Causal tree of all the currently planned books in the treegrave universe, in case readers want to keep track. Names for unwritten books are tentative and may change.
This is not strictly speaking a timeline because the vast distances and time dilation effects of fast travel make it incredibly difficult to be certain what is and isn't happening simultaneously -- you could make arguments for Wandering Star, for example, taking place well before, well after, or at the same time as TTOU. But anything higher on the tree happens in the past of anything on its branches. Outclanner, for example, takes place after TVB and TTOU; they're part of its history. But it's much harder to say whether it takes place after The Vein of Talos or not.
@derinthescarletpescatarian Max has suddenly and the-opposite-of-precipitiously shot into the upper reaches of my favorite character list with this scene thanks
It's time to vote on what the next derinwrites web serial will be. Sample chapters for each option will be provided shortly, then a poll will go up so that patrons can vote on what web serial I should write next.
Inner Life
Nobody knows who they really are when they’re first born. But most people get time to figure it out, and when you’re a body-snatching alien parasite, you don’t get that luxury. The parasites that find themselves on the starship Jolly Codger don’t know what a human is, or what their spaceship’s mission is, or where they’re going. They don’t know who on the ship is an ally, and who is an uninfected human who’ll kill them the moment they’re detected. But they’d better figure it out, because the Jolly Codger has its own secrets and its own enemies, and the real threat isn’t the crew – it’s what’s chasing them.
Child of a Wandering Star
Tyk is a normal adolescent girl, interested in normal adolescent things – earning gems for her carapace, learning to be the best burrower for the hive, making her mother and father and altmother and altfather proud of her. But Tyk was born under a Wandering Star, destined to be a traveller, and it’s hard to really feel a part of a hive that raises you with the expectation of watching you leave them someday. Tyk doesn’t want to go. She’s ready to fight destiny.
But her destiny finds her when a star-egg falls from the sky and hatches a baby god. Soft-shelled, two-legged and clawless, this larva is all but helpless on its own and quickly attaches itself to Tyk. The Stargazers divine that it should be brought to Starspire, the place where earth meets sky, so that it can be returned to its people. This, here, is the destiny that Tyk was born to.
But Tyk’s not sure she’s cut out for such a gruelling journey, and she’s certainly not cut out for raising a baby god. Is this really her journey to make?
Silverbane
Jade was just looking to fulfil her jobseeker requirements and get her Centrelink payment. She didn’t expect to actually get the job working at the mysterious new pawn shop full of weird, creepy artefacts. She had no interest in dealing with bleeding knives, ghost dolls, and whatever the hell it is that keeps using all the mugs in the break room without washing them, even when nobody’s present in the shop but her.
Jade would like to be able to shrug and say that it’s none of her business. She really, really wishes that she was the kind of person who could leave things alone if they weren’t her business. But after snooping a little too deep a little too often, she finds herself tangled up in something a lot scarier than the occasional haunted doll, working for the kind of… “people”… who are perfectly happy to eliminate something the moment it becomes more dangerous to them than useful. And through them, she can learn more about how the world really works than she ever expected.
She just has to hope that it’s worth it.
Our Side of the River Styx
A woman who can see the dead joins forces with her zombie wife to become exorcists-for-hire, helping the dead and living alike find peace. But there’s something strange going on with the barrier between worlds; something stranger than murderous phantoms in white or menacing shadowy figures in hotels. Something… organised. Something growing.
The exorcists are out to pay the rent, not save the world. But when a string of supposedly unconnected jobs forms such an obvious trail of bread crumbs, what is there to do but follow it? Will our Styx-crossed lovers figure out what’s at the heart of this conspiracy in time to thwart it, or does this adventure end in a long-overdue funeral?
The Princess of Ruby Island
Every little girl dreams of being whisked away to be the princess of a magical world on their tenth birthday. But for Jessica Nyle, born on February 29th, finding herself in a strange magical realm on her tenth birthday at age 40 is surprising, to say the least. And what they don’t tell little girls about fantastical magical realms built from dreams is that they’re prone to environmental instability, which can cause mass famine. And that magical limitations can cause factionalisation and extreme power imbalances, which leads to oppression and war. And that the idea of an island made entirely of ruby sounds fantastic, but ruby loses its charm and value as a gemstone when it’s literally the ground you walk on and, as a probably unimportant side detail, one thing you can’t do with ruby is grow crops in it. So that’s less than ideal.
This isn’t the whimsical adventure that mass media had lead Jessica to expect as a child, where all you needed to do to save the world was be brave and true and hold love in your heart and believe in yourself despite everything. Being the Princess of Ruby Island is a dirty job that requires cunning, hard work, political acumen, and a whole lot of luck. And it certainly doesn’t help that forces festering on Ruby Island were quite comfortable filling the previous power vacuum and would very much prefer it if there was no Princess bustling about and messing up their plans.
