Capricon and Beyond: The Renegade Chronicles Compendium

By David Michael Williams

Have you ever wondered what goes into building a world? Want to know more about the heroes (and villains) who call Altaerra home? This compendium for The Renegade Chronicles includes:
- Character profiles
- Maps
- History files
- Sketches
- Glossary of people and places
- Previously unpublished prologue

• Language: English
• Publisher: David Michael Williams
• Release date: Sep 7, 2016

David Michael Williams

David Michael Williams has suffered from a storytelling addiction for as long as he can remember. With a background in journalism, public relations, and marketing, he also flaunts his love affair with the written word as an author of speculative fiction. His most recent books include the sword-and-sorcery trilogy The Renegade Chronicles and The Soul Sleep Cycle, a genre-bending series that explores life, death, and the dreamscape.David lives in Wisconsin with the best wife on this or any other planet and their two amazing children.

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

Welcome to Altaerra!

Or, rather, welcome back to Altaerra!

If you’re reading this, then you’ve likely finished the first volume of The Renegade Chronicles. (And if you haven’t, you can download Rebels and Fools, for FREE for Kindle at Amazon.com and a variety of other e-readers, including the Nook and iPad, at Smashwords.com.)

I created this compendium to provide a more in-depth look at the fictional world I invented for The Renegade Chronicles—and, hopefully, other fantasy adventures. It highlights not only the island of Capricon, which serves as the primary setting for the series, but also the Continent United and other locales, detailing some events that directly contributed to the political upheaval that came to be called the Renegade War.

Creating a world takes a lot of time and, believe it or not, quite a bit of research. The content in this compendium is a compilation of my copious writing exercises, including character profiles, explorations of Altaerran history, and other miscellaneous excerpts.

The glossary, which up until now was available only with the three-in-one digital collection, is a robust resource for those who want a quick reference to the many people, places, and peculiarities of Altaerra. And even though I don’t claim to be an artist, I’ve also included sketches of maps and characters—some from as far back as 1994, when I was a mere 15 years old.

While I’ve tried to minimize spoilers for the other books in the series, there are references to characters and events from those books. I encourage you to read those novels before diving into this compendium, if possible.

My hope is that this book will shed some light on my creative process and the evolution of The Renegade Chronicles over the past couple of decades, answer a few questions, and maybe provoke some new ones.

Enjoy!

David Michael Williams

9/1/2016

CHARACTER PROFILES

Before crafting the plot for The Renegade Chronicles, I familiarized myself with certain members of the cast by composing character profiles. What follows are excerpts from many of those exercises. The descriptions are comprised of answers to series of stock questions.

In some cases, details changed from the planning phase to the final draft of the novel, but these character profiles gave me a solid foundation when writing about physical attributes, personality traits, and motivations.

Klye Tristan

Klye stands at six feet tall and weighs around two hundred pounds. His medium frame is muscular but not sculpted. He has blue eyes and dark black hair that has an almost bluish sheen. He keeps his hair cropped short in back and parted in the middle. For the most part, Klye tries to stay well-groomed and grows a beard only when he hasn’t the time to shave.

Klye wears whatever is available. He has been known to don various disguises, ranging from the garb of a priest to that of sailor. He prefers dark colors, particularly black. Extraneous decorations, like jewelry, he generally does without. When going into battle, he wears only the lightest of armor, usually made from boiled leather or chain-links. He prefers boots to shoes, and more often than not, a knife can be found tucked inside one boot.

Having been a thief for most of his youth, Klye is quite conscious of how he carries himself. He knows how to blend in with his surroundings, but when doesn’t need to worry about fitting in, Klye carries himself with self-assured confidence. He is adept at concealing his emotions, but when he does smile, there tends to be a sarcastic, wry quality to it. Klye’s glare could quite silence a minotaur.

Klye took to the role of Renegade Leader wholeheartedly. His words portray his confidence, though those who don’t know him well might mistake that for bossiness. Klye does not sound educated, but neither does he sound ignorant. He’ll use slang when it suits him, but in general, he talks in the register of those he’s around. He curses with regularity and is not afraid of confrontation.

An unremarkable orphanage was Klye’s childhood home. He knows nothing of his mother; of his father, he knows only the man’s name: Benethan Tristan. He was dropped off at the orphanage when he was still an infant and remained there until he decided he could take care of himself, at which point he ran away and became a pickpocket.

Klye shuns strong drink because it dulls his senses; prostitutes, because they are not worth the coin they demand; and gambling because it’s an even greater squandering of the funds he works so hard to obtain. Klye finds pleasure in duping people, tricking them out of their money, and honing his skills as a thief.

Klye doesn’t like to sit idle, wasting the days away in inactivity. Only the sense of accomplishment makes him truly happy. He has a very dry sense of humor.

As a thief, Klye lied with professional ease. Since he has reformed, Klye tends to tell the truth, but he is not opposed to lying if it suits his purpose. However, he is more likely to be painfully honest and blunt than tactful.

Klye developed the morals that would shape him early in life, and while he doesn’t worry much about what the gods think of him (if there are gods), he sticks to his principles with admirable rigidity. He is not a coward; he’ll unhesitatingly risk his own life for someone he cares about or for a just cause.

Klye tends to expect the worst in just about every situation. Fate, luck, the gods—these are things Klye shunned from early on. He believes he is the ultimate authority of his life and always dismissed the gods as myths. For a long time, he loathed what the gods represented. He answered to no one but himself, and pitied those who needed the reassurance that there were all-powerful deities floating around, watching over them. But as time goes on, Klye is starting to see that there might be something to the spiritual world.

A person has to earn Klye’s trust and respect. Someone meeting him for the first time would probably feel a bit intimidated and maybe even wary—the man can be hard to read!

Dominic Horcalus

Horcalus comes from a long line of Knights of