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Young Writers Society



Hexachord 4 & 5

by sworddance


Here's the next bit of Hexachord, for all those who are interested :D hehe crits are appreciated on this, as always; if you're looking for the other sections, here are the links. ;) thanks for reading =)

Prologue and section one:

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Sections 2 & 3

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Monday morning, Katie returned, relieved to find Cloasia all in one piece. That afternoon, she’d again invited him to ride with her, and he’d accepted with better grace than before- a fact Katie had been quite pleased by.

She’d saddled Flyer and led him out of the stables to see Cloasia waiting there with his mare, Nalani. He wasn’t paying attention to her, for he was standing next to his horse, leaning on the saddle with his arms crossed, staring at something.

Katie paused and followed his gaze, curious. He appeared to be watching Michael as she drilled now both Robin and Jonaleon.

Katie gave a start and looked back at Cloasia. For once, he looked neither angry, nor contemptuous, nor aloof. The look on his face was almost… tender?

Katie blinked as if to clear her vision and looked again. Yes, it was still there. But… mingled with something else.

Sorrow?

Katie stared, and finally drew Flyer near. Cloasia turned, his usual aloof expression back in place by the time she got there.

“Let’s go,” he said brusquely, and swung himself into the saddle.

Katie waited until they’d gone down the road a ways, then asked, “Hey Cloasia… what do you think of Michael?”

He started slightly, then shrugged carelessly. “She’s pretty, I guess.”

“You think so?”

“I guess.”

Hiding a grin, Katie commented, “She doesn’t think she is.”

Cloasia all but halted his mare in surprise. “She doesn’t? Why not?”

Katie shrugged. “I don’t know. Do you really think so?”

Cloasia scowled. “Of course she is.”

Katie suppressed her giggle and fell silent.

After a long pause, Cloasia said, “She doesn’t like me.”

Katie looked at him, catching the too-casual tone. “What makes you say that?” she asked carefully.

He curled his lip. “She told me so yesterday.”

Katie’s heart plummeted. “She did?” she asked quietly.

“Yeah. She said she doesn’t like me, and she doesn’t trust me. She told me to stay away from her, and to leave Jon alone. She said if I were smart, I’d keep as much distance between her and me as possible, and that if I didn’t believe she could harm me, all I had to do was ask around. She also said that it’s now her blades and dragon’s rage that stands between me and Jon, and that I’d best not give her more reason to want to kill me,” he went on, a trace of bitterness and anger in his otherwise bland voice.

Katie looked down, knowing full well that Michael would have said those exact words if Cloasia gave her reason to. “I’m sorry, Cloasia,” she whispered.

“It’s not like I care,” he snapped, pushing Nalani ahead of her a little so she couldn’t see his face.

****

Back at the castle, the drilling had stopped for a short break, and the conversation had turned to Jon’s half-brother.

“I worry about Katie, all alone with him all the time,” Michael admitted, glaring off into the woods where they had gone.

“I have a watch on her, Michael,” Robin said, tapping her head.

“I know, I just… I look at him, and my own warning signals tell me to gut him before he does something to hurt someone,” she said, gritting her teeth in frustration. “I mean, I look at him, and I never see anything… good. He just seems so wrong to me. I can’t see any good in him at all. It’s almost… evil,” she ended softly.

“I know what you mean, Michael,” Jon told her gently. “I’ve known him for years and always felt the same thing. There are reasons, reasons I can’t- I can’t tell you, but- I don’t think there is good in him. If there is, it’s well buried. I don’t- I don’t think he even knows what love is.”

Robin’s spine crawled at this, and she lifted her blade. “Katie sees something there, though. Can we get back to our drill?”

They followed her, but Jon added to Michael in a low voice, “There is good reason to think him evil, Michael. He used to do some evil things to people.”

Michael drew her sword. “If I catch him at anything else, I won’t hesitate to kill him,” she stated grimly.

****

Katie lifted her head and wrinkled her nose. “What is that? It smells like-”

“Smoke,” Cloasia interrupted, narrowing his eyes. “There’s a village up ahead a mile or so.”

“A village! Cloasia- we should go look- if there’s a fire, we-”

“Quiet,” Cloasia ordered.

Katie was about to retort when she heard the hoofbeats in the distance; she stared down the road, watching a cloud of dust grow in the road far off as the sound of hoofbeats grew louder and louder. She looked questioningly at Cloasia. “What-”

A small, maniacal smile was playing about his lips. “Raiders.”


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Tue Jun 19, 2007 10:28 am
Twit says...



Nah, this aint cheesy! It's good! If it was cheese or fluff then Id say so, cos I hate both. Cant do a proper ntpk now, but one thing i noticed:

SD wrote:“Silver!” Robin cried, vanishing to reappear on her horse, galloping down the road behind the warrior.


