Yeah, this is the hook to my rather lengthy story. I'm unable to send requests of manuscripts to individual e-mails at this time, though that should change in the near future. But right now I don't feel I've written enough.

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To Nicki--seeing that large bronze key nestled between the cave rocks gave her a jolt.

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Don't like the first sentence. To Nicki sounds like the start to a correspondence. The POV (point of view) borders on second person. I see some sentences are exactly that. Stick to a single POV and I suggest you abandon the 2nd person POV. A small change I believe will give this first sentence a better punch.

The large bronze key nestled between two cave rocks gave Nicki a jolt.

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Just like the key in her mother's stories. The mark and all. It was dim. She had to get a closer look.

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Disjointed. The information sounds like it was clear in your head but it is muddled to the rest of us. These four sentences do not flow together. It's like being in a car with a first time driver that is having a hard time between the relationship of the brake and acclerator. Go. Stop. Go. Stop.
Rearrange, recompile, reword, rework. Something like...

The light in the cave was dim but she could make out the mark on the key. A mark like the one's in her mother stories. She had to get a closer look.

Not great but you get the idea.

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"You'll only get yourself into trouble climbing back there, girl. Might be bear waiting for you."

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bear? Are you sure you didn't mean 'better'? Finding out there was somone else with her was jarring. I don't know why he is there or who he is. You don't so a very good job of expalning any of it in the next few sentences.

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Her companion, an ex-vielercht on the run, said while wiping the sweat off his brow.

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Good place to say who he is, as in name. Never heard of an 'ex-vierlercht'. A definition would help instead of relying on us to guess. Also, why is the companion wiping his brow? Is he hot? The cave stuffy? Are they coalminers? Or treasure hunters?

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"Mind your own business, pansy." Nicki stuck out her tongue.

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This would work better if you flip the two sentences.

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Crawled on all fours.

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Just cut.

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"I don't believe it." She grabbed the metal key, held it to her chest.

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What doesn't she believe? If it is the same key in the stories than say so. In the second sentence cut the comma and put in an 'and'.

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At the very same moment screams pierced the palace of the gods.

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Definitely cut 'At the very same moment'. That alone will get an editor to put your story down and send you a 'I regret this does not fit our needs at this time'. Are they in a 'palace of the gods' or a dirty cave? This opening gets more confusing with every line.

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"Business in a cave now?

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What does he mean by 'Business'?

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Your curiosity will kill us both. Girl?"

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Why the 'Girl?' question?

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She said nothing but held it to her chest, tears streaming down her face.

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This last line does little to clear up the confusion. Are they in danger? Does the key make her cry because it reminds her of her mother or for another reason?

It was dim. She had to get a closer look. Might be better incorporating these into one sentence. Also, if she can see the mark on the key even though it is nestled between two rocks, I'm guessing it can't be that dim. And if they're far enough away from the back of the cave that there is still the possibility of a bear lurking back there, then I'm confused about the dimensions of this cave and exactly where the key is.

said while wiping the sweat off his brow. That "while" just makes this sound stilted to me.

Nicki stuck out her tongue. Crawled on all fours. "I don't believe it." She grabbed the metal key, held it to her chest. At the very same moment screams pierced the palace of the gods. So where does she crawl on all floors to? This almost sounds as though she drops to her knees, crawls around in a little circle and the key magically appears in her hand. And what is the palace of the gods?

Business in a cave now? Your curiosity will kill us both. Girl?" She said nothing but held it to her chest, tears streaming down her face. So Nikki says this? I have no idea what she's referring to here. And, for me, the tears are too sudden a shift in her mood from sticking out her tongue just a moment before.

I probably wouldn't read on at the moment, too many confusing aspects and, seeing as the key is your main hook, I'd like more indication of what is so important about it.

Good luck with it.

I'm hooked. The idea of a girl finding a key that was referred to in her mother's stories interests me. I'm hooked by questions like, the key to what? How'd her mother know? Is there maybe some arcane magic involved? Did the mother know her daughter had a great destiny?

