Suggestions for running an effective writing group

Like many here, I'm sure, I've wanted to write a novel since I was maybe 12. Every time I'd gotten an idea, I had tried to run with it, got no where, and set it aside.

5 years ago, I finally wrote an intro to a novel that I actually want to make. I consider this the best prose I've ever written, but it's really short, just over 700 words. After a lot of brainstorming and trying other scenes, I gave up again.

I guess seeing the uproar against generative AI got me thinking about the novel again, so I pulled it out and tried to keep working. This time I'm really trying to stick to the advice of "just write" and get a draft done.

But that's still a problem. I'm averaging like 100 words a week, man. I have an idea, toy around with it on the page a bit, and then go through a lot of effort to barely move the needle. I will never finish at this rate, but I don't want to admit defeat again.

What are some other tips and tricks for writing a lot faster?

Hello fellow writers!

Your critiques and criticisms have been super valuable, and I feel like each time I go back to work on my story, it gets better---but only with your help.

Please read through it and give me honest feedback. This is the revised version of Chapter One; last time I was given feedback, the critique was that I assumed too quickly that my characters matter and that I've been introducing too many concepts too quickly, so I needed to just slow down.

I think this chapter strikes a good balance.

Please let me know your thoughts; I'm not really looking for line level stuff. More I want to know about pacing / emotional resonance / and the desire to read the next chapter.

All feedback is helpful---even if it's just to tell me it sucks, and the part where you stopped reading. Thank you!

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CHAPTER ONE - AVON

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. I’ve been sitting here for hours agonizing over whether to keep this narrative, scrap it completely, or just polish it a bit. That’s why I came to this subreddit.

I’m open to any advice and will follow your feedback 100%. no, 150%. If someone thinks this is garbage and tells me to delete it, I will.

While I was briefly jotting down what had just happened in my notebook, Mark’s mention of koryo in Kara-Tur suddenly brought this topic to mind. How could they use the exact same units of measurement as Earth, and even the same names for alcohol? They use miles, feet, inches, and yards, and use words like whiskey and beer for drinks. Could this world be something someone made up? Am I in a coma right now? Is this all an illusion?

I lay back and pressed both hands to my face, thinking it through. Kara-Tur is an Asian-style region, but out of all its lands, only the nation of koryo shares its name with Earth's ancient Koryo. So, I suppose you could chalk it up to coincidence. after all, ancient eras like the Three Kingdoms or a country like Japan don't exist there. And then another thought occurred to me: since the imperial system was based on intuitive bodily measurements, sooner or later, someone else was bound to come up with the exact same thing. The same goes for the names of alcohol. Sharing the same names might not be a coincidence either; it could simply happen by chance.

Besides, these people aren't mere NPCs. They are breathing, fully functioning people living lives of their own. Does a TRPG chronicling these adventures in Faerûn exist on Earth? If one does, and we took someone from Faerûn, like a wizard, or even a god and showed it to them, would it throw their self-identity into chaos?

No one would ever be able to answer any of these questions. Not Elminster, not the books in Candlekeep, not even Shemeshka. If I kept obsessing over things like this, people would start treating me like a lunatic, and I'd actually go crazy myself, so I decided to completely erase it from my mind. Of course, erasing it from my mind doesn't actually make it go away. Unless, perhaps, by the power of magics. Either way, what could I even do about it? I just have to roll with it.

Then, a thought suddenly flashed across my mind. I remembered that back when I first learned Common languages by looking through a vocabulary book, the pronunciation and spelling of everything—from basic grammar, units of measurement, drinks, and alcohol, to nouns and verbs referring to houses or people—were different. I recalled that the magical necklace and ring that used to translate for me (though I’ve since discarded them), as well as the translation tattoo now etched on my arm, were actually converting everything into a language I understood.

To think it took me this long to realize that. Magic was always fascinating yet bizarre. Fortunately, I could safely drop the thought of losing my mind. Dwelling on such stray thoughts made me feel like Harry DuBois. with all the different voices in my head talking back and forth and arguing with each other.

posting my first writing piece is very nerve cracking, tell me the gaps in my little blurt of a peice, tell me where the atmosphere, storyline and description gets weak or vague; if you’re generous enough sprinkle a little advice in there for me too!! This writing attempt was referenced by the instrumental of Bjork's piece Play Dead.

The chaotic, corrupt world went quiet. The ever impending constant stimuli was withdrawn, replaced by an engulfing fiend of wrath, revenge and pure melancholy. I am certain something in me perished that night, left to rot and decompose the blissful innocence and purity that wrapped me tenderly, similar to a baby hugged by its mothers warmth and devotion to protect her little one from the evil that creeps upon the naive.

I did try to shed the spite that remains in me, truly I did. Yet his venom is concentrated. Zealous. Parasitic.

He was my Lucifer. My serpent under’t. The one who made me swallow poison willingly.

That night haunts me. Haunts my sanity, my slumber and the fragments of benevolence I scramble to make me the slightest more sufferable. It is pathetic. His amber eyes were pathetic. His pale vampire-like skin was pathetic. His slender and tall figure was pathetic. His charming enchanting smile was the most pathetic of them all. It hypnotises you, leaves you in a daze of negligence. Reminds you the devil isn’t a man with horns and crimson skin, but the fallen angel filled with rage and arrogance that was beautifully decorated with pink flushed cheeks, luscious dark hair and a glare that’ll burn a hole through your swollen heart. 

I was left with nothing but the disturbance of my own burden of a heart. Beating. Pulsating. I heard nothing but thumps of agony and fractures of my cardiac organ. It was orchestral, a symphony of successful deception. Otherworldly, the way time was sluggish, leaving me to relish the bitter moments of realisation, to fathom it was all a fib. 

His dominance and hubristic nature laced his posture. He held and whirled the amber liquid that accompanied the murmurs of Gnossienne number one, scanned the room as he often does, adjusted the collar of his sleek white shirt and tugged on the side of his raven velvet tux jacket as she comes closer. Her wine red lips perching a coy smile, elegant in the way she struts towards him yet domineering. There’s a thick seductive chemistry that altered the tension of the room. It draped and tightened around the base of my neck, it was suffocating, unbareable, a glimpse of forbidden disloyalty.

His smile carved so deeply into his face, dimples itched so immensely it whispered lust. Pure ecstasy in the way he chuckled and planted a small step closer towards her, to abolish distance, to cut the ruby ribbon that wrapped around us, that held us tight. His eyes were indulgent at the sight of her, drinking in her presence and effortless delicacy. 

the purpose of this piece was to provide clarity and show a clear sense of trajectory within my story, as that seemed to be my weakest area ,as well as abandoning very flowery vocabulary. please be brutual in critique of this , where the story gets weak, where i loose you as a reader, whats vague or too much!! every response is taken forward into my new writing peices, give me , a young writer, your noble knowledge. This was my previous piece that i rewrote - https://www.reddit.com/r/fantasywriters/s/YGr5r3lej4

The walls were painted a lavish cream. The ceilings were high, decorated with whirls and swirls of gold paint. The crystal chandelier dangled its precious pendants over the guests heads. The dining room of the Berkeley’s was filled with foolishly rich men and their fabulous wives. Women were dolled up. Dressed in beautiful gowns, hair in perfect luscious waves and updos. Pearls and diamonds decorated their delicate wrists, earlobes and collarbones. Men stood straight and hubris, they huffed and puffed on their cigars while they chuckled about the stock markets. Their tuxedos trapped the smell of burnt cigars and champagne in its delicate vicuña fibers. That night was a truly jubilant night, cheers of couples and clinks of tall glasses, it was a sight to behold. A night I will forever remember but not for the simple fact I enjoyed hearing pampered women giggle and flirt all night. But for the fact it was the night my Prince Charming was no longer charming. The man I once knew and loved so immensely, became the man I held so much resentment for. The man that trashed our tender love, and replaced it with lust for another woman. That night was the night my life struck midnight. 

It all began to unravel when the snobbish guests no longer seemed interesting or pleasant as they looked. It became repetitive . The same cynical remarks. The same smug chuckles. It was exhausting to feign interest at that point. And so I decided to go on a stroll and find the man that’s matching my emerald dress with his pocket square. Quietly intimate. A quiet symbol of our love. Or so I foolishly thought.

I still recall the way my heart was pulsating.Thumping.Pounding. It felt as if it was going to pounce out my chest. Yet I was stuck. My mouth was dry. My eyes were teary. My ears were blocked. All my senses were clouded by the realisation that my picture perfect husband was having an affair.

He stood there arms draped over her. His large figure concealing her sultry identity, just like the lingering secrecy laced in the air with their treachery; they were in a well furnished guest room. Simplistic in its layout, a king sized bed stood in the middle of the grand room while ruby red duvet sheets laid on top of the golden framed bed, it was accompanied with a french styled headstand, with golden handles. A crack between the red draped curtains allowed the moonlight to shine light on my husband’s sin. It was in fact him. Not some lousy man that can’t control himself. But the man I vowed my life to. 

The tension between them, the thickened air. It realised my presence and swiftly suffocated me with the consequences of the truth. The consequences of my husband’s indulgence of sin. It was unbearable. It wrapped around my neck squeezed tighter and tighter. I gasped for air. The sensual romantic tension between them snapped. It was no longer intimate secrecy, but the grotesque and lewd reality of adultery. 

