I actually can't stop drawing Cookie Run characters. Here's detective novelist Linzer Cookie from the new Cookie Run: Kingdom update.

I needed a break from paleoart, so here's Hollyberry Cookie from Cookie Run: Kingdom in her awesome armor from the Legend of the Red Dragon storyline.

Did another illustration for Wikipedia--this time for Dorypterus, a Permian fish whose previous illustration on the wiki was a really cursed-looking (and more importantly inaccurate) drawing from like 1907.

(It makes me kinda happy that if you do an internet image search for Dorypterus, this image is actually one of the top results.)

The Holly and the Ivy, Chapter 2

Chapter 1 - Chapter 2

A powerful smell, acrid and rich, filled Nan’s sinuses. She sneezed—and her eyes flew open.

The world around her was bright and unfocused, but pungent aromas filled the air and something crackled and popped nearby. And she felt warm, positively hot, wrapped in an enormous fur blanket.

The blanket removed a pawful of leaves from under Nan’s nose. “Ah, there you are,” it said in a deep, husky voice.

Nan blinked and looked up into the green eyes of the dusky-furred female Werelupe that held her. Nearby sat a lighter-furred male, inspecting the chunk of meat that roasted over their fire in a forest clearing. At the sound of the female’s voice, he glanced over and grinned toothily. “It is good that we found you, little one.”

Nan knew these two creatures well. After their king had saved her village from a Monocerous the previous year, he had dubbed Kirven and Nusa the stewards of Caxton Bank.

The Techo broke into a grin. Monsters had indeed found her, much to her advantage. “I’m glad, too,” she said. “But—“ She looked at them in confusion. “I’m supposed to be asleep.”

Did more sketching at the Idaho Museum of Natural History! One of the things I've really been enjoying about sketching fossils from... erm... life...? is the ability to actually view them in three dimensions instead of being relegated to whatever angles are represented in imagery available online. It gives me the ability to pose them much more dynamically and understand their physiology better.

Maybe I made their tyrannosauroid a bit too happy, but I just can't help but imagine him living his best dino life.

Idaho's giant oviraptorosaur! (I know the neck is a little wonky, I was trying to fit the whole thing on the page and maybe didn't succeed.) I suspect these guys had a little more of an upright posture than the average theropod, because with those relatively short tails, spending all their time with their necks extended more horizontally may have presented some balance issues. Their tails were also probably heavily feathered, which helped to provide more weight to counterbalance the front end.

Took a stab (pun intended) at Dinogorgon, one of the species featured on the museum's cool timeline wall that gives a great picture of the history of Earth's biota over the past 400 million years. I've drawn plenty of gorgonopsids before, but Dinogorgon is a rubidgeine, a subclass that were more heavily built. They also have these wide bony flanges on either side of their skulls that probably helped anchor powerful jaw muscles because they were bitey boys. I probably make my gorgonopsids look too mammalian but that's okay because it's cute.*

*This is why I am banned from professional paleoart.**

**Just kidding. I think.

The Holly and the Ivy, Chapter 1

Time for a little holiday cheer!

I really enjoyed writing the Caxton Bank chapters of Worth Searching For, and it made me want to do more with the characters. I thought it would be fun to write a Christmas Giving Day story that draws less from the Victorian Christmas traditions that much of modern celebration is based on, and more from medieval British customs and folklore, as befitting the Meridell region. "The Holly and the Ivy" (the carol) is based on very old English Christmas traditions, so it seemed suitable as the inspiration for this tale.

I also wanted to follow up on what was established about Caxton Bank in Worth Searching For, and show that although the Werelupes started off on the wrong foot with their vassals, their relationship has grown and improved, and it's making everyone's lives better.

I admit I was pleasantly surprised by how little I actually had to edit this one to bring it up to speed with my newer writing. Aside from just a handful of minor prose fixes, I also slightly altered a few details to fall in line with what I later established as canon.

Have a happy and blessed holiday season, everybody!

Chapter 1 - Chapter 2

“Don’t go outside in winter,” Nan’s mother always told her. “There’s a reason most Techos are born on Mystery Island instead of the woods of Meridell.”

“But Mum!” Nan would say, tracing pictures on their fogged-up windows with her blue reptilian fingers. “All the other children get to play in the snow!”

Her yellow Uni mother would then pause from her mending and stoke the fire. “That’s because they’re warm-blooded, love. If you get too cold you’ll fall into torpor, and you won’t wake up ‘til Running.”

“Running?! But I’ll sleep right through Giving Day!” That was all the incentive Nan needed to stay in their cottage until the snows stopped. And that was how winter went in the little hamlet of Caxton Bank, nestled in the foothills of the Werelupe Woods.

Most years, anyway.

The Spirit of Black Keep, Chapter 11

Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter 3 - Chapter 4 - Chapter 5 - Chapter 6 - Chapter 7
Chapter 8 - Chapter 9 - Chapter 10 - Chapter 11

Pharazon swallowed hard and felt a pang of emotion run through him. This was who had been calling him. Quietly, he crept across the rug toward the figure.

It was a large, brown, bearded Skeith wearing black armour. Helmet cradled under one arm, he stared out at the ocean, his expression stern and melancholy. Pharazon thought he resembled Skarl and Hagan slightly, and he seemed thin somehow—not in girth, but in existence. Like a spirit.

As Pharazon approached, the Skeith’s ears pricked and he turned to regard the Draik. “Hello,” he said in a voice so tired and sad that Pharazon instantly felt sorry for him. “Are you trying to resurrect me, too?”