L'incroyable Cassandra Wilder
⚡ TOUTES LES INFORMATIONS CLIQUEZ ICI 👈🏻👈🏻👈🏻
L'incroyable Cassandra Wilder
Home » Deborah Doucette
» Corps Humain, une Machine Incroyable (le Online PDF eBook
Monday, October 23, 2017
Deborah Doucette
Related Posts : Corps Humain, une Machine Incroyable (le Online PDF eBook Uploaded By: Deborah DoucetteDOWNLOAD Corps Humain, une Machine Incroyable (le PDF Online. Corps hum… Read More...
February 2018 (8)
January 2018 (16)
December 2017 (25)
November 2017 (14)
October 2017 (12)
September 2017 (13)
August 2017 (21)
July 2017 (9)
June 2017 (16)
May 2017 (11)
April 2017 (15)
March 2017 (15)
February 2017 (13)
January 2017 (24)
December 2016 (18)
November 2016 (12)
October 2016 (17)
September 2016 (12)
August 2016 (20)
July 2016 (19)
June 2016 (23)
May 2016 (17)
April 2016 (16)
March 2016 (17)
February 2016 (15)
January 2016 (14)
December 2015 (14)
November 2015 (13)
October 2015 (15)
September 2015 (17)
August 2015 (15)
July 2015 (13)
Uploaded By: Jodi Adler DOWNLOAD L apiculture ecologique de A a Z PDF Online . L apiculture écologique de A à Z | Le jardin adlibitum L ap...
Uploaded By: Fr John F Harvey O S F S DOWNLOAD Linguistics for Non Linguists A Primer with Exercises (5th Edition) PDF Online . Linguistic...
Uploaded By: Feral Sephrian DOWNLOAD Manager par l approche systemique PDF Online . Download Skype | Free calls | Chat app Some Skype feat...
Published in Jul. 2015 (Issue 62) | 7984 words
© 2015 by Andrea Hairston.
Editor’s Note: Instead of two original fantasy short stories this month, we have for you a single fantasy novelette by Andrea Hairston (“Saltwater Railroad”), which is about twice the length of a regular Lightspeed story. So, although you are getting three stories instead of four this month, this novelette is the length of two full-length short stories, so you’re still getting the same amount of fiction. We hope you enjoy this minor deviation from our usual offerings, and rest assured we will return to our regularly scheduled programming next month. [ Click here to read Part 1. ] —eds.
For the next few weeks Delia wrestled with hope. She walked the Island talking with Rainbow, who always lashed the tube to her back and stuffed cornbread in one pocket and a peach in another. Delia didn’t show Rainbow the hidden valley, just the inhospitable perimeter. An occasional ship passed in the distance. Nothing got close to the Island. After many dry days, a storm came out of nowhere and chased Delia and Rainbow into a cave mouth at the top of the Island. They watched lightning strike a tall mast. The ship caught fire, burning bright yellow against a black sea and sky. The ruined vessel broke up on the reefs. No survivors washed ashore. Islanders whispered about lost souls. Delia didn’t want to hear about lost souls, didn’t want to think on her son Andrew.
Still, Delia took Rainbow down to the beach. They hurried over planks past Wolf Wedge to gather driftwood, drift-anything that might have floated their way from the shipwreck. Islanders poked through murky debris. Delia waded into the waves. Rainbow hesitated at the shore.
“Red Quincy say giant whirlpools in the sea churn barrels and charred sails our way, not water-spirits.” Delia plucked a spyglass from scummy water.
Melody and Fran cheered. Fran’s leg had healed well, just a slight limp now. She had Melody’s baby slung on her back. Rainbow counted nine women with babies.
“Miz Delia, what you want always floats right to you,” Jenny Garlic shouted. “I have to dig and slog!”
“Ain’t that good for you?” Delia shouted back.
William set a bedraggled hat on Jenny’s bare head. Water dribbled down purple feathers as she scooped wet sand to reveal a wooden box.
“What good is this junk?” Quincy and his ne’er-do-wells ran the rocks with three canoes on their backs. Strapping, muscular free men in the prime of life should have been a grand sight. Quincy smirking at Jenny’s hat made Delia’s blood boil. While the sea was calm, he planned to finish mapping dangerous waters. His crew would launch at a gush of water from an underground stream. Storm runoff would carry them past the worst reefs. Despite irritation, Delia, Jenny, and Granny Peaches spoke prayers for their safe return in Indian and African tongues.
“Savage gods don’t have any power,” Rainbow said. “It’s worthless superstition to worship anything but our Lord Jesus.”
Melody and Fran giggled, nose to nose, lanky hair mingling. Quincy snorted.
William jumped in a Scout canoe. He knew the waters better than anybody except Twilight. “Say a good word for us to your god, then.”
