three questions about writing her story – the most unexpected thing she learned while writing it, her favourite thing about writing it, and what is quintessentially Indian about her Holmes and Watson.

You can order The Only One in the World at Clan Destine Press.

More about Jay:

Along with her roles as General Secretary of the Sherlock Holmes Society of India and Editor of their magazine, Proceedings of the Pondicherry Lodge, Jay is a member of the Baker Street Irregulars, the Sherlock Holmes Society of London and several other international Sherlockian societies. She has written for various international anthologies, and published The Holmes Sutra (MX Publishing) in 2014. A Continuum of Sherlock Holmes, due out in 2021, is her first Sherlock Holmes novel. In real life, she is a corporate lawyer.

Flash Fiction: Nightingaling

This week, @EspineuxAlpha gave me the prompt “nightingale”. My first thought was the Vera Lynn song “A Nightingale Sang in Berkley Square” which led to thoughts of Good Omens. Other related reading came to mind then. Oscar Wilde’s The Nightingale and the Rose; Hans Christian Anderson’s fairy tale; Keats’ poem Ode to a Nightingale, and Shakespeare’s Juliet trying to convince Romeo to stay in their marriage bed by pretending the songbird they hear is not the lark. Percy Bysshe Shelley’s reference I had to look up, but it was a fit too, and so here we have a brief poem about the busy nightingale’s poetic versatility.

Please come and follow me on Twitter if you want to prompt for next week’s #FlashFictionFriday!

 Nightingaling

In Wilde, a nightingale dies for love
to stain a white rose red
Though a graceless student’s graceless love
is colder than the dead.

Hans Christian told a songbird’s tale –
She revived a dying king!
While Keats’ “light-winged Dryad” is
another death-defying thing

Bysshe Shelley’s nightingale is
a poet singing in the dark
Juliet insists that Romeo hears
a nightingale, not the lark

And presiding over angels who
Personify love and hope
In Berkeley Square a nightingale
Sings while they elope

We make of her a symbol
For our triumph and our failing
And oblivious, this sweet songbird
Goes on just nightingaling.

Flash Fiction: The Harp’s Voice

I had to skip last week’s #FlashFictionFriday due to being too busy! But I’m back today with a new story set in the Kitty and Cadaver universe! Here you meet Perdita, who is mentioned in the last chapter of Kitty and Cadaver, and Perdita’s friend Tristen.

Tristen is in part inspired by my good friend Anniene Stockton, who (like Tristen) broke her leg badly while performing. Anniene and I talked about Tristen a good while ago, and finally I’ve had a chance to write her! One day, Tristen and Perdita will appear in a second Kitty novel!

The other prompts for this story came from Alexx on Fire (“a small round pebble”) and Bakersttardis . (the photo of the cottage). Thank you both, and please follow me on Twitter if you want to prompt next Thursday for the Friday story!

The Harp’s Voice

A clink against glass startled Tristen from her doze. She rubbed her eyes and blinked at the dying fire. The midnight chill was creeping in through the windowpane, under the front door, and would soon be coming down the chimney if she let that fire go out.

The sound that woke her forgotten, Tristen pushed aside the blanket across her knees and reached for one of her forearm crutches. With it, she heaved herself up and balanced on the leg not embraced by the laced leather calliper. The brace ended in a boot, also tightly laced.

Tristen was glad her grandmother slept. Grandma Hazel meant well, but she was annoyingly prone to acting like Tristen couldn’t do things for herself. Now, with a few well practiced manoeuvres, Tristen bent to the wood basket, selected some lighter faggots of wood and dropped them over the grate into the fire. She basked in the growing heat before adding a larger piece.

A repeat of the clink against glass drew her eyes towards the array of little square windows. With a hop, she turned towards it.

Another clink. Tristen took up her second crutch, went to the window and unlatched it just as another small round pebble was dropped against the pane.

A raven stood on the window sill. It shook its feathers huffily and cocked its head to give Tristen a beady eye.

‘Perdita! You’ve been ages.’ Tristen ushered the bird in with concern.  ‘Fire’s up again. Let me get you some fruit.’

‘I’d prefer meat,’ said Perdita, a corvid croak to her perfect English. She flew close to the fireplace and spread her wings out to gather in its growing heat before settling to clean her feathers.

‘So would I, but fruit is what I have.’ Tristen cut a ripe persimmon into small pieces for her companion. ‘Did you find anything?’

‘Apart from the fact that it’s c-c-c-cold out there?’

‘Very funny.’

‘I could tell you better if I had some meat.’

‘I’ll fry you up some bacon when we’re back home.’

Perdita hopped on the spot and flapped her wings in a decidedly approving manner. ‘Well, the auguries were right. I met a bat who is not a bat.’

‘Oh, terrific.  I don’t suppose we’re lucky enough that it’s a vampire or a familiar?’

‘Alas, no. This bat speaks for Hoor.’

‘Speaks for or looks for?’

‘Both?’

‘Did Asgard send it?’

‘I don’t think so. It brings a message but the little fellow seems to act alone.

‘You are being unnecessarily cryptic.’

The raven cocked her head again, and Tristen knew Perdita was laughing at her.

‘All right, so you’re a talking raven and guardian of Hoor’s prison, and you are in fact necessarily cryptic. Perhaps we can skip to the chase?’

The window rattled, loud and hard, with the unmistakable sound of wings beating against the glass.

Perdita flew immediately up to perch on the back of the chair in which Tristen had earlier fallen asleep. ‘Bugger. I told it to wait outside.’

