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WHETSTONE is an amateur magazine that seeks to

discover, inspire, and publish emerging authors who are
enthusiastic about the tradition of “pulp sword and
sorcery.” Writers in this tradition include (but are not
limited to) the following: Robert E. Howard, Fritz Leiber,
Jack Vance, Michael Moorcock, Karl Edward Wagner, and
many more. “Pulp sword and sorcery” emphasizes active
protagonists, supernatural menaces, and preindustrial
(mostly ancient and medieval) settings. Some “pulp
sword and sorcery” straddles the line between historical
and fantasy fiction; at Whetstone, however, we prefer
“secondary world settings,” other worlds liberated from
the necessity of historical accuracy.

First released Friday, June 12, 2020

Cover art and Whetstone Seal by Bill Cavalier.

https://whetstonemag.blogspot.com/
https://www.facebook.com/whetstonemag/
https://twitter.com/SorceryWs

Editor: Jason Ray Carney ([email protected])

Editorial Assistants: Anna Tippett, Jacob Lindner

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 CONTENTS

Editor’s Note Jason Ray Carney 4

The Wizard’s Demise Géza A. G. Reilly 5

Queslavalaka J.B. Toner 10

The Temple of Vanas Kieran Judge 16

As Repellent As I Chase A. Folmar 22

Undying Thirst for Vengeance D.M. Ritzlin 29

Kauahoa and the Tattooed Bandit Patrick S. Baker 35

A Thousand Words for Death Pedro Iniguez 42

Totem and Stone Chuck Clark 48

The Price Steve Shaw 55

The Stranger’s Payment Nidheesh Samant 60

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 EDITOR’S NOTE
My love of sword and sorcery began when my
grandmother gifted me HeroQuest, a medieval fantasy
board game. Readers will know the sublime cover art by
Les Edwards: a barbarian warrior swings a giant
broadsword; a wizard gives a blast of eldritch energy; an elf
and dwarf slay zombies, orcs, and skeletons with flashing
steel. 8-year-old Jason was enthralled. It exerted a
palpable magnetic pull, as if this weird dream vision in
cardboard was a portal to another world (and it was). I
asked my grandmother, “What is this?” Her answer was
incorrect but fated: “Conan the Barbarian. Have you seen
that?”
My grandmother was a wonderful woman.
Fast forward thirty years and I am a professor of
popular literature who writes about the value of sword and
sorcery.
But why Whetstone?
During my graduate work I became suspicious of
the arbitrary wall dividing the “interpretation” and
“production” of literature. Most of my colleagues “profess”
literature in only one way: they teach creative writing or
deep reading. I think this divide is artificial and I want to
dismantle it in my own little way by suggesting this here:
do not just “deep read” literature. Make literature, too.
I conducted a study of Weird Tales, the legendary
magazine where sword and sorcery was pioneered by
Robert E. Howard. And I was astonished by the large role
played by the magazine—i.e. the editors, the readers, the
other WT writers—in the creation of the genre. We often
think of writers as working alone, in their belfries, one
flickering candle illuminating their typewriters. A deeper
appreciation of pulp history reveals writers who are in
constant epistolary contact with each other, their editors,
and their readers. Literary art, it seems, requires the rich
soil of a fecund artistic community. I hope Whetstone can
come to serve sword and sorcery amateurs in this way.
I am blown away by the work submitted for this
first issue. I have a little to say about each story below. So,
I’ll spare you specific comments here. Let it suffice to say,
there is vast talent out there.

JRC

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This story suggests the otherworldly milieu of Robert E.
Howard’s “The Mirrors of Tuzun Thune.” Reilly’s antique
lyricism evokes a world of contemplative sublimity.

THE WIZARD’S DEMISE

Géza A. G. Reilly

Age weighs upon me as I watch the youth storm

across the drawbridge leading to my tower. The hoary
visage of Hillom is one that I know few could gaze upon
without fear, but Attra may put my conviction to the test.
Even from the top of my tower, I can see how he moves.
It’s like watching fire spread, leaping from point to point as
he slashes, muscles rippling, cutting down one of my
guards after another. Even when I was his age, with
decades rather than centuries behind me, I did not move
like that. There are a limited number of ways a man can
develop himself, and I always chose will first, then mind.
Strength was never a concern.
That was when I was in the flower of youth,
however. Now that I have wrested all the power that my
will and intelligence could wring from this wretched world,
I have realized that there might be worth in other avenues.
The thought makes me clutch harder at my staff, my most
treasured possession. The princess, bound in her chains
behind me, uselessly shouts her encouragement for Attra,
and I narrow my aged eyes in order to observe the
unfolding of events.
Attra raiding my tower is proof of the value of
strength. As he passes through the portcullis of my tower,
leaving only blood and severed sinew behind him, I lose
sight of him. There are other forms of seeing, however, and
I am able to scry Attra’s passage through my halls with a
simple sorcery. This young man, who began as a thief and
quickly worked his way up to soldiery, then lordship, cuts
through my guardians like a winter’s wind cuts through
comfort. The ape that I have turned to my service bellows
as it attacks, hurling every ounce of the weight of its ten-
foot-tall form against Attra in a tide of savage aggression.
Within moments of action passing almost too quickly to
understand, it dies, carved from midsection to shoulder.
Enormous, its fall to the ground shakes the foundations of
my tower.
There is only one path forward for the young man,
this cutpurse-turned-lord, and it runs through me. That is

5
why Attra is able to resist the illusions I have set to beguile
invaders; he pays no attention to the shimmering forms of
his dead wife, his lost daughter, the titles and honors that
should have been his by birthright. His singular focus is
on climbing higher, taking landing after landing in order to
reach me, kill me, and free the princess I have taken
captive. I almost respect him, in that regard; his will is
almost the match of my own.
Almost.
If Attra cuts me down, as he is even now wrestling
his arm free to arc his sword, white and razor-sharp, to
cut down the serpent nestled at the center of my garden of
illusions, he will take the final step. He will cease being a
lord and become a hero. With my death, the death of
Hillom, this age will die, and a new one will begin.
Though my back may be bowed, my will is still
strong, and I will not see the end of the age of wizards
without opposition. If this young man wants to be the first
in a new age of heroes, he will have to conquer me after
ascending my tower.
Attra’s skin is olive-colored, bronzed now by the
witchfire that had burned away his hair when he triggered
the first of the traps set in my spiral staircase, halfway up
the tower. He moves more cautiously, now, his weight held
on the balls of his feet like a cat, padding silently and
carefully every step of his ascension. If there were gods, I
would commend them for their creation of this man, this
ideal of all that I have spurned in life. But there are none,
so I can only marvel at what Attra has carved out of
himself through force alone.
Behind me, the princess wails as the sorcerous
wards I have erected around her begin to glow. Her music
gives me cause to smile, but I do not do so. I cannot tear
my eyes from the progression of this young man, this
nascent hero, approaching me every second like wing’d
death itself. But I see in my scrying circle that Attra cocks
his head, now, as though he can hear the princess in her
misery. His teeth grind like great slabs of rock, and the
determination in his flint-colored eyes is almost enough to
cow me.
Now he charges, higher and higher, spinning to
avoid one trap’s firing, leaping to dodge another. It is as
though his grace is touched by some mythical higher
power, matched only by the gift of his strength. If that
were true, I would have surely called down and bound that
power for myself by now. As it is, I must rely on other

6
means. I turn from the scrying circle, certain that Attra
will cleave his way through the flying nightmares that I
have assigned to protect the anteroom outside of my
sanctum. Attra has a hero’s work to do, and I have my
own.
Though I cannot see it, I can hear as the
monstrosities, black and many-armed, weave their way
from their ceiling roosts to block Attra’s final moment of
triumph. They are the most awful of anything I have ever
conjured or commanded, and yet, I can hear a
counterpoint to the princess’ wailing: the song of Attra’s
sword slashing through air and pseudo-flesh, given
percussion by the slap of his feet on the stone floor and
harmony by the low growl of his breathing. Undoubtedly
Attra will win against my last defenses, and undoubtedly
he will breach my sanctum. But, being a creature of
strength alone, Attra will not realize one fact.
He will not understand that a staff, too, can be a
weapon as formidable as any sword.
There is no silence, no pause, to crown Attra’s
victory over my minions. There is only the sound of the
last nightmare dying, sizzling as it dissolves back to
whence it came. Then there is the horrid crash as Attra
smashes himself against my sanctum’s ancient door,
hurling it wide. He steps in, as tall and virile as I am old
and bent, as dark and menacing as I am pale and
withdrawn. In a moment, Attra’s flint-grey eyes have taken
me in, and a fury spreads across his features as he sees
the princess of the realm in bonds behind me, warded and
on the brink of death.
Unthinking, Attra hurls his sword at me, and if he
were not distracted by vaulting towards the princess, he
would see his weapon pierce my withered chest. The
wound is deep and certainly fatal, spearing through my
thin form with ease. Attra does not even see the extent to
which he has undone me; the princess and her peril fills
his eyes, and he ignores the all-too-mortal blood spilling
down my soiled white robes.
So determined is Attra to accomplish his task and free the
princess that he does not even see the wards set around
her, glowing brighter now as he wrestles with the chains
securing her in her place. Surely, untutored in sorcery as
he is, Attra acts out of an assurance born of the battlefield:
now that I have been vanquished, pierced by his
unconquered blade, I can do no more to harm him. To
Attra’s mind, I must be a corpse already, though I breathe

7
for a few minutes more. I cannot fault this hero for
thinking as men of action will think, but it is his undoing.
Hero he might be, and strong as any man to claim that
title in good faith, but strength without intelligence can
only defeat itself.
The princess, caught in the grip of sorceries
activated by the wards around her, screams once more
and dies, suddenly shrunken to a wretched shell of her
former beauty. Attra grimaces, the only amount of shock
he is willing to display, and then he, too, is caught in the
paralytic grasp of this, my final trap.
He does not shrink to a mummified version of his
former glory like the princess, however. That would be a
waste. There are no gods and no masters, after all, and
once a man like Attra has died, everything that he might
be must remain unrealized. The princess’ death, so final
and terrible, was a necessary sacrifice to see that
something much more glorious than the death of this hero
is accomplished. As my prearranged sorcery turns my
plans to certainties, I weave one last incantation with
frothing blood on my lips, calling forth a shimmering
portal from the air. Then, as the flow of my pulse ebbs and
my pittance of vitality drains from me, I heft my staff, my
focus, my constant companion in all my conquering of the
realms of wizardry, and break it over my knee.
Laughing, I slump to the ground, holding myself
up with one hand as Attra and I lock eyes. There is a
wrench as my wards do their sorcerous work, a tear in the
sublime nature of this one and only existence we share,
and then I find myself looking down rather than up,
staring into the pale blue eyes that had until now only
peered back at me from every reflection I had ever seen.
The laugh comes from Attra’s throat—my throat
now—as the wards that had surrounded the princess
sputter and die, their purpose achieved. Freed from their
paralysis, I flex my arms, stronger than any I have ever
known. Vitality and youth course through me, and I revel
in the joy of an unbowed back, of vision clear and sharp, of
muscles tensing and flexing without pain. My laugh turns
to a shout of triumph as I, Hillom of the Blooded Hand,
know the feel of will, intelligence, and strength combined
for the first time in my life. Turning, I walk towards the
awful, pale pile of a man on the floor, marveling at how
this body makes the stone floor of my sanctum almost
quiver in submission, like a colossus astride the world. My
staff is broken, and Attra has found himself trapped in my

8
form without the enchantments I had placed upon that
ancient length of wood; held back no longer, the centuries
of my unnatural span are ravaging him like scavengers
upon a carcass.
There can be little life within him now, but
somehow Attra continues to look up at me, aghast, as I
draw his sword from the wound he had created. The blade
leaves the meat easily, gripped at the haft by my powerful
right hand. Shards of bone cling to it, washing to the floor
as a gout of red blood erupts from the penetrating cut as
though celebrating its absence. Attra glares at me from
behind my face, weak eyes filled with bottomless hatred,
as I retrieve the shattered pieces of my staff. And, beyond
all reason, he spits at me as I walk across my sanctum
towards the portal, collapsing in on itself now as my
former power wanes for once and all.
I do not laugh any more. This is too solemn an
occasion for that, now that my initial triumph has passed.
Hillom, the last and greatest of the age of wizards, has
been defeated. This is the dawn of a new age, the age of
heroes, and I now have the strength to make of it what I
will.
Securing my weapons in my belt, I turn as I step
through the portal and hesitate for a moment, just long
enough to give this passing age the attention it is due.
Before I begin my new life elsewhere with adventures and
riches untold brought on by this new body, this new
youth, this new purpose, I pause, and I watch the wizard’s
demise.

9
Toner’s story demonstrates how joyful violence is a key
feature of sword and sorcery; I imagine an ironic smile on
Cundar’s face as he slays.

