The Blood Within – Extract

As much as I am easing off the pedal in December, I am going to try and get some sort of semi-regular posting schedule done on the blog. I do like writing here, and hate feeling like I’m ignoring it. So hopefully I can get a few fiction and dragons posts down.

I mentioned in the November debriefing post that I changed projects halfway through (well, less than halfway, but, you know, who needs accuracy) the month. However, The Blood Within is still very much an idea in my head and I don’t think it’s unwritable, it’s just not writable yet.

So, for my fiction piece today, I thought I’d share with you a bit that I did manage to write. Just to remind myself that it probably isn’t as bad as I think it is and I can totally come back to it as a when it and I are ready.

***

Ghost turned her head, following the sounds of the laughter as it travelled around. It was moving, in very quick bursts, but she was able to follow it smoothly, which was more than could be said for Daria.

She was spinning with every new sound, trying to track the source of the distinct laughs, starting at every noise, even as she staggered, a small trickle of blood seeping out from the wound on her arm. It looked far more blood than usual, Ghost noticed.

The laugh came again, and Daria spun around, staggering as her legs gave way, and Ghost stepped forward to catch her. Daria tried to wave her off, but only succeeding in further unbalancing herself, driving her sword into the ground to hold herself up, before entirely collapsing to the ground.

Ghost removed her two swords first, tucking them back into her belt, before she picked Daria up and moved her off the ground, placing her underneath a tree, her back supported by the trunk so she was sitting up. She remembered the medicine other people had practiced, and it would keep her heart elevated, her body warmer than if it was entirely on the ground, and if she woke up, it would be a more relaxing position to be in.

There was rustling from behind her, but Ghost finished with Daria before she stood up as turned around, looking at the effeminate figure that had appeared in behind her.

It laughed again, its bronzed skin lighting up, even in the shade of the trees. It looked over at her, tilting its head to one side, holding a finger up to its lips.

“I know what you a-are.”

It was said in a sing-song voice, drawing out the last word. Ghost continued to look at the person, and slowly tilted her head so that it mirrored its.

They laughed again, and there was a rustling noise, suddenly appearing right in front of Ghost’s face. She drew back fractionally at the sudden intrusion into her space. It was an action that she took without thinking, and it caused her to blink a few times. More laughter.

It reached out with a long finger, waving it from side to side in front of her face. She followed it with her eyes, tracing it back and forth. Until suddenly it thrust out, just flicking the end of her nose.

For the second time that encounter, she drew back, blinking rapidly.

The person laughed again, and then drew back a little, gazing at her with a fascination that she hadn’t seen since that castle, where Caspian has often had a similar look when he chose to acknowledge her. Their eyes were a warm golden colour, nothing like would be found on humans, combined with their skin and hair, the effect was like looking at a soft fire or sun, very warming.

“You know, it’s been years since one of your kind was around.”

“Six hundred and thirty seven.”

“That long? My, time does fly. Or crawl. Or spin away into nothingness,” they stepped in closer again, but Ghost didn’t pull back this time. She was ready for an attack, although she didn’t think one would be coming.

“Are you?”

She blinked at the person, not comprehending the question.

Some moments passed, then they sighed, rolling their eyes dramatically, “The only one?”

“Yes. I am the only Dhampir. Currently alive.”

“Awwww. All alone. Lonely little Dhampir.”

Ghost didn’t react. She wasn’t sure what the person meant by alone.

“Oh, I remember now. You’re a little bit weird in the emotions department aren’t you? You always did have that problem. Guess everyone forgot that, huh?”

Ghost didn’t respond. She didn’t know if it was actually a question of whether the person was just talking out loud.

It laughed again. Ghost turned her head away, looking back over at Daria. She could still hear the heartbeat, so she knew that she wasn’t dead, but it probably wasn’t good and they probably should go find someone.

There was a pressure on her cheek, and her head was turned back, the person back right in front of her, one hand on her face, gently turning it back to face her.

“Tell you what. I’m feeling nice, so I am going to help you,” there was emphasis on the words I and you, which she thought might mean something, but she wasn’t sure what.

The other hand took hers, turning it over and holding it out, and something cold and smooth was placed in it. Ghost looked down as they stepped away, and she saw that it was a glass vial. Worming the stopped out of the neck, she held it up, going in to smell it, and realising that there was nothing in it.

She looked up at the person, “Empty?”

“For the moment,” they smiled, then brought a single finger up to their mouth, and bit down on it, and Ghost’s eyes dilated out as she smelt the fresh blood in the air.

There was something strange about it, making saliva rise at the back of her throat. It was almost like a tingle at the back of her throat, that anticipation of a meal, but there was something unusual and exotic, something she couldn’t quite imagine or grasp hold of, invoked by the smell of that blood.

The person spotted as she perked up but held up her uninjured hand, wiggled a finger from side to side as they tutted, “Do behave. This isn’t for you to drink. Not yet anyway.”

Ghost stood very still, only her eyes moving, following the person as they moved, fixating on the blood flowing from the injured finger. They walked slowly over to her, stopping just a pace away, and slowly held out their hand, letting the blood run over their skin, until it started dripping off, landed in the empty vial.

Ghost didn’t move a muscle as the vial slowly filled up, even though it was small. Eventually there was only a small space left at the top, and the person withdrew their finger, then took the hand that was holding the stopper, and gently guided her to put it back in.

With a little self- congratulatory noise, they placed their finger in their mouth, sucking at the wound, and gave Ghost a grin. With the smell of fresh blood fading out, she could move again, and looked down at the vial of blood she now had.

“Well done,” they said, “A for being such a good girl, I’m going to let you keep that. Do save it for a special occasion, okay? It’s going to be such a treat for you, and a very nasty trick for everyone else.”

