The Story of it All

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I would really love everyone to read the following post.

It’s long, but it’s everything I would want anyone to know about me and my journey to produce Purge of Ashes, which comes out a week from today, on Tuesday, August 25th. If you ever knew me in real life, or are a fantasy-writer or fan I’ve met online, or anyone who may or may not know this story, I’d love for you to read the following post – because it’s the only one of this ilk I’ll be writing before release day and it means a lot to me.

A lot of people write books, but by this point I know my journey has been wholly unique. Some of you are personal friends. Some are family. Some of you are old acquaintances and we added each other to Facebook back in 2005 or something. Many others are strangers from around the world who also write fantasy literature, or read fantasy literature; some of those well-know names with popular series, others yet searching for their audience. Whether you know only part of the story, or most of the story, this is all of the story: how the World of Imbalance came to be over 23 years.

Dragon Boating

Back in 2003 I was 21 years old. I got a job steering for and eventually coaching dragon boat team practices in Peterborough, ON – helping my father prepare for the annual Peterborough Dragon Boat Festival, an event he helped create and ran up until it paid for Peterborough to have its first mammogram machine. Until then, women had to drive an hour to Oshawa. While out on the water, and being most of the way through university, I got to thinking about writing a fantasy world like the ones I loved the most. There were three ‘modern’ fantasy series that I’d read through and through, and what I lacked in variety I made up for in enthusiastic rereading. They were Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time, George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire, and Steven Erikson’s Malazan Book of the Fallen (then about 4 books in).

I came home one night and hammered out a cast of characters – including the central figures of Purge of Ashes: Orenzo Madleej, Avery Shim ta Salm, Logrum Geras (under a different name at the time), Aronan Kloss, and more. I got the name “Rafien” from an island on a map I’d drawn on precision graph paper – which I still have here next to my desk. I then went to my cottage for a weekend and spent the time creating the map on two 8.5×11″ sheets of blank paper. I have photos of these original crude drawings, and 90% of the World of Imbalance is there.

Somewhere shortly thereafter, or even a year, I got to writing the story. I wrote about 100k words. Each chapter was titled like the steps of forging a sword, or steps to fletching an arrow. Odd. Even odder was chapters 6-10 were exclusively from the point of view of the rat-folk Scalion Legion, particularly Tertiac Raek. Like many writing projects of those in their early 20s, with so much life yet ahead of its author and their youthful energy, it eventually fell by the wayside.


Television Writing & Producing

Fast forward to 2006-2007 and I’d been working in Toronto as a closed captioner – building closed captions for a company called SDI Media. Hit my head on the glass ceiling when I walked in the door. DVD closed captions didn’t seem to be the way of the future with Netflix popping up, and I was still wondering what to do with my English degree. I ended up enrolling in a Television Writing & Producing program at Humber College. My aim was to create an animated cartoon show much akin to Futurama or Undergrads. I did end up writing some episodes and pitching a show called Cajoles of Hell or later Hell Bent, but… nothing doing (though the premise of a Cerberus character where one head is an alcoholic and all three share the same liver is still funny) I was doing nothing with real people, which got under the skin of the course instructors. Eventually, over the winter holidays, our Movies/Late Night instructor, an Emmy nominee by the name of Lorne Frohman, complained no one was writing movies and our job was to write a movie over the break.

Damn. I just wanted to make cartoons. But wait, didn’t I have that fantasy novel I’d half written sitting around? That was something I could make a movie about. I quickly got to work, and it ended up being an exercise I recommend to young authors: strip down the overblown content of that 100k ten chapter story until it is the bare bones of a movie script. Put it in Final Draft. Visualize everything and minimize your dialogue. I wrote a 2-hour fantasy movie for Lorne, and in doing so I finishing the story in my head and wrapped up all the loose ends. It felt suitably climactic because it was Act 3 of a film.

When I was done, he really liked it. He actually sent it to his agent in Los Angeles where I’m sure it’s been used for kitty litter lining by now. The important part of that story is I met my to-be-wife about a month after the program was done, and got to say, “Yeah, I’ve got a script in LA currently” which surely won me some points.

