Into the Night

It's a short story that I've been working on recently, mostly for descriptive practice.

 

     Kain’s eyes flew open. He lie there, motionless, listening intently.

 

Something had woken him. Some subtle motion or quiet sound had

 

alerted his finely tuned senses. He stayed still for another moment,

 

then, slowly, he sat up. Night had fallen sometime ago, and darkness

 

blanketed everything in blue and grey, turning Kain’s world

 

monochrome. Not that it bothered him really; He could see excellently in

 

the dark.

     Kain took a moment to let his vision adjust completely then looked

 

around. The small tent was, as far as he could tell, exactly the same as it

 

had been before he’d gone to sleep. The corners were still crammed with

 

ancient artifacts. The small mahogany desk was still covered in notes and

 

maps, and the small set of shelves holding jars of preserved desert life

 

were still placed, inconveniently, beside the bed.
   

    After checking the room over a few times, Kain gently lowered himself

 

down, back next to Cormic. The archaeologist was sleeping soundly, his

 

steady breathing moving the blankets up, down, up, down... Kain watched

 

Cormic for a moment before making himself comfortable on the bed. He

 

rolled over so that his back was to the archaeologist’s and closed his

 

eyes. It had been a long day. A long couple of weeks, actually. It wouldn’t

 

be unbelievable for him to be a bit on edge. Kain snuggled into the

 

blankets. Besides, he thought, It was probably just the wind. He willed

 

himself to relax and let the cool, calming energy of sleep wash over him.

    Just the wind. . .

    A soft sound carried to Kain’s ears, drifting quietly on the cool night

 

breeze. A gentle music, unlike anything that he had ever heard before. It

 

was beautiful and entrancing and reminiscent of ancient times. Each note

 

fell upon him carefully and deliberately, then faded into near silence, only

 

to be picked back up by the next note and the next. For the second time

 

that night, Kain sat up in bed, his head now tilted to better hear the gentle

 

melody. It echoed softly, as though it came from a far-off place, and no

 

matter how hard he strained his ears, each note was barely audible.

    Kain was up and out of bed before he knew what he was doing. He

 

moved quietly, as not to disturb Cormic, and was soon out of the tent and

 

surrounded by endless desert and cold night air. From outside of the tent,

 

the beautiful music was clearer, but only just, and Kain strained to hear it.

 

But it was the only sound against the silent desert night, and Kain quickly

 

found himself pointed in the direction of the gentle, luring melody.

    He was halfway to the entrance of the tomb before he questioned what

 

he was doing, but even then it was only a question, and there was no

 

hesitation to his steps. Kain crossed the small expanse of desert that took

 

him to the entrance of the tomb. It loomed up at him, dark and gaping. But

 

the music was louder here. Kain took the first step and descended into

 

the mouth of the ancient place.

    In the tent, darkness had cloaked everything with blue and grey.

 

Outside, it turned the golden sand silver. Here, inside of the tomb, it was

 

black. It was dark and suffocating, and turned everything to shadows.

 

Engulfed in the pressing darkness, Kain could hear the music clearly. And

 

something else. Behind the music, soft voices, whispering in an ancient

 

language that Kain knew that he had never heard, but somehow

 

understood. Come. The voices whispered. Follow the music. Find us.

 

Kain stood for a moment, surrounded by the sound, before pressing one

 

hand against a wall for balance, and making his way down the long, dark

 

hallway before him.

    Kain wandered endlessly down the corridors and hallways of the tomb.

 

Time was lost on him. Seconds could have been years. Minutes could

 

have been decades, and hours could have been lifetimes. He wandered

 

for what felt like eternities. And then Kain saw a light. A dull blue shone

 

from the end of a passageway. From where he was, Kain thought that he

 

could see the outline of a door. He turned towards it and picked up his

 

pace.

    As Kain came closer to the door, the music began to grow louder. The

 

darkness pressed down harder and harder. The voices, once whispers,

 

grew and grew until they were shouting. Kain ran, stumbling along the

 

passageway, towards the glowing door. He knew that this was where the

 

music was coming from, and he knew that he had to find its source.

 

Nothing was more important. Nothing else mattered. He got closer and

 

closer to the door. The voices screamed and the music became

 

unbearably loud. The darkness bore down relentlessly upon him. Kain

 

reached out with one hand, keeping the other against the wall and

 

touched the door.

