Anne Harrison
Posted – 26.05.17
Written – Date Unknown…
Tag: #Writing
Intermission #3
The day the Order was Issued…
Kane awoke with a start, roughly shaking the images of the nightmare from his mind… The loud hammering at his door was desperately urgent, it was still dark outside and the cat resting at the foot of his bed glared at having her rest disturbed, hopped down and slipped through the open french doors vanishing into the night as Kane pulled on garments in a rush… A thousand thoughts flooded his mind, panic, annoyance and curiosity… He flung open the door to be greeted by a nervous looking maid accompanied by two guards in Regal uniform.
“You are summoned to the Royal Palace.” The taller guard spoke firmly. “At Once.”
“Dad?” A young six year old lad rubbed sleep from his eyes, standing at his doorway down the hall… “What’s happening?”
Kane simply tilted his head to one side and the Guards parted to allow him to attend to the boy. “I need to work.” He knelt by the lad. “You need to guard your sister while I’m away…” Kane glanced at the awaiting soldiers “…You know what to do.” He added. The boy nodded, slipping back into his room silently pondering over the secret command.
***
At Fenroux Palace in the centre of the Capital City, known as the Northern Heart. The streets were filled with celebration and wonder. It was mid-morning by The time Kane arrived from the Clan Territories and the city was buzzing with a party spirit. Queen Roux had given birth to a healthy bright baby boy, a Royal Prince and Heir.
That news alone gave Kane the understanding of his summons, he wasn’t a fool and he knew this day would come. For near seven years he had held, in secret upon his estate three ‘guests’ three legal Royal Heirs who, in all intent and purpose were already dead publicly. They had only survived these last few years in seclusion upon the whim of Queen Roux, who had personally halted the death sentence upon her only son and two grandchildren. Now, with a new Prince born to the legal King… Jago, who should have been ruler, and his twins Kol and Indigo were insignificant. The traditional order of the throne had been manipulated to suit Fendor’s ambition.
Kane was kept waiting, while Nobles and Knights arrived in mass to congratulate the Royal couple and hope for a glimpse of the tiny Prince. Finally it was Lord Darkfire who greeted Kane in a silent side room. The giant barbarian leader eyed Kane distastefully, clad in traditional clan garb, a tan tunic and dark blue kilt, Kane had adopted the ways of the land he ruled instead of dressing like an outsider. To Lord Darkfire the kilt was offensive and he openly mocked the older, yet smaller man. Kane ignored the remarks.
“Are you going to get to the point?” He shrugged off any insult.
“The Order has been Issued…” Lord Darkfire confirmed Kane’s speculations.
“Very well.” Kane stood to leave.
“Where are you going?”
“Home, I have arrangements to make.”
“I shall be accompanying you!”
“Really?”
“Do you think the King trusts a lackey in a dress?”
Kane stepped right up to the Barbarian, standing chest to physically belly, as Lord Darkfire towered over him. “Do you want to try your luck?” Kane spoke softly, hand resting comfortably upon the hilt of his sword.
There was an uncomfortable silence until the larger man simply took a step backwards.
“You know it would have been easier to have simply sent the order with the Royal Guards instead of dragging me all the way here to the palace.” Kane sighed, bored with the waste of time.
Lord Darkfire grinned then half chuckled as he spoke “We needed you away from your home, to make some security arrangements. To ensure you go through with the order without any resistance.”
Kane kept his expression calm, his mind calculating the amount of time it would take to return home and a thousand more racing thoughts, yet he could not afford to dwell on the threat… “Do you doubt my loyalty to The King, one of my oldest, closest friends?” He spoke without hesitation. “I am perfectly aware of my duty when it was issued to me six years ago. My only concern is why it took so long to act?”
“For the Queen to conceive?” The Barbarian let slip what Kane had guessed.
“Ahhh… What do we know about the cycles of a ladies body?!” Kane grinned slapping the barbarian on the arm then… “Shall we go get this nasty business dealt with? I see no purpose in hesitation, it will be dusk by the time we return. We can get this done this day and break open some spiced wine to celebrate the babes birth.”
He marched past Lord Darkfire, causing the larger man to trot along to keep up. He was spluttering details of his orders as they headed to the courtyard and awaiting transportation. Kane was hardly listening, his mind was tumbling over the empty threat that hung in the air and he pondered over what could possibly await him at home…
Anne Harrison 24.05.17
A whole lotta words
On 26.09.16 I reposted a short story on my blog, on Friday I wrote part 75, bringing current events to a comfortable (current) conclusion… With each post being between 300 – 500+ words… that’s a whole lotta words in 9 months… I fell in love with writing at university, yet at the same time the course also shifted my perspective on publishing. I decided that there was no way I could ever be a published author. So I decided a blog was the perfect outlet for my silly little tale, my outrageously terrible poetry and most of all, my blog became my safe haven, to express myself on matters such as overcoming depression to coping with watching my Mother slowly die… Here was my freedom of expression, where I didn’t need to delete posts because of trolls. My story is fantasy based, has Dragons… nope it’s not influenced by GoT (even if there is an eyeball scene) instead I’m heavily inspired my Michael Moorcock/Anne Rice… I don’t have a hero, my main protagonists were killed really early… oops… My next stage is to jump 14 years ahead… with possibly a few significant scenes before then to include… Ironically, I still personally prefer poetry, but I follow so many wonderful poetry blogs, my words are dumbed into silence. I think, I would like to use the space to explore my adventures, to put my experiences into words, but my characters won’t shut up and demand my attention. I’m taking a little rest from writing, I’m still staggered I’ve wrote so much in just 9 months… maybe this year I’ll actually achieve http://nanowrimo.org
Adventure
*Musings*
I have so many ideas brimming around the corners of my mind, haunting my dreams, characters knocking at the door of creation demanding life. Yet my time at the keyboard has been limited by real life adventures around the country and beyond off to foreign wilderness, ever inspiring my frantic mind, fueling my desire to write despite my inability to do so.
