Blog

Flash: One Soul Per

Image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Rating: Mature

The two girls looked like water nymphs, half-submerged in the bay. “How soon will one of us die?”

Layne frowned. “You should be feeling the pinchers by now. Don’t worry, they only eat dead things.”

Sheep, at least he thought it was the girl with the Sheep constellation tattooed on the back of her nape smiled, “So we aren’t going to have any clothes soon?”

The picture of the two girls naked, with hair floating around them, while chained, had Layne’s fifth extremity lengthening. He adjusted his lower armor to make room. “No, pinchers recognize dead matter attached to living matter and leaves it alone. Only if you dead inside and out will they eat everything.”

The water started to recede, leaving wet lace covering their bosoms and nothing to his imagination. The Keeper of Kaireen’s Sacrifice requested the surviving twin be brought back promptly. Normally those undergoing the Tide Test wore simple white linen. But these two had apprenticed to a lacemaker and wanted to wear their skill on what could be their final day of life. They had spent the day before the Test creating the dresses from new silk and fresh linen, dyed specially for surviving the salty sea. Whichever survived would wear her masterpiece to report to her journeyman position at the lace shop. It was clear the Keeper was proud of both girls, as much as could be knowing one was a monster. Layne did not envy the Keeper his job of raising children and monsters together, never naming either to prevent giving the monsters the power of a name. Only one soul per child birth was given by the gods, and so the question becomes which of a set of twins has the soul and which is a false one. Unwilling to kill a true person without reason, the city set aside the Sacrifice grounds to raise them until they were old enough to be tested.

“We live sister!” One leaned into the other, as hugging wasn’t an option because of the short chains attaching them to a concrete block for the test, while the tide continued to fall back. They kissed cheeks and lips. Hands touched wet legs as if assuring each other that no wounds were hidden by the sea. Turning as one back to their guard. “Please, may we be released.”

Never had both twins survived the Test. But only if one had a living soul would the pinchers not tear her apart in the tide pools.

A new wave, higher than previous, and wind-blown, hit the girls about the shoulders, knocking them over. Layne’s eyes returned to the distant ocean. A storm had rolled in while he had watched the girls. The narrow bay would fill with storm-driven water. Panicked, the girls tried to stand on the cement block they were chained to, keeping their head high as waves returned without the tide.

Tossing aside his spear, Layne ran. He unbuckled his armor and sword before splashing into the water, holding the key in his hand. He quickly unlocked the chains. Sheep made it to the beach, but the girl with the Mare tattoo was terrified of drowning. She fought mindlessly, hardly aware of his presence as her water phobia terrorized her. He finally managed to carry her in and put her down on the sand.

He looked around for the Sheep tattoo, and spotted her as she flung his sword into the ocean. A hand touched his fifth, exposed by the lack of armor, immediately hardening it and freezing him in place. “What…”

“I just want to thank you for saving me.” The girl at his feet rose to her knees. “I really am afraid of the water.” Her mouth claimed his fifth, slowly sucking it deeper and deeper into her mouth until he touched the back of her throat.

He moaned. Barely able to move, he brought his hand to rest on her soaked hair.

“Don’t make him cum sister.” The Sheep had returned. “We have need for his seed if we are to survive.” The girl circled around his back and bit his ear. “And need for many other things as well.” She whispered.

Despite the Mare cupping his balls and her round mouth stroking up and down along his shaft, Layne managed to ask, “How?”

“How?” The woman whispering his ear repeated. “How are we both soulless or how did we survive the test?”

He could only moan a response. Both of his hands clenched the hair of the girl giving him the blow job.

“Enough sister, we need to move him before his fellows return.”

His fifth popped out of the Mare’s mouth. “We won’t own him until he owns us.”

“True.” The Sheep wrapped around his torso and lowered her channel onto his shaft. She squeezed the warm, wet channel around his dick. Already on the brink, he surged into the false woman, his seed spurting into her. “That’s it, give me half your soul.” Her mouth claimed his, and he felt something being pulled unwillingly from him, as much as he willingly gave her is cum.

Once he was spent, the Sheep climbed off him. Confusion clouded his thoughts when the woman instructed, “Take my sister’s hand. You know you want her soon. Don’t let her go until you’ve given her everything you have.”

