Unglued

 My desert garden needs a touch of personality.

I'll make dinosaurs, fun for my kids to look at,

and superglue them to the rocks

or they will shatter in clumsy hands.

I take my birthday clay and shape

my first,

a megasaurus:

long tail, head sideways, claws curled.

Each time I set him to dry I must reattach

a limb.

An arm fell off, a leg, his head.

Then for shaping, peeling off the extra,

smooth with gentlest sponge.

Claws fall off.

Well, I can paint over that.

Right?

Set him to dry, two weeks this time.

Hue lightens as he ages, terra cotta to vague gray.

All in one piece,

he looks as good as my imagination.

Take him down to paint.

I'll make this a fun activity,

earn good Mommy points,

so I pull out a lesser statue for the boys.

Leave the room to retrieve the paint.

Crash.

Tattling: "My brother broke it."

Dinosaur is in pieces.

Broken.

I put him on the shelf,

say I'm sad but do not yell,

earn good Mommy points.

Later, send them outside.

Superglue his arms, a leg, his head.

Cracks remain, and pieces too small for the glue.

I can paint over that, right?

Begin to paint.

Nudge his head.

Head falls off.

Scream at the universe:

"I am having a bad day!"

Wonder, is there some Meaning,

a parable in this tale?

I am the statue trying to fit the ideal,

sometimes coming unglued
or losing my head.

I retreat, let the frustration dry.

Later I'll get the glue

and try again.

The Spectra Uprooted begins

This is the opening scene of Keita's Wings book 3, The Spectra Uprooted.

Keita Sage stood alone among a crowd. Like the other maple-skinned, dark-haired Sprites, she faced the wide wooden stage below. Two men wrestled atop it, arms and legs glistening under the autumn sun as they ducked and dodged. The moves were unfamiliar to her, and her thoughts wandered: to other festivals lost to time, to her friends who must have discovered her absence, to wondering why she felt so out of place among people who looked so much like she did.

The crowd's cheering made her whip around. One of the men had fallen. The other jumped on top of him and wrapped his well-muscled arm around the other's neck. Keita flinched. Before she knew what she was doing, she was pressing through the crowd. The man underneath was squirming, frantic at first but with less and less life, and still the crowd watched and cheered. Keita was a few feet away when the man fell limp against the wood, the sound of his fall hidden in a roar from the crowd. A green cast spread up his skin, and Keita stopped.

Of course. He had gone dormant. He would wake up in less than an hour, embarrassed but unharmed. Keita had been living away from home too long. If the man had not been a Sprite, born into one of the other five clans, he would be dead.

The crowd dispersed and Keita caught only one more glimpse of the hurt man, his skin now bright green, being dragged from the stage. The other Sprites, wearing the pale, yellowish green of the grasslander tribe, strode away in twos and threes, weaving among the huge cottonwoods that lined the bottom of a wide, gentle valley. Keita had seen only the tops of those trees from the prairies, until she came to the edge of the hollow and found the celebrating group. Piping music drifted from the clearing where couples danced, their bare feet thumping the hard earth in enticing patterns. In their speech and movement and in more undefinable ways, the Sprite band showed their allegiance to each other. From babies and childlings, children, adlings like Keita, to full adults, they formed a tight-knit community that she was too obviously not a part of. They couldn't reject her on Equinumn, the autumn equinox, but her strangeness fit her like a garment she could not remove.

This was not what she had expected when she had left the others. They were her friends, but the group was too large, too noisy, too busy to make friends with Keita's home. They weren't interested in celebrating Equinumn, and even her twin brother had ignored her attempts to organize an event or two among their own group. Finding a local village had been her only option.

"Had anything to eat yet?"

Keita jumped. A round, friendly-faced man stood beneath the closest cottonwoods, holding out a turtle-shell bowl of thick brown stew. A refusal was halfway out Keita's mouth when she remembered to bite it back. Not today.

"Thank you," she said. Her hands shook as she took the bowl.

"Name's Bract. I do the cooking for the childlings... and everything else, for my three." He pointed to a trio of youngsters in the branches of the nearest tree. Bract waited, perhaps for Keita to introduce herself, but she said nothing. At last he asked, "This your first meal in a season?"

