As forewarned but not forsworn — and neither forbidden nor forborne — we bring you Issue 4 of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly! Once again we’ve scoured worlds known, unknown, and those only touched upon in dreams — this time discovering two great works of fiction and two of poetry which, oddly, total four: Fiction Contents LIVING […]

LIVING TOTEM, by Vaughn Heppner: Kulik lifted his face into the blizzard, rose from his shivering crouch and kept staggering.  Icy particles beat at him.  Snow crunched under his moccasins.  His toes throbbed, but that was good because it meant they hadn’t frozen. He pulled his fur cape tighter.  Hoary frost coated his eyebrows and […]

DEATH’S LAST DAUGHTER, by Jeff Crook: After many adventures, the mameluke warrior Jafar al-Tinnin is no closer to finding his lover, Leiley, or avenging himself against Imam Nuri — the Sufi sorcerer who kidnapped her. At a cursed well in the Libyan desert, Jafar and his friend Ketei seek the advice of a mad djinn, […]

THE FOOTMAN, by W. E. Couvillier: He’s too weak to move, lying amongst the fallen dying from his wounds. What a fool am I, he thinks while waiting for the last dregs of life to ooze from the gape in his gut. Will a fierce Valkyrie settle from the heavens to lift me to the […]

HERO OF OLD, by John Keller: The hero sat upon his horse; his steely gaze was set. Before him was an army fell. His blade with blood was wet. With aching arms he held aloft, a blessed, shining blade. His battered plate-mail dully shone, No fear his face displayed. A horde of reavers, giants, trolls, […]