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Now I had to learn to shoot. The sound of the rifle was tremendous echoing off the mountainsides. It was late summer and the fireweed was blooming and the huckleberries were ripe. The smell of the gunpowder lingered in my limbic nerves, triggering danger, danger, bravery. Then the summer turned to autumn, and now the hunt was on. The air turned crisp and the birch tree changed from green to golden. Nature was humming and bullets paraded on the flats. I would leave the matriarchal farmer with a glint in my eye knowing the game was waiting. She would always protest, but I had history behind me – when a man is off to hunt, you must leave him alone. She ran to me when I was leaving: don’t go, don’t go. I looked her coldly in the eyes and guided her back to the garden then laughed to myself, as I drove off down the road. I passed the bear then met the man who had dementia right beside his cherry tree. With time, I chose to do my hunt alone.
The witchy matriarch was six-foot tall with piercing, pagan eyes. She was an empath with a hardened character bred from decades of abuse and chronic pain. She spoke the language of the horses, the flowers and the bees, but she doubted me and this would leave me fuming, pacing, slamming doors and acting lawless. I ran power trips like an aristocrat so that I could gain respect and prove this woman wrong.
And so the game, I thought, would be way up high where mankind wouldn’t go. It was a steep hike, miles up the incline of a mountain to a clearcut on the peak. I would see a raven now and then, as I marched upwards, rifle strapped over my shoulder. I waited many days empty-handed, but then the first buck showed up with his proud antlers shining in the sun, trotting down the mountain meadow ready to make acquaintance. The adrenaline hit fast so I trailed him, rushing into the timber, before I reassessed my strategy and headed to my ambush spot. It wasn’t long before he came walking right up to me. Exhilarated, I kneeled into position, but he caught my scent, jumped, and bolted away hurriedly down the cuts back into the timber. I had lost him again. Seriously concerned that I had squandered my only chance, I walked back down the mountain to my car.
There comes those times in life, those certain times, when we must embrace a manic perseverance … a willpower so dedicated that it leads us to walk through harm’s way gladly and trudge forwards unscathed and still highly motivated. I woke up in the middle of the night and trekked back up the mountain to the peak. Bitterly cold, I tramped uphill through the snow determinedly, as a wolf howled and I grit my teeth. In the final stretch before the break of dawn, when there was light to see, I approached my ambush spot and much to my surprise, stumbled right into the buck. He was there feeding overnight. He stared straight at me, startled and curious, and froze into a shaky posture, so I tiptoed even closer, and my only shot was for its neck. Bang. The loud sound echoed through the mountains and he jolted up into the air like he had stepped on a landmine. He sprinted into the timber as fast as his legs would take him. I saw hair on the ground where he had been, but no blood trail. I knew I had missed the shot. I sat there in exhaustion and humiliation. I didn’t know what I would tell them.
I returned to the farmhouse that afternoon to see the married couple bickering away, clearly in a serious dispute. They were not surprised at all to see me empty-handed. I pulled up a chair in their rustic kitchen filled with plants and earthy paintings, just to be treated like the figurehead of irresponsibility. After I told my tale, the man reflected for a steady minute, then looked at me and said he thought I shot the buck. His wife then mimicked his remark, stating, “Always go look for the animal.”
The farmer and I went to look but it had escaped without damage and this led to impatience to get another try due to the fact that the year was wrapping up.
But my optimism came flooding back when I saw fresh tracks in the fresh snow. They couldn’t have been more than a couple hours old. We were in the final days of the season now and I made my ambush by a tall evergreen making sure my wind was right. I waited about half an hour and then a deer walked into sight. He was about sixty yards down the mountain, slightly hidden by a patch of saplings and I looked with strained eyes to see if he had antlers. I was hit with a feeling of radiance. He had little horns on the top of his head. This was a spike buck. I walked slowly towards him, tense to the extreme, manoeuvring to the proper angle to align the perfect shot. I kneeled, took a breath and pulled the trigger. Boom. He sprinted forwards and there was a luminous feeling of an earthly animal member passing on. A flash of red illuminated after the clap of the shot, but when I got to where he was standing, there was no blood-trail. Following his tracks into the timber, I was convinced that I had missed again. Turning the bend and following the hoof tracks — suddenly, in front of me was the dead body of a spike buck slumped in this mountain forest. I had connected through the heart-lung cavity. It felt like I had been told I no longer had to hold up the weight of the sky on my shoulders. There was a profound sensation of deep relief.
