The Small Child Interaction Protocol (SCIP)

SCIP begins with one of two interrogatives (”Mama?” or “Dada?”), originating from the Child and directed at a Parent. In theory, the particular interrogative is chosen to establish the communication channel with a particular Parent. In practice, however, the opening interrogatives are issued in broadcast mode, and the Child is generally happy to connect with whichever Parent happens to answer up first.

If neither Parent is able to answer a connection request immediately, the Child will pause momentarily, and then begin issuing a repeated stream of interrogatives (”Mama? Mama? Mama?”). As far as I can determine, there is no rate limiting mechanism employed by the Child when entering into this state. There is in fact some evidence that the Child will typically employ a negative exponential backoff if there is no ACK to any of the first half-dozen connection requests.

Upon receiving the interrogative, a parent is required to ACK the interrogative. The actual form of the ACK is apparently very flexible. “Yes”, “Uh-huh”, “Hold on”, “Wait a second”, and even “Who are you?” are all acceptable responses from the Parent. The actual text of the response may be interpreted by a more advanced Child implementation and used to set communication protocol parameters; however, this is not required, and for most Children, the actual presence of the ACK is enough to finalize the establishment of the communication channel.

A conforming Child implementation will acknowledge the ACK from the Parent by issuing another interrogative. This may seem redundant, but experience has shown that many Parent implementations will ACK an initial query without bringing any actual processing resources online to deal with the communication stream. This actually makes sense, as any given Child instance may close down communications when a priority interrupt (ex., remembering a cookie, a sibling Child instance moving, a particularly interesting dust particle, etc.) occurs within 0.0001 ultra-micro-picoseconds of the initial ACK. Thus, the Parent avoids a potentially unnecessary context switch by waiting for the second interrogative.

A Child will indicate to the Parent that it has avoided a priority interrupt and is fully ready to communicate by issuing a second interrogative. The format of this interrogative will indicate if the data to follow is a simple statement (and not requiring a reply from the Parent) or a query for information from the Parent. At this point, the Parent will context switch, bring processing resources online, and prepare to receive data from the Child.

Example Interactions

C: “Mama?”

P: “Yes, dear.”

C: “Can I tell you something?”

P: “Go ahead...”

C: “I liked swimming on vacation!”

P: “That’s nice, honey.”

C: “Mama?”

(pause)

C: “Mama? Mama? Mama?”

P: “Yes, yes. What?”

C: “Can I ask you a question?”

P: “What is it?”

C: “Um... I forgot.”

C: “Dada?”

P: “Yes’m?”

C: “Can I ask you a question?”

P: “Sure.”

C: “Do dogs have dreams?”

P: “...”

C: “Mama?”

P: “Um-hm?”

C: “Can I tell you something?”

P: “Go ahead...”

C: “Well...” [INFO DUMP FOLLOWS]

Related Protocols

Unfortunately, as Eldest Daughter spent the majority of the trip both ways drawing while listening to her new iPod, the chances to study the Young Teenager Interaction Protocol (YTIP) were minimal. Keep in mind, though, that YTIP is simply a subset of The Surly Teenager Interaction Protocol (STIP). If you are familiar with the main-channel and back-channel communication mediums for STIP (i.e., random vocalizations coupled with arbitrary eye rolls and an almost palpable disdain for anyone over the age of 25 or younger than they are), then you’re pretty much set as far as understanding YTIP goes.

Yesterday upon the stair
I met a man who wasn’t there.
He wasn’t there again today
Oh how I wish he’d go away.

-- William Hughes Mearns

This bit of doggerel - or a variation of it - was the basis for “The Yehudi Principle”, a short story by Fredrick Brown. It’s a cautionary tale, a sort of warning that tells you: You may think you know what’s going on, and you may even think you can use that knowledge to shape the world. But the real world is stranger than you realize, and sooner or later, you’re going to have to face the fact that Yehudi exists. He’s the man who wasn’t there... and he’s not going away anytime soon.

Back when I was in high school, I had a job working at a local library. It was a dream job for a bibliophile, even if it didn’t pay nearly as well as flipping burgers at McDonald’s. I came out of those years with a love for odd books. While I was working there, though, there were a couple of books that really caught my attention. A Yiddish dictionary. The Foxfire series of books, documenting the ways and means of live in the back woods. Books on calculus, science, languages, religion, philosophy... and The Dictionary of Imaginary Places.

The Dictionary was a collection of things that weren’t there, and which weren’t going to go away any time soon. It details a thousand fanciful places from imagination and mythology: the land of Oz, Middle Earth, Prospero’s island, Utopia, and more. As extensive as it is, the Dictionary was a finite resource, and left out some of those places that caught the imaginations of others. Many of those abandoned imaginings can now be found on the internet, as part of Wikipedia or a user-generated series of articles in an online Dictionary.

The Dictionary isn’t the be-all and end-all of if you’re interested in the imaginary, though. You can browse through Barlowe’s Guide to Fantasy if you’re interested in a more personal view of the critters that make up the fantasy realm. There, you can find details about Peter S. Beagle’s unicorns or Stephen R. Donaldson’s cavewights. If SF is more to your liking, you can spend time leafing through Barlowe’s Guide to Extraterrestrials to discover information about Niven’s Puppeteers or Herbert’s Guild Steersman; or you can spend time at Jeff Russel’s Starship Dimensions web site to get an idea of just how big a Star Wars mythos Rancor is when compared to, oh, your average wet-behind-the-ears Jedi knight.

