Part three in the Dungeons and Dragons themed stories. A true ‘short’ that developed over a weekend. I have wanted to do a piece on this particular subject for a long time, and the current band of adventurers from the Dryad’s Dream was already set up with enough backstory to flesh out the world for me. I love fantasy realms for this reason. Pretty much anything goes, though it is also really easy to get lost down the Tolkien rabbit-hole and start developing politics and language and 2000 years of freaking cultural history… I like realism as much as the next gal, but sometimes you just have to give your ‘willing suspension of disbelief’ a break and roll with it, you know? There’s also ART!

I actually started this short about a year ago, inspired by some rather delightful art by ‘suddenattackfhm’ (on DeviantArt), but like so many of my works, it ended up in my “backburner” folder and was forgotten. I tried to pick it up again more than once, but, as is often the case, I am easily distracted. Anyway, there was a more recent note from ‘sporgasbored’ on the Gwyllion discussion group, requesting more “colony” stories, and I finally decided I had enough incentive to finish the damn thing. It’s not quite as strong on backstory as I would like (which is one of the reasons I kept putting it down), but I think it works well enough for a ‘quickie’. As a side note, if you’re unfamiliar with the mating process of actual shell-less gastropod mollusks (slugs), then pick a cozy sofa and curl up next to an intimate partner (or someone with whom you might want to be), click on over to Google images to do a search for “mating slugs,” and be amazed. You just can’t make this stuff up, folks. Science is kinky as hell.

This is the sequel to Dungeon, taking place almost directly after Wendel, Taya, and the elven sisters Peleial and Lawen return to the Vale with the Wizard. I originally intended it to be a simple postscript to the original story, but in classic Marjorie style, it’s not only longer than the original, but halfway to a full length novel (a solid novella!). I really do need to work on abbreviating my “shorts”. TEN freaking chapters… OY!

In any case, this story deals with more touchy-feely topics, and while it still has a healthy dose of fan service, it’s definitely a more plot and dialog driven piece than the original. I also wanted to keep the Dungeons & Dragons theme going that made the first one fun. You should see a few new references, for those readers that partake (or used to, like me). [X] [Tentacle]

This story was written in honor of my days playing Dungeons & Dragons as a teen. As a geek girl, D&D was pretty much a prerequisite, and being that I was almost always the only female in our group, I usually got a lot of attention (whether I wanted it or not). That wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it meant that my characters were never quite treated the same way as my male teammates. I had watched the all-male groups play, and I knew what happened when a DM let things go R (or X!) rated. At the time, there was simply no way that a group of guys was going to talk about ‘raping villagers’ or creatures with ‘sinister intention’ with an attractive female sitting there at the table with them. Not going to happen. But even then, *I* was certainly thinking about it. A lot. In fact, several illustrations out of the original Monster Manual were my first exposure to tentacled denizens. It wasn’t a stretch to imagine those same creatures choosing to do a little ‘raping and pillaging’ on their own. This story contains a number of those themes, expanded and updated, as well as a many of my own influences, recent and past. I originally intended to have Taya be the main character, but somehow it just felt more appropriate to have a male take the lead, if only for the irony. It was written very quickly (like two days), and is pretty heavy on the sexy stuff, but I thoroughly enjoyed putting it together. It was a whimsical break from the more serious works I have been slogging through lately. [X] [Tentacle] 

Chapter 12 added. There have been a lot of what I would call, “off genre” chapters to this story. Don’t worry. There’s some sexy stuff coming. I have also been distracted this week by another short, so hopefully that will drop sometime soon as well.

Chapter 11 added. Just a quick update.

Chapter 10 added. I am currently up to chapter 15 locally, so there will be more posts in the near future. I also have some art for this series, which will go up at the appropriate time. Not really sexy stuff (yet), but more for fun and character development. I realize this tale is pretty far off from my normal fare, but occasionally doing something out of character is a good thing.