Archives at Zinester: Eros & Rust, Vol. 2 No. 2 15 November 2004. Eros & Rust. Literature

EROS & RUST Vol. 2, Issue 2, 15 November, 2004

A Newsletter/Ezine of Good Fiction and Writing Resources

This ezine is distributed by subscription only. To unsubscribe, check the details at the end of this email. If you were sent this ezine by a friend and wish to subscribe just send me an email at sueateros@yahoo.ca. I do this all by hand - no autoresponder, no mailing lists, so shoot me over an email and I??™ll add you to the list.

Susan Snively, Editor (sueateros@yahoo.ca)

IN THIS ISSUE ...SPECIAL FANTASY ISSUE

* Editorial ??“ National Novel Writing Month is half over!

* Eros & Rust??™s Contest Winner

?· None this month, but there will be one for December

* Author Showcase ??“ C. S. Friedman, Fantasy writer

?· The Visitor, never before published short story by C. S. Friedman

* Original Fiction & Poetry

?· The Lord and Lady, a poem by J.C. Brinson-Untiet

?· Once Upon A Time, a poem by J.C. Brinson-Untiet

?· Scene with Walls and Doors, a poem by Sorana S.

* 2 Original Fantasy Stories:

?· Ghost Before He Died by Goeff Nelder

?· Enemy??™s Eyes by Ben Jonjak

* Bragging Writes - NEW SECTION!

* Calls for Submissions & Market Listings

* Agents & Contests

* Articles

?· Geoff Nelder on FANTASYCON 2004

* Writer??™s Jokes and Other Miscellanea

* Prompts for November: Use in Journaling or Free Fall Writing Exercises

* Classes & Services offered by M Kenyon Charboneaux

* Advertisements

* Info for Advertisers

* The Legal Stuff

* About Me

* Subscribe/Unsubscribe information

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Editorial: The Second Issue

Welcome back to the second issue of Eros & Rust. Well, it seems the first issue of Volume 2 went out okay. I apologize to everyone for all the addresses showing up when you received your issue. I created Lists in Yahoo Mail, expecting only the list name to show up, but was sadly mistaken when I saw all the addresses. Cheryl Wright, one of our subscribers and a good e-friend of mine, suggested creating a Yahoo Group instead, then everyone can manage their own accounts. If anyone has any feedback on this, please let me know. (sueateros@yahoo.ca)

November is National Novel Writing Month! I entered and won last year with my first novel, The Scar of Negradon. Is that novel revised and finished yet? Not on your life. Kenyon is in the process of editing it as I write this, so I know I have lots of work to do when I get it back. Anyway, NaNo is tons of fun and I encourage everyone to at least think about doing this next year. The tension of having to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days (that??™s roughly 1,667 words a day, folks!) is so great that you??™ll cry until you laugh. I??™m well over the halfway point with over 33,000 words to date. Mind you, none of it makes sense, but that??™s for later.

http://www.nanowrimo.org/ is the place to visit.

Some of you may have noticed that I??™m using different formatting for many of the stories and articles. I??™m doing this just to dress up Eros a bit. I hope no one is having problems reading any of the fonts or seeing any of the formatting. If so, please let me know.

I??™ve also decided to do ???theme issues.??? Not all will be themes, but some will. The September??™s issue was mystery, the October issue was Horror; this month??™s is Fantasy, and sometime next year there will be Science Fiction, Romance, Mainstream, and all other genres. I??™m doing this to broaden my own experiences with writing, since mine is mainly fantasy/sword and sorcery. All short stories, contest themes, markets, agents, and poetry will be centered on the genre of the month. All other issues will be just focused on good literature to give you, the readers, a relaxing and enjoyable read.

December??™s issue will feature the original poetry of Akintiunde Kofi Camara, the creator of the African poetry style called eintous. January??™s issue will feature a wonderful man named Jim P. Girard who will share his wealth of knowledge on the hard truth of writing and publishing.

All the Best,

Susan Snively

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ABOUT THE EROS & RUST CONTEST:

Every month we hold a contest here at Eros & Rust. Submissions are taken between the 15th of the current month and the 15th of the following month. The winner is announced in the next month??™s issue and his or her story also appears in that issue. All stories must be original by the author submitting them to win the contest.

Two outside judges will be doing the judging so that there can??™t be any appearance or allegations of nepotism or favoritism. I??™m looking for a third judge, so if anyone is interested, and has writing experience, if you??™d like to volunteer, please let me know.

There is NO FEE for the contest and the PRIZE is $20.

All stories should be 2500 to 5000 words and unless a topic is announced for the month, your subject can be anything you like EXCEPT PORNOGRAPHY or HATE LITERATURE OF ANY KIND

THERE IS NO SUBJECT FOR DECEMBER??™S CONTEST. So send in those short stories!

