If Mythical Beings Really Could Save Us From Ourselves

What myths or legends do I wish were true?

Nature Guardians. 

The ones who push back when humanity goes too far. From the gnones who look after windmills and wildlife, to the dragons of rivers and mountains. The ones who guide us to live with nature, not in spite of it. The ones who can undo the horrific damage we inevitably cause, forcing us to assist them in the healing and doling out lessons along the way. Don't get me wrong, I've no interest in an autocracy of myopic mythical beings. No, no.  I'm a firm believer in balance. In my little fantasy world, the nature guardians balance out humanity.

What would I want to see?

If I'm being honest, I'd love to see the fae proven real. There are so many of them both dark and magnificent. how could I not want to see them? How could I not want to believe in them?

An interesting theory that I've heard a few times and that I give no credence to (But love just the same) is that the Fae are, in fact, the same thing as angels and aliens. Something so completely different from our world that we automatically categorize them into something more believable for us.

The legends, the lore, the regal and horrific blended into one. There is nothing about the Fae that does not appeal to me and I even wrote about them in my very first novel, UNDER THE OVERTREE. They are not the faeries you remember from your legends but they are the Fae and even follow some of the same rules.


Highly recommended read: Raymond Feist's FAERIE TALE.

I Believe in Unicorns

This week we're asking the question: What's the Greatest Myth or Legend You Wish Were True & Why?

My reply to this sort of thing, deep in the still idealistic abyss of my heart - which I've carried surprisingly untainted by collisions with reality since my childhood - is "what makes you think they're not true?"

I believe in unicorns.

So, there you have my secret: I believe that the great myths and legends are true. I can't even tell you where the conviction comes from - it just feels like something I know. I see so-called imaginary beast in my head like they're memories of something I've witnessed in person.

Call it having a great imagination. Call it a kind of insanity.

For me, it's understanding that there's more to the physical world than the frenetic boundaries the small-minded and power-hungry draw around it.

I believe in unicorns.

I believe in them all, quite honestly, but unicorns are emblematic of the rest. The above is a book I've had since I was eleven or twelve. It's one of many books about unicorns I collected during that era. I made a somewhat exhaustive study of them, throughout all the cultures.

In seventh grade, we had to do a five-page research paper, with footnotes and everything, which sent my classmates into a tizzy. I went into a similar frenzy, but of excitement. An excuse to look up everything the school library AND public library had on unicorns! Plus my own considerable library. I turned in a nineteen page report. I also learned not to answer my classmates with literal truth when they asked how long my paper was.

This might have been an early clue of my eventual career, though none of us noted it at the time.

When I was thirteen and my family visited New York City (a world away from our home in Denver), my one pick was to see the Unicorn Tapestries. When they turned out not to be at the Met but were instead uptown at The Cloisters - too far to go on our schedule - I had a meltdown of disappointment, totally bewildering my parents. They'd had no idea of the depths of my obsession. Why would they? Not many people wanted to investigate those tapestries as research into proving their own deeply held beliefs in the actual existence of unicorns.

More than thirty years later, when it finally worked out for me to visit The Cloisters and I got to see those tapestries, it satisfied a deep thirst in me.

I still have all those books.

I believe in unicorns.

Danger in the Stars Excerpt: A Trip to the Garden

I'm just not a fan of doing flash fiction so I decided to follow Marshall's example from earlier in the week and give you a short excerpt involving a trip to a garden from my new book, Danger in the Stars.

                 Miriell shed her shoes and walked across the lush surface she knew was some kind of grass, kept ruthlessly trimmed to form a carpet. She stood in the center of the expanse, wriggling her toes, pulling strength from the planet in this small space of growing things. Nothing but a shadow in the moonlight, Conor stayed on the path, watching her.

                “There are trees and flowering bushes in this direction,” he said.

                “How do you know?”

                “It’s my business to know all the details of any location my boss frequents.”

                The reminder of the realities, delivered in his deep voice without inflection, cast a damper on her joy. He held out his hand, and she walked to join him. Leaving her shoes behind, he drew her deeper into the pocket garden until she stood under the canopy of three ancient trees, beds of flowers all around. Humming, Miriell knelt first by the flowers, absorbing their life-giving essence without doing harm, for here the plants were only conduits for her to tap into the planet slumbering below the harsh city blotting out the surface.

                He went to lean against the nearest tree, showing a decided preference for remaining in the shadows. “You’re practically glowing. This must be helping, then?”

