She crossed the clearing slowly, unsure of her footing in the darkness. The only thing she had to light her way was the low gloom of the forest ahead, and the ever shrinking light from the interior of her home. The forest was alive with the sounds of life and movement. The last of the year’s crickets still chirped softly, and the breeze rustled the trees. Owls hooted in the distance, and the stream chortled softly beside her as she followed it up to the trees, all of which was complemented by the soft crunch of dry leaves beneath her hooves.
She paused at the edge of the wood. The fog was even creepier up close, and it felt cold to the touch. The trees overhead wrapped their long branches thickly around one another, blocking out the starry sky. She felt like she was standing at the edge of a toothy mouth, ever agape, waiting to swallow up the unaware that wandered in. The mist swirled in loose ribbons around her hooves, and grew thicker farther into the forest. With a soft whimper, and threatened resolve, Winterwoods took the first steps into the thicket.
She struggled to remind herself that she walked this timberland nearly every morning, and that she wasn’t anywhere that she hadn’t been before. But a fear lingered still in her heart, because the difference between day and night seemed greatly exaggerated here. Winterwoods had never really feared the night or the dark before, but from the day she’d moved in, something unnatural about these woods itched at her when darkness fell.
As she wandered further in, the sounds of the night faded into silence. It grew deeper and louder until it pulsed with every beat of her heart. She’d never been somewhere where her own footsteps felt muted, where no sounds of nature or any living things reached out to her. Winterwoods stopped on the misty path and stared at the empty trail ahead, fear gripping her completely. Something was terribly wrong. Flipping around, she went to turn back and squeaked in shock.
The path that had been behind her previously now ended mere inches away from where she stood; she was instead met with a wall of trees and a thick fog that swirled menacingly around every trunk and bush. Mouth agape, she attempted to stammer anything to express her shock. She was silenced by a rustling amongst the brush nearby, violently breaking the heavy silence.
Heart racing, Winterwoods shrunk back and dodged hastily into the foliage opposite the sound, then peered timidly out, trying to still her shaking and heavy breathing. There was a brief silence, then a scrambling of feet as a couple of rabbits bounded by. The source of their alarm made itself known briefly after, and Winterwoods stared in horror as it moved silently through the flora.
It was a tall, dark mass that took the shape of a large pony. It had no particular features, only an equine outline that had a faint blue aura around its black body. Without shifting a single leaf it passed through the trees and brush, clearly unaffected by the solidity of the world around it.
The air grew colder, and Winterwoods began to fear that it may hear her shivering in the nearby brush. The dread of its presence was soon so crushing that she wanted to cover her eyes and scream. Her heart kicked against her chest, and her skin crawled as though maggots nestled in her fur. The thing stopped on its course beside where she lay hidden, and Winterwoods shreiked internally, promising anything to the moon if the creature would just go away. After a few lingering seconds, the creature moved slowly onward. After what felt like an eternity of waiting, the mist lessened, and the sweet flowery scent returned.
Winterwoods let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding and dared a glance down the path the thing had taken. The trail was empty. With a small sigh of relief, she shifted slightly in her hiding spot and carefully slid out as to not make any noise. The path she’d walked before was still non-existent amongst the trees; she gulped, knowing that the only way forward was the same path that the monster had taken.
Winterwoods shivered and closed her eyes. She very much regretted coming out to the woods that night. She wished that she’d have just let it go and tried to go back to sleep. With a sigh, she turned herself around and froze… Eyes closed in mid blink, her hair stood on end and she suddenly knew. The air was still very cold… Trembling, she opened her eyes slowly to the horror of the black mass bearing down upon her.
She tried to scream, but it was lost in what sounded like an ocean of static invading her ears. As the world darkened around her and her senses crumbled, she heard voices echoing above.
"You're overreacting," a soft voice started. "Will you just listen to me?"
“No! You will listen to ME for once! There is nothing wrong with me! There's nothing wrong with what I desire! I should say that I am under-reacting, if anything!!! Do you dare deny me as an equal?! I am truly better at what I do than you will EVER be!” it shrieked. “All of this is your fault this time! You must admit for once that there’s nothing wrong with ME!” As these final words faded from hearing, the sweet flowery scent grew strong and then waned with the last of her consciousness.
