Yes, I’m aware that I missed Friday’s post. But I do have an explanation. I am currently vacationing in the frigid Siberianesque land of Ottawa and didn’t bring my external hard drive with me. What I hadn’t considered at the time was the fact I kept all my writing on my external so I really don’t have much to post while I’m here.
My stay is also shaping up to be a little longer than I anticipated but I don’t want to go two days without posting something. And something more than “lol, no posts because I’m stupid.”
Now, I did just see Side Effects and thought perhaps I could write up a post on my thoughts for that movie. However, after discussing it with my friend, I really don’t see much point. At the end of the day, Side Effects is created to be solely entertainment with little thought or care for creating a believable world, characters, themes or narrative. Thus, any discussion about the unbelievability of the characters and the ludicrousness of the plot is a waste. The creators had no intention of making a sound story and deep analysis is really just a waste of anyone’s time.
So, suffice to say I wasn’t a big fan of it but given it’s premise (the possibility of a drug inducing someone to commit murder) was rather stupid anyway. I would have forgiven the movie that small element if it decided to be a more scathing criticism of the American Healthcare System, but it is very conservative in its views and by the end not only is the system itself not at fault but also it was the “wicked woman” who was bringing sin/evil/trouble to the unwitting and innocent male.
So it’s both highly favourable to a corrupt system and stupidly patriarchal in its social views. I much preferred Seven Psychopaths but that movie obviously won’t do nearly as well.
Instead, here’s the beginning scribbles of what I’m working on currently. Forewarning, it is in early alpha and extremely rough so don’t cut yourself on the edges.
—————Break —————
Cry of the Glasya-Labolas
The court thundered. The stone walls shook beneath the tempest of violins and drums as the commanding keys of the piano wove masterfully through the piece. But even the clarion of the trumpets and the gentle weep of the harp sounded little more than background chatter. For there was but one sound that cut through the minstrel band like the stampede of an unstoppable cavalry charge.
And it was produced by the smallest, least intimidating creature Keirn had ever seen.
She stood between the thick stone pillars of the throne hall. Dwarfed on all sides by the yawning arches of the audience chamber for the ancient keep. Even the thick tapestries and heralds hanging from the walls couldn’t dampen the pelting voice roaring from those thin vocal chords. A single, unassuming woman stood unmoving upon a tiny wooden block.
But while her feet appeared rooted, her arms twisted with each haunting symbol that erupted forth from her with a greater force then a storm whipped tide. It seemed inhuman the sounds that she twisted from deep within her breast. Had Keirn not been standing there to experience it himself, he would never have believed it to be true.
And neither could the assembled court.
Every onlooker watched in stunned muteness as the foreign words of this incredible singer drowned out all other sounds and thoughts from their minds. There was no doubt in Keirn’s mind. This was the most beautiful and elegant aria he had ever heard. Granted, he’d never heard one before, but even the Duke Hasselbach sat riveted upon the edge of his stolen throne in rapt entrancement.
And just when Keirn thought it couldn’t more impressive, a sudden string of notes he’d never imagined singable came bursting forth from her, directed right down the hall at the raised lord and his gathered attendants by two thin waving arms.
There was but one soul in the entire chamber that seemed unmoved by the piece.
Derrek Gungric, Keirn’s closest companion and minstrel had his back turned upon the performance and busied himself with a nearby candlestand. Through sheer apparent boredom, he passed the soft flame from one candle to the next, letting the wax drip in thick rivers down the sides until it pooled in the small holders.
“How can you not like this?” Keirn whispered. “I hate your music the most and even think this is damn good.”
“Heard it before.”
“Not like this,” Keirn said. There was no way in this life or the next anyone had heard something like this.
There was a collective gasp as the young singer stepped from her perch. She turned, addressing the courtiers to the sides and the guards standing before the massive barred doors. It was impossible to know what she sang but the delivery gave the briefest impression that it was directed at you alone before she broke the spell and turned to the next face.