So now Purge of Ashes: the Movie was done and… well, that’s it. Back to attempting to write for TV shows. When the program ended, I went back to SDI Media because I needed income, but TV didn’t seem right for me. It was very collaborative, and while I’m a social fellow and now a loud and engaging elementary teacher, other people + my creative process did not seem to mix. I made a comic (The Sword and the Fish, hell yeah) and even then, having to work with the artist felt inhibiting. I felt guilty asking for anything. By this point I had scripts, I had songs, I had web comics, I now had an actual comic, I had built an entire video game also called The Sword and the Fish… I was a jack of all trades, master of none. But writing – like, novel writing – that felt like no one could stop me. It’s just me and the page. There’s no committee. I set out to write Purge of Ashes.

Realmwalker

I gave myself a deadline. I figured if I didn’t, it wouldn’t get done. I gave myself six years to finish. This is obviously a lot longer than a typical author needs, but I was writing mostly on weekends and the like. I’m glad I stretched it that long. I could (and did) hit that target. If I’d undershot things, I think I’d never have finished. From 27 years old to 33 years old, or so, I wrote Purge of Ashes by taking my movie script and expanding it into a novel. I scrapped the Scalion Legion POVs and started building an almanac with all my world data (a quick look shows 349 named characters between books so far) with headings like GODS, UNIQUE NAMES, NATIONS, and FAUNA etc. My favourite month during this time was the August of the first summer I was actually being paid as a teacher. I’d drive my wife to work in the morning, head to a library, read a Wheel of Time chapter in my car until 9am, poach my favourite spot up three levels in a corner with a window, write until lunch – watching an episode of Futurama while eating – and then write until 4:15pm. Then I’d drive, pick my wife up, and head home feeling utterly fulfilled from a creative point of view and ready to waste time all night.

When I was done, I did the typical agent search and query search, sending the book out to a wide variety of names and publishers. Nothing came of it. Very big word count for a nobody. I started building connections with some of the online communities. I met a fellow named Sean Rodden who was excited because he had just gotten a 3-book deal at the small press Realmwalker Publishing Group. I wasn’t sure on a small press, so I decided to read his book and send them my query. His book Whispers of War was a powerful, elegantly written, Tolkien-idolizing (in the only way I’ve ever read that utterly works) epic that kicked some ass. I was so so so excited when Realmwalker offered me a three-book deal for my Imbalance series, starting with Purge of Ashes, and then on to Grip of Dust and Silence of Deluge. (Now a fourth and final book is planned)

Turns out 5-6 authors had been hired at Realmwalker. In fact, about 12-16 authors had become Realmwalker hires in the past half year. Their plan was to release a book a week from January 2016 to April 2016. I drew a short straw and got the last slot in early April. While getting hype for my “deal” (no actual money involved up front) and promoting my peers, I read a couple novels from some of the other authors. It took until March to realize that both books I read were sub-par. In fact, they felt amateurish in a very concerning way. I’d joined on the strength of one book, but the others were not filling me with confidence. Around this time the RPG cover artist went MIA. Things seemed quite shaky and some funds had not been sent where they should have been. By the end of March there were a lot of questions from everyone and RPG had few answers.

Ah, this part.

The week Purge of Ashes was slated to be released Realmwalker announced they were bankrupt and folded. The cover artist hadn’t been paid, others hadn’t; their attempt to start a small press had failed. They were not a con, it should be noted. They were a small press with big confidence in a publishing plan doomed from the start. They helped me strip all the RPG imprints from Purge of Ashes and I now faced three daunting concerns. One, GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! Two, I booked a book launch at Hashtag Gallery in Toronto with friends and family. I couldn’t back out, right? I had to publish, right? It was already booked! (I ended up not getting the books up from the States in time for my book launch… which was an ill portend). Three, Mark Lawrence‘s Self-Published Fantasy Blog Off #2 was going live for submissions in three to four days. I’d followed the first one, and knew this could be the ticket for my series. I’ve got to enter, right? During this emotional tumult? Of course I must! I submitted Purge of Ashes under the wire and felt great for a few months until my assigned blogger read 17 pages and quit, citing its volume of characters and general depth. To be fair, the RPG-scraped copy I submitted was subpar in many ways: its maps were unreadable, its margins were messed up, it had blank pages where maps should be, and my cover was abysmal (after the cover artist left, the RPG folk tried to build me one themselves. My kingdom for someone back then to tell me to let everything go and rebuild before self-publishing, but self-publishing is what I did)

