Bryce Moore's Blog, page 270

ARCgate: When Librarians Get Angry

So there's this thing happening right now on Twitter--on the librarian part of it, anyway. Arcgate. What is it? Well, you could read the post that started it all, or you could just have my recap. There's this thing called ALA. Perhaps you've heard of it. It's the national conference for librarians. I've been to one in DC. It's c-r-a-z-y big and busy, and there's an exhibit hall full of publishers giving away things called ARCs (advanced reading copies of books the publishers will be selling in the not too distant future).



Why do publishers do this? They like to build buzz for their books before they get released to the public. Librarians are a great audience for those books. All is well, right?



Well, wait a minute. For a librarian to get access to the conference, it costs a couple hundred dollars, plus ALA membership dues. It's pricey. But for $25, anybody can get a "exhibits only" pass for the conference and go to see all the fancy publishers and authors and hopefully get those ARCs. (Note--anyone can do this. Librarians could do this, if they wanted. But then they wouldn't get access to the panels and development opportunities, which is supposedly the main draw of ALA, not the free books.)



So one dedicated librarian didn't get some of the ARCs she really wanted to get, because she was too busy doing the thing she was supposed to do--go to panels and get professionally developed. A fairly new, enthusiastic book blogger paid for a pass, and showed off her haul after the conference: 150 ARCs. She was ecstatic. The librarian who missed out and came across this book blogger? Not so much.



Cue the outrage.



What it all boils down to is this: many librarians seem to feel entitled to getting ARCs at ALA--as a perk of going to the conference. It's a conference for librarians, they reason, so librarians should have first dibs on the juicy shiny ARCs. How dare these hoi polloi wander in off the street just to get free books! They can go to some other book thingy.



My take? Librarians who are outraged are looking at this wrong. Publishers don't bring ARCs to ALA as some great Offering to Librarians. Publishers and authors go to ALA to build buzz. The exhibit hall is a madhouse. It's insane. If someone's interested enough to brave that chaos to get some ARCs, they're clearly dedicated readers. Good on them. You don't have to be a librarian to have a corner on books.



Now, that said, other people are speaking out about how rude the exhibit hall can get--how cutthroat it can be, with some people just obsessed about getting their ARCs at all costs. That's not cool, but it's also not just non-librarians doing it. Supply and demand works for everybody.



So this blogger got 150 ARCs. That does seem to be quite excessive, and it's sad that one person should get so many while so many get so few. But if she reads the ARCs and reviews them, or gives them to people who read and review them, then the system is working as intended, I'd say. (If she eBays them all, then we're talking about something entirely different. But don't kid yourselves--plenty of people are doing just that. I remember when I went to ALA and signed Cavern of Babel copies we were giving away, it wasn't more than a few days before they started popping up on eBay. You're not at ALA to make a profit, but it happens. If my Tu Books (my publisher for Vodnik) had copies available at ALA, I would be more than happy to have a book blogger get one.



I suppose I'd leave this topic on the idea that librarians shouldn't feel like they have a corner on enthusiasm for books. It's natural that at their national conference, many people who share that passion will congregate. And when passionate fans all want access to the same thing, feelings will get hurt. But the solution isn't to cast out the passionate fans. Maybe it's to enforce order somehow. Bring the chaos down a few notches. Some of this might also subside as eARCs are more widely used. Who knows? But I do wish many of my fellow librarians sounded a little less whiny right now . . .



Anyone else have anything to add?

About the Health Care Ruling

Because it's going to be all that anyone's talking about over the next few days, news-wise, I thought I'd open my big trap about the matter now. Again. (For those of you who have forgotten, I wrote about this back when the bill was passed, as well. I also have talked about the cost of health care in this country.)



So Obamacare was upheld by the Supreme Court. And now we'll get the obligatory back slapping from the Democrats and pitchfork waving from the Republicans. And we'll hear about how it's the best thing since sliced bread and how it's written by Satan himself.



Thank goodness I don't have television and won't be tempted to watch the 24/7 news people drag this out even further.



