Rachel Starr Thomson

The 63rd Carnival of Homeschooling, hosted this time by Henry and Janine Cate, is up! The theme is “Do You Have Time for Homeschooling?”

For those unfamiliar with the carnival, is a regular compendium of blog posts by homeschoolers, hosted on various blogs, and a great way to get to know some unusual families and great writers. This week’s carnival includes practical tips on everything from writing to traveling with an eye for education, articles on recent news events, and more. Go check it out.

As a writing coach, I’ve had the privilege of helping over one hundred students become better writers. I love it. I have a confession to make, though: I’ve never taken a writing course in my life.

That doesn’t mean I haven’t had teachers. In fact, I’ve been taught by some of the best. Writers have the unique opportunity to sit at the feet of the masters, because words are deathless. My writing coaches span ages and literary genres: everyone from Shakespeare to Beatrix Potter; from Ray Bradbury to the Apostle Paul.

Writers read. If they don’t, they bypass the greatest body of creative instruction in the world.

Here are a few tips for you, O Aspiring Writer:

1. Read through the ages. You may have a poster of Charles Dickens on your wall, but make sure you read things that have been written more recently than 1870. Writing as an art form has come a long way since the 19th century. Become familiar with the styles of past and present, and you can mine them for a style of your own that is neither outdated nor destined to go the way of New Kids On the Block.

2. Read poetry. Read poetry even if you don’t understand it. Read it even if you don’t like it. Poets use language in ways that will enrich your own writing if you let their work sink in.

3. Read nonfiction if you’re a novelist; fiction if you write nonfiction. The styles can learn a lot from each other. Fiction writers know how to pace a story and involve the emotions and passions of their readers–it’s a skill nonfiction writers can benefit from. Likewise, nonfiction writers know how to cut to the chase, communicate clearly, and make the mundane sound interesting. Novelists, take note.

(A quick aside: novelists and short story writers will also find that nonfiction books–history, science, biography, social issues, travelogues, and more–are an incredible storehouse of ideas.)

4. Read critically. When something moves you, ask yourself why. When you’re bored, ask the same question. What’s working? What isn’t? Analyzing the work of others will help you
figure out what’s strong or weak in your own writing. Keep a journal where you jot down your observations, along with favourite quotes, interesting new words, and ideas.

5. Read the thesaurus. For fun. Seriously. I do this when I’m bored. If you doubt the extreme “fun factor” of this activity, look up “miscellany.” Who knew “rumble-bumble” was a word?

And last but not least…

6. Read books about writing. People spend hundreds of dollars on writing courses and conferences, but the library has a host of how-to books that will teach you a lot about structure and pace and dialogue and exposition and everything else you need to know.

The files for Letters to a Samuel Generation have gone to the printer. I hope to have the proof in hand by next week, after which the book will be available for sale.

Feels good.

Major Edit:

An anonymous commenter left a note saying that the story below is historically inaccurate. Accordingly, I spent about an hour this morning looking for reliable versions of it. A.C. was right, but the real story is not so far off.

A while back (think 1909), a fellow named J.E. Hutton wrote a history of the Moravian church which includes an account of this event. A little background: the Moravians were a group of Christians in what is now Czechoslovakia. They’d been around a goodly length of time, but in 1727 they experienced a revival under the leadership of Count Nicholas von Zinzendorf. Remarkably for his time, the good count took an interest in the masses of people outside of the western world who had not heard the gospel. He met a slave from the Danish-owned island of St. Thomas who told him that no one could minister to the slaves in the West Indies without first becoming slaves themselves.

The idea startled Zinzedorf’s community, but it also gripped them. Two young men, a potter and carpenter named Leonard Dober and David Nitschmann, decided after prayer and drawing lots that they would go. They set out for Denmark, meeting discouragement at every turn, and there realized that they could not actually sell themselves into slavery. Nonetheless, they took ship to St. Thomas and helped found many churches there.

