Nanowrimo Update

No critiques, please. I'm participating in National Novel Writing Month and the goal is sheer volume. I'm only posting here so I can have access to what I've written from any computer. Feel free to leave comments in the form of kudos or encouragement. There will be plenty of time for critiquing when November's over.

The King's Treasure
"Ardan, stop!" his mother called after him. He didn't stop. The dust rose up in little puffs around his bare feet as they pounded the dirt road. Away. Away from home and the lies they were telling him.

He ran until his lungs screamed for air and his body forced him to stop by collapsing his knees under him. "No!" His anguished cry escaped his soul at last and immediately dissipated into the warm spring air. "No!" He wailed again and again rolling from the dirt of the road onto the long grassy creek bank beside it. Tears cut muddy tracks down his red face.

After a while, the emotion subsided and he lay numbed, staring up at the bright blue sky as large puffy clouds moved slowly from west to east. This was how she found him.

His small mother gathered his nine-year-old body in her arms. She pushed his dark hair away from his forehead and cleaned his face with the hem of her skirt. Then, she held him close, kneeling there on the side of the road and they both wept, tears mingling and soaking the bosom of her chemise.

She lifted his thin body and together they made their way back to the small cottage at the edge of the clearing. As they came near, he noticed that the yellowed walls and thatched roof looked as cheery as they ever had and his heart rested for a moment. Then, he remembered. It flooded back into his brain and blacked out even the brightest colors.

His mother carried him into the house and placed him on his bed. She knelt down and again brushed away his bangs. "We need to cut your hair," she whispered. Long brown strands escaped from the modest scarf she wore and her eyes seemed bright blue in contrast to the red face around them. No more tears fell, but her eyes glistened with the memory of them.

She placed a kiss on his forehead and stood, straightening her calico skirt and white linen chemise. "Stay here. I'll call you when supper is ready." Their first meal without him. Without his father. Ardan knew his father was dead, yet he couldn't imagine his father's cold body laying somewhere. The soldiers who had come, bloodied from the fight and streaked with mud, had said that his father's body was taken to the castle. He would be buried there tomorrow on the castle grounds in the Soldier's Cemetery with all the honor due a fallen captain of the guard.