Rated R.
He stole her skin. Yes, that’s the one. He stole her skin, so he had her heart. Or her soul. The part of her that would have fought him otherwise.
Incense smoke drifted through the air in the apothecary like ribbons of kelp. The good doctor was brooding over an anatomy manual at his desk, reading by the light of his oil lamp. I summoned my courage, entered uninvited, and bowed deep.
“Teacher, I’ve come to resume my lessons.”
Doctor Zhao closed his book with a sigh. “Against your father’s wishes, Liren?”
“He didn’t forbid me from learning healing lore,” I corrected. As county magistrate, Father lauded the scholarly study of acupuncture and moxibustion. “He only disapproves of me practicing medicine.”
In our first 2017 metacast, we present the Escape Artists (EA) stories that ran in 2016 that are eligible in the upcoming nomination season.
PodCastle’s Award Eligible stories from 2016 are all listed below. Give the metacast a listen and visit our sister podcasts Escape Pod, Pseudopod, Cast of Wonders, and our sister magazine Mothership Zeta to check out their award eligible fiction too!
Originals
“The Wedding of Snow, Earth, and Salt” by Kate Heartfield
“In the Woods Behind My House” by Nicolette Barischoff
“The Color of Regret” by Carrie Patel
“Opals and Clay” by Nino Cipri
“Send in the Ninjas” by Michelle Ann King
“Territory” by Jae Steinbacher
“Beat Softly, My Wings of Steel” by Beth Cato
“Tumbleweeds and Little Girls” by Jeff Bowles
“Hands of Burnished Bronze” by Rebecca Schwarz
“For Honor, For Waste” by Setsu Uzume
“Responsibility Descending” by G. Scott Huggins
“Communion” by Jei D. Marcade
“Archibald Defeats the Churlish Shark-Gods” by Benjamin Blattberg
“James and Peter, Fishing” by Anaea Lay
“The Bee Tamer’s Final Performance” by Aidan Doyle
“Mirabilis” by Shannon Peavey
“Sweeter than Lead” Benjamin C. Kinney
“Madame Félidé Elopes” by by K. A. Teryna translated by Anatoly Belilovsky
“Wolfy Things” by Erin Roberts
“The Beautiful Bird Sits No Longer Singing in the Nest” by Kate Lechler
“How to Survive in Room 105” by T. Jane Berry
“The Ghost Years” by Nghi Vo
“Telling Stories” by Sandra M. Odell
“Gaps of Joy, and a Knot for Love” by S. B. Divya
“Green Girl” by Erica Ruppert
“Dragon Fancy” by Leigh Wallace
“The Seventh Year” by Alexandra Balasa
“Chatter the Teeth” by Kurt Hunt
“It’s a Wonderful Carol” by Heather Shaw and Tim Pratt
“Shaina Rubin Keeps Her Head Under Circumstances Nobody Could Have Expected” by Rebecca Fraimow
Reprints
“This Is Not a Wardrobe Door” by A. Merc Rustad, originally published at Fireside
“The Men from Narrow Houses” by A. C. Wise, originally published at Liminal Stories
“Braid of Days and Wake of Nights” by E. Lily Yu, originally published in Fantasy and Science Fiction
“Thundergod in Therapy” by Effie Seiberg, originally published in Galaxy’s Edge
“Lapis Lazuli” by Tania Fordwalker, originally in ASIM
“Girl in Blue Dress (1881)” by Sunil Patel, originally published in Fantastic Stories of the Imagination
“Squalor and Sympathy” by Matt Dovey, originally published in Writers of the Future Volume 32
“Love Letters on the Nightmare Sea” by Rachael K. Jones, originally published in Flash Fiction Online
“In Mixcoatl’s Net” by Charlie Allison
“The Rock in the Water” by Thoriya Dyer, originally published in PoC Destroy Fantasy
“Further Arguments in Support of Yudah Cohen’s Proposal to Bluma Zilberman” by Rebecca Fraimow, originally published in Diabolical Plots
For more links and information on butoh see here:
Sankai Juku – Clips from Umusuna.
