11
Feb
A tile clicked under Thia’s foot. She cursed, and held still, her eyes searching. A glint. She dropped, rolling off the edge of the roof.
The landing hurt, her ankles howling in pain. Thia ignored them and ran. A left, two rights, straight, then dive through a window. A thud sounded on the frame. Throwing knife.
She ran for the bathroom, diving into the open pit and the stream that washed it clean. Thia brought a knife to hand, and waited.
No sound.
A movement.
Perhaps?
The knife flew. Someone grunted and died.
A whoosh, and the room above grew bright. Glassfire! Thia dropped into the water, letting the stream carry her away. If she was lucky, she’d find another cesspit before drowning. If not, well, it happened.
Choking.
A thin glow.
Air.
Thia gasped, cursed, and ducked. A knife splashed into the water next to her.
They’d catch her here, or at the next pit. Still, she had to try.
The stream carried her as far as her lungs held.
Arms pulled her from the water, and her eyes showed Thia a ring of masks, most scarred. None carried visible weapons.
“You failed.”
Thia slumped, nodding.
A knife slipped under her chin, lifting her eyes to the mask in the centre.
“You aren’t good enough any more, big sister. I’m sorry.”
The world dimmed.
9
Feb
You want a believable setting, don’t you? So steal it. No, not from some other author, from the world around you! Yes, the world outside the window. It’s a beautiful earth, and there’s lots of strange and fantastical places, and many of them haven’t been used as inspiration, even to this day.
Now, as a fantasy author, it’s always taken me a while to get the setting just right. For me, the first focus is usually magic and politics, because both will play an integral role in the plotting process, and because I’m a sucker for making magic systems. But the piece of the setting that always matters most to me is the physical geography. Where are the mountains, where are the rivers, the plains, the forest, the seas. They dictate the politics, and should reflect both that, and the character of the world.
In The Four Part Land, each of the kingdoms is tied to an element (Earth, Fire, Air, Water), and because of that, each one sits atop land that is the closest to their desired element (Mountains, Desert, Plains, Islands). But the geography that the characters walk through and live in is not just ‘mountains’. It has to leap off the page and exist in the reader’s mind.
Are they barren mountains of snow (Alps, Himalayas)? Dust and sand (Atacama Desert/Andes)? Green grasses but no trees (Lake District)? Wooded hills (Appalachians)? Each style of place that an author may use has an analogue here on Earth. Now, I’m not suggesting you simply copy, but rather use the real, physical terrain as a starting point for your writing.
As an example, the mountains around Tri-Hauwcerton in the TFPL look like the Lake District in England, except much larger and somewhat steeper, with far fewer passes between them, and a few more plateaus. They’re changed enough that people who have been to the Lake District don’t recognize the base, but do recognize that the world is plausible, that it feels real.
The way I do this (another technique might work better for you) is to build a top down map of the setting, with the kingdoms, the basic geography and features, and the most important trade routes. Once that’s sorted to your satisfaction, pick a terrain feature and jot down notes about it. Sandy desert or rocky desert? Storms or still air? Flood plains or not?
Once you have the basic idea of what you want the terrain to be, a little poking around on the internet can tell you what a similar place on Earth is. Do a little research, see if there’s techniques for living there that might spark ideas, or if that terrain suits what you want that area to do in the story. If it does, congratulations, you’ve just found the basis of your area.
Now you can play with the features. Is it a sandy desert with a massive stone ridge across it? Is the sand red because of iron in the silicate? At this point, it’s up to you to flesh everything out, but if you’re stuck, there’s always a place you can go research to try and spark ideas.
The next time you build a setting, even a small one, give this a try. It just might take the story in a new and exciting direction.
9
Feb
I live within many things
but shrink from all but one
I live within one lone land
My mind encompasses the sun
I am a tale of many parts
I play but one of them
I see within an endless void
A thing that I become
I float along an endless wave
A knowledge that succumbs
To love and woe and pain and fright
All protection from the night
For hidden in my dreams I go
A home where few can follow
For hidden within my mind I see
A refuge from eternity
8
Feb
The eighteenth installment of a 30k word short story set in The Four Part Land. It takes place 400 years in the past from the time of Tarranau and Chloddio, and details the collapse of Hymerodraeth Heula, the Empire of the Sun.
