Beneath Ceaseless Skies #449, January 22, 2026

“The Great King’s Lost Bride” by R.K. Duncan

“Strike First And Then Give Tongue” by Lalini Shanela Ranaraja

Reviewed by David Wesley Hill

Beneath Ceaseless Skies #449 opens with the strong story, “The Great King’s Lost Bride” by R.K. Duncan, which is set in ancient Greece, and is told from the viewpoint of Nikanor, a young Theban, who is part of the armed complement escorting the titular bride—Alcibie, a Colchian princess—from Samos to Susa. Unfortunately, in the Phrygian hills, the caravan comes under attack by bandits—and by the shades of the dead, which are visible to Nikanor and to the princess but to no one else. Then hell hounds arrive and kidnap the bride, taking her to the temple of the Great Mother, Cybele, in which there is a gate to the underworld, where Hades is waiting for Alcibie… A thrilling tale combining deft characterization and a concrete sense of place, as well as a couple decent battle scenes. As the magazine’s motto states—it’s literary adventure fantasy, and recommended!

I would recommend the next story, too, “Strike First And Then Give Tongue” by Lalini Shanela Ranaraja, except that try as I might, I could not find a single iota of speculative fiction in it, not even a tepid taste of magical realism. It’s a well-written and heartbreaking tale of a doomed romance set in 19th-Century Sri Lanka, and although the protagonist is a wild child who lives among elephants in the jungle, there’s nothing about his relationship with the animals that is deeper than, say, Jane Goodall’s with her primates. A better venue for the story would have been a historical fiction magazine, such as Sundial Magazine (https://sites.google.com/view/sundial-magazine/home). Not reviewed.