A Muse Bouche Review: December 2023

Featured: A Gift of Stars(Renée Gendron) Fiction
Sweet Home Ornithulia (Louise Sorensen) Fiction
The Prodigal (Marian L Thorpe) Fiction
Home From The Stars (David M. Simon) Fiction
A Reunion Eons in the Making (J Dalton) Fiction
William Nelson’s Last Chance (Joseph P. Garland) Fiction

December Team Showcase

 A Gift of Stars

Renee Gendron (@ReneeGendron)

This is an excerpt from A Gift of Stars.

An ache formed deep in her heart. The kind of ache an Osmirian princess shouldn’t feel for her husband, but it was there. Gnawing, whirling, spinning inside her.

She pushed the feeling aside, but the feeling shoved back.

Four days since Sanders had left. Four long days during which she had no idea if he was alive or dead. How did the wives of soldiers on military campaigns endure such anguish?

Back straight, head high, she stepped outside with a reassuring expression.

Two guardsmen stood sentry in the courtyard and their clear gazes swung Calanthe’s way. Their cheeks were thinner than they’d been just a week prior.

Two large cauldrons, commandeered from doing laundry to cooking food, stood in the centre of the courtyard. Edda and Deme stood next to a cauldron, one stirring the contents, the other adding to them.

Dawn broke.

Haggard workers emerged from tents and lean-tos, shuffling their way across the courtyard with cups and plates.

Injured guardsmen hobbled out of the barracks, one with a crutch, many others with scabbed-over cuts that would leave scars worthy of tales over ales.

Each shot her a look. Some held a glint of amusement over her poisoning the camp, others were just weary glances. Gazes that were too tired and too worried and too half-dead to offer a smile or a nod or any semblance of cordiality. One by one, they lined up for their thin soup of wild leek, grouse, and deer.

“Has anyone seen Master Builder Hector?” Calanthe dunked a ladle into a cauldron and served a guardsman.

The guardsman shook his head, then limped back towards the barracks.

Breakfast served to everyone, Calanthe filled a simple tin cup and sipped the broth. It lacked everything—salt, pepper, texture. But it was warm and lessened the growl in her stomach.

The sound of one saw sawing and one hammer hammering filled the courtyard. A pathetic din in a place with two dozen skilled tradesmen and two dozen more labourers.

Fairbanks sat on a stump at the end of the courtyard.

She approached him. “How many tools remain?”

He rose. “One saw and one hammer in Grosmar. Hector’s taken the rest to the pit.”

“We need the tools from the pit to make more tools. Then the master builder can resume work.”

“Tell him that.”

“Has he eaten?”

Fairbanks shrugged. “He’s pressed workers into digging out the pit.”

“That’s not the priority.”

“I know that, Lady Calanthe, but it’s Hector. He won’t listen.”

Calanthe folded her hands over her hip. “I’ll do my best to get the workers back to Grosmar. Please ensure they have a place to stay.”

“Once we get a few more hammers, we’ll build the palisade, then some bunkhouses for the workers.”

“Are there any shovels?”

He downed the remaining contents of his cup. “Hector took them all.”

Calanthe walked to the pit and instructed Hector to release the workers.

The frown lines around Hector’s brow and mouth deepened until he resembled a crotchety old man. He huffed, grumbled, and mumbled a string of curses, then made a dismissive gesture towards the workers.

One by one, they scrambled up the gentle slope of the caved-in wall and walked back to Grosmar with Calanthe.

Hector, however, stayed behind and continued to dig.

Calanthe inspected the first section of the palisade. “It goes well.” She reinforced her voice with approval and admiration.

Captain Magelo tapped a post into its position with a rock. “There’s a partial wall up. Need proper tools to dig deeper and secure the posts.”

Guardsmen and workers alike placed the next pole in and the next one.

“A word, please, Captain.” Calanthe strolled off a few paces towards the Fork.

Magelo handed the rock to another guardsman, who resumed positioning the posts.

“Have the patrols found any sign of Sanders and his party? “Have the patrols picked up traces of the raiders?”

“No sign. The guardsmen dismantled a few Ravelian bear traps. No sign of horsemen. No sign of game.”

No horsemen. No food. No Sanders. “What do you suggest?”

“Suggest?”

“What do you suggest we do to find my husband and his party?”

