FICTION BY THOMAS R. LONG

Thomas R. Long is a writer living in Baltimore. He has recently published stories in Every Day Fiction and Fleas on the Dog. He earned an MFA from the Johns Hopkins writing program. He sustains himself on local beer and his wife’s madrileño cooking.

THE SCOURGE OF RUSTVILLE
by Thomas R. Long

It started a little over a year ago in Rustville. At first, the incidents were too sporadic to be called an epidemic. Within two months, it was an undeniable affliction. It didn’t pay heed to age, sex, or piousness, although it did increase the Sunday attendance at Saint Joseph’s church.

These occurrences always happened in the twilight hours of the night. The afflicted woke up missing an appendage. At first, it was only a finger or a toe. Soon, it progressed to hands and feet. In the morning, the victim would find the wound sealed like a sausage, no pain, just the loss of a limb, and the recollection of a sublime melody.

The Gluckmans began supplying the townspeople with wooden appendages to replace their missing hands and feet. The Towners were suspicious of the elderly couple who converted their furniture repair shop into a prosthetics business. Then Mr. Gluckman lost a foot and his wife a hand, proving their innocence.

My wife and I—both equipped with complete, unaffected limbs—were also looked upon with suspicion, then envy. Although we were new to the province, we worked tirelessly to help the afflicted. Our deeds soon earned us forgiveness for our better fortunes among the Towners. Coming as we did from a famine ravished province, we yearned for a place to nourish our love.

But contrary to our best efforts, things got worse.

A year after the onset of the epidemic, people were losing a second piece of flesh and bone. Someone who previously lost a hand or foot might now lose a forearm or lower leg. But Claire and I were so proud of the Towners because of the way they stoically doddered to the factory every morning without a hint of despair. Rustville’s economy depended upon the factory.

The leaking, mold-encrusted shanties of Rustville clung to the cathedralesque factory like barnacles on a dying Kraken. Pitch smog blanketed the town. No one quite knew what the factory produced, but the labyrinth maze of steam that powered the grinding and mauling could explain the occasional disappearance of Towners. The epidemic that dissolved away appendages had no explanation.  

The Towners survived off the fish scales and gristle left by the procurers of food for the legendary Uptown feasts. The residents of Uptown would never allow workers to starve, but their begrudging largess only allowed for simple survival.

One morning, my wife and I were called into the factory owner’s office, where he sat behind a granite desk. The large, circular window behind him overlooked Rustville and the smog-obscured provinces beyond the dividing wall.

Mr. Talon was in the middle of his breakfast, some rare meat that left red streams dripping from his slack jowls. His hands enveloped his knife and fork as they ripped at the flesh, carrying it to his gaping mouth.

“Been watchin’ you two.” Crunch, chew. “You are the only factory workers with all your limbs intact. It seems the epidemic spares the resourceful.” Suck, lick. “I’d like to invite you to my home for a feast. I’d like to get to know you,” he said as he sucked a piece of flesh it into his mouth.

*****

A belching, motorized carriage collected Claire and me for the evening feast. Mr. Talon’s mansion sat obscured in the thicket of Rustville’s steepest hill, with only a parapet peeking out of the brambles. He introduced us to the finely dressed powerbrokers of Uptown.

The guests eagerly set upon the tables of exotic meats and finely layered pastries as they were brought out to the banquet hall. They gorged themselves to the desperate allegro of a string quartet—emaciated musicians who would go home hungry. The sickly-looking servants who delivered the food quickly scurried away.

The scene robbed us of our appetites. Instead, Claire and I indulged ourselves in a tour of Mr. Talon’s Baroque mansion. We found the scullery stacked to the ceiling with enough food to feed every resident of Rustville for a year. Our curiosity led us to spy into the kitchen through the portiere.

Mr. Talon directed the preparations for the second course, hollering demands at a crew of terrified kitchen staff. The cooks’ white uniforms were defiled by patches of dark bile. They carved strips of meat from two spits turning over an open fire. A servant boy held a gem encrusted tray underneath, collecting the layers of flesh.

Perhaps stags or boars? It took a moment to identify the flayed forms as human. One had been stripped of meat down to the rib cage. The other was still alive and released a ghastly moan that caused the serving boy to nearly drop the tray.

