[Shikhin]

Ok guys. I decided to write a prequel of the Inheritance cycle. Critiques are most welcome. Please as much as you can, criticize my work. This would improve me.

Chapter 1 - Shur'tugal

Brom raced past the crowded streets of Kuasta to the "open auditorium" located in the centre of the haven city, his black hair flowing as the wind rushed past him. He examined the hall from outside. The hall had two doors which were thickly crowded with people. Two sentries were stationed in each gate and were armed with two-and-half hand swords. Etched on the walls was a scene showing a mighty white dragon and a calm looking elf standing beside it.

How beautiful the scene is looking. I hope one day I'll be able to witness such a mighty dragon !, thought Brom as he approached the door on the right side. As the crowd advanced towards the gate it transformed into a single queue. The sentry was questioning each and every person. When Brom's chance came half an hour had whiled away.

"What is your name, young boy ?", asked the first sentry.
Brom replied, "My caretaker Adlet told me not to talk to strangers, but since you request, and I wish to gain entry to the hall, Sir, it is Brom."
"Repeat after me Brom, Eka weohnata neiat aftaka thorna skulblakeya", ordered the sentry.
"Sir, what are those strange word you just said ? I did'nt understand a word out of it? Please repeat them."
"Sir, but why should I repeat those words ?"
"Those words belong to the language of ancient times, which is used by elves. The elves due to its past and history call it as the ancient language. One cannot lie in this language as well."
"But sir the tongue is mine. I can lie if I wish. I still don't understand why you ask me to repeat them."
"Young boy. I don't have time to answer all your questions. Many people await. Fast, repeat them!" said te sentry annoyed by Brom's never ending enquiries.
The sentry repeated the words and told Brom their meaning, tired by his tedious duties.
"It means that I will not steal those dragons."

Brom carefully repeated the sentence making sure that he did not mispronounce any syllable. The second sentry checked whether Brom carried any arms and then allowed him entry to the hall.

Brom gasped with astonishment as he studied the interior of the hall. The hall had no roofs and was thus known as the "open auditorium". The hall was rectangular in shape and on either side huge portraits of dragons and elves were hung, displaying the fine art of artisans of Alagaesia. The hall was equally divided into two. The first part was a stage carefully designed so that it could accommodate a well-nourished-full-grown-dragon. The further half was divided into two parts in the ratio of 2:1. The larger part was made to accommodate standing people and the smaller was meant for sitting people. The latter had fully furnished chairs and was obviously meant for rich merchants.
As Brom was studying the interiors, four elves brought an elder-wood-made-table, covered with linen cloth, and kept it in the centre of the hall, nearest to the stairs. One of the elves uncovered the table revealing five smooth polished stones.

The table may itself cost a fortune. I am sure the stones kept on it are eggs....dragon eggs !, thought Brom.

The first egg was red in colour and had an intricate pattern of veins on it. It was the second biggest egg, just an inch smaller than the sapphire egg. The glint of the sapphire egg caught Brom’s eye and he glared the egg for five minutes before resuming the examination of the rest of the eggs. The rest three eggs were almost equal in size and were of green, white and black colour.

Brom moved with the queue that was approaching the larger part, made to accommodate standing people. The area could hold about 400 people. The people in the queue stood in 10 rows each with 40 people. Brom moved to the eighth row from the left and weasled himself to the front so that he could easily watch the stage. After about 15 minutes the people settled but the sounds of excited talking in the auditorium did not stopped.

Oh! Come On. When will the selection of the riders start!! Is the rider dead ? Fasty come rider!
As Brom was so engrossed in thinking about the eggs that he did not hear and see a huge dragon flying in the sky and noticed it when it landed on the stage. He jumped with surprise. Wow, this one is huge. Ha! It easily beats the dragon inscribed on the wall.
THUD! THUD! THUD!
In three moves the dragon positioned itself to face the crowd. The dragon was a male and was white in colour. A strange looking man/elf jumped from the dragon and fell on the floor, as lightly as a feather. He wore al white coloured tunic and had a brown belt on his pants. He had blonde hair and no beard. He muttered an inaudible line in an alien language and suddenly each sound made by him was magnified ten times.
Magic, thought Brom.

