Two is Ridiculous

In his late-career novel ‘The Gods Themselves,’ Isaac Asimov mentions the ‘ridiculous’ idea of two universes — and two only — existing; that is, if more than one universe exists, then almost certainly infinite universes exist. So any ‘multiverse’ is probably an ‘infiniverse.’

That concept underlies the bulk of my fantasy novels, those that make up the Izan Cycle, but we have no way of knowing — and most likely never will — whether infinity actually exists or is purely a concept and things can be infinite only in potential. Of course, if infinity exists then god (in the broadest sense) would exist, and vice versa. God could be nothing less than infinite and that which is truly infinite must be god. But that’s getting off the subject.

And, again, impossible to prove one way or another (and likely to remain so). Other authors have explored multiverse ideas, some infinite, some not. Pratchett liked to play with the idea of everything existing somewhere. Others, such as Zelazny and Moorcock, set up a tension between two poles (chaos and order, heaven and hell, or whatever you might prefer) and a spread of worlds between them (which would be a constraint of sorts on infinite existence).

In my Izan novels, that tension is between being and non-being, existence and the void. And, of course, non-being doesn’t actually exist. I mean, there’s nothing there, right? But it is still possible to set up a struggle between the two, that which strives to exist and that which wishes to escape it (which is not possible, to be sure). ‘Good’ is that which serves existence — including, but not limited to, life.

Slipping into philosophical stuff there again, aren’t I? I probably wouldn’t write at all if I couldn’t tuck that sort of thing into the stories from time to time, though it is not my main motivation. There are much more mundane, more human, matters one can go on about. The ‘big’ questions may be safely left to lurk in the background. I just give them a nod of acknowledgment now and again.

Qala/Tes

Qala the Pirate Queen appears in four of my (Stephen Brooke’s) fantasy novels. She was introduced as a secondary character in ‘The Eyes of the Wind,’ in which she is still the leader of the pirates. ‘The Crocodile’s Son’ and ‘The Crocodile God’ chronicle her adventures in retirement as a member of the landed gentry (and the mother of a demigod). We turn to her childhood as a refugee in the decaying city of Tesra in ‘The City and the Sword,’ when she was known as Lellie. Later she took the name of the city as her own, becoming Tes the pirate captain before rising to the position of queen.

 

It is as Tes she appears in the novella ‘Storm Stone,’ to be released in about a month (June 28). This is a tale of her days as a young pirate on her way to the top. All the books are available in print or as free ebooks at arachispress.com

Maturing

I wrote the four relatively short books that make up the Donzalo’s Destiny series over something like fifteen months time yet I can, rereading them, see that my style very much matured — improved, I would be inclined to say — during the course of their creation. It became something much closer to what I would call ‘my’ voice. I’m not about to go back and rewrite them or anything of that sort. They’re perfectly acceptable as-are. These were my very first fantasy novels and mark the creation of the entire Izan mythos. It has certainly grown since, and the somewhat murky magic system introduced in Donzalo has become downright scientific in its explanations.

They are also the only novels in which I have used a semi-omniscient point of view. Ultimately, it’s more a matter of multiple POVs but the narrator does occasionally intrude. Not enough to hurt anything; it’s still pretty much the way the characters see things. For the most part, I managed to avoid head-hopping, though in fiction since I have largely restricted myself to one point of view per scene — and, generally, per book.

Speculative Fiction

Samuel Delaney has stated that when the term ‘speculative fiction’ appeared in the Sixties, it was applied loosely to experimental fiction, often with imagery derived from science fiction and fantasy. Perhaps we’d label that ‘literary science fiction’ these days. But speculative fiction, as a name, varied some in its implications over the years (and pretty much disappeared for a while) before finding its current definition as the broad swath of genres stretching from science fiction to fantasy.

I do see it as such a spectrum. What all the genre and sub-genre within speculative fiction share is a self-standing alternate world, with its own internal rules and logic. That differentiates it from realistic fiction, which follows the rules of our own world, and the surrealistic, which bends those rules of the real world — with little regard for logic — to jar the reader’s perceptions.

‘Magic realism’ is, of course, a form of surrealism (by these definitions) rather than speculative fiction.

Rarely do I refer to any of my work as speculative fiction, though I legitimately could. It can sound pretentious, can’t it? My science fiction is readily identified as such. The fantasy — despite most having rather strict science fiction-like underlying rules — would be regarded as fantasy by most. Those terms are good enough for me.

By the way, horror is sometimes included as a sort of speculative fiction but I don’t consider it a genre at all. I would call it a theme, that can be applied to almost any genre. Monsters are everywhere!

Reunited

The novel ‘The Eyes of the Wind’ tells of how the Jewels of the Elements were reunited after centuries of separation, but not how each came to be where it was found. It is to be noted each found its way to a location suited to its nature: the Sky Stone in the mountains, the Fire Stone near a volcano, the Earth Stone in the court of a king, and the Sea Stone in the possession of pirates. How each got there has not been explained.

My current novelette-in-progress remedies that for the Sea Stone. It is the tale of how Tes — later renowned as Qala the Pirate Queen — found it and fought for it, carrying it back to Pirate King of the time. As to where it was before, none can say. Unless, to be sure, I write a story about it.

The novelette is titled ‘Storm Stone.’ I should have it fully polished shortly and may post it somewhere. Or save it for a collection or both! I may write more tales of Tes but there are also many other projects requesting my time.

As for the Fire and Sky Stones, we have not explored their whereabouts through those missing centuries. The Earth Stone, however, had long been held by the rulers of Sharsh as an emblem of their dynasty. But I can’t say how they got hold of it originally.

Wish, a poem

Wish

He wished to be a dragoon,
in a colorful uniform,
but the faeries thought he said dragon — 
to them, that seems the norm!

He has no sparking carbine,
he rides no spirited steed;
instead his coat is of scales,
his heart is filled with greed!

Greed for what? Why gold!
And maybe a sheep or two
to snack on when he’s peckish — 
no one will miss a few.

Take care how you pronounce
when you make your wish;
you might want to be a cop
but end up a carp — yes, a fish!

Stephen Brooke ©2025

Soft Magic

I am not fond of ‘soft’ magic. All the magical events in my primary fantasy mythos follow strict, generally well defined, ‘scientific’ rules. They may be ‘rubber science,’ as the science fiction community terms such plausible but invented rules, but they remain constant. In that sense, my fantasy could be alternatively labeled science fiction.

Most fantasy has used soft magic over the years. And centuries and millennia! Stuff just happens without much explanation. Gods and demons have powers. Sorcerers cast spells. Names have power. And so on. You’ll find it in Tolkien. You’ll find it in Le Guin’s ‘Earth-Sea.’ That approach also spills over into science fiction when telepathy or the transferal of consciousness occurs, often without explanation. I assiduously avoid such things. Even at best, they become a crutch.

As can be soft magic. It’s far too easy to fudge what magic can do when there are no strict rules. Ultimately, having those rules requires us to think creatively about how to work with them. Rather like writing poetry in form; finding the words that work properly can lead us to new insights on meaning, point us in new directions. We will find no new roads if we don’t run into a few obstacles.

