She could hardly remember a time when she could be reasonably described as happy. Occupying a luxurious apartment in a quaint river town, the material circumstances of her life couldn’t be better. The raw, nearly unimaginable suffering occurring just outside her doors hardly touched someone like her, or so you might be tempted to believe.…Read more A Woman In Orhan
Short Stories
Claw Kassain and the Village of Ulath Kai
Once upon a time, the village of Ulath Kai lay in a valley accessible only through the dangerous Bargath Pass. The story went that for many years the citizens of this hamlet lived in peace, maintaining a harmonious relationship with one another and with the world around them. The expansive fields, bountiful orchards and pastoral…Read more Claw Kassain and the Village of Ulath Kai
Hot Out Here
“It is so damn hot out here.” Sam looked up suddenly, her eyes struggling to adjust to the blazing sunshine that was beating down on the patio where she and Jason were sitting. “That’s true,” she responded, feeling herself grow peevish at Jason, who once gain was engaging in his favorite mantra. “But that’s July…Read more Hot Out Here
The Red Cliffs of Golgamon
Try as he might, Sebastian Mondo couldn't focus on his work. He was numb and disconnected. Content needed to be written, messages needed to be sent, but there was something blocking him, a numbness that couldn't be overcome. All he could do was sit and stare at his computer, sinking deeper into his desk chair.…Read more The Red Cliffs of Golgamon
How One Leaves Orhan
What had she been doing? Flames cracked and popped within the ornate fireplace, casting a gold and orange glow through the small study. Amabel sat reclining in a high-backed chair, her thin legs extending toward the blaze. Yawning, she stretched her arms, brushing past the heavy wood and velvety cushion that composed the chair's back.…Read more How One Leaves Orhan
All Aboard to Cravenmoor
Jerome knew that life didn’t often appear this way, at least outside his dreams. Lush forests demarcated by raging waterfalls, dusty mountains punctuated by valleys of swampy marshland and sunlit meadows covered in iridescent flowers – such natural grandeur wasn’t abnormal. He’d even experienced some of it before. Instead, it was the town at the…Read more All Aboard to Cravenmoor
Toward the Stars, Toward Home
There was nothing aside from blackness - divorced from time and space. Then a light appeared, a pin-prick that gradually opened like a film iris. A giant eye stared at him. It was distorted and fragmented, a reflection of an eye rather than the real McCoy. His cheek felt cool and smooth, and he recognized…Read more Toward the Stars, Toward Home
The Skiff
She never listened to me, which was half the problem, but I knew that she was right about my family. My father had enlisted at 18, and like so many of his generation, had served his country and then never talked about it again. He swallowed his pain, buried his anger and in doing so…Read more The Skiff
To Live
Standing wearily in the small, dingy bathroom, with its chalk-white walls and uncleaned mirror, Darren studied his reflection. Sharp angular features, populated by freckles, and flecked with whiskers stared back at him. Sighing heavily, his chocolate-colored eyes drifted towards his bathroom's tub, an unassuming, utterly normal piece of porcelain, its milky color broken only by…Read more To Live
The Building, The Memory
Buffeted by cars on the serpentine highway, he grips the wheel. The air whistles as the car hits 65. The landscape: a suburb, with cookie-cutter banality all around. None of it registers, none of it but one. On a grey hill, framed by a grey sky, there is a hotel. In this hotel there is…Read more The Building, The Memory
Adam Mohrbacher 