A collection of some of my best shorter work in the realms of dark fantasy, STAGESTRUCK VAMPIRES also includes essays written especially for this project — about writing (alone and in collaboration); about transmuting fantastic fiction from page to stage; and about spinning the fictional web of an unexpected, four volume science fiction epic over a creative period of thirty years, and living to not only tell the tale but to write other things. The stories are mostly about monsters, since a monster of one kind or another is a favorite character type of mine — vampires, werewolves, evil geniuses.

My newest story, a novella that has only appeared in electronic form 'til now, is also seen here for the first time on paper: "Peregrines", the tale of a young shaman from a very distant tribe indeed, whose journey of initiation takes him and his sly spirit guide to New York City (really New York as it might be a bad decade or so into the 21st Century) where his path crosses that of a modern and rather grouchy adept of the Tarot deck. Really good stuff: enjoy!

— SMC

Excerpt from "Peregrines"

John, second son of an African diplomat and a Swiss biochem heiress, had spent his youth bumming around the world in search of enlightenment, as he would tell you nostalgically at the drop of a hat. He said he'd met a few holy men who really were holy, so he'd come home a firm believer in generosity toward strangers lest you find that you'd been entertaining angels unawares.

This meant that I would occasionally find he'd let in a street person to sleep in the stock room on a wet night. Sometimes they stole books, or our supply of instant coffee. One gouty old creature of indeterminate sex left a tip behind in the morning.

Now he set these two foreign kids to work on the sidewalk outside the store with a wide push broom and a plastic trash bag. And sure enough, John sent out for pizza for all of us (could I read the man or not?), which left the store reeking of cheese and tomato sauce for hours afterward. That was John, a grownup who somehow retained his youthful generosity, sweet and hopeful.

When Mike and Gene left late that afternoon, the two strangers were working on the tall oak counter that John had salvaged from a failed haberdashery on Seventh. They rubbed the hulking thing down lovingly with stinky furniture oil, which the dry old wood drank up greedily. They were obviously dragging the job out; I wanted them to wind it up and take off. They made me nervous.

Even in the comparative anonymity of lower Manhattan it wasn't smart to take in strangers, particularly dark-complected strangers who spoke broken English. People have been known to report their friends and neighbors to Homesec for less, ever since the Statue of Liberty bombing.

And then there was my dream, which I couldn't quite shake off, and which had metaphorically, at least, suggested danger. Who were these two, anyway? I kept expecting them to wrap themselves in colorful blankets, whip out a nose flute and guitar, and start tootling a version of "El Condor".

At last they were done, reluctantly surrendering the rags John had found for them to work with. While he was paying off the older one for their day's work and I was stuffing my cards back into their carved case, I glanced out the front window and saw the younger boy do something impossible.

He was squatting on the curb, and as I looked he reached down with both hands and stood up again, holding something at about his chest height with both hands, face bent close over it.

I knew what it had to be. For two weeks I'd been stepping over a flattened bird corpse in that gutter, bone and feathers ironed thin by the tires of cars pulling in and out. It was too black for a pigeon, probably a starling or a grackle; I'd been careful not to look closely enough to find out.

The boy hunched over this grisly remnant for a moment, and then suddenly he threw his arms high with his stubby fingers spread. The tattered, misshapen thing arced up, dropped, spread its wings, and flew away toward West Fourth Street.

The older boy gave John a final heartfelt thank you, collected the younger kid, and walked off down the street with him in the soft spring evening.

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Copyright © 2004 by Suzy McKee Charnas