My goal was two-fold today.

1. Hit 40K.
2. Fix those two really bad “scenes” I sketched out last night.

Both goals were accomplished, but it took me off and on all day.  I don’t have any idea what comes next.  *panics*  I’m heading to bed and hoping some very sweet dreams inspire the next section.  I’m off the next two days from the Evil Day Job, but there were several ongoing issues that will likely require me to at least log on briefly.

Words:  3446 (including yesterday’s uncounted words)

NaNo total:  40,499

Snippet:  This was a very difficult but incredibly fun and wicked scene to write.  *laughs*  And no, it’s not as bad as it sounds.  Honest. 

Panting, Dharman took one glance at her face, her mouth hanging open with surprise.  He rolled to his feet and stomped toward the bath.  “Great Vulkar, Sal, your hair is bad enough.  I don’t need your hands on me too!”

“I don’t know why you’re so upset; at least you released.  I’m about to die.”  Sal flopped on his back, smacking his lips with loud appreciation.  “Besides, it wasn’t my hands.”

I didn’t have a cup of coffee until after 7:00 p.m. yesterday, so that should tell you what kind of day it was.

Compound that with difficulties in my story line.  Specifically, working out the romantic arc AND the Keldari arc.  Bringing them together and meeting at the appropriate time is going to be quite the challenge.  I’m afraid it’ll be sort of like building a bridge from both sides at the same time in the hopes of meeting in the middle, only to find out one side started off by an inch and the whole thing is ruined.

And, well, getting the emotional tension from angst to frustration to fulfillment without the journey being too cheesy or easy…   This is far from the same Shannari I started with five years ago.  She’s got different fears this time around, different hang ups, and figuring out how she would REALLY react is difficult.  I’ve been rewriting a lot to get her reactions right.  She’s not afraid of anything but running, but ironically, she runs a lot and doesn’t even know it.

I did manage 1034 words last night; however, I’m not going to update my word counts yet.  I really need to rewrite, fill, and stretch the two “scenes” I started in those measely words.   I need to make them meatier and more complex before I can go on.

Being devious is very hard work.  I’m not very good at it.

I started the next section in Mykal’s POV and trying to not only get into his head and figure out his voice (for one thing, he’s dra’gwar, and I thought he was something else entirely), I’m also trying to figure out exactly who the unnamed antagonist is and laying down hints everywhere that deliberately point to the wrong suspect(s).  This is my BIG TWIST.  It’s hard to lay down red herrings and misdirection when I’m really not sure how this will all play out. 

That’s what first drafts are for!  Figuring things out. 

However, that means I didn’t get a lot of words this Dark & Early session.  I also stopped advancing yesterday’s part 2 section.  I had a feeling things were happening a little too easily.  Easy and clean is never a good thing when writing big candybar scenes that a character has longed and ached to fulfill for YEARS. 

I also managed to sort of run out of DVD. 

What does that mean, you ask?  Well, funny, I was just telling May about the long years of daydreaming I’d done for this story, playing it out in my head like a DVD.  There’s a bunch of things I knew from the very old version I tried in 2004, but I got a lot of things wrong.  (Like who Mykal really is)  Some of the big scenes from that old version are flavoring the story now, but in unexpected ways, which shifts the DVD off its track just a little.  Enough little shifts, and all the sudden, this story is nothing like what I expected.

That’s where I am now.  The dreaded middle, and my DVD is actually a little corrupted.  There are some big black holes it skips, and I’m going to have to find a way to fill in with new dreams.  The way in which Dharman finally gets his heart’s desire was happening much too easily.  The same thing happened with Gregar in book 2.  Too easy.  Not real.  Not him. 

Back to the drawing board.  e.g. I’ll be pulling out the notebook later today and brainstorming.

Words:  520

NaNo total:  37,053

Snippet:  nothing good enough yet from today’s section.    

I’ll cheat and share something from last night’s–as long as you understand this section may be entirely axed and rewritten.

Dharman flung himself out of the Dream so hard he slid off the edge of the bed and slammed his skull onto the stone floor.

Sal yelled, “ALARM!”

Steel pricked Dharman’s flesh in at least five key spots, along with hard knees to pin him to the floor.  Panting, he didn’t move.  “Is she awake?”

