This is the last update before the campaign ends in 4 days.  That’s right - 4 days!  Thanks to everyone who has supported me and this book, whether through order, recommending to others, or both.  For anyone who hasn’t ordered, then do so before the weekend is over!  We’re now at the stage where you’ll either be refunded quickly(if we fail to fund) or you’ll be guaranteed to get the book in your hands or e-reader(if only just over half of those who’ve followed but not ordered just go ahead and order).  Enough sales pitch though, I hate pitching, but I love sharing lore so we’ll move on to that.

I had a hard time choosing what to discuss for this last update at first, but then I realized there is one more dragon type seen in Exile, Magus which I hadn’t talked about yet.  This one is the poison dragon, and the one glimpsed in Exile, Magus plays a larger role in Exile, Hunted and later books in the series.  His name is Saillui, and he is the lifelong servant and friend of the Magus Baron Caldus.  His one appearance in Exile, Magus is in Chapter 60, and I’ll post an excerpt from that here to give everyone an idea of what poison dragons look (and sound) like.  He’s still a bit young here, being only around 50-60 years old, still basically a child by dragons’ standards.

...almost as large as a horse. This figure is more clearly visible, with the bright, almost lime-green scales covering it standing out even in the dark of night. It’s hind legs are meatier than its front, and all end in four digits primarily resembling a bird’s talons but having apparent flexibility at least equaling a human’s hand. It keeps its leathery wings folded against its sides as it walks, merrily swishing its long tail which ends in a bulbous protrusion tipped with a hook. Its neck is only a third the length of its tail but just as flexible. It keeps its expressive, large eyed face pointed toward its companion, the carapace like scales atop its head shifting subtly in unison with the bulges located just under the rear corners of its jaws as it converses with its companion.

Pentaz can’t make sense of the peculiar speech of this dragon, sounding like a string of subtle screeches, exaggerated hisses, and guttural purring,...

Poison dragons are the most sociable of all the dragon types, preferring to spend their time living among humanoids.  Most do so in secret, making use of the ability to assume humanoid forms which they have from the moment they hatch.  A few reveal their form to the humanoids they live among, this being more common with those living in the Zaltruscan empire due to that nation’s near worship of dragon’s (which extends to a lesser degree to serpents which the Zaltruscans feel must be distantly related to dragons).  There are some poison dragons who even choose to ally themselves to Zaltruscan noble families, acting as mounts, soldiers, or more general servants.  Those nobles who make the mistake of treating these dragons as servants(or even worse - slaves) soon find themselves without a dragon ally.

Due to their tendency to live amongst humanoids, poison dragons don’t really have a culture of their own and instead adopt whatever culture the humanoids have.  There are a few traits which they seem to have a natural talent for though, chief among those being stealth and subterfuge, deceit and diplomacy - traits which only further explain why they feel so at home amidst the imperial politics of the Zaltruscan highborn.  Indeed those nobles who are both fortunate enough to have one as an ally and smart enough to recognize the dragon’s talents will seek out their advice on all things political.

As stated earlier, poison dragons are able to change their shape from the moment they hatch, and this is the only way they are able to communicate effectively with most humanoids.  They seem to be able to learn while in their eggs, typically being able to fully understand their kind’s dialect of the Dragon language as well as any humanoid language spoken frequently around their egg.  Unfortunately their vocal chords are not as flexible in their natural form as those of other dragons are.  As such they can only produce sounds necessary for the Dragon language during their first century or so of life, and must assume humanoid form in order to be able to speak the language(s) of humanoids.  By the time they reach adulthood they are able to mimic enough to speak humanoid languages in their natural form, albeit with a bit of a bestial sound.  It is only in their elder years that they are able to perfectly mimic humanoid speech.

Their lack of an elemental nature and weaker magical nature leads most to assume that their Progenitor fathered them with some beast of the wild, likely a venomous serpent, lizard, or even scorpion on account of their tails.  Others believe due to their tendency to gravitate towards humanoid races that their ancient mother must have been a humanoid herself, perhaps some long extinct or forgotten venomous humanoid race.  Many Zaltruscans have proclaimed that Drakij in fact served as mother to the poison dragons with the father being none other than the first emperor of Zaltruscas himself!  They point to the poison dragons’ friendliness towards the empire as evidence, while completely ignoring the mention of poison dragons in legends which predate the rise of the Empire by tens (possibly hundreds) of millennia.  The poison dragons would likely point out that their inability to feed of the elements and reliance on large amounts of physical food as a more likely reason for their friendliness towards Zaltruscans.  After all, one is far more likely to live a long life being paid in cattle by nobles than if one were to constantly steal cattle from the same nobles.

