Heartstone Voids (Wednesday Words 5.10.17)

Welcome to a piece of Wednesday Word’s flash fiction on Darkling Dreams!

A good friend of mine, P.T. Wyant, is doing a blog post every Wednesday called Wednesday Words with a new prompt for a bit of flash fiction writing, just to get in the habit of writing something, anything. (Even if said flash fiction is complete garbage at the time. Garbage is better than nothing though, right?) If you’re looking for some inspiration yourself or just something to aimlessly write, then go check out her blog for this week’s prompt!

With that being said, I am going to share what I came up with for this week’s flash fiction Shard based off a photo prompt. So here is my very rough around the edges minute of inspiration based off her prompt. I’d love to hear what you guys think of it!

(Please excuse any errors you may see, I said it was rough around the edges.)

This tale is also a continuation of Dragonstone from 3.15.17.

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Heartstone Voids

Innin’s bellows echoed off the high stone ceilings. The sounds of distress carried through the maze of passages linking Flamer hideouts to their winged mounts’ dwellings, disturbing those that were trying to rest in the mountain. She didn’t pay mind to the responding screeches and yells from them trying to get her to quiet down. She was too agitated to care.

Smoke filled the space around her, flowing freely from her snout with each distressed huff. The sound of raking claws on stone only furthered her agitation as she paced around and around, wings flaring.

He should have been back by now! Foolish rider! Why did he have to go off on his own?!

The sun had nearly set below the horizon and still there was no sign of Fenian. He had left that morning to try to track down the dragonstone and should have been back by now. He should have been back hours ago, or at the very least have gotten within range to reach out and say he needed her now.

Can’t trap a leprechaun while trying to hide a dragon. She snorted. I could have been out of range while he hunted the leech. He didn’t have to go alone!

Another roar of worried frustration shook the cavern, sprinkling dust down over her shimmering emerald scales. The prickling of dread seeping through her veins with each passing moment was making her antsy. The bond was trying to tell her something, she knew it, but she couldn’t figure out what it was trying to say.

Was Fenian in trouble? Had he bit off more than he could chew without her? Or had he just been delayed in finding the leprechaun and was on his way back now?

Her tail flicked against the stone as she rounded and stomped to the mouth of the cave, staring out over the dwindling landscape below. She could see the forests, the lakes, the towns and kingdoms from here; almost as well as she could see them from the skies. With eyes like a hawk she caught the flurry of movement along the mountainside. She snaked her head out further and looked down to find a female elf hurrying up the carved staircase set into the cliffs. One rickety line of wood railing kept them from plunging to their death. Worthless railing if anyone asked her.

The setting sun glistened off the elf’s hair. Red hair, petite… Is that…? Innin flared her nostrils, trying to catch the elf’s scent on the breeze. Alenia!

Innin rushed out of the cave and pushed off the rocks, flinging her wings open to ride the wind currents down to her. The passing of her great shadow caused the elf below to pause and look up, then retreat a few steps backwards when she landed hard on the mountainside, digging her claws into the rock to hold herself. Pebbles and dust rained down onto the stairwell. She left her wings open for balance and turned her head toward Alenia.

:Alenia!: she shouted telepathically, catching the elf off guard by the booming voice in her head. To her credit, dragons didn’t normally mind speak with anyone other than their Flamer or other dragons. :Have you seen Fenian?: she demanded.

The elf shook her head and blinked before focusing on Innin’s words. “I…” She floundered out of breath. “I… No, I haven’t seen Fenian. I was…actually coming here in hopes of finding him. He said we would meet at the tavern tonight for dinner but he never showed and I haven’t heard from him.” Her brow creased worriedly. “Is he…not here?”

Innin reared her head back and shot flames upward over the rock with a guttural growl, scorching them. Her scales rattled when her body quivered.

“Innin!” Alenia exclaimed. “Innin, what’s wrong?! Where is Fenian?”

:I don’t know!: she snapped, fangs clicking together as she cut off the flames. Smoke poured from her snout with each heavy breath. :He said he went hunting to find the leprechaun that stole the dragonstone, and he didn’t want me to come because a dragon is easily spotted. He left this morning. He should have been back by now! But I have not heard or seen heads or tails of him since. Something is wrong.:

“Have…you tried reaching him with the heartstone?” she asked timidly. “Have you felt anything through the bond?”

:It is blank! An abyssal void! I cannot feel or sense anything even when I should, I can’t even sense HIM!:

Alenia flinched at the senseless fury and worry in her tone, giving her head a shake. “Did Fenian say where he was going?”

