Crownless – Chapter 1 (original draft)

Eamon Kelley had three quarters of the galaxy looking for him, some for good and some for ill, but for three solid years, there was no sign of him.  It was as if he was as dead as the rest of the royal family of the Hybrean Concord, dead thanks to what was described by investigators from the Veritan League as a tragic misadventure, the combination of a seemingly inexperienced pilot and an experimental ship being inspected by the court.  Most didn’t talk about how the royal family wouldn’t have been there if not for an invitation from the League to inspect the newest in a line of exploration vessels.  The League had been courting the Concord, seeking funding for an expedition beyond the Seal, the thick band of nebulae that separated the swath of human worlds from the rest of the galaxy.

Perhaps if both the Queen Dowager and the High King had not been so fascinated by the possibilities of simply exploring the nebulas, the whole affair never would have happened.

The loss would not have been so tragic if the king’s two teenage children, the younger prince and princess, had not been on school break and were on the trip with their parents and the Queen Dowager.  It would not have been so tragic if not for the sailing accident that took the life of the king’s brother six months earlier, if the line had not narrowed so much in the last generations.

And yet, though the line had dwindled thanks to accident and misadventure and simple chance and choice down to a narrow one, the Hybrean Concord would not abandon it.  Eamon Kelley was their king from the moment his father passed from life into death.  It didn’t matter that no one had seen the prince for more than two years before the accident.  He was their king, and he needed to be found.

So the galaxy searched.  They searched for three years, and in those three years, there was no sign of the lost prince, the uncrowned king of the Concord.  Some began to speculate that he, too, was dead, but the Council and Parliament of the Concord refused to believe that.  Perhaps they knew something more than everyone else.

A regency council was put together quietly and without fanfare.  It would keep the Concord in trust for the missing prince, the king who would be.

And they searched in all the places a missing prince might be except for the place where he really was.  He might have stayed hidden, too, if not for a misstep.

Some things are simply not meant to be.

Stretched out on his stomach, grass scratching against his cheek, he squinted at the clearing again.  It was just too big—too big to be nothing.  Since settling here, he’d made it his mission to learn every inch of these woods, and this clearing was wrong.  It was too big, the edges too even.  Something tickled at the back of his mind, just beyond his grasp.

He knew what it was that was bothering him, what was eluding him.  It was the answer to the riddle that the clearing represented.  The clearing itself was new, though he wasn’t sure how new—he hadn’t been out in this direction in nearly a year, thanks to autumn storms and a spring flood that barred passage through the floodplain between here and the spot where he’d made his home.  Still, it was only a few miles away.  Surely he would have heard—

Would I?  He squinted again, frowning.  It had been a strange set of seasons and he’d spent part of the spring and summer away.  Two seasons were more than enough time for something to have been done and escape his notice.

Still, he didn’t like the conclusion that was slowly forming, the ball of dread settling in his stomach, the sour taste at the back of his throat.

Would they dare?  It was possible.  Rumor had it that they were getting more bold in the last couple of years.  Usually, he tried not to think about the reasons for it but lately, he was starting to worry that was about to become impossible.

He closed his eyes, exhaled, and listened.  The sound of the breeze died away, the sound of birds—the sounds of all of the natural things around him that were part of his usual, everyday environment.  He lay there on his stomach in the grass above the clearing and listened for what was different.

There it was.  A faint buzzing.  And—something else?  It sounded like the very faintest sound of voices.  Was it possible?

Nothing’s impossible.  He frowned, opening his eyes.  One slow, deep breath, then another before he shifted bringing his hands forward, in front of his face.  Power came as a faint trickle at first, cool and and then warm, his draw carefully controlled.

Just need to be sure.  His fingers twitched and the magic extended, flowing from his fingertips and down into the the clearing below.  He hoped he was wrong, hoped it was nothing.

He didn’t think he was, though, and the spell would confirm it.

Slowly, the outline of the holographic shielding came into view in his mind’s eye, overlaid with reality by the spell he’d cast.  There was something there, just as he’d feared, something that wasn’t supposed to be there.

His jaw tightened and he slowly came to his knees, creeping back from the edge of the rise.  Whatever it was, it wasn’t that big.  There couldn’t be that many of them, and there was only one actor that would have the resources and the gall set up something like whatever this was—a hidden installation, small, something they didn’t want found.

Probably something set up to do things they would deny into oblivion if they could.

Well.  They’re going to be disappointed.

