Luciatta De Luna's Dark Choice

Luciatta De Luna’s Dark Choice

The eye of the storm drew tighter and tighter, staring down upon the turbulent dark seas. All the while the illustrious serpent Luciatta De Luna, dangerous and alone, dove underneath the dark hued waters hunting a place to hide. The stunning golden emerald green denizen swirled deeper and deeper into the depths where all light grows dim, waning away into the onyx.  She raced, not away from the storm itself, but to hide where all the other dragons no longer dwelled, for her appearance held a strange power all its own, instantly blinding every eye that gazed upon her glittering scales of gold. She was hiding behind the old sunken ship, when she saw the great sea witch emerge from the other side.  She thrashed against the angry waters attempting to get away from the one thing in the entire sea that was immune to her unwanted weapon, but the witch was already upon her with her offer.  She smiled as she trapped the great serpent tight underneath one tentacle, then whispered, “For you, great dragon, an offer I make, your weapon of beauty from you I shall take, and all that I asketh from you in return, to allow that I mark your bright scales in great burns”.  Luciatta knew she must choose, yet to lose her glamorous scales would only lead to a new sort of isolation.  Longing above all else to be free, she thought for a second, then nodded in agreement as the great witch swirled around her, uttering ancient words Luciatta could not understand.  Then almost as soon as it all had begun, the turbulent storm lifted and the sea witch was gone, leaving the serpent to swirl up to the surface for the first time in her life to dwell amidst the other dragons.

 

 

Author's Note

A prompt for a paragraph long dragon story... with a ten sentence limit. The dragon was also required to have an unusual power... This one was tough! ;)

Reviews

[Érenn]

I know what this one's all about. You have given a very poetic feel to the whole write and it does wonders ^^ I also like the name of the dragon very cool. Your words invoke stunning imagery and there is action and ambience provided throughout the write. There are a lot of emotions surging. But the fact that even though this was pretty dark (your forte) you have given it a realistic kind of the happily after feel. No one's every always happy but then again you can be choose something that makes you less sad.

You did a fine job under the constraints of time ^^ And believe it or not I actually saw the feed where Takeshi asked you to write the story, and guess what? I got intrigued as to what it was all about and when I found the contest I ended up writing a story on a dragon as well(oh much much later though... Almost 5 hours after that post was made) ^^ You can read it when you get that and share your views on it. I actually sent you the RR I guess at the same time you sent me one. Great job well done ^^

[M. L. F.]

Haha!! Errenn... I JUST finished writing your review at the same moment you sent mine! Funny... Yeah when Takeshi challenged me with this tournament of tales, it was half to four am here and I was wrapping up a chapter I'm desperately trying to finish, about to drag myself to bed. I'm glad I pushed myself, but I will be going to bed after dinner if I don't get a nap! lol ;) I really thought you came up with unique abilities for both your dragon and his adversary. Quick and good work Errenn. Thank you so much for the compliments on my tale. You always get the mood, moral, and imagery of my writing and that is nice to have. :)

Glad you joined in the game with us, and good luck!!

[Érenn]

OK weird but yes we have definitely been busy going coincidental here XD So i will keep this one short. We did great and all the best to you as well. I had fun making this story even though my forte is long writes and not so short and full of restraints.. So yeah definitely fun ^^

[M. L. F.]

Agreed. :)

[alan peter kelly]

I'm glad i read the authors note...like how you blocked it up and the story was indeed turbulent...in its entirety and well paced, considering the constraints... Enjoyed... :)

[Hannah]

I really like the descriptions and this feels very fitting for a dragon story.

[M. L. F.]

Thank you Hannah. I am really glad you liked the piece. It was a really tough one for a competition, with tight constraints. I have never put an entire story into one paragraph before, but it was a great stretching of the literary muscles! :) Thank you for reading it.
Misty

[Jacob Clifford]

Interesting restriction, and interesting story. Having such a tight limit, while wringing out creativity, will by nature force many sentences to be oversaturated and wordy. Ripe in details and mythical in tone.

[M. L. F.]

Thank you! Yes, there were a lot of sentences that I felt were almost run on. Sentences that I would always break up into two in my normal fiction, I had to condense two into one in this instance, due to the tight ten sentence constraint.... Still dying to know the results of this competition, but we are still to hear. Thanks for the compliments about the details and tone! :) It was what I was going for, the mythical / fable feel.