The patrol gathered itself, and what little it had taken from the enemy squad, and moved out across the land in search of food. The first few places that they came across were stripped bare ruins, but they found a nice cache hidden under one of the outbuildings in the fourth farmhouse. The building had burned down and collapsed on top of a trapdoor, but Taflen had noticed the edge of the door in the rubble, and with Gwyth doing the heavy lifting to clear the burnt timbers, the latch was soon broken off. Rhyfelwyr and Llofruddiwr descended into the dark below to find themselves in a square earthen chamber, with several barrels of grain and dried meats stored away. Sending Gwyth down to hoist each of the containers out of the ground, Rhy then detailed Llof and Taflen and Rhocas to hunt up whatever forms of transportation might be available.
The squad couldn’t carry back all of the supplies themselves, and with a prisoner, Rhyfelwyr knew they couldn’t send a runner either, as they were already a small unit to be out on their own. Cursing at the officers for sending them out here without more men or a wagon, the sergeant waited for the return of his three men. Soon a grunt sounded nearby, and Rhyfelwyr spun round, to hear Taflen call out. “Send us Gwyth, damn you!”
Rhy gestured at the large man to go help, and shortly a wagon came around the corner, with the traces draped over Gwyth’s neck, and his legs churning to pull the contraption along. Taflen and Rhocas were pushing at the back of the wagon, which slowly settled to a stop in front of the outbuilding.
“Where’d you find this thing? I’d thought they’d all been ruined or taken.”
“Some farmer left it out in a little dell in a field about a mile away. Must have panicked and fled.”
“Good work Rhocas, Taflen. Now to get the barrels on top. And Locsyn, keep an eye on your present, he’s looking shifty. Spoke him with a sword if you have to to keep him from being too active.”
With that, Rhy grabbed one of the barrels, hoisting it onto his shoulder, and then over the side of the wagon into the bed. Gwyth followed after, shrugging a barrel onto either shoulder and just flipping them into the wagon. With the others helping, soon all of the supplies were loaded, and they were ready to turn for home.
“Right, Locsyn, get him into the traces. It’ll stop him from trying to escape, and we need the muscle anyway.” This next was to the prisoner. “And if you think about taking a break from pulling, well, the big guy will be pushing at the back of the wagon, and you’ll just get run over, so step lively until I call for a halt.”
The prisoner spat at the ground in front of Rhy’s feet, but the sergeant just waved at Locsyn in response, and his friend proceeded to shove the prisoner in under the traces, and settle them over his head. With a slap to the back of the prisoner’s head, Locsyn set the man pulling at wagon, slowly getting it to move. Gwyth, Rhocas, and Rhy chipped in at the back, breaking the inertia of the heavy vehicle, before letting Gwyth take the first stint pushing from behind. The others would rotate in pairs to free Gwyth up. The sun was near to setting, and Rhy hoped the wagon didn’t slow them down so much that they would be forced to camp for the night before resuming the journey back to the army.
The squad was exhausted when they stumbled into the army camp that night, an hour after the sun had set. Rhyfelwyr had thought of stopping as the sun’s light disappeared, but the next little rise had shown a field of camp fires, and so they had pushed on in that direction. The prisoner was sagging in the traces, only standing upright because they held him so. He had had no breaks to speak of, whereas all of the squad had rotated in short shifts.
An officer soon came to see the prisoner, and took the report of the day’s actions from Rhy. With a few words of praise, the officer dismissed the squad, and led the exhausted, groaning Lianese soldier away as quartermaster troops swarmed over the wagon, inventorying the find and then wheeling it away.
Rhy hunted up a cook and had him make the squad a hearty meal, their right after a day on patrol and in combat. There was little conversation over the meal, and it was only when their stomachs were satiated that they were able to relax in front of the fire and talk about the day’s events. Knowing that Taflen had already spoken with Rhocas for a little, Rhyfelwyr let the conversation roam, although it mostly settled on the ambush of the Lianese patrol.
“You know, I’ve been fighting beside you for years, and I’ve still never figured out how you get that close to lookouts. Do you crawl under the ground or something?” Locsyn was talking to Llofruddiwr.
