THE ALARM By Harris Tobias

The Alarm



A terrible clanging in the middle of the night roused me from my bed. I put on some clothes and hurried into the street there to mingle with my bleary eyed neighbors. At first we thought it was a fire but there was no smoke or flame to be seen. We stood in the cold and beat our arms, the cold air made ghosts of our breath. The clanging didn’t let up so we traced it to its source. It came from the old tower on the edge of the village. The rough stone structure had stood there for as long as the village itself. Silent, locked and largely forgotten it stood watching over the village like a rotten tooth. Its thick oak door locked tight, the key long ago lost. I suppose a monkey or an agile youth could have climbed it but no one bothered that I ever heard of. Now it had suddenly come to life and was sounding an alarm that no one knew what for.

“There is one who might remember,” said the mayor, “Old Havermeyer, the beggar.” So we hurried over to his hut and shook him from his slumber. Old Havermeyer was so old that he was almost completely blind and deaf. He lived in poverty in a tiny shack on the edge of the village. Subsisting on handouts and the begrudging charity of the village’s wealthy merchants. He hadn’t heard the alarm and didn’t understand what we were so excited about. So we got him dressed and brought him to the tower and placed his hands on the oaken door so he could feel the vibrations. Only then did realization dawn on his wrinkled face.

“Ah,” he said. “the tower. The alarm sounds. The dragon wakes. We must flee.”

This statement caused no end of confusion amongst the good people of the village. Our village was prosperous and peaceful, unused to emergencies of any kind. “What dragon?” many villagers wanted to know. “There are no dragons,” said others. “Superstitious nonsense,” interjected the more educated. The incessant clanging continued shouting out all reason and rational thought, so we hurried away to the school house where we could hear ourselves think. We stamped the snow off our boots and lit the stove and soon we could hear old Havermeyer tell what he remembered of the tower, the alarm and the dragon.

“When I was a boy,” he spoke in a weak quavering voice we had to strain to hear, “my grandfather told me that his grandfather helped build the tower. In those days the dragon would come every few years and lay waste to half the village. It would fly in like a great winged bird spitting fire, trample the crops and eat the peasants. It was a force of nature. Nothing and no one could stop it. The only way they knew to save themselves was to give it gold. All the gold. For if any of us held back, the dragon would know and its vengeance would be swift. Dragon’s love gold more than anything and, when they wake, they are hungry for it.”

“These are only old stories to scare the children,” said the mayor. “It’s been over two hundred years since your grandfather’s time and no one has ever seen or heard of a dragon. It’s all nonsense I tell you.”

“Well those old stories scared me plenty,” said the old man. “I for one have never forgotten them. They say a buried chain connects the tower to the dragon. One end is fastened to the bell and the other to the dragon’s leg. When the dragon stirs, the bell rings. It gives us time to get away or get our gold together whichever way we decide to save ourselves from ruin.”

This was just too much for many villagers to absorb. The whole idea of a fire breathing dragon in this modern age was ridiculous.

“I’m not going to flee my home or lose my fortune because of a bunch of old legends,” was the general consensus. Or on the say so of a senile old man was the unspoken subtext. But the seed of fear and doubt had been planted.

“Do as you see fit,” said the old man. “My time in this world is nearly done. I’m too old to flee and I have no gold. I’ll stay and share your fate. I’m curious to know if the old stories are true.” And on this ominous note old man Havermeyer closed his eyes and said no more. At that moment the incessant clanging from the tower stopped, just as suddenly as it began. The sudden silence struck us all as louder and more worrisome than all the clamor, for it meant that the dragon, or whatever it was, had either gone back to sleep or had broken the chain and was awake.

We were a tired and nervous bunch as we shuffled back to our homes. The sky was already beginning to lighten in the East and we hurriedly agreed to meet again at noon the next day. “Come to the village office,” said the mayor, “after we have had some time to think about what to do.” The mayor was a good man. A widower and my only real friend. He was respected by the villagers but not loved. I don’t know if there village had much love to spare.

