Eric K. Barnum's Blog, page 4

Tellest – new game, Quantum Quest is out, and Dar Tania is along for the ride as a premium member!

Besides the Court of Patriarchs, no other character is more central to the Tanian psyche than Dar Tania. She was the first to ride Alerius, the fire dragon, to see Tiamat, to ascend, to create the nation… that bears her name. She was the first human to which a colored dragon begged for help… see Set’s Dream, to save Syliri. Her protege, Dar Ana, took her name and sought to emulate her always, eventually becoming the goddess incarnated as mortal that Ana saw her as. Tania built the Temple at Morbatten and set the stage for all of the revelations that continue to drive Morbatten 1,800 years later. Statues of Dar adorn the empire and have even become haute couture in places like Taysor, Khasra, and Haven. Dwarf, elf, and gnome alike know her visage. She is a symbol of what anyone can do, can be if they combine a bit of faith with persistence and mentors/teachers able to fan the fires of that faith.

If you like board games with a fantasy bend, check Quantum Quest out. It’s fun to see how art is made. Can you determine which pose – A, B, or C – became the final pose, Child of Dragons?

R’Dar Ora Kell’Tayris – New Art

It is said that dragons do not like surprises. In Tania, this axiom: Dragons and surprises and death, is often referred to with another – Dragons and their secrets… kept. For hating surprises as much as they do, the Court of Patriarchs has more than its share of secrets. Ora was a secret belonging to Ynt’taris, the Ice Patriarch. She was hidden in plainsight with one of Alerius’ most trusted and closest friends, Sai R’dar.

I am excited to reveal a portrait of Ora, by artist Piotr Tekien (right side). It has a fun cultural styling that will probably allow you to guess the region of origin the artist hails from. So, let’s review what we know about Ora Kell’Tayris. She was born in 1775 DAR. When she joined Malcor in marriage in 1802 DAR, she was 27 years old. Their son, Alauren, was born in 1803. Side by side is the same portrait by a different artist, Lukas Jordao on left side, who also did the Ynt’taris comic. I think they’re both stunning and beautiful. Lukas’ version focuses on Ora, the kind and loving mother. Piotr’s hits on the aloof and mighty priestess, the first ever, to serve Ice. The styles and presentations speak to different stories of Ora. It’s fun for me to describe characters in my books, and have artists put them into the canon. I’m sure you may imagine Ora differently than I do when writing her. I tell you this: writing Ora is easy. She speaks to me and words flow.

Early childhood. Ora’s parents are unknown. She was orphaned in the Baronies and wandered. With how obsessed Tanians are with the welfare of children, it’s miraculous she was not intercepted by the Temple, slavers, or waylaid and killed before she found her way hundreds of miles to the Great Bazaar in Morbatten and laid back on the fountain’s edge to watch the Overflight Festival. Dirty, starving, malnourished, gaunt, hollow-eyed children are so rare in Morbatten that no one really knows how to handle the situation. A guard tried to shoo her away, and Ynt’taris intervened. It is widely-speculated that Ynt’taris was watching over the child and Tiamat drove her to find the Temple.

Schooling. Ynt’taris placed Ora at Sai R’Dar’s estate with strict instructions to keep her safe and hidden from the world. Alerius and other rank members of The Circle encountered Ora at Sai’s estate and marveled that the Golem Lord had finally accepted a mortal into his household. When asked, Sai said what any good Tanian would say, “I was blessed with a child in need and will not fail the Queen in caring for this child of dragons.” Behind the scenes of her working as a servant, Ynt’taris and later Sai began teaching Ora. She had an insatiable appetite for ancient history and a knack for connecting history to current events… even if she only saw and heard about the events through Sai’s golems. When she reached nineteen, the last year she could attend the Coming of Age ceremony, Ynt’taris took her to Klenna where she tested highly as a priestess and a sage. However, the shrine cleric declared her unfit for Temple service. It was okay. Ora knew this would happen; Ynt’taris had arranged it. The ceremony confirmed what Ynt’taris already knew… Ora had what he called ‘the spirit of Alaura.’

