pug of crydee17

The rain relentlessly battered down on the small group of men who were struggling to the edge of Loomeron forest. As the twenty or so men reached the shelter of the mighty trees on the outskirts of the forest, they slumped down onto the wet grass, catching as much breath as they could. The camp lapsed into a comfortable silence, a rare moment of tranquillity that everyone was making the most of. One man was still standing and looking at the men strewn around him. The man was Rodill Emek and he had somehow became the unofficial leader of this band of desperate men. The events of the last 8 months were the most important and distressing of his life and, yet, he knew his ordeal was only at a beginning. Rodill suddenly sank to his knees and picked up a small yellow flower that was poking through the tough soil at the edge of a particularly large tree. As he admired the beauty of the flower, a thing he was unable to do for months, he thought back to the events that started him down this road of the unknown.

Eight months before

Rodill loosed an arrow into the massive congregation of deer in the distance. A loud scream announced that his arrow had struck home and he silently sighed his relief. He hadn’t eaten for two days due to the unusual lack of game on the outskirts of Eldrad, the village he called home. He had decided to come all the way to Loomeron forest with a few of his friends so that they could finally eat, and eat they would, thought Rodill happily.
"Geez Rodill, that’s one fine specimen you've just brought down there!"
Rodill looked closely and realised he was right. The deer was bigger than usual, and all the better for it.
"Your right there Calder! That thing could feed the village for a week!" laughed Rodill, looking forward to spiking this animal and rotating it on a spit. Rodill looked around, suddenly realising that they were a man down.
"Were has that Rascal got to now?" began Rodill, a hint of irritation entering his tone.
"Who?" asked a small man at the back of the hunting party.
"Breen. I guess he’s gone to relieve himself" Rodill replied as he set off to fetch his massive prize. He reached down and looked at his kill. He gradually regretted what he had done as he took in the sheer elegance of the beast before him. He rubbed his grey streaked stubble in irritation, as he once again looked at the beast, wishing it would jump up and bound away into the hulking mass of trees that was Loomeron forest. As he pulled the arrow from the deer’s neck, he noticed a small mark on the creature’s forehead. It was a sword with a dragon curling around the blade. Rodill backed away in utter horror, his eyes transfixed on symbol. It was the mark of the Ordon slavers, and as far as he was concerned, the mark of evil.
"Its time to go" said Rodill as he turned around to face his comrades.
"Yes, indeed it is hunter"
In a circle around his friends were around fifteen men clad in shining black robes, each with a hood up and a red mask just visible under the hood. The man who had spoken approached Rodill with his sword drawn. The man looked down at the deer and made a muffled noise under the mask. Before Rodill could react, the man struck the bewildered hunter across the jaw with the pommel of his sword. Rodill went down and passed out before he hit the grass.


Rodill struggled to his knees and looked around at his surroundings. He was surrounded by around two hundred people, who all looked worse for wear. Rodill suddenly sputtered and coughed up a considerable amount of blood. He was then pulled to his feet by two men. The man to his left began speaking.
"Excuse me sir, any word of my father?" the young man said in concern "Come on, speak man!"
Rodill peered into the mans eyes and said weakly
"Look here lad" Rodill said, attempting to sound angry, but failing "How in the name of Keldor do you expect me to know your father if I don’t know you?"
"Oh..." the young man said, an apologetic look clear on his face "I’m forgetting myself... two months in this hellhole and I already forget my manners. I am Prince Emerand, son of Armal Mann, King of Thale. You are from Thale aren’t you?"
Rodill nodded and the Prince hurried on with his barrage of queries.
"Is my Father well? How fares Thale?"
Rodill slumped against the wall and ignored the young Princes questions.
"I will answer but please, where am I?" he asked politely, suddenly feeling sorry for the prince. What was a royal doing here anyway? It wasn’t the Prince that answered his question.
"We are in the cells, situated under Unmer Keep" said a small man with a striking multicoloured robe clinging to his small frame.
"By the Trees of Prayer! You are a Rainbow Apostle! How in the hell did they get you here? Why didn’t you use your arts to blast your captors to another world?"
The small man laughed bitterly before saying
"My peoples arts are somewhat over estimated, Thalian"
"Well im still bewildered. Why would the slavers even dare to imprison such important people? So far, the only people ive met in here are either rich or powerful. I’m hoping this is coincidence"
The old man looked closely at Rodill, and stroked his white beard.
"You are observant Thalian. There is indeed a pattern. The slavers are almost certainly in league with another force, and that force is obviously powerful enough to give these slavers ideas above their station. The main reason I was overwhelmed was not the amount of slavers that challenged me, oh no. They had someone with them. The man was my equal in the use of the Rainbow arts. Before my inevitable capture I was able to read the mans mind, as mind reading is my specialty, and I have gained knowledge of the plan that this foul allegiance has in mind. This I will reveal later. All I will tell you is that the plan concerns the four Trees of Prayer" at this most of the prisoners stood in shocked silence "and the slavers are imprisoning everyone who is considered a threat to the plan. Everyone in this prison is indeed either rich or powerful. They intend to bring the defences of each country to its knees by eliminating anyone who is capable of standing in their way"
Rodill stood in shock. The trees were the only link to the gods the countries of Keldor had and the link these trees had maintained the welfare of each country, the crops, the water source all these things were the work of the trees.
"Listen apostle, you have no choice but to reveal the agenda. Our families are out there. What have the trees got to do with the plan?"
The small man sighed
"Ok..." he raised his voice "Gather round everyone!"

Titania

Ok, this is going to be rather long but I hope that since you called this the "rough edition" this is the sort of thing you were looking for. I'll point out the mistakes I saw first.

tranquility (one l) instead of tranquillity

Somehow become, and you use the words men / man a lot here, maybe replace the second with vagabonds or soldiers or whatever you feel is appropriate?

Generally small numbers should be written out (eight)... and maybe he knew his ordeal was only beginning? sounds a little more concise. Take out the comma, it sounds odd.

Should be a thing he had been unable to do

I'd italicize the "eight months before" just so it's a bit clearer

You have a habit of leaving off the punctuation at the end of pieces of dialogue.
So it should be:
"It's time to go," said Rodill as he...
and
"Yes, indeed it is, hunter."

This paragraph seems, I don't know, anticlimactic? First, I'd take out the second around as it sounds odd (repetition), and maybe combine a couple of the later sentences so you don't have to keep saying the man did this, the man did that, etc. as it gets a bit old. Try and have some variety of long and short sentences.

It would have been nice to have some other break marking between the sections.

same problem as before

Could you describe a little more? He looks at his surroundings... what does he see? "People" is kind of generic, not very exciting. What about other senses? what does he smell, hear, etc.?

The dialogue in the last section is nice, but it seems a bit oddly divided paragraph-wise, and occassionally it's hard to tell who's talking. Also, things like this:

"Look here, lad," Rodill said, attempting to sound angry but failing...

It's the punctuation-after dialogue problem. And you're dropping apostrophes again:
I'm and I've, and a period after the word coincidence.

One of my few overall comments is that it feels like things are moving really fast. First he's reminiscing, then he's shooting the deer, then in the dungeon, etc. It'd be neat to see more elaboration. What is the narrator feeling throughout all of this? We hear what he says, but we haven't really gotten to know his character at all.

That said, I hope to see more. Nice work.

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