Under the Mattress by Susie Field

   “You can’t put a price on a good night’s sleep.” The salesman smiles flashing a row of gleaming white teeth. He probably uses the same phrase every time he sells one of these expensive beds, but I suppose it’s true, and I am taking rather a long time to make up my mind. 

   I know I want a double bed and I’ve chosen the headboard in a neutral shade, in case I change the décor in my bedroom, and I’ve eventually decided on a mattress after testing hundreds, well not that many obviously, but quite a few. My problem at the moment is deciding whether to have drawers at the sides or at the bottom of the bed.

   He’s beginning to lose patience. He’s trying not to but he’s looked at his watch three times and now he’s stifling a yawn. I don’t care. It’s an important decision, not to mention a lot of money, and I will not be rushed.

   “The thing is,” he continues through gritted teeth. “How much room do you have at the bottom of the bed? You’ll need enough space to open the drawers comfortably.”

   “I’m not sure.”

   “Well how about at the side of the bed? Both sides or just one?”

   “It’s not a very big bedroom so there isn’t a lot of room. Maybe I shouldn’t go for a divan.”

   He sighs dramatically. “You said you wanted storage space, madam.”

   “Yes, I do really. It’s so difficult.”

   It’s getting dark outside and I notice all the other customers have left. 

   “Perhaps I should come back tomorrow with my husband.” I give him my best smile but he’s having none of it. I’ve wasted his afternoon and he’s going to sell me a bed come what may.

   “I could have the very thing.  Come this way.”

   I follow him to the far end of the showroom, wishing I could make my escape.

   “Here we are,” he says with a flourish. “Plenty of storage in this little beauty.”

   I watch as he lifts the mattress and base to reveal an enormous storage compartment. 

   “Oh yes, it looks very nice.” I hesitate and he’s waiting. “It’s just that it may be a little heavy for me to lift.”

   He demonstrates how easy the whole procedure is and I have a go. 

   “I’m not sure, I’m afraid.” My arms are already aching from the whole procedure.

   I can tell he’s holding his breath thinking I’m inventing another excuse. I’m still peering into the depths of the storage compartment, afraid to meet his eye, when he pushes me hard and I fall. Feeling dazed I turn onto my back, blood dripping from a cut on my head. He’s staring down at me. His black eyes deep in their sockets. He smiles, exposing brown rotten teeth. The stench is unbearable. He licks his pale lips.  

   The showroom is now in darkness, but I can see the figures lurking in the shadows. They approach slowly. I cannot move. I’m trapped. 

The Shell Grotto by Judy Mitchell

(A walk around the south shore of the Upper Lake in the grounds of Bretton Hall, now Yorkshire Sculpture Park, takes in the 18th century shell grotto. Once inhabited by a hermit, this magical place had views of the house, an obelisk and Greek temple on the opposite banks. It was designed to entertain and amuse the guests of the estate’s wealthy owner, Sir Thomas Wentworth Blackett.  Walks in the Park during lockdown prompted this fictional story.)

As she stood and waited, she reached out to run her fingers over the walls and ceiling. The movement of her arms seemed to prompt the slipping sun to catch the light from the soft waves on the lake and she spun around to see thousands of shimmering water nymphs dancing across the grotto. Her eyes followed their gliding shapes and the rippling streaks of silver which fell on to the pearlescent treasures above her head. Smiling at their magical ballet, she pointed her toes and stretched out her hands to join the dance. Her feet whirled in time with the water maidens and she was transported to a world deep beneath the sea in a cave of azure water. Silken, green sea-plants reached out to caress her body and she watched her own hair, which had become loose, tangle gently with the fronds in the underwater garden. 

Loosing herself in the turquoise water lasted only a few seconds as the fiery orb slid down behind the trees in the parkland and the dazzling lights of the water spirits vanished. She made to rise to the surface and leave the imagined deep, lifting her arms upwards and bringing them together above her head to break the water. 

There was a rush of terrestrial sound to her ears. Footsteps pounded down the path towards the grotto and the sound of snorting dogs became louder. There was no time to slip back into the deep blue waters.

‘Well, there you are,’ said the man as he arrived at the door of the grotto, blocking out some of the light and the view of the obelisk and the house on the bank beyond. His body was silhouetted against the light and she strained to see his features. Two dogs pulled on short ropes which he held in his hand. 

‘Are you coming out or do I have to come in and get you?’ 

She shook her head, refusing to move towards him and stayed at the back of the shallow cave, her body turned away from him. 

