orty
July 11th, 2004, 06:53 PM
This is from a completed novel. I covet any opinion, good or bad.
CHAPTER ONE
Year 1210 Days 11-13
Thunderheads had been towering all afternoon hard edged, big-shouldered monsters that grumbled the threat of sky ripping lightning and bark-stripping wind. The lone rider kept one fretful eye on the burgeoning clouds and the other on the rocky hills. With the heavens at the brink of violence, he craved cover. Fortunately, he had just left the shelterless plains and here in the wooded limestone-mountains of southern Pneumaria he was likely to find some sort of refuge, a cave or at least a deep overhang. He was a brave man, a warrior and swordsman with few peers, but his heart hammered, swift reflexes and a steel blade were useless against lightning and wind.
Suddenly, with a leaf-churning blast, the air chilled, and the driving tempest engulfed him. Storm clouds, dense with frenzied power, blackened the sun and whipped the gentle afternoon breeze into a howling gale. Instantly, the horse and rider were drenched by cold rain and bludgeoned by fist-sized-hailstones. Raising a clamor like a stampeding herd on a covered bridge, the wild racket of tree battering hail, chest thrumming thunder and thrashing wind was maddening.
Shouting prayers to Tsarx, he burrowed into the stallion's rain soaked mane and spurred the charger into a turf-slinging gallop. As he pounded down the trail, he frantically searched for any kind of cover from the storm. At last, a score of yards off the path, illuminated by the ceaseless strobe of lighting he spotted the perfect refuge. Just beyond a copse of wind-whipped trees, an enormous slab of rock protruded from the mountain's steep face. There, sheltered beneath the rocky overhang, he saw a beautiful sight, a dark breach - the mouth of a cave.
Great gouts of lightning shredded both sky and hillside as he raced toward safety. "Almost there!" He cried into the wail when suddenly, with a ferocious crack and a blinding flash, a lightning bolt struck his horse in its flank, blowing him from the saddle and jerking his body like a cloth doll in the mouth of a mastiff. Flung from his mount, a spray of blood blossomed when his head speared the gnarled roots of one of the nearby trees.
Shadowy tendrils of unconsciousness dragged him towards darkness. Nevertheless, he bull-doggedly clung to awareness long enough to drag his way through the roar and fury and deeply into the cave. Therein, soaked with blood and rain and pummeled by the storm, he surrendered to oblivion's pull and heard the rending fury no more.
..
Pain. That distant and vexing sensation that had been worrying the edges of his consciousness was pain. It was a bit of a relief to finally be coherent enough to put a name with it. Unfortunately, as he was emerging from his stupor, the pain was throbbing into something far beyond a mere vexation, but that was not the worst. Like a demonic jockey straddling the back of his galloping agony rode an intruder even more dreadful panic. For as the bewilderment of fading unconsciousness gave way to wakefulness, he realized that he was not only injured but also in the dark. The total dark, the hammered shut coffin dark. But even that was not the primary source of his horror. For in a flash of crystalline understanding, like an icicle through his soul, he was exquisitely aware that not only did he not know where he was - he did not know who he was. Then, swept away in a frothing flood of terror, he filled his tomb with his screams.
Later, how long he could not say, an inner "something" managed to press through his panic. Clearly, he would not be delivered from the grasp of his nightmare by yielding to fear. He must try to be calm. He had to think, and take stock of his situation. Thus, on his back in the smother of a hellish midnight, fending off demons of insanity, and biting back his cries, he made this assessment: His head hurt. He probed the right front, the source of his greatest discomfort. It was gashed open and swollen, but not bleeding. It had been though, profusely, as flaky dried blood covered the side of his face and shoulders and matted his hair. Other injuries? He hurt, all over. Since it was impossible to take a visual inventory, he experimented by feel - he wiggled his fingers and toes, lifted his legs, rotated his arms, bobbed his head. After a thorough examination he was satisfied that none of his bones were broken - at least he could move everything.
But, the darkness! Seized by another crippling shot of terror, he feared that he was blind. Could not head injuries cause sightlessness? In desperation, he tossed a hand in front of his face, but that solved nothing, the impenetrable pitch saw to that. Yet, the utter blackness not withstanding, that intuitive sense rose again assuring him that his sight was fine and that he was just in a completely dark place. So, what place? With this thought, he decided to stand and find out. With great effort, throbbing head, and every muscle protesting he gathered himself, slowly took his feet, and there in the suffocating night, he listened.
Holding his breath, he pressed his faculties against the lightless void. Behind him he heard a distant and occasional ploink of dripping water and before him there was the faintest whisper of "Perhaps the wind," he thought hopefully. And then stretching out his hands, he groped blindly in all directions. His left grazed something, so he scuttled a bit closer. It was rock, a wall of rock cold, lumpy, and damp. And the smell that surrounded him? Fetid and earthy. With a small grunt of insight he muttered, I'm in a cave."
As he pondered his predicament, chilling questions like where, why, how, and who bayed like hungry hounds, but he refused to deal with those issues until the present predicament of reaching sunlight had been resolved.
