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lady-merian · 3 years

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For the WIP ask meme, The Dream Story and Prompt, please?

Dream story (a better name will come when I actually work on this)

So I don’t often remember my dreams. Even when I do, they seldom make a good story. This was one of those memorable dreams that I wanted to be sure I remembered, so I wrote down what I could remember and extrapolated from there, based on the very strong feelings the dream gave me.

This is what I wrote:

I had a dream last night that was part Alastair Coldhollow, part Leith Torren, part Tahn Dorn, part something else I don't know what.

Sort of like Alastair, this guy in my dream had worked as a hired sword, then assassin, but a bit more like Leith, he didn't really know what he was in for until it was too late. More like Tahn, fear kept him tied to his…employer… but warred with the guilt of knowing he was doing wrong until he couldn't stand it anymore. He left, but like Alastair it was with the knowledge that his employer would put a price on his head and the true authorities would want him for his crimes. I think his evil employer had protected the guy as long as he was serving his purposes, but when he leaves, the evil employer (who may be plotting rebellion?) wants him back, dead or alive.

The differences between this guy and all my other favorite ex-assassins is that he has a family. Two younger sisters, one married, and the other living with her and her husband. When my guy (he needs a name) quits, he goes to them because he hasn't seen them in a long time and he fears he may never see them again. He really thinks he's going to die, one way or the other.

They don't know any of this. He doesn't want to tell them, but the elder sister's husband somehow knows about it. I think he was personally hurt somehow by my character, and kinda hates him for it. He guilts my character into telling the older sister at least about it.

Unbeknownst to my character, that sister is seriously ill, maybe dying. This may be why she forgives him completely, and it helps the husband to forgive him too. (That is, seeing the guilt and hearing the full story.)

Up till now, he's thought of himself as a monster, unforgivable, and almost ready to turn himself into the true authorities in the hopes of at least getting them to look into his evil employer's (EE from now on) plots, though he doesn't see much hope in that as it might look like an excuse for his deeds, but at least whatever they do to him it wouldn't be as bad as the EE catching him and "making an example of him". I remember a sense of dread along with the guilt in the dream. Hopeless.

He wants to help his sister live. One life he can save. He knows something that the local healer wouldn't know, tied to his service to EE.

Somewhere he'll come across the gospel, but other than that I don't know what happens.

Update:More story thoughts this morning (6/9/17. I wish I'd written the date when I had the dream, maybe a few months ago?)

Anyway, I think a child, someone the younger sister's age, should be the one to tell him the gospel. He'll resist, saying (somewhat patronizingly) that it's a nice story, but in his experience when something sounds too good to be true it usually is. The child, upset, will probably bring up the eyewitnesses, who were tortured and died rather than give up their faith, and would they have done that if they knew it wasn't true?

But that reminds him more of the things he did. He answers something along the lines of "even if it was true, your God would want nothing to do with me."

This story has to be in first person. I know. I've said things like that before. If I ever write it, I will try.

Will I work on a changed names version of the gospel, or will I do it like Tahn in the way she kept it real? I still don't know for sure what I'm doing on Erandir’s Reckoning. It's got the potential to be in the same storyworld, but I don’t know.

"I knew all along that I'd die because of this. The only question was whether it'd be the rope, the sword, or a traitor's pyre."

-my mc. He so needs a name.

Idk. This gets the feel of what I'm thinking. Man, I want to write this.

That’s all I have for the dream story I’m letting the ideas percolate while I focus on my main stories and prompt

Prompt

this one is the easiest to describe. I’m in a very small writing group (small as in, two people besides me) that takes turns picking a prompt (usually one word) and writing short pieces based on them (my shortest was around 140 words, which I realize is hardly even a drabble but that was a rough week. My longest is around 1,500 words.) This year we switched from weekly prompts to making it two or three weeks for each prompt. Life got busy and I write slow. We often write things set in our respective story worlds, but we’ve used it as a way to branch out and explore different stories, new characters, different writing styles, and one of them even spun a neat little self-contained serial story that concluded last year.

