Alex Beecroft's Blog, page 47

Cover art, new contract, and holidays.

I go away and everything happens at once – which is sort of like busses (and how you wait hours for one and then three come within seconds of each other.)  I'm not really back from my holidays yet, since the girls haven't yet gone back to school, but I am at least back from the places of no internet which I have been inhabiting over the past fortnight.  Cornwall – there was much bodyboarding and eating, though not at the same time.  Grandparents – there was much chatting and eating.  And re-enacting the Saxons in a field at the Detling Military Odyssey.  Much Bayeux-tapestry-like embroidery and bone-flute playing was done.  There wasn't a lot of eating at that one, but what there was of it was all fried, so I suspect I return a half stone heavier than I was when I left.

When I got back and unpacked yesterday it was to find a notice that I could no longer keep my website with the host it has been with for the past couple of years, so a frantic day's work later and it has been transferred over to a new host.  I believe that everything is supposed to carry on as if nothing has changed, so my alex@alexbeecroft.com addy will still work, and my blog will still crosspost hither and yon.  This is the first test post, so fingers crossed!

Excitingly, my cover art for By Honor Betrayed arrived half way through the fortnight, and I can now unveil it.  I have to say that I think that with this one Carina continues their winning streak when it comes to cover art.  I'm very happy with it, anyway

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By Honor Betrayed is coming out in early November, and will break the long period I've had with nothing new out.  I can't wait.

Also half way through the holiday I signed a contract with Carina for another Age of Sail novella called Poison and Poetry.  So with that and the two volumes of Under the Hill, I suspect I'm in for an autumn and winter of editing.  Huzzah!  (As my heroes would say.)

Now I'm champing at the bit for the school holidays to end (on 6th September) so I can get down to work on the first draft of The Pilgrims' Tale.  It was nice to revisit the Age of Sail for a couple of novellas, but it will also be nice to do one of my other favourites for a change.

Fear me and my fipple

It may be apparent, from all the little snippets of wild and wacky information I'm coming across, that I'm doing research at the moment.  Previously I've tended to think "nobody could be interested in this stuff.  Just put the book down and walk away."  But this time around, I thought it might be fun to share some of it.  So, here I am discovering that, according to the Anglo-Saxons, my newfound ability to play the whistle may come with unexpected side effects.

From this website http://homes.chass.utoronto.ca/~cpercy/courses/1001Lovett.htm

Since they were similar by nature, musica instrumentalis could exert sympathetic influence over a listener by appealing to musica humana, his own physical music, both emotional and physiological. According to this system of influence, the type of music played could exert specific physical and emotional responses. Soft sounding instruments were played to encourage sleep, and faster songs and dances to promote physical vigor… The musical performance in each of the above examples is a meaningful event, and intended to have a very specific effect beyond its value as entertainment. Along with the beneficial potential of music came the threat that a musician would play intervals calculated to rob the listener of his or her rational ability, leaving the listener vulnerable to the devil's temptation. Despite sounding somewhat fanciful to modern individuals, music's practical, physical and moral influence was treated very seriously in the middle ages.

Members of the clergy often suspected music's persuasive powers of demonic origin, especially when attempts were made to influence the natural world through secular musical acts. As a result, instructions were written outlining punishments for the practice of sinful superstitions. An example of this is found in the latin Indiculus Superstitionum , which forbids the playing of wind instruments to influence the weather or the passing of an eclipse. (Griffiths, 100)

Damn!  I'll have to give up my plan of plunging the world into darkness by playing my pennywhistle after all.  I guess I'll have to settle for disturbing my listeners' reason and making them run around with their fingers in their ears shouting "Argh! No! Stoppit!" instead.

In defence of Arwen

I thought this was interesting, and went some way towards answering all those people who dislike Arwen because she does nothing more strenuous in the war of the rings than to send Aragorn a banner that she had made herself.

From the Viking Answer Lady's webpage (which is just a wonderful thing in many ways)

A famous type of weaving that was used for protection was the Raven Banner: these banners were recorded to have been carried by Danes attacking Belgium and northern France in the 9th and 10th centuries, as well as to Vikings under Sigifrid in the British Isles in 878, and in the Icelandic manuscripts of the 12th and 13th century the Raven Banner is found connected with Sigurðr Hlöðvisson Dyri (the Stout), Earl of Orkney, or with King Harald of Norway. In all these accounts, the magical banner has the power to terrify foemen; the ground of the banner which at rest was seen to be a shimmering white turned black in battle, or else the figure of a huge black raven in flight appeared on the white fabric, which was seen to magically flap its wings. The magical banner is always woven by the mother or sister of the warrior in question, with the magic woven into the fabric as it was made to protect the son or brother. Victory was always assured to the man whom the banner was carried before, but the banner bearer was often doomed to fall in battle (Orkneyinga saga, ch. 6, 11, 14, 17; Njáls saga, ch. 157; Lukman, 135-150).

So probably it was all down to Arwen's magical abilities that Aragorn won the battles at all.

Wildfire, Chapter Four part 1

In which it turns out that Freyja added a few bonus warning dreams of her own to the package.  Not that it helped.

For earlier parts check the Loki or Wildfire tags.

Chapter Four.

Priests and Peaceweavers.