The Moravians were the first major Protestant missionary movement: Dober and Nitschmann beat even William Carey to the field. The watchword of the Moravian missionary movement was the phrase that so caught my attention when I first read the (skewered) version of this tale: “May the Lamb that was slain receive the reward of His suffering.”

I’ve left part of the original post below, as an interesting example of how prettified versions of stories are easily spread. Thanks for the tip, whoever you are!

* * *

“Have You Heard The One About the Two Moravians & The Slave Owner?”

In the 1700s two young Moravians heard of an island in the West Indies where an atheist British owner had 2,000 to 3,000 slaves. The owner had said, “No preacher, no clergyman will ever stay on this island. If he’s shipwrecked we’ll keep him in a separate house until he has to leave, but he’s never going to talk to any of us about God. I’m through with all that nonsense.” Three thousand slaves from the jungles of Africa brought to an island in the Atlantic, and there to live and die without ever hearing of Christ. Two young Moravians heard about it and decided to do something about it. They sold themselves to the British planter and then used the money they received from the sale to pay their passage out to his island, because he refused even to transport them. The Moravians came from Herrnhutt to see these two lads off. They were in their early twenties and would never return again, for they had sold themselves into lifetime slavery, simply that as slaves they could be as Christians among these others. The families were there weeping for they knew they would never see them again. And they wondered why they were going and questioned the wisdom of it. The ship slowly left its pier on the river at Hamburg, heading out to the North Sea, carried with the tide. As the gap widened and the hawsers had been cast off and were being curled up there on the pier, the two young men looked shoreward. Finally one lad with his arm linked through the arm of his fellow raised his hand and shouted across the gap the last words that were ever heard from them: “May the Lamb that was slain receive the reward of His suffering.”

(story used by permission of the Parousia Network)

My eyes feel like they’ve been staring at a computer screen all day. Likely because they have been :).

The official release date for Letters to Samuel Generation: The Collection is tomorrow. It’s not going to happen. The usual unaccountable delays have stacked themselves up against me and my deadlines. However, I should be able to release it within the next two weeks. I shall not complain. In the meantime, you can read all the chapters here.

Coaching is going very well and I’m actually ahead in marking papers. As a result, I had an extra forty-five minutes to work on Taerith. I finished a chapter and posted it.

Other excellent news is that I’ve begun work as a copy editor for Home School Enrichment Magazine. I’m very excited about it and greatly enjoying the work thus far.

Mirian entered Lilia’s room the next morning without knocking. The young queen turned from the window with startled eyes, but she did not question the intrusion. She wore only a simple shift. Her grey overdress, little more regal than a peasant’s garb but made of good enough cloth, was draped over the end of the bed. Apparently she intended wearing it again. Mirian ignored it, striding across the small room to a chest of stained oak, its corners overlaid with gold. She threw it open, filling the room with the spicy scent of perfume and wood. Rich colours greeted her: queen’s clothing, specially chosen and fitted for Lilia before her arrival, dresses in deep red and forest green, mulberry and a gorgeous blue so dark it was nearly black. Mirian fingered the blue dress, almost reverant of its softness. Lilia had been looking over her shoulder this whole time, but now she turned and took a step closer.

“Are those mine?” she asked.

Mirian looked at her almost with disbelief. “Have you not even opened this yet?”

Lilia shook her head. “I thought… well, it was closed.”

“You are at liberty to explore your own room,” Mirian said. “You’re not a slave.”

“I–” Lilia began, but the sight of Mirian’s slave collar cut her short. “Oh,” she said.

Mirian pulled the dress from the chest and let its long folds fall to the floor. “From now on,” she said, “you get dressed every morning. That’s the first thing. If the lords of the castle call for you, you’re not to come down looking like a villager.”

“I’m sorry,” Lilia said. “I didn’t know I had any choice.”

