. . . an per oblationes sacrilegas infantes Dæmonibus offerentes poßit ipsa Hæresis augmentari . . . . . . whether these demons are able to abet their heretical powers through unholy oblations of children . . . —Malleus Malificarum (Witches’ Hammer, 1486) I was just home from school when a woman all in black nearly knocked me down. There was a stain on her […]
The man is sandwiched in a crowd by the turn leading into Egbunike street where Tega lives. “It is magic! My life changed when I discovered it.” The man’s voice is replete with vigour. His outfit bears a semblance to the original FENDI, unlike the labels masterfully sewn at Aba. His shoes catch the evening […]
Last time I slept I woke up naked and in the woods, amongst piles of bodies that I couldn’t determine were dead or alive. I didn’t bother to ask questions as to what had happened before my blackout. I didn’t bother to wake any other person up. I did, however, search through the woods in […]
Mandy finds the jar of baby teeth in her mother’s sock drawer, the week after she turns eleven. Daydreams about a frothy fairy with butter-blonde curls leaving coins under her pillow have long since evaporated; this is the first of many horse girl summers. The jar, white china with hand-painted blue flowers, is nestled between […]
We go by many names. But our most common name is Time Giver—though this is only half true. It has been fifty years since I finished his huà—painting—and fifty years since the village burnt down. With the survivors, I slaved to restore what I had ruined and vowed never to offer time or love again. […]
hear here are some of the things my nails can do: —push through the backs of the cockroaches that run around my room. They’re crunchy at first and then slip-smooth and soft inside. Their they’re fast but I’m faster —when I lie really still in the dark I can feel my heartbeat in my nails, […]
The first time Minna holds someone’s fortune in the palm of her hand it feels like a living, breathing thing trembling against her palm. As though she’s holding a small animal instead of a deck of cards. “I want to know if he likes me,” the girl sitting across from her says. “Can the cards […]
This is a work of the author’s imagination, an alchemy of memory and soul’s longing. Beth joined the turn-lefters, pulled off the highway, and found a park beneath a giant fig tree before the twins even registered. Then heads turned like open-mouthed clowns. Confusion; at last, the dawning. They’d been restless, constrained by seatbelts and […]
When you put the lighter to it, it spits and hisses on the spoon, gives off a sweetish, rank smell. Congeries of bubbles appear and from each as it bursts a tiny figure stretches and claws its way free; they writhe, leap upward like a salmon in pain, then collapse. There’s thousands of them upon […]
I Banji has been scamming for well over six months and he is not far from where he was when he began. His clients pay cheap money: two divorced women from Newton Abbot sent a fifty and a seventy pound itunes gift card, respectively; a fifty dollar card from a young woman who works in […]
