First things first, I'm so happy to be back in the Runner Owen (@runner-owen) universe! I was enchanted and fascinated by this universe from the moment I first read Friend of the Damned, and have been eagerly awaiting additions to this world ever since.
So, I'm very happy to report that Honoria was chock full of juicy Runner Owen lore, which I won't discuss here in case anyone wants to avoid spoilers. But let me just say, I am devouring this worldbuilding and expansions to the lore (no pun intended).
As for the plot of Honoria itself, it was full of twists, turns, and reveals, including a couple I really didn't see coming. My jaw was on the floor! While I feel it was slower-paced than the first installment in the Runner Owen series, this worked to its benefit, as I feel like the scope of Honoria is a little different than its predecessor.
Ultimately, I found Honoria to be a short and highly enjoyable read, another delicious taste of the wonderfully gothic Runner Owen world. I will continue to await any continuations or developments to this series, as I can sense that there is still so much more to this world that the first two installments have only scratched the surface of.
(Also, for the record, if anyone here has been tempted to read Honoria based on this post, just know that you should definitely read the first installment of the series, Friend of the Damned, first. Honoria is a great story, but it doesn't really function as a standalone. I would be completely lost if I came into it totally blind. That's not a bad thing, I just want people to know.)
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Commission for @transman-badass of Owen from his Runner Owen series! Find more information about it at @runner-owen or get a copy of book one, Friend of the Damned, on itch.io!
That's all I can say. 10/10 would wipe my memory to have another go at reading it for the first time.
"You should be a movie critic" they said, "You're so good at talking about the stories you like and why" they said.
@runner-owen while we here you've also unsurprisingly dug out ANOTHER old story idea because I realized that even though the original idea isn't a ghost story it'd be so fucking easy and also fitting with the narrative to be a ghost story, if that makes you feel nice to know.
13 from the icebreaker asks because how could I read “the vampire god known as the Scarred Man” and NOT want to know more
Ohhhh boy! Okay so if you wanna see more stuff about this WIP I've actually got a blog for it over at @runner-owen. I need to properly organize it because it's hard to find stuff rn but there are some gems in between the pretty pictures
But since you asked, let me tell you all about the Scarred Man ❤️
13. Who or what is stopping the protagonist from their goals?
This got long, I am very passionate about this story whoops --
The Scarred Man's true name is unknown, but his reputation is so potent, the mere hint of his involvement makes even the bravest tremble. He is a malicious deity reborn - God of Evil to humans, Grandfather of Vampires to his kin. Not everyone believes he is a god - some vampires consider the idea blasphemy - but he has powers that no others have, and memories that call back to an era long forgotten.
For a bit of context to the setting: this is set in a world that was once ruled by vampires, with humans treated as food or pets. Without warning however, humanity was collectively visited by the Goddess of Suffering, who shared their pain, and encouraged them to rise up against their tormentors. She granted them the knowledge of nature and human magic that had been long stolen from them. With her as their guardian and patron, humanity overthrew the vampires and reclaimed their world - but the vampire elders cursed the planet itself in their last moments, dimming the sun and casting the land in endless night.
Despite this, humanity persisted, and so did the planet. And it's said that on that fateful day, at the very moment the sun was stolen, the Scarred Man was born.
The Scarred Man is charismatic and often disinterested, even dismissive, in the whims of the mortals around him. He feels a bit restricted even, bored of the mind games and politics of the vampire courts, and the rules of the church. Of all the people who needed to join the efforts to reclaim humanity, he was the last of them. As a priest, a scholar and mage, he could be living a comfortable, luxurious life as a member of his society. But what god would be satisfied with that? Not him. He wanted so much more.
What he wanted, to his own surprise, turned out to be Lord Aurum Vim-Calyx. The teenage prince who would grow up to become Sire Commandant of the Knight Hunters, the royally appointed soldiers who defend the people of the capital against vampires like him. By the time the story starts Lord Aurum is an adult, and his rivalry with the Scarred Man long established. Lord Aurum, as the descendant of one of the original leaders of the revolution, a man gifted with magic comparable to the mythical sun, was an almost perfect match. The kind of man the Scarred Man aches to snuff the light from - not in permanent death, but eternal life, as a vampire by his side.
So why is it that he keeps being drawn to this damned young man, Owen Rosedown? Even before joining the Runners Guild of detectives for hire, the Scarred Man felt an odd fascination for him. He rationalized it. Owen was a favorite of Lord Aurum, after all, and more so, the likely unwanted and unplanned result of a vampire - human coupling. But as the boy became more notorious, and more skilled... The Scarred Man began to wonder... And he began to want.