Raegn cursed. Aethelbald's sword had nicked her arm and the slow blood trickled down to her fingertips. She was aware of it's progress, as irritating as a march of ants. She cursed at herself, for acting like a wife, like a little placid woman who had never handled a sword. Too much thinking, that was the problem. Aethelbald sheathed his sword and said;

"I'm sorry. Is it bad? "

She knocked him down with the flat of her sword against his face. He was lucky he didn't get it in the eye.

"You don't apologise for my fault." she said. "If I was of the mettle to be badly hurt by that little scratch I would be using this sword to beat my weaving."

She walked away. Aethelbald rubbed his face, and there was a rueful look on it. Friends laughed at him sitting there in the dust, and his wife walked by and said "You look very well there, husband. You've never been more than a fool." Raegn sheathed her sword. She had called it Lufgifu, the love-gift. The men who had tried to get her for wife in the past had found it a sharp bedfellow…

She walked into the forest, to where a dead pine lay across the swift river. There she sat, kicking at the water, watching the progress of the sun through the summer leaf-dance, listening to the never-ending battle of the wild creatures.

She had had dreams: She was sitting here, in Autumn, watching the fallow leaves fall. There came a thunder, and a wind, and the shadows of black storm clouds. She looked up. Skogol was riding there, over the tree tops, in the form of a swan.

"What do you look up for, Aetheldreda's daughter?" She said. "Do you want to know where the sword is?"

"What sword, Host-Fetter?" said Raegn.

"The sword that will double your Lord's land and bring death to his enemies." Said Skogol. She landed in the stream and sat there, her black legs hidden in the water.

"Yes." said Raegn, "I'll have that sword."

"Look for it in the barrow of a dead god." said Skogol, "But you may find it less bright than you think." Raegn went to Bald Barrow in the East, where they said that Balder's ship had beached, when it had born his body out of the world of the gods. Corpse fire was burning, and the stars were strange. The doorway of the Haudh was low and black. There were runes scratched on it.

"Dead one in there." Raegn shouted, "I've come for the sword, it's no use to you, now you're dry bones. It'll do better in my hands."

The dead one stirred in the tomb. There were runes scratched over the door. The corpse turned it's face to her. It had once been a very beautiful face.

"Why do you trouble me?" It said, "I have been dead a long time, drenched with rain, frozen by hoar frost. Worms have eaten me, and I am cold. You need not have woken me to take the sword. It was never mine."

The sword was beautiful, and bright. It gleamed and shimmered in the corpse light. She brought it home and unwrapped it in the firelight, and it was black. She valued it less after that.

"It doesn't even have a name." said Raegn, kicking at the water and thinking of her dreams. "What use is that ?"

There had been a second dream, not much of a dream by any standards, just a man's face. She had never seen him before, but she knew he was no dream-creature. She knew that neither dream was out of her head, that much she could tell. What was more she sensed Woden in the one and guessed at Freyja's hand in the other, but she had no skill with visions. Her mother might interpret it, or tell its purpose, but she had been a week now in the woods, plant hunting in the Holy Groves with a wooden stave and a knife for blood offering.

That Aetheldreda should be away at such a time worried Raegn. It smacked of careful management. Aetheldreda would not have gone if she had known. She would have laughed, pointing a tattooed finger,

"Well my lass, you're turning into a woman, finally. Perhaps you'd better put down that sword and find yourself a staff."

"Fame is better than wisdom, and to be long remembered is better than any knowledge." Raegn replied to her thought, but her voice was uncertain. She didn't know how she would choose between the sword and the face.

Alfred, that was his name. He would be a berserker, a man who raged under the inspiration of Woden. Strong and sharp as a pattern-welded blade. Death's madness would be in him, the clarity and the poetry of the Gallows God. There was nothing soft about Woden, or his chosen men.

The sun was on a level with her now. The river was golden and orange, and the birds began to pipe in thin voices. She shook her head and strode home. Fate would bring what it would, it was womanly to take too much thought for what might be. She might die tonight, and then all the gods would laugh at her plans.

She returned to the Hall. She smiled at Aethelbald and his wife. Aethelbald nodded, grinning. His wife glowered at her, she didn't care to think that her husband had been seen being beaten by a woman.

Raegn sat at her bench. She was half way up the hall, closer to the Lord's high-seat than many warriors. It was the place of a good fighter, who need not feel any shame for their prowess, but it was not the place of a hero. She slumped there, and her face was worried.

The people came in. The priests were before them, wild eyed and dark robed, and they sat in the shadowed corners with their wives and their children discussing magic, and portents, the wills of Woden and Thunor and Ing. The sorcerer's place among them was empty. The smooth flags of the coloured floor where she cast her runes was left clear. Men walked around it to get to their seats.

The fighters took up their empty mead horns, and servant girls went round quickly and nervously to fill them up. Then the harp was passed from hand to hand around the table, and men sang in slow voices tales of the old countries, and the heroes of the North. Redwald the Fool left the table when the harp was passed to him; his hands were clumsy and his voice unsure. Shame went with him.

Then the harp came to Ceolfrith, the scop. The priests held him in high honour though he was no swordsman. Often Woden spoke in his words. His voice, and his songs were of great beauty, and they were strong; he would give no quarter to despair, nor to self pity, though Ragnarok come and the world be ended.

Ceolfrith put the harp down on the table amid the plates and he rapped on the board with the hilt of his knife until the talking stopped.

