They Shoot Pianos, Don't They?

My husband and I found a piano. By the side of the road. The thing is ancient--the varnish is all crackled. But the thing plays, and plays well.

The fun thing was getting it home. I found it three blocks from home and we wheeled the thing all the way to our garage, up hill and down. (Ever try to control a 1,000 pound piano on a downslope? Whee!)

I wanted a full size, old-fashioned, made-out-of-wood piano. And one just appeared on the side of the road.

Be careful what you wish for. You just might get it.

Friday Snippet, August 23, 2007

Well, I have new stuff! This is the WIP I will attempt to write between now and the end of the year.

I started this story in a much different form a couple of years ago during Holly Lisle's writing class. I've never been happy with it, or the magic system I devised, so I put it aside.

My intent had been to do the story that I posted a snippet of a few Friday's ago, but all of a sudden, everything fell into place for this one. I figured out how the magic should go, and where I went wrong on the previous book, which really doesn't look like the new one at all---different main characters altogether. Here's the first bit. Let me know if it's too info-dumpy.

#

The pounding at her door woke Marina from a heavy sleep. She rolled out of bed to the floor, landing on her feet and hands, silent as a cat. The long sleep had dulled her senses, and it took a moment for her to realize that the light coming through her bedroom window had the slant of late afternoon to it. She tested the feel, but Birthright did not warn her of danger.

Someone knocked again, sounding like metal against wood. Marina stood up and moved from her bedroom, down the hallway to the front door. She peered out one of the sidelights, and made a disgusted sound. Seón di Cambra stood on her front step using his walking cane on her door.

Marina opened the door. “What do you want, di Cambra?”

The prissy Empire man stepped inside. “You look like you just crawled out of bed, mi ama.”

“Astute observation,” she said. He, of course, looked as if he’d just come from the hands of his readyman.

“Late nights are for the young and foolish. Which you are not, usually.”

“Young? Or foolish?” she said dryly, showing him into her parlor. The dust was only a few millimeters thick. She made a mental note to speak with Ana, her maid, cook, and general factotum.

Di Cambra shrugged with that insouciance the citizens of the Kalibarran Empire did so well. He eyed one of the parlor chairs and whacked the upholstered seat with his jeweled cane. Dust rose in the air. He gave her a pained look.

Marina stepped into the hallway, opened the coat closet, and yanked out one of her cloaks. She threw that across the chair. Di Cambra gingerly seated himself on its billowing folds.

She dropped onto the horsehair loveseat opposite him, folded her hands, and waited.

As Marina knew he would, di Cambra fidgeted with his clothes and his cane, hoping she’d speak first. When she didn’t, he sighed.

“I am come from Chian, the Emperor’s advisor--”

“I know who Chian is, di Cambra. Get to the point.”

Di Cambra leaned back, eyes narrowing. “Tiberus.”

She stared at him. “The new continent. What does it have to do with me?”

“See, mi ama? Sometimes getting ‘to the point’, as you say, takes longer than the scenic route. You know that Kalibar has established some colonies in Tiberus?”

“And?” Marina asked.

He flicked her an irritated glance. “And, so, on to what is less well known. Kalibar has allowed some Morland citizenry to establish a colony in Tiberus.”

“My country has colonists in Tiberus?” Marina felt her eyebrows climbing.

Di Cambra cleared his throat. “Yes, well, Morland, as a subject of the Empire, has been granted some rights by the Emperor.”

Marina made a rude noise. “What you mean is that the Emperor can’t keep them out.”

He shrugged again, looking uncomfortable. “I am not privy to the Emperor’s thoughts. Except to say that he would like to retain your services.”

“The Emperor,” Marina repeated. “Would like to hire me.”

“Yes. He thinks you are uniquely suited to the problem at hand.”

“Which is?”

“The Morlanders are missing, and the Emperor wants you to find out what happened to them.”

Marina felt a wave of irritation she could barely conceal. “How many?”

Di Cambra twirled his cane back and forth. “All of them.”

“All! How many is all?”

