FAIRY DOOR EXCERPTS WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
Since around Christmas (2020), I’ve been posting illustrations of scenes pulled from each chapter of my novel along with the related text. I will be posting them together here. So far, only chapters 1-11 are done, but I shall be adding more as I get them done until samples and illustrations for all 14 chapters are up. Sketches for all chapters are uploaded. For fair warning, there are spoilers in some of the entries. I have tried to keep them minor and cryptic enough to not impact reading, but they are there. If you want a larger sample, chapters 1-3 can be read in their entirety on this blog, starting here. Enjoy, and if you like what you see/read, the full novel can be found on Amazon here. : )
Last updated: November 2022
Chapter 1
Eibhlin lifted her face. Seeing the room, all evidence of that day’s cleaning gone, she felt a fresh set of tears forming and moved her gaze to the blanket on the floor, as if thinking to hide beneath it. Then she saw it, half-buried beneath the crumpled pile of clothes and blanket. She pulled the blanket up.
It was a small smithy hammer. Her father being a blacksmith, she wouldn’t have found it too strange to keep a spare hammer among his things but for the hammer’s appearance. It was forged of silver from head to handle’s end. Set into the pommel was an icy blue stone held in place by jagged, silver tendrils and two reptilian tails. The tails melted into the naked handle, crossing as they wound up to the head, where each joined a dragon’s body. From the dragons’ mouths, lighting shot toward the hammer’s face.
Taking up the item, Eibhlin thought how light it felt despite its material. Familiarity flittered across her mind. She had seen this hammer before, but she couldn’t remember when. Running her fingers across the dragon heads, she said, “It’s beautiful, but what good is a hammer made of silver?”
“None, it seems, to you, if it was stored in such a manner.”
Eibhlin stiffened and turned to the voice. Standing on a bedpost was a tiny woman. Black hair spread behind her like a cloak, causing her pale body to appear nearly white. Large, dark eyes locked onto Eibhlin as transparent wings twitched against the fairy’s back. Flying from the bedpost to the hammer, she reached out and brushed long, thin fingers against the silver. “Amazing work,” she said. “More so than I remembered. Human child, will you sell to me this hammer?”
“You… you’re a fairy!” said Eibhlin.
“Yes, and you are a human,” said the fairy without a change in tone. “Now, will you sell me the hammer?”
Chapter 2
Thunderous roaring rent the air as the ocean lay siege upon the cliff sides. All sound gave way to the boom and echo of wave against rock. Within the safety of the crash of waves and the quaking air, with her pale hair the color of cold sunlight lashing her face, she cried.
She cried till the sky darkened, cried till her head hurt, cried till it was too painful to cry. And as the cries left her body, her mind, too, screamed, questions pounding her spirit like the waves did the cliffs. Why? She had never seen her father so furious. Or so sad. Why had this happened? How had this happened? What was she supposed to do?
Eibhlin shivered in the wind and sea spray.
This was all because of that fairy! Because of that deal, everything had fallen apart. All because of trading away the hammer. Staring out at the sea, Eibhlin whispered, “Well, then, I’ll just have to get it back.
Chapter 3
River rock held back trees, forming a clearing, in the place where the fairy stopped. Standing alone near the edge of the Lúrin was a large, wide willow covered in knots. The fairy led Eibhlin to the riverside tree.
Eibhlin asked, “Why are we here?”
“More questions?” said the fairy. “This tree, silly human, is a fairy door. If you unlock it, you can go to wherever its road connects to.”
“Unlock? How?”
Smirking, the fairy reached out her hand. Light twisted together to form the shape of a key that shone soft, white light.
Chapter 4
Eibhlin moved beside Elkir to see what it was when the shape cried, “Oh, thank the Heavens’ Maker! I quite thought I would drown this time. Why, if you had not pulled me out, I might have finally cracked, or worse, snagged and broke my strings!”
In Elkir’s arms sat a strange instrument of dark, reddish wood and resembling a harp connected to a sounding box. On the instrument’s face, silver hummingbirds lowered their heads to a field of aster flowers, flowers that also twisted up the ribs to bloom near the crossbar. A strong, tenor voice rang out from the sounding box. “Thank you for grabbing me from the river. Dreadful things, rivers. Never tell you where you are going and jostle you about as if you should just run along with them. Most dreadful, disagreeable things! In any case, thank you for your help.”
Elkir beamed. “Wow! An enchanted kithara. Such amazing fortune. You’re very welcome, Kithara.”
“It talks,” gaped Eibhlin. “The instrument talks.”
