If short stories are your thing—and the
shorter the better—you can find tiny tales from a wide variety of genres in 365
Days of Flash Fiction.
Here’s a final taste of the kinds of tales
you’ll find:
Troll-Gate
Guardian
Written on December 15, 2013, for 365 Days of Flash Fiction, this piece once again explores the
Worlds Collide universe, and the trouble with associating with they fey.
“They have a troll.” Llew’ sounded far from
pleased.
I marvelled at the
lengths the queen’s enemies would go to undermine her authority, but a troll?
You would have to be pretty low to do that. Still, they do say that all’s fair
in love and war, and the queen had just rejected the hand of a powerful fey
lord. An earl or duke or somesuch. He was the fifth in the last month. At this
rate, we’d be at war with every petty noble in the fey world. I dreaded to
think of what would happen when she got started on the princelings and their
fathers.
I drew the bow,
eyeballing the troll then adjusting for distance and the light breeze blowing
across the culvert. It’s hard to see if the beast is being driven or led, but
in the end I don’t care. I’ve fitted the arrow with an explosive head —don’t
ask, let’s just say the local constabulary wouldn’t be too happy. The elves
have augmented it with magic, so this should be fun.
Aim, allow for
lead, fire.
I’m not the only
one who gasps as the rejected suitor rides up alongside the troll. If the
wizard riding with us hadn’t been such a quick thinker, we’d have had a real
war on our hands, instead of this power skirmish. He thrusts out a hand,
screaming a one-word spell, and the arrow shatters without touching the
intervening lordling.
It surprises the
guy’s horse, who shies away from the sharding missile, snorting and jostling
the troll alongside. Course, trolls being the bad-tempered critters they are,
this one takes offence and knocks the earl from his saddle. The noble steed
bolts, getting clear before the troll can strike out again.
I am swearing a
blue streak as I nock another arrow and raise the bow. This time no one ruins
the shot by getting in between, and the troll goes down—it also goes up like a
roman candle and explodes into several steaming chunks. I see movement in the
shadows of the bridge and run forward. No way am I going to lose the ex-suitor
to a bunch of small-and-shaggies, when I’ve just saved his ass from one of
their larger cousins.
He comes round a
little later and rolls unsteadily to his knees before the queen, glaring at me
all the while.
“My lady, your
wizard saved my life,” he says.
I roll my eyes,
but his next words are like a slap to the face.
“I demand vengeance.”
I wait, not sure
which way this is going to swing; the fey are so unpredictable. The queen is
implacable, and I breathe a sigh of relief.
“You owe me a debt.”
“I owe you my
life,” he confirms, and I get the feeling some sort of ritual is being enacted
before me.
“I cannot accept
your suit.”
“I understand, my
lady. Forgive me.”
“It was a
mistake,” she continues, referring to the whole arrow-and-troll debacle. I
notice she doesn’t point out it was his own damn fault.
“Payment is still
due.”
“I agree.”
Uh oh. I wait. The
elf noble, whatever, looks up at the queen, and I hold my breath.
“You will wed.”
He recoils. I gasp
and take two steps back, bump into her head bodyguard and his 2IC. Their hands
coil around my upper arms. I get the feeling they’re laughing like a pair of
hyenas at my discomfort. Give the earl this, he doesn’t throw up, explode with
rage, or argue. He just turns his head and looks at me. The bow slides from my
fingers and I go weak at the knees.
He is beautiful, but he is also very, very
angry.
“When?” he says,
getting slowly to his feet, his voice cold.
“Twelve months
courting,” she replies, with the slightest of smiles—damn her! She’s enjoying
this far too much—“and then mid-summer. She is my strongest ally in these
lands, the Sunlight-Against-the-Trolls. Midsummer is fitting for such a union.”
Midsummer is their most-celebrated day of the
year. His expression changes, and he looks me over once again. Even so, his
next words are carefully chosen.
“You honour me,”
he says, and cannot keep the sneer from his voice, “but she is human.”
“She is a human
who can wield elven magic, and who was the first to see the gates open,” the
queen responds. I notice she doesn’t mention I have also wielded an elven blade,
and drunk three drops of her blood.
“She is troll
plagued.”
“As are all
guardians against that particular form of the dark. It could be worse.”
“Not much,” he
says, and sighs. “I obey, my lady.”
Then he places his
fingers to his lips and whistles for his horse.
“Yeah, and I love
you, too,” I mutter, as he mounts and rides away.
My two guardians
start to chuckle. Soon they’re laughing too hard to hold me, and I shrug them
off. I remember to make the smallest of obeisances to her trouble-making
majesty and then stalk, over the iron drawbridge and back into the house.
I can shut the
door against the coming dawn and the trolls fading back to their lairs. I can
shut the door on the sight of my unwanted allies riding into the mist. But I
cannot shut the door on the sound of the horn’s dancing silver notes as they
bid me an all too temporary farewell.
365
Days of Flash Fiction is scheduled for release on
October 4, 2014.