“One hundred eleven colonists in total.”

Marina sat back, stunned.

“You can see, being Morland’s finest Seeker, why the Emperor needs you.”

Marina already turned the problem over in her mind. One hundred eleven people missing. On a continent-sized wilderness. Oh, no problem at all.

Di Cambra reached inside his coat and pulled out a purse. He tossed it to her. Marina caught it by reflex.

“Get what you need. The Emperor’s pockets are deep for this one. Inside is his writ, carrying his seal. You’ll find that will open most doors for you. I’ve secured a berth for you on the Sea Sprite heading for New Cordonia at seven tomorrow morning. The ticket is in the purse.”

Marina looked up, protest in her eyes.

“When you arrive in New Cordonia, Governor Alhamba will be waiting. He’ll do a much better job of explaining things than I can.”

Di Cambra stood. Since the interview appeared to be over, Marina stood as well. She gave a slight shake of her head. Di Cambra had known she couldn’t say no. Marina preceded him down the hall and opened her front door.

He paused on the landing. “I know that I am speaking in the wind, but try to stay out of trouble, mi ama.”

She grimaced at him and he gave a slight chuckle before making his way down the steps. Marina felt the slightest bit of satisfaction that dust stained his superfine in the rear.

Apparently, the cloak had been dusty, too.

Friday Snippet, August 17, 2007

And the rest of Chapter Two. Picks up where the last snippet left off. The story doesn't go much further after this. Can you tell I'm stalling until I get some new material down? (grin) I really am working on something. I'm feverishly putting together an outline on a novel. I plan to be a complete idiot and attempt to write a novel from September 1 through December 31. My version of 70 days of sweat?: "90 days of utter exhaustion"

#

She rolled on the ground, holding her wrist with her good hand, screaming and sobbing. When she rolled too close to the campfire and burned her thigh, that smaller pain distracted her enough to surge to her feet and run to the stream. Shanda thrust her hand into the water and steam rushed into her face, smelling of burning flesh and metal. She left her hand submerged for a long time, the cold water numbing her wrist and leaching away some of the agony in her hand, bit by bit. Her tears fell into the water like drops of rain.

When dawnlight peered beneath the trees and the fire in her hand faded to only knife-blade sharpness, Shanda pulled her hand to just under the surface of the water. Something on her hand caught the glimmer of the faint morning light and threw it in her eyes.

She drew a breath, and lifted her hand from the water, palm up. Fused to her palm and fingers, drawing her hand into an immovable claw, the shape of a silver cross glittered back at her.

Attitude

OMG, this picture is so funny! Found it on the web. It is so....cat.

Nothing New Under the Sun

U-Tube is extremely addictive. One can run the gamut from Puccini's Nessun Dorma to Bizet's Carmen. I listened to several renditions of Nessun Dorma and Habanera this evening, and I'm thinking to myself--bring on Paul Potts. Someone I can relate to.

Watching the murder of Carmen in Act IV, I'm wondering, what's the fascination with this? Besides the singing, of course. Some guy offs his girlfriend. Sounds like the evening news. I won't go all feminist and mention what that says about the perceptions of the relationship between men and women--since the opera was penned in a different era. "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof" kinda thing.

As writers, we've come to realize that many stories of the human condition have already been told, and continue to be told. Where we come in is to put our unique spin on those old stories. I guess maybe that's the virtue in Carmen--it's Bizet's spin on a very old tale.

There really is "nothing new under the sun."

Just Say No

I read that the warring HD-DVD and Blu-Ray have made exclusive deals with different movie studios to bring blockbusters out in only one format this Christmas, and will slash the price of their players to give consumers an incentive to buy one format or the other.

JUST SAY NO.

We, the consumer, should just say we aren't going to fall for that crap and make them slash the prices on players that can play BOTH formats. (It's probably not feasible to make them "settle on a format, already!").

Can anyone say BETA vs. VHS? Let's learn from that mess.

