A Long Tango Across A Canopy of Whispering Leaves

By Anita Harris Satkunananthan

The return of the last Festival King was not mere rumour.

Half a dozen heralds from Marip preceded his return, with a new summons from the Steward. Dusk-skinned youth dressed in flowers and skin-tight, fluorescent-blue breeches had read the proclamations from east to west. The Steward was returning the last Festival King. A new Festival King would be crowned at the duels. In the summons were also the names of four hopefuls, chosen from amongst the descendants of former Kings.

Melur’s name had been listed as one of the candidates. It was not a surprise to Melur who had been sleeping within the weave of the forests’ consciousness for twenty-five years since the disappearance of her lover. For those years, the Festival had been Kingless. It was a gap that was unprecedented for the Mykologosia. There had been Festivals for as long as there had been humans inhabiting the sentient mushroom dwellings, and there had always been Kings. But now, there was to be another duel. And if Melur was chosen, she would be the one duelling her lover, as they had both promised each other that night. (Continue Reading…)

Waterways

by Diana Dima

When his father died and left him the boat, he thought to himself, I can do it. I’m a boat-son, a boat-man, I’m no longer a child and no longer have to go home at sunset, when mother and sisters gather around the table and talk about the will and the debts. In the will his father had written to my son, who may yet feel at home on the water. So David spent days in the yard, scrubbing and polishing and waxing, and often fell asleep under the boat tarp in the cool May night.

When he left, he did look back at the hunched house and the village, faint as a smear of dirt on the green and the blue. He did feel a pang of guilt deep under the ribs. But mostly he was driven like a powerboat, like a steering wheel under his father’s hand. So he steered toward the northern shores where they used to go fishing for pike and drop anchor for the night in quiet coves. (Continue Reading…)

The Magnolia Returns

By Eden Royce

The Magnolia blooms out of nowhere at any time of year it chooses, bringing its dilapidated wooden slats and rickety front steps to a neighborhood that somehow believes it has always been there. The butcher shop itself is well-worn, looking like it has seen better days: peeling seafoam green paint on salt-blasted boards, the once-vivid red front door now a faded smear like lipstick after an ardent lover’s attention.

Once it arrives, the locals begin to talk about visiting. They have always talked of the things they miss in life, and more often than not, it’s the food, the ingredients. Depending on when and where the Magnolia appears, either the supermarkets don’t stock the items the locals crave — the chicken feet, the pig tails, jowl, and ear — or these once-reviled parts of the animal have become so popular with the wealthy, it’s impossible for the poor to attain them. (Continue Reading…)

Vedritsa of the River

by Adriana Kantcheva

The Kamchia river had grown turgid after a storm. I surfaced from my habitual pool and bent over the young girl as she lay washed on the bank, her limbs cold and pale as the settling twilight. A small tin boat lay near her half-opened hand — the reason she took a tumble into my river.

I paused.

Yes, though weak, a current flowed beneath the child’s skin; her heart still worked. I placed a palm on her chest.

The river water in the girl’s lungs had no choice but to obey me. I willed it out, and it obliged in a single great spurt. As if she had waited for just that, the girl’s eyes flew open, her hand clamping around my wrist with desperate strength. Her grip tightened while she coughed and choked to take that first breath. She finally managed, yet still she held onto me, her eyes — ah, those eyes the color of storm clouds — taking in my long, green hair, my crown of living dragonflies, my gown of moss and lilies. We stared at each other for an eternity. (Continue Reading…)

Mycelium

by Beth Goder

I only travel to the golden head when the dragonflies are in season. It’s Piack and me this year, rafting up the river past the lilies and arched trees. While I steer us through the river’s gentle snarls, he sings about lost keys to pass the time — he’s always had a thing about lost keys and the doors they’ll never open, the places we’ll never find.

“Are you going to eat what the head gives you?” asks Piack. He’s one year older than I am — nineteen. With the sun behind him, his form swims in light.

The dragonflies buzz around us, brush their wings against our faces.

Piack’s scent is like apples after harvest, and the soft smell of bark, and some deeper, stranger thing. The first time I saw him, he was running through flax fields for the joy of it. I dropped my basket to join him, feet smashing through fallen stems. We were two wild children, stomping across logs, burrowing into fleecy snow, cracking open walnuts like badgers and scuffling through the shells. That feels like so long ago, now.

He brushes dragonflies from my cheek, and as he cups his hand, it looks as if he’s catching the setting sun. (Continue Reading…)

Maintenance Phase

by A.D. Ellicott

Mary woke in an unfamiliar bed, gasping for breath.

She recalled the shots, the dancing, the giggling stumble into a stranger’s apartment while they pulled off each other’s dresses. Her internal organs felt cramped up together, as though they were rats fighting for scarce space in the sewers. Her plan was to sneak home later in the night and return to her own form, but instead she’d slept shifted. She groaned and smacked her hand over her eyes.

“She wakes!” someone yelled from outside the open bedroom door. Her bedmate from last night walked in, red hair in a messy bun and spatula held aloft. “Want pancakes?” (Continue Reading…)

The House, the Witch, and Sugarcane Stalks

by Amanda Helms

The house wakes from its somnolence as the witch trudges up the path made of tarts. Through its rock-candy windows, the house scans her figure for any signs of hurt. The witch’s errands in the city make her nervous. And the house, being made of her magic and therefore of the witch, worries along with her that the wrong person might recognize her, or simply think they do. “They say Creoles all look alike,” she’s said, bitter.

It astounds the house, that the witch could be mistaken for any other but herself. That someone could fail to identify her tightly coiling black hair, her agate eyes, her russet skin as the witch’s, and the witch’s alone. (Continue Reading…)

On the Shoulders of Giants

by Charles Chin

I was born a T12. Sure, it was the lowest of the thoracic vertebrae, but it was higher than any of the lumbars. I should be thankful to have been born high enough to see above the clouds. The L2s and L3s that climb beside me spent most of their youth in the haze below, unable to see the sun, not knowing how much more of the giant there was left to climb. But not me: fortunate me.

I grasp at rocky outcroppings and pull myself up the well worn stairs, carved into the ground by those who came before me. Moss hangs from the edges where feet avoid stepping, lest they slip down into the endless void of white below. The wall to my left rises as a sheer cliff of granite, or perhaps marble. It is difficult to know from the amount of lichen and foliage that hang down like curtains. But through the small holes cleaned out by the hands of travelers before, I can sometimes see the glint of the giant who breathes underneath. (Continue Reading…)