Young Writers Society

Prologue

Lightning lashed across the blood red sky like a whip across the back of a criminal. Thunder rolled and cracked, causing the atmosphere itself to quake. Frothing waves crashed in the sea below, churning and bubbling around the towering rocks that seemed to nearly touch the sky. Rain came down in blinding torrents, cold and relentless.
The elements were at war between themselves, so oblivious to the war being fought in the midst of it all. The rain was stained crimson and the sea below was dark with blood, the rocks slick with it. The roaring of the thunder nearly drowned out the terrifying bellows of the savage beasts tearing through the clouds in pursuit of one another, and the guttural shouts of their barbaric riders.
Flames scorched the clouds, turning the rain to steam as the beasts winged around each other, clashing together until they neared the surface of the water, where they would release the other and soar back into the storm clouds and clash again. The larger beasts chased the smaller ones about the atmosphere, breathing white-hot flame in successful attempts to bring down their prey, while their riders shot their enemies out of their saddles and watched them plummet into the ocean.
Many had already fallen from the sky and into the tempestuous sea to be dashed against the rocks. So many more were bound to fall. This would not end until every last man and beast had ceased to breathe.
Xena crashed against the side of a rock and used her powerful ivory claws to clutch the stone and hold her in place. Her nostrils flared and her chest heaved, her pupils dilated into large black circles. She was trembling all over. She turned her head slightly to see behind her when she felt a reassuring hand on her quivering shoulder and crooned softly in her throat when she saw her young Sabyne pilot sitting on her shoulders. Zander.
He was just as exhausted as she was. A mixture of blood, sweat, and rain had soaked through his leathers and streaked his face. He was no longer certain whether the blood belonged to Xena, his enemies, or himself. He leaned forward, panting heavily as he tried to steady himself in his seat, clutching one of the spines on her neck with one bloodstained hand and grasping his right leg with the other. His teeth gleamed white when his lip snarled over them in pain.
Xena snorted as she folded her wings and climbed to the top of the rock, pulling her enormous body onto the flat peak, crouching there where she could better view the sky. Her breathing eased, and her wings unfurled again.
“Easy, Xena,” he said hoarsely through his teeth as he sat up again.
Blood oozed through his fingers and stained Xena’s scarlet scales. She looked back at him with a worried gaze. He nodded at her, forcing a grin, “I’m alright, girl.”
For a moment, she continued to watch him through anxious green eyes and then turned to watch the battle raging in the sky above, her expression shifting from worried to grave. Zander looked as well. After all the years they had spent fighting together, it seemed they had forgotten what they were fighting for. For the life of him, Zander could not rightly remember. And he no longer cared. The longer they sat there together, watching the dragons tear one another apart and the men shooting each other out of the air, the more he wished for it all to stop.
This war could hardly be called a “war” anymore. It was a glorified massacre.
The only thing that kept him going during all of this bloodshed, the only thing that kept him fighting, was the knowledge that in doing so, it would all end. They all simply fought for peace.
He watched as a blue-scaled dragon plummeted from the sky and crashed against the rocks, into the roiling sea along with the rest of the fallen. It was one of Zander’s comrades.
Zander scowled up at the great black dragon soaring overhead, tossing its head as it breathed white flame through its nostrils, its purple eyes glowing with satisfaction. Its rider was waving a gun in the air and laughing maniacally with victory.
Xena growled and Zander felt her body tense in preparation for a launch underneath him. They were both immediately enraged and rejuvenated enough to fight one last battle for the sake of a brother. He pulled his goggles down over his eyes again and stood in the straps of her harness, crouching over her slender neck like a wildcat prepared to make a kill.
With a terrifying screech, she sprang off of her perch and spread her wings. Zander snarled his lip, unaware of his wounds and fatigue as Xena closed the distance between them and the black dragon. She snarled and spat a ball of flame at the dragon’s left wing, searing the leathery membrane.
The onyx dragon screeched with agony, and wavered in its flight. Before it could right itself, Xena was upon it, snatching its wings in her claws, and dragging both it and its rider skyward.
Zander retrieved a pistol strapped to his leg and fired two shots at the rider, who screamed when the bullets pierced through the thick leather pad on his shoulder and back. The black dragon tossed its head, smoke and flame erupting from its jaws as it struggled for its freedom.
Xena held on, dragging them through the storm clouds as fast as her wings would carry her. Neither of them saw the great golden beast barrel out of the clouds until it was upon them, ripping Xena off of the black dragon and taking her left wing into its massive jaws. Zander felt himself being crushed between the two of them, the air rapidly escaping his lungs. He felt the bones in his legs and hips crack and crush under the pressure of the golden dragon’s body.
The black dragon roared as it captured Xena’s forearms in its clutches and her throat in its jaws, tearing out her jugular. Zander heard himself scream in panic and again in agony, when the golden dragon snatched his arm and shoulder in its mouth and ripped him out of the harness, allowing Xena to fall to her doom in the sea far below.
Zander frantically drew a knife from the scabbard at his hip and stabbed the blade into the beast’s eye, twisting the hilt. The dragon bellowed, releasing Zander in the process. His left arm was missing.
He felt his stomach in his throat as he plunged down to what he knew was his death. The jagged rocks, the raging sea were like the gaping jaws of a ravenous monster, prepared to consume him. This was it. He was going to die.
Though the thought did occur to him, he could not be less troubled by it. What bore deep into his heart and soul was the thought of Xena. As he fell, with the wind tossing his hair into his face and billowing around him, the only thing that he could hope for was that she was not suffering. He prayed for her sake, that she was dead; sinking to the depths of the sea where she could rest forever in the peace they had been struggling to obtain together for nearly a decade. She deserved nothing less, yet so much more.
He closed his eyes just before he hit the water.
A clawed hand snatched him by the waist just before he was swallowed up by the sea. His eyes popped open and a cry welled up in his chest when he saw the flashing red scales stained with dark blood, and the large, glazed eyes looking down at him.
Xena wavered and crashed on a small, flat rock, careful to keep Zander from knocking his head on the stone. He slipped out of her grasp and crawled to up to where her head lay. He ran a hand over her brow and looked at the gushing wound in her throat.
Tears filled his eyes when he turned to face her again, his hand on her muzzle. She gazed at him, and purred quietly. Her sapphire eyes were glazed, but the love she had for him was more than obvious in the way that she gazed up at him. She closed her eyes as a last breath escaped her.
“Xena…” he breathed, gasping for breath and trembling as cold death approached, “Xena…”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That was amazing! I have nothing bad to say at all. This is quite possibly the best story i've read in a very long time.

