A Broken Pact
Community Rating
Description
All living things have needs that must be met if they desire their life to continue. Such needs range from the universal requirement for sustenance, to the more specific, such as the requirement of all higher life to sleep, or even the esoteric, such as the requirement of a pain demon to inflict suffering. The ability to exploit those needs is what separates, to pick a random example, a successful summoner from the shrivelled (but very happy) corpse that had, a few minutes earlier, conjured up a succubus with no plan of how to control her.
The Cruithia Kingdom is well known by its neighbours (or at least, by the subset of them thataren'tcarbonised silhouettes) for exploiting such needs to bring a shining example of the world's apex predator under their control. For the past hundred years, anyone daring to encroach on the kingdom's territory has found themselves faced, very briefly, by a dragon.
But perhaps 'control' isn't quite the right word, and it's that very dragon that the kingdom's betrayed crown princess is going to need to convince to aid her if she ever wants her position back. A creature of selfishness and pride, evil by any human standard, and yet occasionally steerable by those who know the correct levers.
Not that convincing the dragon to help her take back her kingdom is her primary concern. That accolade goes to the need to convince the dragon not to eat her. Again.
This is a short story (8 chapters/17k words) about a betrayed princess and an evil dragon. Neither has a particularly great time.
Published here and scribble hub. If you see this anywhere else, it's stolen.
Information
- Status
- Completed
- Year
- 2023
- Author
- cathfach
Royal Road Stats
- Rating
- 4.6/ 5.0
- Followers
- 252
- Views
- 31,240
Chapters(8 total)
Reviews
No reviews yet. Be the first to share your thoughts!
Community Reviews(10)
- clearmuseRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0Wonderful brief story. Slightly dark arcs, but even in chapter one there's five characters each showing different motivations through their actions. That's kind of amazing for a tiny little story! And they aren't all main characters or anything.
Strong recommendation if you can put up with some mildly dark themes, nothing explored too deep out disturbingly, in my opinion. - RaiethRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0I'm so glad I started trawling through the back catalogue of Cathfach's finished works.
This is a delightful subversion/'what if?' story about dragons and princesses and I'm very glad I checked it out. It's not super serious, but thinks through it's premise logically and with a hint of mischief.
Worth reading if you have a spare hour or two. - aguydRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0It's always fun to read a Cathfach story and this one doesn't disappoint. A Broken Pact weaves a tapestry of competing interests. There's a long-term tension between the various factions, with that equilibrium being by a coup. Because every character/faction's interests feels well-reasoned and justified, it's clear that reaching a satisfying resolution will be challenging. As a result, the final resolution to the story is immensely satisfying.
- GoldenredDragonRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0This story is both horrifying and hilarious. Classic cathfach where the MC gets the story handed to them and sorta deals with it. Over the top narrative arc, but rightfully great!
If you’ve enjoyed an of their other works, this one is a short and fun read. And if you haven’t, then read this and then read the rest! - HamstaRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0There's a dragon, a princess, and knights but it is not a typical dragon kidnapping princess story. A tale of how a bunch of dysfunctional humans take matters into their own hands only to have hilarity ensue. Story is complete and can be finished in a day. Recommend the read. Read on to the end, it probably does not end the way you would expect.
- HyrielRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0I think I read this once before, it felt very familiar. Anyhow, weird and dark, but funny and a good ending. Humans are overrated. I don't really have much to say about this one, it's at the bottom of my imaginary list ranking your stories though, sorry. I'll have to wait til later to keep reading them though, it's high time I slept. Thanks for the giggles and dopamine, wordsmith!
- InnocentWeebletRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0Absolutely amazing!
This is an exceptional story, build upon a unique idea. The pacing is perfect, the story is only 8 chapters(7+epilogue) long and that's all that was needed. It took less than 10 chapters to create fleshed out characters, clearly different from ones found in other works. The fiction contains dark elements but handles them extraordinarily well, they fit in perfectly with the narrative and is in no way jarring.
It was a great reading experience with every chapter being well written, exciting and without grammatical errors. - MK bk-201Royal Road★★★★★ 5.0This is a great short story than pulls a twist in a typical story of a dragon kidnapping a princess (if you count being sacrificed as a kidnap), its darker than one would expect and it had an interesting development, being a short story it will take little of your time to read so i reccomend doing so.
- DupiRoyal Road★★★★ 4.0It was a good short read. It took me a while to process the story, but that end was unexpected so it kept me going until the end. I like the fact you went straight into the focus of the chapters rather than just prolong it, so for readers like me who just want to get to the point can immediately get to it.
- EltrionRoyal Road★★★★ 3.5A quick story, with a complete story arc, without any glaring flaws. However, novellas of this length generally need a big idea to set them apart. Characters are a bit thin just due to time constraints, so memorabilty needs to come in the form of a big question.
In this case, the big ideas seems to be that horrifying cruelty is possible when healing magic is cheap and accessible, and power vacuums are often messy.
The ideas in this story aren't really revolutionary and have been done better elsewhere. This combined with the shortness, and fairly generic fantasy setting, mean that there is not a lot memorable about it.
Though for some reason, there's a part on me that feels like this story reads a little like the script of a straight to VHS 80s fantasy movie. One that a few people remember fondly, but without any lasting cultural impact.
If that sounds like your idea of a good time, and you just want to read a short story about a princess and a dragon, with some simple political drama, this fits the bill.
Do note that it is definitely written with an adult audience in mind.
It is quite violent and makes references to female masturbation and dragon penis. And it is implied that the princess spends the second half of the story nude, due to resurrection magic not restoring clothing.
It doesn't do anything wrong, and doesn't waste your time, so if you're not expecting anything from it, it's an okay read.