                Her breathing was easier, and the muscles of her chest unclenched. The rattle and wheeze disappeared. “I would bless you for this gift had I the right to call upon Thuun for such things any longer.” Rising, she moved to the tree opposite the one he’d chosen and placed her hands on the gnarled trunk, palms down. Touching her forehead to the rough bark, she closed her eyes and hummed one of the simpler hymns. It wouldn’t do to take too much from this place, to siphon so much energy that the living things who also needed lifeforce perished. The planet’s bounty felt so smooth and strong, flowing into her from the depths via through the tree’s extensive root system.

                As if he’d read her thoughts, Conor said, “We probably can’t do this field trip twice, so you’d better take what you need, however you’re doing it.”

                Her protest was instantaneous, instinctive. “I can’t overtax the garden. It’s well tended but fragile, in the middle of the cold city of stone and metal.”

                “Even if it’s the difference between your own life or death?”

                Deciding not to answer him, she changed to a different song and added words, keeping her voice soft.

                When she finished, he said, “I have no idea what the lyrics meant, but the song was beautiful. I’ll take the private concert as fair trade for bringing you here.”

                “A Combine lackey who appreciates alien music?” She made her voice scornful. Sinking to the grass, she leaned her back against the tree and stared through the canopy of rustling leaves at the starry sky. None of the constellations were familiar, of course. Her world lay in some faraway portion of the galaxy.

                “What are you thinking?” he asked, voice quiet in the still night air.

                “Nothing happy.” She gave voice to her memories.  “As Jareck said so dismissively at the spaceport earlier today, we didn’t even know we lived on what you call a planet until the evil ones swooped down from the cold stars, killing and capturing.” She ran her hand across the grass, tiny green sparks flying as her energy renewed. “No prophecy ever uttered in the temples foresaw this fate for me, or those taken with me.”

The story:

Miriell, a powerful empathic priestess, has been kidnapped from her own primitive planet along with a number of her people, and sold to the evil Amarotu Combine, largest organized crime syndicate in the Sectors. When she and her handler are sent to use her power to commit an assassination, she must leave behind her own sister as hostage to ensure her compliance. Miriell cannot ask for aid without endangering herself and others.

Despite his best efforts, Combine enforcer Conor Stewart is entranced by Miriell, and helps her evade the worst of brutal treatment from the rest of the mob. But Conor must keep his distance, before the lovely empath learns that he has secrets of his own–secrets that could get them both killed.

The situation becomes dire when Conor and Miriell come to the attention of both the Combine overlords and the deadly Mawreg, aliens who threaten the Sectors. Can she save herself and the Mawreg’s next victims? And will Conor help her, or remain loyal to his evil bosses?

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Rites of Spring Flash Not So Fiction

Here's my flash fiction:

He lived.

And because he's still around to adore when we seriously believed the old dude with the bad heart, liver disease, and bladder cancer would check out during surgery to remove a bleeding mass on his back, I am bailing on you to sit and hold the grumpy old man.

But look. Isn't his little spring green coat (hiding a wicked big incision) on point for the season?

Spring Fiction and Writing on the Air

I've been instructed to write a "spring themed flash fiction" for today's SFFSeven, and as we all know, flash fiction is my bane.  However, instead, I dug up a long trunked project that will otherwise never see the light of day, and it's sort of got a spring theme.  Spring is mentioned.  Anyhow, it's the beginning (the first 500ish words) of something that didn't work, and it's rough as all get out, but: wouldn't flash be as well?  It certainly would be from me.

---

            Watch duty on the high towers of the Imperial Palace was something of a formality. None of the Imperial Guard minded doing the duty, as it involved little more than staying in the tower for a few hours. Most slept. Rumor had it that in the tenth century the paranoid Emperor Luciex VII had ordered that the guards watch from the towers at all time, and since the order had never been revoked, the towers were still watched seven centuries later. But there was never anything to see.

            Never anything to see, that is, in the most classic sense of what one watches in a tower for—no invading armies, no trouble on the far horizon. Vedix, the capital of the Kieran Empire, had never actually had an enemy army approach it in the entire history of the Empire. And even if an enemy came, word would arrive long before they would be seen. But yet in the towers the Imperial Guard held watch at all times. As a formality.

