The doors stand just ahead of us. The Proprietor struggles, blubbering about paying us off for his life; never mind the locket.
‘There now my good fellow, we’re almost out of this. Once we’re clear of the compound’s defences I’ll be happy to place your fate back into your hands at no cost.’
It is pitch-black beyond the few colourless panes of glass in the garden doors.
‘Karelia, dear,’ said Grel.
The lanterns outside have gone out. He smells a rat. He is going to spin and shoot me. If there were nothing to fear and we walked back to the ship—if we got out of here—I’d lose any credibility I’d built with my contacts beyond the ship. Zelenrid would have been destroyed for nothing. I’d have to start all over.
‘The doors, love. If you please.’
His voice is still level.
If the Hegemony forces wanted to imprison me along with Grel, what charge could they lay at my feet? Accessory to theft? That was the only thing they could prove. I had never gone out with the men on missions, legitimate or otherwise. They kept me behind to watch the ship with the coward engineer.
Then another traitorous thought… maybe Grel had been holding me back to keep my hands clean. To protect me. If we go to prison together, would he feel the same way?
I hook my little finger over the curved door handle. My palms ache as I squeeze my pistols. I force my hands to relax.
I look up, and there she is, through the glass. One eye rolled up at a strange angle, while the other looks right at me. The slum girl stands on broken legs, and stares at me. I tell myself I cannot be accused of murder. No one knows that I shot her, not even Grel. My incompetence with that kill was an embarrassment. That’s why she’s here. Something is going to go wrong, and she wants to be here to see it.
The door latch clicks open but I can’t move. It’s silent beyond. She scared the crickets away.
‘Go on, darling, I’m sure this gentleman is eager to resume his morning,’ says Grel, behind me. His voice is soft. Reassuring. I was so used to being threatened by him, it felt like being pat with the flat of a knife.
I hate him. He taught me that murder is a matter of course. I can’t shoot him. Shooting Grel would make me like him. Selling him would make me rich. I have to earn this victory. I have to outdo him so spectacularly that he’ll be out of my life forever. I have to call down an entire government on his head.
Our heads.
I am an idiot.
No way but forward, now.
I slowly pull both doors open. I must face the ghost. Grel was here. If I couldn’t take her down, he could. We are unstoppable.
We step out into the garden.
‘Drop your weapons,’ comes a voice from the darkness.
‘I must decline,’ Grel replies.
I don’t raise my pistols. Could be the local patrol. Could be groundsmen. Maybe the Hegemony hadn’t sent the detailmen.
‘Look alive, darling,’ Grel murmurs.
‘Urcon Grel, you are under arrest for embezzlement, grand larceny, murder, sedition and…’ A boot scuffs the gravel between the garden and the road. ‘…trespassing.’
I can tell Grel has tightened his grip on the Proprietor by the little yelp the man makes. Pitch blackness drapes the garden. Our eyes haven’t adjusted yet.
My chest feels so tight I think I shall never draw breath again—then a manic thrill creeps in underneath it. The rustling breeze chills my face, heavy with floral perfume. A second later, the sweet, earthy smell of horses surrounds us.
In the next moment, I will either be very wealthy or quite dead.
Grel speaks again. ‘I will remove this gentleman from the mortal coil unless you—‘
Torches flare. First two, then eight, then more—but the two had been enough. There were at least forty detailmen arrayed beyond the garden, bristling with rifles. A dozen or more on horseback. A coach looms behind them, hitched to a team of four horses. A prison wagon.
The corporal shouts my name. ‘Karelia Nayar?’
‘Here,’ I say. The word slips out of me as though it were spoken by someone else. It is the traitor, not me.
In the torchlight, I can pick out the each detailman’s face under their caps. Many of them couldn’t have been much older than me. Sacrifices for tomorrow’s glorious press. Beautiful boys for beautiful caskets.
I want to tell Grel what’s happening. I had intended for him to find out—to rub his face in it; but not while he’s armed and behind me.
‘Put down your weapons and bring us the locket.’
