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So. I've come to the sobering (well, almost) realization that my single largest writing roadblock is "finishing large projects".
I have no trouble doing this at work for technical projects. Somehow my fictions get sidetracked or mysteriously implode after about 120 pages.
It's not that I lose interest in them, it's simply that if I run into a difficulty I find it far easier to start another project. Right now I've got two unfinished novels, at roughly equal length and work.
I feel shamed by the very talented Misters![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kingcadillac and pax_draconis who have both finished drafts of their novels. I am certainly pleased for them; they are both very good. I enjoyed Jason's book, and I am gratified at having been allowed to offer some suggestions even if I had nothing particlarly valuable to say about it.
I'm not particularly envious of the two gentlemen in question, I don't think, as they have both completed works that I am incapable of writing. But I am shamed. I can do this. But I haven't.
[Note: I'm not even really in the same league as my friendladyeuthanasia; it's impossible for me to feel anything but pleasure when I hear of her successes. No, I can't explain the difference. Sorry.]
My new resolution is to push push push on with one until the story is complete. I'm setting myself time, and I'm setting myself production deadlines. I work much better under pressure, even self-imposed pressure.
Now all I have to do is decide which to do.
That's where you come in. I've done pro and con on both, and really it's a waste of time. I'd be quite happy finishing either first. I'd flip a coin, but somehow a survey just appeals to me.
I'm like that.
Here are some crappy drafts from the two projects I'm considering.
Choice One: Aradéc Spring
Fantasy. Marsupials. Religion. Magic. Politics. Muskets. Decay. Apocalypse. Mayhem.
A volley of musket fire exploded from the Cappargarnian lines. Darby winced at the blossoming of smoke around the enemy position and steadied himself for the sound and the inevitable hail of lead. The crackling sound, when it came, wasn’t nearly so bad as the visions of terror Lord Whirripi had instilled in them the night before, but then the Cappargarnians were still five or six hundred yards across the vast field of ripening barley, and the wind was against them.
If any of the bullets found their targets, Darby did not notice.
Ahead of the lines of Hyrágecan chivalry, Lord Whirripi wheeled his horse about to face his Wenemet warriors. The early morning sunlight glinted off his splendid field armour with its sweeping curves and gold filigree. The wind picked up again, and the three great moea feathers affixed to Lord Whirripi’s helm streamed like banners. Even from his position in the third rank, Darby could see the sleeves of his lord’s tunic, a deep blue slashed with yellow, ripple visibly.
Lord Whirripi held up one ungloved paw. Dimly, Darby could hear him shouting, but the wind was too strong to make out more than a few scattered words. To Darby’s right, Janesh in his garish scarlet brocade leaned over in his saddle and muttered, “It’s a good thing the old man likes the sound of his voice so much, because nobody else here can hear him.”
Darby snorted back a laugh, but before he could do much more than nod in agreement to his kinsman, Lord Whirripi had turned back towards the enemy. Up and down the Hyrágecan line of battle, the royal banners simultaneously dipped. Darby and a thousand other cavaliers, the flower of Hyrágecan chivalry, spurred their horses into the glorious charge.
Darby could hear no sound but the overwhelming drumming of a thousand horses’ hooves. He knew the enemy would get one, perhaps two more musket volleys before the cavaliers could close the gap, but after that they would be cut down like the barley. Even with their muskets, what chance had shopkeepers against cavaliers?
With over half the distance covered, Darby saw a staggered chain of smoke from the enemy lines. This time, Hyrágecan horses stumbled, sometimes tripping up those hard behind them, opening ragged holes in the advancing formation.
Darby stole quick glances to either side. The total numbers lost seemed tiny, surely no more than one in sixty, perhaps less. The charge would be through the enemy line before they could reload. Darby gritted his teeth into a rough smile. Perhaps he and Janesh would be warming their feet by the fires of the Sleeping Cat in a few days after all.
Darby felt, rather than heard, the crash of cavalry against the musketeers, like a great tidal wave upon breakers.
Something was wrong. The charge stopped, as if it had hit a rampart. Instead of sweeping through the Cappargarnians, a wall of screaming Wenemet and horses reared up in the front rank. The second rank, moving too fast to veer, smashed into the horses in front of them. Darby and his companions of the third rank tried to stop, but they were already much too close. His horse twisted to the right to avoid the inevitable collision, and Darby desperately tried to rein her in, to regain control. The screams from the front two ranks were unearthly, and already the riders of the final rank were fast upon him.
In the crush of horses, riders, weapons, and armour, Darby felt his horse roll under him, and suddenly his right shoulder erupted in pain as he hit the ground, hard.
He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t see. The confusion of sound was dim in his ears, as if he were drowning. In a faint, forgotten corner of his brain, Darby heard his name. “Now what can that mean?” he wondered idly.
Suddenly, cold air and light pulled him screaming back into the world. Janesh had pulled his helmet off. He was inches from Darby, filling his vision, shouting his name. Around him, chaos and confusion swirled.
“Darby!”
Janesh, too, had lost his helmet, and at least part of an ear. Dark blood matter the fur on the left side of his face and dripped from his muzzle onto Darby. Janesh shook him.
“Darby! Darby, are you all right?”
“Janesh? What happened? You’re a mess.”
Janesh shrugged. “I’ve had worse,” he lied. “Can you walk?”
“I think so. What happened?” He had to shout to be heard, while in the whirlwind around them the cavaliers of Hyrágec shouted, screamed, and bled. Officers barked orders, trying to form up lines.
Janesh helped Darby to his feet and almost immediately pushed him back to the ground.
“Janesh, what...?” Darby’s question was interrupted by a crack! like the first report of summer thunder. All around them, cavaliers and horses fell. As the smoke rolled over the two of them, huddled amongst the corpses, Darby heard the rallying shouts of the captains give way to the wails of slaughter and rout. The hellish smell of black powder settled over them, stinging their eyes and noses.
Darby listened in vain for a rally, for a horn, for an organized retreat. After a long moment, Janesh said “I don’t think we won this one, cousin.” Darby understood the words, but he couldn’t make any sense of them. It was impossible.
“Come on!” Janesh tugged at Darby’s arm. “Let’s take advantage of this smoke before they reload again.”
