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Looking for a steady supply of historical fiction short stories? Every week thousands of writers submit stories to our writing contest.

3280+ Historical fiction Short Stories to read

Submitted by writers on Reedsy Prompts to our weekly writing contest. Whether you’re looking to step back into ancient civilizations, the 19th-century, or anywhere in between, our collection of historical fiction stories is here to keep you riveted.

Historical fiction Short Stories – Page 119 of 219

The Selkies' Welcome

Submitted to Contest #108

We left our home as the light flashed in the night sky. Green and gold like fingers of a flame against a sky as black as tar, the sea still and frigid as we pushed our boat from the shore. Most folk said the lights were the Bifrost, the bridge between Åsgard and Midgard, but I knew it was more than that; it was women’s work. It was the light reflecting off the shields of the Valkyrie, the women sent by Odin to the battlefields to choose who amongst the slain were worthy of a place in Valhalla. Battles raged everywhere since Harald Finehair c...

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The Hole

Submitted to Contest #108

I look around me, the city that until minutes ago was bustling with people and a few cars is now in complete shambles. Even the sky is weeping for her misfortunes. My once always pampered face is drenched and dripping with water. My unshod feet which once had never touched a hard floor are now bleeding from walking for who knows how long? The pain I feel in my legs is keeping me from forgetting I’m not dead. But you know what’s funny? None of these even hold a candle to this hole in my heart. A million questions in my head:‘Where am I going?...

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The Lifeboat

Submitted to Contest #108

The old man stared at me from the bow of the vessel, his cracked lips pulled downwards into a grimace underneath his filthy beard. The armpits of his undershirt were stained yellow with sweat. I could smell his stench; indeed, there was no escape from it. No way to avoid the rancid odor emanating from his every pore. My only solace was the fact that my own odor was likely to be as keen an assault on his senses as his was on mine.I stared back at him from the stern. Oh, how I hated him. His crazy bloodshot eyes – the way they jutted out of hi...

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The Best and The Worst Decision I Ever Made

Submitted to Contest #108

          The Best and The Worst Decision I Ever Made When I was ten years old my parents decided it would be best for me to start a new school. After a year of being bullied, constant trips to the principal's office, and being surrounded by people that caused the faculty to contemplate calling 9-1-1 weekly, it seemed like the right call. I would be transferring to a private school called Coloma Christian. As an overweight and insecure fifth-grader, the idea scared me so bad my hands would bec...

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The Lamp

Submitted to Contest #108

The Lamp Prologue A massive apartment block burst into flames. “Now,” hissed the voice inside my head,”Do it now!” The building was now collapsing. I had to do it now, I had to do it fast. All those innocent lives. All that destruction! I can’t bear it! “Ok, I'm going to do it, I’m going to do it!” I did it... Chapter 1: Strike Legend has it that a rich, but surprisingly ordinary family holds a very unique key. The key is used to open a very mysterious and powerful chest; a chest of which nobody but the ordinary family knows the cont...

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A Legacy of Time

Submitted to Contest #108

All she could think to do was file a missing persons report, but how? where? who would believe her, for all she knew she was probably the one who should be considered the missing person, one minute she was enjoying a coffee with her best friend and the next thing she knew she was standing in front of a burning house. Olivia Woods gave a cursory glance at her surroundings, she had to be dreaming but it felt so real. The ground shook, and the not so distant roar of cannons boomed, Men were shouting and screaming, horses galloped and neighed...

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Fire Deaths

Submitted to Contest #108

Fire Deaths Mary couldn’t help it. Impossible to ignore those floppy ears, dark eyes and puppy jowls. One individual among so many furry caterpillar creatures who snuffled up to their mother’s ‘milk-tray’, pushing and tugging at her teats. Later when one began nibbling her fingers Mary felt a fierce ownership urge. Named him Deefa - D-fa-dog. She felt sure her husband Jack also desired a farm dog. She remembered their romance, a time when they wandered along silken beach sand. And held her hand out to scoop up setting sun auras appearing ...

