Vampire Rule?

I did a reading back in January. A dismal night as I remember. Afterwards, I started chatting with one of the audience. Without having read the book, she told me she felt that in the zot hierarchy, vampires are at the top.

Yeah—they wish. Vampires don't rule in most U.S. cities. But Seattle’s a special case. Kurt is one of the city’s founders, which allowed him to do two things: persuade his human timber baron partners to turn a more or less blind eye to zot labor, and take complete control over the flow of zot immigration to the new city. That Seattle is one of the few places where zots can live in relative peace (with emphasis on the word relative) is Kurt’s doing. It’s the debt all zots in the city owe him. And Kurt is not shy about collecting his due.

So that’s why vampires are on top in Seattle. How Kurt managed to do what he did is a book in itself. But the result was give him an iron grip over Seattle’s zot population. You wanna live here? Gotta talk to Kurt first. Of course, getting Kurt's permission is not quite as literal as it used to be, what with the public university and all. After all, it's in Kurt's best interest that the school attract in and out-of-state zots to Seattle because they spend money. And Kurt's got lots of business interests in the city besides his Last Chance nightclub and Boeing. Restaurants, coffee shops, bookstores, you name it. But it's understood by all the university's zot students that they will leave after graduation. No exceptions. You want to stay in Seattle after graduating? Gotta talk to Kurt first...

Oh--you're wondering why a 600-odd year old vampire would have a major stake in an aircraft manufacturer? Well, Kurt is a Renaissance man...

Revolutionary Politics

So if preternatural power makes zots all that and a bag of chips, why don’t they just enslave humans and take over?

Actually they have, from time to time. But it’s always short lived. The sheer power of human numbers is part of it. Enslave a human population and eventually you’ll face an invasion force you can’t beat. Too damn many of them. Then there’s the animosity between the different zot races. It runs so deep it’s almost ingrained. Historically, zots would sell each other out before they’d cooperate with each other. Humans know this--their sheer numbers and zots’ racial hatreds are their most effective weapons against preternatural power and permanent zot rule.

(That’s the short answer, anyway. The long one is a 10 to 15-page paper.)

But something new is happening. All across America—and the world—zots are uniting. They don’t want to take over. They want something way bigger than that. They want to change the rules. Legal recognition. Equal rights. Humans would never go for it but they know that. Hence the revolution—what they can’t get by negotiation, they’ll take by force.

(That too is the short answer. The long one is an even longer paper.)

Of course not all zots are a part of it. That animosity thing again. So the revolutionaries’ numbers are small. But it’s growing. And they are determined to get what they want.

You might say that Garrett and the revolutionaries are after the same thing: the freedom to openly be what they are without harassment (an understatement, to be sure). Garrett’s method is magick. Way more effective than using armed force. But then each doesn’t know what the other is doing. If they did, would they work together? Interesting question. We’ll never know.

It's Con Season!

Went to Balticon this past weekend--and a good time was had by all. I always go to the RIF (Reading is Fundamental) benefit auction and this year my prize is a life-sized cardboard cut-out of Robot from Lost in Space. Loved that show when I was a kid. Maybe I can find Dr. Smith somewhere. Be great if I could, huh?

At cons, I tend to haunt the literary tracks (no surprise) to meet up with old friends, make some new ones, but most of all, to learn. Tracks on the ins and outs of publishing are always timely. For example, I found out some time ago that many in the industry consider blogs to be a form of publishing and anything that appeared in a blog first will most likely be viewed as a reprint. This is a problem if a publisher insists on first rights. I've already run into this--one of my Zot Musings I later developed into a short story and submitted to a couple of places. No takers--it's already published and they wanted first rights, of course. That's why I haven't posted chapters from my book.

Anyway, someone made the marvelous suggestion that I post chapters that were cut from the final manuscript. So I'm doing just that. This one was cut because over the course of writing the story, Parker, Garrett and Kurt's relationships with each other changed somewhat without me realizing it until later. It was a subtle change, but a change nonetheless and in the context of the entire book, this chapter no longer made sense. Sneaky devils.

Almost running along the hallway, Garrett somehow managed to stem her tears. She didn’t want to start crying. Not now—Kurt might hear and take it as a sign of weakness.