‘I’ll stay here so you can come out. I will hold off my dogs but only if you come out quietly. No shrieking or caterwauling. It will scare these beauties. Come on.’        

Her feet stepped forward until she reached the edge of the lake.  

‘Where is he?’ she whispered, looking up at the higher path above the grotto. In the distance she could see burning torches moving through the trees. 

‘Who are you looking for?’  

She made no reply.  

‘Walk towards the bridge. The other keepers are there.’

Every face she passed stared at her in the light of their torches but he was not one of them. She wanted to see the man with the pointed silver beard who wore a long white robe and had hair that reached down to his shoulders. He was unmistakeable, they had assured her. 

‘Look at his hands if you are unsure. The nails have never been cut and are longer than an eagle’s talons.’

Her captor followed her on the path towards the bridge and she could feel the heat of the dogs’ breath on her ankles. On the bridge, a man stood apart from the others, leaning on a stick. 

‘Why are you on Sir Thomas’s land? Is anyone with you?’

She shook her head but offered no explanation for being in the Park. Avoiding the man’s eyes, she looked down at her feet. 

‘Are you on your own?’

When she did not respond he moved towards her, placing his face only inches away from hers. His breath smelled sour and hot and she turned away to avoid the foul air.

‘Who were you waiting for?’

‘The Hermit. They said he was here. I have to find him. I think he can tell me where my mother has gone.’   

‘Don’t you know that he’s left? Weeks ago. The Master had grown tired of him seeking money from his house guests. He was supposed to entertain them but instead had taken to telling them scary stories, frightening them and their children. He had overstayed his welcome.’

‘They said he knew all things and would know where my mother was.’

‘Why, what happened to her?’  

‘She went away two weeks ago and has not been seen since.’ 

The man with the dogs walked her back over the bridge and up to the house where he handed her over to the housekeeper who scolded her for running off and staying out late.

It was three weeks later that a party aboard The Aurora, Sir Thomas’s boat, saw a body in the shallows of the lake and hauled in the ugly remains of a woman without clothes: bare except for a black rope around her neck and wrists.  

The young servant girl, who had started work only three months before the woman’s disappearance, was called upon to identify the body of her mother.  

They suspected the hermit and sought him throughout the county. A man with long silver hair, strange fingernails and a flowing gown would surely be easy to track down but he had slipped into obscurity as the seasons began to change. Attempts to bring him to justice failed.  The search was called off and the suspected murder went unsolved. 

Weeks later, on a night as black as coal and in driving wind and rain, they found another body. Enveloped in a thick woollen skirt and dark shawl, the slender shape of a young servant girl was found beside the Shell Grotto. In her clenched fist she held a tiny cowrie shell. Her body was wet as if she had been in the lake but those who knew her were certain that the profound state of melancholy which had descended on her after her mother’s murder was the real cause of her death.

The Little Green Mouth in My Brown Bedroom Carpet by Owen Townend

The vacuum had reached the corner of my bed when I heard a wail give out, immediately followed by a disapproving tut. Glancing down at the brown carpet from which it came, I identified a small green mouth with sharp little teeth. My whole body stiffened but what I felt most was the cool sticky sweat on my forehead.

             “I’ll talk!” the voice pleaded before repeating the phrase as a screechy threat.

            “Are you meant to?” I asked.

            The mouth closed at this, briefly thinking the matter over before stating, “I can do as I feel.”

            I didn’t know what to say to that so I answered, “Fair enough.”

            This seemed to invite the little green mouth to speak. So many words streamed out of it that I had no hope of understanding what was being said or what parts of it were important. Indeed the whole thing sounded like pure digression to me.

            Eventually though the mouth stopped to ask me a question: “When do you next meet with the king?”

            This gave me significant pause. “Sorry. King?”

            The mouth sighed. “The king you see twice every day. Unless your sister goes to see him first.”

            “You know my sister?” I imagined a brief and bizarre dialogue, involving her getting down onto her belly to discuss the day’s events with this carpet mouth. If anyone could give it a run for its money, it would be my chatterbox sister.

            “I see her enter the room from time to time but she never stops long enough to say hello. Then again she doesn’t run huge suck machines over me either.”

            I felt a pang of shame here though I really couldn’t say why. When my sister and I first rented this house we had never been warned about any kind of mouth in the carpet. Really the landlord should have admitted such details in the contract.

            “But that is beside the issue,” the mouth snapped. “When do you next see the king? Has the furry biped been made ready yet?”

