The Castle by the Sea - Prologue

The Pond House

In most forests the evenings are filled with the chorus of innumerable insects. The trees hum and sway together, joining in as best as they can. The stars in the vastness above listen in as a joyous audience. The forests near Kemenbar celebrate the coolness and peace of the evenings. For most, it is a time of joy, but not for all.

     

There is one particular forest, known as Tuwull, that lies away to the south. It is deep and dark and empty of all but the thickest of trees. It is entirely inhospitable. For years, no living thing bothered to enter it. Only one creature lives there. It is a creature without a name. For many lives of men, it had been entirely alone.

     

Until a spring evening found two unlikely visitors to Tuwull. It was a young woman, barely aged beyond childhood, and she brought with her a reluctant young man of similar age. He was reluctant not to be with her, but rather to be with her in that particular forest. Unfortunately, his reluctance to appear a coward in the presence of the young lady outweighed that of his desire to run away with all haste.

     

The young lady was an important person, for she was a princess. The young man was her suitor. As often as they could, each would leave their respective quarters and wander under the swirling constellations together hand in hand. Both were very much smitten with each other. They both lived for the evenings together.

     

The Princess slowly gained an appetite for more and more adventurous walks. Each night she would lead him a bit further into the wilderness. This was not enough adventure for her though. She desired to visit the place of her childhood nightmares. She wanted to go to the Forest of Tuwull. She pressed her will upon the poor young lad and under the weight of this pressure, he relented and allowed himself to be led to the forbidden forest.

     

The night air danced about them as they strode through the marshland surrounding the forest. The lad fought the repellence he felt about the whole place. He could not be seen as weak, he knew. Footfalls drummed through the tall patches of grass. The bulk of Tuwull rose up and grew bigger in his sight. He felt his heart give a panicked leap. He thought of running away with all speed. But there was her hair and it was long and the color of strings of starlight and was dancing all about as she hurried to the forest. She turned back to him and gave an encouraging smile. He tried to flash back a confident expression, which evidently he could not pull off because her smile melted into one of repressed amusement.

     

The young suitor found himself entering a wholly unwelcoming tangle of trees. The air no longer danced. It hung all around them, still and suffocating. There was no light of any use. All that he could see made him wish he couldn’t see anything at all. Tuwull was littered with trees that reached high and hide the outside world. No stars could be seen. That worried the lad.

     

The princess was awe-struck to say the least. She turned slowly around taking in all the things she could not actually see. She thought it was magnificent. In her excitement, she spun to the lad, grabbed both sides of his face, and pulled him in for a kiss. And without a second thought, she frolicked about enjoying the forest that was not meant to be enjoyed.

     

The young suitor was quite surprised and more than a little dumbstruck. Suddenly, the whole place didn’t seem quite so horrific. He still thought it was a miserable place, but it softened a bit in his viewing. He decided to give it a chance as long as none of the stories about it were true.

     

They journeyed through the forest, scrambling over enormous, slick roots. As they progressed further into the thick of the forest, the silence grew steadily more oppressive. It began to disturb the suitor’s good mood. In truth, he began to worry for his safety, though he pretended that it was for the princess’s safety.

     

“Think we should start heading back?” He asked tentatively.

    

She continued on, lost in a world all her own. He coughed a bit to grab her attention. She turned to him, “Isn’t this just wonderful?” she beamed.

     

“Yes,” he said, “absolutely wonderful.” She didn’t quite catch the sarcasm in his voice.

     

“I could stay here forever,” she said.

     

“Well sure, but I was thinking we could probably leave soon. It is late and I am growing weary of all-“ He did not finish his thought. Away in the distance, they heard a splash. They froze in horror.

     

The lad peered through the shapes of twisted trunks in the direction of the splash. He felt that every breath was an intrusion on the oppressive silence of Tuwull. He regretted coming there. He should never have let her pleading eyes sway his better judgement.

     

Old stories called to mind terrible images. He grasped her arm and tried to pull her away from the ominous noise. The princess was not in the same hurry to leave. It can be said that she thought the sound meant a grand adventure, which she was eager for. She broke free from his grasp and tore through the trees toward the one sound in a silent forest.

     

He did not want to take a step nearer than that dreadful sound, but the young lad did love that girl dearly. He summoned his courage and followed her between the hanging tree limbs.

     

To his surprise, he happened upon an open area of the forest. The tangle of trees broke apart and opened up to a wide, still pond that stretched beneath the starry sky. The princess was standing at the water’s edge and peering out across the glassy surface.

     

He was in awe of her utter foolishness. He hurried to her, grabbed her wrist and began to tug her back from the edge. Suddenly, her foot caught on some impedance and she tumbled to the ground, knocking him over as well. He spun around to make sure she was not hurt and saw wrapped around her ankle was a green vine. She went to untangle it from her leg, but the vine moved rapidly from her ankle and tangled itself around her wrists instead. The princess was in shock. She just stared at the vines twisting themselves around her arms. Then she recovered from the shock just enough to begin screaming.

The lad sought to prove his valor so he quickly attempted to untie them himself. The vines resisted grip. His fingers could not hold on tightly before they slipped off. The vines were covered in some slippery slime. There were small suckers on the underside, latching on to the girl’s arm. They were not vines, he realized. They were tentacles. He panicked and tried to ripped at them, but they clung yet tighter.

