K.S. Evering

OPENING SCENE - Introduces protagonist and antagonist, tone, and foreshadows the primary conflict.

 

Evie was having nightmares. Nightmares so hellish her body sweat and toes curled. Nightmares so hellish she grew afraid of the dark. Muma took to turning off her light long after she'd fallen asleep, so Evie could slumber in ignorant bliss of the shadow standing in wait to overtake her. 

So why was the light on now? She was sure it was far past the hour when her grandmother usually retired for the night. 

And yet the shock of pearly luminescence gleamed behind her closed lids as she lay still under her blankets. 

Flickering. Pulsing. 

Damn it all to hell. 

The sandbox was set in an open field, and Evie knelt in it, busy building a castle with three little girls dressed far too fancily for such an endeavor. She had built sandcastles many times before, on weekend trips to the rocky shores of Cornwall. But at 16 she thought she left such juvenile activities behind her. Yet her she was, with bucket and shovel, having (she hated to admit) a fairly pleasant time. 

Bleeding monkeys!

With a painful gasp, Evie pulled back her hand as blood pebbled the tip of her finger. She'd spoken too soon. There was something sharp beneath the surface of the sand and it had punished her for her incessant immaturity. 

The three young girls sitting across from Evie were cruel little things. They didn't so much as look up when she gasped; showing no concern whatsoever at the damage done to her hand. In fact, they appeared most adamant about finishing the castle, their concentration unparalleled. And yet...could this sculpture be called a sandcastle? It looked like none that Evie had ever seen, but rather resembled a towering spike. Yes, it was a spike-- massive and endless, with a peak that pierced the ethos. 

Curious. 

Carefully, Evie rummaged through the sand, one-handed, until she found the foul object that had caused her harm. It was a broken piece of glass with a crackling fissure down its middle. She had only a moment to wonder why there'd be glass in her sandbox before she caught sight of her reflection in it. The rupture split her face into two perfect pieces. 

Very curious. The fractured reflection did not look altogether connected. Was it just her imagination, or did her left eye blink several seconds after her right? 

"What are you looking at?" 

They'd never spoken before, but that wasn't why Evie jumped at the sound of the young girl's voices. No, what frightened her was their timbre. Their intensity. Their union. Their voice -- for she knew now that they were one -- was rough, broad, and entirely unlike those of little girls. 

"Oh my God!" 

Their faces were not that of little girls either. Now looking up at Evie, she took in their wrinkled bulbous skin, their endless eyes. They were demons. Demons sats before her. And the demons began to chant...

But what they were saying she couldn't hear. Evie heard nothing over the sound of her own screams. Her legs, in their betrayal, ceased function almost instantly, and so Evie instead dragged herself from the sandbox, from the chanting demon girls, from the ever rising spike, and her inexplicable torn reflection. 

A piercing streak of radiance blazed through the heavens above them, blinding all in sight. 

It’s a dream. 

She woke with a start, and seconds later Evie's anxiety kicked in as it'd been wont to do for the last several weeks. With the mannerisms of a bear arising from hibernation, she stretched, recoiled, and let out a slew of groggy curses. The pile of books previously at the end of her bed were now scattered on the floor, disturbed by her movements. 

Naturally, Muma was already awake; undoubtedly popping garlic pills while screeching through her morning hymns. Evie paused to take it in-- the high pitched, off kilter shrill of praise and jubilee. 

My God. She hated early mornings more than almost anything else in the world. While Muma would insist that she was just being dramatic, Evie was fairly certain she was correct in her assessment that she suffered from hypersomnia. How else could she explain waking up dead tired after a near ten hour rest?

The floor was cool to the touch as Evie wobbled unsteadily from the bedroom to the bathroom, stopping just once to wince as her grandmother (Queen of the Morning People) attempted a most ambitious key. 

The sun embraced every corner of the bathroom, bouncing off the old white tiles that covered the flooring and walls. Pushing aside the Swedish ivy spilling out of the basket above her cabinet, Evie (as was her custom) scrutinized her reflection in the mirror. 

"Bleeding monkeys." She whispered, taking in her matted mane. The bulk of kinky curls that spilled over her shoulders were in daily combat amongst themselves. Today, no one had won. And there dozens of casualties that took the form of gnarled knots. 

The damage was beyond salvaging through the fine art of finger combing, so Evie instead jumped into the bath for a tepid shower. Ten minutes later, naked and unencumbered, she wiped down her mirror to take in her now fully saturated curls. Then she went to work for the second time at detangling them. 