Interview with Ushio Amagatsu (Artistic Director of Sankai Juku) and Theater Critic Tamotsu Watanabe
The closer I get to the island, the more of a dream Tokyo becomes. The obelisks of high glass, the polished people, their nails and shoes so clean. The neon canopies, the subtle dishes, the cab drivers with white gloves on their hands. I leave it behind on the train ride down. Down to the fishing town with its immaculate streets and kindly grandmother, who hosted me in her ryokan and made me a breakfast of rice and fish. Now the fish scatter before my boat, clean waves break against the hull, and the green island looms ahead, rising from the horizon like an old god.
The raven’s ghost follows first. It’s not a surprise, if I’m honest. I killed a raven once —intentional, cruel — some time ago. (I don’t remember why.) At first I saw it in the distance while I prowled the ruins of the once-majestic forest, hunting the men who robbed me. Yet the ghost never approached until now.
It perches on a petrified tree stump. The light from the campfire shimmers against its glossy feathers, blood etching razor-edged plumage. It should be indistinguishable in the night, banked in shadow. I only know it’s a ghost from the hollows of its missing eyes, how its shape bends in unnatural directions at the corners of my sight.
“I’ve naught for you.” I say it to the knives laid out on oiled canvas before me.
The raven’s ghost makes no sound. Its unnatural muteness tightens the muscles in my neck. Ghosts are never silent. Death is neither gentle nor kind.
Travel between the worlds is again possible—our submissions portal has appeared once more! It wants your best fantasy tales, so if you have a short story you’d like us to read, please take a look at our guidelines then visit our submissions portal to submit. We accept both original fiction and reprints under 6,000 words.
We’re looking forward to reading your work.
Best,
Khaalidah Muhammad-Ali and Jen R. Albert, PodCastle Co-Editors
and the editorial team
Rated PG
Uterine cancer, the doctor is saying, and the world ends. Stage Four. That means advanced. It means bad. Your arms and legs and throat go numb. All you can hear is his question, looping: when was your last exam? You can’t remember. Not that it matters now.
In cases like yours we require inpatient treatment. It may take anywhere from several months to. Static. To when? To forever. To death. You’ve never left the U.S. or finished Ulysses. You haven’t done enough of anything, really. You shove back the thoughts.
Rated PG-13
Soru Khara had been hunting her death for many years before she arrived at the crumbling old port of Tyron. She camouflaged her skimmer and stalked up to the rusty gates as the sun set over the citadel, the fishy tang of the sea sharp in her nostrils. The smell of childhood—the smell of things best left buried. It was why she usually avoided ports. This time, though, she had no choice. She was to deliver a letter, like a common messenger. She had not questioned the inanity of her assignment. One did not question the Voice of the Star Emperor; one merely obeyed it.
Rated PG
This story is the sequel to “Further Arguments in Support of Yudah Cohen’s Proposal to Bluma Zilberman,” which originally ran at Diabolical Plots and also ran on PodCastle.
People in our neighborhood are always saying what a pity it is that two such fine-looking people as my cousin Bluma and her husband have no children yet. I don’t see that they’re so fine-looking as all that. Still, I’ve often thought that if Bluma had a little bit more business of her own to worry about, she might have less time to waste getting into mine.
by Rebecca Fraimow
read by Richard Dansky
First published in Diabolical Plots. Read it here.
Rated PG.
Dear Bluma,
I heard that Hershel Schmulewitz, that blockhead, has also presumed to ask for your hand in marriage, which gives you two proposals to consider. Now, you needn’t worry that this will be a sentimental or a wheedling sort of letter. You already know how I feel, and I suppose Hershel’s not so much of a blockhead that he doesn’t feel the same way. I’m simply writing to lay out the reasons, plainly and concisely, why it would certainly be more to your benefit to marry me.