"I am Vrael, Rider of my dragon Machtigen, Lead Rider of the order and carrier of the eggs" said the rider. "Every year I carry six or seven eggs among the elves and humans. The eggs hatch for those who the dragons think are capable of the title Rider. When the rider touches the dragon for the first time an irrevocable bond is formed between them. The rider is generally between the ages of twelve and twenty-five and becomes immortal after he touches the dragon. The rider and the dragon then both undergo arduous training and practise. Please, I request all those who think they have the resilience to become a rider to come on this stage."

Just as he heard these words Brom sprinted towards the stage not caring whether he tripped or fell. When he reached the stage he judged the number of people coming towards the stage. Already four young boys and girls had reached the stage and about two score were following.

When all of them had reached the stage the rider spoke again. "Ok young boys and girls, please form a queue and one by one you all shall touch the dragon eggs." A queue was quickly formed and Brom was fifth in number. The first was a heavily built girl, with black hair on her brow. Tension was building up in her and was expressed on her face. The girl carefully approached the table and touched the red egg. Nothing happened. She then touched the green, sapphire and white egg but resulted with the same response. She was on the verge of tears.

She touched the black egg. She waited. After one minute the egg wobbled a little. A crack appeared on it.
Crack ! Then another and another. At the top of the egg, where all the cracks met, a piece wobbled.
The girl howled with astonishment. A triangular head emerged from the egg and slowly the dragon's body was exposed. The dragon was covered in a thick slimy substance and the sound of the snapping of the egg echoed across the room. The girl still emerging from her shock, touched the dragon.

She screamed with pain and lay down on the floor. The rider stood there as if he was expecting it and motioned one of the elves who guided her out of the hall through a back door.
What happened to her ?

The second in the row was a young man, twenty years old with a clean-shaven face. The man touched the remaining eggs but to no avail. He disappointed left the room.
Bad luck for the man. I am pretty sure it will hatch for me, considering my valour, thought Brom.

The third in the queue was a young boy, about fifteen years old, two years older than Brom. He was handsomely dressed and had a scar on her brow. The boy looked confident that one of the eggs would hatch for him. He swiftly approached the table and touched the red egg. As soon as he touched the egg, it started rolling here and there. Simultaneously number of cracks began to appear on it. The egg slowly shattered into small numerous pieces. The dragon was like the previous one covered in a slimy substance. The dragon was ferocious looking and had dark red scales. The boy touched the egg fragments and examined them, scared whether he should touch the dragon or not.
He looks smart and strong.
Oh! Come on. Why isn't he touching the dragon ?
"Come on, touch the dragon,..... uh ?", said the rider.
"Morzan, Utenilsson", said the boy.

He was still not sure whether he should touch the dragon. A roar escaped from the mouth of Machtigen, as it/he was growing impatient. Touch the dragon, hatchling, said an ancient voice in his mind, also transmitting the though to all present. Startled, Morzan touched the egg. He screamed in pain and fell down unconscious on the floor.

One of the three elves picked him and his dragon and went with them outside the hall. Brom caught a glimpse of a white scar on his left hand, with which he had touched the dragon.
I wonder, what was that on his hand ?

The next in the row was a girl, about the age of sixteen. She neither looked nervous nor frightened but looked excited.
She has some courage and confidence. I think an egg will hatch for her.
She slowly went to the table and touched the green egg. The green egg remained unanimated. Disappointed she touched the white egg.
Crack !
A crack appeared on the egg, and then another. The egg began to wobble and rock moving with an incredible speed. Slowly the calm looking dragon exposed itself to the world. The dragon was covered in a fluid which was almost invisible as it matched the colour of the scales of the dragon. The woman, without astonishment, as if she was expecting the egg to hatch for her, touched the dragon. An involuntarily howl of pain escaped from the mouth of the woman. The subsided as suddenly as it had arisen.

The last elf guided her out of the hall, and two other elves entered the hall.

Now is my chance, Brom thought as he approached the table. I hope one of them hatches for me, please !
A chill crept through his spine as he touched the green egg. A shiver went through the egg but otherwise it remained unanimated.
Neither happy nor disappointed he touched the sapphire egg. The egg remained as it was.
A minute passed. Then, two. But to no avail. He felt dissapointed and angry. Brom turned to return back, when suddenly he heard a squeak. He again turned to face the egg. The egg was vibrating with such a force that it looked as if it would blast off any second.
What is this happening?, he thought.
The egg broke into several pieces revealing a sapphire dragon with a triangular head. The dragon unlike others was not covered in a fluid, but rather emitted out a faint glow. Its scales reflected the light making it appear like a gem, outmatching all, except Machtigen.
Brom's heart sweeled with pride and joy.
The egg hatched for me! Also this is the most, majestic dragon I have ever seen.
He shouted with joy, "YES".
Numerous eyes stared towards him making him fell embarrassed.
He quickly mumbled an apologize under his breath, still excited.
Then he suddenly remembered the pain.
Brom's mind ran a debate with itself.
Should I touch the dragon?
Of course I should. I am destined to be a rider.
But what of the pain that everybody went through.
The pain is just of a few seconds but when I become a rider I will reduce hours of suffering for people.
Okay! I will touch it.

