All that Glisters...It was said of Archibald Leopold Thudd that he had sold his soul to the devil at a very early age, and that the devil had given it back because he felt he had got the poor end of the bargain: most people liked to think that hell was not ready for a boy like Thudd. Wherever there was trouble, you could guarantee that Thudd was involved. Local bookmakers took to running a pool on him for a while, taking bets (and making a fair bit of money on the side) on when he would pick a fight with the wrong bull-necked barbarian, or seduce the wrong mob-connected merchant's daughter. The fact was that the boy had little or no respect for pain, and was
Trystan's BaneFor two score years the land of MyrHas been oppressed by morbid fear,Her borders plagued by a demon lord,Expelled from Hell with his darkling horde.Where fair Adele and Trystan braveOnce played carefree on street and pave,Now doors are locked and wards put forthTo shield against the hostile North.To guard their kin and keep their lands,The folk submit to the Beast's demands.The more they give, the more he craves,There is no end to his needs depraved.Coin they offer, and food and arms,Children he takes, to their alarm,To toil and slave at his behest;They pray that is his sole request.A summer's day is thrown awa
The Ballad of Dyr DynfieIn sleep most deep lay Dyr Dynfie,In guarding shade of an old oak tree,When softly came a wily spriteWith ill intent to the young man's side.With quiet mirth the dusky she,Cold-hearted as all faeries be,Put strangest thought in Dyr's mind,That he needs must some faeries find.On wakening the hapless lad,Who'd known no magic was now gladOf dreamlike intervention sweet,Inspiring him to dare this feat.By silver light on frosty glade,He to the Midnight World was bade,Wherein light spirits through dark did dart,And he heard sounds that stopped his heart.Forbidden melodies, long forgot,Divine melancholy, rending tho
Ride of the NazgulSummoned from your bower in the bosom of the earth,You rise to command the sky for He who waits,While the frosted moon watches in secret rapture.You soar, night-bitten through liquid air,Beneath your eldritch form stretch leathern vanes,Whole pulse is the heartbeat of newborn novae.Beneath your ivory fingers, a cloak of pitch trails tattered banners through midnight airs,Threadbare, blacker than the firmament at the darkening of the moon,Blacker than the gulf between moribund worlds.Your cry tears the sky: the scream of rusted iron on glass,Its pitch a herald, an icy draught to freeze the heartsOf those who dare oppose t
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