I am pleased to report that my new short story “The Third Wish” has been published/recorded by the fantasy podcast PodCastle, and is available on their website in both text and audio formats, so you may read it or listen to it, whichever is your preference. (You can even read it while listening to it, if that is your bent.)

In “The Third Wish the necromancer Martok the Magnificent conjures up a spirit (a genie?  a demon? an n-dimensional higher being who straddles the universes?) to fulfill his every wish, each of which is more unsavory than the last. (All of them involve smiting his many enemies in profoundly unpleasant ways.) The spirit has no interest in carrying out such terrible desires. Can he/she/it they prevent death and mayhem, while still obeying the necromancer’s commands to the letter?

I would like to thank the editorial staff of Podcastle for accepting “The Third Wish.” Special kudos go to Eleanor R. Wood, who worked with me on getting the story into shape for publication. I would also like to commend Graeme Dunlop for his bang-up job in narrating the story for the audio version.