kimurho

I've been slowed to blocked the past few days. The section I've been working on (Chapter Fetch) has already been moved once because while it made sense to write it when I did, it didn't belong where it was. Other things had to go first.

Fetch describes what Murdock does in the Borderland to which the Gate of the Wailin' Post takes him. But ... Time passes slightly differently in the Borderland. This Borderland is the Land of the Dance and it's basically a bubble in reality that isn't much bigger than a few acres. {Odd thought just occurring to me ... might that be the reason for the Dance?}

Murdock has passed through the Wailin' Post in order to retrieve two motorists who went missing on a mountain in western Virginia. One of the motorists ended up in the Dance, the other was moving away at the end of that descriptive chapter (Ch. 3 - Dance).

My subconscious wants me to go back and follow the second motorist for a bit before coming back to Murdock ... because of timing.

Actually, I'm not sure if it's exactly my subconscious. It's not a conscious part of my creative process but I suspect it's the part of my mind that controls my dreams. I don't exactly dream lucidly most of the time but I also always dream lucidly in that I know I'm dreaming. There's a part of me that is watching or reading what's happening. And a part of my mind that orders the dream in a logical plot with one course of action following rationally on another. My mind created these dream filters as protection against the nightmares that use to afflict me, and I have never regretted them because ... Wow! The dreams!

I should be working on Snowfall, but I'm caught up in a new book atm and reading that on my day off. And thinking about my writing process.

It took place in a kingdom with magic. A kingdom in upheaval. The heir to the throne was on the run, the pretender was poised to take the crown.

In my dream, I was a candidate of the Black School of Magic; in order to become a "black cloak witch" I had to pass the test of this fortress-like place which was under the control of the "red cloak witches".

Red-cloak witches had killed off or had killed off most of the Black-cloak witches. They support the pretender, in return for their help, he made magic illegal in his portions of the kingdom. But only persecuted Black-cloak witches. The fortress of the test of magic was in his territory.

My aunt ... I don't know what she was. She was narcissistic, venial, arrogant, powerful, selfish, vain,untrustworthy and did I mention a powerful witch. She hated the Red-cloak witches but from the way I felt about her in the dream, I suspect she was a Red-cloak who had fallen out with her sister witches and now just wanted to bring them all down. She taught me Black magic and encouraged me to take the test of magic.

I watched a Black-cloak candidate try to gain access to the fortress to take the test. Teenaged witches too young for the cloaks they wore stood on the stone bridge across the moat, blocking access the way bullies do in high school corridors. The candidate found a rope bridge off to the side - or maybe she wove it with magic, I'm not sure. She stepped out onto it happily, confidently (because you should always approach magic with confidence.)

She didn't make it across the moat. The beasts in the moat tore her into bloody pieces while the young Red-Cloak witches roared with laughter at her flailings.

Quietly and over time, with the counsel of my aunt (who was heavily pregnant at this time), I collected all the Black-cloak candidates I could find. My aunt was critical in devising our strategies and advising our efforts - but she did not provide any magical assistance (the practice of magic is forbidden when one is pregnant; I'm not sure it was possible, though if any woman could, my aunt would.)

We stormed the fortress en masse, over-ran the young bullies, made our way into the fortress and into the test. Some of us came out with red cloaks, most won the black. We pledged our support to the true heir and ...

My aunt gave birth to her own child (as in, I don't think there was any father). It ... she ... had adult features that were the mirror of my aunt's and a full set of long reddish curling locks, exactly like my aunt's. There was a foreboding feeling at the sight of the child and I woke up.

====================

When I woke up, it bothered me that in the dream I was trying to become a Black-cloak witch. In Western Christian culture, witchcraft is divided into black and white ... rarely grey. Black is evil and strong. White is good and weak.

But I study Gaelic folklore and one of the things I've come across is that magic is described as black but that isn't a moral description. Sgoil dubh, the black school, is the school of magic. The Dark Arts are magical arts. I am reminded that in the culture of the Far East, white is the colour of death. A book I read recently set in the culture of Indonesia stated that black was the colour of rejoicing.

I think that my dream was making a differentiation between magic, per se, and necromancy.

The test of the fortress that I experienced was to face an opponent without having access to my magic. I suspect that the opponent was myself WITH magic, that is, my magical self.

It was not an easy test to pass, but it makes a lot of logical sense. A magic-user ... A Black-cloak witch ... must be the one in control of her magic. Moral considerations, Ethical concerns, Rational thought MUST prevail over the use of magic.

Or any great power, I suppose.

The races* of man are divided along ethnic origins; from the very general - Oriental, European, African, Polynesian, Australian, North American (Native), South American (Native), Caribbean - to the more specific country or region of origin.

* MOST people understand that all men are the same species.

Within a race, there are regional differences even more minute than specific country of origin. People ... humans can live in tents, on boats, in trees, in tenements/apartment buildings, in castles, in caves, in huts. They can live in desert regions, flooded areas, forests, jungles, islands, cities, towns, &c. Classifying a "race" distinction by the type of home seems far too precious and arbitrary. On the other hand, all the races of man breathe air and live above the water and earth. Not all the races of Otherfolk do so. Would water-breathers or amphibious races of Otherfolk be classified as "regional differences" or different species? I suppose ...

I was going to say it would depend on whether they could interbreed but that's a no-go because most races of Otherfolk can interbreed with Humankind.

I think it can be safely said that dwarvenfolk are not the same race as elvankind. I propose that they are as related as the wolf is to the coyote ... or the horse is to the ass. The difference being, of course, that coyote and wolf hybrids are fertile where horse and ass hybrids are not.

It also occurs to me that they'd rather be compared to the tiger and lion than horse and ass but the timer has just rung and I have to go.