thou art my dreaded druid princess...

I slept till 1:00 this afternoon, savoring every moment of it. My insomnia hasn't been striking me much this week, and for that I am grateful. I watched an Eddie Murphy movie, showered and shaved, then greeted Amanda as she returned home from school. My mom's Great Aunt passed away this week, and she left this morning for the funeral which is tomorrow. I have been craving an iced caramel macchiato from Starbucks for the past few days, and I am considering heading that direction sometime this afternoon. I called Courtney around 6:00, and I began telling her about an ancient school of philosophy that I was considering implementing in my own life (Epicureanism), but she fell asleep while I was talking! I hit a few buttons and woke her up. She apologized, I said it was okay, and then I left her to sleep. Bored, I photo-shopped a picture and posted it on Courtney's Myspace with the caption: "Thou art my dreaded druid princess!" I'm not great at photo-shop, but I still think it's funny:

I've been working on my fantasy story and have about sixty pages written so far. I have so many ideas, and I'm fearful of drawing the story out in points. However, I am reminded of Tolkien's one regret in his final product of "The Lord of the Rings": "It's too short." There is one section where I am skeptical of the "goodness" of my writing, so I am going to add a scene or two to make it more interesting. I have a post on difficulties in interpreting the letters of the New Testament (in particular, the Pauline Epistles) that I hope to throw up tomorrow. I have two more sections on my survey of salvation to put up (the first sections ["What is Salvation?", "Why is Salvation Conditional?", "Faith", "Repentance", "Confession", and "Baptism"] are scattered throughout the posts over the past few months). I have written a "Survey on Sin" that I might throw up as well.

I received a letter from J.B.M. (the camp where I'm working this summer); they sent me the curriculum and are asking me to explore it and recommend revisions. How privileged :).

Here is the prologue to the story I am writing:

He stood poised above the bed, the figures sleeping soundly, the awful blade held taught in his fingers. Sweat dripped down his brow, stinging his eyes; veins bulged from his neck, and bloodshot eyes stained with the last trickles of desperate tears hung deep in the hollows of his skull. Every breath shook his frail, battered form, his soul broken and bloodied by a million voices screaming murder, murder, murder, MURDER. His own hands quivered with each beat of his poisoned heart, and venom of the darkest ages seeped like foam from his gaping mouth. He panted despite the cool breeze coming in from the open window, a breeze beckoning a coming storm. Lightning danced through the window, sparkling fields ripe with harvest opposite the sleeping city walls. Murder, murder, murder… The voices refused to leave him, forming a prison in his own mind. His head pulsated with their tantalizing yet ferocious whispers. Kill them. Kill them. You must KILL THEM!

He moaned, fighting off their demands: “No… Please, no…”

Kill them.

“I can’t…” His voice barely rose against the sighs of the midnight breeze. He saw them sleeping, lost in their dreams: a man of great caliber, a warrior whose reputation reached to the heavens, and his beautiful mistress, a woman whose beauty made young woman cringe at their own forms in the mirror. These were the icons of a great civilization, the patrons of a kingdom… and he loved them dearly.

Kill them.

He could hear his gentle laughter, his caring touch… And he could remember standing beside him in the most grueling hours, as they fought alongside one another, stinking of warm blood and arms tired from swinging their massive swords. He saw her tender eyes, heard the way her voice sang with each word. He could feel their young sons tugging at his tunic, begging for him to play with them in the courtyard. He remembered standing beside the sleeping man on the day of his wedding, tears in his eyes from the overwhelming joy. He loved them dearly.

Kill them.

Tears crawled down his face. Lightning flashed, the white-hot light dancing over the steel hilt of the dagger.

Kill them.

“I can’t…” he muttered, sobs forming in the back of his throat.

You belong to Me. Kill them. Kill them both.

“No… No, I can’t…”

Do it. Now!

A scream riddled with sobs broke forth: “NO!”

The shout awakened the man, who broke forth from his slumber. He leaned forward in the bed, saw the figure with the knife looming over him. His eyes bulged in shock. “Brother?!”

The figure wrenched the blade down, driving it through his brother’s throat. Blood sprayed upwards, splashing over his countenance, tickling warm as it slid down the crevices of his face. His brother fell back on the bed, the knife being drawn from his throat: blood gurgled forth, staining the pillow. He groped at the wound. The assailant wept horrendous tears, his entire body convulsing in despair and grief.

The woman had awakened, and being silent in shock, now she screamed, lunging over her husband’s figure. Tears streamed down her face as she tried to stop the bleeding, the blood covering her hands. She looked up at her brother just as the dagger fell upon her face.

Her screams echoed throughout the dark corridors of the palace.