The fifteen minute novel writing experiment is a attempt to write a complete (and very rough) draft of a novel by writing for fifteen minutes each day. I have taken a timed writing from one of the daily prompts done in 2021, cleaned it up a little and used it as my jumping off point into a story. Each day I will take the last line of the story written the day before and use it as my sentence starter and write for fifteen minutes, growing the story as the year progresses.
Day 154: “So the Star helps women,” Anya said the pieces finally fitting together a little better than her earlier reading led her to understand.
“So the Star helps women,” Anya said the pieces finally fitting together a little better than her earlier reading led her to understand. “Like they help themselves by coming together.”
“More or less,” Deran replied.
Anya nodded, but set the thought aside for the moment. “So when she …tested me for the House of the Star, she could only ask me questions and not control my answers,” Anya said.
Deran nodded. Anya sighed with relief. She thought her decision to stay for a while was based on own thoughts, but liked the confirmation. “And the images in the basin?” she asked.
“They would have been accurate as that seems to be Marta’s gift.”
Anya again nodded but wasn’t entirely sure how she felt about that. The image she saw weren’t all positive. Again, she thought that might be something to think about later. She did have one remaining question about the basin though before moving on with her own story. “How long does the basin retain the magic?” she asked.
Deran frowned. “The basin shouldn’t retain any magic,” he told her. “The magic would all reside within Marta.”
“But after she left me to think I looked into the bowl and I saw Lord Mathis. He was dreaming of being crowned emperor.”
“Was he?” Deran replied. He chuckled to his head. “Such lofty dreams.” Deran tilted his head to the side slightly. “Was he dreaming or telling someone of his dreams?” he asked.
“I believe he was dreaming,” Anya said. She told Declan of Lord Mathis walking into what looked like his own coronation and how the images were fuzzy around the edges. “And all of the voices sounded a bit like Lord Mathis own voice,” she concluded.
Deran smiled. “Yes that does sound like you entered his dreams. And it would have been your magic that let you see into them not Marta’s. The stone basin was simply the tool you used.”
“Oh,” Anya said. She blinked. She thought that it was just the residue of Marta’s magic that let her see images in the water. “So I could do it again? Not just with dreams?”
“It is possible,” Deran said. “Or it might just be that you have a skill with dreams. Why is there something you wanted to see?”
“Something in the past,” Anya said. “When I found one of the hidden rooms, the one in the library. I was in there when Marta and the Matron came looking for me. They didn’t know I was there and they were talking about me.”
Anya bit her lip.
“And you overheard what they said,” Deran finished. “Sometimes listening in to find your enemies is less eavesdropping and more good sense,” he told her.
Anya smiled. “That’s what I thought at the time. But what I heard didn’t make sense. My parents died of an illness that swept through town, but Marta and the Matron were talking as though my uncle caused it somehow. I guess I wanted to find out if that was true or not.”
“It is no shame to want to know the truth of the past,” Deran told her. “Knowing it’s truth informs our decisions in the present and helps us shape the path we want to walk in the future.”
Ten til Midnight 