Low level feedback
Some pronoun errors. I was playing as a female the whole time.
You hear the steps of two men getting to their feet behind you, and the metallic sound of two swords being drawn. Fulk hears them, too, and pulls you to your feet, scrapping the skin of your throat.
‘You there’, he calls, pulling your hair and baring your throat, ‘one stop, and he dies’.
[…]
‘You’re reasonable’, Fulk says, taking a step back. ‘Don’t move. I’m not going to hurt him’.
[…]
‘You’re going to let me leave’, Fulk of Stone’s Haven states, close to the door now, ‘and I’m going to let him live. It’s a fair deal, isn’t it?’
‘I’ve certainly heard about your brother’, Lord Ilverton grins. ‘I’ve also heard about your rift. I admire a young man’s attempt at bluffing, but it looks as if you are going to be in no position to provide us with connections to him anytime soon’.
A lot of wonky punctuation. Here are some that I took care to lift, but there are several scenes are littered by them.
‘Master Morkar ’, he says to the unseen newcomer. ‘I didn’t know you were going to stay up so late tonight ’.
You turn , and sees a man who has clearly seen more than seventy winters.
I’ve also bolded the grammar error in this one.
A line break error.
You are going to have to go behind not simply the world’s back, but that of your own employer
and lover
in order to convince him to do as you want him to.
High level feedback
To me, the story lacked a lot of feeling. I was playing as a character that loved Edward, but ultimately decided to leave him in the end for his own happiness in marrying the Ilverton daughter.
Yet, when my MC suggested trying to talk to Lord Ilverton about this deal, she seemed completely stoic and unaffected about this. If I were in this situation, I definitely would’ve been a bit more hesitant, or at least showed a shred of emotion for having to resort to this decision for the happiness of my beloved.
Same for my brother and Julian, too. Felt like they were just tossed in there to advance the story. Maybe a flashback of a memory, or a scene where the MC reminisces a memorabilia given to them would be able to help with this.
Something that confused me
After exploring the Finthorp estate and confronting Master Morkar, he says this:
‘The axe…’ Master Morkar sighs. ‘Your memory must be playing tricks with you, Rodrik. You have seen Elwin’s execution when you were but a child, didn’t you?
I’m pretty sure that the MC was talking to Master Morkar in the paragraph before, then the next paragraph starts with this. I got confused because he said the name Rodrik, when I was playing as an MC named Deirdre, thinking that he had incorrectly referred to me.
Then it came to me that he was probably referring to himself. I think giving him an action that indicates that he’s talking to himself (looking/turning away from the MC, closing their eyes while sighing) would be better for clarifying that.
Unless he’s not talking about himself? Do let me know if I’m wrong.
All in all, I quite enjoyed the story. It’s just as I’ve said in the high level feedback - the lack of emotions feels detaching to me. Maybe it’s just my cup of tea, though.
You have a talent for writing descriptively, especially with surroundings. I hope you don’t mind if I steal that line about Edward’s face being painted with warm hues; it did a great job of immersing me into the story.