Side note: the Goddess of Suffering just so happens to be the wife of the God of Evil. (Not by her choice, but that's a long story in itself.) The Scarred Man is quite sure she too has reincarnated. He's not sure where, but he knows in his bones, his cold unbeating heart, that she too walks the planet, unaware of her nature. And the Scarred Man, he wonders... Yes, he wonders, if his suspicions are right...
Rough concept of the Scarred Man using the Gentleman of Hera picrew.
His favorite mug had a chip on the edge. When he drank, Owen’s tongue rubbed against it. There was no reason to get rid of it, it still worked perfectly well for what he needed it to. It kept the hot cocoa warm during those long rainstorms. Sitting in his dark wood desk, looking out the window, the warmth of it sinking into his hands, Owen allowed himself to feel some peace, to rest, instead of the agitation, the desire to be free from this small room and out there, roaming in the streets. He’d wipe the drops from the corner of his flushed lips, set the mug down as he adjusted the light from his crystal lantern. He’d stare at the paper before him, his journal waiting for the ink with more patience than he himself had. When the scratch of his pen on paper filled the room, blending with the voices from beyond the door to his lodging house, it was the mug that kept him company.
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No, Owen didn’t recognize anyone in the paintings. His crystal lantern swung in his hand, blue-white light shifting and shining through the forgotten room. The young Runner shivered, and the rain beyond the walls roared in the echoing silence.
No, Owen didn’t recognize anyone in the paintings. The dust settled behind his back with every careful footstep. He raised the lantern to the old, old artwork, in their gray-coated, once gilded, frames. A smiling mouth, lipsticked red, a bashful face, a woman holding a goblet of scarlet red. Three strangers, holding hands, with luxurious dresses and pampered bodies. A portrait, lifesized, a man standing, smiling, in his hands, a heart illustrated with loving anatomic detail.
No, Owen did not recognize any of the vampires. He was grateful for that. Lowering his arm, Owen exhaled.
Thunder cracked, the window at the far end he’d passed illuminating the dead tree in the center of the courtyard outside. He’d only looked away a moment, the stretching branches shuddering in the wind, the grasping hand of the vampire gods flexing in the storm. Owen looked to the portrait again, and a slow chill flooded his body. Top to bottom, Owen followed it with his eyes, the slice in the canvas as if a wound carved within flesh, where no damage had been before. And there, at the bottom, a single, simple, knife.
Owen recognized it.
Hey @the-wip-project is this kind of what you were talking about today?
Owen and Lord Aurum live by themselves in two different types of what we know as apartment/flats - Owen lives in a lodging house, and Lord Aurum lives in an upper class complex specifically for rich bastards like him.
The Scarred Man lives in a castle or repurposed monastery, with many of his underlings.
Nora, as a servant in Black Velvet Castle, is often elbow to elbow with other servants, but doesn't get taken to 'the City' when the family heads there because her service isn't valued enough.
Mrs. Darby, the housekeeper, does too.
Mother Majors lives in the family sections of Black Velvet with her daughter and son in law. She used to live in a house in the suburbs with her husband, but sold it under the care of her son-in-law after becoming a widow.
Alyss of Abyss Keep, a character I haven't brought up before, lives in a Keep with the other humans in the vampire lands. It's called a Keep because that's where the humans are, well, Kept, until a vampire with a claim on them needs one.
Locke has a small apartment in a nicer part of the city. Nothing too fancy but definitely a comfortable little place.
I would list more characters but I don't want to bore anyone.
@the-wip-project challenged us to write a few sentences about our chosen WIP. I technically did this already in the server, but I figured I'd mess with it a bit:
19 year old Owen Rosedown is a Runner, a detective for hire, employed by the leader of Theria's Knight Hunters, Sire Commandant Lord Aurum Vim-Calyx, to help defeat the vampires that desire to conquer humanity once not. After a stealth mission to retrieve a journal from Black Velvet Castle goes wrong, Owen finds himself stuck there, forced by his handsome but arrogant employer to remain until he finds the second of the two books. But when a terrible storm hits, Lord Aurum's arch nemesis, the vampire known only as the Scarred Man, takes over the castle, intending to kidnap the residents to the vampire lands, and claim Owen for himself. As the other humans fall into despair, Owen refuses to surrender. Can he free them all from the inside? Or will the secrets of Black Velvet, and the self proclaimed god that desires him, break his spirit?
You can find a blurb for the series as a whole at @runner-owen if you'd like
