Roman and Druid lock eyes in battle, setting off a turbulent flirtation marked by death, vengeance, and the theft of a beloved horse.
The Lion & The Owl is a semi-erotic web series for fans of ancient gay love stories. It is about the attraction that develops between two bitter enemies who share a sexual fighting kink: a Roman elite and a deadly Druid.
Lucius ‘Skipio’ Servius takes part in the tumultuous Gallic Wars as one of Caesar’s trusted Legio X Equestris. His battlefield courage is matched only by his chivalry toward women, a facade that conceals a darker, more complex nature… A man-lover since his youth, Skipio grapples with violent desires and longs for a companion who can accept him without judgment.
Across the channel, cunning druid Aedan the Ancalite takes on his dead father’s mantle as a diviner and warrior. Unlike his people, he eagerly anticipates the arrival of Rome after a drug-induced vision heralds a fierce lover in the shape of a lion... When no man proves brutal enough to fight Aedan for his affections, the frustrated ‘Owl King’ wreaks bloody havoc upon Caesar’s invading legions.
The Lion & The Owl is syndicated on the following platforms: AO3.Gay, Honeyfeed.FM, Tapas, and Pixiv Novels
Dark Comedy | Historical | m|m | BL? | Ancient Rome | Celtic Britain | Enemies to Lovers
The Lion & The Owl is going on a winter hiatus until December.
Even though my illustrated edition print-run Kickstarter failed, I will still release the Invasion Arc as an ePub - this means finishing revisions ordered by my awesome editor, August Garry.
I'll be back in mid-December with a new arc in which Skipio and Aedan spend their first winter apart. Saturnalia is going to be filled with intrigue, a major secret reveal, yearning out the wazoo, and new bad guy I'm sure you're all going to hate - but there's a couple of new characters too, so it isn't all bad.
I’m not going to lie, this is demoralizing. In the past, when I was professionally published, I often went after opportunities like a dog chasing cars. This feels oddly reminiscent of that, and it isn’t a good feeling.
Now, I’m choosing to step back from that and focus on writing for myself, without seeking external validation. I want to get back to simply creating art.
I want to acknowledge this loss by expressing gratitude to everyone who pledged. Your support gave me hope that this series is worth fighting for. Although it’s not ready for print now, I genuinely appreciate your encouragement.
I’ve decided to keep the $1,000 gifted during this campaign and save it until the series is complete. Once finished, I plan to seek publication with illustrations. For now, I will release the first novella in January, but without illustrations.
Thank you again to everyone who pledged, helped spread the word, or gave me their time. Your support means more to me than you know. I’m also grateful to those who sent emotional support messages on Kickstarter and elsewhere.
Don't use adverbs. Said is dead. Always show, never tell. Avoid cliches. Never use the word 'very.' Don't use alliteration. Don't use boring descriptors. Use unique words.
For fuck's sake, what can I use? Seriously y'all, I don't know about you, but all the advice on how to write does Jack shit for me other than make it really fucking impossible to tell a story.
First, I would like to thank everyone who has pledged. I truly hope this campaign funds, but I want to update everyone on where things stand at this moment: the editorial is in its final week, and artwork has begun, thanks to a generous $ 1,000 gift that will be available to me outside of KS should this campaign fail.
What does that mean?
There will definitely be an illustrated eBook. As for a print edition, it relies solely on the success of this campaign. With art starting and edits in their final round, everything remains on track for December/January fulfillment.
Once again, thank you to everyone who has pledged so far - you’ve made this queer old hag very happy.
—Tina
First, I would like to thank everyone who has pledged. I truly hope this campaign funds, but I want to update everyone on where things stand
Got an ugly-gram at Kickstarter accusing me of 1 -being straight (LOL) and 2 – monetizing the objectification of gay male relationships. (they used the word fetishize–I really wish anti-fujo (??) types would stop misusing that word).
Not discussing what’s in my pants, but as a writer and eroticist, I objectify all genders. My work is online, free, not for sale – I simply would like an illustrated edition and thought maybe my readers would, too–that’s why the Kickstarter.
