This sits at 2700 words for today, The chapter, “The Coffin”, is an example of a poem that seems to fit, it is the interlude between seeing the Draugr (not so named in the story at this point, but it will be so named soon) and entering its lair. I didn’t have to edit, or add, a single word of the poem, and yet it seems to fit.

I may do some more writing tonight, but I will take another break (I spent a couple hours with my wife, talking and watching something on the net), and maybe it will still be 9/10/24, and maybe it will be the next day. Coffee and ice cream are before me, but, I’m happy with today’s progress and, can see that the story is coming together.

What I am writing now is the middle portion, having already written the beginning (And edited up to my recent few days writing), and much of the end portion of the book.

The actual ending will depend on several things that occur within the next half dozen to dozen chapters, but it is tying together quite nicely and answering many questions I had.

So, I will end this days series of posts with these two chapters, as an example of word count, and,

process.

Sleep well,

-Timberbee

The Coffin

He lay. I lay. Within the lidless, ivory, vine etched coffin. Breathless. Not stirring. A place between life, and death.

Beneath tall, tall, trees. In deep, dark wood. A bed of leaves, dry, and brittle, above.

While below, beneath the dry layer, wet and mold, and worm, and beetle, and hungry scent.

A world, beneath a world, covering, entrance to, a vaster, unknown / known, hinted at, world.

A place of life never halting, never slowing, of caverns of blackest night, feeding the world, above, with life, of the light, and airy kind.

Below, the eyeless rule, which dwell without light, or space, or absence of, eternal, ever present, pressure,

Far beneath the rolling cloud, the outstretched hand, the driving form, the roaring breath, of brother, wind.

Where Wind, in the below, is a quiet thing, picking his way, through the dark, twisted, ever changing ways, of the deep dark.

Night descends.

Visiting hour. Begins.

The horrors spring forth. From the nothing. From, the nowhere, to leap,

Born anew,

Within a once still, heart, of coldest stone.

Their faces huddle, all manner of monstrous thing, huddle above, to stare down, upon me, to fill the sky, to blot out the swaying, far above tree.

Closed eyes, still do not see,

But, a heart knows joy, kindled, with… Love.

Brothers returned, a heart of stone, made flesh, to beat, once more. Tears fall, from above.

Ambling forms, return, merge with descending, inky black, disappear, into far off, nightmares.

A form stirs, awakens.

Yellow eyes open, in mist black, formless, form.

The coffin dissolves…

The wolf howls, as Beast stirs, night enveloping… all.

Into the Depths

We are in.

We did not follow, for, to do so seemed madness. We found, another way.

We picked our way, following the pulling of the thread, so thin this was, no great, thick cable to draw us, it was subtle, and slight, the thread as though laid atop these fallen, scattered stone, bones all about, reaching out, up, through that which grew here, and we tread among them, our feet like blessings, whispers, in this place, and found ourselves, entering,

Blackness.

A mound, torn asunder, by time, or events, we flow, within, and find the thread, stronger, our eyes practically blaze, for, there soon becomes no light, in this tight, tight, place.

We had thought, that we must abandon cloak and thrower, and shafts, and maybe, even axe, for the way we are led to is so narrow, so slight, and the pulling, is… odd. A jumbled thing.

Had we been new to this, we would have failed. For, something told us, so subtly strong, in that, almost indescribable manner, to retain our clothing, our weapons. A thing we often wondered at, for, what were such things compared to what Rider could do for us, with fur and fang, tooth and claw and plates of bone and thickness of hide.

And yet,

Always,

Always, we are to, retain these delicate, delightful bits of beautiful metal and hide and bone and wood.

And Rider paints for us the Hunters, and their copious, beautiful gear, and, at once, the sounds of their own transformations. Mysteries to be unraveled, should we prove tomorrow to come.

So, we stand, and wait, and test, and feel. In this tight, tight, gloom, and dank, dank, darkness, where creeping things crawl over us, test us. Where web and mold and biting things dwell.

We breath in, and feel out, as we once did, when we followed the pressure, and not, the pulling, then we would test, to find the current, to know the state of the world, and, our place within it. To simply,

Feel, and, dwell.

And the patterns emerged, began to emerge, for we saw, felt, the flow, as though beneath the sea, swaying to it, watching the dance of those creeping and biting things, with the things to small to see, with the things we are to busy to feel, and we saw,

Saw,

The thread,

Pooling, twisting, delicately, descending, through a place unglimpsed, and as yet,

Unmade.

A thinning of the floor, covered with debris, an illusion of the most mundane kind,

Time.

We gently moved, and swept, excavated, a way, and found, an opening, big enough, though tight, still, but well within Rider’s doing, to make us, a, leaner, more flexible, lighter, thing.

We descended, flowed, through a passage not traveled in… it was hard to know, but, the air was different here, cooler, and drier, and the thread practically glowed, and, never had we seen such a thing, never had we seen the sendings, only, felt them, though we knew, each of us, knew, that this was something else, that, magic, was afoot here, and that which we followed, within ourselves, our brother Wind, and his sendings, was contrasted by the one we came to seek, whose realm we were invading, and we would be, unwelcome,

Things.

And it would know us,

And,

Deep within, something began to laugh, began to waken and,

Laugh.