Pity veiled the captain’s gaze. “Ma’am, you may need to prepare for the possibility of…”

Death. Death by misadventure in the hinterlands of Rettkal on a mission that no one in Grosmar understood.

The ache in her heart turned into a hundred piercing sensations. She pressed her hand against her chest and swallowed hard. “There’s no proof the party was attacked. How many horses do we have?”

“Six.”

“Are any of your men fit to ride to the nearest port to catch a vessel to Osmira?”

A disapproving frown flashed across Magelo’s face, then he calmed his features. “When do you want your escort to leave?”

“I’m not leaving. I need to send word to my father.” Maybe he’d finally tell her what was happening here.

Sweet Home Ornithulia

Louise Sorensen (@louise3anne)

Two human females crept up to the towering mass of tree branches, earth, waste, and bones. A foul-smelling mess fell from an upper window in the clouds, and coated the tower with another layer of white-washed waste. The women scurried back into the decorative shrubs at the front of the estate to avoid being splashed.

“I don’t fancy the climb, Lorbas,” said one.

“No help for it, Chell. Let’s find the servants’ door. Maybe they have a lift. It is the famous author, after all.”

They trudged around the circumference of the habitat, passing the huge sculpted metal gates that permitted passage to only the giant Ornithulians, until they found the plain wooden door for the servants’ entrance.

Chellie rang the bell. Lorbas scratched half-heartedly at the scars from the control collar that used to be around her neck.

“Here,” said Chellie. “Don’t be scratching at that.” She fished into her backpack and brought out a tube. “Put some of this on, so you won’t be distracted while we do our job.”

Lorbas took the tube, squeezed out a generous portion of salve, and applied it to her neck, where the scars were turning red. “Ahhh. That feels good. I get a rash just thinking about them.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about them anymore,” said Chellie. “I’m sorry, but as part of your therapy, you have to be exposed to the cause of your problem. Otherwise, I might be doing this on my own. Not that I don’t appreciate your help, mind you. It’s just that spiking and eliminating them has become routine by now. Somewhat routine. It usually goes smoothly.”

“Really? I can’t imagine. After all this time. Have you decided which form you’re going to make it take?”

“No. Not yet.” Chellie gave the question some thought, and tapped her foot as they waited for someone to answer the bell. “I play it by feel. And remember, this is the one that promoted Humans as pets and wrote that damned book, Care and Control of Your Human. He’s the last one on this planet not yet under our control.” She pounded on the door. “What is keeping that servant?”

They waited a while longer. Chellie was almost ready to kick the door down and go in. Finally, the latch snicked open, and a little child with a dirty face peered out at the two. Tears made two clean tracks through the dirt.

“Yes. May I help you?” said the child.

The two women were taken aback.

“Is your mom or dad at home, Sweetheart?” said Lorbas.

“They’re confined,” said the child.

Chellie gritted her teeth. “Are they okay?”

“For now. But I don’t know how long.”

Okay in Ornithulia meant that a human pet had not yet been tossed down the gullet of an Ornithulian, or ripped apart and thrown into a stewpot. But being confined was a first step.

“We’re here just in time,” said Lorbas. “Take us to your leader.’

“A bit of a misquote, Lorb?” said Chellie.

“I’ve just always wanted to say that.”

The child, whose name he gave as Fless, led them to a rickety open lift. They centered themselves on it, rocketed up to the living quarters and jumped out the moment it screeched to a stop.

Fless held back and Lorbas said, “Just point the way to it. We’ll take over now. Can you release your mom and dad? And anyone else caged?”

Fless nodded, and Chellie said, “Get to it now, then. We’ll take care of the Master.”

Fless pointed to the main room and scampered off.

Chellie and Lorbas crept along the floor, past the wide legs of immense hulking furniture, until they came to, from the acrid smell of spices burning on the stove, the kitchen.

“Ugh.” Lorbas turned away and gagged. “I’ll never get used to their taste in cooking. And that smell of rot underneath. This one is a terrible housekeeper.”

Chellie glared at her. “If you’re going to throw up, do it quietly.”

Lorbas put a hand over her mouth and took a deep breath. “No. I’m okay. What’s the move?”

