Walk again the primal worlds of Lovecraft’s ancient behemoths and Burroughs’ untamed jungles; of London’s wild North and Howard’s dangerous creations. Only the brave should delve within these tales…
Excerpt
Mock Sword and Sorcery at your own peril.Â
Oh, we all know the clichés, for they haunt us on late-night movie channels: overly-muscled bodybuilders in furry
diapers, wielding thick swords with even thicker accents, trading ham-fisted dialogue with Italian women in metal bikinis”¦it seems like a parody, really. In fact, it’s exactly that.
I’m not sure who thought it was a brilliant idea to compartmentalize popular fiction into all of the various “˜styles’ that we have now, but I’ve always thought it was a huge mistake. After all, if you have a historical character in a historical setting fighting fantastic creatures, is it fantasy or is it historical fiction? Consider that people in the Middle Ages actually believed in monsters before you make your choice. I’d argue that a dragonslayer book has just as much right to be considered historical fiction, if indeed the author did the research necessary to ground the tale in a believable setting. But I’m getting ahead of myself…
~ Forward: A Scattering of Jewels by Mark Finn, Author, Blood & Thunder: The Life and Art of Robert E. Howard
…What’s so fascinating about Sword & Sorcery? It’s the literature of monsters. And it teaches us how to spot them, and sometimes to find the courage to face them. Perhaps if my young friend had shown more interest, she might have drawn a little inspiration from the great works of Leigh Brackett and C.L. Moore, and found a way to confront her own predator with more grace and fortitude.
I know you won’t make that mistake. Enjoy the works that await you on the following pages, but take lessons from them too. Monsters are out there.
Keep your sword sharp.
~ Introduction by John O’Neill, Publisher and editor, Black Gate Magazine
“Make haste to furl the sail!” Asad al Din bellowed into the raging wind. His crew of Nabataean sailors struggled to haul down the billowing cloud of striped silk, but the power of the wind threatened to drag them off the ship’s wooden deck.
“The might of the storm is too great, Captain!” Jalil called back. “It will cast the crew into the sea!”
“Ease off the main sheet, you great lout!” Asad al Din roared as the knotted muscles of his arms and shoulders heaved against the sweeping tiller, keeping the ship’s nose pointed into the crashing waves. “Carefully now, carefully!”
Three men dragging mightily eased the sodden line through a tackle, allowing the great triangular sail to release its hold upon the storm winds and flap wildly. That done, the rest of the sailors lowered the boom and bound the loose sail.
“We make great speed, even with a bare mast,” Jalil called. “Surely this passing tempest is the retribution of Allah!”
“Ha!” Asad al Din scoffed loudly. “The retribution of Allah is swift, but only against the unrighteous. This is but a storm in the season for storms.”
“There is a fell voice echoing in the sky,” Jalil warned. “And I have glimpsed the dark bulk of a monster within the clouds. I fear this is no earthly tempest.”
“Bah, save your tales of monsters for the children in the bazaar,” his captain replied. “For this is no more than a quick squall. I see the clouds clearing ahead. We’ll be free of this storm yet.”…
~ “Passion of the Stormlord” by Robert A. Mancebo
Ice cracked beneath Krhanik’s boots with a sound like the breaking of a man’s skull. He took another step, and another, and the cold sheet beneath him groaned in protest. Krhanik walked on, heedless of the snapping sounds of fracturing ice, his face upright in the sleeting gale that pushed against his forward progress. Before him rose the image of the wolf, enormous, world-spanning; the beast that had haunted his earliest dreams and filled his blood with poisonous rage. Somewhere ahead of him, in the darkest part of the north, the wolf awaited him “” and Krhanik walked unbowed into the storm to meet it.
To meet his destiny.
Beneath him bone-white fissures snaked in all directions with each careless step, rivulets of spider-silk-fine cracks marring the gray surface of the pack ice. Krhanik did not look down, never looked down. Keeping his eyes fixed on the line of flattened hills in the distance “” the only landmark he could see in the swirling wet of the storm “” Krhanik walked on under a twilight sky fat with rain clouds the color of damp felt.
