More adventures

I’ve been writing. Some. Not great at updating websites, because reasons. But there’s a surprising amount of stuff that’s collecting dust and percolating in the canopic jars of my writing PC. Folders, if we’re being mundane. Some of it will likely never see the light of day, pushed down into the repressed recesses of the amaranth that is Caolle Kachura’s skeleton closet (ooh, easter eggs!) and others contain spoilers that may or may not come to pass. But I like a lot of it and it seems a shame not to post it, sometimes it inspires me to do more of the thing and that has to be good. So proceed at your own risk, or don’t. But since you’re already here…

From the Free Lanes - a hangover she does deserve

Her head was pounding, that had been happening a lot lately. The roll and drone of the ship was somehow comforting, the way it dipped with its navigators bidding. A single, dull glowstone lit up her cabin, the light barely reaching the door. It had been odd getting used to a door again; for so many years she’d slept in a ready room, poised to jump out at the slightest shift in the running of the ship. The door felt isolating, cut off from the ship and the crew.

Nel reached out and covered the stone with her hand, the light almost obscured, just shining through the skin and blood of her hand.

‘You should not sit in the darkness so,’ a deep, rumbling voice told her. ‘It invites the bad thoughts, makes you think the dark things.’

‘Don’t need a lecture, Piper,’ Nel sighed. ‘Feel like a mule kicked me in the head. Or worse.’

‘Ah, a good reason not to let mules aboard the ship,’ Piper’s sincerity swept out of the darkness. ‘The kicking, it is quite painful.’

‘Might start drinking again,’ Nel grumbled, knuckling at her eyes. If she rubbed deep enough she might get to the stabbing pain behind them. ‘Least then I’d have a time I might enjoy before this hells damned migraine.’

‘The drinking did lead to some most memorable times,’ Piper agreed. ‘The mornings after, those I often questioned the wisdom of our nights before.’

Nel chuckled, staring at her hand. She could tendons in her fingers, the skin flushed red against the light of the stone. Transparent in the dark, there was an allegorical metaphor there Piper would have loved. She bit her tongue rather than give voice to it.

‘Remember Watch,’ she said instead. ‘We went on a blinder, you and me. Couldn’t see the next day.’

‘I remember, Skipper,’ Piper said. ‘That was not from the drink though. A rather buxom resident of the town struck you in the face, with your own drink. The brawl that followed was spectacular, I believe the captain had to leave port before first light the next day, in fear we would be pressed to pay for it all. The swelling of yours eyes took several days to go down.’

‘Don’t need to see to yell at this lot,’ Nel grinned. ‘Good times, Piper. Good times.’

‘We have had many good times, Skipper. Many adventures. Perhaps more are still to come, yes?’

‘Wouldn’t think so, Piper,’ Nel whispered. ‘Wouldn’t think so at all.’

‘No, Skipper? What makes you say such a thing?’

A hand reached out, covering hers, gently prying her fingers away from the stone, letting it illuminate the room again.

Nel sat back on her bunk, rubbing at the palm of hand, feeling the tendons flex under her fingers. ‘Because you left me, Piper. You went and died and left me all alone.’