Timeless Tales Magazine: Psyche & Cupid

PSYCHE & CUPID

Timeless Tales 6

Editor Tahlia Kirk

www.timelesstalesmagazine.com timelesstalesmagazine@gmail.com

Design and Layout Geoffrey Bunting

004 Blind Archer Kristen Van Blargan 0 1 4 Psyche Complex Sara Moore Wagner 0 2 0 Mixed Blessings Tamara Linden 0 3 6 The Third Task Ayame Whitfield 0 4 2 The Second Helen Margaret Rothrock 0 5 4 Wednesday Man Claudia Quint 0 6 4 River God’s Bride Donald Uitvlugt 0 7 4 Sika Unmasked Jennifer R. Povey 0 8 2 Curious Machinations Alexandra Carcich 0 9 4 Silver Shadows Julie Reeser 1 0 4 Secret Goddess Jude Tulli

Fiction

Words by

Blind Archer

Kristen Van Blargan

About the story

What are the consequences of being praised for one’s beauty?

In mythology, physical attractiveness is often a double-edged sword. Following this tradition, Psyche’s beauty causes her admiration, punishment, and pity throughout the story. And so my retelling draws out this implicitly tragic element, imagining her as an escort who profits from her looks while also wanting to escape their limitations. Another salient theme in the original tale is the way deception manifests itself in romance, portrayed here within the context of modern dating. Viewed through this lens, Apuleius’s Cupid can be seen as a precursor to the act of online catfishing.

Kristen VanBlargan

BLIND_ARCHER

When he asks me why, I want to answer: My parents had three daughters. They called the eldest clever, and she became a doctor. They called the second creative, and she became an artist. They called the youngest beautiful, and she sells love by the hour.

Instead I say, “Because my parents always told me to do what I love.” He quivers as I slide my hand up his thigh.

“And I love nothing more than this.”

“You’re gorgeous,” he says, slipping his fingers through my hair. “A goddess.”

Does he think he is the first man to praise my dew-plump lips, my arched cheekbones, my wasp waist? Or the last to vanish in the morning, leaving only a stack of bills on the nightstand?

I don’t judge him for this. He pays me not to judge.

When it’s over, he falls asleep under the Egyptian cotton sheets and I pick up Gideon’s. Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the LORD, she shall be praised.

The next morning, I wake alone in the hotel room, the Bible still open next to me. My phone beeps.

Sukie71, you have a new message from Blind_Archer!

I had forgotten my OkCupid profile was active. I haven’t responded to a message in months. They all say the same thing: You have the most beautiful smile. Or: Has anyone ever told you how lovely your eyes are? And most often: I could feast on your body for days.

In my dream-weary state I open the message.

Blind_Archer April 2, 6:07 am Dear Sukie, If my instinct is correct—and rarely is it wrong—you have a daring soul. Because such a soul thirsts for adventure, here is a quest: You follow a winding road that splits into three paths.

I can’t remember the last time I received a message longer than a sentence. I move my cursor towards

6 Timeless Tales 6

the exit button. I don’t have time to read it, let alone reply. But before I click out, my eye catches the phrase you have a daring soul, and I decide to keep reading.

The first is brick. You skip down it and, deep in your daydreams, trip over a man reading a book. As a discerning story-lover, you may realize that this man is none other than myself. We try to seem charming yet effortless, exchanging pleasantries that may or may not lead to a date.

The second is asphalt. You run down this path, singing the sweetest song as you flee from me. Since you are the fastest runner in all the land, I cannot catch you. I never hear from you again. Thus the quest ends.

The last path is overgrown, nearly invisible beneath the brush. It is the longest of the three paths, winding far into the horizon, but that is all you know.

Which path do you follow?

You have but one choice, so choose well, -Eric I’ll give Eric credit: he’s piqued my curiosity. I click on his profile, eager to learn what sort of person composes a fairy tale on a dating site.

What I’m doing with my life: I’ve spent most of my twenty-seven years on this earth reading and I see no reason to stop. When my nose isn’t in a book, I’m usually in an ivory tower trying to convince undergraduates to love Yeats as much as I do.

You should message me if: You’re an intelligent, headstrong heroine flaunting her heart like a badge.

His single profile picture shows him reading a book, his back to the camera. I put my phone into my purse next to the money, the fruits of my beauty. But what good is beauty without love?

The next evening, I look at the message again. I should choose the second path, running far away. If I want to go

Timeless Tales 6 7

on a bad date with a faceless man, I might as well get paid for it. And yet I find myself writing back.

Dear Eric, Your instinct is correct. Fun fact: I’ve started a “Quitting My Job to See the World Fund,” but that’s another story.

How could I choose anything other than the unknown path?

You have but one tale, so tell it well, -Sukie I check my inbox every fifteen minutes until I see a response.

Blind_Archer Apr 2, 10:09 pm Dear Sukie, You walk until you reach a blustery gyre. “O, how shall I walk through this wind?” you say, pushed back by the zephyrs, and take shelter under a tree.

“Fair maiden,” whistles the wind from above, “let my sisters help you.” You look up and realize it is not the wind but a lark. Thirty larks fly around you, protecting you from the windstorm as you move through.

You continue your journey and reach the end of the path on Saturday at the corner of Elizabeth & Prince. Inside Mont Noir at half past the eighteenth hour, your suitor awaits you with dinner.

What do you do next? Answer by calling 917-202-7688.

-Eric After I dial the number, a man speaks: Eric Joseph Nabors isn’t here right now, but his disembodied voice is. Leave a message after the beep, and the real Eric will do his best to get back to you.

My heart pounds when I hear the beep. “I go inside,” I say, “conquering any cyclones that stand in my way. I have to meet my sister at 9:30, but otherwise I’m free.” *** 8 Timeless Tales 6

“I’m meeting someone. The reservation is under Eric.”

“He’s waiting for you inside.” The hostess hands me a box.

“For your phone, watch, and anything else that emits light.”

She looks at my perplexed face and says, “You’ll dine in the dark tonight. The servers at Mont Noir are visually impaired and the dinner replicates the experience of blindness.”

Clever, Blind Archer.

As she leads me inside, I realize that I have never known true darkness. Black envelops me, and I cannot see my hands when I place them on the table. “Sukie?” I recognize Eric from the voicemail recording.

“I was hoping to surprise you,” I say. “Guess I wasn’t quiet enough.”

“Darkness heightens the other senses,” Eric says. I worry that he will hear my heart beat. “It’s nice to see you, in a manner of speaking.”

“Likewise. What’s on the menu?”

“It’s a mystery.”

“The unknown path,” I say. “I like it.” When the waitress arrives with our first course, she holds my hand, guiding it to the plate. I pick up a shell and feel the juices dribble down my lips. The brine and butter dampen my tongue.

“What do you think it is?” Eric asks.

“Oysters Rockefeller.”

“You have a good sense of taste.”

“I eat a lot of fancy food as a waitress,” I say, uneasy at the lie. “It’s one of the perks of a job I otherwise hate. But it pays the bills.”

“Sounds like most jobs,” Eric says.

“You’re a literature professor, right? I always thought academia seemed glamorous.”

“Not so much as a newly minted PhD. I was lucky to get a tenure-track job at all.” The second course arrives. “But I’m doing what I love, so I can’t complain.”

I take a bite. A sweet sauce soaks the wild, sumptuous meat. “It’s duck with a port sauce, I think.”

“Impressive,” he says. “But I’d like to hear more about

Timeless Tales 6 9

you and less about the food.”

“Well, I moved to the city after finishing college. I was a history major.”

“I don’t mean your résumé. Let me know what you love, what you hate. Tell me your dreams.”

Under normal circumstances I would be taken aback by his request, but the darkness puts me at ease. So I tell him that I love people and their stories, returning home after a long absence, and the flicker of quiet that follows snowstorms. I hate doubt and regret. And my dreams simmer; they are waiting to thicken and take form. As I speak, his hand finds mine.

Five courses later, we are deep into the bottle of wine. I talk about my fear of moths and earnest love of telenovelas.

He talks about the time he hid from his parents at Coney Island and his plans to hike the Appalachian Trail.

“Would you like another bottle of wine?” the waitress asks.

“I would,” I say, draining my glass, “but I shouldn’t. I’m getting drinks with my sister. Speaking of, what time is it?”

“9:20,” she says.

“I’m running late,” I say to Eric as I stand up. “I’ll have to skip dessert.”

“I’ll tell you about it to the best of my ability,” Eric says.

I hear his chair pull out and his body move towards mine.

His hand grazes the hollow of my cheek, his breath warms my cupid’s bow, and his lips are upon mine.

I have kissed more men than I can count, and yet I feel dazed, dizzy at his intoxicating sweetness. I steady my shaking hands and run them down his slender arms.

Grabbing the small of his back, I pull him towards me. *** Before I go to bed, I look down at my phone and see a new message from Eric.

10 Timeless Tales 6

I had a great time tonight. I told myself I wasn’t going to say this, but I’m crazy about you. You’re the most delightful woman I’ve ever met.

I reply: Right back at you. Let’s meet again soon.

I think about our kiss and try to imagine his face next to mine. It doesn’t matter what Eric looks like. He could be a scaled, winged monster and that wouldn’t change how I feel.

But the next day, I succumb to curiosity and type his name into the search bar of my browser. No results found.

I try different combinations of search terms, but they all lead to cyber dead-ends. So I right-click his profile picture and hit “Search Google for this image.” A stock photo site pops up. Maybe he models on the side, I tell myself.

The breadcrumbs lead me further into the forest. His phone number belongs to a thirty-year-old named Charles Lovelace. When I search this name, I find a biography on a law firm website. Charles lives in Manhattan with his wife and child. My heart aches when I see his sculpted, smiling face.

I dial his number. “Hey, this is a bad time,” he says. “Can I call you back?”

“I just need to ask you one question.” My dread-heavy voice trembles.

“What is it?”

“Is your name really Eric?”

He pauses. “No.” A week goes by, and then a month. I wait for him to call and say, This was but a test, the final task to try your love.

Or even, You’re daring and wonderful and didn’t deserve this. But you understand, don’t you? The exhilaration of becoming someone else? The comfort of darkness?

There is only silence. I’d rather love be blind than mute.

Timeless Tales 6 11

Fiction Blind Archer

About The Author

Raised in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania at the crossroads of Rust Belt decay and Amish country, Kristen VanBlargan currently lives in New York City and writes for a multimedia publisher. She earned a B.A. in English, summa cum laude, from St. Mary’s College of Maryland, where she received departmental honors and wrote her senior thesis on feminist revisions of fairy tales. Following graduation, she was a trivia game show contestant, competitive Scrabble player, and Applebee’s waitress. This is her first published story. You can see more of her work and read her blog at kristenvanb.wix.com/portfolio.

Poetry

Words by

Psyche Complex

Sara Moore Wagner

About the poem

I was falling in love when I wrote this poem. I’ve always been drawn to this myth and its revisions (including CS Lewis’s Til We Have Faces). So many interpretations center on the redemption of Psyche because her rebirth is really the core of the tale. In a moment of chaos before taking the leap into the unknown world of a new relationship, when trying to give a voice to that feeling, I thought of Psyche in her invisible house, with her invisible servants, before she saw the face of Cupid. In this poem, I hope to both develop her as a character, as one whose motivations for holding the flame up to the face of Cupid were not just forced by outsiders. In this way, she has more agency. Her doubt, her disconnection from herself, her loss of self which comes from a deep relationship with anyone (faceless or not), might be the real impetus for her action. This poem is a moment of self-reflection where the reflec-

tion is changed. She has become a part of this invisible world, too.

But, also, the poem is about my own fear of losing myself to love.

In that way, I hope it will touch everyone who has looked in a mirror or a story, seeking themselves.

r e n g a w e r o o m a sar

e h c y Ps x e l p m Co

What if our love is an invisible house.

Here is the porch swing whose only evidence is wind and a high moan. Here is the door I bump into at first, but ever after is like pushing through a cloud. Inside, a simple wooden table or something grander. I’m not sure.

The portraits you hang on the wall are uninterrupted sky.

At night, you say you are so happy. So much has changed for you. All of this.

I think I agree. When I look into the invisible mirror in the hallway, I see something not like myself. Something full of wind and falling leaves.

