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Post by Shadaras on Nov 3, 2009 12:33:57 GMT -5
The Twilight shone with color that was more than color. It was sound and taste, smell and touch. It was emotion. Everything blended together, and the fey were at the center of it. They were the Twilight. They wove everything together into a whole that was so much greater than the parts that I couldn’t tell where one fey’s influence ended and the next’s began. I fell to my hands and knees, trying to brace myself against the inflow of sheer power. I felt like I should be throwing up all the magic in me. It wasn’t worthy of this place in any way, shape, or form. Technically, I wrote that yesterday. But whatever. I like the Twilight. I'm also not completely sure why I called it that, but it fits. And I hit 10k and am almost certain that my classmates will call me crazy. xD ..but that's fine. And so worth it. And I can see so many ways in which the pacing of these ten thousand words could be better (in all fairness, I could probably extend them out to 20k if I thought about it enough and gave everything the detail and time it deserved), but it's NaNo. I shouldn't be thinking of pacing and stuff during NaNo. Expect another post later today or for this one to get edited, depending. |
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Post by Kathleen on Nov 3, 2009 15:22:14 GMT -5
xD ..I really think you and Kath have rubbed off on me. Consider this: He laughed. It wasn’t a good laugh, either. It was the sort of laugh I’d expect from a movie super-villain. That's the most recent thing I've written. And it's like. So much more something one of you would write than me. *preens* *looks innocent* What's wrong with that writing? That sentence is fun. =D Ahem. I love your excerpts. ;3 I like the Twilight, too. .. which horrifies me to type, because I'm terribly sure I just said something that could be construed in a different way. And all your characters. Because they're just pretty awesome. =D |
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Post by Shadaras on Nov 3, 2009 20:57:27 GMT -5
I never said anything was wrong with it; I simply said that you were rubbing off on me. xD ...it could be! I think this is why I never call it Twilight. Just the Twilight. And my characters are epic indeed. I love them. The walls of the tunnel we’d entered glowed with true light, the same light as the sun. It was disconcerting. That the light wasn’t blinding at all was part of why it was disconcerting, I thought, because even for me, looking at light that bright hurt. If I’d thought it would explain anything, I would’ve asked Cyrus. I doubted he knew the explanation, or that he’d explain it even if he did understand.
“Why is this Summer’s realm if it’s so far underground?” I finally asked.
“What makes you so sure we’re underground?” Cyrus grinned, waving at the walls. “All I’ve seen is a tunnel.”
I sighed. He was right, much as I hated it. This was the Twilight. I wondered how long it would take me to truly understand just how different the Twilight was from Earth. Even Hell had its rules, and they were similar to Earth’s in that walls were walls, down was down, and up was up. Tunnels could only be made with solid surfaces, and if they sloped down, then they really were sloping down. The Twilight, if what Cyrus was implying was true, didn’t follow those rules. I didn’t like that.
Most mortals would consider my existence a failure of the rules, I admitted. But I was used to that. This, I wasn’t used do and doubted I ever would be. Of course, the very fact that I doubted I would get used to it meant that I was fairly likely to. As we emerged from the tunnel into clouds, I pulled my hand out of Cyrus’s and glanced around. I didn’t find that we were standing on clouds odd at all. That we’d just emerged out of another ash tree also didn’t seem too far-fetched. That a Tinkerbell-style fey was hovering in front of us, however, was slightly odd. Especially since she glowed, and I was fairly sure she was the Lady of Summer. “Setheremus.” This time, the voice that spoke my name was unmistakably fey. I raised my head and opened my eyes just enough to look at him. The fey looked like a leonine man, but his form seemed wispy, almost as if he was made of wind and imagination.
I rubbed my eyes with a hand. “What?”
The fey man smiled. “You have an interesting name, child.”
“Would you do me the honor of giving me something to call you, then?” I shifted so that I was sitting cross-legged. I didn’t try removing Cyrus’s hand this time; he seemed to have glued it to me, and it still seemed like one of the only sane points of contact I had in this world.
“Lynne.” The fey laughed, a brighter sound than I expected. “Names are old, child, and the way those of your day use them is not how they were always used.”
I scowled. “Alright, Lynne. Why does this world hate me?”