He crept back to the shelter of the trees, marking the spot on his map as he went, then started toward home.  He would need to see what he could find out about the place, if anyone local knew anything, had noticed anything strange.

And he would need a plan.

His gaze scythed one way, then the other as he strode into the village, hood pulled low to hide his face from the misting rain that had slowly spread downslope from the mountains to the north.  Westnedge was the nearest village to home and the source of most of his supplies, but while he was known, he wasn’t often seen.  That was by design, of course, because the fewer who knew where he laid his head day to day, week to week, the safer he felt.

Paranoia was something he’d never quite been able to shake once it had settled in, and it had been his companion for a very, very long time—and one that had served him well.

He stopped in front of one of the shops that lined one of the village’s narrower lanes, glancing up and down the street one more time before he tried the latch.  The door opened, a bell jangling softly as he stepped inside, casting one more look over his shoulder at the street before his attention turned to the shop’s interior.  The well-worn wood floors and counters were as familiar to him as his own home, clean, neatly organized.  Behind the counter, Val looked up from whatever he’d taken apart—some kind of mechanism was disassembled in front of him on a piece of red cotton, the parts neatly arrayed, a set of watchmaker’s tools laid out alongside them.

He pushed back his hood and set the latch on the door, reaching up to draw the curtain across its window.  He paused, frowning at it for a moment, then glanced toward Val again.  “New curtains?”

“In trade from Marielle for repairing one of their looms at the shop.”  The slender, dark-skinned man straightened and stood from the stool he’d been perched on.  “About a month back.  What’s wrong?  You have a look.”

He exhaled quietly, dropping the curtain into place before he crossed the shop’s floor to the counter.  “There’s something out there.”

“Out where?”  Val’s gaze followed him, brows knitting.

“Seven or eight miles,” he said.  “Beyond Bounder’s Creek and the old windmill.  In Harlowe’s Wood.”

“Mm.  What do you think it is?”

“I’m not sure yet, but it shouldn’t be there.”  He leaned against the counter, peering at the parts laid out on the cloth.  It wasn’t a watch—there were too many parts for that, and too big.  “Did anyone around see anything strange in the spring?  Maybe early summer?”

“Strange like what?”  Val shook his head.  “That term encompasses quite a bit.  Tea?”

He hesitated. “I shouldn’t.”

“Did you come  straight here?”

“Yeah.”

“Then you should.”  Val headed for the corner, for the hidden hot plate and the kettle perched atop it.  There were still a few comforts he kept from his life before coming to the Protected Zone.  All of them were like that in their own ways—little things that reminded them that they weren’t from the Zone even if that was where they’d happened to finally settle in, at least for a little while.  “How long were you out in the rain?”

“Only the last mile to town.”  He frowned.  His cloak wasn’t terribly wet, but that had more to do with him than the weather.  “You didn’t answer my question.”

“I did, I just answered it with additional questions.”  Val set two mugs on the counter, filling one, then the other, gazing steadily at him until he took one.  Satisfied, Val nodded, turning  to return the kettle to its hidden niche.  “Strange like what, Eamon?  Fireworks?  Lights in  the woods?  In the sky?  Strangers?”

“Yes,” he said.  “All of it.  Out of the ordinary noises, machines that shouldn’t be here—any of it.”

Val frowned, reaching for his mug.  “What the hell do you think you found?”

“One of their secret installations,” he said quietly, staring at his own reflection in the mug of tea.  His hair was too long again and he realized he’d forgotten to shave that morning—and probably the morning before, too, judging from the amount of stubble marking his cheeks and jaw.  “The places they bury out here so they can deny they exist.  It must have happened in the spring, I think.”

“You’d have noticed, wouldn’t you?”

“I was in Dern starting at the end of winter,” he said with a grimace, straightening.  “Lord Berem’s request.  Needed my eyes on the flocks before they started breeding.”

Val grimaced.  “I’d forgotten.  Thought you were keeping to yourself more than usual since there were new folk as of Midwinter Festival.”

He sighed.  “There’s always new folk these days, Val.  I just have to get used to it.”

“You’ve been here for a long time already, Eamon.  If someone was going to find you—”

“I know.  Dammit, I know.  I just—it’s hard to shake, you know?  The worry that somehow, someone’s going to recognize me and somehow that’s going to get people here hurt.”

Val’s brow arched almost delicately.  “And doing whatever you’re planning to do at that secret installation isn’t?”

