DWinchester posts
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Death After Death PLUS 318-320
Ch. 318 - Someplace NewThe road continued, and four days after they left Ifrin’s Crossing, they reached the foothills that marked the true borders of this Kingdom. Charia and Brin might end and begin at the river they’d crossed so recently, but the culture didn’t change noticeably until they r...
The Blood-Stained Blade Ch. 132-134
Side note, but I finished writing book 3 this week. On to book 4! How does it end? I guess we'll have to find out in a month or two... Ch. 132 - An ImpasseThe Iron City was a collection of smithies, warehouses, and cages. There were no homes to speak of. The closest anything came to that were lo...
Brewing Bad Ch. 184-185
Ch. 184 - Restless PeaceFor the better part of the next week, things were mostly quiet. A few more nobles died, but this time neither Lucas nor anyone in his employ had anything to do with it. He was so enchanted with his fiancée that he barely paid attention, and unless a couple of assassins paid ...
Death After Death PLUS 315-317
Ch. 315 - Hero of the DayAfter his orb disappeared into the darkness above, Simon sat just where his doppelgänger had been a moment before and waited. Instead of reflecting on that strange disconnect between the man and his aura or even the irony that he was sitting exactly where the other man had ...
The Blood-Stained Blade Ch. 129-131
Ch. 129 - Heart of Fire“Me?” the Ebon Blade asked. “A sword can do nothing alone, but with the right wielder, anything may be accomplished.”The group of souls debated those ideas for a time, and the Ebon Blade was able to bring several around to its way of thinking, just by emphasizing the g...
Brewing Bad Ch. 182-183
I don't want to spoil anything, but in the spirit of making sure people don't renew their patron subscriptions more than they need to, I will say that this book is only a few weeks from ending. While I love the note the story ends on, it makes me want to write another trilogy picking up wher...
Death After Death PLUS 312-314
Ch. 312 - The Long WayDespite his hurry to leave Hepollyon, Simon was in no hurry to arrive in Ionar. That urgency had been caused by the growing discomfort of trying to live a life that wasn’t his anymore more than any tight timelines. He still had more than a year before the volcano was due to e...
The Blood-Stained Blade Ch. 126-128
Ch. 126 - LostInch by inch, the blade was buried in filth. While it stood there, unused and embedded in the stone, the tiny demons built a terrible sort of nest around it, and then multiplied inside that ugly thing like evil wasps. The blade hadn’t been able to keep track of the passage of time ve...
Brewing Bad Ch. 180-181
Ch. 180 - Watch OutMage ambushes aside, on some level, Lucas felt safest when he was riding down a dark road at night. Given the number of monsters in this world that was crazy, of course, but he believed it just the same. Out here he might get attacked by a goblin or a giant spider; a freaking owlb...
Death After Death PLUS 309-311
Ch. 309 - UprootedAfter over a decade and a half in Ordanvale, Simon finally decided to leave and journey south to see the Oracle in her mountain-top city. He wasn’t looking forward to explaining who he was again for the third time, but he had to; it was the only place where he was likely to get a...
The Blood-Stained Blade Ch. 123-125
Ch. 123 - Smoldering EmbersWhen the tide of bottle up evil thinned into a fog, they strode forward. Now the blade could study the details of the plain stone corridor and its rotted contents, and even without any obvious signs of violence, it could see that something was very wrong with the place.Whi...
Brewing Bad Ch. 178-179
Ch. 178 - What to DoSeconds later, the two men succumbed, and he and Lord Torvin were all but alone amidst the limp bodies of his rivals. “Going straight for the throat, huh?” Lucas asked as he set his glass down.“I only did what I learned from you,” Lord Torvin answered. “I’m surprised ...
Death After Death PLUS 306-308
Ch. 306 - A StrangerSimon had been in Ordanvale for more than half a decade when he saw someone he was sure was part of the Unspoken for the first time. He was hardly the first stranger. There had been so many travelers and peddlers that Simon could hardly hope to count all of them. There had been t...
The Blood-Stained Blade Ch. 120-122
Ch. 120 - The SongstressLucian fell from the sky like a bloody comet, and as he did, the blade absorbed souls all along the way, devouring the lesser ones as best it could. There would be no survivors in the meatgrinder that the building had become, and through the archmage and whoever else had occu...
Brewing Bad Ch. 176-177
Ch. 176 - Muted CelebrationNo matter how much neither of them wanted to let go of each other, eventually they did, if only because Lucas was absolutely dead on his feet. Together, they went inside where Lucas was given porridge and tea. That’s when he broke the news to Danaria, Kar’gandin, and e...
