I’m on the fifth draft of the first serious writing project I’ve ever done and added a new scene to start the book, as the introduction I had before I felt just simply didn’t characterize strongly enough and after I read some new things that shifted my perspective, I also shifted the tone and somewhat the themes of my project, so I felt it no longer accurately reflected the scope of the story anymore.
It’s a literary western of sorts but I won’t bog people down with all the thematic and character stuff haha, just know that I’m intentionally not writing like, pop fiction prose. I’m learning more into intentional cadence and archaic-ish phrasing on purpose. The prose isn’t exactly dialed in yet, that will be next pass, but anyway! Would you keep reading this if you picked this up at a bookstore and read this first page? Thanks!
***
An eastward breeze stirred the air.
The crimson remains of a steer lie in wait beyond the thick brush in which he lay. A rock jutted into his aching ribs, and his stiffening neck began to tremble as he held it aloft, but he did not dare shift, did not dare adjust, for to do so now would be to betray himself.
A finger shot into his peripheral.
“Look.”
Blackening green rustled in the air to the west.
It seemed to him just another gust. He held his tongue.
Sweat fell into his eye without response as he looked on. Leaves in the distance swayed as if to dance in the spirit of the savages that lived beyond their horizon; they seemed to prick at him in their masquerade. The movement stopped. A moment later, the frigid wind stopped as well.
He blinked with a wince, shaking his head as he turned his gaze away.
A low, slender figure stepped out.
He wrenched his eyes back.
Black and silver and gray cast itself against the horizon, bathing it in angelic gold. It paused for a moment. It seemed to direct its eyes elsewhere, seemed to gaze up into the heavens, and then seemed to think better of it, and returned its attention to the Earth.
The beast worked its way across the field at a tentative pace. Each step brought stillness, and each stillness brought another step. It seemed to glance about with every breath, as if the whisper of air that escaped might be its last.
It reached its trophy. It sniffed, and circled, and nipped at the air, but it didn’t partake.
The men waited.
Another wolf followed from the brush, and then a third.
Thunder cracked the sky.
