Hey everyone, I've been doing a lot of writing the last couple of days and I've got a lot more to do. So rather than half-heartedly crank out another essay this morning, I thought I'd share with you a sample from the novel I've been working on for the last two years.
To set the scene, monster hunter Leif Manning is stranded at a bus depot during a winter storm. For reasons he's still figuring out, he and the others are attacked by a troll in the middle of the night. So he does what he does best. The monster hunter gears up and goes out to do battle. Enjoy, and let me know what you think!
Blasts of wind drove snowflakes into any exposed skin like tiny needles and Manning’s sinuses instantly felt as if they were packed with ice. Tears, both from the cold and the accompanying pain, clouded his vision. Manning blinked the tears away as he forced the pain out of his mind. It wasn’t his first time doing battle in the cold, and he didn’t want it to be his last. Fighting in the cold kept his mind keen. Also, you never had to worry about working up a sweat. Though the wall at his back provided some protection, he didn’t stand in the doorway for long. Since trolls liked to throw things, he needed to get away from the building where he’d be a clear target and not have innocent people behind him.
“Time to come out and play,” he shouted into the storm. He was in the street now, moving, making himself a difficult target. From the shadows beneath the overpass a chunk of ice the size of beer keg shot out at him. It was a clumsy throw into the wind, so rather than dodge Manning planted his feet and swung the maul in a mighty horizontal arc. The projectile exploded around him, shards of ice buzzing past like angry bees, but leaving the monster hunter untouched.
“You’ll have to do better than that!” Manning’s blood was racing now, hot with the anticipation of battle. “Line drive to center field, a runner of first. What else have you got?”
In the back of his mind, however, he knew something wasn’t right. Trolls were burrowing creatures, with claws that could tear up the roots of mountains. Instead of ice, which lay in piles from the slow plows, the troll should have been pitching pieces of sidewalk, the street, half the on-ramp if wanted.
“That was incredible,” another voice screamed.
Manning looked back toward the bus station, where camera in hand, Casper leaned out the open door cheering. Idiot, Manning thought. “Get back inside!” While he was distracted as another piece of ice, smaller than the first but moving faster, came hurtling out of the shadows. Manning saw it in his peripheral vision just in time to deflect it with his gauntleted hand. “You’re going to get someone killed.”
There was no time to see if Casper did as he was told, as a second later the air was singing with a barrage of baseball sized projectiles of snow and ice moving faster than the untrained eye could see. Using both gauntlet and maul, Manning deflected them in a flurry of defensive movements that left Casper silent. The last snowball struck Manning in the shoulder, spinning him halfway around. The monster hunter snarled in pain but kept his feet. That would leave a mark.
Finally, the troll leapt from the shadows and into the street. It was small, for a troll, but dense, and a shockwave radiated out from the impact. Size, of course, was relative. Small for a troll was still considerably larger than large man like Manning. Powerful legs sat high on either side of square torso, its massive arms nearly reached the ground. Instead of hands the troll had forked, shovel-like nails for tearing at earth and stone. The monster roared, and Manning shouted back in response.
They charged at one another, the troll moving in a loping gate, twisting its awkward body from side to side as it lunged forward. But that didn’t mean that it wasn’t fast. Despite the best efforts of the road crews, layers of snow had been packed down by traffic into a smooth sheet of ice that lay hidden under the fresh fallen snow. Manning, feeling it, knew that stopping to plant his feet and swing the maul was impossible. Even if he could stop without falling, he could only swing with his arms rather than use the force of his entire body. A weak blow would be useless against the rock-hard monster.
So instead Manning used the ice to his advantage. Just as he came within range of the claws he let his feet go out from under him. It was baseball again, and now he was sliding to the plate. If life were a movie, he would have gone between the monster’s legs in a slow motion spray of snowflakes. Instead, Manning slipped to the outside, smashing the head of the maul into the troll’s right knee as he went by. The blow wasn’t hard enough to do much damage, but it did cause the troll to trip and stumble drunkenly into several parked cars.
Once past, Manning tucked into a roll and came up in a crouch. The troll had lost him, disoriented by Manning’s sudden movements before it had to catch its balance. Shortening his grip on the maul so that his hand rested nearer the head, Manning ran up behind the troll and like a lone timberwolf taking down a caribou, and leapt onto its back. Manning pulled his left arm around the troll’s neck and clenched it tight. He had no illusions of strangling the monster. Even if sinews of his mighty arm were any match to those in the Troll’s neck, the hardened tissues would break. He’d decapitate the troll before it suffocated. Clubbing it into unconscious was his best approach. So with his right hand Manning brought down his hammer. Again, and again, and again.
It should have been enough. This wasn’t Manning’s first encounter with a troll. He knew where to strike, and for a creature as small and probably young as this one, the first blow should have dropped it cold in the street. Instead, the troll leaned back with its entire body and in a motion entirely unexpected by the experienced monster hunter, threw itself forward. Manning lost his hold. He sailed through the air and landed on a parked car with force of man who’d fallen off a building. A really tall building. Glass shattered as the roof caved in around him.
