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The Faded BouquetChapter One The inkwell had not dried in nine days. Hua Zhou stared at the black pool, its surface trembling with a cold that had nothing to do with the summer heat pressing against the lattice windows of the archive room. He was thirty years old, a scribe of the Imperial Record, and his promotion depended on the completion of the winter solstice ledger by the first frost. The deadline was a...0 Comments 0 Shares 0 Views 0 Reviews
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The Wistful SilenceChapter One Mikhail Romano was thirty-four years old and his left knee had begun to lock in the damp, a mechanical failure that mirrored the concrete blocks of the detention center where he served. The building sat on the edge of the mangrove shore, a place of mud and crabs where the October grey did not lift but settled like a physical weight on the shoulders of the men inside. He wanted the...0 Comments 0 Shares 0 Views 0 Reviews
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The Pale FractureThe torch hisses against the molten gather, a bright, angry tongue licking the glass as you pull it from the glory hole. Your hand is steady, a habit of twenty years, but the heat is a physical weight, pressing against the back of your eyes. You are Elias, forty-two, a master glassblower in the high court of the Pale Fracture, and you are trying to forget the dream. In the dream, a mirror does...0 Comments 0 Shares 0 Views 0 Reviews
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The Pale ShadowsChapter One "Notice: All salt carriers must present their tolls to the Magistrate by dawn or forfeit their licenses." The ink was still wet on the parchment pinned to the oak post. Carl Barlow read it twice, his fingers numb from the cold that seeped through his wool coat. He was thirty years old, the revenuier of the salt roads, and for twelve years he had paid his toll in service to this...0 Comments 0 Shares 0 Views 0 Reviews
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The Faded ChronicleI Ignacio Robles sat on the cold stone steps of the town square, his hands stained black with oil and his breath misting in the thin air. It was the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, and the Great Bell that had stood over Oria for three centuries was gone, dismantled into a heap of bronze and iron that lay in the center of the cobblestones like a shed skin. He had done it himself,...0 Comments 0 Shares 0 Views 0 Reviews
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The Distant CrownThe notice was pinned to the damp stone of the lighthouse keeper’s hut, its ink faded by salt spray and time. It read: Deed of Honor, Unfulfilled. Claimant: Mona Saleh. Deadline: Dawn. I stood before the mirror-wall of the Eternal Court, the air thick with the taste of copper and old blood. I was thirty-two years old, and my hands, rough from twenty-three of the Tannery Steps, trembled as I...0 Comments 0 Shares 0 Views 0 Reviews
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The Pale BannerThe High Court of Aldenmere smelled of damp stone and old fear. Sir Kaelen Ashworth stood before the dais, his knees locking with a painful pop that sent a shock of arthritis up his spine. He was forty-five, a man whose body had become a ledger of debts paid in blood and rain. Across the marble floor, the King, a frail man of seventy wrapped in furs that did little to ward off the chill,...0 Comments 0 Shares 0 Views 0 Reviews
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The Distant LegendThe dampness in the basement of the old Parliament building did not smell of mold, but of wet iron and old paper, a scent that had settled into Arthur Vane’s lungs like a second, colder breath. He was thirty years old, a junior clerk in the Ministry of Works, and his hands were trembling as he held the leather-bound ledger he had pried from a loose brick in the wall. It was a Tuesday in...0 Comments 0 Shares 0 Views 0 Reviews
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The Distant WhispersThe external hard drive sat in my left hand, its casing warm from the friction of the USB port, while my right hand hovered over the keyboard, fingers stiff with the cold that seeped through the soles of my shoes. The St. Jude’s Asylum basement smelled of wet wool and old paper, a scent that had settled into my skin over the last three years of night shifts. I was forty-two, and I had two hours...0 Comments 0 Shares 0 Views 0 Reviews
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