My pro published career began with gay comics, but the money back then was in OEL yaoi – sorry for my previous choices(?) Anyway… I write lesbian drama with sex because well, I like women. I write gay drama with sex because, I like men. I write what I like and I’m not going to apologize for it.
Maybe do some research on someone before you roll up in their Kickstarter inbox with a misogynistic shit-sundae.
Please keep in mind that you can pledge without a reward (example: if you cannot have gay material where you’re living, or you want to support me but not the work…)
Simply hit the BACK THIS PROJECT button and it will give you the option of adding anywhere from $1 to whatever you wish to add, without receiving a material reward. My old boss just plunked down 1K – I hope there’s no ulterior motive there, but I’ll take it!
Roman and Druid lock eyes in battle, setting off a turbulent flirtation marked by death, vengeance, and the theft of a beloved horse.
A friend made this for my Kickstarter project, The Lion & The Owl. Her choice of music is hilarious considering 'Watching Trees' by Eleven Pond is still my go to ear worm while writing this series.
In the wilds of Britannia, a druid named Aedan the Ancalite grapples with the weight of his father’s death.
Warnings: abortion, ritual drug use, ritual murder.
His life is defined by how much pain he brings his mother.
Twenty-two years ago, she left her princely father’s house to live with a coastal Ancalite named Fintan, who, for all his druidic prowess, never suspected her already caught. Her pains began on the autumnal, and her unborn babe insisted on coming out ass first. The old druidess tending the delivery cut her belly to liberate him, and Ciniod, his mother, reminds her grown son of this trauma every time she must force a fart.
Aedan the Ancalite is a bony sort with alabaster skin and the jawline of a corpse. His messy black curls, rounded nose, and perpetual frown speak volumes of his mother, and nothing of his father. Spindly legs and rangy feet provide weapons against anyone foolish enough to pick a fight.
Still, his deadliest instrument is his mind.
Aedan and his mother journey north to her girlhood home on the Tamesa, a slovenly river with sandless banks that divides the Cantiaci tribe from the Catuwellauni.
Dragonflies hop over foamy islands on puce waters, their wings hissing among the reedbeds, where hungry toads noisily belch their lures behind the gull song; nothing on this river survives without feeding on something else.
Ciniod tends her dead father’s burial stones, her long fingers gingerly plucking out the most bothersome weeds.
Aedan’s long fingers spend the day inside of cunts, and the line outside his tent grows as word spreads of his arrival.
A novice druid with midwifery skills to match his anatomical knowledge, Aedan possesses a unique talent for rooting out the unwanted. High-born women and marsh girls alike seek out the son of Fintan, for he safely cuts out the mistakes, accidents, and criminal spawn.
Today, many pregnancies prove too far along, requiring an agile hand and a deft ear poke to silence the undercooked before their first cry. No woman should hear such a thing, not after making the worst decision of her life.
Twilight brings a fat moon with enough silvery light for Aedan to scrub the meconium from his nails with herb-scented lard. After this, he takes the smoke to rid the herb-stink from his nostrils.
Hundreds gather for the tribal communal, most families from the Cantiaci lands bordering the Ancalite coast. Mute in the company of others, Aedan’s obtuse silence drives away the girls, but lures men eager to reach under another man’s robe.
Weary of new faces, he abandons the bonfire drums.
A field of dirty mares graze in the twilight, their snatches sewn tight to keep the late summer pollen from infecting their wombs. He joins their ranks, climbing onto the thickest mare. She lets out an approving grunt as he braids her mane. Her ears feel damp from the morning’s rain, but her coat is dry against his naked skin.
Hippos, that’s what the Greeks call them.
Aedan’s father taught him to speak and read Greek, but he’s never met a Greek. He misses his father. He also longs for their shoreline home, and the fisherman’s burly son who chokes him until his cock spits.
Yes, his taste for men is renowned, but his violent desires frighten even the most sadistic warriors.
“You’re taller than I remember.”
The craggy voice of Ostin the Ageless invades Aedan’s solitary respite. The archdruid, too old to have a tribe, moves over the pasture with the help of a twisted staff.