Maxwell Adamowski is a Canadian survivalist and woodsman who lived alone for a year in the wilderness performing a series of rite of passage rituals. “The Spike Buck” is one of the first stories in his book, CarQuest.
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In the realm of the Djinn, warmth emanated from apples. Apples were big fireballs that grew on smoky trees whose size, shape, or color never changed. Djinns, who looked like glowing strings, treated these apples as a display in the magnificent orchard and never ate them because fire was the stuff of life in this realm. Wild stallions ran on open russet plains, where a river of lava flowed from charred mountains and formed a valley. Djinns called it the Valley of the Red. They ensconced in this valley to soak up the fire released from the lava.
Down by the Valley of the Red, another realm existed. This was a more verdant realm, unlike the red lands of the Djinn. Djinns frequented this realm out of curiosity, to learn more about the inhabitants. Djinns had an insatiable desire to learn and absorb. While Djinns lived for thousands of years, Mortals of the other realm were transitory. Djinns speculated whether or not Mortals metamorphosed in death and became Djinn at any point in time. Conversely, were the Djinns, Mortals at any point in time? Djinns knew about mortality; they were the fine infinite fire creatures, who were deemed to be superior to any other transients. Occasionally, they also burnt out, but that was when they bathed in the Valley of the Red to get regenerated.
One fine afternoon, Djinn Aggi sat steeped in the Valley of the Red when a firefly flew in from the realm of the Mortals. It whispered news that the Flamenco cave dance would be performed in the verdant mountains of Sacramento. The dancer was a young Romani girl called Drina. Aggi knew many tales about the persecution for hundreds of years. Romani men, women, and children being slaughtered, many fled to exile themselves as they moved from one place to another without ever settling anywhere, known as the nomads.
Aggi frequented the Flamenco dance. Although the Djinn saw it all on its timeline when the persecution happened thousands of years ago, viewing it in art form, gave a new perspective; it made the history of suffering even more poignant, and sublime. He asked the firefly to make a magic potion yet again and turn it into a Romani boy. The firefly had that power, but only to transform the Djinn for twenty-four hours. After that, it would revert into a fire creature that it originally was. In these twenty-four hours, it would have a Mortal heart, a nose, eyes, and an image in a male body with a full range of Mortal emotions, however, he would still, retain some Djinn powers. The Djinn boy would be able to fly across realms. The magic enabled it to become Mortal once every month in the Djinn calendar. The Djinn was accustomed to visiting ancient places, customs, and cultures thousands of years old. It had seen and known many kings, and events; he knew the underworld.
In the realm of the Mortals, a cave was replete yet again, with Flamenco musicians and dancers. A young Romani girl, Drina was on the floor. The dance ensued as her musicians clapped, and sang. Songs rose to a crescendo. Drina looked at her audience in the dimly lit cave fire. There was one that caught her attention. He was a redhead, wrapped up in a robe. Unlike the others, his eyes were red. Drina smiled at him and he smiled back. Aggi felt a strange passion rising. This particular transformation enlightened it of Mortal passion—to feel what they feel. Why and how did love feel? That mortal could even die for love. He never felt this previously when he visited the realm of the Mortals.
Imparting a Flamenco story was crucial for Drina—one of persecution. The fiery dance rekindled an age-old, story. The spirited dancer had been longing to tell her rendition to an audience. As the dance ensued, her eyes spoke, her bosom heaved, and her footsteps tapped the cave floor in a show of a feisty desire to erase this history; all that was too painful to endure.
She danced by a slow fire inside the cave with the accompaniment of musical instruments. A fire burned within her; since the inception of this race, this ancient dance was carried out through many generations of her tribe. This evening, she decided what instruments, she wanted to dance to, tambourines, bells, or castanets. She chose them all. Her red skirt swished and swirled wildly around. With every tap, thousands of defiant embers sparked off the floor.