     

The girl screamed. He followed her gaze to the pond that lay behind him. Rising out of it, a hideous beast gazed at them with a great, sallow eye. Hundreds of tentacles danced and swung through the air. It rose still further until a gaping maw appeared above the murky water in the starlight. It let out a noise that seemed both roar and scream.

     

In one motion, the tentacle around the princess’s wrists pulled her straight up into the air. She was crying for help as it held her aloft. She begged the lad to help her. He grasped around for a stick or rock or anything he could use to save his Love. His hands met nothing but dried weeds.

     

He yelled at the beast to get its attention. It paid him none. It only watched the girl as she struggled to get free, even though escape would only bring her straight to its waiting maw. She screamed and cried. The boy yelled. The Beast watched.

     

The Beast was very ugly. And therefore is often subjected to preconceived notions of ill-intent. She was not trying to hurt the girl. Actually, her goal was to protect the small child. The problem was that she felt that the way to protect her was to bring her under the water. She did this and was thanked for her help by the girl lashing out at her tentacle. She decided that this strange thing must not enjoy water for some reason, so she lifted her out again and set her on the dry ground.

     

Both the boy and the girl were in shock. The tentacle that had grabbed her softly patted her head. They passed from shock to full-on disbelief.

     

“Did it just save you…?” The boy asked.

     

The princess just stared at it. “Thank you,” she said.

     

The boy whispered, “I don’t think it understands you.”

     

“It must,” she said.

     

Tentatively, the boy said, “Yes, thank you, uh, Sir.” The great, enormous beast did not respond in any way except to sink below the surface of the water and disappear. The only hint that a monster lay beneath the surface was a steady growth of bubbles floating to the surface of the peaceful lake.

     

The princess seated herself on the edge of the shore and the young lad joined her. They sat there for hours in the heavy, but now more welcome silence, thinking over the events of that night. They sat there until dawn without speech, only thought. Somehow in unspoken agreement, they had decided to trust the great beast.

     

Maybe her cold, yellow eyes shone a kindness rarely seen in any eyes. Or maybe it was pure, unfounded gratitude for a life saved. Either way, the two young humans sat at the edge of the Beast’s pond and watched the bubbles rise to the surface until the break of day.

     

By that point, both were more than exhausted. However, they knew they were already in enormous heaps of trouble and that they should hurry back to their respective abodes. And so they did. After several weeks, when their grounding periods were over, they each snuck out again to see the strange beast. The princess and even the suitor felt a tugging on their curiosity to see the great thing. Perhaps to assure themselves that they had really seen it.

     

When they arrived again, the Beast lifted her head out of the water and stared at them both for some time. Nigh on an hour passed in near total silence. At the end of the hour, a thin tentacle gave a soft pat to each of their heads. Throughout the night they would sit and gradually they began to talk. And in the silent forest where sound was often a stranger, the beast began to listen.

     

It cannot be said why they continued to visit the thing for many months afterwards. They were very much fond of her. And they were pretty sure the feeling was mutual. For each time they visited her, she would pat their heads and then sit down to listen.

     

The princess and the suitor visited him as often as they could. It was not until many months later that there late night adventures were discovered and made public in a disreputable, but apparently much widely read, tabloid magazine. And both of their royal families were so disgraced that they were forced to toss them out into the world and disassociate from any connection to them.

     

They did not know where to go at first. They had no available home. They had no money or food. Finding out that the cold, cruel world has no place for disgraced former royalty, they trudged to the only place they knew was home. They went to the pond in the forest of Tuwull. They went to look for their dear friend.

     

The two weary outcasts staggered through the tangled brush. Once again, they were hand in hand. He smiled at her through the exhaustion. She smiled back through the pain. Oddly enough, the loss of royalty was more a relief than anything. Now they could spend every night under the stars with the beast. That, at least, was their hope.

     

Coming out into the opening once again, they walked up to the edge of the pond and peered in. Winter was now fast approaching and a paper thin layer of ice stretched out from the edge of the pond. They looked all around. There was nothing to be seen. No enormous, yellow eye rose to greet them. No pat on the head to welcome them. Just ice. Ice and silence.

     

Now they felt despair grasp at their hearts. They felt immeasurably hungry and hadn’t felt their toes in hours. Also, something was wrong with the great Beast. They were alone and lost and most certainly going to die.

     

The suitor slumped to the frosty ground and barely felt the cold. The princess rested next to him. Their breaths came out in short cloudy puffs. Night was falling and they had no shelter. The princess rested her head on the shoulder of her suitor. And he rested his head on her’s.

     

They met the night in frozen silence, just like the forest. Sleep caught them in its grasp and laid them in icy beds. And like that they stayed while the moon made its trek across the sky.

     

When the princess’s eyes slid open, she could see no stars. Everything was complete darkness. It was not, however, completely silent. She could hear the breathing of herself and another and also a dull thrum. She sat up and realized she was warm.

     

This bothered her in her tired state. All she could remember about falling asleep was that she was cold. And now she was warm. She thought that was baffling. All in a panicked state, she called out for the suitor. She heard his groggy voice mumbling nearby. In the darkness, the princess stumbled to him and shook him awake. He sat up with a jolt.

     

“Where are we?” he asked as though he were accusing her of something.

     

“I don’t know.” She responded. She stood and with extended arms felt for something. The princess took two wary steps when her fingers brushed up against stone. But the stone was not cold like she had expected, it was warm and pulsing.

     

“The walls,” she said, “they’re warm.”

     

“Walls? What walls?” The lad asked frantically.