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Timeless Tales 6 17

Poetry Psyche Complex

About The Author

Sara Moore Wagner teaches writing and literature in the Cincinnati area. Her poetry has appeared in many journals and anthologies including most recently Reservoir, The Wide Shore, The Pittsburgh Review, The San Pedro River Review, The Fox Cry Review, and Arsenic Lobster, and she has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Much of her work plays with integrating folklore of various cultures into the contemporary lyric form. She enjoys music, art, and being near any body of water with her husband Jon and children Cohen and Daisy. You can read more here: saralizmoore.wordpress.com

Fiction

Words by

Mixed Blessings

Tamara Linden

About the story

This was by no means an independent effort on my part. After struggling for two weeks to come up with a unique angle, a conversation with my little sister led to the creation of a society in which status is determined by fertility. After writing several biological improbabilities into the story, a conversation (or three) with an epidemiologist friend of mine led to both a tighter story line and a healthy respect for the value of peer reviewed scientific articles. In developing the world and the characters, my primary goal was to show a different kind of strength in a female character and to reflect the high cost of privilege in a society built on fragile foundations.

Mixed Blessings Tamara Linden

In the beginning, there was fire. Then ice. At last, there was life. The earth gave birth once again to the birds and beasts and, finally, to us, the last and least of her children. Unto all the rest of the world she bestowed her blessings of fertility and abundance, and unto us our penance of struggle and hardship. This is correct. This is just. We brought death to the world.

The words of the Creed rang in my head as I prepared myself for what lay ahead. Today, my eighteenth birthday, marked my entry into womanhood. After tonight, everything would be different.

I had always known that one day it would be my sacred duty to produce a child if I could. If I couldn’t, the honor would fall to my sister. Summer would just love it if I proved barren...and I might. Even our family, who ruled by right of fertility, produced a dry womb now and again. If that dry womb was mine, Summer would take my place—and my throne.

“Rose, it’s time.”

My mother stood in the doorway, behind her my grandmother, my aunt, and three of my cousins—all the mothers of the royal family. Soon, we all devoutly hoped, I would be one of them. *** I was waiting on my bed when my mother came to my chambers to fetch me, as she had every night for the past two months. This time, however, I didn’t rise to greet her but remained seated, my arms wrapped protectively around myself.

“Mother, I don’t want to go.”

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Surprise flickered across my mother’s face. With a practiced gesture, she dismissed my maid Hermia and sat beside me, gently taking my hand in both of hers.

“Did he hurt you?” she asked.

“N-no,” I said uncertainly. “I don’t—but it does hurt!

And, mother, he says the most awful things about—when we’re married. What he’ll do to me.”

“Ignore it,” Mother said. “You know you needn’t marry this man, or the next. You can marry whomever you choose—or not at all. But, darling...you must conceive first.”

I nodded miserably, unable to speak.

“You don’t have to do this,” she said. “You can stop. But is it worth your crown? Your future...your family?”

I shook my head. If I turned my back on the throne, I would be cast out of the royal family and forced to live cloistered in the Temple, bearing children for other people to raise. Even worse, Summer would take my place. Already she used her position as princess, never to help her people, but only to further her own selfish ends. I shuddered to think what she would do as Queen.

Mother patted my hand and shook out the ceremonial robe, holding it out for me. Obediently, I stepped into it and let her tie the sash. I took a deep breath; I squared my shoulders. Mother was right—I couldn’t let a man, no matter how disgusting, make me forget my duty. And yet…

“Mother,” I said. “If he hits me, they’ll send him away?”

“After a flogging, yes.” She studied me, her face impassive.

My belly clenched. I’d seen a flogging once before, when I was very young. The memory still made me sick. But now I had new memories to churn in my stomach and disturb

Timeless Tales 6 23

my sleep. I remembered all too clearly the suffocating pressure of moist flesh on my torso and the awful, dirty pain between my legs. I heard again the sick promises whispered in my ear, felt the puff of foul breath on my cheek, choked on the pervasive, oniony man-stench that lingered even after the ritual bathing.

I’d given this monster two turns of the moon with my body, and by law, I was required to give him three. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t last another night, never mind the whole month. But neither would I give up my crown. I pressed my lips together and nodded once, meeting my mother’s eyes.

“Are you ready?” she asked.

“Yes.” “He’s even uglier than the last one,” Summer informed me. “I saw him.”

I shrugged, wincing at the lingering pain in my neck.

“They all look the same in the dark.”

“Silence,” the priestess barked, and we both bowed our heads once more.

“In the beginning, there was fire…”

I focused my thoughts on the small wooden talisman in my hand as I had been taught and tried to ignore the knot of anxiety growing in my belly. The Temple had allowed me a full turn of the moon to recover from my injuries, but now my reprieve was at an end. It was time to try again.

I swallowed against the sudden rush of saliva in my mouth and breathed deeply. Not all men were horrible. My own father was kind and generous and a good friend to my mother even though she had chosen not to marry him.

Hermia had both a husband and a son, and she certainly

24 Timeless Tales 6

seemed to like them well enough. It would be different this time. It had to be.

I tried to imagine gentle hands and kind eyes. A friendly smile, a soothing voice. But all I could see was pale flesh parting beneath the whip and red blood dripping into the dust. The only hands I felt were his, closing around my throat. *** I waited, shivering in the dark. I wasn’t cold, but I couldn’t stop shaking. It took all my strength simply to remain in the room; composure was out of the question.

“Princess?”

“I’m here,” I said.

“Good,” the voice replied. “Stay there. Don’t touch me.”

“W-what? But—” “I don’t want to be here,” he said. “So you just stay in your corner and I’ll stay in mine.”

“Oh,” I said, dizzy with relief. “Alright.”

And I fell asleep.

“I think you fainted last night,” he said.

“So?” “So, you obviously don’t want to be here either.”

“I want to do my duty,” I said. “I want to conceive. But...I’m not exactly keen, no.”

“Why not?”

“Why aren’t you?” I shot back.

“Because all I did was get a Temple girl with child,” he snapped. “If I’d known that it was going to get me marched here at spearpoint and forced to play stud to your mare, I’d have stayed celibate. Better yet, I’d have stayed in my

Timeless Tales 6 25

own country. At least you have a choice about it.”

“Not really.” I shrugged, though I knew he couldn’t see me. “I have to try.”

“Not with me,” he said firmly.

I knew I should argue. Or alert the guards, or try to seduce him. Something. But a tiny, treacherous voice whispered that I didn’t have to. He was only the second candidate. I would try again with the next one. I would be ready. But for now I would rest. *** “What’s your name?” he asked.

“Rose.”

“Don’t you want to know mine? It’s—” “It’s forbidden, is what it is,” I said sharply. “Don’t tell me.”

“Of course we wouldn’t want to break the rules,” he murmured.

“We certainly would not,” I agreed. “Ask someone what happened to the last man who broke the rules.”

As soon as the words left my mouth, I felt something twist in my belly and I realized I didn’t want him to know the answer. I didn’t want him to know what I’d done.

We sat in the dark, huddled in our corners. Hours passed in deafening silence until I thought I would go mad.

“You think I’m a monster, don’t you?” I blurted.

He didn’t answer right away. I bit my lip, willing my tears to stay put.

“I don’t,” he said finally. “But if you want to tell me about it, I’ll listen.”

Before I could stop it, the whole story burst out of me.

I hadn’t told anyone, though I was positive my mother

26 Timeless Tales 6

knew. She hadn’t said a thing about it, hadn’t made any reference at all to the flogging. I was sure it was because she was so ashamed she couldn’t bear to think about it.

“You’re not a monster.”

I jerked as something touched me. My confession had covered the sounds of his careful progress across the room.

When he tried again, I let him take my hand and even curled my fingers around his.

“You’re not a monster,” he said again.

“I feel like I am,” I whispered.

“That’s because you’re a good person,” he said. “And not a monster. You didn’t force him to hurt you. You didn’t attack him. You didn’t even threaten him. A real man, a good man, would never have laid a hand on you no matter what you did or said, but this man tried to kill you over a few insults. No. He got what he deserved.”

I nodded, though I knew he couldn’t see me, and waited for dawn with my head against his shoulder. *** “You’re in the third month,” Summer said. “Still nothing?”

She didn’t even bother to hide her eagerness. I bit my tongue and let her gloat. Let her think what she would. I knew the truth of why I hadn’t conceived, and I wasn’t about to tell her, of all people.

“It’s too bad you’re so boring.” She sighed. “If only he knew how pretty you are.”

“Don’t be absurd,” I said. “Attraction has nothing to do with whether the seed takes or not.”

“Maybe not,” she said, a nasty gleam in her eye. “But it certainly has something to do with how much effort he

Timeless Tales 6 27

puts into planting it.”

She’s just being awful because it amuses her, I told myself.

It doesn’t mean anything. But I felt her gaze follow me as I left, and I knew she would hurt me if she could. *** I awoke to a splash of pain on my cheek and shot upright with a cry of alarm. He cursed as he fumbled the candle, spilling hot wax on himself as well. I stared, dumbfounded.

He was beautiful, not ugly at all. But of course Summer would lie, I realized.

“Princess?” a voice called from outside the door. “Are you well?”

“Fine—I’m fine!” I yelled back. To the him, I hissed. “Hide that! Blow it out!”

But it was too late—the guards, alerted by my all too obvious distress, burst into the chamber and seized the young man by both arms.

“No!” I cried. “Wait—please.”

As they dragged him away, he looked into my eyes and smiled.

“My name is Daemon,” he said, and then he was gone. *** “You did this.”

I slammed into my sister’s chambers, trembling with rage. After Daemon was taken, Hermia told me how Summer had spent weeks dripping poisoned honey in his ear, goading him into violating the sacred darkness of the Trial Chamber.

I should have known. It was just the sort of cruel, selfish plan that would most appeal to Summer...one that would

28 Timeless Tales 6

hurt me but couldn’t be pinned on her.

“I?” She smiled innocently. “I was only trying to help. I don’t know what you’re so upset about. You have a whole year...unless things keep going wrong, of course.”

She smirked at me, her chin raised in an attitude of perfect insolence. I slapped her with all my strength and whirled away. But her slack jaw and bugging eyes were cold comfort against the bitterness in my heart. I held tight to the knowledge that I could still fix this. I had to fix this.

That night, I wrapped my shawl tightly around myself and scurried like a rat through the corridors to the lavish chambers that would serve as Daemon’s prison until his fate could be decided. My courses were due in just over two weeks. If I bled, the whole nightmare would begin again.

Daemon would be held forever as a bond-servant, forced to scrub floors and turn spits for the rest of his life. Anyone could give him an order, and anyone could have him whipped if he refused. He’d be less than the meanest street cur.

Unless I didn’t bleed. *** Our time was almost up. I could expect my moonblood any day now—or not. I closed my eyes, hope and dread mingling in my chest. I’d lied to my mother, bribed and blackmailed Daemon’s guards, defied the Temple...I could only hope it would be worth it. I didn’t know what I would do—what the Temple would do—if I wasn’t with child.

They’d see my actions as theft: as the crown princess, my body belonged to the people, not to myself. There was only one punishment for theft—but I was the princess. It could still be alright.

Timeless Tales 6 29

“What will you do?” Daemon asked, as if he could hear my thoughts. “If we haven’t...”

“I’ll do what I must,” I said. I kept my fears inside; no need for us both to have nightmares. “And then I’ll marry you, child or no.”

“And if you lose your crown?”

“I’ll have you.” I raised our twined fingers to my lips.

“One way or another.” *** This is it, I thought.

I flitted through the shadowy corridors, my shawl wrapped protectively around my head and shoulders. My courses were a week late. Tonight I would lie with Daemon, perhaps for the last time. Tomorrow I would submit myself to the Temple’s examination and find out whether Daemon would live or die.

“Princess.”

I whipped around, crouching against the wall instinctively.

“Gentle Mother,” I stammered. “I was just—” “Silence,” the high priestess said. “Selfish girl. You must have realized that your lover would pay the price for your foolishness.”

“Price.” I had to ask, though I knew the answer. “What is the price?”

The priestess’s eyes glittered. “Death, of course.”

Oh, Daemon, I thought, my heart freezing in my chest.

This was my choice, my risk. I never dreamed the punishment would fall on Daemon instead of me. How could I have been so stupid? I will save him, I told myself. Somehow.

30 Timeless Tales 6

“Let me pass.”

“You will come with me, you wretched girl—” I am a princess. I leaned in, my face only inches from hers.

“You forget yourself, Gentle Mother. Let me pass.”

No time for regret, or fear of reprisal. I brushed past her, resisting the urge to hunch my shoulders against her eyes burning into my back. But as soon as I turned the corner, I ran, nearly bowling over Daemon’s guard as he moved to open the door. I kicked it shut behind me, panting, and stumbled into Daemon’s arms.

“Undress,” I gasped. “Now.” “What’s the hurry?” he asked, trying to take hold of my hands as I frantically stripped out of my gown.

