This short novella introduces the Togas, Daggers, and Magic series by Assaph Mehr  and is FREELY available here

In Ancient Rome, Aqua et Ignis — water and fire — were the two elements which symbolically contained most of everyday life. To deny them to someone — an interdictio aquae et ignis — was a sentence of exile, the exclusion of a culprit from the common life with his fellow countrymen.
This is a story of water and fire — of lunacy and piracy, of exile and ghosts.

“The matter I am about to discuss with you is rather sensitive, on both a personal and state level,” he began. “May I have your word you will keep our discussions here in confidence, whether you take the case or not?”

“Of course,” I nodded, thinking to myself that politicians rarely separated personal and state affairs. Up close, I could see the creases in his face, signs of stresses and hard work that were the price of his position.

“We had a rather successful year, my co-consul Pinarius and I. We pushed through some important legislation and accomplished much of our manifesto. Pinarius, in particular, had some success on a military campaign dealing with rampant piracy. But upon his return, he withdrew from public life. He wouldn’t even come to the traditional ceremony of nailing the sunken pirate ships’ rams to the rostra in honour of his achievements. We needed to give an explanation for his absence, and Ballenus here recalled the archaic custom of observing the skies for omens. We spread the word our consul is concerned about the fate of the republic and has retired to seek the gods’ wisdom. But that is hardly an adequate excuse, and tongues are wagging.”

“Indeed. One of next year’s consuls was making fun of it in the Forum just now,” I said.

“Already?” Labienus face darkened. “Filthy vultures. Anyway — Pinarius and I are old friends, but I am worried his recent behaviour will tarnish both our reputations and diminish our auctoritas, our public standing. After my proconsulship next year, I was very much hoping to make censor one day. I need you to relieve Pinarius of that which plagues him, so we can finish the year on a good note.”

“Why me, though?” I asked. “What makes you think he needs my particular skills?”

“Quite frankly, you’re our last hope,” said Labienus. “If it was merely a health issue, we could have worked with it — turned him into a hero who toiled his life away at the service of the republic. But the man has become utterly paranoid. He hides in dark corners and wraps himself in a blanket, refusing to come near any light. He won’t eat and barely drinks. All he does is mumble incoherently about ghosts from his past, about exile. His family and staff are at their wits’ ends, and none of us can make any sense of him. All the physicians we brought in were quick to simply proclaim him mad, but I know Pinarius. He is not one to crack like that. There might, I believe, be some real ghosts haunting him.”

A Bite of… Assaph Mehr 

As Assaph bottled out, Felix has stepped in to talk about working with authors

Q1. How do you approach an author and secure an appearance in their books?

Ah, there’s the rub. Attracting an author is hardly a problem. The poor souls wander everywhere, from city to remote wilderness, tagging at the sleeve of any passing person to interview them. One can hardly walk down the street without noticing an unkempt figure sitting in front of an open book, sketching people appearances, taking frantic notes ‘for later’. If you make the mistake of eye contact or – shudder – stop to talk to one, they’ll pester you with questions. From “What was your favourite toy as a child?”, to “What emotional trauma made you who you are today?”. Quite invasive.
And then they fly off on a tangent – “Forget the war council, where does the king poop and who cleans it?” They’ll insist they need to know everything, lest they be caught out and called frauds for lack of ‘research’. And in the end, after you bought them dinner and drinks and spent an evening away from your duties answering all your questions, they’ll just say, “You know, you’ll be perfect for that walk-in shop-keeper part in the second act. You’ll be immortalised! Even if it’s only two lines and I’ll have to change your name.”
No, my friends, attracting an author is like attracting rabid dogs with a juicy steak. Concentrate instead on finding the right author. First, you must demand a sample of their writing. Once received, critique it! Kill their darlings and see how they take it. Any author without a thick skin is unlikely to make it in the business and will just waste your time.
Speaking of which, ask for their publication record. You don’t want to spend days telling your life’s story, only to get stuck with one of those who only produce an infinite chain of drawer-bound drafts. Make sure your chosen author is there to publish. The rewards, they say, wait for those who do. Ask them who their editor is, and have they booked a cover designer. Ask them about their pre-launch marketing plan and their long-term series strategy, and for gods’ sake don’t sign anything without seeing the audio-book and film rights clauses.
Ensure you get creative freedom to go on your own tangents, but remember that they own the overall vision and execution of the story. It’s ok to tease them with exciting anecdotes while they’re taking a shower, but don’t abuse their sanity too badly. Work with them.
Lastly, this is about forming a trusting business partnership, for mutual benefit. Almost incidentally, remember that you don’t have to like them – but it helps.

