
Wyldblood
science fiction & fantasy
Wyldblood 11 is available now
Our anthology of sea stories, From the Depths, is out on April 7th. Order here.
Wyld FLASH every FRIDAY!
Broken Wing Syndrome
Anna Madden

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The auction catalog was thirty-two pages. Chrissie went back to page five, the corner dog-eared, and reread a description:
Lot No. 10—Stable No. 45—Registered Name: Shooting Star—Sire: Spitfire—Sire of Dam: Blackbird. Piebald Pegasus mare, 4-years-old, standing at 16.3 hands. On pasture turnout since injury (see appendix for vet details). Currently barefooted.
Chrissie wobbled on her crutches.
Jane steadied her, looking competent in her calf-length boots and stylish rose-gray breeches. Not one to fall from the saddle and break her femur.
Chrissie pushed away, shoving her crutches forward, their metal bottoms dusted by the dirt floor.
The sale barn was massive. The scents of hay and manure and stale air jumbled together. Fates crisscrossed here. Some unlucky lots would end up in the slaughter barn. Potential buyers didn’t want to waste time or funds on has-beens or broken things.
Chrissie understood. Even she had to be picky. A mount for a flight cadet should be sure-footed and reliable. She had made the mistake of taking on a lease before. An aged gelding, easily spooked, without proper strength for maneuvers. He had dropped her on their first take off. She’d learned her lesson then: she needed a partner as a steed. A bond woven of understanding and trust.
Gold numbers passed by: thirty-seven, forty, forty-two. Chrissie took a deep breath at forty-five, then peered between the bars of the stall.
Wide walnut-brown eyes stared back. The mare snorted, pawed a front hoof, both ears alert. Her wings were darkness itself, folded against her sides. The right wing was wrapped with tight fabric and medical tape.
Jane reached for a paper pinned to the stall’s woodwork. As she read, her face grayed. “Says multiple fractures. Even healed, she may never fly again.”
The mare’s mirror-like eyes held Chrissie’s own reflection. Beyond the hurt and the fear, the light shined through.
“She will,” Chrissie said. “And she knows what it’s like to fall, like me.”

Anna Madden lives in North Texas, where the prairie reaches long tallgrass fingers toward the woods. Her fiction has appeared in Solarpunk Magazine, Shacklebound Books, Luna Station Quarterly, and elsewhere. Follow her on Twitter @anna_madden_ or visit her website at annamadden.com.
more stories here


From the Depths
out on April 7th – order here
Our latest anthology is packed with tales of the murky deep. We’ve got fifteen stories stuffed with selkies and sea monsters, pirates and meremaids, intrigue, adventure and more. Available in print and digitally.
ISBN 978-1-914417-15-3


Wyldblood 11
Wyldblood 11 is available now – £4 (digital)/£7 (print) or purchase via Amazon.com
Fiction by Richard Strachan, Michael Teasdale, Isabel Hinchliff, Jonathon Mast, Jo Miles, Chloe Smith, Billy Stanton, Elisabeth Ring, Cassandra O’Sullivan Sachar and Tom Jolly.

Wyldblood Magazine subscriptions
Six issues of cutting edge fantasy and science fiction from established and upcoming writers. Packed with stories, interviews and reviews. Available in print or digitally.
£18 digital / £30 print

Festive ghosts, ghouls and goblins – all from the master of the moody and macabre: Charles Dickens. Victorian gothic at its finest, including the legendary The Signalman and the goblin New Year classic The Chimes – ebook and print – click below £3/7.50 or purchase via Amazon. com
We’re also currently offering up some Gothic spookiness in the form of John Berwick-Harwood’s – Horror: a True Tale, free to read if you follow the link.


Runs Like Clockwork
A Steampunk Anthology
Airships and sorcery, steam driven nightmares and mechanical men.
Thirteen sepia tinged stories laced with adventure and the spirit of a Victoriana that never was.
£3.99 digital / £7.99 print


The Best of Wyldblood is out now!
200 pages full of dragons, demons and dystopian disasters.
Click here to order.
More Wyld Flash
Last-Minute Shopping List for your First Space Road Trip
André Geleynse

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1. Snacks. Obviously. Try to stick to stuff with a long shelf life; it can be a real long haul between fuel stations and the refrigerator gets a little wonky when you get close to light speed. Popcorn’s good, especially for late night movies. Also be sure to pick up some freeze dried ice cream. The Q’otchoriarchs love that shit; it’s the perfect bribe if we get pulled over for speeding or whatever.
2. Map. A PHYSICAL one. Look, I know we all have galactic positioning systems on our phones now, but DON’T TRUST IT. The wormholes make everything go screwy and when you get on the quantum highways the GPS thinks it’s in infinite places and times all at once, and you WILL get lost.
3. Tunes. Good vibes ONLY. If you try to sneak in some of that triple-new wave mooncore shit you were listening to the other day, I WILL toss you out the airlock and you WILL deserve it.
4. Fuzzy blankets. For snuggling, in the dark between the stars.
5. Heavy Mounted Thermonuclear Plasma Cannon. At some point, we’re GOING to end up on the back roads, and trust me, we’ll need it.