“I move quietly.”
“No, I move quietly, and they can hear me from twenty paces or so. You move like a damn spirit, not even here in this world until you pop up and surprise everyone. If anyone actually survived meeting you, there might be a growing rumour about your skill, but you’re so good no one ever knows. And yeah, I know you like it that way, all quiet.”
“Yes.”
“Gwyth, you talk to me, you’ll say more words in one sentence than Llofruddiwr will in an entire day.”
Gwyth doubled over with laughter at that, then put on a silly expression. “Yes.”
“Oh bugger, not you too.”
6
Feb
There exists among all things a strange connection, one that cannot be defined. Philosophers will argue its existence, physicists will try to test for its presence, but none cannot prove it, or even truly explain it. Yet ask a little boy, and he knows, for he can see beyond the world that clouds his eyes.
He will see and hear things that no adult will, for the ability to make this connection seems inherently tied to human imagination, and that is all but gone by the age of twelve, driven out by the mental rubbish of “what’s cool”.
And on this day, a little boy sees a friend, imaginary to others, real to him, and that friend speaks to him. The boy runs home, and asks his mum if he can go stay with his friend. His mother says yes.
Days pass, and the boy does not return. Police hunt for him, his mother begs everyone that she knows to tell her if they have seen him, but no one has.
Later, as a couple walk beneath a tree, they look up and see a strange shape amidst the branches. They call, but the shape does not move, and so the husband climbs the tree, and brings down the stiff body of a small child.
Police are called, and soon the mother comes rushing. She cries and gathers the corpse to her. Despite all the jostling and tears, a giant grin is on the small boy’s face, and when later an examination is performed, no harm of any kind can be found.
The boy had gone and gone beyond to seek his friend.
4
Feb
A hut stood upon the strand. Driftwood had formed it, all angles and pieces piled on. Seaweed was wedged into the gaps. Pulled up in front was an old dinghy, so rotten that it could no longer float. Parts of it were being used to form the door.
A man stumbled out. He was old, certainly, although perhaps his beard and unkempt appearance aged him more than he truly was. A glance at the sky, at the sea, and up and down the shore.
Not yet.
The wizened man amused himself by making castles in the sand, the intense look of a child on his face. He carved them with a long nail, forming windows, crenellations, making it beautiful. He stood back to admire his work, and nodded.
Then he sat nearby, muttering to himself as he watched the clouds and the tides and the sun and the sea. The land he took for granted.
It was time.
The old man poked a tower on the sandcastle.
It crumbled.
He nodded, satisfied, and went inside.
Far away, in a land he had once known, a tower fell. The lord and lady died in the rubble.
3
Feb
This piece is set in the near future of The Four Part Land, shortly after the events in Chloddio.
An arrow flew past his face, leaving him staggered. He drew and fired, a distant scream confirming his aim. He was safe here, mostly, standing atop the battlements while his foes sought to climb them with ladders and break them down with rams.
He shook his head and chuckled. A month ago, his army had attacked theirs, out in the badlands east of the city. And now here they were, sitting outside the walls of his city. That had sure been a turn in the wrong direction.
He stood, aimed, and fired, cursing as his arrow skipped off the armour of his foe. Damn stuff was good. Not as good as what he wore, but good enough. More importantly, there were a lot more people in their armour than there were in his. If it wasn’t for the wall spanning the mouth of the valley, then this would have been over a long time ago. Even now, it looked like it would be over soon enough.
A woosh flew overhead, and he stumbled to the ground, face red. Fireballs. Earth-damned fireballs. Another and another, splashing across the buildings inside the city wall. The structures steamed for a minute, then went out. Firemages would have had more luck if everything here wasn’t made of bare earth and stone. Might be the only city in the world where there was no wood used in the construction of anything.
The pop of rocks against armour.
Oh good, our mages aren’t cowards after all. There just aren’t enough of them, like everything else when you compare us to them.
Still dazed from the near miss, he leant over the parapet and fired straight down. Then again. A shattering sound made him drop back down behind the wall. Two dead. He’d need to do better than that. They all did.
A crunch, and then shouts.
Shit.