He shot his friend a roguish, almost feral grin.  “First, they won’t know what hit them.  Second, they can’t hurt anyone here if they’re dead.”

“You don’t think they’ll send more?”

“They haven’t before.  Too much of a chance they’ll be noticed and someone will raise unholy ruckus.”

Val winced.  “At some point, you’re going to overplay your hand, Eamon.  I just hope I’m not there to see it.”

“I’ll try to make sure you’re not.  I owe you that much.”

Val snorted.  “You don’t owe me anything.  You don’t owe anyone anything.  We wouldn’t have made it this far without you and we all know it.”

He shook his head slowly.  “No,” he murmured.  “You would’ve been fine.  But that’s water under the bridge and a hundred light years away from here.  You’ll ask around?”

“I don’t have to.  Five months ago is when the whispers started, three months ago they stopped.”

“So whatever’s out there, they’ve been up and running for three months.”

Val nodded. “That would be my guess.”

His fingers drummed against the side of the mug as he tilted his face toward the ceiling, half lost in thought.  “There’s a lot of trouble they could have gotten up to in that amount of time.  It looked small, though.  Probably no more than a dozen staff.”

“But how many prisoners?”

“That’s the question,” he said, then sighed.  “I’ll have to watch for at least a few days, see if they slip at all.  Otherwise…”

“Mm.”  Val’s nose wrinkled.  “It’s the otherwise that I worry about.”

“Me too,” he admitted.  “Me too.”

“Can you take a dozen on your own?”

He smirked.  “Remember who you’re talking to.”

“Don’t get cocky.  One lucky shot is all it takes.”

“Well.”  He shrugged and took a long sip of tea.  “I might as well be dead anyway, right?  If I go down, it solves at least two problems for the Veritans, doesn’t it?”

“You think they’re still hunting you?”

“I think they’re still hunting Davion Drake, yes,” he said.  “And probably Eamon Kelley, too.”

“Good thing both have allies.”

He barely managed to hide his wince.  “Yeah.  Good thing.”  At least you’d think so, anyway.  He shoved the thought aside.  “I’ll swing  back through tomorrow.”

“For dinner?”

He grimaced.  “You’re going to insist, aren’t you?”

“People are worried.”

He sighed, nodding.  “For dinner, then. I’m sure it will allay some concerns.”

“More than a few.”  Val reached across the counter to squeeze his shoulder.  “Your secret is safe.”

“I know,” he murmured.  “But habits die hard.”

“Not one I’ll have you break, either,” Val said, releasing him.  “I like having a living friend.”

One corner of his mouth kicked upward into a wry grin.  “And I like breathing, so I think it’s a good thing all the way around.  At the Dapper Darling tomorrow, then?”

“Fifth bell?”

He drained his tea and tugged his hood back into place. “I’ll try not to be late.”

Val watched him as he crossed toward the door.  “If you are, we’ll send a search party.”

He grinned, nodding.  “Understood.”

Then he was gone, out into the street and the misting rain, only the jingle of the door’s bells left behind to mark his passage.

Crownless (NaNoWriMo 2022) – Opening section and part of chapter 1

There are twenty-three worlds in the Protected Zone.  Officially, it is the DeCorte Special Protectorate, named for one of the men who negotiated the treaty that created it almost a thousand years ago.  Within the zone, worlds get to choose how much contact they want with the wider galaxy, get to decide their own path when it comes to societal evolution.  Many are what the rest of the galaxy would call primitive, others are quaint, would be tourist attractions if the most of the planets would allow tourists.  Most have no global governments.  Many seem frozen in time.  That’s what the people who live there want.  Thousands—millions—are born in the Protected Zone, live and die never knowing how much there is beyond the boundaries of their world.  The Zone has its own magic.

Which is to say the people of the Protected Zone still believe in magic.  They believe in it for what it is—a gift, a curse, something special to be used by those who can for good or evil.  Of course, it exists beyond those worlds.  The galaxy just treats it differently outside.  It becomes less somehow, more a tool than something wondrous.  There’s something incredibly sad about that.

Much of the Zone falls into territory granted to the Hybrean Concord, territory that the ruling family has defended fiercely since before the treaty, a swath of space that has been held by the Kelley family for so long, only legends remain about how they came to rule on Tearmann, of how the Concord came to be.

The Kelleys were the kings and queens of the Concord for thousands of years, the only line in the galaxy that never seemed to be broken.

But everything ends someday.

