M.A. Ray's Blog, page 10

How to Name Your Elf

Today I’ll talk a little bit about how I choose names for the People in my books. (By the way, it’s rude to call them elves, but artistic license, ‘kay? Okay.)

Most names will have two syllables, rarely three. If I’m making my own name, I’ll choose from the syllables I’ve already established. Most often, People from the same family with the same gender will use a common syllable (e.g. “Bea,” pronounced “bay” and meaning “fox”). If I want to make a name that means something new, I’ll choose one from a baby-name list, usually Irish Gaelic or Welsh — cheap, yeah, but then I’ll split it apart and reuse the syllables once I know what it means in hituleti.

Female names are either plants or celestial bodies. Rhi = Rose, Cuil = Moon, what have you, so you’ll get Rhialle (Rose Daughter) or Rhiada (Sweet Rose). Cuiladh (Bright Moon) or Cuilran (Red Moon).

Male names are always some kind of animal. Cab = Mouse, Lach = Hare, and so on. You could have Cabhan (Wild Mouse) or Cabgan (Little Mouse); Lachlan (Brown Hare) or Lachmar (Noble Hare).

Familiar individuals will address one another by nicknames; it’s more formal and distant to use the full name. Everyone refers to Beagar (which means “Big Fox,” by the way) just that way because he doesn’t have any friends, or anyone really familiar with him. Likewise, when Eagle refers to himself as “Eagle,” he’s really saying “Vo” and it’s presented in translation.

Any questions? Because I  could go on. And on. And on.

Snippet Sunday #6

I still don’t have a title for this book, but I figure you guys should meet Wolf’s Fang, Eighth Prince of Tangletree (eighth of eight brothers!). One of my best friends, Tiana Clawson, came up with Wolf’s character, and she let me play with him. He’s become a favorite of mine; I really enjoy writing him, and here he is.

***

Wolf went to the back of the nook—there were more bookcases in here, and a bay window with a window seat—it was almost its own room—and flopped onto the green chaise, stretching his legs in front of him. At home, they told him all the time he was weird, but mostly they loved him while they told him. Here in Shirith, he didn’t even need to be told. He felt his difference.

He sort of wondered if Rhusach felt the same, only being interested in one thing, like he was. If you were normal you liked everything under the sun, but Wolf didn’t, and neither did Rhusach. At least Rhusach could have kids—not that Wolf wanted a bunch of babies stinking up the place with their nappies, but Daddy probably would’ve liked it. He sure liked Rhugar’s baby daughters, and Rhuan’s kids too. But when Wolf thought about the necessities he’d need to go through to actually get a baby, he went soft right away.

He felt weird at Shirith, weird and gawky and insecure, and that was the end of it. Right now he wanted to go home more than he’d ever wanted to go anywhere in his life. He hadn’t wanted to come here in the first place, but Daddy had asked him to, Daddy and Mama together, which was hardly fair. Then Rhugar had asked, Rhugar, who Wolf had never been able to say no to for very long, and here he was hiding from a party, sulking on a chaise in the library. He never did that, either.

The Thread of Life, Part 1

Here’s the first part of a piece I’m really proud of, even now. It’s about Rhialle (Rose Daughter), who is Dingus Xavier’s maternal grandmother, and it’s the beginning of her story, or near to. I’ll have to explore the Rootbound more thoroughly soon; they’re an ancient order of sorcerers and fighters. I hope you enjoy the story.

***

You know what happens when you wrap a thread around your finger again and again, real tight? How it goes all purple and red, with white dents where the thread is if you leave it long enough. Rose’s heart felt like that, and the thread pulled so taut it was a wonder her ticker kept on ticking. It was Mouse drawing her that way, she knew. When she lay in her bedroll of a night, writhing sleepless with the torment in her chest, she knew it was Mouse. And it wasn’t like she didn’t want to be with him. She wanted that more than ever. It was just that Rose couldn’t bring herself to give in.

When the road wore her down so hard that her pain didn’t matter, and her lids drooped and fell on their own, she dreamed of him. Wild Mouse—Cabhan. She dreamed their life together, dreamed loving him body and soul. She dreamed his death, and his ruined face, and the blood in his soft brown hair.

She hadn’t even known until it was too late. Busy, she’d been, killing the other two. She couldn’t remember what for. That was how bad she’d gotten, and she knew that, too, even in her dark-shadowed corner of the drab, washed-out world. Everything felt as dry and knotty as her own unwashed hair. She couldn’t unwind a thing. So she walked.