As I said before, I fully support a mandate that everyone have health insurance. Yes, I realize this puts me at odds with many many many of my Republican friends, a few of which are even now unfriending me. Such is life. Call  it a tax, call it a mandate, call it an edict--I don't care. What I do care is that I shouldn't have to pay for someone else's shortsightedness.



When I go to the doctor or the ER, it costs a lot of money. Fact. My insurance pays most of it. Also fact. If you don't have insurance and go to the ER (because emergencies happen, you know), it still costs money. If you can't afford it, they don't turn you away. They still treat you. But the bill doesn't magically disappear. Someone has to pay it. That would be me, through my higher health insurance costs.



This is not fair.



And yes, I realize life doesn't have to be fair. But in this instance, it can be. I see one of two options. Either only people who have insurance or are independently wealthy can use the ER services--in which case the ones without insurance can just heal their broken bones or their cancer or their whatever all on their own--or everybody pitches in and pays for it. You don't want insurance? Fine. Don't have any. But chip in so that I don't have to cover your cheap hide.



(Friends out there who are against Obamacare--tell me why you are. Be specific. Don't talk about "liberties." Explain how not having health care wouldn't essentially tax everyone else. Tell me why I'm wrong. I'm open minded. I'll listen. But I'm doubting you can convince me.)



It also is far from just and fair that the only people who get access to health care are those who are employed full-time, and that the quality of that coverage varies wildly based on what specific employers are willing to pay for. I have writer and artist friends who would love to have health care, but they can't afford it. That needs to change.



So I'm all for this passing. If this election were solely about health care, I would be scared stiff of how hard nosed the Republicans are about this topic. I completely disagree with them, and when Romney boasts about how fast he'll repeal Obamacare, I really worry. Get rid of it, and replace it with what? The old broken system. We can't be playing a big old health care hokey pokey game where you grant it to people one second, then yank it away the next, only to give it back later.



I hate politics.



Sigh.



That's all the energy I have for this topic at the moment. Maybe I'll add more in the comments.

Conquering Our El Guapos: Dieting, Parenting, and a Healthy Does of Ramble

I'm back on a diet. Again. Why? Because I just can't seem to not eat in moderation. Not consistently, at any rate. I know I'm not alone in this. I also know it's my fault. Not McDonald's. (I hardly eat fast food ever anyway.) It's not the way I was raised. It's not what my wife makes for dinner (well, maybe some of that bread . . .). It's me. When I get stressed, I eat. When I eat, I feel better. No one makes me eat. I do it all on my lonesome.



And so I end up on this stupid roller coaster of dieting. Not that the roller coaster I'm on has particularly steep ups and downs. It's more of gentle climbs, followed by mildly exhilarating dips. I'll get my weight down some, and be having some success, and then get busy and lose focus. It's not that I start ballooning out of control. I still eat pretty healthily. But I like to bake. And I like to eat what I bake. And even when I don't overeat, an extra brownie here and another slice of cake there tend to add up over time.



Why do I blog about this? Because when I'm public about my goals, I seem to do better with them. I'm also using the topic today to springboard onto something else I wanted to discuss today: parenting.



I came across this article in the New Yorker, focused on why American kids are becoming such brats. I don't agree with it 100%--I know many parents who are doing admirable jobs of raising wonderful children--but I do think it makes some very good points. When Denisa and I first had TRC, I remember how hard it was. Feeling like we had to do our best to make sure everything was perfect. That he was happy all the time.



That lasted for a good two weeks, I'd say. We were losing it. Denisa was extremely low on sleep, everybody--including TRC--was cranky. Not good. The big turning point came when we realized something: it's okay for babies to cry. They do it all the time. I remember talking to my cousin, who was a big advocate of Baby Wise--something Denisa and I started to follow and still heartily recommend. She told us how she would set a timer when her babies were crying. If they were still going after 15 minutes, she'd check on them--make sure everything was okay--and then put them back down and repeat the process.



I remember the first time we tried that. TRC was crying. And crying. And only 2 minutes had gone by on the timer. 5 minutes. 7. And then at 10, he stopped crying and went to sleep. Slept happily for his nap.



