"The Test" (Fantasy) Part 1

[clockwork]

Ok, I have an assignment to do in my Gr. 9 english class. I am supposed to take two writing assignments from the past and make a third draft. this is why i need feedback and critique so badly. Unfortunately, threads in this forum will only take 10000 characters so in order to see the rest of my story, go to the thread called "'The Test' (Fantasy) Part 2".(put ur feedback in the part 2 thread)

here is my first story, "The Test" (Fantasy)
Note: this short story isnt the shortest

The Test

The crossbow bolt whizzed by Renin Tilstur and thunked into the door ahead.
“Steal a bloody gold ring from a lord and you get half the city guard chasing you! I sure wish I can get out of this one, I can get a fine price for this beauty”, Renin angrily muttered to himself fingering the golden ring on his finger.
The docks district just was not what it used to be in the city of Halden, of Kalder these days. A halfling, a being that looks like a human but half the size, like himself used to be able to nick a coin and buy yourself a drink, but ever since a shipment of clay pottery was raided by one of the dock district’s local gangs, the city guard’s numbers had been increased. It was weird for the king to be so protective of a ship full of clay pottery, which makes it obvious there was something of importance on the ship.
Renin skidded and turned a corner to come to a stop. The alley way ended. Renin cursed and turned around to wait for his death. That’s the way it was now. King Neron was always generous and kind, but ever since the clay pottery shipment raid, he had ordered the guards to kill anyone who committed a crime, no trial. Everyone now thought Neron was mad.
The guards rounded the brick corner of the alleyway and Renin. Grins came to their faces.
“So, how is the agile rogue going to get out of this one?” the guard who must have been the captain mockingly said. He raised his crossbow loaded and ready, held it up to his eye to fire, then pulled the trigger. In an instant a figure, that Renin did not notice before, jumped from the roof nearby and incredulously, snatched the arrow out of the air. Renin wondered why would someone save him, a mere thief in wrinkled clothes that looked like he slept in them for a week, about to go to his death? Ever since the king’s change of heart, this was an everyday situation and no one wanted to get mixed up with the king.
The guards stared in awe just as much as Renin did. This lithe figure is a monk of the Veleen order. The monks from the Veleen order were an enigma, not much was known about them but it is said they are able to do impossible things that reflexes would not allow. The arrow being plucked out of the air by this monk is proof enough that he is Veleenian.
As the monk grabbed the arrow he kept running as if he did not fall off a 20 foot roof and like lightning bounced off the wall ahead of him. He then rocketed through the group of guards striking out with his hands and feet, hitting them in throats and the head. The guards were not even able to draw their swords. They all limply fell to the ground as the monk calmly landed on the ground on the other side of the pile of guards.
Renin finally realized that the monk was standing there, seemingly waiting for him while he tried to run through his mind what had just happened.
“How did you do—how could—why did you get yourself mixed up with me?” stumbled Renin as he tried to ask three questions at once.
“You are needed, come with me”, the monk mysteriously said. Renin wondering why he was even following this lethal, mysterious man, started following him anyway.