Death After Death PLUS 303-305
Ch. 303 - Further ExperimentationDespite Simon’s near miss with the orb, he was undeterred. While it was fun to improve the lives of those in Ordanvale, and that summer he opened up a copper mine after a goblin purge one valley over from the small town, his focus continued to be on his own experim...
The Blood-Stained Blade Ch. 117-119
Ch. 117 - A Real ChallengeThere were no other hunters or divine attacks in the days that followed that terrible night. The Ebon Blade and its wielder made good time and defaced two more small waystones, further altering the magical landscape, making it look like they were going to go south when they...
Brewing Bad Ch. 174-175
Ch. 174 - The Perfect Ambush (part 2)Lucas fell end over end for several seconds before he stabilized his fall. That gave him just enough time to decide how he wanted to land but not enough time to come to grips with the fact that he was probably going to break every bone in his body. Endurance poti...
Death After Death PLUS 300-302
Wooooo! Chapter 300! What a milestone. I love it. It's amazing how quickly stories add up if you just keep going. If you go this far, thanks for reading!Ch. 300 - Field ResearchAs the winter progressed, Simon lost himself in his research. That wasn’t enough to bind him to the town he found him...
Tenebroum is Complete... For Now...
Today, Tenebroum Book 5 is now available, in its final form on Amazon in print and e-book. (Audiobook will be available on October 7th.) Though I'm sure many/most of you have already read the series, I would be remiss if I didn't put it out there.Today I received a picture from a reader who ...
The Blood-Stained Blade Ch. 114-116
Alright, we are back to three chapters a week, with (hopefully) no further commercial interruptions. Thank you for your patience!Ch. 114 - The First LinkPart of the Ebon Blade expected another massive pillar of fire to appear the moment they approached the first standing stone, but that didn’t hap...
Brewing Bad Ch. 172-173
Ch. 172 - The Tolling BellThe bell rang nine while Skylara was getting ready, increasing Lucas’ anticipation. He felt more like bait than a dragon slayer, but he was committed now. It’s not as if he could just bail. Heisenburgle would have no way to see his target. He was trusting that Lucas wou...
Death After Death PLUS 297-299
Ch. 297 - A Short DelaySimon spent the rest of the night hacking the little green monsters to pieces. He was in no hurry, even from the beginning, before the grim work exhausted him. Why should he be in a hurry? With the collapse of the other two tunnels he’d found, he was reasonably sure that the...
Continuity, and Other Topics
So first, let me preface this post by saying I'm just fine. To the best of my knowledge, I'm in perfect health. That said, last week I had a sort of thought-provoking scare. One night after a dinner of chicken and fried rice, I was slammed with one of the worst migraines of my life. Easily t...
The Blood-Stained Blade Ch. 112-113
I'm making a post about it in a couple of days, but just to let everyone know, I plan to resume posting this story three times a week next week or the week after. While I will still be posting Brewing Bad for a couple of more months, it is now written, allowing me to focus on two books, and my o...
Brewing Bad Ch. 170-171
Ch. 170 - Last ChanceThey reached the River Palace a few hours before dawn, which was even bigger than he imagined it to be. He’d heard both Heisenburgle and Skylara describe it in passing as a lesser palace or a vacation spot of the prince, but neither did it justice. The thing was too elaborate ...
Death After Death PLUS 294-296
Ch. 294 - Never AloneFor the first few minutes, Simon just enjoyed the change of scenery. As the distant rumble of the volcano faded along with the portal, he listened to the sound of rain softly pelting the leafy canopy above him. It both felt and smelled like peace, and he decided right away, as h...
The Blood-Stained Blade Ch. 110-111
Ch. 110 - ImpactThe young mage fell silently and invisibly from his perch toward the hard ground below. He tried to struggle and squirm, but the blade held him, twisting his body only slightly so that he made two full revolutions before landing on his feet.When he hit the ground, the only evidence t...
Brewing Bad Ch. 168-169
Ch. 168 - A Dangerous Liaison‘My dearest Mr. Blue,’ the letter began. ‘I can see now that I might have been hasty in judging you. Perhaps we can arrange a rapprochement, and in time, perhaps more will come of it. I look forward to dancing with you again soon, Dutchess Skylara.’It was a short...
Death After Death PLUS 291-293
Ch. 291 - ExperimentsSimon went hunting that afternoon, but more to practice with his bow than for the food. He was planning to stay for a couple more days to trace runes and dig through the wealth of knowledge he’d collected. A deer would have been too much for that, so he’d been hunting for a ...
