Back at it

This week went really well for writing. I added a little less than 6k to this draft and I have written past the few scenes I outlined after pulling the outline from the draft I got interrupted writing. I got it over 50k now. Woop! I am pretty excited about that. I am still very much discovery writing this version of the story despite pauses to think through how each of the story strands are going to come together.

I have a few of the side and more minor characters getting a promotion to “important to the story” which has been a lot of fun. I keep finding little quirks in how the magic works that add and fill out the story. I guess that having a world with four distinct magic systems leaves plenty of room for that sort of thing. And man is it fun to play with.

Here’s a little snippet from the excitement I got to write this week:

A curse broke from him as he realized he had overshot his landing. He hit the ground but couldn’t slow enough to keep himself from flying over the edge. He brought up a block to stop his forward motion as something wrapped around his waist and jerked him back at the same time, another block formed beneath him.

With a grunt he slammed into the platform behind him and his legs folded as the block beneath him rose rapidly. Soon he was on his back in the dirt, a slew of ice and lightning and the occasional ball of fire, flying just over the edge where he’d just been dangling.

“Zuriel!”

Staying low, Aaron rolled over and found Aila’s green eyes looking at him with a mix of relief and fear. She released the plant link, and he looked down to find a vine wrapped tightly around his torso.

“Thanks.”

“Same.”

Writing again

Getting sick derailed me considerably. It’s been nearly a month since I’ve written consistently but now that I have pulled the outline from what I have written and planned out the next series of scenes, I have started trying to get back to my 1k a day goal. I have not succeeded yet, but I have added a little since I got derailed and I am excited about some changes I made to one of the anchor scenes I had coming up. It works much better now.

That said, the draft currently sits just over 44k. I am still planning on about 120k so I am about 36% of the way through my plan.

Here’s a little snippet:

Aaron shook his head and walked back to the far end of the garden. “I don’t need to be good for three days, I need to be able to use all this magic I have.”

“You start at the beginning, Zuriel. You’re not going to face him tomorrow.”

Aaron formed his steps and started climbing. “You don’t actually know that.”

Slight Pause

After recovering from being sick for seven days, I am rereading the 43k I wrote in this draft, summarizing each scene and noting the purpose of it. I am just 12 or so pages from finishing that. Once I finish that, I intend to build a rough outline for how I want to move from where I let off to where I will end the book.

It’s been nice to read it again and still think it’s worth keeping.

Here’s a little snippet I enjoyed on the reread:

“You are an idiot.”

Aaron turned to look at Halvar who sat in a chair he’d pulled up beside the bed.

“Good morning to you, too.”

“You don’t even drink alcohol, what were you thinking drinking a tonic in a world you know almost nothing about, called Star Nectar that smells like sugar and tastes like fire? It literally tastes like fire, Zuriel.”

“Yeah, I kinda remember that.”

“Do you remember anything else?” Halvar raised his eyebrow and leaned back with his arms crossed over his chest.

“No.” Aaron answered reluctantly.

Both a Terrible and Very Fun Week

This week I was taken out by a migraine. Settled in Monday night and hung around until late Wednesday morning. This took me off my 1k a day pace, but not by much. I did get just over 6k added bringing the draft up to 41k.

The writing I did get to do this week was so much fun. I have reached the part of the story that breaks from the last draft so rather than transferring and making minor changes to scenes, I am crafting entirely new ones and building out altered and strengthened plot lines and character arcs.

This has been so fun. I got to write an adorably awkward early scene with Aila and Zuriel as well as a darkly fun scene with the minor baddie where he is gaining actually sinister attributes.

Here’s a little snippet from how Zuriel’s training is going:

“You have already become so much more than I ever thought you would be.” Halvar said, a soft awe to his voice.

Aaron’s smile faded and Pyre nudged his side with his warm snout. He ran his hand on the dragon’s scales and tried to offer assurances that they’d fly soon. Then he turned his attention to Halvar.

“I can’t even handle a real sword. I can’t keep my thoughts from barging in on other people’s minds. I can’t pull fire without blacking out and I can’t form enough stairs to mount the dragon I barely know how to talk to.”

Halvar chuckled. “You’re just going to gloss over the fact that you have three magics and a dragon, then?”

Aaron sighed. “I’ll count them as a plus when I can do anything useful with them.” Halvar stood and offered his hand to help Aaron up. The potion Cyrus had given him had helped, but he’d pushed himself harder than he ever had in his life. And all he’d managed was to leave himself so useless he’d probably need someone to carry him back to his room.

Another Solid Week

I added a little over 7k to The Shadow of Vale this week bringing the word count nearly to 35k.

The amount of the previous draft I am transferring over is really surprising and quite exciting. While I have made significant changes to some of the plot lines and characters, there is still so much that I am finding just works with minimal changes. I think changing some of the context is making some of the scenes work better than I thought they did originally.

