Greetings wonderful readers,
One of the main reasons I made this blog, was so that I could share some of my writing and hopefully get some feedback on it. I would greatly appreciate any comments of both what I do correct in my writing and any suggestions you have for how to make my setting/characters more realistic.
This is the first chapter of a book I started writing last summer and have been working on semi-consistently over the past year. This summer I hope to make a lot of progress on it and hopefully finish it before I graduate.
So without further introduction, please enjoy the first chapter of my book, Dragon of the Storm.
Dragon
of the Storm
Chapter
One
“We had just
pulled the nets in and started home from our fishing trip, when out
of nowhere he swooped down from the storm!” Annie Flighttracker
gestured and paused dramatically.
“The dragon?”
Asked five-year-old Jacob.
“The dragon.”
Annie confirmed. The children all leaned forward. “Unlike my good
friend Meredith or any of the other dragons here, this creature was
born wild. His red scales dully reflected the clouds, his teeth were
sharp, and his breath more dangerous than the lightning! One good
blast, and our boats would be ashes.” Laura gasped as the words
painted the picture clearly in her mind. She imagined the terrible
red dragon breathing fire down onto the little fishing boat, the
flames catch on the wood, the large white sail turn black in the
stream of heat....
“Annie! You and
the children come down, it's time to eat.” In five seconds, Annie's
mother completely broke the tension, smashed the picture, and pulled
the entire group back to the loft.
“Coming,
mother!” Unable to keep the annoyance entirely out of her voice,
wished the interruption could have waited just a few more minutes so
as not to spoil the climax.
With
a sigh she addressed her little audience, “We'll finish the story
later, we better not be late!” One by one they descended the ladder
from the loft.
“If we're late
for supper again, I'm grounded for sure!” Annie muttered under her
breath. They all washed hurriedly and slid into their seats just
before Mr. Emerson—the village leader—sat down. Mrs.
Flighttracker looked at Annie with an expression of disapproval. In
response, the girl simply smiled: after sixteen years of being told
the definition of late she knew it well, and she further knew that
this close call did not qualify.
At the start of
every week, Mr. Emerson would have a couple of families over for
dinner. They had a large room on the first floor of their house, and
a large table where they held any official meeting or social meal.
Because Mr. Flighttracker owned one of the largest farms in the
little village, his was usually one of the families to visit with the
Emersons each week. Unfortunately for Annie, only a few other
families had any children close to her in age, so most weeks the
adults would discuss business and such while expecting Annie to be
seen, not heard and keep the younger children in order.
Today the meal was
relatively enjoyable. Not only had the mothers present prepared a
delicious dinner, but the children had decided to behave themselves
in hopes that then everyone would finish sooner and Annie would tell
them the rest of the story. Seeing how well the children acted, Annie
decided she would not only tell them more that evening, but would try
to time her future story climaxes with dinner time.
After supper Annie
helped her mother and Mrs. Emerson scrub and wipe the dishes. As the
two women continued friendly conversation, Annie worked as quickly as
she could without rushing them, all the while glancing out the window
for fear the day would end before she could meet her dragon Meredith
for a flight.
Generations
earlier, shortly after the village was established, the villagers
allied themselves with the dragons that lived nearby. Despite the
language barrier, the men and dragons worked out a deal that
benefitted both sides: the dragons would help the men with major work
such as building or clearing land for farming and in exchange the men
would share food and shelter. Neither species would eat the other or
fight for sport, and together they would fight common enemies.
Although quite
beneficial to everyone involved, the alliance did not receive
approval from all the villagers. One of the main reasons they they
had moved to this new place was because their old home, Minterus, had
burned under the raging fires of three nearby fire dragons. Those
terrible creatures had killed half the village population, burned the
houses and gathering places, and stolen most of the gold. Because of
these disasters, many of the elders would never trust dragons; some
passed this distrust on to their children so that even now as Annie
helped clean up after supper many in the village avoided dragons
whenever possible.
At last Mrs.
Emerson turned from the shelf where she was arranging dishes. “You
can go Annie, there's only enough work for one or maybe two people
now and I'm sure you're anxious to be gone.” She smiled
understandingly and Annie's mother nodded so after a quick, polite
thanks Annie rushed out the door toward the Big Field.
As Annie approached
the field, a great golden dragon swooped down bending the grass with
the strong air current from her wings. Her shiny scales reflected the
sun and her turquoise eyes seemed to sparkle with excitement.
“Merey!” Annie called in greeting as she ran to meet the landed
dragon, “Ah Meredith, I feared I had kept you waiting. Let's hurry
before someone comes up with a reason to detain me!”
Quickly Annie tied
a long piece of leather around Meredith's neck and front legs.
Although she could ride on the dragon's back with nothing more than a
firm knee grip, Annie preferred having something to grip with her
hands during the flight, especially if Meredith decided to do any
tricks. The harness also made it easier to convince concerned
neighbors that these daily flights posed no danger to Annie's
well-being.
Even among the most
dragon-trusting villagers, only a few flight teams in the Village
Defense rode dragons, and no other civilians possessed such a
friendship as Meredith and Annie. These two had the trust and
friendship that only two creatures who grew up together and know each
other completely can possess.
When Annie was just
learning to talk she found an abandoned dragon egg at the edge of the
south field. Her father built a shelter over it to keep predators
away and continued to give the young dragon food and protection for a
few weeks after the egg hatched. When Meredith reached the age of
three weeks, Gilfera—the leader of the dragons—came by and named
her. However, like most dragon names, the one he gave the young
dragon could not be written or spoken in any human tongue, and so
Annie and her father gave her a human name: Meredith. As time passed,
Meredith taught herself to fly, hunt, and communicate with the other
dragons, however, she kept close to the girl who found her and the
two became an inseparable team. Meredith understood the Minterian
tongue perfectly and with some effort could communicate with most of
the people who tried. Annie learned to understand Dragon almost as
quickly as Meredith did and while she with many of the sounds, the
elders of the village suspected she would one day speak fluently as
her fifth great grandfather had.
In the old times,
before the great wars and disasters they caused, there lived in the
northern lands many families born with the ability to speak the
dragon language. These families tended to become great leaders among
their peoples, and for centuries the dragons and men had lived
side-by-side in a similar—though friendlier—manner to Annie's
village and their nearby dragons. Annie's family was among the
descendants of one of the dragon speaking lines, and her great,
great, great, great, great—or fifth great—grandfather was the
most recent of her relatives on record born with the gift. Given
Annie's friendship with Meredith, and her ability to communicate,
many villagers wondered if she would someday possess the same
ability.
“Annie wait!”
Called a voice from behind.
“So close!”
Annie muttered to Meredith under her breath as she turned to see
eight-year-old Jacob running to her as fast as he could.
“Please, may I
come with you? Mother said I may if it's okay with you. See? She gave
me my helmet as proof of her consent.” Jacob held it up as
evidence. Annie figured it was good evidence too considering Jacob
hated to wear the thing and his mother would never approve of him
riding without it, not to mention she kept it on a very high shelf so
that he could only have it if she brought it down for him.
“Alright, you may
come. But be ready to hold tight, it has been a long day and Merey
and I both need an exciting ride.” With a grin Jacob tied on his
helmet and with a running start leaped for
the golden back. Before he could fall, Annie shoved him up the rest
of the way and swung herself up behind him.
With a few light
steps and a couple quick flaps of her deep golden wings, Meredith
took to the air giving her excited passengers an exhilarating gust to
start the adventure.
*****
Thank you for your time! Feel free to comment below.
Soli Deo Gloria,
~Kristin