I might add that the rules of magic in my stories are also rooted in science (yes, of a sort). They are not just arbitrary rules that have no explanation — or ones that are, in themselves, soft magic. Sanderson’s work tends that direction. However, it is recognized in the work that most practitioners (even the gods, sometimes) do not completely understand the underlying reasons things work. Magic is ever likely to remain a somewhat empirical sort of science.

To Call, a poem

To Call

To linger in forbidden gardens,
  dream beneath the black rose tree,
to play the tunes for fairy dances
  through all night’s eternity,
I seek those distant ebon towers,
  stark beside a shadowed sea
where misted perfumes of the darkness
  rise in writhing ecstasy.

To sleep in ancient haunted ruins,
  now inhabited by owls,
to hear the ravenous wolf pack passing,
  my heart thrilling to their howls,
I  wander unmapped pathways, pushing
  through the muck that clings and fouls
to join the maddened monks’ procession,
  faceless all beneath our cowls.

To call the wind, to send it raving
  through the vaults of fabled kings,
to rouse the songs of ghostly minstrels,
  cold hands on discordant strings,
I speak arcane words of enchantments,
  call upon each star that sings
across the infinite abyss —
  fearing, hoping, what fate brings.

Stephen Brooke ©2025

something like this is likely to be fiddled with for some time to come but it is probably near finished form

Goblins, a poem

Goblins

The goblins are hiding somewhere in your house;
they’re spying on you, your kiddies, the spouse.

Nobody will see them, for they’re far too quick,
quite likely to disappear in one flick

of anyone’s eye, save maybe the cat
(I’m really not certain even of that),

for I suspect mine once did catch a glimpse
of the elusive, diminutive imps.

Her fur stood on end, she hissed and she howled,
but never caught one, though all night she prowled.

Those goblins had melted into the thin air —
that doesn’t mean they never were there!

The goblins are hiding somewhere in your home;
they skulk and they scramble, they sneak and they roam.

From this room to that room they search and they seek,
they peer under beds, into boxes they peek.

They’re eager for any loose loot they can pilfer;
look out for your jewelry, your watches, your silver!

When things will go missing, I know who’s to blame —
the little folk playing their favorite game;

so when people wonder who could be the thieves,
I tell them it’s goblins — but no one believes!

Stephen Brooke ©2024

 

Mewlips and Gibbelins

“The Mewlips” is a tongue-in-cheek—but creepy, none the less—poem by J.R.R. Tolkien, supposedly one of those drawn from Hobbit lore. The sort of thing one recited in the comfort and safety of home or tavern! The mewlips seem a thoroughly bad bunch of swamp dwellers who are apt to devour travelers through their realm.

It is quite likely (and I am definitely not the first to mention this) that Tolkien’s mewlips were inspired at least in part by Lord Dunsany’s gibbelins, found in his short story “The Hoard of the Gibbelins.” Tolkien knew and admired Dunsany’s work, and the story predated the poem by decades.

Now Dunsany’s story, as much of his work, was also not entirely serious, yet it is a deliciously spooky sort of tale. There is also a certain amount of implicit social criticism built into it. That also is not untypical of his work.

The story of the Gibbelins appeared in Lord Dunsany’s ‘The Book of Wonder,’ which is long out of copyright and available as a free ebook at Project Gutenberg. Dunsany is one of the founders of modern fantasy; I highly recommend reading at least some of his work and “The Book of Wonder” is a good place to start.

Wonder, a poem

Wonder

I have pursued the sense of wonder
beneath the hurtling moons of Barsoom
and through the caverns of Moria.

I followed its tracks in jungles where
Mowgli and his brothers howled,
and on the shores of Gitche Gumee.

I once held it for a moment,
off the coasts of Treasure Island,
and voyaged on, to seek new worlds.

I yet hear it calling me,
calling me again to follow
across the hills and far away.

Stephen Brooke ©2024

Pulling Strings

In a couple of my Mora fantasy novels—set in a preliterate Polynesian-like society—I have mentioned someone pulling someone’s strings. This, of course, is a relatively modern expression, coming from puppet shows. So was it anachronistic to use it? I admittedly didn’t think about it much until I worked on my current fiction project, which also mentions string-pulling. It poses no problem there; it is a more ‘advanced’ society and knows all about puppets.

I feel it was all right to use the expression in the earlier novels. It says what I intend my readers to understand, without any roundabout explanations. We can, if we wish, simply think of it as a translation of some Mora expression. Or maybe the Mora people had puppets and puppet shows. Why not? There are other traveling entertainers mentioned. Indeed, they play a major role in some of the stories.

It is entirely possible I will mention puppet shows in a future Mora novel. I might even feature one in some way. That is for somewhere down the line but I do have a couple more tales set among that people in my to-write queue.

The Road to Tesra

This will be a bit of an experiment, posting a longish short story (actually, it edges over the border into novelette territory with 7800 words) in something close to finished form (will see a tad more polishing). It could be considered an 'origin story' for Qala, the future Pirate Queen. It's the earliest story I'll ever write about her anyway. Qala has appeared as Main Character in two of my novels and has popped up in some others. The title is no more than tentative.

 NOTE about a month later: There has been, of course, more editing of this story. Nothing major, just shaping it up some. The title has been changed to 'Beneath the Doomed City.' And I am working on more stories to follow it, probably enough to have a book (not exactly a novel but close enough).

The Road to Tesra

Stephen Brooke ©2024

From the battered ramparts of Famod, Lelanva watched another ship burst into flame.

“Is that one of ours, Lellie?” asked her wide-eyed companion.

“It is.” Her heart sank even as did the vessel burning in the harbor. The relief fleet was defeated, scattered, and the city was doomed. Its low, gray stone walls would not hold against the next assault.

She had heard tales of what happened in the sack of a city. At the best, she and Nib and everyone left alive would be taken away as slaves, perhaps across the Great Sea. At worst—Lelanva shivered and put that from her mind. Action was needed now. “We must escape,” she informed the boy.

He only nodded. Nib trusted her. Trusted her too much, she feared! As Lelanva, he had lost all his family to plague during the siege. Nib was a slender, dark lad, maybe a couple years younger than she was. Lelanva was pretty sure she was twelve.

All around, soldiers prepared for what must surely come. If some seemed unenthusiastic, it was hardly surprising. Perhaps more than a few of them were also thinking of escaping the city. How, when the forces of the Empire surrounded it?

“We need food,” the girl decided. “Any we can find. Anything else we can find, for that matter.” She leaned close and whispered. “I know a place we can hide.”

“Hide? Can’t we leave?”

“Later, maybe, when it’s all over. We couldn’t get out now.”

Nib accepted this. “I dreamed of fire,” he murmured. “And people screaming.”

“Only nightmares,” Lelanva assured him. “We’re going to be all right.” They were. She was going to see to it. She would shield them both from the real nightmare that was coming. “We need to prepare.”

“To hide.” The boy didn’t sound overly confident in stating this.

“Not yet. When the attack comes. Come along and we’ll forage.”