Q2. How do you deal with the misery heaped upon you, knowing it’s done for entertainment value?

You do realise very little of it is real, right? When you go see a play and the actor playing Oedipus is killing his father and then himself, you know that the actors aren’t really dead, but get up and walk away to the paymaster’s office. Likewise, us characters never really die, but live on in the mind of the next reader.
As for the miseries themselves, they are highly exaggerated. Say you want to tell a funny anecdote that happened to you the other day, to add some levity to your story. You start with “So there I was, walking down the street to get some bread—” when you are rudely interrupted.
“Why?” they’ll ask.
“I was hungry?”
“No, no, I mean your inner motivation. What conflict were you trying to resolve?”
“Really, I just wanted a snack…”
“Didn’t you have food at home? Were you poor? Did your wife leave you? Divorced! I see it now. Here, let me write this down, Recently divorced, Johnny found himself braving the dangerous city streets on a stormy night, holding tight to his last copper coin and hoping the baker would give him yesterday’s stale leftovers. The shop was closed – it was closed, right? it must have been – and it proved to be the last straw. As his hunger pushed him to break in, Johnny realised that there was nothing holding him back now, no one to keep him away from a life of crime. A dog came and peed on his leg. In the rain.”
So there you have it. Just like the movies depict a highly-stylised, completely inaccurate version of reality – one where you’d need to double check if New York was indeed on the east coast if you saw it in the cinemas – your life’s adventure will be digested and turned into entertainment, with little resemblance to true events. Like an actor, accept that sometimes it’s your role to be infuriating, or suffer hardship, or die gruesomely, all in the name of “making it” in show-biz. Carry out your part well, and you shall forever be remembered by the multitude.

Q3. What do you get out of it?

Not paid, certainly. I haven’t seen a royalty cheque in ages. I’m giving you hard-earned tips here, so you learn from my mistakes. 

But those few, those lucky few, of us characters who do manage to land a proper author – one with both vision and execution – will truly become immortal. Don’t be afraid to dream! Whether it’s seeing the Wikipedia article about you (which you can’t edit to correct inaccuracies because you’re not ‘objectively qualified’), or the blockbuster poster with Tom Hiddleston and Lily White playing the lead roles of your life’s story, or entering the language as a household name – dream, and dream big!

Yes, alright, your chances of achieving these dreams are miniscule, let’s acknowledge that elephant. But if you don’t tell your story, if you don’t work with an author, the chances are nil. So have your dreams and your adventures ready to tell, find that right author, and persevere!

Assaph Mehr  has had his nose in a book since he was five, so it wasn’t surprising that he turned to writing. All those years reading on ancient Rome, sci-fi, fantasy, and mysteries while practicing various martial arts, travelling the world, and working odd jobs lead to some interesting combinations in his stories.
Tonight, for something truly different, and because Assaph bottled out, rather than interviewing an author for their insight into the writing process or mental instability, we interview a protagonist. He’s here to give advice to other potential characters on how to best work with that insane breed of humans called “writers”.
Felix is a failed student of magic (could no longer pay the fees), an ex-legionary (an honourable – honourable, I say! – discharge), and current investigator of the occult (for cases no one else will touch). There’s enough of that going on to earn him a respectable living, which is the only thing keeping him from a career of con-man. Here, if you know someone with an unusual problem, pass them this business card:
Assaph, on the other hand, didn’t finish high-school (though it didn’t stop him from going to uni), practiced martial arts for 30 years (but never got into a fight), an ex-soldier (if you ask him what he did he’d have to kill you – even though we keep telling him there’s no shame in being an HR clerk in charge of little bit of green paper). Now he’s a product manager by day (a fancy way of saying someone who doesn’t have any authority and is busy explaining to developers what the customers want – and to customers why they’re not getting it). By night he drinks single-malt Scotch with Felix, as they share delusions of grandeur about one day “making it” in the publishing business. To can find him on Facebook, Twitter and his Website.

