The Barrow Lands Bards

By Mel White

Between this world and elsewhen lies the Barrow Lands; the place where things that were once magic go when the magic fades. This is a collection of two of Mel. White's Barrow Bard tales -- the most recent ones that were previewed at Soonercon science fiction convention.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mel. White
• Release date: Jun 23, 2011
• ISBN: 9781458139634

Mel White

Rev. Mel White is a clergyman, author, and activist. On Pride Sunday, June 27, 1993, Mel was installed Dean of the Cathedral of Hope Metropolitan Community Church in Dallas, where he came out publicly with his own, heart-felt statement of faith: “I am gay. I am proud. And God loves me without reservation.” The Cathedral was and continues to be the nation’s largest gay-lesbian congregation serving approximately 10,000 congregants in the wider Dallas area. He is the bestselling author of five books, including Stranger at the Gate, 6 Angry Evangelicals, and The Miracle of Molokai.

Book preview

The Barrow Lands Bards

Mel. White

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2011

All Rights Reserved

Smashwords Edition, License Notes.

Thank you for downloading this eBook. You are welcome to make copies of it to read on your own personal devices (computers, phones, etc.) It may NOT be reproduced, copied or distributed. If you enjoyed this book, please return to Smashwords.com to discover other authors – and to watch for new books from me.

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You can follow me on Twitter (Foxraven)

Or Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/melwhite99

Or read my research journal; http://www.scienceweblog.com

Or my Livejournal: http://wordslinger.livejournal.com

Or Coyote webcomic: http://www.radiocomix.com/coyote/

You might also enjoy reading the graphic novel I did with the late Robert Lynn Asprin. Fans have asked over the past 20 years if there’d be a fourth volume, and I’m pleased to announce that there will be after I finish serializing the first three. I have an inker and colorist picked for the project.

Meanwhile, you can enjoy the merry lunacy over at Radio Comix:

http://www.radiocomix.com/duncan-and-mallory/

The Barrow Lands

Somewhere between Here and There in a place where we haven’t been before is a place called the Barrow Lands. It’s not quite Valhalla – there’s less quaffing and less war and more Ordinary Life in this place and if you die there, you vanish from the Barrow Lands.

The Barrow Lands exist on a fragile fractal border of unities, where other places sometimes intrude and where it’s easy for a dreamer to fall again into another universe and keep on falling through the endless fractal chains of universes – perhaps forever.

The oldest of the inhabitants have shaggy hair and blue-painted skin and speak a soft slurred language that no one else quite understands. They live inside large sod houses ringed by wooden henges and almost all of them avoid contact with others who come into the Barrow Lands. But sometimes one of the high Druids or high Bards of this ancient race wanders out from the nest and goes to the great city of Cithelna, where the Collegium of All Things may be found. They teach those with talent for tale spinning or music how to be bards and bardlets and once in a very rare while they teach another Druid.

Sometimes things from other places end up in the Barrow Lands. Occasionally the Druids will summon something from elsewhere, but more often what comes into the Barrow Lands are the dreamers from other realms who never seemed to belong anywhere or anytime. Most often they stumble into a den of something that really wants an easy lunch, but occasionally they make their way to a city and become part of the Border Lands.

And once in a while the land is shaken by strange powers and magic, for this is also the realm where the old gods go when the last of their true worshippers die.

Bard to the Bone

But you're a PIG!

I arched an eyebrow at the velvet-clad human who