Slate and Earth

A Very Brief, Poorly Written, Hardly Thought Out Summary
Esther Keeling always wanted to be more. She's the Sentinel, charged with protecting the Eternal Forest from the human world lingering just outside. It is a life of subtle twilight and magic like spring rain. It is long, and it is lonely.

Ana Davis is running away. She's pregnant and just brave enough to leave her husband, but she doesn't know where she can go that this man won't find her. Until she stumbles through Esther Keeling's window in the middle of a thunderstorm, a place she's not even supposed to be able to find.

Esther doesn't know what to do with this sad, young expecting mother and she especially doesn't know what it means that she was able to pass through the veil into the forest. But there are things even the Sentinel can't see coming, and those might risk the fate of the forest - and the world - forever.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
A vague and incomplete poetic outline
Characters & more about them
Magic?????

The NaPo Thread
Mama didn't know the forest was magic

The Playlist
To be updated as it evolves:

Spoiler

Rescue My Heart by Liz Longley
All My Tears by Ane Brun
Wolf by First Aid Kit
Hello My Old Heart by The Oh Hellos
Secrets (Cellar Door) by Radical Face
Rescue Me by Unions
Waiting by Alice Boman
If It Don't Work Out by Anthony D'Amato
All Is Well by Austin Basham
Backseat by Carina Round
Sweater Weather by Kina Grannis
Spirit Cold by Tall Heights
Take You Home by Scars on 45
Lullaby by Mary Glenn
Resolve by Poppy Ackroyd
Start a War by Klergy, Valerie Broussard
Hidden In the Sand by Tally Hall
Angel of Small Death and the Codeine Scene by Seafret
Where Is My Mind by Bandit
Planet and Stars by Pavvla
Devil's Resting Place by Laura Marling
Marked for Death by Emma Ruth Rundle
Nocturne by Blanco White
I Found by Amber Run
Lost It All by Jill Andrews

The LMS Log

Spoiler

Week One: 1164 words
Slate and Earth Chapter 1

Week Two: 1284 words
Slate and Earth Chapter 2

Week Three: 1084 words
Slate and Earth Chapter 3 & 4.1

Week Four: 1228 words
Slate and Earth Chapter 4.2

Week Five: 1014 words
Slate and Earth Chapter 5.1

Week Six: 1749 words
Slate and Earth Chapter 5.2

Week Seven: 1046 words
Slate and Earth Chapter 6.1

I'm wondering if you're going to high with your stakes? Or at least, too disconnected from the characters introduced in the first two paragraphs.

This might be personal preference speaking, but for me I very much like it when stakes stay rooted in the group of people introduced. Call me selfish but I don't particularly care about the world. I care about the characters.

So I'm reading this story and going "oh, cool interpersonal relations that impact each other, there's obviously some mystery about what makes her special, and... oh, yet another fate of the world plot, do I really want to invest in something that might have the relationship I was just sold on be completely eclipsed by something Grand?"

At the very least, I'd like to see the stakes rooted in the personal, in the relationship described for two paragraphs. The "change the world" thing currently feels wickedly tacked on, just to show that the story has tension.

But I could be wrong.

@Rosendorn What's the fun of a setting a story in a magical, eternal forest responsible for maintaining the balance of reality if it isn't put at a little world-destroying risk?

As it happens, what you read as tacked on is the entire, well, premise of the story. Or, well, it's the consequence? The thing that happens when the external conflict - the danger of Ana's relationship with her husband - comes to a head with Ana's internal conflict, longing for a life of safety and love for herself and her child. It's also what happens when Esther's external conflict - a lifetime sentence of guarding a magical, eternal forest - comes to a head with her internal conflict, longing for the normal human life she left behind.

Let's just say, love can make you let your guard down and sometimes you never feel truly safe until you can guarantee the danger is gone. But when you try and do that within the borders of a magical, eternal forest because your magical, eternal girlfriend isn't paying attention to the tear you made in the veil that is her eternal deal-with-death obligation to watch out for, well, bad things are bound to happen.

I'm very much interested in writing a story that blends interpersonal conflict with grand, reality-ending conflict. Knowing what I know of my story and my expectations for a first draft, it sounds like your qualms are quite personal ones. Perhaps this story just isn't for you! Which is just fine, since I'm not writing a story for everyone, but for me. And I really dig it!

