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PodCastle 968: TALES FROM THE VAULTS: Candied Sweets, Cornbread, and Black-Eyed Peas

Previously ran as episode 555 and first published in Sword & Sonnet

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 45:30 — 63.0MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG-13

Candied Sweets, Cornbread, and Black-eyed Peas

By Malon Edwards

No one wanted to come out of their houses. Not at first.

They could see my father’s blood soaking the cobblestones. They could see it dripping from the machete in my hand. They didn’t want to come bab pou bab — face-to-face — with Gran Dyab La, the wicked little girl who had just disemboweled her own father.

I wouldn’t either, if I were them.
(Vrèman vre, I’m not really the Great Devil Child. Se pou tout bon wi. If I’m lyin’, I’m dyin’. I just swing my machete like her.)

These people knew that. I had lived on Oglesby Avenue next to them for the last three years, since I was eight years old. Since Papa and I followed Manmi here to La Petite de Haïti in Chicago. Since Papa and I no longer called La Petite de Haïti in Miami home.

I had been nothing but kind to them. I had been nothing but polite to them. I had been nothing but respectful to them. My mama raised me right.

But even that didn’t make them come out of their houses.

I could understand if Papa had been out there. Wearing the softening shadows of the fading half dark. Long, sharp, hungry teeth slobbering all over the place.

I could even understand if Papa was still lying in the street. Me standing over him. Guts steaming on the cobblestones. Blood searching for the gutters.
But the half dark had lifted. The Sack Man, papa mwen, my wonderful and horrible father — Eater of Children — was gone.
All that was left was me. All that was left was efreyan. (Continue Reading…)

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PodCastle 967: How to Come Back to Yourself

Previously published in The Tarot of Love, Flame Tree Press

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 36:33 — 50.7MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG

How to Come Back to Yourself

by Audrey Zhou

 

Lilin is the kind of small divinity that doesn’t invite notice.

She isn’t one of the gods that has to hide deep away from civilization, to avoid the notice of humans; Lilin’s only anchor to divinity is her shadow-self — her shadow in mostly the traditional sense, if shadows had their own minds — which she tries not to think about. Lilin keeps her home on the edge of the forest, down the path from a village she used to do business with.

Of course, it’s been a long time since she’s gone to the village. It’s been a long time since she’s been brave enough to do business.

It’s been so long that Lilin figures herself forgotten by anyone that would bother to look for her, so when the young man emerges from the forest, she forgets to pretend to be anyone other than herself.

“I hear you are a prophet,” he says.

He looks her age — he looks human, even: tanned skin, dark hair falling into his eyes, broad shoulders. But he’d managed to find her, and his eyes are golden like pale sun, and there is a sureness to his voice that makes Lilin suspect he’s tangled up with divinity, just like her.

“Of a sorts,” Lilin says, because prophecy is a loose word for what she divines through her shadow-self. “But it’s been years. I’m not — I don’t do that anymore, not really.”

“Are you sure,” he asks, “that you can’t be convinced?” (Continue Reading…)

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PodCastle 966: Closing Aperture

PodCastle 966: Closing Aperture is a PodCastle original.

Content note for grief

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 34:55 — 48.4MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG

Closing Aperture

By A. E. Lanier

 

 

The shapes and colors in the picture solidified and the pile of fur in Maria’s lap came fully into view.

“Aster?” she whispered, her voice catching as she began to cry.

Like many clients, she had been skeptical of the Polaroid camera, but this was why I used it. It felt more intimate to see the photo develop in real time. Connection with the dead was fleeting, and I liked my work to reflect that. I didn’t need records of every haunted house and ghost tour I worked with and neither did they.

But this was no ghost tour.

“Hello, little fluff,” Maria whispered, her fingers gently tracing the still-developing image. (Continue Reading…)

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PodCastle 965: When I Cowboy in Puuwaawaa

Previously published in The Map of Lost Places Anthology, Apex Book Company

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 44:30 — 61.6MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG-13

When I Cowboy in Puuwaawaa

by Ferdison Cayetano

 

When I cowboy in Puuwaawaa my toss is always true. When I cowboy in Puuwaawaa I drive wild two-ton bulls to the paddock like they been raised from a calf on the ranch. When I’m done cowboying in Puuwaawaa and I ride back into town, the flowers on the brim of my hat catch the eye of all the pretty girls.