Brom extended his right hand towards the dragon. He felt a force field around the dragon and felt as though his hand was in a vacuum.

This is strange. Nobody else faced a difficulty in touching his/her dragon as far as I could judge.Did this dragon not hatch for me.Or am I too weak to touch such a powerful being? Or is it something else I did not ponder upon.

A frown formed on his face. With great difficulty he touched the dragon. A jolt of pain slashed through his right hand upto his houlder and spread through his body. Brom did not know how much time whiled away. His sense of time was skewed. He though it was a week, or a month, or just a second. His mind felt as if it was falling apart and swiftly a soft, gentle being started merging its consciousness with Brom's. Suddenly the pain stopped and Brom's mind steadily started falling in the state of unconsiousness. An elf quickly rushed towards him, not letting him fall.

The last words Brom heard before his mind entered the trance like state were,
"Kvetha, Shur'tugal"
Brom did not grasp the meaning of the words but quickly understood that the words were of great power, too great to be used for a mere orphan such as him. But know he was no more a mere orphan, now he was a mighty dragon rider.

This post has been edited by Shikhin: 27 December 2009 - 03:24 AM

[The Critic]

Not a bad start! I also think that Brom's story will be a welcome addition to the collection of stories on Inheritance Forums. Your punctuation is your main problem here. Also, check your spaces. You're doing well with your spelling. As you progress, this story will take more shape, and until then I can't put out a real critique. As with most beginning stories, all I can do is point out spelling and grammar, which I have done. Therefore, I await further chapters to see what kind of a writer you are. And I will also tell you what is seeming to become my signature comment: have your story in your head before you put it on paper. Doing this makes you a better writer and less apt to make your story seem jerky and instantaneous.

Critic 1

[Sinitar]

That's a pretty good start for a Brom story.You will never see me trying to correct different things related to the text, as english is not my native language, but I'm pretty sure the others will help you .In addition, you have to restrain from using words like stage, photos, and other words which are relatively new.You can replace stage with...an english speaker will help you and photos with fairths(if they are made by elves) or paintings, depends on how you imagined them.I'll definitely keep an eye on your story

[Caducus]

Good story so far continue on with it use more descriptions and a little short but other than that good work I like it keep it up!

[Shikhin]

Thanks for your critiques. Sinitar I am changing photos to fairth and if any of you know another word for stage please inform me. And it is not a short chapter. I was very tired of writing the post (I wrote till 11:10 AM IST). I have divided it into three portions or parts. That was just the first part. I will post the second part in a little time. And I am very good at punctuations. I wrote all of this in MS Word but when I copied it here all the punctuations and formatting were gone. I redid the formatting. I will now put the punctuations.

This post has been edited by Shikhin: 04 November 2009 - 10:48 AM

[Prudery]

Okay, this is pretty good. However, there is one mistake:

"Brom replied, Sir it is Brom."”

It should be; Brom replied, "Sir, it is Brom."

That's just about it.

The wording is a bit rough in the first chapter, both the descriptions and the dialogue. But the description gets much better in the second chapter.
Also, the ending on chap 2 was rather abrupt, dunno if you want to change that or just remember for hte next chapter....

Dialogue is always pretty hard. Try playing with it a bit until it seems right.

Keep up the good work.

This post has been edited by erona14: 04 November 2009 - 11:34 AM

[Sinitar]

I like the description in this chapter, the way you presented the eggs was good.You could've described Vrael's dragon also.What color was he?Was he big?You know, stuff like this.Also, the alien language was the ancient language?If so, you can't really call it alien as Brom has already used it when that guard asked him to do it.It is still a foreign language to him, but in order to be able to pronounce some words in another language, you need at least some basic knowledge.I think you can replace that line with something like:''He muttered an inaudible line in the same strange language he was asked to speak at the request of that guard''.Something like this Of course, you can adapt it to suit your chapter should you find it a nice addition.

