The Reluctant Negotiator

I’m working on a new short story, one that I hope to submit to 2014 Baen Fantasy Adventure Award which gives me a workable deadline to have it finished. It’s a nice break from my current WIP and gives me a bit of breathing time after stressing out over The Writer’s Voice competition last week. Check out the results! Some really incredible stories got picked up.

Here’s today’s progress on my sword and sorcery short story about Salma, a fierce mercenary, who gets dragged into being a negotiator all because she sorta-kinda might have had a relationship with the evil sorceress years ago. Together with a sly thief and a warrior who’s painted up for battle, she’ll try her best to save the Queen’s grandson. She’s also hoping the evil sorceress isn’t still bitter about their breakup.

Title: The Scorn of a Sorceress
Deadline: June 1st – gives a month for edits/review
Deadline for Contest: June 30th
New words written: 1,138
Present total word count: 1,716

Thing accomplished in fiction: Rewrote Salma’s meeting with Nadim, the thief. Had a one-sided meeting with the Queen. Got assigned the job of negotiator despite Salma’s lack of experience.

Next up: Ominous swampland and an old monastery. What better place to make friends with your new travel partners?

Commentary: I’m going super-slow with this piece to make every word count. I’ll probably need to beef up the details down the road, but for now I’m keeping elaborate descriptions to a minimum. Started this piece last week when I first heard about the contest. Fantasy Adventure – how could I pass that up?