The oni blocked Mizumo’s path, looming larger than the strongest samurai, wearing a tiger-skin loin cloth. Muscles rippled under sky-blue skin. Three horns protruded from its forehead. Three-fingered hands covered its face. Elbows rested on knees wider than the length of the monk’s wakizashi blade. Mizumo fingered the sword’s pommel beneath his robes. The oni…
The red “59” flashed from the band on Kena’s wrist, the intensity of its color reflecting how urgent and precious each minute, each second, was. She had given everything for this time and yet, now that she stood here in the stillness and quiet, it felt undervalued. The cocktail of aromas—the earthy spice of the…
She could see the ones that had come before her, and after, that had perched in the chair in the waiting room of the auto dealer shop. They superimposed over her body like layers of frosting on a cake, a finger here, a curly bit of hair there. One tapped their hiking boot. One hummed…
“Speak your third wish, mortal, and let me die.” The voice of the djinn was a mountain falling over. David had picked this spot deep in the forest, a hundred miles from anywhere, so they wouldn’t be overheard. The ancient, wood-bound book cradled under his arm had been right about that, too. “Ah, ah, ah—”…