            It took me a moment to realise that the mouth meant Chiquita, our Labrador Pinscher. She sometimes bursts into my room but normally I keep the door firmly shut as she can make a terrible mess when we leave her. Regardless it seemed the mouth had come across her at some point.

            “Chiquita?” I asked. “We don’t bring her to see a king.”

            “Really?” I didn’t appreciate the accusatory tone that the mouth took here. “You do not take this Chicky-tee outside every morning and afternoon to meet with the King of Dogwal?”

            I needed even longer to unpack this sentence. It eventually occurred to me that the King of Dogwal might also be referred to as The Dogwal King. Dog walking. I laughed.

            “I’m afraid you’ve got the wrong idea here. We don’t take Chiquita to the Dogwal King, we take her dog walking. That is to say we walk the dog, which is Chiquita. Do you understand?”

            The little green mouth opened and closed, thin plastic lips quivering with indignity. At last it bore its teeth and snarled, “I have never been so insulted! I will report this to the authorities, maybe even the King of Dogwal himself! I take my leave of you now but, mark my words, you will come to regret mocking me!”

            Then the mouth closed up and sank beneath the fibres of the carpet. I stood there a while longer, calling out in case the mouth came back with some kind of retort. Nevertheless it stayed away and I vacuumed around the patch it had occupied.

            Though I watched for it when I went to sleep that night, the mouth didn’t reappear. Then, when I awoke the next morning from a patchy sleep, I dressed without any snide remarks catching me off-guard.

            It has been a week now and I don’t believe the little green mouth in my brown bedroom carpet will return. I don’t know precisely what authorities it sought out but it seems the matter has been resolved. Maybe the mouth has seen its error and is too proud to apologise. I get that way too sometimes.

Still I will be glad if I never see or hear from it again. This place is getting thick with dust.

The Piper by Chris Lloyd

A dark, dreary day, Falls Road, Belfast;
For the deceased this journey was his last.
He was one of the leaders of the Party,
Commander-In-Chief of their army.

The family were gathered, the Son concierge
A Piper took his place at the head of the cortege.
He was cold, flexing his fingers, looking at the floor
Hoping he wouldn’t be called to do this anymore.  

The church, two hundred yards hence,
The Piper, a feeling of trouble – he was tense.
This time more so for this was the Chief who
In the Troubles, made people see sense..

A tap on his shoulder, all was ready,
Filling the pipe’s bags he got himself steady,
Set a sedate pace so the family could show
Even in death he was still the man to know.

He walked a slow walk, eyes watching, wary,
Piping a tune, in his in head saying Hail Mary,
People crowded as they passed houses, then rubble;
Telling himself there’d be no more trouble.

He noticed a group pointing and shouting
The Son came quickly his heart pounding,
He said something to the Priest,
Some “old friends”, left out of the feast.

The Piper looked around, made, his pace quicker
The crowd was growing, getting thicker,
He led them to church, piped the final notes,
They walked in, minders checking their coats.

Service over, the Piper stood waiting for the sign.
The Son came forward, said, “Now is the time.”
He led them to where the Chief was being interred,
Everyone singing to the very last word.

The Piper was scared, hoped his debt would be paid.
He was twenty three, living in fear for over a decade,
Paying the price for his father’s “treasonable” dealings;
The Chief had shot him like a rat, without any feelings.

The Piper wanted to leave this scarred city,
There would always be reprisals more is the pity.
Once the debt was paid, this life would cease,
He’d be away within hours to live his life in peace.

The Son hove into sight.
“Thank you, Danny, nice gig, well played son.
Next Saturday, your uncle’s funeral, then you’re done.”
The son walked away smiling like a ghoul,
The Piper slumped down, sick to his soul.
His uncle was not yet dead.

Rogues By Ian F White

The clash of steel on steel rang out loudly in the cavernous cathedral, echoing off the high-vaulted ceiling and numerous alcoves that ran along both mural-painted walls. Each of the two shimmering blades was clasped in a similarly vice-like grip, yet that was where the similarity of their wielders ended.

One was a large man, well over six-feet tall, wide-shouldered, broad-chested, thick of thews. His body was clad in a long coat of mail which fell from neck to knee. The steel helm from which his unruly shoulder-length dark locks protruded, sported a single, wicked-looking spike at its crown. Beneath the rim, his cool blue eyes twinkled with a raw humour that was reflected within the clean, white-toothed grin. He was handsome, perfect of physique, and he knew it.

