Dandelyon's Worlds

So, there I was, happily writing on the current novel, when I realized we had to leave right away (in the middle of a climactic scene!) or we'd miss Mystique​'s doctor appointment. The sun was shining, the cats were playing, and all was well with the world. Well, the outer world. In the world of the novel, all was definitely not well, and was quickly getting worse. I was excited to see how things would play out, and my fingers were flying on the keyboard.

Oh, well, no help for it but to get up and go. Good doctors are like mothers. The more you reliably show up when they want to see you, the easier it is to convince them that there is a real emergency when one happens.

So then it was drive and drive and wait and wait and see the nice doctor (who really is a nice woman) and talk about all the routine boring things that people with chronic illness have to talk to their doctors about.

After that, a quick stop at the natural foods store that is just a couple of blocks from the doctor's office (well, that was the plan). This trip was mostly for my food, so a "quick stop" meant reading all the ingredients (in temporal duplicate) to make very sure there's nothing in the food that I'm allergic to and none of the manufacturers have changed their recipes. Then get in line. Wait and wait. Tell the checker that the fruit isn't black or red plums, it's pluots. Pack stuff into the bags we brought. Then to the pharmacies.

Oh, but first, rush hour traffic. Drive and wait, drive and wait, and then drive and wait some more. I've read that some people plan out their novels while driving; I don't know how they can do that. I'm just fine with talking on my cell phone (hand-free) while driving. That isn't more distracting to me than talking to someone who's physically in the car. But plotting novels? I tried it once, and I got so very, very lost. I do zone out while reading, and apparently also while writing, even the purely mental part of the process. Being totally uninterested in experiencing an automobile accident first-hand, I'm not trying that one again. So, when the rush hour traffic devolved into coast and brake, coast and brake, over and over and OVER again, all it did was waste time.

Then the pharmacies. (Wait--I said that already, and now you're wondering about the plurality.) One pharmacy has a pharmacist who's very helpful, but a computer system that loses one of the doctors' prescriptions. They're not perfect; the pharmacist has been unable to get one of my medicines for over a month, unless I want to buy the brand name at full price instead of the generic with the help of my insurance (though if I was completely out of it, they might approve me making a copay for the brand name at this point). But the nice pharmacist is working on that. The other pharmacy gets the one doctors' prescriptions reliably, but is less helpful in other ways. Happily, Mystique's insurance will cover prescriptions at both locations (unlike mine).

Recently, Mystique's insurance suggested she move to getting most of her meds on a three-month basis instead of every month. That's a good thing, except there seems to always be one or another prescription that gets filled for one month, either due to pharmacy error or a doctor's error in filling out the electronic prescription form, which apparently defaults to a one month prescription. So, go to one place, wait while they fix the one that was filled for only one month, then to the other to find out they didn't fill all of the prescriptions, only about half, so we'll have to wait a half hour while they do their thing. While waiting, get a call from the first place that one of the bottles didn't get put back into the bag when they were fixing the one filled for 30 days instead of 90. Circle back to get the missing bottle, then back again to get the last of the prescriptions, but one of the newly filled prescriptions was only filled for one month! *sigh* How on earth do people who are too sick to think straight or who just lack mental spoons manage?

Eventually, we got home to put groceries away and figure out dinner, and I was very pleased that my reusable cloth bag collection includes a couple of insulated zippered things designed for carrying cooked or cooled stuff to parties or picnics. The stuff we got frozen at the grocery store was still frozen when we finally arrived home.

The cats, who think we should stay home and pet, play with, and feed them on demand all day, were not impressed.



Now I'm yawning, a reminder that I need to make an appointment to try on CPAP masks, since I lost enough weight that the one I've been using isn't fitting so well any more. But it's too late to do that today!

And my poor characters, who are in the middle of confronting the faceless opponent who has been causing them misery for many chapters now, are likely to stay that way until tomorrow. Hang in there, folks, you'll figure it out, I have faith in you.

I found the perfect desk at the Milwaukee Restore this morning. It's big enough for art projects, has two small drawers for pencils and pens and the like, and instead of blocky drawers at both or one end, has legs like a table. It's covered with glass and is a beautiful walnut (the wood, not the stain). And there's the rub. Because it's old and walnut and in good condition, it's way over my budget for a table.



Even if I wait until Thursday, when the store has a general 20% off price, it's well over my budget, and there's no guarantee it will be there that long. The Restore is a place where people donate furniture, tools, and building supplies to benefit Habitat for Humanity, so when they get something in, it's gone when it's gone.

