#The Bone Queen

[caddy-crystal-queen]

Cad Bane was normally a great pilot, normally. His ship got in to many a scrape and it was just fine when he repairs it. But unfortunately he was crash landing towards a planet that he did not recognize and he can’t stop it. He doesn’t panic rather he was very angry and yelling at Todo when they hit the surface of the planet.

It was bad.. well not too bad, his ship was damaged but not destroyed which was good piloting on his part. But Cad Bane himself was injured badly as he crawled out of the remains of his ship to the outside. He could still move his legs which he was thankful for that. But his whole body hurt and he couldn’t keep his eyes open as he passed out, having no idea whether the person who finds him had good intentions or not.

(Guess who made a Cad Bane blog!)

Todo had found help, but it was from a most unlikely source. A lady in old time clothes in dull colors of black, gray, and white. She wore a veil so her face was a bit obscured. She was accompanied by two large constructs made of bone from various dead creatures. They carried the duros back to the palace at the command of their creator, the Bone Queen.

While he was still out, she tended to his injuries carefully. He had beautiful Sapphire skin that made her think briefly of brighter days, better days. She was quiet, careful to not wake him.

Todo had stayed by him the whole time...

[stesierra]

Okay! Since people are asking, here's some of my writing. I'm not used to sharing because on Twitter no one really cared... 🥺 Please let me know if you're interested in learning more about this book or being added to a tag list for my stuff! I love questions about my stuff too... This is new adult fantasy even though publishing says new adult isn't real.

(please excuse my MC's attitude because she is depressed! We've all been there when we released a plague of skeletons.)

The Bone Queen

Chapter 1

When I fell in love with Aubrey, I never thought I'd dream of killing him one day. Why would I? He was already dead.

Now, two years after he’d won my heart with lies, we stood alone in my dimly lit parlor, between its lion-footed couches all in pine green and gold and blood red, Queen Idony’s colors. The golden tapestries that thickly coated the walls depicted Bandrum Palace as seen from the streets of Asteraxe: a many-floored edifice that sprawled across the top of a hill, half hidden behind a mighty wall.

The enormous skirts of my dress weighed me down like I was dragging my own casket around. The bodice hugged my ribs and the corset I didn't need, embellished with lace and embroidered birds, and the sleeves poofed around my skinny arms. It left my scrawny shoulders bare, and even with the fire that crackled in my fireplace, the winter air inside the palace chilled me.

The dress was ivory. The same ivory as my fiancé’s bones.

He clenched my hand, his icy finger bones pinching my skin, and his touch revolted me. But I didn't draw away. I'd learned by now that there was no escape. What point was there in trying? Besides, I deserved this unhappiness. I'd brought it upon myself. Upon the entire kingdom of Sweelough.

When I'd met Aubrey, he'd been nothing but a handsome ghost on Lake Langlyn’s shores. But since I'd freed him—freed them all—he’d become something more. Not alive, even Queen Idony couldn't do that, but she'd given him back his skeleton with which to wield swords and write notes and touch my vulnerable skin. His ghost hadn't gone anywhere; it wrapped around his skeleton like transparent flesh around bones. Now, when I looked into his face, I saw both sharp gray eyes and yawning sockets, both a full, cleanshaven mouth and a skull’s grinning teeth. And the clothes his ghost wore echoed the very real doublet and hose he'd pulled over his bones. Green and red and gold, of course. He honored the queen in everything he did.

He bent close to me, brushing the top of my fashionable tower of hair with his jawbone. He stank of potpourri and dust. “Tell me you love me, Elise.”

I said nothing, just breathed and thought about hitting his bones over and over again with a hammer. In my mind, he crumbled into bits, nothing but ashes in a grave. Of course, it was a fantasy; no one could kill someone who was already dead. I knew because so many people had died trying. Because I had hit him with an axe down on the shore of Lake Langlyn, and it had only torn his clothes.

He said again, “We are to marry in a month. Tell me you love me. Smile at me and say my name, the way you used to.”

“Aubrey,” I said. I didn't love him, but what good would it do to tell him again, when he would only yell at me? It was pointless. Everything was pointless.

His ghostly eyes narrowed, and he crushed my hands in his. “Smile, Elise. Thank me for taking you to wife. For when we met, you were nothing but a serf too stupid to write her own name. Now look at you. Aren't you grateful?”

Tears stung my eyes. When I'd met him, at sixteen, I'd been happy. I'd had parents and four brothers who loved me, and it hadn't mattered that none of us knew how to read or write. What did farmers need letters for? Now, two years later, life was meaningless, and it didn't matter that the tutors he'd forced on me had taught me to scribble my name and read a handful of poems.

Aubrey sighed and leaned down to kiss the back of my hand. For a horrifying second, his lips passed through me, and his teeth brushed my skin. “I'm sorry, Elise. I know I push you too hard. You'll be a good wife. Docile and obedient. Quiet. A good mother to my children.”

If I was docile and quiet, it was only because I'd given up. But his last sentence made me whip my head up. “Children? What do you mean, children?”

He smiled up at me, his spectral mouth matching the grinning teeth of his skull. “Why, Elise, didn't you think I would want a heir?”

