Or “How I unintentionally transformed a villain whose sole purpose was to act as a plot device to something I think turned out pretty cool.”
Sometimes, and by sometimes I mean more often than I probably should, I create characters out of need to move the plot forward. Don’t give me that side-eyes look, now, because I’m sure it’s not an even remotely uncommon practice. I’m also, after a bit of fun personal experience, certain it can result in some pretty fun ideas. Continue reading
Or “I’m pretty damn excited because I’ve been writing all weekend, and this is the most I’ve enjoyed working on a project in a long, long time.”
Tonight, mere moments ago, Joshua’s Nightmares broke the 30,000 words mark. It’s on it’s forty-sixth page, and still has a ways to go before it’s completed. Most importantly, I’m loving every second of it.
I’d also like to extend my thanks to all of my followers. WordPress tells me I hit one hundred followers, and that’s also pretty amazing news. Thank you to everyone who has stuck around and kept reading. You’re all fantastic.
This post feels a bit naked without my standard, rambling prose, and so I’ll end it with this beautiful piece of music from the game Puppeteer (a game truly worth purchasing for its compelling narrative, beautiful art style, and amazing music).
Or “I totally just posted about villains not even a day ago, but have some more stuff about villains. I’m not even a little sorry.”
I wrote what amounted to a love letter to all things villain-related just hours ago, and it spawned another idea that has been bouncing around my brain inconveniently (and preventing me from sleeping, which is awful as I have to be awake in less than four hours from now). I’ve done a lot of talking about Joshua’s Nightmares here, which makes sense because this blog was born as part of my efforts related to working on it. I have a page about the novel-to-be (that needs revising, I fear) that gives a solid enough synopsis of its plot. Beyond that, I’ve not really posted anything from the actual story, whether it’s for fear of it being swiped and used elsewhere (gasp!) or just because I’m overly-picky over who gets to see works-in-progress.
However, it only seems appropriate to share a little, and so I present the villains and monsters (a sampling, so as to not bring out any major spoilers) of Joshua’s Nightmares. Obligatory “the following characters and locations are my intellectual property, and are not to be used in any way without my express permission” comment goes here. Continue reading
Ye Olde Scheduling Conflicte
King Andral groaned a standard, highly regal groan. He was seated, as he always found himself at half past noon, upon his throne. The Royal Advisor, who had stepped away to fetch the Royal Schedule, was taking a little longer than expected.
The king reflected on how he should have just kept his grand vizier around. Yes, the man was highly unstable. Perhaps even a touch homicidal, the king recalled, as the number of Royal Food Tasters who had dropped dead of “a troublesome case of not being reverent enough of the king’s meals” had sky-rocketed. However, he always got the Royal Schedule in a timely fashion.
Normally, the schedule was fairly standard. The start of each week alternated between threats of invasion and conquest by neighboring kingdoms and threats of domination and destruction by warlocks, demi-gods, and so on. By mid-week, some force of evil would have successfully kidnapped the princess (or, on some weeks, the prince, who often behaved as the prototypical princess would be expected to, whereas the princess would often be the one stuck doing her own rescuing). By the weekend, things were usually wrapped up neatly, peace restored in the form of treaties signed, villains vanquished, and feasts prepared in celebration.
“My liege,” the Royal advisor said, his words hindered by a rather unfortunate stammer. “You were right about the schedule. Something seems a touch, a bit, a smidge wrong.” King Andral stood from his throne.
“I suspected as much,” he said quietly as he walked to one of the small windows that overlooked the castle’s northern-facing bridge. The cacophony outside was being generated by a decent-sized band of Kuldarian Hell-Bandits, who were known for their unparalleled brutality in combat, flair for the dramatic, and obsession with what they referred to as “war jewelry”. The multitude of piercings on each warrior’s head caught the sunlight just right that the bridge, from above, appeared to have been coated in quicksilver.
“My goodness,” King Andral said. “What a rowdy bunch this is. Dreadfully shiny, too.” He walked toward the chamber doors, his gait slow and deliberate. He stopped, only briefly, placing a work-worn hand on the massive oak door.
“My liege,” the Advisor said. “Surely you aren’t thinking of going out there, are you?”
