A Cold Castle

By -

     A yelp and crash sounded behind him, and he flinched before whirling around in irritation. Lalia was standing

with scrunched shoulders and an apologetic wincing face next to an overturned pot. 

“Sorry,” she whisper-shouted.

Josef practically growled. He strode forward and grabbed her by the shoulder, dragging her away from the pot-rack. 

“We are standing in the kitchen of a bloodthirsty elf king out for my head and your womanhood,” he hissed in her face. “If you don’t start taking this seriously then there will be terrible consequences, and I don’t want to feel those consequences because you aren’t paying attention to what you’re doing and where you’re going!”

She shrank in on herself for real at his outburst and he could see the edges of her lacy blue head-covering droop with shame. She looked away. “I’m sorry. I will be more careful.”

She stuck closer this time as they moved on, head down, eyes up and watchful behind him. 

There was something very cold and still in the air of that castle. Gone was the sweaty heat of the banquet hall and the prison rooms. Everything felt frozen outside of time. Josef wouldn’t have been surprised to see frost on the armchairs and hands motionless on the clocks. The hands on that grandfather clock were moving, but the ticking was too soft to hear. The carpet muffled the noise of their steps, and Josef almost wished for his armor solely to he could make some noise in this creepy castle. 

“Lalia,” he said softly, and felt her hand on his back. “Which way are we going?” 

“This hall intersects with another ahead. We turn left there and will soon reach the inventory.” 

He nodded, and they kept moving. 

The carpet of the second hall was red instead of the pale patterned blue of the first one, and it made him feel exposed, ready to be picked off, like he was walking on lava instead of wool. 

They reached a pair of tall double doors flanked by empty white urns on pedestals to either side. Again they were to the left.

Lalia tugged on his sleeve. Her face had receded far enough into the shadow of her head-covering that Josef couldn’t see her eyes, but her mouth looked tighter than it should. “This is the room.” 

Joseph moved so that she was behind him and put his left hand on the left door handle. He held his sword at the ready and was still for a moment. He couldn’t hear anyone inside. Slowly he pushed down on the gilt handle, and the door swung open.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Hotel at the Top of the Mountain

By -
   Erraline sat at her balcony looking out at the pearly sky and snowy peaks that surrounded her. Dove-gray clouds softened the stark black and white mountains that ringed the hotel on all sides.    This was her favorite space in her rooms, out here alone with the open sky and cold mountains. Being with them made all her frustrations seem very temporary, they cleared her thoughts and made her feel like something would come, something might change.    "Erraline?"    A voice wafted out from inside, and Erraline sighed. She lifted her head and enjoyed the wind against her face a moment more, skirts ruffling against her legs, stray hairs wafting away from her neatly done hair.    The balcony door opened with a chuk  and Erraline turned away from the wind.    "Erraline? There you are, it's time to begin your lessons."    Erraline followed Madame Oyena into the little library that served as her schoolroom. ...
Read more

Dino Boy: Not Like the Cemetery

By -
  Rex could feel the death in the dirt.  It wasn’t cemetery death, cemetery death was neat and ordered. Bones that belonged to the same bodies were buried together in chosen plots, in their own special places, arranged the same way they’d been arranged in life.  The bones here weren’t like that, they hadn't been cared for. They 'd been jumbled up and mixed together and then rattled carelessly down into the ground like trash. And it wasn't just the bones here. He had always been able to feel the bones, to feel the last ruins of living bodies under the soil. He'd always been able to feel that. The blood was new. And dark.  There was anger in the blood, wrongness, a rage that made it cling. And it bubbled . He could feel it coming up from the earth, screaming through his veins, boiling through his blood and into his brain in a raging, roiling blackness roaring injustice- He gasped as his knees hit the dirt.  He breathed in in deep, heaving gulps and pushed himself ...
Read more

Spirit on a Wire

By -
     The city people say a spirit walks their wires.      The lonely people are the ones who know him the best. From a balcony, from the street, they see a pair of red and black sneakers pace the power lines, the figure above them hidden beneath baggy clothes and a deep hood. You can see his ankles, they say, confirmation that it is in fact the figure of a man walking the space between the telephone poles, only a single black line between him and falling. They never see his face. They only see his back, see his arm, see a collar and a deep shadow.     The lonely people love him like one of their own, and the other people love him as their protector.      He has an iron grip they say, and feet that walk the air like the steps on a fire escape. He needs no weapon for the men in the alleys.       There are stories, you see, stories of old women and young women, stories of beaten men who saw the gray shadow appear be...
Read more