He dashed along the wall to the main gate, one panel hanging open, hinges broken. Armoured footsoldiers were swarming through the gap, held for the moment by the reserve troops. He fired wildly, arrow after arrow plunging down.
Slowly the mass was forced back. He grinned. Best heavy infantry in the world, right there. Armour a foot thick, and the skulls to match.
To replace the broken gate, stones were brought up, and piled higher and higher, sealing it with rubble. He turned and surveyed the plains beyond the wall, the seething mass of soldiers who wanted to kill him, destroy his city. He chuckled.
“Well isn’t this the life?”
2
Feb
How did I get here? Well, if you’ve read the interview with LMStull, you’ll know that I didn’t come to writing in the traditional way. I never wanted to be a writer. The thought hadn’t ever occurred to me, until that one summer’s morning when my Mum said I should give it a shot. That was seven years ago, that day when the two of us first drew the map of The Four Part Land.
The first five years, I was writing without much in the way of plans, or even progress. There was a brief burst of background creation that summer, but I didn’t do much in the way of actual storytelling. Then over the next year or so I slowly fleshed out the idea that would become Tarranau, and started writing the story. I wrote several version of the opening chapter, each one getting longer, until I had the version that became the first draft of the current novel.
During this time, I was also playing around with the idea of the magic in The Four Part Land, and in order to ensure that I could write it, and that it fit, I jotted down a pair of short stories, the first about an airmage, the second about an stonemage. That second one has become rather important, and given me a large pile of writing to do, which I’ll get to in a moment.
Now, at the time I was working a rather boring job, and writing a couple hours a day because of it. But all I had on my plate was Tarranau, and at the speed I wrote (at the time, slowly), I got rather fed up with just having one character that kept trudging on and on (it didn’t help the chapter I was writing at the time was bloated, and needed a severe cutdown in edits), and so, at the prodding of one of my friends, I opened up another word document and jotted down this “Chloddio’s hammer crashed against the shield of his instructor…”.
You see, my friend liked the character Chloddio from Caer Chan Carega, that stonemage short story from earlier. Liked him a lot more than Tarranau, in fact, and was always nagging me to write more about him. So, when I was a little burnt out on Tarranau, I did. I had no plan, no plot, nothing. What I ended up with about three years later was Chloddio, the first draft of a 106k word novel. Not quite what I was expecting that summer’s day at the office.
Now, you’re probably noticing there’s a rather massive time gap between when I started writing and now, and I still don’t have anything published. Well, there’s a good reason for that – I’d end up taking large breaks, often months in length, between finished chapters. And I’d also distract myself with short stories and other bits and pieces. And at the time, I hadn’t really wrapped my head around this whole idea of being a ‘writer’, as opposed to jotting down a neat story idea on the page.
Let me tell you right away those two things aren’t the same. Jotting down stories can be fun. Writing them ends up being work. It’s all the stuff you do after that first draft is jotted down. In the case of Tarranau, it’s been three editing passes, multiple beta readers, layout, copy editing, getting a cover, etc., etc. It’s a lot of work, and all of it has occurred since August 2009.
That month, I sat down with a single chapter to write to finish the book. And over the course of about ten days, I managed to knock it out. (Brief sidenote: my chapters average about 22.5k words). I went straight into editing, because it had been so long since I saw the first chapter it felt like it was someone else’s writing. That first pass only took a week, which wasn’t too bad given the first draft was 165k words long. A good chuck of which was unnecessary bloat.
Editing lets you tell the story you actually want to tell, not the story you put to page. They aren’t the same thing, unless you’re a truly brilliant writer. I’m not, and so there’s all these rough spots that needed smoothing down, places where the text bogged the story and needed a good case of liposuction treatment. Am I happy with the story where it is now? Of course I am, otherwise I wouldn’t be most of the way through publishing it myself. Would I have published it before I’d done all the editing work? Of course not. It wouldn’t be a book I’d want to read, and if I don’t want to read it while being strongly invested in the story, why would someone off the street want to touch it?
So, that leads me more or less to where I am today. There were a few more editing passes after August, a bunch of beta readers, having outsiders edit the book as well, and then the slightly dreary work of self-publishing. Self-publishing is the least fun part of the writing process in my eyes, even less than editing, because it’s not a creation process, it’s not carving a story from a lump of words, it’s poking a great internet beast until it notices you enough to stick a small cover icon in one of its hundred thousand window displays.
