All Comments on 'The Chronicles of Harold the Healer Ch. 04'

My 2 cents

Excellent story! 5/5 stars. Thanks for your time and your imagination.

Great story, I've only just found this story and I'm now eagerly awaiting more chapters to read.

Really loving the series. However I am confused about two things.

Firstly, when was Mark born? Dana mentioned he was born two months before they had set sails. Does it mean he was born even before they went to war, or during the war two months before she left that country where the war took place? How did he not notice her pregnant state the whole time, and then after she gave birth, the baby? How long was the period they stayed in that country? Pella's oldest daughter Sylvia is 24 and she can somewhat remember the war. Then the next daughter Olivia who is 21 was born after they moved here. So that war, rescue, and their subsequent emigration as refugees must have had happened around 22 to 23 years ago. How long did he live there after the war ended. He's only been working for the order for 12 years, so what did he do in the intervening years? Or did he actually come back after spending more than 10 year over there. Dana hadn't told him about Mark even when they were at the war and afterwards, so she must've decided way earlier that she'd leave him, although he was hung up on her for much longer. It'd be great to understand the timeline.

Secondly, your use of the term "a few years". You've used it in different places and I don't think you meant around three years by it. But that's what you think when see "a few years". A few years ago = around three to four years ago. After a few years = after about three years. But the places you've used it felt like you meant much longer than a few years.

In response to the Anonymous comments: thank you very much for reading the story and for paying enough attention to wonder about the timeline! I have been writing the story in small bits and pieces over a long period of time due to a relative lack of free time, plus only a vague idea of where it's going to go, has caused a few minor inconsistencies in details to creep in. Creating a timeline on the go is challenging, and the inconsistency between Mark's age and Olivia's age will require some fancy footwork to explain. I had set Mark's age to be 18 to meet the minimum age requirement for characters to participate in "adult activities" (and he will...), and the war, or Harold's and Dana's involvement in it, would have started soon after he was born according to what I've written so far. It's entirely possible that Dana had not seen Harold since the encounter that resulted in her pregnancy (which would have been her choice) and had wanted to keep it secret from him, for reasons unknown.

They shipped out two months after Mark's birth, which would have made Sylvia about 6 and Olivia would have been 4, so that's an error on my part. 8-( Thanks for pointing it out! Franco is 17 and would have been born after their arrival. Once this arc is finished (with Chapter 5), I will have to go over all 4 of the previous chapters, make a few edits, and update them to make things add up properly. I want to do that only once...

The war itself did not last long, with the main battle being in front of the City; it was the subsequent occupation and rebuilding/restoration process that took time. I'm thinking that Dana and the other Engineer would have left along with most of the soldiers after about 6 months, with Harold and the other Healers staying on for at least 6 more until they weren't needed any more. What he was up to between the time he came home and the start of Chapter 1, and even before the war, remains open for future chapters. 8-)