The big man lined up his hammer on the sword.

“10 says he shorts it.” Someone said in the background.

“20!” Came a chorus of replies.

“Alright, shut it you lot. I need to concentrate here. Badger, stop shaking the sword. “

“Right, sorry. Just don’t hit my hand Thatch!” A thin man said holding the sword in a vertical position on the frozen ground.

The big man, Thatcher, stood with his hammer and gazed out at his target. He wasn’t much for judging distance, but he figured this would be impressive. After a couple of test swings, he took a giant swing and hit the flat of the sword with the massive war hammer. The singing steel flew through the air in a wide arc, somersaulting along the way.

“Come on, come on” Said Thatcher. Just as the sword was about to hit its mark, it was stopped in midair. The sword hovered in the air scratching the throat of a man bound on his knees. The man moaned with slight relief. His eyes watered with fear.

“Aw come on!” The group yelled. “He had that one!”

A hooded figure stepped out from a nearby tree behind the bound man. “Sorry lads. Is this what we’ve come to? This seems like a sick way to go. No honor in it.”

The big man had closed the distance to confront the hooded man. “Honor? You think he was thinking about honor when he burned our home. Or honor when we were hunted through these mountains for months? No, there’s no honor anymore. It’s kill or be killed. That’s war. That’s what he made it.”

“Do you really think he had a choice?”

“There’s always a choice. Once you choose to fight for the False King, you are as good as dog meat to me.”

The hooded figure sighed. “But…”

“But nothing mage. Remember that you’re out here with us. You left your ivory tower and are in the thick of it. Whatever high philosophy you mages have in the Walled City, it’s all shit out here in the wilderness. This man would kill your children and laugh about it. He doesn’t deserve honor.”

The mage looked at the bound man. The man was shivering on his knees as the tears ran down his bloody face. The mage couldn’t help but think this wasn’t the right thing. But Thatcher was right. The man on his knees was trying to kill them not too long ago. The corpses of his allies were spread about this forest clearing being taken by the ice. The mage looked down and sighed. He flicked his fingers and the man began to gurgle as blood filled his throat.

Thatcher grunted approval and went to remove the sword from the man’s throat. “Good man. Now that we’ve hopefully gotten our ethical dilemmas out of the way, we can start to think about them.” The big man pointed the bloody sword toward the edge of a cliff at the end of the clearing. He and the mage took a short walk to peer over the cliff. In the valley below, a vast army amassed. Men and twisted beasts gathered in the name of the False King. The big man looked down and sighed. The cold ate at his bones and he just wanted a warm place to sleep. “Whelp, we had better get to work then.”

Afterword

This is probably a generic fantasy start. I didn’t have much with this one. It was just a short idea. After reading The First Law Trilogy, I have been more interested in grittier fantasy tales. Fantasy is hard to write. The bar is really high. I don’t know that I’ll ever be a great fantasy writer, but I won’t feel bad about adding to the noise. High fantasy will never get old.

Copyright 2022 Devin Butcher