Content with his cock trapped between the mare’s back and his belly, Aedan doesn’t rise to greet him.
Long pale beard full of fireflies, Ostin retrieves Aedan’s discarded smock, rolling his toothless gums behind a smirk. Once browner than the wettest sand, his teeth fell out long before the Ancalite’s found the sea.
Aedan will never lose his biters. He scrapes them daily with a cat bone and whitens them with piss.
“We must divine the future.” Ostin pitches Aedan’s discarded frock. His long, oily hair is unmoving in the wind. His craggy, dry lips spread. “Chaos shrouds the present.”
Fintan the Owl’s sojourn to aid their continental brethren has disrupted tribal peace. Of the strapping druid’s many roles, his most important was taming the northern warlord, Cassibelanus, a bastard who finds murder the logical solution to most problems.
Shortly after Fintan’s departure, the warlord lost control, threatening the Trinovantian prince Mandubracius. The prince’s subsequent victory in a sporting contest triggered a storm of rage that led Cassibelanus to demand compensation for what he felt was disrespect.
Mandubracius’s father, the King, refused him. The old monarch paid for this decision with his life, sending his heir to the continent in search of Fintan.
“I need another Owl,” Ostin says.
Aedan presents his best disinterest. “All sparks will burn out when Mandubracius returns.”
“You’ve found your voice.” Ostin’s thick brows rise. “I recall when many believed you dumb.”
“Fintan the Owl will return with my uncle,” Aedan says. “And the Gods will show our future through the guts of whatever tipsy fool he chokes out for you.”
Ostin hardens. “Your father is dead, boy.”
Aedan sits up and turns his eyes to the old archdruid.
“Mandubracius didn’t find Fintan.” Ostin sits on the grass, a task not easy at his age. “Mandubracius found the Roman wolf.”
Aedan’s stomach hardens.
“The legions fled last summer.”
“They left, boy,” Ostin says. “They didn’t flee.”
“Who says my father’s dead?”
“Your uncle Taran returns with his head.”
Air flees Aedan’s chest as his dark eyes find the stars.
Father now roams the world unseen, searching for a new body to begin again. He will be reborn as someone’s son, then grow into another boy’s father.
Aedan loathes such truths.
A tear falls for the man who loved him unconditionally. The man whose bare feet lifted him high so he could fly like a bird.
The man who taught him the name of everything beneath the sun and under the skin.
“Swallow your pain,” Ostin advises softly. “You’ll take his place in ritual and verse.”
Aedan wants to refuse, but he cannot.
“You’re my Ancalite,” the old man adds, hobbling away. “You strangle the offering, and the Gods will reveal our fates.”
Aedan wanders back to his mother’s tent and finds her whoring for attention. Father’s head sits on an overturned jug like a vulgar decoration. His skin isn’t quite green yet, the gash under his chin sutured with meadowsweet. Duck eggs sit behind his eyelids, and flowering buds keep his cheeks full.
Ciniod kneels before it, wailing while her brother, Taran, sheds genuine tears. Both grieve the man who fucked them—oh yes, Fintan’s taste in womanly men and masculine women was never a secret. Rome took Fintan’s virile body and left them nothing but a severed head.
Aedan remains longer than willing, with no more tears to cry as his father’s last day among them replays in his mind. Father didn’t wish to leave their coastal home, but his mother’s incessant nagging wore him down.
Unable to endure another moment of his mother’s existence, Aedan seeks solace in the druid camp. At sunrise, he finds an empty blanket, one long enough for his rangy body, but sadly, no man fights him to share it.
A full moon means the Gods are watching.
Aedan stands naked beneath his father’s robe, its horned cowl tickling his nose. The salty sand within the feathers of its shoulders brings back memories of their home by the waves.
Father’s cobalt eyes haunt him, as does his straw-colored hair and muscular physique. Aedan possesses none of his father’s attributes, instead favoring his uncle and grandfather, two narrow-assed fools who provide no generational pride.
Tonight’s ceremony unfolds at the seasonal gathering yard, an ageless nemeton with two sacred pines and a ceremonial hut barely large enough to sleep a pack of transient druids.
