EmmyKtz 🐙 The Pink Hydra
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thepinkhydra.com
EmmyKtz 🐙 The Pink Hydra
@thepinkhydra.com
730 followers 500 following 1.7K posts
Emmylou Kotzé, demi-bi PhD holder, editor, & writer of SF, F, kinky romance, and poetry. Work in Solarpunk, Dirty Magick, and Twenty-two Twenty-eight. Links at linktr.ee/emmyktz. I run The Pink Hydra, Africa's newest and weirdest webzine. Dropped this 🇿🇦
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Describe your cat’s personality with one photo.

Gonna cheat because even though this kitten is now 15 the wide-eyed stare has not changed. ❤️ (My mom's cat.)
Kitten with grey points and blue eyes looking wide-eyed at the camera The same cat, now elderly, but with the same blue eyes and wide-eyed stare
November 30, 2025 at 12:37 AM
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Forest of the Morning is based (loosely) on our 17th century, so it's horses & sailing boats all the way.

EXCEPT they have magical pterodactyls living in this world (Quetzalcoatlus sp.) so of course Fish gets to bond with one & can go much longer distances 🤩
Illustration of a group of Quetzalcoatlus from Wikipedia, hunting small dinosaurs
November 29, 2025 at 11:09 PM
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#WIPSnips Nov 27 - "Disorganize"

"Becoming organized." 😬 At the beginning of Goddess of the Dark, our heroes prepare for battle.
He stepped out of the ground-level room with Korak into the yard, emerging into chaos that was only half becoming organized. Dusk had fallen whilst he’d slept, and the uncertain light made him feel he was half in a dream. Everyone seemed to be running, and anxiety gnawed at Nico as they made their way between riders atop exceedingly nervous mounts, girl-sorcerers hurrying to get where they were supposed to be, and guardsmen looking to sharpen their blades and collect last-minute armaments before it was too late. He had to force himself not to glance up at the clouded sky. He would have advance warning of the quetzal’s approach, if Brightfeather’s repertoire of shrieks and screams during flight were anything to go by.
November 28, 2025 at 1:27 AM
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You've just died.
The 6th picture in your phone gallery is what killed you.

This guy? Noooooo. He's only MILDLY venomous 😂🐍
A small grey-striped snake in a bucket with woodchips
November 27, 2025 at 12:05 AM
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#WIPSnips Nov 21 - "Direction"

Fresh from the virtual quill. Still struggling with this whole sequence but I do like the action in this bit. 🏹
Korak cringed back as the shadowy shape of the quetzal’s rider turned his head unmistakeably in their direction. Nico had no idea what was happening, whether they were immune from Baukin Sylvaissen’s magic, what the best strategy might be for this situation, and the quetzal was already winging straight towards where the two of them crouched on the walkway, high above the yard. Reacting by instinct alone, he drew his sword, lunging at the airborne target. The quetzal banked, so close to Nico that he felt the wind of its passing, avoided his blade, and winged high again, beyond the level of the shield. Nico smelled brimstone and burnt hair, and all the hairs on his body stood on end. Korak grabbed his wrist, and Nico was unnerved to see that he was laughing. “They told me you were crazy!” he guffawed at Nico, who could only blink at him. Nothing felt real.
November 21, 2025 at 9:08 PM
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I did a thing for #poemsabout 😬 an unholy amalgam of #dogtags and last week's #desire

cw: seeeeeeeeeeeeexxx

"Disaster at the base"
he takes my hand and marches me towards the communal bathroom the only place we can have any real privacy we run the shower and fuck with our uniforms still on he knows exactly how I like it from behind officer’s cap going flying light grey tunic pulled all the way down my shoulder the fabric’s not meant to stretch that far I warn him not to tear it he only chuckles softly in my ear but still he’s never yet let me down he is young, like me still skinny as hell tags twine around his neck like a collar good dog disaster if we were to be discovered save that kind of thing for your leave keep it neatly partitioned work in one place sex in another don't shit where you feast behind the closed faces the regulation gestures the bland uniform you’re not supposed to find that uniform a turn-on you’re not meant to have aberrant thoughts *only a soldier can love another soldier* we’re in the business of war here, not love keep your head in the game.
November 21, 2025 at 8:57 PM
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Fiancé got me a copy of "Little Nothing" - last week.

