Innkeep, hunter, blacksmith, nurse—Horace has apprenticed for every clan in the domed city of Trenaze, and they've all rejected em. Too hare-brained. Too talkative. Too slow. Ever the optimist, e has joined Trenaze's guards to be mentored. Horace has high hopes to earn eir place during eir trial at the Great Market. That is, until the glowing shards haunting the world break through the city's protective dome, fused together in a single, monstrous amalgam of Fragments. Armed with a sword, a shield, and far too little training, Horace doubts eir ability to defend the market-goers. But eir last stand is interrupted by a mysterious elven figure who can dissipate the Fragments with a single, strange sentence: your story is my story. From the moment it is uttered, Horace knows the sentences holds true for em, too—and when the elf collapses in the middle of the market, e carries them to safety, to recover away from the panicked crowd and inevitable questions from eir fellow guards. It could cost em eir apprenticeship—eir last chance to find eir place in eir home city—but Horace cannot resist the pull of this mystery elf and the call of a new friend. Aliyah has but one desire: to leave Trenaze's safe boundaries and find the forest that haunts their dreams. After an afternoon of board games in their quiet, sharp-witted company, Horace is ready to follow, confronting Fragments and other dangers of the road to understand what happened that day, hear Aliyah's laugh again and finally feel like e belongs.

Fate and friendship brought Horace, Rumi, Keza, and Aliyah together in Rumi’s sentient self-propelling wagon. They seek the forest haunting Aliyah’s dream, hoping for answers about the elf’s past and unique abilities—but first, they need to traverse a world haunted by Fragments, dangerous shards that can possess travellers and react to Aliyah’s presence. They finally leave the coast to undertake a long ocean crossing filled with the sailors’ brand-new games and fearsome myths, but no one expects the latter to come to life. At sea, the Fragments that roam the world have coalesced into a gigantic beast—the kraken of legends—and unfortunately, it shares its landbound cousins’ obsession with Aliyah. The crew may have bested countless storms, but no amount of sea-worthiness can save the ship from the wrath of its colossal tentacles. If they want to escape the kraken and continue their journey, the wagon’s team will need to unravel more of the Fragments’ mysteries, and learn to listen beyond the murmur of the sea. ### Stories from the Deep is the fourth novella in The Chronicles of Nerezia, a queer fantasy series of found family road trips with aroace nonbinary leads.

Fate and friendship brought Horace, Rumi, Keza, and Aliyah together in Rumi’s sentient self-propelling wagon. They seek the forest haunting Aliyah’s dream, hoping for answers about the elf’s past and unique abilities—but first, they need to traverse a world haunted by Fragments, dangerous shards that can possess travellers and react to Aliyah’s presence. They’ve reached Virze, a marvel of art and engineering and a city in which all acts of creation are beloved. A perfect occasion to explore and rest before the next leg of their journey… except that Rumi desperately wants to avoid his hometown and the demons of his past. When the Wagon crew realises half of those might be fears of his own making, however, they refuse to leave. But between the curse that ran him out of town and the source of his engineering skills, Rumi has been keeping even more secrets than they’d expected. He’ll need all their support to face the loved ones left behind and prove to all, himself first and foremost, what he is truly capable of. \—- Motes of Inspiration is the fifth novella in the Chronicles of Nerezia, a series of queer found family road trip novellas that wraps the warmth of cozier scenes in a large epic fantasy plot.