*

The next day dawned bright and clear. What ever sense of gloom and disaster remained from the night before was drowned out by a cloudless blue sky and a bright yellow sun. We joked and laughed at our fear as we went about our morning chores. Someone pointed to the mountain that towered above the village. It was ringed by clouds or was it dragon smoke? The townsfolk eyed their mountain nervously as if at any moment that old familiar friend might visit flaming death upon them.

That morning the children went off to school; the mill wheel turned and the blacksmith’s hammer rang out. It was all so normal, the way it had always been, except there was an undertone of fear and apprehension that infused our every move.

At noon we all gathered at the mayor’s office to discuss further what, if anything, we should do. Suggestions ranged from taking down the tower to digging into the village archives for more information. Some villagers thought the whole thing was a hoax and others thought we ought to gather our gold together just in case.

Finally, the mayor stood up and spoke. “What we have here is a classic puzzle,’ he said to the crowded room. “There’s no denying that the alarm we heard was real. What we don’t know is what it really means.” We all looked at each other and nodded. At last someone was speaking sense. “The oldest man in the village remembers stories about a dragon and the old tower built as an alarm. No one knows if that is true. I propose we send someone into the mountains to seek out this dragon, if indeed there really is one.” This suggestion was met with general agreement.

“Furthermore,” continued the mayor when the hub-bud died down, “I also recommend we gather our gold and jewels together just in case the dragon proves real. That way we can buy him off and save our lives and property. If there is no dragon, we have lost nothing. If there is, we have saved everything.”

The village rose to its feet as one and applauded the mayor’s good sense. The mayor asked for volunteers to go into the mountains and seek out the dragon’s lair. The room grew very quiet and no one stepped forward.

“In that case I nominate Peer Hansel,” exclaimed the mayor. Every eye in the room turned to look at me for Peer Hansel is my name. I blushed scarlet and bowed my head. My nomination was quickly seconded and I was chosen unanimously.

In many ways I was the logical choice for so dangerous a mission. I was unmarried, childless and a relative new comer having lived in the village for only twenty years. Not only that, but I often spent weeks alone in the mountains writing and gathering herbs. I knew the mountains better than most and I was the most expendable. As a bachelor in a village filled with families I was always a bit of a social outcast. The matchmaker had long ago given up trying to match me with any of the village widows and spinsters. So I accepted the mission and told the assembly I would leave immediately. I had never been so popular. My back was slapped and my hand was shaken by neighbors who hadn’t spoken to me in years.

“We will gather our gold and jewels here,” said the mayor. “I, myself, will record your donations. Everything will be returned when the crisis is over. Bring everything you have. Remember what the old man said about hoarding.”

I went home and packed my rucksack and my blanket and headed out for the long march into the hills. It was fine weather and I made good time. As I climbed, the hills grew steep and the trees thinned until I was above them. I could see the great mountain ahead and my tiny village far below. I thought about how I lived there for so long and yet was not accepted as one of them. How willing they were to send me off to find their dragon but not willing to invite me into their homes. They were a small minded, superstitious lot, cruel and stingy they distrusted everyone including each other. I thought about what I was doing. They thought I was brave. Maybe I was. I loved being out in the wilderness and looked forward to spending a couple of peaceful nights under the stars.

*

After three days, I stumbled into the village a soiled and ragged mess. My clothes charred and my hair smoking. I announced to the council that it was all true. “After a hard march, I stumbled upon the dragon’s lair. I was frightened and when the creature saw me, I was nearly devoured on the spot.” The council gasped and sat in stunned silence as I told my tale. “It was the closest of calls. The dragon is bigger and more fierce than anything I could imagine. It has been sleeping for 200 years and it is hungry. It plans to ravage the village, devour us all and burn our homes to the ground.” The fear in the room was a physical thing.

