Onyankopɔn is a woman. And a man. And everything above and in-between. Akuba says Onyankopɔn kissed the tips of His fingers on the sixth day, and sculpted these bodies as worldly vessels for our…

My ghost is trapped in this bedchamber, much as I was in life. It had been my sanctuary, filled with sumptuous fabrics and exotic decor. In death, I understand the lie. We have all been trapped, dragonflies caught in golden amber. Just as my daughter will be, someday, by someone.

Homes for the Holidays by Heather Shaw & Tim Pratt   I stood on the slumlord’s doorstep and took a deep breath — one of the last I would take in this body, which had served me well despite being treated badly. It’s not the body I was born with — I don’t think I […]

The aquarium is different every time I die. Exhibits reshuffling like a deck of cards. The blood loss, though, that’s reliable.

There were more than a few of the planks that could become chairs, but Lucas passed them by. None of them were suitable for the likes of Lord Adelard. The vampire wished to appear powerful. There was only one kind of wood in the cellar that fit that description. He squeezed back, back, back, into the furthest reaches, where once mice and rats might have made a home, back before the rats and mice had found themselves in stewpots and on skewers.

Would you give up your throne to sit by the fire? Would you hold a baby over it? Would you empty the chamber pots of heaven when you hold rightful claim over the highest throne in the room, as the …

27. Parsifal confessed to me that she has never dreamed of Valis. Not once. In her youth, she learned of the city in a book: a philosophical dialogue where a poet, a knight, a musician, and a madman argue about the nature of reality while awaiting the arrival of a fifth person. Near the end, the madman recounts the story of Valis, which the others think is nonsense. Parsifal disagreed, and the city quickly became an obsession (she herself used the word 'obsession'). She said all this while pacing back and forth, refusing to look me in the face until the end.

On the island of Manhattan, there’s a building out of time. I can’t tell you where it is, exactly. It has an address, of course, as all buildings do, but that wouldn’t mean anything to you. What I can tell you is that the building is called The Oakmont.

They have never fought about it. “It’s your body,” her husband says, and means it. Only sometimes, when they’re out walking, a little girl will careen across their path roaring like a giggly tyrannosaurus, and he falls silent. “What’re you thinking about?” she asks, before she learns not to.

The glass bottles are caked with so much grime you can’t see what’s in them anymore. It’s better that way because you don’t think you’d be able to do what you need to, if you could. You fish the knife out of your canvas bag, and a lighter with just enough fluid for one more flash of fire. This is your first time—but you’ve seen your mother do the same thing countless times before. Before she made her first mistake. Before you were forced to take her place.

In the land that is now Malaysia, there once was a tribe of monkeys called the Mawahs, whose king was appointed by King Solomon to be the Raja of the jungle. Raja Mawah built himself a throne on the south bank of the Perak River and ruled the jungle fairly.