Tuesday Teaser

So you remember that "medieval ghost story" I started writing clear back in 2015? Yeah. I got two whole chapters written before it kind of fell off my radar while I dove into medieval Venice and Nick and Giacinta's story instead. This whole process has been very odd for me. I usually pick a story and write straight through until I finish a draft, but somehow it's not working out that way this time. Nick and Gia told me they need a bit of a break. Not from each other, thankfully, but some space to let their story "gel in my head" a little bit. So while it's gelling and I'm waiting to start typing out their story again, I've decided to return to my medieval "ghost story" . . . which I guess I should confess upfront isn't really a ghost story, but don't tell my hero, Alric, that. It will completely spoil the lesson Mariel is trying to teach him!

I shared some previous Summary Sunday snippets from their story with you here and here. Since it's Tuesday, I thought I'd update you with a Tuesday Teaser from a new chapter I began last week.

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Envisioning the test she had set before him had been easy. Plotting and planning the details had helped divert her from the pain of his betrayal through the long days and nights when it had lain so fresh on her heart. A heart she had spent six weeks turning to stone so that no man could ever break it again. But when she had seen Alric fall to his knees in the road, when she had heard him weeping . . . Suddenly a resolve to prove and punish had quivered into a small thread of hope that perhaps—just perhaps—she could do for him in death what she had not been able to do in life.    

Summary Sunday

I'm still playing around with my medieval ghost story while Courting Cassandry is out to beta readers. Here are a few new lines I wrote this week:

Monday: Even with the wind lapping at his ears, he would know and cherish her voice to his dying breath. Dying breath. He shuddered. “Mariel?”

Tuesday: He shivered to know that she could read his soul. He sought to change the subject, hoping even spirits could be distracted.

Wednesday: Alric nodded. Mariel had always paid stricter attention at church than he. "But the grave." How did one speak tactfully to the dead of the tragic, but permanent, loss of their bodies? "What--um--am I to bury there?"   

Thursday: Before he could stop himself he tilted his head, as though seeking the comfort of her familiar, forgiving palm against his cheek. His skin met with empty air. Of course. Her hand withdrew to lie against what he imagined to be her breast.

Friday: “Forgive me. Jealousy is one of the sins for which I burn. But you are free of me now, Alric. If you wish to love another woman, I will not chide you for it.”

Summary Sunday

Courting Cassandry is currently out to some beta readers, and I'm beta reading for some other authors in return, so I haven't had a lot of writing time lately. But I couldn't stand not writing at all, so I broke down this week and started dabbling with a possible medieval ghost story. (Maybe. I'll let you know when I finish it how much of a ghost story it turns out to be. :-) ) It doesn't have a title yet, so I'm just calling it "my medieval ghost story." In case you're interested, here is a sampling of sentences from what I've written on it this week. (I see I didn't tell you who "he" is. His name is Alric, and for now at least, he's a journeyman pewtersmith.)

Monday: The wind gasped and shuddered and moaned through the barren branches of the timber sentinels that soared along either side of the road. Gasped like a woman laboring for her last breath of air. Shuddered as the waves of the sea lashed around her. Moaned with despair as the weight of her sodden skirts pulled her inexorably into the suffocating depths.

Tuesday: But she was gone, and no repentance could bring her back. Then no more useless tears. Tonight he would surrender himself once more to the fever and let it burn away the memory of his sin, as he had for ten years.

Wednesday: He could feel the fire of luck in his blood tonight. He would win enough silver to bed in a fat, soft inn—if he did not continue to roll the dice until dawn.

Thursday: A light, where no light should be, hovering without hands in the air, cast its muted glow against the old standing cross. An icy tickle shivered down his spine. What witchery was this?

Friday: Would it chill him to the quick to gallop through the shade? What if the demon snatched his soul in the midst of the blast, then let him ride on hollowed out, bereft of his former humanity?