I realized I never actually said what I was working on.

I am currently imagining an expansion of the King Lindorm story (a variety of tales from Northern Europe), since that should give me a nice long something to work with, without having to create a whole structure out of air.

A lindorm is basically a wingless dragon.

So King Lindorm, in its original form gathers many typical fairy tale elements:

• A barren queen
• A helpful old woman
• Directions not followed
• Tragedy at birth
• the separating of twins
• The wicked step-mother
• The passive (if living) blood father
• Beauty and the beast elements
• Death and dismemberment
• The good-hearted woodsman
• trying to get out of a bad bargain one made with hell, having to do with one’s soul
• Long-distance communication and mail tampering
• A war with no mentioned casualties
• general misunderstandings that wouldn’t be if people actually talked
• this is going to be the first thing to go. It always drives me *nuts*!
• Villain’s punishment: being pulled by galloping horses in a nail-pierced barrel (*Gack!*)
• This has been done in a book recently, so I’m re-writing that ending. I’ve come up with something else I like even more– though, I can’t say I really liked the nail-filled barrel, so maybe that doesn’t say enough.

I’m actually not interested in (much) modernizing or lampooning. I think it’s a cool story for its genre, so I’m working with what’s there to tell the story I want to tell.