Fantasy Scroll Magazine Issue #8 by Iulian Ionescu

Author:Iulian Ionescu [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: 978-0-9916619-7-8
Publisher: Fantasy Scroll Press, LLC
Published: 2015-08-16T00:00:00+00:00

© 2015 by Simon Kewin

* * *

Simon Kewin is a UK fantasy/SciFi writer, author of over 100 published short stories, as well as the novels Hedge Witch, Engn and The Genehunter. He can be summoned from the aether at simonkewin.co.uk.

From Mutsumi

KJ Kabza

When she saw him on the stone bridge, sakura raining down upon his oblivious shoulders, she nearly stopped breathing.

He was slim, young—looking, serious, and absorbed in the cracked leather book in his hands. Smart but adorably shy—who but a soft-spoken academic would come to a bridge in the height of sakura season, not to marvel at the trees, but to read?

The closer she came to him, the harder her heart beat. He was so perfect. She wanted to tease the book away from him, have him look up, and fall immediately into her eyes. But things would never unfold so simply. Instead, she screwed up her courage and asked, "What are you reading?"

He started. "Sorry?"

She leaned next to him on the low wall of the stone bridge, too nervous to get any closer. She willed herself to speak casually. "You're reading on a day like today."

"Yes." He swallowed. "I am."

"And you don't care about the sakura."

"No. Well, yes, but I've seen them before." He glanced down at the worn stones of the bridge, half-melted into each other with incalculable age. "I just like to read here."

"A bridge is an odd place for that, don't you think?"

"I suppose. But ever since I found it 50 years ago, I've been drawn to it. It feels like a good place; I can't explain it."

She nodded. "What are you reading? It's got to be good."

"Well—"

She leaned over, trying to see the cover, hoping she looked graceful. The leather-bound volume bore no title, but she did see the hash marks tattooed on the back of his left hand. She straightened and tapped her own knuckles. "I saw your hashes. I'm 8,000 too."

As soon as she said it, she winced. The line was so amateurish and awkward, but he seemed not to have heard her.

He flipped back to the title page. He paused before speaking, as if embarrassed of his tastes. "It's a collection of papers about the behavior of memory in a mortal being."

"You mean, the behavior of memory in an animal?"

He stared at her, clearly surprised at her interest. "No. In a human."

"When humans were mortal?" She laughed. "I thought you were a scientist. I guess you're a historian."

He hastily looked away. "I've been both."

She nodded. Her heart kept pounding. Had he thought she was laughing at him? "I think I was a history teacher, once."

"In Seattle?"

"I don't know. Why do you say Seattle?"

He looked at her quickly, and then away. "I can picture you in Seattle, for some reason. I don't know why."

She nodded again. A breeze shook the branches, and another lazy snowfall of sakura fluttered down. Around them on the bridge, couples and groups marveled, snapping pictures of the flowering boughs. She tried to think of something further to say. "Death interests you?"

He turned his book over in his hands.

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