Mirian stared at Lilia for a moment, then nodded. Without a word, she started to help her on with the dress. Lilia let herself be handled, as compliant as a nonplussed child. Several times she seemed about to say something, but Mirian ignored her. She started fiercely on the laces, only gentling a little when she saw Lilia wince as she pulled one too tight.

There was a brush on the table, and Mirian reached for it. Lilia held up a hand and stopped her with a soft, “I can do that.”

Mirian turned from the table and yanked the bedding up on Lilia’s bed. She was smoothing it out when Lilia said, “Thank you.”

Mirian nodded without looking up.

“You haven’t always been a lady’s maid, have you?” Lilia asked.

Mirian looked up and sighed in irritation. Lilia stood in the sunlight, the blue in her dress deep and rich in its rays. Her hair was darker still, and likewise made gorgeous by the sun. Her skin was paler than ever, and her grey eyes were almost pleading–for something Mirian didn’t want to recognize. She pursed her lips and answered, “I am a slave. The queen should not talk with me.”

Lilia turned away abruptly. She took the reprimand as Mirian had expected she would: silently, without protest. She was like a doll: responding to everything that pushed her without fighting back.

Mirian tucked the last stray bit of bedding in and went to the door. She turned and looked at Lilia’s back, bowed head and slumping shoulders, frail white hand resting on the stone by the window.

“Call for me if you need me,” Mirian said, and left the room. She let the door close behind her, slowing it with her hand so that it wouldn’t jar. She frowned. Something was making her unhappy–guilt pricked at her. She didn’t care. She started down the stone steps, telling herself she only needed a glimpse of the sun and some air.

Mistress Grey met her halfway up. Mirian felt her spine go stiff as iron and her emotions straightened in the same fashion, unhappiness fleeing behind the instantly erected wall. Mistress Grey looked at her like a snake at a trapped rat: hateful, but just wary enough to keep its distance.

“Your queen was down here yesterday wandering like a kitchen maid,” she said. The snake struck.

“I’ll do my best to control her next time,” Mirian answered.

“Don’t talk back to me, girl,” Mistress Grey said. “You do your work, and do it well. If the queen shames us in front of Hosten, Lord Borden will have your head.”

Mirian almost smiled: the rat had teeth of its own. For the first time in her life she felt a measure of power over Mistress Grey. “Lord Borden may not see things your way,” she said.

Mistress Grey narrowed her eyes. Her voice dropped to a hiss. “Don’t think I don’t see his eyes following you,” she said. “But don’t you get any ideas. I know the world better than you do, girl. Don’t you start thinking his attentions a good thing.”

Mirian tried to answer, but her tongue strangled every word before it could leave her mouth. Her face was hot; she was blushing, and she hated it. She hated Mistress Grey for it.

For a barely perceptible moment something new came into the mistress’s eyes: bitterness, but a new kind of bitterness. “I don’t know why I bother trying to warn you,” she said. “I should let him eat you alive, for all the good you’ve ever done this place.”

Mirian’s eyes glimmered through her sulk. “Shall I tell him you said that?” she asked.

Mistress Grey stabbed once again, but this time all the venom was in her eyes. She turned away and stalked up the stairs.

Mirian looked after her for a moment. When she started her descent again, her legs were weak beneath her. She stumbled as she walked, and found herself half-leaning on the wall for support. Angry tears were welling up in her–why was she crying? Why? She had never cried as a child. She didn’t want to cry now. She staggered into the sunlight like a drunk, throwing her hand up to shade her eyes.

Her shaded gaze was met by the return of the hunters. Kardas was leading them with the antlers of a great stag tied to his horse’s flank. The new one, Taerith, rode almost beside him. All of the men were weary and filthy, but they had meat with them. Meat enough to lessen the threat of Hosten: meat enough to make a show of wealth and hospitality. She watched them unload their horses until she realized that Taerith had seen her and was coming toward her.
He smiled as he approached, even as she looked for something else to fix her attention on. She shifted uneasily, but resisted the urge to bolt.

“How is your tree?” he asked, bowing his head slightly as he came within speaking distance.

