THE CANDLE-MAKER AND HER KNIGHTS QUESTING, by Kelly Peach, with audio by The Bard     The candle-maker wears a silken gown Of blackest ink and broidered gibbous moons And shiver sta rs. The candles, lowered down With supple wrist while humming mirthless tunes, Are dipped in iron vat of paraffin, Some bacon fat, and […]

SHY DAISIES, by Gretchen Tessmer, with artwork by Andrea Alemanno     She’s muttering to herself oh, clasp these hands together before we’re all done in— keep them steady keep them still don’t shiver even as the woods dress in winter-white all their apple seeds and maple saplings close to the chest, sleeping under this […]

The Portrait of the Bold Captain, by Deborah L. Davitt, artwork by Karolína Wellartová     Every portrait is a lesson in what the portrayed wishes you to see take this one hanging here, the bold and doughty captain his falcon on his shoulder, a sword at one hip, a book hanging from a baldric […]

May has arrived and with it Heroic Fantasy Quarterly issue #56, and oh we’ve got such sights to show you!  We bring you three stories, two poems, with art and The Bard returning to do audio.  We’ve got news on our first-ever comic, and news on both our upcoming kickstarter and our first-ever S&S writing […]

RED-AUTMN SEEKS HIS FATHER’S BONES, By Jonathan Olfert, art by Miguel Santos   At forty winters, Red-Autumn climbed into the forbidden tomb with an old man’s carefulness, clumsy in the dark. Engraved stone chewed his fingertips raw. There’d be worse pain tonight, succeed or fail. He caught his breath at the top of the carved […]