*Congrats to-L Ann Ahlstrom- for winning May's monthly patron commission!*  The winner for June will be drawn the first week of July.

As an extra thank-you to the amazing and wonderful patrons who support my work, please enjoy a month-long feature!


<da:thumb id="486650406"/><da:thumb id="400808221"/><da:thumb id="340980141"/>








<da:thumb id="161638098"/><da:thumb id="58815097"/><da:thumb id="49269357"/>




















<da:thumb id="534721965"/><da:thumb id="487301232"/><da:thumb id="536501285"/>








Wars of Ascendance - Part 1
Chapter I
If there is any lesson that we might learn from that ancient race we now call Dar it is this: they were subject to the same virtues and vices, deserving of the same glory and blame, that we are today.
Excerpt from Phian's Account of Time
Gedorik coughed into his fist. It was more a ragged hack than a cough, and not for the first time the man wondered if this winter would be his last. He was not old, and years of rough living in the northern reaches had toughened him. Yet, for all that, this winter had proved exceptionally harsh and bitter, it's icy fingers continued to grip the land at a time when the snow and ice should have been melting and yielding to fairer weather. Fur trapping in this weather was dangerous, but Gedorik had needed the money: an unnaturally long winter meant buying extra provisions for his larder.
The trapper hawked and spat a wad of phlegm, it steamed in the frigid air and made a dark circle in the snow. Fortunes about to change, though. Thedor


A Theft and a GiftThe parson's child from down the way is standing shamefaced in the white dust of the dirt road, holding out the stolen clamps while his mother firmly grips the back of his shirt collar.
The weathersmith laughs to himself, hiding a telltale smile with a cough behind his large work-stained hand, stretching out the other to take back the miniature G-cramps from the child's small fingers. He separates them out judiciously, choosing the smallest and finest of all, the one he uses to tether faint summer zephyrs in the late afternoon when the sun is high and hot.
"Here you are," he says, setting it back in the boy's smooth palm. "A gift to a future smith."
It's a thing little known to any, save weathersmiths and their apprentices, that every talent is forged from a theft and a free gift. Surprise BirdsThe morning is cold
my car window frosted
in delicate patterns of ice
that half-asleep I scrape away
The sunlight is cold
the sun too far away
to do more than paint in gold
the edges of snow-white clouds
The ground is cold
the brown and yellow
of dead grass covered
in a thin dusting of pale frost
I have no love for the pale day
the bitter wind
that burns my cheeks with cold
demanding that I wake
when from the cold ground
in a flurry of black feathers
a flock of magpies rises
startling open my bleary eyes:
Surprise birds --
patterns of purest white
under black --
revealed only
in a wild flapping of wings
riding on the bitter wind
rising to meet the clouded sky
where the faraway sun
lights up the pattern
of their monochrome wings
and gilds their edges in the palest gold.

<da:thumb id="521205312"/><da:thumb id="528811846"/><da:thumb id="527020170"/>


<da:thumb id="318294482"/><da:thumb id="288012109"/><da:thumb id="356395460"/>





<da:thumb id="81198172"/><da:thumb id="209952922"/><da:thumb id="74162000"/>


<da:thumb id="255585802"/><da:thumb id="441709394"/><da:thumb id="523183516"/>


<da:thumb id="342136584"/><da:thumb id="355800392"/><da:thumb id="198764460"/>














<da:thumb id="350415171"/><da:thumb id="524781765"/><da:thumb id="453516870"/>


Statement of Faith: ArtWhen I write, I write the stories I want to read.
    Of course I want critiques and feedback and advice!  I want to be a better writer.  The better I write, the more I will enjoy rereading it.  The more others like it, the better I know I'm writing, and that called positive feedback; I'll know to keep doing what I'm doing.  If others like it, if others like it enough to buy it someday, cool!  I'm [eventually] publishing for myself and select friends, but if other people want copies and are willing to foot some costs, that means I can afford to print my friends' free copies instead of just giving them a file.  I like that.  The stories are more real when you can hold them in your hand.
    Of course I hope that more of my friends, as well as strangers, will like my stories.  These are my worlds, and the more people who are interested in them, the more people available to chat with me about my favorite subj





If I've missed anyone, (or chosen something you'd rather not be featured from your gallery), please let me know!

Thank you all for looking and for being awesome!
Meadowhaven Website - Tumblr - Patreon