A Snake in a Cast

L.G.C. Smith

Before I started dreaming about rattlesnakes biting me, I was friends with a garter snake who lived under my grandparent’s front porch. One Easter morning, my grandpa called me outside to see something. I was three, I think. My grandparents lived in a brand new house they had built in Spearfish, South Dakota where my grandfather was a school superintendent. The house was on a green hillside with a small creek at the bottom of the property. When my grandpa pointed to something long and narrow in the grass, I was too little to do anything but walk right up to it. It looked a little like a snake, but . . . not. More like the ghost of a snake.

“It’s a snake skin,” my grandpa explained. And he told me how snakes shed their skins, and that this one had belonged to a garter snake that lived under the porch.

I loved the idea of shedding your whole skin, and I wanted to meet the snake that had done it. So I waited and I watched. I remember sitting very still, and wishing for the snake to show itself. I have a clear memory of the snake skin, but I don’t remember seeing the snake. My mother says I did indeed see him, and I named him Ray.


Now Ray up on the porch or his shed skin in the grass was one thing. Later that year, I broke my leg and had a full cast on. I wasn’t four yet, and not so quick with the crutches, although my other grandpa, the self-sufficient rancher, taught me how to use them as soon as he got hold of me. But the day before that happened, I was carried down to sit beside the creek in Spearfish with my other grandparents. There I sat, stuck in one place because of that big old cast on my leg, and what came slithering through the grass but a garter snake, slender, green and wriggling quick.

It was too small for Ray, and its size was a problem. A big problem. That little snake was skinny enough that all it would take was one fast wiggle and it could slip into the narrow gap between my leg and the plaster cast. Then what would I do?!

Being three, I immediately threw a fit and got myself hauled back to the house. No one understood why I couldn’t see the garter snake by the creek as one of Ray’s tribe and be friends. When I explained about it getting into my cast, they insisted it would never happen. I didn’t buy it. If I could imagine it that clearly, it was possible. End of discussion.

From that point on, I was afraid of snakes. Cultural messages certainly reinforced that fear, and subsequent experiences with rattlers kept me on my toes (one even struck at me while I was walking in the alfalfa field surrounding my house in Mission, SD; hooboy, you’ve never seen a fat woman run so fast), but it was my own infant imagination that planted that seed of fear.

I wasn’t afraid of being bitten. I was afraid of a live thing getting trapped between me and something I couldn’t remove. I was afraid of it wriggling and maybe dying in there, and when they took the cast off, there would be a stinky moldering snake corpse, and I would be sad and disgusted. And scared. So scared. Of something I had liked a lot. Of life and death and moving and getting stuck.

Snakes carry heavy loads for us. We dump our most primal fears on their long backs, and off they slither, reviled and feared. But my fear of snakes is more about my fear of my own life and death, of all the things I can’t control, and all the things I’m afraid to do.

But I remember Ray. He was a good friend to a three-year-old girl, and he calls me back to a piece of my spirit from before I was afraid. I’m working hard to get all the way back.

First Words, First Kiss?

In a sense, the opening of a novel is a come-hither kiss of greeting to a reader. We expect different greetings from different types of books. My latest, Eve of All Hallows, is a historical fantasy novella, and the opening, as one might expect, evokes a time long past and a world more magical than our own. It’s about a secret druid queen who must teach and test a brash young Anglo-Saxon king who seeks a boon only she can grant. I hope you like it.

EVE OF ALL HALLOWS
L.G.C. Smith

Samhain, 594 AD, in an Eastern Vale of Gwynedd
At midnight following the last sunset of the old year and before the first sunrise of the new, the walls betwixt this world and the next shuddered, slipped, and fell. Gwyn was there to catch them, seeking tasks and truths, as her mother had once done, and all her grandmothers before them. Samhain it was, so alone Gwyn sat upon a hawthorn stump, gazing into the flames beneath her cauldron, awaiting any who might come to share her fire and a cup of warming broth.

Many came and told their tales. Gwyn listened carefully to each one so she might commit their words to memory. There were other nights the Visitors came to her, but none so important as on this night of summer’s turn to winter. She welcomed all who appeared, be they kindly fat old women, children lost in the woods, hunting wolves, madmen, goblins, half-formed wights, or shadowy spirits. She heard their tales, or simply kept them company if they did not speak. Samhain was hers, and none were turned away no matter how gruesome their appearance or the tales they brought.

When the eastern darkness shrank before the faintest graying breath of dawn, Gwyn blinked and, finding herself alone, rose to stir her soup and ladle a dipperful into her cup. It was almost to her lips, the steam warming her nose with woodsy herbs and the good meaty scent of her oldest hen, when a gentle cough stopped her.

Beside her stood a small, wizened being. An old man, perhaps, but she thought not. He put her in mind of a barrow wight who’d borrowed a woolen cloak and cap from some unsuspecting traveler. His pale, bland features peeked in and out beneath the shadows of his cap, the shape roughly a man’s, but lacking human details. No eyebrows. The nose but barely there. A smooth, unsmiling mouth.

