#secondary world

[beedokart]

Cover Reveal for my next Novella.

A princess/knight wlw dynamic, but with a slight twist.

[inyourbenevolence]

Can any world survive a benevolent god?

@foggyoutline presents:

Cover art by Dionysis Livanis

Produced by @wirelesstheatre

In this original audio drama podcast, each episode is a prayer, some prayers are answered, and a prayer granted can upend the world.

For fans of

Each episode of I Need A Miracle is a short monologue. A new character every episode. Never the same character twice. Always addressing a plea to a listening deity – which never makes a sound.

Play god

You, the listener, stand in for a silently listening god. Hear brazen demands for divine intervention and vulnerable, secret pleas for deliverance. Whose requests would you grant and why? Does anyone deserve a miracle?

Play detective

Which pleas are granted? How does the listening being decide? What are the Upheavals that regularly wrack this world? What threatens to rise from the Depths? And can any being with ultimate power truly be benevolent?

Play the heartstrings

I Need A Miracle is all about the many kinds of wanting, and the many ways of asking for help. How would you make your case to an omnipotent being who grants some miracles but not others, based on ineffable criteria?

Coming August 2024

Stay tuned for trailers, release dates and more:

here on tumblr by following @inyourbenevolence

(you can also follow writer @merelymatt, producers @wirelesstheatre and publishers @foggyoutline for completism)

on instagram @ in.your.benevolence

And find cast and crew credits at the show homepage:

[not-poignant]

Fae Tales - The Nascent Diplomat (Gwyn/Augus)

Pairing: Augus Each Uisge/Gwyn ap Nudd

Tags: Fae politics, past child abuse, past sexual abuse, developing relationship, slow burn, mind games, Unseelie Court (See fic for more tags)

Summary: Augus is summoned by the Unseelie King of the fae to test out his hand at being a diplomat with a secretive, cave-dwelling race of fae known as the vench. He is sent to the remote region of Aethelwaters to strike up a trade deal, with the King’s Mage and executioner - Gwyn ap Nudd - as his bodyguard.

They come face to face with a closed culture largely unreceptive to newcomers, initiations to test their merit, an unusual way of feeding, and pitfalls and traps at every turn. Will it drive the shaky foundation between Gwyn and Augus further apart? Or bring them together?

Fae Tales - 39/? - The Nascent Diplomat - Gwyn/Augus on AO3!

In which Temsen's bluff about how well he was surviving the deprivation of touch and intimacy falters, and he seizes the nearest opportunity to feed, which happens to be Gwyn ap Nudd, with unexpected and potentially unwanted results.

Chapter 40 of The Nascent Diplomat is available now for early release, for folks in the Augus & Gwyn+ tiers on Patreon and Ream! :D Augus grows frustrated with the way others seem to use Gwyn, and instead of seeking to stop them, decides to become one of the people who gets to do this as well, although his approach is far gentler.

[skribeworks]

3 Ways to Avoid Secondary World Anachronisms

A few days ago, I read a post asking readers what elements took them out of the story. The reason might be stylistic or a functional decision the writer had taken. Amongst the more popular reasons for being taken out of the moment were secondary world anachronisms. For example, the characters cry out the name of a present-day primary world deity, or the world has the same days of the week or month names as our primary world. Here are three ways to avoid secondary world anachronisms.

[plainshobbit]

This is my first year participating and I am on Team Tolkien, appropriately enough, I suppose.

Plan to go with a Secondary World story centering on a couple characters that were birthed out of a writing prompt I came across a few years back on pintrest.

Realizing just how much I still have to learn about them (including their names) and their world. 😅

The Eagle and Child: Opening Day

The Inklings Challenge has started! You’ve received your team assignment, the creative juices are flowing, and you’re either brimming with ideas or desperately trying to find some. Like the original Inklings, this Challenge needs a place to discuss writing, so roughly-weekly posts (named after the famed Inklings pub, of course) will give people a chance to talk about their progress through the Challenge.

On these opening days of the challenge, let’s discuss how it’s going. If you like, you can share things like:

Which team are you on?

Which genre are you considering tackling?

Is this similar to what you usually write?

Do you have a story idea yet? If so, care to share anything about it?

Which themes are you considering incorporating into your story?

Are any other story sparks–pictures, events, genre, themes, etc.–coming to mind as something you might want to use to inspire your story?

Are you excited? Nervous? Terrified? Confident? Some combination of new and exciting emotions?

