E - Everyone

Gretchen and the Dragon Pup

Once upon a time, there was a little green witch. Her name was Gretchen, and she was blonde and used to be fair skinned and pretty, but when she was about 30 she dueled with another witch and one of the witch's curses went awry, turning her skin green instead of knocking the other witch out of the air. From that day on, the little witch was known as Greenitch in a cruel spin off of her real name.

Gretchen was a kind old soul, brewing herbal remedies for the people in the town and never asking for payment. She tended a garden, and she owned a cow and several chickens, so she had all she needed to live. One day, in the early morning, she was walking in the nearby mountain, where could be found many herbs she used for her potions. She had found nearly all of the plants she was looking for and was thinking of turning back, when she heard a faint, desperate squeak.

Looking around, she saw nothing, but hurried in the direction of the sound, stopping only to listen for more squeaks. Finally she came to a gigantic tree, a sequoia, and she was sure the squeaks originated in the giant's branches. So she began to climb.

Now, a sequoia is no easy tree, as they can be large enough to drive a house through without breaking the outer bark, and the branches don't start until many yards up. Fortunately for Gretchen, she was small enough to find hand and footholds in the pitted and rutted bark of the tree. She climbed and climbed and climbed, the periodic squeaks giving her strength as they increased in volume. Finally she arrived, panting and profusely sweating, at the branches, and broke through. The sight that met her eyes nearly made her lose her grip on the tree, and she stared for quite a while, until her seizing muscles forced her to tear her wondering eyes away so she could climb to safety. Before her lay an enormous tree house, roof rising Cathedral-high, walls rustling softly as the wind teased the leaves and vines that formed the house. There were no doors, just hangings of living green, which swayed invitingly in the cool evening breeze. Gretchen walked tentatively to the house, all senses on the alert for danger. The house was certainly beautiful, but it spoke of a stronger magic than any the witch had ever encountered before. She reached the hangings, which whispered to her to come explore what lay hidden inside them.

The squeakings that had drawn her here pulled at her to come and help, while her common sense told her quite the opposite. Ignoring said common sense, Gretchen pushed the hangings aside and entered. The first thing she noticed was the bed, or nest really, that dominated the the huge house. It was made of the same substance as the house, but lined with feathers and fur from innumerable and unknown animals. Crouching in the middle, curled in a ball small enough to fit in Gretchen's tiny hand, lay an electric blue dragon pup. He fixed his impossibly blue eyes on the intruder, and the two stared at one another. Then, the tiny dragon let out a piteous squeak identical to the ones Gretchen had been following.

She moved slowly forward, careful to make no sudden moves, trying to ascertain what was wrong with the pup. Noting his thin legs and emaciated belly, she decided he was hungry, and crept closer to him, hoping to win his trust enough to feed him. The enormous eyes remained on her face except to focus on her hand when it began to stretch toward him. He tensed, ready to spring. She stopped mere centimetres from his nose, letting him sniff and decide whether to trust or attack. After a moment, he stretched his neck slightly, bumping his nose to her fingertip, then pulled back, sneezed, and glared at Gretchen as though she had caused a great discomfort. Reassured, the witch began to search the house for food. Finding some, she returned to the dragon and fed him. After he ate, he curled up in a ball in her lap and fell asleep. She remained there all night, waking up whenever he nudged her for more food, and by the time the sun rose and Dawn peeked in the windows, he saw her lying on her back sprawled across the bed, the beautiful blue dragon stretched out on her chest, asleep.

When she got up, Gretchen decided that she liked this place. It was nearer to her herbs than her house was, still closer to the village. Apparently whoever had built the house and placed the dragon pup here was not returning, so there were no animals in the mountain who would attack a cow or chickens, so she could bring them, too. She named the dragon Cordenth. And they lived there and had wonderful adventures, which I cannot for time's sake relate here. But perhaps another time.

Comments & reviews · 2
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User avatar
Sins
Review
Sins wrote a review · Sun Jan 31, 2016 1:34 pm

Hey there! I saw your story here lurking in the green room, so figured I'd come pull it out of there for you :)

So this is such a cute little story, and I love the fairytale theme you've got going here. I'd love it if you did indeed show us some stories of Gretchen and Cordenth's adventures. I'm not sure how long, or how useful, this review will be as your story is rather short, but I'll certainly try my best to help you improve it in as many ways as possible.