“Sit, my lord, if you would share my fire and cup. You are most welcome.” She offered him her soup, noting how the cup glided from her hands without a touch. She gestured to one of the stumps beside her, and seated herself when he did.

“Thank you, Lady.” He sipped the broth. “Ah. A kind and fertile land you have here. This was a happy hen.” He sipped again. “The parsley greened upon fat roots. The onion swelled thick and sweet in the sheltering earth. The water carried joy out of the mountains. The salt sings with the hale heart of ancient seas.”

When he was finished, he set the earthenware cup upon the ground. The sky was moving on toward dawn, and he would soon leave, Gwyn knew, but she did not hurry him. Daylight would not harm him.

“I sought you from my home in the north, Lady, for I have news of one who will come to you before this year ends and the next follows on its wings. He is like a bright storm one moment and a dark flood the next. We have watched him since he was a babe, my kin and I, and he is now a man grown. King he has become in the Old Green Hills. Yet his path is not clear. He wavers between the dark and light. He needs a tempering hand, Lady. One such as yours. To guide him. He doesn’t know how deeply he can scar the land. He cares not. He cares for his people, but not the land that makes them and gives them life. There is . . . concern.”

“What would you have me do?” Gwyn asked. She had seen this soul when scrying. Felt him in the cold east wind. Seen his hands drip blood in visions.

“Teach him to respect the Mother.”

Gwyn was silent whilst she sent her spirit searching for this young king. When she found him, she sighed. “He will not listen. He harkens only to his own will.”

Eve of All Hallows is available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other on-line booksellers.

If you’d like to enter the drawing to win a free copy, please leave a comment. The winner will be announced Saturday, February 18, 2012.

Peace in the Kingdom

L.G.C. Smith

Idiosyncratic as it may be, I spend a lot of time imagining life in early seventh century Britain. The heroes who inspired my “Kings of the North” series lived and died then, as did the Anglo-Saxon saint from whose name comes the place name that is my family name.

I have ridiculous fantasies of getting another PhD, this one in early medieval British landscape history, just because I love pondering the little scraps of information left by material culture, works of poetry and history, place names, field systems, church records, parish boundaries, architecture, archeology and whatnot. Then I make up more stories based on what I learn instead of writing journal articles, so I really I don’t need another degree to do that. But I keep reading Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People. And a lot of other stuff besides.

My thoughts are much on King Edwin of Northumbria these days, as his book is up next. Bede has a great deal to say about Edwin because he was the first Northumbrian king to convert to Christianity. Edwin looms large by virtue of having established some measure of sovereignty over a good bit of what is today England (along with a fair portion of Scotland) and having led the charge for Christ in Northumbria.


It would be, I think, a mistake to view Edwin as any sort of modern-day evangelist. For one thing, Bede tells of him taking a very long time to decide to convert from whatever native pagan tradition he was raised in. In his darkest hour, when his greatest enemy (Æthelfrith, the hero of the first book in my series, Warlord) stood poised to annihilate him, Edwin received a mysterious visit from a stranger who exacted the promise that if there were someone who could save him from betrayal and death, Edwin would offer his allegiance to that lord. Of course this turned out to be The Lord, the Big Guy himself. And even though Edwin was saved, he didn’t immediately attribute that salvation to God. It took some time and another prophesied sign to get him on that path.

Even then, Edwin had to confer with his advisors. Bede would have it that Edwin’s chief priest decided there was no tangible benefit in the old religion. It wasn’t winning them any battles or loot. Therefore, practically speaking, it made sense to jump ship. Then Bede relates his famous ‘sparrow in the hall’ homily, likening the moment of a sparrow’s flight in one window and out another to a man’s awareness of his mortal life. It is but a flash of a much wider reality that is don’t necessarily perceived. Edwin listened to both the pragmatic and the metaphysical arguments.

The final argument, however, sounded all too much like certain hawkish fundies. In the old religion, priests were forbidden arms. So the high priest insisted on being the first to hie himself up on the king’s stallion, grab a sword, cut down the old idols and burn the temple. Bede seems to feel this was noble behavior. I notice that it wasn’t Edwin who did it. He didn’t stop it. But he didn’t do it himself.


Eventually Edwin committed to conversion, was baptized, founded churches and dedicated his daughter to the service of the Church, but my sense is that he did it for political reasons as much as anything personal. Bede’s most glowing praise of Edwin stands out through the many centuries since his life: It was related that there was so great a peace in Britain, wherever the dominion of King Edwin reached, that, as the proverb still runs, a woman with a newborn child could walk throughout the island from sea to sea and take no harm. (Bede, The Ecclesiastical History of the British People, Oxford World’s Classics, 1999, OUP, p. 100)

For all that he was a warrior who rode into battle at the head of his army, sword at the ready, Edwin appears to have cared for more than victory and conquest. A peaceable kingdom was no mean accomplishment if word of it survived a hundred years past Edwin’s reign and into Bede’s lifetime. In an age of warrior kings and saints, this detail offers a glimpse into what peace meant in the early seventh century.