“Yes, I am,” she answered, her voice muffled.  “Get off me, Sal.  I want to see what’s wrong.  Dharman?  Are you alright?”

Her voice rose with concern, which shouldn’t have made him feel so good.  The knees and rahkes left him, but even with his eyes closed, he knew the other Blood hovered close, ready to eliminate him if he proved Shadowed in any way.  He’d taught them well.  “I’m fine, na’lanna Qwen.  Just give me a moment to catch my breath.”

“Let me up.”  Sal must have complied, for her palm settled on Dharman’s cheek.  “What happened?”

“I have a confession to make.”  He opened his eyes but didn’t try to get up yet.  Once she found out he’d been spying on her sleep, she might put him back on the floor.  “I’ve been guarding your Dreams.”

She didn’t say anything, but he could see the thoughts whirling in her mind.  He knew the moment she made the connection, remembering what she’d done just a few moments ago.  Her cheeks flushed and then drained of all color.  “I ate you.”

Squatting down beside her, Sal laughed, cutting it off to a choked clearing of his throat at the look she shot him. 

Lunch session was very, very interesting.  I didn’t plan to write this scene either, but it suddenly came to me, and I had one of those manic crazed sessions of writing as fast as possible before I lost it.

Why so cool?  Dharman meets someone unexpectedly in her Dream.

Words: 1,581 3,301

NaNo total: 34,813 36,533

Unexpected developments.  This might be the big one for Dharman.  Placement is still iffy.  What’s really creeping me out (in a most excellent way) is how this unnamed antagonist is driving events so easily.  I already see the next Dream where he sees how the small seeds he planted here have resulted in exactly the fruit he planned.  I can even see the look on his face.  Although the face I see isn’t the face Dharman sees at all.  *mysterious*

Also brainstormed with Sis, always a delightful experience.  Planning devious things to do to Mykal once he arrives in Shanhasson.  *laughs*

Snippet (spoilers axed):

Vulkar help him, he wanted her so badly.  He growled, “Who am I?”

A flash of light blinded him.  She twisted and curled in his hands, flesh melting into glossy hard scales.  The White Dragon turned, tail lashing, her jaws gaping wide to threaten him with teeth as long as his rahke.

He opened his mouth, but a whinny tore out of his throat.  He jerked his gaze down to his body.  Coat as blood-red as Sal’s hair, he wore the shape of a na’kindre, a very small na’kindre compared to the beast towering over him.  A look flickered in her slitted eyes that tightened his stomach with dread, yet he didn’t turn away.  He’d never turn away from her.

She snapped those mighty jaws shut on his spine and he screamed, broken, unable to fight or flee.

:Is this what you want?:  She roared in his mind, shaking him side to side, tearing through his hide and breaking his bones.  :Is this what you drive me to do?:

:Na’lanna, all I want you to do is love me.:

With a howl, she tossed him into darkness.

“Impressive,” a male said.  “Does she know you walk in her Dreams?”

Trembling, Dharman pushed himself up.  His human body had returned and he didn’t feel pain any longer, but her Dream had shaken him more than he cared to admit, especially to a stranger.  Tensing, he cast out his senses, searching for the source of the threat.  He dropped his hand to his rahke.  “Who are you?”

A man stepped out of the darkness.  Although he was swathed head to toe in black cloth, he didn’t radiate evil.  The man’s skin was leathery and dark, as though burned and peeled and burned again in impossible heat.  Strange markings dotted his cheeks beneath each eye.  For some reason, the man’s pale silver eyes seemed horribly out of place.

A man of such dark coloring would surely have dark eyes.

“I’m here because she Called me, even though she knows not what she does.”  The man smiled, and Dharman tightened his fingers on his rahke.  His skin prickled, his heart pounding like stampeding na’kindre, even though the man was trying very hard not to appear dangerous.  It was the very lack of threat that alarmed him.  This wasn’t Gregar or Rhaekhar, and the only other man who’d appeared in her dreams was Shadow wrapped in dragon hide.  “Would you deny her?”

“I would give her anything,” he replied stiffly.  “My blood is hers.”

“Would you give her your life?”

“Aye,” he retorted, unsheathing his rahke.  “Would you?”

The man chuckled, pacing a slow circle about him.  “We shall see very soon, very soon indeed.”