    Silence.

    The music stopped playing. The voices stopped screaming.

    The door, which was glowing blue with engraved hieroglyphics, faded,

 

leaving only a solid wall. And the darkness, though still surrounding him,

 

was much less intense. Kain stood panting and trembling, his hand still

 

pressed to the wall.

    It was a long time before he managed to move again, and when he did

 

it was only to retract his hand.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    The expedition didn’t last very long. A few days after Kain’s experience

 

in the tomb, a strange fever broke out amongst the workers. Those

 

stricken ill would throw themselves into fits and foam at the mouth. They

 

didn’t speak, but emitted strange, strangled groans that sounded

 

unsettlingly inhuman.

    Dr. Donald Quinn, the expeditions medical researcher, insisted that

 

Cormic take Kain and head back to London immediately. Cormic scoffed

 

at the notion of leaving his discovery because of the outbreak.

    “Oh come now, Donald.” He said. “Kain and I have had all of our shots.

 

We take our vitamins every day. Surely this disease is the result of the

 

unsuitable living conditions and poor medical treatment here. You’ve said

 

so yourself, ‘This country is so far behind in medicine, it’s a wonder that

 

anyone’s alive at all!’” Dr. Quinn tried to tell him that ‘shots and vitamins’

 

wouldn’t save them from a disease that they knew nothing about, but

 

Cormic wouldn’t hear it. 

    The argument between the two of them lasted for hours. Dr. Quinn

 

finally won by pointing out that, without a healthy team to dig and work,

 

the expedition couldn’t continue. Cormic would have to go back to London

 

to hire new help anyway, so he might as well leave before either he or

 

Kain got sick.

Author's Note

Criticism, Critique, Advise! Tell me what you think! :D

Reviews

[anonanon]

Very intriguing story so far, I was invested in it from the get-go. I enjoyed your use of description and character action, I totally saw the story playing in my head. On a side note, I agree with Christophe, a few lines seemed forced 'telling' not 'showing,' but hey I have that same problem as well. Good work though, seems like it could be a good beginning to a novel.

[Decanter Red]

I read it on a more relaxed, non-critical basis so I can't really give a review as detailed as Christoph. I just have to say I enjoy it as great read, some parts got my feet tingling hahaha! Just gotta love the mystery and aura! The only concern would be your formatting of the text, however. It seemed slightly disorganised.

[Christoph Poe]

I'm gonna point out a few things that may help your writing in the future. Keep in mind I am NOT a professional, and even though I know the rules of the game that doesn't mean I always follow them. Never take anything I say literally and directly. Listen to what others have to say as well and put them all together.

"Not that it bothered him really; He could see excellently in the dark."

You're "telling" us something instead of "showing" us.

"He breathed in normal pulses, unalarmed and capable of seeing clearly in the dark."

I find it that this is the most typical issue among new writers, and it's perfectly okay. It took me a long time to grasp this concept, and many tedious exercises. Try this one for example: watch a scene from a movie, one that's probably ten minutes long, and write the scene down. Do not include explanatory thoughts: use pure description. Then let a good friend read your writing, then watch the scene. You can even do that here online if you want, and post a YouTube video!

Also, perform some exercises not using ANY "to-be verbs". Doing this will help you out greater than anything. A great teacher of mind once explained to me that she felt it best not to use to-be verbs unless at the beginning or end of paragraphs. It's nearly impossible to never use them in a novel, but a good novel doesn't use them often. You'll shock yourself how much better it will improve your writing and skills.

Your description works very well, and you have managed to blend your actions with description beautifully! It was very difficult for me to blend the mechanics of writing, but I can see you won't have the same issue.

The story works, but I feel like its missing something at the beginning. Maybe some details on what the main character looks like? Some bit of information on the 'universe' or direct setting?

And I know you mentioned this was an exercise for description, but maybe these thoughts will help you out in future pieces! I hope they help, and I'll be sure to stick around to see what else you're capable of coming up with. :)

[Kaitlyn]

: )

This was really helpful. Thank you!

You mentioned showing the reader, not telling the reader what's going on. It's not something that I had ever considered before, but, thinking about it, it's how I prefer things to be written.

I'll definitely give those exercises a shot, thanks for suggesting them. : )

Your advise is really appreciated. I'm always striving to better myself as a writer and I take all critiques, criticisms and advisement into consideration when I receive them.