Rainbow sputtered. “I don’t know if Quincy wants a prayer from the likes of me.”
“Quincy never thank the clouds for falling down on us or the fish for feeding us.” Delia dried her spyglass and stuffed it in a canvas bag. “He got me pegged for a fool talking to haints. He’s a learned man and say water ain’t got no spirit. Water just is. But I know a thing or two. Being take all your spirit power and when you done run through that power, why, you stop being or actually you’re ready to be something else. It’s like climbing a mountain. At the summit you’re ready to roll down to somewhere new with everything the mountain got to give you. Being takes a lot of work! You ever try to be water?” Delia and everybody except Rainbow smiled at the thought. “Being water and your own self, too, that requires much spirit power.”
“I don’t think I understand you,” Rainbow said.
Jenny pried open her box. She clapped her hands together, thrilled.
“No.” Jenny held up a scroll. “Maps!”
Rainbow stiffened. “What’s that noise? You hear that?”
A hound dog howled and was answered by a high-pitched yap. Rainbow dashed to Wolf Wedge. Everybody followed her. Scouts even materialized from the caves. A black and white dog, hardly more than a pup, scrambled from a few lashed-together boards before they shattered on the jagged rocks. She-dog jumped into Rainbow’s arms and wagged her whole body.
“Somebody found you,” Jenny said as the pup licked Rainbow’s cheeks.
Delia rubbed the pup’s tummy. “What you say?”
“How do, Captain.” Rainbow smiled for the first time.
“If William could see you.” Delia smiled, too.
“Whoever heard of naming a bitch Captain?” Melody asked.
“We’ve been watching those boards.” John Oaks stood atop a boulder, a long rifle in his hand. “Couldn’t make out who was aboard.”
Papa Moonbeam stood by John. He was toting a rifle, too. “You know this bitch?”
Rainbow shrugged. Captain chewed at her cylinder.
“One other dog on the Island.” Twilight jumped down to Rainbow. “Mangy ole thing is very lonely.”
Delia chuckled. “That hound dog got hisself lost in the swamps hunting Indians and runaways. Fool critter didn’t know what side he was on and warned Moonbeam of a gator creeping up.”
“‘Bout to chomp my good right foot.” Moonbeam stomped that foot.
“Hound was too mangy to eat,” John said. “So —”
“Moonbeam and John let him join their Scouts.” Delia liked telling this story. “They fed him good rabbit stew and he been warning the Scouts of ambush ever since.”
“What do you call him?” Rainbow asked.
“Swamp.” Moonbeam set his gun down.
Rainbow nodded. “Captain would love to meet Mr. Swamp.”
Swamp trotted in, snuffling and wagging a stringy tail. Rainbow set the squirming pup down. Captain and Swamp were fast friends at first sight.
“Swamp howled the night you came,” John said.
“Red Quincy’s willing to bet his life you’re a Mainland spy,” Twilight muttered.
“Or scouting for river pirates,” Moonbeam added.
Rainbow didn’t offer a better story. She shivered and scratched both dogs.
“Captain’s come home,” Jenny declared. “Good thing. Wind’s gathering orange clouds.” She pulled violet lace gloves onto Rainbow’s Ethiopian hands. A line of pearls went from the middle finger to the wrist.
Rainbow was too stunned to protest. “I don’t have anything to give you.”
“You’ll think of something.” Twilight yawned and shook weary limbs. She liked sleeping in sunlight, when nobody could get the jump on her, with love-sick Rufus standing watch. “One more hour . . .”
Everybody went back to scouting and collecting. Rainbow kept gaping at the gloves, terror on her breath, a lock on her heart. Delia still had time. Who’d raid the Island in this weather? She’d get Rainbow to open up after storm season.
Tempests roaring up from the West Indies kept folks busy. In between deluges and gale winds, Delia and Rainbow collected what blew in. William helped them carry a tangle of busted furniture and ropes to the cabin one night. Delia was cranky. She cursed and punched knots, trying to rescue a rocker from a rope snarl. She wasn’t sleeping, too busy dream-walking and ciphering Spirit talk. That made her very cranky.
“I hate storm season, too.” William paced in front of her.
Outside Rainbow opened up empty rain barrels.
“I usually enjoy the lightning and the fury,” Delia said.
William tossed a scroll on the table. “Our freedom map is almost done, thanks to my mother finding those maps.” He marched back and forth along the altar of broken things.
“Stop!” Delia muttered. “You like to stomp a hole in my floor, making me dizzy.”
He danced in place. “Quincy says he’s going out the first dry day. For supplies.”
Delia hacked the rocker free. She held up the snarl of rope. “Well, I’ve seen the end of myself twisting in the wind . . .”
That got William to hold still. “What are you saying?”