QUESLAVALAKA
J.B. Toner

You want to know how the Northman came by his

sword, hey? It’s a good tale. As with so many of our
friend’s derring-doings, I’ll no doubt be thought a liar if I
speak the full truth; so let’s not trouble about just how
many men and monsters dulled the edge of his old blade
before it shattered at a warhammer’s blow in the Battle of
Argamore. It’s enough to say that the shoddiest bodkin is a
phalanx of spears if its wielder is Cundar of Raelor.
Still, a fighter isn’t whole without his weapon. The
forces of the Ogre-lord had marched far from the rainy
country of Hylomoria, leaving crimson rubble in their
wake, and all manner of brigands had come fluttering to
nest beneath their poorly-spelled banners. When tavern-
talk avowed that war was coming to the great city of
Argamore, the Northman barely finished his bourbon
before setting out. A true son of his violent mountain town,
he drew breath only to draw steel—so a broken sword was
like the murder of a well-loved dog.
A typical ogre, you know, stands about eight feet
tall and weighs up to five hundred pounds. Not many men
could face such a beast in fisticuffs, and Cundar, though a
tall wiry chap, was no giant. But on the other hand,
although he slept gumming a tiny wooden sword before his
mother weaned him from her breast, he was also deeply
schooled in every martial craft, including unarmed
combat. If anyone could have beaten that hammer-
swinging hulk to death with naked hands, he’d be the one.
I can’t justify what happened when the sparkling shards of
his old sword hit the cobblestones, but my place is simply
to report. Friends, I fear that the ogre who disarmed him
was slain in the most horrific manner imaginable, and I
will describe it only by saying that a burlap loincloth is not
enough to protect what matters most.
Up till then, as the fire and fighting rampaged
through the streets, Cundar had been enjoying himself
immensely. He had no particular investment in the
fortunes of either side, but harbored a profound love of
being outmatched and heavily outnumbered. Every way he

10
turned, there were powerful enemies to slash. But now,
with his night-black sleeves and hair steaming in the
afterspray of ogrish privy-gore, he found himself menaced
by the ticking of the battle-clock. He had to find another
blade before the Argamorans killed the best opponents, or
surrendered.
Well, the gods aren’t always subtle. (I’ll take
another lager, by the bye.) No more than thirty yards up
the lane from where he stood, a broad thoroughfare
intersected it; and there, in a gust of purple flame, a
massive yowling wyvern appeared. Half-bounding, half-
flying in the tempest of wings like a galleon’s mainsail, it
towed a chariot ornamented with the dry, staring eyes of
the Ogre-lord’s defeated foes. And there in the chariot,
asnarl and aslaver, was Yaglk of Hylomoria: the Ogre-lord
himself. In his right hand, Yaglk brandished a triple-
bladed axe the size of a kitchen table—but in his left, like a
butter-knife in a bear-paw, was a longsword made for
human hands. Even as the grisly vehicle went rattling by,
swaddled in sparks and smoke, Cundar recognized the
iridescent glitter of Sorrowfen steel.
It made sense. Garyma, the axe-and-dagger style
popular in the Western Kingdoms, originated in Sorrowfen,
and Yaglk seemed to have adopted some variation of the
style. Besides, that piratic settlement on the shores of the
Gelid Sea was known to forge the mightiest armaments
known to modern warfare, and the Ogre-lord would
naturally covet the best. Therefore, he would now die and
Cundar would take his sword.
He sprinted after the chariot. It was far too fast to
catch on foot, of course, but luckily its trail was not
difficult to follow. As he passed the groaning soldiers
sprawled in the avenue, a brace of werewolves loped from
an alleyway, seeking to prey on the injured. Annoyed, the
Northman spared a moment from his pursuit to deal with
them.
Werewolves can’t be mortally harmed by steel, but
quickly regenerate from ordinary wounds. Already moving
at a jackrabbit run, Cundar leapt onto a smoldering horse-
post, launched himself high into the air, and kicked them
both in the fangs. The haggard creatures, tall as a man,
glared with yellow eyes as he landed right between them.
Then they lunged, their needle-sharp claws slicing through
the air, and he spun like a dervish, catching both their
lead wrists. Momentarily stunned by the kicks, off-
balance, savage but untrained, they fell forward onto one

11
another’s claws: the one sure way to slay a lycanthrope, as
every child of Raelor knows. As they slumped in a
shuddering death-hug, weak cheers went up from the
Argamorans—but their praises were too slow to reach the
Northman’s ears.
After a few more blocks, he realized where the
Ogre-lord must be heading: the Temple of Hyrule the Sun-
God. Argamore was hallowed to that solar divinity, and the
slaughter of the High Priest would demoralize the city’s
military beyond hope of rally. He cut through a side street,
vaulted a fence, and pelted toward the marble spire rising
above the nearby rooftops. But as he passed a row of
burning shops, another annoyance caught his eye. The
city’s fire brigade was struggling to contain the blaze, but
as they labored with their tubs and buckets, they were
being set upon by a rabble of deserters from Kenoma.
Only a few years ago, Cundar had worked as a
mercenary in the Kenoman ranks, where his skills had
immediately been recognized. For months he’d been a drill
instructor for the army there; it was quite likely that he’d
personally trained some of these men. His abiding
frustration with Kenoma’s infantry had been their reliance
on pikes and arrows, their hesitation to engage at close
range.
One of the deserters saw him charging in their
direction, yelled a warning to his fellows, and hurled a
javelin. Cundar snatched it out of the air, twirled it
blurringly, and deflected three crossbow quarrels and a
throwing-knife. Then he was among them, stomp-kicking
kneecaps and snatching out windpipes. The last one died
before the first one struck the ground, passed through,
and went howling down forever to the Devil.
The fires at Cundar’s back began to dwindle as he
came in sight of the Temple. The sloppily tended weapons
of deserters were of no interest to him, nor the shifting tide
of battle: he had but one goal.
High atop the Temple’s outer wall, a lone robed
figure stood. Warriors of Argamore kept surging toward the
gate, striving to get inside and protect the High Priest, but
something kept pushing them back. As the swordless
swordsman approached, he saw the sickly green hue of the
robes and understood: this could only be the Hated Mage.
He’d never met the man, but tales abounded of the leper-
hearted sorcerer from Glorm the Demon-Keep. He dealt in
neither fire nor lightning, but practiced on the minds and
hearts of his victims. Coming into range, Cundar felt the

12
horror of which whispered stories told.
For the power of the Hated Mage was in fear: the
secret dread of each man’s innermost soul. What would
you feel, you may well ask, if he wove his bleak wizardries
on you? Death by starvation, mayhap, weeks or months of
gnawing torment rolled up into an instant. Perhaps you’d
experience the loss of a beloved spouse or child, over and
over again. Or torture at the hands of dull-eyed jailers,
yawning as they turn the wheels of your rack or push the
burning pokers into the sockets of your skull. For Cundar,
there was only one terror that harrowed his spirit.
He looked around and found himself alone. No
enemies, no challenges, no fights. Moldering spear-butts
and rusting glaives were scattered at his feet. A few old
women shuffled by. Grey were the heavens and grey the
earth, and neither deity nor mortal stirred to threaten him.
Slowly, drearily, he paced forward through the guardless
gates into the Temple courtyard.
The spell snapped, and a roar went up from the
soldiers. Freed from their own visions of death and pain,
they followed him through the gate. Cundar shook his
head, awakening, and glanced up at the wall; but the
Hated Mage was gone. He’s still out there somewhere, I
fear, but our Northern friend may yet track him down one
day.
As the Argamorans advanced on the Temple door,
the Ogre-lord’s wyvern burst through the stained-glass
window high in the wall and swooped over them, vomiting
magma down on their heads. Shrieks and chaos ensued.
The archers opened fire, and a great flight of shafts and
bolts shot up to clatter against the monster’s scaly
breastplate. Cundar, for his part, turned and ran back the
way he’d come.
A failure of nerve, no doubt. Or possibly the basalt
steps leading up to the top of the wall. He reached the
narrow walkway where the Mage had stood moments
earlier, and raced along the slippery path as the wyvern
sailed by underneath. He was getting tired now, and his
willpower felt drained after the clash with that dark
enchantment. But this winged thing was the last obstacle,
and it was just now coming into position.
One maniacal whoop and Cundar flung himself
into empty space hurtled through the smoky afternoon
and landed square on the fiery creature’s neck.
Screeching and wobbling in its flight, the wyvern
banked over the courtyard and headed back toward the

13
smashed-out window, hoping to scrape him off. He had no
time for delicacy, nor mercy: plunging his powerful hands
into the monstrous eyeballs, he clutched at the gristle and
ripped the orbs from its head, trailing their long pink optic
nerves.
They zigzagged in through the window, tail-
spinning, and crashed into a huge stone pillar in the
middle of the sanctuary. Cundar jumped clear just before
impact, plunging down to the pews below. By happy
chance, they had been descending rapidly, and he was
only fifteen or twenty feet up. The oaken bench cracked as
he landed, giving just enough to break his fall.
Yaglk’s honor guard was gathered around him on
the altar, two-score of the most brutal ogre warriors in
Hylomoria. Cundar stepped out into the aisle. Behind him,
the double-doors burst open and the Argamorans
stampeded inside. Battle was joined.
Holding the Ogre-lord’s murderous glare, the
Northman stepped up to the altar as the fighting seemed
to part and swirl around them like the foam of breakers on
stone. Off to one side, huddling by his gilded chair, was
the High Priest of the Sun-God. No one spared him a
glance. Yaglk raised his weapons, and Cundar balled his
fists.
The Ogre-lord bellowed and sprang. Cundar dove
and front-rolled straight through the stride of those
bulging legs—came to his feet as the ogre spun around—
and turned loose the One-Inch Punch. The granite tile
snapped beneath his heels. Pounded in the gut with the
force of an angry bull, Yaglk stumbled back three steps
and dropped the longsword that served him as a dagger.
He recovered quickly, but by then the son of the North had
a sword in his hands once more.
Yaglk’s axe-hand came off first, then both his legs,
so cleanly that he stayed on them as the blood gushed
down to fill his boots. The return-stroke disemboweled
him, a stab went through his solar plexus to pierce his
spine, and as he finally began to topple, the swordsman
spun around and took his head.
Gasping for breath, Cundar finally paused for just
a few beats of the heart. The longsword felt alive in his
grip. The weight, the balance, were perfect; the blade-edge
so keen you could almost hear it gleam. At the base, where
the blood-smeared blade met the hilt-guard, was a simple
rune of Sorrowfen. It said “Queslavalaka”: Hammer of
Light.

14
 After a few deep inhalations, the swordsman felt
strength returning to his limbs and his will. At last he had
a sword again. At last he was ready to rejoin the fight. He
turned—and just as he was starting to wonder why the
Temple had gone quiet, he saw that the fight was over.
Their master slain, the ogre guard had dropped their
weapons in despair. A mighty cry of victory shattered the
silence, as the warriors of Argamore cheered the fighter
who had saved them all. And Cundar of Raelor said:
“Fuck.”

15
Paranoia; claustrophobia; skullduggery; shadowy danger:
artful anxiety has been with sword and sorcery long before
Fritz Leiber gave us the hidden terrors of Lankhmar,
atmospherics evoked in this story.

THE TEMPLE OF VANAS

Kieran Judge

The little stone building lurched out of the forest

gloom. Small, simple, and rugged, it had the sign of Vanas
over the top, which was cast in polished bronze. Orel
crossed the little bridge over the stream and stood before
the door. She looked the building over. She didn’t like
heading into temples as a rule but, considering her
desperate need of a roof over her head, it would have to do.
And besides, she’d never needed her knife when dealing
with the priestesses of Vanas on previous occasions.
The main worship room was nothing more than an
empty hall with an altar at the front. Two torches
illuminated the stone figure behind the altar, the goddess
Vanas, the traveller’s guide. The rows of kneeling cushions
were dusty and cobwebbed. Travellers, it seemed, didn’t
pass this way too often.
A side door creaked open, and a man in a white
hood appeared. He was bald with small, snake-like eyes.
He started when he saw his visitor, but quickly regained
his composure and smiled. “Welcome,” he said in a soft
voice. “It is most fortunate of you to stumble across us this
late at night.”
Orel nodded. “I’m in need of a room. I’ll pay
whatever is asked.”
The man waved her concern away. “The children of
Vanas do not ask for payment. Service of the goddess is
reward itself. I shall have a room prepared for you now.
May I take the pack from your weary shoulder?”
“I’d rather you didn’t.”
The man looked as if he were about to protest, but
nodded when he met Orel’s steely gaze. “As you wish. I
shall return when your furnishings have been readied.” He
bowed and departed through the door again.
Orel walked to a cushion near the wall, so that she
could keep a watchful eye on both doors, and sat down
after removing the cobwebs. When she was certain that
nobody was watching, excepting the stone eyes of the
goddess, she swung her pack around to her knees and

16
opened it up.
Wrapped inside a brown cloth were five large
pearls which, despite their age away from daylight,
glimmered with the same sheen as when Orel had
unearthed the rugged chest from the wall two days ago.
They were priceless, so the legend said. Orel hoped the
legend was false, because she intended a very high price
for them indeed.
A shadow crossed the room. Another monk stood
by the altar, a taper in hand and newly-lit incense sticks
burning either side. He was dressed exactly the same as
the last monk, save for a long scratch across his forehead.
How the hell had he entered the room without her
knowing? He must train to move like shadows, Orel
thought.
“Your room is nearly ready, but if you wish to wait
for a moment to pray and offer thanks to Vanas, we shall
not disturb you.”
Orel nodded. Her hand covered the open pack.
The man looked to it in a glance so fleeting that
Orel wasn’t sure he realised he’d done it himself. He
smiled weakly and left her alone.
Orel wrapped the pearls up again and stood up.
She had been too distracted by her prize. Had to be on the
lookout at all times. Anyone could decide they were better
in their own possession.
She could smell the incense already, though they
had just been lit. It didn’t give off an awful stink, as she
had known some religious incense to do, but neither was it
especially pleasing. It tickled the back of her throat and,
even halfway across the room, her eyes began to water. It
might not stink, but it was strong.
As a cough started to tickle the back of her throat
she staggered up to the altar. Something in the back of her
mind told her that something was wrong. She wrapped her
travelling cloak over her mouth and nose. It didn’t block
the incense out completely, but it allowed her a little
closer.
Orel looked over the incense holders but saw
nothing immediately amiss. She plucked one of the
burning strands out and looked it over. Up close, she saw
notches that ran down the latter half of the stick, and a
black, tar-like substance which coated the bottom. Orel
threw it across the room. Garhill sap, of which too long an
exposure could lead to drowsiness, paralysis, comas, and
a rumoured painful death.

