Once again I’ve laid out Raphel’s explanation of why he needs Saeli, how the war started, and his idea of how to bring down the gods. During the last draft, I had done some brainstorming on Verre’s history, specifically about the Cursing, because I needed more information on Scisaxar’s character. One of the ideas I had come up with was that there existed a group of majahel who belonged to neither Scisaxar nor Yuril, and they could use both sattva and rashas qi. The gods destroyed them. The war between Mantles and Cowls began soon afterward.

Raphel thinks that the gods were threatened by the grays, because the grays knew how to travel to other worlds and they knew about the Keeper. He thinks the gods started the war to cover up the true reason for the Cursing of the Midplains.

What he doesn’t know was that the grays were actually delving in some very dangerous things, and the gods had very good reason to step in and stop them. However, due to some personal drama, the gods admittedly did not handle the situation very well. That’s info for the sequel, incidentally. Saeli actually reestablishes the Grays as an actual Order at the end of Shades, and makes an effort to uncover their lore. Or course, some of the new Grays rediscover the dangerous stuff the old Grays were doing, and try to recreate it. As creator of the new movement, Saeli has to uncover the truth of the movement she’s been emulating, which will mean revisiting some of her pain with Raphel. Anyway…back to Shades.

The gray majahel are new to this draft, and that’s become the primary hook Raphel is using to entice Saeli into this plan to overthrow the gods. Secondary hook: ending the war is all about justice, and knowing the truth. That’s a big deal to Saeli, who’s never really liked the war. Raphel is giving her reasons to hate it. Third hook: Raphel is seducing her. It’s subtle, but it’s there. He’s observed her weak spots. He knows she’s intrigued by him, so he’s playing up his atypical-ness as a Cowl. He knows she’s an outcast, so he’s enticing her with a grand vision of saving the world from itself. He knows how she’s struggled to earn the Mantle, so he uses that to undermine her loyalty to Scisaxar. He knows she has a compassionate heart, so he throws out some of his own painful history to illicit sympathy from her. He also knows how to touch her hand or face in such a way as to deliberately make her stop thinking too hard.

Anyway, they are having this conversation in a cafe, where Cara had previously ordered tea. So the teapot and cups are still sitting there on the table, and once or twice I had Raphel messing with them. Just for something to do with his hands while he’s talking. There was one point where Saeli was considering how logical Raphel’s arguments were, and simultaneously watching him trace a circle on the rim of the teacup. The symbolism of that really struck me: how Raphel can sound all logical and straightforward, and all the while he’s actually leading you around in a circle.

So all of a sudden I had this really neat, subtle metaphor I could use during this scene. The teacup is actually a gauge of what Raphel is mentally doing to Saeli.

When he tells her he’s going to teach her rashas qi, she jumps up, bumps the table, and accidentally knocks the cup off its saucer. If you think about it, Saeli has literally been knocked off her Mantle foundations, and the last straw would be her learning rashas. And who picks up the cup and sets it back on the saucer? Raphel. Because what is he doing but setting up a different foundation for Saeli to rest on?

He plays with the cup some more while he’s telling her about the gray majahel. When Saeli finally asks if he can prove he isn’t making stuff up, he sets the cup back down on its saucer and says “Yes, I can prove it.” (He then proceeds to pull out an old scroll and do just that.) Foundation, again. He’s plucking her out of her old beliefs and setting her back down in his.

When Raphel claims the gods destroyed the grays, he spins the cup on the table. That’s because he’s departed from actual history and is conjecturing. That’s what he thinks happened. He doesn’t know what really happened…no one does…but he’s spinning the story that way because he knows Saeli will fall for it.

Raphel points out that the gods fear the Keeper, and knocks the cup over again. He says he thinks the gods were afraid the grays would bring the Keeper to Verre. This time, Saeli picks up the cup. Because ultimately, it’s Saeli who is going to save the gods, not from the Keeper…but from Raphel.

