Fantasy Scroll Magazine Issue #6 by Robert Reed & Alexander Danner & Beth Cato & Brynn MacNab & Erica L. Satifka & Ian Creasey & Jaymi Mizuno & Kurt Hunt & Robert Reed

Author:Robert Reed & Alexander Danner & Beth Cato & Brynn MacNab & Erica L. Satifka & Ian Creasey & Jaymi Mizuno & Kurt Hunt & Robert Reed [Ionescu, Iulian]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FIC028000, FIC009000, FIC015000, FIC003000, dark fantasy, fantasy, fantasy magazine, magazine, novelette, science fiction, science fiction magazine, short stories, short story
ISBN: 978-0-9916619-5-4
Publisher: Fantasy Scroll Press
Published: 2015-04-11T16:00:00+00:00

© 2003 by Ian Creasey

First published in Alternate Species, February 2003.

Reprinted by permission of the author.

* * *

Ian Creasey was born in 1969 and lives in Yorkshire, England. He began writing when rock & roll stardom failed to return his calls. So far he has sold fifty-odd short stories to various magazines and anthologies. His debut collection, Maps of the Edge, was published in 2011.

My Brother's Keeper

Beth Cato

Half the county figured my big brother Samuel had bricks for brains. There was mighty good evidence in favor of that, like the time he decided to walk through downtown naked simply cause it was a hot day and clothes just plain didn't feel good. But I knew Samuel wasn't a dummy, just quiet, with his mind in a different place than the rest of us.

So when I heard him with two speakers of dark words, I knew to hunker down and listen. Here by the barn was the most private spot on our property—or would be, if I wasn't up in the rafters.

I smelled the bad guys before I heard them. Mama didn't get to teach me much, but she did teach me to heed my nose when it came to good and evil and all the grey in between, and those men stank like the septic tank being sucked out on an August afternoon. I gagged against my wrist to keep quiet, Mama's old chain bracelet warm at my lips.

"I want to kill Macaulay," said Samuel.

That name made me inhale with a hiss. Kill Macaulay?

"It's easy to kill someone you hate that much," said one of the men. "But if you want to join our circle, you can't simply kill for vengeance. It's too easy."

There was a long pause. "He's got a wife and kid," said Samuel. I recognized the scuff of his bell bottom jeans dragging against the dirt.

"Three," said a deeper voice, "There's power in that."

"Yes," agreed the other man. "You must kill the entire family, on the equinox, with this knife. Then you can join our circle."

"I want them books of yours." Samuel's drawl was slow, every word dragged out like his puffs from a cigarette.

"You'll have access to our knowledge in stages. It takes time."

"I can do it," Samuel said.

When Samuel took that knife blade in his hand, I felt the wrongness of it rattle down my spine. That knife was an ugly, cursed thing. The other men left, heading back down the trail towards the base of the hill. Samuel stood there, holding that thing, assessing it in his quiet way. I barely breathed. I kept a pencil frozen in my hand, same as it was when I first smelled them come my way.

After a while, Samuel thudded back down the hill. The stink of evil faded. Why was Samuel doing such a stupid thing? If Mama knew, she'd whip his hide. She'd been the only one to ever keep him in line, the only one who understood he was so smart underneath all that stupid.