One

Eamon Kelley had three quarters of the galaxy looking for him, some for good and some for ill, but for three solid years, there was no sign of him.  It was as if he was as dead as the rest of the royal family of the Hybrean Concord, dead thanks to what was described by investigators from the Veritan League as a tragic misadventure, the combination of a seemingly inexperienced pilot and an experimental ship being inspected by the court.  Most didn’t talk about how the royal family wouldn’t have been there if not for an invitation from the League to inspect the newest in a line of exploration vessels.  The League had been courting the Concord, seeking funding for an expedition beyond the Seal, the thick band of nebulae that separated the swath of human worlds from the rest of the galaxy.

Perhaps if both the Queen Dowager and the High King had not been so fascinated by the possibilities of simply exploring the nebulas, the whole affair never would have happened.

The loss would not have been so tragic if the king’s two teenage children, the younger prince and princess, had not been on school break and were on the trip with their parents and the Queen Dowager.  It would not have been so tragic if not for the sailing accident that took the life of the king’s brother six months earlier, if the line had not narrowed so much in the last generations.

And yet, though the line had dwindled thanks to accident and misadventure and simple chance and choice down to a narrow one, the Hybrean Concord would not abandon it.  Eamon Kelley was their king from the moment his father passed from life into death.  It didn’t matter that no one had seen the prince for more than two years before the accident.  He was their king, and he needed to be found.

So the galaxy searched.  They searched for three years, and in those three years, there was no sign of the lost prince, the uncrowned king of the Concord.  Some began to speculate that he, too, was dead, but the Council and Parliament of the Concord refused to believe that.  Perhaps they knew something more than everyone else.

A regency council was put together quietly and without fanfare.  It would keep the Concord in trust for the missing prince, the king who would be.

And they searched in all the places a missing prince might be except for the place where he really was.  He might have stayed hidden, too, if not for a misstep.

Some things are simply not meant to be.

NaNoWriMo 2017 prep – Days 25-27

About half of this is actually from the previous couple days.

  • The current primarch of New York does not have much interest left in keeping the peace with the others in the city and Cassidy Beckett is starting to realize that, especially when apparently vampiric murders begin to take place—or, at least, murders that appear to be vampiric on the surface.
  • Bachman-Koch is definitely involved in the attempt on Daisha (and Becca, who was the true target) and has gotten its claws into the current primarch—or it might be the other way around.  There is also a connection to the Methuselah, though this may not be truly uncovered.
  • Beckett will confront the primarch over his willingness to let a war break out in the city. She will remind him of the risks to himself and the rest of the Brethren in New York.  He does not take her threat of hanging him out to dry seriously.
    • Shortly after, the primarch will get his hands on Adrias Cross and in an incident unrelated to his confrontation with Beckett will order the vampire’s final death. This sets the primarch and Beckett on a collision course.
  • The book starts with Brigid getting her twin children off to school on September 11, 2027. She’s been asked to come in at their school to give a talk about Patriot’s Day and the attack on New York now twenty-six years in the past.  She gets the phone call from Seth in the middle of getting the kids out the door that things are far more complicated than John originally suspected.
    • It’s the twins’ freshman year of high school.

NaNoWriMo 2017 prep – Day 22

  • Ryce Marshall, by now tracked for the assistant chief of detectives position for Manhattan, will react with some (not-so-mild) concern regarding the body that the newly minted Detective Wakefield finds near the hospital at his crime scene. This concern leads her reach out not only to her superiors in UNSETIC and to Cassidy Beckett (a longtime friend), but also to personally reach out to Wakefield himself, which startles the detective (since it’s not typically every day that a deputy chief of detectives for Manhattan personally reaches out to you on a case).  She warns him to tread carefully.  She toys with having him pulled from the case, but settles instead for keeping a close eye on things—at least at the outset.
  • The victim Wakefield finds near the hospital is not the last that he’ll find during his investigation.

NaNoWriMo 2017 prep – Day 21

Apparently, things like to smack me upside the head and layer more crazy into everything.  These two additions below to my notes for the story are proof of that.

  • Tobias Wakefield is initially assigned to investigate the reports of violence going on outside the hospital the night Becca escapes and Daisha disappears. A woman’s body is found not far from the hospital, drained of blood with her throat slashed.
  • Ben Miyazaki gets mixed up in helping investigate all of the crazy going on. He’s a graduate student at NYU in the anthropology department with a specialization in forensic anthropology.  By the time everything is said and done, he’ll have some nasty scars and will have unlocked latent psychic talents.

