Fantasy Romance
Staring at her grave, tears glittered in his eyes even now.
He’d lost count of how many enemies had fallen to his blade, how many that swore allegiance to those that had taken her life he’d ended.
Yet she still lay in the cold unforgiving ground.
Uncertainty knotted his stomach.
She’d been dead and gone more than ten summers, yet he still felt her pain. Her torment.
The poison must have been pure agony.
Her soul had not passed.
Rohan sat on the windswept hill, the sun burning his eyes as the shadow of the Dragonscale mountains darkened his lands.
It was her birthday, their birthday, but she would never see another.
Because they had taken her. Stolen her life when she had seen so few summers. Far too few summers.
Her birth had been auspicious. Should have ended the never-ending war.
But they didn’t want peace. Didn’t want her.
He clenched his hands into fists.
If war is what they wanted, war is what he would give them.
He clenched his hands into fists.
If war is what they wanted, war is what he would give them.
The gods’ gift felt more like a curse.
It revealed that men he’d liked and trusted were consumed by the same darkness that had once infested him.
But rather than fighting it as he had, they embraced it and the wealth and power that came with it.
Other he’d deemed cruel and selfish shone with the light of the gods.
His entire world, everything he knew, was gone.
But the only thing different was him.
The darkness had nearly devoured him and taken all he was.
He thanked the gods every day for saving him, for giving him a second chance.
But part of him wished they had let him die as punishment.
Instead, they had blessed him with Their gift.
I have finished my current edit on Seducing the Ice Queen.
*happy dance*
I am taking a short break from the story before starting my final line edit that focuses on things like comma usage, word variation, and not ending sentences with prepositions.
On day two of this break, a whole new idea smacked me. I started writing it, and after two days, I’m over 4,000 words into it and still going strong! If not for this pesky thing called a day job, I’d be much farther along.
The characters are really coming alive, and that’s the best part about writing for me.
Yes it’s a first draft, and I both love and fear this draft. I love it because anything is possible. Because as I write it, I get to know the characters. Their foibles, fallacies, and strengths. I am a pantser, so this first draft is where I learn what happens to the characters and how they get their happily-ever-after.
*squee*
However, I also fear it because I’m staring at a blank sheet. There is nothing there to rearrange, fix or correct. It’s empty, waiting for those first words that will spur the next eleven revisions. There is no wordsmithed beauty to it. It’s raw and dirty, this first draft.
And that’s okay.
I just have to get it on the page.
After the blow my writing took back in July, I am ecstatic that my muse came back to sit on my shoulder again.
I’ve missed her, and I’ve missed the joy of creating new worlds and the people in them.
I am not very good at listening.
So, as I told you here, my paid editor didn’t like the villain in my current romance novel. She thought the bad guy needed more than just a sense of greed and entitlement.
So, I added another character that was supposed to be the star-crossed villain, doing evil things out of love. I revamped the original villain to be more sympathetic. I did everything the editor said I should.
And it didn’t work.
Why?
Because now I like the characters, and the new “villain” developed their own character in the process. Becoming a person that wouldn’t actually commit murder.
*throws hands up*
I know. I hate it when characters stop listening to their author-god and go do their own thing.
But see, here’s the thing. People do bad stuff all the time. People are motivated by greed, and fear, and lust. Not everyone is altruistic.
I’m not even sure everyone is a hero in their own story.
Yeah, I know us writers are fed this a great deal. But I’m not sure it’s true.
Not everyone thinks they’re blameless. Some people know what they’re doing is wrong and do it anyway.
I want this thing, so I’m going to take it. Yeah, it’s wrong. So what? Yeah, it may hurt someone, but I’m going to take what I want.
Don’t believe me?
How many con artists are scamming people out of their money and justifying it to themselves on some higher moral ground? Because there’s totally heroic reasons to call a grandmother pretending to be her granddaughter in a horrible car accident and beg for money in the form of non-traceable gift cards so the hospital will admit her. *that was sarcasm*
Or calling parents and telling them their child was kidnapped and demanding ransom money or they’re be killed.
So, maybe the villain in this story really is just in it for money. Maybe they’re willing to steal an old man’s retirement savings by pretending to be the love his life. Or maybe they’re willing to kill a scrupulous duke to keep gold flowing.
It’s my story. And while this villain may have had a traumatic childhood on the streets of Aerius, that’s not the story.
I don’t care why he values money over someone’s life. He does. And a flip through the news will show he’s not alone.