I must play Scheherazade for this Goddess: spinning out my existence with stories designed to beguile and seduce her until she can’t bear to dispose of me. After all, I have whatever is left of my depraved life to enjoy the delights of roasting, whether I’m ever cooked and fed to pigs or not. This is what I decide as I choke and writhe and cough and scream, and hang tortured from the neck and genitals over burning coal for all the long hours of yet another afternoon, evening and interminable night. I must be Scheherazade.
A Dozen and One Days
Brin’s uncanny nose for the weather proves accurate. In the morning thunderheads pile up again. She sits up in her hammock and sniffs the air. Then she swiftly climbs that tree to get a better sense of the sky and wind currents. When she drops back
