New Scene for Legion of Traitors

One of the great blessings of self publishing is that, when you find a flaw in your work, you can just fix it. Rewrite, reupload the manuscript, and presto, no more flaw! (Of course, you’ll find another one soon enough, but that’s a problem for later.)

Point is, thanks to several reviewers and my editor, I understand that one of the biggest problems with Legion of Traitors (and thus with the entire first act of the Exile War series) is that Cleo gives up on her children too easily. She’s a mother. Her kids would be front and center in her mind at all times. But when she switches sides to the Archons, she leaves her children behind with the Gentle Hand. Originally, I tried to paper over that with a couple throwaway lines of her inner monologue, but it just didn’t work. So I’m considering replacing those lines of inner monologue with a real scene between Cleo and her kids that explains her choice to leave them.

I want your feedback on how I did!

If you’ve read all the way to Hope for Mercy in the Exile War series, or even if you’ve just read Legion of Traitors, I would love to know your feedback. Does this new scene affect your appreciation of Cleo as a character? Do you think it introduces any land mines that will go off later? Click below to remind yourself about how this goes in the original, and then see the new version. Then let me know on X or on the Exile War Facebook page.

Click here to re-read the original version of the end of Chapter 22

Click here to get the new version of the end of Chapter 22.

And I might add, those of you who’ve read Hope for Mercy will notice a couple strong hints in this!