"I had a dream last night," he said.

Raegn looked up from her wine.

"This was the dream." said Ceolfrith, "That Skirnir, Freyr's servant came to me and gave me a tale to tell, which he said would serve as a warning to us. This is the tale;

It so happened that, when Odin and his brother Hoenir had moulded the world from the flesh of Ymir, they lay down in it's long green grass and while Hoenir slept Odin looked into the fire and dreamed.

He made himself an eagle form and flew. Above the earth he flew, looking with his mad gold eye at the shapes of his world. On the wing he came to the North lands which lay cold on an icy sea. There he saw a single tree which stood in the midst of an empty and desolate moor. About the tree the moor was grey, the wind howled across it and above it black clouds thickened. A spark leaped from Odin's fire to the air, but from the twisted fist of the clouds there leaped a great blazing serpent. Screaming branches hissed at its touch. It smote the tree a dangerous smite.

Leaf after leaf, twig after twig, the tree flowered, and its flowers were yellow-orange, red and gold. Flame crowned it with a radiant garland, but its branches blackened. Again the white hand hit and within its mad light there was a man. There was a man in the tree, a young man, spread-eagled like a sacrifice in the fire. He screamed as a child screams with its first breath. Then he opened his eyes, they were ice-coloured. The fire was drawn to him. It entered in at his eyes, then it was gone.

The tree was burnt and broken. The young man stepped from it in wonder of the cold world. He looked around himself with yellow-red eyes, with eyes as black as charred branches, with wild and newborn eyes. For a moment he looked at the watching eagle, and he seemed to know it, but only for a moment…The eagle returned to Odin by the fire, and saw that it had burnt low. Odin awoke from his dream. That was how he knew that on that day, far off in the world, a new god had been born in pain.

There is a god, "Said Ceolfrith, "Who is of Giant kin. He was born of the woman Laufey, which means The Leafy One, and his father is Farbauti, the Dangerous Smiter. That Farbauti had two sons before him; big lads, they might take on Thor one day. They're black haired and black tempered, and they go a roaring over the world. Men fear them. One of them stirs up the ocean like a woman's cooking pot, flings ships into the air with his little finger. It's never a good thing to go sailing when he's around. His name is Waterspout.

The other one of these two fine boys stirs up the air in the same way. He likes to tear off the roofs of halls, and to fling trees at travellers. It's bad to run into him on a journey on horseback. He is known as Whirlwind. When they get together they're a terrible pair. The third son isn't one of that kind. You wouldn't know his parentage just by looking at him. He is a good-looking one, and well spoken, very wise. What's more they say that he can be helpful if you know how to treat him, and if you don't take your eye off him for a moment.

He is the answer to this riddle;

I know a noble, no friend has he

Men make him, many are glad of him;

But he sleeps unsoundly, stirs in his place.

When he wakes, if no-one watches

He slays the sleepers. The stealthy one

Breaks down the beams; black lies the Hall

Humbled on the heath. Heroes mourn.

A bright slave, a blissful servant,

A treacherous thane, this creature is.

I have heard that he is the most dangerous of the three brothers. Certainly the giants were very keen to get rid of him when they could…The giants call him Lightbringer, the gods say Heimdallr's Foe, the Sons of Muspell call him Bright Victor and the Dead say Grandfather, but his name among men is…"

The knocking at the door startled even Wulfgeat where he sat upon the dais with his elbows on his knees, leaning forward to catch the scop's voice. He raised his head and favoured the Hall wardens with a piercing glance. They stirred by the door. The warriors loosened their swords in their scabbards. They reached beneath the benches for the long hafted spears of ash.

The priests frowned, they sensed a change in the weft of the night. Ceolfrith took up the harp and fingered it softly, nervously. He was not used to being interrupted. A rag clothed slave crept up to the doors and threw them open. He made the sign of the cross before he scuttled back to his place, but for all that there were only two travellers outside. Nothing to be wary of.

Slaves took their horses. The two young men came forward. One smiled, as though he should be recognised. The other chewed at his lip, darting suspicious glances at the rows of eyes that followed him as he walked between them to the dais. The priests stared and, putting their heads together, they began to mutter. Raegn half rose from her place at the bench. The cushions scattered. Cyneburg pulled at her arm, misinterpreting her interest.

"They're no threat." he said.

Alfred saw her there, fitting perfectly into the ranks of warriors like a garnet in its setting. His step faltered until Ingeld took his arm and pulled him forward to be shown to the grizzled bear of a man who sat between the high seat pillars, looking down on them.

He was no bench boaster. Alfred looked up at the strong clear-eyed old man with respect. His hair was grey and his beard still as black as Hel. He sat very upright, with his hand on his sword. There was a look of command on his scarred face. His single hand bore many rings. "Well," he said, and his voice was soft and sure,

"Tell me what you are, that travel in the wilderness at this end of the world? We get so few guests here that the priests, judging from their frightened huddle, seem to think that you're some sort of omen."

Ingeld bowed, "I am Ingjaldr Glapsvidarson." he said, "I am now a trader in silver and furs. Horthaland is my Home Country. Ringproud, my ship burst its nose on a rock near here and I am now traipsing round all Halls in the hope of finding kinsmen who will help me home."

"There are none of your kin here." said Wulfgeat, "But you are welcome all the same. What of you?"