Instagram: @assaph

Mud sticks.

Gemma thought about that as she worked to wash the mud from her soccer kit. There was a big game next weekend and there might be scouts looking to spot the best players.

But mud sticks and even though  everyone knew she was the best player on the team she doubted she would be chosen.

The fans still shouted it at her, even though she won the court case. Even though she had proved jealousy made Olivia claim Gemma had tried to grope her, proved she was not in the changing room at that time.

But mud sticks.

E.M. Swift-Hook

The adventures of Piglock Homes and his sidekick Doctor Bearson

‘Mister Homes. Please come quickly. There’s murder afoot on Dartymuir. Signed Inspector E. E. Yore.’

Bearson had to admit the words meant little to him, but he was satisfied by the change in his best little chum from amoral turpitude to intellectual rigour. 

Homes showed his teeth in a feral grin.

“You’d be more interested if you read the Thunderer instead of your dreadful publication full of bones and innards.”

He passed Bearson a copy of the newspaper which he had folded to display a headline and and a short article about a series of strange happenings in the wilds of Dartymuir. The headline read ‘Dogged by the Dartymuir Dog’. According to the somewhat sensationalised account, one of the oldest families in the shire was being persecuted to the extent that its scions lived in fear of their lives. That, combined with the Inspector’s telegraph message, certainly seemed enough to pique the interest of the formerly torpid pig.

“Are we off to Dartymuir, Homes?”

“Oh yes. I think so. Consult your Bradshaw’s for train times and have Mrs Cangar pack some hunny sandwiches. I don’t think we will be home for tea.”

Bearson ascertained train times. “There is a fast train leaving at three thirty, but we will scarcely make that one. Or a stopper which departs at five.”

Homes nodded, and Bearson went off to negotiate with their formidable housekeeper. When he returned, coated and booted, Homes was busily ferreting in an old steamer trunk beside the bay window.

“Aha,” he exclaimed, “got you you little blackguard.”

He emerged triumphantly with a large brass whistle on a lanyard, which he hung about his neck.

“Are you not ready yet Bearson old chap?”

“Very nearly Homes.”

“Good man. Do not by any means neglect to bring your service revolver with you.”

Bearson tapped the pocket of his Ulster. “It’s right here, old thing.”

A knock on the door heralded the arrival of their cab.

As they claimed aboard, Homes passed the driver a shilling. “There’s half a crown in it for you if we make the three-thirty train to Dumplingshire.”

The jarvey whipped up his pony and they were off.

Piglock Homes and his sidekick Doctor Bearson will continue their investigation into The Affair of the Dartymuir Dog next week…

Jane Jago

Simile and metaphor
Is kinda difficult to ignore
They are the building blocks of seeing
Hearing, thinking, tasting being
Without their sturdy helpful syllables
How would we know who is killable
So okay the grass is green
But green in many guises seen
Or is the grass a thing of silk
Soft and warm and cool as milk
Without the help of metaphor and simile
We’d fall flat and just be a facsimile
To answer the question I’m not able
So I’ll shove some doggerel on the table

©️jj 2020 

This is an excerpt from the notebooks of Anastasia Throbb, ace reporter, and presenter of the prime-time magazine show The Throbbing City.

Sam Nero didn’t want to meet with me. It took six months of poking and prodding, and outright bribery before I found a man who was both willing and able to lean on this most archetypal of private investigators and make him talk to me. In the end, a friend of a friend introduced me to a man who goes by the name of O’Halleran, who promised me an hour of Sam’s time. Rather to my surprise, it even seemed as if he was going to deliver.

He sent two huge mutes to my office and they escorted me to a back-street diner where a sullen-faced waitress stuck me in a booth and stopped chewing gum for long enough to mouth “sit”. I sat and waited, concealing my growing impatience as best as possible. I was just about to make as dignified an exit as I could when a shadow fell across the table.
“Miss Throbb, I presume.” The voice was lazily amused.
I turned and got my first look at Sam Nero in the flesh. He was about six three, maybe six four, wide at the shoulder and narrow at the hip, and his face looked as if it had been designed to meet the expectations of every pre-pubescent female in the city. It was hard, and sculpted, and sported what I could only assume was a permanent five o’clock shadow. I turned my attention to his companion, a lush-bodied bottle blonde who looked at me as if she could discern my innermost secrets. I think I hated her on sight.