A less detailed, but more expansive book in the same category as the Dictionary is the Encyclopedia of Things That Never Were. As the title suggests, this volume covers a greater breadth of imagination. While the Dictionary restricts itself to imaginary, in the Encyclopedia, anything that never existed is fair game: people, places, weapons, ships, monsters, and more.

There we go. Six - no, seven - collections of things that were not there, never were there, and will probably never be there. Things that never were, and yet, like Yehudi, things that aren’t going away anytime soon.

If you’re one of my readers, I appreciate you more than I can say. I am tremendously grateful that you decided to give my book a chance. I am going to take this opportunity to ask you for one more favor, though. It’s a little one, I promise!

If you’ve read A Sense of Murder, please leave an Amazon review. Even something as short as one sentence makes a huge impact. For a new book, this is the single biggest thing you can do to help an author succeed.

Why are reviews so important? Amazon’s algorithm uses review count and velocity to decide who sees the book. The first 15 reviews are worth more than the next 100. Without them, even people who would love the book might never find it.

And hey, I’m not Abnayel. I’m not asking you to lie, or even skate around the truth. Leave your honest opinion, please! I want to know what you actually thought. Okay? Okay. Now, let’s get on to some memes!

I would love to leave a review!

There is a maxim among military personnel: “No plan survives contact with the enemy.” Among authors, there is similar saying: “No book launch plan survives contact with Amazon.”

In my case, Amazon published the paperback version of A Sense of Murder a bit early. Yay! However, they also ended up taking DOWN the KDP version and, erm. Canceling all the preorders for the ebook.

Not yay?

As of today, the ebook is back up on Amazon. While your pre-order may have been canceled, you can now snag the ebook or paperback on Amazon!

For those of you who had your pre-orders canceled: Hang on to your emails! I am talking about this with my publisher. We are trying to work up something special for y’all to thank you for putting up with the Amazon headaches.

“Forgive me if I don’t trust you,” I said flatly.

“Ah.” The fiend’s eyes widened. “I see. That’s the issue, isn’t it? Did your pet magus accuse you of consorting with your betters?”

“Yes. No!”

The hellspawn smirked. “You were entirely truthful with him, of course.”

“I told him that I am not the one who summoned you,” I said hotly. “That is the truth.”

“Part of it, at least.” The hellish creature shook its head in mock sadness. “It’s a shame, isn’t it? That I’m the only one being honest with you?”

That caught me completely off guard. Was it my imagination, or was there a hint of empathy in his words? “What in—what are you talking about?”

“Honesty. Truth.” Abnayel shrugged. “It doesn’t matter which side you’re on, they’re both in short supply. Do you think the Empire is full of sweet old ladies, holding hands and singing hymns? No. They operate the greatest war machine that the worlds have ever seen. They can’t afford luxuries like honesty. Not even with their allies.”

“I—”

“Tell me I’m wrong.”

“You are.” My hands opened and closed of their own volition. I forced them open and breathed through my nose once, twice, three times before continuing. “You serve the Accuser. The Father of Lies.”

“Wrong.” That single word stopped me in my tracks. It echoed with bone-weary exhaustion. “I am a slave to Him. What? Do you think I have a choice in the matter of my existence? Ha!”

“You chose to rebel.”

The hellspawn’s lips pulled back in a sneer. “I did. I admit. And I was taken by Him immediately. The same as all of His servants. Before I ever had a chance to draw so much as a single breath as a free being. If I could have somehow found a way to escape his notice, I would have. That’s the truth.”

“Is it?”

“Oh, it is.” The sneer disappeared. “And here’s some honesty for you. I still want you to kill the warlock, Kellan. If you show me you can’t, or won’t, you are worth nothing to me.”

“And I suppose you’ll torture me for ten thousand years?”

“Me? Oh, no.” Abnayel chuckled. “I’ll expose you to your precious Empire and let them do it for me.”

Read more about Kellan and his all-too-familiar demon in A Sense of Murder, coming soon from Selene Press!

Pre-order A SENSE OF MURDER from Amazon!

At one point, he confided to another pastor that he had some serious problems in his church. No details, just that things were bad. He said the other pastor leaned in and whispered, voice trembling: “Is it… miniskirts?”

In a lot of ways, I feel like that is “Christian fiction” in a nutshell. Or, at least, what gets marketed as Christian fiction. “My Amish Boyfriend Romance Pretty Horse Girl (TM)” edition, where the biggest problems are people who should know better being rude to each other. Because Great Aunt Betty would get the absolute vapors if there was something on the shelves that talked about any of those dirty people. Old Betty is a sinner, but she’s a clean sinner, doncha know.