“Oh, there is a human with you,” said the instrument Elkir had called a kithara. “Inexperienced with enchanted tools, Miss? No surprise, really. You speak with the accent of eastern Enbár, and that place is more exposed to Fae magic. Fairies are not usually fond of tools, too much iron involved, if you get my meaning. No, your shock is natural.”
Shira, having returned to the group, said, “I, too, am surprised. Why should an enchanted instrument be floating down a river?
Chapter 5
She was awoken before tomorrow came by a soft voice calling her name and a gentle touch upon her hand. Strong, sharp shadows hung about the room. The spring water glistened in the moonlight. From outside, insects hummed and chirped. The sun’s world was asleep, the moon’s awake, and now, in her waking, she had intruded into that world. She was a foreigner in that world, and she was not the only one that night. By her bed stood Yashul. The lady held no light, but her face shone as if reflecting the moon, and in her eyes was sadness. Yashul motioned for silence, and she gave a smile so tinged with sorrow Eibhlin almost wept.
“I have a request for you, dear child. Will you listen?” asked the lady.
Chapter 6
Eibhlin screamed and fumbled for the knife, fear and adrenalin deciding her actions. Forgetting to unsheathe it, she swung the knife, thwacking Mel against the crossbar.
“Ouch!” cried the instrument. “First slamming me against someone’s stone of a stomach, now striking me with a knife? What have I done to warrant such discourtesy?”
Collecting herself, Eibhlin gasped, “I… I thought you were a demon.”
“A demon!” cried Mel. “A noble kithara such as myself, recorder of legends since the First Age after Time’s Dawn, a demon? I never thought the day would come, but an insult worse than ‘liar’ has been thrust upon me! Lady Eibhlin, I insist you rescind the accusation and formally request an apology!”
“I didn’t accuse you of being a demon!” said Eibhlin, her face flushed. “I had been worrying about if the thing in this tower might be a demon.”
“Teeheeheeheehee! Silly, silly Sunstrands! Thinks demons live with such pretty bells! Teeheehee!”
Eibhlin stiffened at the new voice. Slowly turning, she scanned the room. Nothing. Without quite knowing why she did, perhaps a slight movement barely noticed by her eyes, she locked onto one of the bell ropes and followed it up. Around halfway up she saw… something.
The creature seemed to be a shadow and almost as unformed as smoke. A clear shape could not be made of it. It was small, and two glowing sparks Eibhlin figured were its eyes shined above a thin, white crescent, like a small moon, that was probably its mouth.
Chapter 7
Reaching into her bag, Eibhlin took out the spoon and the plectrum. Her food remained pushed to the side as she studied the items. Think. There had to be something. Some connection. Eibhlin took up the plectrum again, turning it over, rubbing its surface, searching its grain as if it held the answer.
“Bring Vi something better,” the bell tower’s inhabitant had said.
“Better.” What was “better”? Vi had used that word before, when they had spoken that first night. What did he mean by “better”?
Chapter 8
Still skirting the wall, Eibhlin came around the bend, and what she saw gave her the same emotions as when she arrived at the keyhole shining its golden light in the dark. A monastery! The house of refuge stood away from the cliff on a wide ledge, its roof and stone appearing gilded with silver in the moonlight. A small garden and a well sat to one side, both covered and protected, and standing before them all, as if a heavenly sentry, stood a tree. Such a tree none could think to be of the Mortal Realm. Long, drooping branches, like a willow’s, swayed in the wind. Tipping the branches were pale green leaves that looked as if covered in velvet or made of feathers. White and silver flowers in the shape of seven-pointed stars adorned the tree, and every time the wind brushed them, it almost seemed to carry away some song too wonderful for human ears and a perfume that Eibhlin felt she had smelled before, long ago, but which she could not name.
Chapter 9
They were in a swamp. Black trees stood everywhere, their branches either drooping to sweep against the water or reaching up to cover the sky. Moss hung from branches like ragged hair. Water covered most of the ground, turning the land into an archipelago. There were no natural sounds, so every movement Eibhlin made seemed to break some unspoken law. Her nerves tightened. No sound. Hardly any light. But there was a smell and a taste to the air: wet, earthy, old. Yes, old. That was the word she sensed. Old and hard and cold and forbidden.
Chapter 10
It stood like a slab of solid moonlight. Upon the clock face, neither of the hands moved; they remained forever frozen on a minute to twelve. Noon. Or perhaps midnight, the time of broken spells, a time never to come upon that tower. Just below the clock face, a walkway led from the tower down to a small gate- house, forming a joint structure that reminded Eibhlin of a sundial. One without a shadow. A useless sundial.
Comments
Post a Comment