Back in the Blog Saddle

The past two weeks have just been nuts, and it wasn't until I got back from a recent business trip that the 'I'm away from my Blog' post I thought I had left was apparently eaten by Scribefire, along with one for the WRB.

Anyhoo - a quick rundown:

I finished the Sweat with Sven challenge. It was the third round, though the first time for me. I think I could have gotten more out of it if I hadn't had so much on my plate otherwise. I went into it with big plans to be the ultimate cheerleader and fell woefully short of that goal. BUT I did at least complete the challenge - rather early too. From that aspect, it was a good motivator.

My first draft of Cloak of Deceit, is finished and being edited and slowly re-worked and re-written with the assistance of The ABC. I've sent off a submission package to a contest and am planning to possibly enter a few others this summer.

I'm still chugging along (albeit slowly) on my mentorship with the fabulously inspiring Debbie Mumford, whom I'm sure will be a very successful YA author soon, and on my Fiction Writing Workshop with A. Catherine Noon on the Writer's Retreat Forum. I'm not giving either of these as much attention as I would like, but c'est la vie - for now.

My next goal is to tackle a Nocturne Bite submission. I have plans to write and submit at least three possibilities for this. I'm 3K words into the first one and finding it challenging, but am very excited about the premise for the story. It's set in my Zyne Legacy universe - the one from my second novel project, Witch Hunt.

Two more weeks left of school and I can safely say I am completely crazy for thinking I could do all of this at once. I should manage to pull okay grades, but just by the skin of my teeth. I'm looking forward to having the summer off in order to focus on writing and maybe enjoy a bit of leisure time.

I have a stack of book reviews to do, and some already written. I'll be posting them over the next month rather frequently. Kresley Cole's Immortals After Dark series is one of my new favorites. I breezed through three of them on my trip and liked each one better than the last.

We've hosted a shrunken down version of the Flash Fiction Carnival on the Writer's Retreat Blog. I'm not sure if it is my fault because I didn't actively recruit enough, or if it is a mix-up because of the admin change - but in any event - major kudos to those who submitted - Catherine, Susan and Unhinged. I will have the posts up with a link hopefully tonight.

That is May in a nutshell so far. What have you been up to?

May Flash Fiction Carnival

If you are looking for the Flash Fiction Carnival theme/instructions for May, you can find them here. Happy Flashing!

Spring FFC Entry

For the Flash Fiction Carnival this round, I decided to go with something a little different. This is a vignette of a supporting character in one of my novels. It was written specifically for this assignment, but I'm not sure how it will hold up as a stand-alone piece. I'm okay with that, because I'm glad I wrote it, and if it hadn't have been for this prompt, I probably wouldn't have.

So, here is a short piece with Astrid from Witch Hunt: Inner Eye, for the Spring Equinox.