Out of the tournament, and with its physical publishing issues all the more glaring, I took the book down off Amazon. I’d already started writing Grip of Dust. I picked up where I left off and Purge of Ashes got shelved.

The Decade

Shelved hard. It sat from summer 2016 until now, summer 2026, just… waiting. The reason was simple. I’d made myself another promise. While writing Grip of Dust, I knew it would be bigger and that it was taking me a lot longer for two reasons. The first was I was a full-time teacher now, indeed writing elementary school plays for half the year. If I tried to publish Purge of Ashes before I was remotely close to finishing Grip of Dust I would never have the sequel prepared in anything near the requisite time for readers to not have forgotten everything. I wasn’t fast enough. So I promised I would take Purge of Ashes off the shelf when and only when I completed Grip of Dust in its entirety. Mostly writing every summer and break, I finished in March 2026 (it’s currently in beta reading) while producing 20k words of Silence of Deluge somehow, too. The promise had been made. Now it was time to publish Purge of Ashes properly as best I could once and for all.

The second reason was my boy.

My Boy

My son Sebastian was born right around when I pulled Purge of Ashes from publication in 2016. He faced some challenges from the start, like jaundice and choking in his sleep. He was blotchy with red spots and seemed sad just existing. Half a year in we discovered he was anaphylactic to 4 major allergens: peanuts, tree nuts (cashew, pistachio), sesame, and all dairy. He was blotchy because he was getting these proteins through breast milk. We changed his diet and he cleared up, slimmed down a bit, and grew his patented smile (though now it’s more of a mischief smile). He still also had hypotonia (resulting in 8 years of leg braces) and strabismus (resulting in surgery and glasses) About a year in it was clear he was not meeting baby check points. In fact, he was already about 5 months behind.

Thus began a pattern yet to cease. Sebastian operates at about half his actual age, starting back as young as one. Now, at ten, he’s akin to a 5-year-old in many functions, including basic reading and arithmetic, self-sufficiency, etc – older in some ways, but younger in many others. He was considered to have ‘global delay’ which is a catch-all term until he’s old enough to be eventually diagnosed more accurately. After genetic tests and psych tests he was diagnosed with ADHD and one-blip-below-severe Level 3 autism. Now, I could go on forever about Sebastian’s conditions, and indeed on all medical forms, school forms, and yet more medical forms we do – but his myriad challenges aren’t the point here so much as the impact on Imbalance.

Anyone who has had a kid knows what those early years are like. The sleepless nights of a baby, then the danger-riddled time of a toddler, followed by the cranky logic-bypassing missions of 3- to 4-year-olds. Sebastian’s lived here his whole life. A typical child grows and ages out of this phase and needs their parent less directly, playing more with his sister or his own friends. But not Seb. His allergies make it very hard to go anywhere, both public venues that almost always have sesame and dairy as clear and present danger, and the houses of friends where so many things could go wrong; but coupled with his autism and learning disability, he takes a lot of special care for obvious reasons. I can’t write in the mornings because he finds me and chats. He can’t be explained away. He needs playmates… our waking hours. He can’t control the volume of his voice… our ongoing reminders. Some traits I won’t mention. It’s tiring and it’s a lot. Crap happens like when his full tooth (like, the deep sharp part, too) was knocked out at school and they attempted to preserve it in milk… forgetting he’s allergic to milk. After rushing to the dentist we were told the old one can’t be re-planted and it’s gone forever. No dentist could confirm sterilization before re-planting a tooth and none of them had any idea what would happen if the proteins remained in-system. I love my boy. He dominated the decade.

