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Fantasy Stories Archive
The last six months of stories are posted for your reading pleasure.
| July 2006 | August 2006 | September 2006 | November 2006 | January 2007 |
The King's Foresters - Chapter 1 by Michael Gallant, October 2002
I looked down at the two bodies and shook my head. The buck's body lay where it had fallen, a messy wound behind the shoulder where the bolt had entered and then been cut out. The head was gone, but nobody had bothered to skin or gut the animal. Although it probably hadn't been there more than a few hours, the crows had already been to work. At nightfall, larger scavengers would be along, thankful for an easy meal in the last stages of winter.
The man lay beneath a blanket a few yards off to one side. The best that could be said for him was that he was doing a bit better than the buck.
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Genghis Khan sat in his yurt, sullenly sipping his blood-red wine.
His aide-de-camp came running into the tent and fell on one knee.
The frozen night sky was on fire, blazing with the horrifying beauty of magical warfare, and splashing the vast countryside in flashes of every fathomable color. It was a contradiction with which the Republic of Veil'driel Vanguard had grown accustomed, and under that storm of extraordinary chaos, their camp on the plains carried on in relative routine, becoming a contradiction in itself.
From his elevated vantage point, high atop a ridge that overlooked the plains, General Simian Creed gritted his teeth. His entire Brigade, six legions, reduced to a sea of sparkling idleness as the kaleidoscopic nightmare reflected in their silver armor, with some even staring like fascinated children. To the west, the faraway aura of the distant Fairlawn Cityscape still pulsed defiantly against the attacks, and though the general could not see the devastation those comets inflicted on the city, he could imagine them well, every time one vanished on its course, arcing over the trees, out of sight. All the man could do was shift uncomfortably in his saddle and watch: the impotent commander of thousands.
Jace had gathered up his reins, and was starting on foot towards the trees when something caught his eye. With the haste they had entered the sentry house, he hadn’t noticed it before, but now the thing seemed to leap out at him. The shift torch, the ancient symbolization announcing the presence of the watch, hung dormant beside the archway. It was crafted into a miniature replica of the sentry house itself, and in extraordinary detail.
Jace pulled the flint box lighter from his belt, sparked the flame and held it to the torch, watching the first smoldering embers flicker and cackle before catching completely. The immediate area shimmered in a pulsing, golden halo, and he clinked the flint box closed once again, leading his horse around the back of the house and disappearing into the wood. The augural gesture burned brightly in his wake.
The Sentry had returned to Fairlawn.
Winston stared at the numbers as they spun around on the gas pump. His mind no longer rooted in this world, he once again became lost in a fantasy as he wandered in a far away place.
"Hey you idiot," the customer said. "I wanted ten bucks worth of gas not twelve, spike it!"
The harsh words brought Winston back to the present.
"Oh . . . sorry man, I was thinking"
"Not about your job." The angry man said.
Soroth, sweating profusely, shifted his weight uneasily in the wooden cage that hung by a chain. The cage swung slightly and the wooden bars creaked. But the ogre slept on, snoring through his muckle nostrils, the hairs from which might have served to sweep the filthy floor. The snoring was loud but comforting. Whilst the ogre slept, Soroth was spared his gluttonous leer. Soroth had been reluctant to move lest he wake Gamlugh. But he got sore staying in the one position. Not that there was much room left to move in. And it was hot, even though Soroth was unclad but for a swaddling band. He had outgrown his clothes long past, and now his once athletically muscular body was wrapped in rolls of fat. He wished Gamlugh had not made the fire so hot. Even in the vastness of the great hall of the beast’s castle, the fire was big enough to heat the air oppressively. Over the fire sat a cauldron in which he could hear fat bubbling. And the place stank too. Soroth, for all his months of captivity, had never got used to it. Grease and blood. Suddenly Soroth chilled. What was Gamlugh boiling fat for? He had seen Gamlugh fry men live in that cauldron, but today there were no other captives. It could not be so soon! There must be more time! Soroth was tired of his imprisonment but still he feared the ogre’s final attentions. Gamlugh always cooked his meat live. It was the roasting spit Soroth had feared most, but now he thought the cauldron worse.
"I'd say there's no hope at all," Mike said - or rather, called. "You may as well give up now rather than go down in humiliation." His neck hurt from the continual craning this conversation required, but it could not be helped - his boss was the type of person to whom one simply had to look up.
"Why not?" Varsynne ground his teeth angrily, producing a sound no doubt audible in neighboring buildings. "My record is spotless - the state of Narvin has less pollution, less crime, and lower taxes than when I first sat in the governor's chair." Clearly, he meant that phrase figuratively. "And my policy proposals make the other guy look like a kid playing king of the world. His platform's all rotten wood - come the debates, I'll show him what I can do to wood."
"Oh, crud...the presidential debates! I hadn't even thought of that!" Mike started pacing around Varsynne as he talked. Each circuit took him at least thirty seconds. "Imagine you on national TV...Children will run from the room screaming-"
"How many children watch the presidential debates?"
Something downtrodden and dowdy stares back at me in my bedroom mirror. Colourless lips and eyes hang in a horselike face. It's not a look I'm proud of. It's been etched into my bones by years of weary make-do. Behind me, my sister Miriam touches up her natural beauty from the make-up box she carries with her everywhere. I'm jealous. The bedroom reeks of her own personal musty scent - Chanel Number Whore. In what context did coming round to 'cheer me up' translate to lolling around in my bedroom and messing up my things?
What I actually say is "I think Rob will be back soon."
Ashwan the Magus tapped his crystal ball repeatedly, seeing only the reflection of his wizened face and long white beard submerged in his hooded cloak. It flickered several times, then faded out completely, perhaps forever. He sighed and once again bemoaned the folly of his predecessors and mentors. Magic had once been thought of as an endless resource, like the Great Forest. However, unlike the forest, magic did not renew itself. There was only so much to go around in any single place.
"Eltava." The high-pitched voice rose towards a screech. "I want you now."
Eltava winced, in equal parts from the spite in the voice and from the pitch, which she was sure would have smashed glass if there had been any around. Looking over at where the fifteen-year-old girl, pudgy face red with fury, was glaring at her from between the curtains of her litter, she wished that the ground would open and swallow Beshlaa, litter and all.
But she'd taken the job, and she had to do it. Gritting her teeth, she strode over to the litter. "What is it, Your Highness?" she asked, hoping that she'd managed a neutral expression.
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