This was huge. Mainly, I think the change was going from a child-centered life back to a parent/spouse-centered one. TRC was no longer dictating what we were going to do. We had a plan, and we stuck to it. We've been doing that ever since. TRC and DC get some say in what we do as a family, but they also recognize that the parents have the final call. They have chores, and there are consequences when they don't do them. It's not easy, but I think it's much easier than it would be if the kids were using me as a doormat every day.



How does this relate to my dieting?



It's all about that personal accountability thing. We're all responsible for our own happiness. Each of us, individually. I can't make anyone happy. That's a choice they have to make for themselves. This includes my children. If I went around each day trying to make them happy--to do everything in my power to make sure they had no want left unfulfilled--I would be doing them a disservice. I would be teaching them that someone else is supposed to make them happy. Supposed to handle the Big Problems. I'm happy to be a support, but I can't be the only one.



Just like me and my diet. I can't turn the keys over to Denisa and tell her to make sure I eat right. In the end, it all comes down to me. And while I'm capable and competent in so many other things, eating healthily 100% (or even 75%) of the time doesn't seem to be one of them.



That's okay. I'm working on it. We're all working on things, trying to improve ourselves--hopefully, at least. This all made sense in my brain before I wrote the post, but it seems to have come far afield now. And when that happens, the best thing to do is show a YouTube clip and walk away. Have a good Wednesday, folks.

Adventures in Not at Girl's Camp

So Denisa's away at Girl's Camp yesterday through Thursday. (Girl's Camp in this case means a yearly church camping trip for girls aged 12-18. I think. I'm kind of hazy on the exact details. Somebody says "Girls Camp" and I hear "Doesn't Concern You at All Camp." Denisa's one of the people in charge this year. I try to be supportive however I can (printing up handouts for it, taking time off work so I can watch the kids for her, etc.), but I don't think I have a real handle on what actually happens there. I know there's some hiking and camping involved. This year, there's supposed to be a lot of raining, too. I imagine there's eating, and some sleeping. Probably some spiritual stuff. I'm great at specifics, aren't I?)



What am I doing in the four days? I'll be teaching two grad classes that I've had scheduled for quite some time (friends are watching the kids those days), but other than that, I'm hanging out at home, working on writing, playing with the kids, and cleaning the house some. Movies will be watched. Books will be read.



But it's always more fun when Denisa's here. Even the kids are figuring that out. (Although they do look forward to drinking Kool-Aid, since that's something Denisa doesn't typically tolerate. :-) They've also been wondering if I can take them to the grocery store, or--as it's known when I go with them--the junk food store. We'll see.)



Anyway--that's all I've got for you right now. Some big things in the pipeline, though. Just no news to share with any of you yet. Hope your day was lovely. See you all tomorrow.

Noses, the Olympics, and Die Hard: Vodnik Chapter Nine

We're up to chapter nine this week, and this is another one that has a lot of various odds and ends. First up is the Czech movie Tomas sees with Katka. You know the one I'm talking about--where a woman's nose goes on an international trip, all while still being connected to her face? The Czech and Slovak classic?



Yeah. That one.



I didn't make it up for the book, you know. It actually exists, and is called Tri Veterani. It is truly bizarre, from an American standpoint--but totally beloved from a Slovak one. It's times like this--when watching the movie with my wife--that I'm reminded how drastically different your views on life can be, depending on where you're raised. It's easy to assume that humans all share the same core values. And we do, more or less. But the interpretation of those values can really depend on your culture. What's acceptable and good in one place can be the complete opposite somewhere else. Not that nose-walking-movies is the perfect example of this, but it makes the point.



And yes, we own the movie. Haven't showed it to the kids yet. Maybe we need to correct that . . .



The experience Tomas has smelling food with Katka is also based on my experiences with my wife. She'll often tell me to smell some food to show me how good it is. Bread. Sausage. You name it. For the first five years or so, I had no clue what she was talking about. I'm slowly starting to come around, though. It helps that she's a baker, and that I've had a fair number of good quality sausages by now. :-) And I still remember the first time I was in Slovakia with her and we went to a bakery later in the day. The place was chock full of breads, and Denisa complained that the selection was really crummy.