Thanks for your thoughts!

Just going to clarify a little bit here, since I think some points of mine got lost in translation.

I'm fully aware the "end of the world" is the whole point. I'm not trying to argue that's a bad or good thing (my own personal opinion would rather the stakes be smaller, and feel free to disregard that).

My point was: there's no direct thread from the interpersonal, to the outer.

You had me interested with this line:

Let's just say, love can make you let your guard down and sometimes you never feel truly safe until you can guarantee the danger is gone. But when you try and do that within the borders of a magical, eternal forest because your magical, eternal girlfriend isn't paying attention to the tear you made in the veil that is her eternal deal-with-death obligation to watch out for, well, bad things are bound to happen.

That's the bridge that was missing in the synopsis. I didn't know how the small, interpersonal conflict tied onto the big one, and as a result the big one looked tacked on. But that explanation was a good indication of the tone of the work (that touch of snark, that touch of whimsy) and a good indication of what the buildup's going to be, and I'm interested in that part.

But without that connecting piece, the novel looks to be nothing more than small, interpersonal conflicts, then the end there's a Reveal about the big, overreaching conflict. Without really anything to connect the gap for what makes the small conflict turn into the big one.

It's just fine you want to write about a grand, world-ending conflict. It sounds cool! (Genuinely does, I'll hit up the first chapter) But the synopsis left a little to be desired for how the little things turn into the big things, and that's what I was looking for in the summary.

P.S.- I recognize you probably meant the little mention of the tear in the veil/how she got through to be a hint/buildup, but I assumed the human woman wasn't actually human (as how novels of this type usually go), so I didn't quite realize the tear was permanent and an indication humans can now pass through willy-nilly.

I'm so excited for this project. Obviously I had heard a little bit about it but I'm now excited that I can see the shape of it.

I can't wait to meet Sebastian. He sounds terrible.

Also I am a strong believer that there aren't enough pregnant ladies in fiction. I'm aware she'll have the baby at some point. But still.

You know I'm all for this but I just wanted to say, hey Lauren, I'm all for this.

I am so so happy you're finally writing this!! I cannot wait to read it and meet all of the characters and just also how much depth I know you'll build into this world. I'm so intrigued by how Ana managed to pass through the veil and to see their relationship unfold. Do you see them being fairly hostile towards each other to begin with?

Beyond excited!!

A Vague Incomplete Outline Created From NaPo Poems
Some backstory: I wrote poems based on this story idea for NaPo 2018 which served as some solid world and character building. It also let me feel out a bit of a plot but moreso than that, I think it helped me figure out an emotional arc for this story which isn't something I've ever started with before. So I'm interested to see how that goes!

What follows below is a weird jumbling of a number of poems I wrote during NaPo. It's not so much an outline, really, as a vague emotional guide? It's incredibly incomplete and probably not useful for anyone but me. BUT if you're interested in getting a ~*feel*~ for this story and these characters, as well as some mild-to-large spoilers then feel free to read on!

Otherwise, these are my emotional waypoints for finding my way through the first draft of this story.

--Ana arrives in the forest
There was a poem for this but I don't like it SO SUE ME

--Not a plot point necessarily but, like, Esther aesthetic

Spoiler

This house I've built is everything
I promised the girl in hand-me-down
petticoats and dreams too big for
the world she was given. I am the
keeper of the gate to the forest,
younger than the old ones but I have
crossed the impossible years to hang
chimes from my trees and collect
rainwater in cracked teacups and dance
in the light of this moon so different
from the one I had once known.
I am the witch in the forest, the one
they tell stories of at campfires and
brings hard candies that taste like
spring. I ease colic in their babies and
bring salves for scraped knees and
clear their way out of this world.

(She is touchless, legend, alone and
does not expect the tale etched
upon her heart to be rewritten by
something so inconsequential as the
girl who'll wash in hot as summer rain.)

