Young Writers Society

“Don’t cry, Nemzi.” Papa said. I looked down at the scrape on my knee, my tears blurring my vision. I had tried climbing the oak tree. I had wanted to reach the top. I knew I could, I had the strength, the ability. But I lost my footing and I fell. Small scratches covered my arms and legs. Papa came to me, hugging me close, whispering that everything was okay. I would be alright.

Mama, reading me a bedtime story. Her sweet voice resounding in my head, filling my heart with peace. She showed me the stories of her great-great-grandparents, their parents, and their parents before that. The demons. How her family became well known for demon hunting. She rocked me to sleep, stroking my hair and singing the Italian lullaby. “Dolce cielo estivo, cristallo occhi verdi. La tua bellezza supera il peso del mondo. Io ti amerò sempre, la mia bambina.”

His face was transparent. Pale. And his clothing looked as if he was from the ancient times. I regaurded him cautiously. Attack points flashed through my mind. Was this man a threat? “I am no threat to you. I am your saint. Do you know what that means?” I thought for a moment. Saint. Just like in mama’s stories. This man was a saint? Then, whose saint was he? As if reading my mind, he said “I am your saint, Noemi. It is time for you to start hunting demons, just as your parents have.” Demons. It all made sense now. I relaxed. This man couldn’t hurt me, because if he did, he would die. That meant I couldn’t kill him either. Fair enough. So, I had to begin training now. Brilliant.

SLAM! My father hit me, hard, against my arm. I flinched. I never knew this part of papa .The fighting part, the hard part. Blow after blow, papa came at me. His words stung as much as his hits did. “You FIGHT, Noemi. You keep hitting, no matter what! You can’t just sit there and take the blows. Get up, Nemz, get up. These demons won’t let you rest, like I do.” I was scared. Papa couldn’t hurt me. He wouldnt, would he? His next blow brought me to my knees. Tears streaming down my face, I took a deep breath and let the instincts take over. This was not my father, this was just another being. This being was attacking me, I must attack back. I must kill. In a split second, I jumped up and struck my father in the face, pushed him to the ground, and landed next to him on my knees, my hand grasping his neck. I backed up quickly, ashamed of what I had just done. I had just attacked my father? Oh my god. But he got up and smiled at me, a trickle of blood coming from his scalp. “Good. Now, again.” And he lunged for me once more. This time, I was prepared.

It was the eyes. You would expect them to be black, or red... they were bright voilet, like a poison. They drained you of free will. I was thinking that I would have to make something to reflect the eyes. Glasses maybe... this demon hadn’t seen me yet. I made another mental note to use the element of suprise. My life is full of mental notes... I frowned. My life. This demon is part of my life now. Fourteen and already my life was as tangled as the vines on our wall that mama loved so much. I picked up a dagger and, walking as quietly as possible, I snuck up behind the creature. It looked like a dwarf. Only, it’s skin was wrinkled, and small, tattered wings sprouted from it’s back. It was hunched over, devouring some poor helpless animal. Feeding time. This one would be defensive. It sensed me just as I came up behind it, and turned much quicker than I thought possible. Demons are made of shadows, papa had writtten in his journal. That meant they could break down the atoms in thier body, move them around, and put them back together in a different location. Every movement was almost invisible. It looked at me briefly, then screwed up its eyes and opened its mouth. The teeth were perfect, unlike how I would have guessed. Three rows of perfect, sharp, thin teeth. But its breath was foul.. it smelled like sickness. A putrid disgust of bleh. I jumped back and landed in a crouch. As I straightened, a burst of blue green flame erupted from the mouth of this horrid creature. Pain was next. A searing pain ran up my leg, and looking down, I saw that the fire had left a jagged spiral mark gash on my leg. Singed around the egdes and blood staining my clothes and calf, the wound was a dilemma. I tried stepping, and oddly, found no pain. A natural numbing solution. Brilliant. I turned to the demon, who was now turned back to his meal. He seemed to think of me as unimportant. In his mind, I was defeated. I took that to my advantage, and ran up behind it, stabbing it deep in its back. The dagger burned blue, and the demon let out a houl, then dropped to black mist. Dead, finally. The numbness was fading away, I needed to get home.

