#WritingtheSensesChallenge & #FantasyWIPJanuary Day 18

This one was probably the hardest challenge this week. I thought it was going to be Day 17 but I think I was wrong. It certainly wouldn't be the first time. I'm into music and art so sound and sights are things I gravitate to. But scents can be nostalgic for me and one of the interesting things is, they'll cue songs in my memory. My life might be a running soundtrack...
Read on to see my challenge responses.

#writingthesenseschallenge Day 18 - Scents: Sketches to Details

"One corner of her lips rose in a crooked grin. It had long ago passed for cute. Now it settled at the edge of menacing. But there was no one to see it, no one to judge. And even if there was, who was she to care about what outsiders thought. She had spent most of her life forging her own path. If she had listened to the jibes and criticisms of those around her, she’d be back home in Masori Cavern, serving the lowest ranking Master by doing the most menial jobs that person could think of. Her grin turned into a feral smile, fangs fully bared. She had shown them all what sheer determination and belief in oneself could achieve. But choosing this path didn’t mean she had to let go of her spiritual beliefs.
Ibin grunted as she stepped on a bared root in the path. She berated herself for losing her mind to past memories. A silent prayer of thanks lifted to Andurdrao for the root for as she rounded a gentle curve in the path, a sharp hint of goma trees, tangy woodsmoke, and voices floated toward her on the breeze." ~ Over Land & Under Stone

I had a really hard time finding scent related scenes in my rough draft. I guess because my nose is constantly stopped up, scents aren't going to be the first thing that inspires me. LOL I managed to find this one and was able to work in some rudimentary scent descriptions. It'll be interesting to see how the final manuscript turns out.

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#fantasywipjanuary Day 17 - First Line Friday

My story starts (for right now) with a sort of tribal chant and a character you only see sporadically for a while. I won't say too much because I don't want to give away any more of my story than I'll have to while completing these writing challenges. Also, this isn't a prologue but an actual first few lines of chapter one. I couldn't just share the one line. It's strong, but so much stronger, I think, when you read the whole chant.

When I first started writing, my plan was to use "Creator" as the name all the Clans called the deity. But as I wrote, I thought how unvaried and unbelievable that would be. These Clans are more diverse than that and though they started together in one area, they now live on two separate continents and several islands. So I gave the deity a certain name in each Clan. But the ancients still refer to this deity as Creator (as shown above) and sometimes, in conversation, even the people will refer to the deity in this way.

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How are you coming along with this challenge? Care to share your response to this prompt? Feel free to share below. If you'd rather share on social media, please use the hashtag (#writingthesenseschallenge) so I can follow along with your progress.