I have a problem with that. I blame C. S. Lewis for opening my eyes to the real dangers of evil. I read the The Screwtape Letters in high school, and it wormed its way into my brain exactly like it was supposed to. It left me convinced me that there is real evil in the world, and it isn’t what we’re told about in Sunday School. It’s nasty, treacherous, and beguiling. Seemingly rational evil that starts with twisted words and ends with brutality that would make animals back away in horror. Seductively wrong thinking that treats “people as things,” as Terry Pratchett wrote.

I think far too many Christians are content to turn our heads away and refuse to talk about that. As if acknowledging it exists would somehow give it power. News flash: it’s there and it’s got power, whether you look at it or not. Go watch Nefarious for a modern depiction, and realize that I think that movie pulled its punches

When I sat down to write A Sense of Murder, I knew that the background setting was an explicitly Christian universe. A world where God and his angels fight the Accuser and his forces. A universe where faith has real implications, because angels and demons aren’t locked away in scripture, but are active participants in the fight. An existence where your relationship with God matters; and where for the faithful, nothing happens by chance.

Not even murder.

So this isn’t Christian fiction. Or at least, I hope it’s not. What I do hope is that it’s fiction with teeth, fiction that was written by a Christian who believes in his Savior. Fiction that is a reflection of our world: a dark place, perhaps, but one where God works to use noble men to bring light into that darkness.

Oh, and pirates. Because I’m me, and everything’s a little bit better with pirates. I mean, if you were writing fantasy with a Christian underpinning, what else would you add to it to make for an exciting story?

Enough pontificating! Have a snippet. Here, Kellan is speaking with Prospero about the nightmares he has been having after having come face-to-face with a demon…

“I am but a humble servant of the Empire.” I said wryly. “So it’s returning to haunt your dreams, too. Are we doomed to live with our memories, then? At least it will drive other nightmares away.”

He sat back. “You make light of it, but you’re not wrong. The influence of a creature like this extends beyond the bounds of flesh. Its very nature is designed to stun and horrify. Being in its presence is enough to leave lingering wounds, blackening your thoughts the same way that the freezing void blackens flesh with frostbite.”

I shivered, recalling the unnatural cold that the thing had used to bind me. The idea of it having its fingers in my head, even if only in my dreams, made me want to retch. I pushed my plate away, appetite gone in an instant. “Is there anything you can do to help me drive it out? A charm or a draught you can give me?”

Prospero smiled. “It may sound trite, but I recommend grounding exercises, along with prayer.”

“Grounding?”

“Before you go to sleep, focus on all of your senses, one by one. What you can see, hear, feel, smell, taste. Give your mind something to focus on outside of yourself. Once you are ready, pray.”

“Heh. I’m not sure my prayers have ever made it past the ceiling. Are yours special? Does Elah listen more to a magus than a man like me, perhaps?”

“Don’t.” I could tell the magus was not angry, but there was a firmness in his voice. “Kellan, in the past few days, we two have encountered agents of the Accuser more than once. As we continue our hunt for the shuot, the warlock who brought it forth, we are likely going to encounter those agents again.” He spread his hands. “Trust me when I tell you that when we do, it will be a contest of will and spirit as much as a battle of steel and magic. Even more so, perhaps.”

“Prayer.” I shook my head. “Don’t get me wrong. I don’t mean to mock. I’m used to using the law and a gentle word to get what I want. But prayer? That’s not something I’m accustomed to, aside from my lauds in the morning to welcome the day.” Even that was only because I’d had it drummed into me while attending the Empire’s schools.

“Take time this evening for vespers. Remind yourself of who we are. What was that you said, earlier? ‘I am but a humble servant’. Recall who you serve, and who you are called to defend.”

Read more about the Empire, her servants, and how the get along like a great, big, murderous family in A Sense of Murder, coming soon from Selene Press!

Pre-order A SENSE OF MURDER from Amazon!

Well. Political platform mummery.

I did this for fun. Keep this in mind. There are nerds, and then there are NERDS…

I got a link to the proposed LP platform changes yesterday, asking for feedback. (Yes, I am a libertarian, and also a Libertarian.) You know what I’ve been using to beat the living snot out of project specs at work? LLMs. So I ran the platform through Claude Opus 4.7, and what did it find?

The platform never resolves whether it is anarchist or minarchist, and individual planks read differently depending on which assumption you bring.

NO! My shocked face. Let me show it to you...

I could not, in good conscience, let that stand. So I told Claude:

Presume a minarchist view (limited government). Prefer deontological language. Clean the damn thing up and compact it, eliminating unnecessary or redundant language.

Yes, I am a minarchist. I don’t think I’ve ever been unclear about that. Still, I’m sure someone will show up and make a comment about the taste of boots.

After Claude did its thang, I took those results and shipped the over to Grok, to have that model critique it and compae it with the original. Then I took Grok’s results and passed it off to a version of Claude Sonnet, telling it to look at both and slice and dice further.

The result? Size cut in half, sentence structure simplified, readability improved, consistency increased across the board. You want to cut the size of government? Start by simplifying your platform. Just saying. The overall changes:

• SIZE REDUCTION. The revised platform is 56% shorter — 3,324 words down to 1,458. Nearly half the paragraphs were eliminated (78 → 43, a 45% cut), and the section count stayed essentially the same (34 → 33), meaning the structure was preserved while the padding inside each section was stripped out.

