Kings of the Wyld (The Band, #1)

by Nicholas Eames

Clay could only shake his head in disbelief. Didn’t people know that stories, and the legends that inevitably sprang from them, were the best part? The gods knew that bards weren’t good for much besides getting themselves killed and telling lies, but they were undoubtedly masters of both. Clay had lost count of the times he’d bumbled his way through a messy, bloody, terrifying brawl, only to hear a bard convince a crowded tavern it had been the greatest, most glorious battle ever waged between man and beast. In stories there were marches without weeping foot sores, swordfights without septic wounds that killed heroes in their sleep. In stories, when a giant was slain, it toppled thunderously to the ground. In reality, a giant died much the same way anything else did: screaming and shitting itself.