A creaking sound, like thick glass cracking, came from the half-frozen stream below us. Terèsa’s pole had broken through. My cousin lay on her stomach on the bank, where the willow’s dead fronds swayed over her body and down to the water like a curtain of whips. “I did it!” she called. Her voice carriedRead more…
Archive for the ‘Fantasy’ Category
The Devil’s Temp
| by Fred Warren |
Bad things typically happened on Mondays at Plugin Services, and this day was no exception. With a flash of fire and a puff of brimstone, Chester found himself in Hell. He hadn’t even finished his first cup of coffee. Hell was an office, and the Devil was there, seated in a red leather chair behindRead more…
The Wordwitch
| by Joanne Anderton |
She was silent when the knights dragged her in. Her head sagged, a waterfall of charcoal hair rippling to cover her face. Her emerald gown was torn at the bodice and skirt, and I could see skin, ivory and pink. Sharp, metallic footsteps reverberated from the stone walls and steel doors. I repressed a wince.Read more…
The Kurse of Kain
| by Billy Wong |
Sir Albright the Black, new mayor of the town of Glen, grunted and swore as he tried to remove his mail hauberk. He’d just come home from his initiation parade, and now couldn’t finish removing his armor. “Help me, will you Leonard? I can’t get this thing off. I think it shrunk in the cold.”Read more…
An Heroic Tale in an Enormous Tomb
| by Tim W. Burke |
I see your smiles in the dark; it warms me to know I am so welcome. My time among you is short, so I must begin the prelude. We had been part of a great world named Persepis. A world ruled by empires of enlightened races, driven by powerful magic, and home to dragons andRead more…
The Urchin’s Dark Kite
| by Michael J. DeLuca |
The noon sky was just pale enough for her blue cloak to match it: the perfect concealment. She could extend a hand and believe there was no arm to anchor it. A traveler on roads below might look up at the birds or the sun and never know that Amarantha watched him from the highestRead more…
Clay Head
| by Michael John Grist |
There’s a giant head in my living room. It’s made of grey clay, and it sings through the night. It sings songs about America. Sometimes boogie-woogie or the Big Bopper. It sings Buddy Holly. It sings about the plane that crashed and sometimes the song about the crash. It sings about whiskey and rye. IRead more…
A Time to Every Purpose
| by Carter Nipper |
I felt like a fraud as I approached Haven in my robes of blue trimmed in silver, a child playing dress-up. The scabbard holding my sword sought to trip me with every step, my staff resolved to leap from my sweat-slick hand. Could I, so fresh from the Academy, bear the weight of responsibility theRead more…
The Doge’s Gold Statue
| by Tim W. Burke |
I write this testimony as provenance to the work of art before you. I write to proclaim that I am the superior alchemist of the ages, as I have supplanted even the Almighty with my greatest creation. But I must write quickly, for as dawn comes, my hands grow heavier.
Footsteps
| by Megan Arkenberg |
Beryl´s footsteps are very heavy. The whole floor shakes as she moves around, and doors rattle in their frames. I often wonder that she doesn´t notice these things, but then again, her eyes are not blind like mine.
The Posthumous Life of Eleanor Bell
| by Gwynne Garfinkle |
The Girl Who Slept for a Decade The languid, waxen princess Swoons luscious on the feather bed. Inert, she still inspires love Or something like it. How did she come to this? She may have been beautiful But beauty, she well knew Wasn’t going to save her From boredom or bone-tiredness. Trade her indolentRead more…
The October Man
| by Dave Bara |
Ballantine sat in the field, spinning a long blade of grass between his fingers. Around him were things of familiarity, things of strangeness. Behind him stood tall pale trees filled with golden fruit and amber leaves. A silver shower rained on the trees from time to time, but never was he wet. In the distanceRead more…
Hollow-bellied Jack
| by Tom Conoboy |
Jack is a farmer, an Irish poet who has never written a poem. His farm, little more than a few fields with a house and a byre, is down a track that no-one walks but Jack. It is a ghost road, some say, a bridge between the us and the them, and Jack, in theRead more…