In all the islands you’ll never see a lei papale sparkle like mine, never smell one smells this good. Never get one brings this much luck to your toss and your wrangle. All that, and you ain’t even gonna ask where I got it?

On the slopes of frozen Waomina, in that American west, where the Pryor Mountains rise — that is where I met some friends, and did them a favor, and where they picked these flowers for me.

Waomina. Wao-min-a. Hold on, now. Over there they say Wyoming. (Continue Reading…)

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Special Call for Submissions : Undercity Magic

The City asks for much and gives little, so how do people make a life for themselves with their backs against the wall? For this special edition of Podcastle, we invite writers to give us their takes on the strange, the fantastical, the arcane ways and myths of how people make the impossible possible. We are interested in tales featuring both human and nonhuman characters encountering the challenges of a city; the wily, the shrewd, the schemers, the devious, and those who do not survive in The City at all despite their best efforts.

Submissions from all over the world are welcome, but we are particularly interested in hearing from folks of the global majority. There are many stories set in western cities, and we are keen on expanding our perspectives to include reckonings with urbanity and the idea of “modernity” in places where imperial and colonial interests overwhelmingly define the city and its hardness. We were so inspired by episode 934, C.T Muchemwa’s The Inheritance, which sees a young man in Harare inherit a spirit in the shape of a chicken that makes all his money troubles go away, but saddles him with even bigger problems. We are interested in hearing more about that kind of pull and push. For instance, some speculation on the very real phenomenon of magical doctors advertising their services on posters stuck on poles in Nairobi, Maputo or Lagos; promising an end to issues with poor grades at school, property disputes, divorce and bad luck. What could go wrong? What could go right? Tell us what magical stories your city inspires!

We’re a fantasy publication, so all stories must have a fantasy element that’s crucial to the tale, though it can be subtle. We are unable to consider science fiction or straight-up horror, though dark fantasy is more than welcome. We will consider both originals and reprints for this call, paying our standard rate of 8 cents per word for originals and $100 for reprints. We’re looking for stories between 2,000-6,000 words, though we will consider up to 7,000 words for reprints.

We’ll be open to submissions for a 6 week window, from 9th October to 13th November 2026. Please submit through our Moksha portal. Our standard guidelines apply to anything we haven’t specified here.

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PodCastle 964: The Washerwoman and the Troll

Previously ran as episode 367 and first published in Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine, May 2013

Content notes for elder abuse, kidnapping of a child and death of a child

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:30 — 38.3MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG

The Washerwoman and the Troll

by Julian Mortimer Smith

Bunchunkle was magnificently ugly. The trollmothers said there hadn’t been such an ugly child since Grimshik’s day, and Bunchunkle wore it with the pride and mirth befitting a troll. He could pull a face to make you void your bowels and howl with terror. He had a genius for mischief that rivaled even that of old Quillibim, the Arch Rascal of Moldy Stumps. There was much speculation about what would happen if a human ever laid eyes on Bunchunkle, but as far as anyone knew it had never happened, for Bunchunkle was as quick and sly as he was ugly.

When the faefolk decided it was time to drive the old washerwoman from the Blinking Woods, they did not come to Bunchunkle immediately. He was reclusive and cantankerous and did not like to be disturbed. Besides, they were loath to seek him out for fear of laying eyes on his revolting face. But nobody doubted that he would succeed if all else failed. They knew he was there as a last resort.

 

Read the full text in Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine #57

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PodCastle 963: The One I’m Waiting For

PodCastle 963: The One I’m Waiting For is a PodCastle original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 43:51 — 60.7MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG-13

The One I’m Waiting For

by KJ Kabza

 

For an eternity of days, I wait for her in the cabin. The light outside rises and fades, rises and fades, and the wide rectangles of sky near the ceiling show me sun and starlight, cloud and snow, lightning and rain. I no longer have skin to feel the air, or a nose to smell it with, but the birdsong outside tells me it’s spring, or the moon in the left window tells me it’s winter.