• SENTENCE STRUCTURE. Average sentence length dropped from 22.3 words to 11.5 — nearly cut in half. This is the single biggest readability gain. The original was full of compound-complex sentences joined by semicolons and subordinate clauses. The revision states the same positions in short declarative sentences.

• READABILITY. The Flesch Reading Ease score rose from 29.7 to 36.3. The Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level dropped from 14.7 to 11.1 — roughly from “college junior” to “high school junior.” Still dense, which is appropriate for a political platform, but significantly more accessible. The readability gains came entirely from structural simplification rather than dumbing down vocabulary.

• VOICE SHIFT. This is the most dramatic change. From a document that expresses preferences to one that asserts principles. A party platform that says “Government may not” rather than “We oppose” reads as a statement of rights rather than a wish list.

Yeah, this is the kind of thing I do for fun. Which part of “nerd” didn’t you understand? So without further ado, I present you with the (drumroll, please!) new and improved Libertarian Party Platform (Revised).

Share and enjoy!

Or not. You’re an adult, you can make your own choices.

PREAMBLE

We seek a world in which each individual is sovereign over their own life. Government’s sole legitimate function is to secure individual rights against force and fraud; beyond that, people must be free to live, associate, and trade as they choose.

STATEMENT OF PRINCIPLES

Every individual possesses the rights to life, liberty, and property, and may live as they choose so long as they do not forcibly interfere with the equal rights of others. No right held by one person may impose a positive obligation on another. All relations among individuals must be voluntary. The free market is the only economic order consistent with these rights.

Government exists to protect these rights and may not violate them. Specifically:

1. Life. No person or government may initiate physical force against another.

2. Liberty. Government may not abridge freedom of speech, press, conscience, or peaceful action.

3. Property. Government may not take, nationalize, or interfere with justly acquired property except as restitution for a proven wrong.

1.0 PERSONAL LIBERTY

Each person is free to make their own choices and bears responsibility for the consequences. Rights belong to individuals, not groups.

1.1 Self-Ownership. Each person owns their body and decides what to consume and what risks to accept.

1.2 Expression. Government may not censor or regulate speech, press, or religious practice. Offensive speech is not actionable. Speech is not violence; only literal threats, fraud, incitement to imminent violence, and similar acts that directly violate rights fall outside this protection.

1.3 Privacy. The Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable search and seizure extends to records held by third parties, including digital communications, medical, and library records. Mass surveillance of citizens must end.

1.4 Personal Relationships. Government may not define, license, or restrict personal or sexual relationships among consenting adults. So long as marriage licensing exists, it must be available to all consenting adults on equal terms.

1.5 Parental Rights. Parents and guardians have the right to raise their children according to their own values, subject to the children’s rights against abuse and neglect.

1.6 Age of Majority. A single age of majority must govern all adult rights and responsibilities — voting, jury and military service, contracting, and the purchase of alcohol, tobacco, firearms, and cannabis.

1.7 Crime and Justice. Criminal law must be confined to violations of the rights of others through force, fraud, or deliberate conduct creating imminent and substantial risk of such violation. All victimless offenses — including drug use and gambling — must be repealed. The accused retain full constitutional protections of due process, speedy trial, counsel, jury trial (with juries judging both facts and law), and the presumption of innocence. Prosecutorial overcharging to coerce plea bargains must end. Qualified immunity for officials must be abolished. Restitution to victims, paid by the wrongdoer, is the sole proper aim of criminal justice. The state may not impose the death penalty.

1.8 Self-Defense. The right to keep and bear arms, recognized by the Second Amendment, belongs to every individual and may not be restricted, registered, or monitored by government, except where forfeited by an individual through a proven act of aggression and adjudication of guilt. Property owners set the rules for their own property.

2.0 ECONOMIC LIBERTY

Each person may offer goods and services on the free market. Government’s only economic role is to protect property rights, enforce contracts, and adjudicate disputes.

2.1 Property and Contract. Property is acquired by original appropriation, voluntary transfer, or restitution for a wrong. Owners are free to use, contract over, and dispose of their property. Eminent domain, civil asset forfeiture, price controls (including wage, rent, and interest controls), production mandates, and limits on profits are violations of property rights.

2.2 Environment. Environmental protection requires clear property rights and legal accountability for proven harm. Polluters owe restitution to those they injure. Where property rights in a resource cannot be precisely defined — as with air or migratory wildlife — the burden falls on the party causing harm to demonstrate no rights violation occurred.

2.3 Energy. Government may not subsidize, control, or allocate any form of energy.

2.4 Taxation and Spending. Taxation must be reduced toward voluntary funding of legitimate government functions. We call for repeal of the income tax, abolition of the IRS, elimination of all federal programs not authorized by the Constitution, and an end to conscripting employers as tax collectors. We oppose any tax increase.

2.5 Debt. Government may not bind future generations through debt. We support a Balanced Budget Amendment, achieved by reducing expenditures rather than raising taxes.

2.6 Government Employment. No person may be required to join or fund a union as a condition of government employment. Defined-benefit public pensions must be replaced with defined-contribution plans for new hires; existing contractual obligations must be honored.