His head snapped back at me. His eyes widened, they met my watery eyes. I couldn’t hold it in any longer, tears streamed down my face. His face turned blue. He looked like he was going to throw up. I began to sob as the woman became frantic, leaping to justify why my husband’s hands were wrapped around her. I ran out of the room. To preserve a slither of my dignity. To preserve a crumb of my devotion for my man. I knew there was no coming back from this.

He rid himself of his other woman. Pushed her off him. Rejected her dainty hands that were detailed with almond red nails and a diamond ring. His head spun mercilessly, he knew this was as bizarre as it looked. Clutched and shook his head in attempts to rid himself of remorse so he could think of how he could have preserved your marriage. His eyes and cheeks were flushed as he chased out the room, in hopes of redemption.

Hey y’all, writing about a werewolf/lycanthrope/therianthrope setting and seeking some media inspiration to get in the mindset, does anyone have any suggestions? I have tried to research the topic and found monster anatomy and wikis on abilities, but I’m looking for stories, and those are getting hard to find in the AI hellscape. Bonus points if it’s about a group or tribe of werefolk or about non-wolf shapeshifters.

Happy Halloween to you all!

—
For those interested in the context, I’m writing about a werefolk tribe in a setting where therianthropes were actually the first mortal species created by the gods, and regular mortals came after that as sort of a mockery of their kind.

I’m shooting for a mentality amongst the tribe of a sort of blend between Norse and Native American philosophies.

So as the title says, I’ve had an idea for a fantasy story for a while. I’ve tried to write it before in a more traditional fantasy format and struggled to get going.

I recently finished DCC and it gave me the inspiration to try it again but in a litRPG style setting and it has just clicked and feels like it’s writing itself this time.

I’m struggling a bit with imposter syndrome, like who do you think you are trying to write a book lol.

Anybody else had this?

Also can’t shift the feeling of potentially I’m writing something that will never be read by anybody else ever which make it feel kinda pointless but I’m enjoying it and hours of evening seem to disappear without me noticing.

Any body been here before? Success stories, inspiration & advice all would be appreciated

English is notoriously poor at telling the reader how the word is supposed to be pronounced and I keep running into a big when coming up with names in fantasy settings. I understand that there are some people that don't mind not really knowing the exact pronunciation of these words and authors who only focus on making the names distinguishable, but I really focus on knowing that my readers have a good chance of approximating what I hear in my head.

I'm starting from a rough spot too, since I draw most of my inspiration from Thai culture and mythology. Now, Thai has a standard for transliteration, but I find it really bad at telling people how the words are supposed to sound. Example: Suvarnabhumi Airport should be pronounced Soo-Wa-Na-Poom. Now from that example, you can see that barring sounds that simply don't exist in standard English, I could spell the words as phonetically as possible.

But this runs into another issue: the word don't look pretty.

If I wanted to make Soowanapoom more sleek, it would be something like Suwanapum, but those u's are ambiguous and most readers would pronounce it as "uh".

Pulling from a Laos example. Lan Xang is the name of a historical kingdom. It should be pronounced/written like Lahn Chahng, with the "AH" sound like the doctor is checking your tongue. And that spelling just looks atrocious. I also think the X is must cooler looking than "Ch" but it is misleading to the reader on how to say it.

So I'm hoping to get some ideas on how other people approach this issue when trying to balance pronunciation and the creative source.

My "outline" looks like this: 3 or 4 characters or character ideas, a general description of what I have in my world as of right now, how I want my story to begin and end, then a whole list of various inspirations. I may put in a section of things I scrapped from the book in case I get writer's block.

Right now the story structure of my outline looks like this:

Chapter Start:

Middle:

Chapter End:

I feel like an outline like this would help the pacing of the book a little through not getting carried away with certain descriptions

I have yet to do any research on the topics I wanna talk about in my book and also have yet to read that much as I'm trying to get back into reading so I can make my book. In the meantime, I'll just put random ideas into the ideas file and develop worldbuilder's disease until I've read a lot (maybe 150 books or something) cause its not like I'll be ready to write anytime soon.

I've had the idea for this world in the back of my head for a while (it started out with one character and I went from there), so I finally decided to put it into words to help me fully flesh it out. I've already been writing my own music OSTs for characters and certain scenes, so I figured I should try to illustrate the scenes I see in my head through writing as well.

It's going to be split narratively into two parts. The first part that this chapter is from will be a bit calmer, but there will be turmoil brewing under the surface that gets explored by the journey the two main characters go on. The 2nd part is where it turns into more of a dark fantasy story, so I think that's the subgenre it falls under, but someone can correct me if I'm wrong (I'm still not fully versed on all the possible fantasy subgenres).

Please let me know what parts of what I have so far you like and which parts you dislike! It'll help me know what to do more of in the future as well as what to avoid.

(also pretty please tell me any grammar errors I missed)

This isn't related to the writing, but if anyone has advice on how to make better posts asking for advice and how to upload writing to Reddit in general, feel free to share that as well. I'm brand new to both, so I've found myself struggling to find the best way to upload pictures of the writing without it being blurry or hard to read.

I wrote this story recently that's a bit of a different take on the werewolf/werecreature trope, set in a Germanic inspired magical city. I'm pretty proud of it but am having some trouble placing it due to length, so before I revise or just look further for publications, I'd love your feedback! Even if you just want to read the first page, first five pages or whatever amount you're interested in, I'd definitely appreciate any amount of eyes on it. It's meant to be a social social commentary/mystery about what exactly the MC's plan is, and I'd really love to know if those elements, as well as the prose in general, work for you.

The full text is in a comment below

In my head, or when speaking, I can come up with ideas and plots and characters and dialogue all day long. But, I’ve noticed that for some reason the moment I sit down at a blank computer, I can’t think of anything to type at all. I have an extreme difficulty with letting a first draft be messy or incomplete in the way that they normally are, and find myself attempting to type the final polished version the very first time around. This leads me to not typing anything at all since you usually have to have something to go off of to edit into its final form.

I’ve recently started to audio record my ramblings, then have those transcribed and organized into story beats, and then do a second recording of the actual novel using the story beats as a guide. That way I can have a rough draft down, which then gives me something to build off of and edit.

Looking for critique on the start of my potential book from a dream . (Fantasy unsure of subgenre at this stage.I'm really new at this so please don't be cruel. All Criticism is welcome, Thanks so much in advance. This is my first time trying to turn my ideas into something, I don't think it's great or really anything good so far honestly but thought I would ask for advice and what people think, as I know there are a lot of established writers here, and have seen some great advice be given in the past to people. So I'm hoping I can get the same from everyone who will take the time to look.

Again thanks so much guys sorry for the long post with attached writing it made me write a 125 word post :)

I tried posting earlier.It said I didn't format it correctly, so hopefully I got it right this time. This is the first chapter of a book I just recently started to seriously work on. I'm still in the early stages, so it's pretty rough and there's alot of stand ins where I haven't named people or things yet. I'd appreciate any criticism but I'd also love any motivation you guys could give me to keep working on it. Anyways, here's my first chapter. [Edit: I polished it up a bit and formatted the paragraphs a bit better.]

Navarii's eyes followed the tamri monkeys, leaping between the branches of their enclosure, a series of nets held up between purposely planted trees. Their orange fur almost looked as golden as her eyes in this light as they catapulted themselves from one end of their cage to another, like acrobats performing for an audience. Navarii picked a slice of a peach out of her breakfast, and offered it to one of them, the oldest one. He bared his teeth at her, showing his broken canine, before accepting her offering through the net. Hopefully she didn't ruin his appetite enough for his caretaker to notice. She ate the last of her fruit, and gulped the last bit of lassi from the fine ceramic bowl.

“See you later old man,” she said to the small monkey before walking back towards the [building for housing the small animals collection]. She passed a wheel barrow full of various animal refuse and considered throwing the bowl in it. She caught herself, remembering it wasn't a disposable gourd.

Teams of animal keepers made their way past her, nodding with a “princess” or “your grace”. She crossed a living bridge from one artificial island to another, while the wind blew through the branches growing out of it. Everything here was man-made she thought, even if it looked like it grew out of the ground on its own. She walked through the arch of the [small animal hall], two tree trunks bending towards each other, fused at the apex, then continued as one tree.

She walked down a hall of glass jars hanging from the ceiling at eye level, some of them as big as her. She looked at their inhabitants, each one home to a different kind of frog or lizard hiding. [The jars have soil and plants. A comparison of these living ecosystems is made with the larger city outside. People also live in plants essentially.] Navarii looked up at the dust dancing between beams of light, directed by reflective pipes from the light outside, shining down on the rooms residents.

Navarii entered a domed room, filled with larger enclosures. Cages and jars too large to hang from the ceiling lined the walls, in the center, an enormous wire cage, multicolored finches flitting between branches of a full grown tree, covered in pink flowers. Navarii's attention came to a large jar by the wall, sitting on a table of tree roots coming out of the floor between a similar jar of little red fish and a brass cage with a large green bird sitting on a perch.

“You replaced it!” she called to [animal keepers name].