Alfred was looking over his shoulder. His ears were closed. He started when Ingeld nudged him and looked up wildly, wondering for a moment why there was a man in the High seat, sitting between the three-legged dishes of flaming oil. Between the pillars of wood and the lakes of fire and smoke Wulfgeat sat and looked down on him.

"Alfred," he said, "I am Alfred Athelgrim's son. Athelgrim is Sceldwulf Garwulf's son, Garwulf was Wulfstan's son, who came to England as Hengest's thane…You look like my father."

The hall erupted in laughter,

"Perhaps I am." said Wulfgeat, "Do I know your mother?"

Alfred took a step forward and glared,"I'm not ashamed to give you her name." he said, "It is Ceothfreda. Her honour is unquestioned."

"Lad!", Wulfgeat laughed, "I'm not in the habit of insulting strangers in my hall, but you walked into that. At any rate it's a good lineage you claim. Do you live up to it?"

He leaned forward, fixing the stranger with a level stare.

"Hengest's line went back to Woden." he said, "Woden gave him this island. Who is your god?"

Alfred's head cleared at the tone of the man's voice. It was not the voice of a friend. Though he heard the danger clearly he did not want to deny his faith. He did not want either to lie or to die. He looked to Ingeld for help. Ingeld laid his hand, lightly as a thief, upon his empty scabbard.

"I am a warrior," said Alfred, "I serve the Warrior's god, the Most High."

Many priests now called God by those names.

"I travel to test my courage." Alfred continued, "And I'm not ashamed to stand in any man's Hall."

"It's good to pass a test." said Wulfgeat, "Not so good to fail."

He waved a hand toward the benches.

"Both of you are welcome here," he said, "Sit and eat, drink and listen while the scop finishes his story." "Lord," said Ceolfrith, "I have forgotten it."

He bowed his head, staring into his horn of ale, as if inspiration swam on the dark surface of the liquid. The priests looked at each other again. They had been listening carefully to the scop's riddle, and most of them knew the answer. They looked at Ingeld with suspicious eyes.

Had Alfred been looking at his friend he might have found it strange how he had changed. In the smoky amber light his garnet-coloured tunic showed a rust brown. His blonde hair seemed darker. It had a tawny look in the dim light. Only his eyes were still as dark as the priest's robes where they sat in the shadow.

Alfred was not looking. He was staring at Raegn and his fixed and foolish grin was the subject of many of the night's best jokes. Cyneburg pointed it out to her, incase she hadn't noticed. She nodded absently and put in some good eyework herself.

"It looks like Freyja's cats have been flicking their tails in the hall tonight." said Redwald Aelfward's son to Ingeld beside him.

"So it seems" said Ingeld, "I wonder what that portends. It's rare that the gods show their hands so heavily."

"Good times." said Redwald, "It can only mean good times."

"Maybe." Ingeld shrugged and looked away.

He saw the priests staring at him curiously. When he saw them slipping out one by one to offer blood and questions to the gods he smiled. It was a twisted smile, it showed the white pattern of scars on his lips. Then he left Alfred, and he left the hall, the warmth of human company for the dark blue shelter of the woods and the talk of wolf voices.

That was when he saw Aetheldreda return weary from her journeying and cast herself down in her cold house without lighting the fire. He wished her sound sleep, to wake up in the noon day warmth, not to wake up until he was gone from her Lord's hearth.

Then, quiet and subtle as an arrow-headed adder, he slipped into the houses of the gods. The few watchful souls, who stayed away from the merriment to chase meaningful dreams in the pregnant silence, did not stir. The smell of blood was about him, the oxheads followed him with dead and flybitten eyes. No-one awoke as he desecrated the temple.

When Alfred cursed Raegn in the depth of the night amid the sleeping warriors Ingeld looked on from the shadows without intervening."I curse you with this curse." said Alfred, "May your sword turn against you, may your shield splinter in battle. May your name be forgotten, may your mother and father spit on you, your Lord disown you. May you bear malformed children to a man that you hate and die a woman's death, weeping like a slave. May all this happen if you do not come with me, back to my hall to be my wife."

She did not look afraid, she knew that Alfred was no god's messenger to make these things come true. She leaned back against the wall and put her feet up on the table. Alfred looked away from her critical glance with a frown, but then she said:

"That is a curse I'd sooner not risk coming true. It looks like I've no choice but to come with you."

"Come now." said Alfred, "Desert your Hall as I have done mine for you. We can be married tomorrow."

"You would have me disobey my oath of loyalty to Wulfgeat?" said Raegn, frowning now in earnest. But she knew it was not wise to provoke a curse, and she remembered her mother's saying that a warrior's power lies in instinct, not oaths. So when Alfred said

"I'll invoke the curse." she said

"Very well." She chose Freyja's dream, and the struggle was not so pitched as she had imagined. They got up then as if to be going, and Alfred looked about for his companion and found him asleep, snuggled up beside a fur-cloaked noble. He woke easily though, and looked at them bright eyed.

"We are going." said Alfred.

"It's the middle of the night." said Ingeld, "Never the best time to make a journey."

"Nevertheless…" said Alfred.

"What a man to travel with!" said Ingeld, but he gathered up his cloak and retrieved the unsheathed Firebrand gently from where it was lying under the hand of the Hall-Warden.

