Unleashed Fury (BloodRunes: Book 1)

by Cole, Laura R

  “Thanks, laddy, but if I can't pull myself up onto the stool then I shouldn't be in here anymore, and the draw of the ale is just too much for me to deny.” He gave them a one-toothed grin and called out to the barmaid that he would have the usual.

  Gryffon started up some small talk with the man, even buying him a drink, and slowly led the conversation around to the ruins. “What do you know about the ruins up there?” Gryffon asked, “We've heard that there's treasure there.”

  “Don't you go looking for treasure there, boy, the only treasure you'll find is the kind that will poison your lives. That's if you even made it in and out in one piece. There have been plenty who've tried, oh yes. I've seen your kind before, all young and on top of the world, thinking that nothing can hurt them. Despite all the other people who have tried and failed, they think their ideas are going to get them in. But you listen closely, ain't nobody gonna get into those tombs, they were sealed up good and tight they were, and made sure that no one'd ever set foot inside alive again. They say the Dark King is buried there and his spirit haunts the hallways. No, no, no just stay away from there. Nothing but bad news, and I like you.” The man gave Gryffon a friendly jab in the shoulder. Unfortunately, it was with the hand that held his mug of ale, and he splashed it all over Gryffon, who smothered a laugh. The old man didn't seem to notice. “There's weird stuff that went on up there for sure. Lots of strange markings on the walls, old runes if you ask me. Bloodrunes. You don't want anything to do with blood-magic do you?” he asked, suddenly suspicious, and he peered at them through increasingly unfocused eyes.

  Layna fought hard not to raise a hand to cover her neck, knowing that the movement would be conspicuous. She was conscious of the possibility that her own mark might look just like one of those old runes, and she waited for Gryffon to reply. “We don't approve of blood-magic,” he answered sternly and went on, fishing for more information. “I heard that the actual entrance to the tomb is outside of the main fortress ruins anyway,” he said casually while Layna tried to make her hand relax in her lap and ignore the urge to touch her neck. Unfortunately, the chain to the charm that hung around her neck was now rubbing just on the place where the mark was, and it was making Layna want to itch it like mad.

  “That's what the stories say,” the man said.

  “Just what are the stories?” Gryffon prompted.

  The man seemed to have imbibed enough alcohol that he was in a talkative mood, and he indulged Gryffon. “The stories say that the great hulking castle out there isn't where the real action took place. They say that there was another, hidden location that the Dark King saved for the really important stuff. Ask me, the castle itself is bad enough. I went there once.” The man shuddered visibly. “They say there's another one though, and it's said to be in the hills of the Shadowlands somewhere. There are even those who claim to have seen his followers even now, coming and going from the hidden tomb in great big black cloaks.”

  “Where in the hills?” Gryffon asked, leaning forward in his seat excitedly.

  “Hmph,” was the old man's grunted reply. He showed no further indication that he had any information as to the whereabouts of this hidden entrance, and every indication that he was losing interest in Gryffon in favor of his mug of ale.

  Gryffon and the man exchanged a few other pleasantries before it became obvious that the older gentleman was far too intoxicated to think straight, much less speak in coherent sentences. Layna found it impossible to ignore the itching sensation and focus on their conversation, and she finally settled on removing the offending necklace. She quickly ducked out of it and placed it in her pocket as the man took a large gulp.

  Gryffon eventually excused the two of them, and they weaved through the growing bar crowd and out into the night, wandering the streets. “It's pretty amazing how affected the town still is by the Dark King's presence, even after all this time,” Layna commented.

  “For sure,” agreed Gryffon. “The aura of fear is still here, almost thick enough to touch. If you watch, the people still glance up at the castle with trepidation as they walk under its shadow. Perhaps we should take a trip up there and see what we can find out.”

  “What, in the middle of the night?” Layna asked him as if he were crazy.

  “That way people won't ask questions why we're going there, and we might find out something useful,” he said reasonably. He waited for her reply, and added when she wasn’t forthcoming with it, “Plus, we can both conjure mage lights, so seeing will be no problem.”

  “It's not seeing that I'm worried about,” muttered Layna, but reluctantly agreed. As much as it frightened her, it nagged at her curiosity as well. Besides, after Jezebel and her blood-beasts, what could they possibly come up against in an abandoned building that would be worse?