Despite getting really sidetracked by another WIP this morning, I did get my 1k in today to round out a solid week of writing.

I also did a fair bit of work on some out of sequence scenes that got stuck in my head. That might have been another 1200 words or so, but they won’t actually count until I get to fold them into the draft. 😉

So much was transfer, it was actually kind hard to pick a snippet, but here we are:

“What’s that?”

“A dummy sword.” He pushed it closer to Aaron who took it reluctantly.

“Shouldn’t I be training with a real sword?”

Cyrus rolled his eyes and drew his sword again. He turned and offered the hilt to Aaron while taking the dummy sword back.

With a grin, Aaron took hold of the sword, the tip of which immediately dropped into the dirt when Cyrus released the blade. “Oh! It’s heavy.”

Cyrus sighed and ran his hand over his face. “This is going to be a long day.”

Making good progress

Since last week I have added 12,800 words to the latest draft bringing it over 27k.

Part of that was how much I didn’t want to change. There were several scenes that I transferred with some adjustments and a couple that I copy pasted as is.

This morning I worked through a new portion of the story, where I am making adjustments to some of the character arcs and plot lines and I am feel very good about how it came out, especially since I was stumped when I sat down to write this morning and assumed I wouldn’t hit my 1k goal for the day (I flew past it).

In celebration of another good week, here are a few snippets:

Aaron’s mouth dropped open. “I’m your link? Your rider?”

Agreement.

With that, Pyre stood and pushed an image of Aaron climbing invisible stairs onto the dragon’s back.

Still in shock, Aaron stood dumbstruck a moment until he pushed the image in his mind once more.

“I, I don’t know how to do that.”

The image returned with the added detail of ripples of energy beneath his feet as he jogged up the invisible stairs.

“No, I get that it’s naim magic, I just, I don’t know how to use it like that yet. I haven’t even been here for a day, Pyre. I have no idea what I’m doing.”

Pyre huffed and reached his head toward Aaron, his lips pulling back from his teeth.

“No, no, no, no, no.” Aaron held out his hands and stepped back quickly. “Do not throw me. I’ve never been so close to literally having the crap scared out of me.”

“He needs you, Aila.”

Aila frowned. “Who?”

“Zuriel.” He turned away, looking at nothing as he continued. “You are the last daughter of Abner on Vale, at least as far as well know. You’re a light. He must face down Samael, and I must ensure he survives that, but you,” he met her eye once more. “You give us all hope for what comes after.”

Hello!

Just wanted to poke my head in and give the minimal update I have for The Shadow of Vale.

While I have not written anything this past month, I have had it simmering in the background as I work on other stories. I have a better idea of what themes I want to explore in the next portion of the story. Some ideas I am toying with for my Phoenix Bound story are also sparking some ideas for The Shadow of Vale as the magics and races play off each other since they exist in the same universe.

I will probably scribble out a few scene ideas for the next portion once I solidify them a little more. It’s taking some time to move from having nothing but the understanding that they will get married, and filling out what impact that has on them, the main plot, and other characters. This portion didn’t exist in any previous drafts because this is the first time I’ve had them marry before the conclusion of the main plot, so I don’t have much to build on. The things that worked with mutual pining aren’t necessarily going to work with them married. There was a plot line of them both toying with the idea of marrying other people, for example. That has obviously been nixed.

All that is to say, I am quite enjoying this new set up of working on something simpler (despite occasionally growing bored with it) and letting this simmer in the background. Takes some of the pressure off and lets me get creative with it in a new way.

Plus, I am building new writing skills as I work on a more solidified story.

Thanks for reading! Till next time.

-Michelle

Update. Writing Plans.

I have been thinking a lot lately about what I want to do with my writing and I have decided, as I mentioned in a previous post, that I want to get published.

In the interest of accomplishing that goal, I have decided to focus my attention on one of my more simplistic stories. My Vale stories (or Etherum, as I have begun to call the universe that my Vale, Cardelsiff, and Hallendrest stories exist in) are extremely complex stories with several plot lines, a massive cast of characters and deep ideas explored. In short, they are years away from being ready to publish.

I do, however, have a hand full of stories that are much more simplistic, smaller casts, less plot lines, etc. It is one of these stories I intend to focus my attention on this year. Hopefully I can get a solid draft completed and get to the point of just editing the story rather than scrapping it completely and reworking it as I am still doing with The Shadow of Vale.

There is not much I love more than world building, so these bigger stories will continue to get some work and I do plan to pop in here on occasion with updates. Depending on how often I return to The Shadow of Vale, I may drop updates to monthly rather than weekly.

If I end up dropping it entirely for several months, the updates will of course become a bit more sporadic.

For any of you who wish to follow me on my other projects, as this blog is intended to focus on The Shadow of Vale, you can follow me on X: @wordsandlore of tumblr: @Shellyscribbles

Thank you for reading and joining me on this journey.