The deadly monk and the cunning thief walked for about half an hour through the docks and came to the more meager part of the docks where the cutpurses were many and you could expect to weighed by every eye, for your money of course. The alleys always had a couple drunk men lying in them and every inn smelled of cheap ale and sweat from the sailors. You could always expect a fist-fight or two to happen at a stay in an inn around these parts of the docks district.
The Veleenian walked into one of the inns with Renin following him. Raucous laughter and the singing of drunken men immediately filled Renin’s ears. The monk led Renin to a table in the back.
“How did you come by that ring?” the monk said in a stony voice. Renin could now see his “savior” clearly in the light of the tavern. He was dark of skin and had a face made of jagged edges and scars. He was completely unarmed except for five metal discs with sharp, pointed edges. This man was obviously a man not to tamper with.
“I came by it” Renin said suspiciously. Some lords liked the robbers of their property to be punished in more extreme ways than the guards did and Renin was not going to take any chances. This monk could be an agent searching for the robber to bring back to his own lord for the lords own punishing.
The monk, right after Renin’s reply, pulled out a bag that jingled with the sound of coins. Renin immediately changed his plans. Maybe he could get a couple extra coins for his pocket while dealing with this monk.
“I nicked the beauty off some lord”, replied Renin, entranced by the bag of coins. “I think his name was Lord Caralin or Corlin.”
“Do you realize that that lord has connections to the gangs here?”
“Uh-huh and you’re point is?”
“Do you know who I work for?”
“No, why?”
“I am one of the king’s agents”, the Veleenian said lowering his voice to ward off prying ears. “That ring you are holding is the king’s ring, it was the reason the clay pottery shipment raid happened”.
“Wait a minute, so why is this ring so important to the king?”
“It has vast powers. All you have to do is wear the ring and pronounce three wishes. The user must be careful what is wished for. There are rules however. The rings cannot be destroyed when there are still wishes to be wished, and you cannot make any wishes related to money, your own self and the destruction or creation of people.”
Renin immediately lost the plans he was forming over the power of this ring. He was sort of hoping he could make himself almighty and rich. He almost got up from the table to leave until the shrouds of great riches crept away and he realized he could still make a profit, the bag of glistening coins.
“So why does the king want it?” asked Renin, trying to make some sense out of the situation.
“He was going to make a wall around our city here, and some other things of the same type to help improve our defenses against the enemies neighbouring our country.”
That was good enough for Renin. After all there was a profit out of all this.
“All right you can have it”, said Renin said with the thoughts of what he would do with his gold. Renin took it out of his pocket and handed over to the monk. He turned his hand over but when he turned his hand over to drop the ring into the monks hand, the ring defied gravity and stayed in his palm. Renin stared in disbelief and a look of irritation came to the monk’s face.
The monk sighed and said, “Did you make a wish with it?”
“No.”
“You must have, even the smallest one.”
“Well I did mutter to myself I wish I could get out of the jam I was in…”, remembered Renin as it came back to him. He had wished he could get out of situation he was in earlier while he was being chased by the guards.
“Well, I guess you will have to make the wishes for the king”, the monk said, “when you use one of your wishes the ring is binded to your soul until all three wishes are made and it will not leave the contact of your skin unless you are killed.”
Renin sighed in frustration. How was he going to get out of this? He didn’t want to get into any of the kings business and since this ring was bound to him there was a great chance there are other people out there that would want him killed. For one, there was the gang.
“Why does the gang want this thing?” asked Renin as the question came to mind.

[clockwork]

If you have not read Part 1 to my story you should read it before you read this part of the story.


