The Clockwork Heart
Lila’s fingers brushed the rusted hinge of the hidden door, and a whisper of oil and aged paper curled into the air. She’d found it—the workshop her father had vanished into three years ago. The lock snapped open with a…
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Read MoreThe Clockwork Heart
The Clockwork Heart
The first time Lila touched the gears, the air hummed like a trapped bird. She’d found them buried beneath the floorboards of her late grandfather’s workshop, hidden beneath layers of dust and decades of silence. The brass casing was cold…
The Clockwork Prophet
## The Clockwork Prophet The rain tasted of coal dust and regret. August in Warsaw clung thick, a humid blanket smothering the city’s limestone facades. I wiped my brow with a grimy glove, the oily residue smearing across skin already…
The Cartographer’s Bloom
## The Cartographer’s Bloom The desert wind tasted of grit and sun-baked stone, a familiar sting against my lips. I squinted at the shimmering horizon, dust devils dancing like restless spirits across the ochre expanse. This wasn’t just any desert;…
The Bloom & the Gear
## The Bloom & the Gear The rain smelled of wet earth and something else—something sharp, metallic. Elara clutched her threadbare shawl tighter as she hurried down Willow Creek’s main street, the damp clinging to her like a second skin.…
The Cartographer’s Echo
## The Cartographer’s Echo Dust motes danced in the violet shafts slicing through Old Man Tiber’s workshop. The light, fractured seven ways over Aestinwy’s sun prisms, tasted like ozone and regret. I ran a thumb across the vellum stretched taut…
The Static Between Stars
## The Static Between Stars The chipped Formica of the diner booth felt cold under Leo Klein’s elbows. July 19th, 1985. Cologne tasted like weak coffee and regret. Rain hammered against the plate glass window, blurring Alfredstrasse into streaks of…
The Search for the Sunstone Scale
The rain tasted like metal and salt, slick on Elisse’s skin. It hammered against the corrugated iron roofs of Ossa Bay’s marketplace, a rhythmic percussion that blended with the creak of wooden carts and the guttural calls of merchants hawking…