Temple Training. In much the same way that Alerius trained Dar Tania out of the flow of Time, Ynt’taris trained Ora in the River. However, for the Ice Patriach, it is not a River of Fire. It is a river of icy mist flowing… and Ora thrived. With accelerated training and direct mentoring by Ynt’taris, she transcended within three years. To prevent  any questions about loyalty, Sai arranged for Alerius to “accidentally” discover the transcended priestess. Though we do not know what was said between the patriarchs, Alerius agreed to hold Ynt’taris’ secret priestess and the two patriarchs, eventually joined by Spark, directly mentored Ora.

Ora became publicly known with her first official mission from the Temple, at Dar Shara’s command. Seek out a young paladin along the East-West Major, assess his worth, and if worthy, bear a child with him. Ora found two: Malcor and Calvin. Like Dar Tania falling in love with Sean 1800 years earlier, Ora fell in love with Malcor and was granted a dispensation to be married to him “for a time.” Though worthy, Calvin was not considered and later flunked out of paladinhood.

There is no Book of Ice in Tiamat’s scriptures. The ice matriarch fell at the conclusion of the Dragon Wars. Ynt’taris is alone. Tiamat’s Council of Mothers has an empty seat. Ynt’taris made no secret of his desire that the ancient sage Alaura ascend and take this vacancy. That Alaura died without children frustrated Ynt’taris to no end. It is clear from Tempe writings that Ynt’taris went to extreme measures to capture and revive Alaura’s bloodline. If there were a Book of Ice, it would illuminate how Ice is divinely expressed. Fire is well understood as tornadoes of flame, fire resistance and the application of heat in battle. Ora’s confrontation with Perdition showed a few of these differences that now serve as the initial entries into what might someday become the Book of Ice.

Like how Ynt’taris’ breath weapon is not ice, Ora’s expression of Tiamat’s power drains heat, life, and magic from its targets. In this way, it acts more like negative energy or even Shadow. The ubiquitous flamestrikes and firestorms, so characteristic of Tiamat’s fire priestesses, are expressed by Ora as multiple points of cold… so cold it changes local environments. In the same way that fire priestesses can channel divine fire, Ora is able to channel the expression of the cold limited only by her imagination. Other common combat spells used by clerics are expressed as cold. When tested, the goddess armor of an ice priestess manifested the same as it does for fire. Ora’s transcendence, similar to a fire priestess, veiled her in ice and mist. Her eyes, hair, and lips are touched by blue and silver. Instead of being wreathed in fire, she has a disconnected and aloof demeanor, that has nothing to do with her warm personality. The temperature drops the closer you get to her. If she stands still for very long, ice crystallizes and falls around her.

Living in a world of temperature, Ora suffers from heat. Like Alaura, Ora will likely withdraw more and more into the higher reaches of the mountains. Rumors swirl of a new Temple of Ice in the Shield Mountains, but they are just rumors.

 

 

Runes – What they are. Why they matter

Welcome – the Chaos Rune. This rune represents the 3 primordial powers in the Abyss and at the Gate of Chaos. Gates, also called Nexus in my writing, are mechanisms by which matter is moved from one place to another across time and space. There are 4 special Gates, the Nexus: Creation, Chaos, Warp, and Tehra. While I’ll be revealing the other runes shortly, let’s talk about Chaos first. We see chaos in our own world as life differentiates over time. Sometimes, mutation can even yield up benefits. However, unlike Marvel’s the X-Men, it is almost always destructive and fatal. In the Forsaken Isles, mutation acts like a cancerous infection of the soul that quickly alters the body too.

