*Well, I’ve never posted here before but a friend/chat partner suggested that I share a bit of my work. This is the beginning of a story I’m working on based in a low fantasy, swords-and-sandals setting. I’ve always enjoyed historical fantasies and imagining myself as a poor captive up on the auction block, so here we go!*
Theo entered and stopped at once, looking around the Ivasi king’s hall. Great carved and painted pillars of redwood held up a high, timbered roof. To each pillar was bound a man, beaten and bloodied, but not yet broken. The defeated chieftains, Theo guessed by the look of them. All were muscled, tall and proud, but stripped and secured with thick chains of Theran make binding their hands and feet. Their pride is all they have left, he mused. Theran might would soon seize that from them as well.
Theran officers sat about the hall, drinking wine or sputtering as they tasted the bitter ale the Ivasi brewed. Collared slaves, the general’s own, roasted goat and lamb over the large firepit in the hall’s center. The men traded tales of the battle as they swapped their plunder, a longsword for a druid’s silver sickle, stolen gold for fine northern furs. These trinkets and treasures were worth much to a common born officer and even more to a common soldier, but Theo had no use for them. He still hoped for another sort of plunder.