Q is for Quartz

Quartz here. Yes, I’m back for all of my author’s attempts to lock me up in a crystal coffin and forget me. Let’s this be a lesson to all you characters. If your author ignores you, if she pushes you aside for other projects, deadlines, blah, blah, don’t stop pounding on her imagination! Keep at her, until she spends time with you! I never let up on my fool of a writer and look here! She gave in, for all that she was ‘busy’! She started writing me a story!

Here’s a little teaser from my triumph, my personal WIP, ‘The Cottage and the Cuckoo’. Eh? What kind of a fool title is that?!

“Now!” I snapped. “Tell me what you want, plain and simple! I’ve already guessed what you are, a singing sprite, some sort of kin to the gremlins!”

“Oh, very clever dwarf!” The little man cackled, but his beady eyes narrowed with anger. “Here I was, willing to offer you a home, but you’ve taken my book!”

“You took my brothers’ will!” I growled. “You were forcing them to march and sing!”

“A little song does all living creatures good.” He stared at the book in my hands. “Return my People of Interest to me at once, if you know what’s good for you.”

“Oh, no,” I said. I held the book tight against your chest. “You see, I know how it works with your kind. The only way to make a bargain with you is to have something you want.”

“You know nothing of what I want!” the creature hissed. “However, yes, I will be willing to bargain with you.” He tapped a finger against his lips. “What do you want, dwarf?”