Cyrus started. He hadn’t expected that. I hadn’t expected it either, but the question made sense. If I was going to come into the Twilight again, I wanted to know why. I had to. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be able to argue myself into returning, and returning to school through the Twilight seemed a whole lot easier than flying or using mortal means.
The fey swirled, his mane drifting off and reforming. “Your kin tried to destroy us. We remember.”
“As you can almost certainly tell, I’m not like my kin.” I gestured at Cyrus. “And as he told me earlier today, you shouldn’t blame the descendents for something they we never part of.”
Lynne’s mist stilled. It was almost more disconcerting and distracting than having it constantly in motion. He raised a hand, and I saw the faces of the Twilight peering out at me, eyes in all the colors of the rainbow and some that most definitely weren’t of a color I’d ever seen or heard of before. They blinked out of sync with each other, until I had to close my eyes or throw up for real. Lynne’s voice was like fog, suffocating, condemning. “We are not like you, child of light and darkness. We are not immortal memories like your friend. We are emotion. You are asking us for logic.” Each of those go on, of course, and Seth actually meets Lynne first. But whatever. xD ..I like Han Lian better overall. Edit: My 13,000th word is 'Bible'. I find this amusing. And I did not plan that, either. |
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Post by Rikku on Nov 4, 2009 0:26:51 GMT -5
Ha! =D *feels impressionable-ising*
Fey. <3
... Also, I'm finding it adorably sweet that they hold hands. >.>; Don't mind me, I 'ship everyone.
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Post by Shadaras on Nov 4, 2009 0:34:39 GMT -5
I thought you'd like the fey. xD I am trying very hard not to 'ship them. >.> ...it's rather difficult, because they would be adorable. Cyrus probably does like Seth. Seth really doesn't know what to think about Cyrus, however, for quite a few reasons. Water. You’re surrounded by it, can’t help but move with it. It rocks you to sleep at night and sings to you during the day. It’s where you were born, what you were born for. The saline taste means safety, the motion means home. The water might seem cold to other beings, but not to you. You are part of the water, and it is part of you.
You do not rule the seas, though you’re said to. You belong to the seas, and as such they will listen to you because you need them to survive. They do not need you, but you are the greatest of their scions. They will listen, because you have ever been kind to them and to your less powerful brethren.
So when you tell them that the winged things appearing on the land are trying to kill the Kindred, they listen and rise up in protest. They drown the world for thirty days and thirty nights.
When they drop, and you see the now-barren world, the newcomers are still there. And they’re still hunting you.
You’re afraid, now. You fight them, and the seas help you as much as they can. Your fiery Kindred fall in droves; they are too hot-headed to realize that fighting these newcomers head to head is futile. They have a greater Power behind them than you do, and they know it.
You ask the seas to give you a place to hide, a world that the winged killers cannot reach. They are uneasy, but they agree. You flee, and the sea protects you.
The winged ones fall, and as they fall, they are transformed. You watch. Sea-salt and running water still ward off these killers. The sea still protects you. But you cannot return until they leave, for they will pay any price to rid the world of a power strong enough to compete with them.
So you hide. So you sleep.
You dream the world, and you watch it change. You mourn the passing of each animal kindred as it dies, and watch the land slowly turn to waste. You watch the Power gain control of the world and bring about massacres such as you never wanted to see.
Your dreams turn to nightmares.
They show you a tipping point: a person, a place, a point in time.
One dreamer awakens, and finds his way to that tipping point. None of you know what to expect, or how to change the future from nightmare to dream.
But it’s a chance. So you have to try. Mmm. This makes more sense in context, I suppose, but I think it's pretty. And second person is fun. And this is the last excerpt for today. Really. xD ...if I post again, it'll be for replying/final wordcount. |
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Post by Rikku on Nov 4, 2009 1:19:45 GMT -5
Oh, but you should. <3 ... Mind you, this is coming from the person who keeps on wanting to 'ship some entirely ridiculous pairings, regardless of gender, orientation, and indeed species. xD
That is pretty, context or no. I can sort of guess at the context, too, which is interesting, but it's well-written. Sort of an ... almost a folklore-story kind of feel, y'know? Pretty.