Only one councilman had the wit to ask, “You spoke with it? It can speak?”

“Oh yes. It speaks all right and it spouts fire with every breath.” Here I rolled up my sleeve and showed them my fire singed arm. They all gasped as one.

“How much time do we have? Did you tell it about the gold? What will become of us?” Now the whole group was speaking at once. they were panicked and afraid as well they should be.

“Order. Order,” cried the mayor and pounded the table. “Let the man speak.”

“I told the beast about the gold and pleaded for our lives. Old man Havermeyer was right— only gold can distract the dragon from its hunger. I told it we would give it all the gold and jewels we had if only it would leave us alone.”

“Yes. Yes,” they cried as one. “Give it the gold and let it leave us alone. Let it sleep for another 200 years.”

“I can take the gold to the dragon as I know the way. How much is there? Can I carry it myself?”

“Just a minute,” said the mayor. “The gold is my responsibility and there is far too much for one man to carry. I shall go with you and make sure everything is as you say.”

“Very well,” I said. There was that old note of distrust I had always felt in this town. The mayor refused to meet my gaze. He divided the gold into two heavy sacks which we placed on a wooden sleigh. We bid the frightened villagers farewell and headed out to bargain for the village’s safety. it was already late in the day. Thankfully there was a full moon to light our way. We didn’t stop to make camp. Our sense of urgency kept us going all night long.

We trudged up into the hills, retracing the way I had been a few days before. We climbed above the tree line and looked back on the sleeping village. Around midnight we changed course and headed toward the pass between the mountains. The snow was deep and the going rough. We had not spoken to each other the entire way. Talking took all our strength to drag the heavy sled through the snow. I was tired and the mayor was nearly exhausted being older and sorely out of shape. We were forced to stop and rest many times. When we reached the pass we continued over it and headed down the other side until we reached a fork in the road. There we stopped to rest.

“Did you remember to pay the boy who rang the bell?” I asked. The Mayor nodded. “How about old Havermeyer? Did you pay him for his story?”

“I did everything you asked my friend,” the mayor said getting to his feet. He slung his heavy sack over his shoulder. “Well Peer,” he said offering me his hand. “We are both rich men now, just as you predicted. The villagers will assume the dragon ate us and took the gold. They will be grateful for the peace it has brought them. Enjoy your wealth and may we meet again someday though I doubt it.”

He went to the left toward Urchin and Samarkand, I went right toward Persia and Damascus. The mayor was right. We would never meet again.

BIO:
Harris Tobias was raised by robots disguised as New Yorkers. Despite an awkward childhood he learned to read and write. To date Mr. Tobias has published two detective novels, The Greer Agency and A Felony of Birds, to critical acclaim. In addition he has published short stories in Down in the Dirt Magazine, Literal Translations, Electric Flash and Ray Gun Revival. He currently lives and writes in Charlottesville, Virginia.

HERO OF THE DAY By Michael S. Collins

Hero of the Day


Well, here’s my fairy tale. I hear they are all the rage these days. This one is an old story, but no one has ever heard it from my perspective before, and since I was the hero of the show that seems a strange enigma that needs overturned. So here I am, all words on the page to give you my version of events, that dark day in history when the grizzled, evil beast stole away Belle to his tower.

Her father had three daughters, all of whom would have been the prettiest face at any given dance, but of all of them, Belle shone the best. Her radiant, glowing, smiling face is one I remember well. The father had been a big shot merchant in the district, until his merchandise sunk to the bottom of the Atlantic. After that, he was just another failed money man, plying his trade as a farmhand to try and get the bread on his table. Not a very good farm hand, I hear, but he was reasonably well liked in the area, so I guess that’s Farmer Williams sympathy for you.

