Neither Seyari nor I were in a mood to talk about our wedding the next morning. I’d given serious thought to her points during the night: I did want guests, and some kind of ceremony. And I’d need a new dress.
And we’d need to decide if we wanted someone from the Church to marry us. It wasn’t necessary in Edath—not after the war—but a part of me wanted it. I was tired enough to sleep a little, and in one dream Yevon performed the ceremony.
That image was enoug...
2023-08-05 02:12:58 +0000 UTC
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Somewhere south of Astrye
The demon that was once Lorelei felt the collar around her neck, running a talon over its rune-etched surface. Even when she came back to them, told them everything, told them that Zarenna was the Sovereign of Wrath… they hadn’t trusted her.
And why would they—they shouldn’t. She wouldn’t trust herself, either.
But why did it hurt?
It was for her own good, Great Unc—Master Mordwell had said as much.
...
2023-08-02 03:06:47 +0000 UTC
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“Issa, I can’t believe I have to tell you to hold still!” Ssiina groused.
“I am!” I protested. Nice as the clothes and makeup were, I really wanted to go jump into a pond or wrap myself in blankets. I was focusing really hard on how nice my bed was going to feel later, but apparently it wasn’t enough.
“Your face keeps twitching!” my elder sister said. “It’s messing with the array I’m trying to make!”
Already ready and waiting, Kyrae giggled. ...
2023-08-02 02:56:42 +0000 UTC
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Here's that rewrite I promised, and despite the title, it only changes a single plot-significant event. Affected chapters (and chapter 124 even though I think there's only typo fixes) are attached. The major focus is on 119-120 and 125-126, though there are also significant edits to 121, 123, 139, and 141. See the attached pdfs. The chapters are also updated on SH/RR (through 131).
These changes bring SoW in line with my original draft, and I believe fix a major misstep to narrative flo...
2023-07-30 21:13:46 +0000 UTC
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A/N: If you've missed it on my discord, there's a revision incoming, primarily targeted at Chapters 119-120 and 125-126. Expect it by the end of the weekend, in the form of a post here with PDFs of the most-impacted sections. There are other tweaks that have been made, but they're all referential. The overarching plot isn't changed, I'm just restoring things away from an an ill-advised last-minute change that undermined both character progression and particularly the...
2023-07-29 02:15:33 +0000 UTC
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I woke up in my bed in Phaeliisthia’s estate, feeling like I’d just missed whatever my dream was about. I was certain I’d had one, but I just… couldn’t think of it.
For a deliciously long moment, I basked in the sunlight coming through the window. Then, the memories of the end of Tuo’Antzin crept in like a distant, chill wind off the ocean. I shivered in the sunlight, and the shadows reached for me. Pushing them back, I was relieved to find they obeyed.
The assassi...
2023-07-28 01:00:56 +0000 UTC
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Walking through the castle, Nelys leading, I realized just how labyrinthine the place was. The stone walls seemed to be in good shape, but most of the rest of the place was empty. The little that remained seemed either recent or decayed, and much of it had been torn up.
Like I’d suspected, not everyone had been out in the fight, and I saw a fair few corpses and bloodstains on the way. Joisse pulled close to me, and I pulled my tail loosely around her as we walked in silence.<...
2023-07-26 01:39:18 +0000 UTC
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Ssiina saw a familiar golden flash from down below, and she rushed to the edge of the damaged viewing box where Kyrae was standing. In the background, a chorus of shouts approached as the aftermath of their fight for survival was noticed over the ending of the play. Her elf sister was wide-eyed and shaking, her hands twitching as she half-formed sigils, stopped, and restarted.
Down below, Phaeliisthia was bent over two lamias, one of them clearly Issa. Her sister wasn’t moving. The ot...
2023-07-25 02:25:22 +0000 UTC
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I looked at the two lupaels in the doorway a little closer. The woman resembled Brynna strongly enough that she had to be family, and I wondered if they were here because I punched the castle’s wall down or because they’d met up with the others.
“Road’s clear between here and the city, and the city’s cleared out too,” the Brynna lookalike said.
“Zarenna!” a familiar voice shouted.
“Seyari!” I shouted back, scaring more than a few people by boundi...
2023-07-22 02:04:44 +0000 UTC
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As the play continued on, I found myself drawn to the spectacle below out of boredom. The stone amphitheater was packed, from the stage up to the level of the garden, and into the stands. Are Ussen Ysta’s guards really just somewhere else? The play itself was bright and colorful, and from what I gathered, it told the tale of Uzh’s founding.
Or perhaps history. There seemed to be a lot of cataclysmic storms aided by sigilcraft that sent sheets of rain down into the lower sea...
