Annotated 21-22
When I sat down to write this scene, I meant to find some chemistry between Fr’Nj and Byron, but I somehow ended up with her doing a soliloquy while Byron’s barely able to perform first aid. In fact, one of the captions seems to mock my own original plan: “Good thing I can’t hear all my sister’s varryn-bearer’s inane chitter-chatter! Being deaf is really helping me get some work done here.” (But nicer.)
I guess I was thinking that if Fr’Nj was going to be the one to save them, it was better to throw a big spotlight on her here, since Byron had gotten plenty of attention in this chapter already and she’d gotten very little. Now that I have three sisters-in-law, though, the original concept for the page is a lot more interesting to me.
Original draft of Fr’Nj’s appeal to Graiya and the trees was more detailed about why they should help, though the first rhyming line here alludes to that subject. I liked the notion of her having to bargain more with the powers that she’s pulling in here, but those first-draft narration boxes had less flow than molasses running uphill. Phil’s revisions gave it a kind of music, leading into the familiar beats on the next page.
In-law relationships are something I don’t think are explored enough in fiction, and I’m not sure why. My brother-in-law is someone I really, really value. His joining our family is something that I think improved all our lives. It’s one of the few times as an adult you just get new family members who are also adults, and you have to build that relationship without all the growing up shortcuts. You go from strangers (most of the time) to now being considered family, and sometimes that change can be really amazing in a way that you don’t find with other adult relationships. (Other times it’s a god damn nightmare, but that’s interesting too.)
MtG, with card art by Todd Lockwood. Ah, memories.
“Now that I have three sisters-in-law, though, the original concept for the page is a lot more interesting to me.”
So that train of thought went to a place….