I have notebook and pen packed with me, I have freedom to scribble notes and pour forth my dreams onto paper. The next six scenes have already been played out, yet by the time I get to kill my darlings, I know the plot could change. That is why I love the freedom of writing without thought, to allow my hands to direct the course of action.
I have visited some incredible places and the list of locations before me is even more impressive, I am nervous, I am excited, I hold anticipation barely in check and I know that inspiration will follow me like a bouncy puppy, jumping up always needing attention.
I see inspiration in art, in buildings, in scenery, in the people I meet, the people I pass, in my dreams, in literature, in starring out the window absently watching the world pass me by. Words flow into my brain, cram my thoughts with ideas… I might need a bigger notebook.
I should like to write about my travels too, if my characters ever let me, and I can try if I find WiFi… For now, I must return to work… Even that I can find inspiring!
I will try to write Part 70 at lunchtime, it’s a lovely number to leave you on until I return full of words and slim of wallet…
Love Anne x
19.04.17
Milestone Mayhem
Some happy musings…
So, my silly little ‘notsoshortshortstory’ has reached the milestone 50 posts!
I hardly imagined that a simple workshopping story from my old creative writing class could have developed into quite a lingering tale, which is still flourishing nicely…
I appear to be collecting milestones here currently, apart from Part 50… I now have 150 people following my humble little blog… *Waves To Everyone*
Thank you everyone, I know it’s only a baby blog and many of you have thousands of readers… But I’m so thrilled, especially for people putting up with my brain dribble…
Also! This happened:
And then:
Followed by:
*Does happy little Dance*
Thank you for being there and helping me achieve this lovely collection of milestones.
Love Anne x
17.03.17
Of Heroes and Fools
Spoiler – I’m the Fool…
Here I am, pondering over Story Structure, collecting sources of inspiration. Dreaming in character and re-reading through old University notes…
… Here’s something which has been brought to light, I don’t have a Hero!
I used to have a Hero… He had no name and is simply known ‘The Guardian’, but Kane killed him back in Part 14. How can I follow the well established structure of The Hero’s Journey, if I don’t have a Hero? Does the Hero need to be male? Yet none of my characters feel as though they are the main character… Is it possible to have a tale without a main character? Neither, do I have a main antagonist… I would be tempted to say this was The King, Yet my initial introduction gave him a Fatherly figure but he developed into a Tyrant… He’s dead too… Oops…
I don’t have any answers, just a collection of random tangled thoughts and self doubts that because I don’t follow a structure, because I don’t follow the rules of writing as gospel, I tell a story, I don’t show. I like to think of my ‘Notsoshortshortstory’ as a campfire tale. As I’m sat around with my friends, making up a shaggy dog story on the spot, telling what I see in my mind as if I was speaking to friends under a star lit sky.
I write without a plot, I scribble a few notes, but I’m still stuck regarding the next part currently. So while I’m bumbling along with writers block, you get my insane musings instead. But my little shadow of self doubt questions if I am a true writer?
I write, I love writing, I make things up on the spot and keep rolling with a tale because it doesn’t feel ended yet. But am I a writer?
Because I don’t have a hero…
Anne Harrison 14.03.17
The Best Thing About Blogging
Simply… All you other gorgeous Bloggers out there in blog land!
I adore discovering beautiful blogs to follow, I passionately read through new posts… I have shed tears at devastating experiences people have bravery shared and laughed freely at amusing tales.
I love to read other characters come to life through the words of fellow writers. I find inspiration and feel inferior at times. (most of the time)
I relate to a wide blogging family and hope you keep your words coming…
Thank you all
Love Anne x
03.03.17
Part 32
Alone in the night…
Pepe was not there when Alleia returned to their lavish quarters, he had mentioned an evening engagement and she assumed it was with one of his male companions. Not that it bothered Alleia, she felt dreadfully hormonal and her little one was wriggling playfully. So she curled up, wearing Kane’s uniform, unable to eat, unable to sleep, restless and forlorn.