So, if you're willing to help me buy my dream desk and benefit Habitat for Humanity, I'm willing to do Card Readings (for fun and inspiration, as per federal law), write, or do art. If we don't raise enough or if this desk sells before I can buy it, I will reserve the funds until something else suitable shows up at the Restore, so your donation to me will still go to the same place eventually.

The sticker price for the desk, which would probably be more than $1000 in a regular, for-profit store, is $495.

Current funding level: $25 of $495 (This total includes donations from people here and people elsewhere)

You can send gifts to me at deirdremmm at aol*com or use the Paypal button below to tip. Paypal does take a cut of the donation if you use the button.

Thank you!

Please post here to let me know what (within reason) you want as a thank-you for your assistance in furnishing my writing office. I do reserve the right to refuse a request and refund your money.

This is Denel's reading, posted here for ellenmillion. It's a little long to post as a comment in the card draw, so I'm giving it its own post.

Note: Torn World’s language does not use gendered pronouns, and their names are also not marked as one gender or another. As Rai-Kunabei arrives in Affamarg, she has not yet heard any detail that would let her know if Scientist Oranaan is male, female, or no-gender.

The Shaman and the Scientist

Rai-Kunabei looked out of the window as the train rumbled into Affamarg. The thing was noisy and smelly, but she had to admit it was more biddable than a goat. It also moved faster than she could walk, and saved her the trouble of carrying her bag of divination disks and her bulkier, but lighter bag of clothing. The attendant had also helped her improvise a way to secure her staff, with its dangling bells and wraith-scarred spinning balls, so that she didn’t have to hold it all day to prevent it from falling and hitting some poor citizen in the head.

The city was all straight lines and crisp 90 degree angles, and none of the buildings had a fringe of bells strung over the roof. It looked so strange to her mountain-bred eyes. Her people built homes in low, sheltered spots or on gentle hillocks that had good views of the surrounding mountains. Buildings might have four corners, like the ones here, or five or seven. But the biggest difference was the roads—mountain roads curved with the hills and valleys; these each ran straight from the rail line to the horizon. There must be many hundreds of people living in this lowland city, none of whom would understand her sacred role as priestess. Once again, and despite her long-standing desire to see the world, she wondered, what was she doing here?

It was an emotional response, of course, not a logical one. Logically, she knew that the lowland scientists had invited her to this far northern city to learn what she knew of the mysterious danger that haunted her world’s heights. She glanced away from the window to the letter she clutched, like a talisman, in her hand. It had been delivered to her home, high in the Affabreidalam mountains, in a fat envelope filled with special licenses.

The licenses were tucked into her pouch; this Oranaan had promised to meet her train, and she certainly hoped he would do so, or at least would send someone. She had no idea whatsoever how to find her way around that huge city without assistance—all the streets looked identical to her eyes, and she imagined herself wandering for months down the identical straight streets, wasting away into a wraith herself.

Kunabei laughed at her own fancy, drawing cautious looks from the people in the same train car. Logically, she knew she could ask for directions, and any Monitor would take a look at the letter and licenses, and help her on her way. You’d think she was a crochety great-grandmother, lost a bit in her age and incapable of dealing with the slightest challenge.

In reality, she was a young woman, but definitely old enough to be past letting nerves make her fanciful, except, she thought, that she was bored. For days, she’d been whizzed along, passing the countryside so fast she couldn’t examine the wildlife and plants, much less enjoy their beauty or see how they differed from the ones she was used to. And though there was plenty of time, not a single person had asked for a reading or requested more mundane advice.

She looked again at the letter and wondered who this Oranaan was, besides an important, brilliant, and, by people’s reactions, eccentric scientist. She imagined someone like her grandmother, vibrant despite age and experience, with a sassy sense of humor. Or maybe someone like her grandfather, who compensated for his wife’s fame as a priestess by dressing in the gaudy, bright-colored clothing and jewelry, and flirting with all the old people. She remembered the tales of Oraaan blowing up things and setting his workplace on fire, and decided the scientist must be more like her grandmother.

The train started to slow, and Kunabei checked to be sure her bags were tied securely shut. The people running the trains had little tolerance for people who weren’t ready to disembark promptly. Travel was a privilege and required special licenses, so travelers were expected to be prepared for the normal events of a train trip.

The train pulled into Affamarg Station and lurched to a stop. Kunabei stood and untied her staff from the wall of the train. She slung her clothes onto her back and lifted the divination disks. They made a satisfying weight for her hand. She followed the other passengers to the door and into a room where a Monitor checked licenses.

The Monitor, a tall, very pale man, read her personal and travel licenses carefully, glanced at her priestess license and stopped, looking up at her. “Rai?”

Kunabei nodded, using every bit of calm authority she had learned since killing the wraith. “It’s a traditional title.”

He started to leaf through the multiple pages dubiously.

