Nira and I are six when her eldest brother loses his way in the mist. Three days later his bones get home. An extra finger sprouts from the left hand, and the skull has no eye sockets. But his clothes dangle from the shoulder blades, and dry knuckles scratch at the door for two days before the King's men come.

I'm fed up with the world being divided up into the good guys and the bad guys. It just doesn't work for me. It's not a question of black hats and white hats; that's the movies.

In this episode of the Strange Horizons podcast, editor Anaea Lay presents Margaret Ronald's "The Witch's Knives."

Haeckel would be pleased—although / in his scheme there never was any such / things as mermaids.