The Ballad of Adler Young, Canto 2.5

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Albric Tor > Be eerily dead silent as the army rolls in. where is everyone?

Alder's army > Be confronted by royal shrub guards, Shrubs! Bloody everywhere. menacingly swaying in the breeze

I really like this but can't use it yet. Remind me again when the army actually reaches the outskirts of Albric Tor.

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I simply don't get how can anybody draw that accurately and quickly

The quickness is an illusion. My time-lapse camera has an adjustable frame rate, which in this case compressed each hour of actual time into three minutes of video.

Just at what point do you draw the images? Just before you update, or before? And when do you start coming up with the content?

After pondering the forum commands for a week, I decide generally what is going to happen in the update and think about what images I'll need. I usually draw the pictures the day before I post them, or I'll draw them in the morning and post in the evening of the same day. If by "content" you mean the text of the update, I write that immediately before posting. I'll upload the images to Photobucket first, and paste the links into a text file in the order I want them to appear based on my mental outline of the update. Then I come to Eagle-Time and copy the commands I want to use, and paste them into the relevant places in the text. Then I start writing dialogue. Some shuffling and re-arranging takes place, because as the dialogue starts to flow, the arrangement of images and comments might make a different kind of sense.

How often do you change your mind about the plot?

Because the story appears in installments, I don't have the luxury of being able to change it. I can juggle elements and revise while I'm writing, but once it's posted I have to stick with what I have written.

Have you ever drawn something that you decided to scrap later?

A few times, but not often. In the video you might notice at the end that I drew the desk with the skull on it over to the right in the panel where Adler is modeling his new jacket. I ended up cropping that out because it was a bad composition and the skull was irrelevant to the story events at that moment.

Fifi, be in awe of Adler. Recite to him several of your favourite passages
(Fifi Fofox) "Help" by "smoothing out" Adler's new uniform.
(Thomson) Get riled up by how Fifi is "helping."

"You know what the Foxspell says," Fifi murmured as she sidled up next to me. "Verily, a vixen goeth crazy for a sharp-dressed tod. Elves don't lie! You'll like totally look your best though, if you smooth out all of the wrinkles. Here, stand up straight and I'll like, help you and stuff."



She reached around me and started rubbing her hands over my jacket .. and rubbing something soft against my back, in an obvious effort to work some Wiles.

"So smooooth," she whispered longingly in my ear.

.. was it just me, or was it starting to get hot in here?

"Knock it off, SALV," Ms. Thomson fumed. "This is not at all appropriate. And besides, titillating the Prince is MY official responsibility."

"You should like, delegate," Fifi suggested, letting go of me and primly straightening her jacket.

>Adler:Oh, that kid is good, real good. You'd be annoyed if you weren't just so darn impressed.
>Adler: Regard Lem Junior dubiously.
they are not ready to attack just yet.
Lemuel, look with great pride upon your son.
(Miz Lem) Be very proud of your lil' un

I scurried out onto the porch to get some fresh air, and came up short behind Lemmy and Salmonella.

"Is," I stammered in astonishment. "Is that kid leading my army off on an expedition?"

"That's my boy!" Lemmy exclaimed with fatherly pride.

"He's chock full of misguided enthusiasm," Salmonella sighed dreamily. "It's one of the things I liked about his poppa."

>Lem Junior: CHAAAAAAAAARGE!
Lem Junior, try to convince the army that they should attack en masse immediately, to take the enemy by surprise.
(Army-Mob) Start to slow down, as the Persockity Vitality wears down.

"COME ON, FELLERS!" Lem Junior yelled as he marched down the forest road. "If we hit Albric Tor all of a sudden with overwhelmin' numbers we can take 'em by surprise an' be in the gates afore they even knowed what hit 'em!"

The baglutes stopped playing. The Army began to visibly droop and shuffle its feet.

"FELLERS!" Lem Junior insisted. "C'mon! FORWARD! CHARGE! ADVANCE!!"

The Army muttered and swayed uneasily.

"What's wrong with them?" I asked. "They seemed so enthusiastic to follow his orders a minute ago."

"They's just crashin' from that Persoc-Itoome spiked Usquebaugh," Duchess Catherine replied, from where she was kneeling, still packing the War Chest. "Persockity Vitality is great while it lasts, but the Netherhells of it is, it don't ever last long enough. Leaves a body feelin' mighty depleted when it wears off, too."

(Her Grace CO'D) Finish packing up the trunk. Find a memento of a long-ago love.
he died in the Antglade War. (From a Siege Beetle-weakened tower falling on him.)

"Alas," she continued, in a suddenly wistful tone which I had not heard her use before. "Poor Vortigern."

"Who's Vortigern?" I asked, moseying over toward her.

"Just a feller I knew back in the days afore the Antglade fell," Catherine sighed. "He was a commander in our militia. By the Lady, what a dashin' officer he made! I reckon you could say we was sweeties. We woulda got married just as soon as I got rid of the Duke, but damned ol' Silverbrush's beetles made a tower fall on him, and then we lost the war, and there was a lotta other stuff to worry about. This here string o' teeth is all that's left to remember him by. I used to wear 'em til I decided there weren't no use mopin' about the dead no more. They been in this chest for, oh, I don't know how many years now. Good ol' Vortigern. I miss him. Seems strange I ain't even thought about him in a long time though."

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I honestly can't tell whether Griff means Adler or Lem Junior with "bold elflet".
Or Alice with "heir of Ireneaus" dun dun dun!
Alice called Scuti Preston her "Sire". Is that as in "Ruler", or "Father"? Or maybe even both?
(I&RA Spy) Lurk. Take notes.

"Careful how you address me," Griff whispered. "There may be spies about."

"Perhaps it would be best to draw them into the open," Alice whispered back. "An unseen enemy is a far greater threat than a visible one. I want to know who ordered the Ixies to attack us. Someone here in this camp is dangerously Unseelie."

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Percy, wonder into a cave. Cave, be inhabited. Inhabitant, be far too depressed

Percy le Gobelet was entranced by a mournful voice singing:

I left my home in Athstead,
Headed for the Dachsmark fjord.
But now I feel forgotten by Fuma
And really unbelievably bored.
So I'm perched on the pier in the fjord,
Observing the ebb of the tide.
Perched on the pier in the fjord,
Squandering days.



He peered cautiously into the cave from whence the voice was issuing, and the song stopped.

"What you doin' here, son?" the voice murmured from the shadows.