“She should be dead,” they’d whispered at the chapter house. Behind their hands, as if she couldn’t hear it, and soon they didn’t take the trouble to hide it anymore, and the talk was all whether or not they should lash her to his pyre. She took off like a shot then, best believe, though now she wondered why she’d bothered. They’d been Rootbound, Rose and Mouse, twined together by magic so they were as much one person as two people could be, and from the moment he died she’d felt black, sucking mire around her feet. When they burned him, she felt it over the miles between. Not the flames, no, but the draw of his soul as it flew for the Garden. And that thread wrapped so tight she swore it sliced her heart to pieces.

She walked. And sometimes she thought she saw him, out of the corner of her eye, a flash of his hair, a glimpse of his sun-brown hand lifted to touch her, but his voice never sounded and his fingers never caressed.

Rose was alone. Her feet kicked up road dust in the hot afternoon. Sweat ran down her back inside stiff clothes, worn who knew how many days. She didn’t know where she was, but her shuffling dragged long furrows in the dirt behind her—shorter and shorter until she fell on her face. Why move? She lay there watching boots pass around her. “Drunk,” they said. The Traders’ tongue sounded like crows protesting. “Vagabond.” Sometimes, “Whore.” And they laughed, but why move? No point to it. No matter how far she got from the chapter house, one thought of sweet dead Mouse tore at the wound that never scabbed.

“Miss?”

She said nothing.

“Excuse me, miss?” There was a touch on her shoulder. She dragged gritty lids open to look on a fellow whose age she didn’t give a shit about. He had a sharp face and round human ears, and his hand on her shoulder was hard. “Are you all right?”

“The fuck you think?” she croaked through chapped lips.

“You don’t look all right,” he said.

“Good eye.” She turned her face away from him.

“Let me help you.”

She didn’t say no. She didn’t say anything. He lifted her off the ground and put her, rather gently, in the bed of a wagon, where she lay in damp straw that smelled of green salad. A few stray lettuce leaves wreathed around her in the bedding. She stared up into aching blue. Mounds of white drifted through it, across the sun sometimes, casting the world into shadow. Rose shut her eyes. Mouse was calling her with memories of mouth and hands. She curled like a child in the womb. Her rapier rested across her hip, tempting her.

Mouse wouldn’t have wanted it. He wouldn’t have done this to her if he’d had the choice. Even when she was angriest with him, she knew that. He had loved her, the same way she loved him.

It was down the road a piece, wherever the man was taking her. Took a while to get there. Way out in the middle of nowhere special. The only trees were in the windbreaks. Long way. But she’d come a long way from home already. When they stopped, she heard chickens. Sundown stained the sky hot orange and blistering pink. He came and took her out of the wagon bed, lifting her in thick farmer’s arms. He was big, she realized, big and dark and strong.

She could have killed him in a blink. Put steel through him. She had been good at that once. She didn’t know how long ago.

She didn’t kill him. She let him take her inside and prop her up in a hard chair pulled out from a round table. He tried to look into her eyes, but she looked away, and finally he wrapped his hands around both of hers and said, “It’ll be all right. Sooner or later.” And then he went away. She didn’t move except to let her hands fall into her lap.

Plain little house. He’d put on the cooler. It rattled, and the air from it streamed gently over her sunburn with that fresh, after-rain smell that coolers always had. Oval islands of braided rugs, once bright, now worn and faded, floated on the ordinary sea of floorboards. They crushed her. There were no flowers on the table, and it struck her as wrong. There should have been a vase of flowers.

When he came back she croaked it at him. “Needs flowers. The table.”

“My wife always had them there,” he said. “But—no more flowers.”

“Oh.” She looked at the floor, realizing what he really said.

“It’ll be all right. Sooner or later.” He took her hand and brought her a few steps to the bathing-room. “Here. It gets hot water,” he said, showing her the deep porcelain tub, and left.

Rose dropped stiff clothes on the clean floor and got in. The porcelain chilled her, even when she twiddled the faucet, lining up runes to bring hot water rushing out. She rested her forearms on her knees and sat, and when the tub filled she leaned back in it with her filthy hair spreading like seaweed.

“You’ve been in here a while,” he said, and she drew in a long breath, letting it out slow when he reached down and pulled the plug. The dirty water drained from around her. “Let me help you.”

She didn’t say no. She didn’t say anything. He filled the tub again, steaming water, and washed her. Hands on her body. They weren’t small and clever like Mouse’s, but big and rough—not ungentle, but callused. He washed everything, right down between her legs. She could have been angry, thought it might have made her angry before, but she felt nothing. While he rubbed soap through her hair he stopped, once, to stroke fingers over her ribs. “Thin,” he remarked. She guessed she was. Her joints stuck out in hard knobs, ankles, knuckles.