While their parentage is not certain, it is a widely accepted fact that poison dragons sired one of the most commonly known form of drakes - the wyverns.  This was done during the waning days of the first reign of the Melexi and Thirosians, being part of a breeding program to produce easily controlled yet powerful flying mounts to be used in their constant war with one another by crossing poison dragons with now extinct giant reptiles and serpents.  These beasts survived both the first and second falls of these great empires and formed a thriving wild community of their own.  The Zaltruscans commonly capture wyverns and breed them in captivity to ensure that even the most minor noble can have at least 1 or 2 flying mounts of draconic descent.

While they do not have the innate magic common to so many of their dragon cousins, poison dragons do have a bit of latent primal magic and fascination with it which often drives them to play at becoming magi or servants to a god(often Drakon, but sometimes other gods).  The primal nature of their inherent magic means they can never fully master the arts of a magus, but they are fully capable of understanding the theories behind them and have been known to be quite skilled at teaching those races which are more capable of focused magics, sometimes even opening up their own academies or universities.

I could ramble on about the poison dragons, just love my underdogs of the dragon world(they’re the smallest of all dragonkind by the way), but I’ve already kept you all too long.  There is a stat block included for any D&D players/DMs as usual.  To everyone else:  thank you for your support, and keep reading & enjoying!

Wyrmling Jungle Dragon

Medium Dragon, Neutral or Lawful Neutral

Armor Class 17 (natural)

Hit Points  27 (5d8+5)

Speed  30’ / Fly 60’

Str 13 (+1),  Dex 14 (+2),  Con 12 (+1),  Int 15 (+2),  Wis 12 (+1), Cha 14 (+2)

Saves - Dex +4,  Con +3,  Wis +3,  Cha +4

Language  Draconic, and can understand but not speak 1 other regional or humanoid language such as Common, Elven, Dwarven, etc.

Challenge 2 (450 XP)

Change Shape The dragon magically polymorphs into a humanoid or beast that has a Challenge Rating no higher than its own, or back into its true form.  It reverts to its true form if it dies.  Any equipment worn or carried by it is absorbed or borne by the new form (the dragon’s choice).  In a new form the dragon retains its alignment, hit points, Hit Dice, ability to speak, proficiencies, Intelligence/Wisdom/Charisma scores, as well as this action.  Its statistics and capabilities are otherwise replaced by those of the new form, except for any class features or legendary actions of that form.

Spellcasting (Cha-based, DC 12, Spell attack bonus +4)  Choose 1 class from Bard, Cleric, Druid, Sorceror, or Wizard.  You then choose 2 spells of 1st level from that class list which the dragon can cast 1/day each without need for material component.  Commonly picked spells are below:

  Bard (Charm Person, Sleep)

  Cleric (Bless or Bane, Cure Wounds)

  Druid (Animal Friendship, Goodberry)

  Sorcerer (Expeditious Retreat,  Thunderwave)

  Wizard (Alarm or Identify, Shield).

Bite  melee weapon attack,   +3 to hit, 1d10+1 piercing (6)

Claw  melee weapon attack, +3 to hit, 1d6+1 slashing (4)

Tail  melee weapon attack, 10’ reach,  +3 to hit,  1d4+1 piercing and 2d4 poison (3 and 5)  anyone hit by the tail must make a DC 11 Constitution save or suffer the Poisoned condition for 1 minute.  Succeeding the save negates the Poisoned condition and reduces teh Poison damage to 1/2 normal.  A creature suffering from the Poisoned condition from this attack can repeat the save at the end of each of their turns in order to end that condition.

Breath Weapon (recharge 5 or 6)  Poison spray, 30’ line 5’ wide.  8d4 poison damage (20) and Poisoned condition.  DC 11 Constitution save reduces the damage to 1/2 normal and negates the Poisoned condition.  A creature suffering from the Poisoned condition from this attack can repeat the save at the end of each of their turns in order to end that condition.

I am atwitter with excitement to be sharing the new cover of Overture!  In keeping with the crowdsourcing/crowdfunding tradition, I headed on out to designcrowd.com and ran a challenge for a new cover design.  The winner is this beautiful piece from freelance artist Diana Buidoso.  It captures the feel of the book so well, and I’m over the moon.  Thank you Diana and Designcrowd!