When he saw Raegn make ready he put on a frown and said

"Lady, surely you aren't coming? It's a dangerous move, in my opinion."

"Do you think I'm afraid of danger?" Raegn turned on him in anger, "I am a shield-maiden, I seek danger."

The caution, wise as it was, seemed only to make her more determined to go on.

Long before dawn, long even before dew fell on the springy turf, they stole their horses from the musty stables. Making their way past the snake pit and the almost empty winter pits of grain they galloped along the river bed far out of their way to fool pursuit. Raegn left no message for her Lord or her kin. She thought her mother would know what had happened very well.

In the morning, when the priests awoke, they found the wooden statues of the gods cast down upon the floor, bespattered with the clotted blood of the crushed animal-heads. Upon the altars were erected crude crosses, twigs from the forest, but the phallic statue of Freyr had its cock lopped off. When they found the missing member it had Ansur, the mouth of the gods, which signifies Loki, the Sky Traveller, cut deeply into it.

"The Christians!" Wulfgeat raged, "It was all very well when the forest and the marsh separated us, but now there's Goldboru and that useless husband of hers, and it looks like we're never to have any peace from them. Who do they think they are…coming in here and insulting the Aesir like they were gods themselves? I think we'd better teach them a lesson. Besides, the gods won't be too pleased with us if we let them get away with it…and it's coming up to autumn."

With a whisper, as of secrets, from his dark robes Alfhelm stepped forward, priest of the Terrible One, Alfather Woden. His berserks were watching, hard eyed.

"You move too fast." he said, "I know as well as you what it looks like to a foolish man. But I see the hand of the Father of Hel in it, the Sky Traveller. Didn't he sign the work."

"You listen to him." said Alcfrith, Thunor's priest, a great, burly, common man with ham fists and a warm smile, just like his god.

"He knows his business. Didn't the stranger call himself Glapsvidarson?"

"So?"

"Glapsvidar," said Alfhelm, "Means 'Swift in Deceit', and the Sky Traveller is the Father of Lies."

"What's more," said Ing's priest, a shabby man called Eofor, "You heard the Scop's dream, sent by Freyr. That wasn't much of a riddle, and any fool should know the answer was Loki."

"There's nothing safe that we can do against that one. We just have to get back into the god's favour, and leave the punishment to them." Alfhelm continued, and he fingered the golden arm-ring that he wore.

"And forget about Raegn?" Wulfgeat pointed out, "I know you priests know what you're talking about, but if you'll just think back on your own courtships you'll realise it wasn't Glapsvidarson who was looking at our shield-maiden with such a fiery gaze. It was that shifty lad Alfred, who, you'll notice, wouldn't put a name to his god…Are we just going to sit back and let him get away with thieving our women?""Do we know he did?" said Redwald, "From the looks she was giving him back I'd say she went with him."

Wulfgeat rapped on the wooden arm of his seat, which bore the blows with a malignant look from it's dragon's eyes.

"Look at us all!" he said, "Sitting here like a load of old men gossiping and waiting for winter. A very fine set of warriors we are, for our mothers to laugh at and our wives to scorn out of doors. Can't even protect our women!…Ah but Os curse us…"

The priests made avertive signs,

"Why isn't the sorcerer here? She'd know who was to blame, and where to go for vengeance. Whether it was the Sly One as you priests say, or those Christians of Goldboru's, which is the idea I favour."

Alfhelm said "The fact that she's not here is another reason to see the Sly One in it. I doubt very much if the Christian's god makes such careful management…"

"What is this swarming about like flies on a dunghill?"

The noon sun washed into the Hall as Aetheldreda the sorceress made her splendid entrance.

"And where is my daughter among this hive of heroes?"

Only Wulfgeat smiled then, and his was a smile of defiance for Alfhelm Priest. It was left to the poet to tell her. Aetheldreda waited a week before she set out after them. She had things that must be done. There were gods insulted in the matter, far more important than any woman's love for a daughter. There were sacrifices to be made:

A new statue was carved for Ing. Oxen, a team of them, were brought in from the fields, their horns gilded and wreathes of summer flowers wound between them above their great puzzled eyes. Their heads, hacked necks still bleeding, were stuck on stakes about the new altar. Eofor chose his own son, an acolyte in Freyr's service, to be the bride of the god. The boy was still weeping when Aetheldreda left.

She left a last cast of runes on the Hall floor. They spoke of death and disaster, but only she and Alfhelm heard them. She turned her back on his pleas, drew her hood down over her face and walked into the dark shadows with a dark glance.

15 books I read and adored as a child

Following Erastes' My list of 15 Children's Books everyone should read, itself inspired by 15 Kid's Books you need to read I thought I'd do my own.

Start with the usual suspects

1. The Hobbit

2. The Lord of the Rings (not technically a children's book, but best read first in your teens.)

3. The Narnia books

 

4. The Earthsea Trilogy (that's A Wizard of Earthsea, The Tombs of Atuan and The Farthest Shore, not the later additions.)  Hogwarts has nothing on Roke, and the Master Patterner remains one of my most enduring crushes.

5. Forerunner Foray by Andre Norton.  I don't remember a lot about this now, except for how wonderfully alien it all was.

6. The Famous Five books – like Eowyn, George was a lifeline to me by making it seem normal for me to want to be "almost as good as a boy."  Also they solved proper crimes and mysteries, unlike the Secret Seven.