Like I said--different outlooks on life.



And finally (MINOR SPOILER ALERT), there's Katka's seizures. In the original draft, she was just fine. Still slated to die, but it was due to heart failure, not a brain tumor. This was changed for a number of reasons.




First off, if Katka isn't sick, Tomas finds out about it from Morena through complete coincidence. He was leafing through her death date book, and happened to see Katka's name. Having plot points depend on coincidences is something that should be avoided as much as possible.
Secondly, putting the seizures in up front managed to make the earlier parts of the book have more tension. In the first draft, it took a really long time for things to develop to the point that real significant conflicts started to arise.
Additionally, Katka's condition ties the conflicts of the book together better the more closely it's related to Morena and the vodnik. Tomas finds out the vodnik wants to kill him. He finds out his new best friend is going to die soon. And then he finds out the two problems are intertwined. Deal with the vodnik and Katka's death at the same time.
Finally, Tomas finding Katka's death date by coincidence misses a chance for him to excel as a character. By changing it so that he has the foresight to look for her name in the book, it makes him more resourceful. In the earlier drafts of the book, Tomas had a lot of things happen to him. He was fairly passive, as far as characters go. Having a passive main character is a recipe for boredom. 


After the seizure scene was added in the second draft I wrote, the rest of the chapter didn't change too drastically--mainly because so much of it is scenery/slice of life details like shopping and the movie. But the more I write, the more convinced I become that having scenery/slice of life moments are a must in a book. Maybe not all books, but it's necessary to take breaks from the action now and then so that the characters have a chance to be people.




Think of the Olympics. A lot of people complain that NBC focuses too much on the people stories instead of showing the actual events. But I've watched the Olympics without knowing anything about the people competing. It's not even half as much fun. If you don't know the stories behind the competitors--the issues they've struggled with, the families they've come from--then the competitions don't mean as much. It's just a bunch of people trying to run fast, or throw something farther.




Yes, you can have a book or a movie with non-stop action. Just event after event after event. But I doubt you'd care much. Take Die Hard as another example. Awesome action movie. But it works as well as it does because it takes the time in the beginning to set the stage: to show that the main character has a family. Is trying to get back together with his wife. Or follow the teddy bear McClane is taking to his daughter over to Hunt for Red October, where the bear is a gift for Ryan's daughter (trivia: it's the exact same bear in real life. I know. I just blew your mind). They take the time there to establish what the characters want. What they're defecting for.




There's a temptation to leave out the boring parts, but here's a writing tip for you: parts that establish the stakes and the characters and the setting don't have to be boring. In fact, they may be more important to your story than a lot of the action scenes.

MP3s, eBooks, and 3D Printers: The Wave of the Future

Jonathan Coulton (famed musician of Thing a Week notoriety) has a fascinating piece up today about scarcity and the future of commerce, essentially. I highly recommend giving it a gander (although fair warning: there's a bit of salty language in there).



As an author and librarian, this is a subject that is very near and dear to my heart. Books--written information of any sort--have already made the transition into the digital world. Anyone with an eReader and the desire can download books illegally. It isn't difficult. As more and more eReaders go out into the wild, it's only a question of time before practically anyone will be able to read any book they want for free--no library involved.



The question, of course, is will they?



I'm not sure they will. Just because something is free doesn't mean people won't pay for it anyway. There are plenty of examples of this, from free music over the radio, free television over the airwaves, free water at public drinking fountains, free public sports facilities. MP3s are free these days, but people still pay for them. Why is this?



For one thing, you've got what I'll call the public water fountain effect. Some people just don't like having or using something they might get germs off of. Yes, MP3s can be downloaded, but many times you might end up with some other nastiness along with the MP3. Viruses, Trojans, Keyloggers--you don't know where that MP3 has been. I believe there will always be people willing to pay a reasonable amount of money for the assurance that what they're getting is new, clean, and unspoiled. This is why thrift stores can coexist with high fashion. It's all clothes, but there's a different audience for each level.