Ostara, by LustAndDevotion

Illuminated Astrid wasn’t an Oracle. She’d only studied the basics of divination. And even that was sketchy. Still, she thought, zigzagging her way down the jagged hillside to the beach, it was Ostara – the Spring Equinox. For the briefest of moments, her little part of the earth would be cast in equal parts light and shadow. For the briefest of moments, the energies of the conduit around her would be in perfect balance. If she was lucky, and prepared, she could get a tiny glimpse of the future. She had the perfect question to ask the universe. She was certain in that fact as she unpacked her bag on the fine gravel. The waves crashed against the sides of the rock cove around her, enclosing her in a bubble of gurgles and whispers. Astrid lit the five candles encircling her and dropped to her knees, folding her robe underneath. The question was selfless. It wasn’t for her. That’s why she knew she would see the answer. She wanted to know so she could do what was right for Kean. She loved him, and she didn’t want to see him suffer anymore. Closing her eyes, Astrid invoked her personal circle, and the crashing of the waves beside her seemed more distant. The sky overhead was darkening, still a pinkish hue in the distance, but violet at the edges. She tapped into the conduit and could feel the shifting of the energies around her – each atom re-aligning, as all things do in the cycle of life – coming back to center. If Briana were ever going to come back to her center, to her home, Astrid needed to know. If there was hope for her two best friends to find love and happiness together, she would do everything in her power to see it happen. She loved Kean. She loved Briana. They loved each other. It was the perfect question – innocent, important, definite. One always had to be careful of the questions they asked. Astrid knew that all too well. She lowered her head to her chest, focusing on her breathing, on the grounding force of the shore beneath her, and the airy lightness up above. The light, the dark. Balance. She felt the exact instant it happened, as if time stopped. There was no heartbeat, no breath, and no body for a silken moment. She was suspended in between worlds – the now and the never, the substantial and the infinite. All she needed was the question, but in the place where only spirits dwell, there are no words. Still, Briana was more than a word to her, and so was Kean. They were feelings, and memories. They were hopes, and dreams, parts of her soul. Parts of her soul that had been ripped apart, she realized, when Briana left them. Them. Briana hadn’t just left Kean. She’d abandoned them both, and left Astrid to nurse Kean’s wounded heart through the aftermath. She was still caring for him, and Briana was off touring the world. Astrid’s question wasn’t selfless at all. She wanted Bri back. She wanted Kean happy. She wanted the three of them together again. She wanted . . . things to be like they were before. She exhaled at last, feeling like she fell back into her own body from miles above the ground. Her shot at a moment of enlightenment had passed. A light spattering of rain peppered Astrid’s upturned face and she blinked her eyes open. “What? No lightning? No roaring wind?” she asked the sky. One of her candles blew out and Astrid sighed. “Serves me right,” she said under breath as she got up and shuffled about, re-packing her bag. She should have known that she wouldn’t be able to get a clear answer. She wasn’t an Oracle. She’d thought her question was good enough – but now, after the fact, it was silly. It was too close to her heart. She should have just asked Ce-ce to deign it for her. It started to rain in earnest as she ascended the last curve of the path up the hillside. The froth below her was churning louder with each gust that whistled over the rocks. Astrid gripped her hood over her as she went up the train trestle stairs into the yard. “Screw this,” she muttered as she paused in the back doorway to her house. She looked over her shoulder at the brewing storm, the whitecaps in the straight barely visible past the dusky haze. She shook her head and walked through the door. If she had learned anything from this experience, it was that she was ready for something to change. As she took off her soaking robe and knelt to build a fire in the woodstove, she reflected that her question was so obviously selfish. She wanted to see Kean whole and happy. She missed Briana. She wanted to be free to find her own happiness, without guilt. She couldn’t be Kean’s security blanket any more. She wanted a life too, free from the saga of Kean’s long lost love. She wanted a love of her own. Yep – selfish, selfish, selfish. She chafed her bare arms, then wrapped herself in the closest blanket and nestled into the sofa. In two blinks of an eye, a little ball of orange fluff and claws found its way into her lap. Astrid gazed into the crackling flames of her hearth, and stroked her ginger cat’s luxurious fur, wondering, musing, remembering. She laughed to herself when it struck her that she had a lot more than one question when it came to Bri. It had been long enough, hadn’t it? She was coming back? What was she really hiding from? “Well, hell!” Astrid huffed, and the kitten flounced out of her lap. She would just have to find out the old fashioned way, she decided, reaching for the phone. Maybe it had been an enlightening evening, after all. ---996 words

Keeping Score

This is my contribution to the standard March Flash Fiction Carnival. The prompt was LETTERS/NUMBERS. And as broad as it is, I found it a tough one. So I decided to play around with a character voice in my head, who stems from my free ebook, Once Bitten, Twice Charmed.

*****

My job is all about numbers. Sure, you occasionally get to shoot someone, or ride them to the ground, or chase them down the highway. But mostly, it comes down to numbers. It’s funny, because I was never good at math, but here I am. I’m not a physicist, or a Wall Street analyst, or a salesman. I’m a detective. Lieutenant Aidan Peter Sloane, Boston PD, Shield 7956.

Numbers.

I never thought much about them before I worked the beat. Except maybe my bank account. My phone messages. Now numbers keep me up at night, tossing and turning and throwing them around in my head. Until I can’t take it anymore, and I just go back to work, back to the number game.

Take this poor bastard, for example. The number of bullet holes in his chest? Four. The number of drinks he consumed at the bar last night? Ten. The number of people who saw him leave with a petite blonde, most likely a working girl? Three. The number of possible suspects? Two. The blonde, and her boyfriend. And then it goes on. What was the time of death? Approximately 00:06 hours this morning. What was the last call he made? Received? Two missed calls at 23:23, and 23:24 from 564-2389.

