A momentary pause in the regularly scheduled programing...

 Mainly because I just finished Stanza 5 of "A Sestina Writ in Darkness" and have been editing every free moment I have today.

Let Me Tell You About the Butterfly Man

 "Butterflies and Moonbeams" is a special story (so get your subscription to Weirdbook now so you don't miss it). I say this because it not only birthed a wonderful character, but it outlined his life in broad strokes with touches of interest upon which to later probe. Much like the Patchwork Witch from "For the Dolls Had Eyes" or Doctor Paulk from "The Obsession of Doctor Paulk", the Butterfly Man is established in "Butterflies and Moonbeams" with focal points throughout from which other potential Tales may be culled. "Tell Me About the Butterfly Man" is the first of what are now three stories which have followed this character, Frank Stenoyer Jr., since he rose from a supporting role of 'lead bully' to the starring role with his own oddly menacing nickname. This story arose from one of those focal points.

Now yes, this is a story ostensibly about the Frank, but it is told through the eyes of an inmate in Holman Prison in Alabama in 1971 by the name of Gerald Grant. This is, by the way, Grant's story, not Stenoyer's. Well, it's Grant's story about Stenoyer as told in an interview room in Holman Prison right around the time embroidered, bell-bottom jeans were somehow popular. It is an interview, one given very reluctantly, to a Professor inquiring about this Butterfly Man, something Mr. Grant is highly reluctant to talk about. This Professor, a Jasper Van Hooten, is pretty persuasive.

I've mentioned this guy before, this Professor who really should have more speaking roles. Thus this Tale, 'cause it's a story about this Professor, see, if you squint enough to see a potential story arc launching point insofar as structural approaches. Well, it's about the Professor asking the Inmate about the Biker BoogieMan grown-up Bikers tell little Bikers to keep them being good little outlaw Bikers.

We're all clear on this, right?

Jasper... ah, yes, the Professor, not the community (there is no connection there... the town being named for the semi-precious stone). Now, the first I met this guy, or at least encountered his existence, was in my 5th Tale, "The Little Metal Man". Jasper doesn't appear in there any more than a quick side discussion between Professor and Mrs. Miller about a colleague of his back home who is a bit eccentric, enough so that Mrs. Miller professes he should be in the local asylum rather than the private university he and her husband both work at. That's basically it right there with nothing more for a long, long time. That little name drop and then I dropped him for projects and characters that actually had something to them.

I teased an idea and it is still there, rolling around in the back of my mind but since then, Willard Reams has been keeping his damn mouth shut. Seriously, this is one annoying character. I mean, once conceived, he expected to take center stage and since then, well, I've been waiting for him to produce and this is the time because I know he knows something here. Just knowing that Reams might have an idea, well, "The Journal of Caleb Walsh" confirmed that at some time after 1979 (date of "The Little Metal Man"), Van Hooten took a sabbatical and never came back. Still didn't know squat about this guy. Sounded like a bookish wimp, though, that's for sure.

When I lit upon "Tell Me About the Butterfly Man" as the next in the chute story to write, I had nothing but the passage dropped in "Butterflies and Moonbeams" to go on for how to start this or where to go with it. The writing of this one is one of the most natural I feel I have done from the moment I lit upon the venue, on where it would play out. As soon as I had that, I just let the conversation go and where it went, well, it went into this story. I finished this on May 28, 2019, coming in at 4,970 words.

At the time of this writing, this particular story sits in an odd place. It was accepted into a publication but that publication has gone dark and unresponsive but for a passive website. From the time of acceptance to this time last year would have been 8 months. The one thing I heard which I'll classify as rumor was illness, non-pandemic related. I have many other stories... too many to keep even half of them in circulation in the market I'm learning about so I am not at a dearth of stories or anything, it's just I know that if I submit this one anywhere, it will be snatched up. It is good.

I'm considering this the 3rd Big Lesson in my Adventures in Publishing... though I don't know what that is yet. I just hope this publisher is okay, that's all.

The Trial and Execution of Leopold Tarkenfeld

He did have it coming...

I have had a Leopold Tarkenfeld problem for some time. He has at this point appeared in quite a number of stories, both corporeal and beyond the pale. In his first appearance, "In A Meadow", the deputy interviewed suspects Tarkenfeld of the murder of a prostitute in the alley behind Devitt's General Store. This Tale is set in 1874. His next appearance was without casting credits beyond "rat-faced man", but it is in reference to a fight that takes place in an alley during "Mercy Holds No Measure". This scuffle took place one cold winter night in 1871. The appearance after that is one that I choose not to reveal for it took me ever so long to recognize him after all that time. He is there though and I'm going to just leave it there, though where will remain the mystery. Finally, at last, in "The Journal of Caleb Walsh", Leo appears from beyond the grave with a vendetta in 1887. This means that some time between 1874 and 1887, Leo died. This is the basis of the problem... outside of the fact that he's a bit of an asshole.

By this point I had an idea of what was happening here with dear old Leo. I knew his demise was within the days of the town, just not sure when. I also had at this point, and really the reason for this Tale, realized just how powerful this character is. I knew I had a great villain here, a serious lout that one could, if they squinted, root for... or at least for what he deserves. I also knew I had two versions of this guy, both before and after the grave. As for who he was when alive, that had at this point become quite clear to me. Leo haunted, and still does, quiet regularly my thoughts. He is not a very pleasant person, even more so than I find I'm capable of conjuring. He's a thief, a murderer, a rapist and more, no longer employable by the Mortenson Mine and a fixture among the seediest denizens of Baird's Holler. He also gets his ass whooped quite a lot.