7. The Odyssey (again, not a children's book, but I soaked up the monsters and passed with a child's obliviousness over the whole 'Odysseus decided sleeping with his maidservant was not worth annoying his wife' stuff, and all the 'and then they stopped and, in exactly the same words as they used last time, did another sacrifice to the gods' business.  Funny, I seem to remember it all now, though!)  I'm sure there must be editions with just the adventures and monsters, where all the other stuff is cut out.

8. The Weirdstone of Brisingamen by Alan Gardner – all his stuff was good, but this was best.  (Actually, I take that back. Elidor was his best by a long shot. But the Weirdstone was coolest because it was set just in the next village from where I lived.  In fact I lived across the road from the evil lake of evilness where the bad guy hung out, which was awesome.)

9. Raiders from the Rings by Alan E. Nourse Probably invents the "Mars needs Women" trope but does so in a completely non-objectionable way. Also responsible for my lifelong 'elves in space!' obsession with its magical ending.

10. The Tripods Trilogy by John Christopher Caps of wire IN YOUR HEAD!! (is about all I remember about this, other than it was really good.)

11. Dragon Song and Dragon Singer, the Pern Harper Hall books.  Outcast girl tames dragons and then shows everybody how wrong they were to spurn her.  Actually I made that last bit up, as there were no scenes of bloody flaming revenge, but she did get to storm an all male club and prove she was almost as good as a boy

12. The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Gouge Unicorns! Pirates! A disappearing boy with a feather in his hat.  Salmon pink geraniums & a land that time forgot.

13. The Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov (and its sequel The Naked Sun.  I know, they aren't children's books either, but who says children have to confine themselves to books written for kids?)  I shipped Elijah Bailey and Daneel long before I had ever heard of shipping, despite Elijah being married and Daneel being a robot

14. The Little Grey Men by BB Gnomes! On a quest to find others of their kind in the terrifying wilderness of a small English brook.

15. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint_Exupery Another 'big lessons learned in small places' book, as the titular character is prince and sole human inhabitant of an asteroid about the size of a house.  This is a 'must read if you value your soul' kind of book.

UK authors at LRC tomorrow

If you're a UK GLBT romance author wanting to do a little promo, or a reader who wants to hang out with the UK Meet Acquisitions Team*authors and chat about jellied eels or some such suitably British topic (yeah, go on, you know you want to!), then come along to Love Romances Cafe tomorrow! (2nd August)
The have a session booked tomorrow at LRC for UK GLBT authors – and you're all welcome! It's a chance for us to twist the spotlight on to the UK, after the success of this year's UK Meet and the publication of Tea & Crumpet, to which many generous authors contributed.

Love Romances Cafe

From 12pm EST (5pm GMT) we can introduce ourselves and post excerpts of any of our work. Then we'd love as many of you as possible to follow up with some friendly chat at 3pm EST (8pm GMT) for a couple of hours.
All contests and excerpts welcomed.
And of course you don't have to be in the UK or write about the UK to come and join us for the fun!
*that's me, Charlie Cochrane, JL Merrow, Josephine Myles and Clare London
(wording nabbed from Charlie and Jo – cheers, both!)

Novel or Novella?

Not related to the post title, but much more interesting, there's a month-long party going on on the 18th Century History blog, launching off with a giveaway from me.  Possibly everyone who reads my blog and wants one has already got a copy of False Colors, but if you haven't here's a chance to get one free.

http://18thcenturyhistory.com/post/8336696361/happy-august-its-time-for-our-first-giveaway-a

Even if you're not at all interested in that, the blog is worth bookmarking and coming back to regularly, and not just for the month of giveaways

Meanwhile, back to the post title, I'm 20K into a m/m historical novella set in Saxon times.  It's heading for 30K once it's finished and I'm beginning to wonder if I should expand it into a short novel.  It might benefit from some more buildup and more… well, everything.  But if I do that it will be a much longer time before I can start on the next fantasy novel.  Anyone got an opinion?  Should I
a) Finish the novella.  Start the next fantasy novel.
b) Turn the novella into a novel.  Start the next fantasy novel later.
c) Forget writing!  Concentrate on learning Coton's tunes on the pennywhistle in time for practice season starting in September.
d) Something else.

Further testing

If everything's set up as I think it is, this should appear on Facebook, twitter, LJ, DW & Goodreads simultaneously. (My theory being that I should bring stuff to whatever a reader's preferred platform is, rather than expecting them to come to me.)

Testing, testing

So how come I can post to LJ from my WordPress blog, but I can't post to LJ from LJ's own interface?

Wildfire, Chapter 3 Part 2.

(Previous parts available under the 'Wildfire' tag.)  I thought I'd wait until LJ was back before carrying on posting this, but – fingers crossed – it seems to be OK this morning.

Moral of the story so far – when a suspicious stranger comes to the door immediately after your aged grandad tells you a story about suspicious strangers coming to the door and taking over his life, take a hint, for goodness sake!  Don't treat them like your new best friend.  (This moral courtesy of the "Oh, Alfred, you're far too trusting," theme.)

~*~

 

The sun had barely time to catch her breath before Alfred was back leading two horses, the stranger's smoke-grey dappled mare and Athelgrim's chestnut gelding.