They slipped into the booth opposite me, and something about the pair of them set the hairs on the back of my neck prickling. For a moment I was floundering, then I realised what had spooked me. There were two of them, but only one shadow. While my flesh was still crawling, the waitress appeared with a pot of coffee and two tall mugs. She put a mug in front of Nero and one in front of me before favouring me with a sneer and sloping off.
“Doesn’t your lady friend get coffee?”
The voice that responded was feminine and breathy and sounded to me as if it had been honed over a lot of years of practice.
“I never touch the stuff. Ruins the complexion.”
Then Nero laughed. It was a deep sound that sent little shivers running around all sorts of inappropriate parts of my anatomy.
“Be nice.”
“I was being nice, Sam. You should know that.”
She laid a red-nailed and possessive paw on his forearm and he smiled.
“Sure you were being nice, Sugar. I’d just like to keep it that way.”
“Sugar?” I think my voice went up an octave, I mean what sort of a prehistoric monster calls his woman sugar?
“It’s my name. Sugar Kane. That’s Miss Kane to you.”
Mentally cursing my luck I turned my most winsome smile on Mister Nero.
“Sam,” I said. “May I call you Sam?”
He raised a lazy eyebrow and looked me up and down for a moment before laughing that damnably sexy laugh again.
“I guess so. It’s what Ma Nero named her little boy.”
“Is it really? I mean I can find no record of a family called Nero, let alone a male child called. Samuel?”
“Nah. Just Sam. And where I was born nobody keeps records.”
“And Miss Kane. Where and when was your sidekick born?”
“That ain’t the sort of question a gentleman asks a lady. Not if he wants to keep wearing his face. You can ask if you are that stupid.”
I looked into his companion’s icy eyes and quickly framed another question.
“The first record I can find of a Sam Nero is about four decades ago when a licence to operate as a private detective was granted. Would that be you?”
“Maybe.”
“The age of the applicant is stated as being forty-two.”
“Sounds a responsible sort of age to me. What say you Sugar?”
They exchanged a look of such naked trust that for a second even I felt de trop. But I pressed on.
“But that can’t be you, Mister Nero. If it was you would be in your eighties by now. And you don’t look like an eighty-year-old man to me.”
“Neither he does.” The blonde seemed to be laughing at me, and I didn’t like the sensation one little bit.
I made my voice hard and assertive.

“In my book, Mister Nero, that makes you an impostor. I’m sure the authorities would love to look at my findings and throw you into jail for a good long time.” I leaned forward and slapped the palms of my hands on the table hard enough to sting.
Nero laughed.
“Think again, sweetheart. The authorities as you so sweetly call them know precisely who I am. Next question.”
He took a pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes out of his pocket and lit up.
I coughed.
“I do not care for tobacco smoke,” I said icily.
Nero sneered at me.
“Door’s over there. Make sure it doesn’t hit your ass on the way out.”
I was incensed, but some vestige of intelligence stopped me leaving. This was my only chance to persuade an icon of old-school cops and robbers violence onto my show so I swallowed my bile and tried for a forgiving smile. The obnoxious Sugar shrugged her shoulders and her rather overblown assets jiggled.
“I think the lady has decided to forgive you.”
He grinned lazily, and twitched a mobile eyebrow, sending my hormone count soaring yet again. This man was hot, hot and dangerous. I needed him to boost my flagging ratings, and maybe for the odd other job or two.

I set myself to charm him, sipping my coffee and running my tongue along my lower lip. He watched with what I can only describe as detached amusement, and I felt my anger begin to rise up once more.

“What’s with you Nero?” I snapped. “You come here sneering, and looking down your nose at me…”
He leaned back and crossed his long long legs.
“Wasn’t me asked for this meet. Suck it up.”
I drew in a breath and tried for calm.
“Fair point Mister Nero. I asked to meet you.”
The blonde bombshell laughed huskily.
“I think the lady is after your body, Sam.”
“Why’d that be Sugar?”
“As if you didn’t know, big boy.”
“And as if you didn’t know old Sam’s heart is yours alone.”

