Cthulhurotica by Cody Goodfellow, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Jennifer Brozek, Ahimsa Kerp, Carrie Cuinn, Gabrielle Harbowy, Don Pizarro, Madison Woods, Richard Baron, Juan Miguel Marin, Maria Mitchell, Mae Empson, Nathan Crowder, KV Taylor, Andrew Scearce, Constella Espj, Leon J. West, Travis King, Steven J. Searce, Clint Collins, Matthew Marovich, Gary Mark Bernstein, Kirsten Brown, Kenneth Hite, Justin Everett Page A
Authors: Cody Goodfellow, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Jennifer Brozek, Ahimsa Kerp, Carrie Cuinn, Gabrielle Harbowy, Don Pizarro, Madison Woods, Richard Baron, Juan Miguel Marin, Maria Mitchell, Mae Empson, Nathan Crowder, KV Taylor, Andrew Scearce, Constella Espj, Leon J. West, Travis King, Steven J. Searce, Clint Collins, Matthew Marovich, Gary Mark Bernstein, Kirsten Brown, Kenneth Hite, Justin Everett
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Remarkable.”
Something changed in his wife’s expression. She looked quite pleased. “We could sail to Syracuse, and then travel north to the place where she waits.”
Anaximander’s wife had a large gold-ornamented chest, which she had brought with her to his house at the time of their marriage. She always kept it locked. She kept it in a room in their villa which she also kept locked. Sometimes she sequestered herself behind that door, and he could hear flute music and drum through the open window, as he read in the courtyard below. He assumed it contained her Thracian instruments.
Now, she insisted that they take it with them to Syracuse. But first, while he arranged things and their sea passage, she let him know that she would be gone for several days, visiting her family.
Anaximander was glad to not be invited. He had never met her family, and expected they were quite decadently Thracian since she had been so reluctant to introduce him to them.
But, it struck him that her departure would be a chance to investigate the locked chest in the locked room. It had bothered him particularly in the first few months of their marriage, but he had not thought about it for over a year, gradually settling into their routines. This mention of her need to take it to Syracuse had re-ignited his curiosity.
He purchased locks that were similar enough to substitute, so that he could hide this act of invasion, and entered the forbidden room.
Surely this was simply a cautionary tale, Dennis told himself. It was a warning to not be taken in by the Orphic cult, to leave closed those doors which are not meant to be opened. That Anaximander had chosen to tell it in such biographical terms was intriguing and probably of interest to some literary scholar, but did not necessarily detract from his other scientific thinking nor cast aspersion on the source of his more radical ideas.
There was a strange fetid odor in the room, almost brackish. It had simply been shut up too long, Anaximander told himself, momentarily forgetting the open window.
He considered how angry she would be. But was he not indulging her with this foolish trip to Syracuse? Surely, she would indulge him in this.
He crossed to the chest and forced the lock.
As he lifted the lid, a thick scent of musty brackish wrongness assaulted his senses. Was something dead rotting inside? What had she done?
There was something pink folded on top – a kind of strange almost flesh-like cloth. He lifted it out and shook it open.
It was the skin of a woman, complete but for holes at the eye sockets, hair still attached. He was holding it in front of him by its shoulders. He saw hair like his wife’s hair, curly and brown, and a scar like his wife’s on the left arm. He dropped it, and let it fall back into the chest, noticing for the first time that there were other objects below, other folded skins, sickly dark gray and green, with glimpses of feather and of scale and of fur.
He slammed the trunk, and sunk to a sitting position in front of it. He thought “witch” and “skin-thief”, and “not her, not my wife.” And, “gods protect me.” She would come back. She would know what he had done.
A shriek sounded behind him, and he turned. A hawk perched in predatory agitation, framed by the window, and its eyes were his wife’s eyes.
“Circe?” he asked.
The hawk flew to him, perched on his shoulder, and rubbed its head against the hair above his ear.
He flinched, expecting some attack, but it did not come.
She flew to the chest, lifted its lid with a talon, and slipped inside. A moment later, his wife climbed out of the chest. “I can change others, but not myself. I had to find another way. It is an old craft.”
“Will you change me? I should not have looked into that which you had locked and hid.” In his mind, he saw pigs and wolves, and he was afraid.
She looked at him and let the silence stretch. “Mander, if you will keep me company for the
Something changed in his wife’s expression. She looked quite pleased. “We could sail to Syracuse, and then travel north to the place where she waits.”
Anaximander’s wife had a large gold-ornamented chest, which she had brought with her to his house at the time of their marriage. She always kept it locked. She kept it in a room in their villa which she also kept locked. Sometimes she sequestered herself behind that door, and he could hear flute music and drum through the open window, as he read in the courtyard below. He assumed it contained her Thracian instruments.
Now, she insisted that they take it with them to Syracuse. But first, while he arranged things and their sea passage, she let him know that she would be gone for several days, visiting her family.
Anaximander was glad to not be invited. He had never met her family, and expected they were quite decadently Thracian since she had been so reluctant to introduce him to them.
But, it struck him that her departure would be a chance to investigate the locked chest in the locked room. It had bothered him particularly in the first few months of their marriage, but he had not thought about it for over a year, gradually settling into their routines. This mention of her need to take it to Syracuse had re-ignited his curiosity.
He purchased locks that were similar enough to substitute, so that he could hide this act of invasion, and entered the forbidden room.
Surely this was simply a cautionary tale, Dennis told himself. It was a warning to not be taken in by the Orphic cult, to leave closed those doors which are not meant to be opened. That Anaximander had chosen to tell it in such biographical terms was intriguing and probably of interest to some literary scholar, but did not necessarily detract from his other scientific thinking nor cast aspersion on the source of his more radical ideas.
There was a strange fetid odor in the room, almost brackish. It had simply been shut up too long, Anaximander told himself, momentarily forgetting the open window.
He considered how angry she would be. But was he not indulging her with this foolish trip to Syracuse? Surely, she would indulge him in this.
He crossed to the chest and forced the lock.
As he lifted the lid, a thick scent of musty brackish wrongness assaulted his senses. Was something dead rotting inside? What had she done?
There was something pink folded on top – a kind of strange almost flesh-like cloth. He lifted it out and shook it open.
It was the skin of a woman, complete but for holes at the eye sockets, hair still attached. He was holding it in front of him by its shoulders. He saw hair like his wife’s hair, curly and brown, and a scar like his wife’s on the left arm. He dropped it, and let it fall back into the chest, noticing for the first time that there were other objects below, other folded skins, sickly dark gray and green, with glimpses of feather and of scale and of fur.
He slammed the trunk, and sunk to a sitting position in front of it. He thought “witch” and “skin-thief”, and “not her, not my wife.” And, “gods protect me.” She would come back. She would know what he had done.
A shriek sounded behind him, and he turned. A hawk perched in predatory agitation, framed by the window, and its eyes were his wife’s eyes.
“Circe?” he asked.
The hawk flew to him, perched on his shoulder, and rubbed its head against the hair above his ear.
He flinched, expecting some attack, but it did not come.
She flew to the chest, lifted its lid with a talon, and slipped inside. A moment later, his wife climbed out of the chest. “I can change others, but not myself. I had to find another way. It is an old craft.”
“Will you change me? I should not have looked into that which you had locked and hid.” In his mind, he saw pigs and wolves, and he was afraid.
She looked at him and let the silence stretch. “Mander, if you will keep me company for the
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