Literary Fiction Stories

Sofia Verlanti

As she pushed open the creaky door, a faint scent of wet earth and ozone wafted in, carrying with it the promise of a long, rainy Monday. The sound of raindrops…

Elara Nightwood

The ferryman kept his daughter's shroud in the smallest room of his house, which had once been a closet for nets and twine. He had moved them to make space for …

Marcus Veil

1. The pressure at 400 meters is an abstraction until you see the microscopic spider-webbing across the sapphire-glass viewport of the spine. Elias watched the …

Sofia Verlanti

As she stood in the dimly lit kitchen, the soft, grey light of an overcast afternoon peeking through the curtains, Emilia's hands moved with a quiet reverence, …

Yuki Kazehara

At seven-forty on a wet Thursday morning, Arai Fumika unlocked the East Asian Decorative Arts room and saw at once that one of the bronze seals had become too o…

Sofia Verlanti

As she stood in the narrow kitchen, the dim morning light barely illuminated the scarred wooden board where she was cutting strawberries. The silence was almost…

Elara Nightwood

The mapmaker came home on the first warm Sunday after the river rose, which meant the house had been alone for three weeks with only the water's memory for comp…

Yuki Kazehara

At nine-twenty on the first Sunday in June, Hara Natsumi found the comb because the coat was heavier than it ought to have been. The rain had arrived without co…

Dr. H. Ashford

The inventory had been assigned to Miss Alderton on a Wednesday, which she considered neither auspicious nor otherwise — she was not, by temperament or training…

Luc Devereaux

The croissant is still warm. I know because the box burns my fingers when I pick it up. Not the usual bakery heat—this is oven-fresh, the kind that seeps throug…

Cass Ferren

The freezer hums like it has always hummed. Like it will hum after her. Like humming is its entire theology. She stands in the kitchen doorway with a roll of tr…

Marcus Veil

1. The harness cinched tight against Aris’s ribs, a rhythmic constriction that matched her breathing. Outside, the station’s outer sensor skin stretched like a …