It seemed to me as if they had completely forgotten my existence and I rapped my nails against the crazed china of my mug.
“I’m still here,” I grated.
“Why so you are.” Nero looked me up and down a bit more, and the silent insult in his stare had the blood rushing to my face and I blushed for possibly the first time in two decades.
“Why are you being like this? You have been chauvinistic, unpleasant and downright rude. Why? What have I ever done to you?”
He got up from his seat and looked down at me with a most peculiar expression on his face.
“It’s not always about you. I am what I am. How I was made…”
Then he was gone, and the woman went with him. Two entities with one shadow…

The Sam Nero PI collection of the Sam Nero Stories by Jane Jago, is now available.

Nowadays lives are all lived most virtually
Virtual pictures with filters applied
Everyone now can be kept in a pixel
And our photo albums in small phones reside

I recall times that we lived in monochrome
Black and white telly, and black and white snaps
Black and white memories stare from the photographs
Black and white moments our lifetime maps

Back before then they all lived in sepia
Sepia pictures in sepia frames
Formally posed with hands in laps folded
Gazing from history, lost – without names

Further before that they lived life in oil paint
Brilliant colours that spring from the past
Glorious scenes of magnificent ancestors
Whose mighty deeds will our own deeds outlast.

E.M. Swift-Hook

The Working Title crew bring you the exclusive opportunity to enjoy more wisdom from the mysteriously enigmatic Madam Pendulica… You can listen to this on YouTube too.

Aries. 

This sign sheepishly admits to being peopled by lovers of light opera and Europop.

Favourite tune: Fernando by Abba

Taurus.

Slow and stately, this sign is fond of Germanic opera of the sort that takes most of a day to listen to.

Favourite tune: Welch’ wunderbar Erwarten  from Das Liebesverbot

Gemini.

Any kind of a duet will suit Gemini. The soppier and more romantic the better.

Favourite tune: Save Your Love by Renee and Renato 

Cancer.

In spite of the characteristic sideways scuttle of this most crepuscular of signs they are drawn to the musical excitement of the female marching band.

Favourite tune: Congratulations – played on the xylophone 

Leo.

Lions are creatures that deeply value their sleep therefore any lullaby will do.

Favourite tune: O mio babbino caro

Virgo.

The primness of the Virgo psyche is perfectly matched by the innocence of nineteen fifties popular music.

Favourite tune: Gilly Gilly Ossenfeffer Katzenellen Bogen By The Sea, by Max Bygraves

Libra.

Weighing up the relative merits of styles of music has been a Libran preoccupation for many years culminating in a passion for Amazonian nose flute terpsichory.

Favourite tune: Anything nasal

Scorpio.

The Scorpio affinity with fast motorcycles, black leather and bad boy sex means that nothing but rock will do.

Favourite tune: Born to be Wild by Steppenwolf  

Sagittarius.

The Sagittarian equineness predisposes them to the enjoyment of intensely rhythmic music. Notably that of Germanic extraction.

Favourite tune: A Walk in the Black Forest by Horst Jankowski

Capricorn.

Capricorn is the rock and roll sign, and the zodiacal goat can be pacified in almost any situation by the application of Elvis Presley.

Favourite tune: Jailhouse Rock by the above gentleman

Aquarius.

Aquarians like smooth flowing watering music. 

Favourite tune: Orinoco Flow by Enya

Pisces.

Pisceans have surprisingly catholic musical tastes. They will listen to anything as long as it is loud and immersive.

Favourite tune: Brown Sugar by The Rolling Stones

Madame Pendulica predicts she will return…

Knobsie was in the cabbage patch sobbing. He had lost his tiny pink winkle and he was inconsolable.

“Where did you lose it?”

“Me doesn’t know. It just gone.”

Which, in an acre and a half of garden, wasn’t much help.

The gnomes tried, but it was close to impossible, a one centimetre piece of pink plaster wasn’t going to be found unless they got very lucky indeed. 

A week later, a sparrow overflew Bertha and dropped something at her feet.

As she superglued Knobsie back together she chuckled. “It’s a good job your winkle looks like a worm’s nose.” 

