Window Shopping: Kingdom Without a King- Part 8

The dead man that was Anton Allaine stumbled towards Praesus and I with an otherworldly hunger. Someone had stripped him of his regal armor. Altogether, what was left of him was minimal. His flesh had a dim gray tinge, most of his chest was covered with blood. The only clue to who it belonged was the fact that there was so much of it, that I was certain it had come from multiple sources. In addition to the crimson liquid that seemed to be everywhere, Anton Allaine had apparently had his clothing nearly torn to shreds. It gave him the appearance of a long dead corpse, one who’s funeral suit had been eaten away by earthworms, insects and time under the ground.

Though his body gave the impression of one who had passed over to the other side, Anton’s face held a much different look. If you were able somehow see past the glowing green eyes, you might have noticed Anton’s lips. They were dry and thin, and his teeth seemed to be trying to push them out if the way, with his tongue in tow.

As Praesus and I took in the sight, Asta spoke to me specifically, “I am going to let my brother into your cell. One of two things will happen: You will either cure him. Or he will kill you.”

Praesus gave me a tainted glance. I held up a dismissive hand.

One of Asta’s guards swung open our cell’s door. The other prodded Anton to enter. Both of them regarded Anton with an equal mixture of terror and revulsion, they only went as close as they needed.  

Anton entered slowly at first, but as he got closer he must’ve sensed or smelled us somehow. His sleepwalking shuffle turned more urgent. And along with it, those teeth, pinned down by only his narrow lips began to search by snapping in our general direction.

Asta signaled the guards to shut the door, they quickly and gladly obliged her. Anton, or what Anton had become rather, in large part to me, was getting closer, teeth bared and making indicative guttural sounds in our direction.

Calmly, Praesus looked at me, “What are you waiting for?”

“What do you mean?”

“Now isn’t the time for jokin’ squire. Change the man back!”

My attention bounded from Praesus to Anton’s reanimated corpse, “I can’t do that…”

“What?” Praesus was now backing up, heading towards the rear of the cell.

“I mean, I dunno what I mean.This is all new to me.” I focused, tried to concentrate and see if my powers to bring the dead back to life might include the ability to reverse what I had done, and restore Anton’s humanity.
I reached out with my mind to Anton’s corpse. On some other plane, I saw my thoughts travelling towards him. My will itself flowed from me in a bright green arc, like a tornado crossing over a water’s surface. Then I thought of emptying a colored liquid into a glass of plain water. My will to control this man went from me like a green fountain, crossed the small cell and found him. It enveloped him, catching him up in a green swirling mist. I glanced back at Praesus who was in fact watching intently, but by his eyes I could tell he was not seeing what I was. The guards, and Asta herself, peered intently from outside the cell, but again I could tell they were not seeing this fantasm of power that I was.

Quickly, I swung my gaze back to Anton, the green array had all but subsided, and as it did, it evaporated into nothing- that being if it ever was actually anything to begin with.  

Anton was still. He had stopped with the growls and was standing as still as you would have expected, that is, from any normal dead man.

After several moments, I approached him. Although, I had no idea what I was going to do, or even look for once I reached him. Anton stood, back to the cell door, his eyes locked on mine.

Asta cried out to her brother. Anton didn’t respond, but he heaved slightly forward at his waist, and held up an arm, with his forefinger raised. It was if he were indicating he needed just a moment.

“Anton!” Asta, threw herself at the bars. Anton dropped his arm, as he simultaneously dropped to his knees. “He’s back, he’s hurting, let me in there!”

Oddly, the guards looked at me before making a move. “Let me in there now dammit!” Asta’s voice tore through the small space. This broke the guard’s hesitation and they scrambled, opening the door as quickly as they could.

“Anton, by Eve! You’re back! you’re okay!” Asta flew to him, throwing her arms around her brother’s shoulders. When this occurred Anton returned her embrace, the only difference was Anton grabbed Asta’s slender wrist, and then promptly placed it between his teeth.

Yelling to Anton, I said, “No! Don’t you bite down you sunovabitch!” I dashed towards Asta Allaine and her dead brother. Anton turned her around to face me, as he gripped her, teeth ready to meet flesh. I knelt next to her, and whispered in her ear. I told her how I had the events in the courtyard led to Anton’s death. I told her how all we wanted to do was escape. I told her how I had coerced her to get into this cell. I finished by saying, “All it took was a little hope.”

No longer at the back of the cell, Praesus was now standing at it’s doorway, looking over the battered bodies of the two guards. He stared at his knuckles, now covered in blood, “Cursed...”

Window Shopping: Kingdom Without a King- Part 1

As the purple light grew stronger, I could make out only a few footprints that remained in the dissipating snow. I had no way of knowing who they belonged to. As Old Rufus and I approached the gate, it reminded me how this was already our second journey.

The first started nearly the same, and not long ago. This creature had been there, nearly from the start. As it would happen, I was lucky to have him by my side.

I looked to him, but Rufus still had his head hunkered low, he was sniffing the ground intently. We were now within a few hundred yards of a weathered door, giant wooden planks sealed by a large metal brace and rivets that looked almost modernistic. Together they formed an ingress as big as the entrance to an airplane hangar.

The door was surrounded on both sides by the perimeter that the gate formed. The gate itself seemed to stretch into infinity in opposite directions. Directly surrounding the entrance, the snow had either been disposed of, or had melted away, as it was nearly non-existent. Tundra grass and dirt were exposed in countless patches and tufts.  Flanking the door small bushes, devoid of leaves, begged to be put out of their misery. To look at them was to know they had been burned. Except for one curious thing, a speckle of green couldn’t hide even behind the scorched bushes. It was a pine bough, fresh enough to still have it’s scent. Preasus?