Keep on going, you're doing good Eagerly awaiting the next chapter

[Kari]

When you ask someone to help you, a good idea is to be polite. XD You know, with the pleases and the whatnot. XD

Ugh. Please in future, if you MUST post chapters in bits (when you have enough interested readers, I suggest posting them all up together), you should probably edit the second one into the first. That way, no one will look for it. Just a heads up. Also makes MY life a lot easier. I'll post a critique on both chapters, 'kay?

Brom raced past the crowded streets of Kuasta to the "open auditorium" located in the centre of the haven city, his black hair flying past his head. He examined the hall from outside. The hall had two gates which were thickly crowded with people. Two sentries were stationed in each gate and were armed with two-and-half hand swords. Etched on the walls was a scene showing a mighty white dragon and a calm looking elf standing beside it.

Etched means woven in. Maybe you were going for something like a poster? In that case, a scene hung on the walls or something.

His hair flew past his head? It left his head? Rephrase that. Something like 'his hair billowed in the wind' or 'his hair flowing as the wind rushed past him'.

From what we've seen of dragons, I don't think calling it 'it' really is a good idea, but Brom apparently knew nothing aout them, and gender discenration might need work. XD

This is a pretty good start to a chapter. I usually see many mistakes made here, and you've made no illogical leaps of plot so far.

How beautiful the scene is looking. I hope one day I would also be able to witness such a mighty dragon !, thought Brom as he approached the gate on the right side. As the crowd advanced towards the gate it transformed into a single queue. The sentry was questioning each and every person. When Brom's chance came 15 minutes had whiled away.

'is looking', aka the present continuous, implies the action is happening right then. You're stating a fact; the dragon LOOKS beautiful. Also, why the conditionel? Why 'I would also be able to'? "I hope one day I'll be able to see..' Witness has a different use and syntactical place in the sentence to see.

First of all, what an orderly crowd! Nothing like today's people, who shove roughly. And we're supposed to be educated! If the crowd was so dreadfully thick and the two - two! - sentries questioned each one, then Brom would take WAY more than fifteen minutes to reach the gates.

How is putting only two sentries for a huge crown logical anyway? The larger the crowd, the more the guards. And why are they questiolning the peasants anyway? if riders are present, which they obviously are, they can simply remove the troublemakers they sense. Sentries are scouts, really. Guard duty isn't their thing.

"What is your name, young boy ?", asked the first sentry.
"Brom replied, Sir it is Brom."”
"Repeat after me Brom, Eka weohnata neiat aftaka thorna skulblakeya", ordered the sentry.
"Sir, what does it mean ?"
"It means that I will not steal those dragons."

Brom carefully repeated the sentence making sure that he did not mispronounce any syllable. The second sentry checked whether Brom carried any arms and then allowed him entry to the hall.

Stilted dialogue. "Blah blah,' 'blah blah?' "blah." You need a little bit more reaction. I can understand the guard being bored stiff, but Brom? Isn't he supposed to be excited?

Apart from that, remembering and delivering a sentence in such a weird, foreign language, with making no mistakes and remembering it after just having heard it once is impossible. Especially as he didn't repeat immediately, but just asked questions. You break the mind's short term memory that way, and can't repeat it. Like repeating a seven digit number straight off when someone tells you, but not being able to a few mins later.

Brom gasped with astonishment as he studied the interior of the hall. The hall had no roofs and was thus known as the "open auditorium". The hall was rectangular in shape and on either side huge fairths of dragons and elves were hung, displaying the fine art of artisans of Alagaesia. The hall was equally divided into two. The first part was a stage carefully designed so that it could accommodate a well-nourished-full-grown-dragon. The further half was divided into two parts in the ratio of 2:1. The larger part was made to accommodate standing people and the smaller was meant for sitting people. The latter had fully furnished chairs and was obviously meant for rich merchants.

You kind of confused me here. You described the Hall as having two gates. Gates, however, don't open up TO the building, but to a courtyard in which the building is situated. If by walking through the door you got into the building, they would be just a door. Quite unimpressive, too. What sort of protection would it have?

The elves are nice. The elves like the rain. The elves don't eat meat because it's against their religion.
The elves are nice. They like the rain. They don't eat meat because it's against their religion.

