Getting Out - Sample.

Getting Out is included in my short story collection Adventures By Moonlight.

A tale of seaside resorts and crazy golf, It's a reminder that life has a habit of letting you down.

Even after you die.

GETTING OUT

by Stephen Walker

Abigail Meadows.

Born March 9^th 2000. Died September 10^th 2013.

A beloved daughter.

Rest In Peace.

A hand bursts through the soil.

Another hand bursts through the soil.

And Abigail Meadows is free of the grave.

*

I'm Abigail Meadows and I know what I want.

What I don't know is how to get it.

So I walk the promenade of what used to be my home town, looking for him.

Is he here?

It's the sort of place he might be, hidden in full view, among the milling throng.

But I don't see him this night, not amongst all the people ignoring the illuminations that're the only reason to be here this time of year.

What I do see is people in a new light. Always letting you down. Never being what you want them to be. Faceless. Pretenders. Fakes and Phonies. Never being what they really are.

I see a man lying dead on the road, having just been hit by a tram, the town's illuminations reflected in his blood as it trickles from his mouth and slowly spreads across the tarmac. Welcome to the club, matey.

But he's not here - the one I want.

I reach the start of the pier. A quick glance tells me he's not on it.

I look across the road, at the amusement park and the roller coaster that rises above it like an anorexic Godzilla. And, this time of year, this time of night, the town looks like nothing else but a ghost of what it claims to be.

*

Early morning, I find it, the big glasshouse with a café inside whose seats are for 'patrons' only.

I'm not interested in that. I'm interested in what's behind it; the square crazy-golf course that doesn't have any craziness about it.

And there I spot him, the boy, sat on one of the benches that surround the golf course so you can sit and watch people having more fun than you are.

Well, matey, you might elude all others but not much gets past the dead.

*

I let my backside hit the bench with a force that can't fail to let any observer know I'm not a happy bunny.

I'm now sat beside the boy.

He looks like he's the same age as me but he doesn't look like I expected him to. On the other hand, he also looks exactly like I expected him to.

Whatever his appearance, he's clearly more interested in the people playing crazy-golf than he is in me.

So, lower lip jutted, I watch them too.

I watch them a moment more.

And then a moment more.

I watch them a moment more.

And then, at last, I say it. 'People! For God's sake! What's up with them?'

He doesn't tell me what's up with them.

So I tell him what's up with them. 'Stood there playing crazy-golf when there's a billion different tragedies going on in the world around them.'

'It's not crazy-golf!' a man with a putter shouts back at me.

'You what?'

'It's not crazy-golf! It's miniature golf! Now can you belt up and let people play?!?'

'Well, what's the difference?'

'There's no obstacles! There's no windmills! There's no clown's mouths! Just holes to knock the balls into!'

'Then what's the point of that?'

'It's more grown up!

'Grown up.' I tut at the boy beside me. 'Grown up. And there's not even a windmill.'

He doesn't respond.

So I lean over a wrought-iron arm rest and look down at the ground directly beside the bench.

My frown deepens at what I see.

'I mean,' I tell him, 'look at that. Look at that that maggoty thing down there, being carried off by that ant. Just think how it must be feeling right now. And do they care? Do they eckerslike.'

I shout at the golfers, 'Get off your arses and save that thing, you bone idle-.'

None of them do.

So I again address the boy sat beside me. I say, 'I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, if I care that much, why don't I save it? Well, I don't care that much. Know why? It's because I'm a thing of twisted evil and an affront to nature. Look at these fingernails, matey. Look at the dirt beneath them. You know where I got that from? It wasn't from gardening. Never garden. Two rules in life. Never garden and never go angling.

'No,' I say. 'It came from digging myself out. “Digging yourself out of what?” I hear you cry. Digging myself out of the grave.

'You see, I used to be “people” too – just like them. Maybe I still am. I don't know. Do I look like “people” to you? Or do I look like something else?'

He doesn't tell me.

I start to wonder if he can hear me.

You can download the rest of Getting Out and Adventures By Moonlight from:

Amazon.Com, Amazon UK, Smashwords.

The Downward Slide - Sample.

The Downward Slide is in my short story collection Adventures By Moonlight. In it, a stranger arrives by night in a declining seaside town.

But is he saviour or destroyer?

THE DOWNWARD SLIDE

by Stephen Walker

Early morning, Heldersly Pier stands gaunt and outdated like the skeleton of some long-dead beast. Its back not yet broken, it reaches out to the sea as though trying to find brave new lands out there that can offer more hope than the old ones ever have.

At its very end, stands a helter skelter, tall and stark, silhouetted against a slate grey sky.

Near to that is Theodosius Cripps's Odditorium, a flat-roofed single story building that, no matter how long it might stand there, can never escape a sense of the temporary. Among other magical items on display in its windows, a giant tap seems to float in mid-air as water pours from it.

