#m.excerpt

[serpentarii]

A N G E L W I T H E Y E S C L O S E D ; tagline

❝Let me be the knife in your heart. Let us never be apart.❞

T A G L I S T

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[serpentarii]

M O R D L U S T ; preview

Aspiring businessman-turned-thief Aleksander Fox has stolen the enchanted cloak of the Swan Prince. When it falls into the hands of the assassin Vératre, both find themselves entangled in a much grander conspiracy.

T A G L I S T

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[serpentarii]

THEWRITEBLRGARDEN'S GARDEN WALK ; introduction

❝Hell is inside me and laughs from all my mirrors.❞

genres ; gothic fantasy, romance, horror comps ; amadeus meets my sweet audrina tropes ; the horror of having a body, consuming passion, obsession, codependency, & the poison drips through

Everyone knows that Blythe Lyndwoode is her mother's shame, her grandmother's shame, that she's cursed. Perhaps this is the reason she lives in a colorless world, pinned beneath her father's thumb. Until the day a new dance company arrives in town. And their prima ballerina looks just sweet enough to eat.

T A G L I S T

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[serpentarii]

M O R D L U S T ; september 9th, 2025

imagine me actually following through on what i say i'm going to do and making those character aesthetic intros (still cooking on the animal symbolism post soz).

transcript + more below the cut:

She poured water from the porcelain pitcher of a mismatching set: some cups painted with irises, some with filigree moulding, and a single clear glass the color of moss. It was this last glass she placed loudly atop the bedside table for Liese’s benefit. The gloves and choker came off first. And as she slipped out of her costume gown, draping it over the footboard of her own bed, Liese grumbled something incomprehensible.  “Pardon?”  “I said your ceiling is spinning.”  “The chamberpot is in the corner if you’re going to be sick.”  Liese shook her head, still staring up with glassy eyes. “I don’t think so.”  She had not yet lit the sconces. If she kept it that way, she wouldn’t have to hide her lips with more rouge. She crossed to the other half of the room and sat at the foot of the bed by Liese’s legs.  “What’s wrong?” she asked.  Shuffling over, as if to make room for her, Liese spoke.  “I do wonder… Why do you stay with me? Are you too kind or too stupid to care? Both, maybe?”  A flash of lightning cleaved through the darkness of the small room, illuminating Liese’s features, like the pale belly of a sturgeon, snatched from the sea into the bright light of the sun. She rubbed her eyes.  Shedding her damp slippers and stockings, she lay herself atop the covers beside Liese. 

with this entry, i just wanted to say that i can't believe it's been over four (and a half) whole actually wtf years since i started writing what would become mordlust. two title changes and three drafts ago...

like.......

those of you who've been following this wip for a while, or have at least seen me talk about it in past posts, know that the idea for mordlust was actually multiple ideas frankenstein-ed together.

the first was an uncompleted short story about three frenemies(??), one of which is slowly turning into a beehive, the second was a semi-completed short story about a group of boarding school boys who were The Worst, and the last was an animal bride retelling with a political twist. it was always a point i fixated on in animal bride fairy tales: did anyone go looking for them? who were they before? were they someone important? and the rest spun off from there.

i can definitely pinpoint character traits and relationships and worldbuilding details from reading these older pieces back, it's really neat, like authorial tree rings. seeing how far mordlust has come, even from it's initial draft that i tried to brute force my way through during nano 2021, i feel like i've definitely grown not only in my craft as a writer, but also as a storyteller.

i haven't properly participated in a word crawl in years at this point, and i'm not a super big fan of sprints, so i haven't had a time to specifically dedicate to getting more words on the page. a lot of it is in between the lines/behind the scenes tweaking to make everything as coherent as possible (which is difficult, since i have to backtrack through like 3 drafts + an outdated outline & somehow make sense of it all 😮‍💨).

for anyone who's made it this far, tysm for reading & ty to all my friends who've uplifted me and my silly little wip for the past four and a half years 🙏💖

1 to 5 tag ;

rules ; follow the prompts (change one if you like) and tell us a little something about your WIP ! answers to the prompts can be in the form of quotes or anything you’d like

one word to describe your WIP ;

moldy (it's been sitting out)

two characters talking in a short excerpt ;

three chapter titles ;

chapter iv - a heart of hellebore

chapter xix - hart's gambit

chapter xxvii - spare the sword, spoil the snare

four tropes featured ;

shapeshifting lover

mirror character

from nobody to nightmare

silk hiding steel

five songs from your WIP playlist ;

i actually don't have a playlist for mordlust, so i'll just list some of the songs i've previously said would best fit its world & characters

the golden compass - alexandre desplat

crows ambushed - joseph trapanese

in stori stif and stronge - daniel hart

bird cage blue and yellow - yaelokre

the attic - yutaka minobe

[serpentarii]

wip acrostic tag 1 & 2

tagged by ; @kaatiba mwah <33 soz it took me so long to get around to it 😔

rules ; share a sentence from your WIP that starts with each letter of the word you're given ! my words are treason & storm

t ;

There was nothing here worth keeping that he couldn’t fit in his pockets.

r ;

Receding, the room was left in a storm-bleach silence.

e ;

Eight sable mares drew forth a hearse of glass walls and velvet curtains, crowned with that allusive caterfoil and unseeing eye.

a ;

Aleksander had heard of a village boy drowning in the well once.

s ;

"Seems they let this place alone after the saint came through and killed one of their princes."

o ;

Or maybe he was just denying the inevitable: sold off to body snatchers, dissected, stripped for parts.

n ;

No one dared more than an abrading glance at his companion.

—

s ;

Straight through the center, a train would encounter the highlands and the moors and the very edge of the Uldavans as they breached past the Falkenrisch border, and further east lay the Wyldwald, which did not permit anything at all.

t ;

"Take that which I have given you to the consecrated halls of Herutis and scatter its ashes upon its threshold."

o ;

One meant to be worn beyond the bounds of the ever-changing marches of Cendrier.

r ;

Rosmarin and Natascha hadn’t stirred at all.

m ;

Misfortune clung to him like pollen.

tagging ; @thewritersplace, @veneritia, @thousand-page-dreams, @ladywithalamp, & @bebewrites ! your words (feel free to choose which) are candle & sword

[serpentarii]

out of context tag

tagged by ; @kaatiba tysm for the tag <33

rules ; share a snippet out of context !

In the thirteen years she had known her, only twice had she ever been let inside the Amarante’s townhouse. Not one thing had changed: not the bearskin rug in the foyer, not the antler chandeliers lighting every hall, not the wall of prey fowl suspended in time, wings casting long shadows across the formal parlor.

tagging ; @thewritersplace, @ryns-ramblings, @inky-duchess, @tragicheirs, & @koala2all

[serpentarii]

M O R D L U S T ; isme de lède aesthetic

❝If the shade of her son’s cloak was anything to heed, the Immaculé of Cendrier had taken after his sire in all his good looks. But as he regarded them, eyes dark as ink, Vératre saw through the charm. All the way down to a creature so ancient its body was only remembering the shape it had once taken as a man, his skin barely holding it inside.❞

[serpentarii]

M O R D L U S T ; vératre aesthetic

❝Normally, she’d brew herself a cup of red tea to help ease the way into a dreamless slumber. Tonight, sleep made off with her like a clandestine paramour, and she dreamt of fire and feathers and love poems. 

In the morning, she woke sore. Four slats of pith-yellow sunlight poured in through her window, illuminating a plot of begonia wallpaper. She looked to her dresser, where stowed underneath were her walking boots, clotted with grave dirt.❞