Send all contest submissions to erossubmissions@yahoo.ca and be sure to put Contest Entry in the subject line so I??™ll know. GOOD LUCK!!

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NOVEMBER??™S CONTEST WINNERS

I don??™t have a winner for November, but there will be one for December, I promise! The two entries I have already been sent to the judges.

If you??™d like to enter, there??™s still time.

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ORIGINAL FICTION & POETRY

This is, remember, a paying market - it??™s nominal pay, $10 per story or poem, but my piggybank is small but it is proud to be able to contribute anything at all to that great feeling it is to a writer to not only see their work in print, but to be able to say to their friends, relatives and nay-sayers (and sometimes the same person can be all three - a friend, a relative and a nay-sayer), "See? I even got paid!"

Please send your submissions to erossubmissions@yahoo.ca with Fiction Submission in the subject line.

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This month??™s original poetry is from J.C. Brinson-Untiet.  I came across The Lord and Lady on Mike??™s Writing Workshop and fell in love with it.  Then she sent me Once Upon A Time and The Green Man??™s Sabbath
and I knew I liked her style.

J.C.??™s full name is Jocelyne Cecillia Brinson-Untiet and she published her first short story at twelve.  The name of that story was Vampire Of The Sun and since then she??™s published over 400 short stories, in magazines such as Omni, Scifi, and Ellery Queen.

Her first full length novel, Blood Red, a vampire love story is out, and the next book in the
 series is also under consideration with a publisher.

J.C. claims that poetry is just a relaxing sideline to ???fiddle away my time while trying to figure where I need to go in my book writing.???  Along with being a writer, she??™s also a dream walker; she protects the souls of newly dead and recently born along with protecting people from evil spirits in their
dreams.  J.C. sounds so fascinating that I think I??™m going to have to interview her for an Author Showcase!

The Lord and Lady

By the fern, deep and shady,

There I met an elfin lady.

Dressed in cobwebs silk and flowers,

There she whiled away the hours,

Waiting until dark.

On the soft green moss beside her,

Lay a baby wrapped in eider.

Skin so fair and hair like midnight,

The lady watched the coming twilight,

Waiting till 'twas dark.

Silently, I sat beside her,

Hoping for some words to gather

In my numb and startled mind,

Said the lady "you're most kind

to wait with me till dark."

???Are you lost?" I asked the lady.

"Is this your home, this fern brake shady?

Will others come by star and moon?"

She only smiled, began to croon

To elfin child.

The baby slept. The lady told me

Deep magick of Earth and Sea.

Spells she whispered, strong and old.

"Use them well," she said " Be bold

When spelling in the night."

"Can I work these?" The lady smiled,

Gathered up her sleeping child.

"Oh yes," she answered, " Tis a boon

For waiting with me till the Moon

Slips up the sky."

Thinking deep I sat beside her,

Keeping watch. I heard a rider

Coming through the fern brake shady

"Are you there, my lovely lady?"

Called an elfin voice.

An elfin lord, his clothes all viney,

Armed with sword and digger shiney,

Rode a horse into the fern brake.

Then my heart began to quake

On seeing his dark eyes.

Twilight gathered: birds were still.

The Moon came up above the hill.

Suddenly I felt alone.

???Have no fear, for you have sown

God friendship.

The lady smiled and raised her hand.

Upon her brow a shining band

Glistened by the light of Moon.

???Would you to give forth a boon?"

She asked her lord.

???For here is friend, a watcher bold."

???But they are enemies of old."

The elf lord answered.

???No," she said.

???But guarded us from in this fern bed."

He smiled.

???So there are some who wish us well."

His voice was like a distant bell.

A ring he took from off his hand.

???This will tune you to the land

And magick."

Its stone as pale, just like the Moon.

The air was filled with eldritch tune,

as they mounted, Lord and Lady,

Rode off through the fern brake shady.

I stood alone.

People say elves are not there.

But I have heard their voices fair,

When I sit down in the brake.

Magick spells I've learned to make

All from the Lady.

Is there Magick? For me 'tis so.

For when the sun is sinking low,

I feel Earth's power within my heart

And know that I shall never part

From the Lord and Lady.

?© JC Brinson-Untiet

===============

This interesting bit of prose reads like a poem, yet like a short story.  It??™s unique and different, and that??™s what Eros & Rust is all about.

Once Upon A Time

Deep in time 'fore legends grew when science was nil and skeptics few. In farthest East and Widest West. There beat the heart of Magick.



Two lands apart. One Fair. One Grim. Each harboured secrets safe within, and never did a creature dare to journey twixt the unlike pair.