He gave her clothes. Probably his dead wife’s. A pink dress. The fabric had tiny red flowers all over it, like fairies had scattered them. He gave her food when he ate his own.

“Who are you?” he asked.

“Rhi,” she said. Rose. And then, like it had broken something inside her, she ate with her hands, ’til her concave stomach bulged. Cheese dumplings. They tasted of ashes. The beer was better. It prickled darkly over her tongue and warmed the inside of her, especially when he kept it coming.

“I’m Witold. It’s Muscodite,” he explained. “You’re in Muscoda.”

“Oh.” She hadn’t known it. She’d come farther than she’d thought. He said more, but she let it slide over her, just listening to the sound of his voice and drinking his good beer. Like a jay calling, raucous, the accent flat and unmusical. Not like Mouse. Oh, Mouse.

She went to bed when he told her it was time. He got in next to her and slept without trying a thing.

He snored.

In the morning he laid her sword on the cedar chest at the foot of the bed. It sat there unmoving in its sheath, the little rapier that was hers. He didn’t draw it, and only moved it when he needed something out of the chest. She never touched it.

Things went on like that. Rose shuffled through the motions. At first he asked if she’d cook, but she mostly sat there. The third time his supper wasn’t ready, he asked her to do other things instead. Chickens. She fed the chickens. And there was a cow. She milked that twice a day, lost in the tug-tug rhythm. Raking and mucking. Weeding. The work soothed her more than she realized. Routine soothed her. They went to market to sell produce—he grew vegetables in a two-acre garden. She gained weight, because when he put food in front of her she ate it, and he put it in front of her three times a day. At night he got in bed and went to sleep. The year began to turn.

(to be continued next Friday!)

 

The Fimbetamur: Five Random Things

Welcome to the whatnot about the world I made up. Today I’m gonna ramble about the Fimbetamur, which is important in both of my things (the things that I have so far, anyway).

The Fimbetamur is the High King (or Queen!) at Shirith’s gift. He or she keeps the volcano Fimberevell in check so it doesn’t erupt, and in return receives all the power of fire (plus magma/lava, earthquakes, and other things associated with volcanic eruption).

The Fimbetamur is Big Magic, which means it’s written in stone — all over the Palace at Shirith. The outer walls, the servants’ tunnel, and more places throughout the building are scribed with symbols and sigils to help the Rev Lieseassar in the exercise of the Fimbetamur.
The heart of the Fimbetamur is a tiny chamber deep beneath the Palace, lit only by tiny, fiery runes that cover it entirely.
High King Beagar, his father Bearan VI, and his father Beamar II are the only High Rulers never to visit the heart.
Tradition has the founder of the High Kingdom at Shirith, and the first wielder of the Fimbetamur, as Bearach I. Very little is actually known of him, as any record has long since fallen to dust.
The Mountain Fimberevell is Herself sentient.

Snippet Sunday #5

More from Hard Time this week!

***

Every Worm beneath the earth used to howl in rage and fear at the sound of his name, but he moved shadow-soft and shadow-swift, and on the Mother’s face he left no mark of his passing. Where he stopped for a while, sometimes a bit of what he was would linger: colors brighter, shade deeper, as if he made the world more real.

It never lasted long. He passed through Wealaia to Muscoda in three nights. The closing of the border didn’t bother him; he spent some time watching the guards pass back and forth in front of the stockade, and when he was confident of a gap, he scaled the boards and let himself down on the other side. He disappeared into the mountains, with no more sound than a cat on stalking feet.

The Muscodites, or at least their government, looked badly on his race. That was all right. One or two might have seen him, by chance or by skill, but he was gone before it made a difference, gone like the demon of the forest they’d have him. In the wooded depths, sly whispering ghosts tried to rise and catch at his ankles, but there wasn’t quite enough of him, no, not quite. No dark Power remained in the Rothganar he hadn’t come to know as well as he ought. Wound or illness could drag him down into death, but no Power would, now.

He flowed through the desert by chilly, sunless hours, night after night, sleeping in the heat of the day except when he roused to catch lizards in his bare hands and eat them raw when they’d just finished kicking. He needed food endlessly. The eternal rumble and growl of his stomach grew so loud he worried he wouldn’t be able to hide.

He came into Windish thinner than ever and in agony, a shadow and no more.

A Wing and a Prayer, Part 2

The continuation of Vandis’s story from last week!

*

Less than five minutes later, Vandis sat in a chair in Hieronymus’s office with bare knees sticking out of his nightshirt and bare toes propped on the floor, gripping the seat with both hands. His stomach growled more fiercely than it had when he was still growing.

