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 79: He was good and despite the grumbles, those he chose for the task were sent out to investigate.
He was good and despite the grumbles, those he chose for the task were sent out to investigate. Kasca left off her reading in the sanctuary to follow their journeys. They didn’t start out well. They all crossed the river to the mainland instead of letting the current take them down to the coast.
They used a different outlet than the one Kasca used and the waters were lower. They weren’t ready to be navigated though so it was a rough crossing. Two men fell overboard and were drowned, leaving three to go on.
They stuck together rather than spreading out and Kasca watched them in their journey to the first village. She watched by day and then let them sleep at night. The village they went to was three days journey from the river and not one Kasca could see or visit during her trip.
The sight, however, was eerily familiar when the trio arrived. The gates were open and nothing moved. The fire they tried to use to burn out the disease was just ash after the winter, the storms soaking the pyre and causing the ash to run, leaving only the larger bits. The story was the same. Any wood handy, including bits of furniture were used to get the pyre hot enough to burn the bodies of those who succumbed to the disease.
The remains of the others who didn’t make it to the pyre were scattered throughout the village. Every person and animal was gone. The village was lost. The trio investigated only long enough to see the effects. Then they left. One of them wanted to head straight back to the sanctuary but they had a list of villages to check before returning to the sanctuary.
Kasca didn’t know any of them as they were not places she visited but having tied her sight to the men she was able to follow along. It was a grim course. Each village was filled only with the remains of the dead. They found no living any more than she had.
She found it interesting that the last village to visit was the one they squabbled over the most. It was closer to the river as they made their way back to the Sanctuary. Kasca remembered seeing it on her way down the river. She saw it from a distance but nothing was moving then.
‘Harve,’ she thought it was named. ‘And if it didn’t have any one moving then I doubt it will now.’
Still they debated with one of them under clear orders from Jascon to visit. It took a lot of listening but Kasca finally realized that Harve was where the disease was initially released. They timed the release so I could come in contact with the patrols that came with the collectors.
‘It was their first top for the region this year.’ Kasca realized. They timed the release so the patrol and collectors would not only become infected but would carry it throughout the region. ‘The the Overlord did much the same thing when he was trying to see how it spread.’
Kasca shook her head. It seemed Jascon and the Overlord weren’t all that different. She somehow doubted that wither would appreciate the association.
Reluctant or not the trio went to Harve. The silence and emptiness of the land was beginning to weigh on them. They jumped at the sound of snapping twigs and sighing wind. Kasca could relate as she felt the oppressive fear of the empty land on her own journey. Each night they made camp a little earlier and built their fire a little higher.
Then they reached Harve.
It was as Kasca expected, decimated by the disease.
Ten til Midnight 