Are there any ideas/types of stories that you'd like to see from the other teams? Care to share any ideas/suggestions/wish lists?

This is purely for fun, so share whatever you feel like sharing, or keep your secrets to yourself. However you feel like engaging.

Welcome to the Inklings Challenge! Have fun!

[kyannnite]

murderous tendencies be damned my boy can work a violin

[uncanny-tranny]

I recall saying this before, but it bears repeating:

There could be a billion trans people in the world and it still wouldn't be a bad thing because being trans is not a bad thing. Even if the rate of people discovering they are trans is "disproportionate" to trends from decades ago, that is not a bad thing. In fact, it's a natural consequence for there being more trans people being able to stay alive, and, overall, being able to live in a slightly more tolerant world. You'd only see that as a bad thing if you actively didn't want trans people to either live or live a life that facilitates wellness.

[maybe-boys-do-love]

Ugh! Peaceful Property! You wanted a cross-class romance!? How about we actually dive into the full-on physical and spiritual oppression that produces those classes?? How about we actually depict capitalist systems as literally horrific?? But let's not stop there!! How about we show the wealthy protagonist as directly complicit in those horrors?? Not enough?? How about we make him literally kill the poorer romantic lead?? How about we actually explore what it would mean for someone whose wealth is built on nepotism and a history of exploited labor to recognize what that means about their relationships to other people in the world?? What kinds of compassion do the wealthy need to ask for and what practices and mindsets do they need to change before those they've hurt can even begin to live life unafraid of financial ruin, let alone actually caring for the wealthy love-interest?? What ghosts haunt a cross-class romance and how can we truly exorcise them????

[alecscudder1987]

god i just realized that the reason crowley confessed even after aziraphale said all that shit is probably because he already knows what it feels like to lose aziraphale without telling him he loved him im throwing up

[kalashnikovlobotomy]

(and to getting it back without someone else coming along with it)

bear with me. please keep an open mind. however if you don't want aimless details of this scenario feel free to ignore, there's really not much plot just context.

in this one ame botches a manic magic portal ritual and gets decapitated by accident, and his head disappears but his body is still somewhat sentiment? its not particularly intelligent but it still functions (comically). canada takes his body to england (arthur bc this isn't nationverse anymore) to open a proper portal and him and the body then head (haha) into the unknown dimension to retrieve his head.

meanwhile ame (just a head) is found by rus who is a kind of demon entity of that dimension... they have a "humans are lame" plan to find ame another body and make him an entity too, rus claims it's so he has a friend but ame would be more of a servant by magic system rules and would not be able to return home without the other (not that he knows. rus does though). cana plans to turn ame normal. 🤦‍♂️...

bottom line is, cana (and ame, independently from eachother) squealing like a girl because the demon world is scary, the inherent freakiness of whatever they have going on, iykyk iydyd, ame body walking into walls and ame head carried like a lantern by the scarf and talking to rus. i also like the idea of them somehow messing something up and all three ending up back in the human dimension, except ame is still in two pieces and whatever rus touches visually starts to spiral so they have to go back and fix something. a few more episodes should come after this. ill let you know when i settle on an ending. yay!

[tanglepelt]

Dp x dc idea 62

Danny has been reaching out to the league for help.

He thought he had it handled but then got sucked into a different dimension, had his town almost fed to plants, the town had a sleepy time nap, and for crying out loud vortex literally messed with the weather all around the globe.

Out of everything he thought vortex would of made them realize he was serious.

being sick of it he starts researching. If they won’t help them by choice and keep ignoring him he is gonna force the matter.

Too bad he can’t figure out who any of the hero’s are. But he does find a newspaper that might take an interest in his information. Especially with the anti ecto acts being brought into the conversation.

Is showing up at a random reporters apartment without being announced that smart. No. But he is desperate.

Clark did not expect to have a random white haired teen show up at his building.

Now he has answers about the mysterious attacks and questions of why weren’t they alerted.

[inyourbenevolence]

Can any world survive a benevolent god?

Coming Summer 2024 from @foggyoutline and @wirelesstheatre:

(not final artwork)

In this upcoming audio drama podcast, each episode is a prayer, some prayers are granted, and a granted prayer can upend the world.

For fans of

Each episode of I Need A Miracle is a short monologue. A new character every episode. Never the same character twice. Always addressing a plea to a listening deity – which never makes a sound.

