Usually when I delete a scene from a book, it happens early on, and there’s a good reason for attacking it with scissors. This is a scene that I’d be tempted to add back if I ever did a “director’s cut” of The Emperor’s Edge.
It was originally most of Chapter 3 and took place after Hollowcrest sent Amaranthe off to “seduce” and kill Sicarius. She decided she’d better practice this seduction thing before going after our dear deadly assassin. What happens in this scene is the reason she tossed that idea out the window.
I cut it because I originally thought I’d be hunting for an agent with EE, and everybody said fantasy novels over 100,000 words were a tough sell, so I was trying to shave off as much as I could, and the scene wasn’t that crucial. Also, I’d heard that agents tended to request the first three chapters (if they were interested in your query letter), so I thought it’d be a good idea to bump up the introduction of Sicarius to fall into those introductory pages. Lastly, a couple of my male critique buddies got the impression that Amaranthe was too homely to score based on this scene. Of course, my intention was just to show that she’s better at getting people onto her side than into her bed. đ
So, for those who enjoy such things, I present the old and unedited…
Chapter 3
Seduction. Amaranthe found the thought almost as unappealing as assassination. Well, if she was going to pull it off, she needed practice.
A breeze whistled through the street, causing an icicle-bedecked sign to swing. Two Toes Slink, it read above a crude picture of a dancer holding an oversized mug of beer. Amaranthe regarded the brick building with distaste. She did not begrudge people their need for recreation, but all her experiences with slinks had involved going in, breaking up fights, and arresting folks. People ought to have something more constructive to do with their time than starting barroom brawls.
Layers of shoveled snow were piled against the building’s brick walls. Fresh powder skidded across the slick pavement and curled around Amaranthe’s exposed ankles. She wrapped her parka tighter, partially because of the cold, partially because she felt ridiculous in the clothes she was wearing underneath.
“Give me something sexy,” she had told the shopkeeper before she could think better of it.
The sleeveless blouse was not entirely horrible, and the knee-length skirt that hugged her hips and buttocks like a sausage casing, while not practical, was wearable. It was the cursed sandals that were insufferable. Sandals. In winter. Against all logic, they were in style this season. As a compensation for the freezing weather, the shopkeeper had found her a pair of sandals with fur-lined straps. Amaranthe had a hard time feeling sexy with squirrel tails wrapped around her ankles.
“Tonight, we see if this seduction tactic is feasible,” Amaranthe muttered to herself and reached for the latch.
A distant, chilling screech froze her hand. Gooseflesh rose all over her skin. It had sounded… Amaranthe did not know what it sounded like. Not human.
She cocked her head, listened for it to repeat. It did not.
The door slammed open. Amaranthe jumped out of the way. She landed in a pile of shoveled snow that swallowed her mostly-bare feet.
A man and woman staggered out, both too drunk and too involved with each other to notice Amaranthe. Drumbeats escaped through the door as well, pulsing into the street. She pushed the eerie scream from her mind and hustled inside to find a warm place for her feet.
Fortunately, stoves burned in every corner of the long, low-ceilinged room. Gas jets lined the walls and illuminated two circular stages, one with nearly nude female dancers, one with nearly nude male dancers. They writhed around networks of vertical, horizontal, and diagonal bars with sinuous moves that gave slinks their name. Unmarried men and women, or those pretending to be so, met and mingled in the open area between the stages, often shortened to the ‘Between.’
Amaranthe removed her hat, gloves, and parka and hung them on a peg next to the entrance. She wandered around the men’s half of the slink. The drooling masses in front of the stage, she avoided. Instead she eyeballed groups at side tables more removed from the action. A pack of young soldiers, identifiable by their short-cropped hair, did not pass inspection. Too easy to seduce. A table of university students received the same verdict. If Sicarius was in his thirties, he was probably old enough to be ruled by something more than his penis. He had to have a modicum of intelligence as well, to so efficiently evade Hollowcrest’s forces.
Near a middle-aged group of men, Amaranthe paused. A fat tome on the table labeled Hypocaust Failings and Heating Alternatives promised brighter-than-average slink patrons.
“I admit some of your technology is impressive,” a blond man at the table said, “but you can’t deny the benefits of magic.” His beaded buckskin clothes and long braided hair would have marked him as a foreigner even if his choice of conversation topic did not.
“I’m sure the benefits would be superb,” someone else at the table responded, “if magic existed.”
The empire denied the existence of magic and simultaneously declared its use a crime. Though Amaranthe had noted the incongruity, she had never worried about it, nor had she arrested anyone for claiming special powers. Like the second speaker, she had never seen proof that magic existed. Apparently, the others at the table agreed. They chuckled and raised mugs full of beer or hard cider to salute their comrade.