17
 Orel swept all the incense from the table and
stamped on the burning sticks. Soon she felt the tickle at
the corners of her eyes begin to abate. She pulled the cloth
down and breathed in clearer air.
All her senses suddenly spiked.
From the corner of her eye she sensed movement
to her right: the door opening just a crack, a figure
emerging.
She turned away and used her body to block her
hand going to her knife. She sighed in order to mask that
she was listening to the footsteps. There, getting closer,
any moment...
Orel turned and the knife flashed. The incense-
monk didn’t have time to react before the blade was at his
throat. He squealed.
“I should let you bleed out right here and now.”
He fumbled in his cassock, but Orel wrapped an
arm around him and stepped to his back. “Don’t try it.” He
was silent.
“Can’t speak?” Orel sensed a sudden change as
muscles slackened under her grip. He tried to say
something, but no words formed. A second later he started
to shake violently. Orel dropped him and watched his eyes
roll back in their sockets. Foam dripped from his lips. He
dribbled saliva and bile onto the floor before he fell to one
side, convulsed, and finally moved no more. A chewed up
leaf fell from his tongue.
Orel stared in dismay. She’d seen her fair share of
death, but to keep a Garhill leaf inside his mouth at all
times for an instant suicide was a new one on her.
She looked to the main entrance of the temple.
She knew that she should just leave now, flee into the
night, but no. Things were wrong. Since when did
worshippers of Vanas appropriate ritualistic suicide, or the
attempted subduing of its patrons?
Orel stashed the body behind the altar and
ditched her pack with it. It would only slow her down, and
anyone who stumbled across it would be too busy
worrying about a corpse to inspect the contents. Knife in
hand, she pushed open the door into the building’s
depths.
The hallway was silent. Torches hung from racks
lit Orel’s path as she edged further into the temple. A door
on her right was ajar. Looking in she found a small room
complete with several unmade cots and basin on a desk.
On the floor were droplets of dried blood. Nosing inside she

18
saw a shape fallen behind one of the cots.
Orel crossed over to the body and closed the young
woman’s eyes. “I’ll be back,” she promised.
At the end of the hallway she found a set of stairs
which led down into a gloom that smelled of earth and
mould and smoke. From the darkness she heard a steady
beat, dum! dum! dum!, that found a way to snag at her
heart. She could run to alert the authorities in the next
town, but the temple might be empty by the time they
returned.
And besides, she was too curious for her own
good.
Orel crept down the worn steps. She kept her
breathing quiet, footsteps light. She froze when she heard
whispers not far from the bottom of the stairs. She backed
up against a wall and melted into the shadows.
“She should be out like a light. Roha will be
bringing her down shortly.”
It was the first man. She watched his shadow pass
the wall and begin to climb the steps. When he was close,
she stepped out and put a hand over his mouth. Orel
quickly dipped her fingers inside and located a garhill leaf,
which she threw to the floor. “Not a sound, or you’ll never
make one again.”
The man managed to maintain his composure. He
nodded, before moving back the way he had come as Orel
pushed him from behind.
She led him into an almost exact replica of the
worship room upstairs, only with more shadows in the
dark corners. The altar at the end of the room was a
bronze trough filled with a body tied up inside. The woman
was bathed in a sickly liquid, and burning torches were lit
on either side. Behind this, a large bull’s head was cast
from the same bronze and hastily mounted on the wall
over two large drums. It had three eyes: Lastra, Vanas’
twin.
A third hooded man of the group was standing
over the trough, this monk with black hair. He watched
Orel enter with his companion and backed away from the
trough.
Orel saw the tied priestess and refrained from
spitting on the floor to get rid of the foul taste in her
mouth. “Decided to break in for a little sacreligion? I was
wondering why Vanas’ priestesses were now male. That’ll
be because one priestess is dead and the other priestess is
about to be sacrificed, I see.” Orel waved her knife at the

19
third man. “Untie her.”
The man in her grip spoke behind her fingers.
“Don’t do it. Kill the priestess. For Lastra.”
Orel put her knife back to the man’s throat. Black
Hair by the trough looked to the struggling priestess, to
the hostage, back to the priestess, to the torch, to the
hostage.
Orel sensed his decision before he’d made it. She
had already pushed the monk towards his cohort as Black
Hair’s hand began to move for the torch. The monks
crashed into each other and sprawled across the floor.
Orel leapt across and kicked the bald monk in the
ribs, and he squealed and doubled over. She brought the
knife into the firelight. He raised his arms up but she
found a gap. She saw his pleading eyes, wavered for a
microsecond, and then forced herself to ignore them. She
let the knife drive down into his skull. Metal scraped
against bone as she withdrew it again.
Black Hair snagged her foot and pulled, which
sent her to the ground. She lashed out with her knife and
he rolled away, came up in a crouch. “Fucking bitch,” he
spat at her.
She got to her feet and squared off against him.
“One of you is dead by leaf. The other dead by knife. Any
last requests before the three of you stand before Vanas
together and beg for forgiveness?”
“You can ask them yourself. Better yet, ask Lastra.
He knows just what to do with interfering whelps.”
Orel snarled. Behind her the priestess struggled in
her trough. She glanced back.
Black Hair ran for her, knife out. Orel dived out of
the way, and Black Hair’s foot snagged on a dislodged
stone. He collapsed into the trough, and Orel kicked its
underbelly. The whole thing fell off its stand. The priestess
spilled out but Black Hair was trapped inside as it came
down on top of him, where he found that it was too heavy
to push off from underneath.
Orel snatched up one of the torches and touched it
to a trail of the sickly liquid that was streaming from out
underneath. It ignited, and fire raced back up the river
and into the trough. Suddenly there was a great whoosh!
from inside the makeshift coffin as the man inside became
a writhing ball of flame. Orel threw down the torch and
pushed down on the coffin with all her might.
He banged and screamed but she kept the
pressure on. She closed her eyes and tried to block out the

20
image of a burning man, skin bubbling, organs turning to
molten soup. Eventually, as the heat started to sear her
palms, the rattling died down. She stood back, knife ready
to strike a burning black mass that might emerge. It
didn’t.
Orel sliced through the priestess’ bonds and gag.
The priestess wrapped two slender arms around Orel’s
neck. “Thank you, miss. They were going to...”
“It’s over now. Lucky for you, one of them tried to
kill me upstairs.”
“They just showed up this afternoon. Stormed in,
knocked me out. I woke up in...” she pointed to the
overturned trough. “What happened to Seya? Did they...?”
Orel nodded. “Don’t think about it. Let’s get out of
here.”
The priestess allowed herself to be guided to her
feet. “They’ll have to be buried,” she said, “those three
men.”
“Let them rot.”
“Vanas wouldn’t want that.”
“If you want to bury them, you do that. But not
before we get you clothed, and I ain’t shovelling.”
With an arm over her shoulder, Orel brought the
young woman up the steps. She led her into the main
worship room as Orel went back to find her fresh robes.
She took another and covered the dead priestess, Seya.
Orel collected her pack again. Pearls still there.
She looked up at the stature of Vanas. If I’m ever judged
before the gods, you’d better put a good word in for me.
“I’ll head to the next town and send someone out to you,”
she said.
The priestess nodded. “Go to the Vanas temple
there. Tell them Cadine sent you. And that Seya is...”
Orel nodded. She opened the door into the night.
“I don’t believe, myself,” she said. “But if there is anyone
up there, I think they were looking down on you tonight.”
Cadine smiled. “Thank you.”
Orel saluted, closed the door behind her. The
night was cold, but far more comforting to Orel than the
temple.

21
Folmar’s artful language renders an ancient world both
cruel and beautiful, perhaps in the spirit of Clark Ashton
Smith, the interwar decadent and sword and sorcery great.

AS REPELLENT AS I
Chase A. Folmar

With the evening tide came a corpse galley to the

harbor in Xorull. There, only husks of stone and mortar
still stood, licked at by lingering flames of what had once
been a vast and gluttonous inferno, its hunger only
satiated now that nothing was left to burn. The city, or
what remained of it, spread devoured beneath a blanket of
ash, with not a living soul there to see that ship arrive.
Sea foam dripped in slimy torrents from grinning
skulls and spines, from curved ribs and femurs, from all
those blanched pieces of bones coagulated together into a
single pallid hull, all while the vessel tore through languid
waves at the insistence of oars swung in wide and powerful
arcs. Like a battering ram it broke through shorelines
laden with detritus to beach itself upon a bed of black,
blood-soaked sand, moaning as if the assembled carcasses
felt the pain of so sharp and sudden a landing. With its
arrival there slithered forth the dark forms of wraiths
shapeless to the sight of waking men, those hideous
collectors of the dead who came from beyond the horizon’s
plunging edge, and they spread through the necropolis like
a seething flood of shadows.
Yet soon was found one man who still drew breath
within the silence of so many dead. He sat alone upon the
rim of a stone fountain, searching the soot-clouded waters
for any reflection of his face, his torso, any hint of his
figure, wrapped up and down in heavy bandages sullied
with sweat. Dark, blazing eyes were all that revealed the
humanity below. Unadorned of armor, he carried only an
immense, two-handed blade, so tall that when he stood its
basilisk-head pommel nearly reached the full extent of his
height, but which he leaned upon like a common crutch,
the cross-guard wedged underneath his arm with the
scabbard’s tip pressed against the earth.
The wraiths peeked at the trail of death, spread
like fallen leaves of autumn across the ground, behind he
who lived burdened by the name Ruyin. Nearest were the
broken bodies of warriors clad with burnished plate and
silks once white as freshly dusted snow, whose imposing

22
beauty now lay tarnished in heaps of torn and mangled
defeat. Their silver masks, sculpted in expressions of
cherubic delight, hid each lifeless face from view, while
dried tears of red gruesomely stained the luster they
previously possessed, and made those sharply-angled
smiles horrid to behold. The wraiths could still hear the
echo of steel striking steel in the battle that had ensued
between them and Ruyin, that song of swords and spears
thirsting greedily for blood to be spilled. Alongside its
clattering crescendo, the collectors of the dead caught
wind of a different noise as well, a baleful dirge unfamiliar
to their memory, though potent as the flames that had laid
Xorull to waste.
For those bodies spread farther throughout the
city, who had called it home and stoked their hearths
against the chill of creeping midnight winds, bore no
wounds inflicted by sharp or piercing weapons; nor did the
searing embrace which had swathed them in charnel
shrouds bear in its scent a smoke of natural-born fire.
Instead, the wraiths took notice of a foul and acrid
sharpness in the blaze that had burned here, a stinking
note of artifice whose source stemmed from a pile of
smashed and broken instruments near where Ruyin had
sat. What infernal trumpeting had burst from the mouths
of such devices, the wraiths wondered, to have so
thoroughly destroyed this city and all the inhabitants
therein? And what manner of man was Ruyin, stooped
over and dependent on the support of his oversized blade,
to have not only survived, but fully overcome so ruthless
and vicious an assault?
Curious as they were, the wraiths had but one
task at hand, and so slipped silently within the
lengthening shadows to retrieve and bring back to their
ship all those newly dead. They sulked and scampered just
on the periphery of Ruyin’s senses, unwilling to bear their
hideousness upon even a man as him, wounded and
exhausted though he appeared. They knew well the
scornful ire of mankind; the zealous refutation of fearful
unknowns; the blind adherence to vilifying dogma; the
righteous wrath to cleanse what could not be controlled in
the name of atonement for a dark and corrupted world.
Yet venturing to sneak quick glimpses his way, the
wraiths did not see those thoughts afire in Ruyin’s eyes.
The man who had himself hidden away behind a
dehumanizing shield stared into the darkness not with
hatred or distrust, but with deep wells of unspoken

23
sorrow. A strange kinship stirred within the watching
wraiths, as if Ruyin were closer to them than to those
burned and blood-drained bodies he alone still breathed
among, and that if he could choose, he might cross beyond
that borderless veil of night and leave behind the waking
world for good, sparing not even a single glance back at
the misery it had wrought upon him.
That look vanished, though, when a screeching
whinny bellowed through the city’s deathly hush, a cry
that came not from the earth, but from the ashen air
above. The flapping of vast, feathery wings thundered
through the blotted night, and from thick plumes of smoke
Ruyin beheld the splendor of a unicorn reared in flight,
shining against the desolation like an alabaster arrow let
loose from its bow. Astride its back rode a woman of lithe
and regal figure, robed in flowing sendaline which
shimmered cerulean even in the dreary haze, her crown of
scarlet locks thrashing amid those aerial currents the
winged mount soared effortlessly upon. From above she
scoured the devastation until, catching sight of Ruyin, who
stood alone by the fountain’s edge, she descended.
The wraiths retreated farther at her approach, for
the cruelty of the sorceress Lyramyr towards things
unsightly and distasteful were known well to their kind.
They could see it even now, in the untempered revulsion
with which her violet eyes looked upon Ruyin as she
circled overhead. It was the look a gardener gives to a weed
sprouted unbidden within their paradise, that suddenly
spoils the pristine cultivation they have so desperately
sought for, and serves only as a reminder of all the
ugliness they wish could be purged from their perfect
world.
Yet for all the venom cast his way, Ruyin did not
shrink back. From his scabbard sang the steel of that
mighty sword drawn. He hefted the weapon aloft, grasping
tight its hilt with all his strength, and brandished the
wicked sharpness of its length for the sorceress to see in
full.
“You wish to fight me, broken man?” laughed
Lyramyr from on high, as if he were little more than a
worm for her to squash. “Surely you must know who
graces your vile sight with such resplendent beauty, and
what powerful sorcery lies at the fingertips of that
perfection?”
“I see only a whipping master of rabid dogs so
blind with hatred for their prey that they willingly reduced

