This short story, as with most, has a basic premise and doesn't really deviate from that much throughout the story. Then again in 30 pages there is only so much you can say.

This story is an action/adventure about a group of caravan guards who help out a young bard when their caravan is attacked by a dragon. The cliche mysterious stranger comes in and they accept the quest of helping her find and kill this dragon. Ok, that's all I'm going to say, no spoilers in my reviews. :-)

As I said before the plot is rather straigh forwards, but with enough varation that the reader is not left feeling like they have read it before. The group of adventures has what you would expect - the fighter, cleric, mage - but each is effectively given their own personalities in 30 pages. The young bard Alin is a likeable enough character. I especially liked how we the reader was told about this development of a song throughout the story (kind of a "sub-plot" if you will). I would think it's rather hard to have much character development in 30 pages, but Darth de Bie does a good job of letting the characters lead the way though the story. Nothing with them seems forced or 'un-natural' if you will. The characters talking and the words they use are fantastic!

The plot is, as I said, rather straight forward. Yet, there is an undertone almost right away that something is wrong. This story read much shorter than 30 pages. Meaning it didn't seem that long. There is a decent amount of action in this story and all is well placed. The plot twist is a nice touch. I would be interested to either read another short story about this character, Alin, or maybe even a full novel of what happens after the end.

Now, as with all my reviews the dreaded recommend or not. I would have to go on record as saying this short story is certainly worth the time to read. It was fun to read and from talking to Darth Erik in his thread I can definitly see his personality in this story. If this is any indication of his writing style I am eagerly looking forward to Ghostwalker out in December, 2005.