Archive for Rated PG-13

PodCastle logo

PodCastle Miniature 89: Lapis Lazuli

Show Notes

PG-13


by Tania Fordwalker

read by Khaalidah Muhammad-Ali

 

In Sesara, only the rich wear bright colours. My knight shines in the armour I buff for him nightly, glossy as a jewel. My clothes and skin are the colours of the earth. We stand together with two days of desert at our backs and a forest of black thorns before us. My heart is a bird in my chest.

I was twelve when the slave traders came from the ocean and stole me away. To the Sesarans we Arn all look the same. I was always tall and strong. An unscrupulous trader shaved my head and sold me as a boy to fetch a higher price, and I live as a boy still, because it is better than what waits for me as an Arn girl in this country.

(Continue Reading…)

PodCastle logo

PodCastle 427: Squalor and Sympathy

Show Notes

Rated PG-13


Squalor and Sympathy

by Matt Dovey

Anna concentrated on the cold, on the freezing water around her feet and the bruising sensation in her toes. So cold. So cold. So cold, she thought. A prickling warmth like pins and needles crackled inside her feet. It coursed through her body to her clenched hands and into the lead alloy handles of the cotton loom. Each thought of cold! kindled a fresh surge of heat inside and pushed the shuttle across the weave in a new burst of power. Anna’s unfocused eyes rested on the woven cotton feeding out of the back of the machine. It looks so warm.

(Continue Reading…)

PodCastle logo

PodCastle 425: Flash Fiction Extravaganza! Transformations

Show Notes

Rated PG-13


“Girl in Blue Dress (1881)” by Sunil Patel.
Read by Khaalidah Muhammad-Ali.

First appeared in Fantastic Stories of the Imagination.

Her dress is composed of blues from ultramarine to cerulean, a cascade of hues resolving into one. She stands askew, her expression unreadable, her mouth a blur. The colors in her dress have not faded but her name has. He asked for it, once, but he did not write it down.

Click here to continue reading.


“Mirabilis” by  Shannon Peavey.
Read by Jen R. Albert.

A PodCastle original!

No one’s really seen a girl turn to glass. It’s one of those things journalists make up when they’re bored, like the knockout game or the Russian heroin that rots your skin. They show these pictures of sick-pretty starving girls on the evening news, girls with slatted ribs and fierce eyes, and my mama clicks her tongue and I change the channel.

Meanwhile, Zola eats none of her peas.

Click here to continue reading.


“Portrait of My Wife as a Boat” by Samantha Murray
Read by Graeme Dunlop.

First appeared in Flash Fiction Online.

She smells of linseed, of citrus, the oil that she rubs into all of the little tiny cracks in her face. When she leaves she kisses me and I taste the sea.

Click here to continue reading.

 

PodCastle logo

PodCastle 423: The Gold Silkworm

Show Notes

Rated PG-13


The Gold Silkworm

by Tony Pi

When I first became keeper of the Spirit of Grass, she and I made a pact to never turn away one in need, whether they be rich or poor. Madame Ke was one of the rich.

She had heard of my skills in medicine from her sister, and asked if I would come to the Garden of Timely Rains. I accepted the invitation and arrived in the early afternoon, when the high sun gave glow to the garden pond and terraces. A servant escorted me to the Pavilion for Tasting Autumn Pears where a woman in her thirties awaited me.

(Continue Reading…)

PodCastle logo

PodCastle 420: The Bee Tamer’s Final Performance

Show Notes

Rated PG-13


The Bee Tamer’s Final Performance

by Aidan Doyle

After my attempt to escape the circus fleet fails, the clowns imprison me in the hold of the asylum ship, along with the other performers who believe they aren’t real.

My legs are shackled, and I sit next to a slug juggler and a fortune caller. The slug juggler’s hands move in an unceasing blur as he keeps half a dozen painted sea slugs spinning in a swirl of impossible reds and midnight sea blues.

(Continue Reading…)

PodCastle logo

PodCastle 419: Giants at the End of the World

Show Notes

Rated PG-13


Giants at the End of the World

by Leena Likitalo

It was the last caravan of the giant season. Though the United Company had already started to build the railroad toward the End of the World, the path of iron and wood reached only as far as Halvington. Unlike the other drivers, I realized that the era of salt wagons was coming to an end.

(Continue Reading…)

PodCastle logo

PodCastle 418: James and Peter, Fishing

Show Notes

Rated PG-13


James and Peter, Fishing

by Anaea Lay

James’s boots clanked against the dock planks as he strode out over the water. It was a quiet morning, the sun just breaking over the horizon, the water lapping gently against the dock supports. The loudest noises were the creaks of his ship shifting slightly in the gentle breeze. James took a deep breath, smelling salt and fish, and reminded himself that this was another morning in hell.

He settled down on the end of the dock, his tackle box to one side, his pail to the other. His prosthetic glinted in the morning light as he readied his fishing rod and selected his favorite lure. As he cast off, he spotted Peter at the horizon, late as usual.

(Continue Reading…)

PodCastle logo

PodCastle 416: Braid of Days and Wake of Nights

Show Notes

 

Rated PG-13

 


Braid of Days and Wake of Nights

by E. Lily Yu

With an immaculate thumbnail, Julia peeled open the ziplock bag in her lap. The coil of hair inside, wide as her thumb and nine feet long, was woven throughout with black and gold strands in equal proportion. When Vivian began chemo last May, her hair had skimmed the lower edge of her scapulae. Three weeks later, her purple stripes had rinsed to blonde, and she had not dyed them again. Vivian had smiled at Julia in the bathroom mirror, eyebrows high and brave, but after the first handful slithered to the floor, she handed the humming razor to Julia and covered her eyes.

“You do it,” she said.

PodCastle logo

PodCastle 414: The Men from Narrow Houses

Show Notes

Rated PG-13


The Men from Narrow Houses

by A. C. Wise

The men from narrow houses have smiles like melon rinds, white slices of apple, the sliver of the moon before it disappears. Their clothes smell like earth, and their eyes shine like old coins – copper, silver, and gold. As the wedding draws closer, Gabby begins to see them during the day. They pluck at her with long fingers, like a hard wind worrying at her clothes. They slide around her in subway cars on her way to work; they ride behind her on the elevator on her way to the fifth floor; they lean over her shoulder as she studies spreadsheets on her computer; they dangle their legs over her cubicle wall. They are like reflections on water, always whispering, Tell us, love, tell us everything you’ve seen. You’ve been gone for so long.

PodCastle logo

PodCastle 412: For Honor, For Waste


For Honor, For Waste

by Setsu Uzume

Rohnaq tried to rejoin her unit; but only shoved forward by inches, crushed by the crowd. They walked upward en masse, tier by tier, to the palace. One woman slipped a brown hand over her children’s shoulders to pull them out of Rohnaq’s way. Sweat-scent, sea salt, sour incense, and camphor dogged her all the way to the plaza. Wheat barons and merchant ship captains, cobblers, and beggars. All hoping to conclude old business and hear whether or not their prayers would be answered, and at what cost. Last cycle, Manaph ignored the new siege engine offered to her, and took the engineer’s life. Malajine’s army conquered three of their neighbors in exchange. Rohnaq had been proud of those campaigns, once. Now, they only reminded her of dear friends, lost in the name of service. Rohnaq didn’t dare to ask for a blessing.

A city blessed, every cycle. One life destroyed, every cycle.