24
to cinder what they claimed to protect, rather than allow
one as repellant as I to be housed and cared for by the
good grace of others.”
“Xorull was my city, wretched aberration! You dare
to speak as though blood dirties my hands? Your coming
was the stain which doomed this place, and should my
warriors have slaughtered you as was their duty, Xorull
would still stand proud and magnificent to meet the
coming dawn!”
“Come on down then, sorceress!” answered Ruyin,
his arms splayed wide as if welcoming the coming strife,
“Finish what your hapless fiends could not, and come fight
me here, in the carnage they so effortlessly sewed! See
what your adherents and the fire-spitters they wielded
have wrought in service of your decree, and we shall find
whether the corpses of Xorull judge you innocent or
guilty!”
Lyramyr scoffed and instead pulled tight the
unicorn’s reins, drawing herself higher from the ground.
“Cease your posturing before you fall dead from the effort,”
she spat. “You are not worth the sweat upon my brow. You
are nothing, and will ever be so. Still, such persistence is
tiresome; your wanton lust for destruction must be
quelled, lest it spread further across these pure and
civilized lands.”
A haughty smile curled her lips, and the sorceress
pulled from the broach on her neck a heavy amethyst.
Strange and loathsome words began to pour from her
mouth, a stream of woven incantations that lifted the gem
from her slender fingers and held it suspended in the air.
As if in echo to the final shriek she gave, the amethyst
shattered from its center and left behind a glittering
constellation of fragmented violet in its place. These
separated shards then shot down all at once, burying
themselves into those dead warriors wearing masks of
smiling silver.
For a moment, nothing happened, and the
watching wraiths were as lost as Ruyin to the purpose of
so intricate a performance.
Then, the bodies began to shudder, to stir, as if
pulled by the quivering grip of invisible strings. A
sickening chorus of skin split asunder followed from each
infected host, swelling louder until suddenly, in a shower
of bloodied mist, great seething coils of sinewy meat and
viscera burst clear up from their decaying vessels, and
curling tightly about one another in great, blood-soaked

25
knots, they began to drag each of their disparate sources
together into a unified and horrible whole.
What heaved itself up did so in the crudest
caricature of a man, and could only be called a nightmare
sculpted in flesh. The wraiths bemoaned to see those
many bodies, ones rightly belonging to them and the
waiting carrion galley on the distant beach, rise as a single
entity by the esoteric machinations of sorcery and hurl
themselves blindly Ruyin’s way. The bandaged man threw
himself aside before he could be trampled, quicker than
appearances would have hinted him capable, and with a
mighty cry swung wide his sword. It tore through flesh and
armor alike, leaving a long chasm of crimson where it had
struck; yet the invoked behemoth carried on as if unaware
of the grievous wound, pausing only to turn around and
lumber towards Ruyin again.
His stance low, feet spread wide in bracing
defiance, this time the wraiths watched as Ruyin met the
nightmare head-on. His blade pierced uselessly through
heaps of molded flesh as it bore down against him. The
weight nearly forced Ruyin fully to the ground, and it was
all he could do to simply slow the thing’s momentum as it
forcibly buried the length of his weapon deeper and deeper
within its undulating mass.
A ghastly imitation of what might have been an
arm suddenly rippled up from the golem of flesh and,
lashing out between the distance separating them, swiped
Ruyin with such tremendous force that he was sent
tumbling over through air.
With a dull thud he hit the ground, and crumpled
heavily near where the wraiths cowered in their protective
shadows. Those shapeless forms stirred when they saw his
bandages loosened and dangling free from his body.
Revealed were the grisly sores and discolored patches of
his affliction, scars of leprosy sunken deep upon his skin,
and no longer did the wraiths wonder why Lyramyr so
desired his death. Instead, they crept closer still, circling
as if concerned for his survival as he lay sprawled and in
agony upon the earth, his pain shared between them, his
plight becoming their own.
With a heaving grunt Ruyin lifted his head their
way. He ignored the earth that shuddered with each step
taken by his approaching doom, ignored the cackle of the
sorceress on her flying steed above, ignored even the pain
all but rending him apart where he lay, and stared deep
into the shadows that surrounded him. Arms shaking, his

26
breath short, Ruyin reached out and extended a hand
towards those depths beyond, as if entreating whoever,
whatever, lurked in that darkness for aid.
Or perhaps escape.
All as one did the wraiths break through the
shadows that carried them. Touching Ruyin’s outstretched
hand, they poured through the bridge of that connection
like a writhing black fume, the shadows staining him so
dark that what little light still flickered in the shrouded air
all but drowned in so stygian a silhouette.
“You are all alone, leper; now die alone!” Lyramyr
howled above.
The fist of mangled flesh which came down was
meant to be his undoing; it never reached him, however,
caught mid-descent as if by the snare of some unseen and
immobilizing trap.
Ruyin, suddenly risen to his feet, held back the
hammering blow with arms seeped sable and shining, an
aura of discordant iridescence upon him where before only
wasting skin had spread. While mindless adherence to its
purpose blinded the nightmare to this change of fortune,
Lyramyr let loose a cry of shock from her flying perch as
Ruyin began to tear apart her creation piece by bloody
piece. Somehow, his fingers had been replaced by crashing
waves of twilight, and the golem of collected corpses stood
as helpless to his wrath as those last remnants of daylight
were before all-devouring oceans of night. Deeper and
deeper he shredded through its fleshy miasma, with such
relenting fury that the amethyst’s binding magic proved
unable to maintain the monster any further, and left it but
a twitching carpet of gore strewn across the blood-sodden
earth.
An ashen mask of dismay overcame Lyramyr, and
she fled on her unicorn before the same fate could befall
her, unwilling to contend with that blasphemy of skin and
shadow below.
Ruyin, or the obsidian shape that stood in his
stead, breathed sweet relief to see her departure. The
nightmare slain, and his blade back in its rightful hands,
exhaustion and disbelief quickly drained what little
strength he still retained. A freefall of fatigue clouded his
sight, and so he did not see the wraiths slip from his body
and return to their shadows as he tumbled to his knees.
Wavering upon awareness’s edge, the hard earth suddenly
softened beneath him, as if a warm feather bed on which a
weary soul might rest, and Ruyin allowed himself the gift

27
of falling fully to its embrace. He then closed shut his eyes,
welcoming the merciful dark, and drifted into a deep and
peaceful sleep.
In their gentle grasp did the wraiths carry Ruyin to
the corpse galley’s deck. There he was lain, free in the
open air above, while they slithered below to wield the
great oars that would steer them the way home. Leaving
the port of Xorull in their wake, they rowed and rowed and
rowed, far as far could take them, before sinking low
beyond the horizon and vanishing clear from sight.

28
I have often considered “time” the true enemy of the sword
and sorcery protagonist. Ritzlin literalizes that threat in this
excellent story of a vengeful soul’s dark petition to his god.

UNDYING THIRST FOR VENGEANCE

By D.M. Ritzlin

In all the lands of ancient and august Nilztiria, no

peak reached higher than Mount Fanzubibar. Mighty,
foreboding Fanzubibar towered proudly above the
Jambootan jungle since time immemorial. In a past era it
was deemed to be the only location in the world suitable to
host the holiest of shrines dedicated to Flargesht, god of
justice and vengeance. Flargesht’s priests made this
selection under the assumption that their god would find it
favorable due to its similarity to his own realm, the
mountainous dominion of Thruum.
Tales are told that in bygone ages, the most
fervent and devout worshippers of Flargesht made
pilgrimages to Mount Fanzubibar. These true believers
scaled rocky crags and traversed narrow ledges for the
privilege of making oblations before the altar of their god.
Word was passed among the faithful that on singular
occasions Flargesht himself would appear and answer his
worshippers’ prayers—or so the legend goes. Although
worship of Flargesht still thrives in various lands of
Nilztiria, centuries, perhaps millennia, have passed since a
pilgrim last made the trek to the sacred mount. The fane
decayed, irreparably ravaged by the unforgiving wrath of
Time. Consecrated braziers went unlit. Hymns and litanies
went unsung. Innumerable times did the crimson dawning
of Nilztiria’s sun disperse the shadows from the neglected
shrine, and coequally innumerable times did the shadows
return as the sun sank below the horizon, the luster of its
vermillion radiance weakening imperceptibly with each
repetition.
In this day and age, who would consider
journeying to the forgotten mountain fane? Only one who
believed he had been wronged so greatly that nothing
short of divine intervention could set things right. One
whose thirst for vengeance could not possibly be slaked in
any other way.
This is the tale of such a one.

Dorzandur of Jalp wiped the tousled golden locks

29
from his sweaty brow and reached for the stone ledge
above him. Gripping the surface with fingers like spikes of
iron while his feet sought leverage, he slowly raised himself
above the edge of the precipice. He scrambled onto the
rock-strewn ledge and lay still for a moment, trying to
catch his breath. A stairway of stone had been hewn into
the rock during the days of the fane’s greater activity, but
had eroded and crumbled to the point of uselessness.
After a brief respite, Dorzandur rose to his feet and
studied his environs. The area was littered with ruins of
what might have been a temple once, but one
unmistakable feature still stood: a rectangular block of
obsidian. Engraved upon its face was a fist pounding the
earth; the holy symbol of Flargesht. The altar was as long
as the Jalpian’s body, and half as tall.
Dorzandur approached the awesome altar with
veneration. He took a long swig from his leathern
waterskin, soothing his throat in preparation for the
lengthy prayers he was to recite. Before he began, the
devotee of Flargesht showed the proper reverence by
peeling off his sweat-soaked tunic and removing his boots.
The pilgrim abased himself before the altar.
Chanting in a voice much lower than his natural pitch, he
began his entreaty.

O Flargesht, who reigns o’er all,

I beseech thee, heed my call!
Thy servant hath need of thy terrible sword
Grant me vengeance, O righteous lord!

Startled by the sudden commotion, a flutter of

sparrows erupted from the ruins in which they had made
their nest. Heedless of the disturbance he had caused the
avians, Dorzandur continued, increasing the volume of his
voice.

O Flargesht, righter of wrongs,

Wait no longer, thy reticence prolongs
The fall of the wicked ’neath thy punishing sword
Grant me justice, O righteous lord!

Verse after verse decanted from Dorzandur’s

mouth as steadily as the ever-flowing Tigtyg River courses
into the Thuldroonian Sea. Long before he spoke the
ninety-seventh and final stanza, his voice became harsh
and raspy. Once the prayer was complete, he reached for

30
his waterskin and emptied it down his parched throat. He
paused, awaiting a sign. No deity manifested, no omen
appeared. Dorzandur threw himself before the altar,
banging his head on the rocky earth while reciting the
prayer from the beginning.
Hours passed and shadows lengthened.
Throughout the day Dorzandur remained unwavering in
his determination. After every ninety-seven stanzas he
would look up expectantly for a visitation from his god,
stifle his disappointment, and begin anew.
Fanzubibar became enshrouded by dusk like a
necromancer donning a fuliginous cloak. For the first time
doubt entered Dorzandur’s mind. Perhaps the abandoned
fane was beneath Flargesht’s notice. After such a stretch of
time, would the deity care to materialize here?
The zealot forcefully banished all thoughts of
uncertainty from himself. Such qualms were highly
inappropriate for a follower of the Restorer of Balance.
Would these misgivings cause Flargesht to appear sooner?
More likely they would have the opposite effect. Dorzandur
resumed uttering the sacred stanzas.
During the fourteenth stanza Dorzandur perceived
a subtle change in the quality of the humid night air. He
paused. A ray of gold began to shine down from the
heavens upon the altar. More rays followed, gradually
revealing a majestic figure. Each shining spear of light that
fell from the skies brought more of the figure into view, as
if a celestial curtain was being parted. Dorzandur stared
with awe and reverence at what stood before him.
Flargesht strode out from the miraculous
illumination toward his devotee. One step was enough to
close the distance between the two, as the deity’s height
was more than double that of Dorzandur. Flargesht
deigned not to cover the magnificent bronzed thews of his
upper body or his oak-strong legs with raiment, opting
instead to merely gird his loins with an embroidered strip
of samite. Above his massive beard, its color matching the
radiance in which he had made his appearance, shone two
virtuous eyes of amber.
“Arise, mortal,” thundered Flargesht. “Many
centuries have passed since last I stood upon Fanzubibar.
So many, in fact, that their number is beyond my
calculation! Tell me your tale, young one. It must be of
grave importance for you to have called upon me.”
“Indeed it is, Bringer of Retribution,” rasped
Dorzandur, his voice still weak from overuse. “And it is a

31
tale of woe as well. It racks me with grief just to recollect
it.
“When I was an adolescent, barely more than a
boy, my family and I were forced to leave our home. We set
out on a journey, Desazu our intended destination. On the
roadways of Yom we were assaulted by brigands. I wish
not to share the grisly details of the tortures we were
subjected to. Suffice it to say I was the only one not slain.
My parents, my brothers, my poor violated sister—all gone.
Me they kept as a slave. Some masters treat their slaves
kindly; the men of Yom do not. I suffered a variety of
abuses for years. Were it not for my strong faith in you, I
might not have survived.
“One night one of my captors collapsed in a
drunken stupor close to my pen. I slit the Yomish
bastard’s throat with his knife and escaped.”
“Indubitably, you and your family have suffered a
horrendous fate,” said Flargesht. “What do you wish be
done?”
“That is simple. Destroy every last man, woman
and child of Yom!”
The face of Flargesht became grim. “Do you jest?
You cannot seriously believe that genocide is just
recompense for the crimes against you, however pernicious
they may be.”
“Evil must be repaid with evil,” stated Dorzandur
flatly.
“This goes far beyond repayment.”
Dorzandur stared at his god, aghast. “You mean to
say you will not grant me justice?”
“Not of that nature.”
“Then if you will not cleanse the world of the
rotten ape-men, bestow upon me the power to do it
myself!”
“What mean you?” questioned Flargesht.
“One lifetime is not sufficient to enact my revenge.
Grant me immortality, so that I may live long enough to
end the race of Yom! Evil must be repaid with evil!”
Flargesht looked upon his petitioner with bitter
displeasure. “It greatly distresses me that I came to answer
the call of one so base and callous. Nevertheless, I will
grant your wish—conditionally. Immortal you shall be, but
only until you complete the odious quest you have set for
yourself. For as long as one Yomsman lives, you cannot
die.” With that, Flargesht clapped his hands and vanished
in a blast of golden light.