    

As he asked this one end of the structure they were in peeled away to reveal the bright, brisk morning. The two stumbled out into the daylight and peered around. The structure they had just been in was an enormous collection of huge rocks. Throughout the structure, vine-like material interlaced between them. The two young humans stared at it in awe.

     

“Beast?!” asked the princess.

     

In response, a single tentacle gave each of their heads a pat.

Long Live

          If anything positive can be said of the King of Kemenbar, it is that he was highly adept at planning ahead. When he had the castle constructed, he specifically ordered flame-resistant stone from a small village up north. For years and years afterwards he would stop anyone dumb enough to listen and tell them all about how wise he was for thinking of that detail and how lucky they were to have a monarch such as him.

          What he didn’t plan for was a dragon. The fires of a dragon’s belly are not hindered by any stone, even the flame-resistant kind. Fire of that nature can easily melt castles, small mountains, robust stop signs, and anything else that might happen upon its searing path.

          This night the Kemenbarian castle would be in ruins and the King and Queen would be homeless. Though to be fair, they were already kidnapped by a deranged villain who looked exactly like King Nate and that was mostly what concerned them. They had no idea the castle was under siege by a dragon. Or that they would never see their beloved castle again. Kemenbar would not survive the night.

--------------------------------

          A scream tore the night in two. In some corner of the castle grounds, a hobbit raised a cry about fear and fire and foes. He soon came to regret his outburst as he learned that dragons dislike cries of that sort. His last sight was of the gaping jaws of a midnight-colored dragon, then he met his end in a swirl of hungry flames.

          The dragon, who was called Heath, was having the time of his life. His dark face shone with joy. What more could a dragon ask for than crowds of screaming people and a healthy dose of destruction? He felt alive.

          This was his idea of a fun night out. The fire issuing from his throat was roasting hobbits. His large paws stamped the castle grounds into a pulverized mess. He sucked in a supply of air, then spit it out as a fireball which enveloped the castle walls. The fire-proof stones melted into a puddle of lava. Not long now. King Heath the Handsome Dragon had a nice ring to it. Yes, it most certainly did.

--------------------------------

          Stephanie was awakened by the obscure noise of boiling stones turning to liquid. She had never once heard the sound before, but she recognized it instantly. It is one of those sounds that is nearly unmistakable.

          If you take a newborn baby and place him in a melting castle, he will immediately think to himself, “Why is the castle melting? What an undignified thing to do!” Newborn babies often think about concepts such as dignity.

          Stephanie leapt straight out of bed. The castle was melting. When did that sort of thing happen to castles? She didn’t think it could, but the sound was impossible to ignore. She thought that leaving might be a reasonable course of action. With a speed not seen in several ages of history, she flew through corridor after corridor and out into the courtyard dressed in penguin footie pajamas.

          It was moments like this that she thanked her lucky stars she had thought to install the taser holster in this set of pajamas. One never knew when one would need to rescue a kingdom from melting castles in the middle of the night and luck favors the prepared.

          She slipped the weapon out of its holster and scanned the area while pointing it at anything and everything that moved. Which by this point wasn’t much of anything. Most of the hobbits were either long gone or toasted.

          A black dragon spat out great tongues of flame into the sky. The orange blaze licked low-hanging clouds. It was hot even from so far away. All around her, every surface was charred and smoldering to varying degrees. It reeked of smoke.

          “You, Dragon!” She shouted, ever the brave warrior. “Get thee and thy large bulk henceforth!”

          The dragon looked at her, incredulous. “Excuse me?” He rasped.

          “You heard my tidings, you Great Ashen Oaf!”

          “I am Heath the Great Dragon of the Northern Mountain Passes and Bunny Valley! Do not insult me with your mockery and disgraceful speech.”

          “Thy title doth amuse me,” retorted Stephanie. “Come and face my taser, Vile Beast. Attack this fortress no longer.”

          “Aye, Tiny Wench. I will not. I have come to this castle with an errand at hand and I will fulfill its claims on me.” The great Dragon scraped his claws on the sodden earth. He stretched his lips into a grimace that spoke of raw aggression. Heath intended to intimidate her, but the poor beast did not know what sort of impossibility he was intending.

          “You will not, Beast. You will return to your home. Or else you will meet an unhappy end.” She planted her feet and refused to budge from this struggle of wills.

          “I will not return to my home.”

          “Indeed, you will,” Stephanie assured him.

          “I will not.”

          “Yea, I will make sure of it.”

          “It would amuse me to see you attempt it.”

          They were at an impasse. Neither would budge either verbally or geographically. The two opponents merely stood and glared at each other. Stephanie’s burning eyes jabbed straight into the dead, soulless eyes of the dragon. It was, it can be said, supremely awkward.

          Stephanie thought for a solution to this situation. Here was an enormous dragon practically melting the glorious castle of Kemenbar, and all she had to defend it was a wimpy taser. This was bad news. What she needed was a clever plan which could send the dragon scurrying away.

          “How about we have a staring contest?”

          “Say what?” the Dragon blinked.

          “I win!” shouted Stephanie.

          “What? You most certainly did not win.”

          “You blinked so I won!”

          “We hadn’t yet started the contest.”

          “I think we very clearly did, besides you never stated otherwise.”

          The Dragon was incredibly upset that she not obey the rules that he promptly stormed off and flew into the great openness of the blue sky.

          Stephanie, on the other hand, was victorious and it made her feel quite the hero. She whistled for Gus. He came trotting to her. “Quickly, Noble Steed! We must fly like the birds of the dawn!”

