DP Tool Club 15/CD_ASCQ_15_070894.iso/vrac/sun9406.zip/FIC2

Text File | 1994-06-07 | 13KB | 220 lines

The Queen's Spire
Copyright (c) 1994, L. Shawn Aiken
All rights reserved



          The Queen's Spire
                 by
           L. Shawn Aiken



        The horses bounded down the hilly terrain of the forest, sweat
lathering their hides.   Alisha drove her roan beyond the lead hunter, on
toward the braying hounds.
        She ignored the guard's cries for her to slow down.  She was not aware
of the green blur of tall maple trees whizzing by.  All that existed was the
horse under her and the pounding of  its hooves.
        The brown roan continued down the wooded ravine, cleared a rocky
stream and burst through a row of high, thorny shrubs into a heavily wooded
area.
        She did not notice the rips in her leather riding breeks and white
silk blouse, or the stinging cuts underneath.  She failed to hear the hunters'
horns, or the hounds trailing off to the right.  Instead, the rush of the wind
filled her ears.
        The roan's mane felt coarse against her soft, pale cheek as she hugged
his neck tight.  Her long, black tresses mingled with his mane and trailed
behind her.  Alisha smiled as her mind flowed with the rhythms of the
galloping horse.


        A solitary blackbird sat in the upper branches of an old spruce tree,
singing its lonely song.  Sunlight filtered down through the mixed needled and
broadleaf foliage, casting specks of glittering light on the dry, brittle
carpet of the forest floor.
        Alisha sat up from her relaxed position against the horse's neck.  The
roan was no longer running, but he was jittery, stomping his hooves about and
snorting.  Where was she?  What was Mudfoot worried about?
        She stood up in the saddle and looked around.  Where were the hunters?
They certainly were not around here.  She could not even hear the hounds.
        Trying to get her bearings, Alisha looked around for the sun.  It was
hidden behind the foliage.  She could climb a tree and look around.  Alisha
shook her head.  The last thing she needed was to be lost and  have a broken
leg.
        Towards the left she spied something beyond the thick trucks of the
nearby trees.  It seemed hazy and vague.  She could not make out what it was.
Alisha shrugged her shoulders and tugged the reins toward the left.
        After a few steps the roan began to prance about, snorting wildly.  He
was obviously upset about something.
        "Don't give me any of your guff, Mudfoot, or you won't get any apples
when we get back to camp!" she chided the horse and forced him onward.
        The thing in the distance came into view as she maneuvered out from
behind a thick clump of trees.  It was something black, perhaps a building.
Alisha nervously twisted the gold pendant at her neck and continued on.
        The canopy of foliage thickened above her and gloom set in.  The trees
and bushes on either side of her twisted into menacing shapes encased in bark
as black as coal.  Alisha stroked Mudfoot's mane, now understanding his
apprehension.  She decided to turn back.
        "Alisha..."  whispered the wind.  She looked around.  No one was there.
        "Alisha..."  the wind blew again, rustling the dark leaves in the dark
trees.
        "Hello?" She yelled, still looking around.
        "Alisha," the voice said, "it is me."  She clutched the leather
wrapped hilt of the sword at her side.  A large ruby bulged from the hilt,
forming its pommel.
        "Who is there?"  Alisha asked.  The horse snorted.
        "Your father."  The entire world collapsed into Alisha's chest.  It
was hard to take another breath.  She recognized his deep voice flowing on the
wind.
        Images she had suppressed from many years ago sprang into her mind.
Her dark-haired father, sitting majestically upon his jet-black destrier,
ordering his knights about in preparation for his journey to the front.
        "What?" she said weakly.
        "It is your father," the deep voice responded.
        Alisha looked around again, not believing her ears.  She could see no
one else in the forest.
        He had smiled that day, she remembered.  That was the last time she
saw him smile.  Her father had returned a month later, full of wounds made by
Shadelkregan swords.
        "But..." she started.
        "Yes, I am alive."
        "How?"
        "Later.  It is good to see you."
        "Where are you?" Alisha asked.
        "I am in the black building in front of you," the voice responded.
        Alisha looked at the strange building.  It was a small, black cubicle
with a path made of black cobblestones leading up to it.
        "Come inside.  I wish to see you more clearly," the voice came form
the building.
        "Uh..." Alisha hesitated.
        "Your mother is here with me," the voice added.  The world escaped
from her chest.  Another buried memory sprang forth.  Her mother's sweet face
smiled down at them as she tucked her into bed.
        "You mean . . . I thought . . ." a tear streaked down her cheek.
        "It was all a misunderstanding.  We are okay.  Your mother says you
have grown into a fine girl.  She wishes to see you more clearly also."
        Alisha climbed down form Mudfoot, who snorted, looking wild-eyed at
her.  She started along the pathway of black stone slabs towards the building.
Alisha could make out a dark opening in the center of the building.
        "Mother," she said nervously, brushing her silky black hair from her
face.  It was pitch black beyond the opening, blacker than even the curious
rock that the building was hewn from.  It was so black, in fact, that it
seemed to suck the light from her straining blue eyes.
        "Mother?" Alisha hesitated in front of the structure, "Say something."
        "Come, child.  Come in and let me give you a hug," a sweet, airy voice
floated from inside.  Alisha smiled.  She could smell her mother's flowery
perfume hanging heavily in the air.
        More memories burst forth.  Her mother hummed an ancient tune as she
sat in the garden beside her favorite rose bush.  Alisha had yanked one of the
roses off the stem and looked horrified as the red blood ran down from the
gashes in the pudgy fingers.  All her mother had said was, "In life there is
beauty, but there is also pain."
        Alisha stepped into the opening, but she stopped, a strange feeling
welling up from her stomach.  A feeling that she should run.