The Chaos Rune is shaped by 3 primordial forces: Demos/Creative Potential of Mutation, Gorgos/Destructive Mutation, and Set/Unchecked Desire to Consume Everything. The rune’s design started out as 3 circles on a disc and then a fantastic artist embellished each circle with their own signatures. Demos-Gorgos together are almost as strong as Set. Set watches from his jailed slumber, hungry and anticipating eventual freedom to feed on all that is. Demos fosters growth and change and seeks to mimic the Nexus of Creation. As fast as Demos builds it up, Gorgos gleefully sucks it in the searing burn of the black hole that is destruction. If you had to choose a power, which: Creation or Destruction? I’d pick Creation. It’s endlessly entertaining. It has no end. It’s immortal. Gorgos, unlike Set, understands this instinctively. Demos-Gorgos have a symbiotic relationship… dare I say friendship?

 

Runes are as integral a part of fantasy (and some sci-fi) as Orcs, magic swords, and sultry goddess avatars. Yet, you rarely find any level of explanation or exploration of what they are. Consider the Fellowship of the Ring by the good professor. They get to Moria and there’s this Elvish inscription in special runes. Sting had runes. Glamdring. Anything magical had them. Why not just call it Elvish? Well, of course, he does, but the stage is set for RUNES. The One Ring had runes that you could only see when exposed to flame. It goes on and on. Most fantasy has runes. The Forsaken Isles is no different. Let’s look at rune magic.

As noted in my writing and FI.com, runes contain activation magic and potential that is unlocked through touch or some other user-initiated trigger. Morbatten makes use of rune magic extensively in Bomoki’s Gate, on magical items and gear, and is prominent in even commoners’ lives.

Low Power example. Every household in Tania, that is consecrated to Tiamat, has a ‘hearth rune.’ This is a single ceramic tile that contains and slowly releases heat from the Elemental Plane of Fire. It provides heat without burning fuel. It allows for cooking. It can be used to kindle fuel. It can be used for direct cooking. To the extent it can kindle fuel, it can also release light like a candle. When commoners are married through the act of having a child together, the child is gifted a hearth stone by the local Shrine of Tiamat. In this manner, commoners are subtly encouraged to have many children.
Medium Power example. Commerce in Tania occurs as a function of two widely-used terms: gold and jewels. Gold or a gold coin is a reference to the value of gold required to sustain a commoner family of 5 for 1 year. To this end, a gold coin is literally a gold coin. The Merchant Guild controls the economy via the dragons’ treasure hoard to release or acquire back actual gold so that this value is approximately fixed every year. A jewel is a reference to 10,000 gold coins as it gets difficult to transport that much actual gold. However, actual commerce does not occur in Tania as a function of gold coins trading hands. That would be too cumbersome and slow. Instead, a ‘commerce rune’ is used. The purchaser places their gold, or letter of credit representing jewels, onto the commerce rune and, while touching it, declares the value. The ‘commerce rune’ is able to recognize commerce runes on jewels and Tanian minted gold. When these are not available, the commerce rune recognizes the sincerity of belief that the purchaser believes the offered gold is actually gold. The rune glows with yellow flames when the offered gold is equal to the purchaser’s belief that the gold is actually worth that much. It’s like a polygraph of intent and belief. The Merchant’s Guild controls the creation and registration of commerce runes. Having one is what designates a “shop” as an official one. There are many that cannot afford the commerce rune.
High Power example. The more powerful a magic item, the more likely it is to have runes worked into it. Malcor’s Sword, called the Apprentice Blade or ‘Coming Undone,’ has runes worked all over the weapon’s surface. When Malcor created it, he thought he was writing in Draconian, the language of dragons before the fall of the Eldar. In reality, he was writing in the Merakoran manner of Draconian. Unless otherwise specified, runes in the time of Morbatten are Merakoran, which was the only continent spanning empire with a standardized language, studies, etc. Alerius preserved much of their learnings.
Obscene High Power example. Bloodstones are marked by runes that designate their name and control mechanisms. The markings are unique and known, allowing Tania to scry their location and use. The markings also control whether they explode, go dormant, or become cursed. In this way, Tania controls even the bloodstones they sell or gift. For every 10 bloodstones registered, there is a single black market one – controlled by Perdition – so that Tania can effectively price registered ones against a black market same.