"I doubt if I could have been faster." said Alfred, "Come now, let's go."

"What about my breakfast?" said Ingeld.

"Damn it," said Alfred. "There are more important things than food!"

"Not when you're hungry," said Ingeld with certainty, "But I can see that I'll have to humour you."

They led their horses through the wet grass and cool smelling morning, pinning on their cloaks firmly against the salt breeze from the beach. Men were running the snake-prowed fishing skips into the waves and calling in wind hollowed voices upon the strand. A stout sea-wife came laughing from the shore with her neighbours to find the broiled fish and new bread she had left out for her morning meal gone. Howler, her neighbour's mongrel dog was sniffing at the plate in a suspicious manner. They didn't look very far for the culprit.

As the sun rose the thin mist which clung to the land, like the skin in an eggshell, was spun into the sun like silk on the spindle. Alfred and Ingeld walked their horses along the cliff path where half-submerged boulders lay wet in the slippery mud. Below them the sea sidled in with a whisper, and fleets of sails, like bloodied shields, shone against the water, tossing idly.

"Are you sure this is the quickest way?" demanded Alfred irritably.

"I don't think I'd prolong my journey with you in this humour," said Ingeld, brushing crumbs from his tunic. "Can't you think about your dream and cheer up a bit?"

Then Alfred smiled and was silent.

They reached the turn off where the cliff path with it's slime and belligerent seagulls met the edge of the dark forest that billowed up to the great Hill in the south. By that time the day was hot. Small butterflies were wheeling in the shadows and the lights. They were brown and mottled, like a leaf-fall. The shade of the pines was suddenly cold.

Alfred stopped, "Wait! What sort of a watchman am I, wandering off like a child on a jaunt!"

"So now you want to go back?" said Ingeld scathingly, "It's to be hoped that you never have to make an important decision."

"But I told no-one that I would not be there," said Alfred. "For all I know they're dredging the bay for my body."

Ingeld cursed softly as his horse pulled restively and the rough-spun bridle whipped through his hands, burning them.  "There's a day wasted. But hopefully we'll be able to get back by evening." He turned his horse.

"There's no point in going back now," said Alfred. "I don't believe anything comes of going back on a decision. The harm is done."

"A very good saying for a pagan man," Ingeld, smiled. "The warrior's way is; never go back, never admit to failure or lack of foresight. Never make yourself small before the gods by crawling to them like a coward. They won't care for you if you do. A warrior should be proud."

"You preach." said Alfred. He thought of his brother Edmund. Edmund would look up from the parchment at that remark. There would be a short-sighted frown on his face and his fists would be white. He had brooked no refusal but went into the monastery at the age of sixteen. What would he think of that complement or the company his elder brother kept?

Alfred kept his head down for some time after that. He turned onto the rutted path, whose hacking from the forest Sceldwulf had described so bitterly. There, beneath an arch of trees, they mounted and rode on with speed. Then Alfred said, "I was told Norsemen were good on horseback, but you ride like an English child; both hands in the mane. How do you come to be in England?"

"It's fairly clear to me," Ingeld shifted his grip to the saddle, "That you don't listen to a word I say. As I told Goldboru my brother's realm in Horthaland is threatened from all sides by scheming cowards who fancy a king to do their bidding. The best thing I could do for him was to show them my back, show him I wasn't in the market for knee-crawlers. So I've been about looking to make a name for myself and testing my luck. But you're right about horses, I'd rather walk."

"I don't call it all that loyal to leave your Lord in the hands of men you know to be traitors."

"You can call it what you like," said Ingeld. "But if you'd been there you'd have done the same thing."

"You must have seen some great marvels in your travels," said Alfred.

"Everything's the same under the skin," Ingeld shrugged. "But as you seem to be angling for a tale I'll tell you about some of the different skins there are:

"We were in a wavecutter, a horse of the water, and we were shivering. The leader of our party and the owner of the high-prowed arrow was Thorgunnar Bjornssen. He was a great black-bearded tree of battle and a loud laugher. We headed north, and north and through the sunlight into the six month darkness. Oh it was cold!"

He slowed his horse to an ambling trot and grimaced, hunching up his shoulders and shivering.

"Thorgunnar said," he went on, 'We'll go right to the top of the world and take a look at what the world-serpent looks like…' He was a pagan too. The others, they were all as devout as you like; refusing to pull at the oars on a Sunday and murmuring meaningless things to beads. They all thought we'd fall off the world.

"Well, soon it got colder and we rode on a rock-crystal sea until at last the keel shuddered and the ice closed in around us. We slept one night, all together in the half-frozen slush that was packed in the draft, and the morning, or when we woke in the darkness, all around us you could walk on the sea, tripping over waves.

"For a stretch, that we reckoned as a day, we tried to heat and smash our way inwards, but it was clear we'd never budge. Soon then we went for jaunts on the ice, but that was foolish, it would gape at your feet and chew you up in cold teeth. Indeed, one little cleric, an Englishman called Aethelwitan, was under the ice for hours before we realised he'd gone. He came up bloated and blue, and the blood where he'd bitten off his tongue in struggle was frozen in patterns of lace. We footed him under the ice again – it was as good a place as any other.