        Suddenly, something shot out of the darkness.
        A cold hand clenched around her arm.  She looked down and saw gleaming
white bones with gray flesh hanging from them.
        Alisha let out a shrill scream.  The bones squeezed sharply into her
skin, hurting her.  She screamed again.
        The icy hand began to pull her into the darkness.  With her free hand
she fumbled for her sword.  Its weight felt odd in her left hand as she drew
it form its jewel-encrusted sheath.
        Alisha swung the sword wildly into the darkness.  Without thinking,
she violated all that her cousin Deanna had taught her about swordplay.  Her
stance was unbalanced, she did not get enough leverage on the swing, and she
left her underarm wide open for an attack.  None of that seemed to matter
while the thing had the death grip on her.
        With a dull thud the sword connected with something.  Holding the
sword improperly, the impact sent a burst of pain into her elbow.
        It released its grip and she fell backwards into the light.  Her sword
hit he cobblestones with a clatter.  A howl of anger bellowed from the maw of
the building.
        Alisha started to scramble backwards on her rump, away from the
horrible screeching noise.
        It emerged from the darkness.  White, glistening bones with gray flesh
dangling in pieces made up its skeletal figure.  Atop its slender neck
vertebrae rested a misshapen skull.  A hideous grin somehow formed with
non-existing lips, while a thick, black liquid oozed from its mouth.  Deep
within the recesses of its eye-pits glowed a dim yellow light.
        The perfume smell turned into a putrid, rotting odor.  Alisha shrieked
and fell on her back.  It started towards her.  She screamed, trying to get up.
        Suddenly she heard horses and the sounds of yelling men.  Turning over
on her stomach, she saw several armor clad soldiers on horseback.  In the lead
was a gray-haired man atop a white horse.
        He was garbed in finely made deep-blue robes that flowed behind him
like water.  Silvery-gray hair stuck out from under his gold-trimmed cap and
grew down the sides of his face, ending in a neatly-trimmed beard.
        She glanced back. The skeletal figure had stopped, looking strangely
at its new guests.  Alisha scrambled up and ran towards the men.  The creature
let out a terrible screech and she could hear it running towards her.  She
screamed.
        The robed man stood up in his saddle and began waving his hands about
in strange ways.
        "Get down, child!" he yelled and started making strange,
indecipherable noises with his mouth that sounded like running water.  Alisha
hit the dirt.
        The noises changed, sounding more like water rushing down a mountain
ravine.  The volume increased into a deafening torrent.  The skeleton stopped
and looked curiously at the wizard.
        The old man spread his fingers toward the undead creature.  A thick
column of water emerged just beyond his fingertips and shop towards the
skeleton.  The blast of water hit the monster dead on.  It stuck out its bony
hands, trying to resist the force of the spray.
        The gray-bearded man clenched his fists and a chill grew in the air.
Alisha's ears popped as the water froze, hardening around the skeleton.  The
mage sharply raised fists, the golden cuffed blue sleeves dropping around his
elbows.
        He then quickly opened his fingers and the ice began to crack.  With a
thunderous smash, the skeleton shattered into a thousand glistening shards,
pelting Alisha on the back.
        The blue robed wizard leapt from his horse and ran toward Alisha,
worry deepening the multitude of lines on his face.  She stood up, brushing
the dust from her riding breeks.
        "Alisha, are you all right?" he asked.
        "Kindly address me as 'your highness'," she curtly said.  The thickly
creased worry lines faded from his face and he rolled his eyes skyward.
        "Pardon me, your highness," he bowed, "are you unharmed?"  She
continued to dust herself off, only now noticing the cuts in her clothes and
the sting from the thorns.
        "Yes Hydridian, as much as not," she rubbed her arm where the thing
had grabbed her.
        "You left the hunt, your highness.  We were worried and looked for you.
What happened?"  he asked.
        "I don't know.  I was riding along . . . and then I was here," she
looked at the ground with a perplexed expression.  a look of recognition
crossed Hydridian's face.
        "Ah . . . that is when the Mind-skull must have made first contact
with you," he said, tugging at his grey whiskers.
        "Is that what it was," she asked, "a Mind-skull?"
        "Yes, that's what it was," Hydridian replied.  He glanced toward the
dark edifice.  "Come, your highness," the wizard said, "we must leave this
place immediately."
        "Very well then, Hydridian," she agreed, "fetch my sword and we will
be off."
        "And where is your sword, your highness?" Hydridian asked.
        "Over by the entrance to that . . . place," she motioned with her
finger.  Hydridian looked in the direction.
        "I do not see it, your highness," he said curiously.
        "Nonsense.  It is right over . . ." her voice trailed off as she saw
that her sword was not where she had dropped it.
        "But . . ." she protested.  Her blues eyes shifted to the dark
entrance of the building.  Both of their eyes widened with realization and
they looked at each other.
        "Never mind the sword.  I am sure that my cousin will get me another.
Let us be off."  The wizard nodded, quickly led Alisha to her horse, and
helped her up on it.
        "Naughty Mudfoot," she said, stroking his mane, "you should have
warned me of the danger."  The horse snorted in reply.
        Hydridian looked at one of the soldiers and nodded.  The guard lifted
his horn to his lips and blew several sharp blasts, signifying that the search
for the princess was over.
        As they rode back to camp, Hydridian began to explain the peculiar
eating habits of the Mind-skull.  The words flowed over her like water.  How
could she have forgotten her father's last breath on his death bed?  And how
could she have forgotten, not five minutes later, watching her mother throw
herself off of the highest spire of the castle?
        A tear streaked down her dirty face.  She wiped it off with her
sleeve, leaving a clean patch on her cheek.