This is my lovely story, thingy. Stubookie ( that 's what I'll call it.) Hopefully I formatted this correctly. I know that there is no last name, and I'm sorry for that. I also know that there is this one part that is a little , I don't know, its just a bit rough. I'm trying to get a chance to get more character in here. Sorry if that was your request, but at least I'm trying.Please Read and review.
At around four I heard a knock on my door. It was already dark and I hoped it was my Mom or Dad who should have been done working for the king hours ago. I ran to the door, trying to hide my disappointment as I saw it was not my parents. Instead was a teenage guy standing in front of me. “Hello.” I said.
“My name’s Ryder,” he said, he looked at my face “Why do you look so sad?” I thought it was odd asking questions like these, but after the queen died some people tried to look out for other people. I guess he’s just one of those people.
“My parents haven’t come home after working for the King.” I said.
“Oh, well, I’m sorry I’m not your parents.” His hazel eyes looked sympathetic.
“Is there any reason why you wanted to come here?” I asked, “Or do you just enjoy going to random people’s houses?”
“Well,” he started, “I actually need some food for my family. We’re going through some rough times.” I nodded solemnly and waved him to come in. “I almost forgot,” Ryder said, “What’s your name?”
“Artimis,” I said, riffling through a few of my cabinets. “I’m sorry about your family,” I said, “Not having food 'n all. You can come over here if you need more.” I packed the food in a box I had found in the kitchen.
“T-thanks,” Ryder said as he saw how much food I had put in the box, “T-thanks a lot!”
“It’s nothing,” I muttered, feeling my cheeks flush with embarrassment.
“It’s been a while that I’ve had this much food after I’ve been want-" Ryder stopped in mid sentence.
“Wanting to," Ryder paused for a minute,"Since I've wanted to help out at home. I give most of my food to my father since my mother's gone." I felt a pang of sympathy for him. I pittyed myself because my parents were never home, but he only has his father. Why was I so selfish? "Thanks again."
"I already told you, it's nothing."
"No, I mean it. I'm very greatfull, you've helped out me and my mother very much."I thought his mother was dead. A terrrible thought just formed in my head. "No," I though,"Don't doubt someone like that. Your parents are just suspisious of everyone. That makes you suspicious of everyone, it's not true." I slowly felt myself belive the explanation the little voice in my head just made. Then the other voice in my head-the suspisious one- said,"Who would forget that his mother is dead? I mean, it's not like those are the kind of things that a person easily forgets." I had to admit, that voice was very persuasive, and had a very good point. Who would forget about their own mother's death?
"I thought your mother was dead." I said quietly.
"She is," he said quickly.
"B-but you just said that she was alive. You just said,'you've helped me and my mother very much.'"By now, my voice had gone from quiet to accusing.
"No. I didn't." Ryder said, his voice was insisting.
"Who are you?" I asked,"And don't give me any lies. I need to know if I can trust you, I won't have any spies in my house."
"Alright," Ryder said,"You've caught me. Given me no choice but to tell you. I'm wanted by the king bec-"
There was a knock on the door outside. “Oh no. No, no, no. You've got to help me. Please.Please, help me.” Ryder whispered. I started walking toward the door. “Please,” I heard him say once more as I neared the door.I turned around to see Ryder’s pleading eyes. I was a sucker for eyes like those, if anyone showed me those, I’d be willing to jump off a cliff for them.
“Hide,” I mouthed, before opening the door to a blue uniformed man with a King’s Police badge on it. Great.
“Are you Mrs. _______?” He asked with authority.
“N- no. I’m her daughter, but I could go see where sh-
“ You’ll do,” he interrupted. “We have gotten a call that a strange boy talked to you. You let him in. Ma’am, your neighbors thought that he was an enemy trying to get information, since your parents have such a heigh position next to the King. Since it could be dangerous for the country, we reported it straight to the King, along with a description. It turns out that teenager is wanted. I was asked to take him to the King, and I need to get into your house.” The King’s Police officer was wrong. He wasn’t asking to get into my house, he was demanding it.
“I’m sorry, officer,” I tried to muster enough braveness so my voice wouldn’t quiver, “ I don’t have a teenager other than me, myself, and I, living in my house. Why would I be harboring the King’s enemy? My family is loyal to the King. Everyone knows that. My neighbors must be mistaken,” I finished off my sentence, looking past the King’s Police officer and out into the never- ending winter’s frost.
