It’s The End of NaNo As I Know It
It’s the end of NaNo, or, well, pretty much. It’s 4.15pm here on the 30th, and I have Guides tonight.
As you can sort of tell, I didn’t win NaNo. I started off pretty good, actually being about a day ahead. And then I had camp, and that meant I lost about four/five days of writing time. I had a second overnight camp (but that still equals two lost days when you factor in prep-time and “oh gawd I am tired *snores” the day after) and then I got sick a little while after. So I kinda gave up, and set a new goal.
So all in all, I wrote about 25 000 words in 20 days. That is omgexcellent for me - the most I have ever written in a full month is 20 000 words, and my average is about 12 000. Now I know I can write so much more than I did before, which hopefully means I can keep doing it and finish the drafts for The Circled Green, Lionheart and Bones sooner than I otherwise would have thought.
Anyway, have one last teaser for The Circled Green (if you haven’t read the others, follow the teasers tag back a bit). I wanted to pick something with Aurora, but this is one of the earliest scenes that wasn’t all wrapped up in other stuff. Also, Ciar appears. Whether he is being less creepy is all up to you.
And yes, I know Aurora is weird at times, but just bear with it. Also bear with any errors or awkward sentences, as this is unedited NaNo stuff we’re talking about.
Grandmother Adelaide would kill her if she found out what Aurora had done.
Not only had she gone out without permission, completely missing out one of her lessons with her governess, she was not riding side-saddle as a lady ought to. Her hair was loose, she did not wear a hat, and she was galloping as fast as she could handle the horse.
And if that was not enough to earn her grandmother’s wrath to the point of murder, the fact that Aurora was wearing trousers to do all this would most definitely have done so.
So she ran. Away from Adelaide and her restrictions. Away from a world that forced her into tight corsets and huge skirts. Away from a world that discouraged her from so many things that she wanted to do, instead guiding her towards simple things like marriage. And children.
She rode so fast that the world was a blur of greens, all different shades from light and dark, blended with browns and greys of rocks and tree trunks and branches. The only thing that was truly visible was the back of the horse’s head, a warm brown colour, and his twitching ears. The world was spinning around her and she was afraid that if she stopped she would find herself in some far-off place, like India, having ridden all the way around the world.
Something dark dashed in front of her, and the horse reared up, panicked. Aurora shrieked and tried to hang on even as it did its best to throw her off. Hands reached up to grab her and pull her off. With one last scream she surrendered, and found herself flying through the air and towards the reaching hands. She twisted and turned, trying to escape their grasp but all she managed to do was to turn over and meet them, face to hands.
The world froze like that, with her seemingly suspended in the air forever. The only real thing in a vision of blurry and messy colours, waiting for the world to start up again so she could continue to fall.
It did, and down she went. The hands took hold of her and then there was nothing.
When the world returned, Aurora was not lying on the hard ground. Something was soft beneath her. Soft and moving.
She pressed her hands against the earth on either side and pushed up just enough to look down - and gasped. It was a man, a beautiful man, and he had cushioned her landing with his body. He had to have been the hands that were reaching for her. He had not been trying to pull her off to hurt her, she realised belatedly. He had been trying to save her.
Everything was completely inappropriate - the way she was dressed, the fact she was touching him, the way she was touching him as a whole, legs and stomach and chest all matching up and pressed together. At the very least she should have got up and off him, but she was struck by the way he looked and could not bring herself to move even one more inch away.
She had never thought a man could be beautiful. Women were the ones who were beautiful, like her. Men, on the other hand, were handsome, just like her father. That was the way things should have been, and yet it seemed completely and utterly wrong to call this man handsome. The only word that seemed right was beautiful.
He had striking, high cheekbones, and lips that shocked her with the inappropriate thoughts they caused her to have. His skin was tan but unmarked, the same even colour throughout without a single hint of blemish.
His eyes, when they opened, were so dark a brown that looked black and indistinguishable from the pupils. Even in the brightness of the day they looked like shadows - deep, out of place, and drawing Aurora in even as she fought to look away.
Inside her chest, her heart skipped a beat.
Mirrored from Catherine-Haines.com.