Mind Muser - Novel Activity

Mind Muser – Your task is to imagine you have the ability to appear as a character in your book. For example, you might be Kino’s brother from The Pearl, charged with helping Kino make it to the city to sell his treasure. Or maybe you’re Juliet’s sister from Romeo & Juliet, providing her with advice and solace. The idea for this activity is to allow yourself to get lost and absorbed in the world of your story and interact with its characters. You will appear as yourself, yet will be linked to a character(s) in a manner in which you see fit. You may also acquire skills or abilities based on the events in the text.

Task: Write a creative vignette (a short, descriptive literary text) using present-action language, engaging description, and lively dialogue where you’re experiencing the events of the reading alongside a character or characters. Flex your creative muscle and have fun. Your literary sketch should be at least 150 words.

(Post your response on Writer's Forum and add a graphic.)

Noah Hess/ Hori Ahmes
Mind Muser - Physik
Underlined = added
CAUTION - SPOILERS

    The third section of the I, Marcellus was the Almanac, a day-to-day guide for the next thousand and one years. This was where he planned to hide his note - in the entry for the day that he had disappeared.

    Hori Ahmes, one of the seven scribes, walked into the room, “We art ready with the booketh, sire.”

    “Thanketh thou, Hori. Thou may returneth to thy dorm,” Marcellus replied.

    Septimus was dressed in his black and red Alchemie Apprentice robes, which were edged with gold and had gold Alchemical symbols embroidered down the sleeves. Around his waist he wore a thick leather belt, fastened with a heavy gold buckle, and on his feet, instead of his lost - and much-loved - brown boots, he wore the strange pointy-toed shoes that were fashionable and made him feel very foolish. Septimus had actually cut the ends off each point because he had kept tripping over them, but it did not exactly improve the shoes’ appearance and made his toes cold. He sat huddled in his winter woolen cloak. The Great Chamber and Physik felt cold that morning, as the furnace was cooling after many days of use.

    Hori walked into the room with the other six scribes, ready to bind the I, Marcellus book.

    Septimus was seated at his usual place, the Siege of the Rose, next to the head of a long table in the middle of the Chamber, with his back to the hated Doors of Time. The table was lit with a line of brightly burning candles placed down the center. In front of him was a pile of neatly stacked paper, the results of his early morning’s work that had involved the last, laborious checking of Marcellus’s astrological calculations, which were the final touches on what he called his Great Work.

    “Bookbinder!” Marcellus snapped his fingers impatiently as he surveyed the Chamber in search of the missing craftsman. “Pray, you dullards and dolts, where hideth you the Bookbinder?”

    “I hideth not, Your Excellency,” a voice quavered from behind Marcellus. “For surely, I be here. Even as I have so stood upon these cold stones these last four hours or more. Indeed, I was here then and still I be here now.”

    Several of the scribes stifled giggles, and Marcellus spun around and glared at the hunchbacked elderly man who was standing next to a small bookbinding press. “Spare me thy twitterings,” said Marcellus, “and bring the press to the table.”

    Seeing the man struggling to lift the press, Septimus slipped down from his place and went to help him. Together they heaved the press onto the onto the table with a thud, sending ink flying from the inkwells and pens leaping to the floor.

    “Take care!” shouted Marcellus as spots of deep blue ink landed on the last pages of his Work. Marcellus picked up the page, which the scribe had just finished. “Now ‘tis Despoiled,” Marcellus sighed. “But the Hour is against us. It must be bound as it stands. ‘Twill show that, tho’ Man may strive for Perfection, he will Ever fall short. ‘Tis the Way of the Worlde. But a few spottes of Ink will not divert my Purpose. Septimus, now is the time for your Task.”

    Septimus did as he was taught. He repeated the same steps, take the first eight sheets, fold them, and pass them to the nearest scribe.

    Suddenly Septimus realized that the next sheet of paper was the day. With shaking hands, he pushed his note to Marcia into the middle of a group of eight other sheets - slightly out of sequence, but that could not be helped - and then he passed it to the nearest free scrive for sewing. As soon as the scribe had finished sewing, Septimus took the folded sheets and slipped his note inside. Guiltily, he glanced around him, afraid that all eyes would be upon him, but the steady work of putting the book together continued. The Bookbinder took the sheets from him with a bored expression and added them to his stack of parchment. No one had noticed.

    Since they had now finished the book, together, both Septimus and Marcellus walked in unison, as if it was practised, towards the center of the Great Chamber. There lay a glass tube, and in it was the ‘Tincture of Eternity’, as Marcellus liked to call it. Septimus opened the flask, eyes wide with focus, trying not to spill any of the tincture. He pushed it under one of his arms, and with the other he grabbed his small glass cylinder, and with it he began to stir.

    Without them noticing, while Septimus was stirring the tincture, Hori snuck into the room quietly.

    “A moment of thy time, Apprentice,” said Marcellus. “For surely the Tincture neareth completion and doth require thy attention.”

    Septimus turned the Tincture seven times and then held it up to a nearby candle flame.

    “What thinkest thou, Apprentice?” Marcellus asked Septimus anxiously. Are we yet ready for the venom?”

    Septimus shook his head.

    “When thinkest thou it may be so?” Marcellus asked anxiously.

    Septimus said nothing. Although he had become used to the oddly circuitous way of speaking that Marcells and indeed everyone in the Time used, he found it hard to speak like that himself. If he did say anything, people would look puzzled; if they thought about it for a few moments, they understood what he had said, but they knew there was something very odd in the way he had said it. Septimus had lost count of the number of times people had asked where he had came from. It was a question he did not know how to answer and one that he did not wish to think about. The worst thing was that now, at the rare times he spoke, his accent and intonation sounded odd even to him, as if he no longer knew who he was anymore.

    As soon as Marcellus had left the room and was finished with Septimus, Hori ushered him over.

    “Yeah?” said Septimus, hoping Hori had good news for him. In the time Septimus was in Hori’s time, he had only gotten used to talking to Hori. There was something about him that reminded Septimus somewhat of himself.

    Hori smiled, “I hast good news for thou. Marcellus is taking his afternoon nap. He will be asleep for the next 8 hours.”

    “Thanks, Hori,” Septimus smiled.

    Hori bowed his head, as if Septimus was his master, “Shouldst I anon geteth the Keye?”

    “Yeah, let’s get out’a here!”

    Together they snuck through the Chamber doors and walked towards Marcellus’s dorm. Soon, they would be free!

    “Your name isn’t ‘Hori’, is it?” asked Septimus.

    “No, it’s Noah.”