So, how do runes work, you might ask. The Forsaken Isles are a dynamic place marked by the consequence of Time flowing away from the Nexuses of Creation, Chaos, and Warp. The confluence of these 3 Gates creates Time flowing through our world, Tehra. The Gates power the gods. The gods in turn empower the belief and faith of sentient worshippers in Tehra. When a rune is created, the faith and diligence of the rune’s creator – if focused to a particular god – creates a power signature than can in turn hold magic. A 5 year old child, believing in Tiamat with all her heart, can draw a dragon and it will act like a rune. It can be enchanted. It might not last very long or be able to hold very strong magic though. By upgrading the materials, the skill of the creator (artist really), and by combining the creation with magic and divine power, the creator’s faith and BELIEF that the rune is going to be stronger, last longer, etc the rune’s power becomes true. This is the closest normal people can get to the Eldar Days where WILL = REALITY.

Interestingly, the dragons noted that when adding a person’s signature to formal situations, the signature itself becomes a sort of rune. You can test this out… next time you write a love letter and sign your name, or if someone asks for your autograph… I guarantee that you sign it differently than you would a doctor’s consent form or a package delivery notice. That difference, even in our far distant from the Forsaken Isles world, is rune magic at work. I bet you didn’t know you were magical.

Back to the Merchant Guild example, by fashioning them on ceramic tiles, these runes are guaranteed to break over time and require replacement. In Tania, most mages spend their apprenticeship assisting in the creation of runes or the binding of elementals into Tania’s civic engineering structure. Clerics do the same. The Chaos rune is required to channel any kind of changed state based on the other runes present. Though the order and power does not matter as much as the INTENT in creating a succession of runes, Tania has developed a signature style that allows multiple runes to interact and adjust the level of power brought by the runes. Consider the lower power example of a fire hearthstone rune:

Plane of Fire to hold heat
Chaos Rune to change the heat flowing the rune
Lineage Rune to create an effect whereby the heat is released even without the rune being touched or commanded
Activation Rune by which Plane of Fire is touched or not touched

You could get a similar effect by having a mage cast a fireball at a rune constructed to hold and slowly release the energy.

 

 

A Note about Bloodstones

Bloodstones are a central component of the Forsaken Isles. While they may have always existed, their nature and source was not discovered until after what is called “The First Cascade.” This occurred in 350 DAR. Recounted by King Rojo I through a vision granted by Alerius in Malcor’s Story, the confluence of Actual Orcus coming through into the valley of Morbatten, and the fight that involved the Court of Patriarchs, angels, and several divine powers spilled blood that was later found to have crystallized. Pure sources of Creation, Chaos, and Warp mixed with the emotion of that battle is now known as the Why bloodstones have power. It took the Black Dragon Patriarch, Screem, to unravel the mystery of how to facet/polish, and enchant these into artefacts of power.

The first such created stone is called “The Imperial,” and was named by Dar Ana. It allows its wielder to interject their will into any god’s dominion. The stronger the dominion’s presence, and the stronger the will of The Imperial, the more its wielder becomes a de facto god in their own right. Dar Ana forged it to enable her to battle personally against the foes of Tiamat. Following this, all other bloodstones are named and marked though Morbatten allows a black market of unmarked stones that is quasi-regulated by Perdition, Morbatten’s “thieves guild.”

Stones small enough to carry are called bloodstone gems, rubies, or just bloodstones. Some stones are huge, or weigh so much (even if small) that they cannot be wielded. These are referred to as towers. It is thought that, by Malcor’s time as king, that there are 1000s of bloodstones and towers across the Forsaken Isles. With the events unfolding in Bomoki’s Gate, the future of bloodstones is now in question – will there be more to be found? Dar Ana is certain there are more to be found.

The Healer’s Making Release, Fri March 30, 2018

Fellow Tanians, the novella “The Healer’s Making” is unleashed upon the world. Child of Dragons, come and partake of the mythology that is the fall of Merakor. As a Tanian, you are most fascinated with Merakor’s last days… the how and why such a good empire of righteous peoples was utterly destroyed. If, on the other hand, you are Soran, you are most compelled to understand the building up of Merakor, its role as a peak civilization lost to history and the many heroes who formed the glue of its holy fabric. Human, elf, dwarf, gnome, even orc and other monster races joined into this bright beacon under the King Seat of Lyrion.