This is a little side fact which really does help define Leo. He's a diminutive man, short and rail thin with wiry muscles and a Napoleon-sized chip on his shoulder. He has shown a habit for acting well before thinking and then speaking with his foot fully lodged. He is also not alone. He keeps around him his confederate, or if you were really generous, his friend, Richard "Dickie" Donnelly, a giant of a man with less than the required wits to roam safely alone. Leo long before took Dickie under his wing and together they make a pretty effective team. There's never been enough to bring either of them in on until the brother-in-law of Kevin Devitt, the owner of Devitt's General Store, was found hung in Mortenson's Meadow near his wagon and his wife, Mrs. Devitt's little sister, was missing.

The other Leo is Dead Leo. "The Journal of Caleb Walsh" gave me a good, hard glimpse at the capabilities of this Leo and I like it an awful lot. That Tale as well gave me the idea of what needed to be, what Leo has been up to. Trust me, the List is full of Leo stories right now, ones just waiting for their turn in the chute. Why? Well, Dead Leo is pissed and he has serious and legitimate reason to be. He is pissed at the Judge, a Sultan named Worthington, and he has a serious grievance with the twelve men of who convicted him of whom Caleb Walsh was the foreman. He's a bit pissed at Marshal Thaddeus Barrett as well he should be and his grudge against his council holds water as well. In fact, he has at least as many or more possible postmortem Tales available as I have plans for his appearances while breathing. Dead Leo gives me an excellent opportunity, through the rotten eyes of one who just doesn't know when to quit, to explore the world of ghosts up here on the Bajazid.

Just got to say, Kevin Devitt has now appeared in a few Tales and I know a few things about him that haven't hit the page yet, things which are fallout from "Shanga-ree" as well as a few particular instances of note throughout the town. In fact, there is a novel planned from the POV of one of the two boys in his shop the day Hans Kroeger went to get some beans and matches and whiskey. I really wish I could do nothing right now but sit and roll off things I've learned of this gentleman, and yes, that he is. His appearances in "Shanga-ree" and "Claude" are who he is and that moral character, as well as his prominence as the primary dry goods merchant in Baird's Holler, gives him an outsized civic role which I am woefully behind on tackling. When it is his wife's little sister who is missing and her husband found swinging from a limb, the Law is most likely going to pick up the individual carrying the dead man's pistol and trying to sell his draft horse.

This is where we find ourselves, in the courtroom waiting in the sweltering heat of the crowded courtroom for Judge Worthington to return and for the verdict to be read. Now, I've been told I pile it onto some of my characters, you know, kick them when they are down and then just keep heaping indignities on the? Well, all it took to give Leo the time of his life at this moment was to ensure his dinner the night before was potato stew... not overly fresh. Yup, his stomach is not doing good and he is feeling the pressure in ways affecting his temperament quite negatively. Not a good idea with Judge Worthington on the bench.

Now this Tale is titled "The Trial and Execution of Leopold Tarkenfeld". True to the title, the story splits itself evenly between these two events with the night in extremely uncomfortable wait to keep the two themes from getting in each other's faces. Allow me to just say that the interim is most tense, more so than one might expect before their execution. That the meal left was potato stew from the same batch now stale in the summer heat didn't help his appetite. It didn't help him at all with his attitude in the morning nor that the crowd gathered demanded his hood be removed and his feet unbound because, well, it's a better show that way. That was a bit of a mistake and I'm just going to say the whole affair was one big shit-show.

"The Trial and Execution of Leopold Tarkenfeld" was finished on May 16, 2019, at 4,885 well satisfying words. Satisfying because as this story finished, a whole concept rushed out and I've been trying to play clean up since. See, as for story arcs that now exist, "The Crimes and Executions of Leopold Tarkenfeld" is the one with the greatest potential for racking up a serious pile of stories. As with "The Trial and Execution of Leopold Tarkenfeld", this story arc collection has two primary parts... Live Leo, the little shit who gets an arse whooping quite constantly despite the protection Dickie provides and Dead Leo, a raging vengeance machine on a mission.

I've got my work cut out for me 'cause Leo really can provide me with no less than two dozen more Tales without even really looking too hard. More than half are already set up along with a few other surprises I've learned about. For example, I know for certain that his legacy is felt even in the ridiculously long Sestina I am currently going mad on (just finished 58,000 words today... only 20k to go!) Beyond these Tales here mentioned (or not-mentioned) he has appeared four more times in the stories that have been written, both during his Crimes and his Executions. 

Oh, I should say that he is also pissed at Dickie. All the evidence was circumstantial but damning none the less and Dickie, well, he's kind of slow. Still, it doesn't matter how susceptible Dickie is to suggestion, something Leo had always relied on, it was so not right to sell him out like that. I mean, Dickie didn't finger him, but he didn't not finger him either. I'm gonna have to figure all this out because I know something that happened when a Dentist and his three traveling companions left Prescott on June 3, 1880 and made a right hand turn rather than continuing on to Tip-Top for the night.

I wrote myself a Future story!

 ...and then the clock struck 12.

See, I finished the next Tale, "Venomous Constellations", late in the day on Saturday, April 20, 2019. Now normally I would have celebrated this as a "420" story or some silly thing like that, but that was far from my mind as I finished up this Tale because it was written into the future. Yup, that is correct... I had been able to, for the first time, extend these Tales of the Bajazid beyond a historical record and into a predictive document. I was telling the future! I was writing Science Fiction! It was April 20th and I was writing about what happened on Easter Sunday, 2019... which happened to be April 21st that year.

As you can see, my soothsaying was short lived.

Of everything I have written, I am going on record as saying the last image we are given through our intrepid hero's eyes in this Tale are the most cosmically Lovecraftian an image as I have produced... as far from anything cosmic as could be. I'm kinda proud of it, this imagery. It flowed from the Tale and determined the name at the last second. When I first had considered this idea, another of those early original notes, I had ascribed to it the incredibly horrid place-holder title of "Big New Thrill" 'cause that's what these two dudes are up to... getting their next big thrill. When I came upon this moment in the story, when it had reached this horrific conclusion and they way the words worked themselves out onto the page, I knew what now was to be.