“Not due until next week, yes?” King Andral said, glancing over his shoulder. Tufts of his beard and mustache obscured the King’s facial features, making him difficult to read.
“You know the Schedule better than anyone else, my lord.” The king huffed another heavy, highly royal sigh, and pushed the door open. Once the door had closed behind the King, the Royal Advisor, sprinted to the nearest north-facing window to watch.
The front gate opened after several long minutes, and out stepped King Andral. His face was a deep crimson, and his breath was almost loud enough to be heard over the Hell-Bandits’ war-screams.
“Yargh,” said one of the more heavily-pierced, decorated Kuldarians. “The king shows himself! Let’s gut him and make him into a stew!” Another Kuldarian, more decorated still, stepped out in front, smacking the previous speaker hard upside his head.
“Yergh,” he said. “No. That’s revolting. My gods, who even let this man join our ranks?” He looked back to his comrades in arms, an eyebrow raised. King Andral waited, so as to not offend.
After as much waiting as a member of any royal family could endure, King Andral cleared his throat.
“Yergh,” said the Kuldarian, who then turned back to face the King. “I am Grom-takk, and these are my mightiest men. We’ve come to claim the princess so as to repopulate the once-prosperous valley-nation of Kuldarras.” King Andral pinched his nose, adjusting his glasses afterward.
“While that does sound like a noble cause,” he said, “I’m afraid you won’t be doing that.” The crowd roared with a mix of enthusiastic disagreement and a number of curse-words the King had never been overly fond of hearing, but had grown accustomed to over the course of his time on the throne.
“Yargh,” said the one Kuldarian, stepping forward with a jagged saber raised above his head. “Big words for such a puny man.” King Andral rolled his eyes.
“Not even the most boot-kissing of my knights would call me puny,” King Andral said, making a great sweeping gesture to indicate his Royal rotundity. “And you’ll keep such thoughts of my daughter to yourselves. You lot aren’t even supposed to be here until next week, anyway.” The king gathered his composure, straightened up, and cleared his throat. Grom-Takk scratched his heavily-bejeweled head. After a heavy silence, Gromm-Takk snapped his fingers. The crowd of warriors parted, and a small, bespectacled man made his way through. He had minimal tattoos on his bald head, and a small satchel belted around his waist.
“I’m afraid, my most fierce lord,” the man said, producing a parchment from its carrying case. “Says here we’re not due for another half a fortnight, as the Dread Wyrm Tsonira will have kidnapped her fair majesty.” Much murmuring of discontent could be heard in the ranks of the Hell-Bandits. The king sighed, checking his wrist-bound sundial.
“Off you go, then,” King Andral said, waving his arms to shoo the heavily-armed warriors away. “If tonight goes anything like I suspect it will, my daughter will be returning shortly. Blood-stained and battle-worn, no doubt. Have you any idea how difficult it is to get dragon’s blood-burns out of stone? Now, off with you. I’ll see you lot next week.”
Two of my increasing number of Moleskine notebooks. The red one on the left, complete with Moleskine pen, contains all of my notes for Joshua’s Nightmares so far.
The purple one on the right? That information will have to wait until Monday. I’d like to say I picked a purple Moleskine because it seemed like a mysterious color, but it was actually just a whim decision.
Anyway, Monday’s big reveal. Big news. Good news. Hopefully, and I mean very hopefully, it will result in good progress as well.
Some quick notes before the real, hopefully good, stuff: this is a project I’ve managed to keep under wraps. The following will be the first part in a multi-part series, hopefully with some reader involvement when the chances arise (think “choose your own adventure”, but with no entirely wrong choices). Without further delay, I present the beginning installment of All the King’s Nitwits and All the King’s Clods.
As far as kingdoms went, Edawean was certainly a respectable one. King Aster Kalarmey was a king of the people, just and honorable in even the most dire of times. Edawean held the distinction, out of all the fourteen Great Kingdoms of the Third Enlightened Age (the first two ages had not been so Enlightened, with the First being most noteworthy for actually being a complete descent into uncivilized chaos), being the least riddled with crime, the most free of corrupt nobility, and having streets more devoid of chamber pot spillage than any knight or filthy peasant could have imagined. The signs on each gateway of the castle-town proudly read “Plagues need not enter here,” which seemed to have been working well enough as subjects of King Aster had stopped making such a regular hobby of dropping over dead in the streets.
