8th Day, Upper Fire Month, 1 CE
“Hey,” a man’s voice filtered through the leaves, “over here!”
Liam looked in the direction of the voice, craning his neck back and forth as he tried to catch a glimpse of its owner through the brush.
“Hsst! Not so loud! What if the Demis hear you?”
A second voice came from the same direction – a woman’s voice, worn thin from worry.
“The Demis are all killed,” the man re...
2023-06-24 20:08:01 +0000 UTC
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Under the light of a full moon, a swell of fog rolled into the port of Vigo, billowing over the breakwater and inundating the piers. The fog washed over the wharves and swirled into the city streets, transforming the landscape into an archipelago of apartments scattered upon a ghostly sea.
So empty…
It was all so empty. The piers; the wharf; the city streets. To be fair, it was an hour past midnight, but the day would only show how drastically things had changed from a ...
2023-06-22 23:08:00 +0000 UTC
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That was a relatively short one, at least by this series’ standards. Thank you, dear reader, for your continued interest in Valkyrie’s Shadow!
Where did the Afterword for The Tiger and the Dragon go?
The Tiger and the Dragon was written as two volumes: the usual ‘updates’ in the Sorcerous Kingdom, and the Saraca introduction divided by the lighter intermission with Nemel. The first volume was uneventful in terms of reader commentary,...
2023-06-21 03:08:01 +0000 UTC
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8th Day, Middle Fire Month, 1 CE
“All hail Falagrim Felhammer,” Agni’s voice carried from the dais to the far end of the great hall, “King of Khazanar!”
“Hail to the King!”
The voices of thousands of Dark Dwarves shook the air around Florine. King Felhammer’s coronation seemed a bit premature, but the success of his campaign to reclaim Khazanar was all but set in stone.
And drenched in the blood of millions.
2023-06-19 05:08:03 +0000 UTC
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It stinks!
Florine had never been eaten before, nor had she ever entertained the notion. Now, she sat very still inside the Spawner’s mouth, praying fervently that it wouldn’t swallow her. Then again, it didn’t seem like there was anywhere to go, so being chewed was probably far worse.
“Are you two alright?” She asked.
The Zern pressed against her stirred. When the Spawner had come after them, Florine had grabbed Boobeebee without thought – prob...
2023-06-17 07:09:00 +0000 UTC
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“Report!” A runner jogged up to the command post in the underway annexe, “We’re two hundred metres from the exit.”
“Resistance?” Falagrim asked.
“We’re fighting for the cargo hub right now. Things have slowed down drastically since the Gazers started showing up. We still have plenty of Undead to throw at them, though.”
Falagrim nodded and dismissed the runner. As long as the Gazers had slaves to throw at them, they would have plenty of bodies to get in th...
2023-06-15 10:08:00 +0000 UTC
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“…what are you doing?” Velgath asked.
“Escaping reality,” Florine answered.
Sitting at the end of a pier in the recently-occupied Grimmantle port, Florine held the tip of a Kraken tentacle in each hand. Boobeebee, Isoroku and the Vampire Bride stood nearby, as did Velgath, who had resumed her duties as Florine’s attendant, much to her very visible dissatisfaction.
Squish, squish, squishy squish…
Nearby, the Kraken’s Deepwarden watched her with ...
2023-06-13 11:08:54 +0000 UTC
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“Hmm…this is not very satisfying.”
Florine glanced over at Boobeebee, who was holding the boulder-like corpse of a Gazer Watcher between her forearms. The Zern hero examined the lumpy sphere with a dissatisfied tone in her voice. How she could examine anything without eyes was still strange to Florine.
Boobeebee described it as a sort of Blindsense. That, in turn, meant that she couldn’t perceive purely visual things, which Florine thought was a shame. The Zern could not a...
2023-06-11 13:08:01 +0000 UTC
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Two days later, the fighting still raged on. Inside his temporary-turned-somewhat-permanent command post, Uldun wondered how much longer it would take for the Gazers to reconsider their approach.
They're probably more offended than frustrated.
“Are Commanders even needed at this point?” He grumbled.
The officers nearby only grunted wordlessly in response. One of them yawned widely.
Aside from the scout companies, there was nothing for anyone to do. Even the Elder L...
2023-06-09 16:08:29 +0000 UTC
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“What’s she doing here?”
“Dunno,” Velgath shrugged. “Sightseeing.”
Sightseeing? We’re about to fight a war here!
Uldun curled his lip at the sheer ludicrousness of the Human. Even now, she was examining the corner of a nearby building as if it was the most interesting thing in the world. Under a canopy formed out of Death Knight shields with a bug at her side and a bird on her head. The histories portrayed Human culture as the peak of decade...
