Thought you might fancy a wee look at my draft for The Annihilation of Satine. This manuscript has gone places I was not expecting. Everything was planned to a T, only to take a sudden turn into surprise territory. And yet, I like it.

She had a hot-cold way about her, defiant in how her posture suggested she owned the place despite being here against her will. But the devastation on her face when he addressed her as “Inmate Luna” … Kensington swallowed the shadow of a familiar urge.

“Not to worry. The titles are just a formality.” Too much information, dial it back. He moved an ornamental paperweight to his left and stuck it in the desk drawer, a nothing gesture while he gathered himself. “Between the two of us, we can call you whatever we like. We’ll be spending a lot of time together.”

She watched him while they progressed through the proceedings. Eyes all the while like modified gemstones from his homeworld’s sister planet, the kind that changed colour depending on the angle of the light. That was one thing the facility’s profile didn’t specify: whether this enhancement was purely cosmetic.

Satine Luna spoke with a charmingly low-brow accent, yet she carried herself with all the poise and self-possession of one higher than her station. A professional, then, Kensington thought, and surreptitiously made notes through the transparent filament grafted to the side of his index finger, like playing a tiny violin.

“It’s policy that I watch you disrobe, with your consent, of course.” The well-practised words rolled off his tongue. What little he’d been told of her was just enough to jump to conclusions with, but the surprise on her face was real. Real and so compelling. Kensington would enjoy her induction, enjoy her enjoying it. Perhaps a little too much.

I should probably warn you as well that the unexpectedly pantsy nature of this Satine instalment has messed with me a bit. So far, we’re still looking at a Q3 release, but my confidence in this has dropped from 90% down to 30%. The biggest mystery, it seems, is not what lurks behind the facades of the Bellerophon Centre, but whether this book will release in Q4 instead 🤷🏻‍♀️

Only time will tell!

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