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…

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 …

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…

Long shadows skittered before us, cast by a newly risen sun. Kayta and I loped across burnt desert; tracked the wind-eroded dusty treads of uncounted pilgrims, Covenant youth, warriors. Evaded what few sentries patrolled the perimeter. Empty sky, em…

Flotilla Laputa rises and falls with the currents of the wind. The gasbags in their hundreds above that hold Flotilla aloft kiss the cumulus clouds. The ships and barges and broken hulls that comprise the Laputa creak at the strain. via Pocket

Beneath Ceaseless Skies - Old No-Eyes by Christopher Mahon via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2KMk1W7

Beneath Ceaseless Skies - A Legacy of Shadows by Christopher M. Cevasco via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2MaM9HZ

Grandma’s root cellar looks like a barrow in the gloaming: door facing north, yawning wide beneath the hill. Lintel so low it makes me crouch, threshold so high it makes me stumble. You might have laughed at that if you could see me, brother. I wish…

Her tea shook, and she wondered if at the other end, looking down into his own teacup or water glass or wine goblet, he would see his image of her rippling. “I am a mage.” So was this man, of course, this so-called Magister Lie. The first thoughtsen…

Perrin took a bride in the dark midwinter. With any other sculptor of his talent, the wedding would have rivaled that of the Count de Roche-Sur-Terre, held the week before. But Perrin chose his wife at dusk, swept her off to a priest by moonlight, a…

“It’s your wish,” Amarine said, moving the dandelion puff closer. “I picked this for you. So please, say it. And when you do, we’ll watch the seeds scatter into the swamp like stars.” And then the wish will come true was implied. via Pocket

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…

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…

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

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…

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…

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…

“...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’…

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 …

A pounding at the door chased away the need for words. Cyra's face lost its brief malaise and found the fear it had held a week prior. Adia put a finger to her lips. She led the girl to the cupboard across the room. She whispered for her to be strong. To be brave. And to keep silent. Then she hid her away in shadow.

Leu wiped the plate clean—his eyes on the pot—and then, swiftly, like a bird plunging into water, scooped the egg free with a slotted spoon. From the spice pouch around his neck he took a pinch of Fera sea salt to bring out the flavor. (I always slow my hand as I lower the last flake of salt, to draw out the moment, to make the diners lean forward. When you recreate this dish, you must think how you wish to present your egg, what part of the war you wish this dish to tell.)

She pumps her legs harder, lifts higher. Slapping back. Strike, strike, strike. She cannot slow. She must not sink, stone-skipping on webbed feet. On and on and ever on. Her arms burn with the effort of carrying her child.

Colton had never seen grains project random memories like this. It was almost as if something had shattered the collective consciousness of the tiny machines on this land, forcing them to communicate without thought or reason.

At every opportunity, I asked a variation on the question that haunted me: what would happen to my village if Kirren died before I returned? If we weren't special, why didn't they teach more of us, so there would be no risk of my family starving? They never answered.

Old Iris laughed. “Of course not, boy. I take only the bodies of those fish who offer themselves to my beak. But the world is too big now, and too hungry for light. More wanting out there than there are gifts to be given. For that, it will fall.”

"This isn't your choice," said Jade. "You're dead." She and Dominic glared at each other over the stale pond, as if they were arguing over a simple thing like dirty dishes, like they used to when Dominic was a man of flesh and blood. A pang of grief and longing welled up unexpectedly in Jade's chest, but she pushed it down, away. Focused on keeping her pistol steady instead.

Ada shook her head, staring once more at the Thames. "I do not think what I had in mind will work. The size of the wing, if it is to be large enough to lift me—my body cannot possibly generate enough force to move it. Not with the speed required." Especially not when she kept growing. Every inch meant more weight for the wings to lift, without a commensurate gain in strength.

The fire inside Shams was turning, filling him with a bursting hot hunger, and he would have gulped down every leaf and every tree, the stones and earth, the home and the hill and world for his want of her. “Stay,” he said, and the low branches blackened and curled by his breath. “Stay. Stay. Stay.” She sat with him, sweating but unmoved, and she let him hold her and she let him kiss her, and no more. His hunger remained inside.

She sang those lines with a fierce, forlorn glee. The ballads took her that way, wherever they would, be they sad or glad. It was that blinding, unearthly intensity in her singing, her ability to sway thoughts and glances, that was the reason the townfolk looked sideways and crossed themselves or made the old warding signs. Part of the reason.