Micro-fiction: Triumphal Roar

Triumphal roar

By Jonathan Traynor

Muttering a spell to cast fog in the path of her wizard brother she bent to wrap the wound in her thigh in a piece of leather. Around her the dead and injured of her honour guard.

The bastard child of the chieftain, she was all that remained of the hoped for release from wizardly tyranny of her clan. She was wounded, and if she waited for further volleys of spears, it would be over.

The revolution was needed or the clan would be corrupted, and others fall in wars of conquest.

Did she fall through her wounds or a more grisly end at the hands of her brother? Neither she decided. She reached for her horn, still brimming with mead.

Taking a large swig, she spoke the incantations that would reanimate the recently deceased of her guard. She knew she had moments until the fog cleared, but she took the time. Around her revenants stirred and began to rise.

She pulled aside the curtain of fog for a second, then hurled her axe. It landed deep into her brother’s skull. Her revenants charged. Their slaughter of her enemies was glorious for her soul.

That soul would retire from any position of power. A killer queen was what no one needed. A quiet study of the arts of healing; let someone else make the hard decisions.

She planted her foot on the body of her brother and let one last roar of triumph into the cursed sky.




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