          Now, Gus was a noble dragosaur and he had very lofty ideas of what was and was not dignified. Being likened to birds fell into the “Not Dignified” list. But he knew that the Queen and the King needed help, and by golly he would be the one to provide that help.

--------------------

          This was not the first time the King was locked in a musty cellar and it certainly would not be the last. Course ropes snaked around each of his limbs. He smelled rotting food and misery. Over in the other corner of the cellar, the Queen was muttering to herself. “She’s probably lost it,” he thought.

          If she had “lost it,” then it could only be the fault of his incessant singing.

          “Megan?” He called out.

          She did not answer. In the dark, Nate felt what he could of the knots holding him to a certain spot. He was grateful that it was merely ropes. Often, he would be locked up with chains, which he considered a royal nuisance.

           His raw fingers could not get a decent hold on the ropes in order to untie the knots. He continued at it until he felt that his fingertips might just decide to pack up and find another person to belong to.

          He shouted in frustration an unintelligible noise. Megan’s only response was to cease mutter for half a moment. When she returned to her muttering, Nate just about lost his own mind. Nate slammed his fist into the cold stone floor of the dungeon. He yelped from the pain.

          Then, to his great and everlasting joy, he heard Megan stir, stop muttering, and say, “Nate?”

          Nate would have leapt up, and indeed, he tried, except the ropes held him down. “Yes!?” He said.

          Her voice sounded different, but it was Meg, and she seemed alright.

          “What are you shouting for?” She asked.

          “What do you mean?”

          “Why are you shouting while I’m trying to sleep?”

          “You were asleep?” He asked, incredulous.

          “Yes.” She said curtly, her voice losing its drowsiness began to sound normal.

          “We’re in a dungeon.”

          “And what else should I do in a dungeon? I was having a lovely dream, thank you very much.”

          Nate sat in silence. The dungeon had a quality that made it feel not dissimilar to an enormous, stony lung. You could not hear the movement of air, nor feel it exactly. It was just an idea that you got that the walls were moving, living things.

          At length he asked her, “How will we escape?”

          “I don’t expect we will.” She answered.

          He remained silent after that. “So you’re ok with us staying here forever?”

          “I don’t think that will happen either,” she said.

          “Oh?”

          “I expect Gus to be here with half a legion, before the day is out.”

          Nate scoffed, “First, we won’t know when the day is out, because we’re in a dungeon. We may never see the sun again. Secondly, they’ll never find us.”

          Now it was Megan’s turn to act surprised, “Oh?”

          “How could they?”

          “Gus has a fantastic sense of smell.”

          “You think he’ll sniff us out?”

          “You don’t?”

          “We’re potentially underground in a stinky dungeon, I don’t expect him to pick out our scent.”

          “I think we smell fairly awful in our own right.”

Nate laughed despite himself, “I’m sure we do.”

-----------------

In the end, Megan turned out to be partially right. Gus did sniff them out. And though he didn’t ever admit it, a large portion of the thanks could have gone to Nate’s feet which had a distinctive odor that stood out from the horrendous dungeon stench. Indeed, for several weeks after Nate and his feet had been there, none of the filthy rats that usually frequented the dungeon, dared get within half a mile of it.

It should be noted that Megan was wrong about the half legion she expected him to bring. He only brought Stephanie, which is similar to bringing half a legion, but not enough to get her a point for accuracy.

Still, both Megan and Nate were grateful with the walls of one side of the dungeon were torn away by enormous claws to reveal the beaming face of Gus. They did not remember much of their escape. It was all a blur of late afternoon sunshine and Stephanie barking orders to no one in particular.

In the commotion, no one thought to ask where Mel was. Revenge was not on their minds. They merely hurried home to their castle, that was not as much a castle as it was a pile of rubble in a similar shape to that of a castle.

The people of Kemenbar slept under the stars that night as a homeless people. It did not suit them. Each one of them fell asleep with the distinct impression that they missed their home. None of them slept particularly well.

Constellations

To Meagan. My best friend and my Love. This is a tale that is all yours. Ours, I mean.

I love our adventures and those silent moments. Mostly, I love them because they are all with you.

Every moment of mine will be spent enjoying the beauty around us and in you.

The evening had been a drowsy one. All the various residents of Kemenbar were eager to nestle beneath some covers and chase after some dreams. The stars hung low, almost within reach. A fire crackled, though it wasn’t needed. A few hobbits were still warding off sleep and playing a game of checkers from beneath droopy eyelids. The tiles that patterned the floor grew cool to the touch. It was a welcome relief from all the heat the sun had put off that day.

            Up and down the halls snores could be heard. Down one hall you might hear the deep rumble of a dragon’s snore. Then down another you could hear the rasp of the Living Plants’ deep breathing. Through one specific door, Tortellini could be heard to mutter curses in his sleep. It is said that his subconscious found it useful to practice them so that they were always on the tip of his spiteful tongue.

            The castle glistened and gleamed. It relished the cool washing of moonlight. A person who knew what to listen for might have heard it sigh. And then that person might have heard the castle tense up again. For a door had just creaked open. And a hooded figure had crept out of that door.

            The hooded figure clutched a bundle of something and padded off down the echoing halls. It snuck around, careful not make a sound.