“You Turgonians.” The foreigner shook his head. “For a supposedly advanced people, you can be glaringly ignorant.”
“Why? Because we don’t believe in gods or mind-numbing superstitions? Like that helpful spirit Kendorians think will come during the night and bless their homes, provided they sacrifice chickens on the doorstep? What’s the name?”
“Yugima,” the foreigner admitted, cheeks reddening. “Not everyone does that.”
“I should hope not. There are some smells you just don’t want to wake up to in the morning.”
Amaranthe felt conspicuous hovering, so she eased closer. “Pardon me for interrupting, but this sounds like a more interesting conversation than any of the others in here. Would you mind if I joined you?”
“Please do,” a graying man said.
The nearest fellow acquired a chair from another table while others made room. Another plucked a mug of cider from a passing waitress and positioned it front of her.
This might be easier than I thought. Amaranthe rarely received such consideration when she dressed as an enforcer. She supposed people saw the uniform and not the person. Or maybe her squirrel-strap sandals were performing as promised.
The foreigner promptly included Amaranthe in the conversation. “I’ve always thought Turgonian women brighter than their male counterparts…” The other men booed, though it was with amiable cheer. “Tell me, would you discount the possibility of something just because your government denied its existence?”
Amaranthe scraped away a suspicious stain on the table’s surface. “I suppose not, if I personally saw proof. Can you, by chance, do a magic trick?”
The others leaned forward, grinning. “Yes,” they enthused. “Let’s see a magic trick.” This quickly grew into a chanting of “Magic trick, magic trick.”
Amaranthe wondered if the book she had judged the groupâs intelligence by had been left by previous patrons. Or perhaps it was the number of empty glasses stacked on top of it that accounted for the men’s boisterousness.
“I’m a diplomat, not a shaman,” the foreigner said. “Note the lack of tattoos on my face.”
“A convenient excuse,” someone said.
“If you uncouth oafs ever run into a shaman from my country, you’ll learn the truth and it could be…unpleasant. Better yet, I hope you stumble across a Nurian wizard’s path. Those people are incredibly powerful.”
“So…” A man belched. “Does that mean no magic trick?”
The foreigner sneered, paid for his drinks, and left.
“Finally,” the graying man in front of the book said. “Now we can talk about something worthwhile.”
“He’s not a bad fellow,” another said, jerking a thumb toward the departing man.
“No, but you know the law. We can’t discuss technology with foreigners. Diplomat is code for spy.” He cleared the glasses off the book and fished out notes and sketches.
“What are you working on?” Amaranthe asked.
The graying man leaned forward. “My team–” he nodded to include his comrades “–has won a contract from an industrious businesswoman who’s refurbishing the city’s old buildings with modern heating systems.”
“Interesting,” Amaranthe said. “Are you replacing fireplaces with stoves or is it more complex than that?”
“Far beyond that. Most of the older buildings have basement or ground-level exterior furnaces where the hot air is directed under the floors and up through clay flues in the walls. It’s ancient technology that came with our ancestors from Nuria, along with bronze swords, wooden sailing ships, and other archaic things. Fireplaces were actually a step back.”
Another man nodded. “The empire’s always been so concerned with war and making us all into stoic soldiers who are too good for comforts–” he rolled his eyes and tilted his head back so dramatically he almost fell out of his chair, “–that the only advances we were making for a long time were related to food production, troop transportation, and weapons smithing.”
“I wasn’t aware that mentality had changed,” Amaranthe said dryly. “If I remember my history correctly, a lot of our more ubiquitous inventions like eyeglass and wood-pulp paper were, ahem, acquired from supposedly less advanced cultures.”
“Yes,” another man at the table said, “but now that we have these women starting businesses, there’s suddenly a market for non-military inventions.”
Their enthusiasm for their work appealed to Amaranthe, and she found herself asking more questions.
You’re supposed to be seducing them, came a niggling thought from the back of her mind. Right. She took a deep breath, steeling herself. Thwarting armed bandits she could handle. This was a challenge.
When no one was watching, Amaranthe slid her chair closer to the fellow next to her. She unfastened the top two buttons on her blouse and tried not to feel like a floozy. This is for the empire, she reminded herself.
“Are you hot?” her intended target asked. “It is warm in here.” He waved a hand. “Waitress, bring us some ice.”
Amaranthe forced a smile. That was not the reaction she had expected. She caught the man’s gaze and winked. He did not seem to notice so she did it a few more times.
“Do you have something in your eye?” he asked solicitously.
