The fantasy genre tends to be violent. By its very nature, there are usually swords, sorcery, monsters, and dragons… or at least some variety thereof (although to be fair, fantasy is an adaptable genre which can handle non-violent tales, but these are the exception). Where there are warriors, there will be battle and where there is battle, there will be dying. Probably.

One question any author has to consider when telling a story that includes combat is the level of death. I see four basic gradations, though the lines between them can be blurry. On one end of the spectrum, we have stories with little or no death. Death only happens when it is absolutely necessary for the plot or among vague and faceless masses. I’m trying to think of good examples of this and none are perfect though perhaps C.S. Lewis comes the closest. This variety of story is most common in children’s fiction and, to a lesser degree, young adult.

The next step up the spectrum is when authors want to insert a greater level of realism, yet still want it to remain in the background. Those who die are drawn from a pre-selected pool of killable characters. While perhaps not ‘faceless masses,’ these characters live primarily to die. A classic example are the “red shirts” of the original Star Trek series. If you see a character in a red shirt, their days are probably numbered. Death among the major characters, like in the first step, is almost unheard of except where it is critical for the plot.

The third step takes this a bit further. Major characters are vulnerable to death along with the ‘faceless masses’ of step one and the ‘killable pool’ of step two. The key difference here, though, is that for the major characters to die, their deaths must be meaningful. They are never random or arbitrary. This concept of meaning often applies to the ‘killable pool’ of secondary characters, too, though not always. Most traditional fantasy belongs in this region including J.R.R. Tolkien and Robert Jordan.

The final step is growing in popularity today and includes such authors as George R. R. Martin and Steven Erickson. Nobody is safe. Ever. Even the greatest hero, your beloved character that you’ve followed for several books, can be struck down by a wayward arrow. Never relax, trust no one, least of all the author because fate is fickle and doom is nigh.

These are all viable methods of storytelling, but each is often geared toward a particular audience and what they look for in a story. As mentioned above, the first step is focused more toward young readers while I doubt any children’s or young adult books would leap all the way to the final step. The level of dying also relates to “The Authorial Promise.” Very early on, an author will make a subtle promise to the reader as to what kind of story they’re telling and, if they kill (or don’t kill) outside the bounds of what they’ve promised, the reader is likely to be disgusted. Readers who want raw violence and trepidation in their stories will, because of this subtle promise, usually know to steer clear of C.S. Lewis while those who don’t want rampant arbitrary death and disfigurement won’t pick up Martin.

For myself, I like the third step. I can put up with the first and last steps only in small doses. This is because the first step is too unrealistic for me while the last step is usually devoid of hope. I read for hope and justice as I discussed in a recent article “Words that have Inspired Me.” The last step rarely offers either of these.

Yet even the third step can be a challenge. It is realism without the arbitrary and that means that good characters, characters you’ve come to love, must die. I can easily rattle off a half-dozen or more characters in “Tears from Iron” that I wish had lived, yet they had to die for the sake of the story. In some of my looks at characters “Behind the Pages” I’ll discuss this in greater detail. Sometimes these deaths were necessary for the impact they had on Vistus or Ninanna’s character journey or on the plot arc. Often they reinforced one theme or another. Sometimes they were necessary because I had to show that combat wasn’t clean. When two sides march onto the battlefield, some won’t leave it and it can’t always be the faceless ‘red shirt’ who dies. Not if you are going to weep for the fallen.

And I’ll let you in on a little secret… when I was writing “Tears from Iron”, I didn’t know if Vistus would survive the ending or not. Haven’t read the book yet? You’ll have to in order to discover the answer.