While Saeli is wondering how Scisaxar could have been part of the Cursing, she’s studying the dregs in the teacup. When Raphel finally tells her that they’re going to overthrow the gods, she drops the cup and it spills. This time it stays spilled for a little bit. This is no small thing he’s just told her, after all.

He picks it up while talking about his past, and grips it hard enough Saeli is afraid it will crack. That’s the part of Raphel that could destroy her, after all…his anger over his past. It’s what ultimately forges him into the villain of the story. In her sympathy, she takes the cup away from him…because she will, at the end of the story, pull herself out of his clutches, and she’ll do it out of love.

He finally pins her down with a question of whether she loves Scisaxar or not. To give herself time to answer, she mops up the spilled tea on the table. White cloth, brown stains. This is what her view of Mantles has become. What she thought was pure is actually stained.

Raphel takes the napkin away from her. He folds it up into a little square, and clinks the teacup down on the saucer. Pretty decisive. It’s after this that he really ramps up the seduction bit, cupping her face and telling her he can’t do this without her, that sort of thing. He switches from “you’re going to do this because it’s a good idea” to “you’re going to do this because you really like me”.

Who knew you could pack all that into a teacup. I love symbolism.

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I think, I think, that the scene I’m currently working on will be one of the last to involve significant changes to the storyline itself. It’s the scene where Saeli meets Raphel in the Sari Cafe…only now she’s already been given her Mantle, she has to sneak off campus in order to meet him at all, she and Cara had to deceive Brendan in order to pull off the escape, and she’s got a two hour time limit to get back (before the school gates close for the night). Thus, the whole dialogue will have to unfold in a different order to accommodate the changes. Plus I’m bringing over a shortened version of the dedication discussion, since the first thing out of Saeli’s mouth is going to be something along the lines of “Uh, they kind of made me a Mantle”…which isn’t going to make Raphel happy.

The next major event is the graduation party. I’m sure Saeli will be able to get official permission to go to that. She’ll also be able to tell Raphel about it, since she’ll have a sorarc by then. Plays right into his hands, that…

At the party, Saeli has to have her confrontation with Brendan. I think I still need to have a short scene with him after Saeli gets done talking to Raphel at the Sari…if only to establish some complication in their relationship. First of all, Saeli and Cara had to have his help in getting Saeli through the gates. The school gates have student guards to keep track of who goes in and out, and the High Priestess has given orders that Saeli is not allowed to leave. The gates also have a pair of qi-sensing panels embedded in the school-side entrance that glimmer if qi is used near them. (Of course, they are only set up to recognize sattva qi, because they were designed to catch students sneaking out, not Cowls sneaking in. The school assumes that any Cowl sneaking in is going to be caught by the anti-intruder ward, or the Anjahel guards on duty [who can sense the presence of rashas qi in a person, not just when it's in use]. That hole in the system allowed Raphel to sneak in cloaked, with a student’s name on his lips.)

However, Saeli doesn’t know any rashas qi yet, so she’d have to use a sattva cloak to sneak out. That’s where Cara comes in. Cara is also going to cloak and try to sneak through the gate, but she’s going to purposefully get caught. She’ll then explain that she was sent to test the qi panels, and to make sure the guards were paying attention. Such tests are somewhat routine. While the guards are distracted with Cara, Saeli will slip by. However, both girls know that the guards will report the incident, so they need to obtain actual permission to conduct the test. That’s where Brendan comes in. He’s a senior red cord, and on very good terms with Professor Lo, the Advanced Forms teacher and the head of campus security. He’s also known for his honesty. If Brendan were to go to Lo and say he thought the panels needed testing, and the guards needed a wake-up call, he could probably get the permission they need.

Only problem is, Saeli can’t tell Brenden she’s going to sneak off campus, because Brendan would never allow it. Barring that, he’d never go along with it. So Saeli and Cara go to Brendan and pretend that they saw the guards goofing off, and that it’s making Saeli nervous. Saeli suggests sending Cara to test them, but they need permission. Brendan, already vulnerable to any plea from Saeli and already worried about her safety, agrees and gets the permission they need.