All things wondrous, rich and bright Faeries, Elves and Witches White. Beast that talked and stately Queens, Princes without their tiny peas. Wizards wise with deeds arcane; all mingled peacefully without pain not knowing grief, without a foe. Such was life in Longago.  



By contrast, in harsh Faraway. a place where death would come to play, Orges ruled the craggy land while bones lay bleached in burning sands. Warlocks cruel and Witches Dark, practiced black and wicked arts. Nothing good dwelt in that place. Where Evil lived in every face. 



And so the two lands stayed aloof. Existence of the others proof. That East and West could never meet. Yet, isolated. Incomplete.



But Good confined could spread no cheer and Evil chained could breed no fear. So naught did change and nothing grew there were no tales of daring do. 



No faerytales. No myths begotten. No legends born from feats forgotten. For separately "Twas naught to show. In Faraway and Longago.



Until one Eve, a creature brave (Despite a Promise to Behave) did cry aloud, when story read.



???Oh, not again! They're all so boring!"  "Nothing ever goes awry. I never see the Princess cry! The wizards always get it right and stars are always shinning bright! Or if we visit Faraway. A bad spell never goes astray and ghost and goblins never scare the other evil creatures there!" 



Then enraged he tore from the book the map Of Lands, and had a look at those two places, West and East filled with wonder, filled with beast and in-between a Sea so vast.  That never would be surpassed. 



Then slowly, bending in his hands he curled and rolled the Map Of Lands. Until the Eat did meet the West and there he let the edges rest.



Opposing now are juxtapose for better or worse, the boy supposed. As pleased he heard his mother say. ???Longago and Faraway...???  



?© by J.C. Brinson-Untiet, June 2002



=============================

This poem is by a poet from Romania named Sorana S., a frequent contributor to Mike??™s Writing Workshop.

Scene With Walls and Doors

We circled the high walls and the tall doors,

But we still did not see the castle. Thousands of doors

Opened in our body.

While we walked, young women

Stood on the thresholds, urns held in their hands. We thought

We were walking toward the middle, that we were not

Far
from the center. But still we were always leaving

For an eternal, unending exile.

We heard voices from inside:

The din of a mob and trumpets,

Horses neighing and beating the earth with their
hooves,

As though an army waited behind the doors

Long time, and we saw our faces

Painted on the walls.

The din from inside grew louder:

Soldiers beat their clubs on their
 shields

And the horses were anxious.

Then silence. Night.

Only the pale walls in the middle

Of the burnt field. Strong, stone walls,

Unusually high, and doors

Also unusually high.

Thousands of doors opened

In
our bodies. Slowly their shadows covered us.

?© Sorana S.

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FANTASY SHORT STORIES

==================

This fun little tidbit was sent to me fresh from Geoff??™s mind on the morning of October 22. Geoff told me in his email that often he mis-hears words spoken during phone conversations. He had been speaking with Ruth Hamilton, a historical romance writer from Britain, and thought she had said the phrase: ???he was a ghost before he died??¦??? Well, I guess the story generator in his head went crazy and he couldn??™t think of anything but those words. Later, he brought this up with Ruth only to have her deny saying such a thing.

It seems to me that as long as Geoff continues to misinterpret what he hears, we??™re in for some more great stories from him.

Enjoy!

Ghost Before He Died

By Geoff Nelder

Hadley slipped, forcing a splinter from the oak branch into his thumb. He didn't swear, though every jangled nerve told him to. He couldn't, not while the young mum smiled up at him.

He would have climbed the tree to recover the escaped kite even without the promise of thrusting dumplings straining her low cut T-shirt. He chanced a look down, yep, they jiggled teasingly in anticipated gratitude. He needed to stretch a few more inches to disentangle the kite. Damn, a black-red pearl seeped from his thumb. At least it meant he was alive. Hey! Someone just pushed his shoulder hard. Losing balance again, Hadley swung around hanging onto the branch like an ape. Luckily, the activity swayed connecting branches and persuaded the entangled kite to become airborne.

"Thanks a bundle," shouted the grateful minx.

"You're welcome." But now sloth-like hanging upside from the branch discomforted him too much to really mean it.

"Why don't you drop?" breathed a murmur from the foliage.

"What?" Hadley's muscles obeyed the suggestion but quick reactions allowed his left hand to grab a tenacious twig and the angular momentum of his spindly legs found the solidity of the trunk. Like a terrified Koala, he hugged the tree. His runaway heart pummelled the bark sending frightened insects scurrying for their air-raid shelters. He could smell the musty lichens and his right foot toed around before it located the top of the heavy-wooden ladder allowing his blood pressure and altitude to descend.

