Intermusings Read online

  INTERMUSINGS

  A Cabal of Dark Fiction

  David Niall Wilson

  In Collaboration with:

  Patricia Lee Macomber, Brian A. Hopkins,

  Brett A. Savory, John B. Rosenman,

  Richard Rowand & Brian Keene

  New Digital Edition published by Crossroad Press

  © 2012 / David Niall Wilson, Patricia Lee Macomber, Brian A. Hopkins

  John B. Rosenman, Richard Rowand, Brett A. Savory & Brian Keene

  Cover Design By: David Dodd

  Background image courtesy of:

  http://mysticmorning.deviantart.com

  LICENSE NOTES

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to the vendor of your choice and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  OTHER KINDLE BOOKS FROM THESE AUTHORS

  David Niall Wilson

  Patricia Lee Macomber

  John B. Rosenman

  Brian A. Hopkins

  Brett A. Savory

  Stephen Mark Rainey

  Brian Keene

  Richard Rowand

  Contents

  David Niall Wilson in collaboration

  Introduction by David Niall Wilson

  A Poem of Adrian, Gray – With Brian A. Hopkins

  The Purloined Prose – With Patricia Lee Macomber

  A Wreath of Clouds – With Stephen Mark Rainey

  Moon Like a Gambler's Face – With Ricard Rowand

  La Belle Dame, Sans Merci – With Brian A. Hopkins

  La Belle Dame, Sans Regret – With Brian A. Hopkins

  Ribbons of Darkness Over Me – With Brett A. Savory

  Death Did Not Become Him – With Patricia Lee Macomber

  Within an Image, Dancing – With John B. Rosenman

  Virtue's Mask – With Brian A. Hopkins

  Sing a Song of Sixth Sense – With Patricia Lee Macomber

  Deliver Us From Meeble – With Brian Keene

  Special Sneak Preview of HALLOWED GROUND – with Steven Savile

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  Introduction by David Niall Wilson

  I’ve seen a lot of things written about collaboration, but I thought I’d share something a little more personal in this introduction. I have, over time, been fortunate to be involved in a great number of collaborative efforts, with varying degrees of success, of course, but each and every one was a learning experience worth sharing. Most recently, I collaborated with International Best-selling author Steven Savile on a novel titled Hallowed Ground that I believe is one of the finest things I've ever written (or helped write). In the back of this book you'll find the first chapter or that book, and links to buy it for your Kindle.

  The story begins much further back in time than Hallowed Ground, however. One of my longest standing collaborative relationships is with author Brian A. Hopkins, who I’ve worked with time and again to wonderful results. Beyond what is included in this collect, we have a shared collection titled Spinning Webs & Telling Lies, all western themed stories including all of our stories involving a character named One Eyed Jack

  I have written and worked with Brian for years, but if I had to choose a single instance where the work typified the blend of his style, and mine, it would have to be the story Virtue’s Mask. We’ve bonded over many a fine bit of prose in the past, the La Belle Dame stories, which I am certain have not seen their end, "Another Mile," "A Poem of Adrian Gray," two stories (so far) about a Scary Cowboy with a weird Eye – "One-Eyed Jack," and "Once Chance in Hell," and some others we have tossed about, worked over, not finished and shelved. Who knows what will be the end of it all? The point is, on "Virtue’s Mask," the shades of our selves we blend into the fiction were more apparent than normal.

  In my own writing, until recently, anyway, the word research is four letters long and hated. I have always figured if I could write around a detail, I could avoid looking it up. If I got it wrong, but did so very skillfully, no one would really notice. I’m here to tell you – Brian would notice. He would also rewrite it, fix it, and lecture me on the nuances of every intriguing detail I’d missed. If I let him.

  There are a couple of aspects that are the core of "Virtue’s Mask." One is a society so anal and repressed sexually, due to a fear of disease and governmental control, that physical contact is virtually unknown. The other is the instinct within a man that would make him willing to risk life itself to know that intimacy. I can both anticipate that sort of horror growing from within our own society, though possibly not to that extent – and feel the pain of that man.

  We made the man a musician. I don’t remember which of us made that choice, but I believe it was Brian. He and I both attack the theme of musical creativity often, though I repeat it more than he does. I don’t know Brian’s musical background. I played in bad bands, sang through a lot of chemically induced nights and got lost in parking lots at concerts for years. I have written lyrics that have never been sung, have performed in ski-lodges in Spain and Karaoke clubs in Long Beach – I love music, and somehow it sticks to my writing like last week's lumpy potatoes to my guts.