Hey everyone,

A quick update of where our project stands and its immediate future:

1.      Contest Over
2.     Campaign NOT Over Until 12/31/2016!
3.     Raffle Winners
4.     NANOWRIMO/Book Update

1. Contest Over

So after a brutal 3 months, the Geek & Sundry fantasy contest is over. First off, congrats to the winners and other participants that also receive these updates. Contest highlights:

• We finished tied for 12th out of 406 entries in the official results. Thanks so much for everyone’s support for a respectable showing. Not too shabby, but there’s still work to do.

• In total pre-sales, we finished in 10th place at 179 pre-sales. A very cool stat as it means most of my backers are ordering multiple copies of my book. Without you, there’s zilcho chance of being published! 

• I didn’t jump off a bridge after not finishing in the top 3. Here’s a link to the final standings for visual learners like myself. 

2. Campaign NOT Over Until 12/31/2016!

So my campaign will now run until 12/31/2016. While we are edging close to the 200 pre-order mark, 250 pre-orders is still the magic number to hit. We are 71 orders away from Kingdom of Dreams becoming a reality. Please help me flip over any rocks you can to find new backers and if you have another pre-order planned, please do so. I’ve officially fired myself as campaign manager and appointed my tenacious family members to help get this thing across the finish line. My family and friends have been amazing during this process.

3. Raffle Winners

Will be drawn this week. We’ve had a sick baby, family events and a couple of conferences to deal with, including more this week. Thank you for your patience. In fact, the next update will be dedicated to the raffle. 

4. NANOWRIMO/Book Update

National novel writing month started yesterday. Why bring this up, other than the obvious? One fascinating thing I’ve learned in working on the illustrations for this book is they have unintentionally changed the tone of the original novel. (And for the better, I have some exciting new spices to add!) I was fine for the most part with the happenings in the story, but the tone itself no longer matched up with the illustrations. So other than Dromon the Recurring Nightmare’s chapters, I’m going to rework the other chapters and use NANOWRIMO as my fuel this month. I’ll be posting some chapters and excerpts as I go along. 

So to recap: I appreciate the contest and the activity it allowed to happen. But I’m thankful it’s over and now we can focus full-time on getting published! 

Pleasant dreams,

Kevin

To my dear, lovely readers:

Whew! The Geek and Sundry Contest is over, and out of 406 entries, we ended up in 4th place. We may not have won one of the big prizes, but that’s still pretty darn impressive, I think. Since we reached Quill, The Fairy Stepmother, Inc. is definitely going to be published! I’m now setting to work on finishing a complete draft, editing, and designing a cover. I’ll give a few updates as I go, but don’t worry--your days of hearing me plead for orders are done! My funding drive officially ends today, so if you wanted to snag a signed copy, now’s the time to order.

This has been an absolutely amazing experience. This is my first novel and my first attempt to publish anything, and I’ve been floored by the amount of support and positive reviews I’ve received. So thank you, to every one of you! I look forward to sending you my book!

The Inkshares community is really wonderful--many of my fellow authors have plugged my work and given me great feedback. There are so many great books on this website waiting to be discovered. A few of my friends are still trying to fund their books, and if you’re so inclined, I’d absolutely recommend you check them out!

Witherfist, by Jenny Graham-Jones

Murder at the Veteran’s Club, by Christopher Huang

A Beast Requires, by Jay Lockwood

Raven and Bone by Allison C. Waechter

Unfortunately, this computer doesn’t want to linkify anything. Luckily, Inkshares’ search engine is lickety-split.

Thank you so much!

May you live happily ever after!

Maggie

8th place! I’m absolutely chuffed with that, dear readers. 

To have placed in the top 10 of a contest full of wonderful stories and equally wonderful authors is a real honour. 

Though Witherfist didn’t place high enough to win the contest, the book’s funding campaign continues. The funding period for Witherfist ends on December 31st, so I will be doing everything I can until that date to ensure that the book reaches at least 250 preorders. I would love to hit the full publication threshold of 750 preorders, but to reach that level, I’d need a lot of help from all of you fantastic people who make Inkshares such an incredible, supportive community. 

I hope to have a book trailer video to share with you soon, but in the meanwhile - please continue to share Witherfist with anyone that you think might be interested in preordering. 

~ Jenny

PS. There’s one other contest I haven’t fogotten about! I’ve contacted the two winners of the Amazon voucher giveaway and am just waiting on confirmation of their details, to send out the vouchers.