The woman’s voice was deep and rich, but climbed smoothly up the scales whenever it needed to. She stood with all her weight on her left leg and her fiddle resting against her left shoulder. The right side of her body – leg, waist and shoulder – swayed in time with the rhythm. This rhythm was slow at first, but built towards a steady chorus. At this point, she sprang out of her stance and landed with both feet wide apart, then launched into a jig.
Of course, the entire content of her song was vulgar, bawdy filth.
“And then he said to her at last,” the singer teased, letting the opening of the last couplet ring out as the song drew to a close. Buck had caught onto the words by now, so he knew to put his hand on his own backside as she sang the final line, “I love your ass!”
Buck whooped and clapped as she played herself out with a final flourish on the fiddle. The faces below in the audience were mostly laughing, or beaming, though there were daggers coming from the eyes of some. Buck wondered if they were the ones who had to perform soon after this. He stepped forward and shook the woman’s hand.
“Wow, that – that was wonderful, er – I didn’t catch your name,” Buck said.
“Loilyn,” the woman said, smiling back at Buck. Her smile was small, her lips closed, but her eyes twinkled and she gave his hand a squeeze.
“Loilyn!” Buck called out to the crowd. “Wasn’t that magnificent? Hearty, warm, jovial. And if I may say so, bloody hilarious.” At this, a few tuts spread around the room and Buck wondered if there might be an alternative explanation for the displeasure of some audience members. But that couldn’t be right, could it? There’d been plenty of bawdy content last night. Did they also need plying with some alcohol? He turned back to the woman. Oh. She was a woman. Did that explain it?
“Yes?” Loilyn prompted.
Buck shook himself out of his political analysis. “Yes, sorry. What I would like to say is that you, my friend, have just earned yourself a slot on the official opening night of Princess Myal’s court!”
There was more applause and cheering, but they had to quickly move on if they were going to make any progress today. Before Buck knew it, he was three auditions later and almost falling asleep.
***
Buck sighed and leaned back in his chair. On the table in front of him sat a list of all the acts he'd seen in order of his own preference, with Myal's preference noted at the side. It had taken him until well into the night to sort, and he'd had to work all the way through dinner with his mum, Victane and Hilene. When Dorrea and Hilene had realised that Buck wasn't coming, apparently Dorrea had apparently figured something must have come up and left all the food for later, going over to a friend's lunch instead. Still, Buck's guilt was only compounded as he found himself ignoring them for most the meal, in favour of a piece of parchment.
"Is that the lineup sorted then?" Hilene asked. He had pulled the other chair from the table over to sit opposite the couch, which Dorrea and Victane were on. Buck got up and stretched, then brought his own chair over to sit beside Hilene.
"Not even close," he said. He pushed his hair back out of his eyes. He'd been letting it grow long, partly because of the lack of suitable barbering services on the way here, partly because the further he looked from how Erson would recognise him, the better. He explained, "I've gone over maybe a third of the acts today? And I have a rough order of who we compare the acts tomorrow to. But it's going to be a long hard slog for another couple of days."
"Are you enjoying it though?" Victane asked, taking a sip of tea.
"Absolutely!" Buck grinned. "And everyone else seems to be having a great time too. Well, a few people seemed to have some gripes here and there... I'm not entirely sure what their issue is."
"Probably just folks not appreciating the distraction from our pastures," Dorrea said, waving a dismissive hand in the air. "I wouldn't worry. Yes, we've been down a few hands since the war got more intense, but I'm sure your court will attract plenty of new citizens of the royal valley."
There was a loud, rapid knock at the door. Dorrea looked at Buck with one eyebrow raised.
"Oh right," he muttered, springing to his feet. "I'm nearest the door."
He slipped out into the little doorway area, then opened the door to a panting, sweating Holyon. Behind him the sky was dotted with so many more stars than you could see down in Resador. Generally people stayed outside later there, what with the increased temperature. That plus the light spilling out from all the glass windows meant that light pollution was much more intense, and you didn't get to see nearly as much of the night sky.
"Woah, you okay?" Buck asked, as Holyon leaned against the door frame.
Holyon took a few deep breaths and drew himself to his feet. "Blegh, sorry, must have reached my limit of how far I can run."
"How far have you run?" Buck asked, his eyebrows shooting up.
"About seven pastures, in a loop around from the palace," he said, making a circling motion with his finger. "Gotta get everyone in the... well, in the loop."
"In the loop with what?" Buck asked.
"Sorry. Right. Yes. Erson's been sighted! He's coming home much sooner than expected. In fact, we think he'll be here tomorrow!" Holyon exclaimed, his already bloodshot eyes widening.
"Oh boy, okay," Buck said, "Um, thanks for telling me. Uh... do you need a hand?"
"No, no," Holyon said, already backing away. "Raddig's doing the other side; we'll be fine. Just be ready, okay? We're going to have to run with what acts we already have."
"Sorry?" Buck asked, darting forward so that Holyon didn't get too far away.