“Don’t you love that sound?” Mr. Talon was proud of his preparations. “That means the meat is fresh. The East-Corridor Thrasher almost killed this one outright. Luckily a little life remains. Suffering produces the best flavor. Save me some of the most tender strips. I will partake later, after my guests have their fill.”

Claire led me to the garden through a back door.

“What affliction could compare to the barbarity of these fiends?” Claire asked. “Every day, in that wretched factory, they drain away the lives of the victims of the East-Corridor Thrasher, as Mr. Talon likes to say.”

She danced off to the utility shed obscured by a canopy of vines. I ran after her, unable to nullify her with my words, “What are you looking for, my half-soul?”

Claire threw me a dark smile and continued her search until she uncovered a spray tin covered in explicit warnings and picked it up.

She started to walk away. Once again, I followed Claire, this time back toward the mansion. Inside the kitchen, we were challenged by a servant. Mr. Talon had returned to his guests.

Claire had me hold the can behind my back as she ordered the kitchen staff, “Mr. Talon would like you to prepare the garden. He would like to entertain his guests there after the second course.”

The cooks and servers were hesitant about Claire’s authority. Then a dark sound rose from her throat, matching the distant moaning of the starving quartet. It came out soft but threatened to expose into an abyss. The rising hum had the effect of an incantation that upset everyone and drove all of them outside.

By the time the staff returned, Clair and I had found our perch, obscured by curtains, on the ballroom mezzanine. And what a spectacle! The gluttonous kings and queens of industry devoured the second course with abandon. Many used their hands to fill their mouths so as not to be hindered by the politeness of utensils.

There was not a hint of our mischief on their unsavory faces. It was their stomachs that tasted the poison liberally sprayed over the mounds of decadent delights.

Screams and blood-filled vomiting erupted as the opulent Uptown guests fell into the tables and onto the floor. The banquet room became a sea of gurgling death. I pulled Claire away to make our exit by the back stairs.

Mr. Talon’s scream made us look back from the cobbled street. “You did this!” he screamed at us as we hastily left. “I will devour your souls!”

*****

Under the cover of a purple moon and the chattering of river devils, Claire wrapped her arms around my shoulders. Our coil-powered grapple pulled us up to a bedroom window. The lock and securing nails gave way to my tools.

The protest of a loose floorboard threatened to wake our prey. A few notes from Claire’s sombrous voice returned them to their deep slumber. Mr. Gluckman’s footless leg peaked out from the blanket, as tantalizing as his wife’s handless arm resting on his chest.

Claire kissed Mr. Gluckman on the forehead and still our victim did not wake. I could almost smell the lemon grass and martyr peppers in which Claire would marinate the footless calf once it was extracted. She picked the seasoning so lovingly for each of our gastronomic loves. I would roast the appendage over the simmering musk of winter bark. We never spared a thought on taking anything else tonight, but there would be other times.

Eventually we would return for Mrs. Gluckman’s forearm, but that was to be savored after another visit. The calf that we would leave with tonight needed to be prepared and consumed within two days’ time, before the sweet essence of its owner escaped.

Claire injected opium to curb the suffering of our twilight meal. I applied a ram-skin tourniquet above the knee. Watching the swell of life-giving blood was euphoric.

Claire placed her hand on mine as I sawed through bone. She licked a few drops of blood from her fingers and kissed me full on the mouth. Our bond was renewed, as it would be time and again in the twilight hours. It was always rumored that her kinfolk were descendants of exiled dryads who couldn’t abide by the cruelties of men.

In our youth, Claire and I had made a desperate pact. Many died because they would not make such a pact when the famine came to our province. After the dogs and horses had been exhausted, only one option remained. Others were cruel and brutish in the face of desperation. Claire and I vowed to keep our humanity, even while enacting the starkest terms of our survival.

Claire mended Mr. Gluckman’s new wound with such loving stitches made of blood moss. They would dissolve away by morning, leaving a clean, fleshy stump. Our meal would be sacrosanct: a communion of souls.

*****

Three nights later, Mr. Talon was found in his office by the factory porter. He was missing a heart instead of a limb. Many of the Towners claimed he never had a heart to begin with.