“How have you done this, Vandis?” Hieronymus asked, rather gently, given the circumstances. His black eyes didn’t gleam with their usual humor, or with anything at all. If he wore an expression, it was fear. For a moment Vandis was tempted to worry. What would happen to him now? But this was a gift. She was on his side. She had given this to him, and he had to trust it would be all right in the end.

“I didn’t do it,” he said. “I didn’t do anything. It was Her. Lady Akeere.”

Black eyes met his. Hieronymus dipped his white-bearded chin in a slow, careful nod. “All right.”

“She told me—”

“Stop.” The Head raised a palm. “You don’t need to convince me.”

“You believe me?”

“Of course I do.”

Vandis sat back. It couldn’t be that easy. An unbelievable thing had happened, and Hieronymus believed it.

“I’m old. I’ve met a man like you before. In the old days, we wouldn’t have questioned. Menyoral, we would have said. A rare thing, even then, vanishingly rare. Acacius Xavier was the first one in centuries, and he died when I was very small.” Hieronymus came out from behind the desk and leaned his long body against the front, thin, bent with age. “He was the peace at the eye of the storm. You could feel it. Maybe it was because he was old. No peace in you, Vandis Vail.”

Hieronymus was wrong about that. Maybe there wasn’t much of it, but sometimes. Sometimes things were just so right. And She was there, and everything felt… perfect. He couldn’t have described it.

“We’ve had a lot of peace since it happened,” Hieronymus said. “Not sure that’s a good thing. If it isn’t, I’m to blame. Maybe we need the storm.”

Vandis grimaced. “Can we not talk about that?”

“You don’t think someday you’ll be behind my desk?”

He thought for a moment, hands on his bare knees. “Whether I’m before or behind, I hope I have pants on.”

“Oh,” Hieronymus said, looking down. “Why don’t you?”

“Didn’t get the chance.”

“Go and get some, then. Come right back.”

“I don’t know if I’m getting through the outer office,” Vandis said. He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder at the thick oak door. It muffled some of the sound from without, but not all by a long shot, and he could hear voices, shuffling bodies. Full house out there. At Hieronymus’s confused glance, he said, “Lots of people out there.”

“Hairy ears. Can’t hear through ’em,” Hieronymus said. “Well, they’ll have questions. Go on. Don’t swear.”

“Look who you’re talking to.”

“I’m looking.” The Head shrugged. “Like I said, maybe we need the storm. Keep the cursing to a minimum. That’s all I ask. Holy men aren’t supposed to say ‘fuck’ every other word.”

Vandis rose from the chair. “Good thing I’m not one. And I haven’t said ‘fuck’ in ten minutes. I’m starting to get itchy.”

“Vandis.”

He paused with his hand on the latch, looking back over his shoulder.

“You are,” Hieronymus declared. “The minute you got in my face about Pearl, I knew. How old were you? Sixteen?”

“Uh—”

“I knew I’d be talking to you like this someday. There’s something about you that’s… apart. Different. If you weren’t so down-to-earth, we’d have a real problem. But I suspect She keeps you grounded. Even while you fly.” Hieronymus stopped, and Vandis was on the point of lifting the latch when he added suddenly, very quietly, “You’ve seen Her. Haven’t you?”

Vandis dropped his hand. “I have.”

“I did, once. Afar off. A little figure in the distance. It was—I knew it was Her.” Hieronymus shook his head. “Willing to bet She gets pretty close to you.”

“Yes,” he said, nothing more. He didn’t see the need to tell Hieronymus how close. How She touched him so deep in the soul it bled into his flesh and left him thrumming on his bed some nights, sweat-slick, breathless, the secret thing She gave him, too intense to be called pleasure, too sweet to be called pain. Ecstasy. And the unthinkable thing he had cradled in his heart for Her since he was a boy, which he was certain She knew better than he did, and of which they never spoke. He would die for Her. Not only in Her service, though if he thought She required it he’d throw his life down singing. But for Her. Maybe that was why She called him “My own.” Doctrine aside, he’d never really felt he belonged to himself.

That was all right. He’d rather belong to Her.

“Be careful with Her. She’s beyond what we can know.”

“I can’t. From my secret heart to the hairs on my head, there’s no part of me I can hold back from Her. I’m Hers.”

Hieronymus drew breath to speak, but Vandis turned and swiftly lifted the latch. The moment he opened the door, questions slapped him in the face: how’d you do it, what was it like, why aren’t you dressed, what’s your name? It was too much, too many, all this attention, and he reached for Her like he always did when he was afraid. My Lady…

She answered. He drew Her love around him like a cloak and stood as tall as a man five-foot-nothing ever had. What was there to fear? She was with him. “I’m Vandis fucking Vail,” he said. “Get the hell out of my way.”