The sneaking out goes over without a hitch, except that Cara ends up going with Saeli to the Cafe. Saeli just can’t persuade her otherwise. They get to the cafe, and Saeli doesn’t see Raphel right away. She gets more and more nervous, especially with Cara there, and finally needs a moment to herself. She excuses herself and goes to the hallway outside the bathrooms, and of course there’s Raphel, dressed in street clothes and waiting for her. They have a kind of frantic, whispered conversation, which is interrupted by Cara, who comes looking for Saeli. So Cara meets “Aiden” and is completely and utterly charmed. She now completely understands why her roommate would risk getting in trouble to see this guy again. I need Cara to not be suspicious, because Brendan is about to become suspicious enough for both of them.

Brendan, meanwhile, is pulled into the High Priestess’ office that evening and given the gold cord. The first thing he thinks to do, of course, is to tell Saeli, so he goes looking for her. He doesn’t find her, and he learns that Cara went on into town after testing the gate guards. Well, Brendan’s a pretty smart fellow and he quickly realizes that Cara must have been helping Saeli sneak out. That pisses him off, because not only is she endangering herself by going outside, she tricked him into helping her do it. So he goes into town looking for her.

He finds her inside the Sari, just as she’s about to leave (time’s almost up). Saeli tries to shoo Raphel away before Brendan sees them, and Raphel is quite willing to leave, but Brendan’s already spotted them. Raphel leaves without speaking, and Saeli and Brendan are left alone. Well, now Brendan is triply pissed, because apparently Saeli tricked him into helping her sneak out so that she could meet a guy behind his back. Ouch. And there really isn’t much Saeli can do to persuade him otherwise, without revealing who Raphel is and why she was really meeting him. Problem is, there’s just enough truth to Brendan’s suspicions that Saeli feels too guilty and wretched to tell the truth. Confronted with Brendan’s hurt, the truth actually starts to feel like an excuse. She does like Raphel. She did meet him before she and Brendan spoke in the infirmary. And her own fascination with Raphel was part of the reason she met him again.

So that’s where Saeli and Brendan stand going into the graduation party. It’s probably enough to push Brendan over the edge enough to indulge in a little tanathe weed.

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Geris takes particular delight in being from Lanschport, but then, he’s a weird, perverse kind of guy.

What would Raphel call his cabal? To the larger world, the name would be mostly irrelevant. Raphel is so famous that his cabal is simply going to be known by most people as “Raphel’s cabal”…they aren’t going to care what he himself calls it. But still, they must call themselves something…every group needs an identity.

I’m inclined toward something like “New Iadnah”, or something like that. The Cowls in Raphel’s cabal, or at least a good number of them, are survivors of the Siege of Iadnah. Raphel met Nasira in Iadnah during the siege, an event which definitely changed his life. It’s an identifying point with them…gives them particular reason to want to assassinate high-ranking Mantles. Only New Iadnah sounds a little presumptuous to me. But I dunno, maybe Raphel would name his group something presumptous. Maybe he did it when he took it over from Nasira when he was 18.

I’ll just have to think about it some more.

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So a month or two ago, there was this author that had been recommended to me, and I kept telling myself I should check her out. Then, at the Cassandra Claire and Holly Black event in Vero, that same author was recommended yet again, by those two no less. I said to myself, “I really do need to look into that.”

Then, of course, I completely forgot the author’s name. I knew she had two books, and that the second one was called Fire. Let me tell you, there are a whole stinking lot of books on the market with “fire” in the title…which makes searching in the library almost impossible. Especially without an author. So…I gave up, in the hopes of eventually running across the name again and remembering it.

In a completely unrelated series of events, I ended up checking out a book called Graceling from the library. (Are you laughing yet?) It was one of those few books I pick up, not because I know anything about them, but because the back cover sounds interesting. Most of those are disappointments. This one was not.

