The Giant, the Witch, and the Warlord

By way of explanation: About two years ago I took a year off from all other work to write three prose novels about a questing hero known only as The Outrider. The titles of the three books are: The Giant, the Witch, and the Warlord (Book One); The Sorcerer (Book Two); and The King of the West (Book Three). After the original publishing deal fell through, for reasons I will not describe here, I went looking for a new home for the trilogy. I’ve also considered other avenues of publication, such as running a crowd-funding campaign. Rumor has it Brandon Sanderson, who dashed off four original novels (without interrupting his many other obligations), was able to raise upwards of forty million in his crowd-funder (to which I can only say, “wow”). While I’m hardly in the Sandersonian league of prose authors, maybe I could eke out one tenth of one percent of his success, were I to go the same route. Or, I could first publish the books here, in a new for-pay section of this Substack. The search continues, but I thought I might tease you with an opening chapter. Enjoy.

Please consider the above illustration a work in progress.

Chapter One

An Elegant Way to Kill

Out of the Dreaming East, from the great city of Kelatainen on the Sorrows, the Outrider rode into the west, with a price on his head.

Seven days later, crossing the desert wasteland of Sur, enroute to the slaving city called Dasha Kün, which means the Death of Hope, the rider and his warhorse Khavak had lost any hint of a proper road, and picked their careful way along the dry bed of the Sleeping River, which snaked its dusty brown way through tumbled lands of sand, scrub and hardpacked earth. According to the occasional Badu nomads they’d passed, the river only ever woke during the rare rainy season, which might not come for years at a time. When the rains did come it could then transform with scant warning into a thundering courser that could sweep man and beast away in a single gasping moment. It had been more than a year since the last rainy season. The sky was devoid of even a wisp of cloud. The mud of the river bottom was baked bone dry and had cracked into broken shards, with edges as sharp as knife blades.

Khavak sniffed this way and that, searching for evil signs carried in the dead and windless air.

“Looking for lions still, old friend? I believe we’ve finally managed to lose them. Pay them no heed. Mind instead the road ahead. We’re both in unknown lands.”

Giant atroxa lions with black coats and blacker manes had trailed them for three days, but couldn’t match Khavak’s tireless endurance. When last spotted they seemed to have finally given up, seeking shade in a tumble of boulders. Their grumbling protests continued the chase, where their bodies had given out. Through the lifeless air, they could still be heard coughing their frustrations in the distance.

Carrion birds circled overhead, keeping pace with the rider and his mount, gambling their hours and their days against a likelihood one or both of the creatures below would do them the courtesy of becoming food later.

Even in the heat of the day the lone rider sat tall in the saddle. Under his dark cloak, that had endured too many seasons un-mended, he was clothed in red brimstone armor, from head to foot. The red was so dark as to seem black, in all but the brightest light, as if it were scorched in the furnaces of Hell. His armor was such as the demon knights from Abyssalem wear, being a combination of plate and chainmail, stronger than adamant. A helmet covered his head, and the red glow of hellfire shown from the slit of its visor. His brimstone boots came to sharp dagger-points at the toes, perhaps because everything that could be a weapon should be. Even in the bright desert sun, shadow seemed to cling to him, always looking for places to dig deeper.

His round shield had the device of a cockatrice on it, a warning to steer clear, for it was notorious as a promise of death. A sheathed sword hung heavy from his belt.

The horse wore scant barding, in the shape of an extended saddle, which was also fashioned of beaten brimstone, so as to suggest a demonic beetle’s carapace. The animal was built of heavy muscle and barely-contained fury. It stood a remarkable twenty hands at the shoulders. Its coat was jet black and old scars from countless battles crisscrossed it. A large bag of corked ox hide held their water supply. It was strapped across the carapace, behind the rider’s seat, along with a bedroll containing what few provisions he owned.

When the banks of the dead river grew high enough to merit it, the Outrider abandoned the riverbed, and spurred Khavak back up onto the embankment, where the footing was no better. Sharp stones lay hidden beneath thorn bushes. In their alliance of thorn and shard, they stabbed at Khavak’s hooves and legs. But the horse seemed immune to such annoyances, and his rider considered this was preferable to being caught in what was quickly becoming a deep, narrow alley between two high sandstone walls.

In the shimmering distance ahead they spied the first bridge over the Sleeping River, which promised the resumption of a more recognizable road beyond.

