Snippet Sunday: April 3, 2016

Welcome to Snippet Sunday on Darkling Dreams!

Where writers come together to share a few sentences (8-10) of their current project — whether it’s a recently released novel, a WIP (work in progress), or an older manuscript that’s being revived. Intended to hook readers, gather feedback and build an author’s fan base, Snippet Sunday is the FB group that does all three.

Welcome to April, everyone. Let the April showers, bring May flowers. And even better, the descent (or is it ascent?) into madness for Camp NaNo has begun!!

In honor of it being the first plunge of the year into NaNo months, I am going to keep sharing from the first novel in my series the Dark Heir Chronicles I am working towards finishing this year with Camp, Fated to Darkness. Come May I am going to switch to a different story, either a fantasy or an adventure. I haven’t decided just yet which I want to go from.

Previously on Sunday Snippets: Four year old Heather had been kidnapped from her home by a woman clad in black and whisked off to another realm where she found her kidnapper wanted her to be her Heir. But not just any Heir. After being locked up and put through a ritual that has changed her and her life forever — though she does not yet know it — she has found herself in a small bare essential room with a tiny bathroom, and her new mentor has instructed her to clean herself up and be ready in ten minutes. Having talked of what Ciara finally wants of her, she has now gone through three trying lessons under her mentor’s thumb, and has since passed out. Since then Ciara has finally begun to explain what it is she really wants of Heather.

Picking right up from where I left off in last week’s snippet as Ciara tries to show Heather her fate…

(Some sentences may have been creatively edited and punctuated to try to fit the ten sentence limit. I’m over, again. Can we just agree that my snippets will always be a little longer but not too long?)

~*~*~*~

She shook under the weight of it, her mind still feeling like it was splitting open as the images continued. Her eyes shut against them but it did no good to actually block them out.

Take a good look, get used to it. While those Heirs did well enough here, they were failures in the end. You shall not be one of them, but better than them.

No… Heather couldn’t help but think the single word. To her surprise, Ciara heard her.

No? You think there is a way to avoid this fate? Rule number four was never to bother thinking there might be escape, to never even attempt it. You will become who I say you to be, you will be the Dark Heir, my Heir.

All the images and sounds suddenly shut off like someone turned a faucet off and the pain in her mind faded as Ciara pulled back from it, still staring coldly at Heather. The young child curled upon the ground, holding her head and trying to shove what she had seen out of mind. They may have stopped flitting like a slide show, but they surely were not gone. Some of them felt as if they had been burned into her mind with a hot iron. Some things could not be unseen.

The pure terror on some of the people’s faces, the shrill screams and cries. People had begged for mercy and though some had tried to fight, they had been cut down with not so much as a batting an eyelash for the bloodshed.

It left Heather feeling sick at the war-like scene. Not just the disgusted and horrified kind of sick, but the she was about to lose her lunch kind of sick. How could someone be so cruel and not care about what they were doing? How could they take pleasure in doing it as well?

“You asked before that which being the Dark One means,” Ciara started. “It is to be feared and held above all else as someone not to double cross or even attempt to wrong in the slightest. I am the most powerful witch within this realm, Heir. By the end of your training, you shall be right up there with me. Remember rule number two: show no weakness. Now get up and do it again. You have a long way to go before you will ever be ready for a feat such as you just saw.”

~*~*~*~

Oooooh dear, it seems Heather is going to be way in over her head.

This story is not yet on Wattpad because it is my baby that I hope to publish one day, and if no one will publish me, I am self publishing. But it’s also not on Wattpad because it’s in first draft phases yet. So there will be no “if you wish to read more…”

However! If you wish to read anything else that I do have finished, you can hop on over to  my profile on Wattpad and check out what I have to offer. I love to hear any and all feedback on my work as well. Comments are greatly appreciated, as are the reads.

And if you’re looking for some other great snippets of fellow authors,
hop on over to Facebook and check out Snippet Sunday!