I didn’t answer; I dragged his mouth down on mine. He mistook my desperation for passion and answered in kind— but then, perhaps it was I who was mistaken. *** I paced the room like a tiger, my bare feet whispering against the smooth stone floor. Any moment now, a Healer would come through that door and give me the best news of my life—or the worst.

I’d been trapped in the Temple for three days while the Healers performed a battery of tests to confirm my pregnancy, or lack thereof. They’d taken my urine every morning and mixed it in separate bowls of vinegar, dandelion leaves, and pine needles; they’d left it sitting in the sun; they’d poured it over sugar; they’d even tasted it. They had examined every inch of my body and made me bathe in hot water and powdered mustard in order to bring on my courses. But I hadn’t bled.

Timeless Tales 6 31

Where was the Healer? I sat down, fidgeted, got up again.

I pulled my hands through my hair and chewed my nails until, finally, the door opened. But instead of the Healer, I found Hermia.

“Princess!” she cried. “Oh, my lady, come quickly! Your young man—they’ve taken him!”

“When?” I grasped her arms, my fingers biting into her flesh. “And where?”

“This morning. For—for questioning.” Tears streamed down Hermia’s face. “One of the guards told me. They’re taking him to the throne room for judgment. I’m sorry, my lady, I didn’t know—” I didn’t wait to hear more. I dashed past her, my skirts streaming behind me. If they’ve killed him, I’ll destroy them all. Queen or not.

I all but flew back to the palace, heedless of the sharp rocks digging into my feet or the burning in my lungs. After what seemed like an eternity, I burst into the throne room, where my eyes immediately fell on Daemon’s bruised and bloodied form. He knelt before the Council of Mothers, cradling a broken arm—but he was alive. My whole body sagged momentarily with relief. I placed a hand on his uninjured shoulder and squared my own, lifting my gaze to meet that of the high priestess.

I took a deep breath and said the only thing I could think of, the only thought in my head: “You can’t have him.”

I had meant to speak with confidence and authority. But all I heard, and all the high priestess heard, was a desperate bluff. I had no authority. Not yet. The high priestess smiled, sure of her victory.

“It is not your place to command us, Princess.”

My fingers tightened on Daemon’s shoulder. Much as I hated it, she was right. Unless— “Your pardon, Gentle Mother.” An aging woman in Healer’s robes entered the throne room and bowed politely. “I must

32 Timeless Tales 6

speak with the Princess.”

Without waiting for permission, the Healer approached with measured steps and whispered in my ear. I murmured my thanks; she nodded and stepped back with another bow.

“Tell me again,” I said coldly. “Tell me again that it is not my place.”

“It is not and never will be,” the high priestess snarled.

“You will hold your tongue.”

“I will not,” I said, pinning her with a hard stare. “By right of the Mother’s blessing, I will be your Queen—and I say again, you cannot have him.”

Daemon’s eyes snapped to me; my mother laughed in exultation, right in the high priestess’s face.

“Rose?”

I smiled and took Daemon’s bruised and bloodied face in my hands. “I’ve conceived.”

He closed his eyes, leaned his forehead against mine.

He said, “I love you.”

“As I love you.” I kissed him.

And it was done.

Timeless Tales 6 33

Fiction Mixed Blessings

About The Author

Born and raised in rural New Jersey (yes, it does exist), Tamara now lives in Pennsylvania with a very opinionated black cat for company. Tamara’s storytelling career began at the age of three with “Squirm the Worm,” which was warmly received by an audience of assorted beetles. She went on to study music and eventually earn a degree in music composition. Now, as an exam prep tutor and budding college planning counselor, she has time to devote to her first love, writing. Her work has appeared in Seven Deadly Sins: A YA Anthology (Envy), and she is currently elbow-deep in the second draft of Under the Willow Root, a young adult fantasy novel. Her blog is tamaralinden.com

Poetry

Words by

The Third Task

Ayame Whitfield

About the poem

For this poem, I wanted to look more closely at an easily overlooked interaction between Psyche and Persephone. I was interested in seeing if there were any parallels to be drawn between them, as well as thinking about how Persephone might view this newcomer in her land.

T H E Ayame

T H I R D Whitf ield

T A S K

Two women lock gazes across hell, And this could be a story of their hatred, But no. An agreement wordless, A gift given free - the queen of the underworld Knows what it is to be lost. The princess Is a blooming rose, fresh and bright and Keenly familiar. A box for beauty, Filled with shadows, and the caution On the girl’s lips, the coarse wheat Ground under mortal stones, a safeguard Against the sucking hunger of death.

The same whispered warnings she recalls: Touch nothing. Eat nothing. The queen Feels the ghost of forgotten sweetness Over her tongue, six seeds tart and tight.

She wants to wish her luck, bless her With hands bleached pale by the shadows.

But a corpse-hand would only mar The brilliance of her beauty.

The girl shines with conviction.

Whispered promises of an immortal lover Painted golden across her cheeks For any with eyes to see.

She speeds her on her way Back up to the light. The girl’s Cherub will be waiting, after all-Who is the queen of night To obstruct the call of love?

38 Timeless Tales 6

Timeless Tales 6 39

Poetry The Third Task

About The Author

Ayame lives in Massachusetts and has been fascinated by reading and writing from a young age.

She has actively pursued both for many years. Her poetry and prose blog can be found at avolitorial. wordpress.com.

Fiction

Words by

The Second Helen

Margaret Rothrock

About the story

The first part of the inspiration came from my Latin III class in eleventh grade, when I read through parts of Apuleius’ “Cupid and Psyche” in Latin. I loved how Psyche was drawn in such detail, even though she’d been created two thousand years before my time. I tried one or two drafts about her but I couldn’t seem to capture her the way I wanted.

When I stumbled upon Timeless Tales, I was thrilled to see that “Cupid and Psyche” would be the next theme. That started me really working. I think the breakthrough came, however, when I was watching a movie of “Cinderella” and realized how silly the stepsisters always are. They never have any depth or intelligence, in both “Cinderella” and “Cupid and Psyche”. The stepsisters are only ever hateful, and, in Psyche’s case, devastatingly cruel. So I started toying with that idea, and came up with a pair of sisters who had a relationship with Psy-

che and each other—and whom she could believably be misled by. Instead of being overly trusting, Psyche is now betrayed by a friend. Similarly, Elissa is not really cruel, but tortured, walked on, and misused by her sister (and Cupid himself). The rest of the story fell into place easily.

THE SECOND

HELEN MARGARET ROTHCOCK

“Elissa, get away from that brat.”

My older sister Helen dragged me from the great balcony doors where our younger sister stood. Psyche was staring out over her followers. Men had tried to describe her—like a star, one would say, but then another would argue that a star was one of millions, and she was the only Psyche. She was Venus herself, but purer, newer, said a third. A fourth would point out that it was silly to compare her to anything at all because she simply did not compare. That would end the discussion.

No one described me or Helen that way. Although I didn’t mind—I preferred to remain unnoticed and I’d never seen much point to beauty anyway—Helen felt differently.

“I’ve a plan,” she said to me.

“Not another one?”

Helen was pretty, too, but ugly when she was angry. It was a cruel irony that her namesake had been the most beautiful girl in the world, yet her sister now claimed that title.

“We’ll invoke Venus,” she said. “No one’s worshipped her since the universe started fawning at Psyche’s feet; she must be angry. Her son will do something about this.”

I grimaced. We’d all heard the stories about Cupid and his arrows. A few years ago, he’d shot my aunt and she fell in love with a dog on the streets. My father locked her in a room, and there she stayed. To this day she was still not in her right mind. I could hear her scratching at the door sometimes when I went past.

“I don’t hate Psyche,” I said.

Helen made a noise of disgust.

“Do you love me?”

“I love you and Psyche both.”

44 Timeless Tales 6

She drew her scathing eyes over my face. “You don’t understand.” Before I could respond, she turned and left the room. I watched Psyche, still on the balcony. She felt my gaze and glanced back at me. Her eyes, so unlike Helen’s, were wide with sadness.

She’d heard every word.

At midnight a week later, I woke up to a nightmare. The image was frighteningly clear: a vast expanse of snow, barren except for gusting hail. In the midst of it was Helen, her face almost obscured by the storm, and something dark and red in her hand. At first, she was running after Psyche, holding up the object and taunting her. But then, suddenly, she turned on me.

“This is your heart,” she said. She squeezed. Dark liquid burst from her hand and stained the snow scarlet. Damp with sweat, I woke.

I shuddered and made my way to Helen’s room. My philosophy had always been that facing your fears reveals them to be irrational. Anyway, it had only been a dream.

Helen was awake, staring into the fire as if in a trance, unaware of my presence. Something glittered in her hand.

I realized with a jolt that it was one of Psyche’s necklaces.

She tensed, pulled her arm back, and threw it in the fire.

The room grew hot. An aroma—perfume, or flowers— blossomed around us, and then a man materialized: the most beautiful man I’d ever seen, relaxing against the wall as if amused. He had curly hair and piercing eyes, and there was a dark bow slung over his back, around two enormous…wings.

“Helen,” I whispered, horrified. She turned and saw me--went pale, then furiously red, and finally pink, as her lips curled into a smile.

Timeless Tales 6 45

“Why, Elissa. You’re just in time.”

“You’re the sisters of Psyche?” Cupid asked. “And the nieces of Kirkelene.” Helen nodded, smirking. He grinned.

“With the dog. So you’ve another task for me? I only take the fun ones.”

“Oh, this will be very fun,” Helen said. I might have called it purring if she hadn’t had such a manic line between her brows. “Wouldn’t it be fun to destroy the most beautiful girl in the world?”

He shrugged, but I could tell he was interested by the glint in his smile.

“All I ask is that you shoot Psyche straight in the heart next time she’s near someone disgusting. Then lend me an extra arrow.”

“It only takes one,” he said.

Her eyes flicked towards me. I froze.

“There are two people I wish to…change,” she said.

Cupid had brought an uncanny warmth to the room, but my bones seemed too cold to move, and my heart beat too fast. He handed her the arrow, and she took it, ran her finger along the shaft. Change. She wanted to change me… she wanted to stab me. I was so appalled that the knowledge didn’t reach my muscles at first; when my reflexes kicked in, however, she was already at my side, with my wrist in a grip that made my tense veins throb.

“Now do you love Psyche?” she asked, and, after I’d struggled vainly for a moment, all I could do was close my eyes. She scraped the poisoned arrowhead down my arm.

The same scene replayed in my haunted memory for a year afterwards, sometimes in my waking, sometimes in dreams: kicking at the hands holding me. Stomping on the

46 Timeless Tales 6

feet and throwing myself at the captor, hating every inch of her, every cell, every atom. Blackness, as my eyes squeezed tighter than they ever had. Her voice in my ear.

“Whether you see me first or him, you’ll still be mine.

You’ll see why I hate Psyche so much if you love her enemies.”

My precious reason had stopped functioning. I heard the scrabbling sounds as someone else ran to the door in front of me, but at the time, it didn’t seem to matter who; it was someone to free me, I thought in my mad state.

Maybe my insanity was the arrow’s poison already affecting me, or just pure anger and disbelief at my viper of a sister. But I opened my eyes: and I caught the first clear image that came with the memory, one that overlaid every moment of dreams and daydreams forever afterwards.

His wicked grin.

That was when I loved him.

Whenever I dreamed this, it would end with my heart squeezing and bursting, and red liquid flowing down my body. Cupid would disintegrate. With him, the last traces of my sanity.

By the end of the year, Helen was married to a powerful, rich old man west of the palace. I remained unmarried, as did Psyche, for the first few months. She was a dream, in the eyes of eligible men, as beautiful and unattainable as the sun or the mountains or the goddess of love herself.

She cried about it. I felt sorry for her, but not as sorry as I felt for myself, because my heart didn’t pump blood anymore, it pumped poison. Obsession. I was too proud to tell anyone about the torment Helen had placed on me, so it was only Psyche that our parents went to the oracle about. When they found she was destined to marry, not a

Timeless Tales 6 47

man, but some inhuman, savage, evil thing, there was nothing they could do but leave her on the designated hilltop. When she sent word that she was never allowed to see her husband’s face, everyone tried to convince me I was happier than she.

Both my sisters returned on the day I met (for the second time) the object of my passion: Passion himself. In my veins ran his name, his strength, his grace, his golden hair, his piercing eyes. I hated his arrows, hated his carelessness, hated the way he took my feelings and dragged them behind him like a dog on a chain. And at the same time I loved them all.