Wincing, I put my leg back under the faucet. The wound from my first demon was now pained, and I had to clean it. This, I was not looking foreward to. I took the small bottle of homemade cleaner my mother gave me, and poured some on my washcloth. Gently, I scrubbed around the wound, getting as close to it as I could without actually touching it. The dried up blood liquified and ran down my leg, watery and soapy. I watched it swirl around the drain, as if eluding capture as long as possible, wanting more than ever to just flow freely. That is how I felt now. I did not want this life. But already, from the day I was born, I was forced to flow with the rest, destined to be just as everyone else in my family. My parents had gone off on another demon raid, the most dangerous one in history. They would not let me come. I was too fragile to them, even though I was thinking like a hunter and acting like a hunter and training like a hunter. I was still thier child. So instead of them worrying about me, I worried about them. It had been months yet, and I had not heard from them. Were they okay?

I jolted awake, scared by the intense fear that the last scene had brought upon me. Those were the memories I kept. My first demon attack, my mama, my papa. My saint. The demon scars. Half of it was my life now the other half, mama and papa, were gone. Dead. They died in that raid. I was left alone, to finish teaching myself and hunt down and kill as many demons as possible... I sighed and jumped out of my small, worn bed onto my slightly slanting floor. Another day was upon me, and I had demons to kill.

Hello there I'm Truth and I shall be your reviewer tonight! Comments in bold, corrections and suggestions in red

VousEsEtonnant wrote:“Don’t cry, Nemzi, comma” Papa said. I looked down at the scrape on my knee, my tears blurring my vision. I had tried climbing the oak tree. I had wanted to reach the top. I knew I could, I had the strength, the ability. But I lost my footing and I fell. Small scratches covered my arms and legs. Papa came to me, hugging me close, whispering that everything was okay. I would be alright.

Mama, reading me a bedtime story. Her sweet voice resounding in my head, filling my heart with peace. She showed me the stories of her great-great-grandparents, their parents, and their parents before that. The demons. How her family became well known for demon hunting. She rocked me to sleep, stroking my hair and singing the Italian lullaby. “Dolce cielo estivo, cristallo occhi verdi. La tua bellezza supera il peso del mondo. Io ti amerò sempre, la mia bambina.”

His face was transparent. Pale. And his clothing looked as if he was from the ancient times. I regarded him cautiously. Attacks points flashed through my mind. Was this man a threat? “I am no threat to you. I am your saint. Do you know what that means?” I thought for a moment. Saint. Just like in mama’s stories. This man was a saint? Then, whose saint was he? As if reading my mind, he said “I am your saint, Noemi. It is time for you to start hunting demons, just as your parents have.” Demons. It all made sense now. I relaxed. This man couldn’t hurt me, because if he did, he would die. That meant I couldn’t kill him either. Fair enough. So, I had to begin training now. Brilliant.

SLAM! My father hit me, hard, against my arm. I flinched. I never knew this violent part of Papa. The fighting part, the hard part. Blow after blow, Papa came at me, comma his words stinging as much as his hits did. “You FIGHT, Noemi. You keep hitting, no matter what! You can’t just sit there and take the blows. Get up, Nemz, get up. These demons won’t let you rest, like I do.” I was scared. Papa couldn’t hurt me. He wouldn't, would he? His next blow brought me to my knees. Tears streaming down my face, I took a deep breath and let the instincts take over. This was not my father, this was just another being. This being was attacking me, I must attack back. I must kill. In a split second, I jumped up and struck my father in the face, pushed him to the ground, and landed next to him on my knees, my hand grasping his neck. I backed up quickly, ashamed of what I had just done. I had just attacked my father? Oh my god. But he got up and smiled at me, a trickle of blood coming from his scalp. “Good. Now, again.” And he lunged for me once more. This time, I was prepared.

It was the eyes. You would expect them to be black, or red... they were bright violet, like a poison. They drained you of free will. Try not to use 'you' too much, unless the reader is in the story I was thinking that I would have to make something to reflect the eyes. Glasses maybe... this demon hadn’t seen me yet. I made another mental note to use the element of surprise. My life was full of mental notes... I frowned. My life. This demon was part of my life now. I was only Fourteen, comma and already my life was as tangled as the vines on our wall that Mama loved so much. When using Mama or Papa as a name, they should be capitalized. They don't need to be if you use it in possessive form like: my mom I picked up a dagger and, walking as quietly as possible, I snuck up behind the creature. It looked like a dwarf, comma only, its skin was wrinkled, and small, tattered wings sprouted from its back. It's 'its' because it belongs to the creature It was hunched over, devouring some poor helpless animal. Feeding time. This one would be defensive. It sensed me just as I came up behind it, and turned much quicker than I thought possible. Demons are made of shadows, Papa had written in his journal. That meant they could break down the atoms in their body, move them around, and put them back together in a different location. Every movement was almost invisible. It looked at me briefly, then screwed up its eyes and opened its mouth. The teeth were perfect, unlike how I would have guessed. Three rows of perfect, sharp, thin teeth. But its breath was foul.. it smelled like sickness. A putrid disgust of bleh. Bleh? I jumped back, comma and landed in a crouch. As I straightened, a burst of blue green flame erupted from the mouth of this horrid creature. Pain was next. A searing pain ran up my leg, and looking down, I saw that the fire had left a jagged spiral mark gash on my leg. Singed around the edges and blood staining my clothes and calf, the wound was a dilemma. I tried stepping, and oddly, found no pain. A natural numbing solution. Brilliant. I turned to the demon, who was now turned back to his meal. He seemed to regard me as unimportant. In his mind, I was defeated. I took that to my advantage, and ran up behind it, stabbing it deep in its back. The dagger burned blue, and the demon let out a howl, then dropped to black mist. Dead, finally. The numbness was fading away, I needed to get home.

