Assassins are bad. Angry gods are worse. All that plus cults and demons? In the hero business, they call that Monday.
The worst thing about a man being led to his execution-aside from the whole impending death bit-was that he immediately tried to figure out what choice had brought him there. Which Dannen thought was ridiculous.
The one possible comfort a man could have, when faced with his own death, was that things simply could not get any worse.
The problem, of course, was that things could always get worse.
Sure, on the surface being saved from certain death seemed all well and good. But what about when that saving came at the hands of the God of Mischief, a deity whose sole purpose was to cause chaos? And what if, after being saved, a man-along with those poor fools unlucky enough to be his companions-found himself facing assassins, a strange magical hermit, a demonic cult, and a very demonic demon?
If there are lessons to be learned, then they are the same lessons the world had been trying to teach Dannen since his birth. Insane mages make for poor friends, the only thing better than being a hero is being alive, and the most important lesson . . .
Things can always get worse.
Dannen Ateran spent the week following his battle with the necromancer and his undead army doing exactly what he enjoyed most-nothing.
Certainly nothing heroic. At least nothing more heroic than lying in Claire's bed and reveling in the feeling of having no one try to kill him.
At least, that was, until Perandius summoned him to the land of the gods once more with a mission to rescue a shepherd boy foretold of in prophecy.
Dannen didn't care for shepherd boys and he cared even less for prophecies. But considering that the messenger god confiscated the Divining Stone-which Dannen had given to Claire as a necklace-he decided it might be best to leave Talinseh.
And so Dannen, hoping to keep breathing a bit longer, sets off to the south with his companions. But that was the thing about fleeing from death-no matter how fast a man runs, it's always ahead of him.
And that death, this time, might well come in the form of wererats, or in an ancient sea monster and, if all else fails, there's always the group of assassins hunting them.
Plenty of ways to die and die horribly but then, Dannen had lived long enough to know that if a man went looking for ways to die, he never had to look very far.
Hero Checklist for a long and happy life
Dannen Ateran had never gone so far as to write the list out, but he knew it by heart. He ought to, as he had been telling it to himself for years and himself-fool that he was-had been ignoring it for just as long.
So it was that he found himself standing beside Fedder, Mariana, and Tesler, watching as an undead dragon soared toward them.
And if, by some feat of magic or luck-with undead dragons, skill rarely factored into it-they survived, there was only the little issue of a master swordsman and his necromancer brother to worry about, not to mention an undead horde.
Plenty of ways to die, then, if a man liked a little variety with his suffering.
And the week was just getting started.
The world needed heroes . . . It got them instead.
A swordsman past his prime who has vowed to never wield a blade again. A mage who'd rather throw fists than fireballs and thinks magic is for sissies. An assassin who grows sick at the sight of blood. And a man with a pet squirrel he believes to be an ancient god from long ago.
An evil has risen in the land, one that, if not dealt with, threatens to start a war which would include the gods themselves. To counter it, the realm must call on its greatest heroes, its most courageous adventurers. Unfortunately, those great heroes, those brave adventurers, are all busy-being dead mostly.
So it is left to Dannen Ateran, known in his youth as the Bloody Butcher but, more recently as the passed-out drunk at the table in the corner, to lead his companions against an army of the dead.
They are not heroes. But perhaps they just might do.
