The fifteen minute novel writing experiment is an 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 238: As she stood and walked over to retrieve the necessary fuel, she felt exhaustion sucking at her.
As she stood and walked over to retrieve the necessary fuel, she felt exhaustion sucking at her. Before when she spoke with Bendeasa it was at night. She went to sleep and was pulled to the temple. When the dream of the temple was finished, she was sent back to her bed where she almost immediately fell back asleep.
“This was the first time I was called during the day,” Anya said to herself. She placed the new log on the fire causing a shower of sparks to fly up the chimney. She thought about her tiredness after her bath. Had it just been the result of her extra activity during the relocation and long soak in the hot water or had it been caused by Bendeasa because she wanted to talk with her?
Like the necklace, the thought did not sit well in her mind. The thought that the statue could send her to sleep and summon her whenever she wished wasn’t something Anya wanted to think about. ‘Maybe this was just to let me know about the meeting.’
Anya returned to her chair feeling almost as tired as when she first sat down. She wrapped herself up in the blanket and snuggled back into the chair. “She did say it took a lot of strength from me,” Anya mused even as she felt her eyes slip closed.
She let the thought slide away as she drifted into sleep. When she awoke, the log she placed on the fire was almost completely burned through and the sun outside was slanting in red tinged rays. Anya’s belly rumbled and she stood and stretched, hastening to the fire to add more fuel before it could die out. When the fire was once again satisfied, Anya moved to her small supply of food.
‘I know I’ll have to put it in the kitchen soon, but I’m glad it is here tonight.’
Anya ate and looked out of the window at the setting sun. She smiled. It was a pleasure to see the sun set and to know the time of day rather than to guess it. The vents in her previous quarters let in light and she could guess the time of day from their strength, but it was an indirect light. Here the sun shone in and she could see a patch of sky above.
As she chewed Anya walked over to the windows. The air chilled as she drew closer to them. The windows and door to the small out door space attached to these quarters was far from her fire and small icy drafts snuck in around the edges of the frames. The sky above was streaked with yellow and red, the red growing darker as it streaked along the horizon.
‘Not that I could see the actual horizon,’ she thought as she ate. Beyond the small flattened spot of her out door area the mountains rose steeply. She was in one of the highest peaks so she had quite a view, but there were still mountains stretching out below her and Anya knew she was not seeing the actual ground but rather the shadows between the lower peaks of the mountain range.
As she watched the sun slip lower, Anya wondered how far the mountain range stretched. While she thought to search the maps for the locations of ancient towns and villages and to see how far she was from Tyrin as well as how she might have gotten her, she had never looked to see how far the mountain range stretched.
‘Something to check later,’ Anya decided.
Ten til Midnight 