‘Do it, Kar—‘
I lower my arms just a moment before Grel tells me to. He cuts himself off. I have given myself away. I obeyed the corporal before waiting for Grel’s command, and they knew exactly what we had taken.
He knows. Worse, he was willing to give up the prize to keep us safe. I didn’t expect that.
That was the moment the slum girl disappeared.
Grel’s silk sleeve whispers as he shifts his aim toward my back. I dive to the right. Two shots fire. My arm rips open. I hit the grass.
Detailmen stampede past me and gunfire explodes above me. The Proprietor screams. My face is wet.
‘Hold!’ shouts the corporal. ‘We take him alive.’
Grel barks profanity at the detailmen and I glance back over my shoulder. I blink my own blood from my eyelashes. Grel’s shirt is bloody. Someone had shot him in the shoulder and the leg. Faceless officers haul him to his feet. The Proprietor sobs.
The searing pain in my left arm seems distant. I risk a look. I can’t tell if the bullet has struck bone or gone all the way through. There might be a chunk missing, I don’t know. I can’t bring myself to investigate the mess of flesh and silk.
Heavy padlocks clink shut on an iron bar to hobble Grel. His chains rattle. They toss him into the prison cart. I try to feel remorse, but I can’t feel anything. Maybe they’ve forgotten I’m still here.
Leather dusters whirl about me like bats’ wings and detailmen lift me to my feet. I feel fingers dig into the gash in my arm and I squeal. One detailman recoils and the throbbing softens. He looks at his hand, makes a face, and then bends to wipe it on the grass.
‘Gentle with her, Adams. We have our quarry,’ said the corporal. ‘Bring her here.’
The bats shove me toward the corporal. He sits high on his horse, my nose level with his calf.
‘Miss Nayar, you missed your rendezvous. We were worried.’ His horse pulls at the bit and the corporal tugs the rein to still the animal. ‘I am Corporal Lyle Manfred. I have been instructed to take you with us as a precaution. Doubtless your former crew will be looking for you.’
The corporal beckons a bat who turns me so my left side is under the torchlight. He peels the fabric away from my shoulder and determines that the wound can wait. Someone barks orders to see the Proprietor home and close up the auction house until further notice. They lift me and I ride with the corporal back to town.
For reasons I cannot fathom, we ride next to the prison cart. Grel is silent within. The barred window is too small for me to see him.
We reach town and the rising sun is behind us. My shoulder is a lash of raw, screaming, bleeding, flesh that feels four times its size. I spend all my energy trying not to scream until I hear a whistle from within the cart. Grel stares up at me, fingers curling around the bars.
One of his hands disappears and comes back with a gold coin. ‘Gold starts in the earth, Karelia,’ he says, and he lets go. I watch a wheel grind the coin into the mud.
I look back at Grel and he smiles at me, dashing, even behind bars. ‘Nothing like a dear friend to send you to your grave.’
I’d seen enough of his chicanery to know that the smile was real. He meant to kill me.
That was the last time I saw him.
* * *
The Hegemony kept all their promises. I have my own ship, and Grel will be doing hard time in a vanadium mine
until his tongue turns green and falls out of his head. A few weeks after I got rid of the brass locket the real one showed up in a parcel from Corporal Manfred accompanied by a formal letter of gratitude. I split it apart and had the hollow pieces riveted to my belt. Empty hearts play no music. He would have liked that. Every time I catch floral notes in whiskey I have to remind myself they’ll never let him out. I hope he’s dead.
I wonder if that coin is still buried in the road.
Setsu Uzume spent her formative years in and out of dojos. She also trained in a monastery in rural China, studying Daoism and swordplay. She is a member of Codex and SFWA. While she has dabbled in many arts, only writing and martial arts seem to have stuck. Find her on Twitter @KatanaPen
An Interview with Dennis L. McKiernan
Tom Smith
For those of you that aren’t familiar with Dennis L. McKiernan and his writing, he has been cranking out works of fantasy going on four decades now. His work has often been compared to Tolkien’s, which to be fair, in the early 1980’s when Dennis first started publishing, was the lion’s share of fantasy at the time. Dennis even petitioned the estate of Tolkien to be allowed to write a sequel to Lord of the Rings and was denied. I can’t help but wonder what that would have looked like myself.