Once Upon a Time
Kai Delmas

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“Tell me a story, Alec.” Emma’s frail hand pats the seat next to her bed.
I wait for Emma to remove her hand from the seat and sit down. It’s silly, I know, but I don’t want her perception of me to be ruined by her hand gliding through me.
“Which one would you like to hear?” I scan my archives. There are millions to choose from.
“A new one. Something no one has ever heard before.” Her crow’s eyes crinkle as the wrinkles around her mouth stretch.
“I don’t know of any story like that.”
Every story I find within my archives was written by someone long ago. It’s only logical to assume that someone else heard it at some point or another.
How am I supposed to give Emma something new? I race through my memory files again. And again. Searching for long lost data from the world above, from before Emma came down here.
“Then make something up.”

The Garment Dragon
Lara Slabber

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The study was cramped. Made entirely of wood paneling, the room appeared dark and even smaller than it was in reality, with only the lone candle on the desk for light. Rita pushed her glasses up her nose and scooted her chair an inch closer to the pile of fabric on her desk. It made a harsh screeching sound as the legs scraped across the wooden floor, but she didn’t startle. She barely blinked as she stitched closed a section of the garment was making.
At least, it had appeared to be a garment for the last few hours, with the fabric stretched across her tailor’s ham so she could craft a tunnel-like shape out of thread and cotton. However, a few stitches later, the “tunnel” was entirely sealed off, and what had seemed to be some kind of arm or leg-hole closed off into a conical shape. She twisted it around and shook out some of the excess fabric. She reached into the wicker basket that she had pushed under her desk, crammed beside her feet and a box of scraps, and pulled out fistful after fistful of fluffy white stuffing. She packed it into the garment until it started to take on a new shape. Something of a body, and then a head. Legs – four of them. She stitched until the stuffing was sealed inside, before sewing on a face, which she finished off with two glinting obsidian buttons that reflected the wavering candlelight.
The final step, the most crucial, was the hardest of all, because she had to set down her tools and simply scoop the mound of fabric up into her arms and hold it close to her head. She whispered something to it, giving it some of her own breath, and then the garment stretched and breathed.
And stood.

Days of Creation
C.C. Rayne

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The world dies on a Wednesday. Lilah sits and watches from the porch as squares of grass crumble into dust and blanket the lawn in gray. The willow tree in the front yard droops downwards, its branches stretched like taffy, curled in on itself like a concave heart.
“Why aren’t we changing too?” she asks her grandmother in awe. The grayness slides along the bed of white lilacs, gobbling them up, but it doesn’t dare touch the rocking chair where Gramma knits.
“Don’t worry. We don’t need changing,” Gramma says with a small smile. Her needles go click-click-clack through the operatic silence.
Lilah nods, frowns, mulls the words over, flips them in her mind. Across the road, the Murrays’ house rots in real time, the roof devouring itself with a rumble, withered beneath the burden of age.


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New Free Fiction – Broken Wing Syndrome by Anna Madden
Today’s free fiction is Anna Madden’s Broken Wing Syndrome – about hope, determination and seeing beyond what seems to be obvious. Also look out for: André Geleynse’s Last-Minute Shopping List for your First Space Road TripKai Delmas’ Once Upon a TimeLara Slabber’s The Garment DragonC.C. Rayne’s Days of CreationSandra Skalski’s Dancing in the Treetops Or…
New Free Fiction – Once Upon a Time by Kai Delmas
We have new free fiction on the website! – Once Upon a Time by Kai Delmas is as much about creators as stories – and about compassion, understanding and new perspectives. Also look out for: Lara Slabber’s The Garment DragonC.C. Rayne’s Days of CreationSandra Skalski’s Dancing in the TreetopsErin McQuaig’s Fish Linda McMullen’s The Diagnostician,…
New Free Fiction – Last-Minute Shopping List for your First Space Road Trip, by André Geleynse
Today’s free fiction is André Geleynse’s Last-Minute Shopping List for your First Space Road Trip – because Amazon don’t deliver that far and you can’t get decent chocolate in the great empty void. Or anything else, come to think of it. Also look out for: Kai Delmas’ Once Upon a TimeLara Slabber’s The Garment DragonC.C.…
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