“Oh, I think dissolution,” said Chellie. “From the looks of all the bones in the nest, and the two people waiting to meet the contents of those cooking pots, I’d say this Master has been eating and not petting Humans for some time. It’s a nasty habit, and it needs to stop.”

“You don’t want to keep him as a contact for other planets?”

“No. We have enough of them for that. More than enough.”

“Okay.” Lorbas took a deep breath. “How do we do this?”

“Piece of cake.” Chellie opened her backpack and extracted a hammer, a spike, and a large injector that was loaded with a swirling blue liquid. “Be careful of this,” she said. “It’s hot to the touch.”

Shaking, Lorbas took the heavy injector gingerly.

“Not like that! Hold it like you mean it.”

Lorbas frowned, and held the injector up with both hands, ready to stab.

“Okay now. I’m going to sneak up on it, hammer the spike into its ankle, and then pull the spike out. You ram the injector into the hole and press the plunger all the way in. You got that?”

Lorbas nodded. “I got that.”

“Piece of cake. I’ve done it hundreds of times alone. But they’re getting wise to us. I really should have help for this one.”

Chellie turned and crept along the kitchen baseboards, towards the Ornithulian. She craned her neck to see its face. It was happily stirring a pot and humming to itself. Thick armour covered its whole body, but Chellie knew that the armour held in a circulatory system that was under high pressure. She turned to talk to Lorbas, and found her frozen at their entry point, staring in horror at the giant. Chellie ran back to Lorbas, grabbed her by the shoulders, and shook her. “I thought you’d done this before.”

“No. Not really. Never a hit. I was always an observer.”

“I don’t know what people are thinking sometimes.” Chellie shook her head. “Sending an observer out to do a hit.” She punched Lorbas lightly on the arm. “Can you pull yourself together and do what I need you to do?”

Lorbas frowned and looked down.

“You’re my backup. Our last chance if anything goes wrong. If we don’t do it now, and I have to come back with somebody else, that kid’s parents will be toast. Maybe the kid too. Probably. And anyone in the cages. You get that? Huh?”

Lorbas raised her head and nodded.

“A hundred years of fear and tyranny and worming ourselves into their good graces and trust. That’s what it’s taken us to get here.”

“I got that. I’m good to go.”

“This idiot’s not going to stand there much longer.” Just as Chelli said that, the idiot in question stopped stirring the pot.

“Oh shit. Come on. It’s now or never!” Chellie grabbed Lorbas’ hand and dragged her along, until Lorbas started running. They made it to the Ornithulian’s ankle just as it began to peer down at them. It gave a low rumble that shook the floor. A thousand eyes in the knob of its head focused to get a better look at them. Its beak opened slightly.

Chellie tapped the ankle rapidly, until she found the spot where the armour was thinner than anywhere else, rammed the spike in as far as she could, and then hit it with the hammer, multiple times a second. This is what she trained for and she was good at it. After a dozen hits, the spike penetrated the creature’s armour and she tried to yank it out. Stuck! Muscles bulging, she lost valuable moments wiggling it out. Heart racing, she looked around for Lorbas. Where was Lorbas?

Lorbas was right behind her. “Move!”

Chellie ducked out of the way and Lorbas jammed the injector home and pushed down on the plunger with both hands, releasing potent chemicals into the Ornithulian’s ankle.

The creature stopped turning. The air was filled with a low rumble of enquiry that shook the walls.

“Okay. Now this is the tricky part.”

Lorbas gave her a what-the-hell look.

“Hold. Hold. Don’t move. Wait. We have to make sure the poison is working. See how it will react. Will it try to stomp us? Fall on us? Or just break up quietly?”

The creature quivered, and all over its body, its surface blurred. Its foot rose.

“It’s going into shock, but trying for the stomp,” yelled Chellie. “Okay, now. Run!”

They ran.

When they reached the entryway of the kitchen, they stopped to watch.

As the hard-won biochemical entered the creature’s circulatory system, the creature froze, and then put its foot down. Connective systems reacted to the attack and slowly closed off. Tiny fissures appeared in the Ornithulian’s body. The two humans watched, fascinated, as the discreet creatures that collectively made up the body of the Ornithulian detached, fluttered to the floor, and wandered around aimlessly.

“That’s where Tasty Meat comes from,” murmured Lorbas. “I knew it. I just never really believed it. I was on the science team that discovered the disconnector, you know.”

