Luiglin
Getting worse one day at a time
While I'm busily working on the Trials and Tribulations of a Dark Lord I've had a few other ideas to be set in the same world. The start of one is below. I've not edited it but just need to know if it's 'sounding ok' as a start.
Cheers
------------------------
Today was the first day of Harold’s new job and quite possibly... his last.
Hold on though, take a breath. Let’s take a step back from that opening line.
Here is a world where magic pools in the most unwanted of places, where creatures that shouldn’t be alive quite happily go about their daily lives and prove that they are, where the unexpected is often the norm and the norm is often the unexpected.
You get the idea.
This world is weird; a result of bored Godlings with far too much time on their hands and far too little patience to think beyond their next snack. Not a great start and complicated further over the years by evolution rearing it’s ugly head and meddling. For life is worse than any intelligent design. Life has no rules, no limitations and is all about contradictions, surprises and stupidity. It you look carefully enough you will start to understand why some creatures make up Gods. After all, there has to be an idiot in charge of it all somewhere... surely?
So back we step, to a human called Harold and in a world where weird is the norm, he’s the sort of soul for which the word ‘ordinary’ had been invented. The eighth son of a seventh son, born into the cosmopolitan chaos that is the floating city of Allswelcome, in the shadow of the seventh sibling and happy to be there.
As I said at the start, today will be the first day of his new job and quite possibly... his last.
Harold stood rooted to the spot and eyed the huge iron bound wooden doors that barred his way. The Council chambers stood at the centre of Allswelcome and had long lost any resemblance to any sort of sea faring vessel that made up the floating city. No doubt hidden beneath the grand edifice there still remained the buoyant hulls of ships long lost to history, nailed together and built upon layer after layer.
As he’d grown, Harold had eschewed the childish games of his peers and siblings, concentrating on his letters and numbers. In his teen years whilst they had found the delights of girls he’d remained nose deep in scrolls. For he had a dream, not an unusual thing for any adolescent to have, but while his contemporaries dreamed of glorious quests for loot or power, he dreamed of pushing paper.
His small room at home was an administrative shrine. Neat rows of folders arranged in date order sat above a desk that was neatly laid out with quills and inkpot; the walls covered in numerous sheets of governance lists and contract compliance orders. His father, proud as punch with his other sons, especially the seventh, was in a constant conflict of concern about his eighth son; worrying about this almost fanatical love of paper but at the same time immensely grateful that he had someone to do his bookwork for the inn.
Today though would be the beginning of Harold’s adult dream. No more childish clerical work. For inside this building there stood a proper desk, adorned by an authorised quill, official inkpot, two registered trays— in and out —and a swivel chair stamped with an inventory number that he secretly hoped would creak.
He checked his second hand brief case once more. Just in case, he’d brought his own collection of quills, a range of ink pots covering all the main shades of blue that he could afford, a bag of blotting sand, a new mug — emblazoned with the witty comment ‘Happiness is a full In tray’— and a jam sandwich that he had made this morning. Yes, all there and so far no sticky leaks.
Harold straightened his rounded shoulders, plain grey suit stretching in places they’ve never stretched before. Took a deep breath and pushed at one of the doors.
The hinges groaned in such a satisfying way that it sent shivers down his spine. He took a confident step into a long hallway, adorned either with portraits of mayors from over the ages. The place was empty except for a high desk at the end that stood in the centre and a single filing cabinet standing all forlorn by the wall. Behind the desk stood another set of doors, mirrors of the main entrance. From the doorway, Harold could just about see the balding of a scribe hunched over the desk, deep in work.
He proudly walked down the well-polished floor, heels clicking on the wood in a self-inspiring rhythm. Reaching the desk, the top of which was just above his head, he gave a polite cough and waited.
The scratching of the scribe’s quill continued unabated, punctuated only by an occasional dip into an ink pot.
He coughed once more.
The quill continued its journey.
Harold considered his options. Was this a test? Some sort of prank from his new work friends? Maybe a clerical initiation ceremony?
“Err, excuse me?”
The scribe carried on writing.
Harold peered round the edge of one side, and then the other, of the desk. No help there. He considered climbing the front but thought that would be highly unethical and more importantly quite possibly dangerous.
Edging around the desk and Harold saw that the scribe was a little old man perched atop a high chair. A short ladder was meticulously tied to the side with green folder ties. He tried another cough, keeping a close eye on the figure. The little old man remained hunched over the desk oblivious to everything except his quill.
Despite being ignored, Harold felt a stab of pride at the old man’s professionalism.
He stepped back and considered the rules of clerical etiquette that had been ground into him at scribe school. A polite cough was the advised route for advertising one’s presence. This had obviously failed and the back-up ‘polite knock on the door’ — only normally required for high seniors — was an alternative but Harold suspected that seeing as the scribe hadn’t heard the cough, then knocking on the main doors way down the hall would also be fruitless.
