Kravek Rivakian
December 25th, 2008, 12:28 PM
I am writing a book that I intend to publish by the end of February at the latest. It is a furry book. Here is an excerpt from chapter seven "The Phoenix Revealed". I'd love to have some feedback on what feelings this scene evokes and how well / poorly it is written.
“Where is she going!?”
Galthos stopped, turning about and watching in amazement as the golden furred lioness broke from the crowd in what seemed like a dead heat for the burning building. Before anyone could react, Ellorin smashed the front door of the blazing building into shards with a shoulder, disappearing from sight.
“Ello!” Furi tried to run after the lioness only to be snagged by Keana and Rhutap, both of them restraining her from running into the fire. “Let me go! Ello’s in there! Let go of me!”
She tried to push away from her mother only for Keana to grip her tightly as Rhutap imposed himself between Furi and the building. Turning his head back, he looked to the building and the opening that Ellorin had created.
Keana immediately reached up and tugged on one of Rhutap’s ears, the cheetah reacting by turning his head back to look at her with a slight pained expression as the lizardess spoke. “Don’t even think about it.”
He growled in his throat for a moment as he looked back at the fire. “Damnit…”
Inside the building, the lioness recoiled from the wave of heat that washed over her as a support column for the three story building collapsed inwards, making the entire building creak and shudder. The place was coming down around her and she had to move fast. Rushing past a burning chair, the lioness quickly pulled herself up the stairs, thankful that they had not yet ignited from the blaze.
Focusing on her thoughts for a moment, a mental image of the tavern came to her mind and she tried to remember where she’d seen the cub when she heard another loud meow coming from the second floor. Her head immediately turned toward the sound and she rushed up the second flight of stairs, her ears swiveling about rapidly.
When she heard the meow again, it was coming from farther back in the building and she rushed through an open doorway to find herself standing in one of the tavern’s rear residential rooms. On the far wall, perched just below a window sill was a tiger kitten, panting with panic and heat as the room around him blazed.
The lioness looked up at the ceiling and the condition it was in. If the rooms above were anything like the one she was standing in now, it wouldn’t be long before furniture came crashing through. The tiger kitten turned and spotted her, meowing desperately at her as it cowered in fear of the flames.
As Ellorin dashed across the room, she could hear the creak of the boards beneath her feet and the heat surrounding her, singing her fur. Sweeping her arm around the tiger kitten, she pulled him away from the window, planting her chokran at her feet as she considered the window. The thought of leaping out with the kitten in arm swiftly escaped her mind when the window shattered, sending shards of glass flying. She shielded the kitten from the glass and felt the building suddenly shudder under her feet.
As the floor cracked, the lioness stabbed her chokran into it and leapt forcefully, ripping her weapon out of the floor as the entire back side of the building seemed to suddenly creak and rumble, giving way. The sudden and painful impact of the ceiling above her collapsing made Ellorin crash onto her stomach, thrusting her arms forward to instinctively protect the kitten as she shoved him into the hallway.
She felt the searing heat on her back and the crushing weight of a chest of drawers from the room above pinning her down right at the edge of where the floor had fallen away. Her legs dangled over empty space and Ellorin hesitated for a moment, wondering if she had made a mistake trying to save the kitten.
As she lifted her head, the sight of the kitten still sitting in front of her, pawing desperately at her hands and meowing at her in fear seemed to bring something to life in her mind and the thought that trying to save a child could ever have been a mistake was swept from her mind in an instant. In those scared, innocent eyes, Ellorin saw something familiar…
There are times during which people are pushed to the edge of impossibility when a thought that their mind cannot possibly understand or even think to believe makes itself a reality to them. During those times, a doorway in the mind is opened and through it rushes pure and untainted force. All may choose what they are to do with this force, thereby giving it purpose - pure, unadultrated purpose.
* * *
Standing outside of the building, Furi had started to panic when the back of the building collapsed. She meowed in desperation to find out where Ellorin was and to see her come running out. The lioness had been like another mother to her all of her life, but she felt closer to the lioness than she had ever felt to Keana or Rhutap. It seemed like something she should be ashamed to admit, even to herself, but it was the truth.
In a sudden flash, the building rumbled and the sound of the flames roaring seemed to be smothered by the loud crack that came as the entire building caved in upon itself, crashing to the ground and sending waves of heat bursting outwards. The crowd recoiled and even Rhutap growled as he recoiled from the heat.
Furi screamed at the top of her lungs as the building came down with Ellorin still inside of it. Keana gripped her firmly as her legs seemed to give out from under her, the kitten falling into a despaired weeping. “No! No! She wasn’t in there! She wasn’t in there…”
The lizardess hugged Furi closely to her, gently coo’ing and petting the kitten even as she lifted her head and a tear streaked down her cheek.
