Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #170

Two new stories are the subject of today's review, from the latest Beneath Ceaseless Skies. Also a new cover! The cover art at BCS is always exceptional. Anyway, the stories are both thematically similar, featuring women who are at least part of a wild, magical world. In the first, the main character is a dryad and in the second the main character is not exactly human. Both stories focus on how humans seek to exploit the magic of these individuals, how those in power try to tame the wild to make weapons and servants. And how that urge, to exploit the wild magic, to turn them into weapons, often leads to those weapons getting free. In both stories, that journey, from wild to weapon, is a tragic one, filled with pain, but it's also a necessary one, that these creatures take hold of their own power to fight back. It doesn't make them less tragic, because something is lost in that turning that cannot be regained. But at least it's giving back agency to those who've been exploited and used. Anyway, that's a rambling intro. To the stories!

Art by Christopher Balaskas