©2008 Stacy Bearden Chapter One: The Robbery Moonbeams lanced off the marble pillars of the dilapidated castle. Though old and worn by numerous wars and social conflicts, the castle's tall marble walls blended with bands of steel held their ominous beauty - cold and serene. The seas below seemed to guard any vertical passage to the structure as well as any escape. Three sides were taken by the seas billowing at the bottom of steep, if not straight, walls of smooth, ivory-like rock which was slippery to the touch. The remaining side in view was not guarded to much degree, yet it was completely secure through means of a single entrance path to the huge doors of the castle. A suspension bridge of steel and rotting wood hung precariously over a drop of perhaps two-hundred feet into black mist and mystery in fog. The suspension bridge had not been used in twenty odd years. This from fear of being plummeted to that mystic yet certain carnage. It, too, was beautiful in a strange sort of way. Almost attracting one to walk its steps and peer over the edge. It was not rusted, for the steel, even on the darkest of nights, would glisten and twinkle as stars in the open sky. Water only made the bridge more of a deception in that the wood might appear stable - a lie. And through all this beauty, ghostly images danced and pranced amongst the steel and marble world of the palace. Yes, real apparitions. Real as the evil that forged them. Real as the death that gave them birth and breathed into these lifeless visages so long, long ago. The glowing traces of ghostly presence could be seen walking the bridge, and the occasional demon might even chance to fall through one of the loosely placed boards of the pathway: a type of joke for the sparse human witnesses to see. And it was a joke. No one knew just how serious the being of these ghosts, demons were. No grass grew within one mile of the marble fortress, and no one pondered the question why? No pure water could be found for twenty miles broad of this evil sanctuary. Nothing living could be discovered for fifty miles more, but something did live within this massive shelter of lost souls. When late at night screams of the demons walking the bridge for all eternity split the night-brought fog, someone in that steel tomb heard them. That someone was the creator of all this hell in the entrenched one-hundred miles of the coast and sea. And as all knew, he was a wizard, a sorcerer. What else could he be? There have been countless tales of the wizard Disakk pillaging homes and villages, even entire countries. They are all falsehoods. The wizard, although pitch-black of soul and morals, had never touched the world outside until he contrived the takeover of Kendres. Many full-moon nights, the fiend would sit on his throne of marble and steel by his tower window in the East and think of Kendres. The folds of his leather robes would billow as the arctic winds rushed from the sea to the lofty perch of his tower window and engulfed the tiny room in cold atmosphere. His beard, long and gray, would flap and twist as his skin grew chilled and numb, but he sat steadfast, staring out onto the seas he controlled through his dark practices. In his left, crooked hand he carried a tall ropewood staff with a single pearl entombed in the supple wood. The staff's body twisted downward in a spiral cascade of etched symbols and numbers. The staff terminated with a solid steel point to pierce any enemy who might be stupid enough to confront its owner. In Disakk's right hand, he held nothing save one of his ageless spell books at times, but he did wear a ring. Nothing magical about it. It was steel as were all his surroundings with diminutive black snakes encircling a stunning white pearl of medium size and weight. It had been given to him by the one thing in the world he had loved - his wife. She had been his greatest companion, but she had died long ago due to reasons he could neither prolong nor halt. As great a wizard as he was, her illness was quick, drastic. Perhaps the illness was pure good, for when evil is met by this single force there is no stopping it. Ever. Disakk never forgot this all too true fact. So now, finally realizing that the cold winds were freezing his eyes stiff in their sockets, Disakk hesitantly rose from his tower throne and turned. Staff in hand, he pulled the shutters tight as he went. The air ceased to consume the room and his surroundings warmed as he snapped his fingers in disdain. He did not smile over the feat, although it might have been somewhat pleasant; he never smiled. Disakk trudged down the spiral staircase leading to and from the east tower. Torches on the rounded walls shimmered and tossed shadows as the wizard journeyed downwards now with a new mission on his mind. He must take his daily trip to the dungeons far below the reaches of the marble encasing of the castle. On the lower level of Disakk's mansion, which in all contained seven stories and four towers, there was a room far to the north where a secret passage held the way to the dungeons below. After a good bit of walking the maze of the castle, Disakk entered the tiny corridor and coasted through the far wall, a hologram, to enter yet another passageway. This latest was humid and cold; water beaded and dripped from the frigid marble walls. Past about three feet was nothing but a dark, relentless fall to the dungeon below. There was no other entrance, excluding one, and certainly no other exit to this wretched exile below the earth's floor. Disakk stepped over the edge of the fall onto thin air to float rather swiftly down four-hundred or more feet to the fiery dungeon. He reached its bottom seconds later and softly landed on a raised platform with iron steps leading spirally to the floor of the holding cells. The flooring was of chilly stone, slick and moist with green algae and various diseases. Fermentation oozed from every crack and crevasse, and the smell was raw and sulfuric. This was the first