Icy Paths - Prologue

Icy Paths
Prologue:

Victory and Loss

She ran, leaping over corpses, her feet almost always splashing into pools of blood.

Her heart was beating hard in her chest, and her thighs were stinging. Her hair fanned out behind her as she ran, her eyes taking in the chilling sight around her: bodies lying in piles around, houses being set on fire and soldiers fighting off villagers.
Tears shone in her eyes as she ran, memories of the events flashing in her head.

She remembered how she had gone to sleep, how she had been awoken some time later by screams, how her mother had told her to get out of the house and run for the gates.
And then she had come out of her house, and seen soldiers running around, fighting villagers, and burning houses.


Without thinking, she had run off through the war scene, thinking of her parents, who were alone in the house, probably defending themselves against five or more soldiers.
The thought of it made her heart sink and she prayed that they would remain alive, and safe.

The gates of Byeran, the village, weren’t far now. Lily ran as fast as she could, and soon, she was out of the gates. Out of the chaos, and into a little shelter and safety. She leaned against the gate, panting heavily.
“Magic is more powerful than speed will ever be.” A voice said.

Lily looked behind her. The only thing she saw was a bright flash of light, before she fell to the ground.

This was very short, but there is still room to improve plot-wise:

She remembered how she had gone to sleep, how she had been awoken some time later by screams, how her mother had told her to get out of the house and run for the gates.
And then she had come out of her house, and seen soldiers running around, fighting villagers, and burning houses.

Without thinking, she had run off through the war scene, thinking of her parents, who were alone in the house, probably defending themselves against five or more soldiers.
The thought of it made her heart sink and she prayed that they would remain alive, and safe.

Alright, what you're doing here is a flashback. Ordinarily there is nothing wrong with flashbacks, that is, when they are used appropriately. In this case, it isn't. This the the first scene of the novel. You do not want to be going into the past already. What you need now is to describe action, and save the explanation for after the present conflict has been resolved. In other words, these two paragraphs have got to go. Besides, if you don't give away what happened right away, you create a sense of mystery.

After you take out these two paragraphs, I would suggest that you expand the conflict more, and add more about the voice at the end. The ending right now is way too abrupt. Just when you get into the meat of the action, you stop. This causes confusion, and it doesn't give your reader enough time to really get into the story or even care about what's happening to your character. Just expand this prologue, and I promise it will be much better.

Hope that helps,
Tony

Simple and interesting. Please write more.

Thanks for the critique! I just had a brainwave for this story, and changed the prologue. The beginning paragraphs are the same, though. Is this better? :
_______________

Icy Paths
Prologue

Victory And Loss

She ran, leaping over corpses, her feet almost always splashing into pools of blood.

Tears shone in her eyes as she ran, wincing as she watched people around her die in gruesome ways.
Suddenly, she heard something running behind her, and screamed; knowing it was one of the soldiers.

She ran as fast as her legs would allow; but to no avail. Metal-glove armored hands caught her shoulders, and a cold voice said:
“You’re Rhen Braker, aren’t you?”
“NO!” screamed Lily.
I can’t tell them Rhen’s my sister.
“You’re feeling guilty, aren’t you? Your whole village is burning down because of you.”
“What are you talking about? I don’t know who Rhen Braker is!”
“Don’t pretend. If you aren’t Rhen Braker, then how come you fit her physical description exactly?”
“I’M NOT RHEN BRAKER, NOW LET ME GO!”

Lily kicked and struggled as best as she could, but the soldier’s grip only tightened on her shoulders, almost cracking them.
She screamed in agony.

“BRIAN! OY! BRIAN!” yelled the soldier.
Another soldier came running.
“What now, Coal?” he asked rudely.
“I got Rhen Braker!” replied Coal.
“Yeah?” said Brian, looking at Lily.
“I’M NOT RHEN!” she roared.
“Yeah, sure.” said Brian sarcastically. “Good job, Coal. Take her outside the village and get it done.”
“Get what done?” asked Lily, nervously.

No one answered. The soldiers exchanged glances, while Lily, out of the corner of her eye, saw a house getting burnt.
Screams and sounds of swords clashing clouded Lily’s ears, and the smell of smoke and some other horrible stenches reached her nostrils.

She didn’t dare to look around, her eyes were only fixed on Coal and Brian.
She even felt a heavy thud on the ground near her, but didn’t dare to look at it.


Coal abruptly began pushing her through the village in the direction of the gate.

Lily saw her brother fighting off a soldier and screamed at the top of her voice.
“JAKE! JAKE! JAKE, HELP!”


