#i hope this snippet is adequate compensation :)

[bookwyrminspiration]

:]

~

Keefe made an offended noise. “I meant it! I’m trying to make you feel better about your sad life, because Foster keeps getting on my case about being nice to you and she’s so stubborn about it--and maybe I just like you, you ever thought about that?”

Send me an emoticon for a fic snippet :3

[miserable-pile-of-lies]

The Sleeping Prince of Wallachia Ch. 2 (Beta)

Here's a snippet from the upcoming chapter in my latest fanfic, this chapter is going to be a doozy with what I have planned and there will be a lot more focus on the characters, their origins, and motivations. I hope you all enjoy this teaser.

Summary: Wallachia is in great peril at the behest of Death himself; all those who have attempted to battle the creature have swiftly been executed and made an example of. The key to defeating the beast lies in Dracula's castle, located twenty odd miles out from a small village by the name of Danesti. In this village, the headwoman Greta must act quickly to save her people from the onslaught of attacks by night creatures and other ungodly minions who have sworn their loyalty to Death. Will she alone be able to stop Death or will she require additional aid to save her people and those in Wallachia?

Roasted walnuts indecorously bestrewed the forest floor, being tossed from a perch high above that stretched into the sky. Humming a cheerful tune that foretold the story of Queen Dido, a thirteen-year-old Greta smacked her lips obnoxiously as Marius attempted to scamper away from the branch they sat upon. The young girl hurled an emptied shell of a walnut into the air, given to her by the portly baker Grigore, a Wallachian native that had recently settled in Danesti to toil his goods.

“That isn’t how the founding story of Carthage goes, Queen Dido was bewitched by Cupid’s arrow,” a twelve-year-old Marius moaned wearily at his older friend who crossed her lanky arms unimpressed by the explanation. The Roman boy dug into the pouch that sat between him and his companion, uttering a cry when he felt a pinch twist the doughy skin of his love handles. Offering his finest glare, the adolescent lobbed a walnut at the lass who only ducked backwards in response to the sneak attack with a snigger.

“That cannot be, Prince Aeneas deceptively seduced our founding mother with sweet words only to leave her high and dry in the pursuit of his journey, ultimately courting Princess Lavinia of Italy,” Greta bit out with a scowl as she described the cowardly philanderer that covertly escaped into the night when leaving Carthage at the command of Jupiter. Prince Aeneas went on to become the founding father of Rome, previously recognized as the city of Lavinium when the metropolis was founded by his followers to honor their queen.

Marius merely shrugged at the latter details relayed by Greta, knowing how the rest of the myth went. Queen Dido, in a fitful rage, committed suicide out of spite at the abandonment of Aeneas and sparked the Punic Wars that led to the annexation of Carthage. Presently, both civilizations were relics of the past and the descendants of Aeneas and Dido had long forgotten about the dissension that divided the two to begin with.

“Who cares about any of that, it’s all ancient history anyway; more importantly we should talk about Faiza,” Marius clucked out with a cheeky grin as Greta’s face promptly flushed at the mention of the girl who currently held her affections.

Nimble fingers tapped bashfully against the coarse bark of the tree as she thought of the remarkable Moroccan beauty, two years her senior with an unmatched intellect that could not be found elsewhere in the village. Clearing her throat with a thunderous cough that echoed amongst the thicket of trees, thick chestnut brows quirked up to implore Marius to continue his line of questioning.

Sighing heavily in exasperation, the young man reached across to tug at his closest playmate’s cheek, earning an appalled yelp in reply.

“You vexing little runt, what was that for,” Greta demanded with a scoff, lightly slapping the terracotta toned hand away as Marius held his rib from chuckling harshly at Greta’s indignation. Thoroughly riled by the taunts, the daughter of the headman gracefully descended from the tree, stirring up the emerald leaves that laid in the low grass below. Lips curved upward at the sound of an astonished choke, knowing that Marius would take much longer to get down than Greta.

Leaves crunched in protest, alarming the teenager, who speedily pulled out her short sword to defend both herself and Marius from a potential assailant. Green eyes squinted in concentration rising from the thick branch he sat upon, bringing his elm bow and arrow to target the source of the commotion hidden by the overgrown shrubbery. Palms were presented in a mock defense manner and soon both sword and bow were lowered without further questioning; the newcomer was a fellow inhabitant of Danesti who went by the name of Felix. The scrawny queer man looked affright when he saw their weapons drawn, shaking like a white flag in the wind signaling a surrender from a fallen camp of soldiers.

“Greta and Marius, I’ve come to retrieve you both on behalf of Tobias, he says that your mother is nearing the end of labor,” Felix squawked out nervously forcing his hands to his sides while tipping the crooked point of his jaw in the air, an attempt to reinforce his position as an elder among the children who innocently snickered at the poor fellow.

Tobias was the current headman of Danesti, father of Greta and husband of Iman, patiently awaiting the arrival of his second child with the rest of the men in the village. As per custom, Iman was currently being attended by several midwives and parish priests recruited from the capital of Târgoviște; a far journey that took the travelers weeks to make it to the settlement in time for the birth.

The leader of the village had forfeited several family heirlooms to afford the care needed for Iman and adequately compensated those assisting in the birth. Childbirth was an unforgiving ordeal; one could never be too safe to preserve the life of both mother and child even with the aid of experts.

Honeyed eyes crinkled in joy; the youth absolutely thrilled that she would finally meet her younger sibling. The young girl had been praying that it would be a boy so that their father could be at peace and have a successor that would eventually inherit the role of being the headman of Danesti. If that occurred, her father would stop stifling her fun with Marius and the other village children, forcing her to sit through tedious meetings with the village men about the daily state of affairs of their community.

Regardless of the gender of the newborn, Greta promised her mother that she would look out for her younger sibling and her mother beamed from ear to ear while affectionately carding her rich brown hands through her daughter’s silken hair. Often wrapped in colorful linens covering her form and adorned with intricately knotted scarfs, her mother dressed in the traditional garb that was expected of women hailing from Somalia, a resource rich country found in East Africa. Though it was rare to see out in the open, Greta adored seeing her mother braid her kinky curly hair into the fine thin rows of braids decorated by glassy beads and golden hair cuffs imported from North African traders passing through the area to sell their finery.

The relationship between Tobias and Iman was an anomaly to all onlookers based on the traits of the two; Tobias was a brash man who had no filter and the shortest temper that could set off at a moment’s notice while Iman was quiet spoken yet assertive in her demands, effortlessly carrying herself like a member of royalty. Additionally, Tobias carried the wide frame of a brutish bull, but he was slightly below average in stature while Iman towered over her husband with long slim legs and a slender frame hidden by her garments.