It was impossible to look away. Until Keirn heard a strange rustling and quickly scanned around for the source.
Having exhausted his attention with the candles, it seemed that Derrek was now busying himself with darkening a pair of thick glasses with a large piece of charcoal.
“What are you doing?!” Keirn hissed, slipping as unobtrusively to his side.
“I can’t watch this any longer,” Derrek said.
“So you’re going to blind yourself!”
“That’s the plan.”
Keirn stood momentarily mute.
“We’re suppose to be guarding the Duke!”
“So?”
“How are you going to do that if you can’t see?”
“Shhhh!”
Keirn turned to the intruding voice only to be greeted with Jeremiah’s stern face. The larger man motioned towards the singer with a look of impatience. Keirn cast a glance back at the Duke who appeared to be completely oblivious to the disruption. He motioned to Derrek as explanation for his actions but Jeremiah merely waved his hand dismissively.
Keirn turned back to the stubborn minstrel. He’d already completely blacked out one eye. He sighed, turning from his friend back to the performance. Keirn would just have to settle with being extra attentive to make up for the lack of eyes from the bard.
Not that there wasn’t an already impressive show of force in the court today. Trained archers lined the galleys and four guards stood watch over every entrance. But the show of force was easily forgotten beneath the elegant woman before them.
Keirn then felt a tugging at his sleeve.
“What?!”
“Do you know where Kait left her bags?”
Keirn leaned in close to his friend as the singer hit another stretch of impossible notes.
“Why don’t you ask her?”
“She looks like she’s having fun.”
“And I’m not?”
“You’ve already missed the overture. Besides, I’m doing you a favour by missing this atrocious performance.”
Keirn sighed.
“What do you need now?”
“The leg bones from dinner.”
“Of course you- what?”
“From the swine. You know, you said yourself it was the finest you’d eaten in weeks.”
“I’m well aware of what I ate!”
“SHHHHHHHH!”
Keirn grabbed his friend’s dainty wrist and pulled him from the throne dais. Once he was sure he was out of earshot from the duke, he turned upon the impossible delicate features of his friend.
“First, why in the blazes would you need those. Second, why are they in my sisters bag?!”
“Probably to finish her chime.”
Keirn merely blinked at his incomprehensible friend.
“You’re impossible sometimes.”
“So do you know where she left them?”
“I believe she was requested to leave them in the guard quarters just outside the hall.”
Suddenly, there was a pause in the vocals as the instruments swelled in the break.
Derrek frowned.
“I’ll have to get them later.”
He then began removing his shirt.
Keirn grabbed his hands.
“Would you stop!”
“The wax should be ready by now,” Derrek said, slipping his hands free and tossing his jerkin aside.
“Look, you may be jealous of another bard getting the lead performance for the Duke but that doesn’t give you the right to ruin this. Especially when we haven’t even been compensated yet!”
Derrek paused with his belt in his hand. The woman’s voice burst forth and he dropped his pants.
“Probably best to do it now,” he said, shaking his boots free. Keirn growled, snatching for the discarded trousers as the bard quickly hopped to the candlestand in nothing but his linen braies. There, the blonde man dipped his fingers into the cooling pools of wax and plugged them deep into his ears. As Keirn rounded on him with trousers held menacingly in one hand and the belt in the other, the bard danced effortlessly about his wailing arms before slipping behind him. There he plunged his fingers into Keirn’s ears and the young man could immediately feel the hardening wax plug his ear canals and mute out all but the faintest echoes of the lingering song.
Keirn rounded on his friend, feeling a familiar frenzy drawing in his chest. But just as he was about to wield his friend’s belt as a whip, he caught a sudden shift of motion on his periphery.
He turned, watching as the Duke’s rapt attention turned to that of sheer horror. The honour guard standing by his side merely gaped in fear, their crisp halberds dropping from frozen fingers. Keirn felt the motion instead of hearing anything in that dampening silence. All about him, a perceptible change had overtaken the crowd. The courtesans and guests seemed to draw back from the room, pressing against the walls before turning and fleeing towards the doors.