Great, he thought, sat on the damp grass with his back against the oak. His thumb throbbed, he'd ripped his new denim shirt and his potentially juicy thank you has wandered off. Hadley kicked the base of the ladder in frustration. He shouldn't have done that. It skidded away from the tree. His ears reported the repetitive thudding as the top of the ladder hammered the tree trunk on its way down.

"Bloody hell, what next?" he shouted as he rolled to the right out of the way. As if a spring punched up out of the ground he was rolled right back just in time for his head to punch through a gap in the rungs. His shoulders caught the full weight of the accelerating ladder. Pinned under the heavy wood he took a moment to get a grip on himself and then the ladder. Using both hands to push up, just like a gym exercise thumb blood dripped onto his twisted face. About to wriggle his escape, the ladder seemed to gain weight and forced him down again.

"Not so clever, are you?" said the ladder. It couldn't be. Hadley's brain told him that but the muffled voice emanated from the third rung down ??“ or just above it. Hadley squinted at the space between the rungs. Were the oak leaves up there refracted like in that hellish Predator film? He shook his head. Stupid. He'd come out without eating breakfast, light-headed and lacking sufficient energy to cope with rescue missions and wrestling heavy ladders; that's all.

He stood and looked around him, as ever seeing it through his student-artist eyes. The manicured lawn of this London park always drew him. The emerald hues made greener by the dew, working on the chlorophyll. He counted himself lucky to land a weekend job as assistant park-keeper but he felt he should have stayed in bed today. He guessed the middle of the ladder and heaved it to his shoulder. Damn he shouldn't feel so weak. Once he reached the shed, he'd eat his egg sandwiches.

Each step dragged longer.

"Give up."

"Give what up?" Hadley said, then felt stupid. He stopped and looked around the empty park. The ladder looked too. It started a rotation initiated by Hadley's turned head. The angular momentum of a heavy ladder, pivoted around a slim shoulder, was hard to stop. Hadley laughed his embarrassment and turned to stop his shoulder twisting. The ladder gathered speed. Hadley realised that he and ladder would have looked like a spinning crucifix. But thank God there were no witnesses. His feet couldn't keep the pirouette going. He had no choice but to throw himself on the ground.

As he headed for the verdant grasses once more, his chagrin reddened his face. His anger, directed inwardly, told him that his boss wouldn't have ended up on the ground once, let alone twice in half an hour. His ineptitude must be down to his inexperience. He sat there, like a garden gnome. He decided to leave the ladder until he'd eaten and struggled to his feet.

"Let me out."

"Who are you?" Hadley said, unwisely spinning again. The only other person in sight cycled, illegally, far to his left. Hadley should have cycled to work but his front wheel remained buckled from an accident the previous day.

"You know who I am. And you'd be better off letting go."

"I don't understand. Go fu*king away," Hadley said, standing, brushing off loose grass cuttings and stomping off to the shed.

The kettle, filled and electrocuted, allowed him to tear the cling-film off his sandwiches. He glanced up at a mirror. Two people looked back.

Two Hadleys. One growing greener, who after an experimental twitch, he identified as himself. And another, who looked like him but with a stupid grin.

"Who the fu*k are you?"

"I am your ghost, you idiot. And this is going to get worse unless you give up now."

"You can't be my ghost. I'm not dead."

"Yeah well, I agree there seems to be a bit of a technical hitch there. Are you making us a coffee?"

Hadley reached for another mug; his manners on automatic. Then stopped: "No, you make your own bloody coffee." He looked about the shed. No one shared its space with him, except in the mirror.

"That's just it, Hadley. I can't really get on with life, as I'm supposed to know it, until you properly die."

"Go on, how did this crazy c0ck-up happen?" Hadley said, pouring first his cup, then after a shrug, poured a second.

"You died yesterday and I came into being. Then you popped back to life. Very inconvenient."

Hadley thought then smiled. "The bike accident. My wheel jammed in a drain cover and I somersaulted. I was knocked out for a second or two, not dead. You can go back to wherever you came from and come back in another sixty years, mate."

"Can't do that. The best solution is for you to die properly then you and me will have eternity as a ghost. So much better."

"Better for you, not me," said Hadley noticing that his mirrored ghost held a cup of coffee and that the second one he poured was no longer on the table.

"No, Hadley. Until you die, you will have a stream of accidents, each potentially fatal. Some will be dire, hurtful to others and your life will no longer be the verdant splendour it was. It will inevitably be short and a hell of a lot shorter than as a ghost. Have you any biscuits?"

"Why can't you just be my ghost a long way from me and nip back when I die naturally?"

"Whether you like it or not we are intrinsically linked. An ephemeral but strong glue. There is a way to put me back into your soul, But I don't really want to tell you."

"Why not? Oh, I suppose you'd rather be me but as a ghost than as a microdot waiting another lifetime."

