There are many dangers on a wagon train headed towards the goldfields of California. Veteran cavalryman and guide Abel Carter leads another group west through the Kansas Territory when strange and terrible things start happening. Ghostly natives haunt the prairie, shadowing the wagon train as it makes its way to Fort Leavenworth to winter. Behind the Cherokee warriors, a more menacing, supernatural presences has awful designs for Carter. Will he survive the darkness? Will anyone?

In the late hours of the night Maric Alran, a patreydan priest, hears a voice from heaven, the voice of Davene the Uncontainable. He is shown a prophetic vision of a coming savior for the Nine Realms, a prophet-king called Davion destined to crush the darkness of Mor'Demas, the Rejecter. Young Bram Duighrain, son of a rich farmer and pupil to Alran, believes his future is in scholarship and religion. A tragic turn of events sends Bram on a quest to fulfill the last request of his dying master, a journey fraught with dangers both natural and demonic. Joined by others who have their own duties...

Aryon Grayse was a dreamer, always thinking of faraway places and adventures. While wandering a lonely stretch of beach, he sees something gleaming from the top of a mount of black stone. A silver rod aglow with a mystical light draws him in. He touches it and all goes dark. When he awakens, he finds the mountain has vanished. Aryon rushes home, but is too late. His home is destroyed and his family dead. Coming to believe that his strange encounter on the beach was the cause, Ayron leaves to find the silver rod. He meets a nobleman named Tyrus Baranathes who tells him that he has released a...

A witness to the murder of a fellow apprentice, Caulen Mathersby is forced to flee for his life. In a desperate bid for safety, he sneaks aboard the Morning Star, a merchant vessel departing the city of Luthenaris. Branded a runaway servant and then a stowaway, Caulen must evade capture at the hands of the bounty hunter Val Benlock while also coming to grips with strange powers he can barely understand. He is confronted by Eradshi, a sea goddess, and offered freedom from the magical shackle that binds him if he retrieves a priceless artifact of power for her. What choice will he make?

Welcome to the first issue of MYTHIC: A Quarterly Science Fiction & Fantasy Magazine. This new publication of science fiction and fantasy stories hopes to open up a world of broader, more diverse explorations. Seeking to break out of the worn conventions of both genres, MYTHIC collects stories that push the boundaries, but also provides a home for familiar ones as well.