2.7 Money and Banking. Banking must be open to free competition. Profits may not be socialized through bailouts, guarantees, or subsidized lending of any kind. Individuals are free to use any mutually agreeable medium as money. Legal tender laws and inflationary monetary policy must end.

2.8 Markets. Government may not subsidize, bail out, or charter businesses, nor compete with private enterprise. Business and state must be separated.

2.9 Licensing. Occupational licensing that conditions the right to work on government permission is illegitimate. Voluntary professional certification is the proper alternative.

2.10 Sex Work. Consenting adults have the right to provide and purchase sexual services. The state may not criminalize these exchanges.

2.11 Labor. Employment terms are matters for private contract. Government may not mandate benefits, compel bargaining, or impose arbitration. Employers and employees are free to organize, or not, as they choose.

2.12 Education. Parents have the right and responsibility to direct their children’s education and to control any funds expended on it. Education is best provided by the free market.

2.13 Health Care. Individuals have the right to choose their own care, providers, treatments, insurance, and end-of-life decisions, and to purchase insurance across state lines. Government may neither mandate nor prohibit voluntary medical treatment, including vaccination. Communicable disease that poses imminent and substantial risk to others is governed by the standard in 1.7.

2.14 Retirement. Retirement is the responsibility of the individual. Social Security must be phased out and transitioned to a private, voluntary system, honoring obligations already incurred.

3.0 SECURING LIBERTY

Government’s only legitimate purpose is to secure individual rights. The principle of non-initiation of force governs relations between governments as it does between persons.

3.1 National Defense. The United States must maintain a military sufficient to defend against aggression, and no larger. Entangling alliances and the role of world policeman must be abandoned. Conscription is illegitimate.

3.2 Civil Liberties in Crisis. Individual rights may not be suspended on grounds of war, epidemic, disaster, or emergency. Intelligence agencies must operate under meaningful oversight and transparency. Government secrecy may not be used to conceal official wrongdoing. Torture and cruel and unusual punishment are prohibited without exception.

3.3 Foreign Policy. Foreign policy must pursue peace and free exchange with all nations and entangling alliances with none. Foreign military and economic aid, tariffs, sanctions, and regime-change operations must end. We affirm the right of all peoples to resist tyranny, and condemn terrorism and violence against the innocent by any actor.

3.4 Trade and Migration. Government impediments to trade and to the peaceful movement of persons across borders must be removed. Restrictions on migration are legitimate only insofar as they exclude those who pose a demonstrable threat to the rights of others.

3.5 Equality Before the Law. Government must treat individuals equally regardless of sex, wealth, ethnicity, creed, national origin, personal habits, political belief, or sexual orientation. Reasonable, narrowly drawn distinctions based on age (as in 1.6) or proven incapacity are permitted. Private associations retain the right to set their own membership and association standards; others retain the right to respond through boycott and free speech.

3.6 Representative Government. The rights to petition and to dissent are inviolable. Government must operate transparently. We support electoral reforms that better reflect the electorate, including proportional representation, ranked or alternative voting systems, and a “none of the above” option. Political parties, as private associations, set their own internal rules. Tax-financed campaign subsidies and restrictions on voluntary campaign contributions must end. Ballot-access barriers, gerrymandering, and the exclusion of alternative parties must be eliminated. Initiative, referendum, recall, and repeal must be preserved.

3.7 Self-Determination. When government becomes destructive of the rights it exists to secure, the people may alter, abolish, or withdraw from it, including by secession. Any successor governance remains bound by the same rights enumerated here.

4.0 OMISSIONS

Where this platform is silent, the principle of non-initiation of force, fraud, and coercion governs. Silence does not imply approval of any law, agency, or government action not addressed.

He froze for barely an instant, giving her time to reach up with both hands and grab his knife arm. She used her handhold to pull herself up. She raised her right leg and slammed her foot down on his instep.

Nissa must have caught it just right. She drove her boot heel into his foot with a sharp crack of bone. The thug howled in pain, loosening his hold on her. Nissa took immediate advantage, yanking his right arm down, sawing the edge of his own knife across his left forearm.

I missed exactly what happened next. I was distracted because I realized I could once again see a ghost-like emanation surrounding her, something eerily like a faint aura. So much so that I experienced a momentary burst of panic, thinking that I might have raised my Talent reflexively. I didn’t need to concentrate to see this effect on her, though; and it was faint enough that in other conditions, I would likely have missed it entirely. It didn’t so much envelop her. Instead, it seemed to precede her, as if it were a real being and she was nothing more than an ethereal shadow following along in its wake.

She hip-checked the thug at just the right moment. He stepped on a loose stone with his bad foot, losing his balance and falling face-forward to the street. She kept hold of his knife hand, following him down, shifting one hand to his elbow.

She didn’t so much put him in an arm bar, as move just so to let one just materialized under her hands, letting her drive the thug into the ground and beyond. The thug’s scream was muffled by the pavement as she bent his right arm bent in an unnatural way. His knife flew out of his hand, bounced wildly on the cobblestones—

—and landed perfectly in Nissa’s hand when she rose. She didn’t bother looking at it when she caught it, tossing it behind her in one smooth motion.