“Please miss, the teenager we’re looking for is top priority. The king truly wants this boy. You will get in no trouble if you just show us where he is. Even if you were lying.”
“I’m not lying!” I practically shouted. I heard the echo of into the white haze. The police officer sighed and mumbled something inaudible. He reached for something by his belt, it may have been a gun or a dagger ,you could never tell with the king’s police. Depending on the rank of the officer there were different weapons. Some officers wern’t even important enough for a weapon. Some were helpless if they were caught by an enemy or if someone decided to spring a surprise attack. The officer pulled out a shiny pistol gun. Ryder really was important to the King.
“He isn’t here!” I yelled as the officer slowly raised his gun, “Ryder’s not here. Please don’t shoot.” As the words came out of my lips, I knew it was too late. I had made a mistake, and a bad one.
“Hmm. You do know him," the officer said, casually pointing his gun at my heart,"Just tell me where he is, kid."
“ I don’t know what your talking about!” I almost screamed in reply, I tried to fix my mistake. “ I heard about it from a friend.” That was not on the list of answers that would get me out of being killed. I had said the wrong thing.
“No one, not even some of the King’s most trusted advisers knew that the boy was wanted until a few hours ago. News doesn’t travel that fast, not even among teenagers,” the officer sneered. He shoved the barrel of the gun harder where my heart would be. His finger lingered at the trigger.
“I’ll tell you where he is!” I shouted, just before he pulled the trigger.
“ You’re a lucky person. Now tell me where he is!” This was bad, I didn’t know where Ryder was, and I had a gun at my heart and a demand for him. The King’s police officer quickly made sure I wasn’t caring any weapons before he shoved me roughly into my own house.
“I promised I wouldn’t tell you where he is hiding. I have to honor that promise. I can, however, show you where he is.” I felt the gun against the back of my head as I walked into the living room.
"That's a good girl. Now lead me to him."
I thought about how King Frost had gained his power. How there used to be democracy, a thing that no longer even exists. It has become some fairy tale. A fairy tale where everyone had rights, and could choose their leader. The what happened, was it was monarch democracy. People could choose their leaders. Except everything was limited to the royal family. I was told that things wern’t bad back then. Everyone was happy. Soon, it became complete monarchy. King Frost became the ruler, and happily married Queen Frost. Everything went wrong one morning. Queen Frost requested her morning tea. King Frost said he would deliver her tea. Instead of giving it straight to Queen Frost, he put poison in it and then gave the tea to her. Queen Frost took one sip of the tea and fell to the floor dead. King Frost had become power hungry. Now King Frost is basically a dictator, anyone who questions that dies. I returned to the present and realized I was walking into the living room. I stopped.
“What is it?” the King’s Police officer asked. I felt gun harder against my head.
“He’s behind us,” I whispered. The officer swung around, his gun held out in front of him. His back was to me, and he was shaking.
“W-where is he?” The shouted, no longer sounding filled with authority. “Where is he in here?”
“He’s not in here,” I said innocently. I looked around for something to hit him with. My eyes caught a candle stick colder, I blew out all the candles.Then, I hit the officer with all of my might before he could even utter a word. The officer hit the stone wall and left consciousness.
“I thought you were going to turn me in,” A voice whispered in my ear. I jumped in surprise. I spun around and saw Ryder smiling with bright hazel eyes. “Let’s go,” he said, pulling my arm
“Go?” I asked, “What do you mean ‘Go?’”
“You’ve got to come with me, the King will be looking for you.” I sighed, he was right. I didn't want to go, but I had no choice. Even if I just gave him food, or said hello to him, I would be interrogated, and after that locked up for life. Since I just knocked out the a King’s Police officer, I’d be killed on sight.
“You’re right,” I said sadly, “I’ll go grab some food.” Before I left I heard someone behind me. . I slowly turned around, dreading what I saw. The King’s Police officer had a cruel, smug, evil smile on his face.
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139,534 Literary Works • 672,600 Reviews
I felt you put work in it I saw nothing like big wrong with it. Change things if you want but I like it the way it is.
I think you should elaborate on who this KING is. It's a little unclear who your parents are, too. Besides that and telling and not showing, it's great! Very spooky at the beginning, and I liked the way you described the official's different weapons and their rankings.
well, actually, this was for my elt class (I get to write!).... and she collects our writing and grades them. The sad part is..... I don't have mine back yet. Don't know when I'll get it back. This is one reason why I have issues editing it... and that's also why i can't type the rest of the chapter (so no, it's not a cliffhanger.) Sorry about that. But thanks, and I will edit it (but i don't have enough time now.) Thanks.