He appeared in an armchair in the common room, his beauty glowing in the light from the balcony doors. He wouldn’t meet my gaze.

“Elissa,” he said. A thrill ran through me, my body a bowstring, quivering just after the arrow. He remembered my name. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s about time,” I said. “You and Helen could raze Troy, the way you’ve acted.”

“I suppose we already did.”

“Why are you apologizing now?”

He winced.

“I’ve fallen in love myself.”

Finally he looked up at me. I shivered as for the first time I clearly saw the face I’d dreamed about for so many months. Every night in dreams; every day in thoughts. How I loathed and loved that face.

“Not with me.”

I wasn’t sure if I was sad or angry, but I kept my voice even.

“Not with you.” His shoulders were hunched with something that I, remembering the malicious grin

48 Timeless Tales 6

he’d worn a year earlier, had trouble believing was shame. “I said I was sorry, didn’t I? No.” He paused. “I’ve married Psyche.”

Envy and pity for her, both overpowering, swept through me, though stronger were my love and hatred for him. I held them inside. He wouldn’t see. “And she doesn’t know who you are.”

“No one can. I failed my task miserably and now I’m married to the girl I should have ruined. She’s so beautiful, and lonely, and pure…”

“She told us her husband refuses to let her see his face— so you only come to her in the dark? You make love to her and leave as soon as dawn arrives?” I stopped. “Don’t you know that hurts her?”

“If anyone finds out who I am, my mother will kill me.

She hates Psyche. And now she knows she’s married…she’s watching her so closely, if anyone tells Psyche, my mother will find out…” My words had cut into him, though, I could hear it in his tone and see it in his eyes. He hated to hurt my sister.

“You’re immortal,” I said apprehensively.

“Then she’ll kill Psyche.”

I thought for a minute, trying to grasp which of my feelings were real and which manufactured. My aunt’s condition had seemed more and more believable over the past year. Which was true? My love for Cupid or my hatred of him? And this jealousy of Psyche...was it as genuine as my pity for her? Logic remained elusive. I felt trapped.

“Can you free me?” I asked.

He shifted uncomfortably. “Can Hades raise the dead?

I wish.”

Timeless Tales 6 49

I watched him, speechless.

“Your sisters are here,” he said finally.

He disappeared.

They came in, Helen and then Psyche, to find me staring at the place where he’d been.

“Elissa!” Helen rushed to me and engulfed me in a hug.

Psyche waited a few steps away. “I was just telling our sister to find out who she’s been living with. I told her, take a candle in to see. Could be a monster.”

“He told me not to look,” Psyche said. She sounded hesitant. “His voice is fair.”

“Sirens have fair voices, too,” Helen countered. She turned to me and demanded, “Tell her he might be a monster.”

“He—” What was he? He was—I was unclear. Suddenly anger rushed through me. There was Psyche, who had captured his attention without even trying, while I stewed and lost my sense of reason and went mad with obsession for him.

Psyche, who acted so sweet and innocent, but who must know her husband’s identity—how could she not? How could anyone not recognize that voice, that wonderful voice? Psyche, the most beautiful girl in the world. And I, who had nothing.

“He’s a monster, Psyche.”

“Is?” Helen asked. She cocked her head at me. I looked down at my hands. Psyche trusted me. I was betraying her, my reason, and myself. I was agreeing with Helen. But I couldn’t help it. The jealousy and anger had complete control over me. The poison from Cupid’s arrow had not only doomed myself.

“Is,” I repeated.

50 Timeless Tales 6

Psyche trusted me. Her perfect eyes grew wide.

“I’ll look,” she said.

You shall look, Psyche, and you shall suffer. And I will never see him again. And we’ll both be unhappy. Maybe we’ll both go mad, because it’s not Cupid who is the monster, it’s not even Helen. I was fool enough to let her stab me. I couldn’t prevent passion from overthrowing reason. I have condemned you when you never deserved pain in your life.

I have launched a thousand ships to war.

I am the true second Helen.

Timeless Tales 6 51

Fiction The Second Helen

About The Author

Margaret J. Rothrock first knew she wanted to be a writer in fifth grade when she won an honorable mention in her library’s story contest. She has never been paid to be published before, but she has been on the staff of an informal school magazine for three years and just recently won two national medals in the Scholastic Writing Awards for collections of poetry. She enjoys writing, music, and art, and holds a deep appreciation for great literature. She is eighteen, and very excited to be done with high school this June. She lives in Pennsylvania with her parents, two brothers, one sister, one dog and one guinea pig.

Fiction

Words by

Wednesday Man

Claudia Quint

About the story

I’ve been writing stories behind closed doors for years, for the love of storytelling itself, playing with style and genre and trying to find my voice. I found myself returning again and again to myth, fairy tales, archetypes and romance. The submission call from Timeless Tales on the theme of Psyche and Cupid helped me make the leap! Reading the original myth reminded me how intense the central story is, and how it has led to other variants, like Beauty and the Beast. Envisioning the characters really drove the entire story. Scientists tend to be classified as cold, distant, analytical and aloof -- I realized a scientist was a modern day beast, in a sense, and how the alchemy of science could replace Cupid’s arrow with a syringe. And all of that is true, by the way, when Dr. Childer talks about the chemical process in the brain that results in “love.” It really is a combination of dopamine, oxytocin and sero-

tonin. The science of love itself is kind of wild, when you think about it. But the pleasure in the story, as least for me, is how Rose reverses the roles. She is an extraordinary individual who can see beneath the scientist’s exterior and deliver him from the exhaustion of his purpose. Thus, Wednesday Man was born.

Cl aud ia Quint

Dr. Childer strolled into the next room to speak to his customer, a love-lorn woman named Gretchen. Gretchen had never known love, but Dr. Childer knew that, with his help, she would find her soul mate in the sterile exam room where he mixed his love potion.

Dr. Childer readied the syringe to draw blood. Gretchen squeezed her eyes shut as the needle slid in. He distracted her by asking her to describe her perfect mate to him, a tactic his mother used on him in his own childhood.

She answered his queries in rapid-fire style. “Kind, compassionate, cares about the planet. Wants pets and kids like I do.”

“Gender preference?” he asked. “Religion? Non-smoker?”

Her blood secured in the vial, he set a quivering ruby droplet onto an electronic pad. The screen lit up with graphs and charts and readouts. Clinical, cold, serene.

“What is that?” Gretchen asked.

“Well, you’re aware that we’ve discovered the process in the brain that initiates the chemicals of serotonin, dopamine, and oxytocin – love, in other words. We measure the levels of these chemicals in your bloodstream. From our analysis, we know by what measure we need to activate your brain chemistry. We match you with your chosen suitor, who also consents, prior to your first meeting. Then, on the day of your introduction, we inject you both, thereby making an instantaneous love match. Our method is far superior to online and social media dating sites.”

“A love potion!”

“All scientific, of course,” Dr. Childer dismissed her talk of potions with a wave. “In fact, I even have my own analysis in the computer.” He tapped the screen for emphasis.

“When I’m ready, I have my own injection waiting for me.

Now why don’t we peruse some potential suitors for you?” ***

56 Timeless Tales 6

When his shift ended, he went home. Like every night, he shed his lab coat and set his name tag on the end table with ritual precision. He picked up his cellphone and tapped the numbers, fidgeting, sweaty fingers slipping until he hit the last number. The name flashed on the screen: ROSE. Rose knew him by his voice, and he only called on Wednesdays. First by accident, then by design, she noticed his calls were always timed for the beginning of her evening shift.

“Never Alone Suicide Prevention, my name is Rose and I’m here to help you.”

For months, she listened to him pour out the darkness living in his heart. Through the network of wires and telephony, Rose listened with her headset in her loft apartment and asked him questions which he danced away from.

Wednesday Man, as Rose thought of him, would suffer no intimacy. The second her line of questioning gathered too much momentum and tension, he shut it down and hung up while she listened to the disconnect on the other side, staring at her ceiling and hoping whatever haunted him would at last subside. Maybe one day he would stop calling, not because the sadness of life overwhelmed him, but because he found happiness at last.

After he hung up, she would feed her cat, Zephyr, and stare down at the city from her apartment window as she took the next call, saving the life of a woman holding a bottle of pills in her hand. By the time the night was done and the tawny sky turned to morning, she’d talked a police officer from a ledge, a student from a razor, a grandmother away from rat poison. She fell asleep listening to the sirens map out the city blocks. Little did she know that her Wednesday Man was listening to those same sirens while he scrubbed his hands in scalding water and snapped on his gloves.

The next week, when Rose picked up the phone, Wednesday Man waited on the line for her.

Timeless Tales 6 57

“Are you doing better?” she asked him. Rose did not often speak to the same person more than once but she had come to know his voice, attuned to its unique melody.

“I’m dissatisfied with my job,” he confessed. “It’s pointless. I’m ridiculous. Here I am, helping people find love, and I don’t even know what it’s like.”

“What do you do for a living?” Rose dared to ask, and he hung up.

She cursed and she sat at her computer, pulling off the head set and smoothing out her tangled hair. She pulled out a post-note and scrawled LOVE???.

The next Wednesday, she did not ask what he did for a living. Instead, Rose asked what disturbed him, made him feel so lonely and depressed in his day to day life.

“Most of the time,” Wednesday Man explained, “I love what I do. I bring people joy, I bring them together. They leave the office with wedding plans and names for their future children. They leave kissing and laughing. And at the end of it, I’m alone. I’m the reason for their love, but there seems no love left over for me.”

“Have you considered finding someone for yourself?”

He sighed. “All I do every day is find soul mates. It’s like asking who buries the funeral director, or who cooks for the chef.”

“Or who the suicide prevention operator calls when she’s feeling sad?”

He exploded into laughter. “Yes! Like that!”

“Well, why don’t you try the social media sites?”

He snorted, derisive. “I do a better job than those sites.

Let me give you a piece of advice. If you want to cut through the dross and find a real love match, you need to go to a specialized place.”

“Any recommendations?” She whispered.

He disconnected the line and Rose cursed.

Zephyr licked his paws and sniffed at the headset before

58 Timeless Tales 6

curling up in his mistress’s warm spot to sleep.

“Don’t get comfy,” she said, reaching over to pick Zephyr up. “You didn’t think I forgot about your appointment, did you?”

Zephyr meowed and twisted, rubbing his chin on her arm as she urged him into the carrier. While he stared at her through the cage with the condescending resentment only cats can master, she hefted the carrier and proceeded to make the trip to the veterinarian’s office, where Zephyr would be poked, prodded, petted to his heart’s content.

Rose took the Metro and arrived outside the doors twenty minutes later. Zephyr, however, harbored other plans, and no sooner did the carrier door spring open when he raced out, ignored her plaintive calls, and raced up the sidewalk, before a smooth glass building jutting upwards toward the sky. Rose paused as Zephyr stopped and scratched at the door, rubbing himself upon the surface with the confidence that now, of course, he owned it. Emblazoned on the door in white letters: Eros Associated True Match Technology.

The building seemed deserted, but when her fingers pressed to the glass door, a light flickered on from within.

A figure appeared and the doors whooshed open. A woman in a fine tailored dress ushered her in. Zephyr followed, ghosting behind them.

“You’re the late appointment, aren’t you? Of course, we hold discreet hours for discreet clients. Right this way, the doctor will see you in a moment.”

After being seated in the examination room, ensconced between bleached walls, she peeled open a pamphlet.

Zephyr curled up under the seat, unseen, and proceeded to groom himself, purring. *** While Rose plucked cat hairs off her shirt and read about oxytocin, serotonin, and dopamine, Wednesday Man moved

Timeless Tales 6 59

through his ordinary rituals, cleaning his hands, donning his white coat, and grabbing a syringe for his next intake.

He inventoried a row of vials in the cryo chamber, among them was his own--for that fated future love he would one day meet, court, and become one with. He tapped the vial and noticed the date: over five years ago. It was in need of replacing. To mix another, he took a syringe and plugged in the needle. After filling the vial, he studied the fluid, as though he might find his future lover’s name there.

A knock came at the door. He startled, jabbing himself through the glove, right into the meat of his thumb, doused with serum.

“Exam room one, Dr. Childer,” his assistant’s voice called.

Her heels tapped away down the hall.

He stared down at the syringe, and knocked it into the garbage can. He thrust his thumb into his mouth and looked at the clock, but the seconds were not slowing to accommodate him. Unable to stall, he took up his laptop and entered the long hall. His heart thudded, a flush creeping into his face. Before the door, he held out his hand level, but his body rebelled. The hand trembled and would not still.

Frowning at this development, he opened the door.