As for the Tale itself and those involved, "Venomous Constellations" was finished the night before the story takes place. I was chasing the clock on this 'cause I had the idea sitting and returned to and dropped so many times and then the right stars came together and I realized where to go with it. It was finished nine days after "There is Clearly Something Amiss" making it the 7th story of the year at halfway through April and the 42nd Tale overall.

I always knew who these two guys were, or at least I knew I had met them before... or at least have known enough near enough to fit the bill. I just could never get the right fit to their being there, up in the Bradshaws, that fit a reason not forced. That too had been sitting in front of me this whole time as well and it took this long for them to connect. When they did, there it was. The primary problems the characters face and the resolution all remain pretty much how my notes always said they would. Again, this was a story looking for a reason and a voice. Once I had that reason, the voice followed. What remained was execution.

Now, I know I had a huge burst of ideas flood me on March 23rd of that year as I was working on "There is Clearly Something Amiss" because there is a specific date mention in my notes for this. I had on that day compiled in a single Word document the different needed elements with the names and other information that was developing at the time. This is 4 1/2 pages before I apparently fell asleep with further points to be made and discussed with those point notations already laid out but empty. The information on these pages deal often paragraphs deep on who these folk are and their motivations and that stuff. It is the 6th entry that is curious at second look for the notation added the next morning reads:

"To preserve this, the above sentence was written about 1:30am as I was falling asleep 3-23-19. The last six words I don’t remember typing"

 That which I was referring to was this:

"6:     Brett Flynn is the other and he is as entitled as you would think with wounds delightful at close range"

 There once was a time I slept on a low bed that let me dangle my arm to the floor easily and I kept a pen and pad there. I would sleep with headphones on, something like Roger Water's "Amused to Death" or Jim Morrison's "American Prayer"... some interesting things would appear on that page in the morning... and sometimes I was even able to read them. I have fallen asleep on my keyboard more times than I can count and while most often the result is multiple pages of the letter "v" (most common nose resting location), sometimes interesting things appear. I have no idea where "with wounds delightful at close range" came from.

Oh, and yes, that is an example of the font I write with, MyUnderwood. It's a nice writing font for that old-timey pulp feel.

That which clicked to bring this story from the back of my mind to the fury of my clickety-clacking fingers was Roland Trane and his video blog from "Trane's 'a Rolan". Seriously, why I hadn't connected these before, two adrenaline junkies looking for their next fix with the adrenaline junkie who posted his exploits on-line, I don't know but when they did, there it was. Simple motivational answer... they were inspired to ride Roland's last trail after the video was uploaded without previewing by one of Roland's friends. Thus following that trail, they had a great time. Yup, end of story... good times had by all and now it's back to town for more blow and before work the next day. Got a little time to kill so take this road and find, outside an old abandoned fortress-like compound, the entrance to an old mine or tunnel. Hey, this looks like fun! Time to add spelunking to their list of hobbies right there along with base jumping, mountain biking and white water rafting. After getting really into it, after they've learned all they could...

Now, as the events unfolded in this Tale of 4,911 words, things started taking their own direction. This leads to that leads to this decision leads to... all following the primary plan, just the details really built themselves up here. There are stories beneath the cold waters that flow from the old Baird's Holler/Pitt's Junction tunnel, stories from the week Baird's Holler was damned that I need to tell based on what was found in there. There are other stories as well, one in particular I had no idea was going to show up, but as the horror was growing to absolutely maddening levels in this Tale, when there really is nothing left to do but lose your mind, things get weird and that 4th dimension is crossed.

As for why it is set for that Easter Sunday, I needed the perfect time for two bachelors working in a high end auto dealership to get away and such a time is perfect. I remember one year when my eldest daughter was about 5 and she went to her mother's and so my roommate and I just went out into the desert with some creative targets (for example, an old Pat Robertson sermon on LP pilfered from my grandmother collection she was throwing out) and spent the day blasting away. Was nice 'cause we then went for Chinese while three of our closest friends were at the Thai place down the street. All got together afterwords and was a very nice day all told. When you have nothing else to do, when your responsibilities are shrived (in my case my daughter at her mother's) and work is closed for the day, why not go off on an adventure... or just go blow some stuff up? In such an industry as these two work in, with their familial severances, this is jut the type of day for them. When that date was set, it became a race to get the story finished so that, yes, I would have one future story. This was important for me because a really nice fellow I worked with and who would listen to me work these things out, always begged me to write a science fiction story... so I did. He wasn't amused.

This story also illustrates exactly why I seem to have trouble sticking to a singular theme and working it through such as the "Outside the Circle of Midnight Black" stories. The previous Tale took place in 1980. The Tale which follows "Venomous Constellations", "The Trial and Execution of Leopold Tarkenfeld", takes place in 1874. I am unmoored in Time here. It is not like I'm choosing where I'm going with this. I seem to only have minimal control insofar as getting to add my voice to that which I'm being shown. Oh, also, this might be a good time to remind that I prefer to speak of these as if they are for it helps in my relationship with them... thinking about a dynamic as opposed to a static graveyard.

There is a story of shifting place-holder titles in my List of Tales yet to write. It involves one of the vehicles seen by the unnamed protagonist from way back in "Anger", my 7th Tale. After that beautiful Golden Hawk was discovered up there and knowing that the Free-Men's Collective's truck was up there (you've met some, you'll meet the rest soon), I was still searching for those needed that remained. At some point I noticed a 1970s model pickup with camper-shell up there, CB and other wireless antennae all over it... you know, an enthusiast parked up high for some serious reception. I have yet to write his story, but I know now the signal he was searching for.