Holyon halted his run. "Well, the whole point of the court was to show Erson that he could get whatever he wanted from Resador up here, right?"
"I thought it was to establish a new cultural centre in the north?" Buck said, though he tilted his head to the side and smiled, not wanting Holyon to think he was actually offended.
"Ach, you know what sibling rivalries are like - Myal won't want to say that's what it is," Holyon said. He pointed at Buck and held his gaze. "You be prepared, alright? I want this going well for her."
"Of course." Buck nodded, giving him a quick thumbs up as he scarpered off.
Buck wandered back into the cottage and plonked himself back down into his chair. He looked up and said, "Uhoh."
"What's the matter?" Hilene asked, his voice going slightly high pitched. Buck wondered how he'd been since he'd seen him at the pond that morning. He'd seemed quiet as they parted ways, and come to think of it he'd been fairly quiet this evening too. Buck hoped he wasn't having to go back to watching his words like he had back in Resador. He should check in with him at some point. But for the moment, he had an issue of his own.
"Erson's coming back tomorrow apparently," Buck said, "And I've only found one singer so far that I think would rival anyone down in Resador city."
"Were you really going to find that many more given the few extra days?" Victane asked, who had also spent all day listening to tuneless salutes to roses or lillies or various other clichéd plant life.
"It's not that," Buck said, rubbing the back of his neck. "I just somehow doubt Erson's going to appreciate a song about a couple's journey to mutual love of each other's posteriors. And I don't know if I can do that to Myal, but there'd certainly be no need to worry about him focusing too much on me."
End of chapter
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139,610 Literary Works • 672,619 Reviews
Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world)
And time to finish off Chapter 8
First Impression: Well that was a surprise except from what you said earlier it sounded like the Prince was later than he was supposed to be with the sheperds waiting for his arrival and all that. But then here it appears that he is coming pretty early. Then looking at it from a purely chronological point of view it looks like he's coming home on the scheduled date. From what I could decipher Buck was kicked out on about the morning of the fifth day of the Prince's stay and it has been ten days since that. That would mean for the prince to be one day away he would have had to leave Resador on the seventh day of his stay which was what was mentioned as the scheduled day earlier. Or maybe I counted them wrong. Not sure.
Wait didn't you mention earlier that vulgar content was not for the Princess' ear?
That's tough. In both courts he had to organize the concerts by himself. Hopefully this one is more of a success than the previous one.
"Are you enjoying it though?" Victane asked, taking a sip of tea.
That's a nice subtle reference to the war going on.
Was there really no one else who'd be willing to carry a message? A lot of people seem to like the prince so it seems like there would have been more people willing to do this.
That's nice to see.
I'd have to agree that a song like that would be very distracting.
And that's it for chapter 8.
Overall: Great chapter. Conveys a decent amount of character for the Princess. Dorea remains a little undeveloped. She still doesn't have much unique qualities. But this is really interesting for a story without much action. Also why have not gotten a single mention of Simone? Is she being kept with Dorea? Where does she hide now?
As always take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.
Stay Safe
Harry
Hello! Rin321 here to review, happy review day!
Okie dokie, right to it:
I love the way you describe characters so clearly. This a chapter of an ongoing story, obviously, but even though there have been plot and details given before that I haven't read yet, I was still able to get a sense of what is going on. I had some small confusion throughout but it was only due to ignorance of the overall story, certainly not due to the descriptions of the scenes going on.
This initial description I cannot get enough of:
"The woman’s voice was deep and rich, but climbed smoothly up the scales whenever it needed to. She stood with all her weight on her left leg and her fiddle resting against her left shoulder. The right side of her body – leg, waist and shoulder – swayed in time with the rhythm."
At first, I pictured that this woman was going to do this slow grand thing, but the fact that BAM she going into this unexpected provocative song is a great surprise, and a good one at that. You can almost physically feel this woman's spirit through your descriptions of her and her performance!
I get a little concerned knowing however she is the only one that stood out and the fact that her act can be controversial, as Buck points out when he's trying to find acts for Erson. I hope that it goes well and that Erson has the personality enough to enjoy it for the fun and to not be too serious (if the occasion for the performance calls for it, anyway)
Other than her description in general, I love Buck's description as well. You can tell that he takes his job seriously and he really wants to get the right acts chosen!
Amazing job as far as description, imagery, and diction go as well. It all blended together wonderfully!
Amazing job, I hope to read more from you soon!
~Rin
OMG IT WAS BUILDING UP TO THAT ??
I'm so excited and shocked and pleased and excited and I just OMG ERSON IS COMING
Okay so first off, I love your names. I love the name Loilyn and I just. I love your names, I don't know how you do it, I just love them.
And as much as I would love to have gotten to know her better, I like that there's this mystery about her, almost a fantasy with how awesome her performance was. We never really got Myal's reaction to her, so it felt very forward of Buck to just be like YOU'RE IN! But the way she's brought up again later after he hears the truth about what the court was for and that Erson was returning home early--
OKAY ACTUALLY, I LIKED THIS A LOT. When Holyon told Buck this court was meant for Erson all along, I IMMEDIATELY thought of Loilyn's song, and the fact that Buck ALSO thought about it only emphasized the trouble he was most likely in with this court. He knows firsthand what Erson expects in a court, so if he hAD ONLY KNOWN. And then it left me thinking back like.. yeah that all totally adds up. That totally fits into a sibling rivalry.