Darby shook his head. There would be time to ponder this later. For now, he’d get through this as if it were a field practice. “Where to?”
“Away from here.”
“There’s a copse of trees about, what? fifty yards behind us and to the right.”
Janesh shook his head. “No good. They’ll expect survivors there.”
“What about the stream to the left?
“Good. It might even be behind their line.”
They crawled, rather than walked, through the maze of fallen Wenemet and their horses, stacked sometimes three deep. Gradually the sounds of massacre ebbed to a weary, ominous silence, as the piles of bodies gave way to trampled fields and eventually to rows of golden barley. Darby’s shoulder ached from the fall, and he couldn’t go much farther. He turned to look for his lagging kinsman.
Janesh was some distance behind him, unmoving. “Curse me,” thought Darby, “his ear.”
Darby crawled back. Janesh was still breathing, but he had clearly lost a lot of blood. Panic squeezed Darby’s heart when he saw the trail crushed barley snaking off behind then towards the thinning clouds of smoke that marked the field of battle.
“A one-eyed Malebolge could follow that trail,” he said to no one in particular.
Darby ripped long strips of saffron linen from the folded insets of his puffed sleeves for bandages. Janesh still had his canteen, and hoping he’d filled it with water instead of thin wine this time, Darby liberally poured the contents over the top of his kinsman’s wounded head.
It was wine. Darby hoped it would sting.
With some of the blood washed away, Darby could see that about half of his friend’s ear was torn off, and a shallow furrow was ploughed through the fur and skin behind. No musket did this.
The wound on Janesh’s head oozed blood, but no longer gushed. “Well of course,” said Darby as he tried his best to bandage Janesh’s wounded ear. “No vital organs to speak of here.”
Janesh lazily opened one eye. “I heard that, you know.”
“You dog. How long have you been awake?”
“Not really sure I’m awake now.” Janesh tried to sit up. He failed.
“Take it easy there, Janesh. That’s it, just lay back a bit. How’re you feeling?”
“Terrible. Dizzy. Thirsty. Hey,” he smiled weakly, “don’t I usually rescue you?” Janesh reached for his canteen.
“Don’t bother. I used it to wash your wound. The wenamatin aren’t going to be calling you ‘Tufty’ anymore.”
“That was a ‘38 Toowonoma, you barbarian. You don’t clean a wound with a ‘38 Toowonoma. Are you mad?” Janesh’s words were angry, but his voice was sleepy, and he’d closed his eyes again.
Darby shrugged. “Get your breath back, or we’re going to have worse things to worry about than which wine I spilled.” He looked back down the trail they’d blazed. The Cappargarnians were probably already hunting down the wounded, to ransom them back to their families. It was only a matter of time before someone followed their path. Darby did not want to be around when they showed up. Far to the south, he could just see the ominous dark of Ulbun Forest. Janesh lay on the ground, unmoving, and Darby remembered that sleep was dangerous for a head wound.
“Janesh, did you see what happened to Lord Whirripi?”
Janesh didn’t open his eyes, but spoke slowly and deliberately. “The old man went down with the rest of the first rank. Everybody went down, Darby. Everyone. Six clans lost their lords today.”
“But how? What happened, do you think? It couldn’t have been the musketry.” Keep him talking, he thought.
“Pikes, cousin. Pikes. At the last possible moment, the first line of musketeers stood back, and the second rank set pikes into the ground in front. They were twenty feet long or so. Damn good discipline under a charge. Damn good. Never saw anything like it.”
“Pikes?” Darby was genuinely angry, now. “Pikes? They can’t do that.”
Janesh snorted and opened his eyes. “Can. Did. And now we’re errantry, you and I. Lordless cavaliers Who'd have thought it?
Darby set his teeth in a grimace and eyed the distant darkness of Ulbun Forest again. Janesh sat up, propping himself on his elbows. “What do you see, Darby?”
“Get up Janesh. We’ve got some work to do if we’re going to get to the forest’s eaves before they find us.”
Choice Two: The World is Bound in Secret Knots
Horror. The King in Yellow. Alternate histories. Surrealism. Decay. Apocalypse. Mayhem.
Hell, thought Nathan Wilde, must be very like Seattle in August. Sweat dribbled down his back in time to the wheezing of his lungs in the liquid heat as he climbed up to the porch. It hadn't been painted, maybe ever, and was bleached the colour of old bones.
Wilde wiped the back of his hand across his forehead as he reached the top of the stairs. He glanced behind him. Eight steps, maybe ten, and he was out of breath. Pathetic. Twenty years ago, twice the climb wouldn't have caused a sweat. Well, he corrected himself, maybe in this weather. He took off his sunglasses and, not waiting for his eyes to adjust to the glare, knocked on the door.
Wilde waited. There were a few flecks of yellow on the grey of the door. He conceded to himself that the place might have once been painted.
"Yes?" From the door a voice rustled like dried leaves.
Wilde took out his notebook and peered at the top page against the glare. "Mister, uh, Cas-tag-nee? I'm Nathan Wilde. You left a message at my office."
The door opened to the limit of its chain, then closed.
Dried leaves. "Just a moment, Mr. Wilde." Slowly, the old door fell open. The room was dark, and waves of cold air poured out around Wilde. Riding on the cold crest was the almost overpowering smell of mildew. Wilde took a half step back.
An ancient prune of a man stepped into the light of the doorway. He was much skinnier than Wilde. Tall. His bald head was spotted, and he shaded his eyes with a hand so creased that it might have been an empty glove.
"Do come in, Mr. Wilde," The voice was not nearly so scratchy as it had sounded through the door. The accent was Northeast, upstate New York maybe, thought Wilde.
The interior of the apartment was only slightly more inspiring than the outside. It was cold, and Wilde could practically taste the dusty mildew. The door shut behind him, and the only source of light, a shaded window on the opposite wall, cast a dim yellow glow that barely illuminated the room.
Wilde mechanically noted two doors to his left, a couch and a pair of overstuffed armchairs to his right.
The old man spoke, softly, and Wilde didn't quite catch it.
"Come again?"
"Would you like to sit down, Mr. Wilde?"
"Yeah. Thanks."
Wilde sat in one of the threadbare armchairs facing the front door with his back to the window. He couldn't guess what its original colour might have been.