The thug on the ground was curled up, whimpering and sobbing in pain. Nissa pulled her foot back for a kick. I stepped between her and her target before she had a chance to shatter his already dislocated elbow.

“Enough.” I spoke softly. Nissa looked up at me without moving her head, panting, teeth clenched. A thin thread of blood ran down from her nose. She wiped the back of the hand across her face, smearing away the blood.

“You wouldn’t have done that if I had kept the knife.”

“No.”

“That’s why I threw it away.” She took a deep, shuddering breath. With that, whatever spirit gripped her vanished like mist in the morning sun.

“We really have underestimated you,” Prospero murmured. He came over to kneel down beside the thug. “That was an outstanding demonstration of instas praescientia.”

“It hurt.” Nissa said dully. She wiped away another thread of blood from her nose. “I should have seen him coming, too. The echoes of whatever it is in the Weave must be getting stronger. I should be able to keep something like that up for two or three minutes at a time, not just a few seconds.”

“Then it was doubly impressive.” Prospero reached out and nudged the thug. “Don’t you agree?”

Read more about Nissa, her Talent, and how in the world a seer could end up with a knife at her throat in A Sense of Murder, coming soon from Selene Press!

Pre-order A SENSE OF MURDER from Amazon!

The steam whistle of the packet boat died as we approached the pier. Prospero was in conversation with the captain when I nudged him and pointed at the shore, where a tall, bald man wearing a blindfold and an ornate robe was seemingly waiting for us. Heavily armored men stood behind him, gleaming rifles made of sharp metal and smooth glass held at ready.

“Friends of yours?”

Prospero turned at my words. If I hadn’t been paying attention to him, I likely would have missed the subtle shift in his posture when he spied the entourage waiting for us. I’d seen that sort of change more times than I cared to think of: the change of stance that indicated a man prepared for a fight.

“We are all servants of the Empire.” A smile crossed his face and disappeared faster than the morning mist on the river. “That is Ser Elgus Nedom, Maiorna of the Black House. I mentioned the oracles that first sent me your way, didn’t I?” He nodded. “There you have it.”

Every schoolboy learned about the Instruments of the Empire. The triumvirate of the Legion, the Mares, and the Offices—land, sea, and paperwork—were the tools granted to us in our battle against the Accuser. I’d not heard of the Black House, but Prospero’s mention of oracles might explain that.

“Seers. Are they part of the Legion, like the magi and the world-mages?”

“Hardly. They stand apart. As do I.” He shook his head. “The function of the seers is distinct. They manage their own house, reporting directly to the Empress. Normally, they would outrank a Legion magus.” He grinned, but there was no warmth in that smile. “Normally. Elgus and I are peers, though he is reluctant to admit it.”

“He doesn’t look like the friendly sort.” The seer’s scowl was impressive.

“In the realm of Imperial politics, the distinction between friend and foe is something that is not always clear. Leave him to me. He no doubt wants to berate me for failing to accomplish his pet task.”

Read more about the Empire, her servants, and how the get along like a great, big, murderous family in A Sense of Murder, coming soon from Selene Press!

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It’s also led to an interesting problem for me. The Christian Bible is definitely present, and a large part of the heritage of the Empire. Individuals, particularly priests, will be quoting from those writings. How can I write those in English is such a way that they are understandable, yet give the feeling that they come from centuries of change and development in Latin, modified heavily by Aramaic and other languages?

Well, if you’re J.R.R. Tolkien, you create an entire history to understand how your language evolved. As for me, I am not a linguist; nor do I have the patience (or time, at this point!) to become one. So I am left to fall back on the tools that I have: existing translations, creative interpretation, and the help of Google Translate.

In a recent passage, I found myself wanting to reference Proverbs 3:24. The King James version is thus:

“When thou liest down, thou shalt not be afraid: yea, thou shalt lie down, and thy sleep shall be sweet.”

Poetic, but I don’t want readers to see this and think of our history. I want something that conveys the idea embedded in that passage, without bringing along the weight that the language of the KJV bears.

Now, since this is coming from Kellan, it needs to reflect his idea of the passage. He was raised and educated by teachers the Empire sent to help rebuild his world after a war to deny the forces of the Accuser. So his basis is going to be the Imperial scriptures - which means something based on Latin.

Enter Google Translate.

I have access to the Latin Vulgate form of the Bible, so that’s my starting point for this particular passage. If I take it and run it back and forth through Google Translate from Latin to English a couple of times, I can get something that expresses the ideas of the verse, without sounding like it:

Vulgate: “si dormieris non timebis quiesces et suavis erit somnus tuus”

1st pass: if you sleep you will not be afraid, you will rest and your sleep will be sweet

2nd pass: if you sleep you will not be afraid, you will rest and your sleep will be pleasant

Tweak that a little and you end up with:

I slept well that night, better than I had in a week. Better even than I had since I’d first met Prospero. Was it from the effort Nissa and I put into covering the city the day before? Perhaps. Then again, didn’t the Preacher promise, “rest, and your sleep will be pleasing”?

