Wrong

Though it’s Thursday again, I have a WIPpet for you all.  First a check-in for the Round of Words in 80 Days writing challenge.  My goals are here at my name blog.

Yesterday, I posted a comment check-in to the FB group. This is a cut/paste of what I wrote plus…

Not a lot of progress. Had family over yesterday, spent time cleaning house. Did some blog updates and all my ROW80 visits. Explored some research of neurogenesis and how brain injury affects behavior, plotted out how this might relate to the talents and witchcraft among many of my characters,.. started writing up how one of my MCs deals with brain surgery after his wife’s death (yes, these things are related).

No fresh art except to study some drawing books and get an idea for how to draw hands better.

I also arranged a schedule with my accountability partner, Jennette Marie Powell. And I figured out one of the flaws I had in my goals for this round of words. Adjustments to come.

Baby steps….

WIPpet

Today WIPpet, as promised in Even Louder (my last post from Singer of the Swan Song for a while) is of a more fun bent, being from a JatWW fanfic I write when I need to decompress.  Today’s piece comes from what may be a new section opening for the Was Variation.  Fifteen sentences for 01/03/19…

15 = 01+03 – 1+9 – an extra 1 for being late so many times.

‘Listii caught himself just before he backhanded Brüan. For a moment he lay still, his arm shadowed in the glow of the streetlights.

Taking care to relax his tense limbs, he tried curling up against his pillows, bunching them close, tight, a buffer against…

Wrong. Everything felt wrong, awkward, out-of-place. Even before he tried punching the lumping stuffing into submission, he knew it wouldn’t help.

It didn’t. Might have even become worse.

Accepting the inevitable, he scooched over to his side of the bed and dangled his feet over the side. Next to him, Brüan rustle in a dream and clutched at his blanket. She already had the other two tangle about her. ‘Listii unwrapped himself and patted it toward her side of the bed, giving a wry glance at the woman as she gathered the discarded flannel to her chest and buried her face in it.

He swore she sighed his name before settling.

Before he dwelt to long on his lover’s actions, he set his feet on the floor. How? he wondered as he curled his toes. Two centimeters of wool pile and it still felt like he was stepping on ice.

I hope you enjoyed this snippet.  If you’d like to read more, head over to the WIPpet linky and visit some our other awesome members. WIPpet Wednesdays are hosted by Emily Wrayburn at Letting the Voices Out.  And if you’d like to join in, just do it.  The rules are simple.  Post a sample of your present work in progress to your blog that relates in some vague way to the date.  As you can see, you use some pretty crazy maths.  The real point is to have some fun with words and share the writing experience with others.

A Fighter Knows

Oh, here we are, yet again, a WIPPet Wednesday…  wow!  How did that sneak up on me so fast?

I was planning originally to return to Courting the Swan’s Song for these posts, but well… after fighting with several transition scenes in CTSS that I had set a goal to finish by August (not gonna happen, nope, no way), I just want to spend sometime doing something fun. And playing in the sandbox is pretty darned fun, IM(not-so)HO. So here is yet another piece from my Was Long Variation fanfiction.

For the maths, I have 7 for the month of July; I’m subtracting the 2 twos from the day. Then I am multiplying the remainder by 2 and then 0, getting an answer of zero. And then I figured since a zero word entry would make crappy reading, that I should use the 1 and 5 of 15 to make six.

Six small paragraphs from the Was Long Variation:

She nodded. Her reserve grew as she took his hand in hers. She ran a fingertip over one of his healed wounds. A sting of fresh injury lashed through him where she touched. “A fighter knows another fighter. Even Silav, with his trainer’s grace and pampered beds of silk and feather, had spent years dancing with knives.”

She removed her hand, but a fire coursed through him until the line where her fingertips had touched felt etched in his very bones. “Silav?” he asked, needing to redirect his attention from her touch.

She opened her mouth then stopped herself. A tear formed at the edge of one eye. “Nothing. He doesn’t matter now.”

Someone she loved? She clearly remembered this Silav with more than simple fondness. He wondered if it was a reflection of her shadow-self, but there was no darkness in her gaze. “If you need to talk…”

“No.” She straightened and eased back. “I would just like it if you would spar with me. I haven’t had a real opponent in a long time, not since Alanii Vestimiir and I last crossed blades. He beat me actually–the only person I can remember doing so—though maybe your kinship to him will give you an edge.”

For some reason he knew he couldn’t explain, his grandfather’s name struck him akin to salt ground in the fiery wounds he’d just imagined. The pain, while insubstantial, was indistinguishable from reality. “If I beat you, it has nothing to do with that man.” He echoed her withdrawal and shrugged. “I’m up for your challenge. When?”

For those who are curious, this scene comes just a few short paragraphs after a scene called The Arc of His Own I posted for the Weekend Writing Warriors bloghop in June. It’s a short piece (for the WeWriWa, snippets can’t be any longer than 10 sentences, preferably closer to eight), but a lot of people seemed to enjoy it.

And if you like this sort of thing, why don’t you head over to the WIPpet linky and visit some our other awesome members. You can join us while we shower KLSchwengel with praise and chocolate for hosting this bloghop and putting up with all our silliness. 😀

The Arc of His Own

Good morning, and welcome to my sixth Weekend Writing Warriors installment. The rules are simple enough:

• Add your name and genre(s) to the most recent post on the WeWriWa site
• Post a link to the WeWriWa site on your blog/Sunday post
• Keep your excerpt 10 sentences or less (8-10, no more!)
• Visit other WeWriWa authors and experience their work

(Find a complete set on the WeWriWa page as well as links to pages of all the authors involved. Check it out.)

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Due to popular demand (I don’t normally post pieces in the order I wrote them anymore*), I decided to indulge your request to see what happened after last week’s post: Just Kiss Me.  This nine sentence snippet follows right on its heels…

He nodded. Even if it was a tease, which he doubted, he owed her. He leaned down, lifted her chin with a fingertip. Drawing her close, he reached an arm around. He pressed her body into the arc of his own; he nipped at her lips–not once, not even a few times—he kissed her lips, her jaw, her neck… His fingers caressed the line of her clavicle and breast. A thrill ran through him, warming his senses, sparking images and unremembered thoughts.

She threaded her own fingertips through his hair, clutching. She nipped at his earlobes. Just as he was about to ask if she didn’t mind more, she retreated, swallowing frantically.

Thank you for reading; I hope you enjoyed the snippet. Coming up for WIPpet Wednesday, please enjoy another sample from the Was Long Variation. For the month of June, I have switched all my bloghop snippets to this work as I dive full-steam in the ♥Just Write♥ madness that are JuNoWriMo and Ready. Set WRITE! challenges.

* for those of you who would like to read a (non-fanfiction, but more futuristic) story I posted as a serial back in 2012, please check out the Unnamed Story links on the Stories From My Worlds page.  The snippets aren’t short, so plan some reading time.