She walked up to the clear vessel, where one cracked by tree roots growing into it sat days ago. “It wasn't cheap either… princess,” he said. “The glass blowers were able to salvage the original jar luckily.”

Navarii peered into the large orb, looking past bubbles trapped in the glass at the most unremarkable lizards.

“The plants are pretty at least,” she remarked.

“Yes, but the geckos are the star,” [keeper] said a little defensively.

“But they're so… brown. Do they glow at night or something?” she wondered.

“Umm… no… your grace. But!” He brightened up. “They were found by [explorer] on [islands on southern coast] a couple of years back. And, they seem to reproduce without males. Anyone of them will lay fertile eggs, even separated from the group.”

Navarii's curiosity piqued.

“Well that's kind of weird.”

“Yes! [Explorer] named them the Queens geckos, after you and her majesty's ancestry..”

Navarii looked from one gecko to a the next, something was… wrong? off? strange about them.

“But.. the queens all have father's, just like anyone else,” she corrected him, her eyes fixed on the tiny reptiles.

“Well… I guess [explorer] fancies himself a poet,” [keeper] answered.

“Yeah… I suppose…” Navarii trailed off.

“Are these all siblings?” she questioned. “Like twins.”

He looked at her curiously.

“Some of them… maybe. There's several generations in there. They reproduce quickly.”

[he asks if she wants to feed them, she keeps asking about their genetics basically.]

“I have to go, I'm sitting for my portrait in a few hours,” Navarii groaned. “Can one of you make sure this gets back to the kitchen,” she said, handing him the iridescent bowl.

“Of course, princess, [girl in kitchen] has some ducks for the big cats.”

Navarii headed towards the palace, covering her ears as she walked down a hall of screaming birds before exiting the [small animal hall] through another arch of shaped trees. She followed the paths, every root bridge and island getting older as she got closer to the palace, until she reached a smaller side entrance and passed between two guards. She trekked through the dimly lit labyrinth of trees and stones, the oldest building in the city, probably the world. Navarii inhaled, the smell of cypress resin from the trees that made up the walls and pillars of the structure and smoke from oil lamps and incense filled the corridor. An improvement from monkey shit she thought.

As she reached the more used areas, fresh bouquets of flowers lined the walls. Windows of mosaic colored glass let in kaleidoscopic light. She walked through a room where every surface was covered in spider silk tapestries, alabaster reliefs, and portraits of long dead people.

She finally reached her room and shut the door behind her. I'm going to have to start accepting rides from the palanquin she thought as she kicked off her shoes. The fireplace was burning, with a large vessel of water beginning to steam, a large copper tub in front of it, with the chair that's usually there moved across the room. Why, she thought.

She passed a table with a bottle of wine that the servants kept replacing, despite her never touching it, stepping out on the balcony. She looked out across the city, only the neat rows of canals and plumes of smoke rising from the canopy of trees revealed its engineered nature. Navarii daydreamed about the busy streets and canals below, the boats ferrying cardamom and pepper to markets, vendors selling grilled eggplant on skewers, half nude medicants begging for whatever scraps of food the devout will give them.

A knock on her door brought her back to reality.

“Not one minute alone,” she muttered through gritted teeth. “Come in!”

Several maids poured through the door, carrying a collection of silk gowns and assorted regalia.

“You can come in now,” one of them called through the door, and two young men carried a table in. “Right there,” [head maid] said as they sat it in the middle of the room before arranging jewelry on it.

The other maids put together a similar display of the dresses, as the two men left.

I hope they're not coming back with more furniture Navarii thought.“Is this all?” Navarii asked, walking around the table.

“We could bring more jewelry from the vault…” [head maid] said.

Navarii almost threw herself in front of the door."That won't be necessary, [head maid].”

[Navarii complains that she could have walked to the palace baths before she takes her bath. She receives way more help bathing than she'd like. She wants less scents “no one will smell me through the portrait.” there's incense that smells like burnt sugar and exotic spices. She sits for her portrait. She doesn't enjoy it.]

I've been diligently working on this for over a month now. I've had several friends read it and give criticism. I've been proofreading it over and over. I've double checked definitions and made sure each sentence is clear to a level that I feel should connect to the reader. But I can be wrong! So please tell me if something does not make sense. Unless I'm about to paste some other story by mistake, every sentence is intentional. So please enjoy the first chapter of my story. I'm currently doing some world building and thinking about Melesat and the supporting characters so that the second chapter can really pop. My heart eagerly awaits your rending critiques!

* * * * * * * * * * *

A grey evening rain pattered on a small shack at the village edge. The sign on the door marked it: fortune teller. Its wind-stirred clattering could be heard from inside. A young girl, maybe near her 20th year of life, sat on the floor, flipping tarot cards onto the low, oval-shaped table in front of her. She muttered to herself as if trying to commit something to memory.

A knock on the door lifted her attention away from her activity. "Who goes?" she called.

The voice of a young man with presence called back, "I'm in need of a fortune teller."

"Aye, ya found one. Enter and first right, past the drape." She deftly collected her cards and set them aside.

The front door echoed into the narrow hallway with the sound of bootsteps finding their way. A gloved hand reached into the candlelit room and pushed the drape aside as the man ducked his hooded head under the line holding it.

"Sir, welcome!" The fortune teller beamed. "Quite the weather to be seeking fortune, but I'm glad to have ya. And out of that rain, too. Wouldya some tea?"

Mindful of the two swords at his hip, he maneuvered to not knock anything in the somewhat tight room. "No need." He raised a gentle hand of protest. "But the kindness is valued." He sat on the opposing side of the oval table, cross-legged. His long cloak strewn behind him.

"Quite well, then. What mystical service do you seek of the wondrous Eterisia?" A proud giggle slipped past her lips.

He fidgeted to adjust his position on the sitting pillow and lowered his hood. "I'm actually looking for information."

The girl slumped onto the table in disappointment, her long hair pooling around her. Sheer lace bonnet revealing its hearth-light orange color.

"I can compensate you." His hands raised, as if to ward off potential grumpiness.

Slightly less bruised, she propped her head up in her hand. "What kind of information?" she asked.

"I'm looking for a man."

Eterisia sat up, looking the young man over. He wore a black wool cloak, beaded water dotted about him. A green and white gambeson peeked from the edges of a tannin brigandine. Simple steel vambraces and half greaves. The piecemeal armor did not betray him as a noble. Awash in candlelight, she could see the youth of his face. His hair was a black of The North. Short sides and a week unshaven. With enough on top to grip fingers through. And while he was certainly a bit older than her, something about him intimated more years than he deserved. He was devilishly good-looking with stark hazel eyes. Each flick of the flame turning his earnest gaze into something harsher, colder.

He carried two swords at his belt. One was a minimalistic hand and a half with a simple but artful cross guard and twisted ring guards on either side. The other was not like any sword she had seen before. It was a green of jade, but did not reflect the dim light the way a stone would. It wasn't flat; it seemed to have an octagonal cross-section and fell to a point. Like a large needle with some sort of scrawling on the faces of the blade, or scabbard perhaps, that his body wasn't obscuring. It had no guard and the pommel at the end of the long handle was a sphere with something wrapping covetously around it.

"Who'd be asking?" she asked, having taken his measure.

"Melesat."

"Melesat, who?"

"Just Melesat."

Eterisia squinted disapprovingly. "Some say a man with no last name is a peculiarity."

"I forgot my family name long ago, young miss." He turned his gaze downward upon saying this. As if apologetic and briefly caught in a memory. "I wish I could offer it to you."

"Who is this man you are after? Is he dangerous?" Eterisia asked.

"Perhaps. I won't know until I have found him." Melesat shrugged, then refocused. "He's a stargazer from Steerport. I hear he comes here to participate in meetings of a sort. I'm not keen on the details, but it seems shady. His name is Alane Chartwell."

Eterisia's eyes widened upon that name.

"Are you familiar? Figured a fortune teller might know something about a stargazer." Melesat proffered.

The fortune teller's lips were still, but her eyes engaged in calculus.

"...Let me see your palm," she decided.

"What for, pray tell?" A perplexed look on Melesat's face.

"If I'm to trust ya do good with this information, I must know your heart. I don't want the weight of guilt on me."

Melesat hesitated a moment in uncertainty but quickly concluded, with a shrug, it was a reasonable request. He removed his left glove and offered his hand palm up. Eterisia took it in her left and reached for a small golden bowl of elegant, religious design from a nearby shelf with her right. She dipped two fingers into it, the light reflecting a liquid of a soft dilute red. Her fingers traced a line across the wrist, excess dripping onto the table. She held a single-handed prayer over his palm and muttered a soft utterance. The liquid on his wrist began to lap and course as if aspiring to be the sea. It thickened and darkened to an opaque crimson and began traveling towards the palm, being selective as to which creases of Melesat's hand to follow. It chose four representing heart, head, life and fate.

Eterisia took his hand firmly in hers and began tracing the life line at the base of the thumb with her own. Her face took on a bewildered expression. "You contain a mighty force of life."

A quick huff of amusement escaped Melesat's nostrils. "Oh yeah?"

"I've never seen a thing like it. Must be overfilled with determination." She smiled.

She moved to the heart line, tracing it slowly. Her brow furrowed at her findings, and she continued on, respectfully.

