The Clouds of Escalion has over 8,000 words of deleted scenes that popped up in that way- including an entirely different opening chapter. The book went through a lot of restructuring in the early days of writing, and sometimes I would remove entire pages of text if I found a better way of working through a scene.
While writing Tales from Aquis, I had a look back through the deleted scenes archive as I was in there anyway- and thought I would share the following snippet of Fenrir and Bragi discussing the longhouse.
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“I never did tell you what my ability was, did I Fenrir?”
He paused for a moment, lighting a long pipe that emerged from a small chest in the corner.
“The longhouse and I are connected in a way that defies explanation. While one of us exists, the other cannot die. If you burned this building to the ground right now another would take its place, so long as I lived. Likewise, I cannot die while this building holds together. The moment those men destroyed the longhouse, I felt drawn to this place, as I do whenever I leave. The impulsion is strong; I am shackled here more strongly than you can imagine.”
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Incidentally, chapter six of Tales from Aquis is now complete. The manuscript is already approaching the 25,000 word mark; it’s been quite the train ride.