A couple of posts this week made me think about the wonderful inspiration and friendship that can result from blogging.
The Secret DMS Files Of Fairday Morrow featured something along these lines as their weekly theme. Then came the long anticipated news that my dear friend Donna Yates from
Believe in Yourself has just e-published her novel
Always.
I would love to be able to include all the blog friends here that I have made over the months (you know who you are!) - people I am never likely to meet in person but whose friendship has become important to me in so many ways. (What I always try to do is to promote your blogs whenever I feel an opportunity presents itself, including my own little sunbeam.)
Instead I'm limiting myself to only mentioning a handful of bloggers who are also published writers - besides Donna Yates these include Joleene Naylor at
Amaranthine (who together with Donna graciously volunteered to read and comment on my own scribblings), Roger Lawrence at
Three Hoodies Save the World and Darlene Foster at
Darlene Foster's Blog. As published authors I salute all of you - and you guys have no idea how inspirational you can be to someone like me by showing what self belief, hard work and the love of writing can achieve.
I've always enjoyed writing but I tend to get distracted far too easily. I have a demanding full time career as an IT Systems Analyst, a family who feel increasingly neglected by my many hobbies, a love of the outdoors and a passion for children's fairytale illustrations and paper dolls. But the people I've mentioned have made me feel more and more that I should try to join their ranks and finish at least one of the stories that I have started.
Earlier this year I put together a post called
Some More Adventurous Scribbles in which I outlined the plot of a book I had started writing almost 15 years ago when I was on maternity leave. At the time my mother was my most valued critic and I loved the way she had no qualms in letting me know if she thought anything I wrote was clumsy or anyone in the story was behaving out of character. Then a year later (1999) my mom died unexpectedly. One of the last things she said to me when she realised she had little time left was how sad she was that she would never get to see the end of my book. If I do ever manage to finish it the dedication will be to her and I hope where ever she is right now that she will know I finally got there.
What follows is a complete spoiler of the first part of the book, but I thought I'd share a bit more with all my blog friends of what I have managed to achieve so far. In the earlier post I gave the gist of the story and included a link to the first chapter in its entirety. The end is supposed to be a surprise for the reader - we are conditioned to expect fairy tales and folk stories following a certain path where the hero always triumphs and good prevails no matter what the odds.
My story is set in the 7th century. All of the locations are real but the plot and characters are completely fictitious - one of the advantages of writing about the distant past and an era not particularly well documented. The first part of the novel is set in what we now call Dumbarton and the wider area of Strathclyde. Alcluith (the title) means 'Rock of the Clyde' and was an early name for both Dumbarton and the countryside surrounding it. My characters live in Dun Breatann (the fortress of the Britons) - the origins and naming of the fort are therefore obvious. Later events will move to Eryri (Snowdonia) in Wales, Dun Eiden (Edinburgh) and Urbs Coludi (Coldingham) a monastic settlement on the east Scottish coast (in those days monasteries housed both men and women).
Real life Dumbarton:
What I have consciously avoided, however, is giving any obviously Scottish flavour to the people or events. This era pre-dates the geographical entity of Scotland as we know it today together with that nation's culture and customs. These people were Celts, newly converted to Christianity, kindred to the inhabitants of Wales and Cornwall who were increasingly being pushed ever further West and North by the advancing Saxons.
The names I've used have all been purposely chosen and bar one are authentic to the period. Each was given because of its meaning:
Women’s Names:
Saraid (sor+id) Related
to sár and implies ‘best, surpassing
all.’ According to tradition Saraid
is the ancestor of the Gaelic-speaking people who settled in Scotland.
Aleine
(a+lane) A form of Helen meaning
‘sunbeam.’
Morag (more+ag) Scottish form of mór meaning ‘great’ plus
the ending ag meaning ‘young’.
Bridget Related to the
noun brígh meaning ‘power, strength, vigour, virtue.’
Isla (I’ll+a) The
name of a Scottish river adopted as a girl’s name. Meaning uncertain but it may
be related to aileach, ‘rocky place’.
Ynyra (in+eer+a) Welsh
meaning ‘honour’.
Men’s Names:
Aidan (aid+in) Associated
with strength of mind and courage of heart.
Thought by some to herald stubbornness.
Ranulf Possible meaning is ‘wolf’s
shield’. In its Viking form Ragnvald it
means ‘ruler’s advice’.
Cadoc (cad+dock) From the Welsh cathach meaning ‘brave in battle’.
The only exception is Rowallan - central to the story and chosen only because it is my husband's name (and as I mentioned last time is is still unsure whether to take that as a compliment!)
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| Print by Sulamith Wulfing |
The extract I've chosen comes right at the end of part 1 (containing 5 chapters) - the point I've reached so far.
Chapter 1 ended with Rowallan's defeat and his death in battle against the Saxons. The life of his pregnant wife Saraid is spared by Raedwald, the new ruler of Alcluith. The survival of their unborn child, however, is subject to a terrible decision - only a girl will be allowed to live. Thanks to the ingenuity of Bridget (Sairaid's maid), the baby boy (when he is born) is smuggled out of Dun Breatann. He is taken in by Garrit and Isla, a young couple (recently bereaved by a stillbirth) who live at the edge of a forest in the foothills of the surrounding mountains. Bridget also convinces Morgag, a young noblewoman whose husband Ranulf has been summoned to Dun Breatann in order to swear fealty to its new ruler, to give up her newborn daughter completing the deception that Saraid's child is female. Morag agrees, seeing this as a noble gesture - it is only when reality sets in and she has to hand over her baby that she faces the enormity of what she has done. The last few paragraphs tie up all of these threads as follows:
In
the days that followed Isla carefully cleaned the garments and wrappings the baby
had arrived in, folded them neatly and then placed them at the bottom of the
chest. From time to time she would take them
out and look at them, fingering the soft material with a sense of wonder,
admiring the fine needlework and intricate craftsmanship. Then she would gently put them back and cover
them with her own work. The baby would never
wear them again.