Louise Jones sits in a wooden kiosk directly by the doorway to the helter skelter. To pass the time between customers, she reads a paperback that closer attention reveals to be Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. As she reads, her teeth chew agitatedly on her thumbnail.

She glances across at the Odditorium, where its proprietor Theodosius Cripps stands in that window, showing the floating tap off to a small man who goes by the name of Tik Tok. As Tik Tok watches, Cripps turns the tap off to demonstrate that no concealed tube holds it aloft, and then turns it back on again.

Louise Jones lowers her sights and buries her attention once more in her book.

*

A Bentley stands in a night-time street, gleaming as though polished within an inch of its life, windows tinted to hide all signs of inhabitants.

One of its rear doors swings open and a man climbs out.

His name is Cotton Spawley. He's tall and wide, briefcase in hand and dressed for business.

Looking like a man for whom self-doubt is an abstract concept that need not concern him, he closes the door behind him then takes in his surroundings.

He looks up at the nearest building, a large pseudo-Gothic edifice of the type the Victorians loved to throw up a variation of in every town. A clock face occupies the higher reaches of its tower and a Union Jack flutters proudly from its summit.

He climbs the building's granite steps and enters through its huge, arched doorway.

*

'A planetarium,' says one. 'That's what we need.'

'And who's going to pay for that?' says another.

'The European Union will. I've heard a whisper that, in the next financial year, they'll be making funding available for just such projects.'

Five people are in a room. Four men and one woman. They're sat around a hefty walnut table.

'It's a stupid idea,' says the fifth of them. 'Who's going to visit a town for a planetarium?'

'I would,' says the first.

'Then there's something up with you.'

'What?' says the third. 'You've never looked up at the stars and wondered?'

'I've never looked up at the stars and wondered if they'd look better projected on a ceiling instead of being real, no.'

Thud! There's a noise from behind one of them.

Startled, they look round.

And see a man stood there.

It's Cotton Spawley. Standing only half in shadow, he says, 'Ah the Inner Cabinet of Heldersly town council. The five most powerful people in town discussing, I believe, its very future.'

'Who are you?' says one, 'And how did you get past Security?'

'Security?' Spawley says, 'Security is for those who are afraid. And you're not afraid, are you? No no no, be not afraid of Cotton Spawley, fine councillors, for I am here to make you an offer.'

'What offer?'

The side of his index finger eases aside a net curtain and the interloper gazes out at the seaside resort whose maze-like streets surround the building. His gaze casually passes over a moonlit pier with a helter skelter at its end. Elsewhere within his gaze is a funfair, a roller coaster ringing its entire perimeter. 'This town,' he says. 'I wish to buy its life from you.'

*

'I'm sorry?' says one of the Inner Cabinet.

Now at the table, Spawley plants his briefcase on it. He unclips its twin locks and yanks its lid open.

He turns the case towards them so they can better see its contents.

He says, 'In this case is five million pounds. Oh, don't worry, the money's genuine. Cotton Spawley does not defraud. I believe each of you is a businessman – the good lady excepted, of course.' And he tells her, 'My dear, I believe you run the local waxworks. What a thing that is. Has anyone ever yet managed to guess who that figure stood by the doorway is meant to be?' He tells them all. 'I assume that, as... … ...entrepreneurs, each of you appreciates the value of the British Pound. This money is available to be shared between the five of you. And all you have to do is sell me the life of this town.'

*

Early next morning, Heldersly Pier stands gaunt and outdated like the skeleton of some long-dead beast. Its back not yet broken, it reaches out to sea as though trying to find brave new lands that could offer more hope than the old ones ever have.

At its very end, stands a helter skelter, tall and stark, silhouetted against a grey sky.

Near to that stands Theodosius Cripps's Odditorium, a flat-roofed single story building that, no matter how long it might stand, can never escape a sense of the temporary. Among other magical items on display in its windows, a giant tap seems to float in mid-air as water pours from it.

Louise Jones sits in her wooden kiosk directly by the entrance to the helter skelter. To pass the time between customers, she reads a paperback that closer attention reveals to be Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. She bites her nails as she reads, agitated by something that exists beyond the book.

She glances across at the Odditorium, where its proprietor Theodosius Cripps stands in that window, showing the floating tap off to a small man who goes by the name of Tik Tok. As Tik Tok watches, Cripps turns the tap off to demonstrate that no concealed tube holds it aloft, and then turns it back on again.

Louise Jones lowers her sights and buries her attention once more in her book.

A hand slaps some money down on the table.

She looks up, to see a man stood there.

He says, 'I bet I'm the oldest customer you've ever had on here, aren't I?'

She says, 'We once had a woman ride on it to celebrate her hundredth birthday. Are you over a hundred?'

'I'm glad to say that privilege still lies ahead of me.'

She tears a ticket from the roll beside her, hands him it and he enter the helter skelter.

Her thumb keeping the paperback open at the page she was reading, she watches the helter skelter.

And she waits.

Still she waits.

When the man doesn't emerge from the top of the ride, she checks her watch.

And she waits.

