SFF Saturday is a group of authors who post snippets of SFF prose and poetry for comment. You can check out other SFF Saturday posts, too.
My snippet is another few lines from a work in progress called Herald (at the moment). Eventually, the project be a fantasy loosely based on the Hundred Years War, but it’s in the very early draft stages.
I’ve put all the previous snippets together here, if you need to catch up.
When we last saw Denis and the enemy King of Angth, the Red King mentioned that he didn’t want to hear the screams of the dead.
The Red King strode away. “Come, I’ll give you the names of our fallen, for you are half-way across the field.”
A more careful scan of the land confirmed the king’s words. Hope, a slim thread of it, lay at the back of Denis’s throat like the smell of warmth on a winter’s day. Denis followed the proud back of the Red King, knelt by the next body, touched flesh with flesh, spoke the dead’s name, and moved on.
The Revenan dead still outnumbered the others despite their being closer to the Angth side of the field, but the Red King’s people became more frequent. Many of the Angth were common and unknown to Denis, but their king knew every one of them. Denis touched their skin and spoke their names into the Dragon Herald’s book.
All the more deep was Denis’s shame when they reached a Revenan man he couldn’t name.
Ann Laurel Kopchik 
Never good to falter in front of the King like that…though based on previous snippets, I don’t think he’s going to face punishment.
From the king? No. Denis, however, is very good at punishing himself.
So the king knows the names of the common men? I’m liking him more and more.
🙂
He’s not a bad sort, for being royalty.
Poor Denis. You’re really putting him through it.
Alas, he’s a protagonist…
A very tactile description of the events unfolding and I like the smell of warmth on a winter day – especially in light of the aftermath of a battle. That’s a very unique descriptor.
Thank you!
Yet another brilliant snippet. Poor Denis, indeed.
🙂 Thanks!
This is such a great idea and you execute it so well. The tone is so grim, but you’re drawn in; can’t look away. The king is enigmatic and I love following Denis.
Thank you so much!
This is a really strong sequence – I find myself admiring both sides as decent men, in a dark circumstance. The scene comes alive very powerfully. I am intrigued to know what the King intends.
So would Denis…
This Naming of the dead is a powerful image.
It is, yes.
Oh wow, you’re really upping the guilt factor with Denis. Hopefully he becomes as awesome as the Red King one day. Wonderful battlefield imagery.
Denis is learning a lot in this scene…
I am really liking this Red King. These are great snippets. I’ve put this on my TBR list.
It’ll be a while before it sees the light of day as a book. This is really just the first scene I’ve written of it, and a first draft at that. I have plans… but I need to get words on paper. 🙂
Wonderful descriptions in this piece. 🙂
Thank you!
Oooo, an unknown corpse? Could be trouble.