Writing Help Wanted - For Lesbian / Nonhuman / Fantasy Story

Writing a story can be a bit tricky, I think we've all been there. I've got probably a good dozen stories that have just stalled (I swear I'll return to them!), but one of them is something I do want to complete. Thing is, I need a little bit of ideas from other people to help get'r'dun.

The story is called, "Queen of Hawks".
The set-up is like so: Queen Gwenverre, her majesty of a small country set deeply in Human Lands wants to establish a peaceful and beneficial relationship with the harpies, the local nonhumans who live in the country's mountains and hills. Starting it wouldn't be a problem. Due to an accident a few months prior, she was stranded on the mountains and was cared for by Piktis, the titular Queen of Hawks and ruler of the harpies. They're both lesbians (what did you expect?), and of course care for each other very deeply.
No, the problem is that Queen Gwenverre's court is less-than-enthusiastic about the alliance. They believe that harpies are barbarians, and they're basically right. Piktis is covered in blue tattoos and wears a loincloth and a large necklace made of small animal bones. She doesn't use much in the way of tools, and she isn't strictly royalty; she's just the most responsible harpy.

I have the / a sex scene written, and I quite like it. It's the reason why I want to finish the work; it'd be criminal to let the scene go wasted. I also have some story written, but it's not good. It's more or less a day in the life of Queen Gwenverre as she meets Piktis and tours Gwenverre's castle (with activities). It's boring, slow, and interrupts the plot while also managing to be it.

Things I want to avoid:
The First Time: Most of my stories are girl meets girl. I have few stories where it's girl has met girl, here's their life from there. I want this story to have that as part of it. I want the couple that we see be already established.
No focus on Piktis: This was part of the problem with what I had written. There's no scenes where it's Gwenverre and Piktis alone and interacting together aside from the sex, and that needs to change.

What I'd like to see:
Idea Spit-balling in this thread: I've got a hard time leading up the sex scene, and no idea what to do after it. Ideas for the story would be greatly appreciated!

Honestly, I think your biggest problem is not wanting to do a girl meets girl story.

Without telling that part of the tale, you're going to have to establish it with exposition in order to get to the normalizing relations plot.

You've also got the drama of the Queen getting stuck in the mountains alone. How did that happen? Where are the guards who were undoubtedly with her? Her handmaidens? She's probably been sheltered in civilization all her life. She's going to be in full-blown panic mode lost alone in the mountains.

Then she runs into this harpy, whom she's undoubtedly been conditioned to believe is a savage who would just as soon claw her into ribbons as look at her.

That's where you're going to get to establish your Harpy Queen. She has to show that she isn't what the Queen expects.

That's your story start.

Then you get to the bringing her to the castle thing.

You have a populace who is reluctant to even treat with the harpies. So, the two of them are going to have to keep their relationship a secret. The people certainly not going to accept their queen going down on a harpy.

You have to cut that tension somehow in order to normalize relations.

An easy way to persuade them would be to have the streams up there absolutely running with gold, which is more or less worthless to the harpies. After going through some tension, have the Harpy Queen notice something gold, wonder about the attachment humans have to it, and then reveal it's littering the streams like gravel.

Greed's a stronger emotion than prejudice.

Let the people into the territory to pan the gold, and find something they can offer the harpies in return.

The ending is obviously the treaty. However, there's a thread you could stretch out, because you still have a clandestine relationship that you could write a follow-up to, if you so choose.

First I'll assume in your world harpies aren't human flesh devourers like in myth and many fantasy settings. And while RejectReality makes some good points if you don't want to have girl meets girl it is your choice.

As far as leading into sex scene since they are established lovers then all that's needed is for them to find a place to be alone whether the royal bedchamber or slipping away to a secluded copse and one saying something like "How I've waited to taste your lips again" or other fantasy story talk.

Now when nations become allies it is generally because it is mutually beneficial not so that two lovers can get together. Possible reason typically would be a threat to both their peoples forcing them to join to fight together to vanquish a common enemy.

But if you don't want to go there consider trade. The harpies could certainly use metal goods, jewelry (even cheap trinkets), woven fabric and other human manufactured goods. The harpies could obtain things hard to get for humans due to location, say feathers from a rare bird that nests in the mountains that is useful in religious ceremonies or for spell components or they could even serve as eye in the sky scouts for the humans in return for goods.

But beyond prejudice and tradition let's say one of the powerful nobles has an ulterior motive for trying to deep six the alliance. The Queen is young and untested, unlike her father or mother who preceded her, and he hopes to either marry, marginalize or even usurp her and he realizes the harpies could prevent this.

Just some ideas but it's up to you to decide what kind of story you want, whether battle or courtly intrigue or whatever to give it direction and conflict.

Classic "cart before the horse".

Plots need tension to propel them. Why would being allies with harpies be mutually beneficial? Does the service/resource the harpies are in possesion of? Does this service threaten an existing, but expensive, ally? For example, trade currently runs from point a to point by boat to circle an"impassable" mountain range, vut allying with the harpies could make it entirely passable. Now you have tension with a shipping consortium, and more specifically, whatever rich baron/duke/asshat runs that.

Throw in that the baron/duke/asshat is already trying to court the queen, and now you have tension!

RejectReality said:

Honestly, I think your biggest problem is not wanting to do a girl meets girl story.

Without telling that part of the tale, you're going to have to establish it with exposition in order to get to the normalizing relations plot.

Click to expand...

Agree with this. If you want to, you could play the in media res game, start with Piktis in the castle but then flash back (either all at once, or interspersed with current events like is so popular on TV these days) to the Queen lost on the mountain and how she became lovers with Piktis.

The main thing I want to know, what is your end game? Does this treaty actually succeed, does it fall apart in the worst way and there is war or almost war, do they just give up on it entirely but Piktis and the Queen continue to pay regular "diplomatic" visits to each other?

The Queen's people don't like the idea of the treaty, how do the other harpies feel about it? Does anybody hate it so much that there's a conspiracy to kill either the Queen or Piktis, or frame Piktis for a crime, or do something to provoke a war even while treaty talks are happening?

rutger5 said:

Now when nations become allies it is generally because it is mutually beneficial not so that two lovers can get together. Possible reason typically would be a threat to both their peoples forcing them to join to fight together to vanquish a common enemy.

But if you don't want to go there consider trade. The harpies could certainly use metal goods, jewelry (even cheap trinkets), woven fabric and other human manufactured goods. The harpies could obtain things hard to get for humans due to location, say feathers from a rare bird that nests in the mountains that is useful in religious ceremonies or for spell components or they could even serve as eye in the sky scouts for the humans in return for goods.

Click to expand...

Doesn't have to be for those reasons, but you do need some solid reason why the Queen thinks there needs to be a treaty despite the "obvious" uselessness of an alliance with the savages as observed by the Queen's people. At the moment it just sounds like a transparent plot device to get Piktis into the castle for sexy fun times with the queen, but you need to solidify this in order to drive the non-sex portions of the plot.

To sum up, really, you have solid characters with a solid backstory, but no story to put them in. You don't know what your main plot conflict is.

I've got some characters in search of a plotline myself, so I can sympathize.