The mage burst through the door to the darkened alley, panting. Trying to calm down, she held it open a few moments before she quietly closed it shut. She put her hands up to her face. This can’t be happening, she thought. I’m so close. So motherdamned close. She leaned against the cold, unyielding door, no longer trying to hide her tears.

When her crying stopped, Garrett dried her eyes with her hands, shoved them into her pockets and started for her car. The freezing night and her aversion to cold weather made her feel even more dejected. At the end of the alley, she stepped out from between the buildings and ventured onto the sidewalk. She hesitated a moment, blinking rapidly in the sudden glare of the streetlights. After her eyes had adjusted, she walked to her car. Reaching it, she fished the keys from a pocket in her cape, opened the door and got in. Instead of leaving, she sat behind the steering wheel, staring at the crowds on the street. The bars were closing. Humans were everywhere, obviously on their way home from tonight’s impromptu citywide party. A few minutes later, she finally started the engine and drove off. Maneuvering her way around clumps of raucous revelers here and there, she soon left the Square behind.

Garrett allowed herself to think about Parker. Her lips formed a disapproving frown. “Effit, Park—why can’ ye jus’ accept what’s happened and deal wit’ it?” she said to an oncoming car. As she drove, her face slowly relaxed. She spoke with the werewolf in her imagination, telling him some truths he needed to hear. “Parker,” she murmured, “you know damned well I agreed to be your freyja only because the pack needed one. You needed all the help you could get to cope with the pack war and later, the werehunt. I was the only one you could turn to. My agreeing to be your freyja…” She shook her head. “I never promised I’d stay with you forever Park, and it was wrong of you to assume I would. Find another freyja, Park. Find another, and then maybe we can be friends again.”

By now Garrett was almost home. She lived in an older section of Seattle, about a mile southeast of where Parker lived. She pulled her Altima into a space on the street directly in front of her cozy little house, shut down the engine but didn’t get out of the car. If Kurt thinks I’m going to duet with him if Park doesn’t work out, he’s wrong. Duets were inherently unstable. They usually turned into factions and factions usually turned into wars. And if Kurt thought he could force her into a duet…well, he was wrong about that, too. Garrett’s hazel eyes turned hard. “Jus’ ye try, vampire—anna it’ll be t’ last t’ing ye ever do,” she whispered to the frigid night.

Then a tidal wave of tiredness crashed over her. Wearily, she slumped forward in the driver’s seat until her head rested on the steering wheel. The air inside the car grew steadily colder. Finally, she got out of her vehicle and secured it. Trudging to her house, Garrett climbed the stairs to the small porch and unlocked the front door. Sighing softly, she pushed it open and went inside.

Reality Check...

Reality. Such a dirty word.

My editor recently told me he would be retiring soon. As in, like now. I saw it coming, but...I don't know about you, but sometimes I just close my eyes and carry on, hoping that when I open them it will have all gone away. Never happens but I do it all the same. Maybe that kind of irrationality is the hallmark of being human. If it isn't, I know another--the ability to hold two diametrically opposed beliefs at the same time. That was amply demonstrated to me last week. It's embarassing, so I won't go into it except to say that the Lexus is a very nice car to drive aimlessly about while lost in the desert...

The Alien Within: Cast of Characters--Melera Redux

Wouldn't it be great if you could instantly morph into something or someone else whenever you wished? For you, nothing would be off limits. You could play pranks on your friends (or enemies), crash an A-list party, rob an exclusive jewelry store--whatever your little heart desires. And you'd get away with every bit of it. Of course, you'd have to be careful to morph back into your own form in private. No point in lifting a million-dollar diamond necklace looking like Dubya if someone sees you morphing back into Joe Schmuck in the alley.