"Exactly. Are they in that tin?"

"I still want to know how I can be rid of you. No offence meant."

"None taken. If you insist on putting me behind you for a few more years, though I warn you that life cannot be normal now I've been out of your body, so to speak. You will keep wondering about what it's like to be a ghost and will sooner or later ??“"

"Come on tell me, or...or, you can't have a biscuit."

"Yes, you'd be hard pushed to come up with a greater threat. All right. Remember where you first had the feeling something was different?"

"You mean when you pushed me off my perch in that damn tree? You nearly killed me. Ah..."

"Exactly. Well if you returned to the same position and commanded me to return..."

"No problem, I'll just put the ladder back up."

"...and put the kite back in the branches."

"What? You are having a laugh, aren't you?"

"Deadly serious, and not a similar kite; the same one," the apparition said, then it munched on a chocolate digestive.

"You mean I have to find that woman and steal her son's kite? That's really mean."

"Of course it is. No challenge is without difficulty. You are young and strong and so the test has to be to push your character. Besides, that's the only way, otherwise the conditions wouldn't be close enough to the initial state."

"I thought you became a ghost when I had my bike accident. Can't I go back there and lie on the ground with my broken front wheel?"

"No, I was an incipient ghost then, hardly that. But no worries. If you can't borrow the kite, throw yourself under a bus and get it all over with."

Hadley didn't know what to do. Was this all a dream? No, his sore thumb and other twinges told him he was awake. He might as well see if the woman and her son were still in the park. He could take his sandwich. It wasn't there and a glance in the mirror on his way out revealed his ghost with egg on his face. He wondered if being a ghost made you hungry.

***

He found them at the children's playground. She sat on a bench with another woman while their children played on the climbing frame. The kite lay on the ground but its string entwined itself in her fingers. Hadley pretended to be absorbed in picking litter behind them and listened to the kite-owner's friend.

"...and guess what, Stella, he said he'd take me on a cruise. Hey, isn't that your hero?" Both women turned and displayed grins.

Hadley half-waved.

"Hello, Tarzan," said Stella, wriggling her bosom at him. "You come for your thank-you shag in the bushes?"

"No, no, of course not," he said, which would have been a lie at any other time. "But, I wonder if I could ask a really big favour."

Stella fluttered her eyelashes and sent her breasts wobbling again. "Absolutely anything, you lovely boy," she said but both women could hardly contain themselves with giggles.

"Could I borrow the kite for a minute?"

At that moment Stella's son leapt off the climbing frame and grabbed the kite shouting: "No."

Stella said: "I'm sorry, lover, but we have to go now anyway."

Hadley gritted his teeth. Instincts told him to give his goodbyes, wish them well and have a good day, but his future depended on stealing a little boy's kite and shaming himself. He grabbed it, turned and ran. Behind him, the boy, who had hung on to the kite, fell before letting it go. Three sets of disharmonious screams nearly stopped Hadley but he ran on to and behind a tall fence, guarded with an "Employees Only" notice. He correctly guessed that the injured boy occupied more of the women's energies than the need for a righteous chase.

Flushed with running and dishonour, Hadley heaved the ladder back up the tree and thrust the now damaged kite in the branches.

"There you are."

"About time, too."

"Bugger off. Look, I've done it. Hey, watch out," called Hadley as the branch waved. He couldn't stabilise himself and fell headfirst. From nine metres the descent took less than a second, though adrenaline slowed it down.

"I said you were stupid."

"Replacing the kite was a bluff?"

"Think about it, you have about a tenth of a second left; why would your ghost tell you how to get rid of him?"

***

It could be worse. Hadley looked back at his crumpled body but felt well in himself. His moving body appeared normal and the grass still pleased him, even though the wrecked kite lay there. He found he could pick it up. Time for a touch of repentance and maybe reconciliation. Maybe his alter ego had a point, well that was history now they were as one.

He walked around the park but couldn't find Stella. Rounding a corner he found a group calling up to some idiot who'd climbed a tree. He ran to offer assistance then stopped. The idiot was himself up the tree trying to reach a kite. He looked down. He could feel the kite in his hands but it wasn't there.

He knew what he had to do. Funny, being able to get to the top of a tree without a ladder.

=======================

The next fantasy short story is by author Ben Jonjak, and it??™s the top rated story on sffworld.com.

Enemy??s Eyes

Daul was five rows back and the arrows had already come. They had rained down from the sky in deathly silence and would have caught them off guard if some veteran in the front row hadn??™t raised up his shield and set off a chain reaction that slowly progressed all the way through the ranks. It was better than it could have been, but some of them had still been late with their defenses, or put them up at an ineffective angle. They continued screaming even now, but Daul could hardly hear it anymore.