A woman sitting on the chair glanced up at him.

“You’re not Gretchen’s suitor,” he stated.

Rose set down the pamphlet. “No. I’m not.”

His heart thudded. He loosed his collar, sweat sheened his forehead and his mouth became arid, sandpaper grit on his tongue. Chemicals rollicked from his bleeding thumb through his cranial hemispheres.

“Perhaps you’d like to make an appointment through our –” “I was hoping you could help me now.”

“Oh? The process can take time, you have to locate a suitor.”

“I have that part taken care of already.”

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“Your voice...” he hesitated.

“Yes?” “It sounds familiar. Do we know each other?”

She leaned forward and pulled up her sleeve for the syringe. Childer knew the course and the nature of chemical reactions, imagined that already, his pupils were dilating and pressing the boundaries of his irises, expanding to include the cosmos and showcase the very stars. When he glanced down, her hand too, trembled like his, but without the aid of any potion.

He set down the clipboard and reached into his pocket.

He tapped the numbers on his cellphone’s screen. SEND. From her pocket, a ringing commenced.

His cellphone glowed, illuminating the bead of blood where the arrow of love had struck. She, refusing to answer the phone, stared at him. Her eyes dilated. Breathing and heartbeat increased.

He set down his phone, trembling, and scrawled the final note in his new patient’s chart: Subject appears to be in love already.

The note ended with a trailing stroke of the pen, as though interrupted, pulled away, and dragged down into a kiss.

Timeless Tales 6 61

Fiction Wednesday Man

About The Author

Claudia Quint writes fiction in the vein of myth, fairy tales, and transformations with a focus on romance and erotica. She tends a lavish garden filled with toads and troublesome squirrels, along with society finches and a kind-hearted husband who brings her coffee when she plays video games, and when they aren’t fixing up their dilapidated cottage. You can read more about fairy tales and chasing away squirrels at her blog or tumblr.

Fiction

Words by

River God’s Bride

Donald Uitvlugt

About the story

Although I write in various genres, the aesthetics of haiku poetry influences the style of every story I tell. Classical Japanese haiku takes a concrete subject and, in only seventeen syllables, writes about that subject in a way that creates echoing resonances in the spirit of the reader. The very limits of the form inspires lateral creativity, so to speak.

My story takes motifs from the myth of Eros and Psyche but defamiliarizes them by also drawing from Japanese folklore. I intend the haiku I chose as an epigram both to evoke the love of Yukiko and Tama, and to resonate with the events at the end of the story.

The result is a folktale setting the love of husband and wife against the expectations of society.

川 の 神 の 花 嫁

River God’s Bride Donald Jacob Uitvlugt

ike to kawa pond and river hitotsu ni narinu joined together as one haru no ame spring rain -- Buson (1716-1783) This is the way the story is told.

Once, in the days before Heian-kyo gained dominion over the islands of the rising sun, there was a village in the north country. It happened that the river the village depended on for water began to dry up. At length the village elders consulted a medium. The solution she proposed: wed a daughter of the village to the god of the river.

A certain man in the village had five daughters. Without hesitation, he pushed forward his youngest, named Yumiko.

She had been the death of her mother coming into the world, and had always been a child apart. The village had a dress made and a wedding feast prepared. A grand procession led Yumiko up the mountain to the shrine of the river god.

The shrine seemed as withered as the river, with gaps in the wood planking and tears in the paper screens. The village elders led Yumiko inside and laid out the wedding banquet. The girl knelt at the table and the villagers wound their way back down the mountain. The echoes of the procession bells died away. Yumiko’s knees ached. Her stiff sleeves scratched against the wooden floor of the shrine, stirring up dust. Yumiko sneezed. The evening swallowed up the sound.

Night fell. Yumiko longed to light a lamp, but the medium had insisted on that point. No light. The darkness folded about her. There was no sound, not even the wind. Yumiko

66 Timeless Tales 6

ached for light, for something to keep her company as she waited. Yumiko shivered.

Suddenly she felt arms around her. Yumiko froze, too frightened even to cry out.

“Pour the wine, beloved. Tonight is our wedding night.”

The voice was soft, musical. Its gentleness warmed Yumiko’s heart, even though the arms about her felt cool.

She reached for the jar of wine.

“It is not heated, my lord.”

He laughed, and his laugh was the blossoms of spring and the grasses of summer. “It does not matter. Pour the wine.”

Yumiko shivered again as she poured, but not from the cold. She felt a body press against her, its legs resting against hers. She lifted the cup of rice wine from the table. Hands took it from her, strong but not rough. A pause. The sound of wine being poured.

“Drink.”

The strong hands returned the cup to her. Yumiko drank.

Three times she offered the cup, three times it was returned to her.

“Now you are the wife of Ryuichigawa no Tama.” Muscular arms slid down her own. “How are you called, wife?”

“Y-yumiko, lord.”

“You are truly beautiful, Lady Yumiko.”

The arms lifted her up, carried her deeper into the shrine, laid her upon a cushion on the floor. Nimble fingers undressed her, a heavy form pressed over her, and Yumiko cried out as the river god claimed his bride.

Yumiko awoke alone, her body still singing from the previous night. A clean white kimono was laid out for her, its silk a soft caress against her skin. On the table was set

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a simple breakfast of rice, pickled vegetables, and grilled fish. She ate and, unsure of what else to do, began to put the shrine in order.

She fashioned a broom of twigs and swept the floor. She ported buckets of water from the river and scrubbed the walls. At noon, more food appeared on the table, at evening, a pot of tea. By sunset, Yumiko was tired, but satisfied with the work she had accomplished.

“You please me, my wife.” The voice sent Yumiko’s heart fluttering.

“You are so kind to me, my husband. Putting your house in is the least I can do.”

Unseen fingers brushed against Yumiko’s face. She sighed and fell into the embrace of her husband.

So flowed the days. Every morning Yumiko dressed in a fresh silk kimono. She cleaned or did some repairs to the shrine. Every night her husband came to her, only to leave before the first light. And if her days were somewhat lonely, her nights were full of warmth and love. And the river rose high in its banks.

Spring turned into summer. Shortly before midsummer’s day, Yumiko’s sisters came from the village to visit her. She fed them from the magic table and, after they had exchanged pleasantries, Yumiko asked how things fared in the village.

“Ah, so the princess still cares about us commoners,” answered her eldest sister. “In a word, the village fares poorly.”

“How so, dear sister? Does not the river flow high now, bringing plenty of water for the fields?”

“But the river is so far,” complained her second sister.

“We cannot carry enough water and the crops are dying.

The summer rains do not come.”

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Yumiko looked for a moment at the shrine. At the changes she had made in such a short time. “Certainly the village could dig a channel to water the fields from the river.”

“But a channel is so much work,” said her third sister.

“Hours away from the fields mean empty bellies. Your husband is a god. He can ask the Lord of Heaven to send the rains.”

Yumiko frowned. “My husband is generous, but he is only a minor god of a minor river. I do not know where he stands in the ranks of heaven. He may not be able to do what you ask.”

“I wager your husband is no god at all,” said Yumiko’s fourth sister. Closest to Yumiko in age, she spoke with undisguised envy. “He is but a giant serpent slaking his lust. Or an ogre with red eyes and jagged teeth, fattening you up so he can devour you. Why else would he command that you not look at him? Why else would he come to you only at night?”

“Oh no, sister. That could never be.”

But her sisters’ words planted a seed of doubt in Yumiko’s mind. She promised her sisters that she would speak to her husband, and they left her.

That evening when her husband came to her, Yumiko thought over what her sisters had said. She looked for an opportunity to bring their request forward, but no time seemed right. If her husband noticed her distraction, he said nothing.

In the dead of night, Yumiko rose from the cushion where she but pretended to sleep. She knelt and lit a lamp.

A beautiful form lay on the bed cushion, the most beautiful creature that Yumiko had ever seen. His skin swirled in iridescence, shining all the colors of the rainbow. She

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loved her husband even more at that moment and bent to kiss his sacred brow.

A drop of oil spilled from the lamp Yumiko held. It fell on he husband’s naked shoulder. His eyes shot open, staring straight into Yumiko’s being. With one divine glance he rendered his wife sightless.

Both husband and wife wept as he cradled her against him. “Oh wife, dearest Yumiko, why would you risk such a thing? Did you not know a mortal cannot meet the gaze of a god and remain unchanged?”

Yumiko told her husband what her sisters had said and of the dire need of her village. Her husband stroked her hair, speaking only after a long pause.

“As you have said, I am only god of a minor river. The great lords of heaven do not take lightly to others meddling in their affairs. If I open the gates of the rains, it may mean my life. But I will see what can be done. I will return to you in three days.”

The next day Yumiko sat in darkness. She did not eat, she did not drink. At length she fell asleep on her bed, her first night without her husband. Thus also the second day passed. On the third day, the air grew cold as evening approached. Rain began to tap against the roof of the shrine.

Yumiko smiled. Her husband had succeeded. The summer rain had come at last. Soon her husband would return as he had promised.

The sound of the rain grew stronger. Still her husband did not return. Weary with waiting, Yumiko thought to rest. In their bed, she found something the size of a large stone. Yumiko touched it with trembling hands.

She knew the object at once. Here was his hair, here his ears. Here were her husband’s eyes, the eyes whose glory

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had blinded her. Here were her husband’s lips, the lips that had at once awoken and fulfilled desires Yumiko had not known she had. There was no body below the neck.

Thunder crashed. Weeping through wasted eyes, Yumiko took up her husband’s head and walked from their bedchamber. She walked through the shrine and out the door. Not stopping at the river, she united her tears with its waters.

United herself with her husband forever.

The rain continued to fall. The river rose, flooding the village and washing its name from the pages of history.

One question remains: whose love was greater, the husband’s or the wife’s?

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Fiction River God’s Bride

About The Author

Donald Jacob Uitvlugt lives on neither coast of the United States, but mostly in a haunted memory palace of his own design. His short fiction has appeared in numerous print and online venues, including Cirsova Magazine and the Cast of Wonders podcast. He also regularly serves as a judge at the weekly one-on-one writing competition at TheWritersArena.com.

Donald strives to write what he calls “haiku fiction,” stories that are small in scale but big in impact. If you enjoyed “The River-God’s Bride,” he would appreciate you letting him know at his blog haikufiction.blogspot.com or via Twitter: @haikufictiondju.

Fiction

Words by

Sika Unmasked

Jennifer R. Povey

About the story

The challenge of this story was to distill the story of Cupid and Psyche down to under 1500 words - my first reaction was that it took C.S. Lewis 314 pages to do this right! (Til We Have Faces, 1956).

Which meant I had to really distill down to a single concept - which ended up being the idea of the mask. The mask between us and the people we love. I wanted to go science fiction, because I suspected most people would go fantasy with this one. Which then led my mind to the idea of planned matings and eugenics - and how that intersects with the human desire to fall in love and choose our own mates.

SIKA UNMASKED Jennifer Povey

They didn’t use artificial insemination any more.

Sika wished they did. She wished she could just get this over with with a semen sample, a quick visit to a clinic.

That was against God, though. Other colonies didn’t do this, didn’t make women do this.

Other colonies wanted nothing to do with Baronne over it. She walked into the breeding center with her head held high, albeit covered by a veil.

The veil was to protect her privacy. It was part of the tradition, it wasn’t something she normally wore.

It was so nobody knew exactly which day she had come here. So nobody would ever know who the father of her child was. Nobody other than the priests who guarded the genetic records. Who made the matches.

Who would be able to tell her child what his or her risk factors were.

Who decided who bred.

Sika didn’t have the choice. She stepped into the building, a building she had not set foot in before. Leaving it as a babe in her mother’s arms didn’t count. She would come here as often as it took, then return nine months later to give birth.

They called it a temple. She did not believe in God. She was not sure when she had stopped believing in Her. She called it “the breeding center”, like offworlders did.

She wanted to leave, but nobody left Baronne. Nobody, officially, wanted to.

She wanted to, and perhaps she’d find a way. Stowing away was dangerous, though. It was perfectly legal to space stowaways.

Maybe she could hide her baby on a ship. Nobody would space an infant, surely. Or would they?

They were godless barbarians, after all.

Sika removed her veil once inside. The priestess reached out and held her hands in hers. “Please, do not be so afraid.”

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Was it that obvious? She knew what waited for her in an inner chamber. Or what she would wait for. They made sure they arrived at separate times.

One chamber in, the priestess led her, and then there was the mask, featureless and ivory, the same mask. Always the same, there would be no defining features, no hint as to identity. Holes for eyes and mouth, pushed out to accommodate a nose. She put it on, feeling it cool against her face, fitting perfectly. Then she took off everything else.