The wait was not long. Siege machines began hammering on the walls as night fell, continuing through the darkness. Lelanva knew their thud by now, and suspected it would not cease this time. Not until the fortifications were breached.

It would be best to find their refuge before dawn, Lelanva decided. Not that the city wasn’t already bright with torches and braziers, lighting the way for defenders scurrying here and there. The citizens mostly remained off the streets, awaiting what would come in their homes, be they high houses or lowly hovels. There was little noise other than that incessant thud.

She should have a torch herself, or a lamp. Lelanva rooted among the meager belongings that remained in this house, her house, now and for just a little longer. I won’t ever come here again, will I? she asked herself. There was no need to answer. Candles. As many as she could find. That would do. And an oil lamp, the one of carved stone with the flue, like those used on ships. The one her father had left before sailing away again. Lelanva had no idea whether he yet lived. It was unlikely she would see him again, either.

“Let’s go.” Nib shouldered the load she had packed for him and followed her into the night. “Stick close to the walls,” she warned. “We don’t want to attract attention.” There was an outcry, somewhere toward the harbor, and the crashing of stone on stone. The walls had been breached. Lelanva was a little surprised; she had expected that to happen on the landward side.

It still could. Best to hurry on—hurry toward the center of Famod. Trusting Nib followed until she came to a halt by a low, round stone edifice. “Good, no guards,” she said. It had seemed unlikely there would be.

Nib hesitated as she started toward the arched entry. “Are—are we going down?”

“Yes, Nib. It’s not scary and I’ll be with you. We’ve done it before.”

“Uh-huh.”

But not as she had on her own. Lelanva had thoroughly explored the system of cisterns that lay below Famod. She thought maybe she knew them better than anyone else in the city. A great bucket lay on its side, next to a wide, dark pit. The team of oxen that drew water from the depths in that bucket were gone, slaughtered and eaten weeks earlier. Unlike other necessities, water had remained in good supply through the siege and the cisterns had not been tapped. She hopped across the dry channel that would carry water out to the city and led the way to a smaller opening in the floor, the beginning of a stone staircase that wound down into the dark.

Lelanva had only used this way down at night, when no one was around to stay her. Or no one noticed her, anyway. There were other ways into the depths of the cisterns. She needn’t concern herself with those tonight. Or today. It was already growing light out, wasn’t it?

No, that ruddy light spilling into the room came from fire. “Down we go. Careful!” It was not wise to hurry on these stairs. As soon as they were below the floor level and out of sight, they should be safe. Sooner or later, she suspected, soldiers would look in every building. By then she and Nib should be far down, in tunnels she knew and they didn’t.

“Stay close. Hmm, hang onto my belt. We don’t want to get separated and I’m not ready to risk a light.” She didn’t need one. She knew this stairway well enough. In the blackness below lay the water, deep, still, one of three basin carved into the solid rock below the city. Each of those cisterns was connected. Lelanva knew where the tunnels lay, and other passages where water drained into the reservoirs.

“All this was built centuries ago,” she informed her companion, just to have something to say, something to break the uncanny silence of this place. The words, though barely whispered, echoed through the great chamber. “When Famod was a great port of the Tesran Empire.”

“The Unem,” replied the boy. “They called it the Unem.”

She didn’t know what an unem was and decided not to ask Nib. He surprised her now and again with bits of knowledge like that. His family had known things, too. Nib’s father had been a scribe and had helped Lelanva learn her letters. “You’re partly Tesran, aren’t you?” she asked, feeling her way down, right hand brushing the rough stone wall. There should be a turn soon.

“I guess.”

Everyone was partly something in Famod. Lelanva herself was about as close to being purely Muram as anyone in the city. “Maybe Tesra would be a good place to head for,” she said. They would have to go somewhere, wouldn’t they? She could think about that later. Ah, there was the way. “Right now, we’re turning down this corridor. I think we can have a light.”

If the coal she had carefully packed in sand would light one. She attempted a candle. “Come on, come on.” The candle sputtered and dripped and, at last, a flame appeared on its wick. “We should keep two lights going from now on. I don’t think I’ll be able to use the coal again.” None the less, Lelanva carefully packed it back into its bag of sand.

She lit the little oil lamp from her candle and handed it to Nib. He stared at the flickering light for a moment. “I thought I could see a flame,” he said, waving an arm toward the darkness. “Somewhere—else. I almost felt like I could reach out and bring it to me.”

Things the boy said at times baffled Lelanva. This was one of those times. “Just take care of that one,” she ordered. “We could go up one of the drains and catch a glimpse of what’s going on. It would be safe enough.” The upper ends of those drains were far too small to allow passage of a human body and it wouldn’t be worth anyone’s while to try to break through them. But they would be trapped there if someone followed behind them.

“I don’t want to know,” Nib responded.

She shrugged. “I guess I don’t either.” It really would be better not to indulge her curiosity. Yet she did feel drawn to take a look at what was going on above their heads. Excitement and fear mingled in her heart. Would that she could wield a sword and join the battle!

No, you’re being silly, Lelanva told herself. There is only horror to see up there. Slaughter and rape. “We’d best find a good spot to sit things out,” she said. They crept forward, casting two little pools of light in a great darkness. The girl sniffed the air. “Not down that way,” she said, nodding toward a passage opening on their left. “Basilisk.”

“It stinks,” observed Nib.

“Yeah, but it eats the rats. And it won’t bother us unless we trip over it in the dark.” She had discovered the small—small being about four feet in length—predator in previous explorations.

“A basilisk is a kind of dragon,” Nib went on.

Lelanva knew that. Someone had told her sometime. Oh, she’d heard it from a storyteller in the market. Would the attackers harm an old blind man like him? Maybe no one was safe. Those not suitable to be sold as slaves might be struck down with the sword.

She thought she might use a sword on herself before becoming a slave. Escape into another sort of darkness. But she would rather fight if she had a sword in her hand.

“Here’s the second cistern.” It was smaller than the one through which they had descended. Some said it was the oldest of the three. Another lay closer to the western walls. That was the direction they should probably go to escape the city, away from the waterfront.

Distant, muffled sounds reached them here, rising and falling like the sound of surf on a shore. It was impossible to make out what they were. Though no light reached them, the sun must be high by now. “Not a safe place for us to stay,” she decided, and moved on.

The tunnel they entered was dry. Lelanva had been told water once flowed through it, carried from the hills by the great aqueduct. That had fallen into ruin long before she was born. Now the cisterns collected only rain water that fell on the city, intended as a reserve to the wells and springs that served Famod’s population.

“Can we stop soon, Lellie?”

“Tired?”

“Uh-huh.”

Me too, she thought. “A little further. There’s a good place to eat and rest a while.”

“Are we going up?”

The rock beneath their feet had been gradually rising, barely noticeable but tiring one all the more quickly. “We are. A little. Here we are. Watch for the steps.”

Lelanva could only guess why this narrow stone stairway existed. Maybe it had provided workers access at some time in the past. Now the way was choked by a cave-in, a dozen steps up. It provided a convenient nook for Nib and her to rest a while, hidden from eyes even if someone did venture into the tunnels.