"Thereabouts," Keita said without looking up. Her last meal had been just like this. The day was cold but crystal clear, and the stew sat warm in her stomach. Trees towered over their valley home, unscathed by the future fire that would roar through weeks later. Her father, strong, busy, alive, threaded through the crowds, while dancers proved that though winter came and Earth slept, life would come again. Now the whole valley slept, and Keita had been gone from it three seasons. Nine months. No food.

The man was still watching. Keita attempted to smile as she scooped a square of root vegetable into her mouth.

Warmth. Crunch. Salt. Savory flavor of summer richness, of festivals gone by, of happy days that would never come back. The bowl slipped from her fingers and thudded to the ground.

Warm gravy spattered her toes. The children gasped, and Bract's eyes widened. Waste of food was sin. Keita ducked to rescue what she could, lost her balance, and found herself on hands and knees in leaf litter. Her head spun, and her stomach contracted with pain. She heaved, heaved again, Someone's hands had her shoulders, raised her to a sitting position, let her back rest on rough bark. She took a deep breath, and as the pain ebbed a fraction, looked up into Bract's face.

"We eat at each festival for a reason, adling," he said. "We can't hold off eating more than a season or so."

Had she known that? Eating a meal was an important part of the season transitions. It showed that they could not escape their connection to the world, that even Earth's people depended on the web that connected all life. Apparently the meal was more than symbolic. She ought to have known, but she ought to have known a lot of things. Knowledge was scarce when your childhood tutor worked for the enemy.

Journey to the Summit

Posted by Christie V Powell on December 8, 2016 at 3:20 PM

Two seasons before 'The Spectra Unearthed' opens, Keita Sage went with her father to meet the other rulers to prepare for an arranged marriage. On the journey she decided to slip away...

 

 

Keita Sage crept through the underbrush of the forest, ears alert for any sign of followers. The sunlight sneaked passed the pine branches overhead and set a dappled web of shadow across her path. She placed each step with care. Her father could command someone with a tracking talent to find her, and she needed to avoid leaving a single clue. Going back was not an option.

 

The trail led to the bank of the raging Silver River and continued up a steep trail crossed by rocky ledges. A shiver, half of anticipation, half of excitement, traveled down her spine. She'd been here once before, when she'd sneaked out of the Inner Vale to explore, but she wasn't allowed so far from home without an escort--someone who was sure to be dull and unpleasant, like her useless cousin Felix. Her father's camp was out of her sensing range, at least a mile behind. Home was a three-day journey south--although she could have made it in one if she tried.

 

Home. They couldn't exile her from her own kingdom, and she wasn't about to stick around and find out which horrible foreign kingdom she'd be sent to.

 

The trail smoothed and widened as she climbed, but she hardly noticed until she heard voices ahead. She swore under her breath. She could climb either cliff, but not without notice, especially when Sprites could sense as well as she. She reached out with her mind to sense them and then blanched. No Sprites, but humans, a pair of the unnaturally large creatures, astride even bigger horses. She glanced at the river below--could she climb down the cliff before they noticed?

 

They rounded the corner in an instant, a forest of knobbly legs and boots. Both were male, maybe a foot or two taller than she, but on the horses they seemed gigantic. Long frizzled hair hung past their shoulders, and bundles of all shapes and sizes dangled from their saddles, giving off such a disgusting mix of stenches that Keita stumbled as they drew near.

 

"Hullo!" one boomed. "What have we got here?" The voice might have been kind, but it was so rough and thick with accent that she couldn’t be sure.

 

Her mind went blank. She was so fast at thinking up excuses for her father and tutor--why didn't the thoughts come now? "I...I got lost," she choked out.

 

"You must have wandered a ways."

 

Before she could think of the answer, the second man leaned forward to study the trail behind her. “You came up through there? That valley looks like a good place for trapping but we’ve yet to find a way down.”

 

“There’s nothing you’d want down there,” Keita said quickly. Her father and his escort were still camped in the valley below.

 

The second man’s grin grew. “Humans,” he repeated. “You’re not human?”

 

She gulped as everything she’d ever heard about humans flashed through her brain. Dangerous, especially in mobs. No abilities, but fearsome weapons to make up for it. Her kind had hidden from them after their first bloody encounters 200 years ago, and few still believed in them.

 

She had to escape. “I don’t know what you mean. I’ve got to go.” She edged toward the cliff.

