


Sylvia drew a square on a piece of parchment. She and Lisl gazed at it by the light of the room's one lit candle. In a way, Lisl thought it was silly, but she wanted desperately to become a witch. Fourteen was too old to start over. If she failed she would have to go back to her foster family, and be a servant all her life. Her gaze grew intense. You will see the shape change, Sylvia had said. When it changes, tell me what you see. She had called this a test for mind reading, though what changing shapes on a piece of paper had to do with mind-reading, Lisl didn't understand. Suddenly the drawing was of a…
A tale in the world system of Steam & Stars. For more airships and dragons, check out Moore's award-winning novel, Children of Solo! The dirigible cast a chill shadow across the coffee field as it passed between the distant sun and the fecund plants. Balthasar looked up from his notebook. Squinting into the glare created by the backlit balloon, he recognized the winged, blue hammer of House Bronzewater. His cousin’s betrothed had arrived. Balthasar’s stomach rumbled. Tonight, his relatives would host an exorbitant feast in honor of the impending nuptials. All summer, his graduate student stipend had afforded him only lentils, chickpeas, and mutton. A dragon, even in its human form, needed more red meat than that. He wondered how…
FIVE Sweet Child of Summer, I mourn for your skin Your cold fingers and Chillblained toes. Mother of the Autmn,…
FOUR The bairns speak trilling voices in the night, harsh echoes dancing, afright of the hoary and weighty squalor of…
Back in the days of yore, some 100 years ago at this point, pulp fiction magazines were everywhere. Publications like…
Citation abbreviation notes: AMtF: A Means to Freedom: The Letters of H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard (Volume 1)…
Some stories stay with you not because they are historically accurate or perfectly crafted, but because they remind you of…
The weight of old words, pages unread. I carried it with me in those days. Close to my breast I…
Barrin burst from the raging rapids that had battered him pitilessly from one squall to the next, gasping for precious…
Blood: a pearl droplet on the meat of his thumb. Glass: a sliver, imperceptible aside from subtle pressure between two…
Aisling held what remained of Blightheart by his horn, throwing the goblin magelord's head at the boots of her liege…
