Tag: 2025
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Year 13 Comes to an End
Welcome to the January 2025 issue of Swords & Sorcery Magazine, issue 156. Another year of publication comes to an end. Now on to Year 14. Thanks to the generosity of the folks who have joined the Patreon, this month I feature four new stories and an essay. I plan to keep bringing more stories…
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Shadows of the Forgotten Empire
by D. K. Latta in Issue 156, January 2025 The ruins spread before Tantos like the bleached bones of giants gleaming under the moonlight. His soldiers milled uncertainly about his horse, fidgeting nervously; he could even hear the restless stirring of their unkempt prisoners although they were at the rear of the procession. The company…
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The Hollowed Man
by David J. Lynch in Issue 156, January 2025 A ramshackle cart wobbled to a crooked rhythm down the city street. The wooden frame buckled under its grim cargo, this morning’s victims of the plague haunting the city of Galadia. A boy darted through the street, avoiding the web of muddy puddles as he went…
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Gargoyles
by Ryan M. Patrick in Issue 156, January 2025 “It’s sad, innit.” I sighed, a bead of sweat dripping down my long nose. I didn’t know how the laborers were able to function in the heat. “What’s sad?” “That they’re all coming down.” I shook my head. The man was likely wasting my time, malingering…
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Sharper than Steel, Colder than Death
by Robert Rhodes in Issue 156, January 2025 “They said I should be a hero. They said I could be a king. But all I wanted was to see the sunrise on your face. Every morning, Eleni …” He whispered those words, my lifelong friend—my blood-brother—Petyr Smith, and I was close enough to hear each…
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Sonja, Sex, and the Armour Bra
A few thoughts on Gail Simone’s Red Sonja: Consumed by Bryn Hammond in Issue 156, January 2025 [this essay has spoilers only for the sex scenes] In Sword & Sorcery, I crave grungy women of the barbarian type: women as convincingly uncivilized as Conan. Red Sonja – blustery, crude, smelly – certainly has potential to…