Nanorimo

There is a contest called National Novel Writing Month, or Nanorimo for short. The terms are simple, write a 50,000 word novel in the month of November. It's taxing, it's grueling, and I completed it, producing my very first novel, The Erl King. It's a story of best friends, surviving as outsiders, and discovering heroism they didn't know they had. Enjoy here a bit of the first chapter, in which our heroes and their world are introduced. Perhaps someday you'll be able to find it bound in paper on the bookshelf.

1 On the Lakeside
Johnny Raze gazed at the crystal blue sky, watching the edge of the Celestial Sphere cross in front of the sun. Beyond it, beyond sight, were six more, just like the one his world hovered in, hanging in space like a sparkling string of pearls. They said that seven tiny suns and seven miniscule moons circled the Spheres but of course Johnny had never left his own, the Sphere known as the Wood, in all of his twenty-five years of life. It was also said that within each Sphere lay an entire world, with strange people and incredible places. It was not for this reason, though, that the young man stared into the endless sky. Johnny’s eyes searched the edge of the transparent heavens because he was bored out of his skin.
He was sitting underneath a hanging willow that day, on the edge of a steel blue lake, next to his longtime friend, Whisper. It was a scene few would consider unusual except for the outward appearances of the two men. Wearing nothing but a pair of camouflage green trousers, Johnny Raze’s dark red skin was displayed to all. It was the color of dark apples, or glowing embers, without variation or blotch. Across his thin chest and arms were inscribed black tattoos, zigzagging this way and that like snakes run over while trying to cross a busy road. On his feet and hands were short claws, merely long and sharpened nails some would say, though they were thicker and darker like black iron. Finally, under his short and spiky black hair two tiny horns poked through, spirals running their two inch length like the rifling of a gun. As was his usual, Johnny wore a frown on his face.
His companion was less startling. His skin was the light tan of someone who’d lived under the sun filtered by green canopies his entire life. He wore gray trousers, gray boots, a gray shirt with a black vest, and from his shoulders hung a dirty gray, fur cloak to keep out the chill on cold mornings. His hair was a ragged mop of dark brown and he sported a perpetual smile on his naked mouth. In his hands was a fishing rod, and at his belt were two sheathes with daggers, one straight and narrow and the other curved at the tip. Whisper’s eyes were closed and a small pile of fish lay at his side in the cold grass, too small for a meal but impressive nonetheless. Johnny, his own rod in hand, complained to his friend.
“I’m sure you’re doing something different, just look. I’ve been out here all morning, freezing my ass off, and all I’ve got to show for it is a cough I’m sure is a cold starting up.”
“Oh, do calm down,” Whisper replied without opening his eyes. “It’s like I said. Fishing is a game of patience. And of serenity. Once you’ve achieved oneness with the water the fish’ll swim right to you like an afternoon spawning ground.”
“Yeah, that was three hours ago. I’ve been pragging one with the water ever since it started soaking into my skin! Tell me you’re not-“