An early review calls it a 5 of 5 star “Spellbinding epic.” That made me feel really good. Thanks Celia!

This 41 page novella will take you through the Nameless Priest of Braden’s retelling of the last years before the survivors fled from the ancient city of Gateway to the Forsaken Isles. Now on sale for $0.99 and always free for Kindle Unlimited.

In the twilight of a dying empire, an anti-paladin becomes the unlikely protector

of Merakor’s refugees. In saving them, will he save himself?  

Coming Friday 3/30/18 – “The Healer’s Making”

You were told. You were warned. You were begged… to JOIN MY NEWSLETTER and it’s not too late! Besides early and exclusive content, newsletter subscribers will also receive free access to novellas set in the Forsaken Isles. The first – The Healer’s Making – marks part I of the first Creation anthology. If you’re not familiar with my parlance, there are 3 Nexus Gates in my world that loosely line up with Heaven/Creation, Hell/Warp, and Abyss/Chaos. I’ve already drafted the next two Creation anthologies and will be releasing them when ready.

Here’s the skinny. Each novella will be released as a standalone ebook on Amazon – free to Kindle Unlimited subscribers as always. When all three are published as ebooks, they’ll be gathered into an anthology and published in both paperback and ebook format. Then, we’ll tackle Warp and Chaos later and next.

The Healer’s Making follows a fallen paladin many years before the timeline in my other books. As the ancient civilization of Merakor falls, The Healer’s Making paints a few vignettes of that nation’s last gasping breaths and how any of them survived to come as refugees to the Forsaken Isles. Follow the Nameless Priest of the new god, Braden, as he gathers survivors together and crosses half the vast continent to rescue the last archmage of Merakor and defy the Drow armies ensuring the surface world is dead. Braden is a heavenly creation god who controls the dominion of Healing… magic, divine, regenerative, and natural healing processes.

If in print, 41 pages. 19,000 words. Ebook price on Friday $0.99. Free to newsletter subscribers who will be given a download link in either PDF or MOBI format in Friday’s newsletter.

Ware the Child, an Ice Dragon comic

As an author, as a world-builder, one of the things I really want to do is make the Forsaken Isles a home for the characters in it. Ynt’taris, the ice dragon patriarch, embodies a different dragon type in Tania. The culture of Tania was started by Alerius, no doubt about it. But, thanks to Ynt’taris, the Tanian mindset has certain idiosyncrasies that really make it easy to tell their story. For example, you all know that Ynt’taris prefers the form of a small human girl right around the age of 9ish. You know that in this form, he wanders the children of dragons (aka the Tanians) and renders aid, and also culls predators from the people. Over many centuries, there is not a single generation that does not have at least one Ynt’taris story of some adult being devoured or vanishing after a small girl is spotted. Imagine growing up in this culture where one of the emperors can shapeshift, where those in dire need are aided, and where predators, abusers, and the violent (towards Tanians) are destroyed. As the father of three daughters, I sometimes wish our world was a bit more like the Forsaken Isles.

As a child, you’d grow up feeling safe. As an adult, you’d moderate feelings of fury towards children. After a time, these stories and ways of acting would be so unconscious that Tanian children in Tania take safety for granted. Pedophiles, sociopaths, and those inclined to abuse would self-check, leave, or those who know them would turn them over to the Temple. Even without a law, the Ynt’taris stories culturally prevent all but the worst or insane abuses from occurring. Adults would jokingly tell someone to calm by citing an Ynt’taris story. When someone goes missing, people would speculate – if they had a bad disposition – that Ynt’taris might have made a visit.

