An Unexpected Prompt

The Dire Skies Trilogy came about as the result of a random conversation between me and my fantasy genre obsessed kid in the shallow end of our community pool. A voracious reader, he devoured every book by Terry Pratchett, George R. R. Martin, Suzanne Collins and many more. It was late August and swimming season was winding down. I asked if he would like to write a fantasy story with me; we came from a family of writers, after all. With self-publishing becoming popular, what was to stop us from writing our own stories? “Sure,” he said, being an agreeable lad. To be fair, most of my fatherly hair-brained schemes failed to materialize, but this one didn’t just materialize, it metastasized.

The Email that Started it All

“If Slaga hadn’t been bent over, hauling a sack of barley for the Subcommander, he wouldn’t have seen it: a dull glint in a muddy hoof print, hardly enough to catch his eye. Reaching out with his free hand he plucked it out of the muck, rinsing it in one of the many puddles at the edge of the road. The rain had been steady all day but had recently tapered off as a weak sun tried to push its way through the gauzy late winter clouds.

Slaga’s eyes widened as he brought the thing close, a small pendant consisting of a bright blue stone set into a golden tear drop. There was a hole at the top where it had slipped its chain; he imagined its owner cursing when they realized it was gone. This made him smile slightly, for they would surely be fine folk, the sort that hold their perfumed kerchiefs over their noses when they come near to drones like him. Just as he was about to slip the treasure into his pocket, he gave a cry and dropped it, as well as the sack he was carrying. The jewel burned him! He looked around sheepishly just in time to see the Subcommander walking towards him. He had seen everything.”

And the Response

“Subcommander Dietrick was unusually imposing for a middle-ranking military man. They are expected to be short, rotund and red in the face. Dietrick was the opposite. Tall and lanky, he towered over his workers, and dark eyes peering from a gaunt visage like a molted owl. He toyed with the wheel lock on his pistol, a short, bronze affair that would pulp a rabbit at 25 paces. Slaga wasn’t especially old, but a life of work (and subsequently trying to avoid work, which often proved more strenuous than the work itself) had made him a bit crooked, and more than a little wary about “The Management.”

“What’s this, Slaga?” Dietrick’s voice was as smooth as molasses and twice as sweet. (Molasses that may possibly be laced with strychnine). “Has something…hurt you?”

Slaga had to fight not to make a face. “A bee stung me,” he stammered, “It’s gone now, I think. Sir.” His foot found mud, and mud found the pendant, now effectively hidden from immediate sight. The Subcommander was silent. He cocked his head to the right, and his eyes slid, almost imperceptibly, down to Slaga’s shoes. Deitrick gave a “mmm” of slight disbelief.

“You’ve dropped your bag,” he whispered, black eyes locked back onto Slaga. “Perhaps get back to work? Before we’re all gray…,” He left the sentence hanging in the air, and stalked off.

Once out of sight of the drone, Dietrick rubbed his chin. He couldn’t be outwardly violent, of course, the indentured servants had their rights… Until they were made slaves, naturally, but that would happen soon enough. He slid silently to another worker, and forced him, gently as can be, six inches up a wall. The worker, expecting a fast and not any less painful death, found a silver piece pressed into his palm.

“You watch that other one,” the Subcommander growled, “You see him do anything but move grain, and you come find me. Is that clear?” He shifted back to his smooth, soft tone for the last sentence.

The prisoner nearly shook his head off with nodding. Dietrick stalked off, resting his pistol on his shoulder. Subtlety was one of his strong suits. That is one of two reasons that he was so good at his job, where the only subtlety usually present is an angry old man with a shaved head barking orders at hillbillies. The other reason is that he knew when he was being lied to. He would find out what was happening, one way or another… 

A rabbit hopped by, some twenty feet away. It never even heard the bang.”

And we were off. Very little of the original emails made it into the book but Slaga and Dietrick did, as did the amulet, though it came later. My original idea was the we would have something to work on together, something to pull his eyes off of his screens. Reader, it worked.

The Long, Winding Road to Stheara

For several years, as “The Sky That Broke the Hills” took shape, we would discuss it at length, often in the car. R.E. built a gaslamp, Victorian world: not sword and sorcery but black powder and sorcery. He created ambiguous, complex characters and wanted to avoid cliched tropes. After long talks about characters, plot and the nature of magic, I would say “good meeting!” Eventually his interest waned, but I kept going, bouncing ideas off of him as I went. In the end we ended up with a complete trilogy and characters: Slaga, Floort, Dietrick, Hakka, Thorest and Tern, who for several years were our extended, imaginary family.

Posted on: June 5, 2025, by : T.C.