Intro to the Dark Maiden Route + Excerpt

In my last post I mentioned the new Dark Maiden Route. I've gotten a lot of questions about it and figured I'd just wait and answer them all in a dedicated post.

First off, I want to thank the readers who reached out to me about the color schemes and accessibility issues. I've updated both light and dark mode's colors and added a glow & pulse effect to the cycle options so they'll pop out at you and you won't overlook them. These are desktop screenshots, I posted mobile ones on Tumblr a few hours ago. If you’re reading this on your phone like a normal person this will look very tiny.

It looks a little wonky as a still image but I think once you see it in game it'll be nice. If it's not ideal, we'll make more adjustments this weekend after players have gotten to check it out. Notice at the top left is the name of the story route. Each route will have it's name there so there's never any confusion about which storyline you're playing!

The Dark Maiden

The Dark Maiden Route (DMR, henceforth) is a unique storyline for readers who want a darker romance. It contains all the same content warnings as the regular storyline, except that you can assume that some of the triggers will fall on the more intense end of the spectrum. There will be a list of broad triggers at the start. If you click on them, they'll give you more details but also some (very light) spoilers. My primary concern is that everyone who goes into it recognizes that it's a more sexual storyline where the MC will have a lot less agency than in the main story.

Here are some core differences:

✧ Explicit sexual content begins on what we'd formerly call Night III.

✧ Serax and Valdricht won't speak your MC's language.

✧ They will be more possessive and less gentle.

✧ The MC will have few choices.

✧ Much more sexual content.

✧ MMF only.

The biggest difference is the language barrier. DMR is set in an alternate version of Elovyr. Serax and Valdricht will not speak the MC's language at all. It'll actually be a pretty fun mode for the fantasy language lovers, assuming you don't mind all of the other stuff. As part of preparation for this update and this storyline in particular I made major updates to Wyransith so that it remains consistent in grammar and vocab. I have over 2,000 words including number, temporals, pronouns, articles, interrogatives, demonstratives, spatials, conjunctions, etc etc, you get it. As an extra cool feature of DMR, your MC will already know a tiny bit of Wyransith for reasons you'll learn as her backstory unfolds.

The backstories for all routes will be (mostly) the same and also quite similar to the previous backstories. They will unfold across the first few nights in a series of dreams, with your MC slowly piecing together her past and her identity. This change serves three purposes:

• No long prologue to slough through before you get to the guys. That was just crappy writing on my part and I applaud you all for getting through 20 passages of The Weaver and priestess angst before getting to the actual start of the story.
• The MC can be more present. By starting her in a state where she doesn't know her past, she can focus on what's right in front of her, rather than obsess over what's behind her. By the time her past catches up with her, she'll be able to contrast it with the present in a manner that is more of an emotional punch. Maybe not for you guys because you already know her backstory, but I think for new readers it'll be a lot more meaningful.
• The MC will be more at ease. When she starts initially detached from her past, she'll still experience a vague unease around the guys, but without immediately framing that as 'I'm a Vestal of Dawn and I should stay away from men' she'll be more inclined to relax around Serax & Valdricht, at least initially. It'll also present an interesting conflict when she finally does remember her past.

You'll see this structure in action in the excerpt below. The wakeup -> sithrak scene plays out the same for all players. It's once you're found by Serax and Valdricht that your story will diverge based on your route selection. Here are the first few passages of the Dark Maiden Route. I've removed the choices for the sake of a seamless narrative, but you'll have a few different options for how your opener unfolds. There's nothing objectionable here, no worries.

Excerpt:

You dream of fire and wake to frost.

So vivid is your nightmare that you don’t immediately panic as your eyes crack open to gaze up at the stormy sky. It isn’t rain that falls, but snow. You roll onto your side, wheezing. The air in your lungs is so cold that it burns.

Your hand goes to your throat, as if to assuage the pain of breathing. Tears form in the corners of your eyes, freezing before they can slip free.

“Mother,” you hear yourself rasp.

The word comes unbidden, little more than an incoherent moan and hindered by your frigid tongue.

You sit up, a heavy, snow-caked pelt sliding down your shoulders. You’re quick to pull it back over your torso. The inside is supple and serves as a small haven of warmth against the bitter cold.