“I knew that. You did good,” Chellie said with satisfaction. She eyed the foot-long creatures on the floor. “They’re delicious. As the saying goes, you can’t eat just one.” And she smiled.

She pulled a communicator from her backpack and switched it on. “Last nest cleared.” She turned to Lorbas. “Let’s gather up the kid and his parents and anyone else being held, let them get whatever they want to save. And clear out of here. The salvage crew and food collectors will be here soon to clean up, and we should get our people home. We can come back for the great bonfire when they’re done. This land should make a nice park. Maybe a playground.”

“Home.” Lorbas thought of the new settlements Humans had wrestled away from the giants who had ruled their lives for so long. Home and warmth. Safety. People who loved them and no one trying to cage or eat them. Hughlii.

“Home, sweet, home. I think the kid and his family are going to like it.”

Photo by Vika Glitter via Pexels

This is a slightly modified excerpt from the author’s seventh book (but fourth in reading order), Empress & Soldier.  A ‘cithar’ is a stringed musical instrument; ‘quincalum’ is a civil partner, formalised via an agreement renewed (or not) every five years.

After I have been back in Casil a week, I am given an afternoon’s leave. I collect my cithar from the commander, and the bottle I kept. Then I walk across the city to the house that is now my brother’s.

I think the square has not changed. Then I see the awning shading three shopfronts. The one that was ours when I left, and the ones on both sides. All one striped fabric. Beneath it a man speaks to another. Oil is offered, to taste.

I watch from the shadows until the transaction is done. The buyer leaves. I stand, cross the square. Call my brother’s name.

He turns. “Yes?” Dressed in a tunic of good quality, a belt of soft leather.

“Marius,” I say again, and he hears and sees me this time.

“Druisius!” He stares for a moment. “What—where have you come from?”

“My barracks. I am a palace guard now, yes?” I step into the shade of the awning, put down the cithar. He offers his arms. I hesitate, then accept. We hug. He is taller than me, strong. I have missed him, it seems.

I glance around. “Three shopfronts? The business does well.”

“It does. I told you that, in my letters. But come.” He beckons me to the door that leads to the rooms above the shops. “Meet Vita and the boys. Can you stay to eat?”

The stairs are familiar. One still creaks as it always did. Marius is calling his wife’s name. I step into the main room, stop. New plaster, painted. New tiles on the floor. Carpets. They tell the same story as my brother’s tunic and belt. Being a trader has been no hardship for him.

A woman comes from another room. Olive skin, big dark eyes, her straight black hair clipped back. “Vita,” Marius says, “look who this is! My brother Druisius.” He is smiling, happy I am here. I am too.

Food is brought, and wine, and the two boys, my nephews. The young one, Tadius, is just past toddling; Valens, the older, four and a bit. Not babies. Valens reaches for my cithar. “No,” I say gently, and lift it from the floor. “Marius, keep these for me? The barracks are not a safe place.”

He laughs. “I’ll have to put it out of reach of the boys.” I hand it to him, and the glass bottle. I liked its shape, and its colour. No one asked where it went.

Marius runs a finger along the oiled wood of the cithar. “When did you learn to play?”

“Marcellus taught me. The officer from the docks, yes?”

He nods. “He was killed.”

“In Qipërta. The cithar was his. I will try to find his wife, give it to her for their son.”

“That shouldn’t be hard,” he says, “for a palace guard. Someone in the offices will know where she is. You can ask when you’re not working.”

“But I am not at the palace. Not yet. Too new, yes? So the streets and gates. For a while. Maybe our patron would know?”

“Varos? I could ask.” His face lights. “Did you know his daughter’s to be the Empress now? I’ve spoken to an Empress.”

“I met the Emperor,” I say. “When he was the prince. He thanked me for opening a door.” We grin at each other. Then talk about where I have been, the distant lands. About my younger sisters, married to traders. Both far away, across the sea. About the ships Marius owns now, the warehouses he leases. The markets for grain and oil and wine. I tell him of the carter with his amphorae of oil hidden among the wine vessels.

“There’s always those who will try to cheat,” he says. “Not worth it. By the way, there’s money put aside for you. Part of the profits, each year.”

This surprises me. “Why?”

He shrugs. “Our mother asked me to. After our father died. You’ve got—what?—another fifteen years to serve? What will you do after?”

