Hello from the abyss, long-missed reader!
If it’s been dead on this blog, it’s because I’ve been throwing all my writing energies into revising The Whitemaiden. The reason for such intense focus is that I’ve pushed the deadline forward for my beta reader draft.
The new deadline is:
July 31, 2018
I’d better get cracking!
But first, a few words on how YOU can help when the draft deadline rolls around.
How to Become a Beta Reader
As the author, I’m too close to the work to judge its effect on others. If I want to improve the story, I need a reader to react and share their reading experience.
In particular, I need to know:
- Where are you confused? What strikes you as “off”?
- Where do you start skimming?
- What positive or negative emotions are you feeling as you read? (If any?)
- Which characters do you sympathize with and why?
- Where are you delighted? Where are you disappointed?
- Does the story feel whole and consistent?
- How is this story like, or not like, others in its genre that you’ve read?
If you think you could answer these questions, read on!
I’m hoping for readers who:
- Sincerely want to read the work
- Like fantasy and are more or less familiar with the genre, especially epic fantasy
- Can commit to reading relatively quickly (a full fantasy novel in under 6 months)
- Are able and willing to articulate their reactions to a story (most fantasy fans do this very well!)
If you’re interested, please let me know in a comment below or send me an email.
Thank you for your patience!
Now please enjoy this sneak peek of the [current] first three pages of The Whitemaiden. 🙂
1.
The moment Catirna left sight of the hill-home, the ghost appeared, heart churning with light, and followed her down the path to Tir-Runda. They moved in silence, the trees dark and naked to either side.
It was too late to turn back now. The moment she stepped in the door, her healer sister Alruna would know something was wrong.
Catirna glanced back—once, twice. No ghost had come to her in over a year. She’d thought it was over, that her gift was gone forever. Yet here was another soul returned, so fresh that her heart burned like a small sun.
What was more, she knew this one. It was the village healing hand, Marna Canda-Mullen. Once she’d been pale and slender, with sleek black braids and just the right shade of freckles on her nose. Now her delicate bones were broken, her pale skin was purple and her hair was loose, flat and matted. She wore no skirt nor shawl, only a torn red gown dark with her blood.
Once she’d been lively with talk, but now she was silent. She didn’t plead. She didn’t even call Catirna’s name, as so many others had.
The path wound down the hill, and between the trees appeared the chimney smoke and the sod roofs of the village. Catirna heard sounds of life—shouting, laughing, hammering—but no wailing or white-chanting. Whatever had happened to Marna, it hadn’t happened there.
Catirna held her bag to her side and walked faster. She couldn’t stop trembling. What would Dirmad think, if he saw her like this? It was the Fast—she was hungry, she was cold. But that wouldn’t explain the haunted look on her face—especially if the soul followed her in.
As she neared the village, Marna’s presence strengthened. Catirna felt otherworldly eyes on her like two thorns driven through her heart from behind. Don’t look, she thought, breathing carefully. Keep your eyes on the path and pretend you don’t see her. She’ll find out soon enough you can’t help her.
“Little mother.”
Oh, blessed waters.
“Little mother, please.”
Now she was begging. Catirna prayed the mercy chant under her breath: Spring of Life, have mercy. Fire of Prophets, have mercy. Rock of Wisdom… The voice went on begging just behind her, almost at her neck.
Catirna shuddered and ran the rest of the way down the hill, to where the path opened by the river. As soon as she looked up to the clustered cottages of Tir-Runda, the voice stopped, and the thorns withdrew. She glanced behind. Marna had vanished, loose hair and broken bones and all.
Catirna stopped and surveyed the hill, the village, the river Aspa. No sign of Marna or her burning heart.
Perhaps she’d realized she couldn’t be healed. That her wounds were too deep, that the bones alone would take days to regrow, and in that time they’d be caught. Catirna repeated all the excuses to herself.
“May she live,” she whispered, still surveying the trees. She touched her brows, lips, and heart. After a moment of silence, she drew a breath and knelt to press her forehead to the earth. Now she’d have to sing the white chants again, this time one name longer. Marna Canda-Mullen. Healing hand of Tir-Runda. May she live.
Waters, but Marna had been broken, absolutely shattered. Something had happened, Catirna thought, as she picked herself up and started off again toward Dirmad’s house. Something enormous had happened, and she was sure to hear about it soon enough. Marna had been the star of Tir-Runda.
Let her not follow, by the God, let her not follow me.
In the village, Catirna kept her cloak hood up and her head down. She darted between whitewashed cottages, trestles and kitchen gardens until she came to the wide, bare commons of an eight-house cluster. Dirmad’s was the last house on the river side, a small cottage with cheerless brown shutters, all closed. She approached the plain wooden door, paused to compose herself, and knocked four times. After four long seconds, the knob turned and the door swung inward.
“Tirna,” he said, before she could greet him. Then, blinking through the light, he said, “Blessed waters, what’s the matter?”
Purple skin, broken bones. Glowing heart in a red gown.
Catirna lowered her eyes, buried the thought of Marna, and shook the leather bag at her hip. “Beets for you,” she said. “Nothing the matter with these, I should hope.”
