Exile (Open to two)

[black shadow]

Black Shadow looked at Ashla as she said "This is it. We're at a dead end, we have to face him..." He pulled out his bow and redied an arow. okay, he has strenth, but there's two of us. all we need to do is surprise him. He thought to himself as he fired his arrow. The leader easily sliced the arrow in mid air, stopping it in its path. "Hahaha, you think that one of your silly arrows will kill me... Ardon Firil." The man said with a devilish smile on his face. Black Shadow's anger towards this man grew incredibly after he heard hs name repeated. You little son of a... calm down, calm down. You'll never win with anger. The leader charged, his sword held high in the air. Black Shadow took out one of his arows and ducked below the swing of the worriors sword. as he passed by, he stabbed the horses leg, sending the man flying off the edge. Black Shadow walked over to the cliff, caught off guard when the man grabbed his leg while holding onto a fine. He struggled to maintain balance. He pulled away, also pulling up the leader himself. Black Shadow used another arrow to stab the rider in the hand, causing him to release his leg, giving him time to take a few steps back.

[Ashla]

Ashla sneaked up behind the leader while he was painfully pulling the arrow out of his hand, she tightened the grip on her sword and dealt a death blow. He quickly turned around though and pulled out his own blade, blocking her sword, "Silly girl, do you think you can really stop an experienced bounty hunter like me?!" he mocked her.

Ashla's eyes darkened, I'm not just a silly girl! she placed her other hand on her short sword, spitting in his face.

He spit back at her, "I see your sneaky hand doing it's sneaky trick! Don't think I'd fall for that old trick again!"

Ashla smirked, "Maybe not, but with such a nerve-pulling person like me as your advocacy, who knows? I have a couple more surprises up my sleeves." she let him push her long-sword away from him and she pulled her long-knife up. Both her blades met his again for only a second before he pushed them away again and aimed for her head. The agile teen back flipped away from him and went up to him pulling another front attack, he easily blocked her quick blows and tried to hit her. Ashla blocked and again their blades were in a block.

The leader smirked at her, "I can see your an agile one, missy." he surprised her by pulling out an arrow and stabbing her leg. Ashla cried of pain and dropped her weapons, she looked up to see him swing at her again, Ashla barely dodged him. With her good leg, she kicked his sword out of his hand and drew her small knife she had recently acquired from a blacksmith at the bazaar, running up to him, desperately trying to stab him. Ashla was weakened now, her leg injury was bugging her mad despite her attempt at resistance. This man grabbed her hand and twisted her arm. Ashla dropped the blade and fell to her knees. She looked up to her winning opponent wondering, Where was Black Shadow?

[black shadow]

Black Shadow pulled out another arrow as he watched Ashla's arm be twisted by the man. He slowly moved closer, and just before the breaking point of Ashla's arm, he released the arrow, sending it into the back of the man. He yelled in pain and relesed Ashlas arm. He then threw the arrow Black Shadow had stabbed him in the hand with earlier, connecting with Black Shadow's arm. Black Shadow threw his hand to his wound. Gah! Dang! He took out another arrow and thoguth to himself, Any last words as he released it, killing the now defenseless man.

After this looked at his wound. I'm going to need medical help for this to heal. He looked at Ashla and saw her clutching her leg. She'll need some too. He walked over to the horse and lead it to Ashla, motioning her to get on it. he then took out an arrow and began writing in the dirt.

Take this horse and head to the nearest town. Get that leg healed, you won be able to walk if you don't. Take care of yourself, I hope we meet again someday.

[Ashla]

Ashla's eyes widened at what he wrote, she looked up at him and noticed his own injuries, "But you need a medic too!"

Ashla knew that she hated it when she had been abandoned in the past, she couldn't let the same happen to this man. The memory briefly flashed in her head:

"No! Julius, save me!" Ashla gasped as the men grabbed her. He bowed his head in silence, "I can't... I'm sorry."

Ashla's eyes widened as she realized, "You- You betrayed me! How could you!?" he had no time to reply though as the men took him away.

In the real world, Ashla chocked as she came back to reality, "Julius..."

Black Shadow's eyes showed confutation. Ashla realized she had said his name aloud and shook her head, "Forget that last part- come with me."

[black shadow]

[/I]Black Shadow listened to Ashla say "Julius." Julius? Who the heck is julius? He then heard her tell him to come with her. Black Shadow began to write again.

I... I can't. I can't show my face in civilization. Not yet anyways. My injury, it's fine, I'll be fine.

As he wrote the last part he looked up at Ashla with a clearly noticable fake smile. He then noticed the hard look of determination filling Ashla's face. Dang! I'm not going to change her mind. He thought to himself as he jumped back onto the horse with his strong hand. He then motioned his hand forward, telling Ashla to go to the next town for help. Enough had happened today and he hoped for the rest to go by like a normal day.

