Visiting Hours
“You’re late,” Miriam said. “I’m not late. I’m exactly on time.” “The clock says 4:04.” “Your clock is fast. It’s always been fast. I told you to fix it in…
The Orientation
This short vignette takes place in the Stacks, the largest unlicensed Haven in Vesper, located in Driftwood. “So the first thing you need to know,” Danuta says, lighting a cigarette…
The Buddhist
The chalice was the last thing to put away. Father Mihail dried it with the cotton cloth he kept folded in his cassock pocket. The same cloth, the same pocket,…
Three Days
Luca Severan’s network is missing a report. One absence among seventy-three. It shouldn’t matter. But Severan didn’t build his career by ignoring small irregularities — and this one is pulling…
The Boat
The apartment smelled like his father. Tobacco and stone dust and the sourness of a window left cracked through winter. Dimitri stood in the doorway with his suitcase in one…
The Christening
The gown needed pressing. Vivian held it up to the light in the conservatory, turning it slowly, checking the lace at the hem. Eighty years old. Handmade Brussels lace, Irish…
The Collector
Madame ate the cricket headfirst. She always did. The forelegs came up — two green hooks, very fast, very exact — and took the cricket behind the thorax where the wings…
The Box
The shop didn’t look like anything. Wedged between a tailor and a phone repair stall on the eastern edge of Market Square, it had no sign, no display window, no…
The Piano Teacher
The metronome was off by two beats per minute. Agnes had suspected it for a week. She’d tested it against the clock in the kitchen — the one Werner had…