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Through the Jungle and Other Ways to Escape

Shortlisted for Contest #108 ⭐️

TW: mental illness, substance abuseMom’s guy ran out of benzos, so I figured it was better for me to bring Paul anywhere but home after school. When her pills wore off, at best she’d leave soap bars in the sink with the water running to expose the listening devices she was convinced were hidden inside; at worst, she’d believe that Paul and I were minions of Satan sent to spy on her. Better for us to stay out of her hair, in case it went the second way.Before school, she emerged from her bedroom in a discolored robe. She watched me zip the ha...

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The Man Who Sold the Eiffel Tower

Submitted to Contest #107

My name is Count Victor Lustig. If you’ve not heard of that name, you may have heard of one of my other forty seven different aliases. Robert V. Miller was what they called me when they locked me up in Alcatraz. Another fake name of course. It would appear that no one truly knew my real name, and for a hundred years more it would still remain a mystery.  I’ve lived a wondrous life, I must say. I concocted a counterfeit bank note operation so vast that the very confidence in the United States economy nearly crumbled. They called me Amer...

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Shamus MacFadden's Fiddle

Submitted to Contest #108

Sometimes Colin Fergus would wake to the mournful sound of a fiddle.  He would try to ignore it, but sour old tune continued to rise in his head until it could no longer be ignored.  His memories were filled with images of his life on the Fergus Estate and of Dalton, West Virginia which his Aunt Lucy had told him to forget.  It was her own memories of that horrible place that haunted Lucille Amundsen.   It was a frigid October evening.  Colin awoke to the acrid aroma of smoke.  When he opened his eyes he s...

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Simply Another Secret

Submitted to Contest #107

They grow up in stops and starts, she finds the quiet corners and he drags her to the loud ones. She sits beside her father at court, and he winks at her from the crowd. Together, they learn how to read and write and add numbers.And together, they orbit until they can no longer pull away.They read, once, about twin gods. Brother and sister separated from birth, desperate to be reunited.They decide that is the type of love they share. They are right.At sixteen the Crown Princess is expected to enter an engagement. She meets a dozen men a...

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The Ballad of Marie-Augustine

Submitted to Contest #106

Marie took nothing for granted, especially the love she felt for her family. The grey clouds of mist and steam slowly parted to reveal the clearest blue sky Marie-Augustine had ever seen, or would ever see again. And slowly, then suddenly, sound, consciousness and reality hit her as equally as hard as the masonry, in fact the train, that so violently had, just moments before.    Her eyes began to scour the intricate detail of each brick that the masons had so delicately, and skillfully, carved onto each and every square inch of t...

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Embrace Your Dreams

Submitted to Contest #106

Raindrops were falling from the sky, and one could just glimpse the busy street with quite a few elaborate carriages. I trotted through a muddy narrow path, using merely the faint flickering glow of lamp posts as navigation. My stomach growled in protest, struggling to overcome the appealing scent of fresh baked bread from my basket. No, I shall not, I told myself sternly, for I was only here for the reasons nobody but I would understand as I knelt down besides a dark hooded figure. Dukes, duchess, baroness. By Jove, how much I used to ...

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The legend of Kapo

Submitted to Contest #106

May 1, 1850 Dearest Sister Annie, I am writing to you from Kona Hawaii on my third week as governess to her Highness Emma Rooke, whom most people call Emmalani. She walks timidly on the land, almost on tip toes hips swaying gently.   I have never seen Emmalani run, at least not on land.  She skims from her beach chair to the ocean water, slides in, and then she is simply grace incarnate.  Clean even strokes, and at last in the waves, without hesitation she covers miles swiftly and surely.  As ...

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Phases

Submitted to Contest #106

As always, Kellem didn’t once break eye contact with Hoskins as he received his daily lashes. To my master’s credit, Kellem thought, gritting his teeth as the whip dug into his skin, he never breaks eye contact with me, either. Locked in this agonizing stare down more times than he could count—and he couldn’t count—Kellem had come to know every facet of Hoskins’s eyes as intimately as he’d come to know the fields he planted. They were gray—not the gray nebula of storm clouds, nor the gray sheen of new steel. More like… the gray of a wolf’s ...

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RBE | Illustrated Short Stories | 2024-06

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