elizabeth_oswald

CA Chapter Ten

“Good catch!” Amythyst said, shooting Aspen an approving grin. “Now, hold Amy out. Carefully.”

Aspen sent her a look that suggested he didn’t need the reminder, but he awkwardly pulled Amy’s limp body around until he could catch her under the arms when he released the sheet holding her up. As gently as if sh...

CA Chapter Nine

Ava peered around the corner of the building, saw nothing of interest, and sent a question to Silus. ::Do you see anyone?:: Instinctively, she kept her voice low, even though no one could overhear anything she said in party chat.

::Nobody,:: Silus answered, sounding like she wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or disap...

CA Chapter Eight

After lunch, Ava took Amy out for another ‘walk’. Petunia’s mother, Florence, had offered to clean Ava’s filthy dress while they ate, so Ava was back in her relatively comfortable clothes. She knew she should go back and continue working with the clay, but she didn’t want to get so dirty again so soon. Fortunately, ...

CA Chapter Seven

When Ava was little, long before cancer came to steal her mother from her, she and Molly used to play in a stream near their house. In the spring there were tadpoles, and in the summer and fall, Ava would splash and squeal as she chased after frogs and tiny fish. Her mother, Molly, would sit on the bank, dangling her feet in ...

CA Chapter Six

When Ava went into ‘her’ pod for the third time, she could see Quinn and Dean bustling around the other pod, getting it ready for Amy. LeeAn settled Ava’s mask into place, and for the first time, instead of leaving Ava in darkness until the game started, her view immediately switched to that of the mask’s external cam...

CA Chapter Five

The four days of Ava’s ‘test’ immersion passed quickly. At first she was worried that Veralt might be monitoring her in some way, and notice that she was using skills he hadn’t given her character. When he logged in on day two, however, he seemed just as dismissive as ever, and not suspicious at all, so for the last t...

CA Chapter Five

The four days of Ava’s ‘test’ immersion passed quickly. At first she was worried that Veralt might be monitoring her in some way, and notice that she was using skills he hadn’t given her character. When he logged in on day two, however, he seemed just as dismissive as ever, and not suspicious at all, so for the last t...

CA Chapter Four

The first thing Ava wanted was a haircut and some new clothes. Changing your hairstyle in game was as simple as selecting a new one from your settings, but first you had to go to a barber and buy it. The only style you got for ‘free’ was the one you selected at character creation. Once you purchased the new style or style...

CA Chapter Three

Getting ready to enter the pod was faster the second day. LeeAn applied the sticky electrodes, but otherwise she left getting into the suit up to Ava. The other woman did double check all the seals before she put a new IV in Ava’s left arm, since the right was still healing after the first one. After all that was done, she ...

CA Chapter Two

When Ava woke from her three week immersion in Amythyst’s pod, she’d only known that she’d been surrounded by fluid a minute before because her skin was damp, and there were lingering traces of gel in her nose and ears. Amythyst’s little robot, B.T., had been there with a towel, and Ava had wiped it all away easily, s...

CA Chapter One

Ava opened her eyes to see a plain wooden ceiling overhead, then sat up sharply, feeling her hands ball into fists in the blanket under which she rested. Those bastards had actually forced her into the pod! Admittedly, she’d mostly been pretending she was afraid, but they didn’t know that! She’d expected them t...

Chapter Forty-five (End of Lament!)

The orange juice was more like orange sludge, but Ava drank every drop of it before hurrying off to work. She left a full twenty minutes earlier than she had to because she didn’t want to take the chance that Dean would decide to turn up on her doorstep again. She wore simple black yoga pants and a bright green t-shirt, and...

CL Chapter Forty-four

After her shift, Ava just had time to order her meal from the kitchen, then hurry back to her room to redo her hair and makeup before LeeAn sent her a message letting her know she was on the way. Ava walked down the long hall to the dining area, offering smiles to everyone she met, feeling like she was a new car people were c...

Chapter Forty-three

Dr. Veralt led Ava into the room directly in front of the nurse’s station. The room was a slightly more personalized version of the rooms Molly spent so much time in. The bed looked far more comfortable than the standard one, but it still had collapsible railings and motors to raise and lower it. The blanket was purple and ...

CL Chapter Forty-two

Ava’s screen woke her at seven-thirty with a series of cheerful chimes. She groaned as she swiped at the screen. She’d gotten used to sleeping as long as she wanted and waking when she was rested, and returning to the life of a wage slave was going to be hard.