There is Clearly Something Amiss

 What has become the "Circle of Midnight Black" and "Outside the Circle of Midnight Black", began as three separate story ideas centered around the tragic end of Baird's Holler in 1890. The first of these, the earliest of that trio, was also the first written, "Child of the Earth". The other two had emerged in my head as taking place mid-week and in the form of journal entries and of the end of the week as told in an oral report to a commanding officer. This is the story about that hump-day madness.

Okay, there has been this story going around the interwebs for some while purporting to a report on a Soviet sleep deprivation experiment where the people in it go raving mad. This is all total bullshit, nothing more. Whole story is fake... but it does plant deep seed. The original idea had been for one of the assistants to the Mine Inspector sent down from Prescott to have salvaged the notes of the principle protagonist in this story, a very humble Mr. Archibald L. Temple. That was pretty much it, a rescued artifact documenting a quick onset madness of intense and irredeemable proportions from the victim's perspective. I had no idea how this was going to play out nor what the impetus was of that madness. To get to an understanding of what happened, I figured I'd just follow Mr. Temple from the first notes in his journal relating to this journey.

I have been to Palace Station a few times and at that time, it was the busiest stage stop on the busiest road in the Bradshaws, the highway named for the Senator Mine. I have stood over the graves of Matilda Spence's husband and some of her grandchildren who died at birth. There is not much of Palace Station that remains today beyond this small graveyard and the main house, a modest structure reinforced and used today by the Forest Service. All the rest is gone... but Matilda was there. I hope my portrayal is acceptable.

Thoughts that I had been chewing on as well as new ideas springing forth the whole time filled this tale. For example, knowing what day Mr. Clark, the gentleman running the furnace, resigned his post in "Twelve-Thirtyfour" was important. As well, knowing the state of Mr. Batur following his recent adventures in "Child of the Earth". Then there were the barely planned being made real such as what was found in the meadow. This has led directly now to two other stories connected to this story arc, "Girl Rattled" and "A Rill Off the Sultana", though the second is a month before discovered as I followed the threads of what happened there.

This Tale, "There is Clearly Something Amiss", was completed on April 11, 2019, arriving at 7,346 words... a complete and utter finger given to my goal of remaining in the 5k arena. Thing is, this Tale needed it. As well, being "Child of the Earth", the primary short that begins the whole debacle, is longer than that limit (and done before the decision to hold at that length), the middle story might as well be of a larger size to act as a balance. I plan on having the last independent Tale in this series as well being around this length while all the others that fill around come in below. I know, this all sounds crazy, but it works for me and I suspect that when this is done, it will work in full, giving the reader variation in pace through these side Tales.

There is an awful lot that goes on in this story, too much to even want to get into. Besides, that's what makes this one fun. There are hints all over this, both to other events happening while this is going on as well as to the first listing of which Sultans were around in 1878 on... as well as, told through the nutty old Colonel Nesmith, a brief summary of what happened to them. Uh, looks like I have my work cut out for me figuring out how to interpret some of these, especially whatever the hell happened to Pedro Guzman and to Radul Ivkov. Alas, this is how these stories appear...

The one thing I can truly and honestly say about this Tale is that "There is Clearly Something Amiss". As this works into the series and I expand through the later days, this gives me a clue what to expect. It also offers me a delightfully obnoxious character to play against from the perspective of Mr. Lundmeir as I work through "Circle of Midnight Black". Knowing how Mr. Temple things of him and the encounters they had, it will be interesting hearing Lundmeir's side. I'm suspecting it will include quite a few blue words and phrases.

At the prospect of a double-date...

 I was inspired to write a little Tale...

Some of us in this life are lucky in a way that is marvelous and is hard to explain to those who have no such connection in their lives. What I am speaking of is childhood friend who has grown with you over the years, even when distance demands, and never does it seem the conversation has ever stopped. For me, this friend, a brother as true as any, has been there now all these years through thick and thin and I am lucky to have him. During this horror we are all living through right now, this pandemic, I recently had the scare of his positive test and subsequent illness. His mother as well, aged as she is, has pulled through and as I write this, tears streak my face. I have almost lost him too many times now and damnit, some friendships are worth it. 17 years ago this month (actually in 9 days), I gave him a kidney. He is my brother and those with such friendships will understand. Those who don't, I don't know what to say.

Right around the time I was finishing "The Golden Hawk", the Gods of Inspiration decided to come and pay me a provocative visit. This pal of mine gave me a call to ask if he could come up from the beautiful desert oasis of Tucson to go camping up on the property here in Howells. Absolutely and when did he want to come? Just let me known and I'll get my little girl down to her mom's and... you're bring her? And who? Uh, YES! Let me know the date!

See, little back story on me and my friend. He is a shining star wherever he goes, making friends with everyone in a straight-forward and friendly way. I am a specter haunting the edges of crowds or slipping through unseen and when the light does hit me and my voice is heard, I am accused of being "intense" (that's the word my friend says is the most often used by others). His social ease and a bit of boredom had him somehow connecting with a classmate from our old high school, one who went back to middle school with me. I know why too... I mean, not just because he is a naturally easy where I am tense (he seeks out women to speak to and I pass out when spoken to) but because in the years since I had last seen this very plain, quiet and mousy classmate of mine, something seriously whowza happened. With a hint at who my date was to be, my next story began as soon as "The Golden Hawk" was completed.

This is the story of that date. I could not use my name or that of my friend or the two ladies accompanying, but I knew who I could use. See, I had me a little history. A long time ago back when I was trying to fight my way through college as a single dad working, I took a few writing courses. For one, the focus of my studies had been angling more to the written word as it was specifically because that was something that you did not need to buy chemicals for or lab time or constantly replacing supplies. Instead, it allowed for as much creativity as needed without requiring anything more than a pad and a pen... and weed and beer if you really wanted some chemicals. These courses though, the ones distinct from the media based studies I was focused on, were some of my favorites and the writing courses I would take occasionally after that just because I needed something, anything, have always been my favorite.

