A wan sun shines upon the blasted road, leafless trees bending and genuflecting before the winter gale. In the pale brightness, a black-haired figure stumbles listlessly from one side of the road
to another, weeping silently. Catching a glimpse of your face, he turns jerkily to face you.

"Gods! Pray mercy, neighbor. I am spent, and my tale burns to be told- will you not hear the omens of our doom?"

"I am blessed in the weather, the light of the growing moon, and most of all for my escape. I do not know how many here will listen to my tale, but it is one that bears no delay. I was a hired spearman aboard the galley Marauder, a ship that set out from Metaph, the city of my birth. We journeyed northward under great secrecy, and were many weeks at sea before the Ghalim Archipelago loomed out of the morning mist."

The young man pauses for breath, and shudders deeply, wiping everpresent tears ineffectually from his face.

"The settled peoples of Metaph had driven the minotaur menace briefly from those islands, and we were hired out by a roving pirate to loot the remains and pay a share to his board. I've never quailed at a job, mostly because the ones I choose are righteous in nature- never throwing in my spear for an assassination or an evil deed; I've won a name from my deeds and mild renown, without casting my lot with those who serve dark masters. Never will I, indeed. The War never ends... it may take a new shape, wear a new mask, but it always rages. We must adapt to the changing tides of war, or all is lost...." He trails off, eyes faraway and fearful.

"But hence my haste and my fear: What we found upon those accursed isles of Ghalim will haunt my dreams for decades to come, if ever they depart my mind. Minotaurs came in secret, during the night, aboard longboats to the far side of the quay. They drove us from the coast and our ship, slaughtering those who fell out of bedrolls, half-awake. We formed a phalanx, and managed to hold for a while, those that were left... when... something... foul...
yet impossibly vast and menacing... walked up from the waves of the sea." The young man chokes suddenly, unable to continue. He falls, doubling over and retching horribly, wracked with fear and pain remembered. Mastering himself at last, he continues.

"The Titan Minotaur emerged from the frothing surf, his eyes bloodshot and his muscles heaving. In one massive hand he clutched a warhammer of which elven nightmares are made, and in the other he bore a flail that hung with a perpetual aura of killing frost. With one sweep of that unearthly instrument, a battalion of halberdiers from Seantryn Modan were blasted into the sand, frozen chunks of flesh exploding to strike the terrified remainder of our forces. I tell you, I know not what, God or Abomination, he was... but need brooks no delay, as they say, or I would not be here telling you this! Five men and I fought a desperate retreat toward a high dune, turned and made for the sea."

"Only then, as the salt water penetrated my flesh, did I notice that
the frozen slivers of my comrades had shot into my own flesh, leaving
me scarred as you see, but also dripping with gore and in immeasurable pain from the salt of the Great Sea.

...the Pain kept me going... It became my constant ally, those two weeks... It was Savior, Teacher, Lover, and God. If my body knew pain, my mind and my soul knew madness and despair. Again and again I viewed the images of my comrades' deaths, and could not escape the memory of that laughing titan's visage, snorting
with glee as he ended lives, shattered families, quenched dreams."

"So ends my tale, and if my eyes are wary, call me not discourteous. There is an unholy power rising in the East, traveler. I follow the setting sun as ever I may, but I feel that dark visage following me, haunting me. I pray your fortune carries you far from his hungry, killing spirit. Should you, too, be a meal for his ravening hatred, know that many stout men have graced his arms with their lifeblood- you will stand in no better company!"

"My name I will not tell, for I no longer bear a place in this world. Pain is my steadfast companion, and sorrow keeps hard upon my heels. Take heart if you will... I flee to dark dreams and hope only for oblivion."

The young man stumbles past, weeping afresh, and disappears into the hazy, wan wintry horizon.


*** Text trailer for the Minotaur Chronicles, coming soon from The Faithful of Nazmorghul!