Kunabei smiled, and offered her letter. “I was asked here to meet with Scientist Oranaan.”

“Oranaan, huh? What does the Scientist need with a--a Priestess?”

Rai Kunabei was pretty sure he had a different word in mind. “I do not believe he wants to consult me in that capacity. I believe he has questions about certain phenomena I witnessed in the mountains.”

The Monitor apparently found her answer dull, which didn’t disappoint Kunabei at all. He folded her licenses together and tucked them back in her pouch. “Here you go, Citizen.” He handed her the pouch and then a small booklet of local rules and regulations. “Be careful, Citizen. Oranaan had a fire in the laboratory again just last week. My sister’s kid said Oranaan was tasked with teaching safety in second form.”

She laughed at that. “Teaching is a good way to learn, actually.”

But the Monitor had already turned to the next person in line, so Kunabei strode toward the door.

At the far end of the waiting room, she saw two people in Indigo scientists’ robes. One was a demure-looking woman, and the other was a very young man with tousled hair. The man was waving his arms, talking animatedly, and barely missed knocking a hat off of a passing matron. Though she couldn’t hear them, from the look on her face it was clear that the woman started scolding him, and he dropped his hands to his sides, then she saw Kunabei and gestured, stepping past him to walk toward her.

Kunabei smiled with relief, and walked forward to greet the woman. “Scientist Oranaan. It is good to meet you and your assistant.”

The woman blushed and dimpled. “Rai Kunabei?“

Kunabei nodded.

“Welcome to Affamarg. I am Scientist Denel, and this,” she gestured to the young man, who was gaping at her, “is Scientist Oranaan. How was your trip?”

Up close, Oranaan looked a little less like a scatterbrained teenager, though it was clear he’d never been mistaken for his own assistant before.

“I’m sorry, Scientist Oranaan, no one ever told me what you look like.”

He suddenly grinned, an expression that didn’t exactly make him handsome, but was so very alive and genuine, Kunabei grinned back at him. He turned to the other scientist. “You see, Denel, you should have more faith in your ability to impress people. She thought you were me!” He turned back to Rai Kunabei. “Here, let me help you!” He reached forward and grabbed the bag of divination disks, just under where Kunabei held it, swinging it toward him before getting her permission.

Kunabei let go of the bag—he was a lowlander, after all, and didn’t know he was being disrespectful.

The bag swung into Oranaan’s shins. “Ow!” He gave Kunabei a measuring look. “What’s in here?”

Kunabei smiled, deciding that she liked this impulsive young man. Despite giving himself what would doubtless be substantial bruises, he had not dropped the bag. “Those are my divination disks.”

Denel laid her hand on Kunabei’s arm. “Are you hungry? There’s a restaurant near here that claims to serve Affabreidalam-style food, or we can go get some traditional Mojeveterk specialties if you prefer.”

Oranaan’s stomach rumbled. “Oh, yes! Can we get you some food?”

Kunabei nodded. “I’d like to try the local food, if that’s all right. I’ve never been further than Affabreidalam before.”

They guided her across the street and Oranaan was greeted by name at the restaurant. Soon, they had a good-sized table and Oranaan presented a chit and ordered a sampler plate.

When the server left, Oranaan started to untie the bag of disks.

Denel put her hand over his. “Oranaan, my boys know better than to open someone else’s luggage.”

He blushed. “Ah, I apologize, Rai Kunabei. It’s just I’ve never seen divination disks before.”

“I could do a reading for you, but our tradition is that the Rai should not do readings for the disrespectful. And as Rai, it is my job to uphold the traditions.”

Oranaan’s face fell. “But I didn’t mean to be disrespectful.”

“That’s all right. You can ask again tomorrow.”

He looked woefully at the bag, and then back at her face. “Wait—Denel wasn’t disrespectful, was she?”

“That’s right.”

“Then you could do a reading for Denel!”

“I only do readings for people who ask for them.”

The server arrived with a large platter of food, and set it in the middle of the table, placing small plates in front of each of them. Oranaan turned to Denel, “You will ask for a reading, won’t you?”

Denel thanked the server and shifted the topic to the different foods on the sampler plate.

Oranaan sighed, “Denel? Will you?”

Denel smiled at him fondly. “I might ask after lunch.” She pointedly turned to Kunabei and asked, “What would you like to try first?”

Lunch was pleasant, and most of the foods were very good, if a little sweeter than Kunabei was used to. Oranaan threw himself into the role of host with evident enjoyment of the food, but his eyes darted back to the leather bag holding the disks even while he related hilarious stories about his mostly-failed first attempts to cook the dishes she was tasting.