Still no sign of him emerging.

So, she picks up a marker pen, removes its lid, leans back in her seat and adds another mark to the tally on the kiosk's wooden wall beside her. The kiosk's walls are almost completely covered in such marks, every four marks sealed off with a diagonal slash to keep things tidy.

That done, she puts the lid back on the pen, drops it onto the table, re-finds her place in the paperback and, once more biting her thumbnail, continues reading from where she left off.

But now, she hears a commotion.

She looks up, and sees people being hustled out of Theodosius Cripps's Odditorium.

Once the baffled hustlees are out, they're followed by Cripps himself because it's he who was doing the hustling. Tik Tok is with him. Tik Tok is also hustling but seemingly more in imitation of his employer than out of genuine intent.

With the building cleared, Cripps shuts the Odditorium's glass front doors and locks them. A sign on the doors says Closed for good.

Curiosity piqued, Louise Jones gets up and goes across to join him.

When she gets there, Cripps is pulling down the shutters.

'Mr Cripps,' she says, 'What're you doing?'

'I would have thought that was obvious. I am closing for business.'

'But why? Only yesterday you were telling me about all the money you were making.'

'And so I am. Like the deadly cobra, the power of mystery will always hold a magnetic attraction for the masses. It's not I that is the problem.'

'Then what is?'

'Last night a man arrived in town.'

'Lots of men do.'

'Miss Jones, what is this structure?'

'An odditorium.'

'And in what does it specialise?'

'Things that're odd.'

'The giant, gravity-defying tap, the shrunken heads. Those who are too tall. Those who are too short. The wide. The thin. The shapeless. That of which there is too much. That of which there is too little. This place provides a final resting place for them all, collecting whatever oddities and strangenesses the world may be willing to sell to it. Among the things collected are myths, legends, rumours. Oh, you won't know about those. Those are hidden away in a secret room, at the back, locked, that only I can access. Now, among those myths, legends and rumours is the tale of a man called Cotton Spawley. Rumour has it he travels the world buying people's lives from them. Where he came from, no one knows. What he does with those lives, no one knows. How he came about the wealth that allows him his pastime, no one knows. What is known, from whisper and insinuation, is that, last night, a car pulled up outside the town hall steps. Those few souls who paid heed say that, behind its wheel, no driver could be seen. While a man who sounded exactly like Spawley climbed from the rear of it and, case in hand, entered the building. Cotton Spawley only lives for one thing. And there's only one thing the council could have that they could offer him.'

'Which is what?'

'The life of this town.'

You can download the rest of The Downward Slide and Adventures By Moonlight from:

Amazon.Com, Amazon UK, Smashwords.

Send Me Your Horror - Sample.

Send Me Your Horror is from my short story collection Adventures By Moonlight.

In it, a self-declared master of horror makes a bargain - and soon gets more than he bargained for.

SEND ME YOUR HORROR

by Stephen Walker

When the timer pinged, it found me ready. I got my oven gloves on, the oven open and pulled out that night's meal - my ex-wife's cat on a baking tray. Taking great care not to spill any juices, I placed cat and tray on the worktop by the cooker, closed the oven and stood back to admire my handiwork.

Excellent.

A feast for a king.

Admittedly not every king would want to eat a cat - especially one still in its fur - but my guest tonight was to be no ordinary royalty and I'd been assured it was the perfect meal for him. Just to be conscientious I popped a Satsuma in "Tibbles's" mouth, and turkey trimmings on his ears and, satisfied with my evening's work, I carried the repast from the room.

I took the meal upstairs, eagerly anticipating the outcome of my efforts, then crossed the landing to the spare room, which had been made ready. My hands being full, I toe-poked the door open then entered.

The room was in near-darkness, its windows blocked by shutters, all bulbs removed. The only light came from four candles on chest-high stands that formed the points of an imaginary square on the floor. I crossed to it and placed the cat and tray dead centre. Now I took a stick of chalk from my pocket and drew a circle around the cat, adding a mystical symbol for each point of the compass.

I crossed to the table in the corner. It held my guide; a leather-bound tome bought from a certain man in a certain shop in a certain town in North Yorkshire. It had cost me four hundred and fifty pounds but, if it worked, it would be worth every penny.

For I had a problem.

My wife had left me.

That wasn't the problem. Frankly she was a vain, vacuous thing who'd cost far too much to support and whose performances in bed achieved nothing like the standard a man of my style has a right to demand. I didn't even mind so much that it was Daniel Hobsgood, my deadliest rival, she'd gone with, though it did raise our rivalry to even greater levels. Now, more than ever, I was determined to outdo him in everything he did.

No. My real problem was that, since she'd left, I'd not had a single idea. I'd tried stealing them. I'd tried generating them through the I Ching. I'd even tried recycling my old ones but the truth was that I, Harcourt Stenslow, master of horror, had no more tales to tell.