Another billow of smoke wafted from her nostrils, curling her head toward the elf with blazing eyes of fire. :He mentioned the Enchanted Forest, that was all.:

“Then let’s go and look for him.”

:It’s almost dark!:

“I know…” she replied, trying to sound soothing. It was kind of hard to be soothing toward an enraged dragon though. “But we can still look. If he did run into trouble then we can’t wait till next sunrise. You go on and fly ahead, I will race back and get a horse and a few scouts to help, then I will meet you out there.”

Innin stared at her, trying in vain to calm her racing heart and all the unspeakable thoughts darting through her head. Leprechauns were not a friendly bunch, and their people had never gotten along with those thieves and murderers. She feared for what could be happening to Fenian if he had run into trouble with them. She whipped her tail back and forth.

:No. Send a hawk with a message for scouts to meet us there. I can’t waste any more time. You’re flying with me.:

Alenia’s eyes widened and some of the color drained from her face. “Wha-?”

She broke off in a squeal when Innin wrapped her tail around her waist and raised her wings. She pushed off the mountainside and beat hard to raise higher in the air. Only once she was level in the sky and hovering did she wind her tail to her back to set Alenia down between two of her dark green spikes. The elf clung to the spike in a bear hug for dear life.

“Innin,” she squeaked. “I don’t like the idea of-”

:Oh just hold on and you won’t fall off. I’ll catch you in my claw if you do.: She heard Alenia gulp, then she shot forward in the sky, taking off for the Enchanted Forest. :Now hang tight, I have a rider to find and flay to a crisp after saving.:

“But I haven’t sent a hawk!” she exclaimed, voice nearly lost on the wind.

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Now you can find this flash fiction work and others on my profile on Wattpad! Click here for my profile and go dive into a sea of Shards of Imagination!

Now What?

On Sunday I finished the first draft of Fated to Darkness and since then…I have felt like a lost puppy. I’ve sat on my desk chair spinning in a circle because I haven’t known what to work on. I’m so used to working on FtD for so long now that it feels weird to not be working on it, to not be pushing for that end scene yet.

I feel so lost.

There’s still a very palpable sense of grappling for straws on the reality of completing this novel right now. The “now what?” feeling as I try to figure out what I’m supposed to be doing. It’s been five days since I finished the novel, but I’m still staring somewhat dumbfounded at the binder that holds my concordance for FtD and at my other WiPs with an “aaaaahhhh….” kind of expression. I could almost just flip a coin to try to figure out what I’m doing.

Granted, there are many, many things I could be doing now.

For starters I could get back to working on Clockwork Heart like I wanted to use part of Camp for. I could use the rest of the year, or however long it takes, to work on that novella/novel. Or I could go back to the very first novel I ever started writing, Breaking Point, and continue that. (The more I look at that novel though the more I need to do some outlining and brainstorming and probably a title change too. To what though I have no idea…sort of.) I could even start outlining Shapeshifter Wings and start work on that. Then there’s the option of starting one of the plentiful, new novel ideas kicking around in my head — like Alice in Court, or Book 2 to The Dark Heir series, or the horse ranch storyline that’s been kicking around up there since I was little that actually has a title and subtitle already.

Or, I could forgo novel work for the time being and start on some short stories. I could write the sequel to The Black Lake, or redo that story altogether to make it better then do the sequel. Or expand and fix up The Beast. I could also poke around at Seductress and see if it leads me anywhere beyond the vague storyline and grand ball scene it has.

On the other hand, I could refocus my efforts to editing instead of writing. I don’t mean editing Fated to Darkness. No no. That is going to sit and wait until I can come back with fresher eyes. I mean that I could take this time now and focus on re-editing, polishing, and maybe expanding Rivers of Black more. The thought has crossed my mind to try to publish the story, but I’m not going to explore that spurt of consciousness any further yet. I don’t want to think about publishing right now…

The fact I have finished the first draft of Fated to Darkness doesn’t mean it’s not going to be touched at all until I’m ready to edit though. I won’t let it collect dust for a couple months. I still have a binder concordance I need to flesh out and finish, and there are multiple notes within my book that I need to find a way to organize and put together in a notebook or something so that as I go along and edit and answer the questions I left myself I’ll be able to avoid plot holes or errors.

There’s still quite a lot of work to do on FtD before I get to the true editing phase. So while I spend the rest of the year — I’m hoping to be done before December, because…holiday — finishing the concordance and finding a way to organize those notes and questions to myself, I am going to be working on something else as well. I would like an entire month of letting FtD sit completely ready for edits before I do dive into full on scrutiny paper edits, but until then there’s lots left to do.

