Blackwood were packed with people; sounds of boots and slippers coming into contact with the stone-paved road blended with chatters and laughters of variable volumes. The busyness was usual, but stalls lined themselves into rows, making the atmosphere more suffocating. Destiny was grateful for that. Mr Sadeas’s friends were all over the village, and one of them would find her in no time if they saw her face. She had always accompanied Mrs Elaine to buy groceries and clothes, and encountered some. They weren’t nice people with their feral looks they shot to her.
The cloak would make sure she was unrecognizable. The satchel remained at her back, its straps around her shoulders. She was worried if she held it tightly, others would suspect she was carrying something valuable. It was a riskier move to take. Larceny was common here; the gap between the rich and the poor was quite large when the king decided to put a rich village head who played favor a decade ago. The criminals were put into trials when the crimes involved nobilities.
She knew the mind of a little thief since she had been one until Mrs Elaine caught and saved her. That lady did not allow little details go missing, especially the locket Destiny had tried to steal. If not for her, Destiny could see herself continue being a thief. She didn’t like that miserable life; most thieves are poor, forced to stealthily take others’ fortunes. Adult thieves preferred to break into houses because of the bigger potential profits in them.
Stalls appearing like mushrooms meant the coming of night market; meant she had been gone for two days. How was that possible?
It doesn’t matter, she thought. By now, Mrs Elaine would be worried about me. Mr Sadeas would be mad as to why I’m gone and neglect my responsibilities.
There were only three people who took care of the house - Mrs Elaine, Destiny, and another worker, Miss Eve. Miss Eve was a a single, half-a-century lady, and she would chastise you for calling her Grandma instead of Miss, or for questioning why she didn’t get married. She was in charge for cooking and laundry. Taking care of the children was Mrs Elaine’s and Destiny’s job, and that would be the hardest part in terms of how manageable what they were in charge of. As it was, the children were energetic when Mrs Sadeas was not around.
The orphanage’s were located at the middle of the village, a fifteen minutes walk from the woods. It was a straw house, designed to fill in as many people as possible. Destiny was about to reach it when a voice called out her name. Instinctively, she turned to the voice only to regret it afterwards. She was supposed to blend with others, to not be known, and a simple call distracted her. Not to mention, the call came from his friend, the one she stole things together with.
Delilah, a dark-skin girl wearing an amethyst gown, her hair braided to look like one of the noble’s girls, met her. “I’ve tried to visit you last night, but the house said you weren’t there. Finally tired of living there, huh?” She grinned.
Delilah disliked the orphanage. It took her best friend from her, this much was obvious to Destiny. Also, Mr Sadeas’s infamous reputation spread around like a gloomy cloud; people were accustomed to it, but knew it was bad sign regardless. Delilah knew what he had done to the kids; he talked things that he shouldn’t when he was drunk, and the man Delilah was engaged to have told her all of it. If only Mr Sadeas weren’t associated with important people, he could be arrested for child abuse.
“I didn’t run away. Mrs Elaine is a nice lady,” Destiny said, defending the orphanage through Mrs Elaine. “I just have something... something to take care off.”
Delilah looked over her shoulder, her eyebrows raised. “Ooh, something interesting you have over there.” Destiny tensed, expecting Delilah to check it out. “Oh well. What a shame, really, Mrs Elain with that old bat. Couldn’t see why she married him.”
Destiny couldn’t, too. “I’ll see you later, then,” she said, and patted the satchel. “Need to give this to the kids. You know how hungry they are, those active bunch.” She smiled, and was about to turn to the door when Delilah grabbed her arm.
“Jason heard Sadeas talking last night,” Delilah whispered. “About forcing some of the children to be thieves. You have to save them, Destiny.”
Destiny was stunned; if what Delilah said was true, Mr Sadeas had gone too far. She felt the tight grip retreated, and looked at Delilah, not knowing what to say.
Delilah smiled. “We were friends before, and we’re still are now. I’m going to see that lasts until we die. Here’s a present for you.” She gave Destiny something wrapped in a cloth. “Farewell, my friend.” She waved at her and disappeared into the crowd.