            Once, the shadowy figure walked past an open door. A low growl breathed out from the darkness. From beneath the hood, a female voice whispered, “Quiet, Clifford. It’s only me.” Clifford Jr. wagged his little raggedy tail. He began to pant in a way that showed the deepest admiration a dog can show. His tiny paws hurried to keep up with the girl.

            In a moment, she reached a door marked with a tiny, golden crown and stopped. She grasped for the door knob in the dark. Her fingers twisted the cold metal. Inside the abyss of darkness was only silence. Then a chainsaw-like breath erupted. This was King Nate’s room. Her hand felt for the light switch. Feeling it finally, she flicked it on.

            Nate grumbled and rolled over, throwing his blankets over his head. The girl took off her hood and revealed a dark brown head of wavy hair and muddy brown eyes. Queen Meg- the figure was indeed Meagan- grinned a dangerous sort of smile. It was both beautiful and deadly. She whispered something to Clifford Jr., who ran up and pounced on Nate’s sleeping body. He shot up and yelped. Meg shushed him in a perturbed tone. How dare he jeopardize their mission?

            “You weren’t supposed to fall asleep!” She berated him. A softness in her eyes gave away that she wasn’t really put off by his lazy behavior.

            “I know. I know,” Nate murmured. He slipped out of bed and rubbed his weary eyes. “Shall we be off?”

            Meg grabbed his hand, shot him a flash of her shining smile, and said, “We shall.”

            Together, they crept silently down the winding corridors and out into the gentle night. The moon beamed at them. They were his two favorite people. Actually, the moon (or Gregory, as he liked to be called) considered himself one of their subjects. Most moons tend to be a pale-yellowish color. Gregory was not. He was always, invariably a deep, radiating orange. Nate and Meg each waved at Gregory. Gregory beamed back.

            The royalty strode up to the top of a tall hill. At the very peak, a maple tree drooped over them. Its leaves varied slightly in color. Each of the rainbow’s colors were represented on the tree. In the night, moonlight pierced through them and made the colors vibrant. Meg spread out a blanket underneath the maple tree and its fluorescent leaves.

            Together they curled up on the blanket, sheltered by the charcoal branches of the tree. Nate sucked in a deep breath. He sighed. They hardly spoke. Any words might have shattered the perfect silence.

            Like two pairs of searchlights, their eyes hungrily examined every inch of sky. Each star seemed like a whole new person to speak to. The only noise on that hilltop was the occasional, hurried breath when they could no longer hold it in. Hands locked tightly, they squeezed them often at the pure joy of the moment.

            There they huddled in that spot for hours. The night wore on and Gregory skimmed across the sky, as if it were a giant, jet-black pond that was speckled with thousands of tiny, floating lanterns.

            After many hours of staring, Meg said from beneath exhausted, yet eager eyes, “Nathan?” She didn’t take her eyes off of the one far-away star she had been staring at for some time.

            “Yes, Meagan?” came the reply that was nearly as distant as the star he was looking at.

            “This is home,” she whispered, as though if she said the words too loudly, this moment would burst like an enormous soap bubble. “I want nothing else in the world, but for it to be just me, you, and the stars. It’s nice to hear silence. It’s nice to not have anyone telling us what they want or what we should be doing. It’s good just to be here.”

            King Nate would have agreed. His words, however, got misplaced on the tip of his tongue. Right as he opened his mouth to speak, the sky cracked and a swath of bright red light cut across it. It struck the ground at the foot of the hill in the same manner as a lightning bolt would have.

            The King and Queen sat upright. Standing there, at the bottom of the hill was a man and some other unrecognizable, hideous shape. The man cackled, which shattered the peaceful starry silence. Nate felt the stars retreat to what they thought was a safe distance. As the man and the hideous shape began to tread up the hill, the man called out to them, “I say! It’s been a long time, Nate, my twin.” He sounded jovial. Nate leapt up.

            It was Mel.

            Before Nate could do any of the million and one things he wanted to, great tongues of fire stretched across the hillside, lighting it up briefly. Nate saw a few things. The man was indeed Mel. Mel was holding a sword. And the hideous shape was an enormous, black dragon. The dragon’s fire winked out.

            Mel spoke again in the dark. “It’s time we got caught up.”

            The moment he said that, they were all caught up in another flash of red light. The only thing left on the hill was the black dragon. He roared and engulfed the tree with the rainbow leaves in a stream of white-hot fire. The leaves on it crackled and burned away.

            With a satisfied snort, the black dragon lumbered towards the castle.

Ruthless One

The King of Kemenbar rubbed his forehead. Another day spent with Queen Meg meant another day of being pushed beyond his reasonable limits. King Nate was fond of his reasonable limits. When he was but a young lad, he wrote them down on a particularly resilient piece of parchment. Ever since then he kept them in a secret pocket in his shoe. To this day the parchment is safe and also very odorous.


As it has been previously mentioned, this list was dear to him. It was and is so dear that he refuses to allow its contents to be displayed in any sort of public manner.


What struck him with the sudden need to rub his upper face was this: Queen Meg had been acting much like herself. She was annoying him. What made this worse for poor Nate was that all of the Kingdom's inhabitants were off playing an intense game of tag football. Thus, annoying Nate was the absolute center of her attention. This is usually where bad things stem from.


Every time King Nate opened his mouth to say anything, Meg would shoot right back a witty retort. The witty retort would inevitably shock Nate with its harshness and he would be forced to spend several minutes regaining his courage. Nate would then scoop his pride and courage off the floor and try to say something else. As sure as the sun is to rise in the morning, Meg's next witty retort would be more violent and horrific than the last.