Rhutap growled fiercely in his throat and he slammed a fist into the earth beneath his feet, turning about to face Keana with a look of anger that could have melted a statue. “Why, Keana!? WHY!?”
The lizardess shook her head, lowering her muzzle again and nuzzling the top of the whimpering Furi’s head.
As Rhutap turned back and looked toward the flames which were now slowly being doused by water carriers, the owner of the tavern, Galthos sat on his knees, holding his head in his paws. The cheetah saw the tiger kneeling before the fallen tavern and growled, running to him and grabbing him by the scruff of his neck to jerk him to his feet. The tiger turned about, a look of mixed anger and despair in his eyes as Rhutap grabbed him by his shirt collar. He wanted to throttle the man right then and there and he hissed, his ears laying back against his head.
Never having seen a tiger in such a state, Rhutap held himself back as he looked into the tiger’s eyes. He realized that he had not turned to anger when he grabbed him. He felt the look of sorrow in the tiger’s eyes starting to melt his own anger, realizing that it had been driven by that same sorrow. This man had just lost his kitten in the same instant that they had lost Ellorin.
When Rhutap felt a paw on his shoulder, he turned his head to one side to see a tigress squeezing his arm. “Please, don’t hurt him! The fire wasn’t his fault…” At her side, another tigress, this one a kitten, was hugging the mother tigress’s leg.
Rhutap looked at the two of them and for a moment, began to feel ashamed for hating this man. He turned back to look at the tiger who was no longer looking at Rhutap but back toward the blaze. The cheetah turned his head to one side and released the man’s shirt collar, stepping back from him as the tigress and her kitten went to the man who put his arms around them, tears starting to stream down his cheeks.
“Rathien…” The tiger managed only one word to which the tigress responded with a nod, tears starting to stream down her face as she hugged him.
“Where’s big brother?” the kitten between them quietly asked.
The tiger looked down at her and shook his head as he wrapped his arms around her and picked her up, hugging the tigress to himself. The two couldn’t bring themselves to say anything as Rhutap turned back around, shaking his head. He didn’t need to be here right now.
The tigress looked toward Rhutap, quietly speaking. “Thank you…”
The cheetah knelt down as he reached Keana holding Furi, the kitten still whimpering as she looked towards the fire where the blaze was starting to die down. More water carriers were bringing buckets to douse the flames and it seemed to be losing its ferocity.
The three of them sat and watched the flames being put out and Furi could feel a strange numbness washing over her body as if the breath of life had been sucked away from her. All the thoughts of Ellorin being in the middle of that blaze when it collapsed made her want to cry all over again. She hadn’t cried in a long time and now, it seemed like it was all that she wanted to do…
“Where is she going!?”
Galthos stopped, turning about and watching in amazement as the golden furred lioness broke from the crowd in what seemed like a dead heat for the burning building. Before anyone could react, Ellorin smashed the front door of the blazing building into shards with a shoulder, disappearing from sight.
“Ello!” Furi tried to run after the lioness only to be snagged by Keana and Rhutap, both of them restraining her from running into the fire. “Let me go! Ello’s in there! Let go of me!”
She tried to push away from her mother only for Keana to grip her tightly as Rhutap imposed himself between Furi and the building. Turning his head back, he looked to the building and the opening that Ellorin had created.
Keana immediately reached up and tugged on one of Rhutap’s ears, the cheetah reacting by turning his head back to look at her with a slight pained expression as the lizardess spoke. “Don’t even think about it.”
He growled in his throat for a moment as he looked back at the fire. “Damnit…”
Inside the building, the lioness recoiled from the wave of heat that washed over her as a support column for the three story building collapsed inwards, making the entire building creak and shudder. The place was coming down around her and she had to move fast. Rushing past a burning chair, the lioness quickly pulled herself up the stairs, thankful that they had not yet ignited from the blaze.
Focusing on her thoughts for a moment, a mental image of the tavern came to her mind and she tried to remember where she’d seen the cub when she heard another loud meow coming from the second floor. Her head immediately turned toward the sound and she rushed up the second flight of stairs, her ears swiveling about rapidly.
When she heard the meow again, it was coming from farther back in the building and she rushed through an open doorway to find herself standing in one of the tavern’s rear residential rooms. On the far wall, perched just below a window sill was a tiger kitten, panting with panic and heat as the room around him blazed.
The lioness looked up at the ceiling and the condition it was in. If the rooms above were anything like the one she was standing in now, it wouldn’t be long before furniture came crashing through. The tiger kitten turned and spotted her, meowing desperately at her as it cowered in fear of the flames.
As Ellorin dashed across the room, she could hear the creak of the boards beneath her feet and the heat surrounding her, singing her fur. Sweeping her arm around the tiger kitten, she pulled him away from the window, planting her chokran at her feet as she considered the window. The thought of leaping out with the kitten in arm swiftly escaped her mind when the window shattered, sending shards of glass flying. She shielded the kitten from the glass and felt the building suddenly shudder under her feet.