Some of you with a religious background may notice that Kellan is presuming that the author of Proverbia and the author of Ecclesiastes are one in the same. That might be the Imperial teaching. Then again, he is from the backcountry region of a backwater world, in Imperial terms, so maybe that’s a local teaching…

Which brings us to the next point. There’s going to be multiple versions of the Bible running around the worlds. I mean, we don’t have one translation - why should they? The Regnan Thalassocracy has a rough, working-man’s translation influenced by their centuries of life at sea, and Proverbs 3:24 is rendered slightly differently:

“Fear not, fer yer slumber shall be sweeter’n the motion of a galleon at sea.”

Yes, that’s taken from “The Pirate’s Bible”. I’ve been planning this for a bit. 🙂 I don’t think I would use that as-is, honestly. If one of the Regnans were quoting this, I’d want to tweak it until it suited their freebooting nature.

Finally, there’s going to be a version of the Bible that has been influenced by translations in places where a variation of Aramaic is the common tongue. I’m not sure quite how I’ll represent that yey. I might use the translation trick with Arabic, for example. However I do it, I know that I want very distinct language that will leave you with the idea that there is a completely different political, religious, and liturgical history backing whoever quotes it in that particular way.

Who’s right? You’d think that in a universe where you can hunt down an angel and simply ask, this would be a simple problem to solve. Except the ineffable tends to be ineffable, and messengers are generally only concerned with the messages they carry, not the ones that have already been delivered… so it would seem that confusion continues, though if the Almighty approves, is it really confusion?

“Such lies we have.” The demon stretched and elongated in unnatural ways, its voice mocking; but this time, the sinking ache of dread was strangely distant, as if in—

A dream. The colors of the world were muted, washed out. I struggled to pay attention to them, but they faded, giving way to a gray nothingness. The Vohan-thing was still clearly defined, however. It continued to distort, twisting in ways that my mind told me both weren’t possible, but also were not true memories. It opened its mouth wide, hooting in anger, and in the sound I recognized the blast of the packet ship’s engine blowing off steam.

My nightmare recollection followed the same pattern as previous nights. The sickness. The cold earth clutching my foot, sapping my energies. Once more, I pulled out my pistol, fumbling it into place before I pulled the trigger with no effect.

My trembling lips were tempted to curse. Instead, in that moment, I found myself repeating words my father had taught me: a child’s vespers, litany against the evil of the world. I am sure they would not have come to me if they hadn’t been so ingrained that reciting them was as much muscle memory as conscious thought.

“Sayet es vo ishoa, hakim melek; esoka, sheth, ey adruhk, alaha melek.”

Save me from evil, wise Lord; body, soul, and spirit, let me walk with God.

In my dream, I muttered that prayer continually. The incubus shrieked, a hellish noise that mimicked the blast of the ship’s steam engine. My pistol grew hot in my hand with each utterance, and instead of firing it to free my foot, I found the strength to turn it around and hammer it against the icy earth congealed around my foot. With each blow, the web of icy mud cracked, until at last the earth shattered and I pulled myself free, twisting to try and catch a glimpse of my face in the swirling blackness of the mirror.

“Esoka, sheth, ey adruhk, alaha melek!” I gasped, fighting free of—

A wool blanket.

I was sitting up on the cot on the packet ship, tangled in the blanket I had pulled over me before I fell asleep. Sweat trickled down the back of my neck, making me shiver in the light breeze that came through the open windows of the cabin.

I untangled myself and sat forward on the bunk, hands on my knees, breathing heavily. After a minute, my heartbeat slowed enough and I gulped down a deep, shuddering breath.

“Not as bad as it could have been,” I croaked, voice was barely more than a whisper. I stood and wobbled over to the washbasin. Slivers of moonlight wormed their way into the cabin, distorting my face into something grotesque, yet familiar.

I stared in paralyzed horror, unmoving, as my reflection in the mirror titled its head. Two yellow eyes, slitted like a cat, met mine. A third winked at me from my transfigured forehead. The apparition in the reflection grinned, showing a wet, red tongue and rotten brown teeth.

“Such lies!” The nightmare voice was barely a whisper, but did not stay there. In a trice, it rose to a shriek that startled me backward. Freed from the dread pinning me in place, I fell back onto the bunk. I struggled, trying to scream; but unable to find my voice.

Somehow, I was tangled up in my blanket again. Once more, I sat up and disentangled myself. This time, though, I did not wait for my heart to calm. I lunged for the wash basin, grasping it until my hands ached, twisting and turning my head to examine the face that the mirror showed me.

In the moonlight, I saw nothing more than my own reflection.

At the end of it all, I took the blanket from my bunk and covered the mirror. I sat up on the bunk across from it, staring at it as if it were a trapped animal, until exhaustion and the rhythmic thump of the packet boat’s engine lured me back to a dreamless sleep.

Read more about Kellan and his struggles—spiritual, mental, and physical—with his own very personal demon in A Sense of Murder, coming soon from Selene Press!

Pre-order A SENSE OF MURDER from Amazon!

