This term I have been writing in my free time and I am going to try to make a chapter book.  My friends are going to illustrate it and my teacher (hopefully) will edit it.  This is my first chapter…

Do you like writing?

What do you think will happen next?

Chapter

        One

Hot, salty sweat poured down Flynn’s face. The only thing keeping him going before falling into unconsciousness, was the thought of lying down on his hard bed in that small, dark, room, the only place he could be alone. He spent most of his time there, except when he was working, pushing one of the many groaning iron cogs in the weapon factory.  

     The noise of the iron cogs sounded like giants as they went round and round for endless hours. The stench of sweat and grease filled the rooms of the factory dripping off the workers. The factory windows were so coated with grime that even the midday sun could only manage a sickly light through the glass.  

     The exhausted children were given next to nothing for food, and what they did get, would be a bowl of spinach soup and on a good day, stale bread to go with it.  

Flynn was sure that he would be let off soon since it felt like he had been working for days. Non. Stop. Two slaves had already fallen into unconsciousness lying on the cold, concrete floor; their rags, used as clothes, had holes in them from many slaps of the whip.  

     Flynn couldn’t keep quiet any longer, although knowing the consequences, he cried.  

     “When will you let me off!?”

     “Quiet slave!” 

The slave worker replied nastily.  The whip made a cracking sound and then a slap as it hit Flynn’s skin.  

Flynn was a 12 year old boy with sparkling green eyes and a mop of darkish brown hair.  He had a skinny body and was not very tall or muscular.

     In the dead of the night he had been kidnapped by the Deathly Carriage.  The Deathly Carriage took children away in the night while everybody was asleep.  You knew when it was coming because you could hear the crows screaming, perched on the top of the roof or flying around the carriage as it rattled by.  All children feared these sounds more than anything.  Just a tiny bit more than the Deathly Carriage itself.

     Before Flynn had been taken by the Deathly Carriage he had been living in a beautiful cottage in a clearing by a small river.  He had had a wonderful life there with his Mother and Father, playing with his friends in the village and learning to read and write.  But after his twelfth birthday everything changed.

     Flynn couldn’t sleep that night, his mind still replaying the events of his twelfth birthday when he heard a faint rattling and squawking sound coming towards him.  It got louder and louder and then it stopped.  Flynn hadn’t even thought of the idea that it could be the Deathly Carriage.  He was still half asleep when he pushed the covers off himself and walked towards the window.

He fell back not at all expecting what he saw.  Behind the patterned curtains, parked by his cottage was the Deathly Carriage.  It arched up against the black sky, the crows screeching making a deafening sound.  The coal black horses stamped their feet impatiently, rearing and adding to the noise of the crows.  The wagon bench had a bulky figure sitting on it dressed in a pitch black cloak, holding the reins watching Flynn’s bedroom window.

     Flynn – having mostly recovered – got off the ground where he had been lying and started thinking up a plan.  If I run and wake up Mum and Dad it will probably be too late because the man in the cloak would have come in looking for me.  I could hide somewhere in the room but he could do anything to this house, like burning it down or smashing it to pieces.  Suddenly an idea burst into his mind.

The 12 year old stood as motionless as a stone, in his black shorts and T-shirt, as the door swung open only making a click as the doorknob twisted, its well oiled hinges not making a noise.  The bulky figure walked into the room having to go sideways to get through the doorway.

     Now that he could see the man in the black cloak up close he saw a scar across his left eye and a crooked nose that had obviously been broken in a fight.  This was not a man to be messed with, he thought.

     The huge figure stood inside the ghostly room looking around the space, squinting his eyes in the darkness of the area.  An irritated look came over his face when he realised that nobody was there.  Anger flared in his eyes but he made no sound, instead he walked out of the room and closed the door silently as if nobody had been there at all.  

Flynn let go a deep breath, exhaling slowly, coming away from the wall as if he had walked out of it.

     He swung open the door, wincing at the sound of the lock as it clicked in.  He peered around the door to make sure that no one was there.  He could hear the footsteps of the immense build of the bloke as he walked out of the cozy cottage back to the Deathly Carriage.  At least that’s what Flynn hoped he was doing.

Truth be told, the black cloaked figure was going around the side of the white washed house.  He grabbed two sticks on the grassy floor and started to scrape them together until he had created sparks of fire spitting in every direction, secondly he put it close to the wall of the house.  As it caught on fire to the pine logs, he backed away from the flames as they danced along the side of the house.  He still made no  utterance, but smiled cruelly under the cowl of his cloak, the moonlight making it look even more evil than it already was.