So this person did know what she was, and how it worked. That was unusual, even the vampires didn’t seem to know how she worked, and they theoretically should, given that she was half vampire in the first place.

“What are you?”

The person turned around to her, eyebrows raised, “You have a very nice voice you know, you might want to try using it more than you do.”

“What are you?”

The fact that she was still talking seems to please them, as they smiled a coy smile, “Guess.”

Ghost looked down at the vial in her hands, and then thought back to the sensations that smelling the blood had caused.

“Fae?”

It laughed, “Excellent guess. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve chaos to cause elsewhere.”

The trees rustled, a distinct absence of wind in the air, and Ghost blinked and they were gone. She looked back down at the vial in her hands. A vial of Fae blood. The Fae were such rare visitors to this plane that people often thought they were myth, and certainly the stories of them were varied to say the least. But now she had a vial of Fae blood, if the person was to be believed, and they had warned her to save it. She knew what vampire, human and werewolf blood would do for her, but she was entirely unsure about Fae abilities, and what she would inherit from the blood.

November Conclusion

First of all, apologies for not posting during the entire month. The reason is pretty obvious – I was putting all of my creative energy into finishing NaNoWriMo. And when I wasn’t doing that, I was either doing my masters, trying to keep up with work/social life, and getting ill. Fantastic time to get ill really (but I have medicine from my wonderful doctor now so it should start getting better).

First of all, the big news. I won – I wrote 50,000 words in the month. Yay!

However, this year was really difficult. As you can see, for most of the month I was actually behind where I should have been, and although I caught up at the end, it was difficult to get the words down on the page. Also, the novel I said I was going to write – The Blood Within? That’s didn’t really happen. I got about 10K down on it, and then it just stalled. I couldn’t seem to get it out of my head and onto the page.

So I swapped projects, choosing something which I knew I could get out of my head and write down. It’s probably never going to see the light of day, but it got me writing.

This was actually the first year where I doubted that I could make the 50K. Giving that I’ve been overachieving for a few years now, that was a pretty scary thought. But, I have to remember, that I was doing a lot this year. And actually, managing the 50,000 words alongside everything else that I was doing? Not a bad feat.

So how is the other stuff doing? Well we’ve started the dissertation preparation module in my master’s course, which has me internally screaming every time I have to think about it, but I do think I have an idea for what I want to do, which is a really good start. And I’m mostly on top of that work, which is good.

Work is…well, at least it’s nearly Christmas.

Social life is good, and the tabletop games I’m playing in continue to be excellent. Actually, I’ve been invited to play in a new one that’ll be starting up next year and i’m super excited for that.

The LIFE BOSS hit pretty hard this month. That’s been on and off terrible, but I am getting it sorted out, slowly, but getting there. Stress is a big thing for me at the moment, but I plan on spending December taking things a little easier, and the 365K club comes to a close at the end of the year, so that’s another thing I can take off my plate. That’s actually going pretty well, and I’m sure you’ll hear about that before the end of the year.

So yeah, November was hard, but I am glad that I did it, and I’m super glad that it’s over. December is going to be getting things back on track, back on a steady progress level, rather than the frantic pace it’s been for November. And next year in November, I’ll have finished my degree, so there’ll be more time and brain space for writing epic amounts in a month.

I hope that if you did NaNoWriMo, that the month was rewarding for you, whether you hit the goal or not.

NaNoWriMo 2016 Novel

Okay, so after that marathon post, whittling it down to six, asking everyone I knew for their opinions, getting it down to three, and then spending an inordinate amount of time deliberating over the choice until I realised I’d spent two hours researching one thing on the internet for one of the books and decided that was a level of involvement that meant I should probably write it, I have finally decided which book I shall be writing for NaNoWriMo!

The Blood Within

Dhamphir’s are bad. Everyone know this. What no one can remember is why.

In the centuries since the vampire’s wiped out their half blood cousins, all of the supernatural creatures that roam the earth and the realms beyond have forgotten about them. Even the long lived vampires, the ones who could make them, the ones who killed them, they’ve lost the knowledge to the passage of time.

So when a new Dhampir is born, no one’s quite sure what to do. The most obvious answer is to kill it, but that seems like a waste. Vampires get their powers from the blood of the humans, so what about the blood of a half human, half vampire? Well, that must be a potent thing indeed.

Locked away and raised in isolation, waiting for the time without knowing when, the young Dhamphir has no idea about the herself, her powers, or the outside world. But the outside world knows about her, and it’s grown tired of the millennium long reign of the vampires. Maybe, just maybe, if they can fake her death and pull off a rescue, then they can give her a chance to grow up, a chance to grow into whatever it was that the vampires feared so much.

Of course, there was a time when everyone feared them, and for good reason. They just can’t remember why.

If you don’t recognise that title as being from the master list, that’s because it was called ‘Ghost’ down there. But since Ghost is the nickname of the main character and the book doesn’t actually involve ghosts at all, I thought it needed a change. That’s what I spent two hours on – trying to find an alternative name for the novel. And given I spent that much time finding the new title, I figured that’s probably involved enough to spend the month writing the novel.

And I have so many ideas about it. It’s going to be a huge melting pot of every supernatural creature I can think of, so I get to go make huge long lists of all of those and what powers they might have, because it’s very relevant to the plot. The main character is also going to be interesting to write for reasons I don’t quite want to say because it gives away a lot. Either way, it’s going to be a lot of fun.

And of course the other novels don’t go away just because I’m not writing them. Heck, if I get bored of The Blood Within, or even finish it, then I might explore writing another project. I hope to do much the same as I did last year, giving a weekly update of my progress on the novel and not entirely abandon this blog during November, so I’ll let you know how things are going.