From Stone and Bone, From Earth and Sky

I. The Magician “What do you think?” the Old Man asks, turning my question back at me. He taps the tarot card with one finger, nail tobacco-yellow and tipped in a crescent moon of dirt. “Sacred or profane? Sinner or Saint?” He pushes the card closer as if I haven’t already looked my fill. The […]

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Nine Instances of Rain

It’s easier when I pretend not to know him–when I think of him as a stranger and remind myself that he will still have a normal life. Maybe a better one, even. I used to wear a mask or a fake beard to disguise myself, but he hasn’t recognized me for a long time. Follow […]

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The Curator’s Job

Corwyn’s hair smelled of death. Again. She smelled it–rot, blood, sweat, and mud–as she trudged through the back streets of San Xavier, out of Cobbler’s Hill toward Pallasgreen. After three washes with lye soap, she sat awake as her hair dried and wondered, if she cut it all off, would she still smell death whenever […]

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Between Sea and Shore

The world is filled with spirits who would take a child. The gundarram, who hide in banana trees and send out their foul breath to sicken sleeping infants. The gargar demons with red fur and black wings, who fly through the rainforest looking for naughty children to snatch. Momimo, who appears as a little lost […]

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Game of Primes

You have to forgive my brother; he™s not like any of the boys at the home. Miss Slake says Jem™s a typical, and once typicals reach a certain age they can go most anywhere they want, which means they can get into most any kind of trouble. It™s not like the trouble with Martin, you […]

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The Bulletproof

1 The show starts when the woman in rags sets the box down. Worn edges and flecks of dried blood stain the sides. The wooden box has a depression in the top where the old woman has stood for years. She sets it onto the ground at the back of the tent without a word, […]

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Three Partitions

Chani sat on the women’s balcony, racing through her prayers at the usual breakneck speed of the Orthodox. She was bored. She knew there was a Chasidic position that prayer should be as fast as possible, to prevent the yetzer hara, the evil inclination from getting a few thoughts in edgewise between the words. But […]

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One, Two, Three

We fucked up. We all know it, despite the fact that the others don’t want to admit it. The whole night was a series of fuck-ups, starting with Kerby and his stupid bottle of Latvian tequila – it didn’t occur to him to wonder why the stuff was in the discount bin, did it? (Dumber […]

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The Taking of Book 257

The priest finished his elegy with the usual pronouncements, then added a turn of phrase Elo hadn’t ever heard a priest use. “Gods and the Destroyer be merciful,” the old man had said. Just like any man of the troop might have, with Destroyer and Gods in the same sentence. Elo looked around the bowed […]

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