Layne’s vision narrowed to see only the girl as he grasped her hand. He followed her as she pulled him over sand and rock, his eyes focused on the Mare constellation tattoo on her nape showing between the wet strands of her hair. Darkness chased them as the storm grew closer until he was drawn into a cave high in the cliff face.

Mare pulled him down on top of her as she lay on the stone floor. “To be fair, I should tell you, while there is still some of you left, my savior.” Her hands stroked his shoulders, loosening the last of the linen until he was as naked as an animal. His fifth was refilling with the juices of life, and started prodding the woman’s moist entrance. “You see we weren’t twins but triplets. While one soulless one cannot overcome a true being, two can. The true girl died stillborn.”

Horrified at the secret truth, Layne still could not keep himself from entering her. He pumped into her, feeling the last of him pass into the woman. 

(1,071 words – originally appearing at Breathless Press 10/21/13 for the 9/23/12 Sunday Fun; republished in new blog format on 1/14/2018.)

Editing Rants: Begin to End

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Editing a manuscript when I hit this gem: “…almost started to end the conversation …”

and I am going to let them keep it. It’s a literary work not genre. The rule of “we don’t care what you almost did, started to do, might do, could do – we only want to know about what the character DID do – action-all-the-time.” doesn’t apply for the thinky-feely character emotional study of literary work.

I’m going to curl up in a ball or hit something hard when I done this 70K edit.

You – you genre(*) writers – don’t ever write “start to end” or “almost started”. Just don’t!

If you do, fix it in drafts before your editor sees it.

(*) Genre – romance, mystery, science fiction, fantasy, urban fantasy, horror, etc.

Flash: Unloading

Image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The noise of a thousand bodies in a small space quieted as the ship doors opened to reveal the immigrants new home. Non-canned air slipped in on hot wind, replacing human stink with the unmistakable odor of sulfur. Human noses inhaled deeply the pungent scent, glad for something new to smell after so many days in transit. Bright natural light rushed to fill the corners of the room as the doors widened enough for the ramp to be deployed.

Clarence huddled mid-way in the masses with his family. The trip had indentured them for ten years labor. More likely twenty years for him and Monique to cover the costs of Grandpa and Nanna’s trip. They were young and could suck it up. Food and other living expenses were going to keep the family down for a generation. Still, they had gotten out of the ghetto.

He waited for the other shoe to fall. He figured he wasn’t about to step into Eden. Others might buy the brave new world bit the recruiters sell. But there had to be a reason why they recruited in the slums and not in the colleges. Someone needed to do the work before brains arrived.

The people at the front stepped back seeing their new home. A few started wailing and cursing.

His dad and Gramps pushed the crowd back from the women on one side, Clarence stepped between the family and the mob on the other. Lincoln, a young man and his pregnant wife who had befriended the family on the trip out, helped him. On this new world they were going to be family too. That is if the company allowed it.

Yelling started in the front, and the side walls started slowly moving inward, forcing people off the ship. Nothing for it but to leave, although a few people fought the issue. Idiots, like a company is going to pay to haul bodies out here and allow you to turn around to go back.

Bridges burnt, Clarence and his clan stepped onto their new planet.

(Words 343 – first published 5/30/2013; republished new blog format 1/7/2018)

Other Cool Blogs: Magical Words May 23, 2014

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Mind the Gap

Magical Words continues to give in the new year, despite being shut down, as I review the website again and again for advice. This one is from Jodi McIsaac,Three Tools for Plotting Success“.

  1. Don’t get stuck on the Hero’s Journey
  2. Mind the gap
  3. Twenty bad ideas.

To me, “Mind the Gap” spoke the loudest. It defines reversal of expectation driving a plot, creating surprise and freshness, better than any other writing advice I have read. And “Twenty Bad Ideas” seems like a really good way to avoid common trope pitfalls.

Want to figure out which of the three makes the most impact for you? Go here: http://www.magicalwords.net/specialgueststars/a-return-visit-with-jodi-mcisaac-three-tools-for-plotting-success/

WRITING EXERCISE: Look over your present work-in-progress for a Gap and a scene without a Gap. Which scene is stronger? Which one keeps the pages turning? Can the scene without the Gap have a Gap added?

***

In my flash, The Bleue Toscano Eggs of Power, the supervillain Viper arrives thinking to attack a building. Instead he ends up working on surviving an explosion and escaping the superhero Power Fists. The second scene has him calmly accepting an item, and soon discovers he is out-of-his-depth in the technological world. In both cases his goals changed considerably.