The Dark Issue 19 by Steve Rasnic Tem

Author:Steve Rasnic Tem [The Dark Magazine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: dark fantasy, fantasy, horror, magazine
Publisher: Prime Books
Published: 2016-11-17T19:05:49+00:00

Cate Gardner’s stories have appeared in Shimmer, Black Static, Fantasy Magazine, Postscripts, and many other wonderful places. Her novella, The Bureau of Them, was nominated for a British Fantasy Award, as was her short story “When the Moon Man Knocks.” You can find her on the web at www.categardner.net.

The Absent Shade

by Priya Sharma

“Calm down now,” Umbra said as she wiped away Thomas’ tears. “Let’s play a game. It’s a secret though. You mustn’t tell anyone about it.”

After that Thomas wanted to play every night, so Umbra would get up from her roll up mattress on the floor beside his bed and move the lamps around to cast shadows on the wall behind them. Then she’d lie beside him and wrap her thin arms around him.

“You start,” she’d say, “make me a shadow.”

His hands were a muddle.

“What’s that?” Umbra asked.

“A cat.”

Her hands moulded his. The shadow formed a sinuous feline shape, Thomas’ little finger sticking out to form its tail.

“My turn.”

She placed one of her hands over the other and a dog appeared on the wall. He could see every detail of it, even though it was in silhouette; its shaggy fur, its lolling tongue, the wag of its tail. It cocked up its ears and chased the cat, leaping from wall to ceiling. Thomas squealed and clapped.

“What next?” she asked.

His hands wiggled.

“Is it a fish?”

He nodded, well pleased that she’d guessed.

“Let me see,” Umbra mused as she gathered together the strands of scattered shadows in her fist and fashioned them into a seal that fell into a graceful arc as it dived, the boy’s minnow in its mouth.

“Now, little man, copy me.”

She taught him how to make shadow puppets. A rabbit with index and middle fingers for ears, a swan whose neck was formed from the curve of the wrist and feathers from fanned out fingers. Bears, ducks, turtles, even an elephant with tusks.

“This is my favourite,” she said as she made a pair of birds on a bough. “Watch.”

Her projections were as different to his as a child’s plasticine figure is from an artist’s carving. The bough was in flower and the birds cocked their heads as if listening to each other’s song. Then the impossible: the birds divided and divided, becoming a flock that took flight. Fluttering wings covered the wall in an explosion of feathers.

“Now, that’s enough.” she kissed his forehead when the shadows had taken up their former shape. “Sleep now.”

When he was older he thought about trying to tell someone about her but he knew that he wouldn’t be believed, even though every part of it was true.

“Pleasure or business, Mr. Leung?” The desk clerk smiles at Thomas.

“Business.”

He used to work for a multinational that sent him to quell corporate uprisings, navigate difficult negotiations and strip out smaller companies. His wife, Viola, doesn’t know that he has a new job, one that he’s even better at than the last one. His wife calls him a cold fish which, he supposes, is why he’s so good at this work.

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