This could not continue. I had a reputation to protect - not to mention a bank manager to feed, and so the time had come for drastic measures. Returning to the 'square' I opened the book and, by candlelight, began to read from it. I took care to make my performance suitably dramatic. I've done readings at libraries, festivals and conventions and like to think I know how to deliver a text; feet apart, head back, voice booming, building to an apt crescendo to leave any audience gawping in wonder. Many's the time my oratory has reduced a child to tears - and that's a fact I'm proud of.

Once I'd finished this latest reading, I slammed the book shut and waited.

At first nothing happened.

But then the candles dimmed, as though announcing the arrival of an important personage and, with that, I placed the book on the floor and left.

I emerged onto the landing, closed the door behind me and made sure to lock it. The one thing I didn't want was my guest escaping.

Again I waited, listening as something in that room began to eat, gnaw and slaver. Trotters, or hooves, or feet, or claws, or something, moved around the bare floor, or possibly the walls. It may have been the ceiling. Twice came the flutter of what might have been wings, though it was hard to tell. And, as it ate, the sound grew - grew till it seemed to fill the house.

But then - just as the noise threatened to grow unbearable - with one last grunt, it ceased.

Was my guest gone?

I had to be sure.

I waited a moment.

And then I removed the key from the door and peered in through the keyhole. Seeing nothing but darkness though it, I stuck the key back in the lock and carefully turned it. The lock opened and, warily, warily, I pushed the door. It moved with a long slow creak.

And was I pleased with what I saw before me?

I was delighted.

It had all gone; the cat, the tray, the book, the table, even the shutters on the windows. Clearly my guest had been more than exceptionally hungry. That didn't matter. Everything he'd eaten could be replaced. What mattered was the deal had been accepted. Now I could look forward to my reward.

And so it was that, next morning, I woke with a stretch, a yawn and a leap that took me from my bed and toward the door. I rushed downstairs to the kitchen, where I keep my typewriter, sat before it and prepared to write.

Nothing happened.

This wasn't right. According to the man who'd sold me the book - and to the book itself - I should now be brimming with ideas, finding them so fast I'd have trouble getting them all down on paper.

But perhaps I was doing this wrongly. Perhaps the secret was to switch off my mind and trust in fate. So I closed my eyes, held one finger over the keyboard and prodded it. I opened my eyes to see what I'd produced.

I'd produced a full stop.

A full stop? Of what possible use to me was that as the opening of a tale?

But still, a man must have persistence. And so, after crossing out the mistake, I tried again.

This time I got a comma.

The next time, I got an exclamation mark!

This was too much! I rose to my feet, about to set off for that shop in North Yorkshire and give the owner a piece of my mind.

But then, just as I was about to storm out of the kitchen, something stopped me in my tracks.

It was a sound.

And it had come from my hallway.

Going to investigate, I found no one.

But I did find something- an envelope on my doormat.

That was odd. The postman had already been that morning. The junk mail he'd delivered had been despatched to the kitchen bin before I'd sat down to write.

Nonetheless, there it was, an envelope.

I took it through into the kitchen, reclaimed my seat at the table and inspected this new arrival. It was a curious thing, pale and green, with no sender's address. Its front bore the strangest stamp I'd ever seen; a round, black thing featuring a picture of Venice.

I took my silver letter-opener and cut the envelope open. It contained two sheets of neatly folded paper. The first was an explanation;

Dearest Mr Stenslow.

You won't have heard of me but I'm a huge admirer of your work. This in mind, I wonder awfully if you'd be interested in a collaboration? You see, I have plenty of ideas, such ideas you wouldn't believe. However, sad to say, I completely lack your divine gift for story telling. Thus please consider the enclosed suggestion. If you like it I have many more I could share with you.

I'd do this on two conditions. One, that I receive fifty percent of any money earned from my ideas; and two, that you never, ever, try to meet me.

I look forward to hearing from you and seeing more of your magnificent work in print.

Yours; Demliston Clipperwicke.

Best wishes.

Could it be? Could this letter be the deliverance promised by the mystic tome?

You can download the rest of Send Me Your Horror and Adventures By Moonlight from:

Amazon.Com, Amazon UK, Smashwords.

Stone Dreams - Sample.

This tale from my short story collection Adventures By Moonlight takes a venture into the realms of dark urban fantasy as Billy Morten discovers that the strange and unsettling can reside alongside the fantastical and magical and never have the universe care that they don't belong in each other's company.

STONE DREAMS

by Stephen Walker

Rubber on concrete, echo on walls, Billy Morten chases his footsteps up an alleyway. Always chasing, always running. Things have to be hidden, things have to be found - everyone knows.

This afternoon, he knows it more than most.

Catching up his footsteps then overtaking them, the twelve year old kicks shut behind him a battered door. And he stands alone.

But is he alone?

He checks the lower floor of the abandoned house he's found himself in, one of a row of terraces on the outskirts of town. He finds only cobwebs, silent memories and gouges where wiring's been torn out and plumbing stripped out by gangs. All the residents have gone to new developments on new estates with new names and old problems. Now this is a place shielded from the eyes of kids who'd want what he's found, without appreciating what it is he's found.