And yet, when it could be argued a kingdom is only as good and just as its king, and a king is only as good and just as his most loyal knights. Sir Hector Aldyr, the Exceptionally Bold. Sir Raphael Temmins, the Dispenser of Justice. Sir Gareth Marquis, the Fantastic. Sir Valamir Ysthar, the Frequently Nicknamed for the Sake of Brevity. Sir Bartemas Blainewright, the Chivalrous. There has originally been three additional knights, each one as exceptional in quality as the other five, but they had gone off to greater callings. Sir Jonah the Wise had gone on to become a great scholar of The Holy Church of Mostly Peaceful Gods. Sir Walter the Healing found his true calling as a great medicine man of the times by pioneering a new means of drilling holes in a man’s skull to remove demons from thoughts. Sir Horatio the Snide went on to stand sentry in The Great Castle Beyond when he accidentally shot himself in the back several times with several other people’s crossbows. In honor of their departed members, and because they had emblazoned the name on every piece of armor left in the kingdom, they were to forever be known as The Knights of the Octagon. Their motto, contrary to humorous jabs from roguish figures to the effect of “They’re the great and mighty stop signs of the law”, was to stop villainy at any cost. This was, in hindsight, not particularly inspiring either. However, it stuck as the King decreed it to be good and so it was.
The most vicious dragons found themselves laid to waste by the Knights of the Octagon. The most fiendish necromancers and warlocks found their magic ineffective (largely, in the case of the former, due to the lack of corpses laying about the streets). Witches proved equally ineffective, with the exception of a few embarrassing instances that somehow went without being recorded. Mischief and mayhem were at an all-time low, and as such the Kingdom of Edawean knew an unparalleled time of peace and tranquility.
This is an excellent thing for the huddled, filth-encrusted masses, but it made for knights with little knightly activity to partake in.
King Aster sighed, sitting down at the OcTable. He had endured day after day of chivalrous tales and feasts of honor, and his patience was running low.
“And then,” Sir Valamir said, “I raised my mighty blade Ryskrdlrkadir.” The King Aster rolled his eyes, unnoticed by the others who were in a haze of shared heroic bonding.
“And thusly smote the lesser dragon Krawg,” Sir Valamir and King Aster said together.
“Right good show, that,” Sir Bartemas said, clapping a gauntlet-clad hand against Sir Valamir’s back. “Val deserves a feast for such an exceptional tale of bravery! A feast, I say.”
“No. No more feasts,” King Aster said in protest, standing up from his seat. “Surely there must be something other than boasting and feasting for you lot to be doing.” The knights laughed.
“Such humor,” Sir Hector said, “is only right of a proper king.” King Aster opened his mouth to protest, but a quick assessment of the knights and an even quicker burst of calculated thinking forced him to come to terms with the impending feast–the fifth such feast, as it turned out–in honor of Sir Valamir’s not-so-recent victory.
“Three cheers for Sir ‘Myr!” said Sir Raphael.
“Huzzah!” the knights chorused, masking a quiet knock at the chamber door.
“Huzzah!” Princess Teresia entered the room, her footfalls almost completely silent.
“My apologies,” Teresia said. “I do hope I’m not interrupting anything too terribly important.” There was an almost-audible click as the wheels in King Aster’s head began turning.
“Not at all, my darling daughter,” King Aster said. “In fact, I was about to announce something very important to the future of the kingdom. Very important indeed.” The knights all perked up, leaning in though the king was speaking loudly enough so as to be heard in the neighboring chambers of the castle.
“Whosoever among you goes forth,” King Aster said, gesturing dramatically toward a window across the room from him, “and commits the most heroic deed of you all will win the greatest gift I have to offer. My daughter’s hand in marriage, and, with it, the throne as future king!”
And so, much against many unprincesslike, highly vulgar, protests from Princess Teresia, the knights each embarked on their individual journeys in hopes to achieve the greatest glory.
Which begs the question…whose (mis)adventure should be first?
Phil's Misadventures In Fiction 