Hands above her head, he parted her long dance fingers and pointed them toward the cave walls, lit up with etches of slaughter, of being devoured by mythical creatures on the wasteland who were her ancestors. Romantic Ronda—the Romani dancer carried the memory of this beautiful place in her heart, bore it all, and relived the story of the beheading of the Gitanos by the Rulers of the kingdom. Her dance revealed it through the whine of her waistline art, while she suppressed a cry when she thought of men and women thrown into the deep La Yecla gorge. Until she could not dance anymore; until the all-consuming fire, consumed her. The dancer fell on the floor. In the light of the fire, before everyone, Aggi felt a pain he never felt before, her pain was his pain as he saw this dance of Romani persecution.
Drina looked at him and she transmitted love to him; his red eye was captivating. The young, spirited Aggi, made up his mind that very moment to transport them both to the realm of the White where they could woo each other. The realm of the Djinn was too hot for Drina, she would melt in seconds. The Mortal world was beset with the dangers of persecution. The only one world open for them was to travel into the realm of White where both could be safe. He felt love in his heart for this woman, he wanted to take her away. He knew what he needed to know about Mortals, which was enough for him. He came forward to make her free and happy again.
Aggi lifted her body and shifted her into a realm of White. Light as a feather, she looked down and smiled upon those, still eyeing her; she burned in the enigma of this crowning point of love for the world to note, to remember all that was too painful for her to ignore. What she endured for thousands of years; in this dreadful paradox of art, fame was earned through the sadness of the esteemed Flamenco dance.
In the realm of White, the sphere was dominated by light. Aggi had entered this realm before when the firefly performed the magic on the Djinn land. He had traveled through a portal that had opened before his eyes. In this domain of the lights, and breathing the same air, the Mortals floated in the ether. Aggi felt ethereal, too since, the magic could not revert him into full-fire Djinn for twenty-four hours.
When both were traveling to this realm of White, Drina fell asleep. As she woke up, she found her hand, in hand, and entwined into Aggi’s like an ivy vine. He kissed her and they made love under a profusion of white flowers, Drina saw that these flowers secreted sweet nectar, and pollen grains, Drina touched the nectar mesmerized before Aggi could stop her. She was in his lap. Aggi was cognisant of the impact of the nectar on Mortals. Mortals were allowed to breathe in the realm of the White, but only if they didn’t touch anything was the only constraint. He stood up and before anything could happen to her, Aggi attempted to take Drina out of the realm of White.
“What is this?” Drina asked.
“What is what?” Aggi answered.
“Why do I fade?” Drina asked.
“Because, you aren’t allowed to touch any flowers, or the nectar, here.”
“But I breathed the pollen. Why have you brought me here? What is this place?”
“Without pollen, Mortals couldn’t breathe here, however, the nectar has ingredients to turn a Mortal into light in twenty-four hours.”
“How do you know so much?”
“Should I have told you?”
“Tell me what?”
“That I’m a Djinn turned Mortal?”
“What?”
Drina fainted after that.
Aggi realized that only a couple of hours were left until he too turned into full Djinn and Drina faded into full light. He ran to the brink of the realm of White and flew them back into the realm of Mortals. He lay her down in a forest and her form returned. She opened her eyes and smiled at Aggi. She caressed his face and kissed his forehead and his lips.
“I can be here for another half an hour.”
“Must you return?” she asked.
“Yes, I must but I can meet you once in Djinn calendar month.”
“Take me with you, Djinn Aggi, I do not wish to be without you.”
“I don’t know how.”
“Find a place where I shall not melt. You shall not be fire. We can be one entity.”
Aggi thought fast before his time ran out. His Mortal facade was coming off, the heat was rising from his body and was visible. Clouds gathered. The sky cracked up and the firefly came down towards them. It could have a solution, another magic potion to turn them both into one entity. And for eternity?