Dirmad stepped back and opened the door wider, beckoning her inside. He wore neither jacket nor cap and looked rumpled, as if he’d been napping. Even his beard looked rougher. As she brushed past him, he said, “Now that’s a look on you. What’s happened? Is it Kitty?”
“A moment. Please, I’m frozen.” Catirna shook out her arms and shoulders and took a few steps toward the hearth fire. As she warmed her hands and reminded herself why she’d really come—good enough reason to be nervous—Dirmad turned to grab a chair for her.
“Don’t trouble yourself,” Catirna said. “Runa expects me for the Hour.”
“You mean Kitty.”
“Aye,” Catirna said, impatiently. There she went again, throwing about Alruna’s proper field-name like it was some village girl’s. Her nerves were making her careless.
Dirmad picked up the chair and set it firmly down in front of her. “You’re pale and rickety as an old fence post. Sit.”
Catirna did not so much sit as fall into the chair. Dirmad steadied the back of it with one hand and held onto her shoulder with the other.
“Waters, Tirna. A child could sneeze and blow you over. Haven’t you eaten the midday?”
“If you haven’t noticed, Dirmad, it’s the Great Fast—”
“Aye, but fasting’s not for going about bloodless as a damned ruzhna. Eat something, for the God’s sake. I’ll get you a hunk of bread.”
Catirna kept silent and signed herself once he’d turned. Spring’s mercy, but he meant so well.
Dirmad took a covered basket down from a shelf on the wall and drew out a roll, blessedly small. “I was expecting you’d come this week,” he said, sliding the basket back on the shelf, “but I expected you red-cheeked and smiling.” He handed her the roll. “That’ll give you strength, Father forgive me. Now what’s happened?”
Catirna clutched the roll in her hand and looked up into his eyes, winter gray yet warm. Apparently he knew nothing of Marna.
“It’s not so serious as that,” she said, reminding herself why she had really come. “I simply…need your advice.”
“I ask again, is it Kitty?”
“Nae, it’s—well perhaps, but what I mean to say—”
“Tirna, eat. I’ll wait.”
He drew the beets from her bag and exchanged them for a jar of flour and a parcel of smoked fish from the shelves. Then he tossed a small log on the hearthfire and crouched there poking at it with a stick, giving Catirna time to have her bread. She broke and ate it, but kept her eyes on him. The dry bread crawled down her throat as if to choke her.
Waters, she could not stop wondering about Marna.
After a long silence, Dirmad stood up and brushed off his hands. He seemed in no hurry, but in his movements, in the calm, confident way in which he swung the chair away from the wall and sat down and crossed his arms over his chest—Catirna knew he was waiting for an answer.
She swallowed the last mouthful. Hard. “Kitty’s sick yet,” she ventured, as she brushed the crumbs from her lap. “But that’s not what worries me.” She hesitated. “I don’t suppose you’re hunting this time of year—”
He smiled. She pretended she hadn’t seen it.
“—but you should know it may not be safe. I’ve seen a hawk.” She fixed her eyes on her cloaked knees, where her hands were clasped.
Dirmad’s chair creaked. “A hawk,” he said, in a tone that expected more detail.
“Aye. You know the sort, with the rusted tail. I saw it flying about the hill, and thought I ought to warn you—”
“You’ve not come to warn me, Tirna. You said you needed advice.”
“Well. So I did.”
“You think it was one of the Citadel’s spies?”
Catirna glanced up to see him regarding her through the shadows cast by the fire. She remembered the stare of those brass-colored eyes in the tree overhead, the chill in her heart as they stared a little too long. “I don’t know what I think,” she said. “I looked for that ‘chink’ in the eye—you know, the gleam—”
“You were close enough to see that?”
“Well I was walking the path to the high road font, and it perched right above my head, bold as you please. Normally it’s kept a distance—”
“Normally! What’s this?”
“In any case—Dirmad—” Catirna sighed, already exasperated. She knew where this was leading. She knew. But she also had the sense to admit she needed help, and Dirmad was the only one she trusted. Not to mention the only one Alruna would listen to these days. “It’s not to the point,” she said. “Spy or no, I don’t want Kitty wandering the woods while it’s about. Yet she’ll not keep to the hill-home for anything I say. Indeed I’d not be surprised if I went back now to find her gone.”
“You could have brought her here.”
“She was sick, Dirmad. Pale as a dawn mist.”
“And yet she goes out?”
“I’m as baffled as you,” Catirna said, in a low voice. She looked toward the fire and crossed her arms. “As I told you, she’ll not listen. And I haven’t the heart to stop her by force.”
“Waters, but it’s a damned poor time for this.” Dirmad looked pale as he leaned forward, shook his head and braced his hands on his knees. “Doesn’t she realize they’re looking? This decree will have them crawling the hills, before the third week’s out.”
Catirna remained silent, staring at him. As she puzzled through his words, the cold feeling came back, the one that told her eyes were watching. She dared not turn around.
She cleared her throat and said, “Decree?”
“Waters,” Dirmad said, “can it be even you haven’t heard?”