"Then we tried to melt and break our way out, back to the sea. That was when we cursed ourselves properly, for now there was nothing to show of where we were but the way the ship was pointing. The dragon-head glared out over an ice forest and the ship tossed its tail at an ocean of bone. Then we got hungry, waiting for dawn. Dawn didn't come so often in that place.

"Well we ate the stores, and we ate the plunder. Then we ate the horses, and then we ate Thorgunnar's pet hound though it set its snout down on the deck and whimpered. Thorgunnar, that was Ragnarok to his enemies, wept till the tears froze in his beard, but that didn't stop him taking his share. After that they all started praying loudly.

"Oh we were in a terrible mess then. Frodi the wise piped up; 'There's nothing for it but to pray and suffer. Someone around here has snubbed his nose at God and this is what has come of it. We'd better convince Him we're all sorry, or we'll end up as stiff as the Englander, and somewhat thinner to boot.'

"'Bragi's tongue!' said Thorgunnar to me, "I'd be a happy man if I could blame all my stupidity on Odin. But every hour now my stomach growls at me; 'Thorgunnar you're a fool. You must have sailed clean off the world and into Nifflheim, which is cold comfort to anyone." Then he laughed at his pun until the ice rang and we could hear a great wall of it in the distance collapse like a frost giant slurrying into mud.

"'But,' he went on, quietening down rapidly, 'It's my foolishness that's got us into this situation, and I, or our gods will get us out again without any help from them.'

"So Thorgunnar went out over the ice until he disappeared into the darkness and we waited for him for hours.

"The dawn came before he did. Far, far away over a glittering silver-hoard of snow, like a thread from the loom of Wyrd, shot a thin wire of gold with the sun like a bead on it, white and shrunken. We fancied we could feel its warmth in that instant.

"'Our prayers are answered,' said Frodi, and Thorgunnar returned to find them all on their knees again.

"'What!' he said to them, 'Have your legs gone? Well be sure the rest of you will be following if you don't get on your feet and set about that ice.'

"Then we realised that dawn wasn't any good to us. We were staggering about by then, weak and vicious as new born wolves. We worked out that, with the thickness of the ice, and the distance we were from the open sea it would take us two weeks to smash our way out. Then we almost despaired, because we'd be dead within a week, and a two week thaw was little help to us.

"Now, all this time we'd been travelling to the edge of the ice and dangling a baitless hook and line bootlessly over the edge. Not a beast had even nosed at the hook. But, the day after Thorgunnar's little jaunt we walked out there and, beached on the grey slag, rolling its grey eyes, was a great huge mountain of the deep, a fountain-breathed whale shuddering the ground with its tail.

"Just as we saw it it gave up the ghost and laid its tail and big grin down on the ice for the last time. We carved it up as soon as looking at it and lugged the pieces back to the ship. It was a stringy one alright, and tasted worse than whale meat at its worst, but there was enough of it to keep us alive and thriving until we could get to the nearest land.

"They were all laughing and congratulating each other on their good luck when Thorgunnar laughed his aurochs's bellow and slapped me on the back so that I could hardly breathe.

"'Well!' he said, 'See, you pray on your knees for weeks and your god looks on and lets you starve. But I go one day and ask for a bit of food and Thor sends us this sea-king the very next morning. Our gods don't let us die so easily. Tuck in, it's a gift from the Thunderer.'

"So they gawped at him, then they pushed away their dishes, and Frodi took the rest of the meat and saying, 'We don't take food from demons,' he threw it into the sea. Then he said, 'Now I call on God the Maker to give us wholesome meat,' and he cast out a weighted net on the water.

"It took three of us, Frodi, I, and the sinewy Thorgunnar to bring up the catch and we sailed all the way back to Germania, without a stop, on it. Frodi laughed into his beard all the way there. He thought he'd proved his point."

"He had," said Alfred happily.

"That's what I mean about skins," Ingeld replied. "Frodi said his god had brought fish out of the water where ours could only bring foul-tasting whale-blubber. I say that without the whale-meat for bait we'd never have got the fish, and we'd have starved to death. Frodi put a skin on it to make it look good to him, but I bet Loki's underneath it, laughing at him."

"Who put the whale in the sea in the first place!" Alfred snapped. He saw the point of the story now, and he didn't like it. To teach the stranger not to goad him too far he dug his heels hard into his horse's flank and made Ingeld gallop behind him, clinging on desperately in fear of falling. The sight helped him gather his temper, and soon he slowed and said;

"The Northmen have a reputation of not knowing fear, but I've never seen a woman look as afraid as you do on horseback."

"If you judge my kin by me," said Ingeld frankly, "You do them great injustice."

They rounded by the stony foot of the hill. Alfred craned his neck to look at the top of it as if he had never seen anything so huge and, seeing his awe, Ingeld crinkled his nose.  "This is no mountain. In my country a man would be ashamed to have such a thing as a burial-mound."

"Don't carp," said Alfred, "it's unbecoming.  Look!"

Rising against the smudged blue of the sky were the smokes of a hall. Wooden-walled farmhouses surrounded it in a clutter, their wheatfields just turning tawny in the orange sunset.

"That looks like the place," Ingeld followed Alfred's headlong rush along the wide, hardpacked path more sedately, smiling to himself.

When the dark shambled in on clawed feet like a bear it found them at the Hall. Ingeld looked at his companion and found him resolved. He raised his fist and drummed a hollow roar from the wood. The pagan doors opened and they went in.