The pair listlessly nibbled at some of their bread, too tired to have much of an appetite. Neither had slept last night and had kept going now half way into the day. “Let’s get some sleep.”

Nib at once reminded her, “One of us should stay on guard.” He frowned and added. “And make sure our lights don’t go out.”

“That’s sensible,” she agreed. “You sleep first. I need to think a while.”

The exhausted boy took no time in falling into slumber. Lelanva watched him for a couple minutes. It would have been easier had she left him behind, left him to whatever fate the gods ordained. They would not treat Nib well, would they? The gods of her people were not kind gods. Best not trust them with her own fate.

She found herself blinking. Don’t fall asleep! The girl rose and walked up and down the stairs a couple times. “Is it my turn to watch?” came a small, sleepy voice.

“Not yet. I’ll watch for a bit more.” Watch over Nib. There wasn’t really a choice, was there? Maybe that was her fate! Lelanva giggled at the thought.

She could pray, she supposed, not that she’d ever heard of it doing much good. Not to great Orgum, the Sky Father. He wouldn’t hear a little girl, buried beneath a doomed city. It was the soldiers above who would be giving him thanks now for their victory. Or cursing him for their defeat. Instead, Lelanva spoke a few words to Old Grandmother Moon, who ruled the night. By night they would have to make their attempt to escape.

How soon? As soon as tonight, though it would be possible to hide here for weeks, even months. She’d have to go up and forage for food sometime, wouldn’t she? Not for a couple days. It might be safer then. Oh, she didn’t know. Lelanva held back a sob. But another followed and would not be held back, nor that after it. She bowed her head and cried, a little girl in the dark with far too much responsibility and far too many decisions to make.

Nib got up and wrapped his arms around her. “You sleep now, Lellie. I’ll watch.”

“All right.” She settled down on one of the steps, her body barely fitting its width. Lelanva was not only young, but rather small. At least she was warm; she had made certain both of them had dressed in more layers than one might think necessary. She had no way of telling how long she slept. She knew only that she opened her eyes and Nib was still sitting there, with a faraway look in his eyes. She wouldn’t have blamed him at all had he fallen asleep, nor would it have been likely to matter. Both lights still burned.

She’d need to find more oil or candles too, wouldn’t she? Not a concern at the moment. She sat up, saying, “I wonder if it’s night yet.” Not that it mattered much. She’d just like to know, to orient herself a bit.

“How can we find out?”

“The bats. I know where they roost and we can see if they’ve flown out.” She paused a moment to think. “We should be going that direction, anyway. But let’s eat first! I’m starving!”

But Lelanva ate sparingly and her young comrade followed her lead. Both knew their food might have to last. There wasn’t much down here to eat. Rats, maybe, but not bats! “I wonder if fish get into the cisterns,” she said, mostly to herself. She’d never heard of any being in the water dipped from their depths.

“Crocodiles,” stated Nib, completely straight-faced. Crocodiles in the cisterns was an old tale, told to frighten children who might feel the urge to explore. It had not made Lelanva pause for even a second. She’d wanted to see one.

“Of course,” she agreed. “So there must be fish for them to eat.”

“Or kids who get too close to the water.” Both had to snicker at that. But Lelanva wasn’t sure she’d be willing to swim in one of the cisterns. Too dark, too deep!

They set off toward the western cistern. There was no particular reason to go there, Lelanva knew, but it beat sitting. “Watch your feet,” she warned, a few minutes later.

Nib looked down. “What is it?” he asked. “It smells almost as bad as the basilisk.”

“Bat droppings.” She raised her candle and peered toward the roof. “All gone. It’s nighttime.”

“Do they go out through the cistern?”

“Yeah. We’re close to it.” This third reservoir was partly a natural cave, or so Lelanva had been told. It certainly didn’t have the circular shape of the other two cisterns. It was both wider and shallower. Again, so she had been told. She wasn’t about to jump in and test the depth.

She held her candle high as they entered the chamber. It did little to illuminate the space.

“I’m thirsty,” whispered Nib. “Could we go down and get some water?”

They certainly could. There was no difficulty in reaching the reservoir. “It’s best to boil the water that comes from the cistern,” she reminded him.

“But we can’t.”

“True.” Lelanva thought on that only a moment. “We’ll have to chance it. This cistern is supposed to have the cleanest water.” The furthest upstream, so to speak. Best not to think about bats pooping in it. She stared down into the basin’s depths. A dim, nebulous circle of light floated on the water, barely to be noticed. Lelanva looked toward the skylight in the center of the dome above. A few stars floated in the darkness there.

Nib broke into her reverie. “I hear someone.”

She suspected the boy’s imagination was working again. “Ghosts?” she asked.

“No such thing. Listen!”

Yes, there were voices. Where? They were impossible to locate with the echoes here. She backed toward the way they had entered, pushing Nib along with one arm.

Torch light appeared on the far side of the enclosure, as someone descended the stairway from the level above, the ground floor. Three men. They jabbered at each other in what most called Imperial Muram, which melded many dialects into one language. It had become the common trade tongue on both sides of the Great Sea. Lelanva could understand it. Understand it well enough.

Sent down to inspect the place, maybe, or wandered in on their own initiative. That didn’t matter at all. What did matter was that Nib and she would be in danger if they were spied. Should they put out their lights? They had no way of relighting unless one of them ventured into the city above.

Shouting. They’d been seen or the lights had. There was no sense in dousing them now. “Run,” she told Nib. “Follow me.”

A straight tunnel lay ahead of them, with no side ways diverging for some distance. They’d be easy to follow. Were the soldier after them? Yes, their cries suddenly rang louder as they entered the way behind the fleeing children. Nib was tired and would never be able to outrun them. Maybe she couldn’t either.

The first side tunnel yawned to their right. Lelanva almost ran past, seeking better refuge than it offered, when a whiff of stench drifted from the opening. A plan popped into the girl’s head at once. Perhaps not a well thought out plan, but a plan none the less. “This way!” Nib wrinkled his nose but followed without complaint.

“Don’t stop, no matter what,” she yelled to him. “And jump when I tell you to!”

Oops, her candle had gone out as she rushed along. Nib’s lamp still cast light behind her. The stink was growing stronger. This might work!

Suddenly, a sinuous form appeared in their path, like a great weasel with vestigial wings, blinking and uncertain what was going on. It would not remain that way very long!

“Jump! Jump!” She and Nib both sailed over the confused creature and disappeared into the dark beyond.

Behind them rose howls of dismay. “It sprayed them,” commented Nib. Both laughed and ran on.

Sprayed. That was how all dragons shot their fire, discharging a burning, noxious liquid from their rears. Lelanva wished she could have stayed and watched.

They slowed down a bit. “Are we safe now?” Nib asked.

“Only for a while. They know someone’s down here now.” They would surely come looking again. Eventually. There must be other things going on to keep the soldiers busy. More important things, she hoped. “We’ll have to find a good place to hide.”

“Near the basilisk,” suggested Nib.

