Shots of the relatives, grieving and haunted as they leave the court. Something about the victim’s head: they couldn’t find it at the crime scene. Lost for weeks until discovered underneath a hedge. Found by a black dog. Dragged across the grass and pavement, through the purpling twilight of the Corby streets, the dark jaws clenched upon a pallid, waxen tuck of cheek. The imagery is risen, chill and glittering, like a dew. One of the trophy’s eyes is limp, half-closed, the grey hair caked with mud. Labrador breath, a hot and urgent whisper in the cold, deaf ear. Black jackal lips peel back, impart the snarling knowledge of Anubis, travel information for the lately dead. The head bumps through the guttered litter, nods in solemn affirmation of this grim intelligence, and knows what saints know. Round and bloody, a full stop penned in a larger hand.
A static ocean swells up, roaring in the mind. Hands raised, alarmed, into the field of vision. Gaze at incoherent characters and words that seem to crawl across the naked skin, an epidermal poetry. The lampglow is obscure and scumbled, as if filtering through smoke. There is a want of air.
Reel through the kitchen to the back door and the yard beyond, staggering out into the weed and starlight, gradually becoming calmer in the clean night breeze, beneath the slow and distant wheels of constellation. All the old, same lights. Their perfect, sombre continuity. Stand swaying here upon Phipps’ Fire Escape, the promised sanctuary of the century to come, a creaking and uncertain balcony, that is not now so far above. Through roiling clouds the landings of the vanished years below, these lower floors all lost in spark or panic and devoured already. Overhead, long rags of cirrus snag upon the arc of night, an interrupted glimpse of grace through veils of fume and soot.
These are the times we dread and hunger for. The mutter of our furnace past grows louder at our backs, with cadence more distinct. Almost intelligible now, its syllables reveal themselves. Our world ignites. The song wells up, from a consuming light.
Artist’s Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Alan Moore, Melinda Gebbie, Chris Staros, Brett Warnock, Chip Kidd, Aleksey Zolotaryov, Matt Rota, Annette Buchhold, George Gobel, Datka Lapidus, and all my friends and family for their love and support.
Special thanks to Sean Cunningham and his family for all their help.
Costumes courtesy of A. T. Jones and Sons, Baltimore, Maryland.
José Villarrubia, Baltimore, 2003.
About the Author
Multiple award-winning author Alan Moore is universally considered the best writer of graphic novels in the medium’s history. First recognized for his groundbreaking fantasy sequential stories Swamp Thing, Watchmen, V for Vendetta, and Miracleman, he then moved into other genres with major works like Lost Girls, A Small Killing, Big Numbers, and two that have been adapted into major motion pictures: From Hell and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
Among his many awards are the Hugo Award, the Bram Stoker Award, the Eisner Award, and the International Horror Guild Award.
Voice of the Fire is Moore’s debut novel and takes place in Northampton, England, where he has lived since he was born.
Credits
Jacket design by Chip Kidd
Author and jacket photographs
by José Villarrubia
Additional Design work by Carlos Hernandez Fisher