As his eyes adjusted to the gloom, Wilde noticed for the first time that the walls were covered with some sort of floral wallpaper. It clearly hadn't been washed in decades. Wilde glanced around the room. There was a large patch of grey mold over one of the doors. A large bookcase filled the wall closest to his chair.
"Would you care for some tea, Mr. Wilde? Coffee, perhaps?"
Wilde cleared his throat. He could taste the cold, damp air. "A glass of water would be fine."
The old man puttered off through the door under the mold, and Wilde perused the bookcase.
"A lot about Napoleon here. You a history buff?"
Leaves rustled in the kitchen. "Oh yes, Mr. Wilde." The door opened and the old man brought Wilde a tall, narrow glass. "History fascinates me. Surely the study of the vast panorama of human interactions is the most noble and rewarding of pursuits."
"Well, sure Mr. Cas-tag-nee. Let's get down to business. Why is it you called my office?"
The old man sank into the couch opposite. "Castaigne," he rhymed it with disdain. "Hildred Castaigne. Business it is." He leaned suddenly forward, over the coffee table separating them, eyes glowing with the yellow reflection of the window. "I've lost something, Mr. Wilde, something precious to me."
Wilde glanced again at the grey mold in the corner above the door. "A family heirloom of some kind, no doubt."
"A book, Mr. Wilde, that was taken from me as a child."
"Look Castaigne, I'll need five hundred dollars up front. Is a book worth that?" Wilde ran his forefinger across the coffee table. It was greasy.
"I'm not asking for your opinion Mr. Wilde, only for your services. You needn't worry about your fee. I assure you that I can afford it, if that's what's troubling you. Your down-payment is in an envelope on the bookcase, there. By all means open it and count the bills if it will induce you to take me seriously."
Wilde stood and looked over the bookcase. There was a ratty envelope laying directly in front of a slim grey volume titled The King in Yellow. Wilde started. Where had he heard that before?
Castaigne chuckled, a sound like rolling gravel.
Where before Wilde had been doubtful of the old man, he was now unaccountably suspicious. He glanced around the room again, but it was still the same dingy squalor. Why had he expected it to be any different? Wilde picked up the envelope and sat back down before opening it.
There were five crisp hundred-dollar bills inside. "All right Castaigne, you've got my attention." The envelope vanished into one pocket, and his notebook came out of the other. "Now, what's this book look like? And when's the last time you saw it?"
Castaigne sat back into the couch. "The book is titled Imperial Dynasty of America. It is a manuscript bound in soft brown calfskin, approximately seven inches wide, ten inches high, and an inch or so thick. The title is stamped both onto the spine and the front cover in gilt. I suspect most of it has worn off by now."
Wilde shifted in his seat. "How much is it worth?"
"Oh, it's quite valuable, Mr. Wilde, though I daresay there's hardly a man alive now who would know it."
"Uh huh. And when's the last time you saw it? Any idea where it might be now?"
"As I said, I lost it when I was quite young. As for its location, that's more difficult."
"What do you mean, 'difficult'?"
Castaigne suddenly leaned forward again, tense as a tiger, eyes aglow. Wilde wished he would stop doing that.
"How old do you think I am, Mr. Wilde?"
"Come again?"
"How old do you think I am?"
"I'm, uh, not very good with ages. Is it relevant?"
"Would it surprise you to know that I was born in 1889?"
Wilde stared blankly at the old man, then decided he had to be kidding him. "Naw, you don't look a day over ninety."
"Tomorrow is my 115th birthday, Mr. Wilde."
Best to humour him. "That's great. Happy birthday, old man."
"I can't die, you see."
"That's great." Wilde stood, and the old man mirrored him. "Look, I don't think you've got the right guy for this. There are some people I can recommend..."
"Sit down, Mr. Wilde. There's another thousand dollars for you when you return the book to me."
Wilde sat.
Castaigne began to pace around the room as he spoke. You don't believe me when I say I'm so old. No," he raised a finger, "no, don't trouble to deny it. I mention it for two reasons. First, so you know that when I say the book has been out of my possession for a century, I mean exactly that. Secondly, so that you understand why I need to hire someone to do this relatively simple thing for me." The old man turned toward Wilde and smiled, grim and sad. "I can't get around the way I used to."
This at least, thought Wilde, was true.
Castaigne sat on the windowsill and peeked around the side of the shade. The room brightened noticeably as he pulled the shade perhaps an inch away from the window. Tired of craning his neck around, Wilde stood and faced him.
Castaigne managed a wheezy sigh. "I'm out of my time, a bit. Like that Mr. Burns fellow on the cartoon show." He laughed that gravelly laugh. "Not so rich, of course."
In an heroic effort to bring the conversation back to the job Wilde began, "About the book, Mr. Castaigne..."
The old man turned from the window and interrupted, "It's funny, isn't it?"
Maddening more like, thought Wilde.
"Tell me, Mr. Wilde, did you ever feel like something's gone horribly wrong? That history has somehow veered off it's true course?"
Wilde shrugged. "Sure. Everybody feels like that at some point or another. Especially these days."
Castaigne gave an indignant snort and turned back to the dingy window, waving Wilde off. "No, no Mr. Wilde. I really did expect better of you. The most recent unpleasantness is a sad but predictable outcome of decades of misguided policy and a century of amateur diplomacy. Surely you don't imagine that Britons lived happy and secure following their victory in the"--and at this he sneered--"first World War? The circumstances are much the same. The weight of history tumbles downhill, Mr. Wilde. To quote a contemporary writer, 'the avalanche has begun; it is too late for the pebbles to vote.'"
Castaigne stared out the window a moment before turning back, sighing, "It was too much to expect. I apologise, Mr. Wilde."
Wilde didn't know quite how to take this.
"I have something to show you, Mr. Wilde. Something that will allow you to track down my book." Castaigne shuffled over to the bookcase and pulled down a cigar box. He handed it to Wilde, and then returned to the window.
Wilde glanced at it. Cubans. "Sorry Mr. Castaigne but I don't smoke. Bad for my lungs."
"Open it, Mr. Wilde."
Wilde shrugged and opened the box.
It was full of yarn. No, that's not quite right, thought Wilde. It was black inside--painted he supposed--and there were dozens of strands of yarn and string of various weights and colours strung from top to bottom and side to side. Though the box was only a couple of inches deep, the layers of yarn appeared to go on forever. It looked suspiciously like a kindergarten art project.
