Sword & Sorcery: "An earthier sort of fantasy" discussion

Another experiment, spawn from a commentary on Greg's review of Conan:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

In short, Pastiche is like Fan Fiction in many ways. Have any you like? Links or documents? Published or not? Use this folder as a way to share if you'd like.

I do have a short Conan 'fan fiction' tale I wrote a little while ago. It is an exercise in Howardian style writing, and therefore not entirely successful.

This looks to be a fun folder! And links to fan fiction published online elsewhere is a good idea, Seth!

S.wagenaar wrote: "I do have a short Conan 'fan fiction' tale I wrote a little while ago. It is an exercise in Howardian style writing, and therefore not entirely successful."

Sounds interesting, Stan - are you going to post it?

I have it posted at the REH Forum, and I am not sure if I can post it here as well. It's titled "The Queen's Gift". I will try post it here tomorrow...

The Queen's Gift

Chapter 1

WULF the Vanir stretched his long, powerful legs before him, closer to the hot coals of the main fire of the great hall. His great hall. He sighed with contentment and brought the gem-encrusted drinking horn to his lips and poured more sweet mead into his gullet. He looked around the hall, at the furs and silks, the plethora of spears, axes and shields-and the treasure. Carvings of ivory, clusters of un-cut gems linked by crude gold wire, polished jade figures and piles of little, rough cast ingots of pure silver.

Most of his men had wandered off to their own sleeping pallets for the night, bleary with drink and glutted with rich foods. Only two of his closest warriors remained with him, and they had consumed very little mead, as they were his personal bodyguards. It had been an epic celebration, the return of a long gone son of the Vanir, and death of their Jarl. Wulf had been fighting with a mercenary army in the south for six years, and returned home a rich man. Richer than Bjorn, the Jarl. Wulf's uncle.

Wulf could see the greed and envy in his Jarl's face, and when Bjorn asked for his share of Wulf's wealth, as was his right as Jarl, Wulf slew him where he stood. As the Jarl collapsed with his lifeblood gushing from his pierced chest, Wulf spun around to his cousin, Ingvar. With a roar, Wulf swung his bloody, gem sparkling sword and clove the man's skull to the neck.

Shaking blood drops and gobbets of brain from the fine blade, Wulf addressed the gathered people of the village:”The Jarl is dead, as is his only son. I claim leadership of the clan, and if anyone questions my claim, step forward now and challenge my blade!” No one came forward, and most looked down and shuffled their feet. Bjorn had become soft and weak these last few years, and was probably going to be removed by his son soon anyway. But Wulf made a better leader, and promised a return for the clan to raiding and pillaging in the south. Something that had become less and less of a priority under the leadership of the weak Bjorn. Thus Wulf became Jarl

Wulf had made a small fortune in the south, in Nemedia, fighting in mercenary armies that paid in silver, and turned a blind eye to plunder and theft. He had done well, and was nearly ready to return back to the North with enough accumulated wealth to live like a Baron in his home village, when he had noticed a fellow mercenary's small accumulation of plunder, and had to have it. It was a rather small leather purse, with a few gems and rings within, but one piece caught his eye. A ruby the size of a child's fist, carved by a master artisan to resemble a human skull. And the purse in question never left it's owners side, a young Cimmerian warrior of about twenty six or so summers.

Wulf could not challenge the warrior openly for the gem, for the black haired barbarian was like a tiger among dogs. His ferocity in combat was unlike anything Wulf had seen in all his years of fighting, even wilder than the Berserkers of his homeland. No one man could match him in sword-play, nor any three in pure, brute strength. The cold glint of fire in the savage youth's volcanic blue eyes was enough to deter most ruffians. No, Wulf had to find another way.

And one day, in the midst of a skirmish with outlaw brigands near the border of Nemedia and Brythunia, Wulf found his chance. The Cimmerian, Conan by name, was engaged in a sword fight on foot with two members of the brigand group, when Wulf seen the youth stagger and loose his footing on the blood-slimed grass of the battlefield. Conan took a blow to his steel helmet and went to his knees as Wulf galloped into the fray on horseback and slew one of the enemy with a mighty downward blow that split steel cap and skull alike. Conan, from his knees, gutted his opponent, and then hacked at his neck to finish him off. As he rose to his feet, dizzy and disoriented from the blow to his head, Wulf struck. With all his power, the Vanir swung his sword down on the Cimmerian's helmet with a mighty two handed chop. The helmet split and the weakened sword blade shivered to glittering shards. Conan went down like a pole-axed ox, his head gushing blood. Wulf leaped from his steed, stooped and swiftly cut the leather purse from the fallen Cimmerian's belt, and was back on the horse and into the fray once more, with none to notice his treachery. That night, in the confusion of darkness and celebration, Wulf gathered the rest of his loot, stole a couple of pack horses and fled back to his homeland, a rich man. And now, after a month of travel, he was Jarl.