I have no answer. “Maybe I am dead, yes?”

“And maybe not. You should think about it.”

Too soon. I tell Marius this. He shakes his head. “It isn’t. But I suppose, when it’s only you—no wife or children to worry about, it’s different.” He eyes me. “It is only you? No quincalum?”

I laugh. One man only? Not my way.

It is time to go. I am on duty in an hour. I thank Vita, praise the boys. She smiles. “Come any time.”

Marius walks down to the square with me. “Vita’s right,” he says. “Come any time.”

Illustration credit: Market Place, by  John Singer Sargent, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

On the final Monday of winter 2020, William Nelson, a middle-aged man who was one of Silicon Valley’s most consulted lawyers, sat on a bench across from Starbucks and Baskin-Robbins in an affluent New York suburb. He had never been to the village. The sun was out but the air was chilled, and he watched the people and the cars pass by as he sipped his Caffè Americano, studying the faces hoping to see his daughter, Suzanne Neally.

He hadn’t spoken to her since his surprise visit to her Manhattan office a year-and-a-half earlier. That was when she took him to a nearby park and ignored his attempt to convince her to return to California. That was his home. It no longer was hers. Her home was now New York, with her wife. And when they sat that long ago day on a bench in Madison Square Park at lunchtime, Suzanne gave him an ultimatum. It had weighed on him nearly every day since and it had become almost unbearable: Accept me as I am and my wife as she is or stay out of my life.

And now, suddenly, the world was changing. With coronavirus, each day brought more turmoil, more shutdowns. When would he ever again be able to go to his daughter?

At home in suburban Marin County, after a visit to relatives on Sunday when all these ideas had bounded and bounded in his head until they finally settled, he went on-line. The air was still open, and he found a red-eye flight from San Francisco. It was leaving at midnight and would get into New York at about 8:30. As far as he could tell, the flight was almost empty, and he booked a seat in first class and drove to the airport.

On the plane, he declined offers of alcohol and quickly fell asleep. Only when the plane was on its final approach to JFK did he awaken.

He had no luggage. Only a backpack with toiletries and a change of underwear. When he reached the terminal, he pulled out his phone and found a bench. The picture on the homescreen was of his family in what he once thought was a happy time.

It was about a quarter to nine. He stared at that photo before opening the messaging app. William scrolled down his contact list until he got to “Suzanne.” He opened it. The last message was in July 2018. He hoped Suzanne would be working from home. He thought it likely, given what he knew about her company’s business.

He typed.

{William:} Suzanne. I’m in new york to see you. Please tell me whether you will see me. And where. Father.

He stared at the draft. Would she understand? Would she respond? Had she blocked him?

He added “Love” before “Father” and hit send.

He had come this far, but there was no immediate response. He went to the sidewalk outside the near-empty American terminal. There was no taxi line so he got in one that was waiting and asked to be taken to Bronxville. When the cabbie asked how to get there, William said he didn’t know. The driver found it in Waze, and they began the trip.

Passing the time, the cabbie spoke of how difficult things had been with the virus.

“We have suffered so much. Uber was bad, but this is worse. No one is traveling. This will be a good trip for me.”

William was often gregarious with cabbies, but now he spoke just to keep the conversation going. The Van Wyck Expressway was almost empty though it was Monday, and William never got out of JFK so quickly. Or so anxiously. He held his phone in his hand on his leg, glancing at it as if his will would cause the receipt of a message.

As the cab climbed the bridge to the Bronx and William was looking out over the Sound, the phone chirped. He hesitated and took a breath before lifting it. He opened the message.

{Suzanne:} You should drive to Bronxville. When will you get there?

William breathed again with the words, and he stared at them. Without looking up, he asked the cabbie when they would get to town.

“Waze says it will only be 17 minutes.”

William, his hands shaking, typed and sent the information.

{Suzanne:} There are benches by the train station. Across from Starbucks. Near the movie theater. I’ll be there in 25.

Suzanne had, in fact, seen her father’s first message shortly after it was sent. She was working remotely, as was Kerry, and was in the kitchen preparing breakfast. She rushed to the bedroom and showed it to Kerry.

“What do you think?” she asked.