But that kind of morphing, that's what Melera's cz'ado--shadow--can do, among other things like boosting her already formidable speed and strength. Hence Kurt's name for her, the Wonder Bitch. As for what Melera's shadow is, it's a separate entity that shares "space" in her mind. Sort of like a were, but not really. A were is a separate, self-aware consciousness that shares mind-space with its human counterpart and can physically manifest in its own form--a wolf, a tiger, a shark, whatever. A Xia'saan's shadow is separate and self-aware, but without form. That's why Melera can morph into whatever she wants to be while Parker can only morph into his wolf. There are other differences between a were and a shadow, too. Like the higher emotions, for example. A were can experience its own joy, love, rage, lust, etc., but feelings like these are beyond a shadow. For a were, if an emotion--say, rage--is strong enough, it can break its human's mental bonds and trigger a forced morph. That would never happen with a shadow. It might understand why a particular circumstance would enrage its Xia'saan but for itself, it would feel nothing. A shadow's only interest is in preserving the life of the person that enables it to live. And that, dear reader, is what makes it--and by extension, Melera--so very, very dangerous. During her time in Beloc's prison ship, many of his guards discovered this truth and in the hardest way. Too bad so few of them lived long enough to warn their fellows.

The point of all this explanation is to say that Melera's cz'ado is, like Parker's wolf, another secondary character in The Alien Within, though it doesn't play as large a role. We'll see more of it as the series progresses. But the thing I like best about Melera's shadow is that its fantastic ability is based on quantum theory. I credit David Lindley, author of Where Does The Weirdness Go? for the idea. Read his book sometime. It's fascinating.

The Alien Within: Cast of Characters--Parker Redux

Imagine you're a fly inside Parker's house on a Saturday afternoon. Through your faceted eyes you watch him putter about, wiping down the kitchen counters, now hauling a load of dirty laundry to the basement, then heading back upstairs to pay some bills, maybe stopping by the refrigerator to grab a beer first. What's the first thing you notice? The man talks to himself a lot, doesn't he? Seems that way--nobody's around but him. But you'd be wrong. Parker's not talking to himself. He's talking to his wolf. And it talks back.

Imagine another scene. You're that fly again, this time clinging to a trunk of an oak tree in the wee hours of the morning. Parker sits at the tree's base, his right ear a mere inches away from where you crouch. He's watching someone walk along a path, wondering why they're out so early. The person is abruptly pulled off the path and into a stand of trees. Both of you hear the sound of flesh being roundly beaten. Parker jumps to his feet and suddenly you realize you can hear his thoughts:

Oh, no. Don’t let this be what I think it is.

The victim hadn’t cried out when he’d been pulled from the path, but someone was screaming now. Parker had just taken a step to run towards the commotion when his wolf’s hard mental shove threw him off-balance. He stumbled and almost fell.

And you're going where? it growled.

But—

Stop acting like a damned human. It ain't our problem.

But—

No dice.

Parker wavered. His wolf was right. He’d been about to break a cardinal pack rule: whatever’s happening, don’t get involved unless directly threatened. The rule was callous, but practical. Getting involved might lead to a discovery of what he was, which could be fatal—for him and the pack. But what if it wasn’t an ordinary mugging?

Seems the wolf has more sense than Parker does, right? Sometimes yes, sometimes no. The truth is that they need each other, brothers against the wind fighting to survive the storm of humanity that wants them dead because of what they are. Hardly seems fair. But then life isn't fair. And nobody knows that better than the zots.

My World And Welcome To It, VIII

Humans and zots have been warring with each other for as long as humans and zots have been around. It's always us against them, whichever side you're on. But just as always, there are exceptions to the rule. Witches and scrum are proof of that.

I'm a witch. That means one of my parents was zot and the other human. My mother's an elf. She didn't have to be, but she is. Anyway, human divided by zot equals witch. Sometimes. More likely the kid'll be scrum. Human and zot genes don't always mix very well. A good mix will get you a witch. A bad mix gets you scrum. And a really bad mix is better off dead.

So...witches. Too zot to be human and too human to be zot. Witches consider themselves zots, but other zots don't see it that way. To them, we're half-breeds. To humans we're zots, half-breed or not. Whatever. Anyway, since zots as well as humans consider us suspect, we answer to neither. Witches answer to the ONE, the Source of All Things. And the ONE guides us in everything we do. 'Course, some of the ONE's ideas don't go over too well. Like the deal we cut with humans wa-a-ay back when. "Humans, if you'll stop killing us witches because we're zots, we'll protect you from other zots." It wasn't exactly like that but that's how other zots saw it then, and that's how they see it now. Anyway, I could give you the gory details about why our protecting humans serves the ONE's purpose, but I won't. If I did...Mother, we could be here for days.

Blessed be, my Sisters and Brothers. We witches are the cats who walk by ourselves.