Revival

Some authors write a book a year. Some a book two years. I’m always impressed. How long I take is in no way an indicator of quality and certainly not one of professionalism. But my journey has it’s benefits, too. The main advantage is instead of germinating dozens of book ideas to float about, as many authors do, I have one world I deal in exclusively – more or less like my old heroes from 2003 – and it’s been tightened and tightened and tightened again. It’s been lived in for 6 to 23 years depending on your point of view. Every detail I can muster goes into it. It’s not a concept come and gone, but a home. There are a few bits I might change if I could time travel to 2003, but I can’t change them now – they are a part of me and the fabric of the tale.

So I got Santiago Lozano, whose work I admired on the Malazan Empire page, and Sarah Chorn, whose editing always got rave reviews and seemed dissimilar enough to provide a fresh assessment, and got working on sprucing Purge of Ashes up once again for publication. Since late March, it’s been a steady walk up to release day, learning code for Sigil and the headaches of Word PDFs. I spent two days researching crazy-hard only to find the problem was my font was a slightly modified version of a different font which caused PDFs to turn everything to Arial. I took my beautiful, full colour map and made paperback versions. I created fleurons and sought out reviews and blurbs. And in one week it will finally – finally – be done.

If you’ve read this far, then thank you – no matter how you know me. There won’t be another post like this. I just want everyone to know what it took to produce this book. The book itself deserves that. I want you to like and share it and help it not get lost in the algorithm. I want to do anything I can to help the book reach as many people as it can so they enjoy it on the level I believe it capable of. I want anyone’s help in keeping Purge of Ashes from being lost in the ether a second time.

Thank you for everything,
Joel Minty

Updates!

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Author copy
Author copy!

Since Purge of Ashes is back, I’ve gotta keep with the updates! Since my last post, I finished up and got two author copies sent to me. The first is pictured, looking just dandy. The inside is warm and lovely. I’ve got a few touch-ups for the cover for the final version yet to come. I’ve also created a new rendition of the classic map – since the IDEAL map on this site is too colossal to fit in any book. It’s a pair of black and white (er, cream) mirroring maps of both the west and eastern portions of the world of Imbalance. Hopefully all the detail comes through.

The second author copy? It was gifted to Mr. Christian Cameron whose generosity knows no bounds, and he read it in one fell swoop! Can’t say I didn’t ask him for a blurb:

““A great read. Purge of Ashes is a feast
for fans of Stevenson and Martin”

Christian Cameron

I’m going to feast on that praise forever! Another edit for the cover art as I’m putting this blurb smack dab up where everyone can see. How many exemplary blurbs does one need before bona fides hype occurs?

This Summer Purge of Ashes is back LIKE A PHOENIX!

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With the dramatic release of my cover over at Grimdark Magazine as a fantastic cover reveal, it’s time announce that while Imbalance and joelminty.com laid dormant for many years… neither died!

I’ve been writing Grip of Dust, the sequel to Purge of Ashes, ever since the original release, and having completed it now turn attention to publishing properly. So while beta readers are reading through Grip as I type, the last few months have been preparing Purge for its final push.

Fist off, I hired Sarah Chorn of Bookworm Blues to edit Purge of Ashes one last time – mostly line edits as the book was more or less good to go. I will be done implementing them in a week now that school is over for the summer.

Secondly, I hired Santiago Lozano who is well known from the Malazan Empire group on Facebook to do my cover art, producing the half-realistic, half-artistic gem you see over at Grimdark Magazine. I will post it hear in a few days to give Grimdark Mag their due.

Finally, I am recruiting reviewers for ARC copies and getting on producing the book. I will post about my current ARC team in a separate post, but I’m about 5/6 with requests so far and manage to make one ask per day. This will ramp up starting tomorrow as, once again, school is over.

I’ve got one great blurb to add to my blurb section, though: BEHOLD!