Both pathetic sentences, but which do you prefer? Repeating the subject a million times in a row gets tiring and repetitive, so you should try to replace it with something else.

On either side.. The long or short ends? Also, why would a fairth be considered a sample of ASlagaesia's artisanry? Drawings yeah. Fairths are just 'what I see, yea that, let it be reflected on the block of clay'. It's not really what I would call artistical difficulty.

stage = platform

The first part was a stage carefully designed so that it could accommodate a well-nourished-full-grown-dragon. The further half was divided into two parts in the ratio of 2:1. The larger part was made to accommodate standing people and the smaller was meant for sitting people. The latter had fully furnished chairs and was obviously meant for rich merchants

Wait, what? And Brom knows all of this? HOW? And the logarithm 2:1 is completely redundant. All I thought of when seeing that was WTH? Apart from that, you've made me imagine the hall as being huge, with one huge stage, with people in front of it like at a rock concert on one side and classical music bods on the other.

As Brom was studying the interiors , four elves brought an elder-wood-made-table, covered with linen cloth, and kept it in the centre of the hall, nearest to the stairs. One of the elves uncovered the table revealing five smooth polished stones.

The table may itself cost a fortune. I am sure the stones kept on it are eggs....dragon eggs !, thought Brom.

When you're in a crowd, you hardly can see. Brom was waht, ten? Have you SEEn how little ten year olds are? They're barely 1,50m tall! That said, it would be hard for him to see anything at all squeezed in with the rest of the crowd, especially the casket of egs.

That said, I either want him to weasel to the front or someone puts him on their shoulders so that the chapter can continue.

The first egg was red in colour and had an intricate pattern of veins on it. It was the second biggest egg, just an inch smaller than the sapphire egg. The glint of the sapphire egg caught Brom’s eye and he glared the egg for five minutes before resuming the examination of the rest of the eggs. The rest three eggs were almost equal in size and were of green, white and black colour.

So,. lets have our moment of OBVIOUS FORESHADOWING here. XD I mean, honestly, it's obvious Brom's getting his mitts on the blue one. I'd also prefer if you didn't single them out like that; we see that the saphirre and red one are uber important and the others insignificant. It would even be fun if he set his heart on the white one so that it would look like the one on the poster.

Brom moved with the queue that was approaching the larger part, made to accommodate standing people. The area could hold about 400 people. The people in the queue stood in 10 rows each with 40 people. Brom moved to the eighth row from the left and positioned himself so that he could easily watch the stage. After about 15 minutes the people settled and the movement in the auditorium stopped.

Where are we, nazi Germany? These are simple people with no idea of such things! Remember, Kuasta was completely cut off! By all means, it shouldn't have a grand Hall like this! The crowd won't stand in orderly lines and shut up - they'll keep talking their heads off, all squeezed together. And dividing up neatly is something they definetely wouldn't do. Think about it.

Again, this is a ten year old kid; he should be besides himself with excitement. Instead, he bores me. I see no emotion on his side, something you could really work on. Brom right now is like a mechanical toy; he sees and moves. Adding some emotions to his childish mind and thoughts would help.

Something that I really don't get is, does he have any idea what's going on? He says somewhere above that he's sure those are dragon eggs. If he knew what this was all about, he wouldn't have thought that. If he didn''t, why the heck is he there? XD Chances are he'd know, anyway, what will all the stories going around.

A huge dragon came flying out of nowhere and landed on the stage.
THUD! THUD! THUD!
In three moves the dragon positioned itself to face the crowd. A strange looking man/elf jumped from the dragon and fell on the floor, as lightly as a feather. He wore al white coloured tunic and had a brown belt on his pants. He had blonde hair and no beard. He muttered an inaudible line in an alien language and suddenly each sound made by him was magnified ten times.

ZOMG!!11!!! Materializing dragon!!!!

No.

Dragons are big. Very big dragons are really big. They make noise with their wings when they come close, unless this thing dropped out of the sky. You'd still have seen the shadow.

The rider.. Gosh, you mention his pants after his belt? XD For a moment, I thought he wore none! How does he mutter something inaudibly and you understand the language is alien AND that it was a spell that magnified his voice. His voice might have been naturally so loud.

You haen't grasped the idea of the narrator yet. You're writing from Brom's POV, so he can't know things like this. Therefore, YOU can't write them. Keep to what the character is capable of noticing. He's a child. If some grown-u[ makes an innuendo, he mustn't react; he's still innocent.