“I… no. I mean yes, but it’s gone now.”
“Good.” He smiled and returned to the group conversation.
Hm. Maybe he preferred men. Amaranthe adjusted her chair again, this time closer to the fellow on her other side.
The waitress returned and plopped a bowl of ice in the center of the table. Flecks of sawdust, the stuff used to pack and preserve ice through the warm seasons, stuck to the jagged shards.
One of the men across the table whistled as the waitress departed. She waved back at him and twitched her rump. An interested smile launched across the man’s face.
There, what is she doing that I’m not?
Amaranthe turned to her new target. His arm rested on the table. She casually lifted her hand, intending to rest it on his. He reached for the ice at the same time, and their arms collided.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to bump you.”
Amaranthe tried her wink again. “I don’t mind.”
“You’re very kind.” He turned back to the conversation.
Someone asked her a question, and Amaranthe found herself drawn in again.
What in the name of the emperor am I doing wrong?
 You’re being too subtle. Just press your breasts against one and say let’s go somewhere alone.Â
I can’t do that.Â
You’ve seen women do it a hundred times.Â
Amaranthe shook her head, annoyed at the arguing voices, afraid they might be some indicator of impending insanity.
At the next lull, she turned again to the man whose arm she had bumped. She leaned close.
“Do you…” she started.
He cocked his head with interest. Friendly interest, not lascivious interest.
“…know I have to use the water closet?” she blurted.
Amaranthe rose and strode toward the Between.
“What’s wrong with me?” she muttered. “When did men become more interested in chatting than sex?”
“You offering?”
Amaranthe was almost relieved when the broad man swathed in alcohol vapors planted himself in her path and leered at her chest. There was little point in practicing seduction on someone who was trying to do the same thing though–if one could call his approach seductive.
“Not at the moment, thank you,” Amaranthe said.
He grabbed her wrist. “Why don’t you come outside with me? I’ve got something I want to show you.”
“If I wanted to see that, I’d ask one of those pretty male dancers up there.”
He tried to tug her toward the door. Amaranthe twisted her wrist so the edge rested against the weak spot in his grip, where the thumb and fingers met. With an efficient yank, she pulled her arm free. She was debating on the amount of force required to convince him to forgo further advances when a voice came from behind her.
“Leave her be, you odious thug.”
“Beat it,â the drunk said, âthis one’s mine.”
Amaranthe turned part way to find the entire group from the table lined up behind her.
“She doesn’t want to go with you.”
“Gentlemen,” Amaranthe said, “I appreciate your help, but this isn’t–”
The drunk swung his fist. Amaranthe’s earnest allies swarmed over him like ants on a dropped scrap from Curi’s Bakery.
Amaranthe jumped back to avoid being knocked from her feet. She dodged two tottering fellows who looked like they might be allies of the man who had accosted her. They piled onto the writhing heap. Someone’s chair was kicked out from under him, and another table of men joined the fray.
“Gentlemen,” Amaranthe shouted this time. “Stop this, it isn’t–”
A flying mug whizzed at her. She ducked out of its path. It crashed into the temple of a male dancer on the women’s side of the room. He bellowed in anger, then launched off the stage onto the pile of brawlers. Other dancers streamed after him.
Chaos. Amaranthe could not stop it. She backed toward the door. Hollowcrest had forbidden her from speaking to her colleagues, so she dared not wait around for the enforcers to show up. After grabbing her parka, she hustled outside, barely noticing the cold.
She strode away, trying not to feel like a suspect fleeing a crime scene–or a soldier abandoning comrades to the enemy. Those men had engaged in a brawl on her behalf. How did she let that happen? Here I was condemning the kind of people who started fights in slinks…
When Amaranthe found a sign for a trolley stop, she slowed. She leaned against its steel support pole and shook her head. Maybe she should not have talked to them first. Maybe she should have worn more revealing clothes. She grimaced at the thought. The cold from the pole seeped through her parka. Maybe the seduction scenario was simply too far outside her range of skills.
The grind of wheels on rail announced the trolley’s approach. Amaranthe straightened. She was not ready to give up.
“I’ll get your assassin for you, Hollowcrest, but I’m going to do it my way.”
* * *
For anyone who might have stumbled across this without having read the novel first, The Emperor’s Edge is currently free at Smashwords and Amazon. Give it a try!
A few years ago, I watched a YouTube video from an internet marketing guru (yes, he did try to sell me something at the end) that talked about why Coca-Cola was such a good brand name. Among other things, it had alliteration and rhyme, two elements that help people remember things.
Hi, everyone (and Happy Thanksgiving to those in the U.S.).