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Post by Shadaras on Nov 4, 2009 1:31:58 GMT -5
I know I should! xD ...why do you think I end up with all the hints about how much Cyrus likes Seth? And stuff like this: 'I sighed, and felt the light touch of Cyrus’s hand on my own. My fingers stilled on my thigh, and I looked at him. His leaf-dark eyes caught mine, and my mouth dried up. I swallowed ineffectually, and looked away again. I didn’t move my hand. I let his hand stay there, reminding me of the word I was trying to ignore.' I mean, Seth is out of it during that passage (fey magic (aka, the spell that marks him as having passage-right in the Twilight) does not mix well with religion), but still.
And I am altogether unsure about whether or not the Host and the Kindred could mix. xD ...I could make arguments either way, but I don't think so. There aren't nearly as many stories about half-dragons as there are about fey and humans. ((Which is my explanation of how witches and stuff came about)). And the Host tends to asexual or a 'cubi, pretty much. Not many stories I can think of like that. So. Um. Yeah. xD ..the Kindred and the Host really shouldn't mix.
...that was a longer reply than necessary. xD ..whatever.
And yes. Folklore. Myth. Legend. Truth, in a way. The history of the Kindred and the Host is interesting. Even more so when you add in the fey. <3
Edit: Final wordcount: 17,154. ^_^
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Post by Shadaras on Nov 5, 2009 2:44:06 GMT -5
Final wordcount: 24,073. ^_^ I was still sitting there, blankly staring at the Bible, when Athsceriel entered. My head shot up and I glared at him, shoving all the books back under my clothes. He laughed, and I flushed. I couldn’t help it. He hit his thigh with a riding crop, and I winced at the sound. “Must you?” I said pitilessly. “Why bother, Athsceriel?”
“Because you deserve it.” He hauled me to my feet. “Even more so for reading that abomination.”
“It’s part of our heritage,” I said coldly. “Especially mine.”
“You have no heritage.” Athsceriel hit me hard in the stomach with his fist. “You have no right to be here.”
I choked on a laugh. “You’re the one with no heritage,” I gasped, forcing air into my lungs. “You’re just another dumb demon trying to advance in rank until he gets to beat up people powerful enough to be a challenge.”
He hit me again, this time with the riding crop and on my back. “You don’t know anything about what you’re talking about, angel-blood.”
I smirked, even though he couldn’t see my face. “Like you’ve got any less angel blood in you. It’s just more corrupted.”
His hand tightened on my shirt, drawing it closed enough to start choking me. “Angel-blood, you don’t know what our blood is like.”
I dropped my mask and let my wings force him to drop me. I turned and looked at him. One of my eyes was summer-sky blue. The other was fiery red-gold. I knew the effect it had on Athsceriel. It was why I so rarely dropped my mask while around him. It scared him badly and reminded him of all the power that I could control if I felt like it. “Athsceriel D’Raesche,” I said softly, “do you know what my blood is like?”
He shook his head, silent for once.
I held out my left hand, wrist up, and carefully cut into it with one claw. The blood that trickled out was two-tone; dark and bright. Red as fire and red as a rose. Two very different shades, when it came down to it. I watched Athsceriel’s face, looking for the bloodlust I knew would come. As I saw it begin to rise, I murmured a word and the bright angel-blood clotted and smoothed over, leaving the dark demon-blood wet on my wrist. I wiped it off and said, “That is my blood.”
Athsceriel shuddered all over. He reached out for me wordlessly, though I heard him make a groaning sound deep in his throat. I twisted away from his hand easily and grabbed his wrist instead, holding tightly enough to pierce his thick skin. I shoved his arm towards his mouth and let go, stepping back. I’d done this to him before. It was never pretty, but I couldn’t deny that it was very effective. He smelled the blood. I knew he did. It didn’t matter that it was his own. He bit down on his wrist and began sucking, drinking his own blood.
It made me feel sick. I clenched my teeth together and waited until he regained enough sanity to realize what he was doing. When he did, he looked up at me with red-orange eyes and a face that spoke entirely of hatred. I smiled. “Will you leave now?” I asked gently, fanning my wings slightly. “Or must I give you more reason to?”