Part 2

“The gang has their wishes as well…”, the monk mysteriously said.
“So all we have to do is walk to the castle and give the king his wishes”, said Renin trying to look at the bright side of things.
“Its not that easy. The gang spreads news fast and some of the gang saw you run out of their bosses manor. They have your description down pretty well and there probably all over the district right now, hunting you. In fact, I think we should start heading to the palace right now”, the monk said as his head darted around looking at the door of the tavern. Renin turned his head as well and saw why. There were three gang members, distinguished by the three golden earrings on each of their ears, were glancing at them right now and starting to walk towards them.
“Follow me”, the monk quickly said to Renin as he jumped out of his chair and ran for a set of stairs. Renin jumped out of his chair and tailed behind the monk as they went up the stairs. The gang members were just behind them. The monk came to the end of the stairs and ran down a hallway then into a room. Renin ran in and the Veleenian shut the door behind him.
“Why didn’t you whack them up with your fists and feet?” Renin asked the monk, panting.
“I didn’t have the element of surprise it would be a lot riskier”, responded the monk, who didn’t even seem to be panting or tired. “Could you drag that chest over here.” The halfling ran over to the chest, and pushed his weight against it to come to a stop in front of the pounding door. The monk then ran over to the window and opened it.
“We will take my favourite path to the palace”, the monk said with a grin you would expect never to appear on that face, “over the rooftops”. The monk then leaped out of the window. Renin hurriedly ran over to the window and stumbled out onto the rooftop of the building next to the tavern. He saw the leaping figure of the monk ahead and with a sigh of frustration at what he had gotten into, started running and leaping from rooftop to rooftop.
The thief and the monk left the docks district and came into the royal district where all the nobles lived. The nobles never cared for what was really going on. They just started up their own wars and ended them. Pointless. There were peasants starving in the slums of the docks and gang wars.
When the monk and Renin jumped the wall into the royal district, the palace sprang into view, with spiral towers gleaming in the moonlight and gigantic shining domes, it was a sight that people came to see from all over the world.
As the monk and Renin neared the castle, Renin’s sharp eyes noticed in the night tendrils of dark smoke rising from within the castle walls.
“Do you see that?” Renin puffed as he squinted into the gloomy night at the castle, “the castle is under attack! There’s smoke rising from the castle!”
“We must make haste the king is in danger”, the monk said. There actually seemed to be surprise in the monk’s stony voice.
As the pair of leaping figures neared the castle, screams and the clang of swords could be heard within it.
Finally Renin and his companion neared the castle and stopped. Figures could be seen inside the castle walls fighting each other. Just as Renin was going to ask how to get there, the monk jumped down, running down the wall and came to a stop at the bottom. He then took a ladder from behind a pile of boxes and propped it against the side of the manor. Renin scrambled down the ladder.
“Okay, we got this far, but how do we get inside the castle?” Renin asked. In answer to Renin’s question, the kings agent moved a wooden crate and pried open a sewer lid underneath. He jumped down and Renin silently followed.
Surprisingly, the shouts from above could still be heard from the depths of the large sewer they had just descended into. Renin and the Veleenian started treading through the knee high water.
When Renin was just starting to think was it worth the risk doing this, he noticed a moving torchlight ahead by an opening in the roof of the sewers. The monk stopped in his tracks and pulled aside Renin into an alcove.
“Those are gang members ahead. They must have been coming from the sewers in the docks to the sewer opening within the palace walls. The gang must think the ring is here and are trying to make an attempt to seize take the ring back. You must get to the king with that ring and see if you can save him with a wish. He has no heir and the turmoil for the throne would cause civil war. I will distract them and you must sneak by”, the monk told Renin and then ran off towards the guards without a chance for Renin to have a say.
Renin started to creep forward as soon as he heard shouting and could see a dim shape doing a back flip combined with lethal kicks to the head. When Renin came up to the ladder the monk was fighting the gang members just a few metres away. Renin was able to make himself unnoticed when he wanted to; a trait you can find in someone who lives off of stealing money. When Renin scrambled up the ladder he heard the whiz of a crossbow bolt and saw the monk had taken a hit to the shoulder. The monk kept on fighting.
When Renin scrambled out of the sewers he jumped out of the way of a screaming figure running on fire. Renin then turned towards the towering palace and ran inside.
There was not much inside the castle except for burned carpets and elaborate carved tables. Most battles taking place in the halls Renin was able to sneak by but when he soon started to think if his life was worth the risk, a stray arrow flew by and tore his sleeve. Renin ducked and started crawling past that battle.
Renin finally found the throne room. The king was sitting on his throne with a huddle of Royal guards standing around him with shields raised, swords drawn and slashing at the confident pushing in around them. Renin stood there still taking in the situation but jumped in shock when a hand clasped his shoulder. He turned around flicking the knife from out of his sleeve to the man’s throat, who stood behind him. Renin drew back his hand immediately when he saw who it was. The dark skinned monk was standing there clutching the crossbow bolt protruding from his left shoulder.
“Save the king with a wish!” the monk shouted over the ringing of swords and shields. Renin immediately pronounced a wish.
“I wish for every gang member in this palace to be put into a two day sleep”, Renin announced. He stood there wondering if his wish worked when finally one by one, the gang members started to sink to the bloodied floor of the king’s throne room.
The remaining, all wounded guards stared in dibelief at what had happened but started heaping the gang members into piles.
The heavy breathing of a deep sleep came from the gang members being gathered as the king walked up to Renin. The king had grey hair and a face that looked just well—kingly.
“Oh, noble warrior,” spoke the king in a deep, musical voice as Renin laughed in his mind at what name he had been given by the king, “you saved me and this castle and you have brought me the ring.”
“Yes, your greatness”, Renin said trying to figure out what you were supposed to say to a king, “ but I used up two of your wishes.”
“It does not matter. This ring was a test and I am going to die of age soon. I was trying to find someone using my agent here who would deliver the ring and not run off in terror. You will be my heir to the throne.”
“But, your majesty, I am but a thief who has no honour. Why would you choose me as a king?”
“This is where you are wrong. First of all, you have great courage. This will do you well on the throne at hard times. Second of all, you just displayed honour. You find yourself not worthy of the throne and did not take the opportunity to become a wealth-ridden man by usurping the thrones capabilities and third of all, a halfling on the throne such as yourself will better unite the bonds between man and halfling. With luck it will stop civil war.”
Obviously, Renin accepted the king’s offer to be his heir. The king’s madness, which turned out to be because of his great concern to keep his country out of civil war, was gone now. Renin’s selfish character vanished immediately because of the responsibilities needed to care for the country. He was now a king true to his country.

[daz3026]

I like ur story ver much.. it has a good form to it but wut i like the most is that as i was reading it , it like brought images to my head.