The Grimscribe's Puppets Read online

  As I say, my hypothesis is that the supernatural resembles us only coincidentally, and could be construed in a completely alien way if we offered it completely bizarre tropes to occupy.

  We must not be restrained from boldly, if not exactly recklessly, mapping out the invisible world, designating zones and naming names, by the accusation that we’re simply “making things up.” While this is what we do, it is not so flat. Our maps and names are not authoritative nor are they meant to be, they are only occasions for the supernatural to address us. And we must pin it down. We must. We must provide these means, just as we must put fuel on the fire. We must. The fuel is not the fire, but there is no fire without fuel.

  ~*~

  “There aren’t any secrets like that, not any more. All the old grimoires can be ordered online. Or downloaded. For nothing. In PDFs. Your every movement is watched, and every place on earth is under satellite. There’s no secret spot for magic to hide in.”

  “Not all of the books are available. Not everything you do is seen.”

  “There are no secrets. The more widely available those books become, the more easily you can call up images and even movies of the rites, the threadbare, shoddy impostures that they always were become the more and the more obvious. Once, those books were rare prizes, in a time when all copies were made by hand, when books were scarce and expensive. If you got your hands on one, you made it work. You point at the mysterious words, and your unlettered man believes they say whatever you tell him they say. Merely writing something down was magical. Now, those secrets are all dispelled.”

  “Not all secrets can be dispelled. Some secrets remain even when they’ve been explained. And only the ones who’ve paid the price can really receive a secret.”

  “The price is nothing.”

  “You don’t buy it, no. But you pay a price, to prove that you are worthy.”

  “There is nothing to be worthy of.”

  “Worthy to receive the secret as a secret. The right one will receive the secret, and understand it, without its ceasing to be a secret, even to him. He’ll have the proof.”

  He reaches into his pocket and pulls out glass ampule.

  “Not a soul, or a life, or anything like that. A mystery. A very productive kind of thing.”

  The man looks at him, and at the object he holds out. He takes this proffered thing and drops it efficiently into his vest pocket. All the sorrowful resignation, the weary puffiness, melting from his face, leaving a lean, hard, stern-eyed countenance. The transaction has happened.

  Standing, the man goes within and shuts his door.

  ~*~

  I didn’t recognize the emblem in time.

  It turned out to be a mirror.

  Of course! In the mirror ... yes oh god the windows are splitting in two oh god oh god any moment now—the door is gleaming at me from another world, the door catapults away from me everything that is light—and then there is a rolling kneading, like being underwater or rolled out with a rolling pin churning droning rolling pressure weighing down, being squeezed out like a toothpaste tube—yes I know who the sacrifice is—I know who the next sacrifice is going to be—

  ~*~

  A: “But you do look familiar. I feel like we’ve met before.”

  B: I get that from a lot of people.

  A: I do know you. Don’t I?

  B: “Go ahead. Take a close look.”

  A: ...

  B: “Now. What do I look like?”

  A: ... You ... you look like ...

  A: ...

  A: [suddenly terrified] You look like ...!

  The Human Moth

  By Kaaron Warren

  Behold the human moth. Drawn to the light, antennae out and ears alert, she can’t stay inside on a night like this.

  The human moth emerged covered in thin, downy hair. She has a photograph of herself newborn; she seems to shine in the bright lights of the hospital. Her mother’s arms, white, skinny, not hairy at all, encircle her. The human moth always loved the bright lights. Lying in her cot and later, on her bed, blinking at the light, screaming if it was turned off. She didn’t like it low, didn’t like it dimmed. She liked it so bright it would make your eyes water if they were weak.

  Her mother was the same; obsessed with the light. Her father wore his hat over his eyes, tilting his head back if he wanted to see. He never left the house. “Whoodhireyou,” her mother called him.

  They took in foster children, for your own good, she was told, because Mummy’s a mess down there and there won’t be any more like you, and did he say thank god for that? The human moth’s hearing was very acute.

  One by one they moved in, edging her out of her big, bright bedroom. Making noise and mess, taking up space. Making fun of her because of her rounded stomach. Maybe there was a ball of hair in there. She sucked her hair all rat’s tailed and wet.

  Maybe there was a twin in there. Teeth and mutated bone and tissue. She always wanted a real sister.

  Maybe it was because she ate fabric. Strands of wool, pieces of material.

  They made fun of the way she ate, little nibbling bites like a moth.

  By the time she was eight, there were a dozen children living in her house. Her mother spent her days shouting and the children, all ages, cooked and ate and shat and messed, they went to school when the human moth did not. The more children moved in, the smaller the human moth’s cocoon grew, and the darker it got, the further from the light. She moved into the basement, your own special place, and they kept all the old clothes down there, the bags of mothball-smelling charity clothes, donated for all those dear children. She burrowed in, made her cocoon. She took every candle in the house, every match, and pretended not to hear when they were called for.

  The other children teased her about her hairiness but it wasn’t until she set up her cocoon in the basement and covered the wall with pictures of moths that they called her that.

  She pretended to hate it so they wouldn’t stop.

  Outside the basement window a large lilac bush blocked the sun. She loved the smell and she grew used to the taste on those nights when she was hungry.

