Queer Fantasy and Weird Tales for the People
“If he wants the knife, then we may as well show it to him,” the man said to his companions. To me, he added, “On your feet, then. This will be easier for you if you cooperate.”
Chapter LVI: The Burial-Ground
In the latest chapter of Journey to the Water, Eske gets captured. Again. Not really on purpose this time. You can read it right now on Patreon.
I left Gallia behind, and it receded until it was only a bright spot against a hazy horizon. Then it and the sea beyond were gone, and everything became green, from the canopy overhead to the moss under Bran’s hooves. Only the sky remained a stubborn gray. Rain fell in brief fits from an impenetrable layer of cloud, and the wind blew cold. Autumn was coming to the North, and it would reach me here before long.
For now, though, the forest was emerald green, and the birds sang summer songs in its branches. After the first day out of the city, the stream of caravans in and out of its gates slowed to a trickle. By the time a week had passed, I saw another traveler only once every few days. I sang as well, as I rode, a rowing song of the frost-cold sea, to warn anyone else on the road of my presence and reassure them that I was not a bandit lying in wait for them.
Continue reading “Journey to the Water Chapter LIV: The Ring-Fort”“You are welcome in my hall, Eske of the Bear Clan,” Oeric said. “If you are as brave as you were in your tale, you will serve me well against the barbarians.”
Chapter LV: The Hall of King Oeric
An ambitious warlord’s even more ambitious son, a missing relic, and a long-brewing civil war: Eske has found himself in a pickle yet again. You can read this chapter right now on Patreon.
Ashoka fell quiet, gazing up at the kingly statue. It was as though I fell out of his awareness, disappearing along with the city in the fading sunlight. In Phyreios, he and I had barely spoken—until the very end, he believed in the might and benevolence of the Ascended, so we had little to speak about. He’d called Khalim a charlatan and a sorcerer, and me a barbarian. I’d had no kinder terms with which to address him, though I’d had few occasions to do so.
But here stood a man with a familiar face, who had seen the triumphs and the horrors I had seen. Here stood a man whose gods had betrayed him. Though the animosity between us remained, filling the temple’s air with a tension like a taut bowstring, I could not yet bring myself to turn from him.
“You haven’t found a god here?” I asked. “I count seven.”
Continue reading “Journey to the Water Chapter LIII: Departing Once More”“Take this man outside and cut off his head,” he said. “You can hang it from the wall as an example to the others.”
Chapter LIV: The Ring-Fort
We’re starting a new arc! Eske arrives at his destination and is met with hostility. You can read this chapter right now on Patreon.
Of all the strange things that Deinaros had told me, and of all the evil that I had seen in the pages of his book, nothing disturbed me more than this key he asked me to retrieve. A blade of obsidian glass must have traveled far to end up in the forests south of my homeland, where the earth lay steady beneath one’s feet and the fires at the heart of the world slept without waking. In all its wandering, passed from hand to wicked hand, it carried the lingering miasma of spilled blood. What sorcery had caused this? Surely, the knife had been used to take innocent lives—why else would it be afflicted so?
I steeled myself and held my tongue. Deinaros’ face, at the same time ancient with archaic knowledge and unlined with youth, betrayed no emotion. He stared at me without blinking.
This is a test, I thought. Is he judging my loyalty and willingness to obey, or am I meant to recognize an evil relic by its description, and refuse to lay a hand on it?
Continue reading “Journey to the Water Chapter LII: A Temple of Faces”The ship that took me back across the Summer Sea was not Ramla’s, but the vessel of a woman from the northern shore. Her name was Astraea of Danar, and she possessed the golden hair and sky-blue eyes that I had only ever seen before in my countrymen from the far reaches of the North. I myself, however, favored my mother, and my hair was dark and my eyes were the same as any other man who walked these southern shores. Only my build set me apart from the people who walked the streets of Gallia, whence I was returning.
I asked, but Astraea had never seen the floating mountains of ice, nor walked among the mountains that I had crossed in the early days of my exile. She did not speak my mother tongue. In response to my next question, she declared that she had met the man called Hamilcar and his ship, the Lady of Osona, and remembered him fondly.
“He sails these waters from time to time,” she said. “At the beginning of the year, when the winds are swift and the waves high. If you stay in Gallia, you might see him again.”
I hoped that I would, but my hope lasted only a brief moment. What could I tell him of my adventures since we parted? That I had found the birthplace of my beloved Khalim, and found that I had known him for so short a time that I was hopeless to follow him through the land of the dead? That I had destroyed the city of Svilsara by slaying the being who called himself his god, and left them starving and alone without even the illusion of prosperity to comfort them? That I had aided a man who wished to assassinate a king, and escaped only because I was deemed a lesser threat than my guide?
Continue reading “Journey to the Water Chapter LI: Friendlier Shores”I looked away. “There was no victory in Phyreios. You should understand that better than anyone.”
Chapter LII: A Temple of Faces
Eske meets an old rival and receives a warning in the latest chapter of Journey to the Water, available on Patreon. My Patreon is only $3 a month!
I fell. The rope went taut, tearing at my hands, just as I broke through a web of thin branches and struck the surface of a wide limb below the platform. The rough bark bit through the thin fabric of my trousers.
As expected, the guards cut the rope. It fell in loose coils at my feet. I stood, brushed myself off, and held out my hand to summon my harpoon.
Continue reading “Journey to the Water Chapter L: The Way Down”If I had done evil, I told myself, then the evil I had done was a trivial thing. I had freed Svilsara from the serpent, and left the mage-king alive, giving his foes nothing. If I had to do penance, I would do it after I found Khalim.
Chapter LI: Friendlier Shores
I’ve got a shiny new chapter for you over on Patreon, in which Eske returns to the sorcerer’s tower and grapples with the consequences of his quest. Also, as you can see, I am back to working on the draft!
Space Whales Press 