Retrospective: Hanging at Crosbhothar

The cover of Unsheathed: An Epic Fantasy Collection, which includes this novelette

My #ThrowbackThursday story this week is “Hanging at Crosbhothar”, my first published novelette.

“A village of innocents, lynched. Blood magic. Vengeance-obsessed brigands. Ghosts of the past and a demonic pact. Knight-Lieutenant Arlise Dun faces all of these and more as she chases the bandit lord Eoghan One-Ear through the wilds of Vyspa. Can she cut Eoghan down before he becomes unstoppable?”

Seeing this story in print was a real thrill, as a novelette provided me with an opportunity to really dig into this setting for the first time. Many of the elements developed for this story—more detailed rules of magic, coryphium, the conflict between Corhiel and Vyspa, and the backstories of a few supporting characters—have since become fixtures of the world and show up in later stories.

“Hanging at Crosbhothar” is another one of those stories directly inspired by the call for submissions of the market which ultimately accepted it for publication. Their guidelines specified heroic or epic fantasy along with an element of swordplay or “sword-related” theme. So I decided to hedge my bets and blend those together. Thus was born the premise of my external conflict: Arlise up against a master swordsman wielding an enchanted blade.

This raised further questions. What does this swordsman want? Revenge against foreign occupiers and his fellow countrymen who surrendered. Why is the Order of Watchers involved? Perhaps this swordsman is so ruthless he’ll use illicit magic to achieve victory. Maybe he’s even willing to truck with darker entities in exchange for power. How will Arlise defeat him? Well, that’s one question I didn’t have an answer to when I began writing…

Like most of the stories starring her, the internal conflict of “Hanging at Crosbhothar” centers around Arlise and her backstory. A few of my ideas suggested she’d have experience as both avenger and victim of vengeance, which gelled perfectly with the motivations of this budding villain. Who better to face him down than someone who knows the futility of vengeance and the suffering it inflicts upon innocents?

Of all my stories, “Hanging at Crosbhothar” has probably received the most praise from readers. Especially for its very first line: “Corpses hung from the ancient maple like leaves…”

If you’re interested in this story, you can find it as part of Unsheathed: An Epic Fantasy Collection