A Thursday teaser from the paranormal/occult thriller
By Bruce Blake
I woke to an unfamiliar room which looked like no hospital room I’d ever seen: mass-produced dresser, bed, chair like you might find sitting behind a teacher’s desk, and a table supporting a huge old microwave—the kind that buzzed and moaned as it heated your TV dinner, leaking enough radiation to shrivel your balls to raisins in the process. A door leading to a darkened bathroom stood ajar while a second closed door presumably led to a corridor lined with many similar doors. A hotel room, one of the places where people did their business by the hour. The itchy wool bedspread tucked under my chin confirmed its wouldn’t make the cut for a Lonely Planet Travel Guide.
I stopped and took quick stock of myself. Physically, everything seemed fine: ten fingers, ten toes, arms, legs, head, all the essentials in the proper places. And no pain. I looked up again.
It was all a dream.
It had to have been, because I clearly wasn’t dead. Then a second thought occurred to me: Where the fuck am I?
Somehow, the man sitting on a wooden chair in the corner had escaped my notice during my first inspection of the room.
And who the fuck is he?
His meticulously brushed hair fell to his shoulders in a style last popular when Kool and the Gang and roller skates ruled. The lamp on the dresser beside him cast a shadow across his face, hiding his features. He didn’t look up from the book in his lap.
So it had all been my imagination: the hospital, the doctors, the blood. But what about the men in the churchyard? Did I imagine them, too? None of it explained how I got here. I ground my teeth, bewildered, then looked back at the blond man still engrossed in his book and shivered a little. I cleared my throat; might as well find out what the hell’s going on.
“Ah, you’re awake.”
He leaned forward on the edge of the chair and I swear his eyes glowed. Not in the way of a poem, or a poorly written romance novel, but for a fraction of a second, it looked like they actually cast light. I fought an urge to crawl away.
The man laid his book on the dresser at his elbow, careful not to lose his page. “How do you feel?”
I looked at him, puzzled. “Dead?”
“Sort of.” A look of bemusement tugged the corner of his mouth. His flawless features reminded me of an artist’s rendering of a fairy tale Prince Charming.
“Where the fuck am I? Who are you?”
“You may call me Michael, Icarus.”
I raised an eyebrow; who but teachers use the word ‘may’?
“Call me Ric.”
“Where we are is of no consequence. The why is most important.”
“Don’t get ahead of me here, Mikey.” I pushed myself to a sitting position, making the wobbly headboard bang against the wall—part of the charm of rooms rented hourly. No pain as I shifted, but the memory of a knife blade piercing my flesh made me flinch.
It wasn’t real.
If my visitor noticed, he must have found it amusing because his grin remained intact. I wanted to slap it off.
“You have questions,” Mike said.
He dragged the chair to the side of the bed and sat again. The white dress shirt he wore open at the throat looked like he’d put it on straight out of the package and his dark red slacks dated from the same era as his hairstyle. The aroma of cinnamon and cloves wafted from him, like fresh-baked pumpkin pie. My stomach growled.
“What do you remember?”
“Trevor’s birthday. I missed it.” I looked into the beautiful man’s eyes—not blue or brown or green like eyes are supposed to be, but yellow, like a cat’s. Golden. The light I saw before flickered far in the back of them, almost unnoticeable; I wanted to look away, but couldn’t. “What happened to me?”
“Do you remember the two men in the churchyard? The wounds they inflicted led to the death of your earthly body.”
How does he know that?
I raised an eyebrow and gestured around the room. “And this is…?”
“A hotel room on east 38th.” He chuckled, a sound that made happiness bubble inside me, but I pushed it aside in favor of confusion and doubt, two sentiments which seemed more appropriate given my current situation.
“So you’re telling me I’m dead.”
He nodded.
On Unfaithful Wings
To some, death is the end; to others, a beginning. To Icarus Fell, it should have been a relief from a life gone seriously awry. But death had other plans.
Icarus doesn’t believe the man awaiting him when awakens in a cheap motel room is the archangel Michael, or that God’s right hand wants him to help souls on their way to Heaven. Icarus doesn’t believe in Heaven, so why should they want his help? But the man claiming to be the archangel tempts him with an offer he can’t ignore—harvest enough souls and get back the life he wished he’d had.
It seems Icarus has nothing to lose, until he botches a harvest and the soul that went to Hell instead of Heaven comes back to make him pay.
To save the wife and son he already lost once, Icarus will have to become the man he never was. Somehow, he will have to learn to believe.
Bruce Blake
Bruce Blake lives on Vancouver Island in British Columbia, Canada. When pressing issues like shovelling snow and building igloos don’t take up his spare time, Bruce can be found taking the dog sled to the nearest coffee shop to work on his short stories and novels.
Actually, Victoria, B.C. is only a couple hours north of Seattle, Wash., where more rain is seen than snow. Since snow isn’t really a pressing issue, Bruce spends more time trying to remember to leave the “u” out of words like “colour” and “neighbour” than he does shovelling (and watch out for those pesky double l’s). The father of two amazing children, Bruce was once the trophy husband of a burlesque diva…not so much anymore.
Since 2008, he has concentrated on writing novels, publishing the Khirro’s Journey trilogy (Blood of the King, Spirit of the King, and Heart of the King), three books in the ongoing Icarus Fell urban fantasy series (On Unfaithful Wings, All Who Wander are Lost, and Secrets of the Hanged Man), and the six-volume Books of the Small Gods series. Part One: When Shadows Fall, The Darkness Comes, And Night Descends; and Part Two, When Ravens Call, The Twilight Fades, And Kingdoms End.
Bruce has many more projects simmering on the back burner, so stay tuned to his website and blog.