Discovering fantasy novels in the 80’s thanks to the likes of Dennis, Terry Brooks, R.A. Salvatore and all the talented writers in the Dragonlance stables, I absolutely love the Iron Tower books. Dennis continued to write in the Mithgar world, eventually moving on to some creative reimaginings of some popular faerie tales with a decidedly French flavour.
Most readers would agree that Dennis is far from Grimdark (his work landing squarely in the epic fantasy genre in my opinion), but Grimdark wouldn’t be where it was today without the trail blazed by fantasy pioneers like McKiernan and others.
As busy as he is, Dennis took some time to meet with us and answer a few questions…
Hi Dennis, welcome. Thanks for joining us today and letting us walk around in your head a little.
[TS] Your early stories were very Tolkienesque. What drew you to those stories as a jumping off point, and were there other fantasy authors that really inspired you?
[DLM] First, Tolkien wrote a masterpiece, and I thoroughly enjoyed his world. And when I was laid up with a shattered femur, to stay sane I wrote a very long piece of fanfic about the Dwarves retaking Moria. After all, the Balrog was dead, and that was the only thing that had kept the Dwarves out of their homeland. So, it was a natural for a sequel.
But other than Tolkien, I enjoyed the writings of many other authors before I even found JRRT. Robert E. Howard’s Conan and Solomon Kane come to mind. Joy Chant. Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd and Grey Mouser stories captured me. The entire spectrum of the Lang fairytale series were favourites (you know, the Blue Fairy Book, The Red Fairy Book, and on through all the colours). I thoroughly enjoyed the Oz series of books. The old Norse Sagas of Loki and Thor and Odin were inspirations. I was into pulp magazines back in my youth, as well: Thrilling Wonder Stories; Planet Tales; Captain Future, etc.
Like many others, we take inspiration from all of the things we have read, from romances to westerns to mysteries to science fiction to fantasy to... name your genre. So, as to specific authors who have inspired me, Adams to Zelazny, they all did. By the bye, my personal favourite author is Patricia McKillip.
[TS] As someone who has been writing for so long, you have really been able to watch the industry evolve. Do you think that shaped your writing style, and if so, how?
[DLM] I can’t say my style has changed. I think I write epic fantasy in a quasi-medieval style, fairy tales in a classical fairy tale style, mysteries in a contemporary style, and science fiction also in a contemporary style. I find it natural to shift to the style I think the story should be told in.
[TS] In high school, Iron Tower was easily one of my favorited series, due largely to the epic scope, the battles and the emotion built into it. What is your favorited work that you’ve written and why?
[DLM] You are asking me to pick my favorited child. I will say this, Dragondoom was the story that broke me out of the Tolkien mold, so, for that, I am grateful. It is the favorited of the majority of my readers (though, I must say that the Elf Aravan is the favourite character of many, and whatever story he is in is a favourite of many, and he does not appear until Voyage of the Fox Rider, somewhat after Dragondoom).
[TS] Which of the directions fantasy has taken in recent years would you like to see more of? Which one would you like to see go away?
[DLM] McKillip just keeps getting better and better, so those kinds of stories capture me. I am not a big fan of Dungeons and Dragons stories, for too many of them do little to conceal the sound of dice rolling.
[TS] Here at Grimdark Magazine, we define grimdark as a grim story told in a dark world by a morally grey protagonist. What character(s) have you written that you would consider the most grimdark?
[DLM] All of my fantasy heroes/heroines are pragmatists. And similar to REH’s Conan, when my protagonists decide to kill someone/something truly evil, they do their best to get it done. For example, they run down Black Mages and do them in (sociopaths, psychopaths all). But as far as them being grimdark, I cannot say any of my protagonists are morally ambiguous. If any are, it would have to be a warrior, and the ones who come the closest to being of a warrior cast, well that would be the Dwarves. Brega, for example; yet Brega has a code of honour, and to me that is not morally ambiguous. By today’s standards, either all or none are grimdark.