  Anyway, the protagonist is a musician, and he uses his creativity to lash out. I brought in Alice Cooper. Brian brought in more research. We batted it back and forth a bit, getting our boy closer and closer to both death – and his physical "encounter." We dug ditches and tossed him in. We wrote him – and ourselves – into a predicament that nearly stopped us cold. In fact, if I’d been writing it myself (which I wouldn’t have) – I would have had to backtrack and start over from some point where escape was possible. We needed a POINT to it all, a reason for what happened.

  I will now tell you the point of this diatribe. Brian did not back up. Brian researched. He thought, and damned if he didn’t come up with an angle to slip into place and fill what we had left as a gaping plot hole with an element cooler than I could have imagined.

  Brian does the research that brings us credibility. I don’t know what I ad…mood? A different twist on the characters? I think authors tend to write themselves into a few of their characters each time they write. Brian and I are BOTH in some of these . . . and that was a strange ride, all on its own.

  With Patricia Lee Macomber I've written everything from a ghosted novel I can't name, to a Stargate Atlantis novel – Brimstone – and a number of very cool stories. As in our lives, we are able to blend our muses effectively time and again. We also tend to work well on themed stories. In this book you'll find our take on Sherlock Holmes running head on into Lovecraft, and a longer piece where we made Edgar Allen Poe into a character and took a stab at rewriting his history – and his muse. We will work together again, I have no doubt. We've collaborated on construction, children, life, and words. It's a work in progress that keeps me sane.

  Brett Savory and I have also written a great number of stories together, most notably about a sentient stuffed pig, a boy named Johnson, and his possibly psychotic
– possibly all made-up-in-his head family. These stories are almost all born of puns, like "The Pig & the Pendulum," and "That's Some Pig," stolen from Charlotte's Web. The stories were collected and published by Delirium Books in a pretty successful limited hardcover, and are now available – all of them, including some not in that original volume, in the Kindle book The Compleate Pigge. Brett tends to drive me farther than I'd normally go toward the edges of things, while I tend to draw him back slightly from those same edges. These stories are not for the faint of heart. Our collaboration in this book is something different. "Ribbons of Darkness over Me" was created from a story I'd written long, long before…and was not happy with. We revised it – added some elements that did not exist before – and then we stole the title out of a Gordon Lightfoot Song. I'm pretty happy with the result, though it never reaches the Donnie Darko weirdness of our Pig stories. Brett has written a great number of very fine things in recent years, and has created a small publishing empire of his own.

  Richard Rowand and I collaborated only one time, and long ago. The story was a horror story. Richard was more of a science fiction writer. There were elements of it he thought I might handle better. It was also very personal to him. It involves a young man with a relative dying of cancer. It involves horse-racing, and death. It involves gambling and caring for others beyond sense – and life. I think it's a very good story, and though he does not write these days, I am glad Richard allowed me to include the story in this volume.

  Another very old friend, John B. Rosenman, is another I've collaborated with only once. What we created is probably the story that fits this collection the least, thematically, but I wanted to include it anyway. It's a science fiction romance titled "Within an Image, Dancing." I'm not sure about this story. It falls outside my comfort zone, and we revised it many times for many markets. Not every collaboration goes smoothly. John and I have very different styles, and that is not just to say our prose is different. Our work habits are very different. John writes very quickly. He revises more than I do. He works harder at every word. While I'm convinced it's a worthy effort, I never felt the connection on this one that I do with some of the others I've collaborated with. I'll leave it for readers to determine the merit.

  Stephen Mark Rainey and I worked on our collaboration for the longest time between start and finish. I sent him a partial I'd written, years back. He wrote a little, I wrote a little, we poked it, and talked about it. It sat for more years. Finally I pulled it out and revised it and sent it to him again. He wrote a little, and I finished it. It has a lot of cool elements. It's very Lovecraftian in nature, and there are scenes and pieces I absolutely love.

  In this case, the disconnect was time. By the time we finished it, I doubt either of us had maintained that connection writers have with a work in progress. We finished it…it may read like stories within stories. It may be fine. I think it's a good story, and that it maintains the feel we were after when we started. Again – it is for reader's to determine how well it worked.

  Finally there is "Deliver Us from Meeble," my collaboration with bestselling author Brian Keene. This was also written a long time ago, and the circumstances were different from those of any other of my collaborative efforts. For one thing – we had no idea who we were collaborating with at the time of the writing. It was a project where an editor was facilitating collaborations between authors and only revealing after the project was finished who the collaborator was. I feel like this worked well as a method because when you don't know who you might be trying to impress on the other end, it tends to up your game. I know that Brian went on and included Meeble in other tales, and it made me smile. He's been kind enough to allow me to include the story in this book. I hope you'll enjoy it.

  I suppose, if there are lessons that have been learned through all of this, they are simple ones. If you decide to collaborate, be sure that either one person is distinctly in charge of the project, or that neither of you have any serious ego problems. Work with people you are comfortable with. Try to have a plan up front, because the difficulties of writing from the hip magnify with more minds applied to them, rather than shrinking.

