Probably more than you ever wanted to know about ...
"Despoilers of War"
by Peter J. Mitchell
The Author—Peter J. Mitchell
First off, I'm not Steve Goble—he just picked the same avatar image I did. 
I've been an unpaid writer for most of my life, and a lover of fantastic worlds since my first experience of (the original) Star Wars blew my imagination into overdrive at age six. For me, it's been swords and spaceships ever since. On the fantasy front, my tastes range from the lean, fast-paced action of David Gemmell to the rich and elaborate storytelling of the likes of Guy Gavriel Kay and Robin Hobb *, plus all manner of stuff in between. Including this little trilogy about hobbits that some people may have read ...
The stories I like to write tend to involve friends who are true, enemies who are clever, and heroes who go to great lengths for love, duty, honor or principle (ideally all four). Heroes who are usually very handy with a sword ... (My love of long and detailed battle scenes is one of the things that has made me struggle with short fiction.) I also find it hard to eschew humor in dark and tense moments, or to apply only ONE plot twist where my devious mind can envisage a plethora of complications. I'm not saying I can't exercise better discipline in my writing, I'm just telling you what my natural inclinations are.
What else? I'm not forty (yet). I have a wonderful wife and a toddler who'd be in a lot more trouble if he wasn't so irresistibly cute. I was born in Australia and after having been raised variously in South Africa, Saudi Arabia, and New Zealand, I now actually live here as well.
Oh, and I really hope you like my story in the forthcoming issue of Flashing Swords. 
[* NB: if you haven't read their work, get down to your local library or book store. Now. Do not pass 'GO', do not collect $200 ...]
The Story—"Despoilers of War"
Back in 2005, Pitch-Black Books ran a short story competition based around their "Icons": Quill and Quen, a pair of fantasy characters evocatively illustrated by Storn Cook. The challenge was to concoct a tale from the image of Quen--an armor-clad Amazon with a crow perched on her shoulder and a broadsword in her fists--and Quill--a bearded scoundrel with a burning dagger and flames curling around his free hand. They could be friends. They could be enemies. They could be anything. They just had to be the focus of the story.
I discovered the competition in the course of critiquing some typically-accomplished stories that Rob(ert J.) Santa wrote for it and thought it would be fun to come up with my own incarnations of Quill and Quen (and their adventures) to enter myself. What began as fun soon became hard work--descending into desperation--as I wrote not one, not two, but three separate stories (featuring three different versions of the Icons) that were all imaginative, action-packed tales of sword-and-sorcery adventure... and irretrievably over the acceptable word limit. With slightly less than 48 hours to go until the final deadline, I threw out everything I had done to that point, started from scratch with a(nother) new concept and set of characters and wrote "Despoilers of War" in a furious, adrenaline-charged and caffeine-supported stint interrupted only by the need to sleep for a few hours in the middle of it. 8,300 words (and one very hurried editing pass) later, it was done.
Much to my elation, the story placed third in the competition, thus earning a publication slot in Flashing Swords. The stars in my eyes were somewhat dimmed when the ezine closed down prior to featuring my story, however.
But Flashing Swords has risen from the ashes and my 'lost' story is finally going to see the light of the internet (and, hey, even a print version, now), in a reversal of fortune to cheer the hearts of struggling writers everywhere.
"That's great, Pete," you may be thinking, "but what's the story about?"
"Read it and see," is the glib (and yet undeniably correct) answer, but to keep my editor happy, I offer the following teaser:
The war is over, but Quen is adrift in its aftermath. There are no invaders to left fight, no more battles to be won, and too many warriors scrabbling over the scant work for them in a land at peace. She finds herself asked to guide an expedition of avaricious purpose across deadly mountains where the cold and the ice are the least of the things that will try to kill them. Beyond the hazards of the journey itself, the prize they seek is one she hesitates to concede to a band of foreign mercenaries, the more so when she discovers that they are accompanied by one of the very invaders she fought to drive from her lands. Yet in hard times, roads poor in honor must sometimes be walked ...