Destiny opened present, and tear threatened to burst from her eyes. It was Delilah’s silver necklace, the one thing she managed to hide from the thieves’ master, inherited from her mother. She always kept it to herself, and had allowed Destiny to see it twice during their years being thieves. It must have been precious to her, and now she trusted it to Destiny. Despite their decreasing encounters, Delilah still remembered Destiny, still regarded Destiny as her best friend.
Destiny thought the children were all the friends she had. She wiped the tear. She was wrong, and she wasn’t going to let her friendship with Delilah get severe any more.
She turned to the door again. Her issue with Delilah could wait. She needed to take care of this one immediately. Mrs Sadeas must be stopped, and although she couldn’t figure out how to use the ruby kept safely in the satchel, she knew it would help her somehow. She hated confrontation, but it must be done. There was no other way. If Mr Sadeas couldn’t be saved... She straightened her back as well as her confidence, and entered the house.
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Canary word: Present
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125,018 Literary Works • 672,861 Reviews
Hello.
Haven't read previous parts. Just going off what I see here.
First things first, Zolen caught a lot of nit picks but I'm noticing this generally reads very much like you're an ESL speaker— nothing wrong with that, I'm ESL, too— and it's marked by a lot of words not used quite right. "Feral" is usually describing people who are very wild and generally not "socialized" properly, which I doubt is what you're going for; a slightly more appropriate word would be "scornful" (which is a judgemental look), or "harsh" (again, implying judgement).
There's also your sentence structure. Almost every sentence in the second paragraph uses the word "was", and it shows up 28 times total within the work itself. You're relying extremely heavily on "subject, verb, object" sentences, where more often than not a person is the subject and their action drives things forward. That's fine every once and awhile, but when you start to use it almost exclusively, it gets dry and repetitive.
And all of this is stuff that will get better with practice, but you have to legitimately practice it. It took me years of getting pretty intense corrections and pushback on my work to even start noticing what I was doing, and to start thinking differently.
Part of the problem is how distant everything is. In paragraph three, you describe the life without much if any actual emotion to it; it feels like it's just explaining stuff for the sake of explaining it, without actually giving a perspective on the topic. You have to ask yourself not only why something is there, but why should the reader care about it and how would the character discuss it. There's a transition between everything being purposefully included and everything looking worthwhile to include. Even if something's important, if you can't convince us it's important, then you haven't done your job as a writer.
All in all, this is close but not quite there. The main falling point is how nothing seems to quite flow together, both from a language and from a purposeful standpoint. I can tell everything in here is done on purpose, but there is that missing aspect of reasons for caring. Logically, I know why you've put everything in here. Emotionally, I'm not feeling why you've put it in here. And the feeling part is important. If readers don't feel like it's done purposefully, then it needs some work.
Hope this helps. Let me know if you have any questions or comments.
~Rosey
Now to try at reviewing, going to be a tad thin, but hopefully this helps in some way.
Nit picks:
Spoiler
This line feels wrong to me probably just the 'were' in it. Given the past tense used for the rest of the story, 'was' seems like it would fit better.
I am fine with the term 'busyness', but the rest of the chapter seems to conflict with the tone such a word would invoke. That is to say, its a casual word mixed into words like 'variable', 'suffocating', and 'accompanied' which are quite high brow.
That last sentence feels like a hang on fragment.
'played favorites a decade ago' might fit better
Given the context of later sentences, 'The Orphanage was located' would make more sense.
minute
I recall you saying you don't like the whole ... thing, and while I personally am all for it when needed. In this sentence the break could be a wonderful expression moment, rather then ... you could say "I just have something," she paused, shifting her gaze off into the distance, her eyes hovering like that for a few seconds before she finished her sentence "something to take care of."
Also I imagine you meant 'of' not 'off'
Maybe you should merge these in some way?
Fragment, while you can easily get away with them (I do it a lot intentinally), this one breaks the pace a bit too much.
Plot wise, I liked the tone, tempo, and implied world this chapter built, even if I didn't read this story enough to get anywhere.
Thus the like.
Continue and I will probably stumble back in eventually to like another. Have a nice day, hope this was helpful.