"I've spent my entire adult life working on this box, Mr. Wilde. Almost a century. I've only finished it in the last few weeks, and there are still certain... problems with the implementation. That's why I need your help."
Wilde stared at it. "It's a cigar box," he finally managed. He looked up at Castaigne, whose face bore a sneer of triumph.
"Yes it is. Portable. Move the box, Mr. Wilde. Move it side to side.
Five hundred dollars safe in his breast pocket, Wilde humoured him. He moved the open box, but the yarn inside didn't move; it slid to the side, like the box itself were a viewer into fixed, unchanging universe of strings and yarn. Wilde moved it again. Again the strings slid, but this time he noticed that one strand of thick grey vertical yarn and one narrow orange horizontal thread remained fixed and unmoving. "How does it do that?"
"Think of it as a viewfinder. Or a telescope, perhaps. Each strand is an object or a person. It's possible that some of them are birds, or animals," his eyes flicked briefly to the spot over the door, "or slime molds. I don't really know, and they are in any case unimportant."
Wilde started slowly walking around the room, sweeping the box from side to side. Castaigne chuckled, then coughed a dry rattling cough deep in his narrow chest.
"Excuse me, Mr. Wilde. A touch of something in the lungs. You will note that the strands closest to the surface move smoothly and in unison, while those... deeper strands tend to jump around a bit. I don't know whether that's a design issue with the viewer or just the way these things work. The unmoving orange weft is of course the viewer itself, while the intersecting warp is you. Just out of curiosity, what colour are you?"
If Wilde heard him, he gave no sign.
"Mr. Wilde?"
Wilde's head snapped up from the viewer. "What?"
"The fixed central vertical strand is you, Mr. Wilde. What colour are you?"
"Grey. Sort of a steel grey."
"Curious. Most people are fairly warm colours. Bring the viewer over here." Wilde walked back towards Castaigne. "Good. Now look at the viewer."
Wilde glanced down with a sharp intake of breath. A thick, pale yellow yarn--rope really--stretched vertically across the viewer. It was frayed. Wispy tendrils randomly unraveled from the main strand and splayed themselves across almost half the interior of the cigar box. Castaigne took the box from Wilde's hands.
"Now observe, Mr. Wilde, what happens when the strands are plucked. I believe that this one just here is the coffee table. Watch what happens when I push it deeper." Castaigne pushed his lanky forefinger into the box. And Wilde suddenly realized that he was holding his glass of water. That he had been holding it since Castaigne had handed it to him. There was no coffee table, and there never had been.
Castaigne's lips formed a smirky half-smile. "Presumably one can do the same for people, but one imagines it to be slightly more difficult. One can, however, pluck them quite easily."
A sudden tightness squeezed Wilde's heart. Dizzy, he fell to one knee and dropped the glass. His breath came in ragged gasps and then... And then he was sitting on the faded armchair. The water glass was on the coffee table in front of him, unspilled.
Castaigne sat down on the couch opposite and set the closed Cuban cigar box onto the table. He smiled again, that oily smirk that Wilde already disliked.
"Perhaps you are willing to take me a little more seriously now, Mr. Wilde?"
[Poll #492260]
Edited to add: Please feel free to comment, even if the poll won't let you vote. Cheers!
I have no trouble doing this at work for technical projects. Somehow my fictions get sidetracked or mysteriously implode after about 120 pages.
It's not that I lose interest in them, it's simply that if I run into a difficulty I find it far easier to start another project. Right now I've got two unfinished novels, at roughly equal length and work.
I feel shamed by the very talented Misters
kingcadillac and pax_draconis who have both finished drafts of their novels. I am certainly pleased for them; they are both very good. I enjoyed Jason's book, and I am gratified at having been allowed to offer some suggestions even if I had nothing particlarly valuable to say about it. I'm not particularly envious of the two gentlemen in question, I don't think, as they have both completed works that I am incapable of writing. But I am shamed. I can do this. But I haven't.
[Note: I'm not even really in the same league as my friend
ladyeuthanasia; it's impossible for me to feel anything but pleasure when I hear of her successes. No, I can't explain the difference. Sorry.]My new resolution is to push push push on with one until the story is complete. I'm setting myself time, and I'm setting myself production deadlines. I work much better under pressure, even self-imposed pressure.
Now all I have to do is decide which to do.
That's where you come in. I've done pro and con on both, and really it's a waste of time. I'd be quite happy finishing either first. I'd flip a coin, but somehow a survey just appeals to me.
I'm like that.
Here are some crappy drafts from the two projects I'm considering.
Choice One: Aradéc Spring
Fantasy. Marsupials. Religion. Magic. Politics. Muskets. Decay. Apocalypse. Mayhem.
A volley of musket fire exploded from the Cappargarnian lines. Darby winced at the blossoming of smoke around the enemy position and steadied himself for the sound and the inevitable hail of lead. The crackling sound, when it came, wasn’t nearly so bad as the visions of terror Lord Whirripi had instilled in them the night before, but then the Cappargarnians were still five or six hundred yards across the vast field of ripening barley, and the wind was against them.
If any of the bullets found their targets, Darby did not notice.
Ahead of the lines of Hyrágecan chivalry, Lord Whirripi wheeled his horse about to face his Wenemet warriors. The early morning sunlight glinted off his splendid field armour with its sweeping curves and gold filigree. The wind picked up again, and the three great moea feathers affixed to Lord Whirripi’s helm streamed like banners. Even from his position in the third rank, Darby could see the sleeves of his lord’s tunic, a deep blue slashed with yellow, ripple visibly.
Lord Whirripi held up one ungloved paw. Dimly, Darby could hear him shouting, but the wind was too strong to make out more than a few scattered words. To Darby’s right, Janesh in his garish scarlet brocade leaned over in his saddle and muttered, “It’s a good thing the old man likes the sound of his voice so much, because nobody else here can hear him.”
Darby snorted back a laugh, but before he could do much more than nod in agreement to his kinsman, Lord Whirripi had turned back towards the enemy. Up and down the Hyrágecan line of battle, the royal banners simultaneously dipped. Darby and a thousand other cavaliers, the flower of Hyrágecan chivalry, spurred their horses into the glorious charge.