Then, flip the coin… Tanians worship Tiamat, a Hell Lord. Yet, to an outsider, this type of society would seem strangely “good.” They define their goodness through their opposition of evil. There is not a widespread awareness that Tiamat is a hell lord. A so-called good person confronting a Tanian with this fact would get a shrug. They would point to the clean streets, the playing children, the plentiful food and lack of illness and say, “Maybe everyone should worship Tiamat then.” On this note, Ynt’taris does not consider himself good. He has his own inscrutable motives and hidden agendas. You can tell he is not good because the force multiplier of killing an adult who loses their temper towards a child is most certainly not something a good society would tolerate at all. Yet, Tanians embrace these force multipliers because they don’t just serve the dragons, they worship and love them as the avatars of the goddess Tiamat.

Welcome Lukas Jordao, a new artist to the Forsaken Isles. After he illustrated Daryx, I thought it would be fun to illustrate one of these Ynt’taris stories as a comic. What do you think? This will render best on a computer.

FI’s Guide to the Dark Elves, or Drow

Pronounced however you like it. I tend to say “He’s a Drow,” when referring to an individual so that it rhymes with “ow!” I say Drow, rhymes with “so what?” when referring to the race. Back in the good old Icewind Dale Trilogy when Drizzt was an outcast ranger, and before anyone cared about TSR’s ‘Fiend Folio,’ the Drow were anti-elves. They were every bit as diverse as other races. Drizzt came along and created an enduring archetype that has since made its way into almost every niche of fantasy. I blame World of Warcraft and Lineage Dark Souls for turning them into BDSM dominatrixes with a leather fetish. It looks cool, sure, but no race as long-lived and intelligent as any type of Elf would wear bikini armor and fishnets to war. It’s laughable. Within their own society, you might find this but as a form of worship? I sincerely doubt it.

This picture embodies everything I both love (cool art and I love the battle armor on the monster) and hate (weird sex harness armor) about fantasy dark elves in 2018.

For some fantasy stories and games, elves are a lazy way to interject diversity into the story. It’s less awkward to say, “He’s an elf,” than to say, “He’s a black-skinned elf.” Yet, wouldn’t it be expected to have some level of diversity within any race… especially if the setting allows for humans and elves to have children together? There should be a context.

Here is the Forsaken Isles context. So long ago it’s oral tradition even among elvenkind, there arose a schism between those who had become fascinated with magic (gray), civilization (high), nature (sylvan), and the dark arts. For a time, magic was just magic and one of the fastest ways to attain knowledge is through summoning and interrogating extraplanar creatures, like demons. We don’t know when it happened, but at some point, the majority said, “This is bad” and the practitioners of the dark arts said, “We don’t care; we’re going to keep doing this.” It resulted in what is called the Race Wars, that marked the formal beginning of different elven ‘types.’ The so-called Dark Elves left.

Eventually, those Dark Elves came back and were many times more powerful than the strongest of the ‘light’ elves. The Race Wars began again. Of note, many other races underwent similar upheavals in this time period. This is when dragons became confined in their current forms and breath weapons. This is when Orcs lost much of their power through their god Gruustir, who could not focus on sustaining the worship of Orc, goblin, ogre, and troll. This whole time period is called by mages: The Race Wars and marks the beginning of what most Tehrans would call Time. This second Race War was terrible. The ‘light’ elves only won by re-unifying under the leadership of the Gray Elves. The Dark Elves were barely expelled and hunted until they vanished.

Fleeing underground, the dark elves continued in their worship of demons always seeking the strongest demon, the one that would give them the most power. It was a societal contract that bound them when they eventually found Lolth. They were blessed with power, but at great personal price. Within their own society, they call this ‘The Maddening.’ It was a time when priests and mages rose up in tremendous power quickly, and drunk on that power the dark elves fell on each other. Lolth’s consort, Grazzt, ended this by offering a buffer. The worship of Lolth continued at a societal level but only the priestesses truly worship Lolth now… and they suffer The Maddening as part of that worship.