CHAPTER ONE
Year 1210 Days 11-13
Thunderheads had been towering all afternoon hard edged, big-shouldered monsters that grumbled the threat of sky ripping lightning and bark-stripping wind. The lone rider kept one fretful eye on the burgeoning clouds and the other on the rocky hills. With the heavens at the brink of violence, he craved cover. Fortunately, he had just left the shelterless plains and here in the wooded limestone-mountains of southern Pneumaria he was likely to find some sort of refuge, a cave or at least a deep overhang. He was a brave man, a warrior and swordsman with few peers, but his heart hammered, swift reflexes and a steel blade were useless against lightning and wind.
Suddenly, with a leaf-churning blast, the air chilled, and the driving tempest engulfed him. Storm clouds, dense with frenzied power, blackened the sun and whipped the gentle afternoon breeze into a howling gale. Instantly, the horse and rider were drenched by cold rain and bludgeoned by fist-sized-hailstones. Raising a clamor like a stampeding herd on a covered bridge, the wild racket of tree battering hail, chest thrumming thunder and thrashing wind was maddening.
Shouting prayers to Tsarx, he burrowed into the stallion's rain soaked mane and spurred the charger into a turf-slinging gallop. As he pounded down the trail, he frantically searched for any kind of cover from the storm. At last, a score of yards off the path, illuminated by the ceaseless strobe of lighting he spotted the perfect refuge. Just beyond a copse of wind-whipped trees, an enormous slab of rock protruded from the mountain's steep face. There, sheltered beneath the rocky overhang, he saw a beautiful sight, a dark breach - the mouth of a cave.
Great gouts of lightning shredded both sky and hillside as he raced toward safety. "Almost there!" He cried into the wail when suddenly, with a ferocious crack and a blinding flash, a lightning bolt struck his horse in its flank, blowing him from the saddle and jerking his body like a cloth doll in the mouth of a mastiff. Flung from his mount, a spray of blood blossomed when his head speared the gnarled roots of one of the nearby trees.
Shadowy tendrils of unconsciousness dragged him towards darkness. Nevertheless, he bull-doggedly clung to awareness long enough to drag his way through the roar and fury and deeply into the cave. Therein, soaked with blood and rain and pummeled by the storm, he surrendered to oblivion's pull and heard the rending fury no more.
..
Pain. That distant and vexing sensation that had been worrying the edges of his consciousness was pain. It was a bit of a relief to finally be coherent enough to put a name with it. Unfortunately, as he was emerging from his stupor, the pain was throbbing into something far beyond a mere vexation, but that was not the worst. Like a demonic jockey straddling the back of his galloping agony rode an intruder even more dreadful panic. For as the bewilderment of fading unconsciousness gave way to wakefulness, he realized that he was not only injured but also in the dark. The total dark, the hammered shut coffin dark. But even that was not the primary source of his horror. For in a flash of crystalline understanding, like an icicle through his soul, he was exquisitely aware that not only did he not know where he was - he did not know who he was. Then, swept away in a frothing flood of terror, he filled his tomb with his screams.
Later, how long he could not say, an inner "something" managed to press through his panic. Clearly, he would not be delivered from the grasp of his nightmare by yielding to fear. He must try to be calm. He had to think, and take stock of his situation. Thus, on his back in the smother of a hellish midnight, fending off demons of insanity, and biting back his cries, he made this assessment: His head hurt. He probed the right front, the source of his greatest discomfort. It was gashed open and swollen, but not bleeding. It had been though, profusely, as flaky dried blood covered the side of his face and shoulders and matted his hair. Other injuries? He hurt, all over. Since it was impossible to take a visual inventory, he experimented by feel - he wiggled his fingers and toes, lifted his legs, rotated his arms, bobbed his head. After a thorough examination he was satisfied that none of his bones were broken - at least he could move everything.
But, the darkness! Seized by another crippling shot of terror, he feared that he was blind. Could not head injuries cause sightlessness? In desperation, he tossed a hand in front of his face, but that solved nothing, the impenetrable pitch saw to that. Yet, the utter blackness not withstanding, that intuitive sense rose again assuring him that his sight was fine and that he was just in a completely dark place. So, what place? With this thought, he decided to stand and find out. With great effort, throbbing head, and every muscle protesting he gathered himself, slowly took his feet, and there in the suffocating night, he listened.
Holding his breath, he pressed his faculties against the lightless void. Behind him he heard a distant and occasional ploink of dripping water and before him there was the faintest whisper of "Perhaps the wind," he thought hopefully. And then stretching out his hands, he groped blindly in all directions. His left grazed something, so he scuttled a bit closer. It was rock, a wall of rock cold, lumpy, and damp. And the smell that surrounded him? Fetid and earthy. With a small grunt of insight he muttered, I'm in a cave."
As he pondered his predicament, chilling questions like where, why, how, and who bayed like hungry hounds, but he refused to deal with those issues until the present predicament of reaching sunlight had been resolved.