The confounded tears started to rise again. She cleared her throat. “I don’t know,” she said. “Lady’s maids don’t get outside much.”

He seemed slightly troubled. She noticed that much, as she forced herself to look at him. Why did she feel guilty in his presence?

“I hope your lady is well,” he said.

“I’ll tell her you inquired,” Mirian said, half expecting the words to scare him off. There was something beneath the surface of his words that she recognized as dangerous: an obstacle in the flow of water. He frowned slightly at her words, but his tone did not change.

“Please don’t,” he said. “I would rather you didn’t mention me.” He peered at her, as though he was waiting for her to speak on her own. She didn’t.

“She is well?” he pressed.

“Well enough,” Mirian said. “She is the queen.”

He smiled again. “And I am a hunter,” he said. “You are a slave. What does that mean? It makes us neither well nor poorly.”

The other hunters were finishing their work, and Taerith began to turn back toward them. “I should help,” he said.

Mirian nodded. Was he waiting for her to agree? He unnerved her–talked to her as if they had some understanding. She felt chided. Suddenly her own words sounded empty and childish in her ears. She looked up. The tower stretched above her. Lilia was probably still by the window.
A deep voice boomed across the courtyard: Borden, greeting his hunters. She watched as he emerged and greeted first Kardas, then the others; gripping them by the arm and talking earnestly with them. If he looked her way he would see her.

She slipped inside before he had the chance.

* * *

The horn of Hosten sounded over the fields and roads as the king of Moralia approached. It vibrated in the castle walls and made the shadows of evening tremble. The wolf was coming.

Borden stood on the castle wall and looked out on the road that stretched before him. The sun had half-set, draping the road in dusk. The lights of Hosten’s caravan announced that he had a large entourage with him: dozens, perhaps scores, of men: more than Annar had to man his entire castle. It was a deliberate show of force, intended to cast Annar’s weakness in his face. Borden was determined that the attempt should not succeed.

He left the parapet, calling for his horse as he descended. “To me!” he bellowed, and his guards took up the call. He stroked his beard impatiently as he waited, while around him his men gathered, leading horses, lining up in formation. Kardas and Taerith held the reins of their horses side by side. They made a strong pair: one all darkness and power, the other intelligence and diplomacy. Borden beckoned to them.

“You will ride at my back,” he said.”You others, ride three abreast behind them wherever the road allows.”

He turned to Master Grey, who stood waiting with two of the household servants. “All is ready, steward?”

“Indeed, my lord,” Grey replied.

“Honour Hosten as you have never honoured my brother,” Borden said. “Much depends on it.”

“I understand,” Grey said. Borden trusted that he did.

They rode out into the dusk, torches dark. Borden would signal when it was time to light them. He hoped to catch Hosten off guard, though there was little chance of doing so completely.

It was a dry, cold night. The wind in their faces as they rode smelled of snow coming.
Taerith smelled it. Weeks ago it would have concerned him for himself–he had been on the road then, nothing but a vagabond with little hope or shelter. Now it worried him, but not for himself. Horse hooves on the road kept a steady beat in the otherwise still night. The last hints of sunlight had disappeared. Taerith held tighter to the reins. In the darkness beside him he thought he could hear Kardas’s horse breathing and shaking its head.

It had been Kardas’s refusal to allow his men food at the tavern that first told Taerith something was wrong. Since then, the signs had been everywhere. The already-lean faces of the commoners who came to the castle. The barely-concealed fear in the steward and his wife as they bid the servants prepare a feast for their visitor. They did not fear Hosten–they feared the feast itself. Winter did not bode well for these people in the best of times, but this year, Annar had taxed their stores beyond discretion for his wedding feast. Now Borden taxed them again to feed the visiting king.

The smell of snow in the air was the smell of starvation and suffering.