 

A hand gripped her wrist. Keita forced herself not to panic. She couldn't show them what she was--but how could she escape? And the humans were heading toward her father's camp. She couldn't go back and warn them. Her father, King of Spritelands, had ignored her plenty but until now she'd never known how little he cared. In front of everyone, without the slightest warning, he announced that she, not her twin brother Glen, would attend this year's summit council. Not because she might enjoy the journey or want to meet people from other clans, but because he wanted the other kings to look her over and decide which of their sons she would marry. Quite beside the fact that she knew no one outside of her own kingdom, Spritelands, the marriage would mean she would leave home forever. She would leave the mountains, the trees, the great river below. Even the sky, if she moved to a kingdom where the people lived underground. How could she live without seeing the sky?

 

She couldn't let them find out about Sprites. Images flashed through her mind: gathering at the Autumn Festival, all united, a hundred strong. Training with her favorite cousin Hunter under the great trees. No, she couldn't let these humans discover them. Spritelands was worth saving.

 

The group was passing a pine growing just uphill. One of the pine branches grew across the path, high enough to block horses but easy for the humans to duck under. Keita focused, sending her energy into the tree. The branch expanded, reaching downward, pointy needles sticking into the path. She smiled. Wood bending and plant growth were talents of hers—though undeveloped, of course.

 

“Hey! What's that?”

 

The two men were standing on the other side of it, staring with open mouths at the tree branch that had been growing before their eyes. Keita let go of the tree, but the damage had been done.

 

“Natives, I've heard of,” one muttered. “Talking bears, giant cats, people with wolf heads... but never, in any legend, have I heard of living trees.”

 

Living trees? What a stupid thing to disbelieve. But Keita thought she knew what he meant, and it gave her an idea. Keita pressed her energy into the tree. Its branches began to wave. Then she stepped out, where they could see her, and screamed.

 

Both of them whirled around. "Miss?" one called uncertainly.

 

Keita backed toward the tree while its limbs flailed around her. "Help! It's going to eat me!"

 

A human took a tentative step forward. She took another step back and felt rough bark against her back. She leaned into it and the wood swelled, growing outward around her. The men screamed. From her hiding place, Keita heard them thundering away. She felt them reach their horses and stampede eastward.

 

The men faded from her senses. She grinned and pushed her way out of the bark that shrank back to make room for her.

 

She wasn't going to run away.

 

She knew it was true before she knew where the thought came from. The humans had known she wasn't one of them in a second. She couldn't hide among them without risking her entire kingdom. The risk wasn't worth it. Too many Sprites knew her by feel for her to hide among the other tribes or live alone. They would find her, they would send her home. And strange though home had become recently, she suddenly knew that home meant too much for her to risk, even if she had to leave to protect it. She sighed and turned back the way she had come.

Sterling Smelt

A year after "The Spectra Unearthed" ends, Sterling Smelt is still feeling its effects... 

Sterling endured an hour of the celebration marking the anniversary of his brother’ s death. Crowds thronged around the storytellers, begging to be told how the evil tyrant Jasper was overthrown by his valiant cousin, our beloved king. The story unfurled in all its splendor, with great battles and contests of bravery, every stitch of evidence unearthed that would fit into the proper form. The children gasped and cheered in all the right places, the adults nodded and told each other that was exactly how it was. But they were wrong. The storytellers told no falsehoods, and yet somehow in their simplified story, they missed everything.

A spear of black obsidian pierced the sky above their heads, its glossy side scarred by the names of Jasper’ s victims. Despite its demanding presence, none of the happy crowd even glanced upward. Sterling ran a rough hand over the rock as he found the names of people he knew. Like Eben Finix, not quite sixteen, proud of the wispy beard that made him look older. Or Bruno Pierce, quiet but occasionally making some dry remark that would send his companions into gales of laughter.

Real people. Real personalities, real stories, real potential for everything wonderful in life. All gone.

Cheery music wafted from a nearby bandstand, and many of the children were dancing, free and safe and alive, while their carefree feet crushed flowers that the families of victims had planted that morning. Orange daylily flowers. Blooming one day and gone the next. They were Jasper’ s favorite, but no one knew that. No one knew he might have been up on that bandstand with his banjo, given enough encouragement. No one knew.

My Mother Loves People

 My mother loves people

the way people love chocolate

or kittens or movie theaters.

She smiles, meets their eyes, learns their names,

and speaks with sunshine in her voice.

Her easy words would be wrong on my tongue.

