So for today’s prompt, think about character introductions. As a new character enters, how do others react? Hiss and spit? Circle around warily? Effusive greeting with a belief that whomever you meet must automatically be your new best friend? Not everyone will react the same around a new person. And although a person may behave a certain way around one person, they won’t necessarily react in that manner with the next person they meet.

This week, I offer a snippet of dialogue that shows some of Nikolai’s thinking:

“We all have our unique abilities. Centhia appears to be under the illusion that yours is more significant than what the rest of us possess.” One shoulder rose slightly, and he swallowed a mouthful of coffee, eyes slightly closed. “Some of us are stronger than others. You know you aren’t one of them, and because of that I must spread out my resources to ensure your safety while you insist on living outside my protection. I only do this because I care for you, but I might not choose to do this forever.”

This is from a later scene.

I stepped in front of Nikolai, flinching as his black eyes bored into mine. The pain almost felled me, but I didn’t back down. So prove you have more honour than you think he has. Let me buy him. You can kill him if he steps out of line and tries to harm me.

As Nikolai’s eyes faded to brown, I quickly searched my pockets, found couple quarters and a penny and practically threw it at the troll.

You can read other entries on the Six Sentence Sunday website. So many great snippets, it’s hard to get through them all :} Thanks again to everyone that stops by and takes time to leave a comment.

So for today’s prompt, what boundaries does your character have? Do they get up inside other people’s personal space when they talk? Try to maintain a set distance from people at all times? Imagine both perspectives. If your character likes to get inside another person’s boundaries, why do they do it? What reaction do they get? If your character is someone like a cop or detective, invading personal space could be a tactic to garner information. Would it work? Write a scene where you can explore issues of personal boundaries and the conflict/tension that can result from not listening to someone else’s body clues.

My mouth thinned into a hard line. I turned away, hurt, offended, and unwilling to watch.

“You have dime?” The troll’s voice came out more as a strained gasp than speech. No one responded. “Lady…”

So back to the prompt. Take a list of words that inspire you (maybe joy, thoughtful, kind, courage, etc.) and put them in a cup. Make a second list of nouns (house, shoe, box, etc.). Put them in a second cup. Draw one slip of paper from each cup. Now write something from those two words.

Here is this week’s six. Don’t forget to check out other offerings at Six Sentence Sunday. (Just to clarify, last week, it was the troll that said “stop”.)

He sagged in front of us, slumping to the ground like a big pile of rubble, clutching his shaggy head.

“You don’t have to kill him.” I laid a hand on Nikolai’s forearm.

“It would be better to let him kill you?”

“No. That’s not—”

“So stop interfering.”

Knowing what was coming, I closed my eyes, but not before pain razed across my temple. I plummeted to the ground in an ungracious heap. Still somewhat dazed, I skittered away from the troll, backing up against one of the few tombstones. As I blinked away the distortion in my mind, I could see the troll staggering in circles, a grimace distorting his features. He tried unsuccessfully to unsheathe his axe.

“Stop.”

But based on certain feedback I’d received, I thought I had to change her age. But you can’t just do that arbitrarily without fixing the voice that goes along with it. And guess who didn’t do that. Truthfully, I entered the contest more to find out how old people thought my character might be so I knew whether to fix the voice or the age. In fact, when I sent in my entry, I sat for a long time trying to figure out what age she “should” be, and just slapped a number on. It didn’t work.

Although the age most people guessed is closer to my original intention, my main character is a vampire. As some guessed, she is newly turned (or recently), and I see her age as somewhat unimportant. She would have been about 24 or 25 when turned. This is about a year later. But she’d still think somewhat like a 25-year-old. The ancient, haunting way of thinking that comes with vampires wouldn’t start to set in until she’d been a vampire for most likely decades, if not centuries.

So here’s a big thank you to all of you for helping me sort out this detail.

Nikolai appeared to increase in size so he seemed to loom in front of the troll. His coat rippled and swirled around him, heightening the illusion.

“You not hurt me.” The troll clutched me tighter to his chest, as if to use me as a shield.

“Really?” Nikolai raised one eyebrow and stared at the troll.