Soothsayer Ch. 14, Pt. 1

Notes: Oh my god, what's this, a vaguely naughty chapter at last? How have I written this much and not had any sex in it so far! Goddamn plot. Still, slightly elevated rating for this one, darlins, and we're careening toward the end now! Woooohoooo!


Title: Soothsayer Chapter 14, Part 1.

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"Failure to plan is planning to fail." -- Adam Lakein

                There was a long list of stuff I needed to go over before my actual confrontation with Olafur and his brood. The trouble was, I couldn’t quite remember any of it. Most of it was set-up, things that I needed to do at just the right time in order to get the result I wanted. I was heading out to conduct a symphony of violence and lies, and there was no time for rehearsal. Everything had to happen just right, and that would take an unholy amount of concentration, but my mind swam around like a drunk fish, turning circles and not getting anywhere at all.

          

Soothsayer Ch. 13, Pt. 2

Notes: More Soothsayer, wherein we meet Roger's wife (based on a real person, I know a lot of characters), get drunk in planes, and make decisions about the future. We're careening toward the finish line, guys! One more month, maybe? A little more? I'm so excited!


Title: Soothsayer Chapter 13, Part 2.

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“Where there’s a will, there’s a weapon.” – Yuri Orlov, Lord Of War

By the time we reached Roger’s plane, the last of my adrenaline was finally worn down to the point where the aggression was gone, mostly replaced by exhaustion. I had just…holy shit. I’d just blown up a car. Well, I hadn’t blown up a car, but someone had blown up a car on my orders. It was a spiral of flame and hate and violence and I’d fed right into it, and yeah, that wasn’t really my fault, but it still didn’t make me feel good.

Soothsayer Ch. 13, Pt. 1

Notes: Wow, so much has happened in the past week. I officially sold my super villain story to Riptide, which will be getting a name change. Also, it might become a series, which is amazing. Also, there's a lot more that I'll talk about later this week, but for now! Have some Soothsayer confrontation, Texas-style. This was such a fun chapter to write, oh my god.


Title: Soothsayer Chapter 13, Part 1.

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“Two things scare me. The first is getting hurt. But that’s not nearly as scary as the second, which is losing.” – Lance Armstrong

                Naturally, once Sören knew about the confrontation that was looming he insisted on being there. I figured it would be easier without him there but he thought, and probably correctly, that since he was the one we were fighting over he should have a say in our negotiations.

                “Fine,” I said, “but you keep your mouth shut for the most part, okay? Please? Because you’re not good at defusing these sorts of situations, and I think you know that.”

                “Defusing such situations would be boring,” he told me with a smirk. “I much prefer when you fight over me.”

                “And I much prefer living through these things, so don’t push it, okay?”

  

Soothsayer Ch. 12, Pt. 2 + announcements

Notes: Oh wow, guys! First off, thank you to everyone who commented on Dando Bola going live, I will reply to each and every one of you as soon as I can. Spanish isn't a language I'm very good at, so this takes me some time but I'll get there. Also, the Cody/Ten vignette is being written as we speak, but taking some time. It's coming though!

Secondly, I have tentatively got a new release scheduled with Riptide. Yes! That villain story I posted an excerpt of a long time ago? With the bomber and the guy working at the bank? Yeah, that's the one. This is awesome because I love that story and I really wanted another release with Riptide. Depending on how quickly I get through the edits (and there will be a LOT) it could be out as soon as April. Which is so soon, oh my god.

Thirdly, here's more Soothsayer! We're setting up for a massive confrontation, I'm loving it :)


Title: Soothsayer Chapter 12, Part 2.

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“The path to success is to take massive, determined action.” – Tony Robbins

                Sören didn’t talk to me at all after that, even though I couldn’t stop asking him if he was all right. It had to have been a terrifying thing for him, to be swallowed up by a greater force than he himself was. Like Jonah and the whale, only the whale was just as smart as Jonah and they both knew it. Hell, I’d have been scared under the circumstances. I had been scared just watching it.

Bobby was kind of a bastard, but I took his meaning. Sören wasn’t a big fish in America. I needed to find him somewhere to put down roots—literally and figuratively—that wouldn’t chew him up and spit him out. If I couldn’t do that, then honestly I wouldn’t blame Sören for not wanting to stick with me, because everyone needed a home. Just because I didn’t know exactly where mine was didn’t mean Sören had to suffer along with me. Fortunately, I knew someone in the oil business that I could talk to about that.

   

Soothsayer Ch. 3, Pt. 1

Notes: Onward! And I also get to share the artwork with you, yay! I love this picture of Cillian, done by the exceptional Felixandria/Alex: find her work here: http://felixandria.tumblr.com/  It's obviously Cillian on a better day than the one he just had, but I love the sense of movement she imbued him with.  Next time around I should have another picture done by a different artist. I'm working my way through the cast :)

Title: Soothsayer, Chapter 3, Part 1

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“No friendship is an accident.” – O. Henry, Heart of the West

It wasn’t the impact of the bullet that knocked me over; it was me trying to move too quickly on the slippery, glass-covered mess of a floor. My shoes were pretty things, but the tread had worn away long ago. The bullet hit my arm, I jerked and slid and wound up flat on my ass, and after that, well…things got a little hazy for a bit.

I’d never been shot before. Beaten until I was nothing but red blood over purple bruises, burned more than once with the business end of a cigarette, slashed with everything from chicken wire to Bowie knives, I was well acquainted with the sight of my own blood. But being shot was novel, and I stared in surprise at the perfectly round hole in my shirt, just above and outside of my elbow, as it slowly changed from white to red. Gravity pulled the blood down, staining my sleeve in pretty patterns like some perverse Rorschach card, and I just stared and ignored the sudden furor around me, people yelling and Phin bellowing like a bull, and I didn’t feel anything at all until long fingers turned my head and Roger’s blurry face swam into focus.