Darby could hear no sound but the overwhelming drumming of a thousand horses’ hooves. He knew the enemy would get one, perhaps two more musket volleys before the cavaliers could close the gap, but after that they would be cut down like the barley. Even with their muskets, what chance had shopkeepers against cavaliers?
With over half the distance covered, Darby saw a staggered chain of smoke from the enemy lines. This time, Hyrágecan horses stumbled, sometimes tripping up those hard behind them, opening ragged holes in the advancing formation.
Darby stole quick glances to either side. The total numbers lost seemed tiny, surely no more than one in sixty, perhaps less. The charge would be through the enemy line before they could reload. Darby gritted his teeth into a rough smile. Perhaps he and Janesh would be warming their feet by the fires of the Sleeping Cat in a few days after all.
Darby felt, rather than heard, the crash of cavalry against the musketeers, like a great tidal wave upon breakers.
Something was wrong. The charge stopped, as if it had hit a rampart. Instead of sweeping through the Cappargarnians, a wall of screaming Wenemet and horses reared up in the front rank. The second rank, moving too fast to veer, smashed into the horses in front of them. Darby and his companions of the third rank tried to stop, but they were already much too close. His horse twisted to the right to avoid the inevitable collision, and Darby desperately tried to rein her in, to regain control. The screams from the front two ranks were unearthly, and already the riders of the final rank were fast upon him.
In the crush of horses, riders, weapons, and armour, Darby felt his horse roll under him, and suddenly his right shoulder erupted in pain as he hit the ground, hard.
He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t see. The confusion of sound was dim in his ears, as if he were drowning. In a faint, forgotten corner of his brain, Darby heard his name. “Now what can that mean?” he wondered idly.
Suddenly, cold air and light pulled him screaming back into the world. Janesh had pulled his helmet off. He was inches from Darby, filling his vision, shouting his name. Around him, chaos and confusion swirled.
“Darby!”
Janesh, too, had lost his helmet, and at least part of an ear. Dark blood matter the fur on the left side of his face and dripped from his muzzle onto Darby. Janesh shook him.
“Darby! Darby, are you all right?”
“Janesh? What happened? You’re a mess.”
Janesh shrugged. “I’ve had worse,” he lied. “Can you walk?”
“I think so. What happened?” He had to shout to be heard, while in the whirlwind around them the cavaliers of Hyrágec shouted, screamed, and bled. Officers barked orders, trying to form up lines.
Janesh helped Darby to his feet and almost immediately pushed him back to the ground.
“Janesh, what...?” Darby’s question was interrupted by a crack! like the first report of summer thunder. All around them, cavaliers and horses fell. As the smoke rolled over the two of them, huddled amongst the corpses, Darby heard the rallying shouts of the captains give way to the wails of slaughter and rout. The hellish smell of black powder settled over them, stinging their eyes and noses.
Darby listened in vain for a rally, for a horn, for an organized retreat. After a long moment, Janesh said “I don’t think we won this one, cousin.” Darby understood the words, but he couldn’t make any sense of them. It was impossible.
“Come on!” Janesh tugged at Darby’s arm. “Let’s take advantage of this smoke before they reload again.”
Darby shook his head. There would be time to ponder this later. For now, he’d get through this as if it were a field practice. “Where to?”
“Away from here.”
“There’s a copse of trees about, what? fifty yards behind us and to the right.”
Janesh shook his head. “No good. They’ll expect survivors there.”
“What about the stream to the left?
“Good. It might even be behind their line.”
They crawled, rather than walked, through the maze of fallen Wenemet and their horses, stacked sometimes three deep. Gradually the sounds of massacre ebbed to a weary, ominous silence, as the piles of bodies gave way to trampled fields and eventually to rows of golden barley. Darby’s shoulder ached from the fall, and he couldn’t go much farther. He turned to look for his lagging kinsman.
Janesh was some distance behind him, unmoving. “Curse me,” thought Darby, “his ear.”
Darby crawled back. Janesh was still breathing, but he had clearly lost a lot of blood. Panic squeezed Darby’s heart when he saw the trail crushed barley snaking off behind then towards the thinning clouds of smoke that marked the field of battle.
“A one-eyed Malebolge could follow that trail,” he said to no one in particular.
Darby ripped long strips of saffron linen from the folded insets of his puffed sleeves for bandages. Janesh still had his canteen, and hoping he’d filled it with water instead of thin wine this time, Darby liberally poured the contents over the top of his kinsman’s wounded head.
It was wine. Darby hoped it would sting.
With some of the blood washed away, Darby could see that about half of his friend’s ear was torn off, and a shallow furrow was ploughed through the fur and skin behind. No musket did this.
The wound on Janesh’s head oozed blood, but no longer gushed. “Well of course,” said Darby as he tried his best to bandage Janesh’s wounded ear. “No vital organs to speak of here.”
Janesh lazily opened one eye. “I heard that, you know.”
“You dog. How long have you been awake?”
“Not really sure I’m awake now.” Janesh tried to sit up. He failed.
“Take it easy there, Janesh. That’s it, just lay back a bit. How’re you feeling?”
“Terrible. Dizzy. Thirsty. Hey,” he smiled weakly, “don’t I usually rescue you?” Janesh reached for his canteen.
“Don’t bother. I used it to wash your wound. The wenamatin aren’t going to be calling you ‘Tufty’ anymore.”
“That was a ‘38 Toowonoma, you barbarian. You don’t clean a wound with a ‘38 Toowonoma. Are you mad?” Janesh’s words were angry, but his voice was sleepy, and he’d closed his eyes again.
Darby shrugged. “Get your breath back, or we’re going to have worse things to worry about than which wine I spilled.” He looked back down the trail they’d blazed. The Cappargarnians were probably already hunting down the wounded, to ransom them back to their families. It was only a matter of time before someone followed their path. Darby did not want to be around when they showed up. Far to the south, he could just see the ominous dark of Ulbun Forest. Janesh lay on the ground, unmoving, and Darby remembered that sleep was dangerous for a head wound.
“Janesh, did you see what happened to Lord Whirripi?”
Janesh didn’t open his eyes, but spoke slowly and deliberately. “The old man went down with the rest of the first rank. Everybody went down, Darby. Everyone. Six clans lost their lords today.”
