Eleven Years Later.
Eden, Capital of Pella.
Her skin was chafing from the rope that hung her against the tapestries. Angry red marks circled her wrists, and her body was a patchwork of purple bruises. Valerio thought she looked less like a dangerous witch, and more like a martyr with her hands stretched to the heavens. Blood dripped off her body like a chalice that overflowed with wine. Her chest heaved slightly, indicating a whisper of life within the woman. Val took her once beautiful face in one hand, his smile the edge of a knife.
“I’m going to ask you one last time,” he whispered, “Where is it?”
The woman smiled and spat a glob of bloody phlegm before his feet. “I’m afraid I can’t recall.” Her words slurred on the vowels, as if her tongue was toying with each letter. Val sighed and took a step back.
“I tried to play nice.” With a flick of his hand, the two guards standing next to him stepped forward. They each grabbed a hold of the woman’s ropes and pulled harshly, making her cry in pain as her arms stretched farther and farther away from her body. The veins in her arms bulged angrily. She clenched her teeth to keep from screaming. Val held up his hand, and the guards stopped. “I really don’t see the point in dragging this out any longer. If you want praise for your stubbornness, then here you have it. Congratulations. You are one of the most stubborn prisoners I have ever tortured. Now tell me: Where is it?”
The woman rolled her head back, her eyelids fluttering. She let out a cold, harsh laugh, one that resembled the sound of metal screeching across steel. “You’re asking the wrong question, prince.”
Val clenched his teeth. “Fine. Who has it?”
The witch shot him an icy glare. “Eleven years. That’s how long I’ve been in this hell. You think your father didn’t ask the same questions? I’ll give His Majesty credit for his... creative methods of interrogation. You’re going to have to try harder, boy.”
Val’s fingers curled into fists, but his chiselled features remained stone cold. “I grow weary of these games.” He nodded to his guards. They bowed and left, leaving the prince and the witch alone in the cavern of stone. “I’ll be honest with you. I have no idea why my father decided to keep you around for so long. You have made your stance as clear as possible.”
The prince stepped closer, his handsome features cloaked in the shadow of the torch light. “Then I had a thought. What would I do in your position? Well, I would do one of two things. One, I’d hide it in a clever little hiding place, far away from anyone’s reach, and plan to come back to it in the future, or two, entrust it to someone very close to me. Now, I doubt it’s the first, since you had very little time to conceal it properly, and a poor little peasant might’ve stumbled upon it and unleashed chaos on the world. So I dug further into the second possibility, and do you know what I found?”
The witch tensed, her hands clenching into fists. Val could just hear her thoughts. Not her. Not her. Not her. Val smiled. It was a cold, humourless smile. “Witches like you don’t have many trustworthy friends. They’d have to be very close to you, maybe even living under the same roof as you. So I revisited your little potion shop. You can imagine my delight when I found a pretty young lady working there who had a remarkable resemblance to you. Quite a spell you put on her, too. Nobody would suspect a girl they couldn’t remember.”
The witch thrashed against her restraints. “You'll regret this.” She growled in a tone that promised blood.
“No, I don't think I will." Val reached to touch the witch's cheek. She shrank away from his touch. "It seems that you have exhausted your use to me. I've waited a long time for this. You see, I have a few tricks up my sleeve. This one I reserved especially for you.” The prince lifted his hand and a small blue flame materialized in his palm. The witch’s eyes grew wider as the flame licked the air and took the form of a sharp dagger. Before she could let out a scream, the dagger flew and embedded itself in the woman’s stomach.
Horrible gurgling noises bubbled past the blood in her mouth. Her eyes rolled backwards, showing the whites. Val waited until the thrashing stopped before wiping droplets of crimson from his face, clicking his tongue at the ruined fabric of his sleeve. “Witches,” he muttered, “always getting their blood everywhere.”
Val strode out of the torture chamber, his guards alert on either side of the doorway. “Go clean the mess. And send somebody for Zephyr.”
The burlier guard cocked his head. “What would you like us to do with the body, Your Majesty?”
Val didn’t bat an eyelash. “Burn it.” Without explaining further, Val strode away from the dungeon, kicking a stray black cat out of his way. It hissed at him and scurried into the darkness.
___
A/N: Eek! First chapter is officially done. I actually have a lot of chapters written already, but I'm going to restrain myself from uploading them all at once. Let me know what you think! I love getting feedback, whether it's constructive criticism or general questions. Again, thanks for reading, and I hope to see you in future chapters!
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
Possible AI signals:
Original Text:
Are you sure you want to delete this comment? This cannot be undone.
Mark this comment as a review? Points will be awarded to the poster.
Your comment was posted, but it wasn’t long enough to count as a review. Reviews need about four complete sentences (at least 250 characters). Try writing another review that explains your thoughts in more detail — the author will appreciate it, and you’ll earn points for it.