It was imaginative, and exciting, and unpretentious. I would have built up the world a little more, if I’d been writing it, but the story didn’t suffer for lack of detail. Reading the inside flap, I was surprised to discover that the author lives in Jacksonville, FL. Yay, fellow Floridian! I enjoyed Graceling enough that I went online to see if the author had a blog or something. I started on Amazon, where I was excited to discover that there is apparently another book in the series.

Can you guess what that second book is called? Yep.

Fire.

Proving that yes, apparently I really should have checked Kristin Cashore out when I still remembered her name, because her first book was interesting enough for me to pick up AT RANDOM. Craziness.

In other news, I’m about halfway through the Sookie Stackhouse series by Charlaine Harris. Those are the books that apparently inspired the TrueBlood series on TV, which I know nothing about. But I’ve discovered that if a book spawns a movie or TV series, the book is at least worth checking out. (With the possible exception of Vampire Diaries. I tried to read those and it was like reading Twilight all over again. It was just…meh.) Anyway, I’m quite enjoying the Sookie books. They have a nice balance of mystery, sensuality, solid worldbuilding, and fun, and I really like the protagonist. She’s one of those perky southern women who don’t have a lot of “book larning”, but has a good head on her shoulders nonetheless.

I really need to update my to-read list, as I’ve finished a lot of what’s on it, and have added some stuff. I’ll probably do that in a different post.

The Shades rewrite is going very well. First person works a lot better than third ever did, I’m discovering. Much easier to introspect. But really, I think the best thing I did was starting at the fight scene. It just makes everyone’s motivations and conflicts so much clearer, and make so much more sense. Saeli, instead of starting things off with a dubious and rather stupid plan to meet with a Cowl, is immediately thrown into a conflict with one through no deliberate fault of her own. Yes, she ends up in a mess because of her decisions, but one could argue that there was little else she could do in those circumstances.

No, she didn’t have to sneak into the Temple to get a better look at a Cowl. But her doubts drove her there. No, she didn’t have to jump out to defend the High Priestess against Raphel, but her good heart wouldn’t let her do otherwise. It’s actually the only thing she does all night that a real White Mantle would also do.

She didn’t have to get into a conversation with Raphel, but her own doubts and curiosities, and Raphel’s strange manner, made it inevitable. This is where Saeli’s sense of what’s right departs from White Mantle philosophy. A Mantle would attack, and never give the enemy a chance to speak…no matter the circumstance, no matter how different or fascinating the enemy was. If Raphel had attacked her the second she appeared, that’s probably the course she would have taken, because it’s what she’s been taught. But Raphel tried to talk her away first, and that was enough to shock her out of reacting. Saeli’s own doubts compel her to try and find out why this Cowl is different.

She certainly didn’t have to take Raphel up on his compromise, and let him go when he asked…but it was the only thing she could do to save herself and the High Priestess’ life, given what she knows. (If she had known how much Raphel would risk to keep a gray her age alive, she might have been in a better position to bargain…but as far as she knows, Raphel’s going to kill her unless she does what he asks). She chooses saving lives over the morals she’s been taught, and that is significant. She’s willing to take circumstance into account. She follows her own inner sense of what’s right. This is what makes her so vulnerable to Raphel, but it’s also what will ultimately allow her to break free from him.

Raphel, instead of for-some-mysterious-reason deciding to meet an unknown student just because she asks, is thrown into a conflict with Saeli because of where he was and what he was trying to do. He spares her initially because he’s just killed Denys and is not happy about it, and he really doesn’t want to do it again. And before you start thinking that Raphel isn’t really such a bad guy after all, as Saeli does, know that Raphel objects to killing bystanders not out of the goodness of his heart, but as a matter of pride. He’s an assassin, and normally he’s good enough to get in and out of a place without having killed anyone other than his target. He’s more annoyed with himself at this point, because having to kill a student is embarrassing. Killing two would be unbearable, not to his conscience, but to his pride.