I really liked this. It seems you have quite a knack for writing. Your poetic language, particularly in the beginning, is lovely. Mood is one of those things that you can't put your finger on, it's not something definable. A piece either has it, or it does not. This piece has it in spades. Your romantic description of the scene is just right for the dramatic events. I was transported. Sections of this piece should be on the the pages of a novel on a bookstore shelf. However, other spots lose that undefinable sheen. I will try and elaborate on why I think that is.

You need cut down on your wordiness. Their are a few points where you say in ten words what you could say in two. You also use a few words and phrases repeatedly and close together. If you cut out the extra, the impact of your work will be increased. So I would print this off a do a thorough read through, just focusing on cutting out the extraneous and redundant. You might be surprised at how much you will be able to cut without negatively impacting your piece.

I found the point of view switches to be jarring. You start the story for Xena's POV, but then you switch to Zander's and then you switch between them intermittently. I am all for third-person omniscient narration, but it simply didn't work for this piece. The switches seem sudden and arbitrary. I would choose a point of view, and stick with it. Your piece will be much more coherent.

I'm am certainly not saying that you must tell the story through Zander's eyes all the time, this is third person after all. All I'm saying is you should write the story from his perspective, the reader should be in his head. So you can start with Xena on the rock, but instead of saying Xena did this. You could say "a dragon" did this. We will only get a name for Xena when Zander comes into the picture, because Zander's story is the one your telling. Of course, this, like everything else, is just a suggestion. It's totally up to you.

The fight scene was the weakest part of this piece. It read like a list of actions, instead of an emotional battle between adversaries. Compounded with the fact that most of your sentence construction was noun-verb, it all felt a little lackluster. I think you need to bring the mood that you pulled off so well in the rest of the piece to this part as well. Xena and Zander have to work together like a well oiled machine to pull this off, and yet I get no interplay between them. I would expect one to read the body language of the other, to fight effectively. If you include the interactions, not only will it liven up the section, but it will also strength their relationship for the reader. Nothing is mentioned of the other rider either, it's all about the dragon. You need to add something here.

The gold dragon was also confusing. He just sort of came out of nowhere and then poof everyone is dying. You need to elaborate more. Why was the the gold dragon able to get the upper hand? What made him the better fighter? Why did he get involved in the fight? I am assuming also that he has a rider as well.

To finish up, I would like to talk about prologues vs. chapters. In your title you said that this is a prologue and chapter one. Seeing as their is only one section of text, I am assuming it is one or the other, for it can't be both. Forgive me for explaining if you already are aware, but a prologue is a stand alone piece that is distant from the body of a novel. In other words, one can understand your novel without reading your prologue. A prologue is a teaser, or a separate mini-story, that enhances your novel but is not integral to it. A first chapter of course, is where the main story begins. It would be hard to fully understand the novel without reading the first chapter. Which category does this piece fall into?

Nitpicks, Examples, and Such:


This work was excellent and one of the best pieces I have seen on this site. If you can, please notify me when you post a second chapter. I would love to read it. If you have any comments or questions feel free to PM me or write on my wall!

(Seriously, please tell me when you post again, please?)

W