Because for the last few months I haven’t been particularly generous with my WIPpet contributions, here is a slightly longer excerpt. Be happy and join us!
So today is the 15th and I have for you the beginning of chapter 15. Once again, not a happy part of the story. Kara has gone to war against a Northern invasion force. She has with her a posse of friends, including Laney, her friend from childhood, and Meg, who was once a maid at the palace.
‘Laney?’
The subject of Karavere’s search looked up from her discussion with Meg, ‘Yes?’
‘May I speak with you?’ she glanced at Meg, ‘Alone?’
‘Of course.’ Laney stood, sparing a puzzled glance for Kara. Her friend was normally unflappable to the extent of being obnoxious. Laney could not recall a time when she had last seen Kara looking so vulnerable. ‘I have a room in the west wing. We should not be disturbed there.’
Dragging her steps, hoping to delay the inevitable, Karavere followed Laney to the shoebox of a room where she slept. With both of them inside, seated with crossed legs on the palette, there was no room to swing a mouse let alone a cat.
‘Laney…there is…I….’ the tears leaked from the corners of Kara’s eyes, ‘Oh, gods, Laney, I’m so, so, sorry.’
Laney felt dread creep up from her stomach. It sunk into her bones and filled her throat with its invisible solidity so that she could barely breath past it, ‘What is it, Kara?’ she whispered.
‘Your brother, he’s…’
R.E. Navan 
“Laney felt dread creep up from her stomach. It sunk into her bones and filled her throat with its invisible solidity so that she could barely breath past it,” Absolutely fabulous imagery. I can feel the pain and the dread building up in just such a short scene.
And here I was thinking you weren’t going to tease us since it was a longer post! 🙂
Initially, I wasn’t. But then I added that last line. 😀
That was just mean! Building us up to “You’re brother, he’s…” He’s what!? Dead? injured? Missing? Captured?
Great stuff!
I agree with the others – beautifully written, you really capture that feeling when you know someone is going to tell you somehting unpleasant…
*crosses arms and taps foot on the ground*
*coughs*
I see how it is.
I do like “no room to swing a mouse,” though, and the tension here is very nice.
Hehe. 😀 Glad you like it.
You do a nice job of building tension here, but I’m not sure which POV you are planning of using for the end. So far it looks omniscient…
Good pick up on the POV. To be honest, I hadn’t really given it much thought.
I think I noticed it because I had to work on the same mistake so long… For the draft it’s not a super big deal, you need to get the story down more than anything, but you may want to plan for it later..
I’ll keep it in mind 🙂
Holy cliffhanger, Batman! Way to ratchet up the tension. Karavere is an interesting name. Where did it come from?
Glad you liked it 🙂 And as for the name, I made it up. I strung sounds together until I came up with a name that fitted the character. However, ‘Kara’ is a real name, usually spelt ‘Cara’ which gives a sense of familiarity with the name. I try to do that for all my characters. Although their full names might be foreign sounding, their nicknames are usually based on English conventions.
*sniff* Poor Laney. 😦
I love your descriptions in this scene, though I will also add my “Nooo, cliffhanger!” cry to the masses.
I like cliffhangers.
You succeeded in pulling me right in and making me care, and I have never met these people before. I chuckled at ‘swing a mouse’!
My rough drafts jump all over the place for point of view. I generally know what will work somewhere toward the three-quarters point….and even that might not be final.
Excited to read more, and finding out what the heck Laney’s brother is.