“Last night, I was back on old man Briggs’s plantation.” Delia waved the rope about. She took a step and she was:
— charging toward a grove of Georgia pines. The brown-skinned, hazel-eyed sailor spit a gag from his mouth. He was dressed in bloody rags. A rope circled his waist and wrists. Delia raced through dark underbrush, running so hard her lungs were on fire. A shadowy overseer climbed a ladder and threw the rope over a sturdy bough. The sailor flailed. Delia plowed through bushes and people cowering. The sailor went limp. Delia hugged his legs. She choked.
“It’s Andrew, my Andrew, dying again, on my word!” Delia banged the rope against her chest. She couldn’t get a breath. Before the Island, when she was a settlers’ spy, she told paddy-rollers where to find folks. On her word, they’d dragged runaways, free blacks, and renegade Indians from swamp hideaways.
William gripped her shoulders and talked Muscogee or some comfort Delia didn’t understand. She hurled the rope at Rainbow coming in the door. Rainbow froze. Captain scurried under the bed. Delia slapped William’s hands away. She wheezed and coughed blood. Rainbow marched to the altar of broken things, grabbed the music box, and thrust it in Delia’s face. Delia scowled but took the box. Music filled the cabin: violin, drums, and a gourd banjo. William and Rainbow jumped. They heard the music, too. Captain came out from under the bed. Delia dropped down by the window.
“I ain’t good company,” she said and sang the melancholy tune.
“Let’s go out. While the sea roars,” Rainbow said.
“Now? In a canoe?” William shook his head. “The wind could blow us away.”
Rainbow pulled him outside. They got drenched immediately. He set an angry pace. Rainbow was breathless keeping up. Captain danced, too. Delia watched from the window. She unscrolled the freedom map and stroked the drawing.
“Delia! Delia! What do you see?” Spirits whispered.
A blue-green dragon flew off the paper followed by lush fruits and flowers, fanciful musical instruments, and colorful birds.
“The ships are coming. Are you ready?” Spirits whispered.
A blast of wind lifted the map. It almost flew out the window. Delia gripped an edge. The map fluttered like a sail.
Outside William whispered in Rainbow’s ear. “Are you sure Delia’s all right?”
“She needed to be with herself. You needed to dance up a storm.” Rainbow pressed her hands against William’s damp cheeks. Ethiopian fingers flashed a bit of light. He closed his eyes and shivered at the sparks. She drew her hands down his throat to his chest. He took her face in his hands, tracing her features. He leaned close, pressing his body against hers.
“Are you trying to charm me out of my good sense, like Twilight said?” she said.
“Never out of your good sense,” he replied.
The wind knocked them into a puddle and they spit out mud. Captain licked their faces, wagging her butt. Rainbow smiled for a second time.
“Captain makes you smile,” William said, hauling Rainbow up.
The rain was gentle now, hardly more than mist. Rainbow kissed William on the mouth. He responded with passion. After a moment she pulled away. “Pardon, a French kiss . . .”
He touched his lips to her fingers. “Tell me the secrets of hands that catch stars.”
“I can’t, I just . . . You don’t know . . .” Rainbow hugged herself, shuddering.
“Don’t go,” she reached for him. “Show me where everyone else lives.”
“They live in my heart. And I have shown you that.”
“People don’t talk like you do. They don’t act like this. This Island isn’t on any map. It seems like a good life, but it’s doomed.”
William disappeared into a cave. Rainbow swallowed a scream and whirled in fingers of fog. Delia rolled the freedom map back up and set it beside Rainbow’s cylinder. If they could just make it through storm season . . .
Hot, muggy weather turned everybody mean-spirited. The men bristled and bellowed. The women itched and snapped. Fights brewed below the surface. River pirates would have shot and sliced each other — they couldn’t always keep today together for tomorrow. Red Quincy usually claimed women helped him hold his temper. He wasn’t saying that anymore. Island women were as frayed as the men. Twilight aimed a gun at Quincy and her brothers to stop them fighting over trading and raiding. After a shouting match with John and Moonbeam, Quincy persuaded Jenny’s oldest son, Patrick, to go off with his crew of ne’er-do-wells. Patrick was as smart and brave as Quincy but didn’t know it. He looked up to the older, wilder man. Quincy didn’t ask William, saying he needed brave men, not cowards or clowns. Without William guiding them, Quincy’s three canoes almost smashed up on the rocks twice. That didn’t stop them paddling out of sight. John and Moonbeam headed out in a canoe, too, leaving Swamp tied up and yelping. Twilight jumped in their canoe at the last moment. She was the best shot, no contest, no argument.