Dharman shifted his weight on the balls of his feet to better attack.  “How do you know her?”

“I always know her, and she always knows me.”  The man shrugged, unconcerned.  A long slivered moon of a blade hung on his hip, but he made no move to touch it.  “Yet this, I do not understand.  If she wants to enter so badly, why doesn’t she?  It’s her Dream.  She can do anything she wants, even Call me forth from those burning sands.”

[some paragraphs deleted]

The truth dawned on him. The breath exploded out of his lungs, and his knees sagged until he fell, barely catching himself before he planted his face on the stone.  “She refuses her heart.  She refuses to love.  She refuses…me.”

“Iyeh,” the man’s voice echoed with compassion and he slapped Dharman on the back.  “She can’t shine with love.  She can’t be brightheart.  She can only be darkness and shadow, and that, my friend, is my domain.”

“Keep your filthy hands off her.”

The man laughed, and his genteel, amused tone grated steel claws down Dharman’s spine.  “Oh, this is priceless.  I’ve never had her before you, but this time, young Red, I may very well take her before she’s ever even yours.” 

He leaned down and lightly touched the old scar on Dharman’s chest directly over his heart.  The day she’d brought down the Shining Walls with his blood, her teeth in his flesh, seemed like an eternity, a lifetime ago. 

“This time, my teeth will brand her flesh before yours.”

With a roar, Dharman surged to his feet and thrust the rahke as hard as he could.  His blade sank to the hilt, grinding on the man’s ribs.

Laughing, he grabbed Dharman’s shoulder and pulled his body harder onto the blade, writhing on steel with a low sound of pleasure. 

Appalled, Dharman jerked back, his hand burning with the man’s blood.

“It will feel ever so much better when she does it.”  The man melted away, but his voice lingered.  “Your blood may be hers, but soon, her blood will be mine, all mine.”

Back to the Evil Day Job today, so it was Dark & Early this morning.

I started a section last night, thinking that’s where I needed to be, but woke up with a different scene in mind that happened before.  That’s the problem with “summary” scenes — it’s not always apparent what to summarize and what to live out on page. 

And of course, I’m eager to skip all this angst.  I made that monumental mistake when I attempted this story years ago — I actually skipped all of this and tried to give pieces only via flashbacks.  What a mess.

Shannari made a very difficult request today, but for spoiler reasons, I can’t share much, so the snippet isn’t as meaty as usual.

Words: 1,459

NaNo Count:  33,232

Snippet:

“No,” she said sharply.  They all looked at her as though she’d spat on Vulkar’s name, and perhaps she had.  “I won’t let them grow up as mindless pawns the Gods shuffle around on a chess board.  Although they’re Daughters of Leesha, they’re also mine, and they have a right to lives of their own.”

With my afternoon session, I ran into another full-blown intense emotional scene.  Whew.  Again, my nerves are in tatters.  So intense.  And yeah, not Romancelandia-correct, but the torches and pitchforks would have come out a loooooong time ago for this Story. 

I think I’m ready for a “summary” lead in to the next major part of the book when they officially Return to Shanhasson.  Actually, I think I need a Mykal section.  Squee!  The Keldari plot thickens…

I’ll update this entry again if I get any more tonight after monster homework.  Back to the Evil Day Job tomorrow.

Word count: 1,620

NaNo total: 31,773

Snippet:

She slammed her fist into his stomach.  Her knuckles cracked against the hard slab of muscle, but she welcomed the pain.  This was a good pain.  It told her she was alive.  She hadn’t frozen solid yet.

Dharman didn’t even grunt.  Raising her throbbing fist in his hand, he kissed her knuckles.  Now, he made a low rumbling sound, whether pleasure or sympathy, she didn’t want to know. 

“A few more blows like that and your hand will be broken and swollen.  It won’t hurt you so much if you use my face.”  Like a horse, he nuzzled his cheek against her fist and wrist.  “Or use the heel of your hand to spare your knuckles.  Otherwise, you’ll finish much too soon.”

“We don’t want that,” Sal drawled, shaking his red hair forward to hang in his eyes.  “I want a turn.”

She didn’t think; she slapped him so hard the noise exploded in the tent.  Shaken, she stared at him, her mouth falling open with horror.  Her palm burned.  Lady, what had she done?

