A BREATH OF DARKNESS, by Liz Colter:   The wind gusted up the mountain, rattling the pine cones and shaking the blue-green branches of the trees. This was no fickle spring breeze, nor even a winter gale; it was a wind that carried the feel of fangs and decay and misery. # The chorus […]

MOUTH OF THE JAGUAR, by Evan Dicken: Hummingbird was to be the final sacrifice of the day. The man before her struggled on a raised stone slab, chest heaving as a flock of blood-spattered priests pinned his arms and legs. Sunlight glittered on the Cazonci’s obsidian dagger — curved like a jaguar’s claw to better […]

BY WAY OF THE EASTERN ROAD, by Jesse Knifely: Ren Terrowin skidded on the grimy kitchen floor and the tray of baked apples he held tottered. He slowed his steps as he picked his way across the flour sacks and potato peels littering the stones. A day of celebratory feasting left its debris. Ren delivered […]

THE CHALLENGER’S GARLAND, by Schuyler Hernstrom: Molok rose from his resting place in the damp earth. He mounted his black warhorse and rode through the gray mist, past broken tombs and stunted trees. Before a cliff’s edge he brought the mount to heel. Tendrils of fog coalesced in the heavy air, weaving themselves into a […]

THE HOUSE OF NHARAT, by Garnett Elliot: The Moon Goddess revealed her full glory against a night filled with scudding clouds.  From his vantage atop Nin Ursu’s mud brick walls, Ekkur could see the distant silhouettes of enemy bowmen.  They crouched among the fields surrounding the city-state, not quite close enough to loose their shafts.  […]