Oh, dread juvenalia, no!
Jun. 22nd, 2008 02:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stillsostrangeLike an unfortunate pox, I've caught a meme from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
blackaire. The trunk novel meme.
I just reread all 100k words of my Dread Juvenalia, Falling Towers. It's a dog's breakfast, plot-wise, and full of scaffolding, not enough contractions, manpain, adolescent angst, statements of the obvious, and way too much inner monologue, but I'm still very fond of it. It also reads like a Venn diagram of authors I was ripping off in any given scene. (Jennifer Roberson, George Martin, C.J. Cherryh, Lynn Flewelling...) Not to mention the scene I'd completely forgotten about, when one character asks another "What gods do you pray to?" Seriously--this is comedy gold.
He was dreaming when the guards came for him. The scrape of the door banished green hills and trees, returning him to the dank cell. Adam was glad to wake. He hated those dreams—it would be better not to dream at all. The dreams reminded him that there was something outside these walls, and offered some illusory home that had never existed. Thoughts like that would drive him mad.
Blinding torchlight flooded the room and he heard heavy feet on the stone, the clank of iron. The movement startled the vermin, who scurried away with a rustle of rotten straw. His tears turned the guards into an ugly blur as they chained him and dragged him away.
The men offered no conversation as they walked, and Adam didn’t ask for any. He was too busy making his legs work--long captivity had leeched his strength. How long? he wondered. He had lost track of the weeks, the months. Am I going to the headsman after all? The thought made him chuckle. The younger of the guards started at the sound, his hand tightening on his sword hilt.
“Quiet!” the other said, jerking on the chains. Adam stumbled and nearly fell. Bloody thoughts rose in his mind, but he was too weak to do more than think them.
They took him past the row of iron doors, the row of tombs. The cells here were cold and lightless, buried under the ground--the cells reserved for murderers and perpetrators of other foul deeds, or for those the city wished to forget. The guards hauled him to another room and shoved him inside. This time he did fall, landing painfully on his hands and knees amid a rattle of iron. The door slammed shut behind him.
Adam knelt for a moment, letting his eyes adjust to the candlelight. He could hear breathing from the other side of the room, but no one spoke. Fine. I can play that game as well.
The sight of his own hands was disconcerting. They were little more than talons, his nails ragged and imbedded with grime. The manacles hung loose around his bony wrists. Not loose enough, he thought, trying and failing to pull free. He was too thin all over. He had tried to exercise as much as he could in the narrow confines of his cell, but too much muscle had atrophied, too much flesh had wasted away. Under the dirt, his skin was sallow and pale and his hands too soft where they had once been hard with sword calluses. With a grimace, he raked his matted black hair away from his face. He was crawling with lice and fleas, and for once was glad he couldn’t grow a beard.
Adam pushed himself to his feet, the weight of his chains hindering him more than it should have. Too weak... The room was small and bare, lit only by several candles, but it wasn’t a cell. He could make out a man’s shape standing in the shadows, watching him.
After several moments the man stepped forward. His hair and beard were long and white, his skin wrinkled as old parchment. Robes of dark blue silk hung off his thin frame, and he wore a jeweled chain around his neck. The candlelight lined his face with shadows. He stood across the room and watched. Afraid of me, Adam wondered, or afraid of my fleas?
“I know I’m pretty,” Adam said at last, his voice rough and raw with disuse, “but did you really have me brought out here just to stare?”
She was in her parents’ house again, that burned so many years ago. In this dream she was no child, but grown, and no ravens spoke to her. She walked from room to room, searching for something, someone. Only cold silence greeted her, and a loneliness that grew with each empty room she found. At last, frustrated, she decided to leave the house entirely. She threw open the main doors, but paused on the threshold as she saw what lay outside.
She expected to find the lands of Linden, as she always did, the forests and the distant mountains. The land that stretched out before her now was not Linden. The sky above her was pewter, dull iron, shining silver—nothing so mundane as blue or grey. There was no sun, and the light was the eldritch gloom of twilight, or dawn. She could not have said which. The sky cast a pearlescent grey shadow over the hills and fields that lay before her. Mountains did rise against the far horizon, but these were not the Aillerons, but rather carious spires of rock, like pitted teeth against the sky. She thought the stone was red, but in the queer light it was hard to be certain.
