The revised version that has a plot in mind… Book 1 of 4.
Zela: Elfin Dawn
Prologue
The first night.
The new-made stars glittered in the black sky. The stony earth, clad in soft moss, was as ready as possible as the peaceful darkness could allow.
The immortals trembled in anticipation.
Somewhere, something stirred. With speed like thought, the immortals were there, invisibly, watching.
The elf rolled over and stared up at the stars. They twinkled back, and it laughed, and then lay in silent contemplation for what seemed an eternity.
There came a rush of communication between the immortals. ‘The laugh! Our work is good!’
At last, the elf began to explore its capabilities. It sat up and felt its arms and legs and face. Its body was covered in a short garment. Encountering hair, it stroked that for several minutes. Then, it began to crawl away. It came to a drop in the earth, where the moss gave way and the raw stone was exposed. It sat back and paused, young eyes straining to see what lay below in the dim starlight. The sound of rippling water came to young ears. The scent of scuffed earth and moss was thick.
Again, the elf began to move. Feet first, it slipped over the edge, long toes feeling for something to brace against. Finding a stone, it pushed a little to test it. ‘Cautious. Thoughtful. Excellent.’ The ledge was stable, and the elf sat on it, feeling lower, but the next foothold was only as far down as the length of its lower leg. This surface was soft and yielding, gritty, dry. The elf stood upright and walked forward carefully on only two limbs. Finding dampness in the sand, and then water, it waded in without pause.
Standing knee-deep in cool water, on its own two feet, with the bright stars blazing overhead, it laughed and laughed, making the world ring with pure, unsullied joy, with childlike wonder and delight.
And the immortals laughed with it.
As the elf felt the urge to do something new and waded to shore, more confidently now, the immortals made themselves visible. Unilluminated, simply corporeal, they waited.
The elf saw them and laughed, stretching out its arms in greeting.
Huzzah! Glorfindel saves the day! From Ringwraiths!
Hmm. This picture is based on a picture I’d done the day before of Link, which I didn’t put up here because my scanner/printer decided to die a more violent death than usual and now won’t even print things. Before, it would only scan if the screen-saver hadn’t been on yet, and now it won’t print either. Still, I think I have more than enough pictures to keep going for a couple of months, at least. If the worst comes to the worst, I’ll take digital pictures of them like the whiteboard portrait. Why, oh why does technology have to fail me when I’m doing something cool?
This is… a rather annoying and, though anatomically more correct than some, bad picture. This is Link sitting with Rana (romantically? >_<7) under a tree and asking her the title question. Obviously this is when they are grown up – more or less – and he’s just rescued her and made her laugh. Also… uh… I forgot what I was going to say. I think it was about my scanner that doesn’t work after the screen saver’s been on for a little bit.
Okay, so I figured out why they flipped Link. It’s because everybody’s right-handed and they’d feel wierd using their awkward side to dextrously (is that a word?) swing a sword around. Still, I’d try it… it’s annoying to see him backwards…