“Fuck.” Kerry stopped drying her hair and sat on the bed. “There is no way he would come all this way to pull a stunt like the last time.” She was quite familiar with that last time, when he simply showed up at Suzanne’s office one day.

“Agreed. I have to see him. I told him I would.”

Kerry reached up and pulled Suzanne’s head down, kissing the top of her head.

“This is why I love you so much. You are so forgiving. I’d never be like you.”

Suzanne pulled away. “Yes, you would. Even if you would never admit it. Which is why I love you.”

Suzanne plopped on the bed when Kerry gave her room.

“He is your father, and he did believe what he did was right.”

“I know that.”

They were silent.

“I don’t think he should come to the house until I see him,” Suzanne said.

“Agreed. And don’t tell anyone. Where can he meet you in town?”

“There are benches on the train platform,” Suzanne said. She looked at Kerry.

With that Suzanne rose. “I’m sure.”

“Should I go with you?” Kerry asked.

“This time, love, it will be just him and me.”

Kerry stepped up behind Suzanne. She put her arms around her waist.

“I’m so lucky to have you.”

“We are lucky to have each other,” Suzanne said, as she often did. “I so hope this works. And whatever happens from here happens from here.”

She turned.

“Now, let me tell him.”

*   *   *

William clutched the phone.

“Is everything all right, sir?” the cabbie asked.

“Couldn’t be better. Could not be better. I’ve never been there before. I’m told there’s a Starbucks.”

“Beats me. It doesn’t look like a big place. Someone’ll tell us.”

Waze directed them to the middle of town. It was, in fact, not a big place. It was five minutes before Suzanne was due, and William jumped out to ask a passerby where the Starbucks was. When he was told, he leaned into the cab.

“It’s just around the corner here. I’ll walk. What do I owe you?”

The cabbie rang it up, and William gave him a hundred.

“Keep it.”

“Thank you very much. Have a very good day, sir.”

“I hope to,” he told the cabbie as he started to walk. Then, to himself, “I hope to.”

As he approached Starbucks, William saw the benches. He got his usual concoction and sat on the bench to the left, in the sun. It was a nice little town, and he knew its reputation as being not unlike Mill Valley in its affluence.

His thoughts were diversions, crowding out the only thing that mattered. Suzanne.

He wondered half-seriously whether she would recognize him. He was in gray slacks, an open-necked shirt, and a blue blazer. Suzanne used to tease him that he always looked like he just addressed the U.N. General Assembly when he was in “serious mode.” She once took a pair of scissors to a Hermès tie—it was light blue and one of his favorites—when they sat at a restaurant in San Francisco to celebrate her twenty-first birthday. Kate looked shocked at that and Eric looked amused.

If she were home and up when he was heading out to catch the train to work, Suzanne invariably tried to muss his hair, and he loved the brief contact they had on those mornings, although he always retained the façade of a gulf between father and child much as his parents had with him and his sister. Kate was the same. In retrospect, it seemed cruel.

William wondered whether she would comment that his hair was slightly longer than it had ever been. At least since law school. He wondered whether she would soon have a baby and he would be a grandfather. He wondered about a thousand things as he waited. As he had countless times when he allowed his mind to wander and be free.

He didn’t dare look at his watch. Instead, he took sips of his Caffè Americano. He didn’t know the direction from which she would come. He didn’t know what kind of car she drove or even if she would drive. His head was in constant motion when he wasn’t drinking, praying for a glimpse of her.

Would he recognize her? Then his doubts vanished. He again held his breath for a moment. He didn’t quite see the details of the face but recognized the stride with which he was so familiar. A determined yet relaxed stride as she walked directly towards him. Her dark-brown hair bouncing ever so slightly and rhythmically with each step.

Then he saw the face framed by the hair. Perhaps he saw a smile. He couldn’t be sure.

She paused, but it was barely perceptible. As he stood, she rushed to him.

Author’s Note: This is the final part of the novel Coming to Terms. It was written precisely when it was set. I was not two miles from what became perhaps the US’s first Coronavirus hotzone and a first draft, in which William travels to New York on Tuesday, suddenly seemed unrealistic. He had to leave Sunday or, I thought, there wouldn’t be another chance. So that Sunday truly was a do-or-die moment to see if William’s acceptance of his daughter would not come too late for (as we recall) the prospect of again flying from California to New York in March 2020 seemed like a pipedream.