I also believe that many people are inherently good. When it comes to readers in particular, they develop a strong connection to their favorite authors. They want their authors to keep writing, and they're willing to pay money for those new shiny books. This is why hardcovers have sold so well over the years. Same information, radically different price point, but people pay extra to read it first. Even if you cut out all the publishers, agents, editors and the like (which you can't--I'll get to that in a second), readers will still want new stuff from their favorite authors. Authors who (speaking from experience) can't afford to write for free. Not at the level fans have come to expect.



And what about those editors, agents, and publishers? I believe that more and more, people will turn to them as the gatekeepers of quality. Not the sole gatekeepers. There will always be breakthrough authors--whether they're discovered by an editor or by an audience. But quality rises to the top. Inevitably. If you're writing at a high level of quality, sooner or later, you'll be found, and you'll be paid for it. Yes, some people might continue writing books for free, but unless there's a huge spike in the number of talented, independently wealthy writers out there, you don't have to worry about that subset of the group.



And it's important to recognize that authors don't write in a vacuum. That editors and agents contribute significantly to the process. They earn those paychecks, folks.



So will books become like Legos? Printable and indistinguishable? I don't think so. They're not interchangeable. It will be interesting to see what happens as 3D printing takes off. Laws will change. Behavior will change. But there have been imitation products for sale for a long time. Products indistinguishable from the original. People still pay good money for the original. Why? Because. It's new. It's real. It's authentic.



I suppose I'll end with an observation. A lot of the time in these "what will the future be like" articles (not in Jonathan Coulton's, mind you), writers focus on one aspect of society, taken to an extreme. I believe society changes and evolves in so many different ways that it's impossible to predict what will happen. Yes, piracy will increase. But industry will adapt. Laws will adapt. People will adapt. Libraries will adapt. Authors will adapt.



We all change. Change isn't bad. It's necessary, even if it can be scary sometimes.



Thoughts?

Off to Topsham: How to Organize Legos

I'm at a library meeting in Topsham today, so you're pretty much on your own, internet. Because I love you all so very much, though, I'm going to leave you with an excellent link that talks--in detail--about how to organize Legos. I forget where I came across this, but I've been looking for a good method for quite some time now. We're amassing an extensive collection, and for a while, I thought a series of fishing tackle boxes was going to be the answer. This seems much more effective--and cheaper--which is always a good thing.



Anyway. Hope some of you find it useful: http://www.evilmadscientist.com/2008/how-to-organize-your-lego-bricks-for-efficient-building/



See you tomorrow!

Obscure Netflix Movie Review: The Dam Busters

In my continuing Quest to Watch All the Movies on Netflix (so you don't have to), I took on The Dam Busters a few days ago. The premise was intriguing. WWII British movie made in 1955, focused on the efforts of the British to come up with a way to blow up strategically important German dams. (They were protected in such a way that bombs couldn't be dropped in from above, and they couldn't be torpedoed from below. So . . . WWII and science. Awesomesauce.



And guess what else? It was one of the films George Lucas used to edit the attack on the Death Star together in Episode IV. So it's geekily important to boot.



Did it live up to my hopes?



More or less. The pacing was a bit off in spots (ironically, the science parts were the best done, I felt. As were the actual action scenes. It got bogged down in the preparation scenes at times.) (It also has one of the most objectionable dog names I've ever seen in a film: it's the N word, folks. Awful that they used it. Also interesting that they switched it to "Trigger" for US releases, so clearly they knew they shouldn't be using it. Just goes to show how different the approaches to racism can be depending on which continent you're on. So if that word will upset you, avoid this film. It's in there a lot. Not the dog's fault.)



But overall, they managed to make a subplot of WWII into something that was inherently watchable. Good buildup of tension, and actually more or less historically accurate, judging by the bit of research I did after the watching. Directed by Michael Anderson, who also did Logan's Run and Around the World in 80 Days. If you're looking for a good, lesser-known war movie, look no further. (And comparing it to the Death Star scene in Star Wars, you can totally see the influence--very fascinating on a filmic level.)