--Ana is unwell, Ana and Esther struggle to connect

Spoiler

There are days she won't
leave the bed, Anastasia the
girl with the girl inside her like
nesting dolls, a myth wrapped
inside an impossibility, a woman
wrapped inside a goose down
duvet. I leave the windows open
and she watches stars through
steam rising from cups of tea
and tells me about the flowers
her grandmother grew and dried
like the herbs I hang in the rafters
of my modest home. I tell her these
are not flowers, these are magic, and
she laughs and tells me flowers
were the only magic she believed in.

--Some more Esther aesthetic, she spends a lot of time alone caring for this mortal girl who she is struggling to understand

Spoiler

I drink to drown the taste of glass
between my teeth; when Sebastian
extended the tube from his radio I
held it in my mouth, the filament
burning a galaxy against my tongue.

Centuries past I can still feel
the inertia hot in my mouth;
I thought I leapt but I had been
pushed, falling before I had even
thought to run for the ledge.

--Ana and Esther BEGIN TO BOND

Spoiler

I have never had a daughter
but I have had a pair of silver
spoons nailed to the base of
a tree. Sebastian once said a
strongly worded command
could grow just as well into
something worth protecting
but lately the weight of an old
pocket watch and a soy candle
burnt to the quick is not enough
to keep my feet on the ground.

--And bond some more

Spoiler

Lemon balm, for most things
but especially for the way a
cigarette makes you feel sick
to your stomach, add peppermint
for menstrual cramps but keep
the cigarette. Mullein when that
November cough comes back
and thyme to keep off the flu
or ward off December nightmares.
Lavender will keep you calm and
a rosemary tea will get you through
until tomorrow. Two drops of a
mushroom tincture will help to
get to sleep. Honey will make
most things sweet, but nothing
will ease the gnawing in your
gut that not a bit of this will
be enough.

--Esther has to continue living her life, but Ana gains some strength back and it's quiet but also sad sort of life because Esther has BAGGAGE

Spoiler

On Sunday you'll walk
to the market with your
basket of herbs, dried,
and tonics both sweet
and savory for smelling
or tasting or burying in
the garden of the man
you're trying to leave.

On Sunday you'll sit
in the market under
the tent you bought
last summer at the
folding table you found
in the shed and take
money from women
you knew as girls.

On Sunday you'll promise
remedies for heartache and
dry skin and dreams left
unfulfilled by an ancient
sense of obligation and
this will keep you in food
and heating gas and your
own obligation that keeps
you turning like cogs in
a clock kept turning by
no more than a frequency
spun by a wolf on the radio.

--Esther and Ana continue to bond, Esther begins to show Ana what is really true about the forest

Spoiler

When the sky is clear and the moon
is high, the veil will part and women
return to the forest to revel in nightgowns
and camisoles and old t-shirts with
names of bands they haven't listened
to in years. It is the sentinel who ignites
the lanterns and draws back the veil
and leads them through the waltz they
have done each year for all the years
she can remember. She does not bring
them there but when they return to
their beds their only memory will be
dreams hazy with starlight and thick
with breathless laughter.

--AND BOND SO MORE also at some point Ana gives birth probably sometime before this I don't really know okay???

Spoiler

When she lays with
her lover in the old
four-poster bed it’s
easy to feel young
again. It’s easy to
feel at the start of
things and like the
child may belong
to her and the future
a mere glimpse in
the mirror.

--Some time will pass that I didn't write poems for SO SUE ME but eventually Ana's daughter will grow a bit older

Spoiler

I will never have a daughter,
but I can teach her child to
weave a basket of dry corn
husk and to carve a ward of
cedar wood to keep the nightmares
off. We can brew lavender tea
while her mother sleeps and
I will show her to follow quietly
the tracks left by the King of the
Forest and glimpse his mighty
antler crown turned down to
drink from a stream. She will
carry butterflies in her palms and
the trees will sing her name.

--Eventually we learn some more about Esther's past and this is all I've really got for that

Spoiler

Girls like me we’re
sentenced;
vanity is a dead giveaway
for the wolf who hears
the future
on the airwaves. He weighs
your debt between
his teeth (he’ll never give
you more than exactly
what you deserve) and
drops you in the well
with a crystal or a coin
and tells you
wait
but in the end I
was not a girl like me
but a young woman greedy
for the things
she already had.

Spoiler

A stack of silver dollars at the bottom
of a well dug through slate and earth
is more than an eternity of wealth for
a girl grown old with static in her ears
and morse code tangled in her hair.