2023-07-21 01:16:30 +0000 UTC
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Seyari and the others reached the farms on the outskirts of Astrye just in time to see Zarenna flying toward the castle. A blazing dot of crimson against a pale gray sky, she engaged whatever forces were holed up and magic lit the daytime sky.
“This is our chance,” Seyari said, jogging forward. “Anyone and everyone is going to be distracted by her—let’s secure the city as best we can.”
“I wouldn’t advise we all split up,” Kartania added, her heavy boots digging d...
2023-07-19 01:50:27 +0000 UTC
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A/N: I am moving the Sunday chapter to Mondays. To be fair, a lot of that is having to get up and drive for 3 hours at 4AM every Sunday for the past two months, but even if that's mostly over, I want a clearer weekend and a more solid block of work on Mon-Wed to do most (like 80%) of my writing. Anyway, on with the chapter!
“Issa?” Kyrae asked. “Are you all right?”
I tried to turn my focus away from the sparse shadows and thei...
2023-07-18 02:43:42 +0000 UTC
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Stumbling through the main hall, I realized quickly that I had no idea where to go. Aside from the demon I’d just killed who’d been waiting inside, the castle’s entry hall was empty.
Unfortunately, it was also designed like an old fort—or like a castle. From the entranceway, different halls shot off to the sides, windows looked down on me from the second floor, and closed doors barred my vision.
The hall looked far from deserted, however. More than anything, it looked like...
2023-07-15 03:34:00 +0000 UTC
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A/N: A part 3? Yeah, this one was going to be veeery long if I didn't break it like this.
Unlike the main market, the side market had a busy, hurried air of impermanence about it. Goods cluttered rugs, and rarely tables, as their sellers coiled tightly to make space. On the garden side of the street, bushes and trees were used to display everything from colorful trinkets that reminded me of Kyrae’s bird to adzes of varying size hung by their blades off a large branch...
2023-07-14 01:00:27 +0000 UTC
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My flight was interrupted moments after I approached the wall. In the snowy, barren courtyard, arrayed to defend the main gate, was a motley group of demon cult forces, fronted by lesser demons. I saw all types of lesser demons—at least in variety of forms. Most were reminiscent of the ones that had attacked my friends and I during our training, but some bore strange features that matched no animal I knew.
More corrupt inquisition cultists and demons held the walls, and those were the...
2023-07-12 00:55:16 +0000 UTC
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“Humans have a saying in their language that likens a treacherous political forum to a ‘pit of snakes.’ Often, I wonder if the origin of that phrase lies within our Empire.”
—Jii’Hssen Ssyii Ssyri’Jiilits
“So who was that guy anyway?” I asked, reluctantly breaking a fried fish in two before picking it up.
“The son of the head of a branch family to Ussen Lajiir who controls Ki’Lajiil province to the north of Uzh and th...
2023-07-11 01:19:33 +0000 UTC
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I expected to see auras through the powder kicked up by my landing: demons or corrupt inquisition here to harry me. Instead, I saw an empty field lying fallow under snow. Dismissing my wings, I checked my surroundings nervously.
Nothing but quiet.
Part of me was relieved there was no immediate fight, even though my claws itched, but as I walked toward the outskirts of the town my worry grew.
Maybe they knew they couldn’t fight me? Would they try to make me out as worse...
2023-07-08 01:21:55 +0000 UTC
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Once I finished dressing myself, I looked down and checked that my sleeves were even and everything was in place. I paused. For a moment, what I was seeing seemed unreal.
Just as I was no longer a skinny orphan, I was also no longer a child. In only a little over two years, I’d changed so much that I doubted my younger self would even recognize me. She’d see someone unapproachable: a gorgeous kelaniel wearing clothing of the finest silk. As I was Phaeliisthia’s student today, so t...
2023-07-07 01:49:11 +0000 UTC
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After an all-too-short morning with my friends and family, we continued on the road south.
This path took us past where my friends had battled. The road and hillside were scorched and torn, and the demons’ bodies lay strewn about as they had been left. No scavengers would touch demon corpses, and Tania, Taava, and Nelys searched them for anything that could give us a clue about what lay ahead. Predictably, they found nothing aside from some spare weaponry that none of us had a mind to...
2023-07-05 01:55:19 +0000 UTC
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“Danger is better at seeking us out than we are at seeking it.”
—Uru Farlight, Archaeologist, Anthropologist, and Delver of Lost Histories
From the moment we returned to Phaeliisthia’s estate, the lessons resumed. More intense than before, my sisters and I threw ourselves into studying and training. The meeting with the Jii’Hssen, our aunt, and the knowledge that others were conspiring against us lent a se...
2023-07-04 02:22:26 +0000 UTC
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A/N: Do I owe you all a pdf for V2? I do! Have also been secretly formatting for an epub for you fine folks? I have. Did me getting sick make me miss my semi-secret posting day for it? Yes. Soon (TM). That's all I've got. Oh, except the first chapter of V3. I also have that right below this blurb and I swear it is 99% wholesome.