However, in the midst of her arduous effort, Evie's bathroom door swung open, hitting against the wall, and Muma -- squat and squinty-eyed -- stood forbiddingly at the entrance. 

"Dear Lord in heaven!" Evie jumped back and crouched into herself in a failed attempt at maintaining propriety. "Muma, what are you doing?! I'm naked!" She grabbed at the nightgown she'd dropped on the floor, pulling it over her head as her grandmother tutted in annoyance. 

"Well I certainly didn't expect that." She said unapologetically, although she took care to avert her eyes. 

"You didn't expect me to be naked in my bathroom?"

Muma kissed her teeth. "Stop asking silly questions and put on some decent clothing. We have much to do today." 

Much to do-- of course. Muma always said they had much to do when what she really meant was that she'd pile Evie with busy work throughout the day to keep her occupied. And the chores, if anything, were becoming steeper which Evie was sure was punishment for being disagreeable. She and her grandmother often butted heads (they both had willful personalities) but their rows had recently heightened in their intensity. And when they'd argue over the things that they'd normally argue about -- namely Evie's lack of freedom -- Muma would plow her with chores, and in turn the girl would imagine that she was trapped in a fortress much like Rapunzel. Even more, in this fantasy her grandmother was not her grandmother but a wicked shapeshifting monster. And when they'd argue she'd take her true form of a spindly, albino, black eyed creature near 6ft long. 

This fantasy both frightened and amused her. 

Satisfied that she had adequately disrupted Evie's morning, Muma -- a short plump woman -- her black silk cap placed eschew on her head, left the bathroom as she came-- abruptly. 

Back in her bedroom, Evie absently rubbed her hand against her chest. She'd recently recovered from a massive case of heartburn, which, doubled with her anxiety, was a most unpleasant experience. She then paused to re-stack the books that she'd knocked over earlier that morning. Treasure Island, Frankenstein, The White Witch of Rosehall, her diary (which she never kept up with), and her all time favorite, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. 

Finally, she plopped back down on her bed, her wet curls scattered about her. Why am I so tired all the time? She wondered. It must be the nightmares. 

Her eyes set on the one long crack in her ceiling. If Evie stared at it for too long it'd start to resemble a meteor, boundless and thin as it pierced through the heavens. Her mind drifted back to the demon girls in dresses. It was them that had told her that she was dreaming. 

Curious. Thinking back on their singular voice she found that it was indeed coarse, demonic, and endless. And yet still...most familiar. 

Act of Story Statement: 

Evie must navigate a fantastical new world while battling with her awakening inner demon at every turn. 

 

 

The Antagonist: 

There are three prominent antagonists in my story, but the main antagonistic force would be the Spirit. Evie, my teen-aged protagonist, discovers one day that there is a being living within her, and is fairly certain that this being is a demon. This is unfortunate for many reasons, one of the main being that she’s newly started attending a school where the students are doggedly taught to hunt and kill demons. 

The Spirit is a force that has lived in the ether since the beginning of time. But one fateful day it was forcibly pulled from the heavens and sent crashing down to Earth where it split into two. To stay hidden from those that would use it to do harm, both sides of the broken Spirit entered human vessels, remaining within their souls for as long as the vessels lived. Their possession of the vessels guaranteed that there would now always be a target on the humans' backs as those in pursuit of the Spirit went in search of their human companions.

What’s more, a catastrophic event takes place that causes the Spirit and the vessels they live in to stop hiding, and instead fight on opposite ends of a great battle that involves opening the gates of hell. In this battle both vessels ultimately end up dead. 

Now, hundreds of years later the Spirit has awoken yet again in two new vessels. And the one living within Evie will do anything, at risk to Evie herself, to accomplish the task it started hundreds of years ago.

 

 

Breakout Title:

Volume One

The Other World

 

The Legend of the Scintillant

 

The Vessel and the Spirit

 

 

Genre:

Young Adult Fantasy

 

 

Core Wound and Primary Conflict: 

A teenage girl, imprisoned and betrayed by the woman she thought was her grandmother, takes a Door to a fantastical new world where she finds a new family and friends, only to discover a terrible secret that could ruin the life she’s created forever.