And they did. He met Santo at the outer door, Santo and Evan both, and his friend held out an armful of rumpled clothes. “Thought you’d want these,” Santo said. “Sorry I dropped your pants. Didn’t get much on ’em though, figure they’re clean enough to get along with.”

“Thanks.” Vandis dropped the rest and put his breeches on, right there. The questioners from the office surged toward the door.

Evan slammed it shut and leaned against it, casual-like. For a long moment there was silence, at least among them. Then Santo said, “You’re the worst flyer I ever saw.”

“You’ll need loads of practice, so you will,” Evan said.

Vandis couldn’t have asked for better friends. “That’s all you’ve got to say?”

“Did you expect we’d be surprised?” The door bowed against Evan’s small weight. “You’ve always been a bit uncanny.”

“Weird,” Santo agreed. “C’mon, let’s go get a beer. You’re buyin’.”

Brightwater: Ten Random Things

I thought I’d blather some about people and places and things I love in Rothganar, so today I’m gonna go on at anyone who’s still reading. Here are ten things on the city of Brightwater, which I haven’t set anything in yet or really written publicly about, but that I like to imagine because… just because.

Think Venice meets New Orleans meets Orlando. I put Brightwater in the messy, swampy Semoulian delta. It’s full of tiny islands and stuff. There are tons of bridges from one island to another, and some really nice beaches on the mainland. The water sparkles at sunrise and after sunset.
After the fall of magic, there are a lot of issues plaguing Brightwater, mostly due to climate, silty ground, and pollution. Even stone buildings soften and crumble in the humidity and heat; historic landmarks sink or fall. The harbor is brown with effluvia, but still sparkles — just not from fairies any longer.
Brightwater is presently at war with Lightsbridge, the nearest neighboring city-state. Admittedly, they’re often at war; they hate each other like Hatfields and McCoys. This time, the bone of contention is exclusive trading rights with the Monmouth Islands, a small chain a little way south of Brightwater itself.
The main segment of the population, as well as the rulership, is human, but as a port city, Brightwater is fairly cosmopolitan. The native people, from whom the name “Semoulian” is derived, are few and far between, and have been for millennia. The Semoul, a race of sentient lizard-people, are more insular with every passing year, wishing in general only to be left alone.
Official name: The Kingdom of Brightwater and the Islands
There’s no official language, but most people speak the Traders’ Tongue, plus Deltese, the local language. The Semoula language is a dead one, primarily pursued by scholars. Although there is a movement to resurrect it, along with the distant history of Brightwater, it hasn’t gained much traction.
Brightwater celebrates the Vigil of Longnight with an all-night dance party and parade. The tradition of exchanging a kiss at dawn is said to have originated here.
Before the fall of magic, Brightwater was a center of the arts, especially painting, sculpture, dance, and theater. However, afterward, many artists disdained the humidity of the place for what it did to their work, and moved elsewhere.
The current King of Brightwater, Angelo, is first of his name and seventh of the Bruglio Dynasty. He has no children except his two-year-old heir, Orazio, and is unmarried since the death of his Queen, Celeste of Dreamport, in childbirth.
Most humans living in Brightwater worship Elemer and Cerama, the Lovers, and the Lovespeakers’ order has been based here for seven hundred years, but perhaps the most popular goddess is Dareen, goddess of the sea. The Semoul have their own religious practice, which they rarely share with outsiders.

Snippet Sunday #4

For Snippet Sunday, a bit of Hard Time. Vandis in the basement at Knights’ Headquarters.

***

He wished he’d brought a rag—maybe next time, assuming there was a next time.

There would be one. He knew it. The power seduced him all the way from Windish, beckoned when he was at his desk in the office, enticed while he went about his business. It was always in his mind now, in some way or another. He knew there’d be a next time, and a next, and a next… and he knew why there had been towers for the Black in Dixon Forest. Everyone wanted power, and some were too weak to resist.

Vandis could easily be one of those. He had to be careful.

Pushing his dark thoughts to one side, he drew his knife and this time, pricked only his index finger, on the pad. He squeezed to bring the blood up, took a heavy breath, and touched the magic thing inside the lantern. It took a moment, only just, to leak in at the top. He watched, by candlelight, his blood in the liquid inside, a little curl of deep red.

The magic flared. He fell back, blinded, and landed in an ungraceful heap on the dirt floor—in a pool of the clearest white light.