He crosses to the stairs and glances up.

At the top is a darkness too brooding for investigation. If someone is up there, more fool them; he won't be joining them.

So, he assumes he's alone and, content with that assumption, claims a seat on the bottom step.

Here he can check a precious bundle found in the unlikeliest of places.

But the most precious of things are always in the unlikeliest of places, or they'd have been found long ago and they'd no longer be precious.

Eager fingers start to peel back a muddy blanket wrapped to shield the object from unwelcome gazes.

Then they stop.

From the stair top, behind him, a scuffling of something on floorboards.

Footsteps.

And a voice that says, 'What you got there, Billy? Found yourself a miracle?'

*

Billy Morten scrambles to his feet and, clutching his prize to his chest, he backs away from the stairs. A wall halts his slow retreat.

Not that he's scared of her.

Not really.

She's just a girl, no more than sixteen.

But there's something wrong about her. She's too confident. To cocky. She doesn't move like a girl. In her manner is a hint of the straggling weeds that surround this building and clutch it with their tendrils as though trying to hold it captive.

She calmly descends the stairs.

Her feet are bare.

She arrives at the middle step, claims a seat, then, not looking at him, lights a cigarette. The tip glows red before dying down. A shake extinguishes the match. A flick discards it. It hits the floor and dulls to a shrivel. She says, 'How you doing, Billy?' The cigarette flaps between her lips as she speaks.

'How do you know my name?' He eyes her, suspiciously.

'Seen you around, in the park, the school, the old rec. Seen you in the woods, the ones with the den you think no one else knows about though half the kids in town use it. I see plenty. You'd be amazed. That bundle you're hugging, I've not seen you with that before. Know what it is?'

He hugs it closer, hands checking that it's completely wrapped, with nothing showing. 'It doesn't belong to anyone. I found it in a skip.'

'Never said it did belong to anyone. You found it, it's yours; fundamental law of life. And, trust me, I know more about those than most. But that's not what I asked. I asked, do you know what it is?'

He glances down at it, clueless.

Her gaze climbs the wall nearest her then settles on a point on the ceiling.

And, following a suitable pause, she says, 'I could tell you what it is.'

You can download the rest of Stone Dreams and Adventures By Moonlight from:

Amazon.Com, Amazon UK, Smashwords.

The Strange Case of the Strange Case of the Dog - Sample.

It's another tale from my short story collection Adventures By Moonlight. In this case, we meet a Victorian Super-sleuth who refuses to stick to the script.

THE STRANGE CASE OF THE STRANGE CASE OF THE DOG

by Stephen Walker

From the private journal of Tyberion Mace.

June 21^st, 19-

Having made swift progress in our journey from London, we arrived at Felgate Hall just as its clock was striking three and half-past. It could be heard as we were being granted admission by a womanservant whom I instantly deduced to be one Molly Grapenidge.

'May I take your bags, sirs?' She enquired.

'You may take mine,' I told her, 'but under no circumstances must you either take or touch the bag of my colleague.'

'Goodness!' she declared, 'What a frightfully large bag for a man to hawk around with him.'

'Indeed it is,' I said. 'For my colleague Professor Grainger here is a scientist and his bag contains many chemicals and solutions that, if not handled with the utmost care, may combust and quickly consume this entire house.'

'Gracious!' she said.

'Gracious indeed. Now, my dear woman, perhaps you'd be kind enough to inform your employer Lord Felgate of our presence?'

And the woman did precisely that, meaning that, within minutes, his Lordship was giving us a tour of his mansion.

It wasn't the first time we'd met him, of course. The surprisingly young Lord Felgate had visited us in my study three days earlier, with a dread tale to tell of a devil-spawned hell-beast that had already slain several within his vicinity. Coupled with this had been an anonymous note pushed under the door of his hotel room, promising that he would be next to feel the wrath of the creature.

His local constabulary, being more used to dealing with poachers and over-amorous couples in haystacks, had so far been completely baffled by the case.

Well, who to turn to next in such a circumstance, if not Tyberion Mace; Marylebone's celebrated sleuth who'd so ably handled that potential embarrassment involving a member of the high establishment only months earlier.

Who indeed?

Felgate Hall was a dark and elderly building. If it had been a grand dowager, one might have labelled it arthritic in appearance. Within it lay many a dark and sinister corridor. Just the perfect setting for the type of mystery my dear Professor Grainger loves to inflict upon his readers in the pages of The Threadneedle Thunderer. Heaven alone knew what his devoted following would make of this one.

As Felgate showed us up the stairs, my attention was caught by a portrait of a stern looking man.

'That is Sir Cranleigh Statten,' Lord Felgate told me. 'My predecessor as lord of the manor. He lost his fortune in a Boston card game but vowed to summon the power of Satan himself to reclaim it.'

'And his whereabouts now?'