“But not too near!” Hmm, how did the basilisk get in? Certainly not through the city! There must be an opening somewhere else. An opening outside the walls. She turned into another side tunnel, a curved way that led back again toward the west. Coming to a halt after a few minutes, she announced, “This is as good a place to hide as any, for a little while. Not too long. Hey, let me light my candle from your lamp.” She noted the oil was low when she did so. That would be the last of it. “Maybe you should use a candle too. And don’t burn yourself with it.”

“Yes, Lellie. I’ll be careful.”

He would try to be. Nib was terribly absent-minded. “I’m thinking,” the girl said, “that there might be a way that leads outside the city. We should look for it.” That’s what they should do, yes, for at least a day or two. If they couldn’t find a way, she would have to risk going into the city for supplies. Best not to think about that until there was no other choice.

“Maybe bats go in and out there, too,” suggested Nib.

“Maybe. We’ll watch for them.” Lelanva recognized it as a good suggestion, but she only knew of the one colony. “I’ve never been in these tunnels much. They don’t seem to go much of anywhere.”

The boy held up his candle and surveyed the low, uneven roof. “I think it’s a cave.”

Yeah, he was probably right. No one had chiseled a way through here. Maybe they added to it, though, for some reason she’d never know. “There are lots of blind tunnels and dead ends and cave-ins. That’s why I avoided them.” They actually scared her a little, where they grew narrow or low. She didn’t like those walls so close around her.

This, she would never admit to Nib. Nor anyone else!

“We won’t get lost, will we?”

“We can just follow our noses back to the basilisk,” she assured him. Lelanva did know these passages well enough, she thought, to avoid getting confused. But here she was searching for an unknown way. Where could it be?

They were closest to the west walls here than any other. Beyond them lay the hills. They could give cover for all sorts of animals! Lelanva had rarely ventured out of the city but she had heard tales of wild and dangerous beasts lurking beyond its safety. Maybe no more real the crocodiles in the cisterns, she told herself.

She might find out soon! “Let’s move on. I know a way that runs beyond the western cistern.” The pair trudged forward. It might have been for hours. It was probably day by now, the girl thought. Their tunnel opened onto the one she sought, the one she guessed had once carried water from the aqueduct to the cistern. The way was blocked, further up. That might have been done on purpose sometime, or it could have simply caved in. Either way, Lelanva thought she should give it a thorough look.

But she didn’t like this narrow passage. She felt closed in, trapped, like—like a prisoner. Better than being in the city and being a real prisoner. Here she could escape. She was escaping.

What was that soft, murmuring sound? It was growing louder. The soldiers weren’t following again, were they? “Do you hear that?” she asked Nib.

“Uh-huh. The basilisk?”

“Nah, we’d smell it. Something else.”

‘Something else’ revealed itself a few seconds later when a rat scurried by. More followed. Nib shrank away from them but Lelanva was used to rats. They wouldn’t bother them, even in these numbers. And they were running from something. That, too, was revealed when the first snake slithered into their lights.

“Run!” She didn’t know if the snakes were any more of a danger than the rats but didn’t intend to stay and find out. For at least a while, the two children could outpace the animals. Lelanva gasped on suddenly remembering there was no exit ahead in this tunnel. Not for someone her size, or Nib’s.

“Maybe we should turn and run back the other way,” she choked out. That could be the only way to escape. If the snakes weren’t venomous.

“Look!” cried Nib, pointing to ceiling. Bats were rustling about up there, disturbed by the turmoil below. Then one, another, an entire cloud of little winged bodies took to the air, rushing to escape. There, just above their heads, a hole in the rock wall. The bats disappeared into it.

Lelanva reacted without thought. “I’ll boost you up,” she told Nib, and pushed him toward the opening. He wriggled in and turned around to reach a hand down for her to grasp. Could she find a foothold? A rat ran across her foot, with a shrill little scream of terror. She felt like emitting one herself. All right, she had a hand on the edge of the tunnel now, was kicking her way up. Hissing below. She could see one of the snakes striking toward her leg, by the light of Nib’s candle. Her own, she had dropped.

The boy had hold of her jacket now and helped her scramble the rest of the way up. “I don’t think they can climb,” he said.

“Or have no reason to,” she responded. “No rats up here.”

“Just two really big ones, hiding in their hole.”

“We’ll have to see where the hole leads. Let me catch my breath first.”

This was even more like being imprisoned than before. There was no room to stand, only to crawl forward. And upward; they were definitely moving upward. Like the bats, of course, rising toward the world outside.

“We’ll have to be quiet,” she warned. “There’s no telling where we’re going to come out.” Or if the passage would remain wide enough for them to come out at all.

The way was growing steeper. That could keep them from getting out too. Nib anyway. Lelanva knew she could work her way up a vertical flue and had on occasion. “There’s light ahead,” she whispered. “Daylight.”

A very wan sort of daylight, but any daylight was dangerous. She should be cautious, maybe wait until dark to go the rest of the way. It would be a terribly uncomfortable wait, wedged in this hole. Maybe a peek. Lelanva pushed herself up just far enough to get a look, maybe figure out where they were.

That proved to be inside a small room, walled with great, gray stone blocks. She glimpsed a bit of red sky through a gap high in the wall. Sunset. That explained why none of the bats had flitted back in. What part of the city was this? Carefully, she went to the broken place and peered out. Why, they weren’t in the city at all. They were outside the walls!

She couldn’t see those walls from this angle. “Come on up,” she whispered to Nib. “It’s safe.” For now. They could always bolt back into their hole if there seemed to be any danger.

Nib looked around. “I think we’re in the aqueduct.”

Lelanva thought he could be right. “But what is this room?”

The boy shrugged. “Maybe it was a secret hideout.”

She thought that could well be right, too. “And a secret passage, which we found.”

“The bats found it and showed us,” he corrected her. Then the boy frowned. “But wouldn’t that tunnel we were in have been full of water in the old days?”

“Not deep, I think, and maybe not all the time. A man could probably wade if need be. It would do for emergencies.” She wasn’t really at all sure of this but it sounded plausible. And it didn’t matter much now, after all. She looked around the room. “How do we get out of here?” There was no obvious door. Maybe they could squeeze through that hole in the wall, but it was awfully narrow. Bat sized, only. They certainly couldn’t shift any of those big stone blocks!

It had grown noticeably darker out. Nib held up his candle and peered toward the ceiling. “The way out must be up there.”

Any wooden ladder would have rotted away long ago. Surely whoever built this cell had provided something better. Oh, she was too tired for more puzzles! Every time one was solved, another came along.

“Here it is!” crowed Nib. He seemed to be walking right up the wall. No, there was a exceedingly narrow stairway of the same gray stone as the walls. One could hardly make it out until one set foot on it, and not much better then. Even less so when it was this dark.

Lelanva definitely wouldn’t attempt to come back down it without light. “Let’s see what’s up there. And you be really, really careful, boy. We didn’t get this far so you can fall and crack your head.”

Up they went, sidling with their hands against the wall, Nib in the lead. “There’s a narrow place to go through here,” he said as they reached the top. “Ooh, full of cobwebs.”

“Maybe snakes, too,” she told him. “Slide on through.”

