Snippet
A writing group buddy heard me read this bit aloud, and said "You're a f***ing good writer," after I was done. I was really flattered. Especially since I felt (and still feel, although it is edited a little) that this is too exposition-y and there's not enough, um, something. I'm not going to explain the backstory, because this is the middle of the novel, but I hope the emotion is getting out there the way I want. Some of it (with luck and skill) you'll be able to infer, anyway.
Rain slashed down on the beach as I ran from the wreckage of the village, and the consequences of my saving what was left of it. There was nowhere to go. I just needed to be running. I could feel the extra energy of the Nightwood powder crawling through me, the extra clarity and light and the burning need to be moving. The weather sparked along my veins; the clouds, the wind, the snarl of a storm out of its place. The giant thunderheads gathering at the sudden onslaught of temperature change. I couldn't stand there, looking at the faces of people who were not happy to see me save them with the Stranger's kind of worship. They did not care that I saved them, only how.
Sand whipped into my eyes with the frenzied wind. I couldn't see, but I didn't care. Sobs I barely took note of tore from my throat at each breath, drowned out by rolling thunder. My legs gave out about the same time as the beach. In front of me stood cliffs and weeds and more Nightwood trees above. I collapsed to the sand, the powder beginning to abandon me, and let tears roll down my face with the rain. I threw handfuls of sand at the cliffs and screamed. This is where I started to begin with. Outcast. I had nowhere to go. I was outcast from both my countries. And from my family, now, for a second time.
I felt a hand on my shoulder shaking me. I expected Nodin or Kesari, but it was my father. "Satinka," I saw him say through my tears, but the wind along the cliffs and my own breathing meant I couldn't hear him. He yelled something about sending the storm away, but he didn't understand. I pulled it here, out of its normal pattern. I had nowhere to send it. It put out the fire when I asked. And now it had to play itself out. Calling a storm of this magnitude had its price. I shook Popi off and sat in the downpour, watching the breakers get huge, eating away at the beach. I had no more to give in saving the Holy Island from any more disasters today.
**
And then I wrote this bit for a scene that follows, which I just really like for some reason.
**
When your life is shattered, you contemplate things that never occurred to you before. Actions which seemed unthinkable you suddenly take with no thought at all. And the things you agonized over seem easy in comparison. When your life is shattered over and over again you begin to expect it. I was not even particularly surprised to find myself on a ship again, leaving another part of me behind. What I was surprised was to learn there were still pieces of me to leave.
**
I don't know, I just really like that last line. It gives me visions of what's coming next. Which I am *so* grateful for, I can't even tell you.