“But how? What happened, do you think? It couldn’t have been the musketry.” Keep him talking, he thought.
“Pikes, cousin. Pikes. At the last possible moment, the first line of musketeers stood back, and the second rank set pikes into the ground in front. They were twenty feet long or so. Damn good discipline under a charge. Damn good. Never saw anything like it.”
“Pikes?” Darby was genuinely angry, now. “Pikes? They can’t do that.”
Janesh snorted and opened his eyes. “Can. Did. And now we’re errantry, you and I. Lordless cavaliers Who'd have thought it?
Darby set his teeth in a grimace and eyed the distant darkness of Ulbun Forest again. Janesh sat up, propping himself on his elbows. “What do you see, Darby?”
“Get up Janesh. We’ve got some work to do if we’re going to get to the forest’s eaves before they find us.”
Choice Two: The World is Bound in Secret Knots
Horror. The King in Yellow. Alternate histories. Surrealism. Decay. Apocalypse. Mayhem.
Hell, thought Nathan Wilde, must be very like Seattle in August. Sweat dribbled down his back in time to the wheezing of his lungs in the liquid heat as he climbed up to the porch. It hadn't been painted, maybe ever, and was bleached the colour of old bones.
Wilde wiped the back of his hand across his forehead as he reached the top of the stairs. He glanced behind him. Eight steps, maybe ten, and he was out of breath. Pathetic. Twenty years ago, twice the climb wouldn't have caused a sweat. Well, he corrected himself, maybe in this weather. He took off his sunglasses and, not waiting for his eyes to adjust to the glare, knocked on the door.
Wilde waited. There were a few flecks of yellow on the grey of the door. He conceded to himself that the place might have once been painted.
"Yes?" From the door a voice rustled like dried leaves.
Wilde took out his notebook and peered at the top page against the glare. "Mister, uh, Cas-tag-nee? I'm Nathan Wilde. You left a message at my office."
The door opened to the limit of its chain, then closed.
Dried leaves. "Just a moment, Mr. Wilde." Slowly, the old door fell open. The room was dark, and waves of cold air poured out around Wilde. Riding on the cold crest was the almost overpowering smell of mildew. Wilde took a half step back.
An ancient prune of a man stepped into the light of the doorway. He was much skinnier than Wilde. Tall. His bald head was spotted, and he shaded his eyes with a hand so creased that it might have been an empty glove.
"Do come in, Mr. Wilde," The voice was not nearly so scratchy as it had sounded through the door. The accent was Northeast, upstate New York maybe, thought Wilde.
The interior of the apartment was only slightly more inspiring than the outside. It was cold, and Wilde could practically taste the dusty mildew. The door shut behind him, and the only source of light, a shaded window on the opposite wall, cast a dim yellow glow that barely illuminated the room.
Wilde mechanically noted two doors to his left, a couch and a pair of overstuffed armchairs to his right.
The old man spoke, softly, and Wilde didn't quite catch it.
"Come again?"
"Would you like to sit down, Mr. Wilde?"
"Yeah. Thanks."
Wilde sat in one of the threadbare armchairs facing the front door with his back to the window. He couldn't guess what its original colour might have been.
As his eyes adjusted to the gloom, Wilde noticed for the first time that the walls were covered with some sort of floral wallpaper. It clearly hadn't been washed in decades. Wilde glanced around the room. There was a large patch of grey mold over one of the doors. A large bookcase filled the wall closest to his chair.
"Would you care for some tea, Mr. Wilde? Coffee, perhaps?"
Wilde cleared his throat. He could taste the cold, damp air. "A glass of water would be fine."
The old man puttered off through the door under the mold, and Wilde perused the bookcase.
"A lot about Napoleon here. You a history buff?"
Leaves rustled in the kitchen. "Oh yes, Mr. Wilde." The door opened and the old man brought Wilde a tall, narrow glass. "History fascinates me. Surely the study of the vast panorama of human interactions is the most noble and rewarding of pursuits."
"Well, sure Mr. Cas-tag-nee. Let's get down to business. Why is it you called my office?"
The old man sank into the couch opposite. "Castaigne," he rhymed it with disdain. "Hildred Castaigne. Business it is." He leaned suddenly forward, over the coffee table separating them, eyes glowing with the yellow reflection of the window. "I've lost something, Mr. Wilde, something precious to me."
Wilde glanced again at the grey mold in the corner above the door. "A family heirloom of some kind, no doubt."
"A book, Mr. Wilde, that was taken from me as a child."
"Look Castaigne, I'll need five hundred dollars up front. Is a book worth that?" Wilde ran his forefinger across the coffee table. It was greasy.
"I'm not asking for your opinion Mr. Wilde, only for your services. You needn't worry about your fee. I assure you that I can afford it, if that's what's troubling you. Your down-payment is in an envelope on the bookcase, there. By all means open it and count the bills if it will induce you to take me seriously."
Wilde stood and looked over the bookcase. There was a ratty envelope laying directly in front of a slim grey volume titled The King in Yellow. Wilde started. Where had he heard that before?
Castaigne chuckled, a sound like rolling gravel.
Where before Wilde had been doubtful of the old man, he was now unaccountably suspicious. He glanced around the room again, but it was still the same dingy squalor. Why had he expected it to be any different? Wilde picked up the envelope and sat back down before opening it.
There were five crisp hundred-dollar bills inside. "All right Castaigne, you've got my attention." The envelope vanished into one pocket, and his notebook came out of the other. "Now, what's this book look like? And when's the last time you saw it?"
Castaigne sat back into the couch. "The book is titled Imperial Dynasty of America. It is a manuscript bound in soft brown calfskin, approximately seven inches wide, ten inches high, and an inch or so thick. The title is stamped both onto the spine and the front cover in gilt. I suspect most of it has worn off by now."
Wilde shifted in his seat. "How much is it worth?"
"Oh, it's quite valuable, Mr. Wilde, though I daresay there's hardly a man alive now who would know it."
"Uh huh. And when's the last time you saw it? Any idea where it might be now?"
"As I said, I lost it when I was quite young. As for its location, that's more difficult."
"What do you mean, 'difficult'?"
