Blank Slate

I swing my sword...no, my dagger, towards Princess Acantha. Her golden hair, the same color as my sister's, no, my stepmother's, bounces as she avoids my blow. She smiles, the smirk making me grit my teeth. She's been intentionally grating my nerves since the first time we met. That was one year ago. Or was it a month? A week? Regardless, I dodge her counterattack, then, pressing my dagger to her throat, force her against the closest wall.

I frown. Why did I suddenly think this seems cliché? And why am I now the one with my back pressed to the wall, a dagger to my throat, Acantha's eyes like hot coals searing into my soul? 

"You betrayed me, Jace" She says. But my name is Cerrin. No, Soren. And she betrayed me, didn't she? Wait, I know what's going on here. 

The antechamber of the palace falls away, and I'm left floating in a blank, white space. I search the nothingness, hoping she can sort this out before throwing me back in with Acantha. Not that I'll remember this.

"You know, this is still a weird way to do your character sheets." I say. I have the sense most characters who find themselves in the emptiness say something similar. The Author doesn't respond. She wouldn't deign to speak with me, or if she does, I wouldn't understand it.

"My name is Cerrin. Cerrin...hmm, I do need a good last name. Something strong to go with the tragic backstory you'll give me to explain my villainy. Well, not total villainy. Cerrin Musa." I tell the void, and I can feel that part of myself solidify, an anchor holding me in place. Thank goodness. This would all be easier if the Author could figure this out beforehand, but she rarely ever does. 

The part of me that belongs to her knows that this is her way of letting me create myself, so to speak. She'll pull me out of the story, focusing on the bits of me she knows she needs, then she'll let me talk myself into existence. It's what she does with every character she's unsure about. I'm not the first one to be thrown in the void, and I won't be the last. The knowledge keeps this experience from being terrifying. I might be as annoyed with her as she is with herself, though. 

"I'm Cerrin Musa, Crown Prince of the kingdom of Calceri. I'm not the primary love interest for Princess Acantha, but after we finish the battle here, I'll be tempting enough for her to consider it. And she's beautiful, and a main character, so I'll also consider a relationship. Ultimately, however, I'm just a distraction for Acantha until she meets the true love of her life, a much less problematic man." My head tilts. So the fight she pulled me out of doesn't mean anything? 

"How will I end, if not with her?" I muse aloud, no longer sure whom is steering this conversation.

"The simplest solution would be to kill me off." Wait, seriously? Author, what the heck? "But obviously, I don't want to die. And you are spending quite a bit of time on my development for me to be more of a plot device than a person." I smirk, satisfied with that bit of manipulation.

"I like manipulating people. I like using their own thoughts and feelings against them. It's the way my mother protected me from my father as I grew up." Or at least, it is now. Just like that, my memories whisper I spent my formative years watching my mother manipulate my abusive and cruel father into doing anything other than hurting me. Until the day she died, that is.

"Dead mothers are cliché." I snap, thinking about the way Author changed my position in the palace's antechamber. "Too bad for me, huh?"

"Why don't I like Acantha currently, anyway?" But even as I ask, answers form in my mind. We were supposed to marry each other, and we'd been each other's ticket out of our mutual unpleasant situations. But she'd called the wedding off following the unrest in Kalioss, which isn't even her homeland. And I, in a rage she wouldn't have understood, arranged to marry the Guardian of the Sea instead. But someone else had killed the Guardian of the Sea, and now I have no way out of Calceri. 

Acantha's homeland, Precipa, allied with Kalioss, a country at war with my own, making us enemies. That, along with our personal history, solidified our current antagonistic relationship.

"Cool, so now I have a textbook tragic backstory. But what do I look like? Have you even thought about that?" The Author is famously bad with imagery and character descriptions, so she better get this straight. Whether or not she kills me, it sounds like I'll have an impact. Right now, I'm vaguely man-shaped mist, as incorporeal as the void surrounding me.

"Well, Steele has cobalt blue eyes, so my eyes definitely can't be blue." I answer my question. Not that the Prince of Kalioss should matter. Or maybe he does. 

"My eyes are grey. Certain light can make them look different, but they're grey most of the time." I pause. "Wait, you named a character Steele, but gave me the grey eyes? Aren't your readers going to get confused?"

"Brown, then. I have brown eyes that glow golden in the light. They remind Acantha of honey. And my hair..." I tap a finger to my lip. I don't know if I ever did that before, but now it's a habit I can't break, a clear indicator that I'm deep in thought. 

"I have blonde hair, though it's more sun-bleached brown than true blonde. And it's cut close to my scalp, since I'm a warrior and do a lot of fighting." Hair forms on my head, but its chin length, lighter on the ends than at the root. I roll my eyes. Apparently, Author thinks longer hair is more attractive. My mention of fighting causes my body to solidify under me. I'm all rugged lines and well-formed muscles. Faint scars criss-cross my skin, both from battles fought for my country and within my home. A mole appears near my temple, and my skin tans.

My clothing appears, expertly crafted leather armor with soft linens within. "A prince should only be dressed in the best, after all." I note as I survey the scrollwork design painstaking crafted onto the leather. 

"As for the rest of my personality, I believe we've already hammered that out a bit, haven't we? I'm smart and manipulative, but surprisingly introspective. Also, I'm impulsive, given the whole Guardian of the Sea thing, and I'm brave enough to admit outright that it'd be easier for you to kill me." I swallow a lump in my throat. Maybe I'm not that brave.

"But you're not going to kill me, are you? You've gotten attached. You're going to add me to Acantha and Steele's found family. I'm getting a happily ever after right beside them." Unless Author changes her mind again, which she could.

"If you do change your mind, it should definitely be Acantha who kills me after I tragically side with my father and the other current regimes in the area." I can't believe I just said that. Is she making me advocate for my own death? I already had to hammer out my own backstory and appearance.

The palace antechamber returns in a whoosh of shadows and light. My time in the void fades as I continue my fight with Acantha, our daggers meeting in a flurry of strikes. The blade in my hand elongates into a sword. A warrior needs a sword. 

Unless there's a valid reason for me to be using a dagger. The antechamber fades once more.

Guess Author isn't done quite yet. 

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