The following excerpt is for a work in progress. It is fantasy fiction. A previous post, Nice to meet you....Yadonskhonderhader?, has some other information on the novel. I'm curious about two things:
1) the impression you have on the scene, the characters, or what it invokes.
2) how necessary the rest of the novel might be.
Any other general impressions are welcome also. Enjoy. This is from Seek the Monster. It is a rough draft, but your input will help me figure out if I've done this scene the way I need it to be done to forward the progress of the book:
He was such a normal looking man. He called himself Paulen, short for Kenpaulentarnouses. He was pulling a cart of goods from city to his small town. His dark blond hair was sweaty and stringy. His face was marred by clear evidence of fighting. It disfigured it enough so that his foreign past was less noticeable. Scars and a couple of turns in the line of a man’s nose was not surprising considering the closeness to the river and the invasions a man his age would have seen. Paulen’s feet hurt. The leather in his shoes had been worn thin, though his wife had promised him a new pair upon his return. He felt each sharp rock. One caught the ball of his foot, slipped and cut through to the ach of his foot, piercing the thinned leather. He stumbled. He bumped against one handle of his cart, and then down to the ground. He cursed, rather mildly. He had not, since the invasion, been prone to invective. He preferred to have a demeanor of calm in any situation. He sat still for a moment, feeling the rocks of the path cut into his palms and knees.
He was bruised, and one knee of his pants had been torn. There was nothing else to do, but get up and keep going. What his wife was going to say, he did not know. He did not pull his cart into his yard till dusk was settling over the hills and forests around his town. As soon as he closed the gate, the door to his house slammed open and his plump wife came barreling through. She flung herself at him.
“Oh Paulen, I was so worried about you!”
“Why, wife? Is this not the time I said I would come?”
“But you have not heard the news!”
“Can I put the cart away, and the goods I will sell tomorrow?”
“Yes, my dear. I will help you.”
She moved to the back of the cart and hauled out a larger basket than she normally would have bothered with. She cast a worried glance at the woods beyond their fenced enclosure for their goats, and then scurried back into the house, struggling with her load. He looked at her in some surprise, and moved the cart closer to the door as he always did. She was back out, hefting out another load before he’d chocked the wheels.
“Hurry, Paulen!” she said.
“What’s the matter?” he asked, and then the goat yard caught his eye and he demanded, “Where are all our goats?”
“They’re in your cart shed. Please, hurry. I’ll tell you all about it when we’re safe inside. Don’t worry about the cart. It won’t come to harm.”
Paulen did as his wife asked. When he came in with the last load, and before he could do anything more with the cart, his wife shut and bolted the door. He set the bundle down and turned to her. “So, what’s this about, woman?”
She turned to him, and finally got a good look at him, his torn pants, and the boot that was clearly falling apart. “You met with trouble!” she screamed, and dashed towards him. Touching him. “Paulen, you’re bleeding! You were attacked?”
“No, wife. I fell. I’ve been walking. I’m hungry and want to eat.”
She refused to let him eat, quiet yet, and with an energy that surprised him, she made him take off his clothes. Only then did she sit him down with a bowl of goat and potato stew. There were plenty of potatoes, for she was a good wife and no self-respecting peasant wife would be caught without at least a few potatoes comes spring. He ate while she tended his knees, and his hands, making him eat one handed while she tended one or the other.
“Why are you so worried about a cut knee or two. I’ve seen a great deal worse.”
“You’ve been gone. You don’t know. The wolves have come down from the mountains.”
“In spring?” he said with shock.
“Yes! They killed some wild deer, and even a boar. I’ve heard about a few missing dogs, goats, and three children who went wandering into the woods to look for fresh greens who went missing. “
“And? That’s it?”
“No, Paulen! There was a woman to the village in the south that was killed, another to the east. Dorrenethene, down the street, said they were cut up very badly. Ripped apart by claws and teeth. And, just after you left last week, there was a report of a man who was killed.”
Paulen felt uncomfortable. He put his spoon down and looked at his wife who was kneeling by his side, patting his bloody knee with a wet cloth.
“How do you know it wasn’t an invader. It probably was. Or an outlaw who somehow survived the spring and didn’t get caught by one of the Seekers.”
“Oh no. It was bloodier than that,” she assured him and began to tend to his various bruises. “But if they got a man, I want you inside during the night, please.”
“But what about my business? Or how do you intend we should live if I cannot go to town in a few weeks?”
“The hunters will get the wolves by then, and the village chief has gone to Codhu’s to ask for help.”
“That’s a three day journey! Do you think they’ll be indoors the whole time?” he asked her.
“The chiefs of three villages have gone together.”
“Then it will be all right soon enough.”
“Till they’ve killed the wolves, I insist you stay indoors, and near the house.”
“And how do you expect me to sell these goods I’ve walked far to bring here?”
She paused. She looked at him, gripping his leg. He took a bite more of her stew, and then looked down at her. There was real fear in her face.
Paulen was naked. He was cut and bruised and his left foot still hurt from the cut he’d gotten earlier in the day. Looking down at his wife, he felt stronger than her fear. He smiled at her. “It will be all right. No one is going to hurt you,” he said.
“Till they kill those wolves, Paulen, I must ask that you come indoors at night. We’ve enough saved up that you can wait till they kill the wolves, there’s enough saved where you can postpone your next trip to town a while. Please?”
He could only take comfort in the fact that she was frightened. It couldn’t be that bad a thing to be stuck at home for days with a wife that let him bed her as often as he liked when he was home.
