Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not...

As he peered at the young woman weaving her way past the gas lanterns that lit the plaza, Alistair Galloway marveled at how easily he, if he had already received the go ahead, could have taken her out at that very moment. She hurried, head down, across the deepening Missouri twilight, heedless of the shadows that swallowed her where she passed between the streetlamps. Alistair felt a strange relief that Angus had chosen him to kill the girl. Too many of Alistair's coworkers

A brisk wind had whipped up dancing, swirling, through the courtyard. It grabbed the young woman's scarf and twisted it toward the sky. With a quick hand, she grasped it just as it came loose from her neck. From under a nearby lamppost, a shadow detached from the pole and began to stroll toward her. The young woman shivered. Though she didn't notice any specific dangers, she had never ventured into that particular area of town after dark. Sure, some of the speakeasies in the

"Try not to associate bodily defect with mental, my good friend, except for a solid reason." With the wan lightbulb that flickered overhead, Kaĉjo had to squint to make sure he had read the words correctly. "What is this?" he demanded. Lya turned to see what he held, and she recognized the grey canvas cover with faded blue lines of her favorite book. "It's David Copperfield by Charles Dickens." With a scoff, Kaĉjo shook his head. "I know what it says it is, but it's not," he

Mendilya Kirksey was born under unusual circumstances - at least for her time. Her mother isolated herself, nursed herself through a pregnancy, went to a midwife, and delivered the child in a quiet, secluded room. So, unusual. Fiara Kirksey did not report her pregnancy to the local authorities, as required by law. She didn't let them extricate the fertilized egg and transfer it to an artificial womb. The child didn't spring into existence in a lab, a result of egg harvesting