Harold did it anyway just in case.
Twice in fact.
Cheers
------------------------
Today was the first day of Harold’s new job and quite possibly... his last.
Hold on though, take a breath. Let’s take a step back from that opening line.
Here is a world where magic pools in the most unwanted of places, where creatures that shouldn’t be alive quite happily go about their daily lives and prove that they are, where the unexpected is often the norm and the norm is often the unexpected.
You get the idea.
This world is weird; a result of bored Godlings with far too much time on their hands and far too little patience to think beyond their next snack. Not a great start and complicated further over the years by evolution rearing it’s ugly head and meddling. For life is worse than any intelligent design. Life has no rules, no limitations and is all about contradictions, surprises and stupidity. It you look carefully enough you will start to understand why some creatures make up Gods. After all, there has to be an idiot in charge of it all somewhere... surely?
So back we step, to a human called Harold and in a world where weird is the norm, he’s the sort of soul for which the word ‘ordinary’ had been invented. The eighth son of a seventh son, born into the cosmopolitan chaos that is the floating city of Allswelcome, in the shadow of the seventh sibling and happy to be there.
As I said at the start, today will be the first day of his new job and quite possibly... his last.
Harold stood rooted to the spot and eyed the huge iron bound wooden doors that barred his way. The Council chambers stood at the centre of Allswelcome and had long lost any resemblance to any sort of sea faring vessel that made up the floating city. No doubt hidden beneath the grand edifice there still remained the buoyant hulls of ships long lost to history, nailed together and built upon layer after layer.
As he’d grown, Harold had eschewed the childish games of his peers and siblings, concentrating on his letters and numbers. In his teen years whilst they had found the delights of girls he’d remained nose deep in scrolls. For he had a dream, not an unusual thing for any adolescent to have, but while his contemporaries dreamed of glorious quests for loot or power, he dreamed of pushing paper.
His small room at home was an administrative shrine. Neat rows of folders arranged in date order sat above a desk that was neatly laid out with quills and inkpot; the walls covered in numerous sheets of governance lists and contract compliance orders. His father, proud as punch with his other sons, especially the seventh, was in a constant conflict of concern about his eighth son; worrying about this almost fanatical love of paper but at the same time immensely grateful that he had someone to do his bookwork for the inn.
Today though would be the beginning of Harold’s adult dream. No more childish clerical work. For inside this building there stood a proper desk, adorned by an authorised quill, official inkpot, two registered trays— in and out —and a swivel chair stamped with an inventory number that he secretly hoped would creak.
He checked his second hand brief case once more. Just in case, he’d brought his own collection of quills, a range of ink pots covering all the main shades of blue that he could afford, a bag of blotting sand, a new mug — emblazoned with the witty comment ‘Happiness is a full In tray’— and a jam sandwich that he had made this morning. Yes, all there and so far no sticky leaks.
Harold straightened his rounded shoulders, plain grey suit stretching in places they’ve never stretched before. Took a deep breath and pushed at one of the doors.
The hinges groaned in such a satisfying way that it sent shivers down his spine. He took a confident step into a long hallway, adorned either with portraits of mayors from over the ages. The place was empty except for a high desk at the end that stood in the centre and a single filing cabinet standing all forlorn by the wall. Behind the desk stood another set of doors, mirrors of the main entrance. From the doorway, Harold could just about see the balding of a scribe hunched over the desk, deep in work.
He proudly walked down the well-polished floor, heels clicking on the wood in a self-inspiring rhythm. Reaching the desk, the top of which was just above his head, he gave a polite cough and waited.
The scratching of the scribe’s quill continued unabated, punctuated only by an occasional dip into an ink pot.
He coughed once more.
The quill continued its journey.
Harold considered his options. Was this a test? Some sort of prank from his new work friends? Maybe a clerical initiation ceremony?
“Err, excuse me?”
The scribe carried on writing.
Harold peered round the edge of one side, and then the other, of the desk. No help there. He considered climbing the front but thought that would be highly unethical and more importantly quite possibly dangerous.
Edging around the desk and Harold saw that the scribe was a little old man perched atop a high chair. A short ladder was meticulously tied to the side with green folder ties. He tried another cough, keeping a close eye on the figure. The little old man remained hunched over the desk oblivious to everything except his quill.
Despite being ignored, Harold felt a stab of pride at the old man’s professionalism.
He stepped back and considered the rules of clerical etiquette that had been ground into him at scribe school. A polite cough was the advised route for advertising one’s presence. This had obviously failed and the back-up ‘polite knock on the door’ — only normally required for high seniors — was an alternative but Harold suspected that seeing as the scribe hadn’t heard the cough, then knocking on the main doors way down the hall would also be fruitless.
Harold did it anyway just in case.
Twice in fact.
But that said, it reads well enough once you get going, and there's some nice concepts, like the 8th son of a 7th son, and the floating city made of boats. 
