online short story roundup
The Battle of Candle Arc by Yoon Ha Lee
It was like the advice for learning the game of pattern-stones: the best way to get good was to play difficult opponents, over and over. The trouble with war was that practicing required people to die.
England under the White Witch by Theodora Goss
Harold doesn't hold with this new Empress, as she calls herself, Mrs. Stokes would tell my mother. Coming out of the north, saying she will restore us to greatness. She's established herself in Edinburgh, and they do say she will march on London. He says the King got us through the war, and that's good enough for us. And who believes a woman's promises anyway?
If The Mountain Comes by An Owomoyela
François and Papa were outside, discussing what to do if the water rose. I was in, scrubbing blood from the walls with a palmful of sand.
I, Row-Boat by Cory Doctorow
Robbie the Row-Boat’s great crisis of faith came when the coral reef woke up.
Unsilenced by Karalynn Lee
My lady empress, the courtiers and servants murmured when she passed them in the hallways, and they would make obeisance, but their eyes were full of bright hard smiles, and the echoes of their laughter would come to her once she turned the corner. They would give her an appellation soon, either the Ghost Empress or the Silent Empress. Veillen possessed the dry, utter certainty that more than her father’s memory remained, and it was his presence that still ruled here, as heavy as his jeweled crown.
Worth of Crows by Seth Dickinson
Death circles the tent. She sees the shadow of antlers, tangled like the grove beneath her study, in the towers she betrayed.
You cannot save him, Death whispers; not forever. But perhaps you can save yourself. Is that why you nurse him with the warmth of the souls of crows? So that you may save his life, and offer it to me? Will he be the payment for your debt?
Why have you come? she asks. Is there someone here for you to claim?
Death’s shadow moves as a stag against the watercolor shadows of the aurora. It does not answer.
It was like the advice for learning the game of pattern-stones: the best way to get good was to play difficult opponents, over and over. The trouble with war was that practicing required people to die.
England under the White Witch by Theodora Goss
Harold doesn't hold with this new Empress, as she calls herself, Mrs. Stokes would tell my mother. Coming out of the north, saying she will restore us to greatness. She's established herself in Edinburgh, and they do say she will march on London. He says the King got us through the war, and that's good enough for us. And who believes a woman's promises anyway?
If The Mountain Comes by An Owomoyela
François and Papa were outside, discussing what to do if the water rose. I was in, scrubbing blood from the walls with a palmful of sand.
I, Row-Boat by Cory Doctorow
Robbie the Row-Boat’s great crisis of faith came when the coral reef woke up.
Unsilenced by Karalynn Lee
My lady empress, the courtiers and servants murmured when she passed them in the hallways, and they would make obeisance, but their eyes were full of bright hard smiles, and the echoes of their laughter would come to her once she turned the corner. They would give her an appellation soon, either the Ghost Empress or the Silent Empress. Veillen possessed the dry, utter certainty that more than her father’s memory remained, and it was his presence that still ruled here, as heavy as his jeweled crown.
Worth of Crows by Seth Dickinson
Death circles the tent. She sees the shadow of antlers, tangled like the grove beneath her study, in the towers she betrayed.
You cannot save him, Death whispers; not forever. But perhaps you can save yourself. Is that why you nurse him with the warmth of the souls of crows? So that you may save his life, and offer it to me? Will he be the payment for your debt?
Why have you come? she asks. Is there someone here for you to claim?
Death’s shadow moves as a stag against the watercolor shadows of the aurora. It does not answer.