Here is chapter 5 of "Witch" - after some past reviews i have went back and edited chapters 1-4. Please review and leave comments.
Chapter 5
Precognition
The pale, dead moon shone impertinently down on me; the thin slivers of perfect white lighting a fraction of my way… Was I dreaming?
The forest was so dense; the huge pine tree’s towered, menacingly, above me, as I raced through the brush and undergrowth. I dragged myself - half running, and half stumbling. The moonlight soon becoming a distant memory, as the thick green trees grew closer and closer together. Why was I so heavy? Why was I clanking?
Looking down at my wrists, I found the source of the clanking. Thick, black metal chains bound my wrists, as purple and black bruising formed beneath them. Ouch.
Surrendering to my fatigue, I slumped against a tree, the chains sending a resonating sound around me. I had to get them off.
Magic wouldn’t work - it didn’t even dent them. Beginning to panic I grasped a nearby rock and started pounding at the chains, the echo of grinding metal stinging my ears as gold sparks flew occasionally upon impact.
It wasn’t working.
The realisation that I was trapped didn’t take long to register, but it was just a dream…I would be out of here in no time.
My usual dreams I could never remember. I knew they once existed but the more I tried to remember, the more they dissipated like smoke.
I felt sticky; my clothes (what was left of them) clung desperately to my body. They were torn, the bottom of my pants were charred a deep brown and my white shirt bore evidence to slashes and tears.
Looking down at my body closely, I noticed the damp burgundy stains that nearly consumed my clothes… I was covered in blood. Was the blood there a second ago?
“Tristan?”
The voice was so familiar, it was my voice. Was I talking in my sleep?
This question was soon addressed by a bright white light which travelled at an alarming speed towards me, bobbing and weaving through the tree’s without breaking stride. The angel-like figure stepped graciously towards me, its feet leaving the ground undisturbed.
The figure soon took form, it was me… at least I thought it was.
Bending down to my slumped level, my doubles face stared directly into mine.
My twin put a finger to my lips as I tried to speak, making a shushing sound with its tongue; it took its finger away, leaving behind a cold sensation.
I complied; instead of speaking I studied the figure meticulously, which made my heart slow indifferently.
My twin was soaking wet, his hair, his clothes and his body were dripping with ice-cold water. His face…my face, had adopted a deadly shade of pale, which seemed to have a blue tinge. His lips were a deep purple, as blood poured profusely from the top of his head. The heavy rubies slid rapidly down my twin’s face, staining his glowing white form uninterestedly.
I shivered with disgust; the blood had resulted in a sour copper smell filling my senses. I moved forward to comfort him, to try and warm him. My twin placed his left hand on my chest, his wrist mirroring the bruising on mine. I stayed still.
“He’s coming.”
I woke slowly- my mind refusing to let me leave the dream. I was soaked with cold salty sweat, which glistened in the golden morning sunrise, which threw itself through my French doors and spilled onto my bed.
He’s coming.
The words were a quick whisper, which pierced my mind…
He’s coming.
The grandfather clock read 6am. School didn’t start till 8:30. Sliding out of bed my muscles groaned in protest – apparently not yet used to the early morning’s that came with the new house and life package.
My room was my sanctuary, it was small and cramped and old – it suited me perfectly. Varnished oak bookcases lined most of the walls, leaving room only for my desk, my bed and my double French doors that provided a panoramic view of the back and front gardens.
The balcony was consumed and drowned by a cascade of emerald green ivy, which twisted and wound itself among the yellow daisies and red roses that grew just beneath my window.
He’s coming.
Pushing the thought to the back of my mind, I swung the door’s open and stepped outside, some of the snow had melted overnight; the once perfect canvas of white was now blemished with spattered images of rock and earth.
I shivered, the cold air slid down my spine like a serpent, sending winter’s venom though my near naked body.
The sunrise cast a momentary orange glow, before the remains of the snow reflected it and produced an eternal brightness, sighing I turned back into my room, and swept over to my wardrobe.