 

 

Other Matters of Conflict:

Evie isn’t a normal girl. Muma (her grandmother) aka Helena Eveningstar (the Fey) made sure of that when she stole her as a baby and made her live as a hermit in a cottage in the woods. Now that she’s free, Evie has a new lease on life. Sure, there are things she has trouble swallowing, like the fact that she’s not of the world she’s lived in for all of her life. But her new world really isn’t that different from her old one (apart from the fact that in the Other the folk once existed, the Fey (part folk/part human) being their progeny.

And, also, demons roam the Earth.

But Evie is determined to create her own identity and finally live the life she wants to live. She is making friends in a school of demon hunters (Mab and George) and she’s kindly been adopted by Senior Harinder Ranaday, a demon hunter himself, and member of a secret society. 

But, of course, Evie has issues. Her inner turmoil stems from several different factors. For one, there’s a part of her that misses Muma, even though she knows that she’s a deceitful creature that kept her as a prisoner and constantly glamored her with Fey dust. 

Her second inner conflict is a very relatable one. She’s a teenage girl going to a new school and she’s desperate to fit in. Most teenagers are conflicted when it comes to finding out who they really are, but with most of her memories being falsehoods, and her one friend before she landed in the Other, a middle aged housewife she was glamored into believing was a teenaged girl, Evie has double the amount of insecurities. She knows nothing of her new world. She doesn’t know what shows everyone is watching. What books are they reading? What’s hot? What’s not? Will every word out of her mouth sound stupid? Will she ever make up for what her faux grandmother did to her? 

Evie greatest inner turmoil happens to be the voice in her head. When she’s first aware of its existence she’s reasonably alarmed. Nothing good could come from one who hears voices. However, Evie soon learns that the voice not only speaks to her, but can control her actions too. Her lessons at the infamous Mab and George taught her most plainly what that means. Evie is possessed! And a soul that’s been taken by a demon cannot be salvaged. What will happen to her once her new family and friends learn what lurks within her? What will she do to make sure they don't?

In the background, there is both a political and demonic issue brewing. Let’s start with the political. No one knows for sure where the now gone continent/country of Elphind was located, but commoners (humans) lives were thrown upside down once the folk survivors made an "exodus" from their battered country, and lived amongst commoners in the outside world. Most especially when they made it known that they both existed and that a lot of the elves amongst them were secretly in rule. A power struggle has brewed ever since, and when the Industrial Revolution took place, and commoners officially got the upper hand, they decided that they would never again lose it. (Fe)y Air was created to keep the descendants of the folk – the Fey – dormant (meaning that their folk side wasn’t active).

Now, hundreds of years later, there has been an uptick of Fey showing signs of activity, and the Home Secretary of Englande thinks the only way to prevent a surge is to spread more (Fe)y Air throughout Englande and crack down on Fey showing signs of activity. The WIS (government controlled wise people, or witches) are visiting homes, and workplaces, at the behest of “concerned neighbors”, to take Fey who have been accused of activity and imprison them at Wexley Royal– a hospital that specializes in patients that were either attacked with conjury, or show signs of conjury themselves. 

Now onto the demonic issue. Dust was something organically created by elves and faeries in centuries past. And while the folk are now extinct there are still some Fey that have the ability to create dust. Those that do are usually outed for being active, and sent to Wexley Royal, where they are then cleansed, and their dust sold to the Dark Market in Sub City. But a "dusthead" by the name of Thom Jones came to learn about the the Old One (demon)– Bacchus; the god that comes. He then went on a soul searching journey where he found a rare thyrsus plant and mixed it with animal blood and dust. This laced concoction came to be known as Bacchic dust and when Thom used it he went into a state of manic ecstasy. It was in this state that he heard the voice of the god that comes who implored him to build a cult of followers to follow his will. 

Evie arrives at Norminster, New London the same day that a terrorist attacked. The government believes this group is a fanatic Fey religious order. But the secret society that created the school that Evie attends believes it is the demonic cult of Bacchic dustheads that are currently terrorizing Englande. Evie isn’t aware of any of this, but from the outside looking in she is starting to notice that New London, which is known for its lack of demonic activity, is slowly yet surely becoming more and more dangerous to live. The students of Mab and George are noticing the changes in their city too, and while they are excited, Evie is terrified. The students think this is an opportunity for them to take their studies into action, but Evie can’t help but wonder why an originally quiet city is now teeming with demons not long after she arrives? And furthermore, how did she wind up being possessed herself?  Once her friends and society learn who she is will she be hunted down like the members of the demonic cult?

