‘Where’s Abel?’ my father asks. I’ve changed into his dead daughter’s clothes, dressed her carefully as if she were a porcelain doll, I have been wearing her face for my whole life, and yet he can tell us apart. ‘I’m Abel, dad.’ I respond. ‘Oh.’ That’s all he says. No questions about where I am. He doesn’t care, the thought […]
We live in the countryside, on the outskirts of a small town, surrounded by miles of fields and aspen trees. We supply the town’s market with our produce. Surprisingly, I’m in charge of taking care of the plants, the one thing I’m actually good at, not that I’m better than Abel, but farming and gardening would get in the way […]
Part Two. ‘You didn’t kill her, you were too late, but not by your own fault. Truth is, Lyre has been dead from the beginning. But there is still a way to save her, to bring her back, if you’re interested.’ A being greeted me when I turned around, not human, but not a spirit either, with eyes as dark […]
Part one Arista, a flower native to Briar, with cornflower blue petals during the day, that transformed into a vivid shade of Persian pink as the sun set. They only bloomed here, herbologists all over the world had tried growing them in other nations, but to no avail. They were so rare in fact, that they only grew in one […]
Prologue She never woke up. Briar, a nation of wilderness with fields of linseed blossoms dotted with mauve petals, where legends lived and bloomed from the branches of pomegranate trees. Creatures from every ocean, sky, and land came to Briar, in hope of making some extraordinary discovery. Shadows whispered that even standing near its borders could grant you your wildest […]
‘You should be dead.’ I know because I was the last person to leave your funeral. I was the one you last spoke to. I was the one who killed you with that stone. *** Do you know how hard it is to be a twin? You share everything with them: Everything you own, for everything is hers, your identity, […]
There was someone in my life once who gave me a bouquet of sunflowers, and I took care of them day and night. They were their favourite flowers, so much that they had a dried one stitched onto their hand, its petals weaved into their veins and the stem tied around their wrist, their own version of a lucky charm, […]
There’s an annual gameshow where I’m from: temporary monarchs, where the winners get to rule our nation for one year. Once their time is up, they can sign up to play and try winning again. Dear mirror and reflection, why am I telling you this? You live here, I’m sure you know how it works. You’ve lived here forever, and […]
I dipped my feet into the water as I waited. I couldn’t recognise myself, I looked monstrous, with shredded lips and a bleeding mouth. Your reflection appeared behind me and in a daze, almost reached in. I turned around to face you but something was wrong. You held onto a letter, twin to my own, and pressed it into my […]
The punishment for stealing something is the amputation of a hand, if not both. So it made sense that the punishment for having an affair was the loss of a tongue. ‘Oh hush.’ My mother said after it was done. ‘If you wanted to prevent this then you should have kept out of trouble.’ I wondered if she knew the […]