Cthulhurotica by Cody Goodfellow, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Jennifer Brozek, Ahimsa Kerp, Carrie Cuinn, Gabrielle Harbowy, Don Pizarro, Madison Woods, Richard Baron, Juan Miguel Marin, Maria Mitchell, Mae Empson, Nathan Crowder, KV Taylor, Andrew Scearce, Constella Espj, Leon J. West, Travis King, Steven J. Searce, Clint Collins, Matthew Marovich, Gary Mark Bernstein, Kirsten Brown, Kenneth Hite, Justin Everett Read Free Book Online Page B

Those who did not leave peacefully were dragged from their homes and pushed out toward the hills in the middle of the night. I know not what befalls those poor creatures – only that I would not give cause for Mamie to be judged in the same manner. So it was that as soon as she rose from her slumber, while the morning mist was still low upon the ground, I knelt before my love and asked for her hand.
    The wedding was a small affair. I suspect those who stayed away did so because of the ridiculous rumors swirling around, whispers which suggested Mamie was present at the death of that creature, Whateley. More than once I had heard the mutterings of gossipy old women as I went from shop to shop, purchasing as many items as I could afford, to create a glad air and a joyful space for our nuptials. Those that did attend did their best to keep our spirits high but I was glad when the day was over and we were able to retire. As we lay in what was now our cottage for the first time as man and wife, I remember thinking that this was a new start and with Mamie resting beside me, I dared hope that the troubles unsettling her were behind us.
    I have only scant recollection of the weeks that followed. We ate, laughed and made love as though the world outside mattered not; all that we required could be found in each other’s embrace. When our honeymoon ended and the day came for me to resume my duties at the Corey farm, I whistled a cheery tune as I walked. Even the darkness of the waters that flowed through Bishops Brook, whose blackened banks wind between my home and my employer’s, did little to dispel my lightness of mood. The spring is a notoriously unforgiving time for labor upon the farm but I worked with exuberance, turning and sowing the soil, fully aware of the similarities between earth and man; for had I not also planted a seed that would spring to life, a life that would grow as surely as the crops beneath my feet in the coming months?
    I have since come to learn that there are no certainties. A crop may fail for no apparent reason no matter how much care is taken. And this is as true for man as it is for the land. Come the autumn, Corey’s farm fielded the poorest yield its previously fecund lands had seen in recent years, and Mamie showed no signs of being with child.
    As the nights drew in, melancholy seemed to befall our home. The bright wildflowers that Mamie had earlier that summer picked to decorate our bedroom now lay shriveled in their vases. Dust lay undisturbed upon each surface where I now laid my hand. Mamie too seemed to wither, in sympathy with her surroundings. Her skin, which had gained color following our marriage, once again paled and her eyes, which only months before had enticed me with their bright allure, now lay deep in her sockets. At night she rejected my advances, sighing that the act of love was pointless, since my sweat and labors yielded no reward.
    More than once she cursed me for my inadequacies.
    In time she gave up sleeping in our marital bed altogether.
    Instead, the place of her choosing was the wide bench under our single wide window, her eyes looking to the hills that rose as blackened waves under a gibbous moon, seemingly searching for… what? I can only wonder as to why the child she so desired eluded her. My attempts to reason with her were always met with vehement denials of my logic. She would shout and curse, blaspheming at the Lords name, using words that I care not to repeat and on occasion it seemed as though she was taken by some kind of madness, ushering sounds and words that made little sense to me until at last the apparent fever broke and she would fall, unconscious, upon the floor. It became a habit of mine to allow her this fearful expression until her waking self passed from the world. Her sleeping self could then, and only then, be coaxed back into our bed.
    I was at odds as to what course of action to take. I dared not instill the help of doctors for fear that Mamie