Category: Serial Fiction

High Fantasy Serial Fiction

Divining Rituals — Echoes & Orisons Part Three

An identification ritual much like this one had nearly killed Cynthea, years ago. In a cramped, unlit cellar west of Valgrund, a miller had warned her of an ancient-looking goblet stamped with strange texts that supposedly charmed the eyes. Admar had been upstairs, asking the miller for more details as the quern-stone moaned laboriously and the riverwater rumbled beyond the cellar wall. She’d had all the components correct. Her salt lines were immaculate, her articulations clear. But she’d rushed the ritual, hadn’t known, as she knew now, that magic could never be forced by technical mastery. As with making love,…

Serial Fiction Steampunk

Reliquary Hunters — Part One

Wind howled from the ridges of the arctic massif that comprised the Jokyl Mountains, while the winter sun flitted in and out of brisk wisps of cloud. Hunt Leader Ilia sat cross-legged on the ice, hands resting on her knees, eyes closed. She pictured the flame in her mind, trying to suffuse her body with warmth. Every inhale and exhale took a measured eight seconds. Her pulse slowed. Warmth suffused her limbs, radiating out from her core. The sound of the wind faded as the crackling flame in her mind grew brighter. Her body grew light as she levitated a…

High Fantasy Serial Fiction

Malodorous Charms — Echoes & Orisons Part Two

Threehill was, as Harkital said, a quaint fart of a town.  They passed fields of grain that took up hundreds of acres, then homesteads and gardens of unimpressive design. Off in the distance, there stood the belltower of the Temple of the Heart—not quite grand, not quite proud, stretching just above the eastern quarter of the approaching settlement. Harkital noted that most Biluranian towns were built around temples of that clumsy faith, “like piss pooling ‘round a giggling baby.”  Strange wooden signs rose on either side of the road as they approached, displaying an odd collection of carved symbols: a…

Serial Fiction Steampunk

A Spider for Aemilia — Part Two

A wet snapping of branches from behind interrupted them as a beast thrashed about in the swamp. Balthasar spun, half-expecting to see the hippoguarox, head lowered and charging. Instead, Aemilia emerged from the dense trees on the other side of the fen. Her sweaty horse splashed through the mud and the shallow water, struggling to keep its feet.   How reckless, Balthasar thought. One wrong step and the horse will break a leg, throwing her into the muck. Miraculously, Aemilia crossed the fen without harming herself or her mount and drew up panting beside them.   “What are you doing here?” Balthasar…

High Fantasy Serial Fiction

Transmutory Declensions — Echoes & Orisons Part One

When the sexton returned from digging the poor man’s grave, moonlight carved a thin sickle of white through the shed’s window. In the pale light, the corpse’s fingernails still looked wrong: grey-black and dry, almost earthy, splitting with web-thin fractures that exposed the dead flesh beneath.  With uneasy huffs and muttered curses, the sexton set his shovel aside, wiped his hands at the basin, then brought a candle to the table and lifted the corpse’s hand up to the flame’s spectral glow.  He gingerly pried at a hairline crack on the corpse’s right index finger, watching as the material crumbled…

Serial Fiction Steampunk

A Spider for Aemilia — Part One

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…

Dark Fantasy Serial Fiction

SOIL — Part Five

FIVE Sweet Child of Summer, I mourn for your skin Your cold fingers and Chillblained toes. Mother of the Autmn, When you fell in love You tumbled with the earth And snared its acrid bounty. Hellish Bastard of Winter, Blanch before your betters And return to us our warmth Which you’ve forever stolen. Hard Father of Spring, You stood tall as an oak Sentinel before our home Your leaves soaking up all our woes. Ithica (b. 413). Journaled Year 433. I It is a good night to hunt.  He bounded across the dusky trails round the pathetic Village in the…

Dark Fantasy Serial Fiction

SOIL — Part Four

FOUR The bairns speak trilling voices in the night, harsh echoes dancing, afright of the hoary and weighty squalor of unending sleep. Messages delivered nigh, grasped in sharp talons of ravens, crows, pigeons; whether the cock-crows or refuses to show. May our dreams stay safe; for our sleeps are fraught and the days, so dark, as the sun burrows deep, quaffs the Devil’s draught, As if the accursed swill were as naught but cool, clear water, a gentle man’s drink, atop the Great Mothers’ hill. Ithica (b. 413). Journaled year 442. I After living in the temperate embrace of the…

Dark Fantasy Serial Fiction

SOIL — Part Three

THREE Oft I’ve seen you in the night, or a wan image of you. A pale imitation compared to your brilliance and bright devotion by day. Oft my dreams are fraught. Corrupted echos of memories long faded, extinguished. Long have I languished in nightmares beset; they fall upon me, gnashing, dark creatures of the long black night. Though tonight, it shall not be black demon nor red devil that plagues ill mine troubled thoughts. Nay, I see you, my father as you were in my youth. And you visit my dreams, in your arms you carry another. A boy with…

Dark Fantasy Serial Fiction

SOIL — Part Two

TWO Why must the wind blow when Earth does not know that the Mourning Sun shines, as my light slowly declines? How many years must I wait for you, so belated, to arrive? For how long must I hate, curdling mine blood that turns to shit like soured butter lodged in the devil’s churn? How many moons must I fester brining within bitter salt? Must I scream my soul’s lament, cast mine curse upon the gods for all they have wrought? Or shall I sing a sweet refrain awake tomorrow and do it all again? Ithica (b. 413). Journaled Year…