Was the journey worth it? Oh yes. Very much so. I’ve met a lot of great people, many of them through Twitter, and I’ve had an absolute blast writing down worlds that existed only in my head. There’s a real sense of accomplishment to writing “The End” to a story. And an even bigger one when you write “The End” to all the edits. That’s when you know you’ve really gone and done something. The comments from others often uplifting, but make sure that you’re writing for yourself, not for someone else. Storytelling should come from within. Otherwise it’s too easy to lose the thread and lose the desire. But if you’re writing for yourself and you’ve got the bit between your teeth, keep pulling until you reach a destination. It won’t be where you thought you’d end up, but it will have been an exciting journey. The joy of the surprise ending.
And one final thing – if you’re ever at a party and need something to talk about, just say you’re a writer.
1
Feb
The seventeenth installment of a 30k word short story set in The Four Part Land. It takes place 400 years in the past from the time of Tarranau and Chloddio, and details the collapse of Hymerodraeth Heula, the Empire of the Sun.
It was then that a great shout rent the battlefield, and with it a burst of flame leapt forth to intercept the incoming strike, blasting it backwards and searing the arm of the Lianese soldier clean away, the flames blue from their heat. Rhy halted in amazement and looked over to see tears pouring down the face of Rhocas as he gestured with one hand, the fire streaming from the air about him to building a shield of scorching heat over the downed form of Taflen.
Seizing the opportunity, Taflen rolled away, keeping himself low and under the flame to finally stand up next to where Rhocas still held to the flame, the billowing cloud cinders making the Lianese shrink back in fear. Not one to be stunned by any turn of events, Llofruddiwr took advantage of their distraction to plunge his longknives into the back of two of his foes, and with that strike, the battle resumed. It was soon over, however, for the sight of the fire had heartened the Veryan soldiers and stolen the morale of the Lianese, and soon it was that Rhy, his leg bandaged, was standing over the only living remnant of the Lianese patrol, who had surrendered almost unhurt after Llofruddiwr had chased him down when he sought to flee the battle.
Before questioning the prisoner, Rhyfelwyr glanced over to where Taflen and Rhocas sat, talking quietly to one another. That was a mystery that would need to be explored, and quickly. Rhy saw Locsyn just shake his head, wondering at the new revelations. All of the patrol was stunned by the realization that Rhocas was a firemage, although probably an untrained one. Firemages were something to be feared, their rank high above that of the common soldier, and yet here one was, wandering around out on patrol. Trying to clear his head of all the thoughts that whirred about, Rhy turned to the prisoner, who was bound and sitting on the ground.
“So, what brought your lot out here? Scouting out our army?” The prisoner just glared back in response, his jaw clamped firm.
“Make it hard on yourself if you’d like. If you aren’t going to talk to me, I’ll just hand you over to Llofruddiwr and his longknives. I don’t have the time to wait around for you to warm up to me.” The prisoner’s head swivelled to where Llof was sitting on the ground, polishing the blades of his weapons with bits of cloth taken from the Lianese he had slain. Llofruddiwr didn’t look up in regards to the scrutiny, just kept examining the blades until he had each one shining perfectly.
Rhyfelwyr smiled. “Yes, the ghost over there. He’ll be just as nice to you as he was to all of your fellows.”
The prisoner glared once more, then spat on the ground next to him. “I get it. What do you want?”
“What were your orders?”
“We were shadowing your army for a few days, and then on the way back to report. Been keeping an eye on you, is all.”
“Right, right. And where are your forces located?”
The prisoner looked around and closed his mouth, clearly not willing to talk about that subject. “Llof, you busy? Might need you in a second.” Llof looked up, then loudly and deliberately scraped a sharpening stone across his longknife.
“They’re forming up around Horaim. I’ve been out in the field a week, so I don’t know if they’ve moved or not since then.”
“Good enough. Locsyn, I’ve got a present for you. Keep this little bundle of joy from scarpering for the rest of the day, can you?”
“I’m touched.”
“We’ve still got a job to do, so lets move.”