Nanowrimo 2023 Project -- Dhampir's Story!

 We've reached the halfway point for Nanowrimo '23 and I'm at the 28K-ish mark of the first draft of Dhampir's backstory. In the tale, she's still Dhampirika. I'm sure the draft is going to go past 50K because I haven't even gotten her to the Fomorian homeland yet. A few things have sprung up that I'm going to have to see how it affects the other novels in the series--

1) Aettrynne plays a much bigger role in Dhampir's childhood than I originally thought. In the overarching storylines between the characters, I knew she was going to be the Eravisci's war-mage, replacing the head of their druidic council when he is killed. In working out Dhamp's plot, though, she popped up much earlier than expected--in fact, she delivers the infant Dhampir! (And she also keeps the child from killing her mother during the birth process.) So now, I have the basis of why Dhamp and Aev have a quiet almost sibling-like competitive thing between them. Aettrynne knew Dhampir first yet chose Aeval-Leigh to be her high priestess and protege. More to come on this one...

2) Dhampir now has a love interest from her childhood--Lycaeon. This character had not figured in my plotting but somehow made an appearance in a scene that was meant as a means of Dhampir learning more about the Fomorians. Lycaeon is from Albion, but is also half-Fomorian. While the "spirit" of the raven is honored in Dhampir's human family, giving her the ability to shift into a large corvus, Lycaeon got his name from his family's kinship with wolves. I'm still trying to decide if he will have to be killed off by the end of the book, though. I think it's important that Dhamp thinks he is but I'm considering Aettrynne doing a bit of the timey-wimey stuff and going back to heal him before he dies. In Everstorm, Dhamp has another love interest, but if Aettrynne were to teach Lycaeon how to portal--or take him to the Drow twixt-space--he could definitely pop up in later stories.

Love it or hate it, I've learned that it's fun to use AI to create images of the characters from the descriptions I've used in the books. The intent is to use them more for placeholders or reference, so I can connect to the world when I need to write and I'm just not feeling it. 

So far, for Dhampir, I did one for the cover placeholder for the Nano project and last night, I did another of her and Lycaeon in his wolf form. Really enjoying working on her story so much! This is the first time that I've earned every Nano badge available at the mid-month point!

Dhampir from Everstorm

Dhampirika and Lycaeon 1

Dhampirika and Lycaeon 2

Dhampirika and Lycaeon 3

Dhampir in Second Life