room of three-hundred-forty-seven in the dungeons of the wizard's castle. In the center of this particular room boiled a caldron, bubbling with acidic liquids. It was suspended by a mass of chains stretching up to the lofty ceiling. Beneath was a blistering fire set in a deep pit. Along the walls were various pieces of torture equipment, such as the "rack" of infamous legend. Each was stained with human and non-human blood. Bones hung from the ceiling, still decomposing flesh holding them together. Whenever travelers dared to venture too close to the evil palace, one of Disakk's pets would capture them. They were then brought to this room to wait out the short remainder of their lives until Disakk came to see them to their death. All long and painful. Tonight, Disakk moped slowly along the walls moving parts of each of his torture devices as a child might listlessly play with an old toy. There were no prisoners tonight, and as his pets trotted into the dimly lit dungeons chamber, the wizard was somewhat angered. They entered single-file, hoofed feet clip-clopping on the stones below. His pets were of his own creation, just as everything was here. They were half horse and half Cyclops with four arms and dark fur on their chests. The one eye in each of them burned a brilliant, yellow-green color and lit the room more and more as they finally were all in the room. In all, Disakk's pets numbered three, and they were very capable of doing their jobs. Late at night they would run down their unsuspecting victims, beating them with steel-tipped whips until the blood flowed smoothly. The victims would then be shackled, gagged, and dragged back to the dungeons by the creatures' own passageway. This night, there were no shackled prisoners, and the Trods were worried. "There was...no one?" asked Disakk, calmly enough, but bouncing his staff nervously on the limestone floor. "No, sire," answered one of the Trods in its low, brittle voice, "not in your immediate province. Not for one-hundred miles around. Not in the sea or sky. We humbly apologize, my lord." All the Trods knelt on one knee. This was not enough to appease the tyrant, however. He grasped his staff with both hands and using it as a club pummeled the Trod about the face breaking its jaw with a snap. No scream was heard. Blood spewed onto the cold, green ground. The jaw hung loosely askew, and a single tear could not be seen in the Trod's eye. The Trods were made immune to pain. They had no nerves to feel any pain whatsoever. In just a few seconds, the break would mend itself and the teeth would grow back. Blood would replace itself, as well, for that was the nature of this beast. Thankfully for them. Disakk took great joy in abusing his Trods. Anything perverted pleased the wizard tremendously. "Bring me the Prince!" ordered Disakk frantically as he wiped the blood from his pearl-topped staff. The Trods looked at each other blankly. Not hesitating too long, however, they rose to fetch the young boy from his cold existence a few levels below. Knowing that his dungeons were haunted, and the deeper the level the more demons preside, Disakk only cast Prince Kaele into the eighth level. He did not wish to scare the lad to death, yet. The Trods gathered their whips and made ready for the long journey down into the labyrinth of dungeon cells and levels where the boy was held up. He was not bound in any way. He was simply left to explore the maze of bones and pits and corridors with a torch and a canteen of water. This mercy was to keep him busy during the long hours of his stay. Disakk knew there was no way the young Prince could make his way out. Even Disakk throughout the years had forgotten the exact way through the dungeon levels - all fifty-four of them. The Trods after only one hour of searching located Prince Kaele rummaging around level nine, scared stiff. He had accidentally fallen through an old wooden door. The Prince landed in the ninth level on a bed of dried human bones. The Trods picked up the boy of fifteen years, threw him onto one of their backs, and journeyed back up to where Disakk impatiently awaited their arrival. There were others in the dungeon, at one time, maybe even when Kaele had been there. You could live a long time in the lower reaches of this world - if you were resourceful. Water was abundant it seemed, and rats could be a source of food for the extremely hungry. So, by these means, one such warrior had almost made his way from level twenty-four to level one, but he fallen and had broken his leg as Disakk merely laughed at the man's hopeless attempt. Then Disakk beheaded him. The Prince arrived in front of the wizard in low spirits, needless to say, but Disakk was in very high spirits, morale flying loftily. (He had been sipping on Elderberry wine.) The Prince hopped from the back of the Trod who had taken him and walked defiantly up to Disakk. He was unquestionably a brave lad, but the wizard took no liking to his irreverence and swatted him down to the floor with one hand. "Do you think my father will not notice my disappearance? It is only a matter of time before..." "Before what? You impetuous child! I know your father will notice your being gone! I am counting on that! I'm bored, you see. I need a challenge! You are not the challenge I've been planning for! You failed in your attempt to be set free. They shall have to fight now!" announced the wizard drifting into deeper thought. "It was a game I lost! You wage war over a parlor game!" "Oh, but yes! Life is a game! When you are as old as I unfortunately am, you'll have different values, too, my boy! But now we must wait until daybreak to see your mother cry! My crystal is ready to show us the sights!" Disakk had started a war with Kendres, the seat of the King, William of Mear. And now, as Disakk had hoped, all hell would break loose!   Buy a link to the entire novel, over 57,000 words, for only $4.95 and read anywhere!

 

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