All posts tagged: fantasy fiction

Calm Before The Storm #WeekendWritingPrompt

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The tavern was so quiet that Elias could hear the wind whispering through the gaps in the walls. When the serving girl brought him his drink he paid her with a whole silver, saw her eyes widen, and patted his coat pocket. ‘Keep ’em coming.’ She nodded and darted away. Apart from one table near the door, every seat was taken. Elias counted the mercenaries, almost all of them Roderick’s, their necks marked with his brand. The King had called the practice draconian, but that didn’t stop him hiring Roderick’s men when revolts broke out. That was why rebels had to hire Elias.    

Heart Of The Dead #FlashFiction #SeptemberSpeculativeFictionPrompt

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When the bodies washed ashore, the novices were there to pluck them from the mud. It wasn’t pleasant work. It was a short trip from the edge of the city to the bend in the river. The unfortunates who made it, came out of the silt choked waters heavy and stinking, muscles still locked up by rigour mortise. ‘Another one!’ The cry went up from lower down the bank, further along than the bodies usually travelled. Flexing her fingers to work some of the feeling back into them, Maradine followed the other novices to the cry and tried to avoid looking as if she was dawdling. She let herself breath when she saw the child, eyes huge and bug like, withered limbs half buried in the mud. It was small, small enough for two of the novices to manhandle inside the temple doors without need of her help. She didn’t try to work out how this one had found its way to them. The monks frowned on questions regarding the vessels. ‘Jamie, Galeth, you take …

No Light By This Moon #FlashFiction #MarchSpeculativeFiction

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The settee springs had burst through the cushion and what little stuffing there had been was gone. The remaining fabric sagged or clung to the rusted springs, much like the building around it, and the skeletons beyond it. Eddie gripped one of the springs near the base and tested it. He sneezed as the cloth attached crumbled to dust. The coil snapped free of its anchor, surprising him and opening a line of crimson across his other hand. He cursed and pressed the cut to his mouth. The taste made him gag, as if the pollution in the atmosphere had changed even his blood. He tore a strip from his sleeve and used his teeth to tighten a knot in the bandage. It would have to do, much like everything else he had done for the past six days. Desperation was a great provider of inspiration he had discovered, but he didn’t hold much hope that it would see him through. Asides from the settee there was no other furniture in the room he’d settled …

The Curse Of The Ex-Wife

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‘You know something, I think life was better on the other side,’ said the mummy currently unwinding the bandaged around her torso. ‘So there is one?’ Dr Williams asked, cheeks colouring as the creature plucked a bullet from between flesh her ribs. She examined it for a moment and then tossed it aside into the sand beside the yellow placard marking one of the entrances to the burial tomb. ‘I’m dead, a revolver is not going to make me any deader,’ she sighed. ‘No, of course not, I do apologise,’ said Dr Williams. ‘You just, well you know, caught me a little off guard.’ ‘You were preforming an ancient revival ritual in the middle of the desert over a corpse. What did you think was likely happen?’ ‘Well honestly, I thought nothing would happen,’ Dr Williams admitted. ‘Then why bother?’ ‘It seemed harmless enough,’ he shrugged. ‘The rest of the team have taken the day off and I was the only one about so I thought why not give it a crack. The least the …

Shadow Dawn – Extract

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Sweat was running into Tara’s eyes and she could hear her breath coming in ragged pants, but she met Talis’ next blow without wavering. The staves cracked together like trees trunks splitting and she forced the new recruit back a step. Despite her lack of training, the girl seemed to be keeping up. She watched Tara with sharp green eyes and ignored the stray ebony curls dancing in front of her eyes from her bun. She aimed another sharp jab at Tara’s chest and the princess parried it easily. The girl was tiring, leaving herself open to basic, amateur tactics. Tara took the opportunity. She aimed high but at the last second twisted, the soft grass giving beneath her boots as she swept her stave towards Talis’ anke. Oak met oak and the taste of copper exploded across Tara’s tongue as Talis moved like lightening to block the attack and throw one of her own before Tara’s brain could catch up with itself. Staggering back Tara grinned. She liked this girl a lot she decided. …

