Sequel to the Apprentice: "The Journeyman's Talent"

[Ray McCarthy]

They walked out together as the lift doors opened at the rear of the Library Cafe.

“Maisie, I really appreciate your support, but right now I want to be alone,” said Chainai.

“OK. Fine. Call me if you want to meet,” replied Maisie.

Maisie stood watching Chainai head toward the courtyard. Why wasn’t he searched properly. she thought angrily. She flounced off ignoring the stool her dark blue embroidered cloak caught and knocked over. Nor did she notice that Master Dhramini, the Adept Wizard, was watching from behind her large mug of Molruk.

“You can almost see a thunder cloud above Maisie’s head.” she remarked to the Arch Chancellor.

Millifore didn’t turn to look at Maisie’s progress down the Mall. “She is certainly more annoyed than ever I have sensed, she’s not shielding at all, certainly any Empath or Telepath will feel her as well as seeing her!” he observed. “No-one wants to be in the path of an upset Warlock, never mind Maisie.”

“Wake up, Pasra, the Arch Warlock will knock you down.” Master Gantras pulled the inattentive Apprentice back to the edge of the Mall.

But Maisie stopped suddenly short and was studying a notice board.

Pasra stared curiously. “I see what you mean. She feels like an iceberg. I’m off in case she notices me.”

“Don’t forget that report at class tomorrow,” said Gantras. He as an Arch Telepath could feel Maisie’s animosity and general bad temper .

As Pasra hurried off he went over to Maisie. “Maisie, a moment?” he asked

“Yes, what?” she replied curtly.

“I’m pretty sure I know why you are upset. I just heard about the suicide in court. But you can’t take it out on every nearby Telepath and Empath.” He hoped she was open to reason. She was as the oppression went off as if with a switch.

“Thanks for telling me. I lost control a bit then. Sorry,” she said.

“Someone made a mistake. I’m sure they will face consequences. Do try and persuade Chainai to come to supper anyway. It won’t be good for her to mope on her own.” Gantras gave a gesture and walked off without waiting for any further reply. He could feel the ease in the emotional atmosphere of the Mall.

“You see, Dhramini,” Millifore said very softly, “I don’t need to sort out every problem. Just do the long planning and the insoluble issues. Gantras has reminded Maisie of her responsibilities. She is now part of my longer term planning. Now what about my offer?”

“I see,” she replied, “I’m not sure how long I have. But I don’t want to fight anymore. It’s up to you to convince the rest of the Council. A unanimous decision will convince me.”

* * *

“As you know it needs a majority of a quorum to block any decision I make. But we will have a ballot and I will accept a single veto as blocking the appoint of Dhramini as she has requested it.” Millifore explained.

They passed a bag round the table.

“No white disks so Dhramini is our new Deputy Chancellor. Congratulations dear,” said Millifore.
“So how long have you been at College, Dhramini?” Gantras asked as they walked down to Supper behind the Arch Chancellor.”

“I think about 490 years,” she said, “Old Jarnok was still Arch Chancellor when I was a student. Then we had Nouan for a long time. I forget exactly. Then of course even Arch Chancellor Millifore is well before your time. One of the youngest Arch Chancellors. But very wiley, very deep even then.”

The Arch chancellor preceded them to the platform. He held up his left arm and put his right hand over his mouth. Shortly the buzz of conversation died down to silence. Dhramini stood beside him and gave a gruesome grin.

“I hope you will all wish Master Dhramini, Arch Wizard, well in her new role as Deputy Chancellor. She will of course use trusted Arch Telepaths to investigate any disciplinary issue as she sees fit,” he said.

There was a steady pounding on the floor.

Dhramini raised her arms and it stopped instantly. “Thank you for the ‘vote’ of confidence,” she said, “you may now eat.”

The council sat at their tables and waited for the meal to be served.

“They sounded happy with your appointment.” Gantras suggested to Dhramini.

* * *

Maisie turned to Chainai. It was wonderful now being able to talk directly. So Olef was at another table with some other Journeymen. “Isn’t she a little old to start as Deputy Chancellor?” she asked.

“No, as she has Talent she will be perfectly capable till the hour she dies.” Chainai explained and then poked the food Luci had brought. Luci saw and scowled.

“But,” persisted Maisie, “won’t that be only a few years time?”

“I’m sure all the College council is aware she might only be in the job for 4 or 5 years, maybe a little longer, perhaps even ten years. But they obviously think she is best for the job now,” said Chainai.

Maisie considered this as she too poked her food. But not for the reasons Chainai had. “Kaytim,” she said “What is this?” But really she wondered had the Arch chancellor someone else in mind. After all, all the Council positions were for life.

“It’s a Lorm recipe. Based on imported flour from the Lorm home world. I’m not sure why Cook thinks we should all eat Lorm Vegan food tonight.” Kaytim also poked it suspiciously. “I’ve never actually tried it before myself.” She carefully took a small spork full and chewed it. “Do try it, it’s not bad actually, not as bland as I expected. Unusual texture though.”

“Sometimes the menu is just weird here,” said Chainai.