My tentative plan right now as I start to get the ball rolling again is to get working on the concordance and an organization technique for the notes/questions I left. In doing that, I will be reading through my entire novel, which also means that while I’m reading I can minimally fix light edits. Say a missed word, or the wrong version of a word, missing quotation marks, and so forth. The things that won’t require me stopping for an hour on one paragraph to make it sound the best it can possibly be. Doing this will make the paper edits a little less daunting in red marks.

That’s the plan for Fated to Darkness from here till December. *Prays I can be ready by then*

Because I don’t want to lose the next six or seven months with no writing to show for it — well, that wouldn’t have happened anyways because of July’s Camp NaNo and November’s NaNo — I am going to work on something alongside the next stage of FtD. I believe that “now what?” feeling is going to be geared toward writing Clockwork Heart and trying to finish that story this year, as well as re-editing Rivers of Black.

Actually, my original goal of May was to re-edit Rivers of Black finally since I kind of failed on that one last year. Perhaps that will actually happen now that FtD is done. Then again, I had expected Clockwork Heart to only be a short story and already be done by this time too, but…

Yeah, the universe hasn’t been kind to me this year in more ways than one.

But that’s the plan for now. I guess I’ll see how it works out, though I don’t have many expectations for it. I’ve learned better at this point. The hardest part I think is going to be finding a balance between these three projects now when my life is already so screwy and unpredictable.

Or, maybe, the hardest part is going to be finding the heart that says it’s worth it again…

A Life Too Short (Wednesday Words 5.3.17)

Welcome to a piece of Wednesday Word’s flash fiction on Darkling Dreams!

A good friend of mine, P.T. Wyant, is doing a blog post every Wednesday called Wednesday Words with a new prompt for a bit of flash fiction writing, just to get in the habit of writing something, anything. (Even if said flash fiction is complete garbage at the time. Garbage is better than nothing though, right?) If you’re looking for some inspiration yourself or just something to aimlessly write, then go check out her blog for this week’s prompt!

With that being said, I am going to share what I came up with for this week’s flash fiction Shard based off a three word combination prompt. So here is my very rough around the edges minute of inspiration based off her prompt. I’d love to hear what you guys think of it!

(Please excuse any errors you may see, I said it was rough around the edges.)

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A Life Too Short

In Loving Memory of a Dear Classmate

One of my classmates died yesterday. Unexpectedly; just like every other tragedy that occurs. The sun is shining and birds are singing on this picture perfect day outside, but the beauty is lost on so many today. To us it is overcast by shadow and storm clouds of a different kind. Our worlds have come to a standstill, but life around us hasn’t slowed or stopped to mourn with us.

It keeps on turning, blissfully ignorant to the pain in our hearts.

The clock continues to tick away the agonizing seconds, minutes, hours, transforming them into days and weeks. They say time heals wounds of the heart, but that isn’t always true. Sometimes time only makes the pain worse. It makes days likes this, perfect days, become mockery to our suffering.

Doesn’t the world care?

Of course it doesn’t. At least not all of it. The world as a large whole is unaffected by this tragedy, just like so many others that happen every day, but so many individual lives around me are now grieving and trying to process a loss that is incomprehensible.

How do you deal with the unexpected tragedy of a life so bright, and so full of heart, snatched from a world that was better off with her in it?

The answer is I don’t know.

Maybe you sit and stare blankly at a wall, unable to feel, unable to cry just yet because it still feels surreal. Part of you believes the phone next to you is going to light up and start ringing with a call from your friend, daughter, cousin, sister… But it doesn’t.

No matter how much you will it to not be real it unfortunately is.

Or perhaps the reality slams into you so fast and so hard that you want to find some place secluded where you can scream at the world at the top of your lungs for this injustice. The middle of the woods, a garden shed, sitting in your car, anywhere available where you can let it out. Where you can curl up and cry until you have no tears left, and scream until your lungs give out.

I don’t know how you grieve, how you may cope. Everyone is different. Maybe one day time will scar the wound we now bear, but that day is not today. For when our hearts freeze like an unexpected snowstorm in May, I do know one thing for sure…

The world lost a beautiful soul yesterday. A kind, caring, selfless individual who always smiled and always welcomed everyone around her with open arms. She could light up the room with her presence. I had never met another person so devoted to their family, with such a bright future and a good head on their shoulders. A young woman who touched and changed so many lives with her own. The memories and photos left on her wall speak of a life that was worth every moment of it, and it is a shame it was cut so short at just twenty-two years.

I guess it’s true when they say the good ones are always taken first.

I saw a quote a friend of hers shared yesterday: “How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.”