 

Setting: 

The story takes place primarily in New London, Englande. Evie goes through a Door that she later finds is the entrance to another world– Other. In Other, the faerie folk are not just characters in bedtime stories, but magical beings that once existed, but have since gone extinct. Now all that remains of the folk are their predecessors, the Fey (part human/part folk). 

Norminster, New London is where Tanner House is located. Tanner House is the headquarters for the New London chapter of the Scintillant Society, a secret community of demon hunters. And the head of Tanner House takes on Evie as his new ward when she accidentally Travels to the Other one fateful night. 

Amongst the four chapters in the UK, New London is deemed quite boring due to their lack of demonic activity. Not as boring as the Trau-Wicklow chapter (set on a sheep farm in the middle of nowhere) but boring all the same. 

Norminster is a beautiful borough in the city of New London, known for its quaint cafes, historical buildings, gleaming statues, and housing the Parliamentary. But across the river is Stepney Tower, which has a neighborhood called “Sub City”. Stepney Tower is the night to Norminster’s day. It’s a congested borough, polluted with (Fe)y Air (synthesized gaseous iron meant to keep the Fey’s folk side dormant) and terrorized by cycops (cyclopean Fey police officers). And the city block of Sub City is somehow even worse. Evie has a particularly life changing moment that takes place at a rave over there. 

The idea of Norminster, Stepney Tower, New London, and Other itself is that at first sight these are places that one recognizes. The fashion may not be exactly the same, but not so outlandish that you couldn’t see it coming into trend on this side of the Door. The entertainment runs in more or less the same vein, with tweaks made to represent how the folk culture influences their society. Most Fey look like commoners (100% human), the only thing making them stand out being the black code tattooed on their left wrist for identification purposes. The Other is recognizable, which very often poses a problem for Evie. For in the off chance that she forgets that she is no longer in the world she’s grown up in she’s reminded of this by happening upon a terrifying cycop, wearing a full face gas mask to protect himself from (Fe)y Air (aka the cure) as he hauls a Fey (showing signs of activity) into his massive police van. 

So, to paraphrase what the High Elder Hildimar Travers tells Evie after she steps through the Door, “It’s a world like your own, but…Other”

 

 

Story Statement:

Navigating through a fantastical new world while battling her inner demon at every turn. 

 

 

The Antagonist:

 

There are three prominent antagonists in my story, but the main antagonistic force would be the Spirit. Evren, my teen-aged protagonist, discovers one day that there is a being living within her, and is fairly certain that this being is a demon. This is unfortunate for many reasons, one of the main being that she’s newly started attending a school where the students are doggedly taught to hunt and kill demons. 

The Spirit is a force that has lived in the heavens since the beginning of time. But one fateful day it was forcibly pulled from it and sent crashing down to Earth where it split into two. To stay hidden from those that would use it to do harm, both sides of the broken Spirit entered human vessels, remaining within their souls for as long as the vessels lived. Their possession of the vessels guaranteed that there would now always be a target on the humans' backs as those in pursuit of the Spirit went in search of their human companions.

What’s more, a catastrophic event takes place that causes the Spirit and the vessels they live in to stop hiding, and instead fight on opposite ends of a great battle that involves opening the gates of hell. In this battle both vessels ultimately end up dead. 

Now, hundreds of years later, the Spirit has awoken yet again in two new vessels. And the one living within Evren will do anything, at risk to Evren herself, to accomplish the task it started eons ago.

 

Breakout Title:

 

The Other World

Vol 1: The Legend of the Scintillant

 

The Legend of the Scintillant

 

The Vessel and the Spirit

Book One of the Other World

 

Genre: 

Young Adult Fantasy

 

Comps:

 

Akata Witch by Nnedi Okorafor

Legendborn by Tracy Deonn

A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab

 

Core Wound and Primary Conflict:

A teenage girl, imprisoned and betrayed by the person she thought was family, takes a Door to a fantastical new world where she finds a surrogate family and fast friends, only to discover a terrible secret that could ruin the life she’s created forever.

 

Other Matters of Conflict:

Evren isn’t a normal girl. Muma (her grandmother) aka Helena Eveningstar (the Fey) made sure of that when she stole her as a baby and made her live as a hermit in a cottage in the woods. Now that she’s free, Evren has a new lease on life. Sure, there are things she has trouble swallowing, like the fact that she’s not of the world she’s lived in for all of her life. But her new world really isn’t that different from her old one (apart from the fact that in the Other, faerie folk once existed). Evren is determined to create her own identity and live the life she wants to live. She is making friends in a school of demon hunters (Mab and George) and she’s kindly been adopted by Senior Harinder Ranaday, a demon hunter himself, and member of a secret society. 