No Room For Parlay

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Lillith turned her face away from the horizon and the purple sunset. It was beautiful, a part of her still recognised that, but the beauty failed to warm her like it once had. ‘Captain!’ The cry came from beside her and the knot of tension that had been twisting in her gut for the past week began to loosen. It was time. She’d found him. ‘Captain! They’re in sight and we’re gaining fast. What do you want us to do?’ What did she want them to do? The question had been buzzing around her head like a fly that refused to leave no matter how much she swatted at it. ‘Captain, we’ll be on her in an hour, what are your orders?’ ‘We kill them,’ she answered drily, the words leaving a bitter taste in her mouth. For a second she thought about him in her bed, legs and arms tangled, his lips tracing a path down her spine. He’d known even then that he would betray her someday. She focused on the boat and …

The End Of Days: Solitary Creatures Part Four

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Edwin had suffered through twelve hours, thirty-two minutes and sixteen seconds of Marie’s personalised brand of bedside manner and he was about ready to throw himself at another pack of Hell Hounds. ‘Just sit still,’ she chided, tightening her grip on his Elbow.  ‘It’s really not that bad, and anyway, we wouldn’t be doing this if you hadn’t decided to get into a wresting match with one of those bloody monstrosities.’ She frowned and sucked in her bottom lip, focusing on the muscle squirming beneath the hand that wasn’t pinning Edwin in place. ‘Easy for you to say,’ Edwin groaned, as the muscle seized and spasmed. ‘How many times have you had to regrow your own body parts?’ ‘More often than you’d think, now shut up or I’ll leave you like this and we can see how well walking around without skin goes.’ Edwin scowled but shut up. It wasn’t as painful as having the flesh stripped from his bones but it still hurt like a bitch. He closed his eyes and focused on breathing through his nose but …

One Last Hope

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Grendal, Chief Clansman of the Ruling High Council For Witches, Warlocks, and the magical sorts, did not appreciate being woken before dawn. His bones complained about the cold and his knees refused to cooperate as he traversed the endless staircases and corridors that led from his rooms to the Grand Hall, where the rest of the council was supposedly waiting. ‘Where is everyone?’ Looking around the room he could see four others, only one of which had bothered to change from their night clothes. Looking at the swaying man Grendal reconsidered the assumption and decided that he’d not been to bed in the first place. ‘Well,’ Grendal demanded, ‘where are the rest of the sods?’ ‘Succumb?’ said one of the others. Elmer Throttle sat hunched in his seat, the folds of his dressing gown tightly roped around his midriff and a single fluffy slipper poking out beneath the hem. ‘He believed himself to be a Warawhump, whatever that is. He won’t come out of the cook’s wine cellar and appears to have crafted himself some form …

Saving The City

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He couldn’t have left it well alone. Of all the screw ups in his life, Jupp was pretty sure that this one topped them all. Scratch that. He was absolutely positive, that this moment, standing on this hill, staring at what little was left of the city he’d grown up in, was the most screwed up, screw up he’d ever had the misfortune to be part of. He should have know better than to release something that could survive for centuries in a sealed container. He should have know better than to go rooting through the back room of Old Man Iron’s workshop when he should have been anywhere but there. He should have know better than to steal the jar that quite clearly stated it wasn’t to be opened under any circumstances lest great tragedy and doom befall the land. Jupp was an idiot and he realised that fully. ‘Well the temple is still standing at least, perhaps the gods are with us.’ Gamin pointed towards the slightly singed marble structure near the outskirts …

Recycled Headspace

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Well the truth is, you didn’t survive, but luckily we had a spare available.’ Prompt From Promptuarium ‘Yeah’, thought Cas, turning her hand in the dim light, ‘a spare.’ Dawn split through the forest canopy, turning the world grey and allowing her to pick out the pale scars crisscrossing the skin she was wearing. The story that the doctors had told her on waking sounded like a bad fairy -tale, full of holes and easy to pick apart. They seemed to have forgotten that replicates were supposed to be perfect, unblemished. They weren’t created with scars already littering their bodies. Her’s though? She remembered looking in the mirror and seeing the scar that ran from hairline to jaw, crossing her face like someone had started to draw an ‘x’ through it. The hair had been cropped too close for her to tell what colour it should be but now the ends were growing through blonde, and her eyes… well at least they were interesting. Curling her fingers into a fist Cas brought her hand close …