Notes - The Gray Men

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Great is the battle-god, great, and his kingdom --
A field where a thousand corpses lie.

- Stephen Crane, War Is Kind and Other Lines



This is actually personally my least favorite of the fics that I wrote last year. It's one of the ones I wrote more or less in a single day (though I had parts of it down before hand). One of the problems was that I was experimenting with style again in this fic -- I wanted kind of a pulpy, light feel, touching briefly on dark themes but not actually dwelling on them. "Painting with broad strokes" was the way I put it. Number two, I really didn't want to write the action scenes. (Fail.) Number three, I was juggling three characters, each with more or less equal focus (supposed to, anyway), in less than 5000 words. SO. The pacing got really messed up, especially towards the middle/end.

I know at least one person had a problem with my characterization of Hugh. And I knew where she was coming from and actually agree in that I think I could have handled it better... But mostly, sorry, that's just how I see him. He tries really hard to be cool and smooth and rebellious (hence the cursing), but he's really just a poser and a (grand)momma's boy at heart with a serious soft spot for kids and people in need. Especially at this point in time... He may be twenty, but prior to his current travels, he's been VERY sheltered. Nimue is all he knows. Or knew. And since Nimue is a hermit, his interaction even with nearby Ilian villagers was very limited -- he knows pretty much nothing of the outside world that Nimue hasn't told him, and knowing Nimue, she gave him her own unique spin on everything. XP Besides, Nimue's focus was on trying to beat mastery of "elder magic" into him, so. Between Nimue's imperious, antisocial "tough love" attitude and the kindhearted/slightly naive nature Hugh inherited from Canas (who, recall, also has or had completely ridiculous misconceptions regarding wyverns based on his books XD)... heh. EMBRACE YOUR INNER DORK, HUGH. <3

So writing from Hugh's POV was fun, but challenging in that the poor kid really is a bit dense* in some ways (through no fault of his own), and also because he's more of an observer than an actual participant in the events that follow. And yes, in general I don't think I pulled it off all that well. There are a lot of holes in particular regarding Legault and Mark -- I left their actions and motivations in this story completely ambiguous! (Mostly because there's no way I could have gotten them across with a viewpoint character like Hugh. Even though I myself actually do have it all thought out, for once. XP) I guess it was at least in part an intentional choice on my part though, to have the fic be from Hugh's POV and therefore to leave things really, really open.

* I say he's dense, but he's actually pretty sharp, too, and learns quickly. That's the main part I'm not sure I managed to get across.

Oh yeah, Mark though -- this story really doesn't work on the account that while Mark is a fully realized character in my own head, he's just a blank tactician figure to everyone else, and I really needed to or should have established something more about what kind of a character Mark is in my universe. (My problem was that I didn't WANT to -- didn't want to make it the focus of this fic, because it's not, didn't want to bog down the narrative in backstory or infodumping dialogue...) But frankly, I don't know if I ever WILL explain my Mark; he's essentially an OC and I'm far more interested in the canon cast. Though his backstory really is the key to understanding the fic and 90% of his exchanges with Legault. Oops.

(No, he was not an ex-Black Fang member, though the Black Fang does feature somewhat in his past. No, the Black Fang did not kill a family member or someone he loved. Actually, come to think of it, his story might play a slight factor in Upon the Shoulders of the Dead... but it's not a huge part of the plot.)

As for Legault -- he's kind of an ongoing cameo character through the Gray Men arc (for which this is the only fic I've written so far!) or perhaps not so much a cameo character but really the thread that ties this arc together. He'll make more sense once all the pieces are in place.

Anyway. I considered attempting to edit this one before posting it here, but didn't really care enough to, so in the end decided to just preserve the pulpy feel (it was, after all, sorta kinda what I originally intended) and let it speak for itself.