His daughters strove to keep up his spirits, and helped bring messages to and fro the town for a tidy sum. I would occupy the eldest two as newspaper deliverers, but I must admit, it was the youngest I had my eye on. Innocently, of course, she was fourteen back then, but she would have made a fine wife for someone in time. You could sense that in her. And with her innocent charms and wide-eyed niceness, she had the eyes of the village on her.

It was three years after the ships went down that The Incident went down. The father had heard word that the shipwreck of one of his cargos had been found, and the cargo retrieved. At once he set off for Calais to see how much was salvageable. He never returned for a month. His daughters, all of them, were getting worried. Then suddenly he was back, and in that same instance, Belle was gone. Vanished in the blink of an eye.

Naturally, I was worried. This was no age for a girl to go wandering off in the middle of the forest. But as weeks went by, we began to realise just how serious the situation was. Until Belle’s father finally broke down and told us all the horrible truth: Belle was taken away by a hideous brute of a monster, who lived in a Castle somewhere five miles east of our village.

At this point, I could take no more.

We were in the tavern when I made my stand with the locals. It was a Friday, the beer was flowing mournfully, and people sat about disenfranchised instead of deciding on plans to save the day. That was my jurisdiction. I stood on top of the nearest table and banged my beer mug off the ceiling to get silence.

“Men, and womenfolk”, I said. “Let’s be under no illusions that the fate of Belle is a tricky one. Some foul wretch has stolen her away from our midst, from the protective arms of her father, and we must do something about it.”

“What can we do?” came the cry from the bar. Little Tommy, no doubt.

“Well, we can’t just stand around here moping and hope that one day she was turn up. We can’t just sit around here and make it someone else’s problem. Belle was one of our own, therefore her kidnapping is our problem, and we need to get her back.”

A murmur of support began to rise up from the rest.

“What I suggest is we set up a militia, of our strongest bodied men, ride into the depths of the forest, find the Castle, kill this demonic imbalanced creature, and save our Belle from the Hell she is no doubt in!”

An uneasy silence filled the room, broken by Timmy, Tommy’s brother.

“Well, sure”, he said, “I’d love to join this little Militia of yours. Only, I think I left the gas on.”

Laughter, from every portion of the room, in response to him. It filled every essence of my soul, and anger burned up in me.

“This isn’t funny!” I yelled. “If you are not with me, then I’ll have to do it myself.”

“Look, Gary”, replied Timmy. “We are all with you, in spirit, but that forest is dangerous. All kinds of wild animals live in there. And we have no idea of where this Castle actually is. It’d be a fool’s errand.”

“Fine”, I said. “I’ll go myself, and I will find Belle, slay this vampiric disease, and then I intend to marry Belle.”

I dropped back down to the floor and was on the way out of the door, my hand resting on my trusty sword, when Timmy put his arm out.

“I don’t want to see you going out into the unknown like this, Gary.” He said. “I’ll go with you.”

Old friends. You can always count on them in the end.

Together we rode through that evil forest, heading east, all kinds of hideous monstrosities attacking in the rare instances our guard was down. Snakes and wild boars and cats and animals you would never believe in. The forest is a home to all kinds of hibernating deadliness.

And then we found the Castle. Weeks after the trek had started. The quest.

“Cyclopean leviathan, we have found you at last” I said, starring up into the vertigo inducing towers. We stormed over the drawbridge, but then disaster struck. Timmy died. I’m not really sure what happened, what dark forces the evil at the heart of this stone asylum had used, but he was dead. And I was on my own. I let him drop slowly to the ground, and grabbed my sword tightly in caution.

I knocked on the large oak front door.

A voice called out from the other side.

“State your name, occupation and business being here” it said.

“Gary Gaston, tailor, heroic quest.”

“Very well” said the voice. It sounded bored, but the door swung open. The servant the voice belonged to welcomed me in.

“I hope you had a trouble-less journey” he said. “Now, what is this heroic quest you are on?”

“To save the lady Belle from your evil clutches” I cried and stabbed him through the heart.