Kunabei started to wonder how much of Oranaan’s reputation for carelessness was really a reflection of his joy in being outrageous. Did this reputation let him achieve more leeway to do unconventional experiments than he would otherwise get away with?

The server brought out some after-meal pastries, which proved to be even sweeter than the lunch itself.

Finally, when the server had cleared away all the food and left them with hot drinks (Kunabei had managed to score an unsweetened tea, to her relief), Denel asked Kunabei about the divining disks.

“It would take too long, I think, to try to talk about all of them now. But I could give you a reading, if you like.”

Denel paused just long enough to see Oranaan biting his lower lip, and then responded, “Yes, please. I would like that.”

Rai Kunabei untied the bag. “Do you have a particular question?”

“I—do I need to?”

“No. But you can choose to.”

Denel thought for a minute, but then shook her head. “No particular question—no, wait—tell us about our research, if you can.”

Kunabei nodded. “All right then. The simplest reading is three disks. The first one shows you the nature of the situation the reading is about.” She started to reach in to the bag, then paused, glancing rom Denel to Oranaan. “You do have the right to privacy if you want it.”

Oranaan opened his mouth, holding up a hand.

Denel laughed. “No, no. It’s fine for Oranaan to watch.”

He sat back in his chair.

“That’s what I thought you wanted, but you can’t learn the traditions unless I share, since you did not grow up in the mountains.”

Denel nodded. “That makes sense.”

“All right, I shall begin.” Kunabei reached into the bag and pulled out a disk. It was big enough to cover her entire palm, and was made of soft, shiny bronze. She turned it over to show an enameled image of a hammer smashing some piece of wooden furniture.

“The nature of the problem is Destruction, the embodiment of human-made endings. Whatever you are studying, human actions have made the situation worse, or perhaps caused the situation, either recently or in the distant past.”

Oranaan held out his hand. “May I look at the disk, please?”

Kunabei let it slide gently from her own hand to his. Most people, faced with the image of destruction, didn’t want to touch it, but this young scientist was fearless. He turned it over and over, running his fingers over the metal and enameled sides of the disk.

Kunabei turned to Denel. “The second disk has to do with the tools that are involved in the situation, which, in this case could be either the tools that were or are used to bring about this situation, or it could be the tools you need to address the problem.”

Denel nodded her understanding.

Kunabei reached into the bag and drew out another disk. This one was gold, and showed an elder seated on the ground, a bag by her knee and holding scorched ball whistles in her hands. It was a tolerable likeness of Kunaei’s grandmother, though the artist who made it had never met the old priestess. “This is the Shaman, who is the embodiment of abstract knowledge. From this, I would say that physical tools are of limited use in addressing the problem you are studying. Human perception, intelligence and the knowledge handed down from our ancestors will be vital to understanding what is going on. That is interesting, because usually the knowledge and attitudes that shed light on the topic at hand shows up as the third disk.”

She passed the Shaman to Oranaan, then reached in a final time and brought out an iron disk. The image enameled on one side was a sheer cliff, with a tiny figure clinging precariously to the rock. “The Cliff, which is the dangerous aspect of borders.” Kunabei fell silent, considering the disk. “It might be that the knowledge you need has been passed down by people in very different parts of the world, so that the social divisions remaining from the old borders are a barrier to obtaining the information you need. Or perhaps this is more literal, and the old borders have something to do with the problem. Or maybe,” she looked over at Oranaan, “it could simply be a warning that pushing your licenses to their limits is perilous in and of itself, and the chaos you cause could be threatening your effectiveness to obtain the information you need.”

Oranaan frowned at that. “You’ve heard stories about me. Is that all this is, stories?” He gestured at the disks.

Kunabei shrugged. “Stories are an effective way to teach, and to get people thinking about their problems in a new way. If you are asking me is there some science behind which disk is drawn when, all I can say is that if there is, I don’t know it. All I can offer is my personal observations that people who ask for readings do get some benefit from the experience.”

She placed the final disk into Oranaan’s hand, and unhooked her own scorched ball whistle from her staff, which was leaning in a corner. “It’s similar to this—I didn’t see what scorched this whistle, but something did. It’s not very satisfactory that I cannot tell you what a wraith looks like or why it attacks people in the highlands, but I take comfort from knowing that the whistle protected me.”

Oranaan dropped the disks into Denel’s hands and reached for the ball. “This—this came into contact with an anomaly? And you were there? You survived? You’re not mad?” He stopped short of touching it. “May I hold it?”

Kunabei nodded. “I met a wraith in the mountains and survived. That is how I came to be the shaman for my people.” She put the ball into his hands. “Certainly you can look at it. But remember it is sacred to me. You may not subject it to explosions or laboratory fires or do anything else to it without letting me know exactly what you plan and getting my prior approval.”