  My favored method is this. One writer begins and sends their effort to the other. The second writer begins revising from the first word, and continues at the end. The first writer goes over all of it when he gets it back, and if he sees something he /she knows is changed, and does not feel should have been, he puts it back, to see if the second writer flags it again. The result of this – though it gets slower and more ponderous near the end of a story, is a voice that is neither one writer's, nor the others. It becomes a work neither would have or could have written exactly that same way. That's the magic of collaboration. The stories aren't inspired by a single muse – they are "intermusings," a joining of creative spirits. I hope you'll enjoy those I've included here.

  --David Niall Wilson

  A Poem of Adrian, Grey

  By David Niall Wilson & Brian A. Hopkins

  He met her in the back room of the Weeping Violet. He'd paid half a week's salary and a special dose of chemical stimulus for entry. She was worth it, every penny. Her hair draped over slender white shoulders like the satin vestments of a priest. Her lips, nose, and ears were pierced and pierced again with slender hoops and intricate jeweled studs, and yet she shone through, blending to flesh, metal, and back again until she was one surreal image of dark desire and wanton abandon. She pursed her lips, black lipstick with a gloss coating that caught the faint illumination of the club, petulantly beckoning to him. Her voice was hypnotic, fascinating, and he basked lethargically in the heady depths of her deep green eyes, not really listening to her drone on and on about the music, or the club; saying nothing — only concentrating on the moment.

  Of course, the moment ended. Such is the nature of moments. He was compensated for the loss by the exquisite sensation of her body insinuating itself between his arm and his side, pressing close, and by the heady perfume of her — proximity. He didn’t speak, only lent his arm to the embrace and pulled her closer.

  "I’m a poet," she said. Those words seeped through, even as others slipped in and out and away. "I want to write you."

  The novelty was his undoing. They were up and moving, passing through ranks of leather, chains, makeup, and angst, pressing forward toward — what? She wanted to write him. Nonsense that etched itself in his mind with perfect clarity. He drank in the envy of others as they passed, radiated contempt for their failure. She pressed even closer, and blessedly, she did not speak.

  For the briefest of moments, he regretted leaving. He saw the brute at the door, the glazed look courtesy of his own chemical expertise. He heard the pulsing sound of the music and felt the fresh air driving away the incense-soaked ambience of the Weeping Violet. It might be months before he could afford to bribe his way inside again.

  She pulled him closer and the images dissipated — leaving him to savor present tense and imminent pleasure. She chewed at the black on her lips, lost in thoughts he could not decipher. They walked in silence, she purposeful, he uncertain of their destination, but unconcerned with that particular lack of knowledge.

  She wanted to write him.

  Morning found her sampling the kitchen-made designer drugs stacked on their shelves outside the bathroom. He studied the splendid contour of her ass as she bent to snort a pale blue line of his best, the way her small breasts seemed larger suspended beneath the supple arch of her spine, the way the tendons stretched rubber band tight across the backs of her knees. He scratched beneath the covers at the encrusted remains of their passion, caked like dried paint in his pubic hair, and found that he was getting hard watching her. For the moment, however, he preferred not to let on that he was awake. He watched. He wanted (and wasn’t wanting sometimes the very best of highs?). And he wondered.

  Who was she? How had she come so suddenly into his life?

  His eyes strayed to the wall on which she’d "written him." The letters were small a
nd incredibly precise, seeing as how they’d been written with her lipstick. She’d used the same black lipstick that now marked his neck like cancerous bruises, like the damp, dark stain spread across the roof of his bedroom, compliments of a leaky faucet in the apartment above. The poem was legible, even from across the room.

  First Verse:

  endless spirals

  ending

  Don Quixote tilting windmills

  of loneliness and doubt

  against a sunrise backdrop

  of hope

  sliding relentlessly

  toward hopelessness

  Pretty bleak stuff. Was it him? She’d said she wanted to write him. Did she? And what made her think she knew him that well after one night in which they’d spent more time grunting and moaning than actually talking? What had made her think to write it there, where he couldn’t help but see and wonder over it?

  She turned and caught him staring at the wall. She wiped a smudge of blue from beneath one nostril without the slightest indication of guilt for having been at his stash.

  "You didn’t tell me your name," he said, sitting up in the bed. The sheets pooled in his lap and he was suddenly conscious of the erection there, concealed and yet made obvious beneath the tented sheet.

  "I need to go," she said, reaching for the clothes scattered across the floor.

  "Dante," he said, expecting but not receiving the usual raised eyebrow for his mother’s perversion for The Divine Comedy. "My name’s Dante Penzant. I wish you wouldn’t leave."

  She paused with panties hooked over one dangling foot. "You a drug dealer, Dante?"

  "No."