Now, lest anyone think that Nate possesses a weak disposition, no person could survive much more than half an hour of this. Nate was somewhere between hour 8 and hour 9. His will to live was rapidly deteriorating. Meanwhile, Meg's glee grew and grew with each verbal beat down.


Lest anyone think that Meg is a cruel, heartless creature, she honestly thought that she was being funny. She's just that kind of a person. She could probably throw a rock at your face and then smile with a certain cuteness that she possesses. Before you know it the blood, tears, and  bruises that you've acquired don't matter overly much. You're just lost in her eyes and her smile and you don't care anymore.


Nate's headache persisted. Both the actual pain and Meg. 


I can't say that this story I'm relating to you has adventure. It doesn't. It's more of an explanation. In the midst of sobs, he called her "ruthless." He was bitter and he liked how that felt. So this time he called her the "Ruthless One." She was taken aback. Soon her insults slowed to a trickle.


Nate grew happier. Meg forgot about annoying Nate and went to go catch some fish with her bare hands. Thus, the Kingdom of Kemenbar gained a Ruthless Queen and keep its King's sanity. 

Of Not-So-Mundane Wizards Who Pretend To Be Mundane Koalas Named Stan

Snoozing in their beds, the people of Kemenbar were unaware of much. They didn’t pay attention to the wind slicing through their fields and over their mountains, parting forests of grass as it zipped along. They weren’t aware of the golden sun leaping into the sky and scattering the clouds, which loomed over their majestic land. And it can be assumed that no one knew how important that crisp morning would be.

          The supreme ruler of that kingdom was lending his voice to the chorus of snores, which echoed through the castle. And that was a very good thing. King Nate would need his rest. He did not know it but later that day a visitor would spring upon him an adventure he couldn’t refuse. That is another story. Or rather, the other side of this one.

          This story begins with a peasant. A peasant who refused to admit his name. This Nameless Peasant strode up to the gleaming castle gates on that windy morning. The sun rose in the sky behind him, casting shimmering lights on the metal surface. The guard snapped out of his stupor. Wary of the odd-looking traveler, he questioned him from a safe distance behind the gate. The peasant claimed he was known as “The Nameless One,” and that he had business with the Queen.

          The poor elf at the gate was in a bad mood at being stationed with the “silent” elf. So he admitted the peasant out of spite.

          Having been let into the castle, The Peasant meandered through the halls with reluctance. It would seem he didn’t know where to go, except that he never once made a wrong turn. Somehow he ended up in the throne room. It was nearly deserted. Only a bundle of red fur huddled in the corner.

          The peasant paid no attention to the bundle of fur. He just bent down and took each of his muddy brown shoes off and flung them a great distance away. To the air, he shouted, “Now what?!”

          Silence saturated the room. Off in the corner, the bundle of fur began to get to its feet. An annoyed growl leaked from the dog’s snout. Ever so slowly, the growl grew to a bark. It wasn’t a terribly energetic bark, and spoke more of being bothered by waking up too early, than trying to strike fear in the heart of an intruder. Clifford Jr. hated to be awoken at all, never mind early.

          Thankfully, the peasant’s life was saved only by a surly hobbit named Tortellini storming into the room. “What,” he complained, “is that dreadful racket?” Clifford Jr. gave up after a few more barks and returned to his sleeping spot. Tortellini blinked the sleep from his eyes.

          He rubbed them. The grubby, poorly-dressed man was still standing there. “Who are you, Grubby Peasant?”

          The Grubby Peasant raised an eyebrow. “I am someone who wants to spend as little time as possible in your presence.”

          Tired as he was, Tortellini could see an open door for a witty retort in his sleep, which this pretty much was, “That,” he said, “shall be arranged.”

           He turned and shouted at the top of his hobbit-y lungs, “Gus!”

          The dragosaur rumbled into the room, smoke curling in wisps out of his nostrils. He looked to Tortellini for an explanation of the situation. “Rid us of this pe…”

          “As much as I know we’d both love that,” interrupted the peasant, “It’s not that easy. You see, tiny annoying dwarf, I have to stay here for a few moments longer. And you have to let me stay. That’s just how it’s going to happen. We’re better off not fighting it. For example, right now this terrible logic Im using is starting to sound reasonable to both of us, even though it isn’t.”

          “It sounds reasonable to me…” mused Tortellini.

          “Me too. That’s my point.”

          “Im confused.”

          “You’re supposed to be.”

          “I don’t get it…”

          “That’s the way it’s supposed to be.”

          “Ahh…I see,” said Tortellini even though he was still lost.

          “Do you?”

          “No.”

          “Listen, none of this really matters. No matter how this headache-inducing conversation plays out, you’ll end up retrieving the Queen for me. So, you might as well save us both some time and go get her now.”

          The surly hobbit scratched his chin, pretending to think it over. “I suppose I might as well.”

          “I knew you would,” the peasant nodded.

          Tortellini padded off in search of a Queen, who was just as sure to follow him as he had been to retrieve her. Upon later inspection, he couldn’t make much sense of the entire situation. Everything he did just seemed like the decent thing to do at the time.

          “Queen Meg!” he called from outside her door. His tiny hands wrapped on the maple door. “Queen Meg!”

          He was certain that a growl of some kind came from inside the room. The poor hobbit decided it best not to wait to find out if the Queen would come out. She most likely would. After all, hadn’t he done the peasant’s will? Wouldn’t she as well?