I will not comment on my progress, even though a book this length should not take me more than an afternoon to actually read 😬😭
Cover of "Little Nothing" by Dee Holloway, featuring art of two girls and a very strange horse
November 16, 2025 at 6:10 PM
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*gleefully rubs my bloodthirsty little hands together*

CW: graphic violence, pain, abuse, torture. This is pretty fucked up even though I've redacted the character names.

From Goddess of the Dark, my WIP which will conclude the Forest of the Morning trilogy.
Snippet from Forest of the Morning, book 3, Goddess of the Dark: This is not that bad, it’s not so bad, this is what they do to thieves in Zarath. It doesn’t kill them. How many times had he watched as a shirtless criminal was dragged bleeding off the scaffold in the town square and left to convalesce in the gutter? Usually, they didn’t die. But as the whip came back again and striped his lower back, he had the thought that he had never seen anyone bear more than five lashes. The fifth stroke lashed across his thighs, just below his buttocks, and that was when he began to cry out. She struck again, and again. The lashes bled into each other; he could feel the warm wetness against the dank air, and when he happened to sight the whip in the corner of his eye, its length ran red. He had long since lost count, screaming himself hoarse, when at last she stopped. He could hear her panting. He was close to passing out from the pain, he knew; unable to support his own weight, he hung from his restraints. His breath came in shuddering gasps, and he was shivering violently. He barely had the strength to lift his head as she came up towards him. His blood had spattered her, he saw; there were strings of it in her long hair, over her white shirt, across her face. “And how do you like this?” she whispered softly, brought up her hand and pressed it into the raw welts across his shoulders, covering her fingers in his blood, jolting him with sudden agony that made him lose consciousness for a few moments. When he drifted back, she was standing over him, studying her bloody hand with a kind of detached disinterest. He would remember, later, that there had been no joy on her face, no gleeful sneer at his pain, no pleasure in the thing she had just done. She looked away from him, retrieved her armour and the whip, and walked from the dungeon to the sound of his stuttering, moaning breath and the rattle of his restraints from the uncontrollable shaking.
November 14, 2025 at 4:27 PM
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I feel like it's kind of ~spoilers~ but also not really because I have written MANY short stories about Nico & Fish set after the trilogy and I always manage to sneak "husband" in there somehow soooo...
Snippet from my short story "What Makes a Man" (Cloaked Press, 2024) “Why do you think they took your partner?” Tali asked innocently. “I don’t know,” Fish lied. He was reluctant to explain the gruesome specifics of how a man like Kolfinn could make his temporary powers permanent. A Mage-Gifted sacrifice was ideal, which was no doubt why he’d gone after the girls, but it was likely that a nonmage would be sufficient. Blood was blood, after all, and Fish would forfeit his own Gift ten times over were it ever necessary to save his partner. “You love him very much.” That wasn’t a question, and the simple honesty cut right to Fish’s core. To say that they were more than partners was inadequate. Nico was his husband in truth, in the eyes of the mercenary gods anyhow. They had been lovers since Fish was a dewy-eyed youth of nineteen, more than a decade ago.
November 13, 2025 at 7:43 PM
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This handsome gentleman was waiting in my bathroom tonight, kitted out in a fine velvet cape and the best and bushiest of eyebrows... 🧛🏻😍

(My hand is there for scale)
A large newly uncocooned moth with red eye markings on soft black-and-white wings with large brown "eyebrows" The moth with my hand (average size female) for size comparison. Its wingspan is almost the length of my hand from index finger to wrist.
November 12, 2025 at 10:52 PM
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Seeing a lot of thirst on today's #WIPSnips from us admirers of male beauty 👀

here's my contribution

Nov. 12 - "Shirt"
Snippet from Forest of the Morning: Fish rummaged in his pack, looking for the ointment they used to numb sprains and muscle aches. By the time he found it, Nico had removed vambrace, jerkin, blouse and woollen undershirts, and was trying to assess the extent of the injury for himself. His shoulder was swollen bright red, and Fish winced internally in sympathy. “You should’ve said something earlier,” he said to Nico. “There wasn’t any time, and besides, it was so cold it didn’t hurt.” “Well, all right. Give me your hand, and I’ll help you up. The other hand, Nic.” Fish helped his partner to his feet, led him over to the fire, and helped him down again. “The heat will help. Sit.” Obediently, Nico eased himself into a sitting position on the straw-covered floor, his long legs stretched out in front of him and his left shoulder leaning against the stone pillar of their wash-basin. Fish dropped down cross-legged beside him and began to rub the ointment gently into his shoulder. For a long time neither of them moved nor spoke, Nico seemingly mesmerized by the glowing logs in the fireplace and Fish fascinated by his partner’s well-muscled arms and the way the firelight reflected in his eyes.
November 12, 2025 at 10:46 AM
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It's great that Kobo requires no exclusivity from authors like KU does, and also nice to see prices in my local currency 😸
Rakuten Kobo page for my novel, Forest of the Morning. Cover, synopsis and price in my local currency (Rand). You can buy the ebook or take out a 30 day free trial.
November 11, 2025 at 10:56 PM
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"War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend: the city of the Men of Númenor."