Vanishing to reappear on her horse? There's a few sentances like this that could be reworded. Sorry, cant do them now, but ill try to next week!




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Sun Jun 17, 2007 4:17 am
sworddance says...



heya :D I just realized I'd been neglecting my own threads and popped on to post the next part hehe
well, Shadow, thanks for reading, anyway! rofl well I personally think this next part needs serious work, so... confirm that for me, will ya? And see if you can tell me what to do about it... hehe I dunno. If it is a problem, you'll notice and tell me, I'm sure, but I'm not about to tell you what I think the problem is just yet, else you'll be predisposed to look for it! =P

...and that being said, here's the next bit. Thanks! :D




Robin and Jon lunged, coordinating their attacks on either side of the warrior. They fell back together and swung again when she parried both strikes, watching her movements warily.

“Gods!” Jon panted with an exhilarated grin, “She’s too damn fast.”

Robin withdrew and they circled their friend. Jon lunged- but Robin didn’t move, and for his pains he received a sharp sweeping kick to the legs and hit the ground hard.

“Um, Robin,” he began, staying where he was and scratching the tip of his ear. “What happened to our attack?”

She didn’t answer. Her eyes went wide, staring at something only she could see; the other two went silent immediately.

Robin’s head whipped around. “Raiders!” she hissed.

Michael was over the fence before the word was half finished.

“Jon, get the soldiers!” she barked, going full speed down the road with Robin appearing out of the air hard at her heels.

“Shatahi’la!” she called urgently.

Spirit tore out of the stables, intercepting her rider who performed a flying leap to land on her mare bareback.

“Shatahi’la!”

Spirit responded with a whinny and plunged even faster into the woods.

“Silver!” Robin cried, vanishing to reappear on her horse, galloping down the road behind the warrior.


****


Katie backed Flyer up a step, not liking the look in Cloasia’s eyes as he dismounted, his gaze glued to the approaching threat.

“Cloasia-”

He laughed, a harsh noise which made Katie’s skin crawl. “You might want to get out of here, girl. It’s about to get messy.”

“Cloasia, let’s go-”

Fire sprouted from his fingers as he laughed again. “Go? No. Fun’s about to show up.”

The raiders were close now. They spotted the two in the road and gave a yell, spurring their horses to move faster.

Katie ducked as an arrow flew by her, and scrambled down from Flyer. The jeers of the men grew louder as they caught sight of the young girl, defenseless in the middle of the road.

Katie ran to Cloasia’s side, grabbing his arm. “Cloasia come on!” She yelped and let go as he became unbearably hot, flames licking the length of his body.

As she watched, stunned, he reared back and hurled raw flame at the closest rider, incinerating him in a flash.

The raiding party balked, then someone gave an angry shout and they surged forward, almost upon them now.

Cloasia laughed and sent fire toward another. This one did not die as the other had, but fell from his horse screaming in agony.

Cloasia mercilessly threw bolt after bolt of fire, the heat emanating from him causing Katie to stumble backward to avoid it, covering her eyes. She fell, dragging herself up onto her knees.

“Cloasia- stop- please-

The raiders were all around them, the horses whinnying and rearing dangerously close to her.

Cloasia’s response was to flame harder, his eyes reflecting the blaze before him. With a roar, fire erupted behind him, twisting through the air to form wings of fire upon his back.

Cloasia laughed, reveling in the destruction, raising his hands toward his newest target.

Katie looked desperately in that direction and gasped as she saw one of the captives from the village, bound at the hands and screaming.

“No!” Katie shrieked, and leapt at his hand. She shoved it down, ignoring the pain, and slapped Cloasia hard across the face.

He looked down at her with a snarl, but his eyes cleared a little.

Arrows began to fly again as the raiders regrouped for attack. One long shaft buried itself in Cloasia’s shoulder.

Cloasia growled; his fiery wings hardened into flesh like dragon wings and he scooped Katie up, curling them around her protectively.

With a leap, he began to run down the road. Katie huddled against him in fear, crying out suddenly when she felt the impact of an arrow piercing Cloasia through the chest. He grunted but continued running- two more shuddered through his body; Katie screamed when a fourth came clear through his rib cage.

Over the thudding of his footsteps, the sounds of the pursuing raiders, and the pounding of her heart, Katie suddenly heard a new voice from far down the road.

“Sriiiiiiiiilahi’yehhhhhhh!”

The bloodcurdling war cry rang out through the trees, nearly stopping Katie’s heart.

The raiders skidded to a halt just as Cloasia stumbled, falling flat and sending Katie tumbling across the dirt.

