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Dark Legacy, Chapter 2: Forkroad of Fate

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action, dual-era, fantasy, science fiction
1st
Draft

Published on:

Aug. 8, 2008, 2:12pm

Word Count:

1712

Work Description

Two brother live a normal life, until thier parents are brutally murdered. Now, seperated by centuries from a freak magic accident, one seeks thier parent's killer, while the other simply seeks to survive in an age of steel and concrete.

Chapter Description

Disaster stikes, and our character will soon find himself in a bind he could never imagine.

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            I heard a faint sound, and it took me a moment to realize it was the sound of a bowstring. I looked to the house across from us and saw an archer on the roof, arrow ready. “Mom!”

            The archer fires, but Mother cut the arrow in two with her dagger with a single slash. She raised her hand to the archer as if she was trying to grab him. Fire from the next house over suddenly changed its course, turned completely horizontal, and engulfed the archer in its rage. Wild magic. I never knew Mother knew wild magic.

            I looked at her. There was a splotch of blood on her cheek. I was sure it wasn’t hers. Her eyes had a blaze in them that made the inferno around us look like nothing more than a campfire. The gentle housewife that I knew as my mother was gone. Mother had turned into a totally different person; a strong, determined, and very frightening person. What did she do before she became a mother?

            Mother turned and grabbed my hand. The flames in her eyes had died down a bit. “Let’s go, honey. We have to get to the Temple. We’ll be safe there.”

            I knew that the Temple would be safe, but I was pretty sure I was just as safe with her around. I let her guide me through the streets. Every time we came across a fight, we went the other way. All around us, small battles were raging. It seemed like every Sorcerite in the village were fighting. Just how big was the demon force that was attacking us?

We were close to the Temple. Soon, it was within sight. But it wasn’t over.

Mother stopped abruptly and I almost fell over from trying to stop with her. She seemed transfixed on something ahead. I followed her gaze and found Father locked in combat with a demon. This one was different from the others. He was no normal demon that was sure. I could sense pure evil radiating from him, and I never saw someone with so much skill with a sword. Could he be the leader of this attack?

            “Father!” The words ran from my tongue before I could stop them.

            Father’s attention shifted over from the fight to me. It was a fatal mistake. The demon took advantage of my distraction and slashed his back, surely severing his spine. Blood streamed from the gash, cascading into the air and staining the grass. My father went rigid, and collapsed to the ground.

            “WALKER!!!!!!” Fiona screamed. She let go of my hand and rushed forward with amazing speed, spinning the daggers in the hands. She lunged at the demon and attacked viciously. The demon blocked every blow, defending against both blades with his single sword.

With his free hand, the demon shot a black stream of magic through her chest. My mother flew back a few feet towards me and hit the ground. She did not get back up. The image engraved itself into my mind. The demon turned away from my mother’s body, and began casting magic at other warriors. He took no notice of me.

            I walked up to my mother’s body. Her eyes were still open. I closed them gently. I wanted to say something, but words did not form. Tears blinded me. I grabbed the belt that held the sheaths and picked up the daggers. I put it over my shoulder and gripped the daggers tightly.

“Don’t turn your back on me!” I screamed at the demon and rushed forward. Any other time, I would recognize that there was no way I could take on the demon and live. But I was blinded with rage, and I felt that it was the right thing to do. It was what needed to be done.

            The demon sensed my

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Discussion

The writing was overall better than the previous one, but I am deeply troubled by the painfully overused manner of his parent's deaths.  We shall see...

I was slowly starting to wake up when my senses started to perceive the smell of burning wood and crackling wood.

"burning wood and crackling wood", not a good phrase.  I'd recommend "wood burning and crackling" instead. 

Outside, there was yelling and the sound of metal striking metal. It was the sound of battle.

Unnecessarily wordy, use a semicolon instead of a period, leave out "it was", change "there was" to "I head", and take the first "the sound out.  End result" Outside, I heard yelling and metal striking metal; the sounds of a battle."

The now was all I needed to know at the moment.

You can leave out "at the moment", it's sort of implied. 

I could see smoke raising into the night sky, and the night was illuminated by the flames.

First of all, with the "I saw" in the previous sentence and then "I could see", here.  We don't need to be told that he's seeing all of this, it's implied in the fact that he's describing it at all.  so maybe "Smoke rose into the sky, and the night was illuminated by flames". 

To my right, a Sorcerite was fighting a pair of armored demons. They were not of the same breed as us. They were too far away and it was too dark for me to make out the details. But they both stood a foot taller than the Sorcerite.

The first and second, and third and fourth sentences here can each be merged. 

That dagger of worry that was in my gut suddenly twisted into fear.

At least take out "that was", and prefrerably "in my gut" as well.  We know where the dagger is, you already said, remember?

The two demons overpower the Sorcerite and struck him down.

That should be "overpowered" past tense. 

My mother pulled my arm and pulled me to away from the scene

You've said "pulled" twice here.  Perhaps she "grabbed", "grasped", or even "seized" his arm instead?

The two demons notice us and headed towards us. We were trapped.

First of all, you've already referred to them as "the two demons" once, so this sounds a little repetitive.  Second, "we were trapped" shouldn't be its own sentence. 