          With a great fear in his heart, he flew down staircase after staircase and through hallway after hallway until he came into the room where the peasant was inexplicably attempting to gnaw on his elbow. Gus was staring at him and growling.

          As soon as he heard the Hobbit-y footsteps, the peasant spun. “Where is the Queen?”

          Tortellini shrugged.

          “No matter,” continued the grubby man, “She’ll be here.”

          “What makes you so…”

          “Fate, you ridiculous, pompous dwarf!” interrupted the peasant, for the first time fury saturating his voice. His once peaceful demeanor had fled as if a troll who had been living off of drenched bagels for three weeks straight were chasing it off the side of a very prominent cliff. “Fate makes me sure. It has to happen this way.”

          “Why does it have to happen like this?”

          “Because then I wouldn’t be here. And it wouldn’t happen like this.”

          “Im confused.”

          “Im not surprised.”

          All of the living creatures in that room noticed at the same time that even silent objects grew more silent. It’s nearly impossible to understand unless you’ve been around a truly furious Queen. Believe me, it isn’t something you want to understand. Gus shuddered even though he wasn’t actually in trouble.

          “Who is he?” asked Queen Meg.

          “Who is who, Your Majesty?” piped up the hobbit, obviously with very little regard for his life.

          She looked at Tortellini with great contempt, “That red dog lying in the corner,” sarcasm dripping from her voice, “No, the grubby man, Tortellini! Who is he? And is that why you woke me up?”

          “Well, he is…um…his name is…Frankly, Your Majesty, I haven’t the slightest clue who he is.”

          “Then why is he here?”

          “He wished to speak with you.”

          The Queen turned to the grubby man, “About what exactly?”

          “About your fate, Queen Megan,” answered the peasant, trying his best to be respectful.

          “What about it?”

          “It involves following me. Other than that, I know next to nothing.”

          “I’m to follow you? What makes you think that?”

          “I don’t think it. I know it…You just will.”

          Meg harrumphed. She didn’t appreciate being told what she would or would not do. Hence the harrumph. It was her greatest sign of displeasure. That she wasn’t happy. “I won’t,” she put her foot down, “Not in a million years. Im not going anywhere.”

          “Fine,” said the peasant, walking out of the room very casually. He neared the door, half-turned around, and said “Then King Nate won’t survive until sunset.” And with that, he walked out of the room and continued out of the castle.

          Meg was dumbfounded. She shook her head. But it wasn’t all a crazy dream. “Gus!” She called. “Can you retrieve that cursed peasant for me?”

          Gus nodded. His ginormous, scaly tail was practically wagging at the thought of obeying his Queen’s command. After a few short minutes, He came back in prancing with the grubby peasant firmly in his snout.

          Queen Meg began to interrogate him. “What was that you said?”

          “You heard me. If you don’t follow me, which you will, King Nate will die.”

          “Listen to me…uh…what’s your name, grubby peasant?”

          “Apparently, it’s unimportant because you all insist on calling me such a demeaning name like ‘grubby peasant.’”

          “If I may add my opinion,” chimed in Tortellini, “It does suite you.”

          The grubby peasant glowered at him, “It’s childish.”

          Meg shrugged, “That’s not really news to us.”

          “You rule a kingdom?”

          Meg shrugged again, “Honestly, it surprises me too.” She shook her head, “As I was saying, Listen to me, you grubby peasant, I don’t know what makes you think you can just threaten the King’s life. I could have you thrown off a cliff in 30 seconds flat. Choose your next words with the utmost care.”

          “It doesn’t matter how I choose my words. You’ll follow me and I’ll stay alive. Nothing can change that.”

          “That’s it,” sighed Meg, “Gus! Drop him off a cliff.” Gus scooped him up and as a group they all headed out into the open air. Gus led them all to a cliff which seemed to have come out of nowhere. “Wow,” commented Meg, “I don’t remember this being here…”

          They all shrugged at once. Gus stretched the poor peasant out over the ledge. Strangely, the grubby man didn’t seem bothered. He just waited to be let go. After a moment to build up suspense, Meg said, “Drop him.” And drop him, they did.

          He dropped, just like you would expect. Until he stopped dropping, just like you wouldn’t expect. A giant fluffy pillow popped out of thin air and caught him before he smashed against the hard, unforgiving ground.

          When Gus retrieved him again, the peasant just sighed and said, “It’s no use. He won’t let me die.”

          Meg raised an eyebrow, “Who is ‘he’?”

          “The wizard Im taking you to see. Now, have you seen enough? Can we leave now?”

          Meg sighed an I-give-up kind of sigh. “I guess…Gus? You stay here and make sure Nate doesn’t worry. Oh and don’t let him be harmed. At all. So help me, if he ends up dead you won’t get to garden for a WEEK, Mister.”

          (Let me jump in here for a moment. I know it sounds bad. You’re probably wondering why she’d use such a lame threat to keep me alive. But it’s actually quite effective.  You see, Gus loves gardening. He thinks about it all the time. He dreams about it all the time. When he’s not doing that, he’s thinking about dreaming about it. Or dreaming about thinking about it. Every once and a while he likes to mix it up by dreaming about thinking about dreaming about it. Or by thinking about dreaming about dreaming about thinking about dreaming about saying the word “garden.” I guess you could call it an obsession.)

          Gus staggered back at the mere thought. He would give his life for King Nate with that threat looming over him. Though he was a little hurt that Meg had to stoop that low.

