Lucky 7 Writing Excerpt, and a Mysterious Old Portrait

xcerpt!

Adam tagged all of us who caught his post in the Lucky Seven meme (he's got some great teaser snips, go see!).

The usual, go to page 77 of your MS, 7 lines down, then share the next 7 lines. Since I've been fulfilling half my ROW80 goals, of drafting for Fred and Lyne's story, I'm going to share from that. Except it's all in a notebook at the moment, so there is no page 77. I'll go with page 7 instead; the first ever bit of the story that's been typed!

Fred is in the midst of telling Lyne about the curse that turned him into Beast...

"'We were twins, but my brother came first, by two minutes. And when we were 21, my father told us of the curse. All down the line, every generation, that's when they were told. Some tried to fight, either before the change or once they'd become the beast. All failed.

'You haven't asked yet why I went to Lady Cockerell's masquerade that night. I didn't go because I was ignorant of the curse. I didn't go because I was safe, being the younger brother. I went because he'd chosen not to accept his destiny.'

'But why should you --'

'For family. For honour. I would fight, as every generation for a thousand years had fought. I had one secret strength they hadn't had: I believed in you.'"

Ah, but what if Lyne refuses the call to be his Beauty?

I'll turn around and do the same, tagging anyone who's read this far! If you haven't got a wip you're ready to share, here's a bit of a springboard:

I saw this portrait in our hotel in Chester, England (back in May). It was a Best Western, but renovated from a 19th Century railway hotel, and had paintings up and down the walls along the wide staircases. (Click on the photo to enlarge it.)

I wonder who Elfrida was?