2023-06-07 17:18:13 +0000 UTC
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“Your definition of ‘a while longer’ is a lot different from mine.”
“I’m sorry,” Florine said. “The meeting was a bit impromptu. I didn’t know how long it would take, but I didn’t think it would take that long.”
Their progress through Hardar slowed as the crowds grew, even with a column of Undead leading the way. Or perhaps it was because of them. The underway was only so wide, after all.
“How much will the Undead help with the situation in H...
2023-06-05 19:08:00 +0000 UTC
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A review…
Florine stared at nothing in particular as she was whisked from Felhammer to Hardar on one of the Dark Dwarves’ Golem-powered trains. Her passenger car, as with everything else ‘Dark Dwarf’, was designed with practicality in mind while comfort was seemingly avoided. It was standing room only and built entirely from enchanted steel with emplacements for siege weaponry and arrow slits for the vehicle’s armed guard.
The train itself travelled a bit slower...
2023-06-03 21:08:01 +0000 UTC
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Hunched over her table, Florine worked frantically on a piece of intricate needlework. There was no time. There was never enough time.
They wanted done in hours what should have taken days. Why were they so unreasonable? She mentioned as much and all they did was cut another hour off of her deadline.
Florine glanced up at the sound of approaching boots, then cursed herself for not focusing on her task. They were coming. She was nowhere near done. Her hands moved faster as if what ...
2023-06-01 23:08:02 +0000 UTC
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Florine squeezed through the crowded city street, looking back and forth as she tried to take in the happenings around her. Now that the fighting was over, the streets and the buildings were illuminated with an eerie blue flame that afforded her a better view of the city and its activities.
Everywhere, Dark Dwarf and slave alike toiled away as they cleaned up and restored the damage left in the wake of the weeks-long battle for Khazanar. If she were to describe the scene as a whole, it ...
2023-05-30 23:17:32 +0000 UTC
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19th Day, Upper Fire Month, 1 CE
Florine stopped to frown at the walls of bones framing the main gate of Felhammer Citadel. Blood dripped from the machicolations from which the arms and legs of dead Dark Dwarves occasionally stuck out. Heavy footfalls rang in grim cadence as pairs of Death Knights patrolled the walls, turning the scene as a whole into one of what most people would probably recognise as somewhere between pure evil and absolute evil.
She held in ...
2023-05-29 01:08:00 +0000 UTC
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On the way to the fifth hold, Falagrim’s forces caught up to the trailing fringes of the council’s forces. They consisted of novice soldiers with poor conditioning, the injured still awaiting their turn for healing, and the clansmen who stayed behind with them. As the Undead came closer, they stopped to take up hasty defensive positions in the buildings lining the street.
Falagrim stepped forward and raised his voice.
“You know the drill,” his words carried down the street...
2023-05-27 03:08:01 +0000 UTC
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A band of frost ringed the underway exit, creeping down the passage to stop a metre in front of Falagrim’s feet. It was followed by a carpet of crackling electricity that advanced no further than the previous attack. The banging of metal against metal filled the air with a deafening clamour as the Death Knight formation weathered the unrelenting assault from the armies of Khazanar.
Occasionally, a steel bolt clattered past him, sent skittering down the pavement by the heel of one of t...
2023-05-25 05:08:06 +0000 UTC
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“They aren’t budging, sir.”
“They’re not supposed to budge…did someone try?”
“That bunch from Grimmantle.”
A loud tsk issued from General Haughr Darksteel. Coalition or not, it was a stupid idea to stick different clans together – especially when they were neighbours.
He looked out into the nothingness beyond the range of his Darkvision to where the battalion from Grimmantle filled their part of the encirclement. Since he hadn’t ...
2023-05-23 07:08:01 +0000 UTC
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“But why is it falling up?”
“Is there some rule that says that it needs to fall down?”
Florine frowned as she stared up at the wall of water. According to Velgath, in addition to being over two thousand metres tall, the falls were roughly five hundred metres wide. Boobeebee had mentioned a ‘great falls’ in her descriptions of the Realms Below, but Florine imagined something more…normal. The waterfall – or maybe it was a waterfly –...
2023-05-21 09:08:01 +0000 UTC
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The Realms Below weren’t flat. That’s what Florine quickly found out after they left the cavern at the end of the mines and ventured into the wilds beyond. They were always going up or down and the going usually wasn’t gentle. Caves could be so expansive that one couldn’t see from wall to wall or so narrow that the Death Knights had to sidle through sideways.
And, all throughout their journey, Florine had a sense that there was always someone watching them. Many someones.
...