Spoiler

Take a word and bury it
in the tree by the mill
where girls build fairy
houses in the roots and
chase boys into the branches
and share cigarettes over
shared headphones.

(There is magic in a word in
an attempt to build refuge it
will last for centuries, beyond
the time they'll know your name.)

Spoiler

Come near, girl, the first lesson is this:
take the silver spoons from your mother's
hope chest, while she rests midday in
the salon where one day you'll receive
more suitors than you care to imagine.

You may bury them in the rose garden
for two more years of innocence, or
split them one beneath the kitchen window
the other in your father's drawer for a
long and happy marriage.

Or you may take them to the forest and
offer your mother's silver with your father's
genes and ask for lesson two, but here's
the catch: the test is always harder than
the lessons when every question is a trick.

Spoiler

Death is a wolf with an old ham radio;
you know the signal like the rushing in
your ears that doctor told you not to
spend too much time worrying over --
breaker one a fool doth approach
your throne -- you knew it could not
be the rushing of your own blood but
someone tuned to the frequency of your
mind.

--Then, well, some bad things start to happen but Esther is (willingly or not) blind to it

Spoiler

It started as a spark
at the bottom of the
well; a spot of sun
concentrated on a bit
of grass or a scrap of
paper discarded with
a wish. She called it
the season, the sun, a
wave of heat and by
the time she called it
a blaze the ash had
settled a fine layer
in her hair.

--Something causes Ana to act against her (ex)husband. In my mind, he has come threatening her to take back their child, which because of his standing in the town he claims he will win and Ana will lose, and either she'll lose her child or she'll be back with him and either way he wins. So Ana tempts him into the forest to remove the threat forever.

Spoiler

She created a hole when
she let herself in and dared
him to follow (he should have
been taught to keep his hands
to himself; but had he learned
we never would have been
where we are now would we?)

She nailed him to the tree with
her blade and the walls of the
forest came down like curtains
cut from the rod. It's hard to
fault her but I should have
seen it coming ten miles away.

--But, understandably, this does not go well for Esther and the forest

Spoiler

She should have heard it
coming through the trees
after the girl that she loved,
the girl with the child and
an awe for magic
uncompromising.
It should have rattled the
house like a semi at
midnight; should have
tasted like glass shattered
on her tongue. She should
have felt him cross the
veil into the world she
had been designated to
protect (it was the promise
she had made, after all, in
exchange for all of this that
came after) it should have
warped her vision or strummed
the rhythm that rang inside
her ears -- breaker two
something has distracted
the sentinel --or given her
any way to course correct
before it all began to shatter
around her neck.

wall to wall and treetop tall;
ten-four, death, the sentinel falls

--A murder within the forest unsettles the balance of this place, putting all of reality at risk

Spoiler

The King of the Forest is
sick. Legs grown long,
spindles of bone and ruddy
fur, he towers above the
trees (do not look upon
his midnight eyes, for he
will own your heart). His
twins multiple, each more
monstrous than the last,
shambling blindly through
halls of ancient oak. On a
lake of mirror glass, Death
stands on hind legs, sets
his glasses upon his desk and
howls. The Sentinel must make
the choice and neither answer
suits her.

--Esther is able to rescue the forest, but at a grave cost

Spoiler

Once she is gone, the woman
and her daughter will stay in
the cottage where they learned
to carry a day in a drop of honey
on their tongues and read destiny
from the arrangement of the stars.
It will feel darker and colder and
like a millennia before they are
able to step outside and dance, again,
by the light of the moon. (She has
never known such sadness, and with
luck or despair she never will again.)

Hey! I really dig this story. <3 You know, I love love love stories with such intense character relations and conflict deriving from those.

With that in mind, this seems like it would be a perfectly good character story? I'm not entirely sure why the conflict has to center around all of reality being at risk. I understand it's a byproduct of Ana tearing a hole in the veil, but then there's no more mention of it -- even in your emotion guide with the poetry -- until the very very very end.

It feels like it doesn't belong with the rest of the story. The climax could easily be Ana's husband coming to try and reclaim their daughter, or even Ana luring him into the forest and him coming back changed into something else to destroy this peaceful life she's built.