[TS] Are there any grimdark authors whose work intrigues you or that you really enjoy? What authors do you turn to typically when you want to relax and just read?
[DLM] I read mostly thrillers to relax... those and mysteries. Robert Parker, Robert Craise, Lee Child, etc. Spenser and Hawk; Jack Reacher, and others of that ilk are not bothered at all by taking out the bad guys. Is that grimdark? Perhaps. But it’s enjoyable as all hell.
[TS] Working as a fantasy author for so long, have you developed any close friends in the industry? And are there any authors that you always hoped to meet but never did?
[DLM] I have met more than I can count, usually at various SF/Fantasy/Horror conventions. The World Fantasy Convention has a great gathering of authors. I think I would have liked to meet Tolkien, but he died before I began my own writing career.
As far as close friends, my closest friends are not in the industry, but they are gamers (video and role playing) and are deep into reading fantasy. But Terry Windling, Emma Bull, Will Shetterly, Charles deLint, Mike Stackpole visit every time they are in town. Tim Waggoner, Lois Bujold and I were in writers’ groups together, and Tim was one of my roleplaying friends. There are others, and for those I’ve left out...
[TS] Are there any characters you have created based loosely on yourself, or do you see all of them as pieces of you?
[DLM] Of my heroines/heroes, they and I have similar (perhaps identical) moral compasses, but no particular character is otherwise based on me. The one who might come closest is perhaps Vaindar Silverleaf, an Elf, a Lian Guardian. I know, I know, many might think I am the crotchety old Mage Alamar, but Silverleaf is more like me.
[TS] If you could explore one of your antagonists in a short story or novel, which one would it be and why?
[DLM] I have done a good bit of exploration of various Black Mages (Necromancers all) in my books, some more than others. I have told the backstory of Baron Stoke in fairly great detail (in The Eye of the Hunter), detailing his father, his mother, his upbringing, though I left enough unsaid so that he doesn’t seem trite, for when evil comes into hot light, it merely becomes banal.
[TS] What can we expect to see from you in the way of books or projects in the near future?
[DLM] Actually, I have recently retired. Stolen Crown was and is my last Mithgar novel. As far as my Faery series goes, that was conceived and executed as a five-book series (Once Upon a Winter’s
Night; Once Upon a Summer Day, Once Upon an Autumn Eve, Once Upon a Spring Morn, and Once Upon a Dreadful Time), so no more of those are forthcoming. I might write a third Black Foxes book, but only if inspiration strikes me. In fact, if inspiration strikes me hard enough, I’ll unretire.
[TS] Dennis, thanks so much for taking the time to chat with us today. [GdM]
Review: The Wheel of Osheim
By Mark Lawrence
Review by Matthew Cropley
A short version of this review was originally published on the Grimdark Magazine blog.
In The Wheel of Osheim, the final instalment of Mark Lawrence’s The Red Queen’s War trilogy, Jalan Kendeth, lover of wine, women and slacking off somehow finds himself lost the bowels of Hell itself, in combat with an army of undead horrors, and forced onto a quest to save the fabric of reality. Needless to say, he’s mildly miffed.
The last time we saw Jalan in The Liar’s Key, he was being pulled into Hell after his Viking companion Snorri. The Wheel of Osheim begins after Jalan has escaped Hell, and the events that took place there are given to us in a series of harrowing flashbacks. Jalan seeks nothing more than the comforts of home, yet he is dragged kicking and screaming into the role of the hero and sent on a quest to stop the titular ‘Wheel of Osheim’ from tearing reality itself apart. The stakes are far higher than the more intimate Prince of Fools and The Liar’s Key. Despite the grander scale, the story remains a deeply personal one, and Lawrence’s flair for nuanced character development soars to new heights.
Grimdark Magazine Issue #8 ePUB Page 5