“It’s hard to hold onto my candle. Now it goes back the other way. So no one can see it, huh?”

It was supposed to be secret, after all. Lelanva didn’t bother to remind him of that. A minute later they sat on a ledge on the side of aqueduct, feet dangling, looking toward Famod.

“There are still fires,” she said. “Mostly burnt out, I think.”

Not much light at all came from the city. Torches could be glimpsed along the ramparts. They were really far too close to those to dawdle. “I don’t think we should use the road,” said Lelanva.

Nib looked up. “We can use the channel as our road.”

“Is there water in it?”

“Broken in too many places for that. My dad showed me when we came up here. We used to—used to come out from the city whenever we could.” The boy stifled a sob.

“Then you’ll have to be our guide from here out. I don’t know about anything outside Famod.”

They clambered over the edge of the aqueduct without much difficulty and hiked up its channel. Quite dry it might be, but much litter and dirt had accumulated in it, and some surprisingly large trees had taken root. Moreover, it was broken here and there, though no gaps proved too wide for them to jump across.

Grandmother Moon rose to light their way, in time. Lelanva said a little prayer of thanks for that, though she felt a bit silly doing so. Through the night they walked, resting only now and then, and into the dawn. Famod looked far away now. “There used to be villas up here,” said Nib, pointing to ruins barely recognizable as once having been dwellings. “Rich Tesrans lived in them. They were the first places looted when the Mur took over.”

Like me, thought Lelanva. Her ancestors were barbarians. She wasn’t too far removed from being one herself. “I don’t suppose it would be safe to take shelter in one.” A roof over their head would be nice but most didn’t appear to still have roofs. And the weather was good, as fine a day of early summer as one might wish.

Would that summer had never come. It had brought the fleet of the Muram Empire with it. True, some ships would cross the Great Sea even in the middle of winter, but the Empire had not been willing to risk its fleet before spring. These facts she had heard from soldiers on the walls, from sailors on the docks, from her own father.

“How far does this aqueduct go?” she asked. “I know we can’t follow it all the way to Tesra!”

“There is supposed to be a lake. I’ve never been that far.”

“We’ll go find it later. Right now we need to find a good spot to hide and rest a while.” A thicket of bushes provided concealment, to rest and to eat. Lelanva could spot a grove of hutnee trees below them. Their beans wouldn’t be ripe yet. The girl knew them well as common fare for cattle and impoverished humans. She didn’t know if she would recognize anything else growing wild. The last of their own food would soon be gone.

Both slept soundly and started off again in the mid afternoon. The aqueduct varied greatly in height now as it passed over the rolling hills, sometimes on high arches, sometimes with its channel set into the ground, even cutting through the top of a rise, here and there. Lelanva felt vulnerable when they were down low, though they had spied not one person so far.

She hoped none had spied them! By sunset they could spy the lake glimmering ahead. Soon, water began to appear in the channel. The aqueduct was again nearly level with the ground here. When reeds sprouted from a sheet of water spreading from one wall to the other, it was time to abandon their erstwhile roadway.

“Ooh, what is this?” Lelanva asked, as she hopped down and sank into the soggy ground.

Nib knew. “It’s a marsh.”

She knew the word. The reality was not quite what she expected. She did not like its smell at all, and she had experienced more than a few unpleasant smells in Famod. “Well, we can’t stay in it. That way.” The lake was not large, not that Lelanva knew of any other lakes with which to compare it. Nor did Nib, for that matter; he knew only a little more of life outside the city walls than his friend. It was much smaller that Famod harbor, to be sure.

Some might have named it a pond. Shortly, they were on higher ground and halfway to its other side. “I bet there are fish in there,” said Lelanva. “We can try catching them.” That, she did know something about. She had fished from the wharves of Famod.

They crossed a barely perceptible, overgrown road. “That’s not the way to Tesra, is it?” the girl ask. She much doubted it but was sure of nothing, right now.

“Huh-uh. The road over the hills is paved with stone.”

“Just like when it leaves the gates of Famod?”

“Yep. All the way.” She was willing to believe it. If it were not true, they would find out eventually. They were going to Tesra. She could come up with no other plan.

A sizable compound of stone buildings, falling into ruin, rose ahead. They’d best be careful approaching them. She squatted and motioned for Nib to do the same. “We’ll wait until it’s darker,” she told him. The sun was near sinking behind the hills already. It wouldn’t be long.

Nib whispered, “My dad told me there was a shrine here, to one of the Tesran gods.”

Lelanva knew the names of some of those deities. They had tended to become mixed up with the Muram gods in the minds of many. She wondered if they minded. Or if they even paid any attention.

She could imagine them joking about it. “Dark enough. Let’s go.”

The duo crept toward the buildings. None of those rose particularly high—even without their roofs—save one tall structure in the middle. Lelanva at once guessed that was the shrine, proper, and the others were workshops and dormitories and the like. “I’ll bet there is a big kitchen somewhere,” she whispered to Nib. “Was a big kitchen.”

“The one with the chimney,” he responded, pointing.

Sensible boy. It was indeed a larger chimney than those on any of the other buildings, even if it had crumbled some. It also made as good a landmark as any for them to head toward. A kitchen might be attached to a dining hall. They wouldn’t want to blunder into a large space with nowhere to conceal themselves. She led her friend around to what was probably the rear of the kitchen. Any doors that had once hung in the openings there had long disappeared. One would be as good to try as another. Up a few stone steps and inside they went.

A storeroom, maybe, once. The slight lingering bit of daylight filtering in from outside showed little, and they no longer carried any lights. Those had been doused when they took to traveling in the open along the aqueduct, and they had no way to relight one of the remaining candles.

Lelanva stepped cautiously into the next room, one even darker. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust, to realize there was a man inside, huddled on a stool beside a shrouded lamp. He spied them at once and rose, one hand on his sword, the other lifting his light, then relaxing when he took in who his visitors were. The fellow looked thoroughly Muram—copper-complected, dark of hair, sparse of beard. His outfit was that of soldier, tunic and trousers, with a short sword at his side, but any insignia had been discarded.

“You kids by yourselves?” he asked, peering into the darkness behind them. “All right, then, come on into my home.” He barked a laugh. “I guess it’s mine now! Someone had already been squatting here but they’ve taken off. Maybe the troubles in Famod scared them away.” He looked the pair over. “You’ve come from Famod?”

Lelanva gave him a cautious nod.

“How went things there? Has the city fallen?”

“Taken and sacked.”

“We snuck out,” Nib added.

“Smart of you,” the soldier told them, settling back onto his stool. “I be Sogid. No reason I shouldn’t tell you that.”

“But maybe not others?” hazarded Lelanva.

“Ha, maybe not. Want some grub?”

That they did. “I am Lelanva and this is Nib,” she told him, as they took places on the floor. It was not a clean floor, as most would define such, but the dirt was dry and old and not at all nasty. And there was an intact roof above them.

Sogid gave them each a millet cake. Typical fodder for a soldier. “I was with the Esan troops sent to defend the city,” he said. “I could see it was a lost cause, you know? So I took off.”