First off, don't say it sucks. This is never good. Always be positive. After all, I don't think it sucks. I actually think that the overall idea is quite good. You just need to work on the writing and grammar a bit more.
I won't bore you with grammar critiques, as you already have had them pointed out. However, try reading it backwards, one sentence at a time. This might really help you pin down grammar mistakes. Or, if grammar is not your strong suit, hand it off to a friend. That normally helps.
Keep trying! It's almost there.
Thanks! I know this really sucks at the time. (I first wrote it very quickly), so any critisism helps.
In should be and. Unless you wanted your character to have a casual twang, than it would be 'n.
Heh. You forgot the quotation mark there, mate.
Why would her head jerk up? wan could be short for many things. wandering, wanning, if you want it to be "wanted," then add the t. the first thing that came into my mind was "wandering," and People are usually interested, not alarmed, if one wanders.
A bit sudden. You made me completely believe that he didn't have any food and all, and then suddenly you slap me with "I'm sorry, I'm lying." Slow it down a little, get us suspicious of him first. Put him through a couple more slips and cover-ups so that we get suspicious of him. Then tell us.
First off, This should be it's own little paragraph. lol.
Second off, put a little more emotion behind it. Ryder should start to panic, and since we like him now, we should, too. obviously, since he was lying, he's running from something.
If Miss _______ has a daughter, she would be a Mrs. lol.
[qoute="Midnight Vampire"]“ You’ll do,” he interrupted. “We have gotten a call that a strange boy talked to you. You let him in. Ma’am, your neighbors thought that he was an enemy trying to get information, since your parents have such a [s]heigh[/s] high position next to the King. Since it could be dangerous for the country, we reported it straight to the King, along with a description. It turns outYou don't need a coma here, mate that teenagerOr here. lol. is wanted. I’m asking to take him to the King, and I need to get into your house.” The King’s Police officer was wrong. He wasn’t asking to get into my house, he was demanding it. [/quote]
"I need to get into your house" Sounds a bit gentle if he's demanding.
Wait, she said his name?
Info dump. If you flood us with sudden information, we tend to skip over it and miss something important. Not something a writer wants.
First off, when the climax is already over, slamming us with the cliffhanger doesn't really work. You can build up another little climax, like Ryder saying something, or the officer pinning him to the wall, or...or...something. Cliffhangers only work in the middle of a climax.
A good read overall, though. I enjoyed it. Stories where a character's on the run are my absolute favorites.
One thing I have to say, though; keep in mind your characters are each a unique person. And when each person is unique, they're going to word things differently and think differently, especially since each character in this story has a completely different background than the other. They're going to take things differently.
Well done, mate!
Please please critique it. I really want to know if this begining is better.
I'm finally editing it! I'll fix the cake thing late ( I rewrote that part, but I don't have it with me). I might mix a few suggestions (I'm trying not to though) then I have to type what happened after this scene. I always forget to type it.
Yeah, about being harsh.Sometimes people have to be like that, it gets the word through. About the whole 'me myself and I' quip that you think is lame, it's there because of the fact that a) she's nervous. I would say that if I was hiding someone- but I'm not normal, then again. B) she doesn't really have a sense of humor ( not a good one) c) I just like it... I'm mean like that. It makes me think of someone really close to me who always said that. I can't really explain it. about the moldy cake thing someone mentioned earlier, I keep forgeting to change it, He really wouldn't eat a cake. He hasn't been on the run for very long, but he's smarter than that. I'll try to edit the characters to actually have personalities *gasp*. Ryder is careless with his tongue ( you'll figure out this later). About how fast this is going. Well, the fact is, they're on the run for the main part of the story, runninng into trouble most of the way, and I don't know how to start so it won't be so fast, if you can give me a good idea I'll think of changing it so it's not so fast. Hhmm, about the thing about the 'king wouldn't care about the boy' well, there's a secret about that. I can't tell you though, because it'll ruin the entire plot. The kick in the head thing, I'll try to fix that.
