Welcome to another Fantasy Art Wednesday! Get inspired each week as fun fantasy artwork is combined with a writing prompt to get your creative juices flowing.

It has been a long, exhausting day of walking through harsh mountain terrain. You’re cold, hungry, your muscles are aching, and the sun is about to set. Suddenly you come upon this place, nestled onto the top of a nearby peak. The windows are lit up with a friendly glow, and there is smoke rising from the chimney. The musk of burning wood that carries on the wind makes you long for warm, dry clothes, and a hot meal. But this is a strange place to live, remote and barren, with no good place to grow food, keep livestock, or even hunt for game. Who lives there, and how do they survive in this harsh climate?

When I saw this image, it instantly made me think of my short story about Delevan, a young man whose village was destroyed by wyverns (sometime in my world’s extensive history). Salvaged from the wreckage was an important tome, and Delevan was entrusted to deliver it to a monastery in the mountains for safekeeping. The journey was not a simple one, and he met an unexpected danger on the way…But that is only one possible story. What’s yours?

(Artist Juan C. Barquet)

Welcome to another Fantasy Art Wednesday! Get inspired each week as fun fantasy artwork is combined with a writing prompt to get your creative juices flowing.

This enchanting village seems like something you might stumble upon while lost in a deep forest, just as dark is descending, and you’ve given up all hope of finding your way out again. Otherwise everyone would know about it, and there is an undeniable secrecy about this place.

So the question is, who lives here? The warm lights and the beauty of the architecture seem welcoming enough, placed there by a race with obvious intelligence and skill. Could be elves I suppose, or fairies…but that’s a bit too predictable, don’t you think? This is fantasy, so your imagination’s the limit…

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“Tree House Forest” by RealNam

Welcome to another Fantasy Art Wednesday! Get inspired each week as fun fantasy artwork is combined with a writing prompt to get your creative juices flowing.

As soon as I saw this image, I knew it would have to be featured. Does this not scream out “fantasy quest” to you? The abandoned, half-buried structure with a hole in the roof…light shining down on that misplaced tree…golden sparkles lifting off of it to follow the sunbeam? This would be one of those magical events so typical of fantasy, that comes about only on a certain day of the year, when the sun is in just the right position, and just the right person comes along to witness the event. What are those bright, golden orbs? Is it a magical effect, or maybe even something living–tiny creatures we’re too far away to see properly. Maybe instead of rising up from the tree, they are descending onto it. What has led up to this moment, and what is going to happen once it has passed? I’m not quite sure what those bundles are under the tree, but I’ll bet you have an idea of what they could be in the story that is already forming in your mind. All you have to do now is write it down.