The number of days before I solve this case? Two, if I can catch some shut-eye. They were sloppy, rushed, unprepared. A crime of passion. The easiest, and the hardest kind. The number of hours I’ll sleep this week? Maybe nine, if I’m lucky.

So, why would I do it, you wonder? My paycheck ain’t much. $1236.92 every other week. Eighteen more years, and I can retire. That’s 4,500 more days on the job. But the truth is, it’s the only thing I’ve ever been good at, so why give it up? I failed math, but the numbers and I get along just fine.

Except for once. There’s one number I’d like to change if I could. Five days ago, on my seventh anniversary on the force, a girl was murdered. She was my eighth case that week. I gave myself six days to find her murderer. He was smart, and knew what he was doing. But now that’s tomorrow, and I have no investigation. Because the day she died, Monique Sylvan’s body disappeared from the city morgue.

She’s dead. Or, she was dead. I know it. I saw her. I felt her body, cold, and still, and lifeless. I closed her goddamn eyes for her. Someone killed her. I know that too, in my gut. And I’m gonna find the bastard. But it’s going to take more than six days. I don’t care if it takes me another 4,500 days – I’ll keep looking. Because he’s out there somewhere. A murderer, who thinks he’s gotten away with it. And if there’s anything I hate more than this cheap-ass watered-down mud they call coffee, it’s being duped.

The number of cases I've left unsolved? One, for now.

*****

---500 Words

A Standing Appointment

There were two Flash Fiction Carnival themes this month. The special one for Valentine's Day was LOVE. Read all the entries here.

***

Karen spent the morning of Valentine's Day at the salon. It was one of the few times of year she allowed herself the luxury. With her hair styled, her hands manicured, and her make-up done, she went home to dress. She donned a slinky black dress and a black velvet jacket, along with her favorite diamond earrings - a Valentine's gift from many years before. She smiled as they winked in the light when she turned her head from side to side. It reminded her of the surprise she'd felt, coming home from a tiring business trip to find the small teddy bear on her bed, it's ears glittering with the jewels. She slipped on her shoes and grabbed her purse on the way out the door.

The limo driver was waiting for her at the curb. She eased into the luxurious leather seat with a sigh, turning the ring on her finger idly as they crossed the floating bridge into downtown Seattle. The limo paused outside their first stop, the Godiva Chocolatier. She purchased a box of dark truffles, always his favorite. The limousine snaked through the busy cobbled street of Pike Place, and waited there while Karen edged into the indoor market to buy fresh flowers from her usual vendor, a bundle of scarlet peonies that Clark had set aside for her, just like always. She tried to pay for them, but he assured her they were no charge, and wished her a Happy Valentine's Day. It was one of the few times in the year Karen ventured to the market anymore, but the vendors never forgot her ritual. Her picnic basket at DeLaurenti's was packed and waiting. Sophia slid it across the counter with a knowing smile.

Her arms laden with goods, Karen jostled through the crowds back to the waiting limo, and they were on their way again. The sky was a soft dove grey, but it was warm enough, she thought. Tiny spears of sunlight were breaking through the clouds. The long drive through the manicured grounds was lined with budding Dogwoods - a promise that Spring was near. The car stopped near a gracefully curving path. Karen gathered her things and thanked the driver before setting out for the picnic spot she had shared with her husband for the past eight years. She unrolled the wool blanket and laid it out on the neatly mowed grass, then set out the other items: the flowers, the wine, the food, the chocolates, and the bible. It was marked with the passage that had blessed their union all those years ago.

Karen sat, and ate, and drank. When she was ready, she opened the book and carressed the familiar worn pages as she began to read. Corinthians 13. Love is . . . patient, kind. It always trusts. It always hopes. It always perseveres. She had known that. She had been blessed. Love never fails, she read. Yes, that was true too. She closed the book and sighed, reaching over to touch the stone-hewn date in front of her. February fourteenth. Love is forever, she thought, holding her tears in check.

"What do you say, Frank? Will you be my Valentine?"

--544 words--

Thanks to Kat Oxley for editing!