The hall around me echoed; a smell of wax and wet stone drifted through the air. Incense swirled, its twisting, grey mist drifted toward the vaulted ceiling. Thousands of candles threw flickering light onto the ancient pillars. The gold-etched spines of ledgers stretched back into the dim recesses of the Archive’s hallways. […]
The Archive of Names Read More »
Freya crouched precariously atop the mound of discarded metal. She toyed with the intricate pistons of a small gyrocopter engine, its brass casing glinting against the red rust of the sunset. She tugged the engine free of the surrounding scrap, sending it toppling towards her cart below, piled high with parts. To anyone
A Place in the Skies Read More »
Soren was only a boy when I met him, a boy lost in the Forest of Souls. Princess Savine had taken me there, her newest pikka, to remind me of what happened to handmaidens who displeased her. Her skin was as dusky and golden as the marigolds strewn across the royal table, for on these
The Tiger’s Handmaiden Read More »
My current mess started the day I opened my email to find an unusual subject line in one of the headers. Your Payment to Middle Earth Has Been Accepted. Brutus, my purebred Labradoodle mutt, lifted his head from where he’d set it on my knee, his golden ears twitching.
Your Payment to Middle Earth Has Been Accepted Read More »
When I’d started the hike, solitude had felt like a gift—space to breathe, to let the silence scour away the months of second-guessing and what-ifs. Time to decide what comes next. Now, as stingy sunlight bled away, unease pooled under my ribs, spreading with every breath. Massive storm clouds, bellies swollen
My bike’s brakes squealed; the wind blew away the sound, and browny yellow leaves battered me. The windows of her house watched me as I clamboured off and leaned the bike into the hedge–they were black and hungry and staring, like the eyes of a monster, ready to gobble me up. I pulled
Rachel sneaked aboard at six bells, deep in the night. The ringing masked her tread. The snores of the sailors cloaked her steps, but still, the floorboards creaked. She thought of her sister, held hostage behind the cold stone in Boston Gaol. Rachel steeled herself. She had to get to Nassau.
I saw my first hanging in Wapping when I was four years old. My father swung me up on his shoulders so I could see across the rabble of spectators. The prisoner was a scrawny youth accused of stealing a gentleman’s horse, and as they dragged him to the gallows, his britches darkened
The fucker stole the phone right out of my hand. I was in the middle of writing you an annoyingly difficult text, waiting at the bus stop to meet you, and before I knew what I was doing, I was running down the street after him, giving chase with unreserved fury.
And Here’s What I Said Read More »
I carve deep grooves into the face before me, loose sand falling to the ground in small red piles. The eyes stare back at me with conspicuous intent, concentrating as I do on the task at hand. I do not know why my touch forms the sand as it does, why it holds shape against
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