Naked except for a mask. That was how one went to one’s mate.

Naked except for a mask, she stepped into the inner chamber.

Well, an inner chamber. She knew there were several.

She knew because she had been told that they were all the same. He had his back to her, naked as she was.

Personal preferences didn’t matter. This was about healthy, God-blessed children. She preferred men. At least she had that going for her. Lie back and pretend he was somebody she liked.

He turned around, and she let out an involuntary breath.

His mask was ornate, tinged with purple, but his body was one she would have done any time.

Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.

And then she saw it. The mark on his thigh, dark brown, shaped almost like an opening flower. She knew that mark, but coincidence?

The mask. They were supposed to do this, do it until they couldn’t any more.

She stepped towards him. “Let’s get this out of the way.”

The mark on his thigh. She ignored it. If it was him, she was supposed to pretend it wasn’t. It had to happen.

He pulled her face towards him...and then he pulled off her mask. Sika gasped.

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He wasn’t allowed to do that. He couldn’t do that. Even if he was...

“Kopin...no...” she managed, then she pulled away, and fled naked from the room, leaving her mask dangling from his hands.

Using his name broke the spell. Using his name...destroyed it, the sacredness even she felt.

She might not believe in God, but she hadn’t run from the tradition.

She did now, grabbing her clothes on the way, trying to get in them before she was out of the building. Out into the street.

If it was him, if it was him she’d been assigned to? He’d taken off her mask and her face felt naked.

Sika kept running. She wondered what people thought, a woman running from the temple with her clothing mussed.

People fled the ceremony sometimes, men and women alike. Found they couldn’t do it. She’d heard they drugged them. So they’d drug her, put her back in that room with the man she had thought she loved. Almost, but not quite loved.

Wanted to love.

Had any of the others fled for this reason? She heard footsteps behind her, ducked into an alleyway. Her desire to leave Baronne was peaking. Maybe if she ran to an embassy? Other worlds considered coercing somebody into sex some kind of crime.

Except it was Kopin.

And he hadn’t coerced her. He’d just removed her mask.

Why did she feel that was so much worse?

Running feet. She half turned. Kopin, clothed, but still wearing the mask. Two priestesses behind him.

“You shouldn’t have unmasked me.”

“I needed to know if it was really you. I can’t do it. Not with you.”

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“I thought you loved me.” The drama, playing out, shutters closed in windows above. Shutters opened.

“Don’t you understand that that’s why?”

Sika closed her eyes. “Why?” “How could I just, how could we just--?”

The priestesses were coming up behind him. One of them reached out. Sika saw the glint of a hypo in her hand.

She meant to drug him. “Kopin!”

They’d be drugged, forced to perform, maybe made to forget this. Make sure her child never knew Kopin was his father. Make sure her child didn’t know what a father was until old enough to, they supposed, understand about what men did to make babies. And how unimportant it was.

That was the entire point.

If you had a father... She turned and ran again, not looking to see if he followed.

He didn’t.

They must have caught him. She didn’t stop running, not until she reached the spaceport.

She never stopped running.

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Fiction Sika Unmasked

About The Author

Jennifer R. Povey is in her early forties, and lives in Northern Virginia with her husband. She writes a variety of speculative fiction, whilst following current affairs and occasionally indulging in horse riding and role playing games. She has sold fiction to a number of markets including Analog, and written RPG supplements for several companies.

She is working on an ongoing urban fantasy serial that can be found at makingfate.jenniferrpovey. com. Her next novel, Falling Dusk will be released some time in late spring/early summer 2016.

Fiction

Words by

Curious Machinations

Alexandra Carcich

About the story

Years ago, I began a epistolary project with a good friend. My character, Charlotte, was married to a mysterious man who disappeared as soon as he had secured her vows. My friend’s character, Ada, had adventures down south with magik and a herd of zombies.

Like Cupid and Psyche, the climax in “Curious Machinations” is a woman breaking a sacred promise that she never fully understood. It was easier for Charlotte to fall in love with a mysterious stranger than an invisible lover who visited her bed every night.

MORE TIMELESS TALES STORIES

BY ALEXANDRA:

Troll Hunters Issue 7 The Snow Queen

My inspirations, other than old epistolary novels, were the science fiction of H.G. Wells and the gothic stories of Arthur Machen.

I tried to infuse Charlotte’s world with Wells’ psychological approach to science fiction and Machen’s sinister supernatural elements. The greatest challenge was cutting a story that had spent years accumulating words, characters, and side quests down to a focused and acceptable word count.

In fall of 1873 Father brought us to Boston for his club meeting. Mother and I weren’t allowed to attend, it all being secret inventor business. We were happy to dine out and see the attractions with the fashionable Boston crowd.

They were so progressive, even accepting an oddity like an inventor’s daughter. On our second day in the city, a tall blue-eyed fellow stood on the steps of the hotel. He pinned me to the stoop with his cold gaze, and my hand hesitated on the door knob.

“Miss, if you’re passing the red room could you hand in a card to Mr. Marcellus of Rome, New York?”

“Sir, I am not a member or allowed into the meeting, but if you are so inclined you would be welcome to join and deliver the card yourself.” Mother pulled at my sleeve and would later privately reprimand me for being ‘forward’.

The gentleman’s eyebrow arched and with an annoyed look, tossed a glove in the air. “Their airships and steel submarines are too old fashioned and fatigue me beyond belief. Can one go to the moon in a cannon ball? I’m certain if that end were achieved, they would find nothing but dead rocks. That lot are biased against the real mysteries of life.”

Then he disappeared, I mean really disappeared. At the time I thought he had been suddenly transported like words on a wire, a new discovery in the field of transportation. I was curious about the stranger and wondered what marvelous device he had at his employ.

When we were home in St Albans, I thought of asking Father about the young man, but he was preoccupied in his shop. My questions were compounded when the blue-eyed stranger paid a call at the house. There were raised voices at first, all on my father’s side, then a long period of quiet. It was late when he and father concluded their business and I was alone in the parlor. He received his mass of black wrappings from the servant, and was picking up his hat as I hailed him.

84 Timeless Tales 6

“Will you vanish again,” I called from my seat, “without an introduction?”

He looked at me, and, with a shrug, joined me on the divan. “Valemn,” he said.

“A pleasure,” I answered. I extended my hand and we shook. “I’m Miss Crankshaft, Charlotte.” There was a pleasant air of intimacy as we sat by the fire. I felt much in the silent communion of our eyes. I asked, “With whom are you connected that you are able to travel so suddenly?

Is it Mr. Marcellus?”

“No one is connected with my research, except, now your father. But it is only a loose affiliation. He made a trifle for me because the original was no longer efficacious. Your father is not only at the forefront of his field, but a master craftsman.”

“I thought I heard raised voices during your conference.”

Valemn was silent and, I assumed, reluctant to divulge the reason for the disagreement. He watched my fan beat back and forth. It was a clockwork of my own devising that maintained a steady rhythm.

“Did you make it?” he asked.

I nodded.

“Remarkable!” He touched it with an elegant, ringed finger. The ring caught my attention because it was made of iron and engraved. “A funny bobble, like a windup toy,” he said, stroking its spine. He grinned like an imp.

The fan became heavy in my hand and stopped beating.

I was agitated as my pet, my little creation, died in my hands. I slid to the floor to study it by the firelight. “What did you do?” I wondered. He didn’t answer. He had gone.

At that instant, Father passed through the hall muttering about the confusion of science and fantasy. His muttering caught my attention more than his blustering. He looked in at me, sitting on the hearth rug. “Has the upstart been to harass you too?”

“If you are so at odds, why did you assist him?”

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“It was nonsense, rings of demon symbols, but I have a great regard for his mentor, Mr. Marcellus, who was so influential in the North’s victory.”

The next morning, I took my toy apart and polished all its components. Nothing was missing or out of place.

Something indestructible and dependable had broken. All my life Science had been my familiar friend, more faithful than my parents. Science had confided her secrets in me and I had trusted it. Now, over some inconceivable circumstance, it had broken its principles. I felt lost and wanted my friend back. All the pieces of the fan were the same, but Science had changed.

For the Christmas holidays, Father took us to Baltimore to see to his government contracts. Mother and I attended parties at the Fairlea’s house, held every night to celebrate the twelve days between Christmas and Epiphany. Angeline Fairlea was a belle and entertained us in grand style. We feasted on partridge stuffed with pears. I wondered what would be served when we had passed the bird verses of the song and reached the human gifts.

I was surprised to see Mr. Valemn there. He arrived late to dinner and was given a seat next to Angeline. She had a low neckline and leaned toward him in a provocative manner. That vexatious toddler of my childhood wore false blonde curls and followed the latest trends in tight lacing.

Lately she had been trying to get a husband. This had proved difficult, despite her personal charms, since the war had claimed so many young men. Even a beauty so obstinately determined against spinsterhood could not bring men back from the grave.

She was bold in her questioning of Mr. Valemn and their conversation carried across the table. “Tell me how such an eligible young man, decorated in the war, could remain a bachelor? Especially when all have a societal duty to replace those numbers lost.”

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Mr. Valemn smiled knowingly and ate a spoonful of candied pears. At that point, an officer nearby inserted himself in the conversation and told a dull and longish story of his fiance’s unending faithfulness during the war. The tired cliché dispelled the tet-a-tet. Mr. Valemn was attentive to the soldier, while the belle failed to sympathize.

We retired to the parlor where Angeline serenaded us from the piano. Mr. Valemn joined her for a duet. I was consumed with a bitter anguish. The whispers of my spinsterhood made little difference to me—I was busy— until I saw one with whom I might have reached an understanding, ogle a coquette. After the music, I begged Mother to take me home.

The next two nights were much the same. On the fourth night, during a gamy blackbird pie, Mr. Valemn sat next to me. The seats next to Angeline were taken by more eligible bachelors.

After stirring the plate of inedibles, Mr. Valemn asked, “Do you believe in things outside this world, Miss Crankshaft?”

I thought, and answered, “Your premise is too vague for a proper hypothesis. Do you mean God and the devil?

“Certainly not. I mean what I said: other worlds.”

“If it survives testing by the scientific method. I would examine historical sources—Plato’s idea of a world of forms, as a beginning.”

“Of course.”

“I would also search for an effect the other world may have on this one. Does it have any place in myth and folklore?

Where is Mount Olympus? If the realm of the mysterious was not part of this mortal plane, it would explain the great lengths pagans went to in order to communicate with it.“ “So you would spend your time in the university libraries of Europe.”

Timeless Tales 6 87

“With such a hypothesis to start with, what else is there for it?”

“Have you no sense of adventure?”

“I study things I can practically accomplish. My father is a king of invention. He creates things that are needed. We don’t pursue the obscure unless there is evidence for its resolution.”

Angeline gave me a look of eyebrows throughout dinner.

In the bright light of the dining room, Mr. Valemn did not look quite right. He was pale, and his suit seemed to shimmer.

Next there was dancing, the old styles where couples stand opposite and cavort through figures. As the partners rotated, I danced with Mr. Valemn. A footman waited at the door and, as we passed, Mr. Valemn paused. He apologized for stopping midstep and was handed a telegram by the footman. On opening it, his demeanor fell. I could not suppress my curiosity and asked if he had received bad news. He said it was from ‘Mother’ and crumpled it into his pocket. The rest of the evening he was changed and did not beguile the night away with Angeline, who darted me looks that would kill if they were of material substance.

I stepped away from the parlor when it became too hot.

The drawing room fire was lit, but the room empty, except for Mr. Valemn. He reread his crumpled telegram. I saw the words “my Adonis”...”remarried”...and “your ring”. Then he crushed it again and threw it into the flames. His despondency transformed when he saw me. “Tell me, Miss Crankshaft, are your affections as sincere as the crowd of frills we see displayed every night? Once you have made a commitment, do you stand by it?”

“I am most sincere,” I answered.“I am a daughter of science and know only what is true and believe only what is proven. I am not fickle, just as the truth is not fickle; it only is.”

“Then perhaps you are the one who can save me from this ominous monster, the lurking serpent, a devouring white light.

88 Timeless Tales 6

“What can you mean?” I asked. “How can you be in danger except from cigar fumes or marital machinations?”

“Ah,” he answered, “You have just touched it. Despite your scorn, marriage vows kept faithfully would save me.”

There remained something strange about him, not in his manner, but in the very air around us. The room was dim, but a light crept in the shadows, growing unnaturally.

Mr. Valemn looked bright, not pale, like he would fade into the air. I pondered, “Marriage would save you...from what?”