I don't understand why the conflict can't center on Ana and Esther and their lives, rather than rushing into "all reality is at risk." And honestly, as a reader, even in these early stages of drafting, I should be able to understand the central conflict of the story.

Thanks for your consideration! <3

@Lareine I appreciate your thoughts, but that's just not the story I'm interested in writing! Thanks!

Thanks for the response! I wish there was an explanation, but I understand you're taking your creative liberties with the story.

Might I suggest that if you want to tell a story where all of reality is at risk, you sow the seeds of that risk farther in advance in the synopsis and emotional guide?

Thank you so much! I look forward to seeing this!

This story looks incredibly interesting! I was hooked from the descriptions of the characters, but I'm also a sucker for any sort of story where the characters need to save the world and deal with their personal conflicts. I feel like dealing with outer conflict can sometimes be the key to solving inner conflict - if that makes any sense! I also love how you prepared for this novel with poetry. I've never seen anyone do it before, and it really makes the story stand out.

A Somewhat More Complete Cast List & Character Descriptions

Esther Keeling - Gave up her mortality as a young woman in exchange for an eternity of magic as the Sentinel of the forest. This involved a vague and mystical agreement with Sebastian and a spoiler-y giving up of her mortal body. This was one hundred years ago, at least. Esther has aged in the intervening time, though she will never die. At the time of this story, she appears as a - rather spry and youthful - old woman.

Esther lives in her cottage in the forest, inaccessible by mortals. She leaves every Sunday to attend a local farmer's market where she sells remedies to the town that has built itself, unknowingly, on the border of an ethereal, eternal forest. This was the town where Esther was born, though she was the end of her family line and her parents are long gone. She prefers not to spend too much time there outside of the farmer's market, but does make the occasional house call. She does not have any relationships with the people who live there, but she knows enough about their lives to fill her market stall with just what people are looking for.

This is not, strictly speaking, allowed. But Esther has never been one to play by the rules.

Esther enjoys teaching Ana about her magic, and just generally having someone other than Sebastian to talk to for the first time in more than a century. When Ana's daughter is born, she loves her as if she were her own.

Anastasia "Ana" Davis - Married young to an older local man that once promised he loved her. Neither of Ana's parents are around anymore and she latched on to the safety of someone who could care for her. As these things often go, her husband was not the savior she expected. She's been suffering his abuse for several years, though it's not until she discovers that she's pregnant with his child that she has the courage to leave.

Beyond the understanding of everyone involved, Ana is able to pass through the veil into the eternal forest which is most certainly not something she's supposed to be able to do. It doesn't come without it's consequences, though, and she is only able to make it as far as Esther's cottage before falling ill. Instead of removing her from the forest and returning her home, Esther brings her inside and nurses her back to health.

Ana is quiet and sad and honestly pretty dang tired of being pregnant. She's less upset by the fact that magic is real than the fact that none of it has ever done her any damn good. She's not particularly any good at it, either, despite how hard Esther tries to teach her. She's mostly interested in and panicked about having her child and figuring out what she's meant to do with this life she's left with after leaving her husband. No one has ever asked her to make her own decisions before and she's really just having a hard time figuring it out, okay?

Mike Davis - Ana's husband and long-time local. He was a high school sports star and never left following graduation from the local technical school. He owns an auto shop and coaches the girl's soccer team, where he met Ana for the first time. They didn't come public with their relationship until after Ana graduated, by which time Ana's mother had died and her father was long gone. Nearly ten years her senior, Mike married Ana at city hall and has been providing for her ever since. In public, he's warm and social and well respected for his place in the town. In private, he's controlling and violent with one hell of a mean streak.

Sebastian - Death, the Wolf Who Stands on Two Legs. Broadly speaking, he's the one responsible for balancing the books of the business of all time and space. He appointed Esther as Sentinel to enforce and protect the borders of the eternal forest, where all the dirty business of keeping reality afloat takes place. Mostly, he spends his time at his desk on his island in the center of the mirror lake, tending to his radio.

Saen wrote:I feel like dealing with outer conflict can sometimes be the key to solving inner conflict - if that makes any sense!

