[Critique Group 1] Cleora's submission for 1/16/19

[sitting.duck at springmail.com]

The dwarf is Dog Breath again.
The story so far:
Abandoned by her flock, Sitting, a visually impaired duck, was walking south for the winter when she found a crippled grasshopper who offered to help her in exchange for not being eaten.
Their journey brought them to The Crystal Pond, an abandoned province in the kingdom of Hades Legions which is currently at war with the kingdom of Silent Enigma.
They are summoned to a meeting of the rulers of the various provinces in the kingdom. Some of the rulers consider her useless because she isn't a warrior. Others suspect her of being an enemy spy.  Still others want to eat her.
Two provinces have already been disabled by the enemy kingdom, and a new monarch is needed. Sitting suggests that they could defeat the enemy with cunning rather than fighting. This rash suggestion leads to her being accepted as the new monarch.
Expectation that she can solve the problem and get them out of war in one piece weighs heavily on Queen Sitting.
She has never ruled anything in her whole life and has no idea what to do. In fact, she is not even sure she understands the problem.
Following a school of fish in the Crystal Pond successfully killing the dragon, Regis and Dark Merlin, two of the kingdoms rulers, appear at the Crystal Pond to help her dispose of the huge reptile. They assure her that The kingdom will support her. Dark Merlin, in addition to providing her with a magic carrier and using a spell to heal Grasshopper's broken leg, helps her understand the messaging system. She uses this new knowledge to invite all the rulers of the kingdom to come for a feast.
The next morning After celebrating her killing the dragon, she finds that her food stores have been stolen, her province ravaged by fire and storm, and many of her subjects killed.
If that isn't bad enough, she tries to fly and ends up crashing and almost feeding grasshopper to the new lead fish.
But, for a time, she was able to see normally. They soon figure out that the carrior provided by Dark Merlin is responsible.
Can they slip out of the kingdom unnoticed and put this whole business behind them?


1594 words
part seven
May 7 (Day 5)

Shortly after takeoff, Sitting and Grasshopper flew into a torrential downpour. Not being a strong flier, Sitting soon became exhausted. She landed, and started walking in what she hoped was a southward direction.

“Could you duck your head? I'm getting drenched,” said grasshopper.

Sitting tilted her bill toward the ground. This made it easier for grasshopper to see what was straight ahead. They hadn't gone far when they could just make out a humanoid creature in front of them. He was herding some sheep and goats into an unsteady old shack. Beyond him, was a field of corn and wheat ripe for harvest. Thinking even a rickety old shack was better than being out in the rain, Sitting mingled with the other animals being ushered into the building.
Finding a nice dry place in one corner, she settled down on some straw to wait out the storm. “Do you suppose this is the storm the Queen Bee was talking about?”

“I don't know. Maybe,” answered grasshopper.

a nearby ewe looked around in their direction. Seeing a black ewe close by, she said, “Don't know. It is a magic storm. It started from an enemy spell cast early this morning. It is expected to last five more days.”

The black ewe looked at her. “How do you know that?”

“It was in the province news.”

“When did you see the province news?”

“An ant from the Crystal Pond castle said the Queen bee there told him.”

Suddenly all chances of carrying on a conversation was drowned out by the clattering of large hail pounding the roof of the unsteady shack. It went on for several minutes until Sitting felt sure it would demolish the building and kill them all.

“Whew,” said the sheep when it finally stopped. “I'm glad I was in here when that started.”

“Yeh,” said one of the goats who had walked over to the corner. “I hope the new ruler can do something about this terrible war.”

“Yeh,” said another.

A ram joined them. “Me, too,” he said. “But, I heard one of the ants from the Crystal Pond castle say that Queen Sitting has disappeared. They believe she may have flown away. No one has seen her since early this morning.”

A chill ran over Sitting. She started cautiously making her way toward the door. One thing she didn't want to happen was for this bunch of animals to realize she was that AWOL ruler.
As she neared the door, the human pushed it open and stepped outside. Sitting waddled carefully past him. She stared ahead in shock. The beautiful crops that had been ready for harvest when they went into the barn, now lay in ruins. A few bare stalks were still standing but all the corn and wheat had been destroyed. There was a blanket of large hail covering the ground. She followed the human as he walked over to the field.
“This terrible war,” he said, shaking his head. He bent down and brushed aside some of the hail to reveal a small green sprout just pushing itself up out of the ground. “Thank goodness for the fertile lands spell cast by Dark Merlin. If not for that, the new crops would not grow and mature in time.”

Sitting heard bleating behind her. Looking around, she saw the sheep and goats coming out of the barn.

“Where do you think the new ruler is?” asked a Billy goat.