As soon as I had noticed the pine bough Old Rufus seemed to as well. He darted forward. When he did this, I heard a shout from above. My eyes followed the noise, up and up for seemingly forever. Until I saw a dot of a man perched in a tall turret.

“Restrain the beast. And tell me, what business do you have here?” the voice was steady, and I noticed the man speaking had drawn an arrow from a quiver upon his back. It was primed and rested taught in his bowstring.

“Rufus, come back here.” Old Rufus unconcerned about the archer, lazily returned to my side. “Don’t shoot! Err, don’t fire. My name is...well my name isn’t important. I followed a man here, a umm, a villain!”

The man in the tower hollered, “Keep your sights on him. I’m going to meet him.” Then he disappeared out of sight.

It took me a moment to realize he wasn’t talking to me. My eyes followed his gaze. There was a second turret, again with a platform at its apex, on it was another archer, this one a woman.

“Call reinforcements. Don’t move stranger.” the woman shouted down. Her lip curled in a smile. She seemed to be thrilled to have something to aim at.

“Do you want me to hold up my hands?” I shouted up to the woman.

She shrugged, “If I shoot you, I’m not going to shoot you in the hands.” I pondered this for a moment until I heard a horn sound from within the walls. It was a single long note. The machinery behind the walls groaned and squealed. Moments passed until I heard the mechanisms of the great door being swung open.

When it finally was moved aside four men and another woman greeted me. By greeted, I mean they all gazed at me with dour expressions. I waved, and Old Rufus wagged his tail with minimal effort.

The lot of them had swords, except for the first archer who pushed past the crowd and spoke, “You stated you followed a villain here?”

“That’s right.”

“What did this villain look like?” said a bulldozer of a man with a broadsword at the ready.

“Umm, blonde hair, long, in braids.”

The archer spoke again, “This man is your enemy?”

I don’t know why but I laughed, “You could say that.”

The group narrowed their eyes at me. The female archer, still atop her post yelled, “You want me to shoot him?”

My entire body flinched at the question.

“Not yet.”

“Yet?” I asked.

The archer spoke, “The man with the braids was caught in front of our walls a short time before daybreak. He was covering his footprints with a branch. Sort of the behavior that inhabitants behind the wall might find suspicious. Don’t you agree?”

I nodded.

“Much like the fact that another stranger shows up just after we’ve locked him up. Again, odd don’t you agree?”

“Wait a second,” I raised my hands, begging off.

“Shoot him.” the archer commanded.

Before I could argue any further a white light lit up my right temple, and my vision went black. The last thing I heard before I fell to the ground was, “Get the dog.”


TO BE CONTINUED!

Window Shopping : Kingdom Without a King- Prologue

The wind was cruel, it attacked me from all sides. Likewise, the snow crept higher along the sides of my borrowed boots, the same time as it crunched beneath them. The snow was no longer falling, but from the looks of things, it had came quickly and heavily, not much earlier. The temperature was crisp, cold, and well below freezing. Although, unthinkable, I ignored the elements.

Although, I had been doing the unthinkable for at least the past twenty four hours. I had befriended an otherworldly dog/wolf hybrid. I met some very interesting people who I learned nothing about despite being interrogated by them for hours. I was kidnapped. I stole a dead man’s boots. Oh, and that reminds me, I am at least partially involved in a murder perpetrated by the aforementioned dog/wolf thing. And in most unbelievable fashion, I had transversed dimensions, or worlds, or something.

To be fair, I didn’t really know what I had been doing. It was entirely possible that I may very well be passed out in my basement after drinking too much. But it all felt so real. I guess that’s what all the nutcases say.

Anyway, despite all of that I still felt compelled to leap through yet another window. This was to go after a guy that is nearly twice my size, and seems to be well versed in the art of getting what he wants from people, by any means necessary. Oh, and he has way better hair than me, it’s kinda long, wavy blonde, with these cool braids…

...But I digress. And that’s not why I followed him. If I’m being honest, and I think I am, its because I’m bored. And leaping through interdimensional windows (or whatever these things are) beats real life. I mean at least until wake up from this dream world it will at least provide a distraction.

Next to me, trudging through the same snow was Old Rufus. He was hard to see due to the absence of light. Yet the faint lupine shape seemed to be blacker than the darkness that surrounded. We both scanned a horizon that was barely discernable. The difference with Rufus was that occasionally he would glance at me, his eyes piercing the night. They seemed confident, like he knew where he was going, which was more than I could say for myself. I imagined his line of sight radiating out before us, as though his field of vision were casting high beams. It made me feel better about the journey, and was a way to distract from the cold. Inside another part of my head, the fanciful gave way to the analytical.

Is this pup following Praesus’s scent? We should be seeing footprints right? Wherever this guy Praesus was headed he should be only a minute or three ahead of us, and leaving behind a trail through the snow. Right? Was he supernatural? This thought made my stomach twist in a quick, but lurching knot.

I left these thoughts and returned to the real world. To our right was a faint light in the distance. It peeked in a hazy dark purple that broke against the blackness. But the shape was not reminiscent of a moon, or sun. It was a slash, one that cut a jagged swath across the flesh of the sky. As my eyes adjusted to the new, yet weak light, my brain also adjusted to take in what I was seeing.

Ahead of us was an outline, barely visible thanks to the strange new light in the sky. I had read enough fairytales as a child to know that the silhouette before me was that of a castle. Old Rufus turned to me and grinned in that panting smile that canines have. He then faced forward, lowering his head, hardening himself for the rest of the journey. His body language seemed to hint that once we arrived at said castle our work would just be beginning.