Back in the early 1990s when telephones still had cords and stores still stocked replacements as a staple, I wrote a few little stories in those classes I took. Each year I made sure I took at least one such if I couldn't each semester. Each course I did take produced at least one gem and one flat stinker with degrees between. Those that were gems were all focused upon faux-memories of someone not too different from me. You know, standard retrospective stuff from just a few years distant fictionalized and disguised in characters who are not you and those in your sphere but are elements of you and those in your sphere. The good ones were pretty darn good and I have them all still... but one, the first and the most infamous. I have no remaining hard copies of it and have scoured old boxes of 3 1/2 inch floppy drives to no avail. I have found, in very well kept order, a 5 1/4 inch floppy with a label reading "Roaches" but come on man! I mean, how the hell am I supposed to get what is on there off? I'm going crazy here!

While the secondary cast extended into a small circle in these early stories, two characters were dominant with one being the primary POV through them. There was one story with an agnostic POV, but primarily it was one sided. That was the POV I took here as well because, well, consistency even after all this time must be retained, gosh darn it. I will also say these two are and are not me and my friend and while POV determination places my friend in that position based on the invite mentioned which spawned this story, there is no significance there. These two I haven't seen in decades and it was just nice to see them again and let them tell me a little about themselves.

Now if you want, I can draw you a map on how to take this little trip, or at least the areas that retain their cartography under the eyes in the sky. It's really hard to spot that turnoff. But of the civilized roads? It's a nice day trip and if you're with someone special, trust me, those little cabins are kinda cozy. That said, it is always a good idea to carry water with you when you are out in the Arizona desert. When tragedies do occur out here in this desert, it is the lack of that very lubricant of life which is often the culprit.

"Before I Ask For More Water" is a very nice little story. Seriously, it's nice and perfectly themed as a tale of old friends and new possibilities... until they come upon the young woman washing stained vestments with the dust of the dry creek. This is an uncharacteristic Tale in a few ways, the tempo presented and changed as it is providing the chance to throw such a curve. This is all I shall say here of "Before I Ask For More Water" beyond that it is my 40th Tale, finished on March 27 of 2019 and is 3,542 words long.

I'll also say that it was refreshing to work so lightly even if the break was fated. As for that date, it never took place. Between four busy adult schedules and a couple hundred miles distance and then the withdrawing of our social selves... but it was a nice little vacation in my mind, that I will say. I had a good time, that is, until we needed water...

The Golden Hawk

"In The Golden Hawk, Tommy Gallagher made a bad choice, a hasty decision rushed by Benzedrine and fear. Now, with the nephew of a mobster in the trunk of a stolen car, Tommy's bender finds him hundreds of miles from Vegas on a mountaintop in central Arizona. Haunted by his own folly and specters at the edge of mental collapse, Tommy comes to terms with his planned revenge and opts for mercy instead." 

Yup, that's pretty much it in a nutshell.

I have not written many tag-lines... proof of this is I don't think that's what they're called... but for this story I have and this does pretty much sum it up.

This story was finished March 18, 2019, coming in at 5,748 words. Yes, it broke the 5k barrier, but rules are meant to be broken in need and this story presented that need. My wine-peddling Lovecraft-pushing pal holds to the date of this writing, where I am at 73 Tales, that this, the 39th, is my best, or at least his favorite. I am kind of fond of "The Golden Hawk" as well.

In tracing the development of this Tale, I recall a submission call for "cozy" dark tales taking place in the mid-20th Century. That set me thinking, where can I find any cars from diverse eras wherein a representative of such from the period requested might be found? The answer was obvious, the Amalgamated Metals Incorporated AZ-09-AU mine up near the headwaters of the Bajazid.

"The Amalgamated Metals Incorporated AZ-09-AU mine?" you ask.

Yes, and thank you for your prompt prompt. Way back on story #7 when I was still wandering around these hills without direction, I was following a character whose name, believe it or not, I still do not know, not even after nearly 22,000 words. I followed him for three days as he let his anger build and fester. It was on the second day when he had his only true reprieve and that is because he took off and wandered around with his sketchbook and his Tupperware container of weed. One of the places he visited was an old abandoned mine at the top of the mountain. There is structural reasons why he travels up there as a different journey is underway at the same time. His presence there though establishes this location early on in the history of these Tales. Its inclusion in this story, "Anger", was in part because I already, even back then, knew I needed to enshrine this location. It stems from one of my earliest considerations. Why it was of interest here is because of the number of old cars from diverse eras parked here and there. In "Anger", there was no need to mention their make.

Just on a quick side, the AMI is about to play a monstrously huge role in the Tales of the Bajazid as it is the centerpiece of the project I am currently working on, "A Sestina Writ in Darkness".

So, I had my era and I had a geographical excuse for a temporal spread of automobiles. That's nice and good, but I had no idea what to do. Being that I give people gas five days a week, I see a lot of classic cars in my central Prescott location. As they come through, I always admire as I may, often heading out to talk to the people because old guys with well loved restored cars just hate talking about their dearest hobby.

It was around this time, shortly after "The Dutchman" slipped into my rear-view and I was watching the cars roll past that this absolutely beautiful machine pulled in at pump #2. It was a lustrous midnight black beauty perfect in shape and design and as I made excuse to be out looking like I'm working for the cameras, an idea was forming in my mind. Oh, he was ever so willing to speak about his car, a 1958 Studebaker Silver Hawk. So willing was he that upon request, he opened the trunk so that I may see how much room was inside, explaining that for a story I was considering, I needed such a car with just enough room. How much? Well, I need to transport the nephew of a Las Vegas mob-boss...

