View Full Version : Shards of a Perfect Gem (Solo)
"F-Fina-a-lllly... H-ave h-h--her-r..."
Bloodied once again, aching all over, currently in tears, a young woman panted as she withered over her prize. A young child, a baby in fact, cried out from a basket. Her mother replied.
"I-it's oka-a-ay, H-annuh. The b-bad people - gone n-now..." She pulled the shaking baby out, wrapping it in an extra blanket, and just kept holding her as tears fell. In her own exhaustion, the wounded mother found the strength still to comfort her frightened infant.
Feeling herself rapidly going faint, she lay down. She pulled another blanket from the basket and made a bed for her baby. The mother curled up next to her child. A single, weary arm wrapped protectively around her. She still felt the nausea, the stinging, the internal shock. She shallowly echoed comfort to her child. "I let m-mnever let... happen... again... ..."
"I swear it."
~~~
Raiarea always promised to be an eventful place to be, even if all seemed to be in order. It was in a regular place to be. In a common restaurant, in a common street... heck would break loose...
Under a shabby looking oak building, a young woman played with her child who was safely settled in a basket. Dust collected on the mother's black boots as she happily scuffed in her seat. She chuckled as she pulled a hand into the basket, a baby giggled inside.
It seemed like the perfect picture, but it was doomed to be torn off the canvas...
"Who's the cutest little baby ever, huh? Who's my sweety little pumpkin?? Oh, you are, that's who! Yes you are my cutest little baby doll! Yes you are! Yes you are!"
Ashla Icebreaker didn't care if she looked funny, bent over and tickling the blond bundle inside. As long as it got those adorable, tiny giggles out she was okay. As the baby, Hanuh, laughed and gurgled, her mother found herself chuckling with joy. For the first time in her life, Ashla felt completely lost in happiness and joy. Having her dear child right there with her, she often times felt overwhelmed. This was everything she knew she needed, her precious daughter.
While playing with Hanuh, Ashla's nixstella necklace dangled down. Finding the blue gems shinny, Hanuh simply couldn't resist yanking them.
"Ow!"
Ashla felt like she was being choked! She quickly grabbed her daughter's hand and pried it loose from the necklace's coil. She glared down at the chuckling baby, brown eyes dancing with delight.
Ashla found she couldn't stay angry.
"Hanuh..." Ashla chuckled as she lifted her finger and shook it, "Nuh, nuh."
The blond baby simply snickered some more as Ashla made sure her necklace was still okay. As she evened the jewels out, she heard a small, timid voice from next to her, "Oooh, shiny... Where 'yu git that?"
Ashla's smile faded at first, she turned her head to the voice besides her. The voice belonged to a young boy, no greater than six, who was grubby all over. She realized he was looking at her necklace, the way his blue eyes dazzled.
The Icebreaker smiled and placed a hand on the nixstella strung coil, "You mean this?"
The young elf nodded quickly.
Ashla chuckled and turned to give Hanuh a toy to keep her occupied, a handheld teddy bear with oh, the softest fur one could ever...
Then, Ashla turned to the young boy, "My mother gave this necklace to me. Like you, she was an elf. The jewels on this necklace are called nixstella."
The child appeared to be hypnotized with it, "Ooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhh..."
Ashla smirked, feeling delighted to be the teacher and not the clueless for once. "Nixstella is from the country Eiskalt, where I was born. Rumor says, if you find the perfect spot in those mountains, these clear diamonds shine like rainbows."
The blond boy clapped, "It's very pwitty! Yew aw pretty too!"
Ashla's cheeks went slightly red, she had not expected that last comment, "W-why, tha-ank you!"
So busy enlightening the boy she was, Ashla wasn't paying any attention to her little girl... or the shadowy man right above her...
Duty called when Ashla heard Hanuh start to squirm. She gave the boy a pat on the head, then turned to find that she was in for a storm - flashflood to be exact.
What she saw at first was blurred, but whatever it was, Ashla had looked down to see that her baby was gone! Instantly, the young mother heard her child erupting in terror. She was still in the room. Ashla threw herself onto her feet and rapidly glanced from left to right. All she could find was more people, equally caught up in the sudden chaos in sudden whispers and gasps. It was then though that she heard a door open. Ashla turned to see the door just barely closing... and the crying going faint.
