Scene 7 cont’d: Originally I had the last scene and this part merged together as one scene. I was thinking of splitting them, but that’s no good to do this early in the book—this scene is the first real emotional hit and the reader might be like “Okay… so why are we paying attention to these two again? When do we get back to Cirellio?” So this scene needs to weather it through to the hit. As long as I write it quick and interesting, the story shouldn’t lose its footing.
Asyria releases her shielding, opening up the floodgates for the emotions to pass between her and whoever is on the other side of her thread. It turns out to be an older woman, horribly tortured, miserable, panicked, and abused.
Greggor has Asyria calm the woman down, which takes time. He tells her about how she is a terrible woman, a murderer. How she killed for a living. But Asyria isn’t completely convinced, despite being under Greggor’s spell.
When she finally calms down, the woman reveals she came from the demonic plane, and becomes convinced the voice in her head is an angel. She thinks Asyria is an angel giving her a second chance.
Asyria cries. The misery and false hope is just too much for her.
Greggor has her strike a bargain with the woman, that if she kills someone for them, she can go to the celestial plane. Asyria plays the middle-man with much unease.
~~~~~~~~
HEH- things have gotten a bit complicated on the Dahjal-Greggor-Asyria-Larimosa-woman from the demonic plane-front, so here’s a quick recap:
Dahjal is a demon, a deceiver. He is known throughout the world as Giver Greggor. He has been mind-controlling everyone in the Temple of Marais for at least ten years, maybe more.
So Dahjal=Greggor
Larimosa is Asyria’s mother and was a giver as well, but Greggor kind of ruined that.
Asyria’s father is unknown at this point.
Greggor is not always able to control Asyria like he can other people because of her power level in the art of the seven rays. So Greggor and Asyria have a sort of mind-battle going on, but he’s winning that battle. Despite it all, every once in awhile Asyria realizes everything is not quite right.
So Dahjal is Greggor who is puppeteering Asyria.
Asyria has attached what’s called a thread to a mysterious woman’s soul at Greggor’s request.
Greggor performed a ritual to return a damned soul back to Lura.
The damned soul of a woman who was once an assassin. Now she’s seen unspeakable horrors.
Once Asyria released her ‘shield’, which is a metaphysical shielding to protect her from being affected by other powers, she could feel what this damned soul could, and can control her.
So Dahjal is Greggor who is puppeteering Asyria, who, in turn, is puppeteering a dead assassin brought back to life.
The assassin’s mark? The brightest star.
Hm. Somehow it all sounds more complicated here than it does in the story. lol…
New WC: 4,407
Prev: Scene 07 | Next: Happy Birthday To Me!!!
You know, though, I actually did think now that I would love to hear more about Cirellio and his adventures, because from all you wrote so far here he sounded more interesting than Dahjal. Is there a reason in the story why we should also find Dahjal interesting, a reason you didn’t mention here so far? Seeing how he is a demon, my interest is already picked, but I couldn’t read anything specific about him so far, so maybe you can help me with that if you like.
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Comment by packsister — October 25, 2008 @ 10:40 am
It’s no good just saying ‘oh, by the way, these people are still alive!’ I guess I also mentioned Asyria did find Dahjal’s star, but that wasn’t enough to carry a scene that breaks up the main storyline.
So I brought it all the way to the point where Asyria links up with the resurrected assassin.
Think of it as a complete, undivided thought.
In other words, I do find Dahjal and Asyria quite interesting. ;)
In context, Asyria’s emotional reaction to this woman’s pain is quite touching.
It’s a good sign that you find the MC more interesting. ^__^
Next scene is back to Cirellio. ;)
[Reply]
Comment by cirellio — October 25, 2008 @ 10:50 am
You know, as a potential reader of your story (and I do love reading stories) I have a plea. Make Dahjal likable. Not *good*, because Lord knows I love evil guys, the more evil, the better. He’s a demon already, which makes half the job for me, so I’m eagerly waiting for a moment when I could REALLY like him for something he does. Something evil, done with passion, or something. I think it’s passion that makes characters lovable. And in this case, I’d really like to like him.
[Reply]
Comment by packsister — October 25, 2008 @ 11:03 am
I didn’t know Dahjal wasn’t likeable at this point. But then again, I’m not sure I ever intended for him to be likeable. He’s not the main badguy or anything, although a reader might think that by this point.
Hopefully there’s empathy built up for Dahjal already: He yearns for his own past. He yearns for love. But these are things he cannot have. And there’s always a whisper within him, telling him he should take shortcuts with his abilities which he can’t seem to let stay idle; they seduce and overwhelm him at every turn.
Initially, he genuinely intended to do good and so he became a giver. But his true nature and his ulterior motives (most of which I have not discussed) have twisted good intention into something grotesque.
Also, he has done something pretty evil already. Besides deceiving the world, he has deceived an innocent child by projecting whatever he wanted into her mind. It’s metaphorical rape. And he’s far from done; he’ll do more evil later. But, for now, he’s exiting, stage left! And how all this fits into Cirellio’s story will be apparent before the first third of the book is up.
But I’m definitely open for other ideas for Dahjal. Or better yet: What’s an example of something you’ve seen a villain do that makes you like them better?
[Reply]
Comment by cirellio — October 25, 2008 @ 1:33 pm
The little problem with this whole thing is that all I know about your story is what you write in here, so the picture that a reader makes from reading your actual text itself would surely be different. However, even from what you have said about your story so far, I have already pointed out two favourite characters to myself: Dahjal and Cirellio. Cirellio is the main character, sure, but Dahjal doesn’t need to be important to be, you know, great as a character.
I was thinking of that bit, about him “mindraping” the girl. Gosh, I’m already going all “character development” on you, like I go about my own writing, sorry for that! So if I get it right, Dahjal is kind of noble. He’s evil, but he yearns for love, he wants to be good, but his evil nature seduces him. All that makes him kind of noble to me. So I see several options already. Either he is a tragic character who will try do some good and crush and burn trying. Or he might be a sarcastic character, who could be, let’s say, constantly weighing his options of doing good or doing evil with some dark humour. Since I have no idea what you had planned for him, I don’t know what his role in the plot will be, but the most important thing about such character is the way he thinks of the situation he is in. He may act one way but think and feel something different, that makes it interesting, too. There are more options, and you could find many more, if you want.
Now, what evil thing can he do… Okay, “mindraping” a girl is good already, but somewhat “small” yet. He also shouldn’t have any “big” plans, like destroying the world. It would be just great if he did something inbetween. Like making a point of twisting that girl’s mind, a little torture, pain, crushed hopes are always nice. You can shape these things in whatever form you like. Like if he’s trying to do good, he could try to be good with the girl and fail despite trying, so that his attempts to be good would only make it worse, or something. Or he could slip into some evil habit and hurt her badly enough to leave some damage, and regret it later. You know that I can only speculate that much, not really knowing his role in the story, but yeah, my wish was that Dahjal was lovable, and to me a character is lovable when he 1) has a VERY good reason to do what he does (a very good reason is also the simple “just for fun”, it is a very good reason indeed!) 2) does something evil enough to leave some permanent damage, doesn’t matter if it’s mental or physical and 3) has a very passionate, even radical way to deal with his deed, whatever way that might be. That’s my personal recipe for a lovable evil character in general.
;) You asked for my opinion, so yeah, here it was. Hope I didn’t overwhelm you.
[Reply]
Comment by packsister — October 25, 2008 @ 2:57 pm
[Reply]
Comment by cirellio — October 25, 2008 @ 5:44 pm
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Comment by packsister — October 26, 2008 @ 2:48 am