The Preview Scene

To give the voting minority some pleasure, I will provide another little preview scene. In fact... I will even give you the other half of that glorious opening I provided about a week ago.

By the way, sorry to ya'll about not posting yesterday. That day was a bit whacked out. It was my bro's birthday, a friend's birthday, and I had a friend over that morning to play nerdy board and computer games.

Because of that failure, I figure I owe ya'll this lovely little scene... hopefully that makes it better. If it doesn't, comment and say so, and maybe I can get you some more before the day is done. If it does... tell some friends that you know this blogger who makes embarrassing public apologies to his readers and that they should follow his blog. Even if you can't do either... comment and tell me what works for you in this scene and what doesn't. It's my opening, so it needs to be awesome, and I love it when ya'll tell me what needs fixing. Particularly the backwards-talking guy... does anyone else think of a particular green alien?

Oh, and one of my awesome associates on Holy Worlds suggested I stop using Courier as my font for posts, because it's hard to read. I will follow his advise. I guess I didn't notice because the earliest drafts of my novel (years old) were typed in Courier New, so I have become fairly used to it.

Without further ado... the second half of the opening!

A white-hooded wizard walked closely against the edges of wooden buildings as he turned from alley to alley. Then all at once he disappeared through a doorway that had opened and shut faster than a blink, all without sound.

The room was scarcely lit, an oil lamp, the panes of which had deliberately been smeared with grease and ash, only managed to veil the shadows a few feet around itself, revealing a diamond-shaped table at which sat two hooded figures whose eyes could not be seen. Their hands sat folded in front of them on the table as they watched the white-hooded one and then sit down. He threw back his hood, revealing a line-worn face, though the illumination reached his eyes neither. What little light there was also caught the tips of his white hairs, which were matted flat around his head for the most part.

The woman who had opened the door sat down at the tip of the diamond nearest the door, the wizard on her right, and the other two at each of the other corners. She spoke, “We have all night, dear guests, but still we must speak quickly. These times have turned desperate,” one of those in the shadows cut her off.

“They were desperate even before the rebellion failed. Now they grow worse.” The woman shot a glare at the interrupter, but because of the darkness this had no effect.  “All our contacts in the Green World are dead or captured, the entire ring in the North of our world was nabbed a few weeks ago and we have just heard of it now. In addition our contact into the Shadow Realm has gone silent; hopefully for us he is dead. In anger and vengeance, Nastar is going to bring his army to bear on our very homes so that we may never strike his heel again. When they come, we are defenseless. They will kill us all, if we are lucky, and enslave us all if we are not. I think desperate only begins to describe our plight.”

Before either the woman or the wizard could respond, the other shadowed man whispered in an old and broken voice, “Harsh words no good do. All you speak we know. Danger passed to get the wizard here. Didn’t come for you speak only doom.”

The woman saw the conversation turn for her and so spoke, “We know the state of things. Our rebellion was crushed completely, with little profit at all. All our allies in the Green World are dead except that tiny little kingdom, all our contacts in the North gone, and the insurrectionists in the Shadow Realm destroyed. That is said now. We have met to decide what we do about it.”

The wizard began speaking immediately after she closed her mouth, “Plans yet we can lay that will turn the evil tide back. Our rebellion may have done little, but it has occupied Nastar for months. During that time I had hoped to have won more allies for the resistance in this world, if they were needful, but that plan as gone awry. I went to the islands of the South…”

The first interrupter continued his pattern, “We know what you did. You went South and they wouldn’t even speak to you, which may have been wise. You sent our best rangers of Furth into the mountains to look for long lost dragons, and they died in the cold. You sent messengers to Neotoroth in the hills before the sea, and they were eaten alive by wild beasts. You solicited help from the wizards of Thyron and instead alienated the most powerful allies we might have won by stealing a book of their spells. We know what you did.”

The old man at the second point of the table answered again, “Only you speak useless news ill.”

The wizard resumed, “I have one more plan, one more ally we might yet gain.” He brought a thin book, looking nearly new, out of his cloak and went on, “I have stolen a book indeed, which will be of more value to us than those wizards could have been. This is not a book of spells. Wizards that would do good do not deal with such things, so you would best hold your tongue on subjects you do not understand. This book holds the secret of the release of Kion, the ancient dragon, from the Deep Fog under the earth where he was bound centuries ago.”

The interrupter leaned in close to the lamp, illuminating his whole face. He had not shaved in a few days, and to the look of his eyes, not slept for that time either, “A book of spells sounds more handy than that, unless you mean to release that scourge of humanity upon us.”

“Not upon you. I intend to release him to join us against Nastar. He will join that cause.”

The interrupter was word less has he sat back into his chair. The old man whispered, “Your plots grow more ever dangerous. Yet like I this one.”

The woman whispered as well, “If you both speak well of the plan I can do aught but agree. Go and seek out this last of our hopes.”

The wizard answered them, “I cannot go yet, for I have one other hope to attend to in the South. Rumor has reached us that Nastar’s commanders are rallying in the North. I plan to go there and dispatch them with the aid of a few friends I have in the city of Tomfie, and with the aid of this dragon, Kion. I will go and fetch them, then work our way northward. We can organize whatever resistance we can on the way, so that when Nastar’s armies do come we may not be totally unprepared. What say you?”

There was silence around the table until the woman asked, “These friends, are they very special?”

The wizard answered, “More than any know.”