Reluctantly, he nodded, but still, Kunabei watched him carefully as she took the disks from Denel and returned them to her bag. As she tied it up, the server walked up and bowed to the scientists. “If you are finished with your lunch, we would like to clean this area and get set up for the dinner crowd.”

“Oh, of course. I apologize, we didn’t realize how late it has gotten. Denel took the ball from Oranaan and handed it back to Kunabei, who tied it securely to her staff.

Oranaan smiled at the young woman and reached into a pocket, taking out a thin sliver of metal that shone with swirls of bright color, almost like the mystery disk in Kunabei’s bag.

Oranaan stood and pulled out a pen and signed the rectangular bit of metal, then handed it to the server. “I’m not much of an artist, but this is part of a plate that was damaged in the last laboratory fire. It is, if nothing else, unique.

The server’s eyes grew round, and he took the slip of metal. “Thank you, Scientist. You are welcome to return any time.”

They guided Kunabei back outside into the sunlight, and turned left. Denel started laughing as soon as the door closed behind them. “You turned your—your slag—into tip cards? Oranaan, you are incorrigible!”

Oranaan smiled, and offered his free arm to Kunabei. “Let us take you to the room we reserved for you, and then we can go find an Assistant to take notes while you tell us all about your encounter with the wraith.”

_____________________

As usual, this is posted prior to Canon-Board review, so it may be edited for coninuity. There are other stories about Rai-Kunabei, Denel, and Oranaan over at www.TornWorld.net

Sandie read the local papers obsessively, though most of them weren’t even on paper any more. They had kept her finger on the pulse of her City, so she could sell feature articles and humor pieces to the magazines. Now she also read the #Chicaugwa twitter stream and various local blogs and Facebook pages too. Chicaugwa was endlessly fascinating, vibrant and alive.

But today she frowned as she read. There were more want ads, but people complained of insufficient jobs. Apartment ads were plentiful, and house sales were down. Economic indices were up, but the spirit of the people of Chicago was unhappy, restless, even hopeless. She had seen it first on the street, in the grocery stores and restaurants, but now it was everywhere, even on MySpace. People were leaving, packing up their families and pets, abandoning beloved jobs, and, like it was an afterthought, putting their dream homes into the hands of harried real estate agents. It just didn’t make sense.

Sandie picked up the next neighborhood paper and scanned it, then shook her head. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong, but this only showed the symptoms. She would have to go out and find the cause—but where?

It was time to check a different source of information. The old ways were usually vague or as maddeningly symbolic and obscure as the Delphic Oracle, but sometimes they were needed.

She cleaned her dining room carefully and took the leaves out of the center of the tablee, leaving herself with a proper circle to work on. She laid out a fine, microfiber tablecloth, then set five candles equidistant around the edge and lit them. Five tiny carved cats, each with a cone of incense were next. Then she started to spread the papers on the dining room table. For this, she needed real paper, so she identified a number of the puzzling articles and posts online and set her printer to chattering.

She shifted the papers until the pictures, columns of text, tweets, and advertisements shaped into a pentacle, and the whole table was covered. Finally, at the center of the table, she placed the stand for her crystal ball. It was brass, and depicted five cats, each with different precious stones for eyes—amber, opal, peridot, sapphire, and amethyst. Finally, she lifted the crystal ball from its case and set it carefully on the stand. It was natural quartz, expensive and beautiful.

Then she lit the incense and breathed deep, walking around the table and opening her inner eyes. She sank into the process; she had inherited enough of the catkin magic for this, but only barely. She chanted as she walked, waiting until she felt the flare of the magic deep inside, then turned toward the table and opened her eyes.

She was facing the cat with opal eyes, and saw its tail twitch angrily. It was not looking at her, however. It was looking over at a picture of the Lakefront earlier that year, the article about tourists visiting the ice caves before everything in the city had gone nuts.

Sandie didn’t remember printing that article, much less placing it on the table.

She whispered to the cats, “Show me, please—who is messing with my city?” She leaned over the table and gazed into the ball. Immediately, as clearly as if it were a cute baby animal post on Facebook, she saw a beaver frolicking in icy waters, swimming in circles, up and down and around and around. She watched for a moment, but like a facebook video, that was really all there was to it. As expected, a riddle.

She sighed and looked at the cat, and was surprised to find herself looking at the one with amethyst eyes. She sighed with relief. The cats were willing to answer more than one question, this time. That was rare, and precious, and probably meant that her city was in even more trouble than she had realized. She considered, then asked, “Where should I look first?”