2023-05-19 11:08:01 +0000 UTC
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“Moving out in two minutes!”
Florine looked over her shoulder at the sound of Falagrim’s voice. She immediately regretted wasting the precious seconds spent doing so. Her eyes returned to the mural covering the wall before her, examining its details under the light of a Torch held aloft by the Death Knight behind her.
I don’t have enough time to study all of this.
The illuminated portion was merely one part of the mural and she wasn’t sure how large the wh...
2023-05-17 13:08:18 +0000 UTC
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Is it truly so easy to lease Undead?
Florine knew the process inside-out, yet she was still compelled to ask the question as Falagrim Felhammer submitted his order. The Dark Dwarf, while having the various documents that she had lent to him translated, could not fill out the forms himself so he ended up dictating what he wanted to one of the junior officials.
“I’ll take two of Set A with some Elder Liches on the side,” the Dark Dwarf said.
“Two Country Destr...
2023-05-14 15:08:00 +0000 UTC
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“Boss, something’s happening.”
Falagrim looked up from his reading, tilting his head slightly to look out of the entrance of the pavilion. The owner of the voice didn’t appear, and neither did it look like preparations were being made to receive anyone. He set down the papers in his hand before reaching out to grab his helmet. A minute later, he strode out into the night, finding the Dwarf that had spoken standing at the campfire nearby.
“Where?” Falagrim asked.
...
2023-05-12 17:08:01 +0000 UTC
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7th Day, Upper Fire Month, 1 CE
“Are you certain this is safe?”
“No.”
Florine glanced down at the rock beside her foot. The rock didn’t miss her look.
“The world is not a safe place,” the rock told her.
That might have been true, but it was no reason to make things even more unsafe. Then again, the rock had nowhere else to go.
A day previous, the first compliance violation – at least that was what Isoroku called it – from the trib...
2023-05-10 19:08:01 +0000 UTC
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“What are you dawdling for? Do it!”
The bridgekeepers exchanged one last look with one another before nodding down at the pair of slaves standing by. Their slaves – Stone Giants that stood four times the height of their masters – ponderously swung their four-metre-long mallets in response. An ear-splitting clank echoed along the battlements as the massive steel tools smashed into the enormous anchors of stone at the end of one of the bridges spanning the chasm between C...
2023-05-08 21:10:08 +0000 UTC
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2nd Day, Upper Fire Month, 1 CE
The vermilion banner of the Sorcerous Kingdom snapped in the wind and Florine coughed as a cloud of dust scoured the crater in the middle of the Dale of Defiance. She retreated into the administration’s pavilion producing a handkerchief to wipe the tears from her eyes. Out of habit, she pulled it away to examine the fabric, but she hadn’t worn any makeup since staying with the Zern.
It’s barely summer and thi...
2023-05-06 23:09:05 +0000 UTC
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How should I even report this?
Florine tapped her pen against a blank sheet of paper as she sat at the desk in front of her tent, from which an endless stream of loud snores emitted. The development of issues along the border with the Holy Kingdom of Roble was something that she had been wary of since being dispatched to the Abelion Wilderness, but the problems she was facing now were coming from odd and unexpected angles.
It was a good thing I spent that week with Lu...
2023-05-05 01:09:13 +0000 UTC
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Eh? Is that how it’s going to go?
It wasn’t as if she was tied up or anything. And what sort of hostage would smile like her? How would a Noblewoman get out here if they didn’t want to be here, anyway?
“Worry not, fair lady!” The young man in plate armour continued, “We’ll…we’ll…”
The man’s voice trailed off and he raised the visor of his helm. His long lance rose into the air as he cast a longing look at her, and his entire squadron followed...
2023-05-03 03:08:00 +0000 UTC
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It’s spite. It has to be…
Florine cast a sidelong glance at the pair of Dark Dwarves riding the Soul Eater next to her. The two were desperately clutching at the thing as they galloped somewhere in the neighbourhood of eighty kilometres an hour over the arid plains along the Abelion River. She imagined that not many terrestrial beings had ever travelled so fast, yet Falagrim and his Cleric, Agni – supposedly his sister-in-law – still wore the same dour expressions as al...
2023-05-01 05:08:01 +0000 UTC
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The chime of chisels cutting into stone rose into the air over the new ‘market quarter’ in the Dale of Defiance.
Florine drew her fingers lightly over a slab of freshly-polished sandstone half her height, her gaze wandering over the yard where dozens of hunched figures worked tirelessly into the night. Boobeebee and Iliky’ie walked beside her, their heads turning this way and that as they took in the sight.
“I thought you were familiar with the Dark Dwarves,” Florine sai...
2023-04-29 07:08:01 +0000 UTC
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