My cat, Tabitha still dozed lazily at the foot of my bed her agile and delicate body resting more like a corpse, rather than a sleeping cat. I often found myself longing to be like her, her black coat and white paw socks daringly beautiful, and softly hinting at her deep grace.
Most cats are graceful- but Tabitha puts them to shame, her quick and steady motions like that of a contract killer blended well with her floating feather like movements. Unlike me, she never fell, never tripped and never slipped. Instead she glided like an ice skater, fluidly and confidently.
Emily chirped animatedly all the way to school. I wanted to humour her, but my head pounded and throbbed with pain leading me to nod and sigh at the appropriate points in conversation. She didn’t even seem to notice, gaining full stride her in speech about some TV show.
Jake met us as we got off the bus; sweeping Emily into his arms he planted a deep kiss upon her, her hands engulfing themselves in his long shaggy blonde-brown hair.
“Mornin’ Tristan” he said to me, before taking Emily’s hand and leading us both towards the quad.
Once again, I was greeted by stares and whispers – I was still the new toy in the nursery. Shaking it off I walked with a straight back and smile, trying to seem confident. A reflection in a window confirmed I looked more ‘Pot-smoking weirdo’ then a ‘confident-not-minding-the-stares’ teenager. I decided to drop the act.
People didn’t stare and talk as much as they did yesterday. I was still feeling uncomfortable. All morning I looked forward to lunch, to socialise blindly without thinking up answers in class.
Lunch came none too soon, Jake and Emily introduced me to some more people, and their names vanished from my mind in seconds. I felt sluggish and agitated.
The dream had exhausted me more than I thought, my head still pounded and now I felt like I had a balloon in my stomach, expanding and reducing in seconds...I felt sick.
Lunch at the quad was cancelled today; black storm clouds loomed threateningly above the school, and sure enough in seconds, fat drops of winter rain threw themselves toward earth. Perfect
We sat at a table near the back, jamming myself on a chair between a pillar and the table; the bright lights in the room stung my eyes and caused my mild headache to morph into a full blown-migraine.
I’d experienced head aches like this before, usually when using a lot of magic; I hadn’t used much in the past couple of days. I was being good. The risk involved in using magic...this risk of being caught was too great. So it must have been medical rather than magical.
He’s coming
My head banged like a salvation army drum, grasping at my bag I pulled my bottle of mineral water out, without thinking I slid my fingers down the side, throwing caution to the window, the magic inside me exercised easily, reducing the temperature to minus 5 degree’s Celsius.
HE’S COMING.
The whisper became a scream; I instinctively threw myself backwards to escape my own voice shouting, “He’s coming”, in my head. The bottle of water toppled weakly as I pushed myself away from the table, the room becoming far too bright and vivid.
Turning quickly I searched for the nearest exit, it was so warm.
Was it warm?
Was I warm?
I couldn’t think, my mind still screamed
HE’S COMING.
“Tristan, are you okay?” Emily’s voice rang through my ears, high and clear it caused me to retch in response. The noise was too much, too loud and too close. The room seemed to be breathing, the walls and furniture growing bigger and smaller as my vision blurred.
The voices around me erupted into a frenzied, deafening buzz. I had to escape the penerating din, the blurrs and detailed color. I had to escape. The pounding in my head was sure to cease if I could just get outside. I scrambled for the door, my body feeling heavier with every step I took. The door was mere inches away. Almost there.
HE’S COMING.
My hands flew to my head. The pain was like bright steel, eyes watering I tried to find my footing. The room was now spinning indefinitely, people were now blurred splodges of colour as I continued to search. I had to get out. The pain inside my head grew with every second, my skull felt like it was going to explode
HE’S COMING. HE’S COMING.
My body jerked rapidly. The edges of my vision became black. The buzzing continued to escalate, like that of one thousand irascible bees invading my ears. My body stiffened. Then relaxed, my mind wandered into the darkness of my vision, the light hurt my head, and the darkness shielded me. I fell towards the floor.
I missed the floor.