But all entrances to the throne room had been sealed by request of the Duke. The mob merely pounded useless against the wood.
Keirn wasn’t entirely sure what it was that drew his attention back to the centre of the room. But as he turned his face he could feel a sudden burning wave of heat wash over him. And what he saw caused his heart to stop.
There, standing upon the raised wooden step was a towering horror. Keirn wasn’t even sure what it was.
The creature wore the body of a human, bare chested but with thick irons wrapped about its arms and dangling from large wrists. The chains pulled taut as great iron collars shackled monstrous canine creatures that snapped about the monster’s thighs. But both man and beasts were much larger than anything… human.
The creature raised its head, a burnt stag skull resting upon its sinewy shoulders. From the darkest pits of its sockets burned an undying red light like stoked embers. A dented and torn scale mail skirt hung limply about the creature’s waist, coated in dried blood and flecked with rotted pieces of fur and flesh that gave a nauseating scent of death that radiated from the monster.
Finally, a pair of great eagle wings sprouted from the creature’s back. But these weren’t majestic appendages by bloody and broken masses of torn skin and protruding bone. Great splotches of featherless skin were stretched over the bloodied heavenly remnants.
Through the thick wax, Keirn could hear the hollowest echoes of screams.
The creature raised its arms and the four front hounds bound forward. The chains about its forearms unravelled as the beasts bore across the flagged floor faster than any worldly predator. Before anyone could react, they had descended upon the petrified Duke, curved claws longer than daggers tearing through cloth and flesh in mere seconds.
All the Duke’s guards merely watched in unmoving fear as their liege was torn to shreds before them.
Keirn felt something strike the back of his head and he turned to see Derrek practically naked and staring uselessly at a pillar through his darkened glasses. The minstrel made a gnawing gesture then shrugged his shoulders.
“Now’s not the time!” Keirn shouted.
Then he realized Derrek couldn’t hear him. The feminine man merely smacked him again and repeated the gesture.
But the distraction had shaken Keirn from his inaction and he could feel the pressing need to do something and quickly. He grabbed his friend by the wrist and pulled him away from the throne towards the guard room. He didn’t know what the bard was planning with the bones but perhaps he knew some sorcery to deal with this terror.
Course, Keirn had no idea how he was going to get through the frightened mob.
Yet, as Keirn hurried towards the side entrances, he noticed the gathered audience turning almost as if they were directed. They all peered back to the centre of the room where Keirn could hear only the faintest of whispers mingling with the ravaged slobbers of those great hounds.
Whatever distraction beheld the others, it made pushing past them with his blind, naked friend in tow easier. Keirn descended on the door, trying the handle and feeling it catch against it’s latch.
“It’s locked!” he cried. Uselessly.
This deafness thing was going to take some getting used to. Keirn turned to Derrek for more guidance but the bard merely repeated the bone-gnawing gesture.
The temperature in the room noticeably rose and Keirn could feel sweat beginning to bead upon his neck. He raised his hand to wipe it away and noticed a curiously change seem to overtake his neighbours.
The attendants clutched at their ears, pressing back against the walls or collapsing against the floor. Some appeared to writhe in agony while others drew whatever item or weapon they had at hand. Thus, armed they struck out madly about them, hitting and stabbing whatever their weapons found purchase in.
And in this monstrous crowd, Keirn’s sister was still. With stilling heart, Keirn realized she could still be standing at the Duke’s side where those beastly hounds still feasted. Keirn began to push his way through the crowd.
He’d barely taken a few steps before he felt someone his wrist grabbed. He turned to see Derrek still standing with one arm raised to gnaw. But there was something in his posture that seemed to suggest a great sense of urgency. It was hard to pinpoint what, but something about how he held himself seemed to indicate that if they had the bones then they would be able to get their friends.