Snippet Saturday is the brainchild of author Lauren Dane, wherein a group of authors selects thematic excerpts from their work and shares them on Saturday mornings. This week the theme is holidays.
I've included several holidays in my work, but none so fabricated as the Wintertide holiday featured in A Spell for Susannah's Mother, the imaginatively titled prequel short story to A Spell for Susannah. If the King is fated to love thirteen women before he turns fifty, is he still husband material? One cold, wet Wintertide Eve, the Queen labors over the answer to her husband’s curse.
Here's the first couple pages:
***
The back of the King’s tawny fur coat disappeared around the corner, and the Queen maneuvered herself out from behind the flower seller’s cart before she lost sight of the sneaky bastard who called himself her husband.
The saleslady shot her a knowing look and selected a posy of small purple blooms, a Kingdom Foresta specialty in this cold, wintery season. “Might I interest you in Heartsease?”
“Thank you, no. I’m in a rush.” Normally the Queen would converse with the citizens, but right now she was both angry and incognito. Her lower back ached, and dirty road sludge weighed down her nondescript cloak and gown at the hem.
“I would be in a rush, too, were my babe due any day,” the seller observed. “Luck to you, madam.”
The Queen tugged her hood closer to her face and hurried past, her fury increasing with every cold, miserable plodding step. Wind gusted down the streets of the capitol city as if blown by giants, funneled by the tall buildings on either side.
Wintertide was a day away and the Wintereve Feast tonight. By all rights she and her husband should be warm and safe at the castle’s hearth, toasting one another with mulled cider, stringing cranberries and awaiting the birth of their third child.
Due any day, indeed! The Queen was far too pregnant and exhausted to be trailing Reginald as he skulked toward his latest assignation. Her feet had bloated over the tops of her winter boots. False contractions hardened her womb so frequently it stole her breath. Yet here she was, lumbering along as quickly as she could, because there was no one on her staff she could trust with such a delicate mission. Not even the nurse, home with Princesses Susannah and Calypso.
Instead of enlisting Nursie’s help, she’d told the older woman she had to purchase last minute Wintertide gifts, and Nursie had threatened to call the court healer to prevent the Queen from going.
But she was the Queen of Foresta, the pregnant Queen of Foresta, the pregnant and cranky Queen of Foresta, and by the Dragon, her will would be done.
Her will would be done by everyone except her sneaking, cheating skunk of a husband.
The Queen reached the corner of Flower Street to see Reginald whip into the little alleyway where she’d nearly caught him the first time. Her heart lurched at the sight of him, and she resisted the urge to call out. To beg him to stop whatever he was doing, whoever he was seeing, and come home with her. Instead she waddled down the sidewalk, her huge abdomen earning her more space as men and women made room for the pregnant lady with the scowl.
At least Foresta was a polite kingdom. If anyone had given her trouble on one of her unhappy scouting missions, she might have had to retract the law currently in place that forbade putting criminals, or people who annoyed the King and Queen, to death.
Yet once again, when she reached the alley, there was no sign of the man.
Damn and blast. Where could he be going? The narrow passage led straight to Sundry Street with no detours, no doors, no ladders. Not even any garbage. The cleanest alley in all of Kingdom Foresta, and her husband managed to hide in it.
Next time, she would bring the magic sniffing pig, if she could coax the animal out into nasty weather like this. Not as inconspicuous, alas, but more effective than her human eyes.
The Queen squeezed between the buildings, the press of bricks on her body icy through her warm woolen cloak. She inspected every brick, every cobblestone, desperate for an explanation. She longed to put an end to the King’s deception, but she was not a woman to accuse without proof. Seeing him disappear in an alley wasn’t enough.
But she would find evidence. And once she had it, she would wield it like a rapier.
She was damned good with a rapier.
***
You know you want to keep reading! And luckily you can...for free! Read the whole thing online at: http://authors.thesamhellion.com/freebies/t-z/wallace_spell.pdf
Jody W.
www.jodywallace.com * www.meankitty.com
More holiday excerpts:
Lauren Dane
Mari Carr
McKenna Jeffries
Shelley Munro
Taige Crenshaw
Vivian Arend
HelenKay Dimon
TJ Michaels
Lacey Savage
Or maybe one of these two lookers:




1) Why did you decide to be a writer instead of a cat sanctuary owner?
Several thin lines crossed the expanse of the wide, nondescript valley below until they disappeared. Roads? Too pale and straight to be creeks, plus it was so dry here. Xerode in the Realm was arid like this, with an ocean of sand, but she’d never been there.


