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Posted By: Mir Dec 07, 2004 - 08:58 am

Rame shielded his eyes against the sun and looked over the side of the steep mountain trail. Over a hundred feet below, in the bottom of a ravine, Rame could still make out the battle that was raging on. The ebony skinned elf with a white tangle of hair was fighting a trio of rather nasty looking goblins.

Rame turned to the burly human in front of him. The man was huffing as he struggled up the trail. Hesitantly, Rame spoke, “Shouldn’t we help?”

The man paused long enough to laugh, “Right half-breed…whichever side you chose to help would rather kill you than thank you after you had helped.”

The man traveling behind Rame bellowed and slapped the half-elf on the back, nearly toppling him over the steep incline, “Help one of those and they’d turn on you for sure kid.” He lazily reached out and pulled Rame back to safety by the collar of his shirt.

The last man of the three, the strongest and smartest by far, who was leading the party, turned and looked down at the battle. Slowly, he turned and looked back at the trail, “Besides, it’s a long way back down. Now hurry up, I want to get off this cliff before dark.”

Rame looked back to where the battle was, only to see that one of the goblins had fallen. The elf however, looked like he was injured. The battle persisted, with the two goblins closing in as they backed the elf against the face of the cliff. With nowhere to go, its fighting ability seemed to improve out of desperation.

The half elf turned back to the men, “But it’s an elf…”

The men stopped laughing, “That’s no elf half-breed, that’s a Delvi. Even grown men and warriors tread lightly at the name alone. Dragons and giants are wary of their wrath and lesser creatures of the dark tremble at their passing. It is no creature to be taken lightly fool. That is no elf, it is a dark elf!”

Rame turned, but the man behind him had stopped. He stared at Rame with a sinister look, “Delvin are from the Dark Realm; they only come to the Light Realm to feed on the warm flesh of those brave or pure of heart. A young half-elf like you would make an easy meal for the likes of him.”

Rame looked down at the battle with a new perspective. There was only one goblin left and the Delvi was seriously injured, but fought like a wild animal. Its movements were quick and precise, easily managing to get past the goblins guard. Rame turned away and quickly continued on.

--------------
Later that night, Rame was preparing the evening meal for the men while they talked. They were draped lazily about the camp, laughing and gloating about their latest con. They had managed to convince a small town that it needed protection from a nonexistent band of thieves and ruffians. With the illusionary summoning magic that the group possessed, they had created the image of a large band of people and that had been all that the small town needed to feel threatened.

One of the men stopped talking and turned to Rame, “We’re getting low on firewood, go get some half-breed.”

Rame started, and a chill ran down his spine. The men never sent him out unless they thought that something dangerous was out and about. It was easier to replace the serving boy than to replace one of the ones necessary to summon the illusions. Slowly he stood and walked into the woods.

He tried to stay close to the camp, but there wasn’t much firewood close by. It had already been picked up earlier by the men to start the fire. So he was forced to wander further and further from camp as he picked up broken branches and fallen bark to keep the fire going. As he moved along, he kept glancing over his shoulder into the dark forest to make sure that nothing was following him. All he saw was the dark trees looming. After about an hour of wandering, he thought that it was about time to head back. With his arms full of firewood, he checked over his shoulder one more time, and suddenly felt his feet slide out from under him as the ground gave out beneath him. Firewood was flung from his arms as he tumbled down the hidden embankment and landed in a heap in the concealed gully.

Slowly untangling himself from the larger branches that he had been carrying, he began to pick up the firewood. Gradually he realized that it was rather light in the gully. Looking up, he found himself in the presence of the Delvi from earlier that day. The dark elf was carefully and painfully bandaging some rather nasty looking wounds that he had acquired from his fight with the goblins.

Rame dropped the wood and slowly began to back away. The Delvi’s eyes glowed red as its gaze followed his movements. Its hand began inching for its short sword and Rame turned and fled, scrambling up the embankment and into the darkness of the forest.

The Delvi watched as the last traces of the small creature’s heat signatures faded. The colorful picture gained through his infrared vision was locked in the dark elf’s memory.

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Rame rushed into the camp and dove into his sleeping roll. The men came alert, grabbing their weapons and standing to meet an attack. They stood stock still for several minutes, expecting something to come crashing through the trees. When nothing came, they relaxed and began laughing, “Did you see a Delvi boy? Is that what made you run like that?”

Another grinned and shrugged, “Well, you can’t expect the kid to know that they never stay in the Light Realm for very long. The sunlight weakens their armour and weapons and nearly blinds them.”

The first man nodded his approval, “No dark elf would come near anyway, we’d beat them to pulp and they know it. Anyway, those creatures are rarely seen. You’ll probably never see another one your entire life. Now just calm down and get some sleep.”

