Taking Advantage

I couldn't help myself.  I had to join in Nathan Bransford's "The Surprisingly Essential First Page Challenge."  I hate to take advantage such a clearly nice guy.  He even posted my submission for me because (I'm guessing) the dial-up load times were interfering with my ability to comment on that particular post.  I was able to comment on other posts so I believe I was timing out or some such.  Anyway, I looked over my stuff and decided, weirdly, to try with the opening to Mayhem, I think because it stands out most of all my openings.  This makes me want to rewrite the opening to Masks yet again.  Gawd, I just want to smash my head through the wall every time I think about changing the opening to Masks.  Anyway:

As a small child I once lost my balance and touched my hand on a red hot stove.  Before the pain stabbed into my fingers and struck my mind I remember feeling foolish and frightened.  I cried out a not-very-small-child curse and put my fingers in my mouth just as the pain hit me.  My mother hurled herself across the kitchen and pulled me up into her arms.  That scent of our tribe's plush wool, the softness of homespun cloth against my face, the red hair of a Kilhells woman and green eyes staring into mine had always brought me comfort.

I know I'm dreaming, but that same hot pain I remember feels real, and there's no comfort this time.  I'm trapped in that room again, the desert heat doubled by infernal fire in a hearth.  I'm tied with bark rope on top of a camel hair rug.  Instead of hot pokers, carving instruments are heating to white brilliance three feet from my face.  There's a helefrit straddling me.  Nearby, the blood of an infant has dried to black flakes.  I want to wake up, but just like when it was actually happening, I'm helpless.

Something wooden cracks nearby and all at once I'm awake, gasping, my heart pounding so hard it hurts.  My body tingles from the memory of my flesh burning and I'm sticky and smelly with sweat.  I'm back in the present, cradled in a hammock in the belly of a sailing ship.  Sailors stand around a barrel they've dropped.  One sailor glances my way from under the brim of his dirty white hat with an apologetic look.  The others don't meet my gaze.  I'm not sure if they know something's wrong with me, or if it's just me.  My name is famous.  I'm famous, though hardly anyone has met me.  It's always a surprise when people take my word for it that I am who I say I am.  I'm plenty tall for a woman, but I don't think I'm tall enough for a myth.  I don't wear armor, I've lost my sword, and not only did I fail to do anything to aid the war, I think I might be on my way to assassinate the only man who can save the world.

I think people believe that no one would dare claim they were me.  I don't feel up to defending my name or my honor, though, as I awkwardly climb out of the hammock and go to ease the pressure in my bladder.  I don't stagger as the massive ships rocks from one side to the other.  My sea legs come back faster each time I sail, and take longer to go away when I'm on dry land again.  For hours after a long voyage, sometimes overnight, it feels like the land rolls under me, and I often dream of storms at sea.

Struggling Against the Wind of Submission

Heya, all you INKers! Submissions for the next critique group are due today by midnight!

I've been trying to get something ready, but I don't know if I'll make the deadline. I'll keep plugging away, though, as I want to get the story revision finished so I can concentrate on a newer story revision.

It is good to go over these older stories. I get a good sense of what I was trying to accomplish and where I went wrong and I'm having an easier time reworking them into a theme. It's also fun to see what language I used and how my usage has evolved. I was really wordy (okay, I'm still wordy, but not quite as wordy).

Example: In the old text I have "The wind had slept in the hours she had set out from the Iceholm, but the evening shadows had awoken it, and now she struggled against its icy attack as she made her way homeward."

Ugh, that's a mouthful. So I cut it down: "The wind had slept when she set out from the Iceholm. It woke with the evening and breathed icy daggers into her as she struggled homeward."

The sentence is also getting moved around in the paragraph. Still not liking the icy daggers cliche, but it'll work until I come up with something better. Icy breath? Breathed ice? Blew its icy breath?

Can't . . . turn . . . off . . . editing . . . brain . . .

Excerpt from Signet

He didn't have to go to the Church, however, but to the neighboring Court. It was a long, rectangular black building with a graceless, blocky entrance, also watched by two guards. These doors would always open, day and night.
"Because vengeance cannot sleep until justice is done," he whispered, paraphrasing from poetry.
The guards straightened up and looked wary as he came up the narrow stairway. Without question, they opened the doors. Interesting. He didn't have to declare his business, and they didn't escort him either.
He didn't need an escort. He knew the way.
There, in the cold, plain hallway, the bench where he'd sat and waited his turn at regular intervals from age eleven to age nineteen. At the moment an old woman sat there, nodding beside a middle-aged man who had a sleeping baby in his arms. The man hugged the child closer when he noticed Lark. The shifting drew the old woman's attention. She looked Lark's way and stared boldly, sizing him up as if death held no fear for her anymore. Then she looked back down and clasped her hands tight over her belly.
The door opened and a girl of about twelve years in a dirty skirt and dirtier blouse came out. A cold voice followed her. "Next."
Oh, that voice, so familiar. The old woman and the middle-aged man didn't move. Lark nodded thanks to them and walked in.
Icy blue eyes gazed up and froze. The dark-haired priest stared, the pen in his hand still after a long stretch of scribbling across a ledger. His mouth tightened and he closed the ledger book.
Lark set the bottle of brandy on the desk. Anger bubbled up from nowhere and everywhere, a hatred for this priest that ran so deep it was a part of his spine. The priest hadn't done anything to the boy Lark had been. He'd only been a stone in a cell wall, and as free of personality as rock, but still Lark felt a powerful urge to destroy him. "Remember me?" Lark asked.
The priest turned around to place the ledger among many others in the bookcase on the wall. Then he turned back, folded his hands together on the table, and looked a long time at Lark's face. Defensiveness and loathing gave way to realization in the priest's expression. "Yes."
Lark sat down. "I'm here to pay off my indenture."
The priest continued to stare a moment before he pursed his lips. "Clever."