It’s great fun. And I’d say this even if they weren’t my sisters.

I’m going to post a prompt here that has technically been finished, but I want to continue off of it sometime. It was partly inspired by the dream story, it might even be repurposed for that story if I ever get around to writing it.

Promise

I sat on the ground, trying to get my breathing under control. My hands were tied securely in front of me. A mistake, maybe, on my captors' part. They ought to know I didn’t need my hands free to be dangerous. If I was the only one in this trouble, escape wouldn't be much of a problem.

I wasn't.

Two years ago I wouldn't have cared about the kid beside me, wouldn't care that any attempt to escape on my part would have terrible consequences for him.

Two years ago I would have been on the other side. I would have had a weapon of my own ready to point at him if he tried anything.

I tried not to look like I cared now. If my former comrades had any idea of the lengths I would go to keep him safe, he'd be used against me. More so than he already was.

"Kid" was a misleading term, I suppose, but that's how I thought of him. He wasn't a literal child. He was old enough to fight for the Resistance, after all, and unlike some they didn't allow child soldiers.

He was maybe twenty. Maybe not. I felt ages older. Some of that was his youthful idealism. Most of it was the fact that I'd been living by my wits for almost as long as he'd been alive.

His name was Cade, and he was one of the few in the Resistance who trusted me enough to go on a mission with me. For that, I owed him my best efforts.

I knew how this would go. As soon as a prison transport arrived we would be taken to the Capitol and charged with treason. They would try to learn anything they could from us about the Resistance before we were sentenced. Given Cade's youth, he might not be executed outright. Especially if he gave them something useful. But that was a slim chance, and not one I was willing to take.

For me, there would be no mercy. Unlike Cade, I deserved to be called a traitor. I'd served with the Emperor's army for years until I couldn't ignore my conscience any longer. I’d known when I deserted that I was a dead man if I was ever captured. Joining the Resistance hadn’t changed a thing in that respect. They'd make an example of me either way.

I wasn't yet sure if it was really worth it. Had I made any difference at all?

It would definitely go worse for Cade if he was connected to me. I couldn’t let that happen.

He sat beside me now, unnaturally still. Usually he was a bundle of energy. Always in motion. Maybe he knew enough to conserve his energy for what was to come. His head drooped so that his mop of brown hair fell across his forehead, but I knew he was awake.

We were under guard, but for the moment no one was close enough to hear if we talked quietly. I seized the chance.

"Cade," I whispered.

He looked up, a question in his expression, but he didn't speak.

I took a breath. "When the transport comes, I'm going to give you an opening. When you see the chance, don't think twice, just run. Got it?"

"What about you?"

I lifted my shoulders. "If all goes well, I'll take off in the opposite direction and we'll meet later. No sense making it easy for them, all right?"

And they'd go for me. I knew they would. I clenched my hands to stop a tremor from showing.

His brows knit together. "I don't like your 'if.'"

"You don't have to like it. You just have to run as hard as you've ever run in your life and don't waste time looking back. Promise me you’ll run."

He looked hard at me. "Are you sure about this?"

"Promise me, Cade."

He studied me a moment more before finally saying, "All right. If you promise me you'll really try to get away."

Kid was smarter than I'd given him credit for. Worth any sacrifice on my part. He would do what I could not, and see this fight through to the end.

"Sure. I promise."

My words sounded hollow, even to me; for who would ever trust a traitor?

The end (for now)

Whew. It’s different from my usual prompts, but it seemed like a good choice for this since it was inspired by the dream story. I do have this thing about Ex-assassins. Thanks for asking!

#Whoops I forgot to explain who #Alastair Coldhollow #Leith Torren #and #Tahn Dorn #are. Favorite Ex-assassins who get great redemption arcs #I love them #my writing #ask meme #my ocs #Wip ask meme #wip ask meme answers

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