I can sense the damp in the few bones I have left, so when the cabin around me begins to rot, I am not surprised, but I am very afraid. I know that things must be old to rot. Is she never coming back?

One day, I hear a rhythmic crunch outside. I think I know that sound? Before I can recall, the cabin door pulls open.

An old woman, wearing a thick fur cloak and fur leg wraps that are bound to her lower limbs with sinew, stands at the threshold. Fine snow dusts the fur she wears, and beyond her, I see white ground.

She is not the one I’m waiting for. (Continue Reading…)

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PodCastle 962: The Drink We Spill Out on the Ground

Previously published by Pulp Literature, Issue 39, Summer 2023

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 37:53 — 52.5MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG-13

THE DRINK WE SPILL OUT ON THE GROUND

by Claire Humphrey

 

The perfect day looks like this: I wake up in the spare room at my boyfriend’s family home. I tie my hair in a messy ponytail and stumble downstairs. Etienne plays his guitar by the window, sunlight filtering through the pine branches, a half-cup of coffee on the sill. Andre sits on the counter, waiting for his toast, drumming his hands on the cupboard door. And I begin to hum along.

The perfect day is a snapshot beginning to crease, edges smudged with thumbprints. Me, Etienne and Andre, together in the late morning, making music.

I remember thinking, the day I went down to the culvert, how lucky we were. Not even out of high school and already we had this.

I knew about change, a little. I knew I didn’t want it.

I knew how to make a wish and make it stick. (Continue Reading…)

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PodCastle 961: A Thousand Finer Foldings

PodCastle 961: A Thousand Finer Foldings is a PodCastle original.

Content note for terminal illness

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 40:16 — 55.8MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG

A Thousand Finer Foldings

By Claire Jia-Wen

1.

Phoebe’s mom calls her while she’s in the self-checkout line at Safeway. “I’ve found a solution for your apartment problem,” Mama says.

“I told you, I’ll just commute to San Francisco on the weekends,” Phoebe replies, stepping out of the warpath of a kid barreling a shopping cart towards the snack aisle.

“Aiyah, San Francisco is so far from Berkeley —”

“It’s not really —”

“Anyway, Sagan Liang is renting an apartment in San Francisco and he doesn’t need it on the weekends. I already talked to his mom, she said you can stay there then.”

Sagan and Phoebe’s mothers go to the same church and play pickleball together three days a week. Sagan and Phoebe don’t really talk anymore. “And what did Sagan say?”

“He listens to his mother. You should listen to your mother more. The Liangs won’t even ask for money. He makes so much money now, not like you. You could still go to medical school like him if you wanted.”

Phoebe sets her basket next to the checkout. “Sure.” (Continue Reading…)

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PodCastle 960: Kwong’s Bath

Previously published in khōréō issue 3.2 (August 2023)

Content note for references to suicide

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 26:59 — 37.5MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG-13

Kwong’s Bath

by Angela Liu

 

 

The visits start a week after Kwong’s first surgery.

Despite the stinging January cold, the high school boyfriend sits on the tiled floor in his boxers, scrubbing the bathtub’s edge with a moldy brush.

“Mikey?” She reaches out of the scalding water with a dripping wet hand. He laces his fingers between hers and presses her hand to his cheek in that sweet way he often did when they hadn’t seen each other in a while.

She breathes in the smell of car oil still on him.

“I’m so glad you’re back,” she says. Relief pools at the bottom of her gut as she quietly confirms the mole under his left eye, the black toenails on his right foot where his drunken father practiced his sadism. Proof that he’s real. He’s the first visitor after all, and she doesn’t quite believe it yet.

He doesn’t say a word, but he smiles as best he can with his jaw still missing from the accident at the factory. (Continue Reading…)