Mother pushed me aside and drew her daggers.  With speed I only caught glimpses of she drew her daggers and ran towards the demon.

You said "she drew her daggers" twice, I'm assuming that wasn't intentional.  Also, you can say "it" more, and "the demon" less, we'll still know what you're talking about.  It gets a little annoying reading "the demon" this and "the demon" that, all the time. 

The archer fires, but Mother cut the arrow in two with her dagger with a single slash.

"Fired", past tense.  Probably a typo, ne?

It seemed like every Sorcerite in the village were fighting.

Either "all the Sorcerite's were", or "every Sorcerite was".  I think...

I could sense pure evil radiating from him,

Sense in what way? Is this a special perceptive ability kind of sense, or more of a "gut feeling", type sense.  I realize it's not gonna change how it's written either way, but I'd like to know what you mean. 

Ok, you are aware of how painfully stereotypical this is, right? Having him be responsible for the deaths of his parents.  Be very careful with this; you had better have a really original twist on this. 

Ben slid into the pit; kicking up dusty dirt.

Since you use "dirt" in the next sentence, how about he just kicks up dust. 

 

Hey Joseph --

It's nice to see how tight this chapter is. You give us action at the beginning and it sucks the reader all the way through. Enough opening remarks -- critique time!


I heard Mother said urgently. ”Come on, wake up!”
 

I could be mistaken, but I think the proper way to phrase what you mean here is "I heard Mother say." It seems to flow a bit better in my mind.

Now this fire brings up a couple of interesting points. We your readers know that Draco is half demon. But you've not really told us anything about what that means in terms of senses and abilities. Since he's a lupine demon, can he smell much better than a full human? Also, we don't know much about your world's cosmology or mythology. In typical Christian/Western imagery, demons are associated with fire. Satan is the ruler of the lake of fire and all that. So, is Draco as a half demon able to withstand fires better than others? This fire might be a good place to explore some of these points.


Bahaumut wasn’t back yet.

I don't know if this is really necessary. You've already highlighted that Draco and his mother don't know where Bahaumut is. This sentence is a little speed bump that slows down the pacing. If you cut it, I think the pacing will feel a lot tighter.


It had happened.

This sounds like the incident is a little abstract to Draco. This seems like the worst-case scenario, so maybe using more descriptive language to replace this sentence will spice it up more.


The two demons overpower the Sorcerite and struck him down
 

"Overpower" needs to be past tense rather than present tense.

This also brings up how demons feel about the idea of intermarrying with humans. Maybe some dialogue between his Mother and the other demons during their combat would provide a clearer picture of this social aspect.

Another tense issue here:

The archer fires,


Fires should be fired. And technically, since there's no explosives involved with bows and arrows, it should more likely be "shot."


Fiona screamed.


I had to think a moment to remember that Fiona is Draco's mother. Maybe consistently calling her "mother" rather than Fiona would be appropriate, especially since it's in first-person. I hardly call my mom by her given name, especially in telling other people about her. I remember one time when my dad and I were out to dinner and he casually referred to her by her name rather than "mom." It really threw me for a loop. Unless there's a deep-seated cultural or psychological reason, I think just calling her "Mother" in descriptions would be fine.


He quickly sidestepped and knocked me away with the flat of his blood red long-sword


I'm just wondering, is the sword blade actually colored blood-red, or is it stained with blood? Maybe those adjectives could be a bit clearer.


Ben slid into the pit; kicking up dusty dirt.
 

"Dusty dirt" seems to be a bit redundant and repetitive . Just pick one.

Good work! I'm really enjoying this story. I'm looking forward to the next installment.  

At first, I was going to shrug her off like I did every morning when she woke me up for school, but there was unnatural urgency in her voice. 

This really needs to be shortened into at least 2, maybe 3 sentences. Here's an example,

 

"At first I was going to shrug her off like I did every school day morning. However, she had an unnatural urgency in her voice."

 

Sleep was gone. I was side awake and aware now. Confusion still gripped my senses, but I had it under control. It was like starting a book halfway through. I knew what was happening now, it was just the in between that was unclear. But that could wait. The now was all I needed to know at the moment.

 

This paragraph feels a bit clumsy. The way it reads is confusing. It has a circular logic to it, and it's throwing the reading off. You need to rework this.

 

It had happened. Demons had attacked the village. We had always believed that they would never come. Our village was too small for them to take notice of us. But we were wrong, and now we were paying for being so naive. That dagger of worry that was in my gut suddenly twisted into fear. In order to get to the village, the demons had to have come through the same forest Bahaumut was supposedly at. Had they found him? Was that why he was not home? No, they couldn't have killed him. Bahaumut would not go down so easily. He knew enough magic to make a good escape.

 

This entire paragraph is too clumped together. You could make at least two, maybe three, paragraphs out of this.

 

I see more action in this chapter, good, but I feel as though Fiona's death was a little too quick. Earlier you show her to be expertly skilled, and to have to go down so easily just doesn't strike true to me.

 

The ending confuses me. I'm not sure what to make of it. I don't see the connection between the beginning of chapter 1 and the ending of chapter 2. I hope chapter 3 further explains these things.

 

A lot of what I talked about in the first chapter I see here, too. Basically don't try to jam so much information in (I've had that trouble, too). Watch how you structure your sentences, especially word usage.

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