I might not leave this up very long because I've submitted it for publication to
H.P. Lovecraft's Magazine of Horror, and if they take it, I'll have to take it down from here. But let's face it: they won't take it. Enjoy, everybody. And my skin is very thick, so leave feedback -- good or bad.
On Skellig Michael
By Curragh
He stood in the ruins of a seventh-century monastery on the top of a windswept rock that juts out of the Atlantic four miles off the Irish coast. Generators hummed just below the howl of the sea winds and the thundering of waves against stone. Behind him, black clouds heaved and clashed in a gray sky. He checked his watch. Five minutes until sunrise.
Sheila grabbed his hand and squeezed. She’d helped him steal a boat, load it with gear, and pilot it out to this barren crag.
“Do you think the monks knew what they were doing?” she asked.
“I think so,” he said. “They were recent converts to Christianity. They honestly believed that they were living at the farthest reaches of the earth, fighting for humanity against the forces of darkness that dwell beyond the rim of the world.”
“Does anybody else know they were right?” she said.
He squeezed her hand. She slipped behind him, put her arms around his waist, held him tight and let her hair fall across his cheek. He smelled her alabaster skin and felt her warm breath on his neck. Her hand strayed down below his waist and tickled his crotch.
“We don’t have time for this now, love,” he said. “We’re the last hope of humanity. The old gods are coming.”
She laughed softly, and craned her neck to whisper in his ear. “We’re already here.”
Thu Jan 17, 2008 6:50 am
