http:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/HomewardIntroOutroMusic.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n <\/p>\n
We muscle against wayward powers raging
\nagainst us, pull our oars–this time into a soul-stealing
\nquiet of vapors. Navigation is something none of us
\nmumbles about. We sorely breathe the mist. Six
\ngrey-day passages since the storm that rained
\nand wracked us. Illuminated dances of lightning,
\none serpent-spiraling hotly down our mast.<\/p>\n
At first we thought we\u2019d made fair, costly escape.
\nHewn wood and sail fire. But mercifully doused, finally,
\nby waves the storm itself tasted and spat upon us. Men
\nburned and splintered and drowned. When calm returned<\/p>\n
the five of us remained alive. Now we pull, two
\non either side, Rotate the fifth man to keep watch
\nand sleep. Our charred half-ship somehow remaining afloat.
\nWe pull against visions of the small harbor village
\nour full band ventured forth to raid, against recalling
\nhow our numbers thinned when women
\nskillfully nocked arrows from perches in the trees,
\nbolstering the sharpened defense of their homes.<\/p>\n
Deadly women. A piercing and bloody death for thirteen men
\nscreaming forward, our axes halted as they battered into
\na ditch-rising wall of shields and spears. Then appeared that
\nquestionable mercy: the sky tore wide, dark clouds unleashing
\nangry cover, allowing us torrential escape.<\/p>\n
But, as we lashed ourselves to the oars, seeking
\nfar-away home in this newest violent fray, the wave-rolls
\nwashed a man over the side. We held fast, rowing madly
\nas crashing swells carried a toothy beast from the opposite side
\nacross our laps, following him. We prayed to our fickle gods,
\ncareless branches of lightning cracking in their smiling teeth.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s left of us will pull. Home again, we pull\u2014toward
\nsons, daughters, widows and wives we will embrace
\nwith urgency to take up the long bow more earnestly.
\nStrong sweet drink. We feel the pull. Bend
\nour pummeled backs to it. This fog will pass.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
________________________________________<\/span><\/p>\nScott T. Hutchison’s work has appeared in Vestal Review,\u00a0<\/em>,\u00a0The Raven’s Review<\/em>, and\u00a0Star*Line<\/em>.\u00a0 New work is forthcoming in\u00a0Mobius<\/em>,\u00a0Bristol Noir<\/em>, The Thieving magpie, <\/em>and\u00a0Baltimore Gothic<\/em>.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
Karen Menzel\u00a0<\/a>earned an MFA in Creative Writing: Popular Fiction from the University of Southern Maine. She teaches and mentors students at Iowa State University and Western Technical College. She serves as the Assistant Editor of the Pseuodopod Horror Podcast Magazine. She is the 2016 recipient of the Horror Writers Association Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley Scholarship. Her poems, short stories and novellas appear in more than 40 publications and her first novel,\u00a0SWIFT FOR THE SUN<\/a>, debuted from Dreamspinner Press in 2017.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOMEWARD, by Scott T. Hutchison, pending Audio by Karen Menzel We muscle against wayward powers raging against us, pull our oars–this time into a soul-stealing quiet of vapors. Navigation is something none of us mumbles about. We sorely breathe the mist. Six grey-day passages since the storm that rained and wracked us. Illuminated […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[87,3,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-issue-62-archive","category-main","category-poetry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4307","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4307"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4307\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4339,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4307\/revisions\/4339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}