Characters

Of the five stories I am currently working on, all of them are well over 2,000 words, and one just passed 11,000. That feels very, very good. I can't think of any other time I reached over 10,000 words on a story that was not for NaNo.

What impresses me lately is how I can go so readily from working on an historical fiction one day and switch to a fantasy the next. The characters are so completely different. Here, let me show you:

The meal was served, and the conversation observed over it was hushed, kept to small household matters that Aberlin was not a part of. The Earl's health was raised, but only exhaustion was claimed for his absence. Aberlin suspected more, but she didn't speak her mind. She concentrated on her meal and on the nuances of the conversation between Gilbert and his wife. Theirs was a common enough marriage, made as much for dowry and degree as it was for feeling. They were comfortable with one another in a manner that all strangers eventually become accustom to one another. But there was no true love between, not of the kind that had grown between her and Warrick. And, sincerely, Aberlin was sorry for that. For all her position as tolerated outcast, she was fond of Gilbert and of simple, homely Mary. They were good folk, honest in their word and in their expressions. Which is why she knew something was bothering Gilbert a great deal and it had everything to do with Aberlin.

But Aberlin had made a study of patience. She waited for the news to come to her.

It did so just as the meal was finishing. She knew it was coming when Gilbert looked directly at her, something he'd been avoiding throughout the meal. "We will be making a journey in two days. I am told you are to pack for a voyage."

Aberlin allowed herself a moment to control her emotions before she spoke. In only two sentences, Gilbert had eluded to far too much. She chose the most innocuous of her questions. "And in what manner should I prepare?"

Gilbert looked confused. Clearly, he'd expected a far more condemning sort of query.

"If I am to pack for a voyage," Aberlin explained calmly, "I should like to know in what manner to pack. Will the climes be warm or chilled? Should I expect much in dampness?"

"I . . . I really couldn't say," he stammered.

That is from my historical fiction The Lady Grey. Aberlin is very controlled sort of character. poised and patient. Rhys, from my fantasy Warrior Storm, most definitely is none of those things:

"You're awfully sure of who I am," Rhys told the girl.

The girl's face brightened. It was a pretty face, the kind that hasn't seen much sun or harsh weather, though there was something about it that spoke of past tragedies. Rhys was quick enough to recognize that. Tragedy leaves a mark even beauty can't
completely hide. "I knew from the lock in your hair. I'd have known you from that before I saw you speaking with Caleb."

Rhys' hackles rose and the girl shrank away from the show of anger. "What do you know about that?"

"I . . . I was on my home. I saw you in the street speaking with him." She hesitated, but a streak of courage showed itself with determination. "Did you come to get him away from here? Is he needed somewhere else?"

"The only thing that man needs is a kick in the head," Rhys growled. "And you need a kick in the ass. You've had your fun. Get on home."

"No, you've got it wrong!" The girl reached out as if to catch Rhys before she could walk away. "I need your help."

"Go ask the great Caleb."

"You don't understand." The girl sagged against the wall. "He's the problem."

"He's everyone's problem."

The girl straightened suddenly. "I could get you a horse."

Wariness edged through her, but Rhys hesitated. "How do you mean?"

"You said you needed a horse. I know where a couple are. No one would miss them."

So that was it, was it? "Them, huh? And for this act of kindness, you'd expect me to take you with me?"

"Well--"

"Look, girl, I'm not out on a joy ride. You've got no place with me and no business stealing horses."

"But I wouldn't be stealing them. Not exactly."

Rhys eyed the girl. "Sorry. Can't help you."

Rhys is great fun to write. I don't even bother avoiding cliches with her, because that's just the sort of character she is. In a rewrite, I'll weed them out and fill in either with something more clever or just make sure the tone conveys that sense of her, but for the rough draft I just play.

But I enjoy writing Aberlin just as much. She's a quick-study of others, but doesn't reveal much herself, for the moment. That's going to change later, when she has to trust someone she really doesn't want to trust (he doesn't really endear anyone with the word 'trust' actually). And Rhys will get to show some of her softer side later in the story, too, which will be hard for her.

It makes each day writing a new experience when I get to chose from such diverse characters, sometimes amid the same story. Rhys' dearest friends are as opposite in personality from her as Aberlin is, and Aberlin's nemesis come partner couldn't be further from her in disposition.

Which makes those head-banging days go a little easier. And makes days like today, when I whip through 1100 words without blinking, the most fun of all!