I had my story and it was desperate. My last impediment was the introduction, a decision determined when that first line came crashing through the tall grass. With the geography known and ready calculations available, the era understood through a lifetime of absorption of Americana with emphasis on film noir subculture, my primary research, outside of my regular guides on time-specific phrases (and the reason you won't hear me mention "stooges" when out in the desert), was into the Studebaker Hawks. Holy smokes! I think I done fell in love here 'cause the '56 version of this series, the one to hold the name Golden Hawk, well, that decided my story as well as determined an artifact new off the lot I plan on picking up as soon as my time-machine is ready. Gonna put it in storage and wait.

Of all these Tales, of all these stories that I have written, the singular connecting thread between them all beyond locale is that they all fit in the speculative realm, in particular the genre of the weird. That said, "The Golden Hawk" is the least speculative of all these stories. Indeed, read without context to any of the other stories, I believe a reader might just consider what happens naught but the extreme edges of a near two-day Benzedrine bender backed up by exhausted levels of panic, adrenaline and dread. That speculative element that exists, or those speculative elements haunting at the edges, may easily be so misconstrued. If however the reader of this Tale has encountered any other story so sub-titled with many directly noticed amongst this small catalog of mine, then those elements cannot be missed taking a relatively horrifying ending for the uninitiated and turning it into a nightmare for those who recognize the shadows.

From the opening line unto that surety condemned, this is one of my personal favorite Tales. With the exception of artifact addition, the revelation of one of those vehicles spied by my nameless hero with an anger issue and a sketchpad, there remains no other connection to any other Tales for these characters beyond that spied at the edges of exhaustion. It was not accepted into the anthology I wrote it for... mainly because I think I mistook the concept of "cozy" as being the space in the trunk of a 1956 Studebaker Golden Hawk. Crashing from a two-day adrenaline freaked high isn't that cozy. That's all good though because I have this story because of it. As well, I don't think that publisher is a going concern anymore. Another Tale I would write shortly after this was accepted but that was some time ago and I've heard nothing in, well, let's just say that if they had published it within six months of their acceptance, the rights would have returned to me by now.

By the way, um, my conception of mercy might not be universal here...

De Nederlander

A horrible end awaited three Cavalrymen who followed the trail of a dead man laden with bags of gold in "Waiting For Ants", written in April of 2018. It was one of two stories I had planned inspired by local lore, and by local, I mean lore rich in the history of Arizona. Seriously, if you're a writer from or in Arizona who plays in the old-timey cowboy day, you are going to be tempted to base a story off of the famous Lost Dutchman mine and legend of the Peralta Massacre. The problem that exists for writers of most "western" work is that their home is on the fabled range or the barrooms of cattle towns. They have no reason to go digging in the dirt. That is not really respectable Cowboy behavior. Instead, that is the labor of the supporting cast lucky to have the iron-jawed hero ride past on a horse whose name alone brings quivers of fear into the hearts of neer-do-wells. There are better things for a respectable Cowboy to do than chase lost mines.

Well, um, I have no qualms about digging in the dirt, have done so my whole life much to my laundry's disdain. I descend from those who dug in the dirt and before me on the wall are those family members who did that labor (just to note, it is their photos on the wall). As well, the bulk of my stories are Westerns, taking place in that brief period romanticized in images of the guitar strumming cowboy lonely on the range. My Westerns don't take place out on the range though, nor do they feature as a lead a tough-talking, morally ambiguous ex-preacher/lawman/judge needing to settle old scores or clean up a town. They take place where the real West was won... in the crowded, stinking mining towns that gave reason for residence. Here is where I diverge though for while I do write about a place representative of the bulk of cities started out here, my town is a little weird. I am in the speculative field, after all, or at least one cosmically horrifying rill.

"Waiting For Ants" was part of a two-story event I had planned, a pair of Tales playing off certain elements found in the histories and legends associated with the Lost Dutchman Mine. "Waiting For Ants" was focused primarily on a single detail of a body found in the desert between Wickenburg and the southern Bradshaw Mountains in the early 1870s. Transferred in conceptual time to 1858, that Tale gave me a body of a man in the deserts so described and one of a horse in the rocks in the region of the foothills. "The Dutchman" is the other half of that pairing, the rest of those legends repurposed for the Bajazid.

Seriously, quite a bit of research went into this story. Tracking paths through land I know well in modern display through lost desert trails in a time when the Territory was new in its ancient majesty was only part of the journey. A lot of this research had been gathered over my lifetime of living with these legends in local lore, hometown geek stuff. The prior knowledge that Jacob Waltz, the actual "Dutchman" of history, had some early claims in the Bradshaws (then known as the Silvers) was the impetus of these two tales in the first place. An awful lot, particularly relating to the lie Aert Swygert tells the eager audience at the trading post about, was new to me. That example hinted there, references to the myths of those mountains now called the Superstitions, are from the Diné people, commonly known as Apache... known through the history of the name the Spanish gave those mountains.

What happens up there on that mountain I am not going to say, nor will I mention how Aert came at last to the desert below or how his horse suffered. I will also not speak of his two partners nor the short straw Aert drew requiring his trip for supplies. I will say that I have since discovered that Aert was not as careful as he thought in concealing his departure from that cantina not far from the regional Cavalry post. He watched his whole journey for signs of smoke or dust or the glow of a campfire distant and saw nothing. I noticed nothing as well but I was suspicious.

"The Dutchman" comes in at 4,977 words and was completed the 8th of February, 2018. Outside of geography, there is nothing to connect these two stories, "The Dutchman" and "Waiting For Ants", at the time of this writing to any of the other stories. The only other story I had written at this point taking place prior to the discovery of gold by the Mortenson Party aside from these two was "Kachina", but these two Tales were connected in no way to that. I had suspicions though, ones which began haunting as soon as this Tale left my pen. Four and a half months later, I would know the answer to this in a story titled "I Met a Man as I Lay in My Grave", available upcoming from Soteira Press.

Valentine's Day Spectacular!