“There are things knocking on the door of this realm that would pull me out, since I have opened it a crack. Only a loving wife who kept her sacred vows could anchor me to this world.

What we recognize as physical laws, are not the same on all planes, and have pulled a better man in two. Would you marry me, Miss Crankshaft, and let me move freely between?”

It seemed that the room’s light was not from the fire or the candles on the mantelpiece, but from a coiling thing on the floor. The bright thing had a shape of its own, climbing and slithering around our feet. My heart raced when a tendril wrapped my ankle. I knew it was real, perhaps not from this world. The man in front of me clung to my hands as if he were being pulled away by some supernatural force.

“Maybe you think it would be better to ask one of the women in the other room, but I know that you, as a lover of science, would be true above all others. You, as an inventor’s daughter, would sympathize with a husband who was devoted to his studies and sometimes absent.”

I had not thought of marriage for a long time. But my heart leapt at the chance, just as it leapt in fear at the white thing that had come into the room. “I will marry you.”

“Tonight, this instant, as soon as we can reach the courthouse.”

We left the party together through the back hall without anyone knowing we had gone. At the courthouse he produced two rings from his pocket, very much like the

Timeless Tales 6 89

iron band he once wore. He slipped the small one onto my finger. It was marked with foreign engravings. We said all the traditional vows, my husband required one addition.

“This ring is the symbol of your love for me, so long as you love me and are faithful to me, I will always find you wherever you are. You must promise to never remove it from your finger.”

We were married. The shimmering look of him went away after we exchanged bands. I realized suddenly that my husband was opaque, as he should be. We lived at the hotel in Baltimore. The explanation I had assumed would be forthcoming about the nature of his study, remained a mystery. After a day, he said he must return to work and disappeared. I wired my parents to tell them the news.

Mother’s letter was pervaded with a tone of worry, saying they had given me up for dead. Alone in the hotel, I worked on a pair of self heating gloves. After two days, he returned and sequestered himself, making notes in a book. When he emerged, he lay at my feet by the fire. I adored my husband and was unconcerned with his past or projects.

The next time he left, I went out. The Fairlea parties had reached their twelfth night. The lords-a-leaping were not baked into dinner, but celebrated with twelve dance masters.

Angeline, noticing my ring, pulled me aside. With serpentlike charm, she asked if I was engaged. I boasted the truth: I was married. Angeline was impressed, “How delightful for you, after waiting so long for a husband. He must be very permissive to allow a new wife out in company alone while still on the honeymoon. Oh, but he has gone away?

How fickle men are.”

I was sure that fickle was not one of his qualities. To prove Angeline wrong, I showed her the band and repeated the promises we made.

She laughed, “How quaint for an inventor’s daughter to be swept away by such a superstition.”

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How could I, whose principles were directed by the scientific method, be superstitious? The coiling light creature was a distant figment, and opposed the testable and the proven. Which did I believe: the feelings from that night, or the tangible and the scientific? I fingered my wedding band. I could easily test Mr. Valemn’s hypothesis.

If I found I must keep the ring on for his health, I would do so. With Angeline standing by, I removed my ring and let her examine it. She exclaimed over the carvings and played with it on her own finger before giving it back. All the while, my heart felt sick and I determined to never take the ring off again.

My husband was not at home when I returned that night.

I remained calm. He could reappear at any second...

I have waited for three weeks, in which time he never returned to the hotel. When I remember the intangible presence and lurking brightness on the night of our engagement, I am sure he is prevented from returning. Another world, he had said, with different rules. How can it be true? But I saw it, the thing, the ring, the disappearing. Where else could he have gone? If only I’d had faith in him at the crucial moment, I would not be left wondering if I caused my husband’s death.

What am I to do if my actions, my faith in science’s truth, has turned me into a widow? There is only one thing I am certain of: not everything can be explained.

The one object of significance my husband left behind was his little book, which contains his notes. I first opened it when I felt he would never return. But it is mostly gibberish and pictures, with only a few English words per page. Tears fill my eyes as I turn the pages. I can’t understand a thing.

Father finished his work for the government and I found myself unable to pay the hotel bill without assistance.

Father insisted I give up the farce of marriage and return with them to Vermont. I have acquiesced. Snow imprisons me until the thaw.

Timeless Tales 6 91

Fiction Curious Machinations

About The Author

In high-school Alexandra wrote fanfiction, in college she wrote dreadful poetry, now she writes little fantasies for the amusement of herself and friends. She lives with husband and dog, recently unburied from snow, in upstate NY and dreams of having a published novel someday. This was the first story she’s ever submitted to a publication, and she was thrilled that it was accepted.

Fiction

Words by

Silver Shadows

Julie Reeser

About the story

The Cupid and Psyche story has long been a thorn in my mythology-loving side. It’s a very passive tale for Psyche. She is blamed for something beyond her control.

Her sisters torment her. Her lover doesn’t trust her. She is to be dutiful and patient. Her redemption is in chores! It’s not a healthy relationship, and it would drive one mad. Oh! And then I was off and running.

I will say I was concerned about portraying mental illness in my story. It is not something to take lightly, and is a struggle that continues to be negatively viewed and underfunded. Getting therapy, taking prescriptions, and doing the work are all realities that many deal with day after day.

MORE TIMELESS TALES STORIES

BY Julie:

System Restore Issue 2 Pandora’s Box

Julie Reeser lives in a stone bowl in Montana. She prefers writing flash fiction and poetry, but is also working on her novel about a young woman in the Ottoman Empire. Her short story, Gathering Gold, is available through Black Denim Lit -online or ebooklet. She’s written flash fiction for NonBinary Review in their Frankenstein issue, which is now available in their archives.

She’s planning to do a giveaway on her blog, PersephoneKnits, for a copy of Grendel-Song magazinefor Kindle when it goes live with her Alice In Wonderland-Faust flash, so stay tuned!

SILVER SHADOWS julie reeser

The pills clung to her tongue when she swallowed. She always needed a second cup of water and the medicine tech radiated disdain.

“It’s only two pills, and they’re small,” the tech said.

As if this helped. As if knowing the number and size could change their sticky ways. As if being ashamed was new to her and therefore a motivator.

She shuffled to her bed carrying the shame as the rose-colored pill blossomed and the white one melted like a candle in August. She went to bed and awoke in the dark alone.

Her father had brought her here when she told him what she had seen at night. At first, he had misunderstood. He had thought there was an actual man in her bed. After he raged and cried, she explained with a quaking voice, “No, he isn’t there in the morning. He isn’t even there when I lie down. He only comes to me after I close my eyes. Then, I feel him next to me. When I open my eyes, I can only see shadows and suggestions.”

Shame, always shame. She’d twisted her hands to bruises.

The darkness clung under her eyes and the paleness of the moon stained her cheeks.

Her father took her to the doctor hoping to fix a simple imbalance, but an imbalance tied up in love is no easy knot.

It was love. She was sure of it. Why else would she dread his presence and yearn for him when he was absent? Wasn’t that its own imbalance? A knife-sharp edge she crawled along, an edge that cut her finely in stripes she hid from view.

She found herself lonely now, without him, and just as ashamed as before. The next night, she didn’t ask for a second cup of water. She let the pills hug her tongue and took herself to bed to await his arrival. He arrived in sighs and secrecy, and she realized it was not his touch that tormented her, but his absence in the daylight.

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She gently suggested to her therapist she could have a relationship with him if he were somehow made more substantial. If there were pills to make him fade, why not pills to make him vibrant? There was a risk in asking this, but she had to know.

Her therapist leaned forward. It wasn’t the first time a patient had wanted to hang onto the visions, but she was surprised this one had thought of it. She seemed pliable and afraid of her own sounds. A strange man in her bed should have made her scramble for a cure. The therapist was in her own damaged relationship with a man who couldn’t commit, so she had some sympathy for this lonely, pale girl. Maybe that’s why she answered directly instead of focusing on the need behind the question as she had been trained to do.

“Well, of course, anything which intensifies the dopamine system in the brain might work. People with a dopamine deficiency take their own medications, but there are ways to get it naturally. I’ve heard of people taking an herb called Velvet Bean.” Her training kicked in a little late, but not forgotten, and she asked, “Why do you feel the need to keep the hallucinations?”

The girl answered slowly as if part of her mind were doing other things, and indeed they were. She was memorizing the name and formulating her plan. Three afternoons later, she walked out of the hospital. The trick was in being humble and confident at the same time. People liked it when she behaved as if she were in their way. They liked hearing apologies and seeing the neat part down the center of her scalp when she bowed her head.

“I’m sorry. Dr. Abrams told me to go to the lab. I’m sorry.

I don’t know why she didn’t call first. I don’t want to be trouble.” Pity and shame had their uses. She wasn’t considered a flight risk. After all, she couldn’t run away from her own brain. She had wanted the visions banished. Now she

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believed it had all been a misunderstanding. She needed to have faith in the relationship. Her destination was Chinatown.

The streets were dirtier here, but the grid held, so it was easy to walk to the herbalist. She didn’t have money. She stood outside the shop and shifted her weight from foot to foot. The door was heavier than it looked, and she heard herself grunt with the effort. The odor of things long buried settled into her hair.

The shopkeeper was sleek and quick like a rabbit. “How can I help you? You need something for sleep? Or maybe anxiety?

I can do acupuncture, too, if you make an appointment.”

“I…I am looking for an herb called Velvet Bean. But, I don’t have any money. Do you need someone to help out or clean? I’m willing to do any jobs. Is it expensive?”

The shopkeeper narrowed her eyes and tilted her head as if she were listening for predators. “It’s not expensive if you have money, but if you have no money, then even mint is out of your price range. Why do you need it? You got the shakes?”

She laughed sharply. “No, I was told it would help with my dreams.”

The edges of the shopkeeper’s upper lip curled. “Ah. Is it a good dream?”

She bowed her head once more. Shame. It followed her like a loyal dog. “Yes. I’m sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing? Come along. I have plenty of work. One or two chores should be enough to get you what you need.”

The older woman led her to the back of the shop. On a long table were dozens of plastic bags, scoops, jars, lids, and a scale. The shopkeeper pulled down a box. Inside was a bag filled with tiny, irregular brown seeds.

“I need these sorted by size. It’s a tedious job, and one I avoid if possible. Lucky you.” They both heard the heavy door to the shop open. She thrust her chin at the sink in

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the corner. “Wash up first. People don’t want grubby merch.

Get as much done as you can before we close at seven.”

The door closed and latched behind her. She was sure she heard a lock tumble.

She sat down heavily on the tile floor and considered her options. She could cry and scream for help. Drama would unfold, police would be called, and she would be back in the hospital bed before the day was done. She could wait until the door unlocked, and then force her way out to freedom, but she wouldn’t have the Velvet Bean. Perhaps another shop on another street would offer her work in exchange for it. Perhaps not. The way she figured it, her best bet was to do the job, and hope the shopkeeper would keep her promise.

It became apparent rather quickly that her thin fingers were too thick. She put her head down in defeat. Exhaustion stole over her and with it welcome sleep. With sleep, came her hallucinations. She watched as her lover directed an army of ants to march through a chewed hole in the baseboard, up the table leg, and into the box. They emerged, each carrying a seed. While they marched and sorted, her lover held her and stroked her skin. His touch was better than any drug.

The dream crumbled at the sound of the lock. The shopkeeper saw the sorted seeds and frowned. “I won’t ask how you managed it,” she said, “but a deal’s a deal.” She opened her hand, the pills pooled like silver in her palm.

“You should only take one a day. The brain’s a tricky thing, but I’m guessing you already knew that.”

Nodding, she pocketed all but one of the pills. It was smooth and silky and didn’t need extra water. The shopkeeper watched her and then said, “It’s fine for you to stay here tonight.

Tomorrow, I have more work for you if you want it.”

She wasn’t asleep yet when he came for her. His smile pierced her and she felt herself slip out of her skin. She buried her face in his warm neck, smelled his clean scent,

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and felt his pulse thrum against her lips. His touch burned and sparkled and helped her forget the world. The next day, he was fading when the shopkeeper asked her to get them both coffee and breakfast from the corner deli. She took two more pills, hoping he would stay.

On the way there, he walked away from her. She tried to follow him, but he kept vanishing in doorways, always one step beyond her outstretched hand. The light of an open stairwell danced with dust as he moved through it.

Her heart hammered in her chest as she ran to the open foyer. He disappeared around the dimly lit landing at the top. The stairs sounded hollow as she followed after him.

Where was he leading her? Why would he run? Had she done something wrong?