All the articles she had been reading spun in front of her eyes, as if to say, “everywhere”. She pushed at the magic harder and leaned in to look at the crystal ball. Words from headlines and ads flashed by as the articles kept spinning, faster and faster. Animal rights, natural habitat, pollution, wilderness. Then she was too dizzy to focus and the magic she could call, exhausted, was slipping away.

It wasn’t enough! She reached, swinging her arms out, reaching in an attempt to grab at least one more clue, and her left hand hit a small glass bottle, knocking it over.

What? She had cleaned the room! Where did the bottle come from?

Dizzy, she fell against the wall. She was by one of the doorways, and she grabbed the moulding there, looking over at the table. What had she hit?

An open bottle of indelible India ink lay there, open, on its side. She watched as the ink spread across the papers on the table, forming a complex set of perfect concentric circles, each one overlaid with strange symbols. She watched in horror as the ink sank into the paper, twisting faces from smiles into grimaces of fear or anger or longing and obliterating or reshaping words. The smoke from her incense cones swerved in the still air of her apartment to avoid the area.

She’d gotten her additional clue—someone had cursed Chicaugwa, cursed her city carefully and thoroughly.

She stared in horror at the mess on her dining room table, knowing that it had become her responsibility to rescue her city, though she didn’t have the training or the magical power to even really understand what had been done. And the symbolism of the India ink was not lost on her. The curse had already soaked into the fiber of the City, like a stain on the tapestry woven by the fates.

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Thank you to tigertoy for the prompt!

If you like what you read, and want to encourage me to put more time into one or another of my projects, please let me know. Requests from people who sponsor me will get priority!

With thanks to ankewehner, for the prompt, here is another Catkin ficlet. I am also posting this as my #flashfriday story. I'm hoping to do this more often, though I've been focusing on finishing a novel, whose working title is Clockwork Dragon.

H is for Helpful

Bindi walked the frozen alleys restlessly, changing from human to cat form when the moon rose. Sean followed, his sleek black pelt letting him hide in the shadows. As they drew near to her apartment, he came over to her, rubbing against her brown-furred shoulder with his own. He looked pointedly at the open window.

Bindi stood, her dark tail twitching. The neighborhood felt wrong, as if cold air was emanating from the beaches, though it was early in the winter, and the weather maps showed that the lakeside was, as always before midwinter, warmer than the rest of the city.

She jumped to a wall, and murmured the cantrip that tucked her clothes neatly around her skin as she changed to human form again. The black cat jumped to her lap, and waited. Sean was fun in bed, but lacked either the magical talent or the will to practice even such minor spells. Changing back would have left him naked in the snow.

“There’s something wrong,” she told him.

He rolled his eyes, a very human gesture on his slender feline face.

“Yes, I know I’ve said that before. I just wish I knew what it was, or at least where it’s coming from.”
He looked east. From here, they could see Lake Michigan, or at least the part near enough to the shore to have been turned into a frozen wasteland by the unseasonable cold.

“Yeah, the feeling is worse the further east we go, but there’s nothing out there but ice. When we drove up to Waukee and then all the way to Manistee, the bad feeling was clearly coming from the Chicaugwa area, not someplace in the middle of the great lake.”

Sean purred, remembering the pleasantries on the trip, and rubbed against her, looking again at the window.

“I’m really worried,” she said, not reacting to his invitation at all.

He stood on her lap and shimmied, running a dramatic shiver down his body, and looked again at the window.
“You think it’s the cold? I don’t think so. Weatherworking takes a lot of power…but then, tying magic in to the weather isn’t as hard as shaping it.” She petted his head absently, thinking hard. “It still takes more power than one person is likely to have. If some group is casting a spell, tying it into the cold somehow, that could account for me feeling things are getting more ominous every day.” Bindi shivered for real. “They’re not predicting a thaw for weeks. I don’t like this. I don’t like it at all.” She lifted the black cat up to her face and kissed him. “Thanks, Sean, you’ve been very helpful.” She rubbed his head. “I’ve got to talk to some people about this. See you later.”

Bindi put him down on the windowsill and shifted, her clothes vanishing magically only a moment before she disappeared in the normal feline fashion.

Behind her the tomcat jumped into the window and packed his meagre belongings into his backpack. He left a figurine, a black cat windsurfing, on her dresser to thank her for her hospitality and let her know he was headed to warmer climes. He hesitated, then left a bottle of subtle perfume next to the figurine. The bottle was tied shut with a twist of his own black hair. He would happily take Bindi with him, but Chicaugwa was her territory, and female catkin were as bound to their territory as toms were to wandering. He knew she wouldn’t leave—they never did—but he would be very happy to see her again. And maybe, if this impending doom was bad enough, Bindi would track him down.