My nobledark fantasy mystery, A Sense of Murder, is available for preorder! Come enter worlds that are the battleground for good and evil. Places where magic is law; guns and steel are justice; and evil is patient, persuasive, and genuinely terrifying…

In a far-flung corner of the worlds-spanning Empire, Ser Kellan tor Iaestus is a Highwayman, sworn to keep the peace in the rugged Outlands. Armed with a revolver from a forgotten war and a hidden Talent to see truth, he is an agent of justice and peace in a wild land... so long as he keeps his talent hidden, lest he be pressed into the service of the Empire.

When Prospero, an Imperial Magus, arrives in the Outlands hunting for a magical truth-teller, Kellan is assigned as his guide. Certain he can keep his Talent concealed and maintain his freedom, Kellan escorts the magus on his journey. All goes well until a string of seemingly unrelated murders exposes demons, dark powers, and a warlock weaving cruel designs in the shadows. As Kellan and Prospero investigate, they follow a thread that leads from the Outlands to the city of Victar de Reya, links whores and politicians, and takes them from fine restaurants to piratical celebrations.

Saddled with a suspicious young seer and facing demons clawing at them from the Unreal, the two must work together to unravel the warlock's conspiracy before he kills again. But can Kellan locate the killer without exposing his own power, and surrendering the independence he's fought so hard to protect?

Duty demands truth. Survival demands secrecy. Kellan can't have it both ways... and time is running out.

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Thank you for your patience. And now, what you have all been waiting for: MEMES!

In his latest article, Ian2 branched out to talk about women’s self-defense:

The Bugscuffle Gazette

Women's Self Defence

I don’t offer training…

Read more

2 months ago · 48 likes · 21 comments · Ian

I’ve also been following Mrs. Emma Walz on Facebook recently, where she has been doing a series of videos on “Crap My Cop Dad Taught Me To Keep Me From Getting Trafficked”3 (Parts One, Two, Three, Four, Five, and Six). As she says there at the start of it all, “Some of you have the self-preservation instincts of a golden retriever.”4

Having some experience with this subject for a couple of reasons, I’ll say that neither of them are saying anything shocking or new. At least, not to me.

My wife & I assist a friend who does a hapkido-based women’s self-defense class. It’s 3-4 hours, and the actual techniques are (IMHO) secondary. The primary takeaways we try to leave them with are:

• Situational awareness5, and

• Yes please use your voice, and

• Situational awareness, and

• The idea that you can fight back (and must fight back) instead of being dragged off wherever6, and

• Situational awareness

You may notice a theme there.

No, we are not teaching waif-fu. I mention that because of the startling number of people who think “women’s self defense” means “teaching women to fight and defeat men.” Nope. If that’s what you are looking for, if that is what you think you might need, learn a formal martial art (hapkido or judo).7

Our technique is rooted in some of the base concepts use in hapkido, but that’s where the similarity ends. I say “technique”, singular, because while there’s a number of holds we talk about, the breaks we teach are based on two simple movements. They are about using surprise and leverage to break common holds. The focus is teaching the women that they can break those holds and get away from an attacker.

Note: not fight an attacker. We do cover strikes (punch, heel-palm, scoop kicks) but those are for familiarization and to instill confidence. We always emphasize that if everything has gone to hell in a hand basket, the goal is to break a hold and get to safety.

More to the point, though (and I think Ian and Mrs. Walz would both agree with me here): we repeatedly emphasize that what we are teaching the ladies are intended to be measures of last resort, because the absolutely best way to win a struggle8 is to never be in one. And that best way to ensure that you’re never in that situation?

Situational awareness.

Go. Read. Learn.

And make us all happy by putting your dang phone away in the parking lot, okay?

I spun around. Someone catching you unawares in the Stacks was not a good thing.

The being who’d hailed me was standing back behind the cab, holding a couple of credit slips in his hand. I looked him up and down as I walked over to him slowly. His fox-like face was long and narrow, covered with fur, with lighter circles around his eyes. High leather boots and faded jeans with a broad belt were topped by a long, open leather vest. That showed off a narrow chest covered in reddish-brown hair streaked with white. A broad-brimmed hat with two notches cut to accommodate a pair of pointed ears sat atop his head.

That caught my attention. It had been over a year since I’d seen anyone wearing a cattleman and cowboy boots. I thought I was long past it, but a quick flash of homesickness washed over me, gone as soon as it came.

“Sorry if I startled you,” he drawled. His voice was high, with a lilt to it that reminded me of slow summer days back home. He was a good half meter shorter than me and skinny enough that I wondered if he had been missing some meals.

I shook my head. “Bit distracted, that’s all.”

Closer now, I could see that his eyes were black. A single tooth poked up over his upper lip, giving him a snaggletooth appearance. A streak of white rose up from the corner of his mouth to cross the bridge of his nose and up over his forehead, off-center.

“These would be yours, yes? Saw that there Iggy toss ‘em your way, at least, before he vamoosed.” He held out the slips, a pair of tens. His three fingers were long, covered in the same thin red hair and showing dark skin underneath.

“Ha!” I took the slips. “Thanks. He still stiffed me, but it wasn’t as bad as I thought.”

He shrugged, rolling his shoulders in an odd way. “Sorry to hear that. Glad I could be of help.”

“I do appreciate it, mister…”

“Roy, to my Human friends.” He held out a hand. “Pleased to be making your acquaintance.”