The Land by Thomas Maltman

Author:Thomas Maltman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
Publisher: Soho Press
Published: 2020-08-02T18:22:03+00:00

A Sort of Indoctrination

A few nights later Kaiser and I took a different path past the birches, cutting south where we found a small clearing. A light wind swirled powdery snow in serpentine patterns before us. Overhead the bell of heaven stretched over the open field, infinite stars ablaze above. Winter brought the stars so close to earth I imagined I could touch them like leaves. We strode among constellations. Orion. Taurus. Eridanus, the Celestial River. No wonder the Greeks thought the gods sojourned in such a territory, a limitless night sky of transformations. Who was I becoming? Which story was mine? I wanted to be Perseus, who must rescue Andromeda from the whale before he marries her. Perseus, who trails Cassiopeia across a winter sky without ever catching her, for all eternity.

Did you get away, Maura? You were so afraid. Why didn’t you tell me about the money? Why didn’t you tell me what you were really trying to do?

Looking up at the winter sky, in the cold, crystalline air, I swore I heard a celestial music, a distant ringing like a struck bell. I felt the rotation of the earth under my boots. All this brimming starlight made me fear the aura that precedes a migraine had distorted my vision. No mortal is meant to walk among the stars. Something unnameable bloomed within me:

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