#ArmisticeDay
Faramir from the LOTR movies looking pretty
November 11, 2025 at 5:11 PM
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Convincing you to read my novel by the first sentence. Share yours if you want!

From the moment I decided my epic fantasy needed a prologue, I've never looked back. 😜

books2read.com/forestofthemorning
First page of the print layout of my novel Forest of the Morning. Text reads: Prologue The Armour Hills were brilliant with moonlight. Behind them, the city was burning. Hiram kept a fast grip on his daughter’s hand, willing her not to look back and think about the two they had left behind, willing himself not to stop. They were almost clear of the madness, the slaughter and the burning. They were at the top of the gulley. He stopped to catch his breath. Lathea’s hand, slick with sweat, slid out of his. Her breathing—as it well might be, in her condition—was strained. “They’re killing everybody,” she gasped. “Only those with the Gift,” Hiram insisted. “You and I, we don’t have it. We’ll win free.” She stared at him, huge tears beading in her amber-brown eyes. “Mother has the Mage-Gift.” Her voice shook. “Karat has the Mage-Gift.” She placed a hand, protectively, on her distended stomach. “And you know as well as I do”—her voice broke—“that there’s an even chance my children will have it.”
November 11, 2025 at 1:00 PM
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Post you from a different era.

The mining geologist, 2011. ⛏️

This was for platinum, incidentally 💍
A white woman (me) in white overalls with gumboots, orange knee pads and a hard hat with headlamp, posing in front of a platinum/chromium seam by the entrance of a mine in South Africa.
November 7, 2025 at 3:28 PM
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FUCK AI.

Show me something you made without the use of AI.

My book covers were made from stock pictures and fonts, with art by me.

Tonight I made the first draft of cover art for book 3.

(Pls excuse the shitty photo quality as I am currently in bed with only my tablet to hand 😅)
Two paperback books, Forest of the Morning and its sequel Maiden of Despair are on a blanket. Both covers have sketch art of various character headshots against leafy background. Above them is a sketch (black pen on paper) for the cover art of my third book, featuring hands and an ominous background
November 5, 2025 at 1:09 AM
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I finished watching the 2011 Camelot series. 🤔

For a show that shot itself in the foot with some of the cringiest fanservice of the era, a surprising highlight was Sir Gawain's very consistent asexuality.

We support ace knights of the Table Round in THIS house ✊
Photo of Gawain from Camelot (2011) played by Clive Standen. He's dressed in generic mediaeval leather armour with brown hair and a beard (very chiseled features). The photo is manipulated so he appears to be hoisting the asexuality pride flag (black, grey, white and purple stripes) onto his shoulder.
November 3, 2025 at 9:40 PM
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oho! I have an art reference here 😁

"The Apotheosis of War" by Vasily Vereshchagin, 1871.

Apparently the real-world location of this was meant to be in Uzbekistan.

#TROPRewatch
The painting "The Apotheosis of War" by Russian artist Vasily Vereshchagin. A giant pile of human skulls lies in the desert, with crows flying all about. In the distance is the ruined city of Samarkand in modern-day Uzbekistan.
November 2, 2025 at 6:59 PM
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#WIPSnips Nov 2 - "cobweb"

"Spiderweb" - to round off spooky week, Albryan makes contact with something creepy and unexpected 🕸️🕷️
Snippet from Forest of the Morning: He had not gone far, only a few dozen paces, when he saw the spiderweb. Albryan halted in his tracks, willing his racing heart to calm down. Though the entire area around was criss-crossed with these sticky magic webs, there had not been one this close to his tree last night. The sorcerer had been here whilst Albryan was sleeping, and had woven this without waking him. The idea of someone wielding such subtle magic, of moving so quietly beneath the trees, made the hair on the back of his neck stand up. His mouth went dry. Albryan approached the web, looking carefully for any signs of the sorcerer’s passage, which way they might have gone. This sorcerer was as good a woodsman as magician, however, and had cleverly concealed their tracks. He turned away from the web. Something glittered in the corner of his eye.
November 2, 2025 at 3:48 PM
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#WIPSnips Nov 1 - "Ancestor"