He sat up, blinking the spots from his eyes, and saw it—drank it in. At first all he saw was the light, cleaner than his candle, steady and bright. His vision adjusted by degrees, until he could see all the way to the back of one column of dirty, dusty shelving, and a little of the next besides. He picked himself up off the floor and lifted the lantern by its rusty handle, carefully. When he raised it higher he saw farther back yet.

Vandis walked through the shelves for he didn’t know how long, admiring the collection.

A Wing and a Prayer, Part 1

Here’s another story from me. This one is about Vandis, and as such, there’s a good bit of swearing. Foul-mouthed priest. Check.

***

Vandis hit his forehead. He’d been having the most wonderful dream, all open air and soaring and Her. She’d kissed him, right on the—well, not right on the mouth, but right at the corner, and he touched the spot, for one moment back in that tingly space. Here he was, though, in the shitty apartment he shared with Evan and Santo, with a pain in his head and his feet two yards above the floor and—and—

“Holy fuck,” he said, looking down.

“Too early,” Santo groaned from across the room, pulling a pillow over his shock of black hair.

“Uh…”

“It’s too early, I said.”

Vandis used his fingertips to pull himself along the ceiling. Is this Your doing? he asked Her.

What do you think?

I think I’m stuck up here until I can wake Santo. He crawled across until he hovered over Santo’s bed, legs swinging beneath him. “Hey, help me out.”

“Fuck off. Tryn’a sleep.”

“Goddammit, Santo!” The force of Vandis’s yell pushed him back a few inches. How about a little advice?

Just think yourself down, My own.

Think myself— Vandis let out an audible growl. Fine. Down, I want to go down.

He fell, bouncing his legs off Santo’s footboard, and landed yelping on his ass in a tangle of white flannel nightshirt. “What the fuck!” Santo shouted. “Didn’t I tell ya—what’re you doin’?”

“Just scratching my nuts,” Vandis said, pained. He gave up and flopped onto his back to stare at the ceiling. It really was high.

“Well, I’m up now.” Santo swung his legs out of bed and scrubbed at his face. “Thanks a lot.”

Vandis didn’t want to, but he scraped himself off the floor and limped, aching, over to the clothes press. He was pulling out a pair of breeches when his feet started to rise again.

Come on, Vandis! Don’t you want to play, then? I thought you’d be a wee bit excited about this, She said, the hurt in Her tone unmistakable.

I’ve got class, he said, but he wasn’t protesting too hard. He clutched at a drawer pull as his legs went higher and higher. The nightshirt slipped down his thighs, and when he let go of the drawer to tug it into place, he floated back up to the ceiling.

Class! What fun is that? You can fly, and you’re going to waste your morning at a lecture?

I like lectures.

She huffed. You do not.

I can’t get a Bachelor of Arts in Flying. Until then…

As if your attendance record couldn’t stand a single absence!

Vandis’s hair brushed the ceiling as he hunched over. He didn’t want to hit his head again. His back bounced gently, then came to rest against the plaster, but he felt himself being drawn upward, a pull beneath his diaphragm. “Almost perfect” doesn’t count as perfect. If I miss—

“Vandis,” Santo whispered from below. “Vandis, you—”

“Yeah, I know.” He couldn’t keep himself from grinning. Every bit of color seemed to have drained from Santo’s pleasant, dark-olive face, leaving him greenish and pasty, with wagon wheels for eyes. “I tried to tell you, but oh, no, it’s too early you said.”

“I—” Santo sagged, defeated, and Vandis chuckled.

“What’s the matter, never seen a flying man before?”

“Don’t talk stupid.”

“You sure you—” Vandis grunted when his back slammed the ceiling. A little bit of plaster fell at Santo’s feet. All right! All right!

It’s not everybody’s goddess tries to convince him to skive off, She said. You might be thankful at least.

I am. It’s just— Vandis couldn’t put his finger on it. This was bound to be trouble, somehow, some way. “Mind opening the window?” he asked Santo.

“Okay,” Santo croaked, and crossed to the tall casement on the wall next to Vandis’s bed. The glass had long since been broken out of it. He opened the shutters and morning washed into the flat.

“Beautiful day,” he said. In spite of the early chill, it was blue-glass clear outside, with only a few high clouds marking the sky, far out to sea. The spring dawn shone on the floor of the attic flat, gleamed off what roofs he could see, and cast the east side of Old Town into shadow under the City Redwood.

“Yeah.”

“Well, see you later, I guess.” Vandis shuffled himself over to the open window and grasped the head to pull himself down. His legs floated up the moment he put them outside, and when he looked down—well, his knuckles went white on the window head. Please don’t let me fall.