Lelanva couldn’t bring herself to judge him for that. She’d taken off herself. Not that she ever had any duty to stay. “Are you making your way back to the Esan army?

There was an emphatic shake of his head. “I’d be crucified as a deserter.”

“We’re going to Tesra,” volunteered Nib. Lelanva shot him an annoyed expression but he seemed to miss it.

“Hmm, a week’s journey, at least, afoot,” said the soldier. “It might be the place for me, too. Aye, it just might.” He surveyed the pair for a few seconds. “And I might just accompany you if you don’t mind.”

Lelanva’s first instinct was to mind it very much. She’d done a pretty good job of taking care of herself and Nib, so far, hadn’t she? But she could see no real reason to object. She could even grudgingly admit they might need his protection.

“Do we travel by night or day?” she asked. “We’re ready to move on right now if you are.”

Sogid gave that more thought than it probably needed, giving the youngsters a lingering, thoughtful look before speaking. “It would be best to go by night, wouldn’t it? Until we’re further from Famod. Wouldn’t surprise me at all if the Imperials decided to send some patrols up this way, when they think about it.”

Within the hour, the three were on their way. “The main road’s over that way,” said Sogid, waving an arm southward. “I reckon we could angle to it ’stead of taking that cow-path I came in by.”

Across unknown hills in the darkness? Lelanva wasn’t so sure of that. Oh, but once the moon came up it should be all right. Even the starlight on this clear night helped.

It also helped that the hills were largely barren of aught but grass. There were supposed to be forests further on, but that was yet another thing of which she knew only by hearsay. Around Famod, the harsh winds off the sea didn’t allow for much in the way of trees, much less big trees pressing close to one another.

They walked the stones of the road to Tesra by the time the moon rose. Weary they were when dawn came and all too willing to hole up for the day. The soldier meted out a couple more cakes, and Nib and Lelanva shared what was left of their own store. “It might be hard going in a couple days,” felt Sogid, reclining on his ragged cloak, “unless we find some food somewhere. Haven’t seen any farmhouses or the like, so far.”

“Would they feed us?” wondered Nib.

The man shrugged. “If they don’t, we can take what we need. One way or another.” He gave Lelanva another long look before rolling over and snoring.

So they rose at dusk and walked through part of another night. “I say we stop here and rest a bit,” spoke Somig, a few hours before dawn. “We could start walking by daylight then. Should be safe enough.”

Lelanva might have chosen to go all the way to Tesra by night, but could see there was no reason now. Maybe they’d run into other travelers by day. It would be nice to know there were still other people in the world!

Not very many of them it seemed, when they were again on the road, at least in this part of the world. A ragged man hurried by once, not looking at them and keeping his distance. A shepherd surveyed them from the safety of a nearby hill. At least his dog barked at them. Ruined buildings arose here and there along the way but no one seemed to live beside the road now. “That’s one of the old caravansaries,” Sogid informed them as they approached a tumbled-down place. “The Tesrans put them all along the roads. There’s ones like ’em on the road from Robon.”

“You’re from Robon?” asked Lelanva.

“Lived there,” was all the soldier was willing to say. “Good a place as any to camp.” Without further word he turned from the road.

Lelanva was just about ready to walk on without him. This Sogid wasn’t going to make decisions for her! They didn’t need him anyway. But Nib followed the soldier. The boy looked tired. She was pretty tired herself. The caravansary—what was left of it—once had sheds lining the inside of its walls. Those were largely gone but the stone walls were intact. For the most part.

“It’s safe to have a fire now,” Sogid decided. “You two see if you can find some wood.”

Orders, again. But it would be nice to have a fire. She and Nib gathered armfuls of what they thought might burn, though they knew little of such things. Sogid made no comment when they dumped them, but busied himself with a fire-bow, igniting a small flame. A fitful fire soon burned. That evening they shared the last of the food they carried. Lelanva still felt empty as she fell into sleep.

To be awakened with a start. It wasn’t morning yet. What was going on? Sogid was straddling her, tying her hands together with a leather thong. “Don’t struggle, girl. There, that should do. Now behave,” he growled. He got off her, kneeling now by her side.

“What—?” She didn’t know what question to ask.

“I reckon I can sell you to a brothel when we reach Tesra. Maybe the boy too..” He reached out a calloused hand, slid it up her leg. “No reason I shouldn’t enjoy myself some first though, is there? No reason at all.” His hand strayed further under her skirt.

“Stop!” Nib was suddenly there, fists striking again and again at him.

Sogid casually backhanded the boy, sending him sprawling. “Maybe I’ll have some of you, too, when I’ve finished with the girl.” He returned his attention to Lelanva. She could glimpse Nib lying stunned beyond Sogid. Then he was atop her and she could see nothing but his leering face.

His hands tore at her blouse. “Ha, nothing to see there,” he snickered, pressing his wiry whiskers against her nipples. What was he doing? Oh, trying to slide his trousers down. She couldn’t fight him. He was too big, too heavy, and had her pinned down. And tied! How could she let that happen?

Sogid’s breath came fast, ragged. Then came a sudden deep gasp and he rolled off her. Surely that wasn’t all, was it? That wasn’t at all what she had heard about sex. No, there was blood running down the man’s torso and Nib standing there with a sword in his hand. Where had he found that?

The soldier rose and fumbled for his own weapon, his trousers about his ankles, his erection visibly deflating. Lelanva at once rolled over, throwing herself against his legs. He stumbled, fell, his sword clattering on the ground. “Get him again!” she yelled at Nib, even as she reached for Sogid’s wayward weapon. Then both were thrusting their blades into the soldier’s body, over and over, and far more than was necessary.

“Did he hurt you, Lellie?” asked the boy when both stepped away. He was visibly shaking. Lelanva was a little surprised by how calm she felt herself. There was no time to think about that now.

“No. Never got the chance, thanks to you. Where did you get that sword?”

“I—I needed it and I, uh, saw it and reached out and grabbed it.” He held the weapon out to her. It was longer than the military blade Sogid had carried, and much nicer in workmanship. It could bring a good price anywhere.

As she held it, the sword faded and evaporated. “Oh, well, we have the other sword,” said Lelanva. “Reached out and grabbed it, eh? From another world, maybe?” She had heard of such things, in the tales told in the marketplace.

“I guess, Lellie. I don’t know. I—I don’t know anything.” The boy began to bawl.

She finished sawing through the thongs on her wrists and went to embrace him. “I know you’re the bravest companion I could ever have.” Holding him then at arms’ length, she said, “You must have wizard blood. That means you definitely belong in Tesra. They called it the city of wizards, didn’t they?

“City of wizardry.”

“I was close. Let’s gather what we need and be on our way.”

Before dawn, two companions were on the road to Tesra.

Coast of Spears Video

This is a rather old book trailer I put together for the first Malvern fantasy novel, COAST OF SPEARS. I've neglected that sort of thing (as well as composing music of this sort) for quite some time. Maybe I'll put up some others eventually, though I doubt I'll create any more of these slideshow-style videos.