But, of course, Evren has issues. Evren’s inner turmoil stems from several different factors. For one, there’s a part of her that misses Muma, even though she knows that she’s a deceitful creature that kept her as a prisoner and constantly glamoured her with Fey dust. 

Her second inner conflict is a very relatable one. She’s a teenage girl going to a new school and she’s desperate to fit in. All teenagers are conflicted when it comes to finding out who they are, but with most of her memories being falsehoods, and her one friend before she landed in the Other a middle aged housewife she was glamoured into believing was a teenaged girl, Evren has double the amount of insecurities. She knows nothing of her new world. She doesn’t know what shows everyone is watching. What books are they reading? What’s hot? What’s not? Will every word out of her mouth sound stupid? Will she ever make up for what her faux grandmother did? 

Evren’s greatest inner turmoil happens to be the voice in her head. When she’s first aware of its existence she’s reasonably alarmed. Nothing good could come from one who hears voices. However, Evren soon learns that the voice not only speaks to her, but can control her actions too. Her lessons at the infamous Mab and George taught her most plainly what that means. Evren is possessed. A soul that’s been taken by a demon cannot be salvaged. What will happen to Evren once her new family and friends learn what lurks within her? 

When Evren arrives at Norminster, New London she soon learns that there is unrest between the government and the people. A terrorist group is at large that the government believes is a fanatic religious organization. Members of the secret society that created the school that Evren attends believes it is a demonic cult that is terrorizing Englande. Evren isn’t aware of any of this, but from the outside looking in she is starting to notice that New London, which is known for lacking in demonic activity, is slowly yet surely becoming more and more dangerous. The students of Mab and George are also noticing the changes in their city, and while they are excited Evren is terrified. The students think this is an opportunity for them to take their studies into action, but Evren can’t help but wonder why an originally quiet city is now teeming with demons? And furthermore, how did she wind up being possessed herself?  Will she eventually find herself hunted like the members of the demonic cult?

 

Setting:

 

The story takes place primarily in New London, Englande. Evren goes through a Door that she later finds is the entrance to another world– Other. In Other the faerie folk are not just characters in bedtime stories, but magickal beings that once existed, but have since gone extinct. Now all that remains of the folk are their predecessors, the Fey (part human/part folk). 

Norminster, New London is where Tanner House is located. Tanner House is the headquarters for the New London chapter of the Scintillant Society, a secret community of demon hunters. And the head of Tanner House takes on Evren as his new ward when she accidentally Travels to the Other one fateful night. 

Amongst the four chapters in the UK, New London is deemed quite boring due to their lack of demonic activity. Not as boring as the Trau-Wicklow chapter (set on a sheep farm in the middle of nowhere) but boring all the same. 

Norminster is a beautiful borough in the city of New London, known for its quaint cafes, historical buildings, gleaming statues, and housing the Parliamentary. But across the river is Stepney Tower, otherwise known as “Sub City”. Stepney Tower is the night to Norminster’s day. It’s a congested borough that is polluted with (Fe)y Air (synthesized gaseous iron meant to keep the Fey’s folk side dormant) and terrorized by cycops (cyclopean Fey police officers). Evren has a particularly life changing moment that takes place at a rave in “Sub City”. 

The idea of Norminster, Stepney Tower, New London, and Other itself is that at first sight these are places that one recognizes. The fashion may not be the same, but not so outlandish that you couldn’t see it coming into trend on this side of the Door. The entertainment runs in more or less the same vein, with tweaks made to represent how the folk culture influences their society. Most Fey look like commoners (100% human), the only thing making them stand out being the black code tattooed on their left wrist for identification purposes. The Other is recognizable, which very often poses a problem for Evren. For in the off chance that she forgets that she is no longer in the world she’s grown up in, she’s reminded of this by happening upon a terrifying cycop, wearing a full face gas mask to protect himself from (Fe)y Air (aka the cure) as he hauls a Fey (showing signs of being non-dormant) into his massive police van. 
So, to paraphrase what the High Elder Hildimar Travers tells Evren after she steps through the Door, “It’s a world like your own, but…Other”