@Saen this is my thought exactly! To me, Esther and Ana's personal conflicts, the conflict of their relationship (which isn't REALLY that much of a conflict?? Like they get on pretty well pretty quickly because this story is kind of a romance I think??), and the conflict of Ana's breach of the forest are all pretty intricately tied together.

Though Esther and Ana could have theoretically met outside of the forest, they never would have the chance to know each other like this if Ana wasn't somehow able to enter the forest. Esther would never be so intrigued by her at first if people were able to enter the forest. But mortals aren't SUPPOSED to be able to enter the forest, and there have to be consequences for that happening.

It's probably pretty confusing and not very clear how all of this is tied together, because I still know so very little about this story. xD I have a hard time wrapping my head around things - like a whole novel - until I have the entire thing laid out on paper.

This is more planning than I tend to do before starting a project (usually it all just lives amorphously in my head) but I really enjoyed what NaPo did for my understanding of the story and spending this time fleshing out characters and generating ideas has been interesting. It's all definitely new for me!

To be honest, though, it's also been pretty disheartening to share the early stages of my ideas this way. If I was a younger writer, before I'd developed my sense of who I am as a writer and how I craft stories, it would have been really hard to not want to quit. I'm glad I'm at the point where I can shrug off the feedback that isn't useful to me, but I probably won't ever invite so many people into this part of my process again.

MAGIC

Right, so I keep mentioning there is magic in this book and then there's also the little matter of the fact that I tagged it fantasy and magical realism. But what does that magic actually look like????

Well, I've got some vague ideas that are mostly #AESTHETIC and also a lot of ???????? and also a little bit of screaming into a ~*magical*~ void hoping for some cohesive inspiration.

There are some select lines from my NaPo that I think get at some of what magic is like in this world/this version of our world:

and she watches stars through
steam rising from cups of tea
and tells me about the flowers
her grandmother grew and dried
like the herbs I hang in the rafters
of my modest home. I tell her these
are not flowers, these are magic, and
she laughs and tells me flowers
were the only magic she believed in.

----

I have never had a daughter
but I have had a pair of silver
spoons nailed to the base of
a tree. Sebastian once said a
strongly worded command
could grow just as well into
something worth protecting
but lately the weight of an old
pocket watch and a soy candle
burnt to the quick is not enough
to keep my feet on the ground.

----

Take a word and bury it
in the tree by the mill
where girls build fairy
houses in the roots and
chase boys into the branches
and share cigarettes over
shared headphones.

(There is magic in a word in
an attempt to build refuge it
will last for centuries, beyond
the time they'll know your name.)

----

Come near, girl, the first lesson is this:
take the silver spoons from your mother's
hope chest, while she rests midday in
the salon where one day you'll receive
more suitors than you care to imagine.

You may bury them in the rose garden
for two more years of innocence, or
split them one beneath the kitchen window
the other in your father's drawer for a
long and happy marriage.

Or you may take them to the forest and
offer your mother's silver with your father's
genes and ask for lesson two, but here's
the catch: the test is always harder than
the lessons when every question is a trick.

TBH so much of this magic system is just #aesthetic but I'm interested in playing with language around nature and antiques and radio. Not like top-forty-bop-till-you-drop radio but like old time radio tube personal ham radio pre-television radio.

Part of my style/voice I guess is trying to create unusual or surprising combinations of language in descriptions/prose. I really liked the effect it gave in some of my NaPo poems, so I'm excited to explore it more in prose as well!

Other places I'm drawing inspiration from is We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson (ok so there's not actual magic there but Merricat has practices a lot of superstitions that she believes to be protective/magic and the entire aesthetic of that book is gold) and Practical Magic, of all things. xD

I'd actually appreciate some other folks' thoughts here! What are some everyday objects or superstitions that could be blended into the images I'm working with? I'm going to say that Esther has magic because of the deal she made with Sebastian, and while Ana is maybe able to access some of the herbal side of things she is not able to practice it in the same way. It's more of a subtle magic that occurs over time, as well, than an instant fire-bolt kind of thing.

SOME IMAGES AND OBJECTS I LIKE: silver spoons, old pocket watches, cracked teacups, dried plants of any kind, bare wood, burying stuff, sewing tokens into clothing, carrying small everyday items in pockets, coins, candles, old books.