Announcement

Below are excerpts from works of fiction. You have an opportunity to show the authors how their works should continue.

For each piece, the continuation deemed most entertaining by Evil Editor will be published on his blog. Judging criteria include maintaining the author's tone, and humor or shock value of the "twist" the story takes in your hands. Read the "New Beginnings" on Evil Editor's blog for examples. Submit your continuations as comments.

If you submit a continuation, you agree that it may be published royalty-free, as-is or edited, both on Evil Editor's blog and in books published by Evil Editor Publications. If you wish to be credited as the author of your continuation, include the name you want used on the blog, and the name you want used in any future book.

To submit an opening from your novel or short story, email to EvlEdtr@gmail.com (Not attached). Openings should be in the 150 to 200-word range. Longer ones may be trimmed. Submitting an opening doesn't commit you to publication in a book, but it's hoped you'll grant permission. Do include the name(s) you want used if you want credit for your opening. An opening can be a chapter opening, though if it is, it should be a chapter that doesn't require us to know anything we would have learned in earlier chapters.

Do not comment on the quality of the openings themselves. They will be removed as soon as a suitable continuation is submitted. Save comments for when the piece appears on Evil Editor's main blog (evileditor.blogspot.com).

Chuck

It’s a long way from the gutter to the back seat of a limo, Chuck Mallory thought as he sat in the back of the stretch Lincoln. Recessed lights cast a discreet glow and a hint of sandalwood lurked in the climate-controlled air. It’s not my limo, but still, it’s a long way from the gutter.

Mallory looked at the two men sitting across from him. They were dressed in dark suits and wore serious faces. He didn’t know why he’d been asked -- summoned, really -- to meet Seth Davies, Chairman of the Board of the Port Authority, and Bill Donovan, a fellow board member. Or why he’d been instructed to make sure he wasn’t followed to the rendezvous point.

“This conversation is to be kept in the strictest confidence, Mr. Mallory,” Davies said. “We must have your word on that.”

“Mr. Davies, anything you choose to tell me will be treated with the utmost discretion,” Mallory said. “But you already knew that, or you wouldn’t have contacted me.”

Hadde

Hadde ignored the bitter wind that swept the Great Forest as she scanned the column of raiders passing through the trees ahead. Stronger than the smell of fallen leaves and earth, she could smell their filth and sweat. She smelled something else as well. The scent of rot. The scent of death.

Fifteen of the raiders wore the bright tunics of Kiremi nomads, although they only had four horses, and those half-starved. The Kiremi themselves didn’t look much better. They seemed weary and defeated, not like the last time they had stormed her village. The Wasting is as bad on the plains as it is in the forest, Hadde thought.

Five strangers marched with the Kiremi. Unlike the nomads, they wore bear-skull masks and padded leather aketons and carried javelins and axes instead of bows and sabres. Their long fur cloaks and heavily bearded faces made them look like huge bear-beasts. They looked fiercer than any people she had ever seen. And there was no sense of defeat in the way they carried themselves.

Not only did the Kiremi bring allies, they also brought a captive. She recognized Geros, a young hunter from Fallingbrook. His hands were tied behind his back and his mouth was gagged. Two Kiremi walked beside him. One held a rope tied around his neck.

“The Kiremi are back,” Hadde said as Belor and Calen joined her behind the fallen tree hiding her from view. “They have Geros.”

Sechra

The thread snapped again in Sechra’s fingers. She glanced at her aunt Rena, hoping she hadn’t noticed anything.

“If you can’t keep your mind on the work, girl, let it alone.” Rena said wearily.
“I’m sorry! I tried...”

“What were you thinking of?” Sechra paused, struggled for an answer, shook her head.
“You wouldn’t understand.”

“That’s what your mother always said.” Sechra heard the exasperation in Rena’s voice, and the worry, and the old hurt that lay under it. She understood, but she didn’t know anything to say that would help. She couldn’t bear to sit there under her aunt’s pained gaze and say nothing. She rose and went outside. At least no one was there today to cluck over the trouble the outlander’s orphan made for the aunt who’d been kind enough to take her in. She went quickly through the back garden, now turned and manured for winter—at least she had done that well--through the goat-yard and up into the hills.

As she left the village behind the weight of their eyes and their worries lifted from her. She was lonely, but that was all right. The Queen in the stories she told herself was lonely too, for her countrymen were awed by her beauty and afraid of the secret power in her eyes and hands. Sechra lifted her head, lengthened her stride, feeling that cool strength washing through her...

..caught her ankle on a trailing bramble and fell heavily, face first. Some queen.

Polly

Polly Godwin knew she was lost when she smelled the Thames.

More likely it was a canal, but where on the Wandsworth Convalescent Hospital’s great grounds would a canal be? She stopped to make a map in her head. Toward west was the City of London. The railroad station, where the troop trains arrived, was south, nearer the coast. But where the water must be, she couldn’t picture.

She stood Heaven knows how many floors beneath a 100-year-old pile of granite filled with wounded soldiers from the trenches, in a maze of hallways still lit by gas lamps. Looking for a bedpan liner.

First day on her first nursing job, and it was Prank the New Girl all over again. No doubt an orderly meant to jump out at her from a cupboard. Fine chance he’d find her now.

She started back the way she’d come. In the dark behind her someone groaned with pain.

Alexander

As Alexander, son of Xavier, walked through the crowd of people in the marketplace, someone who didn’t know any better would think he was royalty. The brown-skinned youth strode forward with all the confidence of a general and all the regal bearing of a king. The bags laden with groceries he carried did nothing to detract from his commanding presence. As he went, the crowd parted before him. But they did so not out of respect, but out of fear. Alex might seem human at a first glance, but there were signs otherwise, such as his pointed ears. While Alex was human on his father’s side, his mother was Kenlor, those hardy and enchanted tribespeople that Men considered savages. In the eyes of many, this was a crime beyond all forgiveness. But despite the prejudice he faced daily, Alex refused to hide what he was, and the word shame held no meaning for him. Neither did humility.

Priestess

“You murdered her!?” A priestess in white robes turned away, unable to look at her lover.

“I did what I had to do! Don’t you understand? This is for us--This is so we can spend eternity together!” The handsome youth approached the priestess and placed his hands on her shoulders. She stopped shaking upon his touch and he gently turned her until their eyes met. “We talked about this, remember? Why let heaven decide what’s best for us when we can forge our own destiny?”

“But...murder? This is not you...This is not the man I fell in love with. You’ve been listening to those fools in the town--You let them influence you! Why did you have to tell them that I taught you the ways of the priestesses? It is forbidden for a man to know such things!”

“Why is it forbidden? Because it was ordained by the heavens? If heaven is so against what we are doing then why did they not stop you from teaching me their secrets? Why did they not intervene when we stepped beyond our bounds and used our gifts to control spirits?”