Fiction
Crossroads
John came to the crossroads at just shy of noon, where a man dressed all in black stared up at another man hanging from a gallows-tree. No, not hanging; he was being hung.
John came to the crossroads at just shy of noon, where a man dressed all in black stared up at another man hanging from a gallows-tree. No, not hanging; he was being hung.
Stefan Rudnicki
19:12
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by Nisi Shawl
Princess Ousmani had fallen asleep in her chains, from boredom. She woke to the weight of a dragon’s head resting uncomfortably on her stomach. One rough, scaly paw kneaded her left shoulder, pricking at her skin.
by Cory Skerry
One day it was, “Why haven’t you any hair, Mother?” She stroked her own golden locks, which now swept her ankles, as she waited for an answer.
Gabrielle De Cuir
37:21
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by Kelly Link
My name is Emma Bear, and I am eleven years old. I live on Black Ankle Road beside the Licking River. I live in a palace. My father is a king. I have a fairy godfather.
It was snowing when the wolves first came, loping down Flatbush Ave., lithe and fast, panting clouds, their paws landing with a soft, heavy sound like bombs falling somewhere far away.
Gabrielle de Cuir
32:08
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by M. Rickert
Graveyards creak with too many bones, and the weight of headstones, and when the wind blows the air is dusty with the dead. Ah life, its hoary inevitability. What’s the point?
Stefan Rudnicki
28:19
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But the girl was kicking off her other shoe and at the Casio before Deel had worked out but what. And what she pounded out with her feet was Meatloaf’s “Bat Out of Hell.”
You know all about bending and breaking their terms of service; it would take some serious hacking, magical or mundane, to pull this off. But you suspect magic.
Paul Boehmer
49:40
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Graham came out of the desert leaving most of his men dead behind him. He debriefed, he bathed, he dressed in a borrowed uniform, and without food, without rest, though he needed both, he went to see the girl.
by Cat Rambo
Decades later the music was what really tipped Glen off. He heard a song on the radio, a brand new release, and remembered the day he’d first heard it, twenty years earlier.
Stefan Rudnicki
41:05
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This issue's cover art by MoVille/Adobe Stock Image.