Fred's Return

It took many years and many experiments, but Fred managed to return to his black-dragon form. Greatly pleased with his renewed power he rose into the air, revealing himself to the people of the east. The people were frightened by the sudden arrival of Fred, whose form was based upon the mythical evil that legend said sundered the earth and brought forth the many evils that plagued the people. Some fled before him, some tried to destroy him and others came to worship him.

Soon after he came out of hiding he began to put in motion the plans he had spent long years devising. He bent the humans of the east to his will, subjugating them to form the core of his armies and he sent out tendrils of magic, messages to the evils he had long felt troubling the world. In the far west island of Naevoria Ki’rianataes’roth felt Fred’s call and smiled – as far as any tree is able to smile — and redoubled his assault on the southlands. In their mountain caves the Dark elves, who had long felt his powerful presence and revered him, heard his call and rejoiced at the prospective bloodshed. The Fildirin Wraiths answered the call as if he were their master from the black void, they agreed to await his orders and prepared the legions of Karadera.

Fred's Curse

The events that I am about to recount happened after the Taeran Empire fell under the rule of Kinarell Elvanath and his Karadera armies and his Fildirin Wraiths; during the long peace of Tienlief, when the Dark Elves remained in their secluded mountains and did not trouble the elves and during; and upsurgance in Ki’rianataes’roth’s attacks on the southlands of Naevoria.

Fred spent many years in the Eastlands, for whence he originally came; hiding for many years in caves, trying to avoid the people from https://www.jasminelive.online who had exiled him only a few years before, before the transformations that he had wrought to make himself a dragon. He was forced by the mortal injury dealt to his dragon form by Haraedre Felendor to remain in human form for years as he journeyed. He lived a tortured life, spending too much time dwelling on the hurt that the human wizards had caused him. He soon came to hate the human race that had seemingly taken his long-sought powers from him, forgetting that he was once a human himself. He came to hate the shell he was forced to live in, but he held on, searching for a way to resume his dragon form.

After many years he was able to come out of hiding, for the people who remembered him were long dead. He walked among the humans and despised them even more. He walked the Eastern countries as a powerful mage, changing his name and occasionally his form to keep from arousing suspicion. And so he lived well for many years as the Taeran empire rose and fell, the world changed and he regarded it not.

In the Shadow of a Dragon's Wings

A new period of history unfolds itself. The conflicts that tore through Naevoria will have a resolution, but the world will be subjected to even more troubles before that resolution will come. The world will be torn once more, darkness will cover the land until it is in the Shadow of a Dragon’s Wings.

Fred will come again, after hundreds of years of waiting and healing, he is strong enough to challenge those who threw him down. He has forgotten his humanity and sees the human race as his enemy; the people who cast him down and near destroyed him. He has become a conniving beast and very convincing when he has to be. The dark elves will join him, along with the Karadera and Ki’rianataes’roth. All the evil of the world will gather to him, and all the good shall flee before him.

And in the end, it will be up to Sandra. She saved Fred once; will she be able to do it again? Even I do not know.

And so I shall embark on the telling of the history of Fred’s second coming. Not the actual story, the jasminlive history, the back-story that usually ends up on this ‘blog’.

Storm and Tree

I have found that one of the best times to search for inspiration is during a thunderstorm. Including the strange in-between time before the storm hits, swirling winds can bring life to a dead landscape. As I watched the storm I composed my own soundtrack in my head. Through the dramatic music I saw the world in a new life. It was the trees that drew my attention, dancing in the wind.

Words formed in my mind, a terrible storm, but I didn’t know where the storm belonged. I hadn’t been working on a story that seemed to need a storm. The tree caught my attention again, rustling in the wind. I wondered what it would be like to live in the tree. I didn’t think that it would be all that pleasant during such a storm. Yggdrasil came to mind, the world tree. And the last three words of that sentence cemented themselves in my mind. ‘The world tree.’ I did it again. Another world. Well, we know what to do with those. There is always more room for chaturbat worlds in No More Than Pen & Ink when we get back to it.

Plot

When I sat down to write this afternoon (true, I haven’t been writing as diligently as I probably should have, but that is no reason to snigger like that), I found that I didn’t know which story I was working on any more. I flipped through my notebooks and reviewed the stories. I found that most of them were in desperate need of plot, or at least more plot than they already had.

I never considered plotting to be one of my weaknesses (certainly not as bad as characterization), but my characterization has improved, my plotting hasn’t, it seems. Every time I have considered writing a contemporary story (in the real world, in our time, with no magic) I came to the conclusion that I couldn’t do it. I supposed that it might be easier to build character, and I realized that I would be able to work in a non-magic world, certainly one that I know so well. . . but I could not conceive of a plot that would work in the real world.

I’m not saying that I should try to create such a plot, but that I should be able to.

Aliens

I have decided not to include any alien species in my sci-fi galaxy. This may change in time, (there is always plenty of room for hidden alien civilizations and invaders from another galaxy.) I have never really liked the humanoid-with-bits-and-pieces-of-animals-stuck-on look. If I want aliens I want them to be alien, not to look like a guy in a cheap suit. It is however, impossible to imagine something that is completely out of our experience. Can you envision something that isn’t like anything you have ever seen?

Perhaps an alien species (if they did exist, which is completely irrelevant to this train of thought) would look more human even than the aliens of Star Trek or Star Wars, after all we would share the same creator. Perhaps aliens do not exist (then why the huge and wondrous universe—all for us? Or just to look at?) But they needn’t look like anything on Earth, they obviously come from another planet (being aliens.) Whose conditions are bound to differ from earth at least slightly, in sci-fi you usually see planets that look like places from Earth (Tatooine, Kashyyyk, various worlds from Star Trek that I can’t think of names for, various worlds from various sci-fi novels that I also can’t remember the names of.) Most planets would be at least as complex as Earth, with large number of unique animals and plants (which would mean that constant reference to the same animals (as they do in the Star Wars universe. . . any canon animal is re-used, regardless of where the character came from.)

This is making me want to deal with the exploration and discovery of my created galaxy. Maybe that is what my story is about.