The other was a woman, a clear head shorter than her opponent, yet equally a perfect specimen of her gender. Her full breasts and hips strained at the tight confines of the leather corselet and leggings she wore, as she held her fighting stance. Her long hair fell about her shoulders in golden rivulets that shone in the light of nearby sconces. Her green eyes and set of her full lips marked her attitude as irritable to the point of unconcealed anger. The sleeves of her loose blouse were rolled up to the elbows, revealing a number of scars upon her forearms – the only blemishes upon her perfection.

They stood upon a smooth, ceramic-tiled floor, its mosaic pattern depicting a hideous scene of enslavery and torture. Laying upon the floor between them was a large pearl about the size of an adult boar’s head.

Similar scenes of depravity decorated the walls and ceiling, some contained painted depictions of the massive, four-horned stone-carved idol, adorned with a grotesquely bloated masculinity, that crouched forebodingly atop a dais beyond the sacrificial altar at the far end of the great hall. Above a flat, bat-like nose and gaping, tooth-filled jaws, it’s single, central, large empty eye-socket stared sightlessly down at the blasphemers in its presence.

More items of golden, gem-encrusted finery rested upon every surface in the chamber, or else hung from brackets fixed to walls and pillars. There was enough treasure on display in this one room to secure the ransom of a dozen kings. But it seemed as though the two occupants were both intent on this one over-sized bauble before them over ought else.

The man relaxed his grip a little and his sword-tip lowered until it pointed at the huge pearl, though his eyes never wavered from the woman’s. He was confident in his swordsmanship, but also knew she was skilled in tricks and feints that would press him to his limits. That was part of the reason he loved her; if he was going to die, he’d prefer it to be by her hand. Yet he was not ready for that just now. He cleared his throat.

“It appears we’re at an impasse, my dear Karla,” he said, the words thick with a northern accent. “We both want the same thing, I suggest –"

“You double-crossing barbarian ox!” she hissed, cutting him off. “We had a deal – the pearl is mine. I should have known not to trust you. I can’t believe I fell for your rustic charms. I could have carried out this robbery alone. And I am no ‘dear’ of yours, Theor.”

Theor smiled. “I recall no such agreement.”

“You lying…” her voice trailed off, her eyes widened, her nostrils flared, and she sprang at him with the fury of a wild panther.

Theor stepped in quickly, Karla’s blade sliding along his thigh, showering sparks from the metal hauberk as it did so. They were suddenly face-to-face, body-to-body. Theor slipped a thickly-muscled arm around Karla’s waist and pulled her closer, almost squeezing the air from her lungs. They stared at each other; eyes locked. They paused, remembering; they had been in a similar position the previous evening.

“You brute. I will not…” Karla whispered as she placed a hand on his firm chest and pushed ineffectually, fighting to resist am inevitability, a fatefulness she knew would come to pass, yet still she resisted. It was in her nature.

“Our paths have crossed for a reason. You are an independent woman, Karla, and I respect that. But you are also a woman, and I am a man… I need you… do you need me…?”

Her resistance began to crumble as she stared up into his eyes. She saw the sincerity in them. Pushing their squabble over the bauble to one side, she whispered her answer. “Yes.”

Their lips met, they pressed passionately together, and at that moment, another voice called out from somewhere within the chamber.

“How romantic.”

Theor and Karla span apart, eyes seeking the newcomer, blades poised to strike.

In front of the altar stood a man. He was tall and thin, almost skeletal, clad in a scarlet-trimmed black robe with a high collar which framed his clean-shaven head. His thin lips were pulled back in a horrific parody of a smile. His deep-set coal-black eyes stared unblinkingly at the two rogues, boring into their very souls.

“High-Priest Balthar!” Theor cursed. “Where in the nine hells did he appear from?”

Karla gestured to a thin shadow that split the decorations of one wall. “Secret passage. Damn, I don’t know how I missed that.”

A feint sound drew their attention from the man and the secret door – the sound of stone grating upon stone. They both froze, staring in disbelief and horror at the statue of Balthar’s god. Its claw-tipped hands and feet moved, shifting position, ready to pounce!

The High-Priest spoke again, his voice a deep ululating drone. “The Lord Maltheis… Unsated Eater of Souls… Thrice Accursed Master of K’Alaar … Unwholesome Ravager of Women and Men… Dread Stalker of the Halls of Madness … wants his eye back!”

With a bellow that shook the hall and reverberated in the lovers’ heads and chests, the Lord Maltheis bounded from its perch…