“Good morning!” Amythyst chirped in her ear. “I fi...

CD (actually CL) Chapter Forty-one

It took about two hours to run back to the city, enter the storage facility, transfer the twelve boxes in the storage unit to her new car, and hit a hardware store to buy a few house plants. It was a small detail, but if Liam ever entered Ava’s suite again, she wanted him to see some plants enjoying that east-facing window....

Chapter Forty

The suites were beautiful. They were modern, fully furnished, and had a few automated devices she could control through her screen or her implants. If she had been offered one without ever experiencing Amythyst’s magic house, Ava probably would have swooned. As it was, however, she had to force herself to look enthusiastic ...

CD Chapter Thirty-nine

Carl Landon’s house had extra houses attached to each side. Ava supposed they were wings, and that meant this was actually a mansion, but all she could think of was how hard it must be to get from one end to the other in a hurry. What did you even do with all those rooms?

Amythyst was driving her today, thoug...

CD Chapter Thirty-Eight

Ava swung her legs out of the car and stood, brushing at her fitted gray slacks, though their expensive fabric refused to wrinkle or crease. Turning back to the driver, she smiled politely and tapped her screen, adding a twenty percent tip to the bill. The girl, who looked to be barely old enough to drive, grinned and thanked...

Thank you for your patience...

yesterday, guys. I caught the stomach flu that's going around here and I was absolutely down yesterday. I'm going to try to get two chapters out today or tomorrow (let's be honest, it probably won't be today) to make up for it. If I don't make it, I should be able to get one in Saturday, if I sent the kiddo out with her dad �...

Bits and pieces

I thought I'd give you higher tier patrons some of my working images for the cover. My plan is to use more of Ava's city background on the print book, and actually wrap it around the spine and onto the back.

I used Midjourney AI art generator, and these are my 'base' images. If you look closely, you can see I had to cha...

Cuckoo's Lament cover art

No chapter today because this is what I've been working on since last Friday, so I'm behind. I really need to get Cuckoo started on Royal Road. Obviously, they'll always be way behind you guys, but I really need some feedbac...

CD Chapter Thirty-seven

Even though Myles had assured her repeatedly that she would feel perfectly normal when she woke, Ava was still shocked to find that it was true. She had been in the pod for three weeks - a month and a half in the game - until she could name every organ, bone, and artery, as well as their primary functions and the most common ...

CD Chapter Thirty-six

Amythyst was there, looking worried. “How are you feeling? Do you need to lie down? Of course you need to lie down.” She bit her lip, looking conflicted.

Ava knew her well enough by now to read that as ‘I want something, but I don’t know how to tell you I want something without you getting mad at me’ and said,...

CD Chapter Thirty-five

The next few days flew by in the closest thing to happiness Ava had experienced in years. She ate good food, slept in a safe, comfortable bed, and played her favorite game using the best pod she’d ever heard of, much less seen. B.T. cleaned up after her, and brought her pain medicine to her, but she thought her hand - and h...

CD Chapter Thirty-four

The jungle was horrible. Absolutely everything, including the plants, wanted to kill them. By the end of the day, they were lost, filthy, exhausted, and injured. It seemed like as soon as one battle ended, they were instantly embroiled in another, and they never had time to recover, so Tess had used up several expens...

CD Chapter Thirty-three

The tunnel was dark. In hindsight, this shouldn’t have been a surprise, since it wasn’t meant to be in use yet, but it was fortunate that vampires, dwarves, and whatever Myles was all had [DarkVision]. What did surprise Alpha was just how many monsters there were. The place was absolutely infested, though most of...

CD Chapter Thirty-two

When Alpha opened her eyes, Toggle was awake, staring into her face with worried blue eyes. As soon as he saw she was awake, he extended a vial filled with blood. “Mistress, Tess said you would be here soon, and to tell you she’d be right back,  so I made this for you.”

Switching so abruptly from one place to...

Harvest Audiobook

Last one! Next week, we're back to our regularly scheduled chapters. We're actually getting pretty close to the end of Book One, believe it or not.  I'm trying to decide on series vs book titles. I'm thinking Cuckoo's Dream overall, while book one will be Cuckoo's Lament, and two will be Cuckoo's Aria. What do you think?...

Cultivation audiobook

This one has Khor in it, so he got his own voice. Fun fact: Google gave all the American voices names that start with M, and the deepest male voice is 'Marcus'. Sadly, Motte never has his own chapter, so Khor got that one instead.