32
 A wild grin broke across Dorzandur’s face. He had
gone without experiencing joy for so long he now felt
delirious.
And thus did Dorzandur embark upon a quest the
likes of which no man before had ever undertaken.
With limitless lifetimes at his disposal, he saw no
need to make haste. Rather, he would take his time,
savoring every step toward accomplishment. He started
unambitiously, accosting solitary wayfarers on the
outskirts of Yom. When this method ceased to amuse him,
he ventured inside the borders of his enemy nation. He
moved between small villages, stabbing a shopkeeper here,
strangling a housewife there. Funerals became a common
occurrence. Every night Dorzandur gave thanks to
Flargesht for enabling him in his pursuit of depopulation.
After several years Dorzandur took fewer pains to
avoid detection. His incredible success had allowed him to
grow quite confident. This resulted in hatching riskier
plans, such as poisoning an entire town’s water supply.
Yet for all the graves he filled, thousands more Yomsmen
remained extant.
More years went by; more Yomsmen went to their
doom. Eventually murder became a chore, not a joy, and
Dorzandur looked for ways to speed things along. He
concluded that he should target only the womenfolk of
Yom, thereby disrupting the ability of his foe to procreate.
He likened himself to a general cutting off an opposing
army’s reinforcements. Also, he would ignore the elderly
and enfeebled, for nature would lend him a helping hand
in dealing with those.
One fateful day misfortune struck Dorzandur like
a hammer of ruination. He became lax while administering
a routine death sentence to an unsuspecting milkmaid.
Had the malicious avenger’s senses been as sharp as they
once were, the young boy playing behind a nearby cottage
would not have eluded his perception. The lad witnessed
the act; constables were informed; and within an hour
Dorzandur was apprehended. He resisted fiercely,
eliminating two more Yomsmen in the process, but a well-
timed sword thrust aimed at his midsection brought him
down.
The officials of Yom were perplexed by the fact that
their prisoner still lived, despite suffering what ordinarily
would be a lethal blow. Nevertheless, justice must be
dispensed, and Dorzandur was brought to the deepest
dungeon in the state palace. For several days bread and

33
water were brought to him. Then he was forgotten.
Dorzandur’s wound healed with time, but lack of
nourishment weakened him. He hung limply in his chains.
Although no gray hairs manifested in his beard or scalp,
his unnaturally-prolonged youthful looks began to suffer.
Malnutrition and ennui conspired to torment his mind and
wither his body.
Time passed imperceptibly. A moment could be a
day, or a decade. He knew not the difference, nor did he
know the difference between sleep and wakefulness. He
longed for death, but the reaper’s cold hand could not
reach him, for men of Yom yet lived.

34
Baker’s story allows us to return to a pre-modern world of
enchantment where sorcery and bloody conflict are
ubiquitous.

KAUAHOA AND THE TATTOOED BANDIT

Patrick S. Baker

The warrior stood, tall and strong, on the brow of

the hill and looked down at his opponents approaching
across the valley floor. Standing behind the lone warrior
were the two dozen survivors, old men and women and
children, of the local district, come to the pit of battle to
watch the combat which would decide their fate.
“I am Kauahoa of Hanalei, son of ali’i’ai’moku
Maihuna and ali’i wahine Malai’aka’lani,” the warrior
shouted as he swung his war club over his. “This is the
great la’au-palau, Kahehumakua, weapon of koa since Ku-
the-Supporter created him. I challenge your champion to
single combat. When I win you will leave forever.”
The fifty or so approaching bandits stopped and
one man stepped forward.
“I am Lekeke, ali’i of this band. I will fight you.
When I defeat you, I will eat your flesh, ground your bones
to dust and your mana will be gone forever.”
Kauahoa hitched up his malo over his hips,
girding his loins for the fight. He swung Kahehumakua to
his right shoulder, gripped his shark-teeth edged leiomano
club in his left hand and strode unhurriedly down the hill
toward his enemy.
Two Days Earlier
Kauahoa paddled his canoe up to the beach near a
small, broken-down fishpond, and pulled it above the high
water mark. The kuapa was in such disrepair that only the
fattest, laziest fish remained. Kauahoa grabbed a fat moi
fish from the pond, sliced off its head with single stroke of
his wooden dagger and spit it over a fire of drift wood. He
went to a stream and collected fresh water in his ipu
gourds.
As he ate and drank an old man, carrying a war-
club so heavy he could barely lift it, stormed over the hill
and charged Kauahoa, shouting.
“Brigand! Where is the rest of your gang? Now you
even take our fish?”
“Hold Grandfather,” the young koa said as he
easily dodged the old man’s first swing. “I am no brigand. I

35
will work for this fish.”
“Liar!” The kupunakane swung again.
Kauahoa ducked and then gripping the old
warrior’s malo, lifted and half threw and half lowered him
to the ground and then put him in a wrist lock.
“Now, now, kupunakane,” Kauahoa said, gently. “I
won’t hurt you. Tell me why an old one such as you is here
defending your fishpond. Where are the young koa? The
chief’s men for the pit of battle?”
“Dead,” the old man said and relaxed. “All the
warriors, all the kanaka no luakaua, are dead. Killed by
the bandits.”
Kauahoa released the kupunakane, sat him up,
and gave him a drink of water.
“Tell me about these brigands,” Kauahoa said.
“One night about halfway through the month of
Makali'i the murderous gang of taboo-breakers came out of
the hills. They attacked and killed our warriors while we
slept, leaving just the old, young, and women alive. It is
Ho’oilo, dedicated to Lono, the god of rain. There is to be
no war, no attacks. All fighting is taboo. The bandits
gathered all the survivors together and told us they would
return in twenty days to collect our crops. If we resisted,
we would be killed.”
“How many of these men without honor are
there?”
“About fifty that I saw.” The old man took another
drink.
“Where do they live?”
“In the mountains. No one knows where. No one
dared track them.”
Kauahoa nodded.
“I will fight the ali’i of this outlaw band,” Kauahoa
stated. “If I win, they will leave you be. If I lose, then you
can say I was a crazy outsider and you should not be
blamed.”
“Why would you do this for strangers?”
“I was exiled from my home for youthful
foolishness and arrogance. Now I travel the islands seeking
to win mana and return home a better man and a greater
warrior than when I left.”
The old man merely nodded, seeing the young
warrior’s determination.
Now
Lekeke advanced on Kauahoa. The bandit leader
was heavily tattooed. Each bone and joint had been inked

36
in black on his body, down to his fingers and toes. Only
his face was left unmarked.
At twenty paces Kauahoa started to sprint, raising
Kahehumakua up and to the right for a sidewise strike.
At ten paces Lekeke shouted a spell and in two
blinks of an eye the tattoos separated from his skin and
grew large, so that a black and skeleton-shaped monster
four time the size of a man now stood around the bandit.
Lekeke floated up to the kakua-monster’s neck, his head
where the monster’s head should be.
Kauahoa skidded to a stop and called to
Ku’keoloewa. Kahehumakua grew in a flash from one-
anana long to three. The war club’s great basalt stone
head now as big as a man’s head.
Do not, Kahehumakua whispered to his wielder.
Kauahoa swung and struck the giant’s left leg. The blow’s
rebound sent the young warrior back three steps. He
turned and started to run.
The kakua-skeleton kicked Kauahoa like a
kinipopo peku ball, sending the koa flying and spinning
through the air. Kahehumakua flew in one direction and
Kauahoa in another. The warrior, bleeding from the mouth
and nose, landed with a thump in a palm grove and rolled
to a stop against a tree trunk. Dazed, Kauahoa sat up. The
Lekeke-giant strode toward him. Kauahoa crawled deeper
into the trees, covering himself with dry and rotting palm
fronds, leaving his eyes uncovered to peek out.
One of the bandits ran over to Kahehumakua and
picked up the la’au-palau, then dropped the war-club like
it was burning hot. The second brigand, laughing at the
first, picked up the club and kept hold of it.
Lekeke scanned the grove from his great height.
“Come out, Kauahoa,” Lekeke taunted him. “I will
make your death quick now. Come out, coward.”
Kauahoa lay perfectly still, barely breathing and
did not reply as much as he wanted to. Five bandits
arrived to the scene and started to move into the trees,
searching for him.
“No,” Lekeke said, his tattoos returned to his skin
and he sank back to the ground. “Leave him. If he is not
dead, he soon will be. As long as he lives, he will live with
his shame.”
The bandits went to collect their loot.

As the sun set Kauahoa crawled from his hiding

place, sore and limping, he started up a trail into the steep

37
mountains. Kahehumakua was calling to Kauahoa,
whispering in his mind, telling him to come fetch the great
magic club. Moving slowly and carefully, the warrior
climbed up the defiles and crevasses. The full moon shone
down, lighting his path.
The moon had just reached the top of the sky
when Kauahoa clambered over a rockslide and saw a small
vale filled with outlaws. The flat area was centered on a
pond. A wide waterfall fed the pond from the upper end.
The bandits lay asleep in dirty disorder, sated from their
meals. Near Kauahoa, at the bottom of the path, an old
man crouched in a cage barely large enough to hold him.
Kauahoa drew his wooden dagger and his shark-
toothed club and slipped down the slope.
“Wait, my young friend,” the old man in the cage
whispered as the young koa came close
“Why?” Kauahoa paused
“I am Akamai’Kaapo, kahuna of the tattooing art
and sadly, creator of Lekeke’s kakua-monster.”
“So, Lekeke and his followers will all soon be dead
by my pahoa and leiomano,” Kauahoa said, indicting the
wooden dagger and shark toothed club.
“Not so.” Akamai’Kaapo turned his head at a
noise. “Quick! Back to the top of the hill and hide.”
Kauahoa also heard the odd crashing sound. He
turned and scrambled back up the way he’d come. Just as
he reached the top, the kakua-skeleton, now just two
times man-sized, and without Lekeke, emerged from
behind the waterfall and strode around the valley. At
Akamai’Kaapo’s cage the kakua-monster grabbed the
prison and turned it over, forcing the captive to twist
around in its narrow confine until he was upright again.
The black skeleton finished its circuit of the vale and
disappeared back under the cataract again.
Kauahoa slipped back down the slope.
“Free me,” Akamai’Kaapo said. “I can give you a
kakua-warrior.”
“Like Lekeke’s?”
“Like your own, as Ku-waha-ilo guides me give you
one.”
Kauahoa frowned a bit at the mention of the
sorcerer’s god, Ku of the Maggot-Dropping Mouth. Then,
with one slice Kauahoa cut the cord holding the cage
closed, freeing Akamai’Kaapo.
Kauahoa left the old man for a moment and dashed over to
Kahehumakua. He considered killing the man who had

38
taken the war-club with his pahoa while he slept, but
decided against it. Instead he picked up the la’au-palau
and bashed the man’s brain out with it. Kauahoa thought
this might spread mistrust among the gang.
The young koa returned to see that Akamai’Kaapo could
not straighten up and could barely move. In frustration,
the young warrior threw the bent old man, none too gently,
over his shoulder like a bag of yams and carried him out of
the valley.

Akamai’Kaapo directed Kauahoa through the

mountains to a cave hidden by a curtain of vines. Inside
was a plain grass mat and a collection of coconut shells
and small wooden and bone tools.
Putting Akamai’Kaapo down, the old man told Kauahoa to
lay on the mat, face up. He would start the work.
“Right now?” the young koa asked.
“Why not?” Akamai’Kaapo began preparing the inks and
his tools. “Ku-waha-ilo will guide me and give me the
incantations to free your kahua-warrior when the time is
right.
The kahuna took the soot of some burned candlenuts,
mixed it with coconut milk, cane juice, and some of his
spit. Taking the serrated bone comb attached to a short
wooden handle, Akamai’Kaapo dipped the au into the ink
and then, starting at Kauahoa’s hairline with small taps
from the sausau mallet, began the tattooing process, all
the while whispering prayers, incantations and pleas for
inspiration to his sorcerer god.
Two Days Later
Lekeke’s gang returned to the valley. They then went to the
top of the hill near where Lekeke had fought Kauahoa.
“Kauahoa,” Lekeke shouted. “I know it was you. I
know you freed Akamai’Kaapo. None of these weaklings
and cowardly swine would dare do this. I should have
killed him, and you, when I had the chance. Come out and
face me or I kill everyone and this whole valley burns.”
Kauahoa emerged from the men’s house, the left
side of his body tattooed in the half outline of a man from
forehead to heel, both back and front. He bore
Kahehumakua in his left hand as he strode forward.
Lekeke didn’t hesitate. He yelled out the spells and
his kahoa-monster formed around him.
Kauahoa whispered his incantations and ran his
hand down the center of his body as Akamai’Kaapo had
taught him, releasing his kahoa-warrior. As the black line

39
tore away from his body, the ripping sound was audible.
Kauahoa screamed in agony and staggered forward, nearly
falling to the ground. The tattoos, as they pulled away, left
behind blistered and bloody skin. The tattoos grew and
stretched, forming a black frame-man four times man-
sized. Kauahoa rose into the air until he floated within the
kahoa-warriors chest.
Kauahoa strode forward again, his tattoo-warrior
moving as he did. Lekeke turned and ran to a grove of
trees and tore two large koa trees out of the ground. He
threw one at Kauahoa and then charged, holding the other
like a club.
Kauahoa easily dodged the thrown tree. He called
on Ku the Supporter and Kahehumakua grew to eight
times his normal size, the great basalt stone now the size
of a wild boar. Kauahoa swung Kahehumakua from the
right. Lekeke’s kahoa-giant blocked the blow with his tree,
but it knocked the bandit back a step. Kauahoa swung
again, this time from the left, Lekeke blocked again and fell
back again, this time Lekeke’s koa tree cracked.
The brigand chief kicked out with his left leg
catching Kauahoa’s extended right knee and breaking his
shin bone. The pain transmitted to Kauahoa from his
tattoo-warrior, just as if he had been struck directly. The
warrior stumbled and fell to his injured leg, causing him
more pain.
Lekeke pivoted and swung his crude war-club at
Kauahoa’s head. Kauahoa blocked with Kahehumakua,
shattering Lekeke’s koa tree. The warrior brought the great
war-club around over his head and swung at Lekeke’s
kahoa-monsters legs. Lekeke tried to jump back, but the
huge basalt stone struck home on the brigand’s left calf
and sent him sprawling. Lekeke began to crawl away,
back toward the koa tree grove.
Kauahoa’s tattoo-warrior staggered upright and
limped after the scuttling bandit chief’s tattoo-giant.
Lekeke reached the koa trees. Kauahoa got to his enemy
just as Lekeke pulled another koa out of the ground. The
warrior lifted Kahehumakua up over his head for a
downward strike. Lekeke held the thick tree trunk up in
both hands over his head to block the blow. The great war-
club smashed through the tree and hit the real Lekeke.
The bandit chief’s whole body shattered into a mist of
blood, bone and flesh. Lekeke’s tattoo-giant popped like a
bubble and was gone.
The bandits, seeing their leader destroyed and

40
Kauahoa black giant victorious, fled in every direction.
Kauahoa recited the spells to Ku-waha-ilo that returned
the tattoos to his body. The black lines snapped back with
the sizzle of burning flesh as Kauahoa gritted his teeth
against the scorching hurt. Kahehumakua returned to
normal size as well.
Kauahoa sat, his back against a koa tree and
composed a victory mele while waiting for the healer
kahuna to arrive and set his leg bone.

