Lucif turns to his friend Mi. “Let’s go.”

He is going home.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

The witch stared into the candlelight. The darkness and tempest outside would strengthen her spell, To Make Him Love You More. He wasn’t home yet, now was her chance to cast it.

Decided, the witch chanted.

From Guest Contributor Soleah Kenna Sadge

Soleah is a fantasy writer. You can learn more about her and her writings by visiting https://linktr.ee/sksadge

My footsteps echo on the road pavement in the still, cool morning. It is eerie being out on the quiet streets. I walk before people are awake; the darkness is my ally, helping conceal me. I stop and hide when I hear voices from an approaching patrol. Flattened against the side of a garage, I hold my breath as they pass, innocently chattering. I venture into the street after I can no longer hear them. The punishment for violating the lockdown order is severe. Never would I have believed my country would use military patrols to enforce a lockdown policy.

From Guest Contributor NT Franklin

NT Franklin has been published in Page and Spine, Fiction on the Web, 101 Words, Friday Flash Fiction, CafeLit, Madswirl, Postcard Shorts, 404 Words, Scarlet Leaf Review, Freedom Fiction, Burrst, Entropy, Alsina Publishing, Fifty-word stories, Dime Show Review, among others.

I see the demons you dance with; chanting in your ear, ripping you apart, gnawing upon your flesh—consuming you. Your nightmare has peeled my eyelids open. You say, “I’m a monster that can’t be revived. My carcass is a puppet to the demons that infect my soul: A hollow shell filled with darkness and decay.” I realize the words tangle on your tongue like the English Ivy on the stone walls that trap you inside. I know you’re shackled behind your sapphire orbs that peer upon my face.

Of my fate!

From Guest Contributor McKenzie A. Frey

They live presently. Now they tear the soft meat from the bone, now they hear the twang of resistant tendons. The vibration of it. A chorus of crows. Scudding wings of moths that search for the darkness just beyond. In the pit is hunger. We exist, hands pasted to rifle stocks, glimmering gunmetal eyes, rattle-boned. They know family born of teeth, defined by the low moans of their communes. Their tongues hang together. Our hands hang separately, our nails scratching our own stomachs, our thighs, our faces. But we are all hungry. We will all ooze the same black ichor.

From Guest Contributor Carrie Cook

Carrie received her MA in Creative Writing from Kansas State University and is currently living in Colorado. Her work has appeared in The Columbia Review, Midwestern Gothic, Menacing Hedge, and Bartleby Snopes.

Aviva Blonheim stepped onto the train with her parents. As the German soldier closed the door, he chortled. Aviva, only ten years old, didn’t understand why Herr Hitler hated the Jewish, and as she glanced at her people packed into herds, unkempt, smelling of sweat and urine, she became more frightened. She tightly clutched her mother’s hand.

As the poison gas entered Aviva, she grasped her throat and collapsed into darkness.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

“Are you going to die soon?”

He was in search of true love. His search wasn’t easy. He searched everywhere but never realised how close his love was to him. He had been looking for love at all the wrong places. His quest for love only got longer. He stayed up all night and dreamt all day. The sun went down. The night deepened and darkness hid everything. He thought what could be more mysterious than night when you have secrets to bury.

From Guest Contributor Sergio Nicolas

She surmises blood stains under everything. His skin is cracked like hard dirt in a barren winter. “You could use baby oil,” she says. Later, they share a half-gallon of chocolate chip ice cream, her treat. They always meet by the railroad tracks because of his love of trains and exit signs. He speaks in fragments, and she imagines his past is dammed up, full of unexplained absences. She wants to show him her breasts under the moonlight. She wants to hear him whistle so shrilly it will puncture the dark. Then, the darkness will erase the both of them.

From Guest Contributor Kyle Hemmings

A mere glimmer of light reflected off the patches of clammy wall not occupied by greasy lichen and water-laden moss as he hung awkwardly upside-down, blood rushing to his head.

A furious voice drifted down from above “If he doesn’t kiss the damn Blarney soon, I’m letting go!”

From Guest Contributor Perry McDaid

Still tired, I wake in the darkness. In the distance, I hear a train and the rumble of traffic. I strain for the sound of your soft breathing next to me. An aeroplane passes overhead, now I hear the humming of the refrigerator. Eyes closed, I can feel the heat of you an arm’s length away; just an arm’s length. I reach out to touch you; I hear the angry hiss. Still not forgiven. My heart turns to stone when I glimpse your fury through clenched fingers. Everything turns to stone, hard stone. Hard words echo in the night air.

From Guest Contributor David Rae