Jaycee Woods

In finishing a draft fantasy short story, I was surprisingly as I had not written much in this genre; maybe 2% of my stories.

In this story a mercenary is tasked with finding out the motivation of a notorious murderer. Why not simply a bounty to kill or capture the killer? The killer might not be averse to the client’s interest and might accept coin.

When the merc and killer meet in the wilderness after hunting one another, there is tension of an immediate combat. The merc complains that he is hungry so suggests they make a fire and eat while they talk before there is any fighting.

As they talk, they learn each other’s motives. The killer is motivated by revenge against all mercenaries over the death of her parents and her being left an orphan. The merc realizes despite learning what he was sent to discover that she intends to kill him. As they openly talk about her killing him, the anticipation of combat rises. Yet the charming merc has the gift for gab and strings out the conversation to delay the combat.

Eventually he learns the gap between her current expectations for her life (killing spree until she is killed) and the aspirations her parents & she had for her life (a pastoral life of marriage and family). The climax comes when he helps her see that she still has a choice between a future centered in death or one centered in living as her parents had dreamed with her.

The story is about breaking the rut of an assumed obligation in life to recenter on one’s own independently desired purpose in life.