Three days later, Delia sat by her window in the broken rocking chair. It howled as she moved back and forth. Islanders poured from the caves carrying pork, pickles, beans, a beer barrel, and peaches. Live chickens scurried beside them. Rufus Freedman led a baby goat on a rope. William, in the rabbit mask, jumped from the roof. Delia stopped rocking and marched outside. Quincy, Patrick, and the ne’er-do-wells had returned from their raid on the docks. They were loaded down with ammunition, guns, and two more canoes. Delia smelled blood on them. They’d been drinking, too. Quincy and Patrick bragged on each other and gave their booty away right in front of her door! The goat butted William. He tumbled in the dirt and the goat scampered off. Rufus chased after it. Children tittered. William took off the mask.
“Where’d they get all this?” Rainbow bit into a loaf of fresh bread.
“Where does Quincy get anything?” Delia stormed back into her cabin.
Rainbow broke a hunk of orange cheese from a fat wheel and waved it to William. He smacked the offering out of her hand.
“It’s always over cheese.” Quincy stuffed sausage in his mouth. “Let’s celebrate. Everybody should wear a mask.”
William threw the mask at Rainbow’s feet and dashed up a cliff.
Quincy turned to the mountain gals. “Sing something, Melody,”
Melody was reluctant. Her baby cooed and banged her neck. Children begged and pleaded. Adults looked uncertain. Two men shoved each other, a fight brewing.
Jenny Garlic scanned the crowd. “Yes, sing. It’ll sweeten the mood.”
Fran squeezed her hand. Melody sighed and sang:
My true love went a-roving
Across a narrow sea
My true love went a-roaming
She wanted to live free
They set hounds to her feet
They set fire to her breath
She refused to cry defeat
She refused to see death
My true love went a-roving
Across a narrow sea
My true love went a-roaming
She wanted to live free
Rainbow picked up the rabbit mask. She clutched it, shaking her head.
John, Moonbeam, and Twilight had been gone for six days. When Jenny tried to worry out loud, Delia hushed her with crazy talk about being air, and being lightning, too. Rainbow and Captain sat with Delia at Wolf Wedge waiting through each long night. The sun was about to go down and Islanders whispered and worried. What if they never came back? What if Mainlanders had captured them? William slumped on one of Delia’s rain barrels, near the open window. Rainbow fussed with her cylinder and didn’t notice him. Wailing like a demon, Delia tramped around her cabin, trying not to see death or cry defeat. Her black dress and shawl were mud-splattered and knotted up. Her headwrap was unraveling. She couldn’t get herself to put on clean clothes. In the distance Swamp howled. When Captain joined in, Rainbow couldn’t stand the racket.
“You want to see what’s in my tube?” she said.
William peeked in the window and gasped as:
Poisonous snakes wiggled out of the tube followed by jeweled necklaces, silk cloth covered in gold embroidery, and rolls of parchment with long paragraphs and a curlicue signature.
Delia swallowed a wail and wiped at tears. “Sure. What is it?”
“A painting.” Rainbow opened the tube.
Delia held Captain’s muzzle. “Hush, hound. Rainbow got a secret to share.”
Both Captain and Swamp quieted down.
Rainbow unfurled a canvas. “Saint Cosmas and Saint Damian Healing a Christian with the Leg of a Dead Ethiopian.”
Delia groaned at the title and the image: Two pale, haloed Saints held wands, books, and medicine boxes. They attached the lower leg of a black man to the knee of a white man lying in a bed of lush blankets and pillows. On the floor a dead black man lay contorted in raggedy clothes. Blood dribbled from his unmoored knee.
“I don’t need to see that,” Delia said, pointing to the cabin floor:
The mist man lay contorted in raggedy clothes. Blood dribbled from his unmoored knee. He moaned. The wings on his forehead shimmered.
Outside William squelched a gasp at this vision and rubbed his eyes. Delia turned away. Rainbow didn’t see the mist man. Her eyes were fixed on the painting.
“The patron saints of the Medici.” Rainbow stroked their wands and finery.
“You cut up some poor body for your hands?”
Rainbow rolled up the painting. “So, you agree with the preacher.” She stuffed it in the tube.
Delia turned around. The floor had a blood-red stain. “Who is this preacher?”
“He told me I couldn’t be a miracle.” Rainbow hurled the tube at the altar of broken things. Clocks and wheels tumbled to the ground. Glass shattered.
Delia took out the bottle of sweet oil. “This is from my mother.” She unscrewed the bottle. “I’ve been saving it all these years.”
“Yes, I think she gave me this bottle before old man Briggs sold her away. My belly was big with my first son.”
“Andrew. I heard tales about him from Mainlanders.”
“Yes, Andrew,” Delia stuttered. Andrew floated in front of her, dead in the water. Delia poured sweet oil onto Rainbow’s palms and then her own. “Tell me what happened to you. Tell me your miracle.” Delia slowly rubbed sparkling fingers.
“The preacher cut off my hand
Ciseaux avec ma cousine
Bisexuelles dans plan à trois torride
Une Coréene prise en trio