The artisan hesitates, about to turn the page of the sketchbook given to her by, she is realizing, the most important client she might ever have. “Not alone,” she says, and her own honesty surprises her. “Most of the design, what you’re asking, it’s…

via Pocket

The convoy appeared in a cloud of dust against the Martian dawn atop the eastern hills. Sister Hecuba had just connected the catheter to its port over her right breast. via Pocket

The Dark Lord Mogrash descended to his deepest basement, below the lower dungeons, below the magma reactors, below the well-warded and unquiet family crypts. via Pocket

He says: You’re cold as clay this morning. Where are your socks? Your toes are cold as the silver snout of Old Catch, darling. Coffee’s brewed. Old Catch: A trickster figure, not quite the Devil. Sometimes a psychopomp. One of his common mischiefs i…

A silk merchant travelling through heavy rain in his wagon offers a lift to a black-clad man named Erroi. He accepts, and after they travel together for some time longer, their road is blocked by a fallen tree. This diversion has been caused by two …

CONTENT WARNING: “The gothic is at heart a romance between a girl and a house.” – Jo Walton “Of course it's not like that these days,” she said, and twitched the velvet curtain shut. “Between men and women.” I had fully understood. via Pocket

Matthias browses through his library of worlds. In one of them, a little girl named Sophie is shivering on her bed, her arms wrapped around a teddy bear. It is night. She is six years old. She is crying, as quietly as she can. via Pocket

I should tell you about the gods, yes? Good setting for it. Here in the desert, hunger and thirst sharpen the soul.

I should tell you about the gods, yes? Good setting for it. Here in the desert, hunger and thirst sharpen the soul. Sharpens it enough to poke right through the side of your mind to let in the second sight. via Pocket via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io

Osnat went back to talk to the dybbuk again.

Osnat went back to talk to the dybbuk again. Usually she liked walking up from the subway station, so close the pulsating holiness of 770. Different though Osnat’s own traditions were, the pull of the Lubavitch synagogue was impossible to ignore. vi… via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Strange Horizons - Whom My Soul Loves By Rivqa Rafael via Instapaper https://ift.tt/33XByFb

I don’t exit this world; it’s the only way I sleep. One of two boys in the darkness, hanging our feet off the ledge, staring at nothing.

That’s his name. That might be him, so I may as well say it. I know he promised, and I promised, that we’d only come here together. That in this place, we’d never have to be alone. But she’s right, if that’s him, maybe nothing’s broken. via Pocket via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Strange Horizons - Promise Me This Is Ours By Omar William Sow, Art by Sarah Gonzales via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2MZN5fV

Two in the morning in the booth of an all-night diner a block off Santa Monica Boulevard, and I was trying to convince the Great Mandini to tell me his secrets.

Two in the morning in the booth of an all-night diner a block off Santa Monica Boulevard, and I was trying to convince the Great Mandini to tell me his secrets. via Pocket via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Strange Horizons - The Great Mandini and the Dead Man's Hand By Kevin Wabaunsee via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2VDW3nc

Aboard the ghost ship Nine Lives there are the living, the dead, and a great many cats.

Aboard the ghost ship Nine Lives there are the living, the dead, and a great many cats. And Jourdain, who likes to sleep in the observation nest, body caught somewhere between ship and stars—between everything. via Pocket via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Strange Horizons - The Sloppy Mathematics of Half-Ghosts By Charles Payseur via Instapaper https://ift.tt/30RPfDu

When that summer ended, Brazilians felt nothing but joy.

When that summer ended, Brazilians felt nothing but joy. Flying cars were finally here, and as nobody could afford one, they happily rented them, in the colours of their favourite brands. The flying cars drove themselves; pedestrians now had the str… via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io

As a noun, ajé meant energy, sorcery, power. But to its adepts, it had always meant me, we, us, a way of wishing others well.

On a scalding morning of 1983, father and son walked side by side. They were similar in many ways—light olive skin, mousy hair, a thin nose—but only the father wore glasses, carrying a heavy binder under his arm. “If there’s something your old man c… via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io

There goes another neguinho from Glicério messing with drugs, babbled a neighbor to anyone who wanted to listen, at any square in Baixada. Kids playing soccer, drunkards inebriated with beer and laughter, guys in flatbills getting high in unseen cor…

He promised he’d keep his heart, but circumstances have changed.

He promised he’d keep his heart, but circumstances have changed. via Pocket via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io