Someone was holding me, there arms underneath my knee’s and upper back. I couldn’t look; my head still sang the song of pain, opening my eyes to face the light would cause it to sing louder. I didn’t even know if I was conscious, the buzzing still performed an assault on my ears.
“I’ve got you,” the words glided through the buzzing seamlessly. The voice was cool, even and English. I couldn’t think beyond the fact that I was safe, and the buzzing had stopped.
I slipped nonchalantly into unconsciousness.
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
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Original Text:
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125,018 Literary Works • 672,861 Reviews
I have to say i took great offense to this, callous statement. I know its just an opinion, but you say it as if it were gospel...as if it were fact that only in chapter 5 my work got good. I am DELIBERATELY taking this slow, as this is a BOOK i am writing, not a short story. If you look at most good writers, they don't splash out the entire storyline straight away.
I would ask you, in future if you are going to review my work, to be a a lot more empathetic, and alot less callous towards me, thank you.
Hi
sorry I took a while to review! This story just keeps getting better and better!
When you say ‘my way’ it sounded kind of strange to me, I think something like ‘the way ahead of me’ or ‘the path ahead of me’ might be better
So as not to repeat ‘wrists’ maybe ‘bound them’ then just leaving out the ‘them’ on the end of the sentence.
I think you could maybe add something in here showing how he tries to get them off using magic, like saying how he strained to use him mind, maybe beads of sweat breaking out on his forehead or something like that to show the struggle.
I think this might sound better phrased differently, maybe ‘I never usually remembered my dreams.’
I’m not sure about ‘desperately’ here as you are personifying the clothes but I don’t know if it works. I think it might be better to just have them doing something else so you are not using personification, like clinging ’uncomfortably’ or something to describe how the character feels
As you have said ‘looking’ for when he see’s the chains, I’d maybe change this one to something like ‘peering’.
I’m not sure about ‘with its tongue’, it sounded like a bit of strange action to me. Maybe you could leave it as ‘making a shushing sound’. When you say ‘cold sensation’ what type of sensation? I think it would be better to describe it. Like ’cold tingling’ or ’a strange coolness’ or ’a cold numbing’ or something like that.
I’d maybe change the last part of this to just ‘with a blue tinge’ so that the sentence runs more smoothly.
I think you should have about the blood as the first thing as it is what you would notice as soon as you saw someone. I’m not that sure about the metaphor of the rubies as well, I think you really do have a way with description but it just seemed a bit too strange an image for me. Something that is more likely to be associated with blood, for instance the colour so saying something about ‘the thick ruby liquid’ or something like that might be more effective. I’m not sure about ‘uninterestedly’ on the end here, again you are personifying the blood and I think it would be better not to. I’d probably just leave it out.
As you just say ‘smell’ I would maybe change ‘senses’ to something like ‘nose’ or ‘nostrils’.
I think you could add more to how the twin appears when he says this to make the moment really dramatic, like commenting on how their eyes lock or how his voice sounds. I think you could perhaps add ’to stop me’ or something like that after ’my chest’- just to show more clearly his intentions, but it’s not necessary
I wouldn’t repeat ‘which’ here, perhaps you could rearrange the sentence a little so that ‘I was soaked with cold salty sweat’ is a sentence on its own, then changing ‘which’ to ‘it’ and maybe the other ‘which’ to ‘that’. So all in all something like this- ‘I was soaked with cold salty sweat. It glistened in the golden morning sunrise that threw itself through my French doors and spilled onto my bed.’
I think this might sound better as something like ‘The words were a quick whisper piercing my mind.’ I’m not sure about the ellipses here, I think the sentence might sound better without it.
The balcony was consumed and drowned by a cascade of emerald green ivy,
I’d pick either ‘consumed’ or ‘drowned’ as otherwise you are mixing your metaphors and I think it would be better to just stick to one to present a clearer image, ‘drowned’ might be best as you say ’cascade’ which can be associated with water
Instead of ‘spattered images’ maybe just ‘spatters’ would sound better.