"...Let's see what fate might have in store for you." Her index finger traced the line from the base of the palm and slowly moved along it towards the fingers. The liquid in Melesat's hand began again to lap and roil. And then bubble and boil. It coalesced into a tendril of red shadow and caressed the fortune teller's finger. Eterisia pulled her hand back in pain as a coil of steam rose from Melesat's hand.

Eterisia reeled from her seated position holding her hand. "Ah-! What is thi-!?" She began to cough and her breath was short as she clutched her chest. Her hands moved for her temples, holding them to stymie the pain. A dark magic began to emanate there, clawing forward to cover her eyes. Her mind was filled with images carved in by some force. She let out a sharp scream and dropped to all fours.

"Are you well!?" asked Melesat, arm extended to offer a hand. "Is there aught I can do for you?"

"Y-you stay away from me!" she cried, her voice strained and choked. "I don't know what you are, but you need to get out!"

"I'm sorry." His eyes pleading. "What about the information?"

"Fuck your information! I said get out of my home! Right now!"

His eyes cast downward in shame; Melesat raised his hood and promptly exited the fortune teller's home back into the rainy night. He walked a few steps and paused. He let out a whimpered groan as he wiped his face. As if to rid himself of embarrassment. A piercing scream sent a shudder up his spine. He looked back at the small home to see a curtain fall back into place. He turned toward the village and plodded his way down the muddy road.

Whatever dark sorceries gripped Eterisia granted her a moment of respite. Upon his exit, she clambered to her feet as rapidly as she could to assure the door was barred. She looked out of the small window to find the man standing, a vague resemblance to the one named Melesat. He was a sad and hollow figure with a darkness about him that hung like a foul odor. Something that could reach her nostrils and into her brain--

A stab of icy pain pierced through her temples again. Eterisia let out a wretched scream and dropped the curtain to grab her head. She willed open her eyes to see him through a gap in the curtain. He remained where he stood, turning to look back at the window.

What was once a handsome and healthy young man was now a man akin to a shade. His once charming hazel eyes now a smoldering phosphor that brimmed over with sorrow. He was a tragedy, mantled by an aura of pure night. A shadow of a man, shorn of joy long ago. Even as he turned to walk towards town, her terror did not fade...

...and the lightning clashed.

Time having passed, Eterisia was freed of her acute affliction and returned to her seat at her table. She retrieved her quill-ink and notary and began to write expeditiously, folding and sealing the note with wax and stamp, then setting it aside.

A deep breath and a sigh, Eterisia leaned back on a collection of pillows and reflected upon the encounter with the man named Melesat. Her fingertip still ached from the burn, and her mind was fogged by exhaustion. She closed her eyes to recollect.

Disturbing images raced through her mind. A small boy, utterly hopeless, having leapt to his death. The sensation of being burned alive. Pain of the body and of the mind that seemed impossible. Eterisia's eyes welled at the thought of anyone having to endure such suffering. But the one emotion that was hers... fear. Fear of that thing. That shadow that wrested itself throughout the man's entire being. Whoever—or whatever—possessing a desire, a selfish infatuation, that clung to him desperately; greedily. Warning her against her trespass.

Eterisia had never experienced something so alarming in the years that she had been divining. It was unsettling, to say the least. But it was behind her now and exhaustion would win her over soon. Despite her excitement at finally procuring dried meat today, she could not bring herself to cook as her eyelids would surely weigh her down. Perhaps the shock of the evening had gotten to her? Mayhap rest would be the best course for now.

In a valiant final effort, she moved about the room blowing out the several candles scattered across it. Then hopped into the small alcove built into the wall, fashioned after a box bed of sorts and nestled herself under the covers. She tried to focus on the rain and the coziness of her bed to force the ghastly events of the evening out of her mind. But it seemed the exhaustion was more than enough to overpower any rumination, and she sank into a deep sleep.

The night went on and the rain continued. Eterisia lay soundly asleep. The howling wind scraped the bushes along the wooden wall of the shack. Between the falling of rain and the rustle of plant life lay a brief, yet pregnant pause. So full, it might carry the regret of several lifetimes. But this time, it offered supplication. A hollow thud of the wooden wall being pierced echoed into the room. A jade point driven through the wall into Eterisia's chest. Blood gushed from her mouth with each attempt to cough and in moments, she lay still.

I wanted to ask what you all use when you’re getting both into the meat and potatoes (the writing) and your surrounding activities like worldbuilding, research, proofreading/editing, etc. This is more on the technical side of things, but also open to any other tools that have helped you flesh out your specific worlds and stories! Here are my own to starts

Writing
- AlphaSmart 3000 for the actual act. I’ve been jonesing for a Freewrite but they’re ridiculously expensive ($250+). I got a secondhand AS3K off of eBay and it has been a TREMENDOUS help. Focus apps and other things for computers simply cannot hold up to my ADHD, so having something that types and nothing else has been a game-changer.

- Scrivener for manuscripts and planning. I also love its mobile app, since I can connect my AS3K to my phone with a USB-C adapter instead of waiting for when I get home.

- The Only Plotting Storybook You’ll Ever Need by T. M. Holladay. Having a structured workbook to help me think through and plan out plots and story threads helps me to keep a solid physical reference.

Worldbuilding
- The Complete World Building Workbook by Tanner Teafatiller, similarly as a guided resource for worldbuilding and notes.

- Right now, I’m using Canvas of Kings for mapmaking. I had some drafts in Inkarnate and Campaign Cartographer 3+, but for the above-mentioned reasons I like having a separate non-browser ecosystem for creative work but CC3 was liquefying my grey matter. CoK is much better optimized for city and dungeon maps, but I’m having fun using it for world maps as well.

- Paint.NET for some visuals, but only really getting my feet wet with it now.

- Trying my hand with some building games to have a way to sketch out vehicle designs with an intuitive editor and physics engine for reference. My world is a low-fantasy dieselpunk world, so most of this has been with Sprocket for tank design. Happy to find/use any others folks recommend.

Research
This is mostly scattershot, but I mainly use quick reference materials from Wikipedia and previous reads. Please feel free to drop some resources for fantasy writers and/or worldbuilders if you use any!

It's honestly quite frustrating. I have LOTS of potential scenes, characters and disjointed ideas floating around in my head, with many themes and deep moments involved as well. But it just feels like that; collections of ideas that I struggle to properly string together into a story.

I can write individual, disjointed scenes of a few hundred or a thousand words just fine. I can even write an entire chapter's worth of words just fine. But even after breaking through the barriers of having to write good prose, following good advice on how to write and format a scene, it seems like I have missed something deeper than that... How to fundamentally structure a story. How to set up the framework for all my ideas so that I can present it as a reasonable course of events that happens chronologically, rather than just whizzing between whatever I like for no reason....

Basically, I suppose I'm having immense trouble actually plotting the story. Likely because, while I know a lot of the characterization and future arcs themselves, I'm still stuck trying to think of the major character motivation that would be the catalyst for Book 1. I suppose that's the answer; I have a massive gaping hole in my character's initial story that I desperately need to address. But uhh, there comes another issue; it feels like I have worldbuilt myself into a dead end.

Basically, I need to find a plausible reason (both in-world/Watsonian and out-world/Doylist) for why the military-raised superhuman young man that my MC is would even attend the magical academy that the story is set in, rather than an actual military academy as all people of his superhuman bloodline would anyways, given their obligation to serve the military for over a decade. Said other academy I mention is the absolute most prestigious academy in the entire damn country, yes, but even so, I feel a consuming need to provide an airtight, ironclad justification for the entire story to even happen. For him to be even in the academy in the first place. Whether it's personal (A desire, or ambition, or attempting to find a way to save/cure someone, or trying to solve a mystery, anything) or externally motivated (Prodded by the military to act as their defacto eyes and ears within the distinctly remote academy, and/or attending the academy as part of a deal between the military & the academy to hand over one of their finest future recruits in exchange for something else...), or a combination thereof.

Do you guys stress this much over trying to build internal justification for how the story might happen? I know the entire question of how to solve my particular issue is a different topic entirely, one that warrants another post, but I'm intrigued in how you guys handle the general problem overall. How do you go about with plotting a fantasy novel/novelette? How hard do you obsess over making everything consistent, and are you fine if it isn't very consistent or ironclad, as long as the story itself is fun/good?

I think today's male protagonists tend to be... handsome, tall, and well-built. (I'm not trying to criticize such protagonists. I like them too, and I even have such characters in my writing.)

I'm wondering about a male protagonist who is skinny, short, and beautiful. He is 20 years old, but only 165cm tall... He is also not skilled with his sword. However, he has the ability to control people's minds through speech (not magic or such things). I have thought about this character for almost 3 years. It's a waste to just throw him away.

I want to hear about your thoughts. Do you think such protagonists are unfamiliar?

Thank you for taking the time to read this! 🫶🏻

Chapter 1: Meeting Freya

A warm spring breeze blew across the gardens Alec had walked by so many times before.  The evergreen forest swayed with wind, while the smell of compost with hints of manure hit his nose. He hoped to catch his daily glimpse of her in the garden.