“Why would you?” I cried. “Lady Kinburg tells everyone how she had no choice but to hang her descendents when she came back, because they wouldn't return her lands. The dead don't want heirs. You're planning to rule forever. Aren't you?”

“Of course,” my fiancé agreed, straightening up. “But I would still want children. Offspring who will love and admire me, just as you do.”

Unless they inherited my ability to see and hear ghosts, all the children would see was a skeleton that couldn't even talk to them. They wouldn't admire him. They'd fear him, just like I did. Somehow, that didn't matter, not when there was a bigger issue. “Aubrey, you're dead. You can't sire children. It's impossible. Are you planning to have some living man bed me?”

He scoffed, reaching up to seize my chin. “I'll kill any man who lays a finger on you. You're mine. Forever.”

I ripped my face out of his grip. “If we adopt children, they won't be able to see you.” No other living person in Asteraxe, the capital of Sweelough, saw and heard the dead like I did. They just saw skeletons, awful and deadly. It was my gift and my curse to see more. A curse that had doomed me and all of Sweelough.

He let me retreat to sit upon one of the couches. “But children born of your body will, my love. And it's not impossible. Do you have so little faith in the queen? In one month, on the day of our wedding, she will cast spells upon me to give me the ability to lie with you. With her magic, she'll quicken my seed in your belly. And nine months later, you'll bear me a perfect son.”

Aubrey was going to have sex with me. He was going to force me to bear his child. My thoughts ran in terrified, anguished circles. My limbs grew weak, and I sank into my couch. I wanted to vomit all over his pointed shoes. If I could've, I'd have bolted out into the halls of the palace and straight out the front doors. Running for my life had never sounded more appealing.

But the queen's magic brand wrapped my ankle like a jagged red tattoo, and even now I felt it burning against my skin. She'd promised me, when she enchanted me two years ago, that if I ever tried to escape, it would punish me. And Aubrey had stood beside her, smiling because I could never leave him.

“You look faint, my love,” Aubrey said, stepping up close to me. “Come to dinner tonight. Sit at my side and display your beauty to all the court.”

“I'm not hungry,” I said, and it was true. I was never hungry, and after the horrible news he’d just dropped on me, I might never be hungry again. If I accompanied Aubrey to the Great Hall, where the nobility gathered over feasts of roast beef and fish and fresh fruit, I would only sit uneating in front of plenty, just like all the dead who wanted to pretend that they were still alive. Aubrey couldn't eat, being nothing but bones. I had a stomach and all the equipment needed, but I'd lost my appetite with my family, and now that he’d threatened to impregnate me, it was doubly gone.

He took my hand and kissed it again. “Very well. I will send your maids in to tend to you. But after dinner, I will come fetch you. Queen Idony wishes to speak with you.”

My stomach dropped, and I tore my hand out of his. “What? Why? I haven't done anything wrong.”

He patted my cheek, and his bones were so cold that surely they'd never belonged to a living man. “Fear not, Elise. She doesn't want to punish you. She merely wishes to tell you your new duties in the days ahead.”

“Duties? What duties?” Dread constricted my throat. Duties, whatever they were, would take me away from my rooms and safety. They'd put me in the eyes of the living nobles, and all of them hated me. Not because I was a peasant pretending to be one of them. Because it was my fault they had to bow to a dead queen. I didn't blame them. I hated me too.

Aubrey beamed at me. “Great events are on the horizon. Do you remember that the queen made overtures to our wealthy neighbor to the west?”

Only one county bordered Sweelough to the west. “Ahheleisa. But you said nothing would come of it. That the living were too superstitious to see a gift when the queen offered it.”

He waved a hand. “The living are cretins. But in this case, I was wrong.”

“I’m still alive, Aubrey,” I reminded him. For now. Every other night, I woke from nightmares that the queen had stripped me down to nothing but a ghost and dry old bones.

“Yes, yes. That doesn't matter. We have news now that an ambassador and his party are coming here to Asteraxe. In fact, they are nearly upon us. And so Queen Idony has plans for you. But she’ll tell you the details tonight, I am sure.” He patted my leg through my layers of skirts and petticoats. “Now, promise me you'll eat something.”

“I'll eat something,” I lied. But after he'd left and sent my maids in to check on me, I tilted my head back and closed my eyes and tried to think of nothing. Thoughts kept sneaking in of a dead man's touch and a dead man's children, and I had no peace at all.

[halloqueen31]

[owlpower669]

this is the plot of lmk. right.

[es0tericdoll]

TW: but i always end up binging :(

[queenofheartsdeservedbetter]

I really, REALLY, don't know what I would do without books.

[weirdlookindog]

Laurie Lipton (b. 1953) - The Queen of Bones

[mysticmonkiebusiness]

Happy 5th Anniversary!

[wolfssixshadows]

Friendly reminder that Kaz goes to stare at the Emerald Palace everytime he feels low on rage. Just one good look at the eyesore and he's back and ready to take on the world.

[i-lavabean]

Raj deserved a Hades art style

[maidenofcrows]

“The Crows were added into the Netflix adaptation of Shadow and Bone as a fan service.”