Her heart beat hard in her chest and her thighs stung. Her hair fanned out behind her as she ran; her eyes took in the chilling sight around her: bodies lay in piles, soldiers fought off villagers, and houses burning.


Her brother turned in the direction of her voice, and his opponent hurriedly slashed his side open.
He howled in pain, and then fell to the ground.
Lily’s heart stopped.
What did I do? If he dies, it’ll all be my fault!
Panic clouded her mind, making it impossible to think. Getting away from Coal was out of the question.

Finally they were outside the gate, near an apple tree. Coal, still gripping Lily’s shoulder tightly, pulled an apple off the lowest branch.
“Eat.” He said, gently.
Lily cast a suspicious look at the apple, and then at Coal. “No.”
“Eat it!” roared Coal. “Or I’ll cut you in half!”
Lily took a small bite of the apple, hoping it wasn’t dangerous.
Suddenly, she felt sleepy, and her eyes felt heavy. She sat down on the grass and lay back on it.
“Bye, bye.” Said Coal, grinning dangerously.

Lily then realized, from the look in his eyes, that something was horribly wrong, but it was too late.
The last thing she felt was a searing pain in her chest, before she died.

Hi! Well, aside from the weird spaces in between bunches of paragraphs, it's an interesting beginning. The ending immediately brought to mind snow white -- does this have anything to do with your story? Just wondering.

A stylistic note:

Her heart was beating hard in her chest, and her thighs were stinging. Her hair fanned out behind her as she ran, her eyes taking in the chilling sight around her: bodies lying in piles around, houses being set on fire and soldiers fighting off villagers.

-ing, if used a lot, weakens your writing. I've always heard, and in general I agree, that it's usually more powerful if you make it more active. e.g.:

Her heart beat hard in her chest and her thighs stung. Her hair fanned out behind her as she ran; her eyes took in the chilling sight around her: bodies lay in piles, soldiers fought off villagers, and flames leapt from house to house...

“Don’t pretend. If you aren’t Rhen Braker, then how come you fit her physical description exactly?”

You know, this might be a good place to sneak in a description of the character -- "... then how come you fit her physical description exactly? X years old, __ hair, __ __ eyes..." I couldn't tell how old your main character was...

That was a deadly mistake.

Show, don't tell. You don't need this -- the reader should be able to tell it's a mistake because he get's injured.

Your first line was good, you got me at the "leaping over corpses" part, but you introduce Lily's name a bit late -- any particular reason for that?

The characters aren't really three dimensional yet, since there hasn't really been enough time for thorough development, but I like the names -- Rhen and Coal.

In dialogue, if you have "Blah blah," said Bob -- you're supposed to use a comma instead of a period inside the quotes and the next word should be lowercased, unless it's a name. In some places you've got it right but in some you haven't.

Oookay, I'm done. Sorry if anything I said came across as rude, it wasn't meant to and it's only my opinion anyway.

It was good overall, I'm just sort of picky, lol.

Plot wise, this is a big improvement!

Thanks!

Jerita - No, Snow White doesn't have anything to do with the story. Thanks for the critique! I'll fix all that.

Magicman - That's very encouraging, thank you!

Yeah, I like the second version better and it's very well written. I'm intrigued I must say. You mention that it is a prologue and yet the main character, at least of this part, is dead by the end. I take it then that she is not the main character of the book? Is Rhen? Do we get to meet her? And if not, how does this link to your story? Is it posted on here?

Anyway, your spelling is good, I like your descriptions and there's a lot of action so good job with this one.

Yes to all your questions except the last two.

First chapter is finished, but I want to change it, it's wayyyy too...yuck.

The second one was better. I wasn't pwned by info dumps like the first one did to me (ouchies)

The background can be expanded on. That is, add some descriptions of the background so I know exactly what the place looks like.

I really liked it. Sounds like a cool story. I would like alittle more background, though. The one thing that I didn't like was when Coal said "Then why do you fit her physical description exactly?" No one talks like that. It sounds really weird.

I agree the second one is the best. It's longer and more interesting.
I can't wait to read the rest.
Keep writing!

~Rachael

I agree with Life Is Sexually Transmitted. You should just keep it out. Otherwise, not bad for a start. This beginning has been a bit overused, but still...good

very sketchy, but sounds alot like an idea i had once!

She ran, leaping over corpses, her feet almost always splashing into pools of blood.

try cutting out almost allways

soldiers running around, fighting villagers, and burning houses.

try not to say this so often

other wise u did a great job! keep it up!!

COOL! This is really awsome. I want to read more. Its perfect, but I have a request could you check this out? Its a prologue too, and since this is awsome I want your opinion on it ^_^

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