The First Mask Falls

By Holly Lisle

The villain revealed the first bit of himself today, the first hint that he is the villain and not a hero caught up in something bigger than himself. I got my full 2000 words plus change and hated — absolutely hated — having to stop. I think I could have run for another 2000, easy, and maybe farther. The villain-scene was short, our next look through Talyn’s eyes as the darkness gets its claws into her and starts dragging her deeper into hell was longer, and I still have a scene with the true hero to do to flesh out this triangle and I’m so itchy-impatient to write that I can’t stand myself. I can’t leave Talyn where she is. But I have to, at least for a while.

Some of Talyn is the story of bad love — of real love for the wrong people and and real love from the wrong people and of the nightmares that can bring. A lot of it isn’t, but this part I’m writing right now burrows straight down into the beating heart of that particular core theme, and it has hooks into my imagination that I can’t shake. I’m going to have to write again later today, somehow. Right at the moment it’s a compulsion. The only way to the end of this tension is straight through the middle, and I’m going to have some rough and sleepless nights until I get there.

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