Saturday, November 28, 2015

Holiday Joy

Thanksgiving's come and gone (who had pie?), and now it's time for more freebies.

First up is One Sunny Afternoon, which will be free from December 1st (THIS TUESDAY! :D) to December 5th.

Then comes The Muse, which is free from December 7th to December 11th.

Finally it's The Maze, which is free from December 13th to December 17th.

Tell your friends. Tell your grandmother. Also, when those are all done, the title for the next one will be made public. (I'm excited. Don't let me be an excited dork by myself.)

-Lalla

Sunday, November 15, 2015

Outtake

On one hand, this is made of adorable. (Which is why it didn't make it into The House on the Moor.) On the other hand, poor, poor Abigail. It must suck to know the guy you think is a murderer can pick you up. There go your hopes of, 'well, if he tries to stab me I can totally overpower him'.
* * *

She’d lost track of time-staring at the scenery would do that-when she became conscious of a warm weight on her shoulder.

“Nathan?”

Don’t be dead, don’t be dead…

No, just asleep. He’d been quiet, but…never mind. It had been a busy day.

She ought to move him, really. But they couldn’t be that far from home…she’d just leave him there. If she was being honest, she didn’t have the heart to move him.

She did make herself a little more comfortable, at least, before going back to looking out the window. He didn’t wake and she found herself checking every so often that he really was still asleep.

At one point he shivered and nestled up against her side. She reached over for the mack kept in here for sudden downpours and tucked it around him.

“’bigail?”

“Go back to sleep, we’re a ways out yet.”

“Thanks.”

“Shh.”

He sighed and said nothing else. She wasn’t sure he’d been awake at all, really.

She leaned against the window and took no small pleasure in being warm for the first time since they’d gone out. He didn’t move other than to burrow under the coat, one hand creeping up to hold it closed around his neck.

She’d close her eyes for a minute, she decided. Just for a minute…
* * *
She woke, a little, to Nathan’s voice.

“I’ll take her up to her room. Good night, Palmer.”

“Good night, sair.”

What? What was he talking about? Were they back already?

“Abigail.” She was awake, just give her a minute… “Come on.”

Before she could gather her wits enough to protest, he’d picked her up. No. No, she could walk, just give her a minute to wake up proper!

“C’n walk…”

“I doubt that very much.” She squirmed-well, twitched, anyway. “Don’t do that, you might find yourself dropped.”

Good. Dropped was better than carried.

“Down.” Lord, why wasn’t she waking up?

“In a minute.” Soon enough, he set her down on what she vaguely recognised as her bed. “There you go. Good night, Abigail.”

“Nathan?”

But he was already gone, door closing softly behind him. Well. If she wasn’t becoming aware of a dry mouth, she’d have thought she dreamt the whole thing. Stranger things had happened, but not many.

Tuesday, November 3, 2015

Winter





Pretty much. Unless you are a relative (that I know and like, not some distant one I see once every four years) or a dear friend that I never see, no hugs for you.

I hate hugs.

There. I said it.

I don't know why. I'm not traumatized or anything. My childhood was great. I just...I hate hugs. The closeness. The touching. Often, the smell of perfume/cologne. And, in recent times, this odd trend of 'hugging everyone, even if this is the first time you've met'. Seriously, what's that? What happened to the handshake? Or a little bow? That's kinda charming. (No hand-kissing, please, everyone I've known who tried to pull that off made it creepy and weird.) No. It's 'hug' now. Hug or nothing.

But now! Now it is winter (sort of), and winter means flu season. And, more importantly, winter means ways to avoid hugs from strangers. (Family doesn't care. Family just descends on you like hug-vampires and you have to shut up and accept it.)

I love winter. Winter clothes (so soft...), cold nights with coffee with Bailey's in it (that mint kind...*swoons*)...everything. Because it doesn't snow here. If I lived in snow-land I'd probably hate it.

You know what else is great about winter? No hugging. Well, less hugging among casual acquaintances, anyway. Either you run into them while shopping, which means that one or both of you has full hands, or you can claim, 'yeah, scratchy throat, better not'. Because nobody wants the flu.

-Lalla