41
Iniguez’s strength for worldbuilding is on display here; in
just a few thousand words, we are introduced to a realm of
rich lore animated by compelling political strife.

A THOUSAND WORDS FOR DEATH

Pedro Iniguez

The slash at his belly burned like hellfire and in

an agonizing instant, Eneko knew he’d suffered a mortal
wound. Moments before, Azeri had morphed into a blue-
feathered falcon and darted toward the eastern sky.
The necromancer plucked the jewel-encrusted
dagger from his belly and groaned, more so at himself than
at his lover, the shapeshifting witchqueen of Zargol. How
could he have let her slip by? He should’ve known better.
She’d proven to be his deadliest adversary yet.
Eneko looked upon the battlefield. A wave of blue-
and-white tunics crashed into a mountain of ebony armor
like ocean tides slamming against the cliffside. Amidst the
pitch of clashing swords and clanging spears, he heard the
throbbing in his head, the blood pumping faster as his
heart worked twice as hard to keep him alive.
He discarded the knife and looked upon the speck
in the sky. She’d been gifted power at an early age. Power
that had warped her mind. When she’d realized her true
potential, she’d returned to her homeland to claim the
throne at the cost of thousands of lives. And that was only
the beginning. He knew: for the sake of the world, Azeri
must not live.
The militias of Vela Nova fell upon the retreating
legions of Zargol from the southern swamps of the Phyrian
continent. Their ranks were a collection of goblin raiders
and blood-thirsty barbarians.
The Vela Novans pressed southward, leaving him
in the flanks of the dead or dying. At his feet, the blood
from his wound pooled, creating thick clay.
“Bone conjurer,” a wounded pikeman said. “We
can press the attack further and drive our enemies into
the swamps if you can resurrect the fallen at our feet!”
“That’s not what I’m here to do,” Eneko groaned.
“Are you not a necromancer?”
“I’m only here to advise on the movements of the
witchqueen,” Eneko replied. “And if necessary, offer
protection from her spells. Besides,” he said, “when the
dead return, it is near impossible to control their actions.

42
They may very well feast on what used to be their
brethren.”
Eneko waved off the soldier and looked upon the
sky. Before the speck vanished into the horizon, he
impaled his staff into the ground. The crystal at the head
of the staff radiated a purple aura. The familiar pinch of
talons squeezed his right shoulder. He turned, looking
upon Bela, perched in all her beauty. The raven met his
gaze, her clouded white eyes nebulous, haunting. Her
resurrection had changed her visage; no one or anything
ever came back the same. She’d returned mostly
unchanged: her memories, her instincts, all intact. The
eyes were a small price, he figured. But a price there
always was.
“Bela,” Eneko moaned, each word a fresh stab to
his abdomen. “Pursue Azeri before she escapes. Lead me
to her.”
The revenant bird flew across the sky and gave
chase.
“Sir!” The shout came from his left. A Vela Novan
infantryman approached his side. Eneko offered the man a
sullen glare. The foot soldier took a step back. “Sir, the day
is ours. We are victorious against the witchqueen’s forces.”
“Just one battle. Many more to come in the days
ahead. Lest you forget the bloodthirsty warlock, or the
wizard and his armies,” Eneko muttered. “Tell your
commander I must depart. I have business elsewhere.”
Eneko turned from the battlefield and limped
eastward. Stacks of black smoke spiraled upward, the
smell of flesh in the air. Lives that would never see another
dawn. What had the world become? The plane of Phyria
carved and divided up amongst powerful mages, sitting in
their keeps, reigning over chaos. They’d traded their souls
to the Dark One for a mere glimpse of power in the mortal
realm. Awaiting them was a gift of seared flesh and an
eternity of servitude below. If, Eneko thought, he could
send them there first.
His enemies were many:
Waerloga, the oathbreaker: the murderous warlock
who held dominion to the east.
Evocantos, the conjurer: leader of the demented
Kraken cult on the ocean cliffs to the south.
Mago, the mad wizard, protected by his bodyguard
Osric, the paladin, said to be gifted with divine
protection.
How was the world supposed to face such odds?

43
He wasn’t sure he’d been up to the task. A sole
necromancer out to save the world? If it hadn’t hurt so
much, he would’ve laughed.
His mind wandered to Azeri, the shapeshifter. The
witchqueen of Zargol. His lover. No, that was ages ago.
Before she’d turned on life itself. There was a time when he
would’ve given her all the riches of the world, hen he’d
stave off death itself for her satisfaction. Now, he knew
what had to be done. His task was as much for the sake of
the world as it was to reclaim the power she’d had over
him.
As he reflected, he trekked onward. Through a
meandering mountain road. In the distance, tendrils of
lightning flashed inside storm clouds like the lashings of a
caged beast. The rumble of thunder rolled in like a
stampede.
As evening fell, an icy wave swept over his body.
He grimaced and cursed under his breath. Ironic. He’d
dealt in death yet had no power to stop his own demise. No
incantation from his lips could yield the inevitable. He
shook the thought and carried on.
Peculiar, he thought. Bela had yet to report back.
He rubbed the gem on his staff. It was said to be
the crystallized heart of a vampire, though he couldn’t be
sure. There were countless mysteries in the world, some of
which were best kept hidden in the shadows. He inhaled
and concentrated, his soul searching for any feint pulse of
Bela’s essence. Then, a short glimpse of her, falling,
crying. The soul link became severed. Darkness.
He came to the end of a slope. Ahead, a small
town sat nestled under the shadow of the storm clouds.
He ambled through the broken gate at the mouth
of the village and spotted a black heap alongside a patch of
tall grass and milkweed. He parted the scrub and felt
tightness seize his chest. Bela’s feathers swayed to a gentle
breeze. Talon punctures dotted her body. Eneko wicked
the moisture from his eyes and gently lifted her body. Her
claws ran with blood. She’d put up a fight.
“Good girl,” he whispered, tucking her body inside
a pouch slung around his torso.
A lantern’s light flickered through the open
window of an inn. The door swung ajar. Perhaps the
townsfolk would know something.
Inside, he heard raucous laughs and mugs
slamming on oaken tables.
Like a carnival of drunks, men with soil-stained

44
shirts howled at one another across the tavern. Eneko
surmised them to be farmers, quenching their thirst after
a vigorous day.
He took a seat by the only empty table, a nook
toward the rear of the hall. He groaned, struggling to sit.
He pressed a hand against his wound. Blood seeped out
his belly. Dark spots now dotted his vision. By sunlight,
he’d be dead and damned like the rest, his soul the
property of the Dark One in his fire caverns below the
mantle of the world. He prayed that he’d have enough life
in him to finish the job before then.
Focus on something else.
He surveyed the room. Odd. He wasn’t pestered
over his appearance or questioned over the smoke in the
sky. He hadn’t so much as received a dirty look or the
flash of a dagger. The patrons were content to laugh and
slouch over a mug of piss-water in peace.
A tall, hunchbacked man with a dumb stare
stepped over his flickering shadow. “What’ll it be?”
“I’m surprised you noticed me,” Eneko said raising
an eyebrow.
“Wassat?” The innkeeper responded.
“Nothing. In my condition, anything I drink will
pass right through me.”
“You alright?” The man asked, his eyes darting
back and forth between Eneko’s face and his blood-stained
robes.
“I’ve been wounded by a witch. I have reason to
believe she has fled to this town.”
“Ahh,” the man said rubbing his chin. “I do
remember seeing a strange woman. She headed south a
few hours ago. She’s long gone.”
Eneko nodded and pursed his lips. His eyes
caught something curious. Specks of dried blood marked
the innkeeper’s left shoulder. “Shame. Before she fled, I
vexed her with a curse linking our lifeforce together. If I
perish, she does too. I simply came to bargain with her.
She was the love of my life. I owed her that much. Very
well. Tell me, do you have a cemetery nearby? My pet
raven has died and I wish to give her a proper interment.”
“I’m not sure…”
“Do not worry yourself. I will find it. Take care.”
On his way out, the men continued their drunken
howls, oblivious to him as if under an incantation.
Later, he found the graveyard by nightfall. It was a
small plot littered with overgrown ferns and broken

45
tombstones. Some of the grave markers were inscribed
with the words: In death, freedom.
Beams of moonlight pierced through the clouds
while Eneko shoved out handfuls of worm-ridden dirt. He
dug out a hole and sighed. He retrieved Bela from the
satchel and nestled her close to his chest. He knelt beside
the hole, closed his eyes, and whispered an old prayer.
“You’ve resurrected her before,” the familiar voice
said at his back. “You could just do it again. Or have you
realized you were never truly a necromancer?”
“Resurrection comes at a cost. It means syphoning
the life-force from a living being.”
“Yet, your selfishness drew you to that power as it
did all of us.”
“As a boy, my family was slain by Zargol
marauders. Then, I heard whispers of a cult of death
worshippers who had the power to resurrect anyone. I
sought them out and they took me in. Little did I know the
consequences of necromancy. Or the cost.”
“Remind me of the cost,” she said, the sound of
ecstasy in her voice. “I want to hear you say it. I want you
to relive those agonies before your death.”
Eneko inhaled a deep breath. The air was moist
and slightly sweet. “When I learned the ways of
resurrection, I set out for their graves. I brought them
back. Mother. Father. Sister. Except it wasn’t my family as
I remembered them. They were nothing more than
revenants. Rotting, stinking cannibals. They nearly
slaughtered the entire village before I stopped them. I’d
witnessed their deaths twice.” He bowed his head. A breeze
whipped across, carrying with it the scent of flowers.
Dragon lilies. Azeri’s favorite. “I’ve learned many lessons
since then,” he said rising, still clutching Bela at his heart
in one hand, and his staff in the other. He turned slowly.
Atop her head sat a crown fashioned from the ribs of her
enemies. Her face was smooth and symmetrical and her
skin, a light olive complexion. Her lips were full, and, even
now, Eneko longed to kiss them one last time. Despite her
beauty, he could afford no mistakes. To underestimate
Azeri meant certain demise.
Eneko met her gaze. It had been years since he’d
done so. Her green eyes stared back. Coldly. Cruelly. Just
as revenants came back with something lost, so had she.
Whatever love she may have had for him in the past was
gone, neglected and left to wither and die. “You loved me
once,” he said. “Knowing that kept me alive all those years.

46
You gifted me with Bela. Fitting I suppose that you took
her away now in the end.”
“Drop the staff,” she said, disregarding his words.
Eneko dropped it at his feet.
“Now for the curse you’ve cast upon me.”
Eneko smirked. He’d been right. The innkeeper.
Her shapeshifting abilities knew no bounds. But,
sometimes the most powerful of spells were but simple
lies.
“Our destinies are entwined. I perish and you do
as well.”
“No. I’m afraid I can’t allow that.”
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Azeri, but I am
dying.”
“I could heal you right now, and kill you. That
would free me of the curse, no doubt.”
“I suppose so. I also suppose our history means
nothing to you. You’d really throw it all away and slay
me?”
“Did you forget? Are you so blind, bone conjurer?
You tried to kill me first.”
“I don’t kill,” Eneko said. “Not anymore.” He took a
single step forward. “I simply tried to stop what you’ve
become. I can’t allow you to follow your course. It is a path
of destruction. Your oath to the Dark One has driven you
mad. You sit atop your throne and rule over your kingdom
of death.”
“And we could’ve done it together, Eneko. Enjoy
your last breath.”
She lifted her hands, her fingertips emanating
blue light. The blue aura took hold of Eneko. The flesh at
his abdomen began to grow back, one sinewy strand at a
time, as if the effects of time were being undone. The pain
subsided. He clutched Bela to his chest, the magic bathing
them both.
The cloud of blue dissipated. A feeling of euphoria
washed over Eneko. The feint beats of a small heart
thumped against his hand.
Azeri cackled. A bolt of lightning flashed across the
sky, blinding Eneko. When the light subsided, she had
already transformed. In the woman’s place now lurched a
black panther, teeth bared like spears, its shimmering coat
revealing muscular legs coiled and ready to spring.
Eneko smiled. His death prayer had not been for
naught. A pair of gnarled, shriveled hands sprang from the
moist earth below the witchqueen. Decomposing digits

47
wrapped around her hind legs. She growled and turned in
bewilderment. Another pair of limbs broke from the soil,
clutching her front legs. Before long, a multitude of hands
sprang from the cemetery like roots, clawing at Azeri’s
feline form. Revenant fingers pulled her into the depths of
shadowed earth below. The panther howled in its death
throes, the roars rivaling the thunderclaps of the storm
above.
She gurgled her last breaths while Eneko turned
away. The reanimated tended to wake hungry. Tonight,
they would feast well.
By sunrise the spell would dissipate and the dead
would sleep again.
The raven stirred in his hand, her white eyes
regarding him in confusion for a moment before the
warmth of familiarity returned to them.
“You know, Bela,” Eneko said, retrieving his staff.
He began west, toward the battleground. “During my
necromancy studies, I was made to learn a thousand
different words for death.” The lightning split the sky in its
fury. He nuzzled Bela’s soft head, tears rolling down his
cheeks. “They just never told me love was one of them.”
Bela squawked, jumping out of his hand and onto
his shoulder.
They walked alone in darkness, knowing at least,
they had each other.