Why would I do a nasty thing like that? Let go, My own.

He shuddered, took a deep breath of the clear air, and opened his hand. He didn’t shoot up like he’d feared he would; instead he drifted gently higher.

“Vandis!” Santo called, leaning out. “You forgot your pants!”

“Aw, shit!” Now that Santo mentioned it, he felt a breeze on his nethers. He pulled the nightshirt down. “Toss ’em to me quick!”

“Which ones?”

“They’re hanging out of the drawer! Hurry up before I get too far.”

“Okay, okay…” Santo disappeared inside and reappeared a moment later with Vandis’s breeches wadded up in a fist. “Ready?”

Vandis held out his hands. Santo wound up and flung the breeches. They unfurled in the air. As Vandis stretched forward, his nightshirt went up around his waist. He yelped, and the breeches started to fall, ten feet short of his grasp. His mouth dropped open, and he forgot about his nightshirt for a moment, trying to swim in midair to catch the pants, but it was air—there was nothing to pull against.

His breeches flopped onto the cobbles, three stories down. He swore so foully even Santo’s shrinking face looked shocked.

“Want I should try again?”

“What’s the point?” He’d drifted even farther into the sky, and he’d just be out his other pair. Wind tossed his hair and flapped at the flannel. “Pick ’em up for me, would you?” he called. He couldn’t quite hear Santo’s answer. Higher and higher he floated, shivering a little and wishing he’d caught his pants. And then—

Well, he forgot all about it. The city spread itself beneath him, bay to Pit. The people, horses, and carriages shrank away, into dolls, into dots, and then into nothing at all. He laughed, wondering if anyone had ever been so high in the history of the world.

Yes. She laughed in his mind. But not in your lifetime.

He might have said more, but the sight of the city stilled him. It was like the scale model in the square up at the Palace, but bigger, breathing, through a furry smoke haze. He couldn’t pick out the apartment building anymore; then he couldn’t find Knights HQ, or the Cathedral of the Winds, or even the Palace Complex, high on the cliff in New Town. He couldn’t even see Last Resort all alone on the promontory.

When he drew in air, it didn’t satisfy—and his hands, he realized, were numb with cold. His feet, too, and his arms and legs prickled. He struggled for breath. I need to get down. I need—

Vandis plummeted. He left his stomach behind and dragged a girlish scream like a streamer through the frosty sky. The skin of his face flapped; his nightshirt snapped and cracked in his windy wake, plastered to his body, and Dreamport rushed up to meet him, swelling and exploding before his watery eyes, faster and faster. Help! was the only word he could push through his panic.

Just tell yourself to stop, She lilted.

He spluttered, or would have, if his lips worked. As it was, they didn’t even close enough to hold his spittle in, and wasn’t that about the dumbest thought that could come into a man’s head at a time like this?

Best hurry, My own…

He howled, “Stop!” as well as he could manage. His stomach jarred back into its proper place. His heart slammed; his head spun; he opened his eyes. His nose was six inches from the slates of a rooftop. He gasped for air, sighed out relief—at least until he felt himself rising once more, and saw the slates dropping away. “No! Nonononono! Stop, wait, I don’t want to go up again!”

He stopped. His heart pounded away in his rib cage, and his gasps sawed in and out, but he hovered stationary and relatively safe. After some minutes, though, he started to wonder how he was meant to go anywhere or do anything. Swimming with his arms and legs wouldn’t get him far. It was always so easy in his flying dreams, when She took his hand in Hers. Can I go forward? he asked.

Why not try it?

He didn’t like that innocent tone of Hers a bit, but he didn’t see what choice he had. Okay. I want to go forward. And he shot smoothly away, bounced off a chimney, and tumbled into the narrow space between two houses. This time, he managed to catch himself before he got within arm’s reach of the ground. Need to learn to maneuver. I can do that, right?

Of course. Try looking where you want to go, and moving your body a bit to match. Like—like sledding, or swimming.

I want to go slow, he told himself, or maybe Her, willing himself to drift along, skimming the rooftops of Dreamport’s New Town. When he reached the edge of the crater, he floated over that, too, and thought himself carefully into descent under the branches of the City Redwood. He spread his arms, getting the hang of it now, and tilted himself into long swoops around the trunk. His fingertips brushed the thick cracked lines of the bark, around and around, nearly to the ground, before he pressed for height again.

Up above the city, near the top of the great tree, he marked HQ, just there to the east on Temple Row. The great cathedrals pressed close to one another, but there was space around Knights Headquarters, grass, the chapel at the front, a little rectangle at this distance. Vandis thought himself out over Crater Bay.