You look around, seeking something familiar. The darkness of night is combated only by the muted moonlight filtering through thick clouds overhead.

You’re in some sort of structure. Dilapidated wooden walls serve as a frame against the harsh winds. The ceiling that should be above you has collapsed, broken beams slumped on the far side of the room, their surfaces covered in frost and snow. To your left is the remnant of a stone chimney; to your right, a doorway. Through it, you see only snow.

You take a shallow breath and resist the urge to cry out. Panic won’t serve you.

Instead, you scan the space around you. The ruined beams. The doorway. The chimney. A few scraps of torn cloth near your feet. A jagged piece of wood that might once have belonged to furniture.

None of it stirs a memory. You take note of what looks like a cauldron near the remains of the fireplace. It's half-buried in the snow. Whatever happened to this place, it happened a long time ago.

Who am I?

Such a frightful question to ask. Your fear is only compounded when you realize you don't have an answer.

A name. I must have a name.

You find yourself holding out your hand and turning it over. Your skin is a curious, misty blue tone, but what holds your attention is your nails. They're long and dark, with pointed tips.

Not human.

You don't know what to do with that information, so you shelve it away for later.

If there is a later.

The whole setting has the feel of a dream. The abandoned structure, the endless snow in every direction, and the cold. Gods, but the cold. Even as the details of your past elude you, you're certain you've never known such an awful, bone-deep cold.

"Modohar," you say without thinking. With the word comes memory.

Modohar. The underworld. The final destination of the wicked and the unrepentant.

Could that be what this is?

Before you can give it proper consideration, your thoughts are flung off course by a sudden, stabbing pain in your middle. As you double over, your hands fumble about, seeking some sort of wound, but finding only smooth, unblemished skin.

You fall to your knees and press your hands to the floor, eyes shut tight as the pain claws its way through you.

When it passes, you lift your head and whisper to no one—or to whoever might be listening.

"Please," you murmur. "Just tell me what I did. Tell me what I did wrong."

Your voice echoes oddly.

"Tell me what I did..."

The echo sounds as if it's coming from behind the walls. You hold your breath.

"Tell me what I did wrong..."

This feels wrong.

You rise and bolt from the hovel, running into the wind without thinking. Outside is a sea of snow, turned blue beneath the iron sky. The cold is a beast without mercy. It scrapes across your face, bites at your joints, and works its way beneath the pelt, as if trying to burrow into your bones.

The snow glitters and cuts like diamonds. The wind drives it sideways, scouring your skin and choking your breath. Each inhalation is like sucking in shards of glass.

Too soon, your legs grow heavy. Your steps begin to falter. You don't realize you're climbing until the ground gives way beneath you and you slip, falling hard.

Your leg twists beneath you at an unnatural angle. Pain flashes white-hot, blotting out everything. You curl inward, eyes shut, your breath coming in short, ragged bursts.

You think the worst has passed.

Then you open your eyes.

Something moves in the snow. Slow and Deliberate. Lumbering.

It draws closer.

Its body is black and slick like cured leather. Its arms are long and curved like scythes, ending in blunt, stunted tips. Its neck flows into its head without break, a seamless curve with no distinguishable face.

In the way that you can only be in nightmares, you're paralyzed as you stare into what must be the embodiment of Death itself.

You brace your palms against the snow and try to rise, but a sharp bolt of pain shoots through your leg. Your body jerks, collapsing instantly under its own weight. The limb is useless. You won't be able to run.

Swallowing your panic, you force yourself to go still. Movement will only draw attention.

As the monster draws near, you say a selfish prayer to a god whose name eludes you.

Please, don't let it see me.

You gape as what seems to be the creature's mouth begins to open, expanding from a small slit to a wide, yawning cavern. There's just enough moonlight to make its many rows of jagged teeth gleam.

"Great gods," you croak.

You'd assumed it was staring at you, but as you speak, its head jerks, reorienting so that it's pointed directly at you. Its mouth works, opening and closing as a lump in what appears to be its throat begins to quiver.

"Grrrr..." it says in a high-pitched warble. The second attempt is far clearer. "Grrrr...reat gods."

It's mimicking your voice.