"Hey!" Ashla called, racing after whoever the culprit was. As soon as she got there, the Icebreaker flung the door open. She stormed outside to find... absolutely nothing. Nothing of her child that was. Nothing but passing people on a busy street.
Hanuh was gone.
The desperate mother simply couldn't take it in. Her child was gone. She could only stand there, the screams that precious little girl released haunting her like a ghost. Tears flooded in heavy, dreary eyes. Blinding slowly, she questioned why on earth she'd been so careless. The only clue to be found was several feet ahead of her - a now trampled teddy bear.
It felt like a nightmare. One of those kinds of nightmares you knew you were just dreaming, but was deathly terrifying anyways. The Icebreaker couldn't feel a thing. She felt like a ghost as she walked over to the dropped teddy. She slowly bent over, the sounds of passing people calling her out for getting in the way never reaching her ears.
She picked up the bear. It was filthy, the cotton seeping out through the half torn limbs. It was all she saw. This bear had been Hanuh's very first possession. As a newborn she snuggled beside it. Tears poured from her mother's eyes, Hanuh was lost and it was all her fault.
The Icebreaker slowly stood up, holding the bear with shaking hands. She was still haunted by those so terrible screams... but now the world began to come back to her.
Ashla took steps back up until her back contacted the wall of the inn. One hand held the bear, the other made it to her head in aching wonderings, How can I get her back?
Ashla heard a voice suddenly, "Lost your kid, eh?"
Ashla sharply turned to see a ragged, wrinkled man leaning on the wall at the other side of the door. He smirked, "Do not worry, dearie, she is safe for now."
Ashla's eyes instantly went frost. "What are you doing with her?" She asked in a surprisingly calm tone.
"Eh, keeping her until you come by." The man pushed himself up and handed a peace of paper over to her, "You have twenty four hours. Pay by then or she's history."
The paper was loosely scribbled on, the writing was recently made, most likely this same day. It read:
Meet us on Curel's Hill
Give us 10,000 Solid Gold
Your necklace.
Or else...
After gathering up what she needed, Ashla was off! It had been a good three hours since Hanuh's kidnapping, and her mother was more anxious than ever. She felt so guilty, so guilty she let this happen. For the first time since even before the Eiskalt War, since when she first figured out her true heritage, Ashla truely felt like a failure. The young woman's heart ached, her head cluttered with dust. There was a void deeper than being left with nothing. Ashla lost what felt like everything before. She lost her name as an Icebreaker simply due to heritage. She lost her country, she lost her only home... but actually losing someone dear to her? She never was that close to her cousin Fulgur II, but she felt this deadness inside when he died in the war. She had felt so alone when her uncle died, it was her first time by herself and she had been terrified. But no, this was worse than even her uncle. Far worse. If something went wrong and they killed Hanuh anyways...
She would never forgive herself.
Ashla shook her head as she walked through the forest towards Curel's hill. The dark soil felt like jello under shaking feet, the wind carried the stench of some dead carcass. The trees whispered a dreary song of doom around her. Sunlight beat down from the skies like a beam of drought. There was no comfort here. Nothing could stay the words bombarding the mind.
Worthless! Branch member! Hopeless! Dud! Broken! Filthy! Fake! Unfavorable! Good as dead!
The accused kept getting beat down with claims of guilt. The guilt reigned in her, raining down, until she reached her destination.
It was just a regular hill... aside those heads of long dead dark elves on sticks.
On the other side of top, away from the heads on toothpicks, were a group of elf bandits. There was six of them. Most of them were blonds, two of them being brunettes. One brunette and two blonds were woman, the other three were men. Thry wore common clothes and had axes and oak bows on them, as well as flint knives.
Ashla couldn't help but scoff at them all, So uncivilized...
The forest still contained the stench of the dead, but a much more recent kill than the heads promptly stuck on the hill. A group of crows flew away from the trees, broaking a storm as they went to scavenge dinner. The black crows flew away, shuffling the branches of tainted oak trees, leaving a gap within what was supposed to be silence.