“Expansive in scope and flawlessly executed, this is epic fantasy at its best.” ~ Sarah Chorn, author of ‘Of Honey and Wildflowers’

Rag the Grenadier

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Update! As promised, I took a while away until I had something more juicy to post. Here’s where things are at:

  • Purge of Ashes is on submission. Came close-ish once! Have to keep sending.
  • I’m 130k into Grip of Dust and… about half done. Eek.
  • I got less done this summer than last due to ‘life’, but progress is progress…

…which leads me to the end of August where, instead of starting a new chapter in the WIP, I decided to take a break and write a short story for the Grimdark Fiction Readers & Writers group and NegativeHP’s fourth upcoming short story contest. In a few days I wrote “Rag the Grenadier”, an idea that had been percolating for some time, and joins “Residue” as now two short stories written for the World of Imbalance.

Lo and behold, it got all the way to the finals before coming in 2nd (to a story by the editor of Grimdark Magazine no less!) I’m pretty happy with that result. If you have a moment, head over to NegativeHP and give it a read! (and while you’re at it, read the winner “The Duellist” which was my favourite of the rest).

It’s Time

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The truth is you can post about your book, or writing books, or trying to write books, until you’re blue in the face – but authors with titles to their credit do the very same. And I’d listen to them over me, so… The blog and website are tools of trade. They are purposed with drawing eyes. Without a product, they are as useful as signs directing consumers to empty vendors or unstocked shelves.

As such, this site waits. I have lots to say – little battles vs. finalizing a novel, balancing editing vs. children, trying to balance multiple story lines – but there is no purpose until there is a product. When the site was (proportionally) thriving I had a book inbound, and that makes all the difference with keeping up. Frankly, I’m far better off producing word count on the WIP, or inching Purge of Ashes closer to as professional a launch as I can achieve, then reminding passersby of my existence while yielding no news of interest. The product sells the product.

Now, though, the time has come. I looked at my wife a few nights ago and blurted, “I might never actually touch Purge of Ashes again.” I wrote. The editor edited. The beta readers beta read. Now I am working with the exemplary Michael R. Fletcher at producing an eye-catching query letter and synopsis. It is time.

So consider this my official website warning – there is nothing to report until one of the following two things happens: either I get picked up by an agent, or I announce a release date for Purge of Ashes self-published.

Until then, keep reading.

Fall of Autumn

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Another summer passed. I got around 25k written this summer, which is much more than last summer, but I had far greater opportunity. Unfortunately, I also extracted 21k words from the same WIP, saving those two story lines for a third book. This left me not far from where I was, although in truth it is much farther progressed. My skeleton for the book is now almost complete but for a few toe bones.

I wrote chapters 2, 4, and 6, mainly. These would be following the characters from the end of Purge of Ashes and picking up shortly after it left off. I cannot stress enough how much more difficult it was to work on these than the other seven or so I had already written. Those chapters were fresh characters, fresh locations, fresh story lines, and lots of action. It felt great to hammer those out because building and creating is just a lot more fluid than grooming and preening. But these follow-up chapters, that start after a climax, are tough. You have to re-establish the ambitions of each character, you have to deal with the repercussions of what just occurred, and in my case they themselves had to re-establish what the hell they’re doing and how they are going to do it. It’s a lot of exposition or inner monologues, with less time for action (not a problem since half a world away every other chapter keeps the pace up).

So while the word count is not as special as I would have hoped, the actual job done in steering the story in the right direction was essential: a worthy challenge for a mind without the distraction of the day job. After this post I’m starting on a pair of chapters that are basically a heist. I’ve been waiting to write these scenes for years. They up the ante and the adrenaline. It’s nice to know, now that I’m teaching all day again, that it is this kind of work waiting for me at home – where I can get into the adventurous side of things rather than the emotional. It’s freeing.

1 of 7 beta readers are in, and the others have till the end of the month. Moving on Purge of Ashes will come sooner than I expect, and I hope my finances are ready. I am not publishing anything short of a pearl this time. There can be no regrets.

Paternus Review

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Cryptozoology on steroids.

This book laughs at conventions, does everything I hate, and then pulls it off with a cavalier attitude that reminds me there is no set formula for writing a book.