He yelped in pain. At this point I realised he was actually invisible, but not to worry, I got him anyway. You never know, that servant could easily have been Timmy’s killer.

Inside the castle, were books everywhere. Shelves of books rising up to the ceilings on every side, and the ceiling were ten men high at the very least. A librarian’s wet dream. I strode up the stairs, dispatching demonic invisible servant after demonic invisible servant, and finally I found myself in the bedroom.

There was the grotesque gargoyle in all his wickedness, draped across a chair. He acted like a King lion regal. And sitting next to him, laughing, in some form of ecstatic joy over a terrible joke, was Belle. The object of my quest. Having fun. She was meant to be suffering and being tortured to make my heroic saving of her from the hands of desperate destitution and criminal civility all the more heroic. Instead she was here, laughing her head off, seemingly having the time of her life. Clearly, she was brainwashed. I could stand it no longer.

“Monster, rise and face your enemy” I yelled.

They both turned around.

“What is the meaning of this?” said the creature. His voice boomed out over the room, and echoed down the stairs and along the castles Cyclopean walls.

“Gary, what in Hell's name are you doing here?” said Belle. She seemed surprised by the appearance of her knight in shining victory.

“I am here to save you from foulest Hellspawn” I cried aloud. Impressively.

“And where would that be?” she said.

“Why, right here!” I cried.

The monster rose to his feet.

“I’m afraid I have to ask you to leave.” He said. “You will upset my wife.”

“WIFE?” I yelled.

“That’s me” said Belle.

I could take this slight no longer. I lunged forward and plunged my sword into the deep abscesses of horror that was his chest. Blood began bubbling out of a wide wound, and he sunk to the ground. Easily defeated. It was now that I could triumphantly take Belle home.

Only she wasn’t happy to see me. She was screaming, and screaming, and screaming. And fawning over the body of the dead villain, and crying, like a woman in deep mourning would. And she pushed me away when I went over to see how she was, and ask why she was crying. Strange, women always do weird things at the moment of success.

It was as I was thinking this that she began to attack me, with a fury gained straight from the bowls of Lucifer itself. Unwomanly power. She was a possessed harlot. I struggled from the blows, and fought to defend myself, but then, it was not to worry, as she died. These things happen.

Belle was dead, but at least the foul monster of Hades was defeated. I think, as heroes go, that was a pretty good job on my part.

It was then that there was the knock on the door. I waited patiently for a servant to answer the door, until I realised that I had rid this world of them. So I went down and answered the door.

Two policemen stood on the front door. They were dressed in the Metropolitan Police’s finest outfits.

“Excuse me, Sir”, said the first one, “We’ve had reports of a disturbance.”

“A disturbance?” I said.

“Yes, Mr Gaston, a disturbance. We had reports from the pub that you had gotten drunk and started yelling out abuse against your ex-wife. Then you and Mr Granger set off to her house to ‘sort out that husband of hers’.”

“That’s not quite true”, I said. “I had a heroic quest to fulfil.”

“We have found Mr Granger dead in the driveway, stabbed to death with a kitchen knife. Attempts to raise Mrs Beast’s parents have been thwarted. Tell me, Mr Gaston, where is the homeowner and your ex?”

I shrugged. “They are upstairs”, I said.

I never understood why so many police showed up so fast. Why they surrounded the streets and looked at me with a mixture of loathing and fear. I accepted the handcuffs without any debate. The charges happened without my understanding, and the judge put me down for life. I still don’t understand it, to be honest. What a way to treat a hero! I rid my village of that evil scum. So what if my village was London, and my forest, in reality, Hyde Park. It still counts. I still succeeded. Nothing could ever have thwarted me in that heroic quest to save my Belle from the clutches of bestial viciousness. And I did. In death, she was saved. And that was all me. I am a hero, you see. That’s what we heroes do. Save folk.