Chapter 2


The great doors of Wulf's hall blew inward with a great gust of wintery wind and scattered dry leaves. The coals of the fire flared brightly with the fanning of the wind, and in the doorway stood a man. He was tall, broad of shoulder, with a bearskin cloak spreading like giant raven wings in the tempest. The giant turned and closed the doors, and the wind was gone. He wore a scale-mail shirt, heavy wollen trousers and a polished steel helmet with short bulls horns on each side. At his side was a long sword, sheathed in a scabbard of wood and leather. His face was hidden in shadow, and Wulf did not recognize him as one of his clan. He looked like death itself, or one who deals it.

“Who are you man, to enter my hall without invitation, or escort? Are you addled, or just a fool?” growled the Jarl. “ These two fighting men can take your life with just one word from me, and I can have half a hundred fighting men in here in an instant to tear you apart like wolves on a sheep!” The Jarl's bodyguards stood on either side of him, naked steel glimmering in the light of the torches.

“Unlikely, for most of this village is besotted with drink and snoring away as we speak.” rumbled the tall stranger. His voice cut the smokey air of the hall like growl of a tiger. He stepped forward a stride, and now Wulf could see his eyes; a strange, volcanic blue that was both fire and ice. And unsettling.

“Nonsense! I have four men at the main gate who have not touched a drop of mead all night, on pain of death. Guards, to the hall! Cut this fool down where he stands!” Wulf barked out the order loud enough to shake the rafters, but no one came.

“Your guards are on the cold ground, laying in pools of their curdling blood. Hell, a Cimmerian child could have cut their throats as easily as I.” The stranger laughed, “You Vanir were always blind and deaf in the dark. I was no great feat to sneak up on them and steal their lives from them with a knife!”

“Who are you?” the Jarl spluttered.

The stranger shook off his cloak, and pulled off his helmet, allowing his shoulder length black hair to fall free, and frame the dark, sinister face. The face of a dead man, the face of a ghost.

“You!” gasped Wulf. “You are dead Cimmerian, I killed you on a battlefield in Nemedia over a month ago!” The Jarl staggered back, knocking over his chair as he fumbled for a weapon. “This cannot be, you are dead, I split your skull!”

The two warriors looked somewhat confused at the exchange between their Jarl and the big Cimmerian, but they were born to the sword, and sworn to protect their Jarl with their lives, if need be. They gripped sword hilts a little tighter, and prepared to leap at the enemy before them.

Conan barked a laugh like a wolf.” That tap on my skull? You'll have to try harder if you want to kill a Cimmerian like that. Oh, I was wounded for sure, and my vision blurred for a day or so. But you really should have cut my throat when you had the chance!” Conan drew his sword. “You took something from me that day, something I have come to take back.”

The blade in Conan's fist was a Vanir sword, forged with the finest steel brought north from Iranistan on the trade routes. Double edged, with a deep fuller running nearly the full length of the wide blade, it was polished to a bright finish and was about as long as the Cimmerian's arm from shoulder to extended fingertips. The leather wrapped hilt was designed for a single handed grip, and as Conan advanced towards the Vanir, he stooped and grasped round wooden shield in his left hand.

“Kill the dog!” ordered Wulf, and the two warriors roared and leapt at the Cimmerian. There was a brief exchange of blows and curses, and Conan jumped back for a moment. One of the Vanir sank to his knees as his lifeblood sprayed from his severed neck cords, and as he died, his last breath whistled from the open windpipe. Conan whipped red gore from his sword and turned towards the second guard.

The Vanir went mad, and swung blow after blow wildly upon the Cimmerian's blocking shield, splinters of painted oak flying before the berserker onslaught of glittering steel. And then the tip of the sword bit too deeply into Conan's shield, and the Vanir found himself unable to pry the blade free in time. Conan wrenched the shield away to his left, and the blade bent, then sprang from the grasp of the surprised Vanir. At the same time, Conan swung a mighty blow directly to the top of the bodyguard's head. Leather helmet and skull collapsed together with a horrible crunch, gushing gore like a smashed melon.

Conan dropped the now clumsy shield and faced Wulf. “You took something from me, and now I intend to take it back, as well as relieve you of your miserable, thieving life!” growled the barbarian. The fighting madness was upon him, and his eyes flashed like blue steel, and the veins stood out and writhed like snakes on his massive limbs. Wulf had just seen the Cimmerian cut down two of his best men without seeming to try, but he did not lack courage, and strutted boldly towards the barbarian.

“I know you seek the ruby skull I took from you, but I will never just give it up to you, you dog! I am a Jarl, and a Vanir warrior. You will have to kill me first!”

“Nay, yapping jackal, I care not for the gem. I seek the ring.” said Conan.

“What ring?” questioned the Jarl.

“The ring on your left hand, fool!” barked the Cimmerian. The Vanir glanced down quickly, and only then remembered the ring. It was a heavy, silver ring, plain but for some inscription on the outside in a script Wulf could not read. Shemetish, or something, he thought. Found in the same pouch as the ruby skull, and placed on his finger as an afterthought.

“Ring or ruby, either way you die tonight, Cimmerian. And I will tell my brothers of your foolish journey to my hall for a stupid trinket, only to die on the end of my sword, while the baubles remain mine!” laughed Wulf.

“Nay,” the Cimmerian said, “ before nights end, you will be just another Vanir I sent to Valhalla, or Hel!” And before the sound of his words died, Conan attacked.