Daul was past the moment of fear. The nausea was gone, the tightness in his bowels. There was no way out, nowhere to run and hide. The forces had engaged. The arrows were proof of that. So now he was committed, and that lent him a peculiar type of calm. He was just waiting for it. Waiting to run forward to die or to live. That appeared to be his destiny. Now that he had marched up to the precipice, he found he could handle it.

He was not a large soldier, not the kind that reveled in battle. There were those around him that were. Men the size of mountains who considered the fray in a completely different perspective. It would take something special to bring them down, and they took the field with a reasonable expectation to be able to walk back off it when all was accounted for at the end.

Daul, on the other hand, was of average size. He was well trained and athletic, but this was his first battle, and he knew that there were those in the opposing army who had advantages of both size and experience. One strike was bad enough, two was unnerving. But as he had already concluded, there was no way out of it now, nowhere but forward to run.

Five rows back, he thought. Maybe, just maybe, the battle wouldn??™t come to him. Maybe he could stay hidden behind his comrades.

He looked to his left and saw a mammoth man with bulging muscle and a huge red beard smiling in anticipation. Something about that crazed look told him that he would be seeing action, that he wasn??™t far enough back for security.

As one they started to move. Daul hadn??™t heard any word of command, but the press of the bodies sent him forward. Shoulder to shoulder they crept along and Daul found that he could not allow himself to drift further back in the ranks as he had been secretly planning to. They were all too close, and they all pushed each other along as if they all shared the idea of the subtle retreat.

The walk became a jog, the jog a run, the run a sprint, and the exhilaration of the moment stirred his adrenaline. This was the battle. This was the moment of truth. And he felt the pounding of his heart in his ears and in the shortness of his breath. He resolved instantly that if this was to be his last accounting, it would be a good one, and he let loose with a wild scream that was picked up an repeated by the hoarse and nervous throats of the men beside him. His whoop became louder with their augmentation, and he picked up his own volume to pay greater homage to the cacophony they were creating.

Everything slowed in a sense. His eyes recorded the images that flashed before him. The color of the men. So stark and white against the green fields and blue skies.

The feel of the grass beneath his boots, the stalks already trampled and broken. The sharpness of the air as he gasped for it, seeming to cut his throat as he drew it in. And then, the clash of the weapons from the lines ahead.

It was like standing in one place and watching a storm blow in. A sheet of water and darkness, chaos, the fist of nature, coming at you in a black wall and then swallowing you.

Daul struck out around him madly. Nothing came close. Nothing was allowed. Arms, hands, broken spears, the moment they entered his field of vision he smashed them away with a strike from his slender sword. He spun in circles, blindly, mud and blood tossed up from the foul below and smearing his face and clothing until he was an unrecognizable mass. He stood in one place, never advancing, and the battle came to him.

It thinned after a while, after an eternal minute. Daul had no idea how long it had been, but he knew he was exhausted, and that there was nobody close to him. Slowly, his senses returned. The berserker rage that had overcome him had spent itself, and his body had rightly decided that the best chance for survival lay again in absolute faith for the control of his reason. He stumbled forward, the throng just ahead. He surmised his comrades were the ones whose backs were to him.

Suddenly, out of the wall of flesh broke a single soldier. The enemy, he could tell by the color beneath the mud. He was frenzied and broken like a struggling deer. Young, like Daul, he broke from between two bodies and looked up one and down the other before ever turning his eyes forward. He was nose to nose with Daul before he ever noticed him in his path. Daul just stood there in shock, waiting for him to come.

The madness had left Daul, the kill instinct, and it had left this soldier as well. Daul was watching him keenly, but detached, as in a vision, as he stepped forward. The soldier seemed relieved to be out of the fray. He seemed overcome that the two pillars of men he had passed through had taken no heed of his escape. He finished looking behind him and turned his eyes forward, meeting the eyes of Daul.

Daul saw himself reflected. For the first time in this battlefield of lunacy and mud, he saw the watery blue of intelligence. There was a soul in those eyes, an understanding. This was a young soldier, like him, one that was only looking for a way out.

They paused, a fragile truce. They waited and drew nervous breath. Daul could see a pleading there, the desire to escape. Or so he thought. Was he just imagining it?

With that question the moment was broken and the brief tranquility was overwhelmed by a stampeding fear. It was a battle. This was the enemy.

The other soldier saw the change in Daul??™s posture and started to react, but it was too late. The sword had already skewered him. The lifeless body slid down the blade, and Daul came face to face with the eyes again, the eyes that had pleaded for non-aggression.

He turned the sword down and to the side, the body slid off in silence. He had triumphed, he had slain his attacker. But he felt nothing but scorn and self-loathing. No words had been spoken, but this man had asked for a truce, and Daul had responded to the request with blood.