Well, that might have been a bit of a flash there, but 2019 was hitting high and hard quite quickly. I had just burned out those five stories between late November and December and had begun the new year with a story ripped out in a week. I was feeling quite positive and these Tales, especially writing them on early morning shifts, were keeping me sane from the bat-shit nonsense that was work... basically the failure to keep a 4th person on staff in my department leaving me stretched too far too long while still doing the whole single-dad-of-autistic-child bit. These Tales were my moment of sanity and peace... ironic as that may sound considering the subject matter I was playing with.

Now, the inspiration for this Tale which I am about to tell about was one of the many dropped hints found in my third story, "I'll Always be With You, Boys". That story is predominately a conversation and there is one small section therein which has plagued me since I wrote it. I know why this was on my mind, this little bit (hopefully) unnoticed (seriously, it is not meant to be noticed), and that is because of the checks I had made into that story in preparation of "Forgiven". For that story, as I was looking in on the Jeffords and Arn reference, I found this disappearing hint hiding not too far distant. That caused me to wonder why William made that sour face and looked away as he answered Alexander, declaring in softest terms that no, he had not ever seen any of these men lost in the mines but the one they claimed was one of the Kroeger brothers and then his eyesight is poor at evening light.

I suspected something.

"Come With Me, Dear" is actually a rather tender little Tale. It comes in at 1,834 words, at this point my 2nd shortest story... and there is no hidden meaning to the word "tender" either. It is kind of sweet it it's own way (and no, "sweet" isn't a loaded word either... I'm not that bad). I was given a deep dive into Nesmith's private life, a moment unfortunately common and always hard on the heart. (sigh... I might have told one bad joke too many)

In all seriousness, this is a nice story and that is an odd word to use with the Tales of the Bajazid. Horror can have a hea... can reveal depth of character and their capacity for emotion in the face of the incomprehensible

Whew! I can go with that one 'cause, well, it's actually quite accurate. One other thing I can state with accuracy is the date of completion of this story... January 13, 2019. I was now two weeks into the year with two solid stories done. I was wondering if I should revise my goal. I was also fearing what potential rabbit hole, or mine shaft, waited for me if this pace proved precedent.

William Nesmith is one of my oldest characters and one whom I've developed an actual fondness for. Oh, he has some horrible personality traits and is in no way a noble or heroic figure... it's just, for all his loathsome traits, he's definitely not the worst guy in Baird's Holler... not by an extremely long shot.

For Valentine's Day this year, I'd like to offer everyone the opportunity to learn what tragic secret William Nesmith has hidden away. You can find this Tale, "Come With Me, Dear" in Fear and Fables by Stormy Island Publishing.

Forgiven

I had just finished 2018 focusing on one of the many Sultans yet who had not graced my pages either in any way at all or as more than just a name dropped at some point. With my new goal set in sight, same as the last with a secret finish, I began 2019 immediately looking at some of these individuals who should be playing a larger and more dominant role in these Tales. Just on a side note here, this rarin' energy to tackle the line of Sultans ended here. Don't want to build this up too much or anything, it's just that I follow where the stories lead and as soon as this Tale, "Forgiven", was finished, I started chasing other shiny objects 'cause they were there and demanding. Here though, I was ardently pro-Sultan in my arrangements and began at once (literally, first words were started just after midnight New Years Eve).

Now, here's what I had when looking at who I should try to follow. First, at this point, I had only about half of that company of 30 men who first found gold in this valley named. A few had become close friends, to some degree or another, and some were acquaintances and then there were those names just dropped and left such as Jeffords who is mentioned in "I'll Always be With You, Boys" along with Sam Arn and Charles Lahore. Now Charles, he I have only hinted here and in "The Obsession of Doctor Paulk" and I had then nor have yet to delve deeper into what I know of him beyond his death. As for Sam, he and Jeffords are mentioned in the same sentence in "I'll Always be With You, Boys" as ones whom William Nesmith asks of Alexander Gitney whether he had seen them amongst the visitors who haunted him nights.

As to the reasons why these two should be counted in amongst Gitney's visitors is that all of them were ones lost in the mines. From this hint I have assumed that Arn and Jeffords both perished... or were lost... in the depths but I knew not how. I do not still know what happened to Sam Arn. The last I heard of him was in the summer of 1872 when his beloved dog Punch disappeared. Before that, he was seen half a year before watching with Charles Chesterfield the attempts at getting the body of an unknown woman out of the large cottonwood that hung over the Baptist church that was being erected. I still don't know what happened to him. His death is hidden from me, as are his bones, but I've heard some whispers amongst some of the Mortenson Men who visit that there might have been an explosion involved. I'm in no hurry to find out and I am sure that when the time comes, he will be there.

As for the other, he was just a name with nothing attached. Being that I at least had a place in which to start, him being lost in someway in the mines, I had my number one suspect, someone I did not need to really push much harder on. There were others in the background waiting, such as Hamish Rós and Steven Clayton, or even John S. Mortenson himself, but Jeffords began speaking to me immediately. I suspect he was ready for some time as the story came out with relative ease, especially when two other thoughts occurred to me, the first being the shuffled step of Buck Jackson as he walked through Alex Gitney's house and the night in which Buck Jackson died, Christmas Eve 1871 when the moon was full and the bulldogs were howling. Seriously, the story came in a flood after that, all 3,836 words.

Just a quick aside here: Around this time I also decided that I really, really needed to set up some databases of my stories in order to keep track of this growing cast and their connections, some way in which to keep things straight. Well, I've ended up with a few now and in a few posts, I'll go into some of them. This post is about "Forgiven" though, a story which I finished on the 7th of January, 2019, seven days after beginning it. This is mentioned here because one of those databases, the one I call "Baird's Holler Master Story Index" has within it a separate page for each Tale detailing certain aspects of it such as the date it takes place, whether or not it has been published (or sold), the cast of characters, what story arc if any it belongs in, word count, story position of order written, and when the story was written. Everything beyond this date I have that direct accounting of.

