Second Saturday Stories

Her mind should have been focused on the open range ahead of them, or the way that in a few yards they reached a divergence in the pathway, but the peaks around her kept calling her attention and Bronwyn found herself transfixed by them. She was looking for familiarity she realised with sickening surety. Her past called to her over the span of time and at once she held the same pre pubescent fear she’d held in the mines. The toddlerkin fear of things that bite in the night.

Bronwyn Ironcraft and her brother Everitt trek through the white expanse of the Greytusk Mountains set on winning the prize money that will fund their search for Bishop, their missing brother. Caught in the grip of a horrifying flashback, Bronwyn makes a mistake that may kill a fellow contestant. Has she driven their goal out of reach? and, what's worse, has she killed a man? 

“Bickering won’t get us anywhere out here. This isn’t about you and me. It’s about Bishop and the easiest way to win, and right now the easiest thing for me to do is just let you do what you want.” Everitt consulted the map once more before moving towards a pathway hedged in by two peaks ahead of them. Bronwyn kept pace as an awkward silence fell over them. In the distance she heard a cracking report echo into the cold and wondered at what their fate would be. 

Bronwyn wakes from a vivid nightmare before a great tournament begins. She and her elder brother Everitt must work together to win a prize promised by King Rygeer. The pair must battle not only their bitter rivalry but the scores of others who have come from their village as well as neighbouring city states to compete.

Fern himself picked up the book and began using mage powers as if he’d known them his whole life. With his short sword he drew runes in the dirt. He then spoke incantations from the book that brought a great pillar up to crush his fellow guard on the ceiling of the cave we were in.

Bishop Ironcraft sought out the Wizard in hopes the superstitions were just that: a sad old Hermit living in the woods that developed a misunderstood reputation. Being misunderstood by the villagers was a fate Bishop and his siblings are familiar with, so he felt a kinship with the old man. When he found him, Bishop realised truth and lore were not so different, and that Wormwood deserved every ounce of fear from the villagers. 

“What I noticed.” Everitt started as he threw his weight into the bale while lifting, finally upending it. “Is that our brother is still missing and you’ve been absent more and more. At first I thought maybe you were searching for him without me. But I’ve been asking around and nobody’s seen any evidence of you around the village these nights. Now? Now I don’t know what to think.”

In the darkness of the library a pact is made, but can the mysterious contact honour it, or do they have machinations of their own at play? Have they made a deal with the devil, or made a powerful enemy out of the queen? 

The queen did not break her attention from Caulderwilde below. “The King thinks this a matter for his guard. I don’t trust the fumbling iron hand to work that is as delicate as this. I want that book found and the wizard interned. I want eyes inside this tournament.”

Momeht has been vocal on his stance that the riches be used as an opportunity for the entire village to prosper. After his pleas are ignored by the King, the Friar must decide if the oath he made to his faith will be enough to keep him from interfering with the tournament, but are his intentions for the prize as altruistic as they seem?