I lifted the sword—and set it back down. Pursing my lips, I glared at the weapon, then picked it up again.
The clanking of blades drifting in from the courtyard beckoned to me. Taunted me. I clutched the hilt between my palms.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I visualized the exercises my father had drilled into me.
I can’t escape the song. It winds through the air in snatches, filling my head with memories. The melody cuts the half-healed wounds on my heart open again, but I deserve the pain.
I chase the elusive notes through the busy city streets, narrowly avoiding collisions with ladies carrying parasols, children wearing tiny sailor suits…
“With the beat, Master Quintin. With the beat.” The black-clad man paced in tandem with the metronome, his polished shoes clicking like talons on the marble floor.
I would have welcomed an ice pick to my skull over the abrasive tick, tick, tick dictating my every musical inclination. But my parents had made it clear that if I didn’t submit to…
I have never lived through a wilder time than the summer when the guys of Mount Rushmore—George, Abe, Tommy, and Teddy—decided to form a boy band. I worked in the visitor center, and as far as any of us knew, the boys had never heard pop music. Yet one night Abe started belting out
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I may look like the average Weimaraner, but I play a mean violin. I pick the strings, Scratch strums her zither, and Blizzard keeps time with his hooves. The sun sets on the horizon. Our animal band wraps up another day of jamming together in our overgrown, dilapidated cottage.
I sniff and…
Matt Caterpillar raised his guitar, looked out across the crowd at the Garbage Bowl, and heard crickets. And ants. And roaches, beetles, and myriad other insects—all cheering for him and his band.
As he strummed the opening chords of their new ear-worm hit, “Gimme Some Leaves,” he marveled at their
My fingers hover over the ivory keys, and I smell smoke. I don’t have to strike a note to hear a sound. But it’s not a clear, crisp middle C ringing in my ears—it’s screaming.
The memories flooding my mind haunt me more than any discordant melody ever could.
Yesterday, I declared war.
On a bugle.
0600. Time for “Reveille.” Our base commander, Wizard-General Lytton, won’t waste even the newest recruit mage on that duty. A simple spell makes the bugle perpetually hovering by the flagpole sound any required call at the proper time.
Until yesterday. Ten seconds into the silence
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“My Sam.” Aba strode in waving pieces of paper. “Look!”
I peered up from my desk. Being such a slow day, not a new case to be had, I longed for an excuse to stop shuffling papers and paying bills. My hubby was the best possible distraction. “What, love?” I stood up to kiss him,
“How does one communicate with a sea spirit?”
High-pitched shrieks continued to reverberate throughout the vessel as I dropped the question on the engineer. My crew and I stood with plugs in our ears, but our methods to keep ourselves sane were failing.
“You’re asking me, an acoustical engineer, if I know how to talk to an invisible force
Kai Zimer had a useless gift. People praised his voice as angelic, but what value did Merfolk have for a male siren? The two most popular career choices for Mermen were tending the coral farms or joining the military. But since he couldn’t even keep a shellplant alive for more than a week,
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She had always been imprisoned inside the stone walls of the tower. She did not know why. It was just how it was—the way it had always been. The darkness of the place was part of her now.
Her favorite place was the windowsill. She loved to sit with her back pressed
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