The sound of hooves and voices, jangling tack and wagon wheels reached through the darkness, first seeming to swell from their own ranks and then clearly signalling the presence of others. A moment later the glimmer of torches became visible as Hosten’s party rounded a bend in the road. Borden lifted his hand–Taerith could barely make out the motion in the scant moonlight–and commanded, “Lights!”

Taerith reached for the torch bound to the side of his saddle. Beside him, the noise of striking flint was accompanied by sparks, and Kardas’s torch flared to life. They lowered their torches so the heads touched, and Taerith’s blazed up in return. He dismounted and ran to light the man behind him. Flame birthed flame, and soon the column pocked the darkness with orange light and the drifting outlines of smoke.

Borden still held his hand high. The riders came to a halt behind them, reining in their restless animals.

“We wait,” Borden said. His voice carried to Taerith and Kardas but not beyond them. “When he is twenty paces off, ride to my side. We will greet him together.”

They made no answer. Borden knew they had heard, and would obey.

Hosten had seen them. They heard shouts from the other party, relayed back through its ranks long and loud enough to indicate at leasty forty riders, with horses and wagons. Borden’s fifteen did not flinch at the sound, anymore than their leader flinched. The newcomers slowed in their approach, ascertaining who it was that waited for them in the road. They came into sight: forty men at least, all alike in the torchlight. Borden raised his hand and beckoned with his fingers, urging his horse forward at the same moment. Taerith and Kardas moved as one, riding to either side of their leader.

Five horses broke from the approaching column. In the center a huge man rode astride a grey warhorse. Before him, even Borden looked small. The man wore rich furs, yet there was nothing either soft or luxuriant about him. His long golden beard was streaked with grey: piercing eyes were hawkish in their power, even in the darkness. In height and girth he was a bull, and like a bull, it was all muscle and power and unstoppable force. He rode up with two warriors on either side of him. Borden spoke first.

“Welcome, my lord Hosten.”

Hosten raised a hand in greeting. “Well met, Lord Borden. Where is your brother the king?”

“He prepares for your arrival,” Borden answered.

“You are as grim as ever, I see,” Hosten said. “Short answers and hidden meanings, eh?”

Taerith shifted uneasily. Hosten was considerably older than Borden, as he drew closer that became clear. Yet the condescending note in his voice sounded more like a challenge than anything else.

Hosten’s eyes left Borden to quickly assess his men. He gave a half-snort at the sight of Kardas and beckoned to someone behind him. “We took the long route here, and brought you a gift from the north,” he said. A man rode up behind him and handed him a sack, tied shut with twine.
Hosten laughed as he hoisted the bag up.

“Heads of the northern devils we protect you from,” he said, and threw the sack into the road.

Taerith’s stomach lurched and he looked away, dreading lest the bag should come open. His eyes went to Kardas, who watched the progress of the sack with stony interest.

“They’re troubling the border early this year,” Hosten said. “They’d be snarling at your heels already if my men hadn’t cut them down like the dogs they are.”

The sack still lay in the road. Borden, distaste written on every feature, turned to command Taerith to pick it up. Kardas anticipated him. Before a word could be said, he dismounted and picked up the sack. He bowed to Hosten, who watched him with an expression that was both amused and hostile. Without a word, Kardas turned again and mounted, tying the sack to his saddle.

“We will escort you the rest of the way to the castle,” Borden said. He had hardly acknowledged the sack, and he did not look at Kardas now. “Feasting awaits you.”

“As it should,” Hosten replied. He smiled and waved his hand. “Feasting shall always accompany a wedding, eh, Borden? A joyous time for all of you. For all of us.”

Borden nodded curtly. “Indeed,” he answered.

He turned his horse, and galloped ahead. His men parted the way for him and then fell in around the newcomers, riding in pairs. Taerith reined toward Kardas, but the young man dug his heels into his horse and galloped ahead.

* * *

Copyright 2006 by Rachel Starr Thomson. Do not reproduce without written permission of the author.

Enjoying the story? Download the whole thing as an e-book from Smashwords: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/82687