“For me, everything is a bit weird,” said Maisie.

Chainai laughed.

* * *

Later at Chainai’s apartment they were having a light snack that Luci had prepared.

“I’ve been putting this off all evening, dreading telling you really,” said Olef, “I want to move to the Village complex. It’s handier for Shape Changing. Also I don’t really want an assistant at the moment. I know these Apartments too are really for Masters. Anit could take the Apartment, she is still in a Dorm unit, which isn’t fair. Also she has no assistant. Dairig is happy to transfer and so is Anit. The Arch Chancellor says it’s OK if you, Chainai and Maisie agree.”

Chainai and Maisie looked at each other amazed at this unexpected news.

“Well, I guess you were only here while you recovered and now that we solved the Orb Mystery we can admit Anit to the study group,” said Chainai.

“I know she was a little upset that she couldn’t join us,” said Timot, “of course I’m biased and although I’m sorry you want to go we can visit the Village Complex and you can visit here any evening to Maisie or Chainai probably, It would be great for Anit as most of her master work for Master Jayson is in Maisie’s lab.”

“I suppose it’s not as if you are going away anywhere. Still a surprise. I guess if it’s what you want I agree.” Maisie reflected. “You are right, it will be handy having Anit near the lab.”

“That doesn’t mean the three of you can stay up all night. Especially not Timot sleeping in Anit’s apartment and I rather it was only class party sleep overs in your own apartment Maisie!” Chainai exclaimed. ”Otherwise I agree.”

“Can I call Anit and tell her?” Timot asked.

Chainai agreed.

* * *

Dear Ray (Maisie wrote),
How is the Starship construction going on Earth, or is that now classified information? We got a message from Intergal1, it is now approaching the Andromeda Galaxy. Their big radio and optical arrays are scanning in greater detail than ever before and they are cataloguing stars to identify likely jump destinations.

I had forgotten that of course I was a British Citizen as well as Irish as I was born in N.I., my Father was both and my Mother was naturalised British. Quite how this escaped me I’m not sure as I never lived in the Republic till I left College. But it makes no difference. I was quite entitled to leave Earth. No-one coerced me and I am happy to give up British Citizenship too. I only ever had an Irish passport, even when I was still living in N.I. I disagree with the UN, of course anyone has the right to leave. Is the whole of Earth turning into a Soviet USSR style “Federation”?

 

[Ray McCarthy]

I've chopped Maisie's email in the middle, 1441 words. This is start of the book. It's about 110K words and is practically hours after the Court scene in "The Apprentice's Talent." The next book in this Story thread unsurprisingly is "The Master's Talent". "The Solar Alliance" is a parallel story to these, but I might "fold it in" as interspersed Chapters. It took the Aliens only 6 months to get Maisie from Earth to Caemoria, It will take the Earth's fleet of six "Valkyrie Class Starships" about 5 and a half years. There is a believable technical explanation, if we allow the imaginary Jump Drive and Talents (We'd call them Magic).

 

[Brian G Turner]

Maisie stood watching Chainai head toward the courtyard. Why wasn’t he searched properly. she thought angrily. She flounced off ignoring the stool her dark blue embroidered cloak caught and knocked over. Nor did she notice that Master Dhramini, the Adept Wizard, was watching from behind her large mug of Molruk.

Millifore didn’t turn to look at Maisie’s progress down the Mall.

Aside from the punctuation error after "properly", I keep being thrown by what the prose says the characters don't notice. All of the above is close together, and too much of it is focused on people not looking at, or noticing, other things.

This puts in mind my previous comment in the other Critiques thread - you keep putting unimportant things at the fore, and your important things in the background.

You also use dialogue a lot, with no real character reaction or emotional content. IMO this makes your dialogue simply look like infodumps, with no regard to character.

Looking at this excerpt, I would also suggest you take a closer look at how you use POV and research strengths and weaknesses of this a little more. If we're in third person limited/close, and with a specific POV character, we should only see what the character sees - not what they don't. However, if you're aiming at an omniscient POV, it does not strike me as disciplined or playing up to its strengths - though that may be just because this is only an excerpt.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

real character reaction or emotional content

Yes, this is obviously something I need to work at. For now I will work at it by continuing to write new stuff and also studying other books that do it well. Several of my readers have mentioned this.

If we're in third person limited/close, and with a specific POV character, we should only see what the character sees - not what they don't. However, if you're aiming at an omniscient POV, it does not strike me as disciplined or playing up to its strengths

It's certainly easier to change POV on a per chapter basis. I need to study how to change from the character POV (usually Maisie) to an omniscient view when I feel the Character can't possibly know a fact and yet for Story arc I think I need to communicate what's happening to the reader. Some "events" or "discussions" that happen will only affect Maisie in next book.

Start of earlier book "The Apprentice's Talent" (now rewritten a lot) http://www.sffchronicles.com/threads/549411/

 

[Jo Zebedee]

I think what's needed in close third isn't switching to omni, actually, but being close enough to Maisie for it not to matter what's known elsewhere. This is hard to get used to doing but if Maisie is your pov character for this scene then nothing in the back story should matter until it impacts on her.