This is good. But...it seems to missing something. Everything is happening so quickly, like you shoved this story into a washing machine on put on fast-cycle. Slow down, girl. I want to know more about the characters. Who is this girl? Who's the guy? Spend some time building up to the story instead of dunking the reader straight into the action. This is my tried-and-true hierarchy of story writing: Characters first, setting/description second, plot last. You, my friend, seem to have mixed the order up here. I really don't care about the story itself, if I'm not attached to your characters. Fix = spend some more time structuring your characters and world before this scene.
Your dialogue sounded contrived and unrealistic. Listen to the words you have the police officer, Ryder, and your MC speak. Read them out loud. Do they sound like something a person would really say. Dialogue, like speech, has syntax. The syntax here is off. Sometimes the purpose of dialogue isn't to push the story ahead, but to keep your characters talking like real people. Most converstaions you have with friends and family are pretty pointless.
Hungry, hungry, hungry. That's two too many, by anyone's standards. Replace them with alternative words.
The teenager description is totally irrevelent. He's just plain wanted.
This is what I meant by unrealistic dialogue. It just sounds awkward. In my opinion, you could do away with this entire line.
Generally, Kings aren't personally notified about "wanted teenagers". They schmooze politicians and host feasts. The local law enforcement is who'd want this kid.
The "me, myself, and I" quip is lame. Cut it out.
A lot of telling here. Don't tell us what you could show us. Or leave out. Brevity is the soul of wit, my friend. We don't care about this information. This is a story, not a history book! You have the same problem three paragraphs down in p. 13. Too much telling and backstory. Cutting it out or seriously toning it down would help this piece greatly.
That must have been one high kick. What, is this girl a karate mentee, or something? Even Jackie Chan would have a hard time kicking the head of a bad guy at eye level. Just have her hit the police officer on the head with a candlestick or something. Much more realistic.
Anyways, you've got a nice start here. I'm looking forward to more. Sorry to be so harsh with my crit, but you're a good enough writer, I think, to take it.
-Kylan
keep it up, that was really good. Can't wait to find out what will happen. by the way, what's with the whole moldy cakish thing?? No one in their right mind, not even someone who's starving would eat that. By the way if he was always "on the run" wouldn't he know he could get sick?? Anyway, why does he give up so easily when he accidentally gives away his secret?? Wouldn't he try to cover it up a bit more? And why was he so careless to what he says?? Answer me those questions, and I will probably understand those parts a bit more...
--Lucky
This is good. But...it seems to missing something. Everything is happening so quickly, like you shoved this story into a washing machine on put on fast-cycle. Slow down, girl. I want to know more about the characters. Who is this girl? Who's the guy? Spend some time building up to the story instead of dunking the reader straight into the action. This is my tried-and-true hierarchy of story writing: Characters first, setting/description second, plot last. You, my friend, seem to have mixed the order up here. I really don't care about the story itself, if I'm not attached to your characters. Fix = spend some more time structuring your characters and world before this scene.
Your dialogue sounded contrived and unrealistic. Listen to the words you have the police officer, Ryder, and your MC speak. Read them out loud. Do they sound like something a person would really say. Dialogue, like speech, has syntax. The syntax here is off. Sometimes the purpose of dialogue isn't to push the story ahead, but to keep your characters
Was he really that hungry? Ryder had been hungry, but I didn’t know he was that hungry.
a wanted teenager
I shouldn’t have even mentioned I was on the run, I should just have said that I was poor. I’m an idiot
When the King heard of this
I don’t have a teenager other than me, myself, and I, living in my house
The police officer sighed and mumbled something inaudible. He reached for something by his belt, it may have been a gun or a dagger ,you could never tell with the king’s police. Depending on the rank of the officer there were different weapons. Some officers wern’t even important enough for a weapon. Some were helpless if they were caught by an enemy or if someone decided to spring a surprise attack. The officer pulled out a shiny pistol gun. Ryder really was important to the King.
I kicked him in the back of his head before he could even utter a word
I liked it.
Very entertaining
Keep adding to it.
I agree though you need to put more spaces in.
No problem. Always glad to help
:D:D:D:D:D:D:D
Thanks. Sorry about that, like I said, I was in a rush.
Well, I haven't done any critting on it because it looks so...
huge. There's an edit/modify button in the right hand corner of your screen.
Ugh. Man, I knew I did something wrong. But I was being rushed. Is there anything else......anything? Or do I need to reformat it? If I have to reformat it, do I have to post another thread, or can I just edit it somehow?
put a space between paragraphs.
:D:D:D:D It looks huge at the moment 
:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D