When she follows him up to the tower, he admires her for her tenacity. Mind you, he’s still going to kill her…perhaps even more so at this point, as it’s obvious she’s not going to leave him alone. But he’s curious enough about this Mantle who is acting so un-Mantle-like that he’s willing to hold back for a few minutes and see what she does. It’s when he figures out that she’s gray that the stakes change for him.

He realizes that he has a golden opportunity in Saeli to realize a plan that he’s been concocting for years. But, of course, now he can’t kill her. Hell, he can’t even hurt her in any significant way, as that would destroy any future trust she might have in him. But if he kills the HP, he knows he’ll have to fight Saeli, and thus probably hurt or kill her. However, if he doesn’t kill the HP, he’s going to face hell from his cabal, who are counting on him to take down the Mantle leader. And if he doesn’t choose quickly, he’s liable to get caught anyway. Saeli’s presence in this scene actually puts Raphel in a very difficult position, although of course, Saeli won’t know any of this.

He chooses Saeli, because even a faint hope of taking down the gods is worth the risk for him.

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Brendan acted on his own once before, when he kissed Saeli and I wasn’t expecting it.

I just (re)tackled the scene where Brendan reveals his true feelings for Saeli. And found that I needed to completely rearrange the conversation, because about 90% of the things they talked about the first time around have happened differently (Cowl broke onto campus and killed someone, as opposed to Cowl simply broke onto campus and disappeared) or have not happened at all (Raphel hasn’t taken Saeli on their little midnight philosophical walk yet, Saeli hasn’t claimed to have met “some guy” downtown yet).

So my problem was, how do I lead up to Brendan’s confession this time around? My inclination was to do something really simple, like have him say something like, “See, you almost died last night, and that made me realize something…blah blah blah.” You know, when I actually write it out like that, I see that it kind of makes Brendan look like a sissy. Good thing he had other things on his mind.

After a bit of back and forth between Saeli and Brendan, where he both wants to speak his mind and simultaneously doesn’t, and Saeli is getting more and more confused and annoyed…Brendan finally blurted out something that changed the whole timbre of the scene. “What did that Cowl do to you last night?”

And I remember that White Mantles believe Cowls have neither morals nor inhibitions, and that male Cowl raiders are known to (supposedly) steal women and rape them.

And I realize what Saeli’s story up to this point (”The Cowl was going to kill the Priestess, I talked to him, he decided to let us live if I let him go”) would look like to a White Mantle whose feelings are not entirely neutral. Brendan has jumped to the conclusion that this Cowl raped Saeli, and the reason she hasn’t admitted it is because she let it happen so that she and the HP would live. It’s a logical assumption, given what Brendan knows about Cowls (they’re promiscuous), about Raphel in particular (he’s never left a victim alive before), and about the circumstances (Saeli was alone with Raphel, they cut some kind of deal). And Brendan, dear, protective soul that he is, has got to have the truth of the matter…and thus we have this completely spontaneous scene where Brendan basically accuses Saeli of selling her body to save the HP’s life.

And of course Saeli’s first reaction is something along the lines of “Why the hell could he even imagine such a thing?”, which forces him to admit that it’s not the morality of the situation that bothers him…it’s the idea of her being hurt by a Cowl like that. So Brendan gets to admit how he feels without ever having to say the words, which is good. It reinforces him as a strong male and also as a White Mantle (Mantles don’t talk about feelings much).

It also puts Raphel and sex together in Saeli’s head for the first time, and even though she finds the very idea revolting at first, the seed is planted. Plus, right after this scene concludes, Saeli is going to go back to her room and find Raphel waiting for her.

It really is great when my characters know themselves better than I do, and get themselves into deeper messes than I would have come up with for them.

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I’ve made two new playlists over the last week…really just gathering music that seems to fit a theme. One was for To Wake a Windmaker. Lots of adventure songs, music that kind of lifts you out of yourself, makes you feel like you could do anything. Interestingly, that playlist has collected three Kutless songs, whereas before I hadn’t really listened to them. I’ve also started a soundtrack for the sequel to Shades, which is tentatively called “The Angel Experiments” at this point. Not much in that one yet, because the story is still in the very early stages of planning.