As for "Forgiven", this was going to make me for the first time confront Buck Jackson's death, something that I knew to a slight degree what happened and directly when, but nothing more aside from the boon that death brought his widow... and thus me with a whole raft of story possibilities. I'm kinda thankful to Buck myself, and in a way, Felix Jeffords. The only thing I truly knew of Buck's death outside of him being lost in the mine was that his loss was a sacrifice, one which saved the lives of 15 other Sultans, an engineer named Hugh Goff who I met in my very first story, and some dumb jackass who got stuck with all these important people. Just so you know, that jackass will have his own excellent adventure as the last story written in 2019, finished that Christmas Eve. His mention here was, well, beneath the notice of our dear Mr. Jeffords. He had other things on his mind.

So, what I knew was that Jeffords, Jackson, Goff, 14 other Sultans (owners of the Mortenson Mine... I forget, I should remind that occasionally) and some dumb jackass trapped in the mine and I knew that all but Buck Jackson would make it out. Okay, well, how does Jeffords play into this? That was the discovery of the week and the reason this story just came out so clear and clean. See, Jeffords started telling me, as apparently he told a lot of people in his last year and a half after the accident that took Jackson, his confession. Oh, I was uncertain at first his claims, just like his colleagues with the Mortenson Mine and even Delores Jackson herself. Yeah, he was never considered a very likable man, but this defeat which came over him following that evening was extreme. He bore guilt that none would accept and confessed to crimes past none knew how to respond to for they were confessions 2,000 miles distant among men trying to heal their scars.

Felix Jeffords was not a good person. Oh, he had no trouble with himself nor his personality because, well, he was from when he was, from where he was, and of the trade his family had been in. He wore his bitterness on his sleeve for he lost everything irredeemably in and following that conflict which tore the young nation apart. He was of a long line of slavers, dealers in human flesh, a trade his family had been long steeped in and, due to what he considered a blasphemous tragedy, saw it all come crashing down with the enforcement held by the tip of a Reconstructionist bayonet. When, after a year of night-riding, it was no longer safe to return home, he fled west with all that hate still in his heart. It still burned four years after becoming one of the richest men in the Arizona Territory, still stung that to save his reputation, he had to sign a contract making him the equal of a black man.

As for where in the mine this tragedy was to take place, I had that already as well. In "Tears in Green Satin", I hinted at the very basic structure of the mine with the mention of one particular tunnel and the drifts that spread from it. The B-line is the suspect tunnel here. The lettering goes all the way to H with the A-line being the primary tunnel. The B-line was one known to be closed 1874, the date that story concludes. Being the gold was discovered  in 1867, the town risen the next year, and the tragedy which took Buck taking place at the end of 1871, here again was another accidental fit. From the hints I've heard, this particular tunnel was abandoned for good reason.

This is all I'm going to say outside of I really found a love of slavers with this story. Please, don't take that wrong. This fondness I have developed for them, be they folk like Felix or those found in other Tales taking advantage of the Credit Ticket system (for starters), is based on how delightful it is to put them in my stories. See, those in my stories, be they young or old, race and religion not withstanding, their moral fiber strong or frayed to tattered ends, it doesn't matter. This is the god-damned Bajazid and, well, it don't care. Thus, as Chronicler of these Tales, I must assume for these records an agnostic stance as best I can. I admit I develop extreme fondness for some of my players for divers reasons. In some cases, such as Norbert Pike and Ernest Weber, I really like the guys and feel slightly bad for what my keyboard is going to be doing to them in the next couple of weeks. With slavers, taking them as a class, I've grown fond of them because nothing that I do to them ever makes me feel in the least bit as if I over-did things. They're kinda fun... if you know what I mean.

Oh, tomorrow is Valentine's Day... just in time for my dearest love story to show up next in the cue...

Resolutions Renewed

 Thus ended 2018 with 17 Tales added to the growing collection that was my obsession. The whole of this project at this point was 35 stories written with two of that number being Sonnets Redoubles. Added to this number were the two chapters which I had set out for what I call the "Circle of Midnight Black". The year just finished taught me a few things, chief amongst them the value of setting limits. I speak here of the decision to cap the Tales at 5,000 words. This forced me to condense my thinking and thus writing, forego a tendency to be excessively wordy and to learn a length comfort. I was absolutely successful in all these endeavors. Yes, "Tears in Green Satin" exceeded that limit as did "Butterflies and Moonbeams" by three words after an edit, but considering my output, a level which stunned and challenged me, one real exception to that rule in 17 stories isn't bad.

I had developed over that year a rhythm in the telling of these stories. As one story would be drawing to a close, I would try to start listening to the whispers around me. If one found compelling interest, I would begin to listen as I neared my final words on the work ending. That way I would be able to launch right in without pause or doubt. At other times, I would find my inquiries ignored with no true voice rising to interest. Then I would turn to my notebook and begin thumbing through those ideas that I've been able to capture in notes and lists of titles to remind. By keeping a constant purpose, I was also not only able to meet but exceed my goal. As well, at this point, I had now a few acceptances and in my hands, a couple of books with my name in them.

Thus I made a declaration anew, the same as before out loud though I privately set my goal at 18 since I knew I could do 17. I also kept to the idea of focusing on a specific word range. I had by this point begun developing different story arcs within the whole of the collection, the intersections between the different arcs at times non-existent. I was getting confident and, with those copies in hand, starting to feel like a real writer. My goal remained the same though... find a creative outlet in my quiet little world so I don't go mad and sit in front of banal programing. For me, that creative outlet I have discovered to be the primary key to my mental health. When I have no such outlet, when I let the world overwhelm to where I am not listening to the needs within, then I grow depressed and I stagnate. Thus the importance of these Tales, the need to have this means of release and the re-dedication of purpose declared at the introduction of the new year.