Castaigne suddenly leaned forward again, tense as a tiger, eyes aglow. Wilde wished he would stop doing that.
"How old do you think I am, Mr. Wilde?"
"Come again?"
"How old do you think I am?"
"I'm, uh, not very good with ages. Is it relevant?"
"Would it surprise you to know that I was born in 1889?"
Wilde stared blankly at the old man, then decided he had to be kidding him. "Naw, you don't look a day over ninety."
"Tomorrow is my 115th birthday, Mr. Wilde."
Best to humour him. "That's great. Happy birthday, old man."
"I can't die, you see."
"That's great." Wilde stood, and the old man mirrored him. "Look, I don't think you've got the right guy for this. There are some people I can recommend..."
"Sit down, Mr. Wilde. There's another thousand dollars for you when you return the book to me."
Wilde sat.
Castaigne began to pace around the room as he spoke. You don't believe me when I say I'm so old. No," he raised a finger, "no, don't trouble to deny it. I mention it for two reasons. First, so you know that when I say the book has been out of my possession for a century, I mean exactly that. Secondly, so that you understand why I need to hire someone to do this relatively simple thing for me." The old man turned toward Wilde and smiled, grim and sad. "I can't get around the way I used to."
This at least, thought Wilde, was true.
Castaigne sat on the windowsill and peeked around the side of the shade. The room brightened noticeably as he pulled the shade perhaps an inch away from the window. Tired of craning his neck around, Wilde stood and faced him.
Castaigne managed a wheezy sigh. "I'm out of my time, a bit. Like that Mr. Burns fellow on the cartoon show." He laughed that gravelly laugh. "Not so rich, of course."
In an heroic effort to bring the conversation back to the job Wilde began, "About the book, Mr. Castaigne..."
The old man turned from the window and interrupted, "It's funny, isn't it?"
Maddening more like, thought Wilde.
"Tell me, Mr. Wilde, did you ever feel like something's gone horribly wrong? That history has somehow veered off it's true course?"
Wilde shrugged. "Sure. Everybody feels like that at some point or another. Especially these days."
Castaigne gave an indignant snort and turned back to the dingy window, waving Wilde off. "No, no Mr. Wilde. I really did expect better of you. The most recent unpleasantness is a sad but predictable outcome of decades of misguided policy and a century of amateur diplomacy. Surely you don't imagine that Britons lived happy and secure following their victory in the"--and at this he sneered--"first World War? The circumstances are much the same. The weight of history tumbles downhill, Mr. Wilde. To quote a contemporary writer, 'the avalanche has begun; it is too late for the pebbles to vote.'"
Castaigne stared out the window a moment before turning back, sighing, "It was too much to expect. I apologise, Mr. Wilde."
Wilde didn't know quite how to take this.
"I have something to show you, Mr. Wilde. Something that will allow you to track down my book." Castaigne shuffled over to the bookcase and pulled down a cigar box. He handed it to Wilde, and then returned to the window.
Wilde glanced at it. Cubans. "Sorry Mr. Castaigne but I don't smoke. Bad for my lungs."
"Open it, Mr. Wilde."
Wilde shrugged and opened the box.
It was full of yarn. No, that's not quite right, thought Wilde. It was black inside--painted he supposed--and there were dozens of strands of yarn and string of various weights and colours strung from top to bottom and side to side. Though the box was only a couple of inches deep, the layers of yarn appeared to go on forever. It looked suspiciously like a kindergarten art project.
"I've spent my entire adult life working on this box, Mr. Wilde. Almost a century. I've only finished it in the last few weeks, and there are still certain... problems with the implementation. That's why I need your help."
Wilde stared at it. "It's a cigar box," he finally managed. He looked up at Castaigne, whose face bore a sneer of triumph.
"Yes it is. Portable. Move the box, Mr. Wilde. Move it side to side.
Five hundred dollars safe in his breast pocket, Wilde humoured him. He moved the open box, but the yarn inside didn't move; it slid to the side, like the box itself were a viewer into fixed, unchanging universe of strings and yarn. Wilde moved it again. Again the strings slid, but this time he noticed that one strand of thick grey vertical yarn and one narrow orange horizontal thread remained fixed and unmoving. "How does it do that?"
"Think of it as a viewfinder. Or a telescope, perhaps. Each strand is an object or a person. It's possible that some of them are birds, or animals," his eyes flicked briefly to the spot over the door, "or slime molds. I don't really know, and they are in any case unimportant."
Wilde started slowly walking around the room, sweeping the box from side to side. Castaigne chuckled, then coughed a dry rattling cough deep in his narrow chest.
"Excuse me, Mr. Wilde. A touch of something in the lungs. You will note that the strands closest to the surface move smoothly and in unison, while those... deeper strands tend to jump around a bit. I don't know whether that's a design issue with the viewer or just the way these things work. The unmoving orange weft is of course the viewer itself, while the intersecting warp is you. Just out of curiosity, what colour are you?"
If Wilde heard him, he gave no sign.
"Mr. Wilde?"
Wilde's head snapped up from the viewer. "What?"
"The fixed central vertical strand is you, Mr. Wilde. What colour are you?"
"Grey. Sort of a steel grey."
"Curious. Most people are fairly warm colours. Bring the viewer over here." Wilde walked back towards Castaigne. "Good. Now look at the viewer."
Wilde glanced down with a sharp intake of breath. A thick, pale yellow yarn--rope really--stretched vertically across the viewer. It was frayed. Wispy tendrils randomly unraveled from the main strand and splayed themselves across almost half the interior of the cigar box. Castaigne took the box from Wilde's hands.
"Now observe, Mr. Wilde, what happens when the strands are plucked. I believe that this one just here is the coffee table. Watch what happens when I push it deeper." Castaigne pushed his lanky forefinger into the box. And Wilde suddenly realized that he was holding his glass of water. That he had been holding it since Castaigne had handed it to him. There was no coffee table, and there never had been.
Castaigne's lips formed a smirky half-smile. "Presumably one can do the same for people, but one imagines it to be slightly more difficult. One can, however, pluck them quite easily."
A sudden tightness squeezed Wilde's heart. Dizzy, he fell to one knee and dropped the glass. His breath came in ragged gasps and then... And then he was sitting on the faded armchair. The water glass was on the coffee table in front of him, unspilled.