The firefly found them and flew around them. Drina and Aggi continued to look for a solution. In the realm of the Mortals, neither Aggi nor Drina knew how to live together in peace, nor communicate with her people about his magical existence. Drina had only to touch the nectar in the realm of White, not even taste it, she had begun to fade into light. Firefly whispered of a fourth realm, the realm of Time where they could both be the same entity, eternally.
Before firefly could tell them about the catch in the realm of Time, they became euphoric and, they were so engrossed in kissing each other that the catch eluded them until Aggi’s body heated up, his newfound skin pores began to emit puny balls of fire. ‘What’s this?’ Drina asked surprised. She was still in full Mortal form, but Aggi was changing and disintegrating. One whom she fell in love with, the redhead and the red-eyed boy, who brought her up into the realm of White and saved her from the sharp incisive lights cutting her up until she faded.
Beads of sweat appeared on Aggi’s body. He began to pulverize. His body was on fire and his skin was flaking off. Something to do with the transformation, Drina reasoned. What would she turn into? Where could she go? Aggi was becoming a Djinn again. The firefly turned back and forth until Aggi became full fire. But another transformation occurred. Aggi was now turning into ash. He lay before Drina in an inanimate heap of ash.
“What happened?” Drina began to cry. She didn’t care; she wanted Aggi to be Djinn again. Let him live. In the realm of Time, Aggi and Drina could be one entity but only as ash and dirt where each would absorb the other in time. That was the catch. Reverting to a Djinn, Aggi’s mortal body shed and became ash under the new magic potion for the Realm of Time.
Her thousand years of tears came undone. Tears of persecution, and love for Aggi the Djinn, flowed unhindered. She collected Aggi’s ash and placed it on her lap in the forest before the firefly. The firefly saw her pain, the depth of her love for the flame Aggi once was. The firefly cupped her tears in hollyhocks and poured it over the ash. The ash began to stir, and it started to rise like a fire twister. In the twister, Drina saw a flame, flying and breathing again. Djinn cooled down and found the strength to stand, bodily back; both breathed the same air on the realm of Mortals.
A metamorphosis had occurred here, in the realm of Mortals, a miracle allowed them to be together as they both desired. They took each other’s hand; hand in hand, Drina and Aggi walked abreast towards the edge of the realm of Mortals. Then they stopped. They stood spellbound as they watched the fretful firefly, turning into a gaseous mass, dissipating into a star.
Mehreen Ahmed is Bangladeshi-born Australian novelist. She has published ten books to date and works in Litro, BlazeVox, Chiron Review, Centaur Literature. While her novels have been acclaimed by Midwest Book Review, Drunken Druid Editor’s Choice, shorts have won contests, Pushcart, James Tait, and five botN nominations.
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RFM will begin publishing again on January 21st at 11:00 a.m. US EST with the short story “Rowan” by Irish writer Naomi Elster. Naomi’s bio reads:
“Naomi Elster’s writing has been published and performed almost 30 times, including in Imprint, Crannóg, and Meniscus, and at the Smock Alley Theatre. She has campaigned for reproductive justice and pay equality. She has a PhD in cancer and leads the research department of a medical charity. Originally from Laois, in the Irish midlands, she now lives in London. “
Rural Fiction Magazine would like to publish more writers from around the world, regardless of your country of origin.
RFM is seeking short stories, poems, reviews and press releases, on rural fiction books that reflect the beauty, tranquility, joys, anguish, sorrows, humor, tragedy, comedy, and drama of rural life. RFM believes that all stories are about people and that genre is secondary. Therefore, RFM is open to almost all genres such as mainstream, literary, romance, horror, western, mystery, thriller, historical, realist, coming of age (Bildungsroman for those who speak German), science fiction, magical realism, dystopian, etc, so long as they are connected to rural life and culture anywhere in the world.
Your work must be in English. It can a translation from your native language, but it must be in English, which is spoken around the globe and gives the work and author substantial worldwide exposure.
For more information on what RFM is accepting and on the submissions guidelines, please go to our submissions page.
Please note that there is no pay for this other than a publication credit and exposure to the American and English markets. However, all rights remain with the author.
Currently, RFM is publishing material within a few weeks of acceptance, though this may vary depending on the number of submissions.
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