I understand that. But the actual fan service was when they showed Inej Ghafa kissing one of her blades before throwing it right into the Darkling’s chest

[stesierra]

WIP INTRO: THE BONE QUEEN

Title: the Bone Queen

Genre: NA fantasy

Setting: The kingdom of Sweelough

Tropes: forced marriage, undead ruler, undead fiancé, ghosts and skeletons, pattern magic, unwise affairs, pregnancy (no, it's not Aubrey's), poisonings, depression, anorexia, damn all nobles, big hair and big dresses, and illiterate peasant MC

Story:

Two years ago, Elise accidentally freed an army of the undead. She paid for it. The Bone Queen snatched Elise from her family and locked her away in Bandrum Palace. Elise hates everything about it: the dead maids who wait on her, the queen who tortures her when she forgets to play the perfect noblewoman, and her undead fiancé, Aubrey, who expects Elise to carry his heirs. Elise's magic, which lets her see the dead as if they're still alive, makes being a brood mare to a skeleton all too possible. She has to escape, but the Bone Queen has bound her to the palace with a spell that lights her nerves on fire when she tries to leave. Worse, if Elise refuses to marry Aubrey, the queen will lock her family up for life.

If Elise knew how to use her magic, maybe she'd have a chance, but the queen has made studying magic illegal. When Elise discovers a visiting ambassador is a spy and a secret magician, she blackmails him into giving her magic lessons. Maybe she should feel bad about that, especially when the ambassador falls in love with her. An affair with him risks everything, but Elise is desperate for comfort in the land of the dead. But his love and his help aren't what they seem. He never meant to free her. If Elise is going to escape and save her family, she'll have to do it alone. And she'll destroy Aubrey and the Bone Queen on her way out, or die trying.

The Characters:

Elise Cropper- our main character and POV. 18 years old. She was born a serf, bound to the land of Lord Moorthleigh, near the shores of Lake Langlyn.

Aubrey Sommer, Duke of Winworth- undead fiancé and true asshole. He tricked Elise into loving and freeing him. He deserved neither thing.

Mausart Tola, Earl of Ardaris- the ambassador from Ahheleisa. Late twenties. Hot as far as my ace ass can tell. But he has his secrets.

Queen Idony Allard of Scarlett- the bone queen, the new ruler of Sweelough. This is her second time ruling, but death took the crown from her last time. Never again.

Lord Moorthleigh- Elise's former landlord, who still owns her parents and little brothers.

Lady Moorthleigh- a friend? An enemy? Elise doesn't know.

Worst Comment from a Beta: Why doesn't Elise want to marry Aubrey? He's rich and she should be thrilled with her luxurious prison. Also, she's too mean to the undead maids who are spying on her. What a bitch. (Paraphrased)

Status Check: In rewrites, after about five drafts and a paid developmental editor. 109k words before revisions. I will try to query it when the rewrite is done. Not currently available for beta reading.

It has two complete standalone sequels (The Spellbound King (106k) and The Matriarch's Daughter (96k)) I must also rewrite. This series is going to kill me but I love it. My mom, who loves everything I write, complained that it was weird. I'm very proud.

First chapter here.

Fic snippet here.

Map here.

Please ask if you want to be added to my taglist and specify if it's just for this book or all books.

Credit for (modified) WIP intro format @sleepyowlwrites

Art commissioned from KozzDraws.

Taglist

@janec23

@gracewritesbooks

@anonymousfoz

@moremysteriesthantragedies

@elizababie

@sm-writes-chaos

@bellascarousel

@palebdot

@hyba

@da-na-hae

@macabremoons

@the-dragon-chronicler

@teacupsandstarlight

[yasashii-leaf]

Y/n woke up in an otome game, in the body of the evil fiancé who wants to bring hell to the main female protagonist, the heroine of the game. Y/n decides to join the kingdom of the Ivory Queen who is the main antagonist of the game.

Apparently very few humans live in the Ivory Queen's kingdom so upon her arrival she was brought back to the Queen.

Y/n to explain the reasons why she decided to leave her native land to live among demons (y/n really didn't know that there were so few humans in the kingdom of the Ivory Queen, it didn't matter never been specified or specifically mentioned).

The queen accepts her into her kingdom but with several guarantees that she becomes her concubine.

As the Ivory Queen's concubine, y/n's role is to take care of Sun, Mac and Bai he. Since the queen has neither the time nor the desire to take care of them in such a physical and affectionate way.

But from time to time it happens that the queen invites him into her private rooms for a cup of tea or to talk.

[somecluelessidiot]

Can we just appreciate Six of Crows for a moment?

Like, the characters each have their own elaborate backstories and reasons for wanting the money and the whole plot line is so well put together.

Also, it's just completely bonkers because one moment they're planning a heist and how to get back at Van Eck, and the next Kaz is making a "your mum" joke.

[moonlightbae333]

[dragonqueenstormwitch]

i like to think about how in rule of wolves kaz finds out nikolai can turn into a demon and inej likely finds out about zoya turning into a dragon from nina so kanej’s next meeting is just both of them trying to one up the other with the royal gossip they found out