1

One Autumn evening, when a harvest moon hung ripe and full in the November sky, Mark decided to make a homunculus. He just thought it might be fun. It was a pretty easy spell, all told. He gathered a couple of spadefuls of the clay-rich soil from his parent’s back garden, mixed it with some well water and a few dry herbs from the larder - spearmint, sage, amaranth & hyssop - you know, witchy stuff. He shaped the gooey, cloying mass of it in the bathtub until it was roughly human looking.

The trickiest bit was harvesting a sliver of his soul. As he pulled the glistening shade out of himself, a bit of it snagged on a particularly extrovert aspect of his personality and it took no end of pulling to jostle it free again. When he sliced it from him (wielding a small silver knife that he’d found in his mum’s workroom), Mark felt nothing. Like nothing squared. He felt a complete lack of something. As though the experience itself has been elided. The was a moment of total cosmic dread, then everything snapped back into place and he genuinely felt none the worse for it.

Once the soul had been pinned in place, it was merely a case of saying the right words at the right angles and within moments, the little mud moppet sat suddenly upright. It clambered to its feet and edged around the sides of the bath - leaving a smear of red earth as it moved - its little distended belly pushed up against the porcelain. Seeing Mark, it raised its arms to him, peering upwards with blank eyes, clearly asking him to lift it out of the bath.

When Mark obliged, it went cheerfully toddling off down the hall. As Mark diligently hosed off the muddy stains, he heard something shatter in the kitchen. The dog started barking excitedly, caught somewhere between alarm and curiosity.

By the time Mark got there, the homunculus had somehow got hold of a party pack of almonds and spread them liberally all over the kitchen floor. The dog was having a field day.

Mark loved almonds.

2

The homunculus was a big success with the family. It was soon able to do basic household tasks like chopping vegetables and taking the bins out. It could even respond to the human voice and do what you asked. Mark’s Dad said it was way better than Alexa.

After that first night, its skin had dried to a pleasant rubbery consistency. It no longer left a trail of dark red earth wherever it roamed. It was warm to the touch too. Not hot, but certainly warmer than room temperature. Like it had recently been baked in an oven and hadn’t cooled entirely yet.

One night, Mark had used it as a surprisingly effective hot water bottle but had woken the next morning to find the tiny creature spooning him. Which didn’t feel right at some gut level. Sometimes, out of the corner of his eyes, he swore he could see a ghostly thread, like condensed steam, that stretched between them. But whenever he turned to look directly there was nothing there. He put it out of his head.

Magic is weird.

And when it was clear that the little guy was here to stay, he named him Munk.

Short for homunculus.

3

Munk was growing.

Mark first noticed it when he awoke to find Munk looking at him from the side of the bed. He was now tall enough that his little head poked up over the side of the mattress. Mark looked at Munk. And Munk looked at Mark.

And that’s when Munk smiled. Which was odd because Munk didn’t have a mouth. Or at least he hadn’t up until that point.

The growth spurt meant that there were even more jobs that Munk could do. He mowed the lawn and cleaned the dishes. By the end of the month, he was nearly as big as Mark himself. He had stretched himself like gum. Initially tall and willowy, Munk began to fill out as the weeks passed, gaining mass and muscle tone.

One evening, Mark’s mum had come home from a board meeting to find Munk doing the hoovering. He was casually holding the sofa over his head with one hand as he did it.