There’s an old saying around here, that Beauty killed the beast. And if you ask me, that beast killed beauty, because she was dead to me when she started going out with him. This was my fairy tale. I don’t quite agree with how the end turned out. Seemed far better when I was going over it. The Beauty didn’t kill the beast. I killed the Beauty. To save her. Because everyone needs saving, in the end.

It was a mercy. She’d have thanked me if she could. I know this. I believe this. Trust me, I am an honourable man.

Just, don’t look at me like that. With those critical eyes, through the bars of my cell. Don’t look at me like that! Like I’m some sort of serial killer. I’m not a serial killer, for gods’ sakes, I’m a hero!

SWEET THINGS by Lou Treleaven

A warm TKnC welcome to Talkbacker, Lou, with something a bit different...

Sweet Things

I love sweet things. Goodies, tasty morsels, delicious little treats. A fairy cake here. An iced doughnut there. I deserve it, with what I have to put up with.

When I met Gustaf, I knew straight away what sort he was. A plain Madeira, reliable but boring with a tendency to go crumbly with age. He was rich, which was the icing on the cake. And he was desperate to get married, which was the cherry. He had been married before, you see, with two children who needed a mother. Not that he told me that. I only found out when he produced four airline tickets for the honeymoon.

He had been scared, he confided. Scared I would refuse him if I knew. I was too beautiful for a man like him and he had hardly believed his luck when I had shown an interest. The fool didn’t realise I only wanted him for his money. Well, as the saying goes, a fool and his money are soon parted. But before I had got half the surgical procedures I’d planned, Gustaf lost everything on the stock market and soon we were living in a two bedroom shack in the middle of nowhere while Gustaf pottered around pretending to be a groundsman.

Me, the Queen of Tarts (read that any way you like), married to a woodcutter and dragging up two brats like a wicked stepmother.

I wasn’t having it, not one bite.

The children were the sort of annoying little cupcakes everyone coos over. They sickened me with their creamy youth. The boy, Hansel, was tall but still rather stringy for my tastes, but the girl would soon be rising to womanhood and bringing the photograph of her dead mother on the mantelpiece to life before my eyes.

That picture. That picture. The beautiful wife who never aged. I smashed it one day in a fit of rage. Gretel burst into tears but Hansel simply picked the photo out of the shattered glass and said, “She doesn’t need props to make her beautiful.”

I knew what he meant. It was at that moment that I made up my mind. I put an arm around them both. “Oh my poor little ones. Let me be your mother now. I want us to get to know each other more. Why don’t we go for a picnic in the woods together?”

Now I knew Hansel and Gretel wouldn’t be keen on the idea. Firstly, they hated me, and secondly they were afraid of the woods and never went in there if they could help it. There were rumours that a witch lived there who caught children and ate them. Where that all started I don’t know.

Before the brats could disagree, I grabbed a basket and called out to Gustaf that I was taking his delicious darlings for a special treat. Gustaf was delighted. He stood in the broken pieces of his wife’s photo frame and waved us off with tears of joy in his eyes.

Poor, besmitten Gustaf.

I led the children into the woods, turning left and right and doubling back until they had no idea which way we had come. I had grown familiar with the little tracks and pathways recently, however. I stopped at a clearing and threw down the picnic basket.

“Unpack this,” I ordered Gretel. “I’ll go and find some sticks to make a nice little fire.”

“There are sticks here, Stepmother,” pointed out Hansel.

I gritted my teeth in irritation “Yes, but these are damp. I’ll find some much better ones. Just stay here and unpack the picnic.”

I walked off laughing quietly to myself. There was nothing in the basket but a stale loaf of bread. It might keep them alive for a few days but there were plenty of creatures in the forest who preferred meat to bread. As I crept back towards the house I couldn’t help rubbing my hands together with glee.

I saw a number of shiny white pebbles dotted along the track but thought nothing of it until later when Gustaf and I were enjoying a romantic meal back at the shack. I had to make him fall in love with me even more, so that when he heard of his children’s tragic deaths in the forest he would be so blinded by love he would not think to blame me.

