New Pathfinder Web Fiction!

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

If you're reading this blog on paizo.com, rather than aggregating through some sort of high-tech feed to your personal mobile command unit, or beaming it directly to your personal communications satellite—as one of the last Paizonians without a smart phone, I really have no idea what such things are capable of these days—it's likely you've already seen the little tab just above this that says "Web Fiction." And if you're a fan of freebies, you've probably even checked it out, and already read through the excellent free Pathfinder Tales stories by folks like Dave Gross, Rich Ford, and J. C. Hay.

Yet while the fiction itself is easy to find, it's come to my attention that people might not know that new installments in our free fiction series go live every single Wednesday, with several thousand words of new free content each week! Perhaps even more importantly, I've realized that while we've been slaving away bringing you the stories, we've been totally bereft of a forum in which to tell you about them.

All of which stops today! Going forward, I'm going to make it my mission to announce each new story on this blog as it launches, the better to preview things for you and let you know what's coming down the line. And as it turns out, I couldn't have picked a better time to start. (Well, except for the very beginning, but that's beside the point.)

This week sees the first installment of "Certainty," a new story from up-and-coming fantasy novelist Liane Merciel. The author of The River Kings' Road and its forthcoming sequel, Liane really understands how to bring some grit and realism to a fantasy world. Fortunately for us, she's also a fan of Pathfinder, with a grasp of the history and feel of the setting that's simply astounding. In the new story, Liane follows Ederras, a former paladin of Iomedae who's lost his faith (or at least, his self-righteous conviction), on his journey to the Worldwound to reclaim a sense of right and wrong—or die trying. But it turns out that even in Mendev, light and dark aren't always clear, and the hand that smites the demon might be just as corrupt, in its own fashion, as the demon itself...

Click here to read the first chapter in this new free short story, and don't forget to check back every Wednesday for more adventures on Golarion!

James Sutter
Fiction Editor