“Hey, you okay?”
I startled, then picked up a flat, round stone, dusting the snow off it. “I...
2023-07-01 02:00:17 +0000 UTC
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The night was calm, but it wasn’t still. A gentle breeze blew in from across the surface of the estate’s glass-like tarn, lending a slight chill to the summer night. Hinssa’s family estate was dark, and the stars overhead shone bright and large, casting long shadows from squat trees.
Tyaniis slithered silently through the garden, her thoughts far away back in Ess’Sylantziis. She would be Jii’Hssen soon. Already, many were against it, and she had swayed few. Her beloved, Hinssa...
2023-06-30 00:51:49 +0000 UTC
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Our meeting with Aunt Ssyii lasted long enough that the shafts of light from up high near the dome angled up the sides of the room, painting the columns with faintly orange light.
We talked more about the future, and I had a monsoon of information about hssen etiquette and living in the Emerald Palace thrust upon me. Most of it blew through, as I bent like a flexible tree into a gale.
Hopefully, I’d remember the important stuff, but I had a year to learn it anyway. Phaeliisthia ...
2023-06-23 00:56:51 +0000 UTC
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Seyari’s voice broke the long silence. “We should leave—take Zarenna elsewhere to recover.”
“They would track us,” Kartania said, a hard edge to her voice. “We will camp here—it’s open enough that nothing will sneak up on us.”
I risked cracking my eyes open. Seyari and Kartania stood up next to me, one to each side. Joisse stayed in my arms, and I felt her breathing slow as she drifted off to sleep.
“Can I stay like this?” I asked the air.
Karta...
2023-06-21 02:39:30 +0000 UTC
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“…and after the garden, I’ll show you our wing of the Palace, Sister! Maybe not today, but soon! You and Kyrae can pick between a few rooms, but I think I know the one you’ll want. Mom would want you to have it anyway,” Ssiina finished with a bright smile.
I smiled back, just in time for another series of sharp knocks to come in through the door. They sounded dull and far away—probably a result of whatever sigils Dyni and Tyaniis had made. Not wanting it to go to wa...
2023-06-20 01:03:21 +0000 UTC
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When I came to, the world was silent and dark. I felt exhausted; mana exhausted as well. Trying to break Lorelei’s binding was the last thing I could remember, but I struggled to put together why I felt like I needed to move. My whole body burned—but not with holy magic. Really, I’d forgotten the feeling of painful heat, and it took me some moments to separate the why from the pain.
I smelled charcoal first. Then, blinking, I got one eye open—the other still da...
2023-06-17 00:54:55 +0000 UTC
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Phaeliisthia tipped under us, and Sire Tyaniis slid out of the saddle first, leading Ssiina by the hand out into the plaza in front of the Emerald Palace. Chin and posture high, pointedly ignoring the crowd and rapidly approaching taaniir, she beckoned dismissively to me and Kyrae. Her and Ssiina coiled in the plaza facing the palace gates, and Tyaniis’s face before she turned bore a stony expression I couldn’t read, situated under hard eyes.
Even knowing that our sire’s demeanor ...
2023-06-16 00:41:39 +0000 UTC
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Seyari spotted the demon first. We were near the top of the pass, the trees around us short and the snow deep. They’d seen us before we saw them. Up on a ridge ahead of us, a blur of motion was the only sign we got before they dipped out of view, doubtlessly headed south. A scout?
“Zarenna—” Seyari started.
“On it,” I replied before she could finish.
A quick few steps, a leap, and a rush of my magic and I took flight after the fleeing scout. They were fa...
2023-06-14 03:14:33 +0000 UTC
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Cold. Absolute, bone-chilling, no-fun cold.
“H-how are we colder when w-we’re closer to the s-sun?!” I shouted over the wind.
“The air is thinner here. Less to heat.” Phaeliisthia responded with a terse rumble from underneath us.
“What does that even mean?” I hissed through chattering teeth.
Kyrae hugged tighter against me, her meager warmth not nearly enough for my freezing lower body. “Maybe being small and warm isn’t always so bad, Issa!...
2023-06-12 03:00:07 +0000 UTC
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“Behind us,” Taava hissed, her ears twitching. “Someone’s runnin’ our way.”
“Human?” Seyari asked immediately.
“They’ve got two legs. S’all I know.”
“We—” Kartania started.
“We’ll stop and wait for them.” I cut her off. “If they’re not aiming to hurt us, they should just keep moving toward us.”
“Sister…” Kartania warned.
I gave her a cold smile. “While I’m not in charge of you, I am in charge of t...
2023-06-10 01:56:50 +0000 UTC
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