Simo Srinivas lives in Colorado with their spouse and two senior, standard-issue tabby cats. Their short fiction has appeared in Fantasy Magazine, khōréō, Dark Matter Presents: Monstrous Futures, Deathcap & Hemlock, Decoded Pride, and The Archive of the Odd, among others. When not writing about all things weird and queer, Simo can be found on the trail intently counting pikas. You can also find them on Twitter @srinivassimo and online at srinivassimo.com.
Outside is the palace of slaughter. Under its gambrels of boiling sky, there is the cold unforgiving sea; there are mountains ready to cradle your bones. Along its corridors of singing grass, there are horseback warriors who will cut you to pieces.
It takes the lieutenant one hundred years to climb the hill to Lao Po’s house. By then, the warlords have come and gone, the Republic has risen and fallen, and developers have been petitioning the ruling party to demolish Lao Po’s hilltop hut for decades.