As they approached the arched stone bridge, a knight in glistening silver armor came out to challenge him. Three circular plates adorned the front of his cuirass, one on each breast and another on his belly. The plates were shaped into shallow, concave bowls, and polished to a mirror finish, making their utility clear. In addition to the extra protection they provided against sword or lance, the mirror plates could catch the sun’s rays and reflect them into his enemy’s eyes.

“Clever,” the Outrider said.

“Good morning, sir,” the knight said, once the rider had approached close enough to hear. “I am Ydris Bin Kadar, known in many lands as the Leopard of the Sands.” Though they were alone, as far as the eye could see, he spoke as if addressing multitudes. “Perhaps you’ve heard of me.”

The rider in black reigned in his horse a good distance from the bridge and the knight perched on it.

“Perhaps not.”

This earned a brief scowl on Bin Kadar’s face, quickly replaced by a practiced counterfeit smile of knightly courtesy. He wore a conical steel helmet, partially wrapped in a white turban, striped in azure. A cloak of matching color and pattern draped from his shoulders and over the back of his buckskin mount. Even in the dead air of the windless day, it somehow managed a dramatic billow. He had an oiled black beard, shaped into three jaunty points, growing from his nut-brown chin.

“Have I the pleasure of addressing the blackguard bandit known as the Outrider? The demon knight up from Abyssalem?”

“Any man who calls me a bandit had better look to himself,” the dark rider replied. “But Outrider is certainly one of the many names by which I’m known. The rest is false. I’m no knight, and not from the depths of Abyssalem, though I understand your mistake. The demon I won this panoply of arms and armor from, by right of combat, could rightly answer to your description.”

“You dare claim you slew a demon rider of Abyssalem. And in single combat, if you then laid claim to his gear and treasures?”

When the rider whose only claim was not to be a knight didn’t answer, Bin Kadar continued.

“How do you see?”

Continued silence was all he received in reply.

“I only ask because the holes for your eyes in that helm seem to be clogged with molten fire. A hellish signature, if anything is. And yet you seem to see just fine. I can only conclude demonic magic is somehow at play. If so, I cannot help but indict you as a trafficker in dark practices. No matter though, since it’s my intention to deny you this crossing, and the road beyond, thereby forcing you to contend against me.” Bin Kadar’s mount occupied the apex of the bridge’s arch. On each side of the bridge, the dormant river’s embankments had become too deep to risk trying to cross other than via the bridge.

“To what purpose?”

“To the purpose of testing myself against another fighting man of renown, which is itself an honorable enough undertaking, so as to embrace the very essence of virtue. However, I’ve scant interest in testing myself against a crippled opponent. If your eyesight is afflicted, speak to it and I may reconsider my objective.”

“No.”

“No? What do you mean by no? No, you aren’t handicapped?”

“I don’t fight for sport.”

“Ah, yes. I fully understand, and gladly accept your terms.” This time Bin Kadar’s smile was wider, brighter and more authentic. “No simple sport, but a duel to the death it will be, which is a sacred undertaking, sanctioned by the gods. I pause to swear a solemn oath to those very gods of sand, sky, sea, and abyss. Hear then my oath: All which is about to be done will be done to their greater glory. No quarter will be granted, and when we’ve finished, only one of us will live to continue on his way, richer by at least one horse, a brace of weapons, and a suit of armor. I must confess, in addition, should I prove the better man, I’ll have earned the reward for your head, chopped and delivered, still encased in its infamous helm, for a more perfect identification. I’m informed the purse has grown into a truly promiscuous weight of gold, is that so?”

“How would I know? I heard someone had placed a reward on my life, but I don’t yet know who. I’d be interested in finding out.”

“Why bother? You’ll be dead in a moment and such knowledge won’t help you in the next life. Now then, to our grim business. If you’re moved to swear any final vows of your own, I grant you a moment to do so.”

“I’m already under the burden of one vow, which is enough. I don’t believe one can stack them.”

Bin Kadar had a long scimitar sheathed at his belt, along with a brace of curved daggers. He carried a green lance of remarkable length. It was made of a pliable round stalk of dragon grass. Flexible, but as tough as steel, it only grew in obscure lands to the east. It was tipped with a knife-bladed steel head. With every slightest movement the lance’s shaft warped this way and that.