The waist high brick walls that lined the garden were covered with Ivy that was carefully stopped from spewing over the public sidewalk.  Trellises of vines were starting to grow in the warmth of spring.  The fruit trees in the back corner were starting to bud.  

Most would say the garden was overshadowed by the ornate, white stone walls of the Castle of Aquaria, but to him it was invisible.  

Alec looked for her by the blueberry bushes, but she wasn’t there today.  He wasn’t late, he never was, he always passed by at exactly 8:29 am.  

He thought maybe today would be the day he would stop and say something.  But how would he spark conversation with the beautiful girl working silently in the lavish garden he would never belong in.  

“Maybe compliment her plants,” he thought. He mocked himself  with how he’d sound interrupting her with something so mundane.  

His train of thought broke as he passed the vine trellis and saw her red hair. Her freckled skin glistened as the sun hit it.  Her long red hair fell effortlessly behind her.  She was wearing the long white sleeveless dress she always seemed to wear.  The smears of compost on her hip was clearly visible. 

She stood up and looked over to him, catching his eyes. Her lips turned to a smile.  Her emerald green eyes seemed to pierce into his mind, evaporating any hope of thought and action. He felt his heart drop, his face blush, and looked away continuing on as he always did.  Once again too nervous to interrupt her.  

He had walked this way for years, he didn’t even know her name.  He wasn’t sure why she was there every day in the largest castle in the kingdom, maybe the world.  She did not seem like any princess he’d seen, nothing like Leya of Aquaria.  Maybe she was the gardner? But he thought no way someone so beautiful was just a gardner.

He had spoken to Leya of Aquaria, the beautiful golden haired princess of this very castle just a few months ago. He could manage to talk to her idly, so why couldn’t he do it now?  His memory of talking to Leya played in his mind, trying to bring some semblance of self confidence back into his mind. 

**He had been fetching groceries from the market in the next town over, when Leya walked in with the clanks of her armor.  Her long blue cape trailing behind her.  She had walked by him, and investigated the pyramid of melons.  He had watched her reach for one that was not at the top of the pyramid. Then suddenly the pyramid had collapsed, and they all rolled off the table. He had effortlessly floated all of them down softly on the ground, careful not to be too obvious and make a spectacle. 

His mother would have scorned him for being so reckless as to do this in public for something so mundane. But thankfully no one was paying any attention to the speed of melons falling from a table. 

Leya knelt down to try to gather the melons while batting her cape out of her own way.  He got beside her to help her.  

“I’m sorry, it’s these silly frills they make me wear, I’ve told father I hate them.” She collected as many melons as she could hold.

“It’s alright, none were damaged. I’ll help you put them back.”  

Together they put  the stray melons and put them back on the display. 

“That’s lucky, I’m glad I don’t need to carry all these melons home now.” She looked at him, her eyes lingered for a moment. 

“Good day princess,” He stood, with the last melon in his hand.

Leya smiled at him with her perfect princessly smile and grabbed two as well.  The two of them stood in line and paid the shopkeeper and she waved at him as she left. 

**As he walked away from the garden, he contemplated how he could be normal in front of Leya, but something about this red haired woman made him unable to think straight.  Just a glance from those emerald green eyes made his entire mind go blank and his heart skip beats. He thought for a second about leaping over the walls and walking straight over to her.  What would she do if he just walked up to her and took her in his arms.  His mothers warnings of staying away from others took hold in his thoughts and he kept walking.  

—-
Freya walked over to check to make sure her melon plants that were starting to vine onto the trellis, inspired by the oddly chosen walk down memory lane Alec had as he walked by. As she leaned down her red hair got in her face and she brushed it away spreading a bit of dirt into her hair by accident. 

She loved the idea that she was a mysterious gardener.  Maybe there’s a world where she could run away and have a nice garden, taking him with her, of course. She could be this beautiful mysterious girl in peace with him, and never again feel in such detail what others thought her to be.    

His thoughts grew to a whisper and disappeared as he walked away from the gardens.  She continued with her plants with a light hearted smile on her face enamored with his kind thoughts of her.  Few thought of her in such a kind, soft way.   

She wondered if she would ever feel comfortable walking up and talking to him.  How would she do it? Would she tell him that she knows all of his thoughts already. Would she say, “ You don’t need to worry, just walk up and kiss me.”  Could he even be in the same room as me? She thought.  Her smile faded as her reality overtook her hopeful thoughts.
——---------------------

King Garth stepped outside to see Dr. Everett walking up the long winding path through the tall evergreen trees in front of the Castle of Aquaria.   

He met him at the front door. “Thank you for coming, I know you must have traveled far.”  King Garth stood tall and proud, but Dr. Everett could not help but notice his eyes seemed to hold fear. 

“I came as soon as I got the letter,” Dr. Everett said. “How is she?” He tried to hold back his eagerness.  He had awaited a personal invite to castle for many years.

He had feared his invite may never come after the last time he had been there. He worried the King still was concerned that he had too many sympathies for Terraria’s affairs to be around his daughter. 

But finally, King Garth stood in front of him in his royal armor begging his personal attendance on the matter at hand. 

“It was the worst it’s been in a long time, I thought we were making progress, but,”  The king clamored to explain, his arms seeming to speak with him.  

“Did Dr. Thomas tell you anything before it happened?” 

“He was convinced he could get her to do it at will.” The King said, looking at the ground.  “I knew it was a bad idea, but he convinced me that it would help her if she learned to control it fully, to let it out and hold it back.”

“Is he….dead?” Dr. Everett asked out of more curiosity than concern. He had heard talk of this phenomenon but had yet to see it.  No one had ever been quite clear with him on what exactly “it” was, he only knew it had happened at least twice now, likely more. 

“I don’t think so.  I’m not a doctor.  I have him down in our chambers where we have kept the other ones.  Their hearts still beat, they continue to breathe, but they don’t move.  Allyse, Anna, and I have always thought she breaks their mind if she gets too upset. Much like a piece of glass shattered into little pieces that can never be made whole.  Never able to command the flesh again.”

“Can I see him?”  Dr. Everett asked, fully prepared for the King to be upset he was not more concerned with Freya.

“I’ll take you down there.” The King led the doctor down into the chambers of the Castle, down where he tried his best to hide the worst of this secret from his Kingdom. 

“Anna keeps their bodies alive as long as she can, but overtime they seem to wither away, and then their organs stop.  When death sets in, we bury them.  The longest I’ve seen it take is a year, some seem to go faster.“ The king spoke as they walked down the halls. The conversation that felt out of place in this ornate castle.  

Dr. Everett noticed that it seemed like the castle was devoid of servants now.  The last time he was here there were far more people walking the halls, caretakers, knights, cooks, and other people to make everything move. 

Out of the corner of his eye he caught a familiar face.  She was standing by the fireplace  in one of her floor length red dresses, her long brown hair in a messy ponytail.  Her brown eyes met his from across the room.

“Please you must find a way to bring him back, I worry this is the time she may finally succumb to the belief she is a monster. Please.”  Anna walked towards him looking into his eyes.  She placed her hand on his shoulder. 

“I will help her and Dr. Thomas  as best I can.”  He paused remembering their years together.  He put his hand over top of hers and met her gaze intently. But, without another word he continued with the King.  He felt Anna’s gaze beating down on him as he walked away. 

“Has anyone ever woken up?” 

“No.”  The king said without emotion, continuing to walk him into the dark catacombs underground.

The wet underground catacombs did not invite guests often.  He walked past several doors, some with bars and locks, others that hung open.  King Garth led him to the end of the hallway and opened a wood door whose hinges screamed. 

Dr. Everett walked into the room to see his old colleague laying on a stone platform.  He had tubes hooked into him giving him fluids.  Dr. Everett checked him head to toe. 

He checked all of his vitals signs, his blood returned when his finger was squeezed, even his abdominal organs still worked as best as he could tell by listening.  His pupils contracted when he shined his light. Dr. Thomas seemed perfectly fine, except that he was unresponsive to the world around him.  

“I must speak with her.” Dr. Everett looked up from the motionless man, and turned to face the king.  

 “Shouldn’t you wait.  We must discuss what it will be like. The last doctor spent weeks with us studying from afar before he met her.”

“I have faced death and danger more than most, I do not fear her.”  Dr. Everett stared at the King.

The King looked him up and down.  Dr. Everett stepped off, unconcerned with his approval.  His chance to see Freya was too important.  The King would need to physically stop him. 

He walked past the King who remained still,, “Check the garden, she’s usually there this time in the morning,” he called out as he walked out the doorway. 

As he walked toward the garden, he saw Anna again. “Garrett be careful, you mustn’t upset her. Do not speak to her.”  It seemed she had been waiting here, knowing just how long it would take him to leave the catacombs. 

He had been practicing for years for this moment. Dr. Everett nodded at Anna with a brief half smile and pushed through the door that led out into the garden.  The bright light hit him,  the sun beaming directly into his eyes.  

“Dr. Garrett Everett? Anna has thought much about you.”  It entered his mind before he even saw her. It felt like a small pin stabbing through the center of his skull, like the strange aura before you succumb to a powerful migraine. 

She stood holding a watering can in the morning sun over a  flowering bush.  She poured a brownish liquid at the base of the bush from her can and lightly massaged the soil with her fingers working it into the dirt. No gloves, her hands already caked with dirt.  