"Great gods," it says again, this time matching your tremulous croak.

You attempt to comfort yourself, assuring yourself that if you just keep quiet, it might not be able to see you. It has no eyes that you can discern, and you doubt it can smell anything in the storm. The notion brings little comfort. Already, your limbs are numb, and even your heart seems to be struggling to keep warmth in your chest. Despite the magnitude of your terror, your pulse has slowed to an irregular thud.

Without warning, the creature surges forward, clearing the distance between you in the time it takes to inhale the breath to scream. In the same instant, another pain lances your middle, this one more vicious than the last. Your vision turns white.

In your disorientation, you imagine the creature's mouth has taken hold of your abdomen, its myriad teeth digging into your belly as if you were nothing but a beast yourself—an errant fawn who strayed from the herd and ended up in the jaws of a wolf.

For an indeterminate amount of time, all you know is agony. But then, it begins to ebb. When your vision clears, you see the creature. It lays in the snow, less than a span from your feet. Dark fluid oozes from its head, blackening the snow. Sticking out of its head are two long arrows with gray feathers.

For several seconds you stare at them, frozen by what you assume to be shock. Yet as a new shadow appears within your vantage, you realize you're capable of only the barest movements. Your legs no longer obey your will. Even the pain in the twisted one has gone utterly numb. The mere acts of blinking and breathing become daunting endeavors.

The figure coalesces into a giant of a man, all in black from his high boots to his sweeping fur cloak. Even his face is concealed, wrapped in some sort of dark linen, save for a single strip of exposed skin around his eyes. Those eyes burn through the storm, a radiant blue like moonlight through frosted glass.

Despite his unnatural size, he moves with preternatural grace, as if the storm and the snowdrifts were no hindrance to him.

You try to move. Even though he seems to be staring straight at you, you're terrified of falling beneath his notice and disappearing into the clutches of winter.

Your body now refuses even to blink. You manage a low sound, somewhere between a cry and a groan. The last of your air goes with it, and as you try drawing in another breath, the air simply hangs in your mouth.

A thought unfolds in your mind.

The monster wasn't Death.

This man is.

As your lungs begin to burn for want of air, you decide that you're relieved. If he can make the pain stop, then you'll accept whatever comes next.

He draws a sword from a sheath at his belt as he nears you. With a swift, graceful flourish, he severs the head of the fallen creature. The sword turns, and in another fluid sweep, he wipes it on the leg of his pants, resheathing it just as he's moving to kneel in front of you.

“Veth thy sevin llavesh, lynira?”

Strange words flow from behind his mask. His voice is at once deep and achingly melodic. You perceive the tilt of a question, but even if you understood him, you couldn't respond. Flecks of darkness are already appearing in the corners of your vision. They multiply rapidly.

The faintest of creases mars the space between his lovely eyes. He reaches up with a gloved hand and pulls down his mask, revealing a face that could only be divine. His features are striking—clean angles and brutal symmetry. Fine wisps of black hair cling to his temples, framing a marble face with high cheekbones and a broad jaw that slopes into a cleft chin.

Sensual lips part, but he says nothing. He seizes your chin, his grip as rough as you'd expect from such a large man, yet still startling enough to wrench a clipped grunt from you. Then, he descends, his mouth closing over yours.

Warm breath fills your mouth. At the same time that he breathes into you, his arms go around your body, pulling you close. Whether it's his breath, the way his strong hands rub life into your back, or the heat you're able to glean as you're pressed against him, you manage to take in air.

The man draws back, his lips leaving yours. You're given space to draw in shuddering breath. The air you take in is rich with his scent. You exhale in a moan, your head lolling to the side as you gasp for air.

Your savior wastes no time in pulling you the rest of the way out of the snow. Once in his lap, he wraps his heavy cloak around you and rises, lifting you up. As your head goes to rest against his chest, you experience the first stirrings of hope.

The man handles you with such familiarity that he must know you. And something about him feels right. Maybe it's just relief at having been rescued, or your trembling from the cold, but it feels as if your bones are vibrating as he holds you to his body.

He surveys the area with a frown as snow gathers on his dark garments. His lips hardly move as he says, “Eri’th talven gath’vir. Nei veyn venirith.”