Three stars, maybe a smidge higher.



(And in other Netflix news, I've now watched America's Sweethearts, bringing my John Cusak number of seen movies to 23. Verdict on this one? I enjoyed it, although I enjoy pretty much anything Cusak is in. I have no idea why. Denisa thought it was too vulgar in many spots. I did think it was ironic that a sweet romantic comedy had that much profanity and crude jokes. So take that for what it's worth.)

In Which I Realize I am Don Draper's Son, or, The End of Second Grade

I remember leaving second grade behind me. I remember my teacher: Mrs. Ramundo. I remember doing worksheets in math, going to Gifted and Talented, looking forward to recess, talking about Garbage Pail Kids (forbidden!) at lunch. Yes, these are distant memories, but they're quite clear, and there are quite a lot of them. I still recall what it felt like to sit in class waiting for recess to finally roll around. How the end of the year felt, with class work rolling down, parties ramping up . . .



It doesn't seem like that long ago.



And today, my son is through with it.



The other week, I came across some home movies of him. Movies where he's younger than DC is now. Those memories are clear enough that they might as well have been yesterday. I could close my eyes and step back into that, it feels like. Drive home, and still find TRC that age.



It's very strange to see my son entering into the space of his life where I can actually remember occupying. It's enough to make a guy philosophical.



We bought him a bike last Friday. He's already riding it like a pro. He did a much better job learning than I did. (As I recall, it took me weeks--though that might just be a remnant of how long days seemed to last back then.)



Part of me is very tempted to treat TRC the way I wanted to be treated at his age. To view his struggles as identical to the ones I went through. And in many ways, they are. But at the same time, in many ways, they're not. The summer when I was 8, the big movies that came out (big for me, at least) were Harry and the Hendersons, Superman IV, The Chipmunk Adventure, Benji the Hunted--there were hushed whispers of RoboCop. The original Legend of Zelda came out for the NES (still remember that awesome gold cartridge).



Internet? Computers? iPads? Netflix? Facebook? Cell phones? None of these existed. The reality I must accept is I am to my son (1987 to 2012) the way 1962 was to me in 1987. 1962! Manchurian Candidate, State Fair, To Kill a Mockingbird. We're talking Mad Men season 2. Don Draper's son in that? That's me growing up in the 80s to my son's point of view today. I am DON DRAPER to my son (minus the womanizing, the smoking, the poor parenting, the drinking, and the personality disorders, of course).



That's a hard pill to swallow, because like I said--I still remember looking forward to recess.



So just like the 8 year old I remember being would tell Don Draper's son to get lost--would insist that he didn't understand what I was going through . . . that's how my son views me. (Again, the analogy isn't perfect, but I'm trying to put abstract thought that's hard for me to wrap my brain around into a format that's familiar to me, and that's pop culture.) And frankly, Don's boy wouldn't understand being a kid in 80s, just like I can't understand being a kid in 2012. More so, probably.



And at the same time, things haven't changed at all. Kids are still kids. They're mean to each other. They have feuds. Homework is still hard. Chores are still a pain. As an adult, you recognize all these things. But I remember what the 60s seemed like to me growing up. Old. Ancient. The Jetsons. Flintstones. Andy Griffith.



My mind. It is blown.



Thoughts too big for a blog post today, folks. You'll have to fend for yourselves the rest of this fine Tuesday.[image error]

Vodnik Deleted Scene: Tomas Drowning

Guess what? I came across an even earlier draft of Vodnik today--the original first draft, that I only got halfway through before I decided enough needed to be changed that I should just start over from the beginning. This might not be that exciting to you, but I was tickled pink to come across it. I knew it existed, but I thought I'd just written over the original draft when I was editing it.



Now I know I actually kept a copy. (Which is very like me. I don't like throwing things away. Especially not digital ones.)



