Meet Topsy

“This is Topsy.”

Cassandra saying her name caused the girl’s wings to explode from her back. She squeaked, tried to look back at the Goddess’s blessing, and in the process, promptly fell over. “Sorry.” She tried to pull herself up, stumbled into Cassandra, and stuttered. “Sorry.”

“Aguane do not apologize.”

The girl’s face colored bright red, which was the same shade as her unfortunate hair, and her dark green eyes grew wet with tears. “Sorry,” she whispered.

Ryu groaned at how annoying that was. “No speaking, you. Cassandra,” she relished using the name that was most likely to give the Haven’s leader, or usurper depending on how you looked at it, a migraine. “What the hell do you mean she’s Aguane? We haven’t had any new members for a century. I like it that way, we all do.” A series of grunts sounded indicating her squad’s agreement.

“And yet, based on this creature’s wings, we both know she’s Aguane. So the question is, what will the queen of the Aguane do about it?”

Cassandra was wise enough to use her magic to make herself disappear at that moment. The twang of the arrow striking the ground was the only sound after she was gone. The so called, “new member” was left, standing next to it, staring with eyes that were even more round at the arrow, which would have been a kill shot if Cass hadn’t poofed out. Ryu looked at Xia and scowled. “You missed.”

“You never told me to kill her. I just made sure she’d leave.” Xia slung her weapon over her shoulder.

“What do you expect me to say about that?”

“A thank you would be nice.”

“When the hell have I ever been nice?”

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#RISEUP

It’s time for girls to #RISEUP.

Stop sitting in the back of the class. Stop caring about what boys think. Stop hiding the awesomeness that is you.

Yes, being a kid sucks. Yes, there are all kinds of injustices you suffer every day. But if girls stood together and fought against people telling you NO or YOU’RE NOT GOOD ENOUGH or LOOK WHAT A ________ YOU ARE, many of those injustices disappear. You can’t do it alone, you need your girls. You need sisterhood. You deserve sisterhood. Together, you can do it all. Together, you can make that mountain not only move, but dance. Together, you can do it all.

And you’re going to have to, because women aren’t setting a good example, so it’s time to start leading the adults. You’re our only hope.

#Makethemountaindance

#WednesdayWisdon

I think my Wednesday Wisdom this week is to know when I have none. I’m all out. Empty. A wasteland. I feel like my muse took a vacation, and I’m stuck at home checking out her instagram feed and sitting like this …

So to show my infinte wisdom, I believe I’ll go with, “This blog will have a new entry as soon as the writer gets some inspiration.”

I Don’t Care What You Read …

As long as you do.

Out of all the things my parents did right, nothing was more powerful than this statement. “I don’t care what you read, as long as you do.” I had it easy, my Grandma was a librarian who’s superpower was teaching kids how to read. It was the equivalent of being raised by this woman …

It didn’t take her long before I was …

When I was in fourth grade, I was dragged to the principal’s office, because on of the books on my desk was considered “porn.” It was by the amazing Judy Blume, and at the time it was horrific to think a mother had let me go to school with such filth. I explained it wasn’t my Mom who gave it to me, it was my Gram. Both of them came at the call by the principal with the wrath of true Mother Lions in full force. After forty-five minutes of words like slut shaming, ignorance, book banning, and have you checked you resume floating out from the closed door, I was summoned within to be informed by the principal she was very sorry, she misunderstood the situation.

If I’m lucky enough to talk to a school or group of kids, I always touch upon some of Grams’ main points about the power of reading. When you read, the power is in your hands. You get the information you need about a situation and can make up your own mind. When you’re a reader, it doesn’t matter where you go to school or how far you go in school, you’ll always be self-educated. When you’re a reader, you get to go anywhere you wish to in the world in any time period.

Who doesn’t want that?

My parents were right. It didn’t matter what I read. It mattered that I did. So I’m going to go now, get my book, and enjoy the time machine I find within those pages.

Have a great weekend!

#WednesdayWIP

Covers … covers … I get teased all the time about the changing of my book covers. Just as I don’t like wearing the same outfit every day, why should I have the same book cover? It’s not like I’m changing the name of the book. When my publisher says we have this great idea, arguing seems like a truly stupid plan. So yes, our beloved covers are going to be changed …

in honor of this image’s retirement, I thought it would be fun to do a blog entry bidding it a tearful adieu.

#ThrowbackThursday

This is from the second diary in our Haven series, Helm Abomination. Verity went from the frying pan … straight into a nuclear reactor. Enjoy!

Eric, Maddox, Crane, and Talon landed and drew their weapons. For these guys all to be this uneasy we had to be on the trail of something bad. I pulled my own sword and braced my stance. Eric flanked me, “We think there’s a Snee Ne-Iq here.”

God. Bless. You.

Why do I even have to ask at this point?

Talon guessed my frustration, “She’s a cannibal. Usually she just sleeps, but we believe she snatched a kid.”

“Otherwise we would leave her alone,” Wren finished.

Then I felt it. I whirled around to the mountain face and braced my body. The others followed suit. “Why are you guys still on the ground?”

“We’re high in the mountains in British Columbia. The air can be way too thin to keep aloft. It’ll be more effective if we don’t even try. Think you can handle fighting next to us for a change?” Wren winked.

“Definitely,” I quipped, “bring it on, bird man.”

Pop goes the weasel, or the Snee Ne-Iq in this case.

