The note pinned to her swaddling blanket said, “Books can raise her better than I ever could.”

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But it’s not just all punchlines and bruises.

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Naia was sure there was some kind of trap hidden in this peaceful looking field of cartoonishly perfect mushrooms–little red and green-blue toadstools with white spots, lovely frilled gills, and jaunty stalks. Their tops glittered suspiciously with golden dew in the early morning light.

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The eyebrow stayed raised while she stared at him, letting his question hang unanswered in the air between them.

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It’s not hard to get used to the dark. In the beginning, your eyes miss the light, but no darkness is perfect. It took three days before I acclimated to the absence of light, and in that time, another child was taken.

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By the time her brain caught up with her body, she was already in motion and momentum had taken hold.

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She remained still and silent until the sun rose over the lip of the valley and made all the ghost apples glitter like stars in the light.

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They measured their hope in brittle silences, shattered to pieces by the tolling of the bell.

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There’s a special word for the murder of a king. Even their deaths must be held to a different esteem, though in the end, they rot just like everyone else.

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He brewed a honeysuckle mead that tasted like sunshine and green grass and languid afternoons. He made an apple cider that made you think of bonfire smoke and falling leaves.

When the weather changes to fall, I start thinking about all the foods I’ve been missing all summer. Plus I was hungry when I wrote it, so the flash piece this morning was very, very food-centric.

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