“This is the Kel Sayadess, the Windborne Terror, or perhaps the Stinging Wind is more accurate. I regret the name doesn’t translate exactly, considering my native language is sweet poetry, as opposed to the crude erudition of the so-called common tongue.” Bin Kadar lifted the lance high. Holding it in the middle of its shaft, both ends drooped low. It had to be almost six meters long. “It’s the weapon of my people. Wielded by an expert it can whip in at an opponent, cutting him wheresoever one desires, without ever requiring the attacker to come within range of the other man’s weapons. I do not apologize if that places you at a disadvantage. You might’ve had a slight chance against me, were you smart enough to carry a bow.”

The Outrider had heard of such a devil lance, and the men who bore them, but never before encountered one.

“I assure you I’m exactly such an expert. On Evening Star, my warhorse, so much more agile, I suspect, than that graceless shard of black coal you ride, I intend to dance and circle around you, faster than you can follow. A wild dervish. A whirlwind of blurred action. All the while my barb flicks at you, from every direction, but never the direction you expect, nicking at you time and again. I can deftly target even the most insignificant opening of your armor, striking between the joints, until you bleed to death. It won’t be fast. A thousand cuts aren’t unheard of in the Dance of the Kel. In time your frustration will turn into a longing to die. You’ll beg me to put an end to the torture, and administer a final mercy. I won’t.”

Bin Kadar smiled again, giving the terror of his promise time to seep into his intended victim’s heart and possibly do some damage there.

“One cannot expect the condemned man to admire the rope about to hang him, so I don’t suppose you’d agree, but while it may be a brutal way to die, let me assure you it’s a truly elegant way to kill.”

Bin Kadar paused then and waited. His horse bucked eagerly, pawing at the dusty stones underfoot. The animal did have a kind of dancing quality to it.

“Am I supposed to give a speech now? I don’t have one prepared.”

Impertinence in the face of death didn’t surprise Sir Ydris Bin Kadar. A rare few reacted that way, affecting a brave countenance. After all, when one’s final doom is written, what good is fear and trembling beforehand, except to embarrass oneself at the gates of the next life? He took a firm grip on his lance, about two thirds of the way from its bladed tip, tucking it securely under one arm.

“Can I admit, I’ve given a version of this speech many times, to victims not as brave as you? Will you believe it, but most turn their mounts during my soliloquy and attempt to gallop away, hoping to steal a few precious paces head start while I’m distracted by my own words? Sad to say it doesn’t work. I’m never caught off guard, and Evening Star is the fleetest of all earthly horses, descended in fact from the skyborne Lidonys, the hunting god Eburnen’s own immortal ivory stallion. It’s true. May the river run dry if I lie.”

The Outrider glanced at the Sleeping River’s dry bed.

Bin Kadar smiled again.

“It’s not as satisfying,” he continued, “to have to ride a man down, cutting him from behind, until he turns in dying desperation to make his final stand.”

Bin Kadar was in no hurry to proceed. He liked to savor this moment before beginning the long and sometimes exhausting process of a formal killing. He liked to consider his opponent fully, take the measure of him, and this tall dark warrior was no exception. He found the flat, dull surface of the man’s armor disturbing, as if it actually drank in the light, reflecting naught in return. Was that a clever trick of engineering from some gifted armorer, or did it emanate from the material itself, proving it as something infernal? Among the many stories about the Outrider, he’d heard his helmet was a thing possessed, and the demon inhabiting it was the actual scoundrel at large in the world. Anyone cursed to wear it was merely an unwilling vessel, forced like a puppet-on-a-string to act out the demon joculatores’ diabolical horror show. Bin Kadar could easily believe such a tale was true. In his martial travels and countless adventures he’d seen many evil things in the wide world. And it was known by learned scholars and philosophers alike that any number of fell creatures are sent crawling up from the abyss to harry the souls of good men. It’s the glory and misery of every man in this life to continually find himself tested by the gods, above and below. It’s their way of taking our measure.

The Outrider carried his wide disk of a shield in his left hand. It covered most of his body on that side. With his right hand he made no move to draw his longsword. Below him Khavak twitched and snorted.

“Your horse is nervous.”

“Anxious.”