It is entirely speculation, but I suspect that Edwin made his choice to convert to Christianity for reasons in which personal faith may have been only a small part. In light of the orderly peace Bede describes, Edwin likely saw Christianity as a means to bring together the disparate peoples of his time. The more numerous British were already Christian and had been from late Roman times. The less numerous Anglo-Saxons were not, aside from the odd king, but as they gained political power, their kings may have seen advantages to be had in adopting the religion of the majority of the population.


They did so in a fractious fashion pitting the authority of the Roman Church against that of the Celtic Church, but behind both iterations of the faith lay similar teachings about the relations between mankind and God. Those could be drawn upon to order the relationships between men and women in communities where the lines of power and authority were shifting. The Good News offered functional templates for everyday life wherein all lives mattered and were worth preserving. The choice of the sparrow in Edwin’s hall is no accident of rhetoric. It highlights the teaching of Matthew (10:29-31) that claims that God knows if a single sparrow falls to earth. If such small creatures have worth and value to God then so should people understand that the worth of a human life is great, as well. This lesson was vital to establishing peace in Edwin’s kingdom.

Life in early seventh century Britain was dicey. Peace was hard to come by. I think Edwin saw a better chance for it under Christianity. I also think history records that he was a charismatic leader, probably more beloved than he was feared. Yet Edwin’s peace did not last long. He ruled Northumbria for seventeen years, and his death ushered in another short period of chaos and conflict that showed how tenuous his peace truly was. But it lived large in the memory of his kingdom and remains a part of the dynamic history of the North.

My New Year begins with thinking about King Edwin and the peace he wrought. By year’s end, I hope to have cast him into war again, and learned what a peacemaking old warrior might do with modern conflicts.


PS: In other news, Staindrop has been renamed Master of My Surrender. Apparently men tend to hear 'Staindrop' and think “Monica Lewinsky” and “dress.” To those of you who went there, all I can say is that yes, I was aware of the connotation, but most women did not go there. They really didn’t. However, I can only take so much adolescent snickers, and in the world of ebooks, it’s an easy fix. To those of you who’ve bought it, thank you very much, and please beware this is the same book you already have.

Staindrop by L. G. C. Smith

I’m very pleased to present my first ebook, Staindrop (A Paranormal Erotic Romance Novella) by L. G. C. Smith. This is an erotic ghost story that I started working on the last time I was in England. The heroine is caught between two lovers, the ghost of an Anglo-Saxon king and a very much alive English duke.


Elizabeth Jory is in love with a ghost, which kind of sucks when it comes to sex.

Rafe Crosfield, the hot physics professor she meets in York, might be the man to tempt her back into the land of the living. But when he’s making her scream and melt, who’s driving her to such mindless pleasure? Just Rafe, or is her ghost there, too?

Rafe has secrets of his own. His sexual inclinations make it hard to find the right woman. Can he convince Elizabeth, who seems perfect for him, to stay long enough to find out?

It’s a little naughty—in all the best ways. Until December 15th, you can buy it for $.99 at Amazon, B&N, Smashwords, and other places fine ebooks are sold. After that it will be $1.99.

It’s exciting to have a book in the marketplace again. After all, it’s been a long time since my earlier books, written under the pseudonym Allison Hayes, were published. I thought I could happily write forever in obscurity without publishing. I love writing. The process of crafting imagination, research, language and creative juice into a story fulfills me like nothing else. It’s enough.

Then things changed in my life. My husband, a teacher, is being forced into early retirement. Our income, never impressive, is going to take a killing blow pretty quick here. I no longer have the luxury of writing to please myself alone. I need the marketplace. I need readers.

Fortunately, I love readers. Readers are family. I come from an actual family of dedicated popular fiction readers, but whenever I talk to a reader I don’t know, if we read romance, fantasy, science fiction, thrillers, mystery, horror, or any subgenre or combination of these, we have something to talk about. Something fun. The connection is instant. Like with family. I love readers.

As an author, my goal is to give readers a satisfying book. No going commando on editing or anything like that for me. Fellow Pens Lisa and Adrienne have read and critiqued Staindrop. The incomparable Alicia Rasley edited, and then Lisa proofread. My beautiful cover was designed by our very own Gigi Pandian’s Gargoyle Girl Productions. She did a fabulous job, don’t you think? Martha and The Alpha Division coached me, held my hand and did the file conversions that would have taken me way too long on my own. Every one of the other Pens inspires me to share my books with readers again instead of sitting on my hoard of stories like an agoraphobic dragon.


After Staindrop, I will be publishing another novella, this one a historical fantasy, Eve of All Hallows, about a young Northumbrian king looking for the Welsh witch said to possess the power to grant kingship over all of Britain. Look for Eve of All Hallows in January 2012.

I’d like to give two copies of Staindrop to readers who comment on this post. I’ll draw at random on Saturday, November 26th and announce the winners here.