When I make a soundtrack, I usually find at first that there’s one, maybe two bands that have multiple songs that fit…and it’s not always a band I’m expecting. As the playlist grows, so does the number of “theme bands”. I also try to pick out a theme song for each story idea I come up with, which is sometimes very difficult. The songs on my Writing Projects page are theme songs, which I’ve just tweaked, actually. Theme bands keep the list together, in a way. I also like to make use of songs that I own more than one version of. It’s really neat when I can use the main version of a song in an early part of the list, and then towards the end drop in the acoustic version, or a live version, or just a different recording, to reiterate that theme in a slightly different way.

I’ve been writing like mad this week, but not really in a very organized way. Been working on the chapter I lost, the next chapter, and my “fanfic” in tandem. Mostly the fanfic…because I’ve been enjoying it way too much. But actually, it’s more than just a sex scene. (Even though it is that. Which is why I’m probably the only person who will ever see it.)

It’s actually a story-breaker. I’m writing it with the full understanding that if this scene had happened, the rest of Shades would not have. I’m exploring a lot of Raphel’s character here, specifically his past (i.e. Nasira). Nasira abused him for so long that there’s no way he could make love to a person he even remotely cared about without dealing with that demon from his past. This scene explores why Raphel waits for so long to openly turn Saeli’s romantic feelings against her in the actual story. He could have seduced her at any time; he knows how she feels about him, and he knows how to use it. But he holds back for two related reasons, one conscious, one unconscious.

His conscious reasoning is that because Nasira used his erotic feelings against him, he’s made a promise to himself to never do that to anyone else. Raphel can rip out a woman’s heart and soul, and he’d have sex if it suited him…but he’ll never make a woman admit that she loves him, and he won’t use that knowledge to take her body. What he did with Mora (he had sex with her once, in a ritualistic sense, in accordance with the old laws that required a ras and his/her second to literally consummate that relationship)…that skirted very close to the edge of his boundaries, because he knew Mora loved him and he did care about her (although not a in romantic sense). He forbade her to admit how she felt, and he made it very clear that he was only doing it to make her his second. She agreed to those terms. She loved him enough to go through the agony of being physically intimate with him on those terms. Tragically for her, she’s probably the person Raphel trusts most in the world, and she knows it. Mora lost herself the moment she stepped into that role.

But there is a certain line Raphel will not cross with Mora, because he really does care about her. He’s careful around her; he watches how he says things, watches how close he stands, makes sure their boundaries are clear. He protects her, as far as that goes. In fact, when he starts being deliberately seductive towards Mora towards the end, that’s really when Saeli understands that he’s lost himself…because even though he’s never really made it clear, Saeli knows that he would never do certain things, and taking advantage of Mora is Number 1 on that (admittedly short) list.

Now I have to see what that list would look like.

1. Never take advantage of Mora’s feelings.
2. Keep your word/ Never tell a deliberate lie.
3. Never use a woman’s feelings for him as a weapon against her.
(4. Never seduce/force a virgin.) Saeli wouldn’t know about this one.
5. Duel honorably, when possible.

6. Do what is necessary.

Raphel starts breaking #5 near the beginning of the story, and by the end of Shades, he’ll have broken #1. (Don’t know if #4 will ever come up. Probably not. It’s just something I know about Raphel.) #6 starts trumping all Raphel’s moral boundaries, one by one.

The unconscious reason Raphel refuses to truly seduce Saeli is because he is not entirely immune to falling for her. He sees a lot of himself in her. The way she resists him reminds him of the way he used to resist Nasira, and the comparison has implications he just won’t admit to himself. He knows, subconsciously, that if he does to Saeli what Nasira did to him, Saeli will either run, or turn on him. (Raphel turned on Nasira.) Saeli is too strong for him and there’s a part of him that knows it. And he cares enough about her to not want to force her into that dilemma.