God Bless,

Michelle

Chipping Away

I only added a few hundred words to The Shadow of Vale this week. I have been working more on the story I have set on Cardelsiff. Its been a lot of fun and I am actually writing a lot, just not in this story.

I am struggling a bit with what is happening along side Zuriel and Aila’s story. Since I cut so much of what is happening in the actual conflict of the world, I am still piecing together the events. So while I have a good idea of this first part, which I think will probably be its own book, I want to be setting up the next bit, but I just don’t now what that entails just yet. Its super clear and then really foggy and then I know how it ends.

Since I don’t have anything to share from The Shadow of Vale, here is an excerpt from my other story, Phoenix Bound. Enjoy!

Despite how close she’d gotten to the woods, she hadn’t quite reached the cover of them when arms wrapped around her and she fell, tangled up with her captor.

A hand slapped over her mouth before a scream could escape her.

I’m not going to hurt you.

Tears leaked from her eyes as she sobbed and struggled against the embrace of the naim. Another man she’d trusted foolishly.

I’m going to let go, but please don’t scream. I don’t know how strong he made that potion; he might have suspected it was for him.

For him? Mara stilled and soon after, the arm pinning her own arms to her sides loosened and then fell away along with the hand on her mouth. She rolled away and rose to a crouch and found herself face to face with the orange naim, his eyes surprisingly bright in the darkness.

They stared at one another in silence for a long moment until Keegan finally straightened and without taking his eyes off Mara, collected a bag and haphazardly folded the blanket she’d been laying on and tucked it inside.

She tore her gaze away and looked to the trees.

You don’t know this island. You’ll get lost.

Lost on an island was probably better than what they had in mind for her.

Except, he hadn’t given her the potion. He hadn’t bound her. He just stood watching her. Coiled and tense, but somehow not threatening.

Koray hadn’t seemed threatening either.

Though Keegan didn’t remind her of Koray. He reminded her of Russ.

The potion. Why did you ask for it?

Keegan flinched and lowered his eyes before he sent. I didn’t realize you heard us. I can’t make potions and the only way I could think to get you away without him following was to give him a sleeping potion. He’s a light sleeper, so sneaking off wasn’t an option. I never intended to use it on you. He turned his gaze back to her.

Again, they stood still and silent for a long time before Keegan let out a breath and started toward the trees.

Why should I trust you? She sent as he came beside her.

He looked at her, a weariness in his eyes. You shouldn’t trust me. He paused. But you do. With that, he started off into the trees.

Mara watched him and then glanced back toward the embers where the fire had been. She thought she could make out the sprawled from of the wizard in the shadows.

Coming? ‘Cause Skrok wasn’t playing a part. He meant what he said.

Mara shuddered and turned toward the dark woods where she could only just make out Keegan’s form within the shadows. Taking a breath, she started into the darkness after him.

Happy New Year!

I intentionally skipped posting after Christmas because I didn’t write anything and it just felt appropriate to take a week off.

This post is just late because of some shifting work schedule that threw off my weekend.

So, the Shadow of Vale, Draft 3 is just over 87K now. I haven’t written a lot on it this past week as I have been capturing some ideas in other stories, but a series I read this weekend actually got me in the proper head space for the scene I am working on, so I have made a bit of progress recently.

I still constantly wrestle with the urge to scrap this draft and start over. I wonder sometimes if I am ever going to write a version of this story that doesn’t make me want to scrap it and start over.

But I won’t know if I don’t try. So, onward!

Here’s some scribbles from recent efforts:

“What happened?” he rasped, his eyes still closed. All he could remember was leaving Aila to Chiron and starting outside with Halvar.

“Pyre fought for you.” She gave a weak smile. “You tried to mount him, but you got hit with an imbued stone. It blocked your magic. Your blocks stopped working and you fell. Halvar tried to catch you, but he couldn’t use his blocks either. As you fell past him, the stone blocking your magic took out his, too.”

Zuriel’s eyes opened in alarm. A grunt escaped him from the pain when he flexed his core. “Is he alright?”

“Yeah. He didn’t fall as far as you did. He’s okay.”

Zuriel looked at Aila. He noticed her somber expression and the tight line of her mouth. There was a lot more to what happened.

“What else?”

“Pyre wouldn’t let anyone near you. He just about destroyed everything in front of the palace and single-handedly repelled the attack.” Her voice was soft, and her gaze was far away as she toyed with the fabric of his shirt. “It took them a long time to get to you.”

He stayed quiet for a long moment, waiting for her to go on. Her face grew tight, and her eyes filled with tears.

Then he noticed it. The wards. One on the room and one…

“Your mind is warded.”

Aila nodded and wiped the moisture from her cheek. “A messenger told Agur you were unlikely to survive and…” she broke off, wiping more tears as they fell. “He wanted you to be alone if you died and I lost it.” She met his eyes again. “So, he told me.”

Zuriel felt a sharp pain in his chest as her nostrils flared and her chin trembled. “Oh, Aila.”