The hallway was empty and smelled of unwashed bodies and garbage. The doorknob to the apartment on her left was locked, as were the next four doors, alternating right and left toward the shadows at the end. The last door opened at a touch. There were clothes strewn around the threadbare carpet and a mattress on the floor in the corner.

Some of the mass moved, and she was startled to see a woman smudged and wrinkled like an old newspaper.

“He went through there,” the woman muttered through doughy lips. Her skeletal arm pointed toward the window.

The window was closed, but slid open as if it were used as often as the door. The fire escape seemed much higher than they had climbed, and for a moment, she clung in fear as the wind tore at her hair. She scraped it back with a shaking hand just in time to see him. He stood on the flat rooftop of the adjacent building. He glanced back at her, and seemed disappointed in her hesitation. She couldn’t bear to think he might be ashamed of her. The fear of his disapproval forced her to action.

She backed up to the wall and ran two pounding steps, all the space afforded by the narrow metal railing, before

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flinging herself toward the gritty black roof across the gap.

As her back heel left the landing, she knew she wouldn’t make it. Her heart had leaped with her and now hung in her throat, caught like a moth cupped in hands.

She heard him whisper in her ear how much he loved her. She turned her head away from the gray alley rushing toward her, and stared into his eyes. He looked proud of her and her heart soared to know she had pleased him. He held her tightly around the waist, and they were floating toward the cloudless sky over the city. The beating of her heart stuttered and skipped before it settled into what felt like twinkling and eternal starlight.

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Fiction Silver Shadows

About The Author

Julie Reeser lives in a stone bowl in Montana. She prefers writing flash fiction and poetry, but is also working on her novel about a young woman in the Ottoman Empire. Her short story, Gathering Gold, is available through Black Denim Lit - online or ebooklet. She’s written flash fiction for NonBinary Review in their Frankenstein issue, which is now available in their archives. She’s planning to do a giveaway on her blog, PersephoneKnits, for a copy of Grendel-Song magazine for Kindle when it goes live with her Alice In Wonderland-Faust flash, so stay tuned!

Fiction

Words by

Secret Goddess

Jude Tulli

Aurora had always heard that when Venus smiled, the colors of the world grew brighter. Yet when Mercury delivered the mortal slave girl Venus had sought for so long, the light around them faded a little closer to blackness.

“Harlot,” the air between them froze with the goddess’ contempt as the veins on her forehead glimmered a beautiful shade of blue. “Never mind the grime that lives on your face and hands and underneath your fingernails. You somehow believe you are more beautiful than I! And you somehow managed to seduce my son Cupid, whom I fear must be going blind or losing the few wits he once had in his old agelessness, in a vain attempt to steal his quiver to use for your own personal whims.”

Aurora settled on her knees, mesmerized by the tightly-woven curls of Venus’ hair, the measured rhythm of her breath and even the perfect snarl that played upon her lips.

Words refused to assemble in Aurora’s mind within the slender token silence.

“I cannot allow these misdeeds to go unpunished,” the goddess decreed. “Unfortunately for you, I am not the proper judge to decide your fate. I leave that to the goddess you have harmed most directly. Psyche, devoted bride of Cupid, I grant you full authority. Though nothing would please me more than to beat her senseless for the scandal she brings our family, I have left that satisfaction entirely for you.”

Psyche descended from the autumn sky as a leaf might fall from a tree; delicately, with an eloquence long forgotten by the world.

Aurora felt the elder goddess’ chill abate, if only slightly, by the younger’s presence. She could see why Venus had

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felt threatened by her daughter-in-law amid the stories of old; though both could disarm any Caesar with a wink, the latter’s curls were sleek and slack like Aurora’s, and her breath ran slow and deep. What’s more, Psyche possessed a radiance of spirit that seemed worn down within the Goddess of Love by eons of wanton jealousy. If she trusted either to execute justice, it was sure to fall from Psyche’s fair hands.

“Aurora.”

When Psyche said her name the prisoner straightened to appear as tall as a mortal can from the knees up. “That is I.” “You are the bastard child of a noble mother and one of her husband’s own farm slaves. Beautiful as you are, how is it you have forged your way from such humble beginnings to become the object of a goddess’ wrath?”

Aurora’s eyes held Psyche’s tight while her tongue wove her defense from air to ear: The Tale of the Accused I have sunk to this pitiful depth in much the same manner as you once did, my dear Psyche. When I came of age, fellow household slaves began singing praises of my beauty.

I did not ask for it. Nor did I encourage it, yet once my master’s highborn friend compared me to your unparalleled mother-in-law, this moment became my destiny.

Like with you, Venus sent Cupid to see what the fuss was about. I suppose he took a liking to me.

He offered me an arrow, that I might spark the affection of any gentleman I desired. I am not ready for such an ordeal, yet I offered no mention of that fact.

No, wrongly I accepted his gift with the intent to rekindle my mother’s feelings for my poor lonesome father, that

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they might live out their remaining days in the same love bonds that brought me before you.

In stolen moments I scoured the house for opportunity, for my mother has disowned me fully to escape the shroud of shame that she herself wove. Slaves have invisible eyes in many places, and when I finally caught her, alone in the peace of a mid-day nap, I pushed the point against her supple neck. My heart fluttered with gleeful anticipation to watch as her skin compressed, and time stood still.

Once the blood began to flow, I would summon my father under pretense of emergency. Then I would flee under cover of shadow, lest blindness nestle itself a home inside my eyes. That was my plan.

Just then a little familiar voice rang through the air.

“Mommy! Mommy! I had a bad dream!”

I withdrew the arrow from the siege it held at mother’s throat, and hid beneath the bed. I listened as my half-sister Renita confided her night terror of losing her mommy to a pin-prick from a shadowy figure.

How my heart seethed to overhear my mother wiping tears and lavishing comfort upon her other daughter. Renita was born to the right father: my mother’s husband and my master. So it was I who endured her nightmare come true.

I lost my mother to a shadow of a man who buys and sells other people on the reckless winds of his whims.

Still, amid the calming sniffles of poor Renita, an unwelcome realization shook me to the core. If I brought mother back to my father, my own happiness would be forever tainted by such boundless sorrow as ne’er befits a child’s heart to hold. My mother, too, would lose her home and every last vestige of security. Even my father would receive

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no bolster to his wretched status; rather he would be shunned by slaves and nobles alike, though for differing reasons.

In the darkness beneath my mother’s bed I splintered the arrow shaft in two and whispered in my mind, “Dear Cupid, divine lover of the second most beautiful goddess in creation’s vast embroidery, please forgive me for disobeying you. The drum of my heart thanks you and I ask for nothing more than the joy your visitation has bestowed.”

If I could, I would absolve any fears of your husband’s unfaithfulness with me, merciful Psyche. The seduction the Goddess of Love accuses was nothing of the sort. Your husband came to me in a dream, and admired me my decision. He stroked my cheek and I kissed his nose in gratitude as a daughter to a father.

We laughed and for a moment, the whole of creation was love. *** Aurora swallowed though it hurt, for her mouth was dry with fear. She had spilled her soul over the floor at Psyche’s feet and expected instant kinship and sympathy, yet a calculating glare was all she met.

“Please believe my innocence. In my dream I wasn’t thinking of you.”

Psyche’s eyebrows arched and Aurora felt the gesture as a blow to the stomach. “I wasn’t not thinking of you, cherished Psyche. I just wasn’t really thinking at all; like you must have felt when your gaze first met his darling face though he implored you never seek to know its visage.”

Venus shook her head as a shepherd before the slaughter.

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Aurora cleared her throat if only to break the silence.

“If it was wrong of me to accept his blessing, I beg you to explain to me how I have caused you harm, and more importantly, how I might make amends.”

Psyche turned her face away and looked to the sky deep in thought. Venus tried to lock eyes with her daughter-inlaw, wearing upon her countenance a parade of knowing looks that told Aurora her truth was not believed, but Psyche’s eyes searched deep within herself, and her gaze met nothing.

When the younger goddess spoke, her voice nearly sang the sentence, “Where the willow weeps above the fountainhead that feeds the Stygian Marshes, where the dragons await a sacrifice to consecrate our pending treaty, there you shall be hung by delicate wrists in sacred offering.

There will all amends be made.”

Aurora’s heart sank. She knew it would come to naught, yet in the flattened tone of one accustomed to injustice, she had no choice but to protest. “By my father’s life I swear your judgment must be flawed, for I have meant you no injustice. You, whose loving union with Cupid has often been my only encouragement amid a life o’erflowing with distress. Yet if my blood shall heal some wound you harbor, I surrender it to you; the mortal you who knows what shame I wear. Beloved Psyche, all I have to give is yours.”

Venus snapped her fingers and Mercury swept Aurora up and away. He bound her hands to the branch of the willow Psyche bade, yet in sympathy rested her feet on a bough below, that her arms not bear the strain.

He looked at her through eyes of dew and kissed her cheek. “All will be well, my dear Aurora, for less than an

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eternity ago Psyche herself nearly leaped off yonder ledge. Surely she has not forgotten what it is to be mortal and forsaken.”

“She has.” Aurora began to cry, for the heartbreak of Psyche’s condemnation far overshadowed her fears. Her tears mingled with the racing current below just as one of the crimson guardian dragons caught her scent.

“Like Psyche before you, refrain from jumping to your own demise. The utmost stations in the underworld are reserved for those who look despair in the eye,” Mercury called over his shoulder as he flew off in haste.

Two red, scaly eyes peered into Aurora’s soul. A searing tongue burned the tip of her nose and more dragons circled. The breeze stirred by their flapping wings bristled her spirit.

“Vultures,” she thought, though her lips made not a sound.

They looked their quarry up and down, flared their smoking ember snouts, growled and gurgled at each other until a solid ring of jagged wings became her world. Aurora turned her head and found to her enemy’s ilk no end.

She knew then how a fly must feel, cornered by a spider in its web. “Make haste and finish it!” she shouted.

Fire burst from forty mouths at once. They missed! Her hands were free! But Mercury was nowhere to be seen.

“Underworld be damned,” she said, and jumped.

The largest dragon of the flock roared and dove and caught Aurora on his back. He flew her up and under the mythical fountainhead. When the water touched his glowing hide it screamed, a fiery curl of hisses and steam, until Aurora was so wet that even her bones could use a squeezing.

He ferried her down to solid ground and let her go.

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“Did that hurt?” Aurora asked the guardian.

He nuzzled her cheek, his wide-eyed face a cascade of little tremors.

“It sounded like it must have hurt, poor thing.” She kissed his nose and marveled that dragons can smile. “Death by soaking, then? Or am I all seasoned up and ready to be fed to the Goddess of Love and her menagerie of pets?”

“Drink this.” Psyche appeared behind her, cup in outstretched hand.

“You brought me out this far to poison me? Won’t that taint the meat for your new allies?”

The goddess laughed. “The guardians have been lamenting for centuries that no one who wanted invulnerability deserved it. What good to guard a treasure when ne’er a drop is shared with anyone at all?

“But I say you deserve much more than that. Drink this, my dear Aurora, and become like me: ageless and immortal.”

The golden goblet surrendered the sweetest drink that had ever indulged Aurora, and as the ambrosia warmed her from the inside out, the waters of the Styx dried and left an inviolate skein atop her skin.

Psyche could scarcely contain the love behind her smile.

“My husband and I have watched you since Venus began her latest covetous rage. For my daughter Joy I mixed ambrosia with the milk I yielded, but upon you the dragons have bestowed a life without the hint of possibility of an end. Come start your life anew, as the adopted child of Psyche and her Cupid.”

And so it was that Aurora shed the limits of mortality, and began to seek a place in every heart, beginning with that of her newfound grandmother Venus, whereupon a

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kiss on the nose ushered in the thaw of spring. With her sister Joy she reveled in the bonds of family and friendship ever deprived with Renita. Her first order of business with the mortal world was to free her father, but that is a story as substantial as it is noble, and worthy of its own proper place and time.

A slight dilemma arose in that Aurora refused to change her name, lest she feel disingenuous responding to one that was not hers. Still, she wished not to eclipse the other goddess Aurora. Perhaps for these reasons, or perhaps simply because she never sought attention, you will not find any temples or ceremonies in her devotion. Yet Aurora, forevermore the Secret Goddess of Selfless Love, carries the best of life’s benevolence through the ages.

When the northern lights fill the night sky, it is said to be the Stygian Dragons whispering to her a serenade of light. She might even have touched your face this very day, through a wind-borne mist or the kind word of a loved one; through the stranger who assumed your cause for no obvious reason, or perhaps, if only you could recognize it, a sacrifice beyond measure.

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