I love people differently.

I see a stranger. I prepare to speak

But...

What if they are offended?

What if they feel obligated to listen

when they are bored, uninterested, don't care?

Perhaps I should not risk

their happiness for my desire to connect.

Any words may give awkwardness, offense, even pain

but if I offer love

people can choose which to receive.

So I smile, meet their eyes, learn their names,

try to put Mother's sunshine in my voice.

The words are not easy but I practice, I try

because we love people,

my mother and I.

Keita and Amber

This is a scene from an unpublished prequel of Keita's Wings. Keita has been summoned by her mother, queen of the Sprites, to learn more about a queen's job. 

Keita always paused when she entered the courtyard. Rows of silver flowers grew against the dark green hedges, and mosses of all shades covering the ground. Keita’s eye was drawn to her mother, who sat in an ornate wooden throne at the front of the room. With long blonde hair, bright blue eyes, and a sparkling silver dress, she stood out like a beacon in the dark green room.

Rushing footsteps interrupted. Keita looked up as a bony Lectran woman ran into the courtyard. “Amber! How good to see you!” she gushed.

Keita rolled her eyes at the woman’s exuberance, but her mother didn’t seem to mind. “Hello, Poppy. How are you today?”

As the woman and her mother gabbed on, Keita forced her face into an interested expression and stopped listening. She hardly noticed as the woman left and another took her place. From that moment on, the courtyard was never empty. As soon as one person left, another took their place. Some just wanted to talk, some asked questions, and a few brought disagreements for the queen to solve. Keita’s mother talked and joked with them, and none seemed to leave unhappy.

Finally a group of Mer girls left, and the courtyard was quiet again. Keita looked at her mother. “So queens talk to people all day?”

Her mother grinned. “It’s a hard job, but someone’s got to do it.”

The Sick Camp

The Sick Camp: The Spectra United (Keita's Wings book 2) sneak peek 

Posted by Christie V Powell on August 8, 2016 at 12:25 PM

The smell hit her first, rank with decay and death. A man with no foot sprawled across the ground in front of them, changing his own bandages. Two children were lying a few feet away, wrapped in blankets, their faces covered in red marks. Keita scanned the camp for a sign of a well person—surely someone was taking care of these people. She saw no one.

“Keita, wait.”

She hadn’t realized she’d moved until she heard Brian’s warning. She bit her lip. He was right—if she healed these people, they’d join the other camp, and stories about inhuman healers would spread like wildfire. Humans couldn't know about Spectra, she knew that, but how could she just stand here when she had the power to heal them?

Amala charged into the crowd, searching for her father. Across the camp, a boy staggered in, pulling a cart. He stopped, dropped the crosspiece, and helped a frail old man out of the cart. Next he lifted out a small child, and another… how many people fit in there?

The older boy looked up. “Did you come back to help?”

Keita couldn’t speak.

“Some people come help. But they get sick too. I’ve lasted longer than most. That’s my dad. My mom caught the fever, and then my brothers, and my sister’s got it…”

The little girl in his arms was listless, her face red under the dirt. Her eyes were open, though, and when her brother stopped talking she focused on Keita, as though the girl knew she could make a difference. How could Keita not help?

Suddenly Brian whipped the pack off of his back and began digging through it. He pulled out the ragged toy Lucy had given to Keita. “You see this?” he asked.

The girl and her brother nodded.

“Well, this ball is magic. If you touch it, the magic can make you better.”

Keita stared. “What are you talking about?”

Better to have them believing in magic toys than people, right? he asked silently.

Oh. Right.

She held the ball out to the girl. “Try it.” Weak fingers stretched out, and as they brushed the worn fabric they bumped Keita’s hand.

The suppressed power burst from her. The boy cried out and leapt back. His sister dropped from his arms. She yelped, but it was a strong cry. Then, her eyes full of wonder, she climbed to her feet. Her face was not so red, and her gaunt cheeks had filled in. Her brother stood. “It works,” he breathed.

Before Keita could blink twice she was surrounded. The people pushed and shoved and clung to each other, and her energy jumped from contact to contact. The camp was no longer silent. It rang with shouts and cries and laughter.

The sun was sinking. Keita had not realized how long she had been working. The last drop of sunlight disappeared and she sank to her knees. “Thank you,” she told Brian. “I think… I will be happy later. Right now a rest might be nice.” And she dropped.