Winterwoods jolted awake with her heart pounding in her chest. Sitting up, she trembled in the darkness of her room, unsure of the questionable fear that pricked at every ounce of her body. Something was terribly wrong. It was still very dark out; and was long before dawn she guessed.
“Wait…” she whimpered. “What just happened?!”
6982999 Yeah, they're not meant to be super long, and these are more or less to set up whats going on. But theres also at LEAST five more chapters to come. So theres plenty more story to tell and the future chapters will be somewhat longer.
6995384
Okay, I wasn't sure how that even slipped in, I don't really use ';' very often anyway. I don't view them as a very essential thing in terms of creative writing.
Also, as for starting sentences with 'and', it's actually something that I have no idea why teachers tell students, because you 100% can. I think people assume you can't merely because it is a coordinating conjunction often used to separate two clauses, but the rule that you can't start a sentence with one isn't actually based on any grammatical or historical foundation. Creative writing isn't taught in school much these days, unless you go to college for it. Creative writing isn't required to be so formal like it is when you're writing an article or an academic essay, which is the reason I love it so much, and is why I'm more than willing to start essays with 'and', 'but', 'yet', and 'or'. I actually spent time researching this topic when I first started writing fanfiction, and was amazed that my teachers had always told me that a sentence couldn't start that way. But it's probably because most school writing wants to be formal, and they'd like to prepare students for college. I just wish they'd make the point to define when you don't have to use, and when you should use formal writing. I felt like school tried it's absolute hardest to squash creativity in students, which is super depressing to me. They should be offering opportunities for students learn to express themselves creatively in whatever format they like along side general education.
I wasn't aware that people assumed you couldn't start a sentence in a word ending in 'ing'. Thinking on it now, I can see how it would appear that the leave were the ones who stepped outside. That is a change I'll be making soon. Mistakes like that tend to happen more when I write late at night like I do, especially since my usual editor has been busy lately. He hasn't gotten the chance to look it over yet, but I didn't really want to wait to post it, but it will be updated when I get feedback from him as well. ^^
Unfortunately, repetition is another side effect of my writing late at night, but that's when my creative juices flow the best. It just lets grammar, spelling and stuff like that suffer a bit. Which is why I definitely need editors, lol! I'll look it over again soon and make sure that gets changed up a bit so it's not so repetitive.
I've actually been thinking hard on the issue of her appearance for a while, it's been bugging me because I wanted to share her appearance but was actually afraid to spend much time on what she looked like, because people seem to be upset when people write stories that involve original characters. It's like they assume that it's going to be another bad self-insertion about an over-powered pony sona that is somehow in a "super-serious" relationship with one of the princesses or one of the mane six. You know, the type that usually end up being a neon colored "Lord of Death" and is like 99.99% likely to also be a black alicorn. For this reason I refrained on her appearance, and had hoped the cover photo would give them an idea of what she looked like. But there are actually a few places that I could easily slip some description in. It's where I'd originally planned to give the readers some hints at what she looks like.
And thanks so, so much for the feedback! I've been needing some for a while now, and it's been really hard to get people to read it, let alone let me know what was good/bad about it. It's kind of disheartening sometimes when you taking writing it seriously enough to make something with lots of care and consideration. Did you read both chapters by chance, or just the first one? I have a third one I'm working on if you wouldn't mind giving that a once-over when It gets posted.
Hello again!
For chapter 2
1. "She felt like she were standing at the edge of the toothy mouth of the forest. Ever agape, waiting to swallow up the unaware that wandered in. "
Combine those sentences. The second one doesn't work by itself.
Overall, I think the grammar is pretty good---I think I spotted a few minor mistakes but it's fine.
Again, you captured the emotions well, and it certainly left me with a lot of questions.
I think you did a really good job with setting the scene and the atmosphere!
However, don't be afraid to say something about what Winterwoods looks like---people don't mind Earth Pony oc's as much as Alicorn OC's, trust me. At the very least, tell them she's an Earthy Pony and they might like her that much more, just knowing she's a realistic pony, and not an overpowered draconequus or whatever, you know? (No offense to the draconequus owners).
Anyway, very nice work, and how on earth do people use the pony emojis on this site?
-- The pioneer with a heart for people and a thousand stories to tell ~+~