Tristen limped to the chair to retrieve her other crutch and then moved, more nimbly than expected, to the other side of the room where she’d left her small lyre harp. Her much larger, much older harp was at home in Mile End, but Tristen took this sweet little instrument wherever she went, slung across her body in the leather sling she’d made for it. She put it on now as the rattling ceased.

‘Where did it go?’

Perdita flew to the closed window and placed her eye to it. ‘Gone. Not away, alas, it… oh dear.’ The raven twisted her neck to look… upwards. ‘Does your grandmother have a fire in her grate upstairs?’

Tristen gave time for one very expressive swear word  and sat down so she had her hands free for the harp.

She swore again when her grandmother came down the stairs, a bat hanging from the front of her nightdress.

‘Tristen. This little beast came down my chimney. It’s demanding an audience.’

‘Grandma…’

‘I knew you weren’t here for just a visit.’

‘Sorry, Grandma. The leaves warned that a portent would manifest at the cottage. I wanted to make sure you were all right.’

‘You wanted to see what was coming.’

 ‘I can do  both.’

 ‘You can’t. You smashed your leg to bits and now you have to sit at home and leave the minstrel work to others.’

Grandma Hazel never could get her head around the fact that disability didn’t mean no ability. Tristen had worked hard to maintain dexterity of a different kind and to hone her music magic. It was one reason she’d moved out of her grandmother’s house to her own place ten years ago.

Her grandma’s disdainful gaze fell on the bat. The bat’s gaze was just as baleful in return.

‘I’ll banish you,’ Grandma Hazel told it. Tristen wished it were that easy.

‘Why have you come?’ Tristen asked the bat. ‘Did you come to free Hoor?’

Perdita flew across the room, cawing a warning to the bat, before alighting on the top of the harp.

The bat released the old lady’s nightwear and flapped to the carpet by Tristen’s feet.

Once upon a time, Tristen had been an acrobat. She had danced across narrow surfaces, balanced like this raven upon the crown of the harp. When she fought the creatures of darkness, she was so fast, so clever, that the darkness told stories about her. Her minstrel magic had been expressed through movement and through the closest a human being could come to flying.

And then she had fought where she couldn’t win. She’d fallen and shattered the magic right out of her bones, so she’d thought. Her grandparents had decided to leave the carnival life to care for her, in this peculiar little cottage, with its thatched roof and all its family secrets.

Tristen had thought she might wither and die of loneliness and sorrow, but Grandpa Silas had made a harp for her and during that long year of healing, she’d learned a lot of things. She’d learned to channel her magic through the strings of her instrument. She’d learned to walk, with her bad leg laced into the leather brace, and the two crutches on her forearms.

She’d learned new ways to fight.

Tristen ran her fingers across the strings. The larger harp would be better for this, but she could manage with this, she supposed. She began to pluck a melody, then the harmonies. She sang, crooning to the strings and the air and the messenger on the floor, building a bridge.

Listen, listen I will tell you
Speak, speak, I will hear you
These words of mine
Become thoughts of thine
And thy will speaks to me too.

The bat squeaked. Tristen played and the squeaks became words in the air, following the melody.

I am come from Asgard.
I fear Váli ’s heart so hard.
He swears revenge still upon
The grieving, unforgiven one
My winter master, Hoor.

Tristen and Perdita knew the story. Loki had tricked Hoor into killing his brother Baldr. Vali was born and grew in a day, his sole purpose to avenge Baldr’s death. Deceived and grieving Hoor had been trapped hundreds of years ago in an earthen pot, preventing him from destroying the world with a never-ending winter. Perdita was the latest in a line of long-lived ravens who made sure that Hoor could not escape until called to Ragnarok. Tristen and the messenger sang bursts to each other, and it became clear that the bat came with a warning of his own.

Unseasonable, the seasons be
The frost and the sun confused be
The shape of winter
The blooms of spring
May, tangled, set the beloved killer free.

Global warming was more dangerous than Greta kept telling everyone. Tristen wasn’t sure what she and Perdita could do about that, except to be more vigilant and try to speak to the ancient one, the true guardian of the prisoner, who lived in the Thames. The last thing anyone needed was for Hoor to escape and for his inconsolable mourning to doom everyone to frostbitten death.

Tristen did her best to sing her thanks for the warning.

‘Open the door the Grandma,’ she said at last.

Grandma opened the front door and the bat launched itself into the winter night.

‘Bloody Asgard,’ grumbled the old lady. ‘I wish they wouldn’t bother you with it. You’re done with all that magic now.’

Tristen was the very opposite of “done with all that magic”. Her Mile End community depended on her. ‘Perdita’s the sky guardian,’ was all she said.

Grandma eyed the bird grimly. ‘Is Vali coming to claim Hoor, then?’

‘Not yet. But we have to keep him sleeping in the river, for everyone’s protection.’

‘I don’t know how a lame girl and a vain bird are going to achieve that.’

Tristen wasn’t sure either, but she had more faith than Grandma. Grandma had lost most of hers when Black Annis had murdered Grandpa.

‘We’ll manage,’ Tristen said. ‘And I’m not the only Minstrel on the planet. There’ll be help if I need it, I’m sure.’

Like the rumours that Rome’s Burning was changing their name and line-up, now that Alex and Kurt had died. She’d best make sure she had the bass player’s number on speed-dial, though.

Just in case.

The story of Hoor is told in a short story that appears in Scar Tissue and Other Stories.