Shadows & Sorcery #24
Welcome to the twenty-fourth issue of Shadows & Sorcery! This week’s edition is a paid subscriber post, but the first story is free to read for all because I’m just pleased with it.
And what’s more, I still want to give away a few free subs to free sign-ups or any curious soul who happens across this newsletter. All you need to do is message me here on Substack, or shoot me a DM on Twitter because I have to manually input emails for paid subs, that’s all.
In this edition we have two tales of curious undead, two grim northern lands and their strange secrets, and the invasion of a strange cult of fire…
Today’s tales are:
Northern Saints
Knight’s Crypt
Church Undead
Tower of Catacombs
Consumed King’s Parish
Northern Saints
Out of the wind and steppe did they come, clad in beast-skin cloak and strange patterned cloth atop maille, beard and braid dyed storm-silver, and great chained scrolls heaved above their heads. That these were holy folk was only discovered after a score of guardsmen were downed by bronze club and oaken staff, and their mission made known: the Storm King seeks new subjects, and the mighty may answer his call.
The great rich heartland is replete with faith. The labyrinthine streets of the capital are home to entire pantheons, and there are single hearths in boarding houses with venerable cult practices. Intricate rites are performed for days on end within the incense-choked chambers of sky-flung cathedrals, vast golden domes ring with the songs of worshippers, bells toll into the early hours. Gods, prophets, and forces beyond the ken of humankind seem to converge here to be communed with and called down. And among them now was the Storm King.
He dwelt, they said, where land became as frost, and towering icebergs created a cold jagged landscape that stretched into infinity. In the north, the saints said, there were sky gods who had granted fire, there were earth giants who had granted steel, there were demons from the deep dark waters who offered secrets from before man ever walked the world. But the people who worshipped these things were dead, and the treasures of their gods lay in the fortress and fastness of the Storm King.
The north tribe had once brokered with many gods in the olden time, but the Storm King came from the ice and the tribe threw their lot in with him, and their faith proved well-placed. The Storm King did not demand complex rites, nor did he pass down esoteric laws and taboos, no, he told folk how best to survive, and valour pleased him. He told the mighty of the coming battle against which the muscle of his faithful would throw itself for the sake of the next generation. Those who saw reason and swore fealty were welcomed as kin. Those who clung to mercurial sky spirits and water demons were sent to their gods, cowering before the the blows of the Storm King's hammers and the bite of his spears.
The Storm King's dominion grew in the heartland, and warrior cults grew about his name. But as suddenly as they appeared, the northern saints vanished back to their cold land, along with a retinue of ten thousand converts. Their quest was successful, their numbers bolstered, and the clangor of the Storm King's hammer in the sky now foretold the coming of the great battle they had spread dire warning of. The old songs were sung over the frigid leagues, and somewhere in a land no living memory holds imprint of, the wild warriors guide their blades and hammers by the sound of thunder, their bodies in bloodless slumber, and the world is held firm against something from beyond for a little while longer.
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