She was a beautiful, tall red haired woman with porcelain skin dotted with freckles. Her long curly red hair blew slightly in the morning breeze. She wore a long white dress with dirt smeared on her hips.  The sun reflected off of her emerald earrings.  A necklace with another emerald hung around her neck.  Her feet were bare, covered in garden dirt.  

“You can hear me?” He thought to himself. 

“I can. I’ve gotten all of my shoes covered in dirt if you must know.”  The words fluttered into his mind softly, it seemed she may have heard his thoughts on her appearance. 

“If I think like this, can you understand and respond?”  He thought, trying to keep his mind as clear and focused as possible.

“Yes, just like that.” She whispered into his mind.  Her voice now seemed soothing and soft.  It gave him goosebumps the way she reached up his neck and into his mind to deposit the thoughts.  Her emerald green eyes looked up from the garden to meet him and acknowledge his presence. 

Dr. Everett admired Freya’s sprawling garden, but he remembered his lessons.  Find something to focus on. He saw a rather large lizard walking up the stem of a bush.   He placed his focus on watching it move through the garden, certainly looking for bugs with the fresh manure.  

“I can tell you’re trying to manipulate your own thoughts, take a few steps back.”  The words felt more forceful this time, and more painful than the first ones. 

He stopped, and took a few steps back, now completely in awe of her, the way the sound seemed to grow louder and quieter at her control.  She clearly was more in control than the King and Dr. Thomas had implied. He felt with the last thought he was pushed gently backwards almost like a parent holding out an arm to stop a child from touching a stove.  The force behind the thoughts felt especially curious.  

“This is my favorite place.  The quiet helps me think and concentrate, where I can have my own thoughts.”  She said to him softly.  He let the thoughts enter, the more he accepted the thoughts, like they were his own, the less pain he experienced. 

“Sorry—,” apologizing for his eagerness to see her, perhaps this was something the King would have warned him about had he slowed down, but that was not an option, he had waited far too long to be able to meet Freya to hesitate. 

“No it’s okay,” she interrupted within his own mind.  “I think it sincere that you were genuinely so interested in meeting me.  It’s nice to meet someone who’s not afraid of me, that hasn't happened in a while.  Your mind is so full.”  She explained as she puttered about the fruit trees with a shear in her hand. 

He caught a slight smile on her face. 

“You saw him though.  Why is he like that, do you know?” He could feel Freya sinking her hands into his mind and examining his memories, it was an odd sensation.  

“I do not. I was—-“. he thought, but Freya’s thoughts hit him faster than earlier,  before he could even complete his thought she already knew his intentions and responded. 

“No I do not know either,” she returned, answering his question, he had yet to ask.  “I do not think they are broken as my father says.  Anna thinks they are misplaced.” 

The color started to fade from Dr. Everett’s face. He sat down and focused his eyes on a bush. 

“Do you need to take a break? It took Dr. Thomas months before he could talk to me this long.”  Freya left his mind, and she walked away from him to the other side of the garden.

Dr. Everett was still focused on keeping himself calm, his emotions plain.  His head throbbed. He didn’t think it, but felt a deep sorrow for Freya’s loneliness. He felt slightly nauseous.  He focused on his breathing.

Dr. Everett thought about how exciting this was. She truly was the psychic he had known her to be.  Her connection to the metaphysical plane must be continuous. No need for perfect focus or training, rather she needed to learn to hold herself back. 

Dr. Everett gained his composure after a few moments and stood.   He walked towards her again ready to continue. 

“I am wondering do you hear me again?”  He thought to himself wondering if his mind was back on air for her.

“Yes I can.”  Freya thought softly.  “You are right.  I have never worked for any of this.  I have spent much of my life trying to stop doing it.  It is effortless for me.”  She continued to inspect and prune the trees as she fluttered her thoughts to him. 

He took her earlier advice and stopped there, this time slightly further away in the garden.  Dr. Everett decided to sit on the bench facing the forest to the south side of the garden.  He watched the trees swaying in the wind, and placed his focus there. 

“Are you able to stop if you want?”  He thought to himself in order for her to hear.

“If a thought is loud enough it will come through.  I can focus on one person.  Dr. Thomas really helped me to work on focusing on thoughts versus just listening.  The monks in the forest helped as well. But, I am still working on it.”

“Is that—-“ he began to think, but Freya already understood.

“No, Dr. Thomas wanted me to do a specific thing that I have spent years trying to control and never do again.  The day it happened, I had told him to stop, that I wasn’t ready. He tried to make me.  But he got so close I could reach out and touch him.”  He could feel the energy behind Freya’s thoughts increasing, the speed, the force was almost overwhelming.  He focused on his breathing and tried to receive the thoughts willingly.  

Freya walked closer towards him.

“His thoughts were so loud.  His memories, his opinions of me, my father.  His intentions to conquer using me. His mind was filled with horrible visions of war and destruction.  He had thoughts of using me to destroy our Kingdom.  I screamed for him to step back.”

Images of Freya dropping to her knees and Dr. Thomas collapsing played in his mind placed there by Freya.  He felt the regret she felt.  He saw memories of the other times this has happened when she was a child.  She showed him the fear of being around others for fear she would lose control and hurt someone else. She showed him the last day she ever went in public several years ago.

“When he realized what was happening,  he tried to move but the link was too strong.” Her lip almost quivered, her eyes held sadness, they looked puffier.  A tear formed that she tried to wipe with her dirt covered hands smearing dirt on her cheek. 

“My dear Freya, I am so sorry.”  Dr. Everett had never felt such sorrow in his own life.  The emotional weight that came with Freya’s thoughts brought him to a dark place, he felt as if he was back the day Anna gave up on her dream of having children.  Was this her normal state of being, such deep sadness? He felt the loneliness again.  

Freya stepped away and walked to the other side of the garden.  Once she was away the sorrow lifted and Dr. Everett was able to have his own thoughts again. He wanted to walk over and embrace her, but it took every fiber of his being to hold himself together through this psychic link. 

 “What does she mean his consciousness was broken or misplaced,” He ruminated on the thoughts and memories she had given him.  He tried to think to himself, somewhat forgetting this could be heard by her.  

“ It always happens so fast.  I have never meant to make them collapse the way they do.  It just seems to happen if I get too angry, frustrated, or upset.”  She explained to him.

“No, I can tell that Dr. Thomas brought this on himself.”  Dr. Everett thought.  He had been suspicious of Dr. Thomas for a while.  

“Yes I know he wanted to use me.  I know he disliked my father.  I saw such violence and destruction in his heart.” 

“I am unsure of his goals. But the more I learn, the more I think he wanted you to be a weapon, likely for Terraria.”  Dr. Everett thought while trying to focus his mind onto this exchange alone.

“I never understood how I could be that, I think I am more of a curse than a weapon. His ideas of me didn’t seem to fit me in the slightest.”  

“You are right Freya, you are a lovely young woman. We can make sure no one ever does that to you again. “ Dr. Everett thought as he looked over towards her away from the toad he had been focusing on to keep his mind in one place.

“No one but Anna has ever thought that before.” Freya softly thought into his head, the voice almost cracking again, as if this time about to finally break down in tears. 

“Maybe that can change.”  Dr. Everett thought peacefully as he looked at Freya from across the garden.  She had stopped tending the trees, she stared back with her green eyes looking into his from across the garden.  Her face seemed to react to this thought, he could tell her breathing had shifted.

“Maybe.”  Freya thought to him as another tear ran down her dirt stained cheek. 

Chapter 1: Princess Emily

Eric crept through the thick brush, crouching under branches. He needed a clear shot at the deer just out of sight, the meat would feed him and his mother for weeks.  He pulled his bow off his back, pulling an arrow silently from his quiver. 

He placed it upon the string, pulling it back.  He brought his hand to its resting point on his face.  As he readied to fire, the sound of a cracking stick alerted the animal.  It darted off through the brush.   

He took a moment to assess his surroundings.  He was somewhere behind the Lord’s castle, where he had been warned not to go numerous times, this was eleven land. 

He rested behind a tree and drank from his water.  The grounds of the manor caught his eye, but not for the beautiful landscaping.  No, the bright blonde hair of the teenage girl prancing in the grass stole his attention. She waved her arms in rhythmic motion, like a choreographed dance.  Light seemed to flicker from her hands, blue and red.  She looked so free, fluttering about in her green dress, barefoot. He crept closer trying to make out what she was doing. 

Fire appeared  in her hand, then snow, maybe ice, in her other.  She threw it forward towards a tree.  Again and again, the more he watched the less free she looked, she looked deliberate, precise, as if this was a rehearsed dance she did every day.  

She must be one of the princesses.  He’d seen them around, sure, but something about this glimpse of her imprinted something different on him. It felt real and personal in a way that exchanging pleasantries at the market never would.  

Were his eyes deceiving him?  He had heard of humans capable of magic, but had never seen it firsthand. She enthralled him, he watched what must have been an hour until she wandered off out of view.

Though he went home, his thoughts did not leave the beautiful girl in the grass.  He walked through the brush back home, holding no game, only thoughts of her.  

