Warning: This work has been rated 16+.
An empire made of ash, a throne of debris, a crown of bone. Her eyes mimicked the deepest oceans and the coldest ice, her skin a swarm of stinging frost, her touch filled with venom. One mistake and she would bring you to your knees. She had spent years building her empire and one mortal would not bring her fortress to a fall. Only one had built her and only one had broken her, he had quite quickly fallen after the destruction of his first queen. He had tried to create a new queen as quickly as he had crushed the last, like glass, but he had failed to do so when his first creation had risen again.
He remembered how suddenly the sky had filled with smoke, ash. In that moment he realized what he had done and what destruction was before him. The air grew tight around his face as his feet, crunching in the leaves of autumn, slowly came to a stop. His eyes grew white, his chest caved in, but as his final breath was about to be heaved, a large creature had thrown its wings down before him. The white eyes pulled forward to study the creature, a female, crystal blue eyes, skin kissed by the frost of one thousand winters, a crown of bone, a dress of moth eaten silk, the dress of an old queen.
"Spare me." The fallen man pleaded with the old queen, "And tell me, why would I do that for such a man as you?" She tilted her head back and dropped her eyes to study the, now, small man. Dark hair jutted out from her crown, through the bone, their eyes locked, "Because I am the one who created you and I am the one who can restore you back to your rightful throne." The old queen cracked a smile down at the small, white eyed man, "That is a very funny thing to say as you are the one who just so recently tried to replace me with some minuscule, lonesome, piece of-" The man cut her off with a gasp, "And what were you when I created you? Hm? As I recall you were just some wandering soul on a lost path to nowhere!" The kneeling man spit at her feet.
White metal gleamed wildly in front of his face, "I was more than what you give me credit for, a wandering soul but I held more power than what you had thought!" The queen let out in rage, she had pulled a sword from behind her high black wings. It glittered as if touched by snow, the handle even mimicked the look of ice, the man shuttered as if he were afraid it would fall. "That is true, you were much more than I had anticipated." He pressed out of his slowly crushing chest. "Callisto", whispered the man, his back came loose, he fell, hunched over.
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138,357 Literary Works • 672,109 Reviews
Hello, Steggy here for a short review!
The beginning of this short piece is really what brought me to wanting to read this because you kind of give us a description of what the whole setting looks like and just from those few words, it seems that most of what is going to happen is going to be a dystopic kind of kingdom. Though I do like this opening sentence, it doesn't seem to bring any real plot to what is going because I'm more confused as to who you are trying to speak of. It does give off a sort of mysterious vibe from it but I want more description as to who is this man. I do think if you try to even out your thoughts, the beginning could be stronger than it was before.
You may want to add 'smoke and ash' because since those two things are together, it would make more sense than just adding a comma. Speaking of which, with the paragraph that follows straight after it, again, you don't give a reason as to what the destruction might be. It could be a number of things but I'm going to assume that the destruction could be some war that happened between two regions or whatnot.
When writing dialogue, be aware that you should try to space out the dialogue so when someone is reading it, they don't have trouble figure out who is talking or what is actual part of the story.
The ending was a bit dramatic. Because it just happened within a minute of just dying and just from that, I think this kind of work is like a prologue or sorts because it deals with giving a sort of background to what is happening so it can make sense later on.
Overall, this beginning and whatever comes after does have some potential. Your idea is a neat one and I'm excited to see what could happen later on.
If you have any questions, let me know!
Steggy
Hey, I'm here to leave a quick review!
While the first and second sentences of this paragraph are interesting, I honestly don't like the entirety of it. It reads like a synopsis from when the queen exists to the moment of her death as well as how she dies. There's also a lack of focus of point of view here where the first four sentences quite clearly show us this is from the queen's PoV while the rest of them tells us this is from his creator/destroyer's PoV.
Once you start the chapter and you have to refer to a character, it's best to refer to him with his name as soon as possible because there's no reason for you to not to. This is a third PoV novel, after all, which means more information is given to the readers, unlike a first PoV novel where if the PoV character doesn't know a character's name, she can simply call him 'the man'.
Here I would advise to keep the dialogues separate. If the man speaks, open a new paragraph to him and ends it with a new paragraph for the queen's dialogue. I like the conversation they're having right here but it seems to me a bit too cryptic. Also, the previous paragraph you refer to the queen as a 'female creature' but you don't specify if she's a female human or something. Best to replace it with 'woman' or 'lady' for the sake of brevity.
