In the past 7 days, I have had:
A nettle in my eyelid
A UTI (If you don’t know, don’t ask) requiring antibiotics
A case of poison sumac that is still pestering me
Friend stress
work stress
stress stress
Hormone stress
House stress
If I am behind in my writing, I think you can understand why
This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/574416.html. You can comment here or there.
“There’s an art to this.” She had her hands full of ribbons, red and blue and green and black. It was the only thing on her body, except the high-heeled shoes.
“An art?” He lay sprawled across the bed, watching her. He liked watching her; his eyes tracked the sway of her ass, the way the ribbons trailed across her breasts, the way one foot moved in front of the other. She, on the other hand, wasn’t looking at him. She didn’t, often, never had, really.
“An art. A craft, if you will, a skill, a decoration.”
“I don’t want to be decorated.” Her hands were obscured by the ribbons; he couldn’t see what she was taking out of the dresser. “What are you doing?”
“Most arts have their tools.”
“Tools? Not just the ribbons?” Those ribbons trailed down her back lie curls of hair, although her hair was now cropped short, baring her neck. Once, he’d watched the black-blue locks make little s-curves across her spine. Now he tried for a look at her hands, only to be foiled again and again by the turn of her hip, the drapes of the ribbons.
“Of course not. Don’t… that would be silly.” She twisted one arm behind her back, just as she pivoted on her heel to face him. She was smiling. He wasn’t used to her face with a smile on it. He wasn’t used to the way it lit her up, the way it hitched something deep in his throat.
“I’m not silly.” He frowned at her over the thumping of his heart. “I want to know what you’re doing.”
“We all have wants.” She crossed the distance between them, too fast, far too fast for her short legs. “Do you want to know what I want?”
The ribbons draping off of her breasts were nearly touching him. He swallowed and tried anyway. “Do you want to know what I want?”
“Of course.” She smirked at him, as if she knew it wasn’t the answer he’d expected. “And do you?”
It was a test, wasn’t it? “Yes?”
“Well, then.”
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Eighth in a series of character-building vignettes following a bunch of characters through their time at Addergoole & beyond.
Basalt shows up in Addergoole: Year 9 as Ahouva’s rescuer-slash-Keeper; Thorburn shows up as Ceinwen’s Keeper, and Brydan and Indigo have passing mention through the series.
“Oh, Bry, he’s something else.”
Basalt hadn’t been aware he’d dazed out until the voice brought him back into consciousness. Being around Brydan seemed to do that to him, especially in the last week. Since the dance. Since he’d kissed her, and told her she was an angel and…
…the rest was a little fuzzy. Basalt had drunk more than he ought to, but the booze had been flowing freely, and he’d always been able to hold his liquor before that.
He blinked up at Brydan. He hadn’t been told to move yet, but he didn’t really mind. Kneeling with his head on her lap was one of the more comfortable ways he could think of to pass the afternoon.
She was frowning, however, which wasn’t as good. “Indigo. I don’t recall inviting you in.”
“You gave me a blanket invitation, remember? And I wanted to show off mine, but you’ve beaten me to it, as usual.”
Even where he was, Basalt could hear the growl from the doorway. His shoulders tensed. He didn’t mind being in Brydan’s lap, but it was going to be hard to defend her if he was stuck here.
She patted his shoulder. “It’s all right, sweetie. You can move.”
He didn’t want to, not really. But he did, standing, stretching, and getting into a nice bodyguard position looming just behind Brydan’s left shoulder.
He didn’t want to look at the other people in the room, either, but he did. There was something about the woman’s voice that made what he and Brydan were doing sound dirty somehow, instead of just right and proper. And the growl…
Yeah, he’d been afraid of that. The woman was the blonde-and-sometimes-blue girl, Indigo, one of Brydan’s friends and in the same Mentorship as Brydan. The other… yeah. Basalt met Thorburn’s eyes and shrugged.