As the floor cracked, the lioness stabbed her chokran into it and leapt forcefully, ripping her weapon out of the floor as the entire back side of the building seemed to suddenly creak and rumble, giving way. The sudden and painful impact of the ceiling above her collapsing made Ellorin crash onto her stomach, thrusting her arms forward to instinctively protect the kitten as she shoved him into the hallway.
She felt the searing heat on her back and the crushing weight of a chest of drawers from the room above pinning her down right at the edge of where the floor had fallen away. Her legs dangled over empty space and Ellorin hesitated for a moment, wondering if she had made a mistake trying to save the kitten.
As she lifted her head, the sight of the kitten still sitting in front of her, pawing desperately at her hands and meowing at her in fear seemed to bring something to life in her mind and the thought that trying to save a child could ever have been a mistake was swept from her mind in an instant. In those scared, innocent eyes, Ellorin saw something familiar…
There are times during which people are pushed to the edge of impossibility when a thought that their mind cannot possibly understand or even think to believe makes itself a reality to them. During those times, a doorway in the mind is opened and through it rushes pure and untainted force. All may choose what they are to do with this force, thereby giving it purpose - pure, unadultrated purpose.
* * *
Standing outside of the building, Furi had started to panic when the back of the building collapsed. She meowed in desperation to find out where Ellorin was and to see her come running out. The lioness had been like another mother to her all of her life, but she felt closer to the lioness than she had ever felt to Keana or Rhutap. It seemed like something she should be ashamed to admit, even to herself, but it was the truth.
In a sudden flash, the building rumbled and the sound of the flames roaring seemed to be smothered by the loud crack that came as the entire building caved in upon itself, crashing to the ground and sending waves of heat bursting outwards. The crowd recoiled and even Rhutap growled as he recoiled from the heat.
Furi screamed at the top of her lungs as the building came down with Ellorin still inside of it. Keana gripped her firmly as her legs seemed to give out from under her, the kitten falling into a despaired weeping. “No! No! She wasn’t in there! She wasn’t in there…”
The lizardess hugged Furi closely to her, gently coo’ing and petting the kitten even as she lifted her head and a tear streaked down her cheek.
Rhutap growled fiercely in his throat and he slammed a fist into the earth beneath his feet, turning about to face Keana with a look of anger that could have melted a statue. “Why, Keana!? WHY!?”
The lizardess shook her head, lowering her muzzle again and nuzzling the top of the whimpering Furi’s head.
As Rhutap turned back and looked toward the flames which were now slowly being doused by water carriers, the owner of the tavern, Galthos sat on his knees, holding his head in his paws. The cheetah saw the tiger kneeling before the fallen tavern and growled, running to him and grabbing him by the scruff of his neck to jerk him to his feet. The tiger turned about, a look of mixed anger and despair in his eyes as Rhutap grabbed him by his shirt collar. He wanted to throttle the man right then and there and he hissed, his ears laying back against his head.
Never having seen a tiger in such a state, Rhutap held himself back as he looked into the tiger’s eyes. He realized that he had not turned to anger when he grabbed him. He felt the look of sorrow in the tiger’s eyes starting to melt his own anger, realizing that it had been driven by that same sorrow. This man had just lost his kitten in the same instant that they had lost Ellorin.
When Rhutap felt a paw on his shoulder, he turned his head to one side to see a tigress squeezing his arm. “Please, don’t hurt him! The fire wasn’t his fault…” At her side, another tigress, this one a kitten, was hugging the mother tigress’s leg.
Rhutap looked at the two of them and for a moment, began to feel ashamed for hating this man. He turned back to look at the tiger who was no longer looking at Rhutap but back toward the blaze. The cheetah turned his head to one side and released the man’s shirt collar, stepping back from him as the tigress and her kitten went to the man who put his arms around them, tears starting to stream down his cheeks.
“Rathien…” The tiger managed only one word to which the tigress responded with a nod, tears starting to stream down her face as she hugged him.
“Where’s big brother?” the kitten between them quietly asked.
The tiger looked down at her and shook his head as he wrapped his arms around her and picked her up, hugging the tigress to himself. The two couldn’t bring themselves to say anything as Rhutap turned back around, shaking his head. He didn’t need to be here right now.
The tigress looked toward Rhutap, quietly speaking. “Thank you…”
The cheetah knelt down as he reached Keana holding Furi, the kitten still whimpering as she looked towards the fire where the blaze was starting to die down. More water carriers were bringing buckets to douse the flames and it seemed to be losing its ferocity.
The three of them sat and watched the flames being put out and Furi could feel a strange numbness washing over her body as if the breath of life had been sucked away from her. All the thoughts of Ellorin being in the middle of that blaze when it collapsed made her want to cry all over again. She hadn’t cried in a long time and now, it seemed like it was all that she wanted to do…