'Deceased. Presumed. He vanished on an expedition to the Amazon and was never seen again, feared eaten by the devil fish they claim swim such waters.'

After dinner, I gave Felgate my instructions as to what he was to do.

Which was precisely nothing.

He was to stay in the house and refuse to admit all visitors unless they were either myself or Professor Grainger.

And now?

Grainger and I went on our hunt for a slavering devil-hound.

You can download the rest of The Strange Case of the Strange Case of the Dog and Adventures By Moonlight from:

Amazon.Com, Amazon UK, Smashwords.

When Dromgyddru Gets Here - Sample.

When Dromgyddru Gets Here is another one from my short story collection Adventures By Moonlight. It tells of what happens when a world on the edge of existence finds itself receiving an uninvited visitor, and the things that visitor finds when it gets there.

WHEN DROMGYDDRU GETS HERE

by Stephen Walker

(4,100 words)

I am dead but I am here.

For I am within this world, within its rocks and shores, within its smallest of creatures. I am within its skies and stars above. For I created it all.

I am within the only house upon this world, the one that stands on high atop a rocky crag almost too steep to climb. A house sharp and jagged, as though seeking to tear a gash in the purple sky that frames it. Although I did not create that house, I am in there as well.

But another is here.

It enters as a shooting star, blazing across that purple sky. It arrives with noise and fire and, when its energy is spent, it crashes to the earth.

But this is not the Earth, pretty wanton, nor any other world ever trod by mortal men. For this is Curulath, and it is a tiny world.

It is a harsh world.

And it is home to only two beings who know their own names.

Zykalon stands by the crater, a tall, gaunt creature; his head, the skull of a long dead animal. But, within those empty eye sockets blaze twin fires that could burn the soul. Blood red robes cover his body and his fingers are as long as the scythes they resemble.

Beside him stands Crattos, monstrous, huge, a creature of living rock. I made him too, as I made all things that belong on this world.

Zykalon and Crattos gaze down at the thing that has just smashed, from on high, into the slate hard ground. Smoke rises from it. Even in the night's darkness, it is clear that it is a strange and fearful thing. Even Zykalon, all wise Zykalon, has never seen such a thing before.

But he has his suspicions. Is that nightmarish tangle before him a creature? Is it an object? Is it alive? And, if it is, has it ever been truly alive?

These are not known.

But Zykalon, must know all.

So he orders Crattos lift it from its crater and take it back to that lofty house upon that peak.

Crattos slings it over his shoulder and, accompanied by Zykalon, carries the new-found thing up the one thousand and five steps carved into the side of the peak that supports the house. Having conquered the steps, he carries their find into the entrance hall then up narrow, twisting staircases till they reach a room high in the building's solitary tower. There, he flings the thing down onto a bed.

Zykalon chides, 'Well done, my friend. If this creature was not deceased before, the force of that fling has no doubt finished it off.'

Crattos says, 'I was not created for gentle acts.'

'So it would appear. But this thing we've found, let us assume it still lives. Chain it to the bed. For I fear I shall not deem my dreams safe to keep until I know our guest – if guest it be – is properly secured.'

*

Crattos says, 'It is her.'

It is morning, and Zykalon and Crattos have returned to that room.

But things have changed. No longer chained to that bed is the fearful thing they pulled from a pit last night.

Instead a woman lies there; so pale of skin that snow itself would deem itself dirty beside her. Her hair is the colour of the skies outside, as are her lips, and the fingernails that some may almost call talons.

Stood beside her bed, Zykalon leans forward and studies her face from up close. In response to his servant's comment, he says, 'It is who?'

'Her,' says Crattos. 'My creator.'

Zykalon says, 'Your creator is dead. You, of all beings, should know that. And I fear that even the likes of her cannot return from centuries of oblivion.'

*

Hours pass.

Hours mean nothing to the likes of us.

*

The creature awakes with a start.

It sits up.

It pulls a lop of hair away from its face and tucks it behind one ear.

Then it realises that, to do this, it must have a face and it must have an ear and it must have a hand.

It studies the back of that hand, then turns it over to study the palm. It looks itself up and down and realises that, whatever it once was, it's now a woman - of sorts.

That woman tries to move her other hand.

But she can't because that arm is chained to the bed. She gives a quick tug at the chain.

To no avail. It seems that, for the present, she's going nowhere.

But now she spots something.

In the corner of the room, in a chair, sits a collection of bones and robes assembled into a simulacrum of a living being.

Her gaze narrowing at it, she says, 'And who might yoube?'

It says, 'I might be many things but I am called Zykalon. And you might be?'

She says, 'I might be even more things, but you can call me Arcadia.'

'When I found you,' he says, 'you were a thing unrecognisable. But it seems you have since taken on the appearance of one long since dead.'

'I tend to do that.'