“I don't know,” said the Ram. “She made short work of the dragon, but doesn't seem to know what to do about what is happening now.”

Sitting waited for the flock to move out of hearing range before launching herself once again into the air, and heading south.
She hadn't flown far before she started looking around for a place to land. “Flying is hard work,” she said as she landed on top of a cliff, and ran a few steps forward before stopping at the edge.

“what's that noise?” asked Grasshopper.

Sitting tilted her head toward the sound. In the valley below, an army of berserkers and axe men were locked in a fierce battle with an army of skeletons and ghouls. The battle was beginning to turn in favor of the army closest to them as the sun was nearing the horizon. At last the other army started falling back and finally turned and ran. It had been a tough battle but the forces defending the valley had won. Four axe men took up posts on the sides of the area remaining alert ready to sound the alarm should another attack come while the others tended to the wounded.
Sitting launched herself off the cliff and glided down to a clear area at the edge of the battle ground. She moved her head from left to right, taking in the whole view. Near one edge of the area was a banner on a tall pole. A slight breeze straightened the flag enough for them to make out the crest and colors. They read Hades Legions above the picture of a crumbling castle with the words Crumble To Dust below it.

“That's Dog Breath's army,” said Sitting. “I wonder who the other army was.”

As they watched, Dog Breath came riding up followed by several wagons. They were still gathering up the dead and tending to the wounded when an army of swordsmen and knights on horses came out of the darkness and attacked them. A few of Dog Breath's soldiers fought valiantly to delay the enemy while the others escaped. Sitting and Grasshopper watched in horror as the new army utterly destroyed the meager exhausted remains of Dog Breath's army. It wasn't clear if Dog Breath was among the ones that escaped. The banner of the new army showed a greyish shimmering coat of mail over the words shadow mhail, but they were unable to make out the name of the kingdom it belonged to. One of the knights rode up to the army commander.

“Do we pursue them?”

“Yes. Our mission is to completely destroy them. They defeated our friend province, Shrouded Graveyard of Silent Enigma. We must not let them escape. .”

“How far are we going to go?”

“Whatever it takes to make the new monarch of Hades Legions surrender. We must keep the pressure on. Word is they are ready to break. They have elected a duck, of all things.”

“A duck? I like duck. We can have a feast when it is over.”

An evil gleam appeared in the commanders eyes. “I agree. Maybe we should make that a part of the reward for our help,” he chuckled.

“How long do you think we can get away with interfering in this war? I hear the king got a threatening message warning us to back off.”

“It won't matter. Hades Legions is about to surrender. The duck is stupid and inexperienced. She has no interest in this fight. She will surrender, or flee. I don't care which. Victory is ours.”

Sitting sat a safe distance away, unable to believe her ears.

“Yep. We stand to be rewarded handsomely if that stupid duck they have for monarch now can be scared into surrendering.”

Another knight rode up carrying the banner for Crumble to Dust. “I heard a rumor that the duck has flown.” 

“To bad,” said the first knight. “I was looking forward to roast duck,” he smirked.

“How could this happen?” Sitting whispered. “Doggie is a mighty warrior. He and his crew rebuilt the ruined battlement on my castle.”

The knight tossed the banner to the commander who caught it, broke it in half, and threw it on the ground.

Sitting's blood boiled. She ran up to the warrior and tried to bite him on his rump, but only succeeded in jamming her bill into the seat of his armor.

Clank!

He turned, and looked all around. “What was that?” 

Sitting aimed lower and nipped a nearby soldier on the heal.

He grabbed his heal and looked around. Seeing nothing, “Let's get out of here! This place is haunted.”

Sitting took the hand of one of the dead soldiers and began to pull on it. The corpse began to sit up.

Grasshopper started rubbing his wings together making an eerie screeching noise.

“For real,” said another, his eyes growing big as he watched the dead body rise. “There's nothing here worth taking. We defeated the army, that's what we came to do, not to risk our lives against weird magic. Let's get out of here.”

With that, the army gathered its things and fled.

“That was fun," said Sitting.

“Yep. Now what?" 

“Something is curious to me.” 

“What's that?” 

“What is going on here. They were talking about me like this battle was supposed to scare me into surrendering, and this army wasn't from the kingdom we are at war with.”

“I noticed that, too.”

Sitting and grasshopper sat in stunned silence for a long while before Sitting followed the smell of water to a stream running through the center of the valley. They found some plants and insects along the bank to satisfy their hunger, then Grasshopper got back in the carrier, raised the windshield and lowered the visor to secure himself in the carrier and make them invisible again. Sitting paddled out into the middle of the stream, laid her head on her back, and the two of them drifted off to sleep while the stream gently carried them along.
To be continued...