I might have posted this one before but I really love it. 🖤 At the heart of the entire conflict in my novels, and this between two men who love & trust each other like no-one else.
From Forest of the Morning, book 2: The dance stopped all at once, Fish coming to rest on one knee with his arms outstretched and his head thrown back, and something crested, overflowing through and out of him. Nico could not contain a gasp of fright. Lightning, bolts of it, blue and fierce, flashed and danced around his partner’s prone form, across his outstretched hands, along the skin of his face, which was still and calm. Nico watched with bated breath as the lightning arced forth, soundlessly exploding outwards towards the sky, branching out in a great glowing tree over the surface of the lake. It fissured and glimmered, a nest of silent blue snakes as cold as stone. It was beautiful, yet Nico felt a primal fear arise deep within him. Fish curled in on himself, appearing to push through something as sticky and unyielding as cold tar to bring his wrists together crosswise, palms of both hands spread and facing outwards. He moved his right fingers into a complicated, deliberate gesture, and the lightnings flickered and glowed and then dispersed, vanishing so silently and suddenly that Nico blinked and wondered if perhaps he had been imagining things. Tension drained out of the air as if a plug had been pulled somewhere in the ether. Fish gave a groan and collapsed to a crouch with none of his usual grace, his hair hanging limp with exertion. Nico wanted to go over to him, but was held back by apprehension. Fish had not warned him away, yet he could sense the danger around his young partner, thick as pea soup fog. For just a moment, Nico understood precisely how his distant nonmage ancestors must have felt, coming to land on this wild shore a thousand years ago and seeing a display like that. He shivered, thinking of the fireside stories people in Svanfeld told, of the slender dark Morgei with their inscrutable almond eyes, watching from the primaeval forest as the men of Svanfeld and Vailana stumbled through their hunting grounds. Alt text continued: Yet the eyes he imagined were the same as Fish’s eyes, deepset and golden, and Nico had never feared what lay in those eyes, not until Fish had flung a sizzling cloud of red-hot energy a few feet over his head and made it rain body parts around him. How dangerous was he, truly?
November 1, 2025 at 9:55 PM
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Minizine #3 is officially released! ⚔️

Our featured short story is "The Sword of Bellerose" by @mxgomez78.bsky.social. It's a dark S&S-type fantasy with a twisted relationship between the Lady Bellerose and her "sword."

Ko-fi: ko-fi.com/s/e5c9440194

itch: thepinkhydra.itch.io/something-ol...
Cover of Something Old, Something New featuring the Pre-Raphaelite painting "Clytemnestra after the Murder" by John Collier. The titular Clytemnestra, a woman wearing fine clothing and jewellery, holds a curtain with only sinister shadow behind. She leans on an axe almost as tall as she is. If you look closer, you can see a look of confusion and madness in her eyes. Text on the cover reads: Vol. 1, No. 3, November 2025. Poetry by A. E. Housman. Artwork by John Collier. New: Sadomasochism & sorcery by Matthew X. Gomez. Reviewed: The best gory offerings of indie mag Inner Worlds.
October 31, 2025 at 10:47 PM
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#WIPSnips Oct 31 - "Monster"

Given the day, I felt this creepy scene appropriate 🪾 What else is out there in the woods? 👀
Snippet from Forest of the Morning: Still, she couldn’t help feeling a twinge of unease as she strode up the path. It began to climb almost immediately, twisting up to the cliffside. The woods pressed close on both sides, sombre evergreens towering over the birch and star chestnut that had just begun to unfurl their new leaves. The mountain’s silence hung over all, birds asleep in the late noon heat, no wind stirring in the branches. She had not gone more than a couple of paces when suddenly there was a loud rustling in the bushes behind her. Velda whipped around, her heart racing, but there was nothing. She scanned the muddy path, and noticed the swaying of a large wormwood bush to her left. Slowly the leaves on the bush came to rest, and silence fell all around her. Velda slowly let out the breath she had been holding. She had never carried a weapon in the mountains. There had been a bandit attack on the town one winter, when she was about eleven, and they had warded themselves with crossbows set upon the high walls of the monastery. Emmett had kept a cudgel in the kitchen and sometimes taken it with him on late errands, but had never needed to use it. Lynborder was a remote place, and its people were not so rich as to tempt burglars or highwaymen. As for monsters… If there was anything there, it would have attacked me by now, she told herself, and turned her back upon the slope. Doggedly she trudged up the familiar path, yet she could not shake a prickling feeling at the back of her neck, as though something else were out there in the woods.
October 31, 2025 at 7:54 AM
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#WIPSnips Oct 30 - "Spell"

Us who write fantasy are just going to have to choose, so difficult 😅

Here's a little bit of fluff from a short story.