Play god

You, the listener, stand in for a silently listening god. Hear brazen demands for divine intervention and vulnerable, secret pleas for deliverance. Whose requests would you grant and why? Does anyone deserve a miracle?

Play detective

Which pleas are granted? How does the listening being decide? What are the Upheavals that regularly wrack this world? What threatens to rise from the Depths? And can any being with ultimate power truly be benevolent?

Play the heartstrings

I Need A Miracle is all about the many kinds of wanting, and the many ways of asking for help. How would you make your case to an omnipotent being who grants some miracles but not others, based on ineffable criteria?

Coming Summer 2024

Stay tuned for cast and crew reveals, episode titles, trailers, release dates and more:

here on tumblr by following @inyourbenevolence

(you can also follow writer @merelymatt, producers @wirelesstheatre and publishers @foggyoutline for completism)

on instagram:

at the show homepage:

[bookshelf-in-progress]

Stolen Moments: A Fairy Tale

A spur-of-the-moment story for @inklings-challenge

The princess steps into the center of a whirling masquerade. She is resplendent in green as the Queen of May. A man slips through the crowd and stands before her, dressed all in brown as the Autumn King. He bows with a flourish, silently asking for a dance.

She stands like stone. “You should not be here,” she says.

“Can I not dance with my wife?”

He reaches for her hand. She pulls it away. “I have no husband.”

“In this place, no. Yet I remember otherwise,” he says. “And so do you.”

She turns on her heel and strides away. He follows, quick as ever. The dancers part around them like water. She scowls. He was always too clever for her, always too quick. Even a world of her making bends to accommodate him.

“Do you know what I’ve done to find you?” he asks. “The countries I’ve crossed? The mountains I’ve climbed? I’ve fought gryphons and giants. Searched for treasures lost since the invention of time. Flown to the moon and tunneled to the center of the earth.”

“I’m sure you enjoyed yourself immensely.”

“I bargained with the four winds, gave up my shadow, traded three days of my life just to have this moment with you.”

“I am sorry you wasted your time,” she says. “Do what you will, you cannot take me from here.”

“No,” he agrees. “You are trapped here by your own will, and only by your will can you escape.”

She chose this day well when she arranged her escape. The grandest ball the Mountain King ever held, the day of her sixteenth birthday. Long before she ever met that too-curious trickster who stole away her heart with cheap promises. Here there is music, beauty, bounty, every pleasure she can imagine. She will gladly live in this day forever if it means freedom from her ties to him.

“You think you can persuade me,” she sneers.

He laughs. “No one in the twelve worlds can do that.”

“You think you can steal me.”

Even behind his mask, she can see his gaze darken. She has offended him. “I will not steal a wife.”

“What do you call our wedding day?”

“You chose me.”

“Do you call it choosing, when you hid your true face behind so many lies?”

“You had your own secrets.”

“Do you blame me for hiding them?”

“No,” he says.

She stops. Of all the things she imagined him saying, this was not one of them.

“No,” he says again. “You were right to keep your secrets. I was wrong to seek them out.”

She turns to look at him. He removes his mask, revealing his deceptively young face. His eyes, once blue, have turned greenish-gray. His face has three jagged scars.

“You hid from me,” he said. “As I hid from you. I should have been patient--proved that you could trust me. Instead, I forced my way into your secrets and destroyed everything. I'm sorry.”

She is speechless. She expected excuses. Dazzling explanations.She had never expected contrition.

He reaches beneath his jacket and removes a small glass pendant. It shines the same bright blue his eyes had once been.

“This is yours,” he said.

Her heart. Taken from her in a childhood curse so long ago. Only her husband could put it in its proper place, if it remained unbroken during five years of marriage. Prince of thieves that he once had been, he had found it and broken it on the eve of their second anniversary.

“You repaired it,” she said.

“I replaced it. With mine.”

She has seen him in a million lies. This is not one of them.

“You may stay here if you wish,” he says. “I came only to atone. I do not expect you to forgive me.”

He places the pendant in her hand, bows, then turns away.

When he leaves, she knows she need never see him again.

“Wait,” she says. She removes her mask. “Don’t leave without your wife."

He stops. The other dancers disappear.She puts her hand in his and kisses him as she did on their wedding day.

He is alight with joy as she pulls away. "Does this mean--?"

“I forgive you,” she says.

He laughs aloud.

The heart he gave to her, she freely gives to him. The blue returns to his eyes as their hearts are restored, new and whole.

As the curse crumbles around them, they leave the ballroom behind.