Ashla stood at the bottom, eyes narrowed. She'd spent all her tears. Now, there stood a ticked off mamma who refused to play games.
"Where is she?"
One of the bandits, a heavily built blond, laughed. One of the underweight looking women called out, "Why so hasty, mommy?"
Ashla only blinked, her numbness causing her to easily shrug off the insults. "Where's my daughter?"
The heavily built one spoke, "Well, where's our pay?" He asked.
Ashla was no longer wearing her necklace, she carried a burlap sack in her hands. It was surely the ransom, as she indeed lifted it to show them. A skinnier man grinned and started down the hill to collect it. When he took it from her hands, he didn't seem surprised that it was heavy. He nodded to her, "Our leader is in the Hashkekowyn cave twenty miles from here, same with your child."
Ashla bit her lip... then stomped her foot like a toddler, "She's not here!?"
A brunette man called from above, "Of course not! What would you expect? For us to give you that brat before our pay?" The others burst into laughter. Ashla scowled.
"You don't know who I am, don't you?"
"Yeah," the noisy woman from before jeered again, "You're an anxious, crazed mommy. The perfect bait for ransom bidding."
Ashla let out a low pitched growl, "I am an Icebreaker of Eiskalt. You shouldn't mess with me..."
"Well we have!" The skinny man who took the bag waved it in front of her, "And this proves it."
It was as if the Icebreaker name meant nothing to them at all.
The man suddenly dropped the bag while waving it though. What was inside it shocked all six bandits there. The other woman, a girl with short blond hair, jumped. "Lady, you're in big trouble..."
Blood.
There was a small puddle of blood on the forest floor.
Ashla choked on the remaining blood in her throat, dripping out of the side of her mouth, but not before the blond girl punched her again. This time on the head. Ashla was tough, she could stand most of the beating, but she was too weak to pull her arms away from the other two bandits holding her like a marionette doll. Ashla's head quickly rolled back to face the woman hitting her.
"You idiot! You dumb, old, freaking idiot!"
Ashla dared to roll her eyes.
The other woman, watching from behind, gasped, "How dare you?!?"
Ashla felt the impact of the blond's hand against her cheek. The Icebreaker coughed, more blood oozing out, then scoffed, "You jerks have no hearts, do you?"
One of the bystanding crooks walked over and punched her head, cursing her in the elvish tongue. Another bystander of the group chuckled. Ashla honestly couldn't tell what to do. She knew where Hanuh was, but could she escape these bandits? .... and how could she get there before they did? Behind the rest of the group, groggy eyes spotted the bag full of rocks, various stones scattered on the ground. Next to them was Ashla's one weapon she'd brought with her, her broadsword.
Ashla sighed, how to get out of this pickle?
Just then, her saving grace came in an unexpected form. The stench of rotting flesh had always been thick in the air, but none present could ever have guessed that an animal corpse had not been the only culprit. A group of undead elven corpses, survived from the days of the Corpse War, burst out of the trees. They didn't outnumber the six bandits plus one screwed up Icebreaker, but they were enough to get even these bandits worked up. In an instant they dropped Ashla like she was a rock and ran up to the four corpses.
Ashla couldn't take a single moment to rest, as much as she wanted to. She instantly applied her healing abilities upon herself. Before she could feel the Spirit Ability's side effects of nausea and weakness, Ashla crawled away.
She didn't know how, but she'd made it back to her room in the local town's inn. Ashla wanted to rescue her child more than anything, but she had to nurse herself first. Ashla had several bruises covering her body from the beating those crooks gave her, and she was officially barfing into a barrel. She had been at this suckish rate for several hours, and the skies of Althanas were pink in sunset. It took a while, but Ashla put cream on her bruises and wrapped herself in bandages. Her healing had taken care of any other damage caused, but her body still naturally was left with some bruising like it was a piece of fruit. These too would heal in their own time though.
Unfortunately, Ashla had no time to heal any further. As soon as her nausea ceased, Ashla had put her chainmail and shirt back on over a loose undershirt. She threw her shawl and now bloodied cloak back on and clipped her remaining weapons on her belt. She slowly stood up and looked to the door.
Time was ticking. She had to move.
