© J.B. Norman — Published by Emona Literary Services™
Kat sighs inwardly.
It must be a day that ends in Y, because the Hammered Nail has once again become a battleground.
She finds herself taking cover behind an overturned table between the two familiar female mercenaries.
“We meet again,” the one on the left says. “It’s us, Alma, the Lady of Explosion Magic —”
“— And Akari, the Mistress of the Way of the Sword,” the other one says by way of introduction.
“I remember,” Kat groans. “I’m about to get exploded again, aren’t I?”
“Well,” Alma says. “I am the Lady of Explosion Magic.”
“There are other ways to solve your problems than exploding them!” Kat protests.
Alma stares blankly at her.
“I don’t follow.”
“So,” Kat says. “Want to tell me who these guys are and why they’re trying to kill me?”
Alma thoughtfully touches her chin with her finger. “Hmm,” she says thoughtfully. “This is either the Evil Dragon Cult or the roving band of brigands.”
“No,” Akari interjects. “This is the pirate crew out for revenge after we apprehended their captain.”
“Oh,” Alma says. “Of course. Them!”
She shrugs apologetically at Kat.
“It’s hard to keep them all straight sometimes.”
Kat’s jaw hits the floor.
“Just how many people are trying to kill you on any given day?”
Alma shrugs again. “A few dozen, at least.”
Kat buries her face in her hands and bites back a frustrated scream before taking a deep breath.
“Just help me find my friends and my sister and try not to explode any of us,” Kat demands tersely.
“Of course,” Akari says, drawing her sword and leaping out from the cover of table.
Alma smiles at Kat in a way that makes her think she’s about to get especially exploded.
“I may be the Lady of Explosion Magic,” the Pelayan mercenary notes. “But I’m also quite good at other kinds of magic.”
She pops out from behind the table and hurls a bolt of ice magic to cover Akari’s advance across the Nail.
Kat scrambles to follow after the Yamatai swordswoman.
Seeing her sister approach, Dunstana ducks under one of the pirates, stomps on his foot, creating an opening to allow Niamh to shoulder tackle him while Lena sweeps his leg from behind, sending him tumbling over a fallen barstool.
“We’ll call it a tie,” he groans.
Dunstana dashes forward, dodge-rolling to close the remaining distance. She springs to her feet in front of Kat and Akari, grinning broadly.
“Kat!” Dunstana exclaims happily. “I just shanked a guy!”
“You what?”
“Shanked a guy,” Dunstana repeats. “You know, like, there was a hunk of lamb leg on the one of the tables, so I whacked him over the head with it. And then I, um, ate it…”
“Captain Kid,” Kat sighs. “That’s not what shank means.”
“It’s not?” Dunstana exclaims. “What is it?”
“I’ll tell you when you’re older,” Kat mutters.
“Cool sword,” Dunstana says breathlessly, eyeing the gleaming steel in Akari’s hand, almost as long as she is.
She turns up to Kat.
“I want one for my birthday,” she declares.
“Later, Captain Kid.”
More Realmgard Short Scenes here.
If you’ve enjoyed my content, please consider supporting me through Ko-fi or Patreon, or through Paypal by scanning the QR code below:
Follow Realmgard and other publications of Emona Literary Services™ below:
Subscribe to the Emona Literary Services™ Substack newsletter here.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
The author prohibits the use of content published on this website for the purposes of training Artificial Intelligence technologies, including but not limited to Large Language Models, without express written permission.
All stories published on this website are works of fiction. Characters are products of the author’s imagination and do not represent any individual, living or dead.
The realmgard.com Privacy Policy can be viewed here.
Realmgard is published by Emona Literary ServicesTM