This is gonna take the power of a LOT of friendships to sort out.
The Cinder Boy
Owen is a wizard’s servant, and has been since he was old enough to walk. He doesn’t remember the mother who abandoned him there or the world she came from, and has never really thought much on the issue. Until the day the old crone comes to the wizard’s tower and, defying the wizard who tries to throw her out (Owen had never, until that moment, see anybody successfully defy the wizard), tells him that his mother was one of the Cinderellae, the hidden organisation of destiny-weavers named for the punishment doled out to them if they are caught – to be burned alive on the town pyre. Other people, she tells him, will try to get their hooks in him, and this tower can no longer keep him safe.
With the help of three friendly breezes trapped in the bodies of helpful mice and a shard of mage glass for protection, Owen must journey into the dangerous world that the wizard’s tower has sheltered him from his whole life. He’s watched the wizard weave people’s destinies for years, but until now, he’s never had to weave his own.
He’d better figure it out fast. Because danger is brewing in the kingdom, and he seems to be somebody’s pawn. He just wishes he knew whose.
Drops of Blood Like Neon Stars
This one is already being written on and off in my free time. Promoting it to main story would allow me to spend my full time on it and ensure weekly updates.
Vampires are good at stability. Life in the Scarlet City has been stable, despite the competing blood factions, for a long time, as has been their mutually beneficial relationship with the human city above. But when a drastic political play by young vampires coincides with a mysterious slate of human murders, Lissa needs to find out what’s going on and put a stop to it before the City is plunged into all-out war.
Holy Light
It’s been 164 years since the Rapture, and 157 years since the end of the world, but humanity’s still doing what humanity does best: holding on. Ageless and resistant to damage and disease, the people who had the luck and quick thinking to hide themselves from God’s purifying light as it uplifted every soul it touched a century and a half ago live on in the dark, doing their best to keep going forward in a world trying to end. But with no new souls coming into Earth, no children have been born since the end. And all it takes to be abducted to heaven is one mistake, one small kiss of sunlight. Eventually, humanity is going to lose this fight.
But Claire thinks she might have found an answer. A way to bring new children into the world once more, a way to return to the flow of normal time. And if it works, then just maybe, they can save the world.
I Am Not The Chosen One
Hannah is having mysterious dreams of a gate on a hill. Jake is getting urgent messages from a strange man in the mirror. Victoria might have accidentally summoned a demon, and Blaire is the luckiest unlucky seventeen year old in the world and has almost died three times this week alone, which is great for his tiktok career but less so for his long-term survival. But the thing that’s really interfering with all of their lives is the shadowy organisation of strangers who keep trying to abduct them.
They’re looking for the Chosen One. The Chosen One, firstborn child of the lost princess of Vanalia, needs to go with them through a portal to a magical land to save everyone there from a tyrannical dark lord, but anyone other than the Chosen One would almost certainly die. Hannah, Jake, Victoria and Blaire are pretty sure that none of them are the Chosen One, but the strangers seem dead set on trying anyway. The only way out seems to be to find this lost princess or her firstborn child for these strangers, and send them off on a magical coming-of-age adventure. But how does one even go about tracking down a Chosen One?
Denise Frank’s Feelgood Recipe Blog
Join me, Denise Frank, on my blog, where every week I share one of my favourite recipes! Every recipe blog needs long, rambling personal stories before getting to the recipe, and mine is no exception. I’ve had a lot of time to cook and not many people to talk to since The Event, so you can expect a high quality blog from me, full of recipes that have been tried hundreds if not thousands of times! Thousands of times over thousands of days. Thousands and thousands of days. I’d have thought I’d be noticeably older by now, but I’m not. I guess that’s what good food and a positive attitude can do for you!
Come and visit my blog for delicious recipes and happy memories, and positive affirmations to help you make it through the day! After all, we gotta get through today to see tomorrow, and there’s gotta be something worth seeing tomorrow! Experience suggests that it probably won’t be something pleasant, but it’ll definitely be something worth seeing! This has to end eventually. Join me to learn to make delicious apple crumble, a microwave brownie for every day of the week, and a beef jerky recipe that my husband used to love! Can’t wait to see you there!
Every month I have to talk into a microphone about my story for like ten minutes and every month I get super nervous about it and put it off and every month I finally push myself to do it and it's just like ten minutes it's fine
That’s right guys, it’s the finale! What happened to all those Kates? Let’s find out!
The next short story patreon goal is about dragons! Space dragons! Robot space dragons! It’s a... political mystery, I suppose?, and a scifi fantasy that is titled The Dragon Tamer until I think of a cooler name for it. We start it at US$210/month and I am so excited!