You attempt to ask him what he's saying, but you can't get words past your chattering teeth. Before you can puzzle over what he said, there's another voice. It speaks loudly to rise above the wind.

“Zhevrin veth eri veiryn sair?”

Without responding, the man begins to walk. Or perhaps he's gliding. You're scarcely tousled as he moves in long strides.

Once more, you have the sense that you're in a dream, although this one is far more agreeable. Who the man is, or the other one whose voice you heard—neither detail matters. All you care about is that the monster is gone and you're enveloped in warmth. You close your eyes, the last of the tension leaving you.

The peace doesn't last.

The pain in your abdomen returns. Just as before, it's a stabbing agony that wrests the breath from you and makes your body clench up. This time, it claws farther than before, scraping at the inside of your torso. In the delirium that follows, you imagine another monster, this one caged behind your ribs and clawing to break free.

You have no way of measuring how long it lasts. When your vision finally clears, you see the man biting the finger of his glove. He pulls his hand free and then reaches into the bundle of furs in which you've been cocooned.

His hand brushes over your abdomen, seeking the wound that's causing you such terrible distress. You try to tell him that whatever it is, it's inside you, but speech is still impossible.

The man withdraws his hand and then bizarrely brings it back to his mouth, biting down on the flesh between his wrist and thumb. You try to turn away as he brings his hand down to your face, but he outmaneuvers you and presses the wound to your lips.

“Rotyth velin’vir."

The words seem to snake into your mind, expanding in your head until they're pressing against your skull. Without thought, your mouth opens wide, granting space for him to push his bloodied flesh into you. For a fraction of a second, you're disgusted. Then, the first trickle of his blood slides onto your tongue.

One taste is all it takes for you to latch onto him. Your tongue turns frenzied, seeking the puncture wounds. You lick and suck at them, desperately drawing out his blood.

His blood is warmth spilling from a divine hearth. It swells within you, growing to fill you up. Heat rushes through your body, reviving the parts of you that had gone numb. The knot of pain in your abdomen unfurls, the beast within now pacified.

Before, you were in the underworld, but this is paradise. This man—this god—must have heard your prayer and come to save you. You want badly to thank him, but all you can do is continue to drink.

For a while, his blood flows into you in a thick, steady stream. But as time passes, the flow begins to slow. Before long, you swipe your tongue over the punctures, only to find that they're gone. His skin is smooth and unbroken.

You open eyes you hadn't realized you'd closed. A rumbling sound of protest moves through you as the man withdraws his hand. You've regained enough control of yourself to issue a plea.

"More."

He stares down at you, blue eyes shining. Behind him, the dark clouds roll by in a blur. The wind has picked up, and you wonder if he was able to hear you over the gale.

"Need more," you tell him.

“Veth thy zairyn?” he asks in response.

You don't understand, but you let the words repeat in your mind and seek meaning in them. He speaks as if you should know what he's saying, and something about his language doesn't feel wholly foreign.

As you try to make sense of his words, he brushes his thumb against the corner of your mouth. He then wipes it against your lips, and your gut tightens as your tongue darts out to lap up the stray drop of blood.

In some ways, it's worse than having nothing at all. With your eyes, you try to convey the depths of your need, but when he withdraws his hand, it's to pull his mask back up over the lower half of his face.

"Zven, lynira," you hear him say.

Something about his tone and the way he glances away from you tells you that there will be no more. The knowledge provokes desperation. You do your best to contain it, assuring yourself that somehow, some way, you'll taste him again.

Such a profane desire, says a voice in the back of your mind. Like so much else since waking, you don't know what to make of it, and you're soon distracted as another face appears in your field of vision.

It's another man, this one similarly garbed in heavy furs. His face is wrapped in cloth the color of parchment, which contrasts with the bronze skin around his blue-green eyes. Those eyes are glaring at you.

✧ Recoil.
✧ Glare back.

Thoughts:

Not much, I already said a lot up there. I’ll be making a similar post about the Fated Mates Route (FMR) mañana and going over the changes we’ll have there. So far it’s been a huge boost to my daily writing since starting full time and I’m really optimistic about how quickly the new update will roll out.

-Mortish