“Don’t give it all to him just because you know he likes pain,” Dharman growled, drawing her attention to him.  “I like pain, too, when it comes from your hand.”

“I like anything you do.”  Sal tipped his head back, shaking his hair away from his face so her handprint blazed clearly on his cheek.  “Give us more.  Hands, teeth, whatever you need.”

Dharman shifted his weight forward, his eyes flashing in the tent.  “Vulkar, especially your teeth.  I want that most of all.”

Goal today:  break 30K.  Need 1778 to do so.  I’ll edit this entry with the day’s progress.

FYI:  found the theme song for Dharman and the next 100 pages or so of Return.  Cold As You by Taylor Swift.

You put up walls and paint them all a shade of gray.
And I stood there lovin’ you and WISHED them all away.

Got it.  1931 words to finish formal challenge between Shannari and Varne.  It needs much polishing (action scenes sometimes require me to get up and act it out before everything flows smoothly), but the bones are there.

NaNo Total:  30,153 words

Snippet:

Laughing, he [Varne] merely leaned aside and her blade missed him entirely.  “I thought Gregar taught you better than that, Khul’lanna.”

Letting the missed slash carry her arm in a full arc, she whirled with the stroke and flipped the rahke smoothly in her palm for the rear stroke.  Gregar had drilled her ceaselessly, both against himself and her Blood until the day she’d stabbed Sal in the abdomen and nearly killed him.

She didn’t try to gut Varne.  Not yet.  But his sharp exclamation told her she’d cut him deeply.

Finishing the full circle, she flipped the rahke back up in the traditional strike position and gave Varne the best wide-eyed foolish outlander look she could muster.  “I’m sorry.  Did I hurt you?”

Overall, this was a tough day, although the word count doesn’t reflect any struggles.  I’m truly happy with the progress, but ugh, I’m wore out emotionally.  I’m ready to skip all this angst and get busy with the nagging already.  *winks*

Those of you who’ve known me for years might know that I actually started writing book 3 of this series back in 2004 or so.  I had about 200 pages in it.  Then I ended up stopping to rewrite the first book, and all sorts of paths crossed and narrowed until I truly began to wonder if I’d ever have the chance to finish Shannari’s story.

For the record, not a single sentence of that original 200 pages is useable.  All utter rubbish.  But it’s important to understand that certain events will still happen.  I’ve known how this story would end since 2004 — I just didn’t have the skills to make it happen.

Yet in all that time, this story still manages to shock the hell out of me.  There I was, writing along tonight in Dharman’s POV, and something very key just popped out and slapped me so hard I about fell out of my chair.  Spoilers removed.

Today’s final word count: 2,626

NaNo count: 28,222

Snippet:

“And that is why I challenge you.”

Varne spluttered and surged to his feet, looking from Dharman to Sal and the other Blood standing with hands on rahkes at her back.  “You would send each of your Blood to fight me?  So be it.  I’ll kill them all, and then who will fall on you, Khul’lanna, when the next assassin strikes?”

Dharman quivered with fury.  He took at step toward Varne, his teeth aching, jaws straining to keep from bellowing.  Lightly, Khul’lanna dropped her hand to his forearm, and he stopped in his tracks, but he didn’t drop eye contact with the other warrior.  Challenge had been declared.  To look away would be to lose the first part of the challenge, and by Vulkar, he would never lose a challenge for her sake.

“Not my Blood,” she said pleasantly.  “Just me.”

Dharman whipped his head around so hard his own hair stung his face.  He stared down into her eyes, letting his fury and concern flare through their bond, but he didn’t say a word.  Not before their enemies.  :Varne is not to be trusted.:

: I was taught by the very best, and it’s well past time that I taught Varne a lesson.:

She spoke truly, but Dharman still didn’t like it at all.  He turned back to Varne and glared at him, deliberately flaring his eyes and nostrils wide, stiffening his shoulders, commanding his full presence as First Blood and proudly one of Khul’lanna’s warriors.

But what he could he say?  To threaten Varne with harm if he injured Khul’lanna would only diminish her own pride and honor.  So he said nothing, nothing at all, though he had to bite his tongue so hard he tasted blood.

