Free SF -
October Rain by Dylan Morgan from Hazardous Press.
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Mankind teeters on the brink of extinction in a solar system choking under the glare of a dying sun. An assassin for the Martian Interstellar Correction Agency, Steele has one more assignment to complete before a big payoff and the chance of a new life: a job that will reveal the true horrors of mankind’s futile existence and threaten the very people who make his life worth living.
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The Shadow Eater by A. Attanasio is free.
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A gnome wanders among strange worlds of immeasurable beauty and terror on a quest for magic to restore the health of a goddess. If he fails, all creation will dissolve. And so he must dare anything to succeed, even trespass a realm of terrible darkness, pain and dread sorcery—Earth.
The Lady of the Garden, one of the godlike Nameless Ones, has used her magic to dream into existence the worlds of the Bright Shore. But now her unborn child lies motionless in her womb. An intruder from the Dark Shore, the malevolent shadow of her dream, threatens the life of her unborn. If she cannot locate and expel this shadow thing, she will waken the child’s stern father, and he will dissolve the dream—and the Bright Shore will vanish. In order to save the Lady of the Garden’s baby, an old gnome travels through the many worlds in search of the creature of darkness whose presence threatens the dream of creation.
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Three free stories, two fantasy and one SF, by Mike Allen from Mythic Delirium Books:
Sleepless, Burning Life
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In the afterlife, the warrior Jyshiu searches for her lover Amritu, a goddess cursed to dance eternally inside a cage that hangs at the top of the clockwork universe. Kitsartu the Engineer imprisoned Amritu when she created the cosmic spheres; Amritu's dance powers the gears that make the stars turn. Should the goddess ever escape her cage, the universe will end.
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She Who Runs
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No girl had ever lived so long wearing the curse of She Who Runs.
Lassamtu was not her name, but the name forced on her by the high priest in the temple where she'd been enslaved since her mother's murder. Nor had she asked for the suicidal task thrust upon her, to hurl an enchanted spear into the eye of Abzu, the Serpent that strove to crush the Egg of the World. The priest doomed her to the curse of She Who Runs, a spell that forces her to run at inhuman speed with no control over her destination. It won't release her until she strikes Abzu blind.
But Lassamtu will discover that all she's ever learned about the creation of her world amounts to lies and deception. Her tormentors will learn she's nowhere near as helpless as they thought. And that's only the start of this sinister yarn.
Part mythical fiction, part science fiction, part horror tale, this off-beat short story by CLOCKWORK PHOENIX editor and Nebula Award nominee Mike Allen first appeared in the anthology SKY WHALES AND OTHER WONDERS (ed. Vera Nazarian, Norilana Books, 2009.)
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Stolen Souls
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"Far above the rest ... Venner lives in the near future, where aliens steal living human brains to use as computers. His wife is such a victim, and Venner vows to recover her. So he allows himself to be cyborged, and tracks the brain thieves across the universe. But as he approaches closer and closer to his goal, he must surrender piece after piece of his humanity to gain the edge on his adversaries."
-- Tangent Online
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