For his part Garrit never asked Isla
whether she thought about the child’s origins.
During the first weeks after his
arrival Garrit pondered the question of the baby’s identity and the
circumstances that compelled a total stranger to bring him to their door. Garrit knew the world was full of
indiscretion and that there were any number of feasible alternatives. The infant could have been born to the
unmarried daughter of a noble family, a girl who was betrothed to an
influential and wealthy suitor. Such a
union would be cast in jeopardy should an unwanted child of dubious origin
throw doubt upon the suitability of the bride.
More likely though, the babe was the
result of a careless dalliance carried out while a lady’s husband was away for
a prolonged period, making it impossible that the child could be his own. Garrit knew the lifestyle and values of the
high born differed greatly from his own.
A helpless infant could be disposed of easily without remorse, his life
snuffed out for no other reason than the irresponsibility of those who brought
him into the world.
As time passed the reason why the
child was brought to them became irrelevant.
The overwhelming emotion that filled Garrit’s heart and mind was gratitude.
Gratitude that this strange, unexpected turn of events had brought the wife
he adored back from the brink and his small family unit could resume a pattern
of normality again.
Tentatively
at first, Garrit made cautious forays into the forest, lengthening the duration
of his working day over a period of time until he had re-established his
original routine. Eventually the relief
he experienced when he returned to a household of tranquil domesticity was
replaced by the expectation that it would always be so.
Ranulf was perplexed. Since their return from Alcluith he had found
Morag distant and uncharacteristically distracted. He too mourned the loss of their newborn
daughter. The child’s sudden death was a
complete surprise as the infant showed every sign of thriving after birth. But these things happened and Ranulf expected
the healing properties of time would dull the pain and give them the
opportunity to move on.
Ranulf understood Morag needed a period
to grieve but he was losing patience. Children
died in infancy all the time. It was an
accepted albeit unfortunate fact of life.
Morag would have known there was every possibility her baby might not
win the struggle for survival during those first anxious weeks. The child had also been a girl, not the heir
he was hoping for. Her loss was to be
regretted, but it was not as though his firstborn had been a son.
What Ranulf could not understand was
why Morag was showing no sign at all of recovery. There was a nagging doubt that did not sit
easy with him. Try as he might Ranulf
could not shake the feeling that something untoward had happened while Morag
was kept apart from him in the women’s quarters at Alcluith. It wasn’t just the oath he had been forced to
swear, safeguarding his family and their holding. Something about their time at Alcluith had
left Ranulf feeling tainted and increasingly unsettled. Morag’s strange behaviour was adding to his
sense of unease. There was a persistent sensation
of discord hovering at the edge of his
reason. An anomaly he knew should be able to detect and understand.
Ranulf shook his head to clear these
troubling thoughts and contemplated his sleeping wife as she lay silently in
bed beside him. The answer to her
problems, he decided, was easy. What she
needed was another child to take her mind off the one she had lost. Hopefully the son he longed for who would
inherit the lands Ranulf had gone to such pains to protect.
Well,
he smiled to himself gleefully - that was one area in which he could make a
concerted effort to be part of the solution.
As Ranulf drew Morag into his
embrace he wondered how long it would be before she reacted with the same
willingness and enthusiasm she had shown before the onset of her
pregnancy. Morag did not turn away or
spurn him. But neither did she welcome
his lovemaking. She lay silent and
compliant and it was painfully obvious the essence of her spirit was somewhere
else. Something fundamental in their
relationship had been quenched and Ranulf found himself hoping that in time the
spark of her being would come back to fill the void left in their lives.
Saraid sat before the open window
contemplating the stars scattered like diamond fragments across the night
sky. Soon she would have to close the
shutters against the early winter chill, but for the moment she craved contact
with the heavens even if the Almighty no longer felt inclined to acknowledge
her existence.
Saraid sat perfectly still. She held Morag’s daughter as she watched the glittering
expanse of the heavens. An unwanted tear
slid between her lashes and she turned her head to stop it falling on the
infant’s upturned face. Brushing away more
tears with quiet determination she moved to gently stroke the soft skin of the sleeping
infant’s exposed cheek. Warm and content
the baby’s peaceful slumber did not falter.
Saraid resumed her contemplation of the sky.
‘Rowallan’,
she whispered softly to herself. ‘ Sleep well my love, wherever you may be.’ Already Saraid was unsure whether her thoughts
went out to father or to son.
Far away, at the edge of the great
forest the child who was born to be king lay safe and secure in a humble
woodsman’s cottage nestled in the foothills of blue ridged mountains. As he slept the innocent and dreamless sleep
of infancy, the baby was completely unaware as yet what fate still had in store
for him.
--- oOo ---
In the normal course of events it would be expected that the paths of these children (named Aidan and Aleine by their respective foster parents) would not cross and that they would never meet, living out their lives (so different to what they should have been born into) in obscurity.
But destiny can sometimes have other ideas!