All in all, I think this novel has potential. It's a nice surprise to read a plot where the queen doesn't spiralling down because of a male lover but instead because of her creator, and it makes the story interesting, like how does he create her? Is it in a literal sense or metaphorical? I would suggest to add in a little bit more details in the surrounding, a little bit more exploration about the actions to smooth the pace, and definitely gives us more information to make what's happening clearer. As it is, the chapter is too short to be a chapter, so there's addition you can make.
Keep up improving!
Hey there Lacee! First off, a huge welcome to YWS! I hope hope hope you like it here <3
Let's get right in, shall we?
I like the picture you paint in this first sentence. This is a simple start, but man is it effective. My only (very nitpicky) nitpick is maybe change "debris" here. Your other two descriptions are effective and paint real destruction, death, and decay. However, debris here doesn't quite paint as effective a picture as the other two. Perhaps you could change it to the other three "d" words above (a throne of death or destruction or decay. I think decay would work the best in my opinion)
A wonderful start! I would also warn you against keeping fragments in this. While the first part of the sentence isn't a fragment (or maybe it is, it's still early for me lol) it is slippery territory. But, all around a strong start!
I quite like what you're doing here. Once again, you described something in threes (a recurring theme in this story, I hope?) and the metaphors you put here are wonderful. Bravo!
This feels weak. Here's a link about the importance of verbs when writing. (Seriously, it's so wonderfully written and such a good read) The first thing I noticed here is that your verbs are, at places, weak and detract from how almost wholly strong this story has been. For example, instead of:
You could do:
(please note these are examples that aren't that great but I hope you get my point) Verbs can be the saving grace of a sentence, or they can be wasted on "came" or "sat" or "went". When you go back and revise this, I encourage you to make a mental note for these passive verbs and slaughter them with extreme prejudice!
When doing dialogue, it is much easier on me, the reader, if you start new paragraphs every time a new person speaks. I had to pause for a moment to understand that the speaker has changed, and that brings me out of the story. You want as little of those as you can.
Overall Thoughts
Praises
-Your use of metaphors and similes are wonderful, and exquisitely paint a clear picture for me. You have a way with your descriptions that seem natural, or natural in the confines of this story.
-You manage to put in enough exposition to keep me enthralled. I enjoy that!
Criticisms
-Your dialogue seems clunky to me, as in it doesn't feel like someone would actually say some of what's written in here. Formality often lines the edge of rigidness, and rigidness in dialogue breaks the flow of reading and pulls readers out often.
-Your exposition, while I liked it, seemed a little out of place. Since this is the very beginning of the story, perhaps it would be better to leave it all mystery and awe (so don't tell us it's the king that the revived queen is picking up, or that he tried to replace her. I liked more how I learned of it from the dialogue than you just telling us what 's happening in the first paragraph)
-Weak verbs and repeated descriptions. I went over the verbs above but I noticed that you had repeated ash in both the first and second paragraph. This is a minor nitpick, but just wanted to point it out.
-This was a short chapter, and felt more like a prologue. That said, I WANT MORE! Please keep writing and posting to YWS. You do need points, and in order to obtain said points, you need to review pieces just as this is reviewing yours! It's a cycle but I hope you do write more.
Omnom
Hey, AJ here for a quick review!
This looks really interesting! I know it's short, but I'd love to read more of this story. Here are just a few suggestions.
- "and one mortal would not bring her fortress to a fall." The to a fall sounds awkward. Maybe "one mortal would not cause her fortress to fall."
- "Only one had built her and only one had broken her, he had quite quickly fallen after the destruction of his first queen." This is a comma splice. Maybe "...broken her; he had quite quickly..."
- "Spare me." The fallen man pleaded with the old queen, "And tell me, why would I do that for such a man as you?" The dialogues here are confusing. Who is speaking in each? You might want to clear that up.
- Some of the sentences need some rewording. There are some more grammatical errors, but also just unclear sections.
This story really intrigued me! I really like the imagery you have in the first two paragraphs (especially the first sentence. It really grabbed my attention). I would just clear up some of the details in the paragraphs. The story is a bit unclear, but I'm sure that that will be fixed if/when you write more.
If you write more, let me know! I'd love to read it.
Happy RevMo!
-AJ