Morning all and welcome to the Fifteen Minute Novel. Here I take the start of a story idea and work on it for fifteen minutes a day. I started with an old writing prompt that interested me, cleaned it up a bit to fit the basic outline of the story I want to write and then set aside fifteen minutes each week day to see it grow. Each morning’s writing starts with the last sentence of the day before. And so now we have the story of Kasca…
Day 8: Once there she could speak to her contacts, pass on the information she was sent to relay and hopefully learn things in return.
Once there she could speak to her contacts, pass on the information she was sent to relay and hopefully learn things in return. While the information she had was vital, she found her own list of important questions needing answers growing.
Kasca moved as quietly through the woods as she could, heading in the direction of the village while keeping an eye on the nearby road. Nothing was moving on the road. If there were patrols then they already passed. After so long seeing nothing Kasca paused her steps, listening. She quieted her breath and remained still.
She heard the sound of owls hooting softly in the distance as they began the night’s hunt. There was almost the non sound of their swoop. More a notion of displaced air than sound when they dove for their prey and glided up back to their trees.
There was little else disturbing the woods. She heard no sound of a patrol, no sound of travelers who might have been caught on the road, nothing. When she last passed this way the patrols were not as frequent as they were around the Overlord’s stronghold, but they were regular. The overlord wanted no impediment to goods reaching his central district whether they be man made or natural like a tree fall.
She heard no sound of any patrol.
After a while Kasca once again got into motion. She moved forward cautiously listening to any sound. The continued silence was making her twitchy. Her steps parallelled the road and while she was hidden in shadows, the moon bathed the open space of the road with silverly light. She could see the road tolerably well but knew if there was movement she could freeze and be hidden in the shadows. The road curved and Kasca slowed her steps as she saw something in the road. It was a dark mound of something.
It wasn’t moving.
She sunk down into the shadows and went motionless as she studied the mound. It was in the center of the road, but she couldn’t tell what it was. It could be someone sleeping for the night, wrapped up in a cloak. It could be something entirely different. After a time, she realized it wasn’t moving at all. She cautiously moved forward. She kept to the deeper shadows but angled slightly closer so she could see what was there.
‘It would be several people if it was a person sleeping,’ she thought.
The shape was too big for just one person. It had to be several all sleeping close to each other or something else. As she eased closer, Kasca leaned on the side of something else. Nothing was moving. There was no shifting of breath in or out, no shifting or stretching in sleep.
She took a deep breath as the wind shifted and nearly choked on the scent it brought her. It was the scent of rotting and decayed meat. Whatever was down there was dead long enough to stink.
Still cautious, Kasca angled her path slightly closer. She had to lift her sleeve to her face to block the stench. Closer her eyes picked out details. The claws, the teeth, the fur. It was one of the monsters the Overlord created. Kasca swallowed hard and retreated from the form, slinking back into the shadows.
Ten til Midnight 