The door flung shut behind her.
First stop, the hill again.
She'd left her sword there, and now hoped to find it there. She also hoped to find any signs of the bandits. If luck was on Ashla's side, they wouldn't be back to their leader to tell him what she did.
When Ashla got there though, she only felt dread.
By all means, Ashla was still a compassionate person. She valued life and tried to keep it up as much as possible... but there was a pile of dead bodies sprawled across the hill.
Ashla pulled one hand up to her mouth, but kept count with the other.
"One, two..." She counted six.
All six bandits were dead.
Ashla let out a shaky hum. If only four undead corpses could do this...
She shuddered as she walked up to the closest to her. She constantly looked left to right, maybe the undead were still around. With dread boiling in her veins, she turned it over. It was the brunette elf who had taken the rocks. The Icebreaker knelt down, looking around one final time, before focusing on the dead man. Ashla's eyes fell to the massive cut across his chest, most likely the killer blow. Then she looked down to his belt. Amongst all his weapons, one set somehow caught her interest. A pair of iron butterfly swords with rough leather sheaths.
Ashla pulled them up. She noted with how small they were, about ten inches, they could fit on her back waist. She placed them on as she looked over to her broadsword, sitting where the bandits originally cast it off to. Ashla then ran over, scooped it up, and left before anything bad happened.
She left the gathering crows to have their feast in peace.
Ashla eventually arrived at the cave. She didn't know what time it was, but nightfall was upon Althanas... Ashla couldn't stop thinking about her child.
Inside the cave, there were several torches lighting up such darkness. Ashla instantly recognized the basket which sat on the ground next to a wooden chair. Hanuh! The child did not make much noise, but the light movement of a stirring blanky let Ashla know that her baby was sleeping. Ashla narrowed her eyes as she looked to the old oak chair. She was surprised of how fat he was...
A brunette elf who had quite some weight on him looked at Ashla. He smiled and got up, "My dear, welcome." He then pointed to the basket and put his finger to his lips, "Shhhhhh, the baby's sleeping."
Ashla felt a smirk come across her face, "Hand her here."
The man frowned, "Weapons?"
Ashla was still armed. Of course, she looked ready for battle and not an exchange. She sighed and removed most of her weapons. Her steel dagger was on her leg. As she took her weapons off her belt, she moved her broadsword in front of her leg and unclipped her dagger. She let it fall into her boot.
After her weapons were dealt with, she stood up and extended her hand. "Now?"
The man walked up to her, eyeing her intensely. Ashla was surprised with how tall he was, even for an elf. He must of been a good seven feet of height! No wonder her was the leader. Ashla herself knew how to keep authority in a situation though, having been the duchess of a country and now the leader of an organization. Ashla crossed her arms and held his gaze. The man bit his lip. "My men never returned the ransom to me ahead of time."
Ashla stifled her urge to gulp and look away. "A sudden invasion of the undead caused us to part. They should return soon..."
The man pointed with his beefy arm towards her stash of weapons. Ashla's eyes turned to see that she'd made a mistake. The man scowled, "Then what are those doing here? They belonged to one of my men."
Ashla cursed herself for taking a dead man's weapons. She tried to scramble an excuse in her head, but it was too late. Apparently, this fat man was a strong man. Ashla found herself flying in the air towards the wall of the cavern.
Ashla fell to the ground with a slight ache in her back. Once again, this girl was tough. But could she take another beating today?
Ashla pulled herself to her feet, her ears ringing and body just wanting to fall apart. When her ears stopped and Ashla could hear her child starting to cry, she suddenly felt nauseous. She looked up through the strands of long, thick hair in her face. The moment she saw the man walking towards her with a leaf sword she bolted into action. In an instant she found herself from the corner of the cavern to standing right in front of her foe. She now had her dagger out and hopelessly swung it towards his arm. In an instant the lumbering elf grabbed it and was able to twist the knife out of her hand. Moments later, Ashla felt a blade slice across her upper leg and then against her chainmail. The chainmail protected her stomach and chest well, but her shirt she wore above was ruined. She didn't mind that though, the pain in her leg starting to tip her pain tolerance. She took one limp back - it just saved her from what could have been a killer blow in the face.