Strong backs carry a hastily-made oak deck, the very stage for tonight’s sacred rites, over the nemeton’s low mud fence. Ropes pull it up to stronger druids, who set it atop pine birch stilts, high enough for the Gods to convene without touching the soil.
Aedan is entranced as Eadaoin of the Bibroci, a handsome druidess, steps into the circle, her green-painted spear skimming the stone surround. She presents him with a gourd-mug of redcap tea, its bitterness transforming into a savory broth with the first sip.
The world slows, and the thundering beat softens.
Heat fills his chest, and he puts his lips together and blows, lips warming from his breath. Owl mask over his eyes, Aedan twists to the harmonic strings and the beating drum, the cowl over his head falling away to reveal black curls tamed with a paste of red, perfumed mud.
Whale oil paint made white with crushed shells covers his skin, creating a lanky apparition. A performer since boyhood, Aedan’s ethereal acrobatics, as he cartwheels around the mighty bonfire, cast a hypnotic spell upon those still sober.
A tickle crawls up his spine as he transforms, becoming what he must to convene with the Gods.
His skin tightens as feathers sprout. From the shadows, his wings unfurl, parting the smoke as his talons lift from the earth. From the sky, he sees those outside the circle rejoice. They raise their children high, hoping they, too, can soar like their druid owl.
Bonfire’s light filters through the revelers, creating shades that everyone regards as long-dead kin. The muddy stretch beneath their feet glistens, and only the Owl’s keen eyes notice the large animal prints forming on the sheen.
A beastly feline appears and stalks the shadows.
Leo, like the one Heracles fought in a Greek story. The majestic cat shakes its mane with each blithe trot. It fears nothing, for no one here can kill it.
The songstress’s howl transforms into a chilling scream. The lion leaps at a young girl, and the onlookers recoil as if struck. The great cat shakes her small body in its powerful jaws. White robes turn crimson. A torn leg is released. Another small limb rolls to her mother’s feet, but the woman is now a statue of fine stone.
The Owl lands upon her sculpted head, catching the feline’s attention. It opens its dripping maw, dropping the limp girl before letting loose a roar that makes the statue crumble. The Owl’s wings flap to remain airborne, but quickly reclaim their place upon her, though she is no more than a hill of rocks.
The lion circles the feathery bird on its stone pile, growing closer with each new orbit. Then, the golden cat pounces, and the Owl takes flight. A bright moon beckons, its round, pocked face a beacon for the rising Owl until a wall of water collides with its body.
Murky depths surround Aedan.
Surface light quells his confusion until a splashdown destroys the serenity. Through the bubbly froth comes a paw. Bubbles fade and reveal a strapping man.
Dark green eyes find Aedan in the murk. Swollen lips part in perfect symmetry, baring a mouthful of pristine teeth. The hairless man strokes toward him, bringing his bone-deep virility within striking distance.
Aedan doesn’t attack. This hairless brute is everything he wants and nothing he needs.
The watery barrier between them weakens with each slippery pass. Body to body, they sink deeper, falling from the light until darkness surrounds them. Drowning matters little to Aedan, not when it’s this pleasurable.
Fingertips tease his foreskin…
Crisp air slaps Aedan across the face.
Stars fill the sky above, while below, Ostin stands within the ring, sickle blade in one knotty hand and his staff in the other. On the platform’s edge sits the sacrificial lamb, a bearded innocent with his ass on his heels and a full belly of porridge laced with root magic.
The lamb weaves to the music, coherent enough to remain upright yet blind to the sinew cord sinking past his nose.
Aedan jerks both ends, testing its strength, while below, the seer raises his curvy blade and speaks a litany of words only the Gods understand.
What tedious pomp.
Aedan is the Owl, and the Owl waits for no seer.
He pulls the cord around the offering’s neck, crossing his arms and yanking the ends. The man topples, his portly flesh bouncing while his backside taps at Aedan’s toes. Thick arms thrashing, the man fights, his piss-wet legs kicking wildly over the platform.