The first thing I want to bring up is Gretchen's motives for climbing that tree in the first place. She could hear the squeaking and so she was intrigued, so I understand that, but to go all the way and start climbing the apparently enormous thing seems a bit odd. I'm sure you want her to be quirky and what not, but it just feels like there's not enough of a motive there for her to go ahead and start climbing the thing. Even if you specified that the squeaking resembled that of an animal's, I think it would help because then we readers would be like, "oh okay, something could be in danger so she wants to go and check." At the moment you merely describe it as some squeaking, so maybe elaborating a bit on that (without giving it away) could make the whole thing seem a bit more realistic.

The only other critique I have for you is based on my (limited) knowledge of Physics. You described the tree to be extremely large and very tall, so I find it odd the Gretchen would be able to hear the squeaking from the bottom of it. I mean, she can't even see the treehouse from the bottom of the tree, so that in itself signifies how tall it must be. I don't know how loud dragons squeak, in fairness, but it seems unlikely that a baby dragon would be able to be heard from that far away. What I'd suggest is to simply make the tree a bit smaller, or maybe have Gretchen's attention captured by a falling twig or something instead. Or maybe note how loud the squeaking is? I don't know, it's entirely up to you!

That's about it, I think. I'm sorry this review wasn't the most helpful, but hopefully I've given you at least some ideas. If you have any questions or comments regarding this review, please don't hesitate to let me know!

Keep writing,

xoxo Skins

Hello, Skins! You're right, that is a bit absurd logically and physically :P. This story was completely off the cuff and there was very little revising, so I'll go back and change those :). Thank you so much for your help :)

No worries, I'm glad I could be of assistance! Haha, that's fair enough, hardly a big issue at all though :)

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7whitewolf7
Review

Hello, I'm here to suggest some edits that I think would make your story better. :) I hope they help! The content is good, however it doesn't flow well over all, so I would suggest that you reword some of the sentence parts.

I'm going to change your paragraphs here, and you should compare them to yours above and see if you like any of the changes. :)

Once upon a time, there was a little green witch named Gretchen, she was blonde and fair skinned and pretty, however when she was about 30 she dueled another witch. One of the curses she cast went awry, and it turned her skin green instead of knocking the other witch out of the air. From that day on, the little witch was known as Greenitch in a cruel spin off of her real name.
Alright! Does that read a little better? Next paragraph! :)

Gretchen was a kind old soul, brewing herbal remedies for the townspeople and never asking for payment. She tended a garden, and owned a cow with several chickens, so she had all she needed to live. One day, in the early morning, she was walking in the nearby mountain, where there could be found many herbs she normally used for her potions. She had found nearly all of the plants she was looking for and was thinking of turning back, when she heard a faint, desperate squeak.
This one is good! As well as the next, we're skipping it!

Now, a sequoia is no easy tree, as they can be large enough to drive a house through without breaking the outer bark, and the branches don't start until many yards up. Fortunately for Gretchen, she was small enough to find hand and footholds in the pitted and rutted bark of the tree. She climbed and climbed and climbed, the periodic squeaks giving her strength as they increased in volume. Finally she arrived, panting and profusely sweating, at the branches, and broke through. The sight that met her eyes nearly made her lose her grip, and she stared for quite a while, until her seizing muscles forced her to tear her wondering eyes away so she could climb to safety. Before her lay an enormous tree house, [roof rising Cathedral-high, walls] (I'm not sure what you are picturing here :/ though I have an idea) rustling softly as the wind teased the leaves and vines that formed the house.
The last part is fine, so I cut it off, and the next needs no edits :)

She moved slowly forward, careful to make no sudden moves, trying to ascertain what was wrong with the pup. Noting his thin legs and emaciated belly, she decided he was hungry, and crept closer to him, hoping to win his trust enough to feed him.
The enormous eyes remained on her face except to focus on her hand when it began to stretch toward him. He tensed, ready to spring. She stopped mere centimetres from his nose, letting him sniff and decide whether to trust or attack.
After a moment, he stretched his neck slightly, bumping his nose to her fingertip, then pulled back, sneezed, and glared at Gretchen as though she had caused a great discomfort. Reassured, the witch began to search the house for food. Finding some, she returned to the dragon and fed him. After he ate, he curled up in a ball in her lap and fell asleep. She remained there all night, waking up whenever he nudged her for more food, and by the time the sun rose and Dawn peeked in the windows, she was lying on her back sprawled across the bed, the beautiful blue dragon stretched out on her chest, asleep.
Next!

When she got up, Gretchen decided that she liked this place. It was nearer to her herbs than her house was, still closer to the village. Apparently whoever had built the house and placed the dragon pup here was not returning, so she could stay there. No animals in the mountain would attack a cow or chickens, so she could bring them, too. She named the dragon Cordenth. And they lived there and had wonderful adventures, which are tales for other times. ;)
I hope that helps some!



The highlighted children are not mine.
— AresFig