The man reached out and yanked Ashla up close to him. Ashla could barely read his movements, but suddenly he had her own dagger in his hand and not his sword. The only thing Ashla could feel was this pain, the only thing she could hear was the cries of the child she was standing for. Ashla felt several slashes against her cheek, she could see him wave her dagger, covered in blood, in front of her face. She heard him sneer words. Ashla then found herself suspended in the air again. She hit the cavern floor and slid on it. The young girl now felt delirious, lost in an ocean of pain. When Ashla looked up to see the man bending over to the basket though, motherly love and the numbness in blood she had alone pushed her to persevere one more time...
The Icebreaker's eyes froze over. She desperately lunged towards the man one more time. The best she could do when she reached him was to wallop his head with her bare hands and attempt to choke him. Being a bit pathetic in muscle, and already being in her poor state though, it didn't go well. The bandit grabbed her by the hair and threw her several feet away from them.
Ashla heavily gasped for air between the lingering cries of pain. He stood up, still holding the knife, "I guess I have to kill you first, woman..."
Just shut up and go to haide already! As the man came down on her, reaching for her neck, she grasped his bare, hairy hands. The Icebreaker was fully enraged, beyond her own consciousness and morals. She froze over his arm. The man gasped in surprise at this move. Ashla then thrust her knee into his stomach and reached out with two fingers, aiming for his eyes.
Ashla gouged her fingers into the man's eyes. Before he could break away, Ashla numbed him with her Particle Restriction - it was obviously quite painful. The man broke away, falling back in all his weight and pulled his hands to his face. As he screamed, Ashla crawled on top of him, grabbing the closest hard thing she could - a jagged rock.
Her eyes were still icy, blood dripped down from her cheeks. Hair was sprawled everywhere. The girl started hammering the rock against his head. "You!" *wham* "son!" *crack* "o-"
The man reached for her again in attempts to push her away. Ashla swung away then started to hit him again. She didn't care what she was doing, she was doing this for her child. All that crying, all those beatings, all that running and worrying... every time the rock collided with the elf's head, it gave her sweet deliverance...
She didn't stop until her arm couldn't move anymore.
It was as if the cave went silent. Her eyes went back to blue as the stone fell out of her trembling fingers. The man in front of her was dead. Ashla slid off his stomach and was barely able to support herself with her other arm. Face to the ground, she could only see the grey, cave floor and the hair that blocked her view from all else. Images of beating him came back to her suddenly. She saw herself mercilessly beating him. Blood was on the that rock right now... blood was on her hands.
Her eyes rolled back as she puked onto the floor.
The sounds of her child crying faded into her head again. It was the only thing that kept her from killing herself right there and then...
~~~
"F-Fina-a-lllly... H-ave h-h--her-r..."
Bloodied once again, aching all over, currently in tears, Ashla panted as she withered over her prize. Hanuh cried out from a basket. Her mother replied.
"I-it's oka-a-ay, H-annuh. The b-bad people - gone n-now..." She pulled the shaking baby out, wrapping it in an extra blanket, and just kept holding her as tears fell. In her own exhaustion, the wounded mother found the strength still to comfort her frightened infant.
Feeling herself rapidly going faint, she lay down. She pulled another blanket from the basket and made a bed for her baby. The mother curled up next to her child. A single, weary arm wrapped protectively around her. Ashla still felt the nausea, the stinging, the internal shock. She shallowly echoed comfort to her child. "I let m-mnever let... happen... again... ..."
"I swear it."
Philomel
01-13-15, 02:17 PM
Thread Title: Shards of a Perfect Gem (Solo) (http://www.althanas.com/world/showthread.php?28452-Shards-of-a-Perfect-Gem-%28Solo%29)
Judgment Type: Condescended Rubric
Participants: BlueGhostOfSeaside
Story: 18
The story you write here is a good one, with a thought out story-line and a general planned plot. You use setting to your advantage, changing each scene to go with the emotion of the time, such as a cave for the final dark ending, and never really forget it. Your use of such details, as the torches in the cave are really strong, however you could have used more of these small aspects to strengthen your writing. Pacing however, was a weakness, as it could have been slowed down a lot at the start, especially during posts 1-3 and then in posts 8- 10 at the height of action. In a way the story in these sections seemed rushed, as if you really wanted to get onto the next part of it.
