Every book I write starts with a person, but somewhere around the second page it needs a place to stand. For The Immortal Child, the sequel to The Unfettered Child, that place is Sunat Kabisa, the capital of Havalla. I want to show you a little of how it came together, without giving anything away.
Why a bazaar city?
The Unfettered Child spent a lot of its time in dark, close spaces. When I started the sequel, I wanted the opposite at first: noise, color, crowds, the smell of bread and spice, and a hundred voices bargaining at once. A bazaar gave me all of that. It's also a place where everyone is selling something, and a lot of them are hiding something too. That tension is the kind of thing dark fantasy runs on.
I drew on Persian architecture and old Silk Road market towns for the look: tiled arches, hanging lanterns, striped awnings, and narrow lanes that open suddenly onto light. I didn't want a copy of any real city. I wanted a place that felt lived in, where the stones had been worn smooth by centuries of feet.
The Meydan: the heart of the city
At the center of Sunat Kabisa is the Meydan, a vast tiled square ringed by two stories of pointed arcades. A long reflecting pool runs down the middle, and a turquoise dome rises in the distance. In daylight it's a market. At dusk it becomes a stage.
I love writing public squares because so much can happen in plain sight there. A song can draw a crowd. A crowd can hide a stranger. Someone on a balcony can watch everything and say nothing. The Meydan gives the city a heartbeat, and it gives my characters somewhere to be seen, whether they want to be or not.
A city told through one street musician
Places only come alive when someone walks through them. In The Immortal Child, one of my guides is Omar, a nineteen-year-old street musician and an incorrigible charmer who plays the barbat, a short-necked lute. Omar knows every shortcut, every vendor, and every corner where the coins fall best.
Seeing the city through a musician changed how I wrote it. I started paying attention to sound: the echo under an arch, the hush of a square when the first note lands, the way a song can carry across water. Omar doesn't describe Sunat Kabisa so much as play it.
Worldbuilding from the ground up
Here's what helped me most, if you're building a fantasy city of your own:
- Start with one street, not a map. Walk it in your head and notice what you smell and hear.
- Give the place a rhythm: what it's like at dawn, at noon, and after dark.
- Let a character's job decide what they notice. A musician hears the city, and a thief watches its exits.
- Keep the details sparse and true. One worn step says more than a page of description.
Coming soon
The Immortal Child is still being written, a little every night. If you'd like to walk the lanes of Sunat Kabisa with me as the book takes shape, start with The Unfettered Child and come along.
Thanks for reading. You can read The Unfettered Child on Amazon, and join my newsletter for behind-the-scenes updates. You can also find me on Facebook and X.
— Michael