48
Many of Clark’s passages read like narrative poetry,
specifically his description of the two objects that center this
story, memorable artifacts ablaze with cosmic intelligence.

TOTEM AND STONE

Chuck Clark

Turkael stood concealed in the foliage, perfectly

still. The sun rose and paced its uncaring tread across the
sky, and he stood still. A browsing deer ate the dried fruit
he had hung from his belt, and he stood still. Night's
cloak drew over the sky, and he stood still.
At last, long after the darkness had grown old,
something happened.
The knife, made of some strange iron, had been
left where the stranger dropped it, fleeing from Turkael
and the other men. The stranger had somehow crept
through the village in open daylight, killed the wise women
in the sacred hut, and stolen the village god, the ebony,
copper studded totem that had brought them peace and
prosperity for generations. With this totem in hand, the
stranger had fled, faster than even the fleetest of the
villagers. When they had reached this clearing, the
stranger had turned, and Turkael had thrown his spear
true. The stranger had vanished in a flash of light and
noise, leaving behind an unnatural smell.
And the knife.
The others had marveled when they examined the
knife, but Turkael warned them away. Turkael had no real
authority over the others, but there was an edge to him
that made men listen, and when violence came to hand,
even the elders valued his judgment.
The knife was made of some sky metal, light and
strong, but sharper than any edge of bronze. Priceless as
such a weapon was, Turkael trusted his own arms and
sturdy sword, and distrusted anything that stank of
sorcery. More importantly, he also knew that such a thing
would not be left behind, and had waited a night and a day
and nearly a night again, knowing the stranger would
return.
And he had.
A patch of darkness between trees had moved a
fraction closer to the knife, and Turkael sprung forward,
his bronze sword swinging up before his limbs could insist
they had cramped. No subtlety, no art was carried in that

49
thrust, for it was a pure animal violence in his thews,
uncomplicated by any thought or sophistry. Such was
why, where another man would have failed or faltered,
Turkael's sword passed whatever enchantment girded his
foe.
It was like stabbing a mountain, or smoke, or a
torrential waterfall. It was like stabbing himself.
His sword shattered, the heavy bronze vibrating
wildly from his hand, leaving tattered leather and bleeding
skin. A noise and wind like nothing he had ever felt
battered him, and for a single instant, like lightning, he
saw a face of nightmare in a swirl of dirty robes, features
of cold and ancient avarice, before it too shattered, leaving
a pile of filthy rags with a peculiar absent quality that he
knew meant whatever obscenity had taken their totem was
not merely fled, but truly gone.
With steady hands, Turkael reached into the rags,
and pulled forth both of the things he found. The totem
and a black stone, cold and greasy, alien on his fingertips.
The rising sun caught the blood and copper on the ebony
totem, burning, vibrant, and alive. But the black stone
swallowed the sun's light, and gave back nothing. He
turned his back on the clearing, leaving behind the sky
knife and whatever evil it represented, and leaving the
remains of his own bronze sword as well. But the strange
black stone he slipped into his pouch, and with it a
shadowy strangeness in the back of his mind that he could
not quite see.
The village children ran up as soon as he drew in
sight of the village, but hung back, none quite closing the
distance until after the men came out to greet him. It had
always been this way. Born and bred to the village lands
like all the rest, Turkael was cast in an older mold, more
akin to his grandfather's grandfather than the other men
around him. Never quite as tall or as pleasant to look on
as the others, there was still a raw vitality to him that
others lacked. Where other men would fight and kill, he
would rend and slay, and no matter how much he was a
part of village life, the others felt that difference in their
bones. He was a well-mannered wolf in a pack of wild
dogs.
Reaching into his pouch, Turkael took hold of the
totem, pulling it out and raising it high. The people
cheered in wild jubilation, his difference forgotten for the
moment, and he felt a deep contentment of a sort he had
never known. He put the totem in one of the young

50
women's hands, and if her fingers lingered in his palm, or
her smile lingered in his view, that was no hardship to
him.
All that long night, the village celebrated their
returned totem, and Turkael, long accustomed to the cold
at the edge of the firelight, found himself thrust into the
middle of the festivities. Dancing and laughter were two
things he would have said he had little use for, but it is
easy to think so from the outside, and his accustomed
reserve did not last long. He found himself smiling,
dancing with the young women, and easily speaking with
the other men. Always before, he had felt the distance
between himself and the others. It was nothing so definite
as mistrust, or even being unequal- he was the match of
any man in the hunt, and an accomplished warrior. The
other men had always treated him with respect, and even
admiration. He was listened to in councils and his advice
sought out in many matters. Certainly, he had never been
disliked. But tonight, he realized that he had never quite
been liked either. He had always been accepted. Now he
was included.
Leaving the company of the men around the
central fire, and the women in the shadows just beyond,
Turkael walked the edge of the village, musing on his
changed circumstances. Having rescued the village's
totem, he was a part of things in a way that he had never
been before, and felt connected to his people in a way that
he never had. Always before, he had walked apart, among
but never quite with the people around him. He thought of
the future, and his heart swelled with a hope that he had
never known or considered. He placed his hand on his
pouch, and his step faltered, an icy thread of doubt
creeping into his limbs.
The black stone, forgotten in the light of his victory
and newfound status, was not in his pouch where he had
placed it. There was no question in his mind that the
stone was some deviltry or evil. Even now, he understood
that the offhand way he had picked it up, the absent-
minded fashion of his dropping it into his pouch, were not
in keeping with his essential self. He, who refused to
touch so formidable and valuable a weapon as the iron
knife because of it's sorcerous nature, would never have
normally touched such a thing. But he did, and he had
brought it back to the village, with the totem.
An unaccustomed anxiety quickening his
footsteps, he turned back to the village, heading not to the

51
central fire, but toward the sacred hut. As he came close,
a feeling of unease, of something absolutely,
fundamentally wrong, overwhelmed his senses. Men were
forbidden from entering the sacred hut, and every custom
of his people warned him off, but Turkael was made of
sterner stuff, and where others would turn back, he found
that he could not back down from whatever horror he now
feared he had brought to the village. With fearful but
unfaltering feet, he entered the dark hut, and beheld the
scene within.
The last of the old women who had tended their
god, the only survivor of the raid that took it, lay dead on
the floor, her head propped against the altar at the wrong
angle. Her face looked at him with disapproval. He did not
belong here, and even in death, she clearly was not going
to let him forget it.
This thought evaporated when he looked up to the altar.
The totem looked different, dulled somehow, its copper
tarnished, seeming to wearily accept the weak light of the
brazier instead of throwing it back. Its ebony body had
weathered, the smooth polish he remembered from that
same morning gone. And its face! Where that morning the
totem had been vibrant and fine, a stout figure with bright
copper eyes and teeth in a wide, hungry smile, the face he
now saw grimaced, and beads of blood dotted it like sweat,
as though the small figure were engaged in some mighty
effort, its little fists clenched, straining against an invisible
foe.
The black stone lay on the ground before the altar,
gleaming in the light of failing embers, reflecting colors he
knew could not be found under the wholesome sun or
moon.
His instinctive urge to act overcoming his fear, he
reached toward the stone, hoping to smash it on
something, throw it into the river, something, anything.
As his hand neared the stone, it seemed to retreat without
moving, as though the hut itself became larger, the stone
further away the further toward it he reached. He
persisted, shoving his hand against strange barriers that
he could neither see nor understand. His hand seemed to
distort under the sorceries around it, stretching further
and further away from him, while seeming at the same
time to be reaching back toward himself. His hand
seemed to shrink, to become younger, a child's hand, an
infant's. His hand grew old, his fingers twisted back on
themselves, blind snakes that burrowed back into his

52
palm, fleeing the stone that he was so foolish as to reach
toward. The stone laughed.
Turkael looked up to the totem, and saw it had
changed again. The god of the village looked at him now,
pleading, begging for something. In the totem's dull
copper eyes, he saw reflected the easy smiles and
welcoming words he had first seen and heard that day,
and understood what needed to be done. Understanding
that, he also knew what it would cost.
Leaving his hand in the strange space around the
black stone, he reached with his other hand toward the
totem, carefully picking it up off the altar. He could now
see the lines of force and power between it and the stone,
the war being fought between whatever dwelled within the
totem, and whatever lurked on the other side of that
gleaming black stone. He understood that whatever their
village god was, it had once been something else, long
before it was caught up in the bit of wood and metal that
they had worshipped and guarded for generations beyond
knowing. And whatever this stone was, it was something
else too, some door or weakness in the world that
something was reaching through to attack their god.
Bound as it was within the totem, it was not strong
enough to resist the awful thing on the other side of the
stone.
A lesser man might have hesitated, or reflected on
what he stood to lose, for Turkael well knew that he was
an instant away from losing not just the new sense of
belonging he had finally earned, but from losing any place
in the village at all. And since it was not in his nature to
worry of what might be, he grabbed the totem from the
altar and brought it screaming triumphantly down at the
black stone.
Smashing aside whatever strangeness had stayed
his other hand, the totem struck the stone full on and,
with a dreadful crack more akin to bone than wood, the
totem shattered.
A bare instant of silence, and the walls of the hut
were burst asunder. Scarlet smoke billowed out of the
broken ebony totem, coalescing into something with too
many limbs and too little sanity, a savage shape like a red
waterfall crashing upwards against the stars. The black
stone rose up into the air, and opened up like some
impossible dark flower, becoming a hole in the darkness.
The red madness that was the village god rose up into that
hole, filled it, and closed it. With an impression of cold,

53
impotent rage, the stone shattered with a terrible crack,
and shards rained down on the flattened remains of the
sacred hut. Turkael looked down at his arm, twisted and
altered beyond any use, and then up, at his fellow
villagers, who stood amazed, too stunned to react.
Ever a man of action, and no fool, he began
running before anyone could decide what to do.

54
Shaw’s story of an epic showdown between two titans of
the battlefield displays why comic artists and writers have
found the genre’s truck with larger-than-life heroes and
villains so attractive.

THE PRICE
Steve Shaw

“You can’t win, boy.” The General’s voice sounded

battle hardened. Like crunching gravel, but with less
compassion. “Because you’re not willing to pay for it.” His
massive sword cleaved through the air at what seemed an
impossible speed. It found only a tree instead of its
intended target. The tree gave way, felled by the edge of the
brutal weapon, and joined the growing chaos of this battle
field for two warriors.
Plumes of smoke encircled them, carved black
wounds into the mist-filled night sky. They rose from what
was once a camp of soldiers. The sounds of the wounded
and dying carried through the haze, but no man nor beast
dared interfere with these two warriors, for the spectators
were mortals, and mortals do not interfere when titans
clash.
The General’s red armor flashed crimson and
orange in the fire’s light, contributing to the menacing
stature of the man. The armor seemed to match its
master’s fury as it twisted and pulsated with rage, calling
out, thirsty for blood.
“Do you think Malice was afraid to bleed when he
killed your father?” the General called out as he swung his
sword again. “Of course not!” he bellowed, as once again,
his opponent slipped out of reach, leaving his sword to
thunder into the soft earth. A rapid succession of arrows
was the only reply he received. Two, three, then four
arrows pelted his armor, and four arrows shattered there,
like waves breaking against a crag. “No, Malice knew the
price he would pay, both in body, and in soul.”
Frozen on the sidelines, the General’s forces dared
not move. The healers did not attend to the wounded, the
slaves did not flee; even as their tents burned, the men did
not look away from the duel waging before them. The force
of their General’s massive swings rolled over them as they
watched. They were helpless to change the course and
captivated by the melee. They had seen their General, the
so-called “Crimson Breech,” in battle countless times

55
before. He was not the kind of General content to send his
forces to war while he idled in a chair. No, the Crimson
Breech led his men into battle, and acted as both
vanguard and tactician. They had seen his red armor defy
hurtling boulders, absorb the blows of countless swords,
and weather the storm of an infinity of arrows; never did it
show the faintest sign of wear; not so much as a scratch
marred its ruby patina. They knew this archer would not
find purchase. They knew his arrows would not bite flesh.
They knew he would die screaming. They stood, watching
and still, fearful to even breathe, lest their breath draw the
ire of these two titans.
“Your father trained you well,” the General
growled. His opponent had used a feint to put distance
between them, freeing himself to loose a barrage of arrows
without the fear of his enemy’s blade. Even still, each
arrow proved as impotent and futile as the one that came
before it. “But he trained you as a father, and that has
made you weak and afraid.” Caring little for the twigs that
broke against his plate, the General adjusted his grip on
his sword, brought the blade up to cross his eyes and
covered the only opening in his armor. He growled as he
plotted his way towards the archer. “Malice told me of your
father’s last words,” he said in a mocking tone. “How he
begged Malice to spare you.” With a red flash and a
sudden burst of speed the General covered the final
distance between himself and the archer. His sword lashed
out to the side; unsurprisingly, the archer dodged again,
but this time, a crimson-gauntleted fist was waiting for
him.
The force of the blow sent the archer falling to the
ground; as if in response to his falling, the rain began to
fall. A new trickle of crimson joined the red menagerie of
the General’s spiked knuckles. “Your father was a hard
man once,” he boomed. “He was willing to pay the hard
price then.” The General kicked out at the archer as he
began to rise to his knees. There was a crunch. The
General felt the satisfying sensation of broken ribs. “And
then, he found this pathetic orphan baby, and he forgot
himself.” Another kick sent the archer flying back, his bow
finally falling loose from his grip. “You are the reason he
died, boy.”
Once again, the General raised his foot, preparing
to bring the heavy leather down on his quarry’s face, but
instead of the all-to-familiar sensation of breaking bone,
he felt a hot spike of pain rush up his leg as an inhuman

