eytan writes for nanowrimo

Ricad is a little older than Cohl, but you wouldn’t know it from the way he acts. He is cis. He thrives on contention and finds entertainment in causing strife and arguments. He has been excised from several friend groups because of this. Cohl and Bernid are his two latest gladiators. No one knows exactly what he studies. 

Bernid doesn’t say much, or, apparently, think much. He is cis. He’s a combat specialist. He likes drinking and music, and if he has other interests, no one knows about them. He studies combat and also business. He is older than both his friends by a few years. 

dear jon,

i know you and i only met once or twice, but i liked you. i thought you were a pretty solid guy. i was and am very sorry and a little shaken to hear of your suicide earlier today.

i won't say "i can't imagine what drove you to this" because i have nearly been there myself, and i hope that if you continue to exist, you do so without pain or anguish.

i know we didn't know each other, but i admired your casual nature and the way you knew dylan's thoughts that were totally unknown to me. 

my thoughts also dwell on your widow, or should i call her your ex wife, and her kids. i really can't imagine what they are going through, although i don't guess it makes any difference to you now. but i can't help but think that she is going to start to think of herself as cursed.

i'm sorry you felt like taking your own life was a necessary step to take, but i guess there's not much to do about it now. i'm sure you will be missed, though. 

The small arms dealership went silent as a stranger entered. He was humanoid--thank goodness, the shopkeep thought--but wore a strange bodysuit: form-fitting, with a sort of horn on the forehead. It appeared male but with all these species streaming into the sector, who could say?

The customers--regulars who spent all their spare time in the shop--stared, although the stranger did not appear to notice. The suit did not appear to have any kind of sensory apparatus. No camera, certainly no eyeholes. The stranger turned its head, seeming to scan the room, and then approached the shopkeep's counter.

A small whisper of "Tenno" emerged near a corner of the room and quickly spread. Again, the stranger gave no indication that it cared or even noticed. It was examining the rack of pistols on display behind the shopkeep.

"I don't want any trouble, now," the shopkeep said. "We mind our own business out this way."

The stranger looked down at the shopkeep and seemed to stare for a moment. Then it raised an arm, and every pair of eyes in the shop watched as it indicated a pistol on the top rack, the newest design from one of the premiere armorers in the sector.

"It's 18,000 credits," the shopkeep said. He wasn't going to lose out on a customer, even if it was a wanted fugitive who gave him the willies.

The stranger sat a small clinking sack on the countertop. With practiced speed, the shopkeep sorted the various denominations of credit units into neat stacks. The stranger had more than 25,000 in his pouch.

"This is more than enough," the shopkeep said, but the stranger shook its head. It tapped on the clear countertop, indicating the shelves of ammunition stored there.

"Oh, of course," the shopkeep said. "Do you have a preferred brand? I have a special deal..." He stopped speaking, since the stranger was giving no reaction whatsoever. He retrieved the pistol and removed the merchant's lock from it, and stacked the appropriate amount of ammunition beside it.

This short piece is basically just me chasing plot bunnies and exorcising bloodlust.

Pretty big warning for blood, drugs, sexual predation, and uh...dudes eating dudes. (ha ha! innuendo.)

Slightly related: I think this is just gonna be a general writing blog for the forseeable future, but i'm keeping the url the same, because i like it.

Anyway, story.

I don't know what it is about me that makes it so that finishing a story is more or less the hardest thing for me to do, ever. But I hate that.

So I have torn down my schedules and my calendar and crumpled them up and thrown them away.

eeww

I mean, unless major depressive episodes are a valid excuse.

Anyway, I'm working on plotting out the rest of the story today! And I am also going to try to plan out my NaNo writing schedule. (I'm thinking three hours in the morning and three in the afternoon. Plus whenever else I feel like it.)

Old Capital/King's College: The seat of the Mage-King, and the largest city on the Eastern half of the continent. The city is located north of Broken Hill College, west of the Slow River, close to the foothills of the Ice Mountains. Fun fact: the Old Capital was the top city of the old Empire, and only certain parts of it have been reinhabited under the Mage-King's rule. Much of it remains in ruins, although continuous efforts to rebuild are in effect.

Headland College: A mage's college near Harbortown, on the southern headland of Harbor Bay.

Various unnamed villages.

Flesh out the plot!

I have six very rough and very short chapters written already, but those were written more or less off-the-cuff, and grew entirely organically from my starting vision.

But now that I've got a bit of a foundation, it's time to plan out the rest of the story! and that's mostly what I'll be doing today.

It's fairly large, probably Russia-sized, or maybe a bit bigger. The northern edge borders on the arctic zone, and is bounded by a bigass mountain range called the Ice Mountains--because they're always snowcapped and the only thing beyond them is more snow.

Telvon, Anarise's hometown, lies near the foothills of these mountains, within sight of the Frozen Sea and the Regular Sea (that's not actually it's name) on the eastern side of the Continent. Whitehold College, where Anarise studied magic, is a few miles to the north. The river Telv comes out of the mountains, running too swiftly to freeze even in the coldest winter, and so Telvon (and, by extension, Whitehold) remains amply supplied even in the depths of winter.

Farther south down the coast, in more temperate climes, is Harbor Bay, and the port city of Harbortown, the largest city east of the Slow River. Harbortown is a port city, and sees a great deal of traffic and trade from all over the Continent, and across the Sea as well.

Northwest, and inland, from Harbor town is Clearspring Mountain, a lone peak famous for a spring of clear, pure water that bubbles up from the depths of the earth, and flows into a small river which eventually empties into the bay. There is a small village at the foot of the mountain.

Nearly due west (and quite some distance away) lies the village of Riverwatch, one of the first places Anarise comes to visit. Riverwatch is small and dusty, remarkable only for its large and impressive watchtower, a remnant of the system of beacon fires that formerly ran the breadth of the Continent, in the days of the last great Empire.

Downriver from Riverwatch is Cumber, a goodly-sized trade town which straddles the river on both sides. And west from Riverwatch, along the old road, is Broken Hill College, where Anarise reappears in the Material Plane, and where Igdir Spellsword resides as a functionary of the Council and teacher of magic.