125,005 Literary Works • 672,805 Reviews
Hey! Ashlingwolf here for review day!
Let me tell you, I haven't read the prologue to this story. I don't know exactly what it's about- but I really want to. I found this story really interesting, really engaging, and very well written.
I don't know why it's so appealing, but the trope of those in power being evil (in this case the monarchy), is so appealing to me.I find that it really gives space for good stories that I tend to enjoy. I am also excited for when we find whoever this girl is- if she means a lot, she must be important. I do wish to see more of the black cat. I'm not sure how yet. I'll figure it out.
I didn't find any grammatical errors, but I could have missed something, so I'll just say, like always, always remember to proofread!
I really want to continue reading this story, and I am excited for more to be uploaded. I'll have to satisfy myself reading the prologue.
Keep writing, and please notify me when the next installment is up!
-ashlingwolf
Thanks so much ashlingwolf! I'm really glad you enjoyed it
The prologues definitely do help set up the story, so check them out if you ever have the time! Again, thank you for reading and the next installment should be up very soon!
Thanks so much ashlingwolf! I'm really glad you enjoyed it
The prologues definitely do help set up the story, so check them out if you ever have the time! Again, thank you for reading and the next installment should be up very soon!
Hey intrastellar! (cool name btw xD) My name's Jhinx and I'm gonna try to give you some hopefully constructive critiques to better help your story. I understand that you've actually written quite a bit of this, just haven't posted it all yet. However, whenever you go back through and edit this story, hopefully my tips may help!
I haven't reviewed in quite a bit, so I may be a little bit rusty. First things first, some disclaimers: I haven't read the Prologue parts yet. I'll do so later and maybe review them as well, but this will be my first impression on your story and characters. Also, I'm reviewing as I read, so if there's a plothole that might get explained later on that I make of a note of, please just excuse that.
Anyway, let's get started.
Alright, so I'm a stickler for beginnings. I believe it's really the most important part of the chapter, or even story, and you must make an impression on the reader.
Unfortunately, this introduction was a little lackluster, and let me explain why.
You had nice imagery here, but the whole scene was muddled by this line here:
"Her wrists were beginning to chafe from the rope that hung her against the tapestries."
When you use words like "beginning to" or "starting to" as an adverb to another verb, it weakens the verb. So, while in other circumstances the verb "chafe" would be have strong imagery and be a great way to start this scene, it gets muddled with the addition of "beginning to". If you can, either omit the adverb or try to find a better verb to explain the situation of starting to chafe.
These two sentences have something in common. It seems like you're trying really hard to get powerful imagery, but failing to do so. I don't see how someone can look like a martyr, nor how blood can drip off her body like a chalice overflowing with wine, as it wouldn't exactly be dripping.
This serves no purpose other than telling the reader this person is a prince. It's an awkward sentence which could be better said as "I can't seem to catch a break with you, can I?" or something along those lines. This just seems painfully obvious right now.
Now, see, this would have been a much better way to tell the reader Val is a prince. It's a good sentence full of character and does much better than the earlier sentence. If you want to be even snarkier, you could add italics to "prince", making it seem like this woman thinks Val isn't good enough or something along those lines.
This is another example of what feels like you trying too hard at providing imagery. For one, predators smiling before pouncing on their prey just makes me laugh, ruining any kind of tension that was there. I think you would have been just fine with saying it was a cold smile.
See, I have a problem with this, character-wise. If I were that witch, I wouldn't give into the prince's toying with me even if he had supposedly found whatever I hid. Because maybe he hadn't and he's just luring me into telling him where it's at. She's been at the game of receiving torture a long time, this just feels too fake.
This was funny and a nice way to end the chapter. I assume you are hinting at black cats being an old wives' tale of bad luck. Or maybe the cat has some sort of importance later! Maybe it's a character who can transform into a cat xD
Overall, I did quite like this chapter! It's a little short but it kept my attention the entire time, which I can't say for much other stories. Your beginning was weak, and it felt like it was trying too hard to have imagery in it. It did get better as the story progressed though. The only other major complaint I had was how out-of-character it felt when the witch threatened the Prince. She was calm and collected just before, and I assume she was being tortured for awhile. Why did she spill the beans now?
This feels like set-up to make that other witch the main character. I do hope you won't make her a Mary Sue.
I might read the prologue and I will look forward to reading the rest <3
Hi Jhinx, thank you so much for your review! I appreciate your honesty, and of course I'm constantly on the lookout for ways to improve my writing. I did take heed of your suggestions and I'm definitely going to keep them in mind while I edit. I do hope you stick around for future chapters! Again, thanks for reading
Side note: let's just say that the black cat will appear again very soon *hint hint wink wink*
I'm looking forward to it! I'm going to read through the prologue and I can give you a bit more analysis then. I'm looking forward to the next chapters!