I still feel like the end is a bit abrupt, and I wonder if it makes more sense to end it after Buck either hears the news or the narration thereafter as Buck pieces it all together, and save the dialogue for the next chapter to discuss outloud. Or just more of a dramatic pause at the end here as this IS kind of a big issue now that Buck has found himself in and could benefit from a moment of suspense.
I freaking laughed out loud when Buck asked him how far Holyon ran. It still makes me laugh, rereading it for the umpteenth time.
So regarding your concerns, I don't knoooow...well. I'll jsut talk this out here and see what thoughts are spewed.
You had mentioned being worried about Buck ignoring his mother and friends, and how this might be weighing down the chapter's intent, and I don't think that's necessarily the case, and that's mainly because that probably could have been stressed more. It was kind of thrown in last minute in the 8.2 segment around lunchtime, but I feel like this could actually be worked in even more, or maybe in 8.3, we can see some concern or exasperation from his mother and friends who are noticing Buck is forgetting about them already. Maybe Victane suggests to Buck that they all play Go Fish with his mother or something, and Buck's like nono i got a mess to clean up.
Simply working in some of that emotion more to emphasize this new conflict he's about to face. (Or perhaps this will take time to develop too, as that's usually something that takes time to negatively affect loved ones.) But basically, I don't think that's interfering as much as you think! But your concern IS valid if that's another goal for this chapter because I think his mother and friends are too patient to be disappointed with Buck for his absence yet. That'll just happen over time as he becomes more invested in his new job.
So the little nugget we got with Buck realizing he had promised lunch with his mother was golden, I liked it a lot. It was small enough to not get in the way, but it was concerning enough to stand out and make the reader take mental note of it.
He also isn't AS distant as you think with the added blurb at the end here where the narration shows concern that Hilene might revert back to his original behavior in Resador. The rift is obviously not there yet (ALSO DON'T HURT MY HILENE BOI OMG).
I can also say, though, that the chapter DID feel clunky pacing-wise, and I feel like this is simply a direct correlation with your hesitation when writing this. So when you go back to edit, I'd consider writing with the intent on keeping hte main focus with Buck's new position and the build-up to the Erson news. The More Distant Buck trope will just happen naturally over time.
Hopefully that all makes sense of what's going through my miiind. I'm willign to discuss more, though, if I didn't hit all of your concerns or I said something confusing.
Looking forward to reading more!! <3
woops yeah i should have Buck get a nod from Myal or something. or generally establish that he has the full authority to approve folks.
yeah that makes sense... I might have to think about this more because er... well I can't explain exactly why yet but I'm not sure quite how much time this dynamic is going to get to develop. But it also doesn't need to be it's own thing by the end of this section either, because it's building into a thematic character thing in the next part as well. This will make more sense in like eight weeks' time xD
I actually was hesitant for writing a lot of this. For almost everything I've had the images in my head and just been writing down what I see, but chapter 8 was the first where I felt like I had to make things happen. I've got some pretty clear images of what's going on for chapter 9 though... hehehehe...
One other concern I do have is - does it seem a bit repetitive with Buck just organising concerts all the time? Like one big performance night is basically what the first arc built up to as well. There's more that will happen that mean it's not the same thing, but I just want to suggest this idea to you. I'm sure you'd have said if it felt repetitive, but now that I've suggested the idea, do you think it could to someone else? Zero worries if you'd no idea how to answer that haha
Thanks for the review!!
That makes as much sense as it needs to!!
And like I said, it does kind of show through that you were a bit unsure as to how to approach this, but I don't think it was too far off base that it's uneditable either. Once you write the rest, revisiting this might be much easier to tackle!
It might feel repetitive to someone else, but I'd say as long as it has its own unique spin or outcome, it's probably fine. We don't want the reader to have deja vu, like they had just read this back in Resador, so there's certainly room to make this next arc its own thing. I think it's at risk of feeling repetitive if too many elements line up between the two or the end goal/result of each arc is too similar.
In a way, the first audition/concert is a foreshadowing to here because Buck doesn't care about auditions unless he really likes the content they provide. The first concert was a matter of fulfilling Pires' goal of marrying the prince, which ended in a fiasco. This concert is a matter of serving Myal -- quickly turning into simply pleasing Erson -- and the result of which I don't know yet. There might have to be some amount of success, though, considering the ending of the previous concert, else I'd be doubting his capability as a lead entertainer (which could be the case, he might not be all that great a leader).
I'm rambling again. XD I think, though, as long as the two concerts feel different, then it should be fine. At it's very basic, the scene is set up a lot like the first one in Resador, but the situation is very different -- well, until Buck's news about Erson returning sooner. xD THAT COULD BE INTERESTING.