Writing Sample

Sample:

Clenching her fingers so tightly around the wooden box, that her knuckles turned white, Hyacinth considered turning on her heel, and leaving this place; fear choking her, completely cutting off her air supply. Though it was an equal possibility that it was her blasted corset that was to blame for that . . .

Even as the thought of leaving entered her mind, Hyacinth crushed it immediately, pulling herself up to her fullest height, and throwing her head haughtily into the air. She was going to do this. She was going to sell her soul.

To think of it like that, to actually say the words aloud, was utterly surreal. She. Was. Going. To. Sell. Her. Soul.

As odd as it may have seemed to say aloud, Hyacinth couldn't help but feel that anything was preferable to returning back to the castle, where her father would drunkenly stumble into her chambers, and slip naked beneath the sheets, groping at her. Raping her. As he had for so many evenings, since she was a young girl.

It was that thought which had the young woman, immediately dropping to her knees, raking her nails over the sodden ground, pulling up grass and dirt, throwing them to the side in a blind haze of panic and fear. She couldn't stand to live in the constant paralysis of fear, that she had been for so long. It had to change.

Once it looked as though she'd dug a big enough hole to fit the box in the ground, Hyacinth dropped the box into the wet earth, using both of her hands to dump the pulled up grass and dirt, back into the hole, burying the box.

Rising on legs that had turned to jelly in the midst of her panic attack, Hyacinth crossed her arms across her chest, pulling the fur of her coat more tightly around her shoulders to ward off the October chill.

How long did this usually take? Hyacinth wondered, her gaze scanning the perimeter of the low dipping valley. She'd never summoned a crossroads demon before, but one would assume that they'd be there, practically in the blink of an eye. Wouldn't one?

. . . "Good evening lovely," said a smooth, deep baritone.

Spinning on the sole of her leather boot, Hyacinth Claymore came face to face with a very handsome man, who looked to be about a decade or two older than herself. Fear washed over her like a tidal wave, but politeness demanded that she respond to his greeting.

"Hello," she mumbled, her voice coming out slightly shaken.

"So, what brings me here, I wonder, a deal no doubt, young Hyacinth," the other replied, as he circled around the young princess, his hands buried in the depths of the pockets of his pants.

A strange calm blanketed her shaken nerves, as she considered how to say the words aloud. It was one thing entirely to think about selling one's soul, it was another completely, to actually do it. But he hadn't been her 'father' for so long that it was easy for Hyacinth to blurt the words, "I want my rapist dead."

But that was a lie . . . She didn't merely want him dead. She wanted him to suffer. To feel the f e a r that he and her brother had instilled in her, the pain of being brutalized in new and humiliating ways. . . She didn't want him to have a moment of peace. Ever.

"Forgive me, but I'm not sure of the proper etiquette, when it comes to doing this," Hyacinth said, making a vague motion to the expanse between she and the demon.

"Well it's really quite simple, love. . . You 'sign' the contract with a simple kiss, and voila," the man waved his hand flagrantly through the air, a smirk adorning his face now, as his chocoate-y hues landed on Hyacinth. "The deed is done, your soul is mine, and your father is dead."

"Well let's get this over with," she replied abruptly, her stride slightly slowed by the weight of her skirts around her legs. Raising onto the tip of her toes, Hyacinth brushed her lips against his own.