Paternus is bold. It doesn’t care what you expect or what you’re looking for, and I love novels that stride into the room with a confidence that lets everyone know: ‘No, that IS how it’s going to be. Get used to it.’ There is no pandering here. Below are some broken conventions that were hard to hurdle at first, but eventually became endearing:

1. It’s not written in past tense. At first this is weird weird weird, especially as Dyrk slips from consciousness to consciousness mid-page. By the end it is invigorating, allowing him to tell all perspectives at the same time, without forcing an artificial stopping point where the point of view shifts. Therefore there is less repetition than a typical multi-POV because what’s beheld is beheld.

2. If has lots of info dumps. At first you’re wondering why you are reading an ancient history of some of the different monsters that show up (and there are lots! Also, he is careful not to ALWAYS explain their backstory, just in pertinent situations), but eventually these morsels become the most delicious part of the book, with my favourite part to read actually being a CALM between action scenes wherein characters parse out some understanding as to what’s going on. When Ashton builds such mystique into the major players, their backstories become both critical and some of the best reading.

3. Parts of it are like a YA. One scene early on had me half-barf from cheese, but then that was BEFORE the major events of the story. Once Paternus pulls the ripcord there is no going back to normal. One of the greatest strengths of the writing for me was that his characters’ reactions once under fire are intense and excellently done (and damn hard to write, I’d imagine, as the events are a supernatural supernova). Once again, this contrasts my issue as Ashton turned how I read the book on its head.

4. The book has some strange scene organization. While I still think this is true having finished, I would rather read a story with enough heady content to require some back and forth than something linear. All my favourite series have lots of events happening and some careful weaving between them, so I still like that it is going there, that it trusts its reader enough to put it together – or keep key scenes in the back of their mind. I’d recommend reading it as swiftly as possible, which I didn’t do, but now wish I did.

In the end, this is a unique series with some unique writing that is sure to shake up your reading list, and even beyond the scope, and the careful crafting, and the sheer badassery – that in itself should be enough to incite a read.

Plus, it’s great to see a book where vampires and werewolves are merely fodder.

Beta Read

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Cover
Last night I sent my book out for its first beta read. That would be 2+ years after being originally published. Now let us never speak of it again.

After the latest round of editing, I am very excited for their feedback. For the first time I really feel like the writing has caught up to the story itself and tells it clean and true. I cut 7,000 words, most all of them useless, and brought the first 30 pages from tepid to intriguing. Now, when I hop in and read a page here or there, I just read. No fixing, editing, or shuffling in my head. Just smiles on my mouth.

As for the new cover, I just threw something together in Photoshop to differentiate between this and my previous version. I’m pretty proud of it, even if close attention exposes my shoddy work.

My beta readers are:

Dyrk Ashton – Fantasy Faction’s choice for SPFBO#2 and third place finisher, Dyrk is the author of Paternus: Rise of Gods – the novel I’m currently reading – with Paternus: Wrath of Gods coming out July 10, 2018.

James Downe – co-author with AEsc Adams of the 5+ book series Legacy of Ash, his website is constantly expanding with new information about their detailed world.

Michael Baker – author of the Thousand Scars: Counterbalance Book 1 (hey, a sister series to The Imbalance?), he’s a diligent author who gets things written.

Tom Smith – I had to Grimdark it up a little with the next two, as I do draw some inspiration from the genre. Tom writes for Grimdark Magazine and knows how to get dirty.

Femke Geisolf – is a badass blogger who connected with me over our mutual love of the Malazan Book of the Fallen. She works hard at expanding self-published fantasy in Europe.

Debdip Chakraborty – is a friendly fellow from Kolkata who is working on his own book and is much loved by the online fantasy community.

Khaled Jabar – won my seat designated for a total stranger. It’s an important role!

I’m super excited to let the book out of my hands a while so I can focus on its sequel. Last year I made some headway twice a week, but this summer I expect to have more than triple the opportunity to push it close to completion.

Mark Lawrence Contest Entries

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I mean, I might as well post them.