This New Spring would be unique, or so the Emperor had been told, because on that night both moons would be full, and furthermore the Imperial Astronomers had told him that according to their calculations, on this night the Blood Moon (as they called the smaller red one) would eclipse the Ice Moon (the larger white one), creating a previously unseen spectacle in the Vedix sky. Such a sight was one to be seen, and therefore, the banquet. One in which anyone of any name at all in the Empire would wish to attend. The entire Imperial family, the Archdukes of the greater houses of the Empire, as well as the Nobles of the lesser houses of the Protectorates, the whole body of the Senate and Generals of the Imperial Army. This event was to be unprecedented. So the Emperor had ordered.  

            Today all the Imperial Guard was watching was large numbers of Kieran aristocracy coming into the palace and milling about. Tonight, by imperial order, was to be one of the greatest banquets ever known in Kieran history. This would be the one for the history books, the Emperor had decided, and so he had invited every person of note within the entirety of the Kieran Empire to attend. And by invite, he meant a command. Ignoring the invitation would be an act of political suicide.

            People had been traveling for weeks to arrive in time for the event. The entire Imperial family, the Archdukes of the greater houses of the Empire, as well as the Nobles of the lesser houses of the Protectorates, the whole body of the Senate and Generals of the Imperial Army came at the request of Emperor Gelmin V.

            While the festivities were hours away from officially beginning, several of the guests had already begun gathering in one of the gardens of the imperial palace. For them, it was a casual, relaxing time before the actual banquet, unaware of the busy rush of the palace staff to put all things in order.

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Also, last month I appeared on Writing On The Air, and now you can listen to the podcast of that interview.  Check it out!

Flash Fiction: Rites of Spring

Spring has sprung, the grass is riz
I wonder where the dragons is?
No snow to mark their prints
No ice to frost their flames
How are we to know from whence the dragons cames?

They say the horde will ride
Demanding tithes of gold
Taxes in the season of rain and mud and cold

Spring has sprung, the grass is riz
Do the dragons wonder where their hatchlings is?
Wrapped and tucked in blankets
Buried in the well
When they burn my village, I'll see them all in hell




*A riff on the original "Spring in the Bronx" by Anonymous

Flash Fiction: Rites of Spring

Our mission this week? Flash Fiction on "The Rites of Spring.: I went new school on the rituals. This time around, it's the prom.



There were four of them to take out one little girl. Seemed a bit like overkill, but as I worked for her grandfather, Dmitrius, I knew how much she was worth.

The kid just wanted her prom. I just wanted to be at home sleeping. I hate bodyguard work, especially when no one is supposed to know about it.

She was down on the dance floor, swaying to a soft song with her date, and I have to saw she looked beautiful. Perfect dress, hair pulled up and then cascading down.

I had a nice view from the windows on the roof and she was easy to separate from the rest of the crowd because we'd met a few times over the years. Mostly the only time I see kids is when I'm teaching classes.

That's a different job and filed under a a different name. When I'm doing this stuff, I go by Buddy Fisk. It serves me well enough.

Any way, they weren't exactly subtle. Most of Dmitrius's enemies aren't. They lack the class of the old school gangsters,

Four of them in one big van that might as well have said "Kidnappers R Us" on the side. First one climbed out, I was already halfway down the side of the building. By the time he'd headed for the front doors of the community center they'd rented for the prom I was waiting.

Want to know what I mean about the class of the old school gangsters? These jackoffs were ready to go in and shoot as many kids as they had to to get to their target. The old guard believed in doing things quietly when they could. You might get a little collateral damage but that was the exception.

I reminded them about what class is.  First guy coming up was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt advertising his favorite beer. I tossed a throwing knife and nailed him in the jugular. Three steps forward and hands reaching for his throat while he died. Before he hit the ground I pumped three rounds from my Sig into the next two. Suppressors are great. They don't really make a weapon completely silent, but there was a lot of background noise inside that place and that helped.

The fourth one tried to retreat. I saw his eyes go wide and he stepped back, shaking his head. It's easy to be brave when you have three other goons with guns to hold you up.

Me? I work alone.

I didn't have to interrogate them or any of that shit. So I just ended him. Two to the back of the head.

Remember how I said I work alone? Not completely. I had to do bodyguard duty. There might be more attempts to ruin the kid's prom. So I dragged the bodies to the sides of the building and into the the shadows and then I texted one of the guys who works for Dmitrius full time to do the actual clean up.

Back to where I could see the roads leading to the club. When the prom was over, I was going to make sure that his little granddaughter got home in one piece. Then, I was going to pay a visit to a man who thought he could take out Dmitrius by hurting his family. The details of what I was going to do to him were very graphic.

It was going to be a long night.