Absently she plunged her hands deep into the jacket pockets and found items forgotten therein. Curious, she sat up and pulled out the contents upon the sheets before her…
Discovering a tobacco pouch and tinderbox, a few coins, a handful of scrap parchment and three new arrow heads wrapped in oiled leather…
Unfolding the parchment Alleia discovered basic child-like attempts of writing, scribbled practiced alphabet and short simple words – Cat – Dog – Rock – Man – Kane … He had been trying to teach himself to write.
However, turning the parchment over, she uncovered a collection of sketches, charcoal and chalk. The hand drawn pictures were breathtaking, each one her portrait. They must have been drawn from memory, yet each one was so finely detailed, a mole on her throat, freckles, curved smile line, single nose ring. All tiny features carefully recalled.
An older, dog eared parchment was jumbled in with the rest, yet this portrait was not of Alleia… She frowned, a lock of hair tumbled free, a shot of jealousy cut through her core… His pictures clearly indicated an unspoken affection, yet her own reaction to the mysterious girl caused Alleia to question her own emotions…
It took a while to identify the last sketch and her jealousy subsidised as she realised the image as ‘The Child of Prophecy’… A gasp escaped her lips as she clutched the hair, realising that the blonde Curls must have once belonged to the most magical creature ever to have graced the land… Deep within her own womb, her unborn fluttered and twitched…
“You cunning bastard Kane…” Alleia mused to herself, carefully tucking the hair and sketch away…
Anne Harrison 21.02.17
Falling in Love with the Imaginary…
Friday Lunchtime Ponderings…
…I think I have covered, or at least started to cover, this topic before… But I possibly got distracted and danced off on another train of thought before I could put finger tips to keys and pull the words out my brain…
Disclaimer: I’m not clever, I don’t understand psychology, nor pretend to, I can not include any intelligent quotes (because I’m not sure what they mean) nor do I have any answers… Sorry my friends, all you get here will be some mad ramblings…
Rambling Commencing: Isn’t it just delicious how we, as normal every day mortal folk, can find ourselves in love with the imaginary. The characters that grace books, screen, cartoons, comics, games, movies and so on… The lovable rogue, the bumbling fool, the anti-hero, the stone cold killer, the gunslinger or the sheriff… No matter what genre of fiction we embrace, we will find these archetypes and we embrace them, we follow them through their ‘lives’ we may visualize them differently from authors descriptions, artists representations or actors, er… acting…
Fandoms are born from people sharing the same passion for certain characters or series of adventures, it expands, morphs into Comic-Cons, beyond that to entire theme parks, events, studio tours… Where we the mundane can step into the world of Fantasy, Fiction or Sci-Fi etc… We dress as our favorite characters, we have lightsaber battles with Jedi when we’re dressed as Sith… Wand duel with a Slytherin while taking a selfie and sharing it on social media… These things bring total strangers together, we can talk about the ridiculous without actually sounding ridiculous, because the stranger we’re chatting too understands perfectly the made up jargon you’re talking about…
It makes me (personally) feel like I am part of a huge family, I am a cosplayer, I admire the creativity the dedication and perfection of come costumes. I’ve never tried LARPing, but this could prove to be the ultimate step (for me) as a (non)writer, to become your own character, to act as they would act and put yourself in their shoes…
This whole concept is so expansive and so inclusive, I don’t think I’ve really scratched the surface here and could express myself further, include more examples, genres or characters… Good or Bad, Love them or Hate them… None of this ‘world within a world’ would even begin to exist if people hadn’t sat down, picked up a pen and wrote about the imaginary people inside their heads, by doing so, they crafted life, love and a whole realm where nothing is impossible in a world where we are restricted to reality, sometimes the incredible can be tangible.
Yet none of it would be so if there was never a ‘Once Upon a Time’ …
I’m going to get back to my own writings shortly and I’m going to leave you with a passage from Michael Moorcock, introducing one of his most chaotic anti-heroes… This is where I fell in love with the imaginary…
“It is the color of a bleached skull, his flesh; and the long hair which flows below his shoulders is milk-white. From the tapering, beautiful head stare two slanting eyes, crimson and moody, and from the loose sleeves of his yellow gown emerge two slender hands, also the color of bone. “
Anne Harrison 17.02.17
Putting Faces to Names
You’ll need to click the link to see the pictures (ignore the mad scribblings please) but I can not find the images anywhere else currently, though I’m quite sure they’re kicking around somewhere, today they are being illusive…
My sudden burst of writing has left me with a whole host of posts that I need to return to and edit, I’ve been writing quicker than by brain can get all the words from the scene it sees to my fingers on the keys. This has also left me with constant dreams (and daydreams) of following events… Now I can see my characters very clearly in my head, yet I have added no descriptions in my writings – I could – but I always like to imagine what characters look like when I’m reading a book, so it kinda also work the other way around too. Everyone visualizes what they read differently…
… So, why am I sharing a collection of images of models, vampires and goths?
To create a little game… If you were to relate any of my characters to the random images (attached in the above link) … Which character would you connect to which picture?
You don’t need to reply, it’s just for fun… Besides, it gives you all something to read while I’m busy editing silly mistakes and dreadful spelling…
Anne Harrison 16.02.17
Tatterhood 