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July 25, 2009
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It's been almost a year since this chapter was pretty much finished (August 3rd), same as Chapter 216, since I worked
on them almost simultaneously.
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According to my notes, I actually lost draft 3.00, and had to rewrite it. And it was one of the few cases where
I've had to rewrite something, and it turned out better than what I originally had. (By re-write, I don't mean
revise, where I see what I wrote before and can edit it. I mean write again from memory.)
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Marsh melon's were something that was there from the beginning in the 1st draft. I simply liked the how they
sounded. I came up with them when either eating or thinking about marshmellows.
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This chapter came out fairly easily, requiring just a few drafts. Obviously it's setting up the climax of the
volume, so that shouldn't be a surprise. One of the additions of my later drafts after I began writing again
was the part about how there are several groups of paladins, while all necromancers are from Umbra. I think that
makes that section work a lot better. It's a good thing I have my notes.
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There are obviously two big sections here to this chapter. Draven telling Melfina about Umbra, and Wayland demanding the
Tome. The transition between the two is kind of abrupt. But I don't know a better way to do something like that. In my
original outline for the Volume, the main purpose of this chapter is the "Return of Wayland". I didn't want to just start
with him right there, and get to the arguement right away, so the Draven stuff was added (and good thing. I think it adds
a lot to the chapter.) But in terms of the transition between the too... could it be better? If it can, I don't know
how to do it.
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It's a good thing I wrote 216 and 217 at the same time. In my notes, I wasn't sure where I wanted to put the letter to
Wayland, from Reba. Actually... in the middle of writing this, I'm not sure if it's not better to have placed this
document at the end of chapter 216 instead. It works chronologically to read the letter, and then builds up questions
about "What is Reba going to tell Wayland?" which get answered in the following chapter, as opposed to being a reveal to
Melfina's question in this chapter.
It still works this way, however, and it's important to get some sense of Stark's reaction to what Lord Luna said, in 216
for that chapter. That document would certainly have been out of place if it was put into this one.
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Now as for the connecting the break-in, to Wayland, through the information recovered by Lady Reba, that was an important
realization to make, that only came to me after I started writing to Volume. The break-in chapter was simply going to be
a chapter to illustrate what Stark is doing with the guards. But while writing that chapter, I discovered it could start the
whole chain of events that lead to this point. Without that, the Volume may very well have felt like it was lacking some
cohesion.
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And lastly, I renamed the Warden Supreme to Warden Primus. I was never happy with the "Supreme" part of the title,
and was in the shower while I was thinking about Transformers and their names. That gave me the inspiration for this.
This is the first time that I've ever renamed something that was already established. But I think it's worth it.
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Word Count: 1,503
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