“Hello Stepmother.”

I nearly choked on my leg bone when I heard Hansel’s voice.

“I just wanted to say thank you,” he continued. “For the picnic.”

“Good,” I said, finally managing to swallow.

Hansel’s face was as stony as the trail of pebbles he had left. “And the extra time in the forest by ourselves.”

“Glad you enjoyed it.” I smiled at him mirthlessly. “We must do it again some time.”

Hansel left the room and Gustaf grasped my hand and kissed it passionately. “I never thought such a beautiful woman would ever agree to be my wife,” he gushed. “But to see you be a mother to my children as well, especially in these hard times we must share together – it’s just the –“

“Icing on the cake,” I cooed lovingly. “We’ll go again tomorrow.”

And so we did. The children were even more reluctant but Gustaf insisted. It made him happy, he said, to see his little honeybuns with a new mother. Mother? I nearly choked with disgust at the word as I hurried them away into the leafy darkness.

This time we walked twice as fast as before. There were no pebbles to guide them home now, I made sure of that. We found a new clearing where the trees stood round like candles on a cake.

“I’m going to get some wood,” I said. “Hansel, Gretel –“

“Yes, we know,” said Hansel.

On the way home I noticed that somebody had carelessly dropped pieces of bread all along the path. I whistled and threw a few pieces up in the air. Soon the path was full of twittering, squabbling birds. Such a shame to waste food, I always think.

When I got back to the shack I prepared another delicious meal for Gustaf. The sort of meal which would make a husband swear never to leave his wife. He got so drunk on homemade wine, he didn’t remember to ask about the children until the following day.

“The naughty things refused to come home with me,” I sobbed. “And now they’ve probably been gobbled up by wild animals!”

I knew Gustaf would want to search the wood. I insisted on giving him a drink for the shock first. Then another, and another. When the crying finally stopped I slipped out. I had to be sure the brats were stripped of their meat, one way or the other.

They had found the house, my other house in the woods. My fantasy. It hadn’t taken them long, once they had given up trying to get home. The smell had probably driven them to it. Nothing like the smell of gingerbread when you’re starving.

That devil Hansel had eaten half the roof and Gretel the window frames by the time I got there. I shoved Hansel in a cage to fatten him up, but Gretel was already ripe and so I told her of my intentions.

“Show me the oven,” she said, no doubt intending to sound brave, so I did. My lovely, huge oven, big enough to cook anyone who wandered into the woods unprepared. When I told Gretel where our household meat had been coming from, she didn’t believe me. I put my head inside, just to show her, and the cursed creature pushed me in like I was a Christmas cake. She cranked the oven up high, that girl, burning me from the outside in. I only escaped with my life because the timer was faulty.

It took me two days to crawl back to the house where my husband was waiting for me. Every movement was a torture. Half my face and most of my fingers and toes were burnt off. I was blackened and charred, a neglected piece of meat.

“What have you done to the children?” he yelled.

“What have they done to me, you mean!” I shouted back. “Look at me. I’m ruined!”

“They said you planned to... to eat them.” Stunned at his own words, Gustaf staggered a little and steadied himself against the wall.

“So what if I did? It’s your fault. I would have been content with plastic surgery but you had to go and lose all our money. I had to go back to my old ways. Did you want a wife who looked like an old crone? I need meat, Gustaf! Human meat! It keeps me beautiful. And you want me to be beautiful, don’t you?” I advanced on Gustaf, who backed away. “You would give me your children if it kept me beautiful, wouldn’t you?”

Incredibly, the silly fool looked like he was about to agree. Desire, confusion and self-loathing flashed across his face. Then he broke down in tears. “They’ve gone,” he sobbed. “They blamed me and left. You’re all I’ve got, and look at you!”