Friday Snippet, August 10, 2007

This is a piece I wrote at the beginning of the year. Then a huge event happened in my life--one of those life-changing ones that you never see coming. I just can't seem to take up the threads of this story again. I'm a different person than I was then. Maybe some day--but even then, the story will be different.

Short synopsis: Shanda has been sold by her father to some traders, who bring her to a forest and set up camp. A dark figure shows up in her dream, frightening her. She wakes up to find herself alone and the traders gone. She attempts to leave the forest but finds she keeps circling back to the same camp.


Obviously, she couldn’t get away from this place. Some magic was at work—something she couldn’t figure out how to fight. That left only one action. To face her fear—to face the one who kept her from leaving. The very thought made her insides knot. And night had nearly fallen. Something told her that he was strongest at night.

Lurching to her feet, Shanda went to the campfire and kicked at the embers, trying to find a live coal. She found an answering spark. Snatching at twigs, she knelt and carefully nursed a small flame from the embers. Once she had the fire going and a supply of windfall to keep it fed, Shanda took a half-burned branch and scratched a circle in the dirt around the campfire, containing her and the campfire inside. The branch left behind soot and ash, defining a crisp, clear circumference.

Shanda had seen the village wise woman draw a like circle many times. For protection, she’d said. She clutched her grandmother’s cross in her hand and stared out at the gathering shadows. Shanda realized she trusted her grandmother’s loyalty and devotion to that cross more than she did some circle in the dirt.

When night pressed against the confines of the circle, he came.

“Who are you?” she said. “What do you want?”

He walked toward her and the firelight fell on his face, illuminating his features. She trembled at the beauty and the cruelty she saw there. No kindness, not a spark of humanity, softened the glittering edges of his perfection.

He surveyed her from head to foot. Shanda felt exposed and raw, bared before his gaze like a sacrificial lamb. She shivered. He tried to cross the circle, and paused, watching her. He looked down at the sharply defined circumference and a half smile touched his mouth.

She stood straight and defiant and held the cross at arm’s length, between him and her heart, like the old stories she’d heard her grandmother tell of the valkans that walked the night and were only driven away by the devotion and purity in their intended victim.

He saw the cross and smiled no longer.

“Throw that away.” He spoke for the first time, and his voice hurt her head, the ringing command in it causing her arm and hand to tremble as if she held a great weight.

Shanda almost did his bidding, but caught herself in time. She took a fresh grip on the cross.

“No,” she said, grim. “It is mine, and I will hold it.”

For the barest second, inhuman rage sat on his features, then smoothed away as if it had never been.

“Do you think this circle in the dirt and a piece of metal will hold me back if I desire to have you? You, who cannot even prevent your own father from selling you to the highest bidder?”

Tears welled in her eyes. To have someone else know her shame—that gave unexpected sharpness to her pain.

“I can help you,” he said softly. “Is it your wish to see your father pay for what he did to you? Just say the word and he will suffer every day for the rest of his short life.”

Her hand sagged, and the cross with it. Did she want her father to pay for what he had done? She realized she did. The thought that she could make him hurt –yes. A part of her responded to that promise.

“You see?” he said. “You have hatred in your heart and you do not deserve to hold that cross in your hand. Throw it away, and let me give you what you want.”

Despair touched her with spectral fingers. Maybe he was right. How could she even hold that cross while her heart was so stained with rage against her father?

“Yes, you see how unworthy you are. Stop fighting a lost battle and surrender to me, girl.”

In the space of one breath to the next, motion ceased, awaiting her decision. In that small space, she heard her mother crying. The sound was as full of raw pain and despair as anything she now felt. Shanda’s vision cleared and she saw that he leaned toward her, within touching distance.

Alarmed, her hand flashed up to push him away, the cross still in her fingers. When the silver touched him as her hand pushed against his chest, he screamed, high and shrill.

Pain, terrible pain in her hand. Fire and molten heat.

Shanda screamed along with him, her hand feeling as if it had fused to a hot bar of metal. For what seemed an eternity, they stood, locked in their separate agony. Then, with a wrench that spilled her on her ground, he was gone.