          Meg turned to the peasant, “Where are we going?”

          “Nowhere, yet. First we need to do some things.” He walked over to a bush and began pulling out random costumes seemingly out of nowhere. “You’ll need to have your friends put them on.”

          Meg groaned and went in search of Steph, Johanna and Kristen. About twenty minutes later, they all came out of the castle each in their very own costume. Meg was wearing a cowboy costume. Steph was wearing an astronaut costume. Johanna was wearing a queen costume, which made things a bit awkward between her and Meg for the rest of the afternoon. And Kristen was wearing a robot costume.

          None of them looked particularly pleased. “Why,” complained Steph, “do we have to wear these, again?”

          The peasant just shrugged. “Im merely doing as Im told.”

          “What psycho is telling you to do all this stuff?”

          The peasant looked around nervously. In a hushed voice he said, “Someone who doesn’t appreciate being called a ‘psycho’.” He clapped his hands together, “Shall we be off?”

          No one objected. So they began a long trek of hiking through the meadows and valleys for the rest of the day. The sun beat down on their shoulders (except for Megan’s right shoulder…) all day. Soon they began to complain of the constricting costumes. But the peasant wouldn’t relent. He refused their pleading to take them off.

          They trudged all day long, while the peasant occasionally muttered to himself. Eventually, they came to a hole in the middle of a field. It wasn’t a particularly large, but not very small either. The peasant stopped and stared down into it. He seemed to be waiting for something, so they all crowded around it. Just as they were all working up the nerve to question him on it, a small, fuzzy gray head popped out of the hole.

          “’ello!” It beamed. “How are you doing today?”

          All of them were dumbfounded. Except for the peasant. He just seemed irritated. The head grew a torso and then limbs. Once fully out they realized it was a koala. “It’s good of you to join me. My name is Stan. And this…” He pointed towards the peasant, “is Drake.”

          Suddenly, the peasant, who was now known to be Drake, morphed into a panda.

          Stan grinned, in an all-too-giddy-for-any-sane-person’s-taste kind of way, “I’d explain why you’re here, but…I’d rather not have to explain twice. So, I’ll just see you in a few hours. Goodni...”

          None of them heard the end of that sentence, because they all blacked out.

          When they awoke, they were tied up in ropes and chains. A mob of fuchsia-scarf-wearing bandits surrounded them. Much to their surprise, King Nate and Gus were tied up.

          “How did you guys get…” Johanna started to ask.

          Gus just sighed. And Nate said, “You don’t want to know.”

          The group of them stayed sullen and silent, until Stan showed up cackling with delight.

          “Now,” He began, “I would like to explain my story without any interruptions, so please, keep your mouth closed. It’s better for everyone that way.”

          Rubbing his furry little paws together, he paced around the circle of them and began to elaborate on the reason for this whole escapade, “It all started years ago when my rival wizard Drake, the panda, mocked me. He said I would amount to nothing. That my spells were useless and idiotic. He said that I was so inferior to him; he might as well have created me. He said it would take a cowboy, an astronaut, a queen and a robot telling him otherwise for him to believe that I was of any value whatsoever. He didn’t think I was worthy of the title of Wizard. So I set out to prove him wrong.”

          He grinned, “I tried the one spell that no one else had ever tried. I erased myself. Memories people had of me, my effects on the world no matter how small, even my family, I erased it all. Well, almost all. I kept one thing. I left this tiny corner of Drake’s brain open to my command on a certain day far in the future. That day was yesterday. And yesterday, I got him use the only spell that would bring me back. That was only part of my plan. Now I must finish it.”

          Stan strolled over to Queen Meg. “Stand up, please.” At his words, the chains disintegrated.  She stood, unsure of what else to do. “Now,” he said, his voice booming, “Tell me that I am a great and powerful wizard!”

          Meg froze. “That’s it?”

          “Yes. Yes, of course.”

          “You went through all that just for me to call you a ‘great and powerful wizard’?”

          Stan shrugged. “Why not?”

          “Ok…” Meg sighed and said, “You, Stan, are a great and powerful wizard.”

          “NO! NO!” Stan complained, “That was all wrong! Say it with feeling! I’ve been waiting hundreds of years to hear you say it. The least you can do is say it like you mean it!”

          Queen Megan tried it again, “You, Stan, are a great and powerful wizard!”

          He applauded, “MUCH better.” Then he turned to Drake, “Did you hear that? Did you hear what she said? I TOLD you I was a great and powerful wizard. And YOU didn’t believe me.” This sort of thing went on for nearly half an hour, while Drake just sighed and looked defeated. After he got all that out of his system, Stan turned to the group and said, “You guys are free to go now.”

           They didn’t have time to thank him because no sooner did he finish saying that, and they were all standing inside the castle. No one spoke for several minutes. Gus got bored and trudged off to find his garden. Still, no one spoke. Until King Nate’s stomach growled and he said, “I could really use a sandwich…” So he trudged off to make himself one. Most likely with bacon on it.

          When she could take the silence no longer, Queen Meg uttered one word, “Awkward…” And they all spent the rest of the evening laughing about how insane their lives had turned out to be. They even wondered aloud what their lives would have been like in a boring, reasonable place. Kind of like an alternate reality. So they named that place “Earth” and even began telling stories about it. Which King Nate wrote down in his spare time.

          On cold, drizzly nights they would sit around reading those stories and laugh about how their alternate selves could turn a boring planet into a magical one.