One of the oldest characters + Fanarlem sexuality (Patreon)

A Taste of Magic, Chapter 4:

Dalaran, the annoying necromancer who pops up in The Sorcerer's Equal and A Taste of Magic, is one of the oldest characters. This artwork of him is from 1994, when I was 12. He was a more favored character originally, but frankly he was still pretty annoying from what I recall so it wasn't a big stretch to make him the town pain-in-the-ass.

I was extremely into historical dress as a kid and I can tell I was going through an Elizabethan-era thing when I created the Ven-Diri. Even though this is not great art I still love the intense detail on the lady's dress with multiple layers of collar, slashed sleeves with little puffs, flowers adorning the skirt, and the beads in her hair!

Dalaran was always a necromancer in the story, but originally he was quite powerful and lived in a tower in the deep dark forest that looked like a lighthouse with a beacon on the top. He seduced Queen Azure of Otaré who had pretty much fallen out of love with King Edvar. I could still have that happen but I probably will not. I'm not sure that sort of soap opera would fit in very well with the rest of the story. When I was 13 everything was a soap opera plot because we were all watching The Young and the Restless!!

This chapter is where I also had to first address the awkwardness of Fanarlem sexuality. Well, at least it certainly CAN be awkward. Fanarlem, being created, don't have a natural gender or sex. Either someone has to decide for them at birth, or you would have to wait until they were old enough to decide for themselves.

That's been true through the whole history of the story, of course, and it's been interesting to see gender and sexual norms change in the real world over time and consider that in the context of the story.

Most Fanarlem are assigned a gender at birth by the telepath who calls their soul. They don't always get it right and some Fanarlem might switch their gender identity along the way. This is pretty normal. But no Fanarlem are given sexual parts until adulthood. They're expensive and it isn't thought that they need them anyway. In adulthood sexual parts are only given to Fanarlem who were made for sex. This is obviously quite a traumatic thing for free Fanarlem who usually have to come up with money to buy their own on very low wages. Therefore at this point in history, the majority of Fanarlem are probably sexless, even Fanarlem married to each other. Unless they marry a flesh and blood person few of them are likely to pay for that expense. One of the most common insults for Fanarlem, particularly male ones, is koknabad, or "child without balls".

This also does mean Fanarlem can embody both sexes at once, either in one body or by having two different bodies! More on that later.