If Raphel was capable of thinking in terms of healthy relationships, he would understand that Saeli is a good match for him. But as it is, all he sees is that she could get through his walls, and he can’t risk that.

Okay, enough Raphel Psychology 101. Writing an erotic scene is an interesting endeavor, to say the least. You start running out of words really fast, and it’s difficult to find synonyms that make sense/aren’t jarring/cheesy/inappropriate. Also, you kind of have to feel what you’re writing…and you learn just how much of the experience of being turned on is all in your head. And I’m sorry to say, that’s part of the fun.

On working through Shades backstory, I’ve decided that the reason there are so many old Cowl raider traditions dealing with sex is because the first mages discovered rashas qi through sex. (Rashas is fueled by strong emotion). When the discovery was made, the only way they knew to raise the energy was through sex. The first cabals began as energy circles, with the ras and his/her second as the powerhouses. The energy they raised in the bedroom, per se, was used by the whole cabal. (That’s why, specifically, the old laws require a ras and a second to be intimate. It’s also why, as Geris points out, a ras can have any woman he wants in his cabal.) Incidentally, even though such unions are no longer necessary, Cowls who are sexually intimate with each other do find it much easier to raise qi together. There are certain advantages to a linked ras and second.

Incidentally, that means that rashas qi, as a discipline, is actually a lot older than sattva. It would be interesting to work out exactly how rashas evolved out of sex energy, how sattva grew out of rashas, and how each became associated with a particular god and a particular ideology.

I think I need to come up with another term to use in place of “second”, as the position has acquired other connotations and history. That person isn’t just a second in command.

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Then of course, there’s the “I’m still recovering from the hard drive crash” excuse, but at this point, I think I’ve exhausted that one. I did a once-over of the first book of Shades, and did a little writing today.

Mostly, I’ve not updated because I really haven’t felt like it. Not from a lack of exciting or interesting things to report…in fact, I think it might be due to too many things to talk about. I’ve read several books since Wednesday, all of which were good enough to merit a blog-nod, at least. But…meh. I don’t feel so much like reviewing anything right now.

I’ve actually felt like sitting down and writing some erotic Shades fanfiction. (I suppose I can hope Shades will be enough of a hit someday to merit fanfiction…and it can be fun to anticipate what people are going to come up with. Dear gods, the slash will probably be awful).

One, to see if I can actually bring myself to write an erotic scene…what words I can/cannot get on the page, where evocative turns into gross/cheesy/unrealistic/just plain bad, etc. Shades does not need such scenes, and won’t contain any, but I can think of a couple of places in my Tindaari epic that might. (Celeste is a whore, by profession. Nuatha’s relationship with her is intimately *cough* tied to both his own sexual awakening and to his character arc. Some of that growth is going to take place in the bedroom…and I’m just going to have to get over it.)

Two, Saeli and Raphel’s relationship is grating on me right now. Not on a writerly level…I’ve just reread the whole manuscript so far, and I think I’ve got the level of sexual/antagonistic/partnership tension about where it needs to be. But I think it’s safe to say that I’m more emotionally attached to these characters than anyone else could possibly be. I want them to get together because I like Raphel and I’m a lot like Saeli, in some ways. Pure wish fulfillment. Something I know I can’t do in the story itself without destroying it, but something I *want*, nonetheless. (Hey, that’s what fanfiction is for, IMO. Pairing off characters just because the fans want it, not because it’s in any way hinted at in the canon.) This is actually a sign to me that I’ve Saeli’s and Raphel’s relationship right in the story, because part of the tension lies in the fact that they are, in some ways, perfect for each other…and yet, it just can’t work. I want the reader to hate that. I know this probably sounds ridiculous, but I want the reader to fall in love with Raphel and despair. It’s the major underlying problem Saeli has to overcome.

So, but okay, writer-me is satisfied, but fan-me is still grinding her teeth.