For those who don’t know, every so often Mark Lawrence hosts little writing contests, of roughly 300 words or so, with a panel of stellar judges. You write, usually with a theme of key words to mention, and then they are ranked and prestige falls upon the victors. While my entries never achieved anything notable, I loved the process for a few reasons:

  1. It forces you to work with so few words you quickly learn how essential it is to be efficient or curtain your ambition.
  2. It made me think about what type of scene is ideal for such a contest.
  3. Reading the winners sometimes really impresses. Other times it doesn’t, but then you learn from that, too. Five major fantasy authors as judges deemed this 3rd place. What do they see that is lost on me?

They also gave me a chance to write other content from my Imbalance world. While I toil away on the books (Purge of Ashes is preparing for beta readers in July) I rarely get to hop away. For both of these entries I went somewhere in-world distant and it taught me more about the world itself. I recognize that writing in my own world may inhibit my chances of winning, but this is the world I write in. Until it is done, I write in no other.

Without further ado: Bridge From Dard and Cutting.

Bridge From Dard (requirement: using the terms ‘life’ and ‘death’)

“I’ll be fine, Norae. You’ll see.”

We will see.

She would not get too close. She had her pole if need be.

The Bridge to Furl stretched out before Thanol Baeddicus, four lines of ropes coiled upon ropes framing an ingenious succession of interlocking planks. Each was long as a man and rooted by sturdy metal pins thick as mauls. It obscured not far from where Thanol was making his way out, lost to the blanched air of a soothing snow storm.

Morning had done little to alleviate the night’s chill, and the bridge itself was thick with snow heaped tall as her hand. It sloughed from Thanol’s boots to drop a thousand leaps to the chop below.

“See? Immaculate! A work of virtuoso engineering!”

So you said in crossing.

“Immaculate!” he repeated.

The man was a gifted talent. Her span in Furl as his apprentice had braved his thinly-veiled pomposity to find the skill underneath relished the exposure. In her naivety, Norae had assumed such capability beckoned an honest man. When the bridge had been proposed, such naivety withered. Life was, after all, the vandal of innocence. The greater fault lay at its feet.

Not my own.

“She withstood a blizzard, Pupil Norae. A blizzard! Warleader will march by nightfall.”

Two pins were shoved deep in her rucksack.

“If—”

Thanol reached the plank that felt their absence. Easy to see in daylight. Impossible under snowfall. He gave a weak squeal and slipped through. Norae had her pole ready, but it would not be necessary. The magnate was already fallen to his death.

Chilled, she rubbed her hands together. Just the night’s work catching up to me.

Norae of the Dard drew her knife and began at the ropes fixing the bridge to her cliff.

Cutting (requirement: using the terms ‘night’ and ‘day’)

“Wait, heading where?”

“Lonely Child.”

“And how many?”

“Two thousand. More. I-I’ve been riding since noon, sir.”

Rold the Lobber chewed, eyes set on the outrider. Offland’s finest knelt, feathered headdress splayed across his goat-horn helmet in a mess that bore a striking resemblance to Rold’s mess of a kingdom. He addressed the supplicant with his fork while cutting with his knife and cursing the man’s belligerence. This is why I need guards on the doors. Those boots just ruined my carpet.

“Get Latmask. Have him marshal half our horse and get going. If they can muster in twenty they will arrive with well over an hour to spare. Have him… hide… in the hills, or something.”

“S-Sir, it will take three—”

“Four hours to get there, give or take an axle. I was just dining with my eldest son and his family no less than a week ago. Think I don’t know the roads between here and Banor?” He snatched a third potato.

“They were already at the border, sir,” the man said, overloud.

Rold gobbled down the potato half chewed so he could sooner upbraid the mongrel. Remain after being given orders? Utter pomposity! Plus he stinks of horse. Preparing to lash out, he caught a glimpse of the man’s trembling comportment. Caught the dust coating his boots and the length of their shadow.

“I—”

Since noon, sir.

The room heaved under a sudden, suffocating weight he could not unsummon. His knife clattered away, a numb attention grasping at senses that each slipped free, bleary and useless. His mind slugged its way through the loathsome calculation, then, pushing back his chair, Rold the Lobber stumbled away to the balcony where he faced a depthless night cutting through the light of day.