Though the story is exciting and it is easy to understand your desire to get onto the point when Hanuh and Ashla can finally be together again, many things seem to be almost too fast and Ashla too accepting of the situation. You could have expanded on the conversation with herself and the wrinkled man, and used this maybe to your advantage, even bringing him back as one of the warriors later, which would have been really interesting. You do have a strong sense of beginning and end, especially in your repetition of such, which just makes the story more intriguing, and all the emotion is there. However, there is definite room for growth from this. Try putting a lot of detail into your small moments of tension with dialogue and description and this could raise your mark more.
Character: 19
One thing you did particularly well in this thread was capture the heart of the reader and make them exceedingly empathetic towards Ashla. In her tears and her mumblings at the beginning and end (posts 1 and 14, with the words, “"I-it's oka-a-ay, H-annuh. The b-bad people - gone n-now..."”) there was a definite expressive power which really proves you are growing as a writer in terms of knowing your character and writing her well. Even her actions are gentle at times, towards her baby, then powerful when she fights in post 12, showing that you have the ability to be flexible in terms of writing. In terms of action you have definitely improved since your last thread, which this judge did judge, and so extra EXP is going to be awarded here because of this.
However, within a Character context you could certainly develop persona to the extent of adding more of a thought process within Ashla’s mind, to demonstrate the conflicting sides of her as she flits from good to evil in terms of alignment. For your character, this is a certain interesting aspect that you could really explore to develop your persona. Elsewhere, persona is unfortunately lacking in this piece, in terms of presence or strength. Also, in the thread, there was a little confusion of what Ashla did do. As a level 5 character it is known she is certainly extremely powerful, yet she was overwhelmed by six men without so much as a clear fight. If you added action scenes into this, with her possibly fighting and downing a few of them this would make your writing not only more exciting but would show you really know how to manipulate situations with your character.
Overall, Character was done well, in an impressive style, and you have shown you can develop as a writer, so congratulations.
Writing: 16
Writing, overall, was well established and strong, with no noticeable spelling mistakes or grammatical errors. Though, you do place dialogue within a paragraph with other complete sentences, whereas each dialogue line should be on its own (post 2). Similarly, a couple of times the sentences were a little clumsy - such as one from the opening (and closing) section with “Bloodied once again, aching all over, currently in tears, a young woman panted as she withered over her prize.” This sentence has a lot of clauses, each with a comma break, indicating a same-length pause between each. A wider use of punctuation or conjunctions would help here, and your writing in general. Instead, you could try: “Bloodied once again, aching all over and currently in tears, a young woman panted as she withered over her prize.”
Word choice in terms, however, is really strong and a clear indicator of a good writer, especially within this same sentence and the use of “withered”. This shows an ability to be flexible with language, and to imagine it in unusual locations. In general, there is a wider expansion able to be done in terms of linguistic technique, and as a writer you could start to use similies and metaphor in order to expand your descriptions. There are a few adjectives littered around, but a wider use would have been good in this peace. Again, similar to pacing, it would have helped to slow down things a little more, to explain them in terms of Clarity. However, these points aside, your skill in writing is clear and simply needs the aid of a thesaurus or concordance to begin experimenting in your language.
Wildcard: 7
Wildcard points here are going to your general development as a writer, which, over the past few months, has become clearer and more defined. Through this thread you show a strength of tone and story which is carried through to your final post. You balance the beginning and end well, closing it into one finished story and present it neatly with more or less even-length posts. Therefore, well done.
Final Score: 60
Rewards:
BlueGhostOfSeaside (http://www.althanas.com/world/member.php?16205-BlueGhostofSeaside) receives:
1900 EXP*
75 GP*
*Extra EXP and GP is given as writer has developed greatly in terms of skill and style since last judgement.
Spoil Requests. Awarded: Two rusted iron butterfly swords. Awarded for 95 GP and taken off total awarded GP amount which was 170 GP.
BlueGhostOfSeaside also levels up! CONGRATULATIONS!
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