Beneath him, beneath the creaking ice, the fathomless salt depths of the ocean rolled cold and hungry…
~ “The Wolf of Winter” by Bill Ward
The arrow hummed past Miri’s head. It spent itself in a saw grass clump just a few paces ahead of her horse. She twisted in the saddle to spot the bowman who had loosed the arrow, caught a glimpse of his black robe as he scrambled down the side of the tall rock he had perched on. Most likely he had climbed it to spot her, and had taken the unlikely shot when he did.
She had a few moments while he remounted. Miri scrambled from the mare, tugging at the halter rope as she trotted forward to scoop up the arrow. The soldiers sent by the Priestesses of Ishtar to kill her mother, and incidentally her, were superbly equipped. Miri had been taught the fletcher’s art by her mother, who after forty or more lifetimes had an amazing skill with anything having to do with fighting, death or destruction. But Miri had never seen anything so exquisite as these arrows. They were fashioned of some dark wood, nearly black, smooth and slightly oily to the touch, perfectly round and straight, with no trace of knife or draw. The feathering was slightly spiraled, and very long, almost a fifth of the length of the shaft. They were tipped with square patinaed bronze heads, barbless but covered with whorls and cuneiform etchings, prayers perhaps. This was the ninth black arrow she had collected.
She shoved the arrow into the quiver that hung from her saddle, grasped a handful of mane and swung back astride the mare. The horse spun toward where she had stood and nickered in complaint at having its hair pulled. Miri turned the mare’s head in the direction of the marsh, away from the bowman, and kicked it into a trot. The trail was uncertain here. Any faster would be far more dangerous than the man following her, deadly though he might be. She hadn’t far to go, anyway. The clearing with the small village was only a short distance…
~ “As from His Lair, the Wild Beast” by Michael Ehart
Silence. Not even the fall of a single dew drop disturbed the ominous slumber. Thick vines twined their way from out of the choking undergrowth to quietly stalk and strangle the tall, sinuous trees whose canopy blanketed the sky and cast the world below into a constant, green-hued twilight. And through that deep quiet came a whisper, like a gentle caress of wind winding its way down unseen trails in the growth.
Ikuru felt power surge through him, coursing beneath his skin, lending strength to muscle, sinew and bone as the jaguar tattoo transformed him into something other than himself. His blood pounded with the power of the Runner, and the jungle’s unnatural stillness spoke to him of horror. He plunged farther ahead into that absence of sound, of life, following its tale toward the acrid scent of fire and death that clung to the stagnant air; ever away from his painful past and deeper into lands unknown.
He soon found this story’s sad beginning. The huts were smoldering skeletons, cradles of soot and ash that still embraced the bodies of the villagers who had once lived here. The terrifying scene reminded Ikuru of his own village, a season ago, when the skinless men and their cruel priests had brought the road of death to scar the Mother jungle.
They had spoken to the king with lies of undreamt wealth, had exchanged gifts and accepted hospitality. Then came the great treachery, and in the course of one night their superior numbers overwhelmed and massacred all of the soldiers and any who they thought might offer resistance. Even the totemic powers of the King’s personal guard, the most powerfully tattooed and feared of all the warriors, fell in the tide of slaughter. In one night the kingdom, and a people, ceased to be…
~ “Runner of the Hidden Ways” by Jason Thummel
A man of sense does not dwell long amongst the shadow-crested peaks of the Uryl range, Voyvodin wisdom said. For when the winds come shrieking down those jagged slopes, they come from the unknowable darkness between the stars and can blow a man to madness.
These words echoed through Vasily’s thoughts while he assessed the strength of his chains and rolling prison, endured the jackal-like laughter of his once-allies-turned-captors, considered the smoldering eyes of the girl-slave who had bewitched him to turn on his qasaq company, or swore dire vengeance against the dark robed figure leading them higher into the mountains. With every moment, he remained alert for any opportunity to secure his freedom.
Mutt-faced Barot banged his mead cup against the bars of the cage and then stepped aside. The scars across both of his cheeks made a cruel, savage smirk from even placid expressions. His face far from placid, he said, “I always knew a woman would be your undoing, Vasily.”…
~ “Vasily and the Beast Gods” by Daniel R. Robichaud
Copyright 2008 Jason M. Waltz. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.
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