Well, I didn’t quite make a 10K day or even a 6K one, but 4K is nothing to sneeze at, either. Everyone has just arrived in Hellas and are on the royal trireme headed to Hellaspont for the second wedding, Danaë just got hit with two pieces of bad news, and Matthias is helplessly watching the captain of his guard losing his lunch over the side. Well, things can’t always be roses, right?

Also, I’m in the mood to tease. So here’s one of the banners the amazing Jay Aheer made for me from the cover. I’ll do the full cover reveal very, very soon, I promise.

Today’s stats:

Started With: 48,647 words
Wrote: 4,041 words
Total word count: 52,699 words
What else did you do today, Nicola: Cat chores, cat chores at my friend’s house, mailed off jewelry sales, hit Walmart up for #0 padded envelopes, went out AGAIN in the middle of the night to get tuna for my eldest cat because it’s the only way I can get him to take gabapentin for his sore right front leg

Writing Tips: Listen to your characters. Sometimes they will go off script (another reason why it’s a good idea to consider your outline as more of a general concept for the story rather than step-by-step directions). Frex, in this chapter I learned that my master mage Ife plans on retiring once she sees Danaë gain full mage status, and Schrader the cavalry subcommander really, really hates being on a boat. Also, a particularly sleazy grand magister in Hellaspont is making things difficult for my empress of storms. Somehow, I think he’s going to get his comeuppance soon. Heh, heh, heh…