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New IOL Deets

The scene of Luke and Elliot getting together and confessing their feelings was almost only ONE SENTENCE LONG. Many thanks on behalf of the fandom to the anonymous critique partner of Sarah’s who told her that absolutely wouldn’t fly.

Elliot and Luke Post-IOL

Sarah says that Elliot doesn’t go over the border much, even though he is able to. Luke is afraid of Elliot going somewhere where he can’t follow, and even though Elliot doesn’t even think of it as a possibility, he tries to be respectful of it.

Pet names: Elliot sometimes will take classics and make them weird (like he does at the end of IOL). Luke will occasionally embarrassedly call Elliot “darling”.

Luke has fairly regular contact with the harpies. Elliot tends to spearhead their contact in terms of keeping up correspondence - he knows relatives even Luke doesn’t, and they often attend harpy festivals. According to Sarah, it’s a classic case of the in-law being the favorite kid. She jokes that he could have just gone to the harpies and lived with them when he was exiled, and they would have gladly taken him in.

WHY SARAH

TWTBD Parts 1 & 2 were initially meant to be published on consecutive Sundays. SARAH SUGGESTED THAT THERE BE A LONGER WAIT IN BETWEEN.

Why Elliot do that?

Even though Elliot has made some progress with his insecurities, he still thinks that Luke doesn’t truly know the worst that he can do, and just puts up with him. Over the years, they have worked through smaller issues, so he’s learned that he can be forgiven for these things (while before that he considered himself completely unloveable). Once he’s committed treason, he thinks that is the worst possible thing, something completely antithetical to Luke’s value system as a soldier, so he considers it inevitable that their relationship is over.

Sarah likened it to “the mortifying ordeal of being known” –  Elliot never holds himself back from being completely known, because then he can be loved for who he is. But Elliot doesn’t think that Luke knows the worst he can be (even though Luke obviously does and accepts him for it).

Luke’s Letters

Luke starts with angry letters, then more worried, then back and forth between the two. Some of the letters Luke sends to Elliot are well thought out and composed (probably because Serene helped him), while others are basically drunk late night texts that he has to admit to Serene later with shame (side note from me: anyone wanna write the fic that comprises all his letters? or am I gonna have to do that myself). 

Luke doesn’t even consider them broken up in the first place and was entirely unsurprised to hear what Elliot had done when he returned, while Elliot dramatically thinks they’ve been broken up for months. He doesn’t want to hurt himself by looking at the letters when he thinks he knows that they will say.

The meantime:

It had been a month since Elliot was exiled by the time Luke and Serene returned from war. By the time Luke arrives it has been almost four months. A lot of that time was spent figuring out what thad happened, possibly variously threatening people who had been planning on executing Elliot.

“A lot of Elliot’s diplomacy relies on the fact that there are people who will enact violence for him”

Peace is not a stable thing, and there isn’t an easy answer for it. As they get older, it becomes more difficult, since adults are held more accountable for their actions than children.

Serene and Luke actually were trying to figure out the diplomatic way to solve the situation: i.e., sending letters to form a plan once communication was initiated.  After getting no response, they tried to get him pardoned, which was difficult considering someone apparently has a transcript of a long speech Elliot gave that essentially said “I did it and I’m not sorry”. 

Luke and Serene would sometimes spontaneously decide they were going to go find him alone, and the other would talk them down from it, or they’d decide to go together, and Golden would convince them to wait.

Where’s Serene?

The story was unfortunately too long to include Serene, or even the few references to her that were initially included (such as Mark mentioning a rumor of the Sunborn Champion being involved with her).

Logistically Sarah couldn’t get Serene to the battle, since Luke would have flown to get to Elliot as fast as possible. She says that Serene definitely arrives within the day.

What happens after TWTBD?

Luke and Elliot have to have several conversations, starting with a yelling conversation, a tender conversation, and then the normal combination of yelling/tender/insults. 

“If Elliot says loser, Luke knows that he’s okay and so pretty much the first words that Elliot said to Luke in the battlefield were reassuring because when he says loser, he means I still love you, which is what Luke was getting worried about.”

Elliot puts himself in tall towers and high places specifically so Luke can find him.

Sarah specifically quotes “This Ain’t a Love Song” by scouting for girls: “I know I’m lost, but I’m waiting to be found”.

More IOL

Sarah has said this before, but just in case anyone has missed it: she definitely has ideas of what happens to the characters in the future. She has said she has a strong story idea which would also need another novel in between to explain the middle events – so essentially a trilogy. TWTBD would take place in between these second and third books – the second would explain the events up to TWTBD, and the third would continue on from there. To be clear, Sarah has not confirmed whether this is actually in the works yet, or whether these would take full-length novel form or short story form.

On Trans and Nonbinary Individuals in IOL (specifically in elven culture):

Sarah says there would be some more freedoms for nonbinary/trans elves or dwarves than in human culture, but they would be restricted in other ways.

Sarah acknowledges that the IOL universe has been represented in a more binary way thus far; she plans to delve more into gender beyond the binary in the future after taking time to get the details and complexity right.

Long Live Evil Information

Sarah’s new upcoming novel! The protagonist is thrown into her favorite fantasy novel, but is unexpectedly classified as an evil sorceress and cast out with the rest of the villains. From how Sarah talks about it, the novel delves into villainy in fiction and what truly makes a villain. It also explores the joy of finding magic even if you think you’ve reached the stage of your life where you’re past it. (I AM SO EXCITED)