'Oh I know what you are,' he says. 'I was in some doubt last night but subsequent events have confirmed my suspicions. Though I have never before encountered your ilk, I have heard whispers and rumours. I know from where you come. I know of the things you serve. It is said they send emissaries into our worlds for purposes unknown. To observe? To report? To hinder? To assist? No one knows. But I do know a chain of iron would never hold you. You'd merely slip through it like air passing beneath a door. But a chain of gold, like that one, well that's a whole other matter.' He watches her for a moment, and then he says, 'Tell me, Arcadia; why are you here?'

'I don't have the slightest clue.'

'You fell from the sky.'

'I never seem to arrive with much dignity.'

'Arcadia, are you a threat to my dreams?'

'I suppose that depends on what you dream about.'

The twin balls of fire within those empty eye sockets watch her for a moment.

And then?

He shouts out, 'Crattos!'

The door opens and Crattos is stood there.

Zykalon tells him, 'Release our guest.'

The monster enters the room. He crosses to where Arcadia kneels on the bed and, with one tug, he snaps the chain.

As she frees her wrist from the last remnants of the chain, Zykalon says two words. He says, 'Hit her.'

Crattos's huge fist rams into the side of her cheek, knocking her off the bed and onto the floor.

Rising to his feet, Zykalon says, 'You are an honoured guest in this house, Arcadia but if you seek to do anything that threatens my dreams, I will have Crattos tear you limb from limb.'

You can download the rest of When Dromgyddru Gets Here and Adventures By Moonlight from:

Amazon.Com, Amazon UK, Smashwords.

The Mummy Shrugged - Sample.

"Now all we have to do is hang around in our flat and wait for Bandage Boy to turn up looking for a good tonguing."

It's another adventure for the nation's top occult investigator, as Liz Sanford finds herself up against a mummy's curse, the clueless schemes of her colleagues and the machinations of her self-declared arch-enemy.

Can she get to the bottom of a mystery that's remained unsolved for thousands of years?

And just what is Geraldine Koliakov's involvement with wardrobes?

The Mummy Shrugged can also be found in my short story collection Adventures By Moonlight.

THE MUMMY SHRUGGED

by Stephen Walker

(6,000 words)

There were certain jobs in this life that you knew were rubbish without having to do them.

Official Government Occult Investigator was one of them.

If you did it, you knew you'd either be bored out of your mind because there was no such thing as The Occult to investigate or you were going to be in a regular battle for your life, with the forces of evil.

Unfortunately, in her first eighteen months in the role, Liz Sanford had discovered that both those things somehow managed to be the least of the job's drawbacks.

That Monday morning proved no exception as, the moment she walked into her office, she was hit in the face by something.

It was a carrier bag.

And, as it had hit her, she'd heard heard the words, “Betty, put this on.”

*

The twenty-six-year-old picked the bag up from where it had fallen, assumed it wasn't the thing her boss had just ordered her to put on, and opened it in order to study its contents.

Inside, she found two items of clothing.

She frowned at both of them.

“What're these?” she said.

The bag had been thrown at her by her boss Lou. From his chair behind his desk, he said, “That, Betty, is your brand new she-pharaoh outfit.”

“My what?"

“Your she-pharaoh outfit. It's what you're going to be wearing from now on."

“Why would I be wearing a 'she-pharaoh' outfit?"

“For your job. At the museum."

“What job? At what museum?"

“The Salford Museum of Antiquities."

“Lou, what the hell're you on about?"

The Department of Occult Investigation was based in a back office, up some stairs, in the middle of Sheffield. She'd have liked to have claimed that starting a working week in a state of total confusion was a new experience for her but, sadly, it wasn't.

Lou said, “The whole country's gone Egypt crazy.”

“It has?”

“Don't you read the papers?” he said. “The mummy of Shimankhtep has just been loaned to the museum, by some place in Germany. It's zillions of years old and everyone loves it. Therefore, as a special treat to everyone – yourself included - you're going to be spending the next week at that very museum, giving daily lectures to children about life in Ancient Egypt.”

Her sidekick Alison Parker was sat in the plastic chair beside his desk. She was twenty one, all in black, with purple hair, and a ring through her nose. The girl said, “You'll knock 'em dead, Liz. I've never met anyone knows more about Ancient Egypt than you do.”

“But to do that,” said Lou, “it's vital you get in character. Hence you'll be dressed as a she-pharaoh.”

“This is just a skirt and head-dress,” Liz pointed out. “Where's the top?”

“There isn't one,” he said. “I have it on good authority that she-pharaohs of whatever dynasty it is we're talking about didn't wear them.”

“So let me get this straight,” she said. “I walk into my office this morning and the first thing that happens is my total moron of a boss tells me to get my norks out? Does the phrase, 'Inappropriate requests of a female employee,' mean anything to you?”

“It's not my idea,” he said. “It's hers.” He pointed at Alison.

Alison said, “Liz, you have to face it. Since you punched the nation's favourite sculptress in the face, thinking she was a robot, the public mood's turned against you.”

“Not that they ever liked you in the first place,” said Lou.