The sea air filled his lungs. Below him, water sparkled with the dawn. Bliss.

You could go a bit faster, My own, She suggested.

I’m still getting used to it, he said defensively.

Oh, go on, stretch your legs. So to speak. I won’t let you hurt yourself.

He snorted, pushing an image at Her, the roof slates from six inches away.

You can’t begrudge Me a laugh every now and again.

It’s not funny enough I’m up here in my fucking nightshirt?

Just a bit faster. You’ll like it. I promise. And She gave him a little nudge. He zipped forward again and found himself in the middle of the bay, heart pounding, with white sails and blue water below.

How fast can I go?

Faster than I can explain to you.

Vandis thought about it without the form that words give, without the solidity of image. He wanted it. It wasn’t safe, but what about this morning was safe? He wanted it, and while he wanted, the waves began to slip away beneath him, faster and faster, and he was bolting north like lightning. The air dragged at him, but it couldn’t stop him. He blew right past, quicker than the wind. He could outrun the wind.

Vandis’s delighted whoop trailed away behind. He was freezing his eggs off, hundreds of feet high, terror pushing at the boundaries of his mind. He’d never felt so good in his life. The sky rushed around his body, through his hair, clear and blue and beautiful. He spread his arms, exulting, exalted. My Lady…!

She laughed, as delighted as he was. Turn southwest.

Can’t I go a little—holy shit, is this Rodansk? It had to be. A small harbor exploded and receded, so far down, and he flew over black basalt cliffs, greening mountains.

Yes. Turn back. If you’re not careful, you’ll get too cold.

He swung himself south again, into a broad loop. The curvature of Rothganar’s surface greeted him, blue sky touching deeper blue water. In the distance he saw Dreamport, a dark smudge in the blues. Could I fly around the world?

Not without heavy clothing. At top speed, in a few hours.

This isn’t top speed?

Heavens, no!

Maybe it was fast enough for today. Already Dreamport grew in front of him, buildings sharpening and swelling, the Redwood stretching tall. What a morning! He’d already been to Rodansk.

Slow down. You’ll overshoot.

It wasn’t until he did slow that he felt how fast he’d really been going. He had to hold the nightshirt down. As he pulled back over the harbor, a delightful thought occurred to him. Dawn service should just be finishing up. Why shouldn’t he grind it in the faces of everyone who disliked him?

Oh, he hoped Reed Westinghouse was at service this morning. He hoped it with fire in his heart. She snorted into his head as he cruised over Temple Row, between two spires of the Cathedral of the Winds.

Vandis descended gracefully on the chapel, getting his feet under him. He was sure he looked magnificent. Then his nightshirt flapped up. He gave an unmanly squawk, lunged for the hem, and planted his face in the dirt between two stone pews. Occupied pews. With his bare ass in the air like a white, hairy banner. “Fuck,” he said, indistinctly, and sat up on his heels. His cheek hurt, and when he touched it with a cold hand, his fingers came away red. That’s what I get for showing off.

His Lady giggled.

Hilarious. Now everybody’s seen my ass.

“Vandis?” Pearl said, a tiny whisper, and he turned wide eyes up to her. Right in front of Pearl. All he could think of was the night she’d tried to kiss him, and his face flamed.

“Uh—” Pearl just saw my pasty ass, he thought, and scrambled to his feet. He barged through, up the aisle, past Hieronymus laying sandalwood on the incense burner, and inside.

“Pardon me,” he heard Hieronymus say as the door swung shut.

The Head had followed him in.

Fuck.

(to be continued next week!)

I’m Trying, I Swear

Expect a lot of fiction and not a lot of raving. I think. I’m trying to have something to say, but it’s hard non-fictionally to tell you how and who I am.

The brain surgery seriously, seriously messed with my head. No, seriously.

I don’t know what else to say. I guess I could tell you about what it was like waking up.

See, I don’t really remember waking up per se. I remember nothing of surgery. One moment I was telling my family I loved them; the next, I was having bizarre delusions of science-fiction hallways. I only vaguely remember the Intensive Care Unit, though I think at one point I had a nice shower, and I remember wishing to be let alone.

I remember an absolute shitload of drugs.

Oblivion. I remember that, too. Sort of.

It’s taken a long time for things to resolve properly. I’m not sure they have yet. I’ve been horribly depressed, which is nothing new, but it’s on an utterly different, utterly deeper level.

I can’t express to you what it’s been like, what it’s still like. All I know is how to fiction (I hope). So I’m doing that and I’ll show you what I can.

❤