[Skie and Avery]

Plot ~ 10/30

Story ~ 3/10 – I feel like there was a lot of untouched potential. What story you had here was completely overshadowed by the lack of story clarity and clipped writing.

Setting ~ 3/10 – The setting wasn't really mentioned or used much. There were plenty of opportunities - peering through bunches of leaves, the sounds and smells of the horses, even the way riding a horse feels. When Black Shadows writes on the ground, have you ever written in the dirt with a stick? The stick drags, there are little weeds in with the soil, and the furrows of dirt that get kicked up around the stick can tumble and obscure letters and lines. These are just little details that can make the story come alive for your readers.

Pacing ~ 4/10 - The pacing wasn't terribly bad, though with the lack of detail it did feel rushed. I felt you did better towards the end, because black shadow and BlueGhost seemed to just work very well together to play off of each other and write a cohesive scene, which was something that I felt was missing in the first couple of pages of the thread.

Character ~ 9/30

Communication ~ 3/10 – I liked that Black Shadow tried multiple avenues to communicate with Sentinel and Ashla. Sign language and writing things down were great ideas for expression of a mute character, but you have to understand realism. You wrote your entire life history in the dirt. A suggestion, go outside sometime and write these things in the sand or soil, see how long it takes, how difficult it is, how HUGE the area of writing is, and most of all, how it makes you feel to huddle over, crabwalking along as you scrawl with a stick. Because this is the way you communicate, these are the things that need to be taken into account when you use this method. I liked that Sentinel inferred at first and when Black Shadow started writing, felt proud that he'd been correct.

Action ~ 2/10 – You lost a lot of points here for lack of good description. At one point, black shadow wrote that he killed two guards. Just one sentence, like that. Well, how? I also thought it was seriously cliched that just as he said that they were safe, here come guys on horseback! They get killed and there's just enough time for this ridiculously time consuming explanation and everyone to come to an understanding of the simple facts of the situation before they're attacked again. Some chaos, but not really a level of it that draws me in or makes me even apprehensive for the fate of our heroes.

Persona ~ 4/10 - I didn't really get a feel for black shadow's personality. Is he a hero, a villain, an antihero? I felt like Sentinel was able to give him more of a personality than came through in black shadow's writing when his character felt confusion and questioned black shadow's nature. Ashla's personality was consistent in that it was vapid, but the glimpses into her backstory didn't contribute much to the character when they weren't elaborated on.

Prose ~ 7/30

Mechanics ~ 2/10 – There were a great many mistakes, especially between BlueGhost and black shadow. You definitely want to know the meaning of the words you use. At one point it was said that black shadow sprawled towards something and back, which gave me the mental image of him doing an open-armed worm across the forest floor. Hilarious, but likely not what you were going for. BlueGhost said at one point that she saw confutation in Black Shadow's eyes. Hey, that's a real word, but likely not something you're going to see in someone's expression. There were a lot of words that weren't misspelled but misused, or misspellings that Spellcheck wouldn't catch (like using fine instead of vine). A lot of commas weren't used correctly, as well as run-on sentences or times where a period was just left out when it was obvious that a single sentence was meant to be two or three. These are all small things that really distract the reader from being able to get into the story and enjoy it.

Clarity~ 2/10 – What clarity? There are two instances here that really struck a nerve with me. One was when Ashla and Black Shadow were on horseback. From reading, I thought that BS was in the front, and Ashla behind him. She was able to engage in swordplay with a rider that came up behind them. And then somehow she was able to take the reins while he shot arrows, but there was no mention of how awkward it was, that Ashla's face ended up in his armpit and she couldn't see, how BS had to twist his body to shoot, how that might have affected him. And then his hand was on her shoulder? Did he reach back or was he suddenly behind her? I just don't understand.

Secondly, no one seemed to be able to keep straight if the attacking party were the guys Black Shadow's father had sent after him, bandits that had been at war with Black Shadow's people, bounty hunters also after Black Shadow, or just city guards that were jerks and had for some reason kidnapped Ashla because she didn't have any food?

Technique ~ 3/10 - There was no real technique here. Sentences tended to be simple, and there was no description. Just using writing techniques such as metaphor (comparing the approaching hoofbeats of the guards' horses to an oncoming storm, for instance) will not only add a richness to your writing but help the setting come alive and earn a better score not only here but also under Story. I'm not saying that your writing style needs to be flowery and filled to the brim with description. One member here once wrote five pages describing a drop of water falling. There is such a thing as too much, but what you have here feels more like a skeleton - an outline of writing - than the finished product.

Wildcard: 3/10 - I wanted to like this, I really did. However, it felt incomplete and not for a lack of ending. I think you're moving in the right direction, and I'm looking forward to seeing you improve.

Total ~ 29/100

black shadow gains 600exp and 150gp
Sentinel gains 464exp and 140gp
BlueGhostofSeaside gains 232exp and 70gp

[Letho]

EXP/GP added.