Daul was still standing there over the body when the battle ended.

The soldiers came walking back, picking their way through the bodies. Some in a daze, others joyous and relieved.

A meaty hand crashed down on Daul??™s back.

"You??™re first battle, right lad? Nice to see you???ve made the cut." It was the man-mountain with the fiery beard. "You??™ve got a few tricks now, you??™ll make it OK. The ones that survive their first battle, tend to make it all the way. Glad to have you with us."

Daul didn??™t make a response. He knew what the difference was between the ones that made it and the ones that didn??™t. The ones that made it killed. They ignored the pleas for mercy in the enemies??™ eyes, they accepted the rules of the situation they were in and didn??™t waste energy on dreams for a peaceful future.

Daul looked up and the carnage and the brutes that surrounded him. This was his world, these were his people, the desolation and the foulness of the living.

He glanced down one last time at the body at his feet, peaceful in its death-mask, and as he turned to walk off the field of battle with the other grotesque and misshapen approximations of the living, he wondered who the real victor was.

?© Ben Jonjak

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AUTHOR SHOWCASE

This month??™s Author Showcase features the fantasy/science fiction writer C. S. Friedman. A one-time costume designer, Ms. Friedman now has seven novels published with DAW Books and has even been published in Russian, Dutch, Polish, Italian, and German. Some of her books include the Coldfire Trilogy (includes Black Sun Rising, When True Night Falls, and Crown of Shadows), as well as her newest book The Wilding, set in the same universe as In Conquest Born, her first novel.

I was extremely fortunate that Ms. Friedman returned my request for an interview. She??™s a very busy woman, teaching high school creative writing and planning her next fantasy trilogy that she??™s promised will be as dark and haunting as the rest of her books.

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Interview with C. S. Friedman:

Q: When did your passion for writing begin? When did you know that you were going to be a writer?

C. S. Friedman: I have been making up stories as long as I have been alive. It??™s not something I even remember as having a beginning. Interestingly, my editor at DAW once told me that is true of all their current female writers.

Nor was ???Being a writer??? ever an issue. I simply wrote. I had no overwhelming desire to get published and honestly, I never gave it a moment??™s thought. Then one day when I was about 25 I looked at something I??™d been working on and thought, ???Wow, this is good. Really good. If I ever wanted to publish, I think I??™m good enough. Now.??? So I sent it in.

I realize in this I differ from 99.9999% of young writers, to whom getting published is a dream, but for me, writing was a personal exercise...creativity pouring out...I didn??™t write for other people, I wrote for me, and I rarely showed anything to anyone. In that sense, this whole career kind of took me by surprise.

Q: Would you say that you write fantasy or science fiction? You also seem to be pretty adept at horror, as well. Which genre is easiest for you to write?

C. S.: Well I write both fantasy and science fiction, and books that are both, with horror whispering darkly around the edges. As a matter of fact I just came back from being a Guest of Honor at Conjecture, where the theme was cross-genre fusion. My style is dark and intense, and both my science fiction and fantasy are spiced with the techniques of horror to make for a truly visceral reading experience (I hope.) But the categories have more to do with style and taste than any hard-and-fast division of literature, and you could argue for years about what the differences between them are and never get any clear answer.

Science Fiction is of course the genre I first fell in love with and the one that I??™m happiest writing. Those who know me well can see the threads of that even when I??™m writing pure fantasy; you might say that even when I deal with fantasy in subject matter, there are underlying whispers of SF in the structure -- which, now that I know you will ask me to define that ::Grin:: ....SF is a puzzle. Whatever else is going on, there is an underlying question (???What if????) and an assumption that the more you understand about the world you are in, the more you can control it...or perhaps just come to terms with it. So above and beyond all plot and character issues, good SF encourages the reader to put together a complex puzzle piece by piece, with new discoveries at every turn. The result can have powerful things to say about morality, human nature, and questions of identity, without ever having to say those things outright. Good SF makes us question who and what we are, and our base values....but *really* good SF never lets on it??™s doing that, you just enjoy a good story and only later, hours or days later, discover you are seeing the world in a more interesting light for it.

Fantasy can do those things as well, of course, and I try to make mine do so, but the focus overall is more escapist -- instead of asking ???what if???? fantasy offers ???let??™s assume...??? The goal is to immerse oneself so completely in the fantasy world that one forgets it isn??™t the real thing. I think this can be combined with all the elements that make SF strong and in fact my fans tell me that is indeed what draws them to my work.