Wincing, I put my leg back under the faucet. The wound from my first demon now hurt, and I had to clean it. This, I was not looking forward to. I took the small bottle of homemade cleaner my mother gave me, and poured some on my washcloth. Gently, I scrubbed around the wound, getting as close to it as I could without actually touching it. The dried up blood liquefied and ran down my leg, watery and soapy. I watched it swirl around the drain, as if eluding capture as long as possible, wanting more than ever to just flow freely. That is how I felt now. I did not want this life. But already, from the day I was born, I was forced to flow with the rest, destined to be just as everyone else in my family. My parents had gone off on another demon raid, the most dangerous one in history. They would not let me come. I was too fragile to them, even though I was thinking like a hunter and actinglike a hunter and training like a hunter. I was still their child. So instead of them worrying about me, I worried about them. It had been months yet, and I had not heard from them. Were they okay?

I jolted awake, scared by the intense fear that the last scene had brought upon me. Those were the memories I kept. My first demon attack, my mama, my papa. My saint. The demon scars. Half of it was my life now the other half, Mama and Papa, were gone. Dead. They had died in that raid. I was left alone, to finish teaching myself and hunt down and kill as many demons as possible... I sighed and jumped out of my small, worn bed onto my slightly slanting floor. Another day was upon me, and I had demons to kill.

Overall, nice emotions in there. I cannot comment on the plot just yet, but it sounds like a nice beginning. My only complaint would be the superficial mistakes. It would be a good idea to use spell-check before posting. Other then that, it's great
Keep on writing!

-Truth-

Ooooh, color me intrigued.

A putrid disgust of bleh.

Erm, this makes no sense. I get the gist of what you mean and I love the idea of using "bleh" as a descriptor here, but "disgust" as a noun really doesn't work here. Maybe something like "A putrid mess of bleh" or something. "Disgust" as a noun is more of an abstract concept, as opposed to the concrete thing you are describing here.

TheTruthLiesWithin covered the grammatical nitpicks really well, so I'll just move on to other stuff.

I liked this. The idea was interested and the idea of using the flashbacks for introduction worked surprisingly well here. The only thing that became a little distracting after a while was the italicization. After a while, when the paragraphs began to get longer, I began to wonder if all the story was going to be in italics. Then, when it abruptly switched so the italics were gone at the end, I was sort of jarred out of the story for a minute. And then... it was all a dream.

That last paragraph really weakened the rest of the piece before it, methinks. I mean, you had some strong material, original material, in the beginning, and then by going for the dream beginning, it sort of undercuts it all. A million stories have begun with the hero waking up in the morning. Why not have the flashbacks, then go right to some sort of action? Go right to the daily routine, or to some important interaction, something, anything, other than waking up.

This is entirely suggestion, but don't worry about pointing out that they were flashbacks. The italics make it clear. Maybe to make it even clearer (and introduce non-italicized text sooner so it's not such a surprise when the main narration shows up) why not interspace it with other action? Like, have italicized flashback, some sort of marker (like *** or --- or something to clearly delineate where it begins), then normal narration, marker, flashback, etc. We'll get a clear picture of the character's past, not to mention see how it relates to the story in real time. We don't need the character to shake out of a train of thought or wake up from a dream or anything. We understand that it's not happening in real time.

Liked this a lot. The premise has hooked me. I'm on to more.

Feel free to drop me a line if you have any questions!

~GryphonFledgling

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I have to say, I really liked this a lot..
It flows pretty well and I liked the way you described the demon!
The slight errors have already been pointed out, so I won't repeat, but...
I like it. (I said that didn't I?)
Keep writing!! You'll only get better.