I think it’s quite natural for a book series or trilogy to add characters as it goes along. Not only does it allow for the replacement of characters who either meet an early demise or simply aren’t involved anymore, it gives the writer a chance to shake things up. I’m not sure how often one of those characters who makes a late appearance was supposed to show up from the very beginning.

When I originally concieved of The Water Road it was as a book that old the stories of four characters. Two, of course, were Antrey and Strefer. The third was Renzi, who appears in The Endless Hills. The fourth was a Sentinel who, at the time, was named Faaip (after the odd track at the end of Tool’s Lateralus album).

Faaip was going to futilely chase Antrey through the Neldathi mountains and provide a separate point of view for what she did with the Neldathi. But it became clear the further I got into The Water Road that it was really the story of two women on parallel paths after each discovered a terrible secret. Renzi and Faaip just didn’t fit into that, so their stories got cut. Renzi’s became The Badlands War, a novella that should be out next year in some fashion.

Faaip was just forgotten until I started working on The Bay of Sins. I wanted a point of view character who was leading the search for Antrey once she leaves her exile. What better person to do it than the one who failed so miserably before? I changed the name to Faerl, surrounded him with a mind walker second in command and a few refugees from Renzi’s Rangers and turned him loose.

It makes it more interesting (I hope) to have someone with a past specifically related to Antrey chasing her rather than just some goon with orders to follow. It drives Faerl to do some hard things and, in the end, seals his fate before he even gets going. But saying more would ruin the story.

This is the final Water Road Wednesday post that deals with a person or place in the world of The Water Road trilogy. Now that the first two books are out (with the third on the way!) it’s gotten progressively harder to talk about such things without running into spoilers.

From here on out it’s all excerpts from The Bay of Sins, a cover reveal, and the release of the final book in the trilogy!

For more information on The Water Road and The Endless Hills check out the trilogy page here, which includes links to all my Water Road Wednesday posts this year.