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PodCastle 631: TALES FROM THE VAULTS — Another End of the Empire
* Author : Tim Pratt
* Narrator : Cheyenne Wright
* Host : Hamilton Perez
* Audio Producer : Peter Adrian Behravesh
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Originally published at Strange Horizons.
Rated PG for superseded oracles, despots past their expiration dates and probability witches.
Another End of the Empire
By Tim Pratt
“I am here,” Mogrash said. “Give me the bad news.”
“A child dwells in the village of Misery Chin, in the mountain
provinces to the east. If allowed to grow to manhood, he will take
over your empire, overthrow your ways and means, and send you from the halls of your palace forever.”
Mogrash relaxed. This was, at least, not an immediate threat‚ not like the pronouncement of metastasized bone cancer she’d given his grandfather. He sighed. “So I’m expected to send my Fell Rangers to the mountains, raze the village, leave no stone upon a stone, enslave the women, and kill all the younglings to stop this dire prophecy from coming to pass.”
“It’s what your father would have done.”
“Yes, but I’m more modern than he was. Besides, we’ve seen this happen a thousand times‚ the attempt to stop the prophecy will make it come to pass, won’t it?”
To read the rest of this story, visit Strange Horizons.