The other guy showed all his teeth, in something that was definitely not a smile. Basalt just shrugged again. It could get embarrassing, sure. But if Brydan was anything like Indigo…
“He’s pretty awesome, isn’t he?” Brydan patted Basalt’s shoulder.
He straightened up a little bit and smiled at her. “So are you, miss.”
Basalt: His First Year
Nyyrikki: Her First Year
Orliath: Her Second Year
Cynara: Her Second Year
This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/573312.html. You can comment here or there.
Seventh in a series of character-building vignettes following a bunch of characters through their time at Addergoole & beyond.
If you’ve read any Addergoole at all, Rozen should be familiar to you.
Addergoole, Year 2
The school was in the middle of freaking nowhere. It was in the middle of nowhere, and there were less than 40 students, over half of whom had already been here a year. It was in the middle of nowhere, there were less than 40 students, and the older ones all acted like there was some sort of massive joke going on. And it was a four-year sentence. Rozen was ready to punch someone.
He already had punched one guy – half of a pair, creepy rednecks with a “banjos” vibe going on and the same smug attitude as the rest of the upperclassmen. He’d broken the bastard’s nose, and the PE teacher had shown up about three seconds later.
Luke might have been a head shorter than Rozen, but he had “don’t fuck with the Marines” written all over him. Rozen had stepped back, shown his hands clearly, and waited for the officer to ask unpleasant questions. The two shits he’d been fighting had laughed and run off.
That’s how he’d learned their names – Meshach and Shadrach – and learned that there were times when the authorities here would just not care if you broke someone’s face. The school was still in the middle of nowhere, but it had a few advantages.
“Well, hello.” A long-fingered hand landed on Rozen’s bicep, and her turned to look the owner in the face, ready to punch again. He’d already had to explain to two predatory women that he was nobody’s dog, thank you very much, nobody’s boy, and he wouldn’t come when called. This one…
…Could look him in the eye, which was impressive. Most of the time he was looking at the top of women’s heads. She was wearing heels – he checked – but that still meant she was nearly six foot tall in her own right.
Her lips were red. Her hair was black. Her smile was hungry. “I’ve heard about you already. That’s impressive; it’s only the second week of school.”
“If you’ve heard of me, you know I don’t bow to anyone.” His voice was coming out a little thickly. He was human (or whatever) and she was, he had to admit, gorgeous even in a school full of pretty girls.
“I know. And that’s all right, I don’t have any interest in boys that do. But would you be interested, maybe, in laying down for a while?”
“This school moves fast.” Which wasn’t to say he wasn’t interested.
“The school moves the way it moves. I, on the other hand, move the way I want to. Right now, that would be under you. She offered him a hand. “I’m Dita, by the way.”
“Rozen.” He shook her hand. This school had a couple advantages, he supposed.
Basalt: His First Year
Nyyrikki: Her First Year
Orliath: Her Second Year
Cynara: Her Second Year
This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/573042.html. You can comment here or there.
Okay, I’m going to give this a try.
Someone (*cough* T) suggested I try writing stuff set in the real world.
I’m pretty unsure about this – I like being a genre author! – but I’m willing to give it a try.
Give me a couple real-world prompts and I’ll see what I can do.
This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/572810.html. You can comment here or there.
I’ve gotten lax on these…
The little one was getting too close to Girey.
19,103 words (goal 18700; 8689 words on Rin/Girey with a goal there of 8800)
13,897 to go!
This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/572434.html. You can comment here or there.
Okay, I did the math. If I keep the books at the planned wordcount, one Book of Addergoole: Original Series is about 25000 words.
I’m still going to write a bit of bonus content, so I probably won’t get all the way through TWO books of Addergoole during Nano, but I’ll get quite a way towards that goal.
And speaking of bonus material:
http://www.addergoole.com/TableofContents.html
Are there Question-answers or Bonus stories you’d like to see updated/rewritten? Are there bonus stories I never wrote that you’d like to see?
This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/572043.html. You can comment here or there.