NaNoWriMo 2017 prep – Days 17-18

The notes from today and yesterday is actually a background scene, set in September 2021, in Fredericksburg, VA.  Cassidy Beckett seeks some help from some rather unusual sources…

Just Another Day in Fredericksburg

Location – café and coffee shop owned and operated by Kasey Greene Lord

The bell on the door jingled and Vellin tensed across the table from me, jaw tightening.  “We have company,” he murmured, though he didn’t turn.  I leaned sideways slightly, looking past him to the door.  My brow furrowed slightly.

“I didn’t think they could walk around in daylight,” he continued.  “Is it who I think it is?”

“In the flesh.”  My chair scraped quietly against the floor as I stood up.  It was early evening in Fredericksburg, the sun starting to slowly sink lower but full dark was still hours away.  “Are you going to pick her brain?”

“Fuck no,” Vellin muttered.  “I don’t have a death wish.”

“I’m sorry if I’m interrupting something,” Beckett said quietly, closing the door behind her.  She moved away from the windows even as I walked forward, drawing some more of the shades.  The vampire shot me a relieved smile as she took off her hat and sunglasses.  “Thank you.  The clouds help but it’s still difficult.”

“Have you been here since last night?” I asked, a ripple of shock fluttering through my guts.  New York wasn’t an impossible drive, but it wasn’t exactly a short one, either—Vellin and his wife, my best friend, knew that very well, since it was a trip they’d made almost every weekend for four years after their summertime wedding nearly ten years ago.  Vellin had gotten into Columbia’s law school and none of us had been willing to let him give that up.

I couldn’t imagine how Beckett could have made the trip down during daylight hours, though.

She gave me a smile that was thin, but real.  “Since about an hour before dawn.  I rested for most of the day and as soon as I felt it was dark enough, I came looking.  You have children; I thought maybe it would be best to find you before full dark considering by the time it’s actually dark you’ll both likely be home for family dinner.”

She was right, though I was almost loathe to admit it.  Sam had just taken our youngest with him when he’d gone to pick up the twins and Harrison from school, leaving me and Vellin alone at the coffee shop to talk Conclave business.  Kasey would be doing the same, along with half a dozen of our other friends.

Truth be known, Beckett had picked the perfect time to show up without drawing too much attention to herself.

“You want something,” Vellin said.  It wasn’t a question and I barely managed to suppress a wince at the slight edge to his tone.

Then again, he and Kasey both knew her better than I did in a lot of ways.  Kasey had spent most of Vellin’s time at Columbia working at Beckett’s store in Hell’s Kitchen, keeping an eye on Order business—among other things—in the five boroughs while still somehow managing to keep up with the politics back here at home.

“You always were direct, Lord,” Beckett said, though her lips quirked into a slight smile.  “How’s Mara?”

“She’s fine,” Vellin said.  “What brought you here, Dr. Beckett?  You don’t drive five and a half hours without warning for a social call.”

My gaze slid toward Vellin, lips momentarily thinning before I forced myself to relax.  His magic was up and I could feel it—but then again, my shields had snapped into place as soon as I’d seen her coming through the door.

It wasn’t that I necessarily saw the vampire as a threat, but it never hurt to be careful.

“I have a favor to ask,” Beckett said, then sighed quietly.  “Can we sit?”

I nodded, motioning to a nearby table.  Vellin’s jaw tightened, but he followed my lead, taking a seat with his back to the wall even as Beckett settled into the chair across from him, leaving me facing the door.

“What did you come to ask us for?”

She stared at me for a few seconds, as if she was still processing my question.  Then she cleared her throat.  “It’s been ten years since she disappeared,” she said softly.  “It’s been ten years since anyone’s heard anything from Rebecca Reid.”

My stomach gave an uncomfortable twist.  She and I—all of us—had spoken on the subject over the years.  “Dr. Beckett, we’ve tried to scry for her before and there hasn’t been a trace.  The New York enclave doesn’t know anything?  There hasn’t been any sort of changes?  That’s where her pack is from and they would know—word would come to them before it reached any of us down here.”

“I know, I know,” she said.  “And I didn’t come down here to ask you to try to scry for her again.  It’s something different this time.”

Vellin eyed her.  “What?”

“The New York enclave won’t listen to me, doesn’t trust me, and I can’t blame them.  They still think I had something to do with Becca’s disappearance even though I didn’t and that sentiment has only gotten worse as time’s gone on.  I can’t go to them and ask them what I’m going to ask of you and the enclave here in Fredericksburg.”

