Sorry, Jannert, you're wrong. The plural of it is they or them. Person Nominative Case Accusative Case Possessive Case 3rd person singular, Masculine He Him His 3rd person singular, Feminine She Her Hers 3rd person singular, Neuter It It Its 3rd person plural They Them Theirs The man glared at me with his beady eye. The eagle glared at me with its beady eye.
Oh of course you're right. What was I thinking??? I wasn't. Bad editing. Sorry. It's not as if I didn't know that. Eeek. One push of the Post Reply button and that's me...urkkk... shut up, shut up, more coffee...
Thanks for the word support folks. Owesion and Ubron held their weapons’ like ward-spears, surrounding the dagger-wielding Vril in a low stance. Correct?
What do the weapons possess? If you're talking about the weapons' capabilities, you're talking about something that they possess. Here, it's a simple plural. No apostrophe. Incidentally: Owesion and Ubron held their weapons. Owesion and Ubron held the weapons that were theirs. Anybody know why there's that difference?
Tricky one this: “Tell me about your Daydalu tribe!” It demanded, mispronouncing the tribe’s name. Should this be tribes' name as a tribe has more than one person in it?
How many tribes are there? A football team comprises eleven players, but is still a singular team. So the tribe is singular, and the "s" comes after the apostrophe.
Just thinking 'everyones' is without apostrophe as it's a pronoun? Owesion began walking to and fro, checking everyones equipment, even that of the Vril; who gave him haughty looks but he insisted on making sure.
The rule isn't for all pronouns, it's for possessive pronouns. Like, the pronoun "he" has the possessive pronoun "his". But there's no possessive pronoun associated with "everyone" so you'd write it as "everyone's". (Also, that's no place for a semi-colon).
Thanks, damn I thought the semi-colon would be perfect there for joining what would be two sentences together...
The second clause isn't a grammatically correct sentence. (Also, your pronouns are a bit confusing. I was going to try to rewrite it, but I have no idea who "he" is referring to). ETA: Okay, maybe... Owesion began walking to and fro, checking everyone's equipment, even that of the Vril; the old man wasn't pleased by the inspection, but Owesion insisted on making sure.
It should be tribe's. The tribe is a singular thing. I know in the U.K. there is the tendency to pluralize singular institutions when one is referencing the plural makeup of that institution, but even in the U.K., this rule seems to be applied to specific institutions, not generic concepts. A tribe or a herd is a general, generic thing. Apple Inc. and UKIP are specific, understood institutions. Frankly, how you guys keep that singular/plural thing, depending on whether one is talking about the unity or the multiplicity, straight in your heads is beyond me. We do not make this differentiation in American English. Apple is always is, it is never are here.
Ok, really complex one this. I *think* this is it. Wilderen triggered the staff again, this time the energy flow flowed out like watery energy, what reached the stunned beast merely pushed at it briefly then dissipated. “Empty!” He grimaced. “Soliter arrows' and Faern’s spinning toy are our wards now.” Wilderen spoke with grim, laconic humor as he collapsed the staff.
Are the arrows owned, or do they own? The apostrophe goes with the person/thing that owns, not the thing BEING owned. So, no. "Soliter's arrows" is correct, not "Soliter arrows'" (Also, two comma splices in the first paragraph. You have three complete sentences there, and complete sentences can't be joined by a comma.)
Wilderen triggered the staff again. This time the energy flow flowed out like watery energy. What reached the stunned beast merely pushed at it briefly then dissipated. “Empty!” He grimaced. “Soliter's arrows and Faern’s spinning toy are our wards now,” Wilderen spoke with grim, laconic humor as he collapsed the staff.
I'd disagree with that last comma - I think I'd leave it as a period. If it were "said" instead of "spoke" the comma would fit, but I think of "spoke" as more of... I don't know the words. But it's independent of the dialogue. We might said "Wilderen spoke" as an independent sentence, while we wouldn't treat "Wilderen said" that way.
In this case, yes, I agree, the wording is rather arguable as to whether it's a dialogue tag that's a dependent clause or if it's a beat, independent and separate. I think an argument can be made for both cases in this particular instance.
Then in this case, the best syntax would be no possessive apostrophe at all on Soliter. “Soliter arrows and Faern’s spinning toy are our wards now,” Wilderen spoke with grim, laconic humor as he collapsed the staff. The reason being that now, knowing what Soliter is, the above phrasing makes Soliter an adjective that modifies arrows as part of a noun phrase. Adjectival description replaces genitive (possessive) case as mode of ascription.