A strange foreboding filled her at the thought of setting foot onto this land, a sense of irrevocable change. But what else was she to do, with only an empty house behind her? She took a step out of the doorway.
Do not, a voice said. She could not say where it came from, nor whether it was male or female, only that it was gentle, and inexorable, and froze her where she was.
You should not be here, my Lady. Go back.
And turn she did, searching for the speaker. She was still alone. And the house was no longer a step behind her. Now it was some distance away, a distance that threatened and left her cold.
“Where should I go?” she called out. Her voice was a tiny thing under the boundless leaden sky.
Go back to your house, while you dream still holds.
“But I’m alone there.”
You will wake, and be among friends. You do not belong here, Lady. Go back.
I’m only dreaming. Even as the thought formed in her mind, the house in front of her wavered and became even more distant.
You do not wish to wake here, the voice warned, still kind, still relentless. Go back.
Thrice warned, she thought. There would be no more warnings. So she ran. Cold wind whipped at her hair, set her skirts to flapping, threatened to steal the breath from her lungs. Still she ran. The house did not move again, but it seemed less and less solid the nearer she came. Her heart was heavy with dread, her feet were heavy as they raced over the silver-shadowed ground, and still she ran.
The house was just ahead of her now, the wood and stone as tenuous as light and shadow. She reached out to open the door, but her hand passed right through it. With one last desperate stride, she threw herself forward, through the fading door, over the vanishing threshold...
And woke gasping in the darkness. She was sitting up, her lungs still burning, her heart pounding. The shadows around her were unfamiliar, the bed beneath her strange. She reached out a trembling hand and touched heavy bed-hangings. They were real, tangible. Beside her in the dark, she heard Caitlin’s deep breathing. That was a familiar sound, and it drew her back to herself.
Vallorn, she reminded herself. Eisgard.
So comforted, she lay back down and pulled the blankets close around her. It was some time before she fell asleep again.
Magic Swords, Spunky Princesses, Witch Queens, Daring Escapes, White Stags, Psychic Connections--this book had it all! A Random Thief even shows up toward the end, as if High Fantasy Council had realized I didn't already have one in the party and had him overnighted to fill the void.
Actual chunks of plot will be repurposed in The Bone Palace, along with the characters. I wonder how much else I could salvage.
blackaire. The trunk novel meme.I just reread all 100k words of my Dread Juvenalia, Falling Towers. It's a dog's breakfast, plot-wise, and full of scaffolding, not enough contractions, manpain, adolescent angst, statements of the obvious, and way too much inner monologue, but I'm still very fond of it. It also reads like a Venn diagram of authors I was ripping off in any given scene. (Jennifer Roberson, George Martin, C.J. Cherryh, Lynn Flewelling...) Not to mention the scene I'd completely forgotten about, when one character asks another "What gods do you pray to?" Seriously--this is comedy gold.
He was dreaming when the guards came for him. The scrape of the door banished green hills and trees, returning him to the dank cell. Adam was glad to wake. He hated those dreams—it would be better not to dream at all. The dreams reminded him that there was something outside these walls, and offered some illusory home that had never existed. Thoughts like that would drive him mad.
Blinding torchlight flooded the room and he heard heavy feet on the stone, the clank of iron. The movement startled the vermin, who scurried away with a rustle of rotten straw. His tears turned the guards into an ugly blur as they chained him and dragged him away.
The men offered no conversation as they walked, and Adam didn’t ask for any. He was too busy making his legs work--long captivity had leeched his strength. How long? he wondered. He had lost track of the weeks, the months. Am I going to the headsman after all? The thought made him chuckle. The younger of the guards started at the sound, his hand tightening on his sword hilt.
“Quiet!” the other said, jerking on the chains. Adam stumbled and nearly fell. Bloody thoughts rose in his mind, but he was too weak to do more than think them.
They took him past the row of iron doors, the row of tombs. The cells here were cold and lightless, buried under the ground--the cells reserved for murderers and perpetrators of other foul deeds, or for those the city wished to forget. The guards hauled him to another room and shoved him inside. This time he did fall, landing painfully on his hands and knees amid a rattle of iron. The door slammed shut behind him.
Adam knelt for a moment, letting his eyes adjust to the candlelight. He could hear breathing from the other side of the room, but no one spoke. Fine. I can play that game as well.