The opening sentence almost worked for me. I think the em-dash is inappropriate (a decent book on grammar and punctuation will explain why better than I can). Also, it's hard to visualize what she's seeing. Is she inside a cave? (And if it's dim, where's the light coming from?) I think the remainder of the first para is almost okay, because its disjoint structure seems to me to express the disjoint, confused way she's thinking.

Except, "It was dim" -- what, the key was dim? I'd suggest a new para here, something like, "They had left the evening sun far behind them; it barely penetrated the cave deep beneath the palace of the gods. She crawled forward in the near darkness for a closer look ..." You could even have some stray beams of sun glinting off the bronze ...

I'd give her companion a name (she knows it, right, so why withold it?) and feed in the ex-vielercht thing later; right now, she wouldn't be thinking about that, just the sweat on his brow.

"Crawled on all fours" isn't a sentence, and it's a detail that could perhaps be earlier.

"She grabbed the metal key" -- I think you can drop "metal", we know it's bronze already. You could include a new detail to make it more real; perhaps how it felt, or maybe it's dirty, dusty, grimy with oil, whatever.

Where's the palace of the gods? Are Nicki and her companion in caves beneath it? If so, I'd get that detail into the first para so we know where we're located from the start.

Who said "Business in a cave now? ..."

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To Nicki--seeing that large bronze key nestled between the cave rocks gave her a jolt. Just like the key in her mother's stories.

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I found this opening quite strange, I don’t understand the to Nicki? Why not start it something Nicky could see the large bronze key…
Also gave her a Jolt, didn’t flow for me I imaged electrocution, how about urged her onwards? Or use some other sense or form to show how by seeing the key motivated her.

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It was dim. She had to get a closer look.

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There is nothing linked to the dim, could be a person could be a light? Plus it’s not a strong adjective. You could use another form, In the low light she struggled to find a hand hold in the rocks. So rather than just saying dim use an action to explain the difficulties.

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"You'll only get yourself into trouble climbing back there, girl. Might be bear waiting for you." Her companion, an ex-vielercht on the run, said while wiping the sweat off his brow.

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Is it necessary to introduce another character so soon and take the focus away from Nicki? I think it just distracts and takes away from the flow. Why couldn’t Nicky have these thoughts instead? Keeping the focus tight and building empathy with Nicky. Or just leave it out and add it in later.

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"Business in a cave now? Your curiosity will kill us both. Girl?" She said nothing but held it to her chest, tears streaming down her face.

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I found this distant and the tears running down her face just seemed out of place. One moment she had the appearance of child, sticking her tongue out, next she has tears. Again I would like to have some emotion here, you don’t have to give the reason why she is crying but build some emotions into it.

I wouldn’t read on, I like the concept, some nice ideas, but I found it too be more like a script than a narrative. I just think it’s needs to be tightened up with more focus, either on the emotional side, or with all out action. But it seems to be trying to do both and with just 13 lines it’s a tall order.

That is the kind of critique I am looking for. All of you, I am incredibly indebted to you guys. I am glad I found this site.

But about this opening. Maybe you guys could help?

You see, the story, in my mind, really starts with the finding of the key, which sets all the action in to motion. Unfortunately, there is a rather large amount of background information that goes with that key, and the problem I'm facing is this one: How can I build rapport with the characters without including the immense back-story that would explain how Nicki and her companion(his name is Adolfo, by the way.) got to that particular cave so far away from both of their homes in order to find the key?

I really don't feel comfortable starting back at the capital with Nicki and her mother, not only because of the length of it, but also because Nicki was under the impression that the key was destroyed. This means that the character's primary motivation to use the key, which is the corner-stone of the story, wouldn't actually come into the story until about 10,000 words into it. Before that the story would probably have something akin to a slice of life feel, and the jump to high fantasy I'm afraid would be too much.

So basically, I'm faced with the task of cramming a lot of information into the first chapter. This isn't optimal for me because my specialty for first chapters is to introduce two or three characters and let their personalities bounce off one another for awhile, getting the reader interested in the characters, and not the plot. Cramming information isn't exactly my strong suit. XD