After the Dragon... new fiction

Writing a sequel to a fairy tale is a hard act to pull off but in our latest story – After the Dragon – Tobias Backman manages it perfectly. As for his bio, he writes: Tobias Backman used to hate cliffhangers until... Find out what happened next and more at www.tobybackman.wordpress.com


After The Dragon
by Tobias Backman

The knight had found the secret lair, slain the dragon, and, despite burns and bleeding wounds, he’d rescued the princess, dragged her out of the cave seconds before it collapsed. 

That should’ve been the hard part. From then on it was just marry the princess, inherit half the kingdom, and happily ever after. But nobody had warned him how much of a bother the princess was – eighteen years old and never heard the word no. Nobody had told him how hard it was to rule a kingdom: dodging arrows and training with sword and shield nine hours a day was nothing compared to managing inbred nobles and peasants who thought pigs a legitimate currency. 

He probably should’ve asked himself, though, who was inheriting the other half of the kingdom. He should’ve wondered if there wasn’t a younger sibling, a prince who became sole heir when his sister was gone, a prince with a massive grudge now that his plans had been foiled. And he probably should’ve wondered if the prince wasn’t the type who’d poison his own family to get rid of a few obstacles. 

​Taking in the scene of his in-laws and wife sprawling with their faces planted in their soup, his own throat itching and burning, and the prince grinning at him from across the table, he definitely should’ve asked the cook who’d been helping out in the kitchen lately.