I may do it, just because. Maybe in between the actual finishing of the last chapters, in that time when I’d normally be checking Facebook or something. This is not something I’d be posting here, by the way. I know too many people that read this that I probably wouldn’t be able to face again, if I did. ;D No erotica on Nightphoenix’s blog, sorry.

I’ve decided I need to go back and read The Society of S by Susan Hubbard. I think, out of all the YA books I’ve read recently, that story’s pacing most closely resembles mine; a bit less action, bam-bam-wham, a bit more literary. (This is only compared to today’s popular YA, which tends to read very, very fast.) Since I enjoyed Society of S, despite its slower pace (or maybe because of it), I should go back and pay attention to how that was done.

Not much else to report. The spring forward thing is killing me. We didn’t eat supper tonight until like 8:30, ’cause I just couldn’t get my act together. Now it’s nearly midnight, and we have to go to bed soon. *sigh*

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Anyway, that’s why we’ve taken a break from our regular schedule of bloggish activities. I’ve actually been, you know, productive.

And the apartment is clean! It’s great! I can actually concentrate on clearing up some areas that always get ignored because I’m too busy trying to catch up with a backload of dishes and laundry.

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I’ve also been working on a book cover idea. It’s a scene that doesn’t actually appear anywhere in the story, but is rather a nod to the initial dream I had that inspired the story in the first place. I was with some dark-clad people, and we were hiding in a big city from a group of cold, white-robed people marching down the street, chanting like monks. I wasn’t one of the dark people, though, and I had the impression that I was actually supposed to be with the white-robed ones. But I wasn’t really one of them, either, though I was more like them than I was like the dark ones. But the dark ones weren’t really so bad, I found. (Thus, Saeli’s unique position in the world was born). Originally I had called the two groups the Blacks and the Whites, but it was suggested to me that those names were much too un-politically correct, and I agreed.
 
Scan:

This is the scan of the original drawing I did. It’s cobbled together from a bunch of different sources, which I put together in Photoshop and printed out. I then did what many might consider cheating, and traced straight from that composition using a lightbox. I would torn my hair out trying to get that architecture right otherwise. I’ve had to tweak the image sufficiently that I no longer feel guilty about it. (Wait…no. I never felt guilty about it. Oh well.) It looks weird at the bottom because the drawing is bigger than the scanner, and so I had to scan it in two pieces. The drawing isn’t going to show up on the finished piece; it’s only a guide for my Photoshopping. The figures in the foreground are Raphel and Saeli (if that wasn’t obvious). That is the High Priestess leading the line of professors; I haven’t decided who the others are (if anyone). That’s supposed to be the city Temple in the background.
 
Value sketch:

I learned about the concept of an underpainting in one of my Stetson classes, but I think this is the first time I’ve ever actually *needed* to do one. The purpose of the underpainting is to figure out where all the lights and darks will be. Because my source images came from so many places, my source composition had no consistant value scale whatsoever. (Plus, they were all daytime images, and this is a nighttime picture). The final image won’t be sepia-toned.
 
Where I’m at now:

Here’s where I’m at in the coloring process. I made the scene take place in the purple hour, Saeli’s favorite time of day. Right now I’m just filling in the flat colors; I will go back in different layers to put in the shadows and highlights. White buildings at night are interesting, to say the least. Black and white clothing isn’t much better. I’m trying to make it so that the grays on the left side of the image are made from purples, and the grays on the right are made from yellows, so that I have a warm gray/cool gray contrast. Saeli is pretty dead neutral.

The amount of work I can get done when I’m not at home is astronomical compared to what I do at my desk. I wish Books-a-Million opened earlier than 10AM. Places like Panera Bread and various coffee shops open early, but you really aren’t supposed to just sit in there without buying something (some places have a policy), and that could very quickly get expensive. I suppose I could sit outside and work (maybe when it gets a little warmer, heh). I got a lot of writing done Monday…if I can do that on all the days when Eli is at school, I can have the first book of Shades done by the end of March, which is my goal.

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