They shouted to each other, real fear in their voices, and wheeled their horses about in a panicked every-man-for-himself retreat, each concerned only with his own flight far from there.

Katie crawled painfully over to the fallen Cloasia, who had rolled onto his side, breath coming laboriously.

“Cloasia,” she whispered, pulling herself up into a sitting position.

He turned his head to look at her. “Hi Katie,” he whispered back.

She took hold of his cheek gently and eased her knees under his head, her heart dropping down to her stomach when she caught sight of the arrow shafts deep in his back, the blood now mixing with the ashes which were all that was left of his wings.

“Cloasia- are you- are-”

He laughed painfully. “Yeah, this is it for me. Nothing you can do.”

She dropped her head, infuriated with the feeling of terrible uselessness stealing over her. “Can’t I get you a healer?”

He curled his lip contemptuously, just as he’d always done. “Do you seriously think a healer can fix this?”

An angry tear slipped down her cheek. “Only if you don’t talk like that. Don’t you want to live, Cloasia?”

This time, his laugh became a choking cough, but he answered, “I don’t know. Should I? Nothing much for me in life anyway.”

“There’s everything for you in life,” Katie said fiercely, clutching his shoulder. “Everything.”

He laughed again, a bitter sound. “Everything. Let’s see. My parents are dead, my half brother and I hate each other. The Queen of Magic is swiftly starting to agree with him. I’m pretty sure I just lost my horse. And we can’t forget, that woman-” His fingers reached toward the arrow through his heart as pain of two kinds seized him. “I didn’t know I could feel love,” he whispered, tears fighting their way out of his eyes, “But I love her, and she doesn’t love me. She’ll never love me. And all I have for anyone else is hate- no one even wants me to live.”

“I want you to live,” Katie argued, raking her fingers through his hair furiously. “And she doesn’t know you. You saved my life. There’s more to you than she knows. I’ll tell her you’re good, she’ll see- Cloasia?”

She grabbed at his arm. “Cloasia- Cloasia can you hear me? Cloasia!”

Frantically, Katie leaned down and pressed her ear to his chest, heedless of the blood.

Nothing.

She stared at him, at his closed eyes and still chest, at the blood pooling around him, and pushed herself away, sobbing. She stood and took a few steps down the road, still looking at him, and suddenly Michael and Robin rode up beside her and dismounted. They stood next to her as she covered her face and wept; Robin’s face was grim, Michael’s an expressionless mask as they gazed down at his corpse.

Jon galloped up in front of a unit of troops, halting just before the girls.

“We cut them off at the curve,” Michael said curtly. “They’re finished.”

Jon nodded and turned to his captain. “Help the captives, then go to the village and do what you can there.”

The captain saluted and led the soldiers around the people on the ground, breaking into a canter as soon as they’d passed.

Jon dismounted and stood with the others, looking down at the bloody body of his half-brother with the same unreadable expression as Michael.

Katie uncovered her face and looked at him, then whimpered and turned away. She took a few shaky steps back in the direction of the village, and stopped as her eyes beheld the sight of Cloasia’s blood on her hands. She closed her fists and looked away, toward the scene of Cloasia’s fiery attack.

The wind swept over her, filling her nostrils with the putrid scent of burnt flesh.

That was too much for her. She retched and covered her mouth, falling to her knees on the side of the road, vomiting. Jon was beside her immediately, holding her steady as her stomach emptied itself of all its content.

Feeling Michael’s arm come over her shoulder, Katie shuddered and fainted. Jon caught her as she fell forward and eased her onto her back.

“Give her to me,” Michael said softly. “Let’s go back.”

Jon nodded and Michael took her friend from him, mounting, and rode away.

“Jon,” Robin suddenly said. “Look.”

Jon turned, and as they stared, Cloasia’s body went up in smoke, leaving nothing but a pool of blood and arrows where it had been.

“He was fire,” Robin said quietly.

____________________

ACK!
Too cheesy? please let me know what you think... I've been struggling with this segment; every time I reread it, it seems too cheesy, but then it doesn't, but then it does, then I can't figure out how to fix it, and... yeah. You get it. Any other thoughts? :D thanks!


~sworddance




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Thu Jun 14, 2007 8:06 pm
Twit wrote a review...



Like it once more! Sorry I can't crit it more thoroughly, but there's nothing to point out! :D That makes it a compliment if you look at it sideways. :wink:

Can you PM me when the next part comes up?




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Thu Jun 14, 2007 7:51 am
SeraphTree says...



I like this part AWWW
anyway.....
Since it's from Katie's point of view, maybe you should show more emotion or thoughts towards the end.
Just an idea ;D





By swallowing evil words unsaid, no one has ever harmed his stomach.
— Winston Churchill