elizabeth_oswald

Chapter One hundred eighty-three – Sew What Now?

The house was small but very tidy. The front door opened onto a small sitting room, with doors leading to the right and left.

A single chair sat next to one of the windows, where the light streaming through the fine yellow curtains fell the brightest. In that chair sat a woman, far too thin, with deep lines carved into her face, and thick strands of gray wound through her brown hair. In spite of all this, when she looked up toward the group entering her home, Pandy could see a distinct...

Chapter One hundred eighty-two – Bun and Switch

“I’m sorry,” Pandy said, at the same moment her companion murmured, “I really am sorry.”

They were forging their way to the other side of the square from ‘Needle and Treads’, and somehow one or both of them managed to step on someone or something every few feet. As Pandy had so often done in her past life, they soon gave up on apologizing for each incident and simply offered a steady flow of, “Pardon me. Excuse me. Sorry,” until they finally reached an unoccupied bit ...

Fun times and steep learning curves

So as you probably figured out, I got an offer to do the audiobooks for Broken Knife.

I truly had no idea how this worked, so when my publishers said, "They'll do $XX per book", I thought that was what I was supposed to pay them. As it turns out, they want to pay me for the privilege of making and releasing the audio books, which is pretty darn cool.

But the next step is telling them who I'd like to narrate the audiobooks (with the codicil that if the ar...

Chapter One hundred eighty-one – Haupe Couture

“Don’t their parents worry about them?” Pandy asked, taking another bite of something like brittle cotton candy.

A small horde of children were running among the carts, laughing and shouting, as adults shook their heads or smiled indulgently.

Augustus looked surprised. “Why would they? Those children are all old enough to have had their revelations. They can take care of themselves so long as they don’t get into anything too dangerous, and any adult who sees them in tro...

Chapter One hundred eighty – Lettuce Be Friends

The carriage was crowded with two adults, a teenager, five children, a cat, a dog, and a rabbit stuffed into it.

When they reached Lanthorne Court, everyone except for Miss Cupcakes and Lord Winston piled out. Pandy felt a bit like she was escaping a clown car, especially since someone’s digestive system was Very Unhappy about the sausages they’d had with breakfast.

While the smell dissipated, everyone else stared around at the bustling crowds, and Lord Reedsley spoke to the ...

Whose Voice is in Your Head?

So, just theoretically, whose voice do you hear when you imagine Kaz?

And, if there was another voice for Lianhua and Li, who would that be? For funzies, maybe choose from this list: https://podiumentertainment.com/performers

(Disclaimer: I do not hear voices in my head. Totally.)

Chapter One hundred seventy-nine – When the Moon Fills the Sky

< -and she refused to eat her asparagus!> Pandy finished, somehow finding this as strange as any of the rest of it.

Asparagus hadn’t been her favorite in her old world, but here it was sweet, and crispy, and juicy, and simply delicious. How could anyone not want to eat it?

I don’t know much about children.

But isn’t that just how they are at that age?

Pandy had called on Keros as soon as she was ...

Chapter One hundred seventy-eight – Muffin to Worry About

The morning of the Open House dawned bright and clear.

The break in the rain the day before had allowed the ground to dry out enough that the lords and ladies who descended upon the school were able to step off the stone paths and wander the grounds freely. Which made Pandy wonder who – besides her – was keeping the grass short, because she’d never seen anyone cutting it. Were there tiny, scythe-bearing elementals sneaking out to do horticultural maintenance at night?

The f...

Chapter One hundred seventy-seven – All That Glitters Is Not Goals

The presence of the Reedsleys kept that weekend exciting.

It turned out that Lord Reedsley had attended Falconet for three years, while Lady Reedsley studied with tutors until she was eleven and could start at Kestrel. That meant everything at Falconet was new to her, and she thoroughly enjoyed being shown around, and would comment on which parts of it were the same or different from the other schools.

Pandy, of course, was already well aware of the fact that Falconet, at least, w...

Chapter One hundred seventy-six – Sounds Like a Plan, Pan(dy)

The next stop was the kitchen, where they found that the cleanup from lunch was complete, but it wasn’t quite time to begin dinner.

Most of the staff were taking a break or eating their own lunch, but the chef, Mr. Farrier – a slightly-more-than-middle-aged man who was as kind and cheerful as his wife – greeted the children happily as they entered.

“Come in!” he said, gesturing toward the large double sink that was usually full of dishes when the children came in for c...

Chapter One hundred seventy-five – Disguise the Limit

Only about twenty students remained at school that weekend. That was a change from Gacha Love, where all of the main characters and most of the secondary characters stayed around.

Of course, they were older, and more of them had come from outside Knightmere, so that made sense. The situation was far different at Falconet, where the students were only six to ten years old, and most lived in or near the city.