At some point, this underground empire shifted from Tehra towards Lolth. It is not in Tehra. By being even a fraction of a step closer to Lolth, the priestesses are exponentially powerful. When this happened, certain children suffered a strange form of ablinism where their hair became brilliant white or silver. Their skin turned completely black. Their eyes adjusted to see in the total dark. This first generation were considered avatars of Lolth and were named ‘Drow.’ All other dark elves can be called Drow, but they actually just look like a continuation of the defectors from Gray, High, and Sylvan sub-species.

Unlike their surface cousins, the Drow have no compunctions about having offspring with other races. They are so intermixed at this point, that half-Drow/other species are a sub-race to themselves. The only exception is that Drow females only bear Drow offspring. It is considered treason to do otherwise and the children are cast out or sacrified to Lolth depending on the social status of the female.

The Drow religion is matriarchal. The actual society is not. It is ruled by a high king, often titled as emperor. Priestesses of Lolth and paladins of Grazzt are afforded tremendous respect. They act like judge, jury, and executioner as they see fit though there is a rule of law… it is stilted towards the Drow, the Temple of Lolth, and then the dark elves. As per many fantasy tropes, the dark elves are a backbiting and stabbing society, yet they thrive because they do so through the sub-race proxies.

Whenever a family gathers enough wealth to sanctify a temple to Lolth and support a Great Mother Priestess, they are considered to be a great house. In the time of King Malcor aka Rojo II, there are Six Great Houses: Do Larus, Rudan, Pleidaran, Culfinrey, Djinfenrey, and Lanshar. There are many other houses, self-titled because of alliances with one of these six. The imperial house of Ka’ix (kai-icks) would be considered a seventh house. Each house has a specialization by which they are known. These are:

A royal lineage linked to the Race Wars and pre-Race Wars nobility within elvendom
A temple of Lolth, or many temples of Lolth. While one Great Mother tending to a temple is enough to be a Great House, it is not enough to hold power for very long
A military presence or alliance structure that allows them to hold onto their specialization
Land holdings on the surface of Merakor, and nexus gates by which to reach those lands

Part of the oral history of the Drow is that the surface elves forcibly expelled them because they were racist, ignorant, and belligerent. The Drow see it as their purpose to bring all elves into the worship of Lolth, by force if required.

More on the dark elves later. They are on my mind as I work my way through the outline and early chapters of Merakor II. I keep running into them as an over-used trope and cliche even so I put key to PC and vented that frustration so I can focus on the Drow of the Forsaken Isles.

Daryx, dark elf ranger and member of the Circle of Morbatten

Unleash the First Dispatch! Vol 1 – March 2018

The first newsletter “Dispatches from the Isles” has been sent forth into the world. If you missed it and want in, you need to subscribe NOW. I’m not going to repost newsletter content on FI or Facebook. One of the key advantages of the newsletter will be exclusive content like:

Free short stories, that will be for sale on Amazon
Short story anthologies, that will be on sale on Amazon
Art in progress previews
For fun, reqs for said artwork
Glimpses of other project work for FI, etc.

Alliance Author: Sean Hinn and “Days of Ash and Fury” 3 book set on sale: $0.99

Enter the world of Tahr and eyeball stare down Sartean D'Avers, gathered together in 3 book series on sale for $0.99. While it is not my intent to do advertising on FI, I will gladly recommend and help build the community of indie authors who deserve renown and praise. You know FI... try Tahr, a world falling apart and the powers that are trying to hold it together, or rule what is left. I just finished reading the first book, Omens of Fury over the weekend. I enjoyed it and rate it 5 of 5 stars!

Classic fantasy races come together through vision, adventure, and fate. If you like pulse-pounding adventure, well-developed characters, a plot that pulls and twists and teases, give this a try. My next book and short stories won't be out for exactly the amount of time it takes you to enjoy Sean's Tahr.

What else are you going to do? Unless the answer is tabletop gaming, I'll tell you what you're going to do - you'll be reading this 3 book set on sale for $0.99. Sorry, the paperback edition will cost more.

You won't regret it. And, for the morbidly curious, Alerius, Ynt'taris, and Spark would definitely defeat Sartean, either in draco et draco or full onslaught mode. You know it.