[plainshobbit]

Posted this earlier today.

Made these yesterday.

The Eagle and Child: Week 2

At just over a week into the Challenge, it's time for another check-in! Here's a chance to talk about your writing journey so far.

You can share things like:

Have you settled on a story idea yet?

What kinds of things--music, images, stories, themes, etc.--are you using to inspire your story?

How have your ideas changed over the course of the week?

Have you written any of your story? How much?

Do you have an idea of how long your finished story will be?

Have you created any extra things related to your story–artwork, playlists, moodboards, etc.? Do you care to share?

What are your plans for the coming days? What do you hope to accomplish?

How are you pushing yourself with this writing process? Are you hoping to develop any new skills?

Have you learned anything from this writing process?

Or anything else you care to discuss. As always, this is just for fun, so you can share as much or as little as you like. Thank you all so much for continuing on this writing journey with us. Have fun!

[vulpinesaint]

back on the topic of eddie brock never being the first choice. crazy to me to think about the origin of the venom symbol which is that the symbiote Was With Spiderman First. the venom symbol is a slightly creepier version of the spiderman symbol with an extra bend in the legs cause it's the symbiote's best approximation of what it thought spiderman wanted. and when spiderman rejects the symbiote and venom shows up it's still the same suit just on a different person. the symbiote learned emotions from peter parker and it is angry and hurt at not being wanted but it stays in the form it thought he wanted... peter parker disarms eddie brock once by telling the symbiote that he wants it back and attacking once the symbiote starts to leave... eddie has such a hard time throughout the comics with the fact that the symbiote Will Leave Him if prompted by the right person. and be so honest. what would you do if you were eddie brock and no matter where you went or what you did there was a symbol that you were somebody else's second choice emblazoned across your chest

[catkin-morgs-kookaburralover]

This story, for which there are seven parts, is dedicated to everyone affected by Hurricane Helene. It was not written because of that, but a water-based natural disaster is part of the plot. It does not focus on it, but is a story of hope. The text of section one is under the cut. I hope to post all sections before the end of the Inklings Challenge. Despite this being my third year, this is the first I've actually posted anything other than snippets, so I hope I'm doing this right. I haven't yet written more than this, but I do have an outline for the other six parts, so hopefully that will work. @inklings-challenge

One: Admonish the Sinner

First of all it must be understood that every world is connected, as every village is. Some are just further away.

This is not a story of Earth; this is a story of a world nobody bothered to name, in a village nobody called anything other than the village. But that does not make it any less beloved—by people or by God. Sometime, a long time before this story is set, someone from Earth came to this nameless world and gave them the greatest gift of all, truth: but that is another tale entirely.

The night sky of this world is strikingly different from ours. Most prominently, two moons watch the world below, and every forty-seven years or so, flooding hits the island. They call it Big Tide, for it is the pull of the two moons combined that does this. It is regular enough, and has enough warning signs, that everyone should be perfectly ready for it.

As is common in humans (and these are humans like us, though the world is different), not everyone believes the evidence laid out in the world.

This is a story of Big Tide, specifically the one of the year three thousand, two hundred and twenty by their reckoning. This is a story of Paula McArthur.

%%%%%%%

The wattles were flowering, and it was Paula’s favourite time of year. There were several different wattles, but this was the deep gold ones she loved the best, the ones she gathered by the armful and adorned her home with. Now she only held a single sprig and enjoyed it to the full. It was too close to Big Tide to unnecessarily damage the wattle trees; they could be badly damaged by the rushing waters, and might need everything they had to survive. But one twig wasn’t going to hurt it.

The sky was a clear pale blue shot with fine clouds, a mass of them shining near the horizon with the sun gentle on them. Paula raised her face to the sunlight and closed her eyes, smiling. It was spring, and she never felt more alive than in springtime. 

She had been working all morning to prepare for Big Tide, largely transport. Her hands were tired of the precise positions needed to be held in order to hover exactly enough to transfer items in mid-air between hoverboards rather than landing to do it, which would waste time. Tide waited on no man, but Paula was skilled enough to know when she could be sloppy about hoverboarding, and enjoyed hoverboarding in a more slapdash manner than most people she knew. She had graduated earlier than most of her classmates from a controller to haptics. Tomorrow, though, she might use the controller again to make sure she was fresh enough to hover efficiently overnight during Big Tide itself. 