He murmured the one cantrip he had mastered, and the enchanted pack shrunk down into a battered-looking collar around his neck. He prowled through the small apartment one last time before leaping to the windowsill and pushing it closed from the outside. He leapt lightly to the alley, and set off. He felt lonely already, but even so, it felt good to be on the road, headed away from whatever doom was aimed at Chicaugwa.

I went to an excellent panel on anger in fiction at Loncon. They started with a quote from Abigail Nussbaum, who said there is an "increasing prevalence of vengeful victim characters, who are condemned not for the choices they make in pursuit of revenge, but simply for feeling anger..." (emphasis added)

My first reaction on reading that quote was, Wait--that's not fair! Anger is an emotion. Sure, it's a powerful one. It's a reaction to bad things happening, but the emotion itself isn't bad, and feeling it doesn't make you a bad person. Sure, anger can inspire you to do bad things, but so can any emotion, including "good" emotions like love. And it's just not right to punish people for their feelings.

I have long maintained that anger is a powerful emotion, and potentially a strong force for good. Anger is the energy that says "this is wrong and has to change". Sometimes you need to move past anger without making a change--for example, if you are dying, no change is possible, and you have to move on in the grief cycle.

But other times change is both possible and desirable; the challenge then isn't to eliminate the anger, but to find ways to channel that energy constructively rather than destructively.

The panel itself was interesting; people said you need to separate the emotion from the consequences; it was clear that they were recognizing that when you feel anger, or another emotion, you have choices to make not only about whether to express it but how to express it. I would have said you need to separate the emotion from the action, and also the emotion and action from the consequences. That might seem nit-picky, but I have run into problems in the past where one person assumed that the only possible reason for an action was his reason for that action, and he condemned someone else not for the action, but for what he thought was the motive for the action.

Another thing that was discussed by panelists is something I could rephrase into the old cliche, "the squeaky wheel gets the grease." You have to speak up to initiate a change, but sometimes merely speaking up isn't enough. Sometimes you have to be loud and persistent to be noticed. (Of course, sometimes being loud just gets the people you need to listen to shy away in fear or distaste. Other times, it locks your desired audience into a closed defensive mind-set where they are too busy defending against a perceived or real attack to really hear your words.) But that doesn't change the fact that sometimes yelling is needed to convince someone to listen.

Panelists also mentioned things I hadn't realized, for instance the fact that if a minority expresses dissatisfaction with the status quo, no matter how politely or calmly they speak, they are perceived to be angry. This was a big "aha" moment for me, since I've been bewildered at the reactions I've gotten from white men at times--them believing I was making an angry attack would explain things nicely.

This also (in my mind, anyway, though I don't remember any one panelist stating this conclusion) may explain why we are taught that anger is a negative and harmful emotion--it's a force of change, and the people in charge want to stay in charge. Anger is dangerous to them not only when it is expressed destructively, but even and perhaps especially when it is expressed constructively.

Anger might lead to real change, after all.

And there's certainly things that need changing all around us.

So, if you're angry (and I hope you are, at least some of the time), be careful. How you express your anger matters. If you're not careful, you could destroy things you value, hurt your friends and alienate your allies. You could make the needed changes harder.

You've got to remember that the goal isn't merely expressing your feelings. That's important, but it isn't nearly enough.

So if you're angry, consider what your bigger goal is, consider your audience, and act carefully. Good luck making the changes you need manifest in your life!


And now I'm off to consult with certain of my characters, because I suspect some of the stuck-bits in my stories have to do with not identifying or clearly showing their anger. I wonder how many of them will heed my advice? Will they make changes or dig themselves in deeper? You know, from a writing perspective, this is exciting stuff!

So, I figure you folks deserve an update--I had big plans, once taxes were done, and as you have seen, or more precisely not seen, I haven't been doing the planned world building A-Z ficlets. Of course, I haven't been doing much except for sleep, taking pills, monitoring my temperature, and coughing. I am a lot better than I was on Easter, but am still getting up, making food to take my antibiotics with, and laying back down, exhausted, afterward. I haven't had energy for writing or Sketchfest (the 50th!); I've done some half-hearted re-reading of stories and some half-hearted computer games (with a ludicrous rate of dyslexic mistakes).

There will be more writing, I hope very soon. It's very frustrating, at least in theory, but mostly I'm too tired for even that. And if I can't even keep track of which colored bubble is next, I'd probably muck up any writing too. I don't feel so bad about abysmal gaming; I'd feel much worse about bad writing.

Oh, well, tomorrow I'll call the doctor and see if he's satisfied with my progress so far. I'm not done with the antibiotics yet, but if he has additional advice, I'll be happy to listen.

You all stay well! I don't want to share this misery.