  Her mother didn’t like the lilac but she didn’t take the bush away. Her mother said, “It’ll turn your flaps purple, just watch, make a mess of you down there if you’re not careful.”

  The human moth never went to school. Her parents kept her safe at home where only her foster brothers and sisters could laugh at her.

  Her parents weren’t cruel but they weren’t kind. They taught her nothing about cooking or thinking, they only taught her about eating and about the light. They taught her about survival and that some have to die so that others can live. They made her sing the babies to sleep, read to the other children till her throat was raw. Some nights she wished she could sew her mouth shut, like a normal moth so that she wouldn’t have to sing anymore. Her voice was weak and she didn’t always remember the words, would sit with eyes blind, mind blank, while the children screamed with delight at her stupidity.

  “You be nice to the poor little souls, they’ve had a hard life,” her mother said. As if the human moth was the luckiest girl on earth.

  In her cocoon, she watched the moths around the streetlight. They were free, but they were obsessed, and they flew together, they made no sound, they were simple in their needs and wants. They didn’t eat; they had no mouths. They knew when they would die and how, and the pain of starvation would be sad for them because it was the end, but it was also inevitable. She thought there would be a certain comfort in that.

  When she could capture them, she liked the feel of moths across her palm. Liked the fine powder dust they left behind, far finer than talc. She wished she could find powder as fine.

  The human moth watched the babies being powdered, the glaze-eyed concentration on her mother’s face. Her mother ate talc powder by the spoonful, and she fed it to the human moth too, but never the others. When the human moth complained of her painful lungs and stomach, her mother f
ed her more. “It’ll fill you up,” her mother said, “and it won’t make you fat. Fatter. It won’t make you any more roly poly than you are now,” and she poked the human moth’s stomach to make the children laugh. “Nothing like the sound of a child’s laugh,” she said, glaring at the human moth for not joining in.

  The human moth imagined the powder working its way through her skin, making her insides smell like lilac as well.

  Her mother loved talcum powder. The human moth knew when her parents needed privacy. Her father appeared carrying a bottle of baby powder. He would shake it like a castanet, come on baby, and her mother would follow him and shut the door after her.

  Her mother’s skin was scaly and scratchy and she came out in the morning looking like a ghost. Head to toe, runnelled talcum powder. Naked. “Don’t stand there with your mouth flapping open,” her mother said.

  Her mother had no self-control. Her father always said that when they found her folded around a wine bottle. The human moth was the one to clean it up. He wouldn’t.

  As the children began to leave, to grow up and move out, her parents made their plans. They would put her in a place, a home, they would lock her up and they would go away, because, her mother said, they had not lived a life at all, but instead they had sacrificed for their little girl so that she would want for nothing.

  She wanted for everything.

  Out of respect for her parents, after she smothered them she stretched them out like moths collected. Down in the basement her father had nails and hammers, he was a handyman but he never helped her.

  It was exciting to her, seeing them like that. She was too terrified to speak to the police when they eventually knocked at the door, but it was clear, it was obvious to all, that an animal had done this, a hardened criminal, and that the human moth should be given all the privacy to grieve that she needed.

  It was lonely without them, but it was nice not to have to open her mouth.

  She lived alone in the big house until the failure of the lights. She had medical texts to read, and the Field Guide to Moths. She had cut out most of the moth pictures already but she liked to memorise the names.

  She tried not to eat because moths don’t. But she got so hungry. She had no willpower. So she pretended to be a silkworm, eating enough to last the transformation. Most moths live off the fat stored in their bodies. She couldn’t live off fat, or off textiles.

  She ate tinned food, ate it cold. Beetroot, tuna, pineapple. Baked beans, spaghetti, mini franks. Her mother was terrified the food would run out with all those children, then the children left and the parents died and all the tins were left. If a meal was slightly tainted from waiting for so long to be eaten, she ate it stirred through with lilac. She bought the bush inside and kept it by the window, where it flourished.

  She kept the lights burning all the time. Every light in every room. This for a very long time because she was terrified that she would not find the switch in the dark. There was no one to tell her to turn the lights off.

  Then…failure. Her power went and there was no light. She had candles and torches, but she knew they wouldn’t last long. The candles would burn down and the torches run out of power.

  So she had to leave. Find a light place to live.

  The first house, the light hummed musically, but there were too many comings and goings. She never knew who would be in the bathroom, or who would bang on the door for her to get the fuck out. She needed time for her powdering. A moth dies without a powdering.

  Talc made her cough and sneeze. She loved the lilac-scented smell of it so much, sometimes she closed the bathroom door and puffed the talc out until it filled the air. She breathed in, mouth open, tasting the sweet powder.

  Talc brought her mother back so real, that and the underlying smell of sweat. It was always warm in her childhood house.

  She had to leave that place; there were too many people and they wanted to talk to her. She kept her lips pursed closed and when someone asked her a question she smiled as if she were an imbecile.

  She thought they watched her throat, purple from the lilac. She’d live off lilac if she could. She loved it in her honey and her tea, she had her lipstick sent from America, lilac flavoured and shiny and thick on her lips, she wore it at home and out but she couldn’t stop herself from licking it off. She sucked on lilac lozenges from England and she cooked lilac into her porridge. She stirred lilac-flavoured sugar into her tea and she ate it by the spoonful if no one was watching.