Anyway--one of the coolest things about it was that I found the original prologue, which I haven't read in six years. It's the scene where Tomas drowns as a child--something which is only referred to in the book as it now stands. Yes, some of the characters have changed personalities some in the meantime, and it's much darker than the final book became--but I thought it was cool enough that I wanted to share it with you all today. I'll resume normal commentaries next week. For now, I hope you enjoy . . .



Prologue






The festival was just
winding down when Tomas saw him: a strange little man in a top hat and dressed
all in green, sitting on a rock and piping on a small flute.  The man looked at Tomas and winked.  For his part, Tomas was suspicious.  His parents had always warned him about
talking to strangers, but this was the day of the festival.  Over a hundred people had flocked to Trencin
castle to meet and trade and do the various things medieval reenacters did,
like fencing and juggling and archery.




Tomas looked around him. 
There were still plenty of people there, haggling over last minute
purchases.  The sky was free of clouds,
and everything was bright.  He looked
back at the little man, or to be more specific, at his flute.  Tomas was only six, and he loved anything
that made music.




Finally his curiosity overpowered his fear, and he walked
over to the man, who continued to play. 
It was a strange song, full of runs and trills, and it reminded Tomas of
the stream up by their cottage in the mountains.




When Tomas was close, the man took the wooden flute out of
his mouth and held it out to the boy. 
“Do you like it?”




Tomas nodded.




“I have another, you know,” the man said.




Now that he was closer to the stranger, Tomas noticed some
details that hadn’t stood out as much from farther away.  First, even the man’s hair was green.  It flowed out from beneath his hat like water
from a spring, and it matched the green of his hat and coat perfectly.  As for his clothes, he was dressed formally,
in a suit with tails and a vest. 
Curiously, he didn’t wear any shoes.




“Where are your shoes?” Tomas asked, his suspicions roused
again.




The man laughed. 
“It’s been such a long day, I took them off to relax a while before I
went home.”




That was a reasonable answer, even to a six year old.  The man put the flute back to his lips and
resumed his song.




Tomas listened to it for a while longer before he asked,
“Where is the other one?”




The man stopped and smiled. 
“Beg pardon?”




“Where is your other flute?”




“Of course.  It’s right
over there.”  The man pointed up the path
a little, toward the main keep.  “Right
by the little pool.”




Tomas turned around to see
where everyone else was.  People were
beginning to break up and leave now.  He
could see his parents over at the far end of the castle terrace, by the Lover’s
Well, talking to Uncle Lubos.  Tomas
always felt safer when his uncle was near. 
He lived right next door to them, in the same building, in an apartment
he had all to himself.  Tomas looked back
at the man again.  “Can I see it?”  If anything went wrong, Uncle Lubos would
take care of it.




The man leapt off his rock
like an acrobat and smiled even wider. 
“Come right this way, then.”  He
held his arm out in invitation, and Tomas started up the path.  It was a steep climb for a six year old, but
he was used to that.  When they got to
the pool, Tomas looked around for a bag or a box where the flute might be.  There wasn’t one there, only a fire that was
on its way to going out.  Smoke wandered
around in the air, tickling Tomas’s nostrils and making him scrunch up his
face.




“Where is it?” he asked.




“Don’t you see it?”  The man pointed.  “It’s right there.  By the edge of the pool.  See?”




Tomas didn’t.  He went forward a few more steps.  There was nothing there.  The pool had developed as runoff from the
castle’s gutters had slowly carved their way into the rock over the years.  There was a large stone pipe that led into
the ground, and a lot of stagnant, green water, but no pipe.  “Is this some sort of a trick?”




The man’s face turned
serious.  “I assure you, it is not.”  He looked over his shoulder, and Tomas
noticed that they had gone out of sight of the rest of the people.




In a flash, the man grabbed
Tomas by the shoulders and jumped into the pool with him.




Tomas managed to get a gasp
of air before he went under, and he struggled against the man’s grip.  There was no give at all, at least none that
a six year old could overcome.  The water
was dark--too dark to see anything except the dull light of the sun seeping
down through the surface.  And none of
this made any sense to Tomas.  He kept
fighting, but his breath was running out, and his lungs were beginning to
burn.  The man, on the other hand, gave
no sign of tiring.