Like I said before, your description is brilliant but I’m not sure if it is a little over the top here, its not really that daring an image. I think you could simplify it a bit.
I think ‘simply’ might work well added after ‘leading me to’ or something like that. ‘her’ and ‘in’ need to swap places.
‘engulfing themselves’ sounded kind of odd to me, maybe ‘losing themselves’?
You need a full stop or comma on the end here
I think you could join these sentences together and maybe change ‘stare’ to something else as you quite recently used that word. For example- ‘People didn’t watch and talk as much as they had yesterday, but I was still feeling uncomfortable.’
I’m not sure about ‘blindly’, perhaps ‘easily’ or ‘lazily’ or something like that.
The dream had exhausted me more than I thought,
Maybe ‘more than I had originally thought’ or something like that would be better to show that it was what he was previously thinking.
I’m not certain but maybe ‘every few seconds’ or ‘repeatedly’ might be better here than ‘in seconds’.
I think ‘when’ might be better as ‘after’ as I think that’s what he means, that the effects show up afterwards.
I’d maybe leave out ‘this risk of’.
Do you mean ‘wind’? That’s a more commonly used saying
This sounded a bit awkward to me, I’d maybe work on rephrasing it. Here’s an example- ‘I instinctively threw myself backwards to escape the words being shouted in my head.’ You don’t really need to repeat the actual words as you have already said them
I’d maybe change the second ‘the door’ to ‘it’ as it is already clear what you are talking about and saves repeating it.
I don’t think you need ‘that of’ here, the sentence might run smoother without it.
I’d have ‘then relaxed’ as one sentence, maybe adding ‘I’ before ‘relaxed’. I’d maybe specify where the light is- like ‘the light from the room’ or something like that and I’m not sure about ‘I missed the floor’ as he doesn’t really miss it- he’s just caught before he hits it. Something like ‘I fell toward the floor… But never reached it.’ would make more sense.
You repeat ‘buzzing’ here a few times, maybe you could change one or two? For instance the second one could be ‘the words glided through the noise seamlessly.’. ‘sang the song’ sounds kind of gentle to me, maybe something on screeching would be more appropriate
Overall: You managed to show his collapse really well, you painted a very clear picture for the reader and made it feel as if you were really there. This is a great piece of work! I know you were feeling uncertain about your story but I think you are doing brilliantly, I hope you stick with it
I’d think about having the dream in italics just to show it is the dream and separate it more from when he wakes up, I thought the dream was a nice way of introducing this chapter though
I thought it was a nice ending having Nick step in, but I was confused before this as to where he was. I thought Tristan really liked him so despite having a headache (as it only gets a lot worse when they are sitting down) I would thought he would have mentioned him. Perhaps some thoughts from Tristan’s perspective on Nick would help to keep him in the picture, especially as they had seemed so wrapped up in each other the day before
You are still having similar problems with punctuation, I haven’t picked them out as I am not great at it myself but I know there are quite a few mistakes with commas and full stops and things like that. I really would advise working on that as it really gets in the way when reading if the punctuation is not correct.
Other than that, I am loving it
The sunrise cast a momentary orange glow, before the remains of the snow reflected it and produced an eternal brightness, sighing I turned back into my room, and swept over to my wardrobe.
look at that... one sentence. Read through it and break it up!
Emily chirped animatedly all the way to school.
This change was very sudden... What happened the rest of the morning? He was thinking about his cat... then >BAM< He's at school, reflecting on the bus ride! Think about it... what happened in those 2 hours?
Okay... just a quick one this time!
Well, this was much better! I enjoyed it, and the language you used pulled me into the moment... just when I thought I wan's going to get anything good from you!
Well, you proved me wrong. I would continue reading if this were a book, but it's not. One thing though: Why did you have to wait untill the 5th chapter to make it good? Your forst 2 were okay, then the next to (Sorry to say) but a little bit boring and confusing.,.. but your 5th is great! How come it took you this long to get into the story?
Well. it's night time where I am - so I have to go. Great chapter though!