For example, in the Coldfire Trilogy (Black Sun Rising, When True Night Falls, Crown of Shadows), the underlying question is ???What if magic really existed? How would it work? What might we become, in such a world???? So I took descendants of our society and put them in a fantasy type setting, to explore what might come of it. As we see men and women struggling against darkness within and without themselves we wonder if this is what we might become, were the rules of our universe the same. Thus the traditional metasetting of fantasy -- Good versus Evil -- becomes a tense and often disturbing exploration into where the line is drawn between the two, and makes us question if we would make the same choices as the characters, were we in the same situation.

Of course, truth is, a *good* book can do that in any genre, and I try to combine the best elements of both genres in everything I write.

Horror...horror is the ability to write something that the reader does not just absorb with his brain, but feels in his gut. To invoke fear and/or revulsion so powerfully that after he puts the book down to go to sleep, he still wants the lights on. It??™s a stylistic technique that has tremendous impact if not overapplied, and I love the fact that readers write me to tel me that years after reading the Coldfire trilogy, the horrific images in it still haunt them.

Q: Do you think your work is primarily plot driven or character driven?

C. S.: Very much character driven. That is its strength. A written work succeeds or fails based upon how much you care about the characters in it; emotions are not stirred by plot elements but by how much you identify with the people you are reading about. That does not mean plot is not important, but it is far easier to change a plot element that is not working after 300 pages than it is to change an element in a character??™s psyche.

This is the hardest thing to teach young writers, especially those who are taking story ideas straight from D&D games. Gaming characters are usually pretty superficial templates, which are seen merely as vehicles to get from plot point A to plot point B. A few personality quirks may be thrown in to make them seem more than that, but they rarely have the depth of background you get when you design something from scratch for a written project. Without that depth, without the personal resonance that makes us care about a character, a story about hunting demons or destroying a piece of magical jewelry falls flat.

All my books have started out as a character concept, or a plot point revolving around a character concept. Sometimes they are not couched in fantasy/sf terms to start with. Gerald Tarrant of the Coldfire Trilogy was based upon my thoughts of the frustrations that Medieval Catholics clerics must have faced, wanting so much to explore the world around them, but banned from many areas of intellectual exploration. A man of great faith at odds with his Church, when in fact -- in this case -- he helped found it. This Alien Shore began with the question of what we would become if our society accepted what are now considered mental ???handicaps??? as normal, rather than trying to ???cure??? them, which led to several characters whose unique mental frameworks provides them with unexpected strengths and tension-filled trials...not to mention the inevitable Puzzle.

Q: How do you get the ideas for your books and stories? And how do you choose one over another to actually write?

C. S.: Well after a couple of years on any one book I am really, really tired of it, so I generally do the opposite. I just finished The Wilding, sequel to my first SF novel, and This Alien Shore before that, so now it??™s time to go back to Fantasy and weave a tale of magic so dark and ominous it leaves my readers shivering.

Ideas do not come easily to me, and less easily now that I do this for a living and have to keep to a schedule. Nothing keeps an idea from coming like the thought, ???ah, I have to have three new ones on Monday.??? Nonetheless there is always inspiration around us, and all you need is one good question -- ???what if???? to get started.

The question for my new fantasy trilogy is...???What if magic existed, but the cost of it was so terrible that few would be willing to pay it???? Keep tuned for answers :-)

Q: When you write a book, do you follow a routine? Are you disciplined with a schedule or do you just write when the mood strikes?

C. S.: I am so poorly disciplined I could give lessons in being poorly disciplined, except I would never have the lesson plans done on time :-) That said, no professional author can write ???when the mood strikes???. You have to do it every day and you have to do it even if you don??™t want to and have no ideas and really want to be doing something else.

Q: How do you prepare for an idea for writing, for turning it into a book or a story? Do you outline the characters, setting, plot, etc. before you begin to write?

C. S.: I do not do formal ???planning??? for anything. For most books I know my characters, my world, my situation, and were I want the plot to go. As you write each chapter you open up all sorts of new potentials for what comes next, and if you outline too meticulously it??™s very hard to change direction when that happens. That??™s my excuse, anyway.

Q: Do you research for your novels and if so, how much? Was there a lot to do for your Coldfire Trilogy?

C. S.: I do exhaustive research, the goal being that you should never see it in the book. Even my magic is based upon science, trying to make it as realistic as possible. This Alien Shore involved a lot of research on individuals with alternate cognitive styles, particularly works written by those suffering from Autism and other unusual conditions, seeking insight into how that changed the way they viewed the world.

Q: What do you think is your greatest strength as a writer?

C. S.: Making readers care about my characters while they are reading, and think about my themes long after they have finished reading. Nothing makes me happier than a reader who stays up all night because he can??™t get my book out of his head.

Q: And of course, then, what do you think is your greatest weakness as a writer?

C. S.: Lack of self-discipline, see above :-)