I can't crit on the ipad easily, so won't do a line by line but your dialogue punctuation isn't quite there. In the Toolbox thread in writing resources about a page back I have a long, boring, post about punctuating dialogue which might help a little (tis tricky to get right.) Also, within the dialogue you have a lot of asked and exclaimed and persisted etc - these are telling devices and can stand out, whereas said is an invisible word which the reader skips over easily. Your actions and the dialogue itself should tell us how it was said...

 

[The Judge]

I need to study how to change from the character POV (usually Maisie) to an omniscient view when I feel the Character can't possibly know a fact and yet for Story arc I think I need to communicate what's happening to the reader.

I'd suggest you don't do this within scenes. I'd agree with Brian that the use of omni in that first scene isn't controlled, so the head-hopping is very disruptive, and from where I'm sitting, wholly unnecessary. For instance you could have her overhear the dialogue when the others talk about her, and then show how she feels about this, or you could put it into the mouth of the character who confronts her eg "You were wholly inattentive, Maisie -- you knocked over that stool, yet you failed to notice the contact with it or the noise it made falling. Am I right?" She can then see the stool on its side and admit to herself she didn't notice and feel ashamed of having lost control in such a way.

Some "events" or "discussions" that happen will only affect Maisie in next book.

Then I'd suggest you don't include them here, since unless they are earth-shattering on their own, the chances of anyone remembering them until the next book are remote, so you'll need to talk about them there to remind the reader anyway, when you can do a flashback or some such, so you'll just end up duplicating things. And they will simply clutter things up if they are not relevant to the plot/action/character development here.

I have to confess I found it very difficult to engage with this. Part of the problem is that there are so many names and we don't know who these people are or what they are. I rather assumed this was a piece from the middle of the novel, so to me -- since I thought they'd all been introduced before this -- lines like Master Dhramini, the Adept Wizard and He as an Arch Telepath read very awkwardly, since we shouldn't need to be told this again. Then I read in your second post that this is the opening of the novel, so we've not seen them before, not here, only in the previous book. That being the case, I really don't think you should be starting like this, introducing so many characters so quickly and in such an info-dumpy way on the very first page, as it's incredibly confusing. I know that there's an argument no one is likely to pick this up before having read the first book. Nonetheless, I really would urge you to reconsider. Frankly, you also need something a good bit more interesting as an opening of a novel than someone having a snit for some unknown reason. (I know you say about a suicide -- but we don't here know anything about it.)

I also think you need to consider carefully what the actual point of the scenes are and whether you have chosen the best means to convey that point. For instance the scene in Chainai's apartment. Basically one guy is moving out and someone else is moving in. That it? Is that actually of any real importance to the plot? If you're having scenes where the new person is suddenly and unexpectedly there and we need to know how and why, couldn't just a "With his promotion Olef had moved to the Village Complex [as being more convenient for shape-shifting] [if you feel the need to explain why -- and if giving Complex a capital once, make it consistent] and Anit had taken his place in the apartments to be nearer the lab." ie 30 words or so instead of nearly 300. If there are going to be repercussions which make it important for this change-over to be dealt with at length, then you need to get some feel of that here eg "The ???'s won't like it, someone moving without their consent. They'll make trouble for us." otherwise it really does read as not terribly interesting or informative, to me, at least.

Following on from that, even if a scene is important in itself I think you need to look at every line and ask yourself what it is doing there eg “Don’t forget that report at class tomorrow.” It may be that report is vital for the plot. Frankly, though, it just reads as unimportant filler, and for me there are just too many lines like this, which don't appear to move the story forward or give insights into these people and their characters.

Sorry I can't be more enthusiastic, but I hope some of my comments might help as you make revisions.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

I rather assumed this was a piece from the middle of the novel

Maybe the "The Apprentice's Talent" and "The Journeyman's Talent" need to be combined as a single novel.

 

[tinkerdan]

I would agree that this needs a lot of work. A lot of dialogue is not so bad if it can be accompanied by some more narrative to give us some insight into the feelings of the characters. But I'm strong on characters within the story.

Nor did she notice that Master Dhramini, the Adept Wizard, was watching from behind her large mug of Molruk.

If it's necessary to include the Adept Wizard at this point I suggest instead of what the character didn't see you place notice on what the character sees. I only say this because I just finished reading a piece with this type of narrator reveal that massively annoyed me. If it becomes possible and fits reasonably some time later we might discover this. The bottom line is if it's important then you should rethink it; but that's only so you won't annoy me with it.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

I think I understand that ...
There are many aspects I'm sure I can't get right, such as punctuation and some sentences word order, also typo and accidental repetitions. If I can do a good story then maybe some of the more trivial stuff can be sorted by an Editor.
Meanwhile I think I should note the comments, many of which I agree with, but concentrate on writing more rather than picking over what I have written just yet. AFAIK I not on any deadline, so writing more and worrying about more editing later seems a useful strategy.
I shall experiment too.