Usually, the first time I catch sight of one of these things that I was created to spot for my friends, my brain reels in a desperate attempt to process the pieces of the creature, so I don’t freeze up at the whole horrific picture.

The Snee Ne-Iq just looked like a woman.

A cave woman, but nothing so out of my realm of experience that my brain did the stop and stare. Or freeze and freak.

Her hair was in serious need of conditioner and a comb. She was wearing what looked like animal hides, sewn together by a blind guy, and she had long strips of leather braided over her legs to make some kind of crude boots. I couldn’t tell what color her skin was because it was so covered with dirt.

But she was no different from any other female.

When she reached the summit and saw us, she froze. Turning to the side, the Snee Ne-Iq pulled a short dagger from her belt. This is when I saw it. On her back she had a pannier, one of those things Robin Hood uses to carry his arrows? Well, this woman’s backpack had a kid inside.

A terrified little girl.

My anger flared, blistering me past caring of any outcome or problems. I saw a flash of red, and I charged. Who did this bitch think she was? Eating little girls? There’s a McDonald’s like every five minutes in my country. We are the fattest nation in the world. Canada couldn’t be much different. There was no justifiable reason to snack on tiny people. Kids have it tough enough as it is.

Have you seen how many books they have to carry home every day from school? Most of them use rolling suitcases because they’re so heavy.

I guess I’ve been paying more attention in my training than I realized.

The guys were beside me, and whenever they got close enough they pushed me back behind them. At least they were trying. The Snee Nee-Iq was more powerful than any of us realized, and she could move like lightning when her safety was in jeopardy. Then Talon went down.

These guys were ruthless and unstoppable in the air.

On the ground, they were out of their league.

Which was when the quicksilver movements of the Snee Nee-Iq took out Wren.

Eric and Crane moved to cover their fallen comrades.

Which left Maddox and me. Oh good. You know it’s going to be a crap day when you have to fight side-by-side to save the life of a kid you don’t know with a guy who hates your guts.

And wants to marry your fourteen year old little sister.

This can’t be my life.

#WednesdayWIP

It was no small shock to come to the end of my Haven series … and discover a whole new story. Technically this isn’t a WIP, since it comes out in a week, but here’s a piece from HARBOR ABSOLUTION, hope you like it.

Eric came into the farmhouse with a hesitant step. “Verity,” he swallowed hard, “we need you to come outside.”

Ignoring him seemed like the wisest choice.

“Help us. Please?”

“I am not the ruler of Helm.”

“You are all we have.”

“Sucks to be you, huh?”

“Verity,” crouching beside me I watched from a disinterested space as he laid his hand on my arm. I couldn’t feel him. I couldn’t feel anything. “Verity, there’s a situation outside, girl. A bad one. We need you to lead us.”

“The last time I tried to lead, I got half of you killed.”

“No, girl,” his sigh made my hair move. I still felt … nothing. “The war is Cass’s fault. Not yours. No one blames you.”

“I blame myself.”

“We still need you, honey. Please come outside.”

Last time I went outside the slate tile where I stood dissolved into my bare feet and slowly moved up my legs. Looking down, I was not surprised to see that I was covered with a striped pattern, marking the places where I absorbed stone. The universe will always provide when you know how to ask. My problem was that I had asked not to feel any pain anymore. Not to feel anything at all.

So its solution was to turn me to stone.

I secretly hoped that someone would put me in the garden when there was nothing left of me but a pretty Verity statue, dressed in a miniskirt and baby doll tank.

And a great pair of heels.

Girl priorities. Get used to it.

He pulled my body from the chair where I sat staring into my Grandma’s empty hearth locked in the pain of the past. I had no family any more. Parents were gone. Grandma disappeared. Sister close to death last time I saw her, probably dead by now. Brother had been gone so long I was sure he was toast as well. Isn’t there some famous quote about being a destroyer? Oh yeah. J. Robert Oppenheimer said it at the trinity test in New Mexico. Of course, he stole it from the Bhagavad Gita. I guess I get to do some theft on him. “Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.”

That. Was. Me.

#FridayFeeling

From the final installment of Haven, HARBOR ABSOLUTION

“You lost the God-squad?”

Right. Willow’s bellow got me to refocus on the issue at hand. My sister and her friend’s pending mutiny. Tell me something. Do other teenagers have problems like these?

“They weren’t helping as much as watching.”

“Even watching is better than nothing,” Willow said.

Stepping in between the budding feud between Kai and the resident witch, oh, our only witch, seemed wise at that point. Crap. We need Willow. “It was the best thing to do under the circumstances. You have to understand, if they’re not willing to help all of us what good are they?”

#ThrowbackThursday

“Why did Haydn tell me I had a choice between you and the Shade?”

Just as the last words cleared my lips, Cass’s shadow seemed to grow to a hundred times its normal size. A low rumbling laugh, the kind I heard that first day in the forest came taunting at me on the afternoon breeze. I guess taking a Shade vacation was not in my cards.

“Never mind.”

“You were made”—she looked away from me—“not born into this conflict. The only reason you’re at Haven is because I found you first.”

Deciding a change in topic would be wise, I shook my head as the shadow retracted back to normal size. Maybe it was my imagination? I did almost get eaten. That had to play hell with a girl’s senses. To think the twins wanted to come visit me. Over my dead body.

Hmm. Maybe I’d better stop mentioning my dead body. This is getting a little too possible in the scheme of things.