She unsheathed the ivory knife on her hip.  “You’ve coveted this rahke for a very long time.  If you win this challenge, I’ll give it to you.”

Varne sneered, “And if you win?”

“Then I’ll finally remove that perpetual glower off your face.” 

“Give the lad your other blade,” Varne said stiffly. 

She arched a brow at him, slowly unsheathing the black rahke Rhaekhar had given her as a claiming gift. 

Dharman’s fingers knew every carefully carved rose and thorn by memory.

It had taken him months to finish it.  The Camp’s master bladesmith had taken as much care with the steel.  Blaine had always told him he’d have an apprentice position if he wanted, but there was only one thing Dharman had ever wanted, and she stood beside him.  Before he ever saw her face or knew her name, he’d made the hilt with her in mind, hoping beyond hope that it might catch Khul’s eye if he finished it in time.

“Why?  Are you afraid of what I’ll do if I have two blades?”

“The black one isn’t part of our challenge, only Gregar’s rahke.  That’s the one I want.”

“Very well.”  She handed the rahke to Dharman, and the darkness in her eyes sent a shock of worry through him. 

So cold, so hard, so fragile.  He feared she might shatter beneath the strain, or worse, slip to Shadow.  As unobtrusively as possible, he drifted through her mind, seeking any hint of Shadow or corruption that might strike her unawares, but he found nothing but endless snowy fields and sweeping drifts against her Shining Walls, that pride and self control that she used as a weapon.

Taken aback, Varne was slow to unsheathe his own rahke.  “You want to challenge me now?”

She smiled and Dharman’s scalp tried to gallop off his skull.  “Absolutely.”  She didn’t look at him or the other Blood, but simply said, “I need you to let go of me now.”

Words bubbled up within him.  Her bond had sheeted over with thick snow laced with treacherous icicles.  :Beware his rahke shift.  He likes to feint at the face and then toss the blade to his other hand.:

:He stole that move from Gregar.:

Relief filled Dharman enough that he dropped his hands and signaled the rest of the Blood to step back and form a ring about the two challengers.  Gregar’s gift of Death always felt like a cold frost spreading in the darkest night.  If the Shadowed Blood were present, nothing would keep Khul’lanna from winning the challenge.

With her attention wholly centered on Varne, Dharman used the Blood sign language to give them his commands. 

Guard.

It was the highest level of protection short of a Death Rider alarm.  Deliberately holding his hand unmoving several moments to emphasize a delay, he gave another command to only her Second Blood. 

Kill.

Sal grinned widely and nodded.

Varne would not leave this challenge breathing, unless Khul’lanna willed it.

Sitting at Kaldi’s (coffee shop) and slowly wading through drowning sorrow and angst.  It’s snowing on the Sea of Grass.  Winter has arrived, and this time, Summer may never return.

I reread last night’s section and added a bit of detail, then continued with the next section.  Slow going, but high emotion, so that’s okay.  After two cups of coffee, I need to stop and get something to eat, and hopefully find an outlet ’cause my battery’s half dead.

Home now.  Feeling rather down, but I couldn’t figure out why.  I was listening to one of the new songs on my playlist–Love Story by Taylor Swift–and I found myself in tears.  Well duh, after these past scenes, it’s no wonder.  Unfortunately, the miserable blizzard has only begun, but at least I recognized what was the matter.  To cheer myself up, I’m pushing onward from this current doom and gloom scene so Shannari can kick Varne’s arse.

Don’t get me wrong–I love how these scenes have played out.  Heartbreaking, killer scenes, taking lines from as far back as Rose and twisting them as weapons.  As an example, you might remember a certain Shadowed Blood who said something very much like this once, but as you can see, it’s certainly not Gregar speaking now.

:Run, brightheart, run to death.  Run to me.:

Today:  679  1270 words

NaNo total:

Snippet (why this book is called Return to Shanhasson): 

“Aye.”  Kae’Shaman squeezed her shoulder, his aged fingers digging into her so hard that she made a little sound of pain.  It shook her out of her dulled, frozen state, and she looked into his eyes.  “They need you to return to Shanhasson.  They need you to wear the Rose Crown, a constant symbol of love.  They need you to shine, Shannari dal’Dainari, Last Daughter, because something darker than the night comes to your Green Lands.  The Endless Night is coming.  He’s coming for you.”