“This is a reason to leave?” He flung out his injured arm, and where the leftover drops of blood hit, they scalded the surfaces. I winced when one hit a textbook, but didn’t say anything. He advanced. I didn’t move, letting him grab my shoulder. It was a bruising grip, but it didn’t matter. I’d been hurt worse before. He leaned down into my face and said, “The pretty boy’s afraid of me, isn’t he?” He paused. “And of the Lord.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. His statement could be interpreted in two different ways, and they were both true, though he didn’t understand it. “I fear the Lord, yes,” I said, once I had my laughter under control. “You?” I shook my head. “You could barely inspire fear in my classmates.”
His claws dug deep into my shoulder. I almost made a sound as the pain hit me, and then forced it to leave me alone. He shook me, and his claws went in deeper still. “Your classmates have never met a real demon. How do you know what would scare them?”
Somehow, I summoned up a smile. “The Lord is on their side, Athsceriel. How could they fear?” |
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Post by Shadaras on Nov 5, 2009 12:01:58 GMT -5
...I think I'm modeling Athsceriel after my dad, in part. This is strange. And ever so slightly scary.
*goes back to writing*
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Post by Shadaras on Nov 6, 2009 1:31:59 GMT -5
*gives up* ...I wrote about two thousand words this morning, and school apparently killed all motivation I had for writing today. So. No excerpt today. And final wordcount, 26,140.
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Post by Shadaras on Nov 7, 2009 2:38:10 GMT -5
32,005. ^_^ When the bell rang, I left and went to find Cyrus. He was waiting for me by the church, a slight smile on his face. I scowled at him. “Afraid?” he asked.
I suppressed my urge to swear at him and entered the church with trepidation. I wasn’t sure what to expect, despite Cyrus’s assurances that nothing bad would come of it. When the church didn’t do anything to me. I let out a breath, and Cyrus shook his head. He led me to the very center of a pew and shoved me down. I laughed at him, but didn’t say anything. As the rest of the class filed in, I watched the pattern. Everyone was sitting somewhere else, just so that they didn’t sit near us. It was like a bubble of anti-gay people. If I’d thought I’d be able to get away with commenting on that in a church, I would’ve. Even last time, people had sat near Cyrus. Mostly girls, but people. This time, there was nobody.
It irked me. I didn’t do anything about it, mostly because I wanted to see what Father Kirchner would say when he entered. If I hadn’t thought that it would be going over the top for a reaction, I would’ve cuddled with Cyrus. I doubted he would care at all, judging by how he’d been acting. I hid a shudder, and didn’t meet Cyrus’s eyes when he glanced over at me. I didn’t like the implications of that at all. I could hear him starting to ask me if I was alright, but he never really got a chance, because Father Kirchner entered then.
The doors made a very impressive boom when he closed them, and I saw everyone turn to look. Dressed in white robes – for once something other than normal clothes – Father Kirchner was impressive. He was relatively short, but it didn’t matter. He was impressive simply by virtue of his personal power. If I were to define what he had, I’d say he had some sort of charisma-based magic, and that was why he held the position of a priest. I thought that he could rise further in the hierarchy if he felt like it, but that he just didn’t want to.
Father Kirchner surveyed the room for a moment. I saw his gaze pause at the bubble of isolation Cyrus and I were in. Then, as if everything were perfectly normal and he weren’t wearing a robe that looked like it was designed for someone in ancient Greece, he walked down the aisle to the altar. But instead of beginning with a prayer, as usual, he looked directly at Cyrus and me. “God does not forgive you,” he said, his mellifluous tones ringing through the halls. “But Jesus will plead for your souls nevertheless.”
I stood without thinking. “Our sins are forgiven by dint of Jesus’ blood,” I said softly, undercutting Father Kirchner’s words with ice. “There is no sin that his sacrifice does not cover, unless I’ve missed something.”
I saw Father Kirchner’s throat work for a moment. “You have succumbed to the call of the Devil himself.”
“That’s what you call love?” I laughed, letting scorn coat my voice. “It’s not true, anyway. We’re friends, nothing else.” I paused, surprised to find that I meant each and every word that I’d just spoken. Interesting. “Why do you assume that we’re lovers?” Father Kirchner’s fingers were white, I noted. I smiled charmingly, letting just a smidgen of my succubus heritage show. “Perhaps you should repent for this.” I bowed slightly and sat, refusing to acknowledge all the stares.