It was not long before he saw her again, not in her backyard, but in the market. She was with her brothers, shopping for meat and fruit.  He tried to edge closer to her, he was still unsure of her name.  He pretended to eye the freshly picked strawberries. He stood by the careful arrangements of berries from the local gardens and  pretended he might buy such a delicacy. 

She walked towards him and inspected the very shelf he was in front of. Eric looked down, averting his gaze, his heart fluttering with anticipation.  

She picked a strawberry out of the basket and ate it, then another.  He looked up at her, ready to make eye contact, even though his heart rested in his stomach. She smiled and winked at him with the deepest blue eyes he had ever seen as she chewed the berry. Before he could remember how to speak, she skipped off back to her brothers. How could a girl so casually steal his heart like this?

He had never felt like this before.  He was determined to meet her somehow, properly, and not just in his dreams.  But how?  They were a poor family, his mother barely made ends meet. He had started working at 14 to make sure they could eat.  

When he walked home that afternoon his heart ached looking at the gate of the lord’s manner. 

He recognized the woman working the flower garden on her hands and knees. It was his neighbor.  

“Miss Darlene!” Eric shouted as he walked over towards her. 

She sat up and looked at him.  Her dirt covered hands held a small flowering plant and a small shovel. She had a wheelbarrow of dirt beside her, she looked to intend to be here a while. 

“That you Eric?”  The woman asked blocking the afternoon sun from her eyes with her dirty hand.  

Miss Darlene was another common folk like Eric, sure they had homes, but their land was protected by the Lord of Eastover.  They had small farms, they were safe, it could be worse, certainly. 

“Yes ma’am, need any help?”  Eric walked over, proud of his plan, and sat beside her.  He was no stranger to hard work. 

“You can help if you want, but I ain’t paying.”  

He laughed. She showed him how to arrange the little flowers in a pattern in the bed. They worked for hours together until it was nearly dark.  Covered in dirt, tired, and sweaty, he started to wonder if his plan was flawed. 

“Almost done, just need water, the can is by the shed.”  She told him. 

He got up from the ground and walked towards the shed.  His hands were caked in dirt, his nails blackened. 

Out of the corner of his eye he saw her, a simple short blue dress that still showed her knees, her bare feet curled beside her.  She held a purple book that looked old and worn, her long blonde hair blowing gently in the breeze, her head leaning against the tree. She was focused, she didn’t register his presence.  Where she had pranced so freely before, she was locked on this book.  What was she reading? He could go visit the library in the next town.  That could be a great way to make conversation. 

With his heart returned to his stomach, maybe lower, he walked towards the shed where Miss. Darlene said the watering can was.  He reached for the door but could see she was walking over to him.  This was it, his heart raced, almost ready to beat out of his chest.

“Who are you?”  Her voice was high, she did not seem to care for pleasantries. The sound of her voice seemed to suck the very moisture from his mouth and make his brain go fuzzy. 

“Your neighbor, Eric.”  He faced her, her blue eyes stared into his. 

“I didn’t know we had neighbors.  Show me.”  

He stared at her for a moment, did she intend for him to show her where he lived?

Her head tilted slightly as he paused, her hands moved to her hips.  It did not seem to be a negotiation, she made a request that he needed to fulfill. 

She followed him as he placed the watering can and placed it by Miss Darlene.  He caught the smile on Miss Darlene’s face as they walked off together. 

He walked her slightly outside the gate, and around the corner to point down the path that led towards his house. 

“Huh.  I guess I thought you were elves.” She looked up at him with her piercing blue eyes. 

“All human.” He struggled to sound normal.  

“I’m Emily by the way.”  She held out her hand.  

He started to panic, do you shake a princess’ hand? He lightly grasped her hand as if to shake, but he struggled to remember how his body worked, or customs.  She did not seem to think this was an awkward move. 

She may have even smiled slightly. 

“How do you feel about magic human Eric?”  She asked him as those eyes continued to rid his mind of thought.  

He was unsure of how to respond,  “good?”  How could he tell her hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the magic he saw her do just a week ago. That she had already taken up a permanent residence in his mind. 

She smiled,  “Look!”  

She held her hand palm up in front of him, and closed her eyes.  A bright flame erupted from her palm. She opened her eyes and looked at him.  

A smile appeared on Eric’s face.  

“Is it real?”  Eric asked her as he experimented with the flame.  It did not crackle like a wood fire, but the peaks of the flames danced around in the same rhythmic patterns.  

He put his finger in it and quickly withdrew it, it didn’t seem to burn, much like a normal fire. 

She seemed amused by this and smiled.  He picked up that this was something important to her.  

He moved his hand quickly through it like he had done around a campfire.  She giggled and kept her fire going. 

Now he was genuinely curious if it was real, and put his finger in it slightly longer, “Ow!”  He recoiled his hand.  It burned exactly like a real fire.  

“It’s fire human Eric!”   She laughed uncontrollably and snorted.  The flames went out.  Emily continued to laugh at him.  He started to laugh as well, starting to feel natural. 

She touched his arm as she was laughing, making his heart sing. She stepped slightly closer to him. 

“How did you hold it like that?” He asked her, he was desperate to know more about her.  

“Well it comes from me.  If you put a fire in my hand from the fireplace it would still burn—I think.  Actually,  I might have to try.”   She paused and held her gaze.  

He wanted to speak, but he merely found himself staring into her deep blue eyes.  He was fairly sure he was smiling.  

“Emily, Dinner!”  They both turned to hear someone yelling. 

“Bye human Eric!”  She skipped off.  

His heart swelled, and returned to its normal place in his chest.  He remembered how to breathe normally and walked back over towards Darlene and sat beside her.  That conversation almost felt normal, they knew each other’s names. 

“Now I see.  You have a crush on Princess Emily,  but never call her that, it’s the quickest way to upset her.” 

“Yes ma’am.”  He continued to help her plant flowers, his face barely able to contain the ear to ear grin. 

—-----------

Emily grumbled to herself as she put on the long blue dress her mother made her wear for the party.  She wanted to be in the field practicing, or reading, or doing anything other than this.  

She braided her hair as her mother would want.  She placed the lily in her hair, the flower of Eastover, since she was a “Princess.”  She wished her parents would let her pick her own suitors.  She thought of Eric she had met, the way he looked at her.  It seemed like he actually liked her as a person.  He showed interest in her magic, he helped Miss Darlene in the garden.  Whatever pretentious boy she was about to meet would care for none of that, he would just want her as some pretty face to parade around. 

She walked down the wooden stairs, the sound of her sharp heeled shoes clacking against the grounds. A viewing party was waiting for her as she came down.  Her parents, her brother, her sister, and the family of the boy all waited at the bottom for her. 

“Very Beautiful,”  “Beautiful,”  “Stunning”  The group spoke their required pleasantries, she was unable to discern who was even talking.  

A man she did not recognize, offered his son Bart for her to get acquainted with. She held out her hand.  Bart averted his gaze from her eyes and kissed her hand.  Emily did her best to smile as was expected of her.  His parents were the lord of some town a ways away. 

“Would you like to take a walk?”  He asked her as she stood awkwardly investigating the fruit display.  

“Sure.”  Emily responded.  

Walking would make this easier, she thought.  At least then she wouldn’t have eyes examining every move she made. 

She walked with him as properly as she could, her feet hurt in these shoes her mother put on her.  She couldn’t remember the last time she wore them.  She wanted to kick them off into the trash can behind the stable.

“Emily,  what do you think of the land to the West of here? My family owns much of it, you could be my wife and never want for anything? We could travel together, see the world.  With you at my side, I could be a councilor one day.” 

Emily was unsure how to respond to any of that.  Did he think she liked him?  Did she have a choice? Did he know she was only 15? Was he 15?  In just 5 minutes he had confirmed everything she had assumed of him. 

“Yeah.” Emily said, having realized she had paused too long, unsure of what she was even responding too.  The moment he bragged of riches her repulsions got the better of her.  

A bell rang and they all walked to dinner.  He sat with his family, Emily’s family surrounded them, they sat next to each other at the long table.

“Dear would you light the candles?”  Her mother said. 

Emily knew what she meant, she wanted her father to get the matches to set the ambience.  But, she could not help herself.  She reached over her dinner, her dress brushing against her food, and grasped the wick with her finger.  Flames erupted.  She did the same for the other two candles before she sat back in her chair. 

Emily could see her mother glaring at her out of the corner of her eye, but she did her best not to look in that direction.   Baron and Valerie, her brother and sister, were amused at least.  Baron had never liked that she practiced magic, but that did not stop him from respecting her for how far she had come.  Valerie had even said she wanted the family sapphire amulet to go to Emily, since Emily clearly wanted it far more than she did. 

“How did you do that?”  The boy asked her. 

“Fire magic.”  Emily smiled looking into his eyes for some sort of reaction.  Would he be impressed that at the age of 15 she could produce magic?  Did he even understand how rare that was?

The boy furrowed his brows and did not respond, he looked away from her. He began to eat his meal, without speaking to her again.

Emily ate her dinner, and asked for seconds with her older brother.  Her mother did not seem impressed.  Emily was halfway done with her fourth chicken thigh she was eating with her hands when her mother slammed her napkin on the table. 

“Emily, you eat like a man, and not even a gentleman.”  Her mother stood up and stormed off.  