Without further warning Outrider spurred Khavak forward, which did take Bin Kadar by surprise. Why try to close the distance between us, before even arming himself? Is he suicidal, or has he conceived some rudiment of a plan, however reckless? If they met and fought in the span of the bridge, within the confines of its stone railings, it would severely limit Evening Star’s room to maneuver. With not enough time to wheel and retreat, Bin Kadar had no option but to kick his own mount into forward action. If one horse and knight could muscle past the other and make it out onto the dusty field beyond, he’d have the room he needed to implement his original plan. And since the dark warrior hadn’t properly armed himself, there was scant reason to fear any other outcome.

They passed on each other’s sinister side, just like two tourney knights in a formal tilting match. And in this case the Outrider’s large shield helped Bin Kadar, as he began to bodily slide along its smooth outwardly-curved surface.

But then the first of two odd occurrences happened. At the moment they were directly opposite each other, shoulder to shoulder, with only the cockatrice shield separating them, the Outrider fell out of his own saddle, laying himself over Bin Kadar’s lap, the man and his shield partially pinning him to his seat.

As quick as a striking viper, Outrider reached out then with his unarmed hand, past his own shield, and across Bin Kadar’s body. He grabbed the dragon grass spear just forward of where Bin Kadar gripped it, at which time the second odd occurrence: the half prone man sat straight up in his saddle again, seemingly without effort, as if his heavy plate weighed nothing, and he hadn’t actually fallen at all, or perhaps the blunder was an act, a mummer’s show of feigned clumsiness. When he sat up again he brought the captured spear and Bin Kadar’s body with him.

In the brief moment he had to resist, Bin Kadar struggled frantically to keep his seat. But it was no use against his opponent’s iron grip and astonishing strength. At that same time the massive black warhorse spun in place, almost as if it were a practiced maneuver. But how could it be?

In a sudden stab of epiphany Bin Kadar realized the Outrider’s bold plan. Unless he let go of his grip on the dragon grass lance, he’d be pulled out of his saddle and launched over the stone railing, down to the rock hard river bed far below.

But he couldn’t let go, or he’d be the one entirely unarmed. Maybe he’d survive the fall with unbroken limbs, and be able to draw his scimitar, but that wasn’t likely. And even then he’d be unhorsed, facing this diabolical pair who might indeed be demons from the pit, working in accursed tandem – one monstrosity mounted on another.

Outrider twisted hard, aided by Khavak’s wild pivot. He brought the bowed spear with him, and the silver-clad knight with the spear. The knight’s body swung wide and helpless, like a flail.

Bin Kadar realized he was out of time. Every chapter of his life had been written. He should’ve let go of the spear, while their bodies were still pressed tightly together, and grappled his adversary hand-to-hand, or else have drawn one of his daggers. He might have had a chance then. Now, because of that brief dither of indecision, he was launched flying in a high arc through the air, over the bridge’s edge, to the ground below. He vaguely noticed the spear flying nearby, dramatically bowing and warping, one way and then the other, making its lovely signature sing-song sound as it did so.

He landed badly. He felt a blinding flash of pain, almost exquisite in its embrace. As if from a great distance, he heard internal things crunch and sunder.

He must’ve passed out for a time. When he began to come to, dizzy and mostly delirious, he found himself lying on his back, with his head twisted at an unnatural angle. One eye was half buried in the dirt. With it he followed the progress of a tiny darkling beetle making its intrepid way along the dry riverbed, indifferent to the human drama nearby. His other eye, focused independently, was pointed towards the sun, almost directly overhead. Odd not to have them aligned in the same direction, he thought. I imagine something dire had to break in my skull to cause such an occurrence. He tried adjusting his gaze, without reward. Then he tried to move any part of his body, but nothing responded the way it was supposed to. Some efforts brought renewed pain and terrifying grinding sounds. More frightening though, other efforts resulted in no feeling whatsoever.

He realized he was dying and gradually accepted that knowledge. It was after all fit for a fighting man to die as the result of desperate battle. He realized it would be a slow and agonizing death and wasn’t nearly as philosophical about that prospect. He began to weep with the unbearable pain that washed through him, in wave after wave, and inwardly cursed himself for his weakness. How can I dare hope the three battle maidens will receive me with the proper courtesies I’ve justly earned, if they find tears staining the cheeks of my corpse?

Then, after another moment passed, he sensed a welcome shadow eclipse the unforgiving sun overhead. In his fading awareness he just had time to feel the sharp edge of a dagger marry itself to the gap in his chain mail between chin and neck.

“The mercy you would’ve denied me,” where the last words he ever heard in this life.