Castaigne sat down on the couch opposite and set the closed Cuban cigar box onto the table. He smiled again, that oily smirk that Wilde already disliked.
"Perhaps you are willing to take me a little more seriously now, Mr. Wilde?"
[Poll #492260]
Edited to add: Please feel free to comment, even if the poll won't let you vote. Cheers!
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-12 04:44 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-12 05:08 am (UTC)I've written short stories, even novellas, and neither of these ideas will fit in that format.
Make no mistake, the rough bits will be polished - these excerpts are little more than crappy first drafts and normally I wouldn't make them available, but I wanted to give y'all a flavour.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-12 05:19 am (UTC)Pulling out and declaring victory...is there victory in never finishing either? You know I think George RR martin has it right...write one chapter at a time and then merge the chapters into something like a book...anyhow I vote for the Spring book because I don't toy with madness. I'm too good at it.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-12 07:45 am (UTC)1) Advertise what your deadline is. It then becomes a matter of saving face and personal honour that you achieve your own target, otherwise you look like a lazy slacker to your friends.
2) Corollary to this, make sure your friends know to richly mock you if you miss your target. I am blessed with a surfeit of friends ready to richly mock me. I'm just lucky like that, I guess.
3) Set realistic deadlines, but don't allow much slack. Just enough pressure to put yourself under, well, pressure...
4) Be prepared to ditch other projects until the first one is finished. It got to the point with me that I even rationed my LJ posts to prevent myself losing steam.
Apropos of nothing, I wasn't helped by the fact that approximately two thirds of the way through the book i realised I was writing a completely different novel to the one I originally thought I was. Rather than go back immediately and rewrite parts one and two, which was my initial instinct, I soldiered on and finished the draft, then went back and extensively rewrote the whole shebang. I think this had a considerable bearing on finishing.
I made a post a few months back about dread. I went back and reread it a few days back, and it's all still true.
Endings are really, really hard to do.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-13 12:32 am (UTC)Thom, I honestly think old fashioned scheduling and structured time would benefit you a lot. I'm a highly schedule-phobic guy, but I found a deadline to be very helpful.
I'll add a few of my own ideas:
1. Perfectionism isn't a virtue. It's a crutch. Get rid of it.
2. Examine your protagonist. Do you feel strongly about him/her? If not, drop that and go on to something better. If your main dude isn't deeply (if not rationally or clearly) connected to you, you're making love to the wrong woman, so to speak. Find a character you can love, and give it life. Otherwise, you're wasting your time.
3. I know you know this, but never edit while you write. It's too exhausting. It's like masturbating and riding a motorcycle at once. You won't get where you want to go and you'll probably end up injured. So, ride your bike, then have one off the editorial wrist, but never at the same time. Ok?
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-13 06:36 am (UTC)True story.
like masturbating and riding a motorcycle at once
It is probably a sad testament to the company I keep that I know someone who attempted this. The gentleman's assessment of the likely outcomes is spot on.
I know someone who attempted this
Date: 2005-05-13 03:09 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-13 03:45 pm (UTC)The two of you are ganging up on me now.
Well done.
Cheese.
what?
Date: 2005-05-12 07:45 am (UTC)Just some thoughts
Date: 2005-05-12 08:24 am (UTC)There is no point me answering the poll as I find both pieces bright, fast and vivid. So, given the choice between which to continue, I would consider the following:
a)Passion. Drafting potential covering letters for both of them will clarify which one really stimulates you, and which one you feel will stimulate others.
b)Plan. Which is easier to map out in your head? Drafting two synopses or plot plans should make that clearer, even if none of it turns out that way when you write it. Having a direction helps get you through to the end, though of course, it may be a different end.
c)Payment. If it's really a flip of the coin, check out your market and consider which novel is more likely to give you the appropriate return, whether that's a quick sale or the sense of breaking ground or whatever.
These are only my opinions of course. I find this works for me if I can endure the drag of doing it. Of course, I seldom can!
(no subject)
Two unfinished novels is a perfect time to finish one. I'm drawing to a close on my third attempt, Cicatrix, which should be a finished first draft by the first week of June. It's just a short book of pulpy urban fantasy, but y'know? I picked the particular idea I picked for this project specifically because what I had in mind was finishing it, a chapter a week even on weeks when my devotion to Art is flagging. My devotion to Art was what dragged down the unfinished ones, because I was never just right to deal with them . . .
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-13 03:48 pm (UTC)There's no better reason.
Wombats can wait.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-12 01:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-12 01:55 pm (UTC)Without question, The World is Bound in Secret Knots. Why? Not because I'm biased (although I sort of am, I suppose), it was a lot more atmospheric than the other piece. I felt a pulse as soon as I started reading it.
I'll tell you what some very amazing author folk have told me about getting through first drafts: blast your way through it. You're gonna hate big chunks of it when you're done, but at least you'll be done. You can go back and fix stuff, which is a whole lot easier than finishing the first draft. And then, without too much fuss over it, send it off to school. Get it out there to publishers and start your next one.
I'm so flattered you put me in some other category, my friend, but we all have the same struggles! Drop that shame. It's doing you no good. Let me encourage you to just blast through to the end. I'm sure the rest will come naturally, because you are a talented writer.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-13 03:47 pm (UTC)Off to the races.
And other clichés.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-12 02:53 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-12 03:15 pm (UTC)Truer words were never spoken.
Welcome to the club
Date: 2005-05-12 03:21 pm (UTC)With me, I think I am accustomed to short, time sensitive projects, and when they are done, I move on to the next one. I cant seem to get motivated for a long reaching "done someday" type of project.
If you find this works for you, let me know.
Voting
Date: 2005-05-12 07:59 pm (UTC)"'Secret Knots" grabbed me firmly and hauled me in. I looked up unhappy that there wasn't more.
This could have to do with the fact that I read the former while aiming for sleep, cold sober, and the latter after much house work and a beer. I don't think so, though. I might have liked "'Spring" better with more background. It's easier to read a piece of something set on a familiar planet.
So I think I wish you'd finish "'Secret Knots" first, then go back and do "'Spring". Both are good.
knots
Date: 2005-05-12 08:13 pm (UTC)in the tatters of the King
Date: 2005-05-12 11:02 pm (UTC)