Her older brother, Baron, was trying his best not to laugh at her, but when she looked over with grease and chicken seasoning all over her mouth, he broke.  The image of his little sister in a proper dress, her hair done perfectly, covered in food was too much. 

Her sister gestured with a napkin.  Emily laughed with him as she wiped it off.  Her older sister put her face in her palm, but Emily could see that she was smiling at this as well.  Their father glared at all of them and then got up from the table without a word.  

The boy and his family quickly left during dinner.  Emily walked up the stairs to get out of this uncomfortable dress and shoes.  She walked in her room to see her mother sitting on her bed looking out the window, her back to Emily. 

“Emily, you really must be more of a lady.  You will never find a prince or anyone of note the way you behave.   That boy said he does not wish to see you again.”  Her mother didn’t turn to look at her. 

Emily did not see the matter with any of this, if anything it was cause for celebration.  Thankfully her mother was looking away from her, so she didn’t see Emily smiling at the news. 

Slowly her parents gave in that magic was not a phase throughout her childhood.  She had trained with Master Dru, an accomplished mage, though it had been many years since he had accomplished, since she was 6.  

Her grandmother had been a powerful mage.  Emily had only known her a few years when she passed.  Somehow, she saw something in Emily, even as a child who could barely walk.  She showed her how she made fire and ice magic.  She showed Emily the book, the pictures.  She never told Emily that almost all of humanity had forgotten how to do magic without artifacts infused with dragonfire.  Perhaps never telling her the limits is how she broke through them. 

Emily awoke in a tangled pile of blankets that morning days before her 16th birthday.  16 was a special age, that was when the body was strong enough to put on an artifact and let it fuse with you, granting you its power, as long as you wore it. 

She rushed to throw on a dress and ran out the door.  She saw her brother had made toast, and promptly swiped a piece while he was not looking, and ran off with it in her mouth.  

She ran through the town of Eastover towards Master Dru’s cottage. She slowed for a moment to see if she saw the blacksmith apprentice, but he was not there yet.  She went back to running towards her destination. 

 She was out of breath by the time she arrived.  She opened the door to the small cottage just outside of town.  It was a quaint house.  He lived on the path towards the next town.  Emily couldn’t remember the name.  Even though her father had told her it was important to know such things.  Her mind filled with other things, probably ones he would not think are important. 

“You’re late.”  Master Dru was already waiting for her and stepped out in his typical blue robes.  

“Sorry!  I was reading and I overslept.”  Emily panted. 

“Let’s go in the back.”  

Emily tried to catch her breath and followed him.  He led her through a wooden gate into the back of the small home.  A long grassy clearing with two targets sitting on top of wooden blocks filled the yard, a deep forest behind.  Many of the trees had singed trunks and most of their lower branches were gone.  The fence behind the targets was nearing total destruction. 

“Let’s see if you have been practicing.” Master Dru sat in a chair on the back porch as she took her spot in the grass.

Emily set down her small leather bag behind her.  She stood with her feet shoulder width apart,  her eyes closed, she breathed in, then out, rhythmically.  She felt the energy coursing through her veins.  She focused, the feeling started in her heart, then flowed to her arms, and into her hands.  She envisioned the flames in her hand.  Her hand grew warm.  She threw it forward.  

She opened her eyes to see a small fireball fly through the air and break against the top edge of the target, adding more singe marks to the brutalized target. 

“That was better right!”  She looked to Master Dru for approval. 

He smiled at her.  

“Again.”

She repeated, she felt the flames in her hand, and released.   This one flew slightly further and broke apart on a tree, adding to the scorch marks.  

“Again.”

This time she used her other hand.  She felt the ice course through her.  She felt her body temperature cool, ice cold energy flowed into her right hand, and she released it.  An icicle shaped burst of blue energy flew through the air and hit the target encasing the target in a thin layer of ice.  

“You are doing better with the ice, focus on that one.  I’ll make you some warm tea.”  Master Dru stood slowly and wandered off.  

He always made Emily something warm when she did ice magic. Italways made her cold when she practiced, even on a warm day.   She took no time off, over and over, she practiced.  The target was fully encased in ice after several minutes.  

Master Dru returned.  He looked down the range at at the frozen target. 

“Let me hold your hands Emily, lets see how we are doing.” She held her hands out.  

He grasped her hands and closed his eyes. “Let’s take a break,  you are nearly depleted.”

She sipped her tea as they walked back inside.  He already had her favorite turkey, bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwich ready for her.  She sat down and happily ate. 

“Tell me, what have you been reading.”  He sat back in his chair.  

“I’ve nearly finished Begginger Ice and Begginer Fire Magic.  I am almost through the mana strategy book you gave me.”

“I really think you should pick one school, I worry it's holding you back.”

“Mother said I can have the Ice Amulet and the family Fire staff when I come of age.  I feel drawn to both.  And, you have seen me produce both without artifacts or anything!”  Emily explained with her mouth slightly full. 

Master Dru couldn’t help but smile as he watched her eat.  

Emily’s 16th birthday could not come soon enough, she had never awaited anything more her entire life. The morning of, she woke to her mother standing by her bedside with the two family heirlooms that had been promised to her; An ancient sapphire amulet, that was the largest gem she had ever seen, and a wooden staff with a large ruby on the tip.  

Emily reached for the staff first with her left hand as she sat up from her bed and pushed back her blankets.  She felt the flames course through her body.  She felt heat, warmth, she saw the burn mark from her bare foot on the floor.  

She put the amulet around her neck.  She felt the opposite, she felt icy cold energy flowing through her and into her right hand.  Her right foot had ice around it on the hardwood floor.  

—-------
Layaria and her mother, Elmeira, returned from their long journey north to pay respect to the Elves that died in the war against the Dragonkin hundreds of years before.  A patronage all Elves must take, to observe the graves of how many it took to fight back the Dragonkin with the humans.  Never again would they allow the beasts to return.  They lit fires on top of the mountain, for each of the dead, 2784 in total.  Their numbers today were not nearly that great, there were maybe 100 in their clan, the largest in the area. 

Layaria and Darth were the youngest in the clan at the age of 54.  Their entire families made the trip with them, 19 Elves in all.  

They walked back slowly through the snowy mountains, across swamps, and into the forests that surrounded their hometown of Noreisha.  They walked down the long dirt roads that would eventually lead to Eastover.

All of them turned as the sound of hoofbeats rapidly approached, a cloud of dust formed in the rear.  Several men on horseback came into focus. The men rushed them, yelling and whooping, slashing with swords.  

“Get off our roads!”   They yelled at the elves as they ran through their group on horseback.  

Darth blocked one of them and he fell from his horse.  

Darth looked at him, as if to consider killing him.  But he ran to protect his mother, and grandfather who had tripped while scattering into the woods.  

The man ran at him again.  Layaria appeared out of nowhere and smacked the man on the horse with her stick.  

He fell to the ground.  Another one rushed her on foot.  She blocked the attack with her stick, but she was shoved down into a tree.  

Several more men ran to help them.  

Darth’s eyes glowed purple as he stood up from the ground.  He slammed his foot and a rush of purple energy knocked all the men to the ground.  He grabbed and slammed the man who was attacking Layaria.  

They both ran into the woods.  Layaria got close to Darth, and grabbed his hand.  

They flickered out of sight.  

Elmeira held close to several older elves from her and Darth’s family.  They stayed crouched behind a tree.  Elmeira kept all of them invisible.  

The men ran through the woods searching for them, but found no one.  They searched with their flames through the dense brush.  Eventually they gave up, and walked off.  

They sat there for several hours until it was getting close to nightfall. Unsure of where they were, they tried to find the road. They emerged from the woods together. They came upon the remnants of their caravan,  several  wagons, smashed, their horses stolen. Two larger elves pulled the consolidated wagon once they piled their belongings in it.  The elders now needed to walk, slowing them down considerably. 

They saw another human on the road.  This one looked different than the previous ones.  She did not carry a sword, or armor, or a horse.  She did not whoop or charge them.  She was small and blonde, a female. She was holding her robes closed.  She looked fearful. 

The girl tried not to look at them, but Layaria walked towards her as the representative of the group.  

“Please, are you from Eastover?”  She asked the blonde girl.  

The girl's blue eyes darted around the group as she paused before she answered, “yes.”

—-------------

hey hey!
i’m currently about 60% finished writing my first novel (yay!!) and i’m already planning the next two. i was inspired by some recent pieces of media ive seen and wanted to make some more stories.
my first novel is a gothic romance set in 1860’s victorian england. it’s time travelling with vampires, witches and the church/church members as the main antagonists.

**my second novel will be set in the same era but WLW, without the time travelling and will be witch seeking revenge on her executed friend x nun who truly believes the church does no wrong. i have thought about and brainstormed some actual plot ideas and progression but i’m at a loss for endings — i’m not sure if i want it to be a happy ending or a tragic one, all i know is that i want it to be full of tension (this is where i need help!)**
**ive attached an image of my brainstorming (its on paper sorry, i hope my writing is legible enough)**

my third novel will be, again, set in the same era, will be MLM between a vampire-hating warlock and an openly homosexual runaway vampire from a different country :P havent brainstormed much on this yet but in case you wanted to know the third idea <3