[Takeshi Yamada]

I forgot to weigh in with my rating before. Nice job. ;)

[M. L. F.]

Thank you Takeshi. Very nice.. :)

[Takeshi Yamada]

I forgot how good this piece was, so I read it again. Well done!

[M. L. F.]

Thank you Takeshi! Your opinion is always of great value to me. This one was hard, as you well know. But yours turned out just fantastic!! ;)

[E G TEN]

You did quite well here Dear, letting your main character dives right away to get your story rolling.
Using the Serpents POV to minimize the limited words/sentences alowed. Storytelling was present
The whole time, very cool. Thanks EG

[M. L. F.]

Thanks EG. Glad you liked it.
...Misty

[Tsubaki Kuro]

For just a ten sentence story you did a really good job. I am surprised at how much details you were able to add to this story.

[M. L. F.]

Thank you so much Tsubaki! It was an exercise like no other.. I am surprised as well. Haha.. ;)

[mattavelli]

This dragon's got it rough. Reading, I felt the encounter with the witch seemed rushed... go figure, ten sentence limit. Haha. Great write! Did you win the contest?

[M. L. F.]

Eh... Yeah, It wasn't rushed, but really where do you squeeze the requirements for this one in? lol. It had to have a unique title, It had to have a unique power, It had to have a fitting setting for a dragon, and action. A start, conflict and resolution in a paragraph, about a dragon. What a challenge. Most people had a month. I had a few hours, not to mention I got the challenge from my good friend at like almost 4 am Dutch time, so I am just happy my brain worked! lol

[M. L. F.]

Nope, we haven't heard who wins yet, but I am dying to know ;)

[M. L. F.]

Don't want to jinx myself... :0

[mattavelli]

Is the contest on this site?
Its good to ignore my opinions about story structure. Mine are pretty bad. Haha
The challenge looks fun though. I'll check the contest page.

[M. L. F.]

http://www.writerscafe.org/contests/A-Short-Dragon-Story-Tournament/52576/

That is it.... the link above...

[mattavelli]

Here's one for superheroes.

http://www.writerscafe.org/contests/Superheroes%21/52792/

I'm going to give it a shot.

[hcarson]

It sounds as though your right, it was tough but you did a great job!! Shame it was so short as i was enjoying it haha!! Good job :)

[M. L. F.]

Thanks! I wanted it to have a bit of a fairy tale feel. A fantasy piece.. Just glad it didn't put you to sleep. :) Haha..

[hcarson]

I saw the sea wjtch like ursula from little mermaid so you definitely acheived what you set out too :) ...loved that when i was younger...flounder and sebastian...ok i wasn'that young either lol...see why i loved your story now...i'm a total big kid :) very impressed with how you managed it with the guidelines you had o follow, well done :)

[M. L. F.]

Thank you for the compliment! I thought of that after submitting it as well. I thought, oh no, I think I just made my sea witch with tentacles, and I hope no one thinks little mermaid! Hahahahah!!! How hilarious. I used to watch it too. Maybe Ursula was stuck in the recesses of my tired mind as I penned my witch, but I hope not! :) I'm glad you enjoyed the tale.

[Takeshi Yamada]

Misty, thank you for indulging me by staying up until your morning to write this fantastic tale of a beautiful dragon who forsakes her beauty for freedom.

It's impressive what this author was able to write in such short notice. (I contacted her literally hours before the contest closed!) Some of the lines that I especially liked were:

"The stunning golden emerald green denizen" I love the idea of a gold and emerald green dragon. The word denizen was a nice touch too.
"...but to hide where all the other dragons no longer dwelled, for her appearance held a strange power all its own, instantly blinding every eye that gazed upon her glittering scales of gold." Nice choice for the power and it fed into your story nicely.

I also liked the choice you made to have the witch speak in rhyme. It made it more story-like and also showed a bit of your talent with poetry too. Good job fitting a complete story under the constraints provided. Glad Luciatta De Luna was finally able to find her place among the other dragons.

[M. L. F.]

Thanks Takeshi... :) This one was hard. I hope it isn't too bad... lol. Tired minds tend to miss a lot in edit and creation. Nice exercise for me though, for sure.