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If the brick wall is around the crossing, the sorcerer will 'materialize' inside it and can act on it.  The wall won't keep her from crossing.

If you piled fifty cubic yards of rock on the crossing 'point' it would be a problem.  But the stronger the sorcerer, the more the sorcerer can cross away from the center of the crossing-point.  We've already seen Kirsey cross so far away from the center of a crossing-point that nobody knew where he came from (when he got Forsk and Tecta home and learned what Melayne and her daughter were up to).

Another idea to use, later on.  Thank you.

Oh the crossing isn't a gate, and you don't see someone approach.  The crossing is opened by a spell and the opening is brought down over persons/things, which appear on the other side.  So far, we've only seen Kirsey and people with him run as they made the crossing.

Kirsey sometimes does showy stuff, but it's showy stuff that's useful

All:  I've got a number tasks on my plate, but I'm trying to be sure that Erevain remains there.  In picking that work up, I find myself circling around a flashback scene.  I may put it up when I have a version of it, in a day or two.  I'll probably drop it into one of the Erevain chapters.

As to the treatment of 'mother', 'father', and such as proper nouns: If this is a change that teachers of our youth have embraced, I will reject it, digging in my heels, standing athwart history and yelling 'STOP'!  Between lawyers, child welfare agencies, and teachers there's little reason left for children to respect their parents.  But in your period, at least, there is such reason.

Veggies and Meat

You raise ask this in my review.  I'll give you the best answer I have right now, since I'm still learning.

The most important thing is to keep to one topic at a time, and to organize your topics so that you move logically from one to the next.  So, with rare exception, you don't make a stew.  You serve the meat and veggies on the same plate, but separate.  Sometimes you do garnish the beans with bacon, or the beef with scallions, but you do so with a light hand.

Descriptions of setting go at the start of a scene, or in a break in action within a scene.  You can add adjectives here and there ('a grey rock', 'deep, ominous shadows', 'rushing brook'), but you need to respect the pace of the narrative.  If you were a storyteller giving the story orally, would you be speaking expansively or driving forward?  Shape your topics and your phrase, sentence, and paragraph structure around that pace.

A couple of specifics out of the review:

It's not that their scent is pallid.  It's that the word 'scent' is pallid (which is why I quoted it).  'scent' is a milder word than 'aroma', 'aroma' milder than 'smell', 'smell' milder than 'reek'.  I'm not sure that any of these is quite the word you want, but hounds follow scents.  People recoil from a stench.

You can give us a clue by describing them as a swarm or using a verb that describes hive-like behavior.

But by genericizing them, you're leaving that column for us to fill in.

Ironically, if it were 'power' (singular) the question would be different: what special power does Skrune have?

I'm not suggesting an information dump.  This reader would like a clue or a tease.  What power(s) should he have.  (Don't tell me.  List them out yourself.)  What would he want to be able to do in that situation?  Why?  What would he try to do?  What would the result be?  If his action should result in a glowing finger, why?  What is it indicating?

Now, how do you tell us that in the fewest words?  Does the effort tire him further?

My confusion here is that you say he hopes =they= are safe.  The kobold chatter reveals danger, and since the last safe/endangered question is about the teammates, that's the first place I try to attach the danger.

You write 'sound of kobold chatter'.  What does 'sound of' contribute?  For me, it makes the kobold chatter more remote in the presentation, and I read it as being more remote in the physical layout of the scene.

Instead of moving the kobold chatter to the object of  'of', why not present it directly as 'kobold chatter' or 'chatter of kobolds'?  'chatter' is a strong, colorful word, and if you don't hide it behind the preposition, it and the kobolds can support some garnish, that is, some description.  They practically ask for it.  'sharp chatter' or 'short, swarming kobolds', or 'angry kobolds' or ... .

Well, I don't play soccer.  Not a sports guy, and the only 'flow' sport I even remotely care to watch is hockey.  That said, what kind of guy is Skrune?  Does the rise of adrenaline make the deadly threat into pleasurable excitement?  Does the exhaustion cancel it?  Is it 'not one more job to do?', which would call forth a sigh?

Does Skrune believe that he's in real danger of death or defeat?  If not, then he might sigh.  But if his eyes are darting for an escape or focussed on a threat to be defeated now, I don't think he'll sigh.  He might draw a deep breath in preparation.

As I write this, another question comes to me.  What is Skrune trying to do now?  Escape?  Escape to where?  How?  What event will mean safety?  What event will mean success for the mission?  What event will mean failure?  Aren't these essential parts of Skrune's circumstance, and don't they define his options and give meaning to his choices?

You don't need to answer these explicitly.  But people, even desperate people, act with purpose and intent.  We can't understand them unless we have some glimmering of both purpose and intent.  Discovering (revealing) purpose and intent is a major storytelling tool.  What is the villian trying to do?  How is this move going to help the hero?

Classic example: A man walks into a bar and asks for a glass of water.  The bartender reaches under the bar, pulls out a pistol, and points it at the man.  The man pauses for a moment, says "Thank you," turns and walks out of the bar.  What just happened?  This is a brainteaser, but it is also a story, and the key to the problem is discovering for yourself purpose and intent.

Hope this helps.

Note to Karin Rita Gastreich:

In a review you called out

On the text marked, you asked me to put the mother's name, Melayne, in after 'mother' as an apposative (as I just did earlier in the sentence).  After considering this serveral times, I believe it would be worse than what I have now.

Consider the text from 'Merran practiced' through 'mother'.  There are nine words and six references to persons:

• Merran

• her (lessons)

• her (father)

• (her) father

• her

• (her) mother

The appositive would be a seventh personal referencee in ten words.  Moreover, it would be a new name at the end of that long string, and the reader would have to slow to learn it..

'Melayne' appears at the front of the next paragraph, and it's the first personal reference after the mention of Merran's mother.  If the description of the building's layout did not intervene, it would be the next word after 'kitchen'.

If I seek any change, it will be to move that text, or some of it, somewhere else.

Remember (as I'm sure you do) that Tazar has his own unseen enemies.  I'm assuming that he's going to meet them again, maybe in the catacombs.

By the way, when Tazar takes his armor and weapons off for Griffon, I can see him saying 'Guard it,' to whomever, in a way that makes even Griffon take notice, and makes the ones charged with guarding it gulp and assent.  Not with the threat of violence, but something deeper.  As Griffon said, Tazar is a warrior.

It will be hard to pull off if yu choose to do it, but it could be a very strong character moment.

More like the Grammar Goblin, I'm afraid.

On a more serious note, I'm not sure I could adapt to your style of story.

When I look at a review I've done, I sometimes wonder whether the author will hate me forever.  I do hit hard with them, and sometimes I get overly dramatic.

Amy, you made Tazar so distinct that it's easy to see what's not in his Voice (you've got the PoV).  For a less deeply carved character, it would be much harder.

The Bravo is for the whole sequence.

Now ... when Elston first appeared after Jaylene's resuurrection, Alda saw the blackness of anger within him.  I have to doubt everything now, so I'm wondering if there's more than we understand to that blackness--or to that anger.

If the enemy can use Behira's Veil against Behira's forces, can that enemy also strip the Veil, to fuddle the forces?  Or has Behira withdrawn it altogether so it cannot be used against her?

Has an enemy breached Asgaard?

Sil doesn't count?  What about her big sex scene with Kha?  And we've been told of the Founders.