Tomas was saved as suddenly
as he had been put in danger.  The water
blazed alight, and he felt his entire arm sear with flame.  The pain was too much.  He blacked out.




#




His parents found him by the
pool, stretched out and soaked except for his right arm, chest, and part of his
neck, which were black with char.  Worse
yet, he wasn’t breathing.  His uncle
pushed them aside and rushed to the boy’s side, administering CPR quickly and
efficiently.  After a few repetitions,
Tomas coughed out an alarming amount of water, sputtering for air as his body
automatically fought for life.  He opened
his eyes for a moment, screamed, and then just as quickly lost consciousness
once again.




The next ten minutes were a
bustle of activity.  Some of Lubos’s
friends made a stretcher, and they rushed Tomas down the hill to a waiting ambulance.  With a roar of sound and commotion, his
parents and the boy were whisked away, leaving the rest of the revelers staring
after the ambulance, confused.  How could
a boy who was drowning receive third degree burns at the same time?




But night was coming, and
tragic accident or no, they still had to leave the castle before closing.  Tents were packed up and wares put away, and
Lubos, who worked as the night watchman at the castle, saw the rest of the
group out.  Only once all the people were
gone did two other forms emerge into the open, the little man in green from the
pool where the boy had almost drowned, and a much different figure from the
smoldering campfire next to it.




It was definitely a woman,
but her skin, hair, clothes--everything about her was made up of what looked
like solid fire.  Her hair was a burning
red in the shape of a woman’s long locks, but where normal women would have
strands of hair, she had strands of fire, each strand pulsing and flickering
with the same light as the campfire.  Her
skirt had stripes, alternating shades of flame, and her blouse was the blue of
the inside of a candle.  Her skin was a
lighter shade of orange, with her features well defined and beautiful.  The air shimmered around her, like it does
above pavement on a hot day, and when she spoke, smoke came out of her mouth.




“You are an idiot.”  She glared down at the man beside her.




“Well why did you have to go
intruding like that?” he said.  “You
nearly got yourself killed.”




The woman shuddered, the
fire inside her rippling as she did.  “I
couldn’t just let you kill the boy.  He’s
practically the only human left who can still see us.  Still talk to us.”




The man sniffed and adjusted
his green tie.  “They don’t have to chat
with me for me to take their souls. 
What’s the difference?  They all
talk to me once their dead.”




“The difference is he was my
friend.”




This was met with a bark of
laughted.  “Friend?  A human? 
For a fire vila, you certainly have a strange choice of companions.”  He flicked his fingers, and drops of water
sizzled where they touched her.




“You are a pest.  I’m just glad the boy’s out of your
reach.  He’ll think twice before he comes
near you again.”




The smile on the man’s face
turned from one of enjoyment to one of contemplation.  “Ah, but they forget.  They always do.  I’ll get him eventually.  The boy’s uncle works here.  He’ll be back, and one day, he won’t be
watching.”




“Not while I’m around,” the
fire vila said.




The man looked at her.  “Of course. 
I forgot about you.”  He shrugged
and walked back into the pool, his head disappearing below the water, leaving
only ripples.




The fire vila watched this
happen, then smoothed off her blouse where the water had touched it.  While she was looking down at her clothes,
the man resurfaced and let forth a stream of water from his mouth, right onto
the few remaining flames of the campfire.




The vila shrieked in pain as
steam hissed from her body.  The man kept
up his spout of water, moving it around the fire and thoroughly soaking
it.  The woman staggered to the edge of
the water.  “Stop!” she managed to get
out.”




The man shook his head and
kept the water coming.




The fire vila was fading
now, with large holes appearing in her clothes and body as first an arm, then
her legs, and then her torso started to fade. 
“The agreement,” she gasped, and then in a puff of smoke, she was gone.




“Agreement.”  The man
came out of the water again and stomped a wet foot on the now sodden
campfire.  “Outdated and overrated.  What sort of an idiot creature makes itself
out of something so easy to get rid of?” 
And with that, he walked off in the direction of the well, brushing off
his suit coat as he went.