“We need to sort out your PR,” said Alison, “and we need to do it fast. Nothing warms the public's heart more than the sight of a woman being nice to children. And everyone but the Secretary of State for Education thinks education's a good thing”

“And whipping my tits out is your idea of educational, is it?”

“It's the museum director,” said Alison. “He insisted. He said, 'Miss Parker, if Dr Sanford isn't historically accurate, the whole deal's off. Our reputation as a museum would be in tatters.'”

“Not only that, Liz but check this out.” Lou flung a huge lump of something at her.

She caught it and looked at it. “What the hell's this?”

“Anubis' head. At one point in the lecture, you put this on and tell the kids how the Egyptians dealt with the dead. Kids love all that stuff. It'll be like Horrible Histories.”

“But there is one slight problem with the head,” said Alison.

“Which is?”

“One,” said Lou, “it doesn't let air in, which means you might find yourself passing out, and, two, thanks to a design fault, it'll only fit the human body if put on backwards.”

“So let me get this straight,” she said. “You want me to stand there with my tits out, my head on backwards and talk at a bunch of kids until I collapse?”

“Everyone loves a plucky loser,” he said.

“They won't love anything. Because I'm not doing it.”

“You don't have a choice,” he said. “The Minister's big on it.”

She planted both palms on the table, leaned forward and gazed a steely gaze straight into his eyes. “Lou. What am I? I'm the nation's Number 1 occult investigator. I save the country from paranormal peril. How does this help my image?”

On the desk, the phone rang. Alison answered it. “Alison Parker: Department of Occult Investigation. Yep? Seriously? You're joking! No, I don't suppose it is a thing you'd joke about. Don't do anything. We'll be right down there.” She hung up the phone and grabbed her coat from the back of her chair. “Emergency time, folks.”

“Now what's up?” said Liz.

“It's the museum's Director of Antiquities,” Alison told her.

“What about him?” said Liz.

“He's been murdered,” said Alison.

“Thank God for that.”

*

“You see. This is why people don't like you,” said Lou. “The correct response to, 'A man's been murdered,' is, 'Oh no! That's terrible!' Not, 'Thank God for that.'”

“Oh put a sock in it, sexual harassment boy. You're only upset because his death means you're not going to get an eyeful.”

Liz and Lou were at the museum, studying its Director of Antiquities who was lying dead, on the floor, several feet away from where an Egyptian sarcophagus was lying open on a stand. It was obvious from the marks on his neck that he'd been strangled.

“This is how I found him,” said the man whose phone call had alerted Alison. When they'd arrived he'd informed them he was Montefue Beesley; the place's Assistant Director of Antiquities. “Not only that,” he said “but the mummy's been stolen.”

Alison was over by the sarcophagus, hands resting on one side of it as she peered into it. “Liz,” she said, “what's this?”

“It's a sarcophagus,” said Liz.

“I mean inside it.”

Liz rose to her feet and went across to join her.

It seemed Alison had spotted a parchment lying on the casket's floor. It was covered in hieroglyphics.

Montefue Beesley said, “I've never seen that before. It must have been hidden beneath the mummy for all these centuries.”

“No one's ever had the mummy out of the casket?” Liz asked.

“Oh good gracious no. It's far too fragile for that.”

“Yeah its so fragile it's strangled your boss.”

“Miss Sanford, you can't possibly be saying...”

“I'm an occult investigator, Mr Beesley. When I find a strangled man, a missing mummy and a mysterious parchment, I leap to the only conclusion I can.” She pulled out her phone and, not wanting to disturb the parchment, took a snap of its arcane symbols.

Alison said, “Can you read it?”

“It's in some sort of code,” said Liz. “But fortunately for us, I know a man who can fix that.”

*

He might have known more ways to embarrass you at a party than any man she'd ever met but, she had to hand it to him, when it came to things no one understood, the man in question knew his stuff.

That was why she was now in the lab of the man both she and he knew as Science Dave. She'd met him at university, eight years earlier, when they'd both been studying there. Him, for some sort of science geeky thing she couldn't care less about. And her, getting the doctorate in demonology that no one ever took seriously because everyone knew demons didn't exist.

Admittedly, as, after a year and a half as an occult investigator, she'd never once encountered anything that even vaguely resembled a demon, they could have been right.

This instant, Science Dave was stood before a blackboard, studying the photo on the screen of the phone Liz had just handed him. He said, “Let's see. If we transpose every third symbol on your mystery parchment with every fifth one, assume that half the characters are just there to throw us off the trail, throw in a little Sumerian, turn it all upside down and squint a little, we should have a message that reads...” He grabbed a piece of chalk and started to write it out on the blackboard, a letter at a time, his chalk clacking vigorously with each stroke.

When he'd finished, he took a step back and admired his handiwork.

His handiwork read; ALL WHO POSSESS THE SARCOPHAGUS OF SHIMANKHTEP MUST DIE!!!

You can download the rest of The Mummy Shrugged from:

Amazon.Com, Amazon UK, Smashwords.