Aedan’s mask falls. The drums cease, the strings stop, and the crowd quiets. His smile, rarely seen, forces many to turn away. Even the ageless seer, no stranger to violence, stands slack-jawed at the Ancalite’s delight.
Pleasure soaks Aedan’s brain as his cockhead stabs at the choking man’s slick hair. He will not drop this kill, not tonight. Not ever. No. This suffering will last for an eternity if he wishes it!
A pointed spear drives past Aedan’s chest, its sharp end poking a clean hole in the offering’s crown.
The man goes still. Aedan drops him, watching as the corpse falls away and lands with a sickening plop at Ostin’s feet. The seer wastes no time, his blade finding the throat…
Seawater invades his mouth. The arm that surrounds his neck draws tight as hardened flesh prods his buttocks.
Aedan drives his head back, striking his captor.
He strokes free, frantic with pain spreading throughout his skull. The unconscious lion man drifts away, blood curling from his nose.
Aedan cannot look away, nor can he fight his desire. He swims to the floating man and eagerly swallows his prominent flesh. He tastes apples through the saltwater as he coaxes honey from the slit. Thick life fires into the back of his throat, and Aedan swallows greedily, his hands full of the man’s buttocks. Sweetness soon gives way to brine, forcing him to push away.
The lifeless beauty floats to the surface while Aedan sinks into darkness, a trail of milky white ribboning from his lips-
Sunlight blinds him in the warm morning wind. No revelers remain, their leather tents going with them in the night. Alone on the platform, Aedan fixates on the bloody sand below.
Ostin leans on his rod.
“You’re not your father’s son.”
Eadaoin appears alongside the old seer, careful to keep her bare feet off the red earth.
“What did you see, Ancalite?” she calls to him.
“He saw nothing,” Ostin says. “The Gods tasted his murderous glee and showed him only his destiny, not ours.”
“What did you see?” Aedan asks her.
“I saw my tribe in chains among the wolves,” tears glisten her ruddy cheeks, “What of your people, Ancalite?”
Aedan folds into a handstand before tipping off the platform.
He lands on his feet before her and says, “My tribe will lure the wolves into the water and drown them.”
“There is no water. There is no drowning,” Ostin says. “You see, but you cannot divine.”
“I am the Owl,” he says. “I will lead the Ancalites.”
“You’ll be the last Ancalite to die, but you’ll die all the same.” Ostin limps away. “Along with your bloodline.”
“I’ll be free,” Aedan yells.
“Free as an owl in a lion’s cage can be,” says Ostin.
Ciniod’s boy enters the mourning tent, and her dead husband’s Owl, Clota, shimmies along her perch to greet him. Last night’s rumors are true: Fintan’s successor stands before her.
Aedan takes Fintan’s head by the ears and presses his lips to its lips. Though flowers pack the mouth, it stinks of decay, and her strange boy’s kiss lingers long enough to pluck her nerves.
“Andrasta gave your father to the Romans,” she tells him.
“You dare blame the War Bitch,” Aedan seethes, his ugly face made tolerable with anger. “When it was you who nagged and cajoled him and Taran across the water.”
“I loved him!” she cries.
“You loved him so much, you sent him to die.” Aedan steps to her, his eyes blacker than a shark’s. “You didn’t think about the void that would be left behind if he left Cassibelanus.”
“You’re going to blame me for Mandubracius making a cunt’s run to the wolves?” Ciniod confronts his closeness. “They attacked our kin across the water—”
“Your kin,” he accuses, finger pointing. “Your fight.”
Taran enters the tent with his fists clenched, but a look from Ciniod halts his advance.
“If he had stayed,” her son says, “Cassibelanus would’ve behaved himself. Mandubracius would still be here, and Rome would have no reason to return.”
“Fintan loved your mother,” Taran says. “That’s why he went.”
“No,” Aedan shakes his head, his voice steady. “He loved you, Taran. That’s why he went.”
“Matrimony is a shared life,” Ciniod tells him. “Best times and bad, two remain one.”
“Or in your circumstances, two remain three.”
