by K. G. Wilkie
Dürin:
Contracted to Priscilla. A little bit of a grump but a softie to children.
Wengyar:
A spirit dog that acts as Aeron's pet. It lives in the spirit realm, but Aeron can still summon it.
Taiya:
Leader of the Alchemists. A member of the First Five, one of the founders of their group. Faint freckles, grey almond shaped eyes, thick brown wavy hair, dimples, prone to smiling and cheerfulness.
Cillean:
The former king of all vampires in the Shadeworld before the dragons rose to power, and his subjects still defer to him as if he still ruled them. He is loyal to the positions of the king and to the crown prince, rather than being specifically loyal to the individuals themselves, but some suspect he is starting to grow a little fond of Aeron.
Daerick:
Cillean's right hand man, seneschal and organizer of his household and duties as well as his personal guard and traveling companion. He speaks formally but has a playful personality.
Alabastor Fyojhan:
General of the Blue Crows, Aeron's personal guard
Priscilla:
Jackie's little sister who is also a nymph. She is still a flighty child, but has some depths of wisdom from her calm personality.
Hawthorne:
A Daemon who works for Aeron and is sent on personal errands for the prince. They are both fond of each other. He has a twin named Rowena. Like all daemons his power allows him to wield fire.
Rowena:
Her twin is Hawthorne. She also works for Aeron. Though both twins sometimes get in trouble for their playful antics that unfortunately usually involve literally playing with fire, Rowena is a little less likely to cause trouble. Her powers are different from a dragon's, but there is enough similarity that both species tend to get along well.
Brietsch:
The head of the Domed City and all the Wizards that live in it.The oldest of all the Wizard elders. He assigns his secretary to do most of the work of running the City for him but still demands the respect he earns as being in charge of everything.
Gruzelvelt:
One of the elders of The Domed City of wizards. Does not listen to others and chafes in his position as Brietsch's secretary when he thirsts for greater power. Has a large ego. He is a wizard so though he has the ability to cast magic he is still of the human race, and therefore one of the weakest species in the Shadeworld.
Kraelek:
Young wizard who is part of Domed City. He was a rising star among the apprentices, but shamed his people in an official negotiation and has been demoted to cover Darien's old chores of mopping and cleaning the vice head wizard Gruzelvelt's chambers.
Veronica:
A golem that acts as the host for Alyss and coordinates her activities.
Murray:
A palace worker that visits with Alyss and repairs the golems.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Author's Page
K.G.Wilkie won awards for her work in poetry and short stories before she decided to take the plunge and make being a YA author her full time job. The Shadeworld is her second series, and PS The Dragon Bites is the second of ten books.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Acknowledgements
The Shadeworld series has been a bit of a rollercoaster for me so far, which makes sense as it encompasses my first venture in authorship and is a huge undertaking of a story as well. I first attempted to write this book back in 2014 during my breaks in between classes as a commuter stuck on campus all day, but ran into a major problem with the story that made me abandon my fifth draft long before the ending. I came back to the story in 2017 when I realized the problem with it was that it was much too large of a story to fit even the main points into a single book, so I took the plunge to divide it into a truly epic ten book series. Since then I've come across roadblocks in my quest to release the installments the fifteenth of every month- I ran into some roadblocks with the publishing part of the process in December and delayed the release of PS The Dragon Fights until January- but I've still come a long way since my first ever published book took me six months to write and ended with a less than professional end product. I still think Family Inflamed is an interesting book, but now with what I know I'd change a lot about it, from the cover to the editing and marketing, and I wouldn't have been able to make such a huge leap in my abilities as an author if I hadn't been guided by a few industry veterans that took me under their wing.
I would like to acknowledge the amazing supporters in the Indie publishing community that have helped these books be their highest quality.
Carol Rushing, my editor, gave me gentle encouragement as she slogged through contradictory plot and repeated paragraphs as well as endless misspellings and grammatical errors. She also solved the mystery of why all the paragraph indents disappeared! She worked on this book as well as PS The Dragon Bites.
Nicholas Santasier did a wonderful job narrating the first book and agreed to continue working on the audiobook editions of the rest of the series which has been a lifesaver. He also pointed out the need to get in touch with Carol in the first place and patiently waited while I redid the entire book, for which I am eternally grateful.
Stephanie Fontecha made a beautiful set of covers for the series after I called her in a panic a week into releasing the first book when I released my diy cover that was meant to be vaguely letter-like in appearance was actually a coupon which confused potential readers and was ugly to boot.
Additionally, my goal as an author is not just to write full time, but to avoid being a classic part time author because writing books couldn't pay the bills. I still have not reached that goal, but I credit the generous spirit of the Indie author community for guiding me on the business so I can continue to work towards that. The great resources at the Writer's Union, Alliance of Independent Authors, and the 50booksto20k group have been great supports in my professional journey.
