Preludes

I have had an AO3 account for more than a year. Almost eighteen months, to be exact. In the mad rush to publish Coils of the Serpent everywhere I could manage, I signed up — only to discover that AO3 frowns upon original works, preferring to remain a site reserved for fan fiction.

It has been a long time since I wrote any fan fiction. I wrote some back around 2013. It was a piece about my Elf Mage Warden from Dragon Age: Origins. From memory, it detailed the events following the end of the game. Unfortunately, I think I’ve lost it. At best, it’s located a computer some several thousand kilometres from my present home.

However, that was not my first foray into fanfic. Back in the nineties (yes, that long ago), I wrote a lot of fanfiction. My friends, family and I used to play a role-playing game based on Roger Zelazny’s Chronicles of Amber: The Amber Diceless Roleplaying Game (Amber DRPG for short). Keeping a journal of our adventures was highly encouraged by the game developers. They even published six editions of the Amberzine, featuring fanfiction stories set in Zelazny’s world.

Why are you mentioning this, you stupid old goat? You might be inclined to ask.

Well, dear reader, I now have a use for my AO3 account. I have published a short story called Preludes. It’s about a Prince of Amber who is pursued by a devilish mist and must convince a knight to help him so they can both escape.

I fell into old habits. It stars one of my old Amber DRPG PCs as well as a character from my own writing. I thought it would be fun to see these two meet, and it the result turned out quite well. Even if I do say so myself.

Please enjoy, Preludes.