“That’s enough,” Taran scolds.
Aedan steps into her, no longer the boy from her yesteryears. “My father died because of you. Not Andrasta the War Bitch. Not the Romans. Not even Taran. You.”
Taran comes between them, but Aedan slinks around him.
“When he didn’t jump to your suggestions, you goaded Taran into taking up the cause.” Aedan glares at her. “And when he talked Tara out of it, you gave him no peace until he did what you wanted, when you wanted, and how you wanted it!”
Ciniod stands on virgin territory. Her son, ever the silent observer, bursts forth with a torrent of words, as intense as the Stour after a rain.
“What did you see last night?” she wonders.
Aedan turns his back on her.
“You saw something that gave you a voice,” she presses.
“Your father died with honor.” Taran comes between them. “Tell him, Chinny.”
“You took my father from me,” Aedan glares at her, “and I will never forgive you for it.”
Spite becomes her. “Fintan’s not your father, boy.”
Dark eyes condemn her.
“You’re a product of our stupidity,” she adds.
Taran’s head pivots from Aedan to her and then back to Aedan.
“Ravens have nothing on you when it comes to misdirection.” Aedan folds his arms. “Stand up accountable for what you did to him, and stop hiding behind the things you’ve done to me.”
“Done to you? I gave you life, you little shitter,” Ciniod says. “I think that warrants some respect.”
“You think wrong,” he says.
“Well then. You may carry your anger to your deathbed.” Ciniod turns her back on him, knowing she won’t be able to much longer. “My life continues either way.”
“I hate you, Mother,” Aedan’s whisper warms her ear. “I always have and forever will.”
“Yes,” she says as he leaves her tent. “But I’m all you’ve got, my little hoot-hoot!”
The Lion & The Owl is a semi-erotic web series for fans of ancient gay love stories. It is about the attraction that develops between two bitter enemies who share a sexual fighting kink: a Roman elite and a deadly Druid.
Lucius ‘Skipio’ Servius takes part in the tumultuous Gallic Wars as one of Caesar’s trusted Legio X Equestris. His battlefield courage is matched only by his chivalry toward women, a facade that conceals a darker, more complex nature… A man-lover since his youth, Skipio grapples with violent desires and longs for a companion who can accept him without judgment.
Across the channel, cunning druid Aedan the Ancalite takes on his dead father’s mantle as a diviner and warrior. Unlike his people, he eagerly anticipates the arrival of Rome after a drug-induced vision heralds a fierce lover in the shape of a lion... When no man proves brutal enough to fight Aedan for his affections, the frustrated ‘Owl King’ wreaks bloody havoc upon Caesar’s invading legions.
The series is for adult readers. It contains sexual content and mature themes, such as war violence, period-specific attitudes about abortion, sex, and slavery, as well ritual drug-use and murder.
Production Budget
This campaign aims to produce a modest Print Run (100 books or more) of The Lion & The Owl series, beginning with the ‘Invasion Arc.’
The campaign includes the production of a digital illustrated edition that will be sold at retail for $11.99 if the campaign is successful. To produce an illustrated eBook, the total needed is $1350 (this total includes KS fees), with 115 backers paying $10 to create it.
The goal, however, is a print run.
The quoted cost for an offset book production, with a minimum threshold of $2,400 to ensure a 100-unit print run. The total of $2,700 comes from Kickstarter’s share and its Processing Fee. This print run needs 80 backers to produce 100 paperbacks; anything extra is a bonus, with the listed eBook as a promotional extra.
[See Budget Image at Kickstarter]
Digital Specifications:
Format(s): PDF, ePub
Language: English
File size: 20-80 MB
Production: Jutoh Anthemion
All tiers come with both digital formats.
Content inside is identical to the physical book.
Physical Specifications:
5”x8” paperback (perfect binding)
Full-color gloss cover with an interior color-cover
240-58 interior pages (depends on illustration placement)
6 full-page b/w illustrations (2 color on interior cover)
Individual Poly Wrap with Support
Production: Offset Printing by Onpress Book Printing
Please Check out my Kickstarter page for Reward Tiers!
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