“Yes, look at me,” I said. “And you’re all I’ve got. I’d say you’re nearly ready now, too. The oven here isn’t as big as the one at the gingerbread house, but after all, you are a woodcutter and there’s a very big axe in the shed. If I can’t have your money, I’ll have my beauty back.”

And I did.

So beware, my dears. Beware of second marriages and wicked stepmothers and old women who live in the woods. But most of all, beware of sweet things.

I was a sweet thing once, you know.


BIO:
www.loutreleaven.wordpress.com

LOST CAUSE by Vallon Jackson

LOST CAUSE

“So what are you thinking of charging her with, Constable?”

“I want to throw the book at her this time, Sarge. She can’t keep on getting away with it all the time.”

“The judge takes one look at her and he’ll throw the case out.”

“Don’t let the blond curls and cutsey turned-up nose fool you, Sarge. She’s a bad one, alright. This is the third time that we’ve had her in here this month.”

“I agree that it’s time we started looking at some sort of intervention. Before she gets out of hand and does some real harm. But-”

“Burglary with intent...is that not bad enough?”

“OK, slow down, Constable. Before we get her out of the cell I want the full facts.”

“She broke into the house, Sarge and...”

“Wait a minute. She broke in?”

“Well, not exactly. Door was open, but that’s beside the point. She still entered a dwelling as a trespasser with the intent to cause damage or to steal. That’s as good as burglary when you go by the definition...”

“Don’t start quoting definitions at me, son. I’ve forgotten more definitions than you’ll ever know.”

“Sorry, Sarge.”

“Carry on, and let’s keep this brief shall we? There’s no solicitor here, just us real men.”

“OK, well, she broke..eh, entered this house when the owners were out. She went all the way through the place, broke a chair, ate some food.”

“And that’s where you’re getting the criminal damage and theft angle from?”

“Well, yes, Sarge. It’s right isn’t it?”

“In a way, yes. What does the Crown Prosecution Service say?”

“I haven’t consulted with them, yet. I trust your opinion, Sarge.”

“Huh...you were trying to tell me my job a minute ago.”

“I know. I was over-stepping the mark. Sorry, Sarge, I just don’t want to let the little bitch get away with it again.”

“Language, Constable. You know that’s not the way I run my custody suite. Now, carry on. What else did she do?”

“Well, apparently bounced on every bed in the house and then...”

“Don’t tell me. She didn’t defecate in the bed again?”

“Not this time, Sarge. No. She just lay down and went to sleep.”

“...and that’s how you caught her?”

“Yes, Sarge. Mr and Mrs Bruin came home and there she was. All tucked up like there was nothing the matter. She hit them with her usual story: y’know the one about being lost?”

“Obviously they didn’t believe her?”

“No, so she just gave them a load of verbals and did a bunk.”

“She did a runner?”

“Yes, but I got her.”

“Good work, Constable.”

“Something else we might want to keep an eye on, Sarge. When they found her she was in the baby’s bed.”

“Was the baby in the bed at the time?”

“Well, no, but you still have to admit it’s a little weird.”

“Weird but not enough to put her on the sex offenders register just yet.”

“I was thinking...”

“Forget it, Constable. We can’t go with that around here. You know that.”

“Sorry, Sarge. I forgot for a minute.”

“Once upon a time it was different...but not now. Any way, never mind. Go bring her from her cell. Maybe you’d better get a female to go with you.”

“I can handle her, Sarge.”

“That’s not my concern. Sweet-looking little thing like that, you know how the defence are: if they think you’ve been in her cell alone? I wouldn’t put it past them to shout sexual assault. Can see the headlines now. And her with that cute little face like butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth...”

“Wasn’t butter, Sarge.”

“Eh?”

“Wasn’t butter she ate, it was breakfast cereal.”

“Ha! Very funny. Just go and get her.”

“Yes, Sarge.”

“Wait on. Before you go...for the charge sheet, how do you spell Goldilocks again?”