Wulf had seen many warriors in his day, as a Vanir raider in the north, and a mercenary in the south. He had never met a man he felt he could not best in one on one combat. But he never had to face Conan of Cimmeria before.

The two warriors met in the center of the hall in a clash of steel on steel, and the blades flickered and flashed like summer lighting in the orange glow of the torches. Feet stamped, furniture crashed under the impact of heavy bodies, and savage curses rent the smokey air. Several times Conan avoided crippling blows by the breadth of a finger, saved only by the animal-like reflexes inherent in his barbaric heritage. Wulf was far faster and stronger than Conan had anticipated, and he redoubled his efforts.

The two swords locked hilt to hilt in a squeal of grinding steel, and the warriors crashed together chest to chest, sword arms trapped between them. The Cimmerian whipped his free left hand under Wulf's right armpit, and with a roar, heaved upward with both free hand and trapped sword arm. The Jarl was launched half across the width of the hall, and landed on a great dining table, crashing through it onto the hard packed dirt floor.

Wulf rolled to his feet, and rose upwards, shaking splintered wood from his shoulders, raising his sword once more, howling like a wolf for blood. As the sword came up, Conan leaped in and swung his blade in a glittering horizontal arc, right to left across Wulf's midsection. Brass studded leather and flesh parted easily to the kiss of that razor tip, and his belly gaped open to the push of purplish entrails, blood and ghastly bowel fluids. As Wulf stood frozen to the bite of the wound, Conan swung the bright sword once more overhand, crunching into Wulf's collar bone, chopping deep into the chest cavity. It was a killing blow, and the Vanir slowly kneeled before his slayer, blood gushing hot from his great wounds.

Wulf kneeled before Conan, bubbles of blood staining his lips scarlet. “What is it about the ring, Cimmerian?” he croaked. “What is it's value, that you would slay me for it?” His breath gurgled wetly, and great red ropes of drool hung from his slack jaw.

“It was a gift, from someone I cared for.” said Conan, his eyes looking past the Vanir, looking far to the south where sea was warm, and the wind directed a fleet ship like a tigress against any merchant vessel unlucky enough to stumble into her course.

“A wench?” gasped Wulf, his life flame flickering. “Some tow-headed barbarian trollop? I am slain for some...woman?”

Conan gripped a fistful of of the Vanir's long red hair, and yanked his head back to glare full into the fading eyes. “She was a Queen!” he said, and released the Jarl. Wulf , still kneeling, collapsed over backwards onto the hard mud floor, and breathed his last blood clotted breath.

Conan stooped, removed the silver ring from the dead Vanir's finger, and placed it on his own. He clenched the mighty fist and stared at the polished silver sheen for a moment, then whirled and stalked from the hall like some great lion of the grasslands, and began his journey back to the beckoning South.

I've printed this off to read, Stan, as I'm not fond of reading fiction off the PC screen.

Let me know what you think, and be honest!

Just read it half an hour ago and I thought the story was pretty good! There was some nice action and an interesting brute of a character in Wulf - I'd be into reading more about him.

The writing's good too but I notice you have an aversion to hyphens (shoulder-length hair, double-edged, leather-wrapped hilt, single-handed grip, one-on-one combat, hard-packed dirt floor, blood-clotted breath)! ;) Also, information about Wulf's career that was given in paragraph two was repeated in paragraph five and there was the occasional typo (e.g. 'seen' for 'saw' and 'loose' for 'lose') or omitted preposition (e.g. 'like the growl of a tiger').

But overall, I enjoyed it - if only the tale was longer!

Thanks for reading Greg! This is a first draft that was edited on the fly-and it shows. I have very little writing experience, this is my second completed short story and I am currently finishing a third. It is so helpful to have another set of eyes read and critique one's work. I can see why it is so hard to write a story using another writer 's creation, and why so many writers dropped the ball with Conan. Far better to use a "Clonan" than the real thing!
Again, thanks for reading and critiquing. Man, I need an editor...:)

You're welcome, Stan! Everyone needs an editor! The problem is that when we write, we become so familiar with our own text that we don't notice the errors, like repeated sentences and words, while the word processor's spell-checker will see a word that is correctly spelled but will not notice that it's being used in the wrong context.

Greg wrote: "You're welcome, Stan! Everyone needs an editor! The problem is that when we write, we become so familiar with our own text that we don't notice the errors, like repeated sentences and words, while ..."

S.Wagenaar, Greg has a keen eye. He caught me inappropriately using "compose" and "comprise." Greg do you ever consider free-lance editing?

S.E. wrote: "Greg wrote: "You're welcome, Stan! Everyone needs an editor! The problem is that when we write, we become so familiar with our own text that we don't notice the errors, like repeated sentences and ..."

It's interesting you say that, Seth. I was an editor of a local antiquarian journal for two years and a co-editor of a college journal for another year, and had served on the editorial board of the former for 5 years previously. I've also been an anonymous peer reviewer for another journal over the past 6 years or so. BUT... all of this has been unpaid work! Maybe I should consider doing some free-lance copy-editing/editing as you suggest.