Presently she took out her lunch, and ate it while walking. In the distance a kookaburra laughed; Paula came to an abrupt halt as a green-blue iridescent flash clued her into the presence of a river dragon nearby. It turned and looked at her, bright blue eyes wise and calm. After a moment of silence and mutual respect, the dragon moved properly into her view and arched its sinuous back, raising its crest. Paula lifted her chin and brushed back the dark fringe to look more intimidating. The only sign the dragon gave of seeing any change was to raise its scales in a largely vain attempt to inflate its size. Abruptly it put down its scales and ran in a blaze of colour, uttering a high keening cry that faded as it retreated.

Paula turned to see who had disturbed her, smiling as she recognised the intruder. “What brings you here, Martha?”

Her friend grinned in response, lighting up her tanned sombre face. “You, actually. I came in search of you.”

Paula half gestured to herself, merrily. “Why trouble yourself?”

Martha grew serious at once. “I care about you. Aren't I allowed to?”

“Certainly, as I do.” 

Martha smiled a little incredulously. “Anyway, surely it's time to go back now?”

Paula raised a single eyebrow, then tilted her head back and assessed the position of the sun. “I guess. Why did you come to find me, Mar?”

“Oh, you know, I hardly see you now.” Her manner was evasive, which baffled Paula. “You're always out walking.”

“It's spring.” Paula waved the sprig of wattle at her. “The best time of the year. What's your favourite season?”

“Winter,” said Martha definitively. “Cold and empty and bleak.”

“Why do you like it that way?” she asked in surprise. Last time they'd talked about the seasons, she thought Martha had waxed poetic about the dying fire of autumn. 

“It's silent,” was Martha's quiet response. “Nobody bothers you.”

Paula paused to assess the time, decided they had to go back and led the way; Martha trailed her. “I thought you liked people.”

There was a short silence. “People don't tend to like me.”

“That's nonsense,” she responded immediately. Martha smiled, sad and sarcastic. 

“I don't tend to like me.”

Her calmness bothered Paula, and she sped up slightly. “Well, I do. You're fun, conversational and well read.”

“Which is why you disappear alone for hours.” She caught up and shot Paula a sidelong look, as if to say, I know your secrets. Except there were no secrets to know. 

“I like spring. It feels so alive and fresh, like all the past year's mistakes are washed away and there's new growth instead.”

“Very poetic.” Instead of amusement, Martha's tone was sour. She dodged past Paula and trotted quickstep the whole way back.

%%%%%%%

“I don't know what I did wrong,” finished Paula, twisting her hands nervously. “She got mad and I don't know why.”

Her mother glanced hurriedly across to check the next load wasn't ready, then turned to Paula again. “When people aren't happy it can be a temptation to take it out on others, especially those who are.”

“She said she was worried, and then she just changed and didn't want to talk to me.”

“Rebecca!” The shout made her mother focus on her own work; Paula moved her hoverboard closer to her father so he could load it up. This one was three bags of flour, heavy on the back and requiring stabilisation, which Paula remained still for while her father adjusted the controls. When it was done, he gave her a thumbs up and she gestured with her gloves, rising away from the site and on the journey to higher ground. It wasn't as easy to handle the unbalanced board; she would have done a lot more, and easier, with a transport hoverboard rather than the jury-rigged family board, but it was more economical and the decree had been that fuel, not time, was of the essence, since they'd planned well in advance. Indeed, today being the day before Big Tide, they had expected to have no more transport to do apart from the people, but someone had been digging too enthusiastically in their garden and cracked an underground storage container, so all of that had to be moved. 

She was most of the way there, wind in her face, when a fast personal hoverboard raced up beside her, village elder crouched to stave off the wind. He matched her speed, then unwound and said, “I'll take over from here. Take my board and go back—we need you to persuade people to go.”

“What?” She was already moving, assessing how to swap boards without any risk of either of them tumbling into the trees below while stepping across. “Why?”

He grimaced. “Turns out there are people who haven't prepared and don't want elders coming to help. Your dad suggested you could try and help instead.”

She started to shuck the gloves, then changed her mind and pressed buttons, keying them to the elder's hoverboard instead. As ownership switched, both boards lurched violently, and Paula barely held her position. The elder was wearing magnetic boots and so didn't run the risk of falling. Once she had stabilised it, she said, “So where do I start?”

“Ask your dad when you get back.” His expression was calm and focused as he adjusted the settings to accommodate for his weight. “For now, just get going. Time is of the essence. Big Tide waits for no man.”