I felt another uncomfortable flutter and made eye contact with Vellin, though only for a second.  He frowned and gave me an almost imperceptible nod.

“Then ask,” I said.  “The worst I can say is no but you realize that I don’t speak for the enclave, right?”

“Only when they ask you to,” she said, her voice grave.  “I need you to find Ioan Adam Griffon.  Find the alpha and you’ll find the rest of them—or at the very least, a trace of her.  As much as he and I didn’t like or trust each other, the one thing we agreed on was her and I know that he would never willingly let anything happen to her.  Find him and you will find them.  I’m sure of it.”

“What makes you think we can do that?” Vellin’s voice was heavy with skepticism and suspicion—and more doubt than I’d heard in his voice in a long time.

“I don’t know if you can,” she admitted.  “But I also think that out of anyone, you have the best shot and frankly, you are my only shot.  Please.  I will beg if I need to.  All I ask is that you try.”

“We’ll have to talk about it,” I said, fighting the sinking feeling in my stomach.  It would probably end in some kind of argument, but at the end of the day, Vellin and I both knew what was going to happen, no matter how much we argued about whether or not we should or would.

We would do it—we’d find a way to at least try to help.

“You’ll owe us a favor,” he said.

Beckett smiled.  “If you find him, I’ll owe you more than that.  How long will you need to discuss it?”

“Give us a couple of days,” I said.  “It’s not like we need to talk to one person.  There’s a lot of moving parts.”

“Fewer here than in New York,” she said softly.  “I’ll be back at the end of the week.  Thank you, Wolf Shaman.  Thank you, Lord.”

She stood from the table, donning her hat and sunglasses again before she stepped out the door, the bell’s jingle marking her departure, an oddly cheery sound in the wake of our conversation.

I looked at Vellin.  “Have you talked to Solace about her at all?”

“Not recently.  Not since the last time.”  He took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly.  “We’ll have to call the Conclave.”

“And I’ll have to talk to the pack.”  I rubbed at my temple and shook my head slightly.  “Life gets complicated whenever she shows up.  Just when I think that maybe we’ll have a moment’s peace, something new.”

“We could have retired,” Vellin said, then cracked a grin.  I punched him in the arm as I stood up.

“No one’s ever going to let that happen, Nick.  You and I both know that.”

He just shook his head.  “We can dream, right?”  The smile faded.  “What do you make of it, Haley?”

“Of what?”

“Of any of it.”

I shrugged.  “At the end of the day, she came asking for our help because there’s someone out there that needs it.  I think you and I both agree on that piece of it.”

He nodded.  “The Conclave’s going to be edgy about it.”

“So’s the pack.  But she’s played everything straight thus far.  Inches and miles, right?”

“Yeah,” he said quietly.  “Inches and miles.”

I squeezed his shoulder and he smiled again, reaching up to cover my hand with his.

“I’ll see you later, okay?”

He nodded.  “We still have to finish the conversation we started before Dr. Beckett got here.  I do want to know how they’re doing.”

I smirked.  “If you weren’t so concerned about the way your wife looked at him, I’d invite he and his sister down for a refresher course.”

Vellin snorted.  “Are they still trying to recruit us?”

“It didn’t sound like it,” I said, then smiled.  “Why, disappointed?”

“Fuck no,” he said, then grinned.  “Though it’s flattering to be wanted.”

“Don’t you have a brief you should be working on?”

“Probably.  Invitation for dinner tomorrow night still stands?”

I nodded, fixing the shades before I made my way to the door.  “You and Kasey are in charge of dessert.”

“You bake better than I do.”

“Then bring ice cream.”

“Five o’clock?”

“Five-thirty.  After soccer practice.”

He flashed me a thumbs up and I waved on my way out the door.

Just another day in Fredericksburg.

NaNoWriMo 2017 prep – notes for days 15-16

  • Daisha will do anything to help Becca.
  • Tyne never knew Becca before she was brought back to New York. Her uncle, Lars, used to be associated in Becca’s father in the past, which is part of what drew Tyne to New York—that and her uncle’s recent disappearance.
  • Magi in New York (or perhaps just closer to the Alberta site) feel some kind of ripple when the enchantments finally break?
  • The facility near Spiritscrossing that the Lost Pack went to investigate and shut down was linked to Bachmann-Koch, but a different division from the one that Brigid was nearly killed investigating.