The sight of his own hands was disconcerting. They were little more than talons, his nails ragged and imbedded with grime. The manacles hung loose around his bony wrists. Not loose enough, he thought, trying and failing to pull free. He was too thin all over. He had tried to exercise as much as he could in the narrow confines of his cell, but too much muscle had atrophied, too much flesh had wasted away. Under the dirt, his skin was sallow and pale and his hands too soft where they had once been hard with sword calluses. With a grimace, he raked his matted black hair away from his face. He was crawling with lice and fleas, and for once was glad he couldn’t grow a beard.
Adam pushed himself to his feet, the weight of his chains hindering him more than it should have. Too weak... The room was small and bare, lit only by several candles, but it wasn’t a cell. He could make out a man’s shape standing in the shadows, watching him.
After several moments the man stepped forward. His hair and beard were long and white, his skin wrinkled as old parchment. Robes of dark blue silk hung off his thin frame, and he wore a jeweled chain around his neck. The candlelight lined his face with shadows. He stood across the room and watched. Afraid of me, Adam wondered, or afraid of my fleas?
“I know I’m pretty,” Adam said at last, his voice rough and raw with disuse, “but did you really have me brought out here just to stare?”
She was in her parents’ house again, that burned so many years ago. In this dream she was no child, but grown, and no ravens spoke to her. She walked from room to room, searching for something, someone. Only cold silence greeted her, and a loneliness that grew with each empty room she found. At last, frustrated, she decided to leave the house entirely. She threw open the main doors, but paused on the threshold as she saw what lay outside.
She expected to find the lands of Linden, as she always did, the forests and the distant mountains. The land that stretched out before her now was not Linden. The sky above her was pewter, dull iron, shining silver—nothing so mundane as blue or grey. There was no sun, and the light was the eldritch gloom of twilight, or dawn. She could not have said which. The sky cast a pearlescent grey shadow over the hills and fields that lay before her. Mountains did rise against the far horizon, but these were not the Aillerons, but rather carious spires of rock, like pitted teeth against the sky. She thought the stone was red, but in the queer light it was hard to be certain.
A strange foreboding filled her at the thought of setting foot onto this land, a sense of irrevocable change. But what else was she to do, with only an empty house behind her? She took a step out of the doorway.
Do not, a voice said. She could not say where it came from, nor whether it was male or female, only that it was gentle, and inexorable, and froze her where she was.
You should not be here, my Lady. Go back.
And turn she did, searching for the speaker. She was still alone. And the house was no longer a step behind her. Now it was some distance away, a distance that threatened and left her cold.
“Where should I go?” she called out. Her voice was a tiny thing under the boundless leaden sky.
Go back to your house, while you dream still holds.
“But I’m alone there.”
You will wake, and be among friends. You do not belong here, Lady. Go back.
I’m only dreaming. Even as the thought formed in her mind, the house in front of her wavered and became even more distant.
You do not wish to wake here, the voice warned, still kind, still relentless. Go back.
Thrice warned, she thought. There would be no more warnings. So she ran. Cold wind whipped at her hair, set her skirts to flapping, threatened to steal the breath from her lungs. Still she ran. The house did not move again, but it seemed less and less solid the nearer she came. Her heart was heavy with dread, her feet were heavy as they raced over the silver-shadowed ground, and still she ran.
The house was just ahead of her now, the wood and stone as tenuous as light and shadow. She reached out to open the door, but her hand passed right through it. With one last desperate stride, she threw herself forward, through the fading door, over the vanishing threshold...
And woke gasping in the darkness. She was sitting up, her lungs still burning, her heart pounding. The shadows around her were unfamiliar, the bed beneath her strange. She reached out a trembling hand and touched heavy bed-hangings. They were real, tangible. Beside her in the dark, she heard Caitlin’s deep breathing. That was a familiar sound, and it drew her back to herself.
Vallorn, she reminded herself. Eisgard.
So comforted, she lay back down and pulled the blankets close around her. It was some time before she fell asleep again.
Magic Swords, Spunky Princesses, Witch Queens, Daring Escapes, White Stags, Psychic Connections--this book had it all! A Random Thief even shows up toward the end, as if High Fantasy Council had realized I didn't already have one in the party and had him overnighted to fill the void.
Actual chunks of plot will be repurposed in The Bone Palace, along with the characters. I wonder how much else I could salvage.
