There are times when my characters frustrate the shit out of me, I swear to god. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, make with the clicky over on that link there on the right hand side that says KT's Characters.

I've been trying, on and off for a few weeks now, to finish a short story called (of all the creative things) First Nights Part Two. Really, it needs a better title, but that's beside the point. Loria and Diya have just become lovers and I wanted to do a "morning after" bit to sort of round things out. First time I tried it, both Loria and Diya were trying to outdo each other on the "we're not worthy" parade. Which started an argument between them. Ok, I have no problems with my characters arguing. I don't even have too much problems with them having a varied assortment of ego-problems. But I did not want to see them spending four paragraphs whining about which one of them was less deserving than the other. Sheh! (as Diya would say.)

Thank god for the delete key.

I backed up and started over, and didn't let Diya say the thing he wanted to, so the conversation has moved back in a different direction. Got it headed where I wanted it to go, and all of the sudden - wham! - Diya starts telling me all about his third visit to his father's home city of Zhakistahn. They're on their way home from Zhakistahn when the caravan (Diya's father is a trader) is attacked by the Ven'Hedi. Diya's all of about eleven years old at this point... and his first falcon, Calif, gets killed saving the boy's life. I said... "Ok, Diya... I see that. Now, can we finish this bit over here with Loria?"

No.

Diya instead starts telling me all about Loria and Kevil leaving to return to Marsember for three months. He helps them, rides out with them to the cave where Jelarthna hid the portal and then leads their horses back to Alanis. "Ok, Diya... that's great, can it wait until they actually go? What about this..."

Um... that's nice, Diya, who are these people? Oh... Ven'Hedi captives. These are the same Ven'Hedi who just shot down Kyar (his current falcon). Um, Diya, there are ten of the Ven'Hedi... um... oh, shit... and there he goes, charging into a Ven'Hedi camp... lucky me, I missed most of the carnage. Diya comes back to himself to tell me about leading six horses and the two captives who lived, back to Alanis.

Captain: Master Diya-al'Ati, you killed six Ven'Hedi? Alone?

Diya: No, sir. Diya could not find the other four horses, and there were the prisoners to think of.

I'm not really sure where the conversation goes after that, but I know Diya takes one of the Ven'Hedi horses as his own. It's an ugly horse, mostly brown, with a large white blaze across a rather snubbed nose, which covers one eye, but not the other. The horse was one blue eye and one brown one. Diya names the horse Paint, and it becomes his personal mount, as opposed to the Ranger horses. I'm not sure why he wants this horse yet, he hasn't told me.

But we still haven't finished this other conversation. Diya... honey, please. Come over here, sit down... calm down... remember Loria? Please... tell me what she said the morning after you first became lovers. Please.

Please.