🎶"....Because you're miiiiiiiiine"🎶
Snippet: ‘I am not leaving Nico here on his own,’ Fish spat. ‘Not for anything.’ ‘I didn’t say that,’ Tali snapped back. ‘I was going to say that you could break the spell by its own rules. I know this kind of web. It’s tangled and complicated, yes, but it can’t hold up against a strong emotional bond. Against love.’ Fish looked blankly up at her. ‘What do you mean?’ ‘Like in the old tales,’ Tali explained, ‘Nico could be awoken from this magical slumber by his true love’s kiss.’ Fish could feel himself flushing, and hoped that Tali would not notice, given the gloom of the chamber and the deep brown hue of his own face. ‘I—I hadn’t thought of that.’ Tali shrugged. ‘It’s worth a try, right? Nothing to lose by it.’ Fish shifted his feet until he crouched comfortably beside Nico, and leaned his torch against the wall. Tali watched avidly as he took Nico’s hand, carefully testing the edges of the spell that had woven itself securely around him. Tali was right. The touch of love—real, strong, true love—would wither the silver tendrils into nothingness. But anything less—a bond based solely on sex, for example, or one that involved any form of abuse or coercion—would harden the tendrils, making it even more difficult to extricate Nico from their thorny clutches.
October 30, 2025 at 10:53 AM
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#WIPSnips 29 Oct - "Broomstick"

Multiple mentions of "brooms" in Forest of the Morning, but this chapter opening is my fave ✨🧹
Excerpt from Forest of the Morning: Chapter 8: The Guilds Nico had succeeded in backing him into a corner of the yard, and was coming at him with a swordstroke aimed right at his head. There was no escape for Fish—at least, no escape that his partner could see. Fish ducked beneath the flying broomstick handle with lightning speed, rolled, and caught Nico across the shins with his own stick on the way up again. Nico fell to the ground, swearing loudly, as Fish straightened up, grinning and leaning the stick against his shoulder. “You’ve been spending too much time practicing with Siegfried,” Fish told his partner smugly, one hand holding the stick, the other resting on his hips in a deliberately languid posture. “You’ve forgotten how a smaller opponent can trick you into spending your strength against him.” Nico glared up at him. “It’s not fair,” he growled, panting. “How do you beat me every time?” “You’re too easily distracted.” “No, I’m not,” Nico insisted, and began to argue with him. Fish took the opportunity to catch his breath, feeling the cold Firstmonth air blowing through his thin shirt, drying the sweat he had worked up during the match. Nico did not know how close he had come to winning, and Fish would never admit to it.
October 29, 2025 at 2:43 PM
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#WIPSnips Oct 28 - "Costume"

Gonna go with vibes for this one. Even though it's not a costume ball, it's still a fancy dress party 👗
Snippet from Forest of the Morning, book 2: Green seemed to be Mialiné’s colour, and Fish had anticipated that he would look dreadfully out of place on her arm wearing red. His waistcoat now was a deep seafoam blue, studded with bronze buttons, and the shirt he wore underneath it was of the softest white silk Fish had ever seen. Albryan had helped him dress and clean up earlier that afternoon, saying much less than usual. At the end of it, he’d simply clasped Fish’s hand and said, “Good luck.” The trappings of privilege and wealth in Qwu’Mallorn were not so much different from those Fish already knew: a luxurious carriage ride, a picturesque castle a mile or so out of Tenna, beautifully dressed young people holding court in an ancient, open-walled garden surrounded by baskets of flowers and bustling servants. The air was redolent with the fumes of tobacco and perfume, rose-water, vanilla, cinnamon and sugar. There were a lot of young men who brushed past, stopping to make small talk with Mialiné, or offering her some light snack or cigarillo. She all but ignored every one of them in favour of Fish. He was intrigued by the lack of chaperones or older adults, and Mialiné was happy enough to explain everything to him.
October 28, 2025 at 4:48 PM