The most sensible of the three finally spoke, “We will remain here for the night. The signs of battle should keep others away.” He settled back down on a log and stroked the fire, ignoring everyone else in camp.

Rame was trying not to feel foolish as he slipped further into his sleeping roll and heard the two men laughing and speaking about him. It didn’t matter what they said though, he knew what he had seen and no amount of punishment or reasoning was going to convince him otherwise. Rame fell asleep that night without food and with nightmares of heart devouring dark elves plaguing his mind.

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The next morning, Rame woke early and cooked the men a large, rather elaborate breakfast, hoping to make up for last night. He didn’t want them mad at him, and after the humor of the situation wore off, they would probably beat him so that he didn’t ever do it again. He cooked a sweet porridge with bread slathered in butter and some yellow cheese that he had found in one of the packs.

When the men finally woke, all of them seemed pleased with the breakfast. They dug in without a word. Usually they insulted his cooking before they ate. After they were finished, they left their bowls where they had sat and moved to the side, discussing something amongst themselves. Rame thought that he heard something about a dream that they had all had. Not really caring what they were talking about, and eager to be gone, he quickly washed the dishes in a near by creek and repacked them. Seeing that the men were still talking, he quietly slipped off into the woods.

It took a while, but he managed to find the hidden gully again and carefully made his way down the embankment. When he reached the bottom, he carefully looked around. The Delvi appeared to be gone, but there was a stack of firewood that hadn’t been used. Rame recognized a particularly gnarled branch that he had picked up the night before. The fire he had seen the night before had gone out several hours ago, all that was left was ashes and some smoldering wood. The half-elf moved over to examine the fire. He heard a crunch under his foot and carefully picked it up, looking down. What he saw was a partially charred human-like hand. The crunch had been bones the small bones in the hand cracking.

Rame stumbled away from it. He turned and heaved, losing everything that was still in his stomach. Wiping his mouth with his sleeve, he quickly scrambled up the bank and away from the hidden gully. Now he had proof that the Delvi had been there and that it did indeed eat flesh. He ran blindly, eventually stumbling back into camp.

Posted By: Mir Dec 07, 2004 - 09:01 am

This is a story that I've been working on for a while. The story started based on a scewed idea for the Dark elf called the Delvi (The word Devil rearanged) that are even more evil and vicious than the normal ones, and actually require flesh for survival. Anyhow, please tell me what you think of it. The next chapter should be coming soon.

Mir

Posted By: talisman Dec 07, 2004 - 11:09 am

Its quite good and quite well written, with good dialogue, though if this is Chapter 1, I think you need to provide more background information to the races, characters etc

Anyway, here's some comments on the writing...

<< The ebony skinned elf ...

Would 'An' be better since we don't yet know anything about the character in question.

<< “Right half-breed…whichever side you chose to help would rather kill you than thank you after you had helped.”

Don't use the words help and helped in the same sentence. I recommend losing "after you had helped" completely.

<< With nowhere to go, it upped its fighting level.

Sounds like video game talk lol. People don't have 'fighting levels' in real life, though I know what you meant by it.

<< As he moved along, he kept glancing over his shoulder into the dark forest to make sure that nothing was following him. All he saw was the dark trees looming over him. After about an hour of wandering, he thought that it was about time for him to head back.

You over-use 'him' in this bit.

You use rather a few times. I never think it sounds right in fiction. Too indecisive perhaps...

<< The Delvi’s glowed red

Missing a word I think.

You use 'carefully' twice close together in the 2nd to last paragraph.

Hope that helps.

Posted By: Mir Dec 07, 2004 - 11:12 am

Okay. I'll edit it, thanks.

Posted By: Bmat Dec 18, 2004 - 03:41 pm

The ebony skinned elf with a white tangle- Too many descriptive words. We may not need to know at this point that the hair is a white tangle. As to whether it should be "the" or "an" I'd say that "the" is fine. It means that the watcher had seen the elf before and was watching him now. "an" would mean that it was just an elf that happened to be fighting.

The paragraph starting "The men stopped laughing." It seemed as if they had been laughing a long time. The word "lightly" was used twice in the paragraph.

"replace one of the ones" needs to be fixed.

If it can be, it might benefit by being condensed. For example, the long paragraph on the breakfast, does this need to be there in such detail?

As I noted before, you are a talented writer. The story is vivid, and the dialogue is very nicely done.

Posted By: Mir Dec 18, 2004 - 10:14 pm

thanks. I'm still trying to get the right amount of description. I like richly detialed stories, but see where I could be a little over. thanks for pointing it out.