Gettit?

“I am Vrael, Rider of my dragon Machtigen, Lead Rider of the order and carrier of the eggs” said the rider. “Every year I carry six or seven eggs among the elves and humans. The eggs hatch for those who the dragons think are capable of the title Rider. The rider is generally between the ages of twelve and twenty-five and becomes immortal after he touches the dragon. Please, I request all those who think they have the resilience to become a rider to come on this stage.”

Cold chap. If I was in that auditorium, I'd either think 'what a snot!' and leave or surge forwards. 'Hey! This guy says I can live forever! Woooot! gimme a dragon!' He treats the occassion as if it was a game, with no reference to the hard training and dangers. Really, fix this. Generally, it's like a for-all kind of situation; he's saying nothing of interest, apart from the immortality bit, and isn't helping these people get what being a rider is about.

Unless it's just about being immortal.

Your dialogues are generally stilted, cut off, like sentences. I'd suggest you listen to people speak and try to imagine characters as people. For instance; in my view, Vrael is a kind, happy-go-lucky, laid-back guy. He would be friendly, smiling, and so on. Not a block of wood with a computerized voice coming out of it.

When writing, you can always try and think of the emtotion of that point and add adjectives that add qualities to his voice, his face, his eyes, etc.

"Welcome." is very different to "Welcome!" he smiled brightly, his eyes shining. Which is preferable?

Just as he heard these words Brom sprinted towards the stage not caring whether he tripped or fell. When he reached the stage he judged the number of people coming towards the stage. Already four young boys and girls had reached the stage and about two score were following.

When all of them had reached the stage the rider spoke again. “Ok young boys and girls, please form a queue and one by one you all shall touch the dragon eggs.” A queue was quickly formed and Brom was fifth in number.

You have something with queues, dontcha? I'll call you Queue from now on. XD Little kids with eggs and dragons won't sit still like that! And who's Brom calling little, the squirt? XD

Sprinting forward like that is.. logical, but wouldn't he be scared? Don't forget, amny people will come forward, not just kids. You did say til 25, which I think is innacurate. Humans were picked when they were ten years old.


As a whole, it's not bad as a whole, just needs a lot of work in several areas, emotion, dialogue, description and logical sequence being the most important of those. XD Good work on the start of it!

[Shadeslayer Asrafel]

It's good a like it so far, keep it up

[Stormfire]

Shadeslayer Asrafel, I know you're new, but don't just say it's good, or it's bad. Please tell the author why you like the story or what you dislike it about it. Kari&Gatomon's post is a good example (don't worry, we aren't expecting super long posts, just more content).

[Shikhin]

Thanks For your comments. I know I am not that good and I can improve . I will improve my dialogues but not make Brom as a child like boy. As you no he doesnt reveal much of his feelings and emotions. I will make some improvements in the first chapter though. Please read it again if you want to. I would be happy if you do so.

This post has been edited by Shikhin: 05 November 2009 - 12:14 PM

[Kari]

There's a difference to not showing emotion and not HAVING emotion. Not showing emotion comes from some experience, and Bromie's just a little kid. He should be a kid, not some stone.

Also, you should make him show emotion inwardly, at the least.

[Shikhin]

I am writing the rest of the first chapter in the first post itself. I will finish writing it till tommorrow same time. A little bit I am writing now. Hope you enjoy it.

This post has been edited by Shikhin: 07 November 2009 - 04:01 AM

[murtagh kicks ass]

Thanks For your comments. I know I am not that good and I can improve . I will improve my dialogues but not make Brom as a child like boy. As you no he doesnt reveal much of his feelings and emotions. I will make some improvements in the first chapter though. Please read it again if you want to. I would be happy if you do so.

i thought thant in the books he didnt reveal much of his emotions because he had lived with them for so long that he had subconciously stopped showing them, he wouldnt have been like that before he moved to Carvahall

[murtagh kicks ass]

That's a pretty good start for a Brom story.You will never see me trying to correct different things related to the text, as english is not my native language, but I'm pretty sure the others will help you .In addition, you have to restrain from using words like stage, photos, and other words which are relatively new.You can replace stage with...an english speaker will help you and photos with fairths(if they are made by elves) or paintings, depends on how you imagined them.I'll definitely keep an eye on your story

YOu could perhaps replace stage with, raised dias. up to you though