Death came with the dawn. We’d shot down all the birds for miles, so it was silent when the two janissaries stormed into my yurt. They bound me with a leather strap, pulled a sack over my head, and marched me through the bog. The stench of breakfast and blood wafted in the morning breeze…
Extinction. Fractures within fractures, breaking the whole. A river dilutes into streams that lead into an ocean. Salt and seaweed muddle the sweet water, erasing its purity. A firm root and a tall stem decay into wispy branches, and then— “My dear, you haven’t touched your eggplant soup.” Tamaz’s butter-oil voice broke my anxious thoughts….
The sand tribes claim that a jinn with eleven fiery horns, born before time began its flow, climbed a ring in the seventh heaven and — overcome by some mysterious, primordial rage — hurled a thousand and one pearls at the earth. A thousand of those pearls burned as they surged toward the ground, becoming…
It was said the waters of the High Holy Sea flowed through the Archangel and fell upon the world from heaven. It was said that baptism in the water rebirthed a soul, cleansing it of sin and darkness. The priests never said how cold the water was or how it tasted like rust. It was…
You don’t refuse a summons from the Shadow of God, even if you’re a veteran of twenty battles, with a body count longer than a sheikh’s beard. I’d left my anvil weeks ago and journeyed by carriage to Kostany, the Seat of the King of Kings. Finally through the gate, I recoiled at the fishy…