How lucky we were indeed.

Tonight I choose not to mourn anymore, but to celebrate the bright life she lived instead. Tonight I light a candle in her honor. She may be gone but she will never be forgotten for the joy she spread and the lives she forever changed. The world may not have stopped to mourn with us, but know we would have stopped the world for you.

Rest easy now, and fly high, angel.

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Now you can find this flash fiction work and others on my profile on Wattpad! Click here for my profile and go dive into a sea of Shards of Imagination!

Declaring A Win And A Completion

Camp NaNoWriMo April 2017 WINNER!!!

That’s right. I managed to pull off the win on the very last day of Camp. As predicted, after the long work week I had, I totally blew getting anything done on Saturday. So come Sunday I was up and writing from the moment I woke up to get that final 5,669 words I needed. Come to think of it, I didn’t even stop to eat until I had validated, which by that point was definitely dinner time. Whoops…

But I pulled off the win! Hooray! *Throws confetti*

30 days, 30,058 words (30,053 after validating), 65 pages, and 4.5 chapters plus a blurb.

It may not have been a pretty win this month, but it’s a win. And guess what else?

That’s right, baby.

Fated to Darkness is FINISHED!!!

SQUUEEEEE!!!

Excuse me while I scream, cry, laugh, and essentially freak out internally for a little bit again.

I can’t believe I’m finally typing those words. I’m in shock. It’s a dream come true. (Or, well, the beginning of a dream come true.) I actually did it. I actually finished my first full length novel after almost three years of working on it with NaNoWriMo’s and spare time.

And this isn’t just any novel to me. This is the first book of the series that is my heart and soul. The storyline that has been kicking around in my head since I was a little girl. The characters that have literally grown up with me in my head. They’ve been waiting for this to happen for as long as I’ve been waiting for it to happen.

I finally did it.

Book 1 of The Dark Heir chronicles is complete.

I’m still in shock, and I’m definitely still freaking out internally. *Happy dances*

This whole month, this whole book, has been a roller coaster. I started out this Camp with the intentions of having Fated to Darkness finished within the first week so I could spend the rest of the month working on Clockwork Heart. (Obviously I didn’t get to work on Clockwork Heart at all.) But I was both excited and scared out of my mind to finish this novel.

I struggled to get through the end of this book for many reasons ranging from frustration to hesitance, but I made it and I managed to type these words for the first time in my life:

When I got to those words — which I’m not going to leave them in come edits, I just wanted to be able to write them, lol — I had to stop and just stare at my Word doc while I tried to process the fact that I actually did it.

It was quite an interesting day of writing on Sunday to get to that point. Because I was so frustrated with Chapter 41, I left it off with my lengthy ranting note to redo the chapter. I didn’t try to pick up from where I had stopped, but I did jump ahead just a little to the end of the chapter where I knew how it was going to go down to the smallest detail.

Once I got to that part the words just started flowing again full force. The end of Chapter 41 went down without a hitch — though it could use a bit more bang — and I went onto writing the Epilogue. (That was another word I had to stare at whenever I typed it because I couldn’t believe I was seeing it.) I thought the Epilogue was going to be a bit difficult to write because I have to be very careful in what I reveal in it. (No I’m not going to tell you why. Mwahaha!) Surprisingly it didn’t give me the issues I thought it was going to, and it even ended up setting up the Prologue for Book 2!

Of course once I got to writing the words “End Book 1” I realized I was about 150 words short of hitting goal for Camp.

Go. Figure.

I was not going to write a 150 words of something new or another WiP, and I realized the blurb I made years ago for Fated to Darkness needed some tweaking and kind of sucked. So you know what I did? Yep, I took that final little spurt of words and wrote another blurb!

Gods I hate blurbs…

This one wasn’t that bad to write though, shockingly.

It got me to the NaNo win so that’s all I cared about. I just can’t believe I’m going to be setting this novel aside now for awhile so I can come back to it with fresh eyes. I miss my characters already. I miss Kailyn, and Matt, and Gods…I even miss Ciara, the evil bitch. It feels really weird to not be working on their novel. I feel lost.

Granted, I’m not putting it away completely yet, there’s still a few things I need to do with it before I’m ready to begin editing — which I plan to be the start of next year — but I still miss them already.

But alas, the explanation of that headache stuff I need to do, as well as my next plans, can wait a couple days. After all, I’m still celebrating my win and the completion of my first full length novel.

Camp may not have gone the way I had planned for it to go last month, but it will definitely be one that goes down in my history books. I did it, baby! Now excuse me while I go celebrate some more and squeal in happiness.