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 29: He stepped to the side and Drax took his place in the globe of light.
He stepped to the side and Drax took his place in the globe of light. Drax smiled. “You have some experience with scrying?” he asked.
“I do,” Kasca replied.
“Which method are you most familiar with?” he asked.
“I was taught to use a bowl of water.” She told him,
He nodded. “That is the most common method and expanding the range can take many forms.”
Drax walked her through using an object from the place she wished to see to enhance her focus. While this let Kasca head further north than those in the Sanctuary it did have limits so Drax walked her through how to search with just her mind, using her mind to follow a thread of thought to a place rather than a bowl of water. He thought she would have better luck if she tried the water method to look in on her home first.
“By convincing yourself that you can scry that distance it will make it easier for you to do so without the water.”
Kasca nodded. Her teachers said much the same thing. Belief often powered ability. If you believed you could do something then often you could. If you believed you couldn’t then it became a self fulfilling prophecy.
“Do you have any questions?” He asked.
Kasca looked at him and tried to think of anything she needed to know. As she studied him, she saw a few small red bumps near one of his nostrils. The globe of light began to fade.
“If you think of any questions we can cover them next time,” Drex said. “One week from now,” he told her.
“Right, until then,” Kasca said. The light faded. Kasca took a deep breath.
“Maybe they were just blemishes,” she thought. She recalled the description of the disease. Kasca swallowed hard. Drex was in the protected part of the Sanctuary. “I’m sure they were just blemishes,” she told herself. She wasn’t convinced but there was nothing she could do. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“I need to practice the scrying and find out what I can,” she told herself. “Maybe I’ll find there is an antidote.” Somehow she suspected that might be a better search than how things stood at home.
“First I need to find out how far I can see.”
Kasca took out one of the larger bowls in the kitchen and after wrapping up in her cloak she opened the door. She looked to the ewers of fresh water and decided they weren’t needed. She filled the bowl with snow from one of the mounds covering the area around the cottage and quickly returned to the cottage. She placed the snow filled bowl by the fire and then hung her cloak up by the door.
She tried to push the image of Drex out of her mind. She could do nothing for him or any of the others except look for more information.
She moved back to the table and looked at the bowl of snow. Beside the fire the snow was quickly melting. When the bowl was simply full of water, she picked it up and placed it on the table.
Ten til Midnight 