The upside of this quiet, almost abandoned, school was that Than...

Pandy's New Name!

Eventually, Pandy is going to have to give someone her new name, and it won't actually be Pandora or Pandy, much less Miss Boxx. So, what should it be? Give me the funniest, punniest, most in-joke names you can think of. I will absolutely use the best one!

Chapter One hundred seventy-four – Bad Hare Day

Pandy managed to get back to Thaniel’s room just before seven, but some other students had already been awakened by their bowels and were wandering the halls, so she couldn’t shift and open it.

Instead, she sat in the hall until the bell rang, and within thirty seconds, Thaniel himself threw the door open, hair sleep-mussed and still wearing his nightgown.

As soon as his eyes fell on her, he scooped her up and returned to his room, only to be forced to dodge around Isidor, wh...

Chapter One hundred seventy-three – Accent on Flüff

At just after five o’clock in the morning, Pandy opened the door to Ms. Wellington’s office, slipping inside and pulling the door closed again with a deep sense of relief.

If anyone was still watching for her, this was probably the last place she should be, but if she was going to do this, she needed a few things she’d been forced to leave behind.

Somewhat to her dismay, Pandy’s new clothes weren’t still strewn over the chairs and desk, but when she entered ‘her’ bed...

Chapter One hundred seventy-two – (Lago)Morph Than Meets the Eye

Augustus had been absent from meals far more often than usual over the last week, but he was there tonight.

Pandy was glad to see that the shadows beneath his eyes were entirely gone, though he still looked like he’d lost a little weight he couldn’t really spare. Hopefully, he really had turned Mr. Benjamin over to the ‘proper authorities’ – probably the Knights of the Royal Eagle – and had returned to his role as chancellor of Falconet.

Pandy wouldn’t know, since s...

Chapter One hundred seventy-one – Spud Outta Luck

The week before the Fall Festival was a long one. After all the excitement on Monday, the rest of the week seemed to drag.

Pandy couldn’t even distract herself by paying attention to Thaniel’s classes, because all of them except Governance and Leadership were just the same thing over and over again: preparing for the school’s Open House on the first day of the festival. By Thursday, all of the children were able to perform their part in the activity with something akin to competen...

Chapter One hundred seventy – Save Point

Augustus waved to Professor Beeswick, who hauled the teacher back up and threw him over his shoulder, beginning the walk back around to the other side of the building.

Pandy wondered briefly why the dragon didn’t just use those beautiful wings to fly back, but then decided Mr. Benjamin must weigh too much and dismissed it from her mind.

They walked in silence past the kitchen, the Still Room – whose door was marked, but Pandy had never entered – and into the dark dining hall...

Chapter One hundred sixty-nine – Pumpkin a Fight

Pandy spent several minutes explaining as much as she could to Thaniel and Isidor.

Thaniel actually seemed happy to hear that Pandy would be effectively restricted to rabbit form for a while, but then insisted on a hug and a lullaby, which Pandy was glad to provide, though she did feel a little odd singing in front of Isidor. The older boy only watched, stony-faced, and rolled away to face the wall before the song ended.

By the time Thaniel fell asleep and Pandy was able to slip ...

Timeline for The Broken Knife!

I got an email from my publisher today (ZOMG that feels so weird) regarding the timeline for TBK.

Anna has confirmed that her current project will end on Friday and she’ll be able to start on Monday with book 1 if we’re ready. I’m going to set you up with a month for each stage—it's longer than we normally do, at 2 weeks, but if you’re happy you can always hand in early and we can move along, but gives us a safety net—this means that book 1 will b...

2025-09-25 19:06:20 +0000 UTC View Post

Chapter One hundred sixty-eight – Cloak and Rabbit

Small Group that day was run by Ms. Davenport, who seemed quite satisfied with the change.

The first thing she did was inform them that Ms. Wellington absolutely wouldn’t be returning. “I’m certain this comes as a shock,” she said briskly, brushing her hands together as if to clear away any traces of the former teacher, “but we shall bravely continue on. Now, who can tell me what you were learning?”

The children, of course, were well aware that ‘Ms. Wellington’ was...

Chapter One hundred sixty-seven – Bits and Bytes

The first time Pandy did this, it had come as part of Ismara’s Blessing I.

Or at least she’d assumed it did, since she got both the inventory and the blessing at the same time. But now, while she felt something inside herself expanding, and fully expected to come apart at the seams, in fact nothing happened except that a few words appeared in front of her, briefly blocking the waterfall.

Your Inventory has been expanded by five slots. Stack quantities vary by item. 2025-09-24 03:00:38 +0000 UTC View Post