56
metallic voice screamed out a single word: “BLOOD!” It
appeared that the Crimson Breech could bleed after all.
Countless battles, endless armies, furious fathers,
and avenging sons, all have failed to make the General
bleed. So foreign was the sight that the soldiers who swore
allegiance to him initially thought their eyes were deceiving
them. “Perhaps this was some brilliant maneuver that they
cannot fathom?” they wondered. But soon the confusion
gave way to fear, to doubt, and as those learned in the art
of war know, no army can survive on doubt.
The first movement in their camp did not stir the
men. As the slaves pushed free from their broken cells, no
alarm was raised. As they made their way through the
camp, no soldier offered them resistance. As they neared
the tree line, not so much as a head turned to mark their
flight. As the men watched their leader proven to be more
mortal than god, the General began to lose more than his
own blood.
With a sudden burst of strength that seemed
impossible from the smaller man, the archer sprang to his
knees and tackled the now off-balance General. A golden
dagger was clutched in his hand; it flashed brightly despite
the cloudy skies and falling rain. The pommel of the blade
ended in a demon’s head; its cruel mouth moved as it
whispered and begged for blood, more blood. The archer,
locked in a grapple with the larger man, began forcing the
blade down toward the calm, shark-like eyes of his enemy.
The General’s massive gauntlets clenched around his
wrists like vises. “My father was a good man,” the archer
said through clenched teeth as tributaries of blood and
rain became one river streaming down his face. “And he
taught me enough to kill you, old man.”
A hoarse, but genuinely joyful, laugh echoed from
the man’s helmet. “Good!” He bellowed as the knife inched
closer. “You do have it in you!” The General released one
hand from the struggle and delivered a bone-crunching
punch to the brutalized ribs of the archer. He was
rewarded with the sight of blood trickling from the archer’s
mouth. But the archer did not relent. “Now you’re
learning. You need to face the pain to win,” the General
shouted. Another blow to the ribs. The blade began to
scrape the crimson visor and the demon-headed pommel
cackled its bizarre, metallic laugh. “Yes, embrace your
anger! I might have a use for you after all.” The General
pulled his fist back again, knowing that this punch would
either cleanly break the archer’s ribs or drive the knife

57
deeper into his visor. But just as the blow would have
made contact, the archer relented, avoiding the worst of
the blow by diving away. He raced across the muddying
field and reached for his discarded bow.
This second movement in the camp began to draw
attention. The wounded began to move for shelter. The
able men began to ready their weapons. For the first time,
they began to look to each other for courage, instead of
their leader: the Crimson Breech, the Red Thunder, the
Storm Caller, the man they knew as General of the Zoso.
Three arrows were loosed before the General rose
to his feet; unconcerned, he barely noticed that they were
not aimed for him. The archer’s arrows screamed out into
the dark and found their targets: two men who had broken
and ran from the General’s army, two men who would
have gone on to murder, to steal, and to plot. Two Zoso
soldiers who were his enemies, now dead. And this simple
thing is what they never understood, what no one
understands, that this man, armored in red before him,
was not his only enemy. They are all his enemies, all that
would do evil to those who could not defend themselves
from it. And when the Zoso were dead and their General
forgotten, he would still be there, and he would still have
enemies.
“I’m disappointed,” the gravelly voice growled out.
“I thought you were learning.” The General raised a
gauntleted hand to his face and wrenched the golden
dagger from his helmet, its tip close enough to draw a
trickle of blood from his eyelid. With a shock of pain, he
dropped the cackling dagger to the ground, blood now
spewing from its razor toothed mouth. He hefted his sword
again, now ready to end the fight.
“Alas,” he thought, “Malice’s nephew is not the
man we hoped for. Even after witnessing the murder of his
father, he remains soft and scared.” The General decided
to kill him then. He would spare the world his weakness.
His strikes came fast and precise, a deadly
precision the General had yet to display to the archer.
Four simple strikes would do it. First, a powerful
crossbody strike would force the archer to dodge to the
right. Then, an upward sweeping strike would bait the
archer to step backwards. A third strike would be simple
enough, and then a few steps forward and the blade would
drop, the archer would fall back again, and that’s when
Leeland would thrust forward, impaling the archer,
snuffing out weakness from the world.

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 And so it may have been, but the fourth strike
never came. Instead, it was his third swing that bit flesh,
that familiar sensation as the blade caught resistance
before rending flesh from bone. But something was wrong.
The resistance was too light and the smell of iron in the air
was too faint. That’s when he saw it, a smile widening on
the archer’s battle-scarred face. The archer had predicted
the move, and stood his ground. Instead of dodging back
from the falling blade, the archer turned just enough to
avoid the death blow. The blade bit into the flesh on his
back, perhaps nicking a shoulder blade on its way out.
“The archer paid the price after all,” the General thought,
just as he saw the bow raise and the arrow loose. They
were too close to react and the gap in his visor too large to
protect him.
The arrow found its mark—his eye socket—as he
fell and the world narrowed to a small point and vanished
into oblivion. The General had but one though as he died:
“I’m proud of you.”
The archer turned to the camp, which was now
hushed and terrified. “My name is Atrix Laverix, son of
Vincent Laverix.” His voice cut through the rain as if it
were carried by one of his arrows. “The Zoso will fall!
Malice will fall! And all those who would profit from the
reach of their shadow will fall!”
The thralls of the Red General, their courage
already wavering, now broke at the words from the son of
Vincent, their ancient enemy, whom they had forgotten. As
they fled, many threw their weapons aside. Still more
discarded their signet rings, tokens of allegiance to the
Zoso, for they hoped to be free from the curse now laid
upon them. Echoing after them in their flight, they heard
the final doom of the archer: “I am the Order of the
Watchful eye, and I will find you.”

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The sword and sorcery hero is often a stranger, an outsider,
but occasionally betrays glimpses of deep humanity; this
perennial sword and sorcery theme is on display here.

THE STRANGER’S PAYMENT

Nidheesh Samant

I could see him walking towards the town from a

mile away. The stranger, clad in his silver armor, stuck out
like a sore thumb amongst the modest clothes of the
townsfolk. His massive frame moved slowly, dragging his
longsword behind him. My eyes followed his sluggish
movements through the market street. He stopped
momentarily at the apple vendor, seemingly asking for
directions. Satisfied with the old vendor’s answer, the
stranger resumed walking. He was walking towards The
Barrel and Hound, the only inn in town. I made my way
silently through the crowd, which was giving the stranger
a wide berth. As he reached the entrance of the inn, the
stranger had to hunch over to step inside. I moved to the
window and peeked inside. The stranger had no issue
procuring a room. The hunting season was a few months
away, and so the inn had no other guests at this point of
time. The stranger produced a purse of coins from under
his armor, and paid the innkeeper a gold coin. The filled
purse begged me to return at night, under more
clandestine circumstances.
Under the cover of night, I made my way through
the deserted streets. Making sure there were no onlookers
around, I let myself inside the inn through the window.
The innkeeper was out cold on the ale counter, snoring
thunderously. I tiptoed across to the flight of stairs that
led to the guests’ rooms. I noticed the only missing key on
the rack, the key to room 001. I stepped gingerly onto each
stair, trying to tread as lightly as possible. As my foot
landed on the fifth stair, it let out a long drawn creak.
Nervously, I looked over at the innkeeper. He stirred awake
from his slumber. My heart pounded in my chest as he
slowly began turning his head in my direction. I stood
rooted to my spot, careful not to move even an inch. As he
finished turning his head, I realized he was still half
asleep. He wiped the drool off the sides of his mouth and
promptly went back to sleep. Once his snoring resumed, I
continued walking up.
The very first room on the first floor housed the

60
stranger. I tiptoed to the door and kneeled outside it. While
she was alive, my mother always told me I had magic in
my blood. However, I had learned to manifest it only one
single way. I placed my palms gently on the door and
traced moved them apart, tracing a rune on the wood. A
swirling portal opened up, letting me look inside the room.
It was like looking into a shallow pool of water. The image
swayed with the currents, but it was clear. I could see the
stranger sleeping on the bed, his huge body barely fitting
on the mattress. His armor and weapon lay to the side, as
did his purse of coins. I continued observing for a few
seconds more, making sure he was in deep sleep. Assuring
myself, I closed the portal and began working on the lock.
These old locks were a piece of cake for my experienced
fingers. The door was open in no time. I snuck inside the
room, rapidly tiptoed to the purse, and grabbed it. Peeking
inside it, I was satisfied with the amount of shiny metal. I
exited the room, making sure to lock the room back
behind me as soon as I was out. I tiptoed down the stairs,
past the sleeping innkeeper, and let myself out of the inn.
It was the perfect score.
I waited at the graveyard as I had been directed to.
I was breathing hard, exhausted by my swift movement
from the inn to the graveyard. I had run as fast as my feet
could carry me. The bandits appeared together, walking
towards me in their filthy robes. I could see them clearly in
the moonlight as they brandished their blood crusted
weapons with grotesque grins on their faces. Their leader
walked up to me eyeing the purse of coins lying clutched
in my hands. As he approached, I held it behind my back.
“Where is she?”
The bandit leader smirked and snapped his
fingers. Two bandits stepped out of the shadows,
approaching him slowly. Between them, they dragged a
prisoner by her arms - my sister. Bruises covered her face
and her limbs, but I could yet see the fire of life in her
eyes. The leader grunted and motioned with his hand. I
slowly extended my arm towards him, holding the purse
out. He grabbed it in one swift motion and turned around.
He began walking away from me.
“We had a deal.”
The bearded bandit turned around and stared at
me with understanding. He nodded his head, and walked
up to me. He placed his hand on my shoulder and swiftly
kicked me in my guts with his knee. I collapsed to the
ground, the wind knocked out of me. Gasping for air, I

61
watched as he drew his sword and walked towards my
little sister. She glared back at him as he drew his sword
back, ready to end her life. A sudden commotion halted his
hand. The silent graveyard was filled with cries of pain. A
massive man stood towering above the headless bodies of
two bandits. Before they had collapsed to the ground, the
man was rushing towards the other bandits who stood
between him and the leader. Even if there was another
enormous man in town, there was no mistaking the
longsword. He was the stranger from the inn. In two
sweeping steps he was upon the next duo of bandits. They
had barely drawn their weapons when his blade was
already at their torsos, cleaving clean through them. Three
more bandits stepped out from the shadows and
surrounded the stranger. The stranger sidestepped the axe
strike coming from behind him, showing surprising agility
for a man of his size. The stranger quickly spun around
taking the bandit out with a vicious uppercut slash. In a
fluid motion, he made a semi-circular turn and thrust the
sword inside the chest of the next bandit. The third
attacker took a wild swing with his axe but managed to hit
only the dense air. The stranger had already preempted
the strike and had taken his position for another blow. He
rammed the hilt of his sword into the head of the bandit
who was caught flat-footed. He had no time to raise any
defense against the heavy hilt smashing into his face,
cracking his jaw. As the bandit with broken jaw dropped to
the ground, an arrow went whizzing past the stranger’s
ear. He dropped to the ground and rolled to the side,
grabbing the axe from the knocked out bandit. He threw it
in the direction of the arrow’s source. A yelp from the
shadows confirmed the axe’s hit. The stranger readjusted
his stance as he got back to his feet.
The two guards holding my sister left her on the
ground and hurriedly stepped back towards their leader. I
crawled to her side as the stranger approached us, his
eyes trained on the bandits. As he walked passed us, he
shot me a cold glance, sending a chill down my spine. The
two remaining bandits and their leader charged at the
stranger attacking him together. The stranger blocked
their swings with his longsword, digging his boots into the
ground. With one mighty push, he threw back the three
assailants. As they fell to the ground, the stranger brought
his sword down on the bandit closest to him. He followed it
with a massive swing beheading the next bandit. The
leader scrambled up to his feet and dropped his battered

62
weapon. He offered the purse to the stranger, begging for
mercy. The stranger lowered his sword. With his other
hand, he grabbed the throat of the bandit leader. His large
fingers easily wrapped around the bandit leader’s neck.
The stranger raised his flailing body easily into the air, as
effortlessly as he was picking a ragdoll. The bandit’s eyes
bulged as the life was choked out of him. It did not take
long for the flailing to stop. The stranger dropped the
bandit’s lifeless body to the ground. He bent down and
picked up the purse.
The stranger walked up to us, dragging his
longsword behind him. I placed myself between him and
my sister. He raised his sword and placed its edge on my
neck. I could feel a trickle of blood flowing down. My sister
held my arm tightly. The stranger glanced at her and then
looked back at me. Lifting the sword up he rested it on his
shoulder and winked at me.
“Next time, you will pay with your blood.”
The massive man turned around and began
walking away without waiting for a reply. He left us in the
middle of the graveyard, a fitting place for fresh corpses of
bandits lying around us. I hugged my sister tightly as we
watched the stranger’s form disappearing into the misty
night.

63