Mare Testimonii

Mare Testimonii is a story written and illustrated by Iron Eater. It ran in Issue 86 at https://www.shousetsubangbang.com/mirror/mare-testimonii/.

Author's Notes

Yes, it’s technically named after a Queen song.

I actually sat down and plotted out an entire outline for this one, since a mystery story requires a certain amount of tightness with its story to work, and even with that framework I found I had to aggressively cut down details, drop entire scenes, and similar acts of chainsaw editing; my original draft was around 28,650 words, and unlike last issue where I was able to just move the starting point up to save myself a few K, this one required lots of agonizing decisions. Learning how to kill your darlings is rough! Maybe one year I’ll actually write a Rhoanish story under 25K and have a Ward and Wainwright tale in the December slot, but that would probably end up book-length. Then again, maybe that’s not so bad.

Getting a chance to show Mr. Ward interacting with people other than Hugh was a delight, since he is an unrepentant turbo-asshole if he chooses to be, and when the upper classes are involved he regularly makes this choice. In a modern setting it’s safe to assume he’d be a big Bong Joon-ho fan. Showing his parents–and establishing that he has a background as a child laborer, as “mudlarks” were a very real thing–was quite satisfying, as this also gave me a chance to show him having positive interactions with people other than Hugh, ranging from the affection given to Primrose and Ezekiel to the manipulative but genuine kindness shown to Mrs. Wimbly. He’s very much a behind-the-scenes guy and I figured it couldn’t hurt expanding a little on the knack for social skills hinted at in In Ossa Venenum from October 2019. For the record, “Ori” is short for “Orion” (his middle name), not a mangling of “Aubrey.”

In case it wasn’t obvious, Ezekiel is fully aware of Primrose’s professions (she practiced both before they started courting, much less were married), and it doesn’t bother him much since she clearly knows what she’s doing. This isn’t an exact historical setting (those studying Hugh’s outfit in particular will note its separate elements are playing Calvinball across a century or two) so she’s got significantly better, safer access to contraceptives than an actual working Victorian woman. Might be silphium-based, since for all we know people didn’t drive it to extinction in this setting? Either way, Mr. Ward is an only child by design, and his parents planned him well in advance.

This one’s a bit more about the injustices of class systems than queerness this time around, though I’d like to think there’s still a modest dose of the need for self-love and understanding of one’s nature and finding healthy ways to engage in such (and maybe a bit about appropriation w.r.t. Lord Cadfael? he’s a dick and also probably not even a little gay so it’s not a perfect metaphor).

I really wish I’d been able to do more with the “Mr. Cutty thinks Hugh is a vampire” angle but there are only so many words to go around in one of these. Maybe next time!