The cat walked up to the police officer, meowing. The sounds resolved into words in Officer Savannah Leahy’s mind. “There is something sinister going on in this neighborhood. The dead are screaming for justice.”

The police officer hooked her fingers in her belt, then frowned down at the cat. “Isn’t that kind of like an over-dramatic movie cliché?”

The cat twitched her tail. “Cliché or not, it’s true. Savannah, they are disturbing my dreams.”

Savannah crouched down and held out her hand for the cat to sniff, as if this were a normal stray. “So, what are they saying?”

“There’s no words, just screaming.” The cat twitched her tail, as if the human were being particularly dense.

“Look, I know you’ve brought me useful information in the past, but I don’t know what I can do with this—this complaint.” Savannah stared at the cat, trying to figure out which neighborhood woman this might be, when she wasn’t clad in tabby fur.

“Find and punish the killers!” The cat sounded stressed-out.

Savannah sighed. That was easier said than done. “I need more than that. I can’t just catch murderers like magic, you know, Cat.”

“Don’t call me Cat.” The tabby’s tail lashed.

“Then tell me your name.” Savannah asked every time the cat approached her.

“You know better.”

“Well, Cat, I can’t exactly fill out a citizen complaint that the dead are unhappy. I have a caseload, and paperwork, and a life.” More accurately, Savannah had the first two in abundance, and a thus-far ignored New Year’s resolution to work on the third. “Look, I’m not unsympathetic, but I’m just a cop.”

The tabby twisted to lick the tip of her tail. “You are a police officer, but you are not ‘just’ a police officer. A crime is being committed, and you will investigate.”

“I can’t investigate something I can’t see, hear, or touch.”

The cat nodded. “I knew you would say that. Here—this is the best I can do.” The cat flicked her tail to the side and revealed a set of earbugs nestled between two protruding tree roots.

Savannah bent to look at them. The earbugs were made of some exotic wood, golden with a remarkably red grain. They were carved into detailed butterflies, and linked with a braided silk cord. Their tiny carved eyes gleamed at her, and somehow the carved wings shimmered with iridescence. They were beautiful. Savannah reached to pick them up, to examine them more closely. She had very little magical talent, but these—they made her fingers tingle. She stood there, staring at what she realized was at least a powerful magical tool, more powerful than anything she’d ever hoped to hold in her hand. She longed to keep it, but found herself thinking about putting it down and walking away. Magic was never free.

The cat’s tail twitched. “They’re for your ears.”

“I couldn’t tell.” Savannah’s sarcasm was reflexive.

The tabby’s tail continued to twitch.

Cautiously Savannah raised one exquisitely carved butterfly toward her left ear, then jerked it away again as a raucous, dissonant howling invaded her consciousness. She tried to drop them on the ground again, but the cord caught in her fingers. “What is that?”

“Don’t play dumb. And don’t lose the earbugs.” The cat turned and vanished into the bushes.

Savannah tucked the earbugs safely into a pocket. She could return them, perhaps, if she could find the cat again, but it would be a dangerous insult to throw them away. For the moment, she was off-shift and hungry. This would have to wait at least until after dinner.

______________

Thank you to moon_fox for the prompt. (queenoftheskies I haven't forgotten you.)

Some of my friends did a world-building month in February and I wanted to join in, but I just couldn't. I didn't have enough spoons--or perhaps pencils would be a better metaphor, in this case. I wasn't quite tired enough to evade feeling envious, though.

So I've decided I'm going to do a world-building month in April instead, and am combining it with the April A-Z challenge. Now all I need is topics for every letter of the alphabet!

If I have to, I suppose I can make up topics myself, but it's more fun if friends challenge and inspire me. I'm collecting prompts over here.  Or you can leave questions or other prompts here.

It's good to see you all!

It sounds idyllic, doesn't it?

Life is never that simple, of course. Any big accomplishment requires (usually substantial) amounts of just plain hard work, and writing excellent fiction is no exception.

But so much of my life, I've had to go to sleep when my mind and spirit were ready to write, even if my body wasn't ready for sleep, so I could get up before I felt really rested and be awake enough to go sit in somebody else's desk all day being coherent and competent and productive until quitting time.

Mind you, there are many things I like about the day job I chose, since I had to choose one (I am reasonably certain I would have lost fingers to factory work). There are definitely things I will miss about it (the work itself, not just the regular paychecks). These last few days, especially, I've been told I've been doing an excellent job there, and will be missed.

But I have another dream, work that I love more. I have been trying to do this work in my off hours, but with limited success.

And even though I'll doubtless trade the positive performance reviews for a significant proportion of virtual rejection slips, I'm excited to be doing this.

I feel so lucky that I can start to work at making my dreams real in my own "on" hours.