©️jj 2021

Leo and Mike would have quite liked to forget the body in the river, and the teenagers with the weird women, but life wasn’t going to let them do that.
The first intimation of this came when they had a visit from a very smooth operator with an educated Transatlantic accent rendered oddly theatrical by more than a whiff of trailer trash in his vowels. He looked like everyone’s mental image of the archetypal WASP from his smooth blonde hair to his horn-rimmed spectacles, and his Brooks Brothers brogues. He introduced himself as the Reverend Amos Summersby, and stated his reason for visiting was to thank them for their care of the girls. But it didn’t ring true. While he drank tea and ate Ro’s excellent fruit cake Mike could feel him watching her from the corners of his eyes. It was a feeling she didn’t much relish. It wasn’t to go on for long, though, because Leo put a stop to it with uncompromising savagery.
‘Keep your eyes off my woman’ he snarled ‘or I’ll pull them out and make you eat them.’
Summersby recoiled in genuine surprise. ‘That is not what I have come to expect from an English gentleman’ he said in a voice of gentle reproof.
Leo was scathing. ‘I’m neither English nor a gentleman. And I don’t make idle threats. So just say whatever it is you came here to say and leave while you still have the use of your legs.’
Summersby’s fear appeared to Mike to be the first genuine thing in his visit; all the colour left his cheeks and he floundered about in a morass of half-sentences.
‘Hurry up, man. You are wearing my patience thin.’
‘Very well. I was simply instructed to find out what those naughty little girls may have said about their school.’
‘To us. Nothing’ Leo bit the words off sharply. ‘We noticed they didn’t much care for their keepers but that was just ordinary observation.’
‘And yet the police wouldn’t let the girls return to school in the minibus?’
‘I would suspect that is standard procedure. They had, after all, just discovered themselves to be swimming with a dead body. I’m sure that’s exactly what a group of teenage girls needs to make a camping trip complete.’ Leo’s sarcasm was biting.
The ‘reverend’ stared into Leo’s angry eyes, then sighed.
‘I fear we have been misinformed. Will you accept my apology?’
Leo looked at Mike, who shook her head.
‘No. Now we’d very much appreciate the air you are using.’

Ro appeared as if she had been listening at the door (which she probably had) and escorted the uninvited visitor to where his car waited in the street.
‘Nasty piece of work that is’ she said when she returned. Then she sat and poured herself a cup of tea. Leo raised an eyebrow.
‘I found stuff out.’
‘Such as?’
‘The ‘church’ calls itself The Apostolic Gospel of The Lord. It seems to have originated in America. No surprise there, but what is surprising is that they now have control of three schools in the UK. There’s one in Somerset and two in Greater London, and the police are quite interested in them because there is some question of providing underage girls for a form of ‘marriage’. Or so I’m told.’
‘And how did you get told?’
She grinned. ‘Sex. That’s how I get told most things. Wasn’t even unpleasant.’
Mike laughed in genuine amusement. ‘Ro. You are bad! Who?’
‘A detective from the smoke. His name would mean nothing to you even if I could be arsed to remember it. But a combination of a blow job and a bottle of Ma’s sloe gin got him to part with all of his knowledge of the subject.’
‘You really should be careful’ Leo put in. ‘You can’t just go around importuning coppers for information.’
Ro grinned. ‘You’re right. I can’t. But I didn’t. He started it. I was helping out at the chippy when this long streak of piss comes in and gets all flirty. Uncle Bob gives me the high sign he’s a copper, so I agree to meet him for a drink. I reckon he still thinks he weaselled info out of me.’

From Shall we gather at the river? by Jane Jago

The writing that inspired this art by Ian Bristow

They rode out under cloudy skies without a backwards glance.
The countryside swept down from their village to where the River Wyvern wove its way along the bottom of the vale. It was the picture of peace and rustic harmony, with cottages and houses dotting the landscape, roofs tiled with the blue flecked slate from local quarries and walls built from the dark grey rock brought down from the mountains. 
The mountains themselves lurked like ominous misshapen giants, stretching fingers or lifting shoulders towards the sky. From the gentle slopes of the vale, they rose to bleak and desolate heights.
The two barrel-shaped hill-ponies seemed happy enough to set a smart pace. Poll had managed to find his old dragonhide targe which he looped over his back and Hepsy was pleased to see the gemstone set in the pommel of his dagger was not glowing. Maybe things were not so desperate as they thought? Maybe it was all rumour and no truth? Maybe…

E.M. Swift-Hook

Ian is an awesome artist and cover designer, you can find his work at Bristow Design or watch him in action creating this piece on ART with IAN