Fictional Worlds

The game’s not played to win but to see how long you can last. The Wit MacMahajan taught Morholt that, after his accident, while he was in Rexhame’s hospital and she was growing him a new arm from sculptwood. Only he didn’t realize the truth of her … Beneath Ceaseless Skies - Periling Hand by Justin Howe via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2NiBVW1

Verity was broken, fractured in a way that Hester alone could never hope to mend. Dissatisfied with her appearance, Verity would disappear for months on end, only to return bruised and bleeding from yet another endeavor in the name of obsessive self… Beneath Ceaseless Skies - Cold Ink by Dean Wells via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2M2zGl1

Goya found the blade. I should say that first. He pulled it from the silt at the bottom of the creek bed, where its hilt sliced through the reflected clouds on the water’s surface as though it were itself one of the emperor’s great airships. He reac… Beneath Ceaseless Skies - The Wizard’s House by Stephen Case via Instapaper https://ift.tt/1zJSoVh

It’s easy to shoot a dog. Susanna watched Papa do it one bitter morning, winter before last, when old Karo couldn’t get up off his blankets, so she knows how it’s done. via Pocket

We went to the lake of our ancestors on the longest night of the year. As the oldest, I had to make sure I and my four sisters and little brother gave greetings to our parents in their first year under the ice. via Pocket

“...wanted me to marry Logo the tanner. He’s got a beautiful home, she said, and you soon get used to the smell. Mother, I said, I don’t want to get used to the smell. I don’t ever want to be the sort of person who doesn’t notice the stink of sheep’… Beneath Ceaseless Skies - The Thought That Counts by K.J. Parker via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2NSLszI

The closer you get to the city, the less you see it. From far away, approaching from ten miles down the dusty road, the white-brick windmills gather breezes with their turning metal blades at the edge of the walled arena. The highest nobles’ houses … Beneath Ceaseless Skies - Angry Kings by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2Ps9web

In late summer of the fourteenth year of the reign of Fei-hu the Road-Builder, on a day when the portents suggested peace and prosperity throughout the city and all its territories, the warrior Aun-ki woke up and found that her skin caught fire at t… Beneath Ceaseless Skies - Fireskin by Joanne Rixon via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2OSMNqE

After I spoke to the tablecloth, its edges unraveled and slid through the arm of Aakash the Undying, neatly stitching up the flaps of his recently purloined skin. The serving boy had startled at the oath, but I made a tamping motion with my hands. T… Beneath Ceaseless Skies - Weft by Rahul Kanakia via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2MnVKvk

Mei Huang considers the merit of an objection and quickly finds it inadequate. The threadbare comfort of a riposte will not put rice in her bowl, or ingots in her purse. Worse, it might even soil her reputation, diminish her standing. So many hours,…

Once again it was that horrid time of year when the cashmere silk spiders crept from the bowels of the city of the angels and spun their pale web across its spires and domes, and Lukas the vendor of miracle tea felt a deep shudder begin in his testi…

They say that when you go to the sky-reflected ocean and strip yourself as bare as the day you were born, the water will take you in. It will hurt—don’t fool yourself. The transition between one life and the next is never without pain or grief. via … Beneath Ceaseless Skies - Speak Easy, Suicide Selkies by E. Catherine Tobler via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2w8zqe0

The slender jawbone lies in the palm of his hand like a crown. Raising it, an offering to the night, stretched starlight gleams on milk teeth. via Pocket Beneath Ceaseless Skies - The Scrimshander by Damien Krsteski via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2MDgPkw

It’s the last day of autumn, and Jiteh’s twin brother is dead. He sits on the edge of his cot, thorns popping like seedlings from between his knuckles and poking through his sweaty scalp in a blood-slicked crown. “I’m scared,” he whispers. via Pocket Beneath Ceaseless Skies - The Sweetness of Honey and Rot by A. Merc Rustad via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2w2Hnm7

The silent proctors walked beside Ukeme into the examination village, checked him for iron and palm leaves and concealed cloth-patterns, and brought him to a hut. He stood at the threshold for a moment, looking down at the floor just inside. via Poc… Beneath Ceaseless Skies - The Examination Cloth by Jonathan Edelstein via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2Iya2XH

Erinia was at the table to win, more than anything else. The need for it filled her bones, burned through her lungs, steadied her will. She wanted it more than earning the Empresses’ favor, more than testing her mettle, more than the pleasure of def… Beneath Ceaseless Skies - The Ghostpotion Games by Christian K. Martinez via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2OReUXp

The leader of House Hawthorn’s Court of Birth lived in a part of the House that Samariel had never been to: a wing of dusty, disused corridors where the wainscoting had rotted away and the wallpaper’s elegant asphodels were obscured by elongated smu… Beneath Ceaseless Skies | Court of Birth, Court of Strength by Aliette de Bodard via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2y0Btme

The folk of the Infinite Forum swore in nine languages and ninety dialects as a cat’s black shape darted up Via Antiqua’s hot white stones. They hissed again as they spied the magic-twisted bloodhound bounding after it like a carnelian thundercloud.… Beneath Ceaseless Skies | Shadowdrop by Chris Willrich via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2PebcYm

Yes, I went walking with him near the Deaf King Inn. There are some in Quadril who will call that my first mistake. via Pocket

The rot hound struck in the dark hours of the morning. It took one of our horses and left a geld woman bloodied and wild, telling tales of a two-headed wolf with eyes like the last embers of a fire. I had known this would come. Not the wolf but some…

“—and she said, well, that’s as may be, lad, but if you don’t recall what color it was, then I don’t see how I can help you!” Roars of laughter seemed to shake the hot taproom. via Pocket Beneath Ceaseless Skies | The Tragedy of Zayred the Splendid by Grace Seybold via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2Ahrmed

Years after their friendship had ended, Ser Maerwynn heard tales of the evil Queen Loreen: her curse of silence on the centaurs; her demand that each stone used to build the townspeople’s homes be paid for in daily drops of blood; and finally, the m… Beneath Ceaseless Skies | The Crow Knight by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2R1y7Xr

When the magistrate arrives in Immen, the first thing he does is summon Grandmother Seung, druidess of Yang Village Behind-the-Mountains, to ask for her magic potion. via Pocket Beneath Ceaseless Skies | Magic Potion Behind-the-Mountains by Jaymee Goh via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2ye1bUp

Like you, I grew up with the telling of the Tale of the Scout and the Pachydormu. That telling, on the night of first new moon of winter, marked my years between toddler and twelve like tree rings. via Pocket Beneath Ceaseless Skies | The Tale of the Scout and the Pachydormu by Gregory Norman Bossert via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2PtV7hp

A few days before the end of our world, my mother took me to her favorite tailor to be fit for a dress I would never wear. She swept through Amaurel’s opulent central gallery like a dragon made of merlot and diamond, her chin high, her tongue cavali… Beneath Ceaseless Skies | The Bodice, The Hem, The Woman, Death by Karen Osborne via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2CEq8eO