  She liked to stroke her throat because it was covered in a silky, downy hair and it felt nice on her fingers. There was hair on her large, soft stomach and she liked to stroke that, too.

  The human moth was spared the embarrassment of people asking her if she was pregnant because people didn’t often see her. If she fluttered between a man and his light he’d look up and swat at her. By then she would have snipped off a corner of his shirt and have it tucked under her tongue.

  She found a small apartment, up high, quiet. Some days she watched the moths outside and thought she could join them so easily.

  The human moth couldn’t fly but she had flapping wings of flesh under her arms. She went walking at night, especially when the moon was waning and the lights of the houses shine so brightly the glow hurt her eyes.

  The lights outside were so beautiful and varied all she could do was follow them.

  She liked curtain-open people. These ones she could watch. Although curtain-closed people she could creep up and listen and she could mark the house for next time, write in chalk they couldn’t see or rub up against the letterbox or spit, or piss.

  It was warm outside her apartment. The human moth sweated a lot and the talcum powder she wore caked onto her like the makeup of little old ladies. She learnt not to shake the talc on when she was soaking wet out of the bath because it clumped and was not powdery at all. Instead, she body buttered herself and then stood in the shower, tipped the shaker up.

  She enjoyed the warm open air, and walked for an hour, or two, keeping her eyes on the streetlights, her hands out to catch the moths. They led her to the park, where a drunk man slumped under a light on a park bench with his elbows on his thighs. His face resting on the palms of his hands.

  She was attracted to his sweat just like a clothes moth, although they don’t like the light. They’ll hide under rugs and the caterpillars love to chew on dirty clothes.

  His wallet bulged out of the back pocket of his dirty pants. He’d fallen over, mud along one side of his clothing, blood oozing out of one ear.

  He had a yellow wristband and this he waved at her as she sat down. He didn’t seem to mind how she looked.

  “All you can drink! What do they expect is going to happen, all you can drink? Those bitches, they’re all over the big bosses, forget about the rest of us,” he said. His voice was clear and too loud. Apart from the two of them and the moths the park was empty. He looked sideways at the human moth, assessing her. Would she do? Clearly he’d been turned down by the women he worked with but the human moth thought he was lovely.

  She shifted closer to him and he didn’t move away. She was glad she powdered herself; the smell of lilac rose off her and she hoped he liked it.

  He said, “So, what’s your name? What’s a….woman like you doing here alone?”

  She opened her mouth. She wanted to say, “My name is Lobesia. Do you want to go and have a drink with me?” She always thought of a different moth name.

  But she was so unused to talking, a small cough came out. She looked at his mouth, wet, open, and she wished she could cover it up, keep it quiet.

  She fluttered closer to him. He shook his head at her, a look of disgust across his face, and he stood. She smiled, lifted her arms. Kicked his feet out from under him, sat across his chest and pressed her arms across his face. Fat and fleshy, damp, she covered his mouth. She remembered a story she read, many times, called The Cocoon, about a young butterfly collector. The smell of the butterflies. And then he was smot
hered by them and she wondered what it would be like to die that way.

  She took his wallet and his briefcase, too, because you never knew what there would be.

  She wanted to powder him, stake him. But there were voices. Shouts. She was seen, noted, followed.

  Back to her small, high apartment. The streetlight shone right up in and the bed rested beneath the glow of it.

  A lilac bush grew in a pot on the window sill, and it seemed to exude its scent to welcome her.

  She took a lilac petal, then another, filled her mouth with it. She didn’t have much time; she knew this with the sense her parents gave her, the flight response. Her parents didn’t see the human moth coming, though. They thought her well-trained, obedient, like all the other children. They were surprised.

  She ate every petal off her lilac bush. She didn’t think they’d let her take it; she didn’t think they’d let her take anything. Or do anything. They’d make her talk and they’d think her crazy with every word she spoke.

  She sat comfortably in her chair, a mirror set up in front of her. She wanted to get it right. She’d planned this for a long time; known that one day she would have to protect herself this way, transform herself so that she was a moth, she really was a human moth.

  Opening her mouth wide, she squeezed superglue onto her bottom teeth, then shut her jaw. She was careful not too put too much, not wanting her tongue to be glued.

  It tasted of pure chemical.

  She squeezed glue onto her lips, then pressed them together gently.

  She felt exhilarated.

  The light shone brightly through her window

  The human moth, no mouth, covered with powder, went out one last time, to stare into the windows, to follow the light.

  Behold the human moth, who will not eat again.

  Should a moth feel so hungry?

  Basement Angels

  By Joel Lane

  It wasn’t the blackouts that frightened Max Parry so much as the recurrent feeling that they proved the rest of his life to be unreal. They’d been happening since his late teens, usually when he was tired or hungry. It was due to a temporary overdose of the medication that had kept him alive since that dreadful summer of thirst and weariness at the end of his school years. Ever since, he’d suspected that he was a ghost, and the blackouts seemed to confirm it.