Hard and Soft

We sometimes speak, in the fantasy genre, of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ magic systems. This refers to the rules of how magic works in our created world, whether they are clearly delineated or ‘anything goes.’ There is a very wide range between those two. Tolkien’s magic is fairly soft; it is simply magic and some can wield it. This is not unlike the magic of the myths from which he drew many of his ideas.

Tolkien does soft magic well. In other hands, it can become nonsense, following no logic, and providing easy solutions to any problem that comes along. On the other end of the spectrum, an author like Sanderson provides quite strict rules for the use of magic.

All this, for the most part, is how magic works, not why it does. Admittedly, if one gets into explaining the nuts and bolts of it, one veers toward soft science fiction. I plead guilty to this. I need to know why my magic works, and it needs to be grounded in science of a sort. No depending on nebulous ‘elemental’ magic or ‘the power of words’ or anything of that sort.

Of course, my characters don’t need to know what I know. Most sorcerers are operating on empirical knowledge. It’s like that bit by Arthur C. Clarke about advanced technology being magic to those who don’t understand it.

More than a few old school science fiction writers leaned heavily on telepathy to create ‘magic.’ Andre Norton used it a lot, whether working in SF or fantasy. Even Edgar Rice Burroughs threw it in from time to time. Unfortunately, that can be as mushy as any soft magic, if we do not have a clear idea of how telepathy works. It doesn’t work in my primary fantasy worlds, but...well, the books do explain mind reading and more, and it all fits into the concept of infinite worlds and the ability to enter into them.

Admittedly, I do not clearly state why some have that ability. But then, we needn’t explain why some have better hearing than others, need we? Or why some are smarter! We just say ‘genetics’ and that’s how I explain it—some are born able to see or even partially cross into other worlds. And that is the basis of all magic.

Or I should say all known magic, or magic that works in my worlds. If we posit infinite universes there would have to be all sorts of magic out there. That is only of academic interest as it would not impact any world where it didn’t work!

So perhaps the bulk of my fantasy is really soft science fiction? It could certainly be argued but I would not attempt to market it as such. It reads like genre fantasy so that’s what I call it. It’s all part of the speculative fiction spectrum anyway.

Portals

All mirrors are magic mirrors. ~ George MacDonald

In 1858, George MacDonald wrote what may be considered the first modern portal fantasy, ‘Phantastes.’ This was also MacDonald’s first novel of any sort, followed by many more, both fantasy and mainstream. With William Morris (who wrote the first modern high fantasy), he laid the ground for the fantasy writers of the Twentieth Century.

Strictly, neither man is ‘Modern.’ Their writing belongs to the late Romantic. I might be inclined to describe them as precursors to modern fantasy rather than its first practitioners. They are very important precursors, to be sure—one can draw some direct lines from MacDonald to C.S. Lewis (or to Tolkien from Morris, for that matter).

The portal in ‘Phantastes’ is to Faerie; it opens quite early in the narrator’s own bedchamber, thanks to his fairy blood evincing itself when he reaches sufficient maturity. No wardrobes or doors are needed for this initial passage (though others appear later in the narrative). The one world, our world, simply fades into the other. Near the end of his career (1895), George MacDonald created another—and better—portal fantasy, ‘Lilith.’ There, the portal lies in a library and is somewhat better defined as an actual passageway between worlds.

‘Alice in Wonderland,’ written less than a decade later than ‘Phantastes,’ did much to popularize the portal concept. It may be argued, however, that it is not fantasy in the genre sense, being dream-based and full of absurdities, taking it closer to surrealism. ‘The Wonderful Wizard of Oz’ carried the concept into the Twentieth Century—if one is willing to consider the tornado a portal. My own stories have used similar storms to open portals, but have carried no houses to other lands! Perhaps the cave where John Carter falls into unconsciousness, to awaken on Barsoom, can also be considered a portal. I’m willing to include it among the important portal fantasies. Important enough to spawn its share of imitators, anyway.

But the ‘true’ portal fantasies with which almost all of us are familiar are C.S. Lewis’s Narnia tales. Actual, physical ways between the worlds exist in them. At the same time, the experience of the children transitioning from one to another on entering the wardrobe, is surprisingly similar to that in the opening of ‘Phantastes,’ written a century earlier.

‘Phantastes’ is a decent story though without much cohesive plot. It gives a first person account of the protagonist’s rambling journey and of his making stupid mistake after stupid mistake. I occasionally wanted to shake the narrator and scream, ‘Pay attention when folks warn you!’ Such dependence on the protagonist’s bad judgment is not a good plot device—in its way, just as bad as the hero who makes no mistakes at all.

The tale is told in a clear, serviceable prose style—decidedly better than what one gets from some of his contemporaries—but one might do well to skim over MacDonald’s attempts at poetry. He certainly couldn’t match Morris there! The overt symbolism might be off-putting to some. One of the main points there seems to be that ‘Faerie’ is all around us and the mundane world is an illusion. This is akin to some of the Christian symbolism we encounter in Lewis. One can hear echoes of MacDonald in Dunsany, in Lewis and in Tolkien, in pretty much every modern writer of fantasy. The shadow that follows Ged in LeGuin’s work is not so removed from the one attached to our protagonist in ‘Phantastes.’

As a read, the novel hovers somewhere between ‘good’ and ‘very good,’ readable and reasonably interesting. It might even be called a minor classic, though mostly for its influence on the fantasy stories to come. ‘Phantastes’ is, of course, long in the public domain and may be downloaded as a free ebook at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

Roots

William Morris is generally (and probably accurately) considered the inventor of the modern high fantasy novel. In ‘The Well at the World’s End’ and other tales penned late in his life, he created autonomous fantasy worlds with no connection to that in which we live (essentially, the description of what makes a story high fantasy). These books certainly influenced those fantasy writers who followed.

But before these came the two Wolflings novels, ‘The House of the Wolflings’ (or, in full, ‘A Tale of the House of the Wolflings and all the Kindreds of the Mark’) and ‘The Roots of the Mountains.’ These could best be described as historic fantasy, stories set among the Goths at some point in Antiquity. There is magic, but it is relatively low-key (prophecy, primarily) and the gods seem to take some interest in the doings of men. There is more of that sort of thing in ‘House;’ the supernatural element is barely to be found in ‘Roots.’

They are, in some respects, more accessible than the high fantasies that came later, if only because he avoided some of their archaic pseudo-medieval language. These were also influential novels. Their mark is all over Tolkien’s tales. His Goths are the template for the Rohirrim. That’s the most obvious borrowing from Morris, but we find echoes of the older writer’s work throughout Tolkien. Even the poetry is sometimes surprisingly similar.

Morris was not the writer Tolkien was. The novels are good enough, but neither masterpieces nor epics. The plots are straightforward, even a bit pedestrian. An enemy appears, there is fighting, some thoughts on mankind’s fate are thrown in. There is not a great deal of tension, no deep questions about good and evil, to be resolved by victory. This does not keep them from being perfectly good stories, and worth reading. For someone new to Morris, I would tend to recommend ‘The Roots of the Mountains’ as a starting place—especially if one already knows Tolkien! This book, and much of William Morris’s fiction, is available as free ebooks at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.