About The Mythic Sons Story
This is a fantasy memoir of Xacarius "Xac" Cassovell — half-satyr bard, former frontman of The Mythic Sons, and a man with an almost supernatural talent for making bad decisions. Years after the band's rise and spectacular collapse, Xac sits down to tell the story himself, looking back with equal parts humor, regret, and the kind of perspective that only arrives after you've survived your own disasters.
At its heart, it's the story of the Mythic Sons. For a brief, glorious stretch of time, they were the biggest thing in Vadura. Xac sang lead. Brad, a tiefling with a gittern and enough charm to start wars, handled backup vocals. Gunther pounded the drums. Odo supplied impossible pixie falsettos and more glitter than any reasonable person should encounter in a lifetime. Becket brought his magically enhanced vielle and the quiet steadiness the rest of them lacked. Together, they became something none of them expected.
Then it all fell apart.
A lot of that has to do with Lirien.
Lirien is an ancient sentient lyre carved from living wood. She is brilliant, magical, dramatic beyond measure, and hopelessly in love with Xac. She speaks directly into his mind, occasionally plays herself when she's feeling emotional, and has very strong opinions about nearly everything—especially Xac. She helped make him famous. She also played no small role in everything that followed.
The story begins on the night the band finally breaks apart at Woebryn’s Echo Amphitheater. From there, Xac works backward through the years, retracing the moments that built the Mythic Sons into something extraordinary and the mistakes that slowly pulled them apart. The reader knows from the beginning how it ends. The question is how they got there.
Xac tells the story the way Xac tells everything: with jokes, detours, questionable self-awareness, and occasional attempts to dodge responsibility. He'll interrupt himself to promise stories he'll tell later. He'll insist certain decisions made perfect sense at the time. Sometimes he'll even be right. Beneath all the humor, though, is someone trying to understand what happened to the people he loved and the life he lost.
If you've ever wondered what happens after the legendary adventure is over—after the applause fades, the band breaks up, and everyone goes their separate ways—that's really what Xac the Bard is about.
Also, there are vampires.
In fairness, that's rarely Xac's fault.
Stay with me on my writing journey. I hope you like the band as much as I do.