Thursday, November 8, 2007

nanowrimo word count and excerpt


NaNoWriMo word count today 2579 bringing the total word count to 14012. I am above the required amount which is 1667 x 8 days = 13336. Yay!
Found this fantastic picture of a mermaid. It personifies the look I want for Jaden, my mermaid of Aquilonia. Unfortunately it is copy right protected so I can't post it here. However I can share an excerpt with you.
Here is a little excerpt of Aquilonia:
Chapter Two Aquilonia
Jaden slapped her tail in the water again. She sat on a boulder near the beach of a deserted island. Landers generally were not a problem but sometimes they tried to capture mermaids. Jaden never understood the desire of landers to own a mermaid. Away from water she had legs like the landers. Yet the land dwellers seemed to think owning a mermaid was somehow magical.
This island had no landers on it. Jaden had explored the island on foot time and time again. She learned about the food and the animals that existed on land. Today she stayed on the boulder near the beach. Today she wanted the satisfaction of slapping her tail in the water.
She smacked the large fin at the end of her tail on the water. Tiny fish scattered. Crabs no bigger than her finger nail dodged into their tiny holes.
“How could my father dismiss me like that? He treated me like a child,” Jaden said to no one particular. She wanted to vent but she didn’t want the entire ocean to know she was having a temper tantrum. “Imagine my embarrassment when he told me, in front of the entire court, that I was picking up someone’s nightmares. That this Emperor Khai had been kidnapped two years ago and nothing I dreamt about him mattered.” Jaden picked up a small crab and stuffed it in her mouth. Her teeth crunched the shell that satisfied more than her hunger. “I am not a child. I am at the age of joining. I’ve seen twenty-five years.”
Jaden looked at her reflection in the water as it calmed around her tail. Her long hair reached to mid-tail. When she had legs her hair came to mid-thigh. Green tresses with blond and red highlights she decorated her hair with shells and coral. Her princess crown made of pearls encircled her forehead. Her lips were full with a slight green tint. Her eyes were golden with long lashes. Green with gold accents covered her eyelids. High cheekbones and a long slender neck completed the image she saw in the water.
Jaden sighed. She was indeed the age of joining. Soon her father will find a prince in another undersea kingdom and marry her off. She would be joined with some scaly tailed merman who probably blew bubbles while he slept.
“Old enough to be joined and still dismissed as a child,” Jaden huffed. She dove into the water. She had to talk to her father. She had to let him know that she was not a child. She was an adult and a dreamer. She should be treated like an adult and with the respect a dreamer deserves.
First, she would swim until her anger wore off and she could talk to her father in a calm, adult manner.
Jaden propelled herself as fast as she could go. She didn’t pay attention where she went. She just paid attention enough to keep from running into rocks, and other sea creatures. She headed out to sea.

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