“You are insane,” Cyrus murmured, but he sounded admiring. “How did you manage that?”
“Three years of hiding and you stop assuming people mean your true self.” I shook my head. “Instead the assume other things. And I warned you.”
He reached up to squeeze my shoulder. “That you did.” This is also known as about the point when I really stopped wondering/caring just how much these two reflect my friends and me. Oh, and today I finally set off the primary conflict. xD ...at 31k or so words. My characters are silly. |
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Post by Shadaras on Nov 8, 2009 1:39:29 GMT -5
I wrote about 500 words today. Yeah, if I tried, I could write 1-2k before midnight. I don't want to. It doesn't matter that much to me.
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Post by Rikku on Nov 9, 2009 2:08:33 GMT -5
You will let me read this when you're finished, yes? ^_^
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Post by Shadaras on Nov 9, 2009 2:53:50 GMT -5
Yup. ^_^ 37,016. Final count for today. They stopped when Father Kirchner entered, at least. And there were other people sitting around us today, so he didn’t lecture them on that again. Instead, he looked at Cyrus and started lecturing him on God’s will. I hid a smile. It felt like Father Kirchner heard the same rumors as the students, and was determined to force Cyrus to stop believing in fairies. This, more than anything else, was why I had stopped Cyrus before his debate with me had gone too far. I wasn’t going to get in trouble for it now. Father Kirchner knew me as a quiet, but religious, student.
It was rather nice to be thought of well by at least one teacher, even if he was the teacher who managed to think well of practically everyone. God’s love for all his children, and all that. I believed in that much. It worked for humans, since they were his blood. The Host... we were more like his little siblings, born with fractions of his power and forced to work for him. Cousins, maybe. Lesser than him, but not directly of his blood. I wished we were, sometimes. But if we had been, he wouldn’t have been able to cast Lucifer and his force out of Heaven.
The war that had started stuff rang through God’s realm today. Lucifer could never give up, and God knew that. Thus did the Host fight amongst itself, not even trying to deal with the fey or humans very much. Of course, the fey had begun this, now that I knew both sides of the history; the sky-fire genocide had made Lucifer rebel. He hated the idea of killing off an entire race just because they wouldn’t do as asked, just because they were protecting their homes. Which meant, of course, that he essentially tried to do the same thing to the Host.
I never said that I agreed with him. Now I understood his actions better, but that was all. |
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Post by Shadaras on Nov 10, 2009 2:36:08 GMT -5
=D ...final count: 42,020. Cyrus looked just like he always had. The other one, who I presumed had removed the stuff holding me in place, looked like his brother. I searched through my memory, and then said, “Cyrus? Nellen?”
They stopped talking. I felt a slight surge of satisfaction at that. Then, the shorter, stockier one turned to me. His eyes were pure hellfire, but the lines of his face were so close to Cyrus’s that they had to be brothers. “Setheremus.” He glanced at Cyrus. “I didn’t know my brother had told you my name.”
Cyrus shrugged easily. “He dreamt, and asked some questions. The truth was easier than figuring out a lie.”
Nellen crossed his arms. “Sieroche, you should have asked.”
Cyrus ran a hand through his mane of tiny braids. “Lords of the wind, Ney, don’t you get it? He’s our only chance at this, and you want me to stall and lie to him just so that he doesn’t know your name?”
“Si.”
The laugh that burst out of Cyrus was more in keeping with the dragon I’d known. I watched, bemused, as Cyrus stepped forward just enough to tug at Nellen’s short-cropped black hair, just the same color as his. “You are even crazier than I’d though,” he said, still laughing.
Nellen shook his head, a grin on his face. “I can’t beat you, Si.”
I narrowed my eyes and forced myself to sit upright on what turned out to be a giant log. “So, Cyrus, how much of what you told me was a lie, in some form or another?”
Cyrus hesitated. “Enough to get us both in trouble.” Edit: Amnei? I hate you now. xD ...and I am so going to catch you. And soon. I'm far too stubborn not to. |
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