  They sneaked through the shadows to the edge of town and mounted Axe and Fly. It was a fairly quick ride to where the massive castle stood, its gigantic form tainted with evil so pronounced that Layna could feel it leaching out of its stones without even touching the power.

  They left the horses tied outside, and carefully circumvented the gate that had been half-heartedly constructed to keep people away. They stepped lightly across the drawbridge, which creaked with age under their feet. The portcullis was halfway down, and they ducked underneath it quickly. Layna had the awful sensation that it might come crashing down on her at any second, spearing her with its ghastly sharp spikes.

  Layna glanced up at the murder holes in the ceiling as they passed underneath them, and saw with horror that though they were now plugged with age-old grime, tar still stained the edges. Evidence that at one time they really had been used. She breathed a sigh of relief when they reached the other side and were under the fresh air and stars once more.

  They jogged across the massive courtyard, and their feet made soft pattering sounds as they climbed the stairs towards the main entrance to the castle. Layna could see where the weather had taken its toll on the stones here as well. They were crumbling around the edges, and a few of the statues that had once stood proudly guarding the door, had toppled over and cracked or shattered. Moss and lichen covered every surface, vines snaked up the sides of the walls, and a tree had even pushed its way through the cobblestone. The gigantic wooden door was peeling and the ironwork was rusted.

  It was still impressive.

  Gryffon pushed open the door with surprising ease, and they carefully stepped over the threshold. Inside, the evidence of looters was predominant; there was not a single piece of gold trim, furnishings, or anything else of value to be seen. The room seemed mammoth, its vast empty space seeming to extend for miles. Their footsteps echoed alarmingly loud, and the moonlight shone in with soft radiance through the once beautiful windows. Gryffon whistled, impressed, and this sound too reverberated off the walls with eerie clarity. A tangy, brackish stench filled the air. Torn skeletal flags, once displayed proudly along the high ceiling, now dangled mournfully, blowing ever so slightly in the wind coming through broken stained glass.

  They picked their way through the mess of rotting and broken furniture, glass shards, and vegetation that had been blown in or had started to grow up through the stone floor. It made it uneven in spots, and they had to watch their footing as they came to stand before the dais. Many years ago, in this very spot, the Dark King had once sat to lord over his kingdom. Layna gave another involuntary shudder as she moved closer, and it came into plain view.

  The throne was a daunting sight. It was made out of bones, somehow melded into the stone framework of the seat, arranged in a morbidly artistic pattern. Two human skulls had been placed at the end of each armrest; their teeth were filed down to pointed fangs, and it looked as though the eye sockets had once held something before being pried roughly out.

  “Talk about intimidating your audiences,” Gryffon commented, unsettled.

  Layna nodded emphatically, her eyes wide. They moved off from the disturbing sight, and chose a hallway off to the left. It looked to
be a main corridor that might lead them to somewhere useful.

  “What is it exactly that we're looking for?” Layna whispered to Gryffon.

  He answered at a regular volume. “Anything, I'm thinking we should check the library, even though there's unlikely to be anything left, and then see if we can't find our way down into the dungeons. That seems to be where the most,” he paused, “-interesting- things seemed to have happened.”

  Layna let out a barely audible moan. She had been afraid he'd say something like that. As they left the audience hall, the moonlight dimmed, and Gryffon and Layna both whispered the words to enchant mage lights. Two little balls floated out in front of them, illuminating the hallway with their muted glow.

  The state of the rest of the castle mirrored that of the audience hall. Upturned furniture not worth looting making obstacles in their path, and dust and spider webs clung to them as they passed. Layna's imagination ran rampant, and she kept swearing that she saw things lurking in the rooms. She had to keep reminding herself that, with the exception of rats or other animals who had claimed the castle as their home, she and Gryffon were the only living things here. A prickle of unease tickled at her senses.

  They eventually found the library and were disappointed that, as Gryffon had predicted, there was nothing left. There was a huge charred pile in the center of the room that, the rocks surrounding them discolored and cracked. It looked to be the remains of one of the book burnings, as though the people had simply knocked all the books off their shelves and burned them right there in the library - with no regard or care for whether they were books about blood-magic or not. Layna could hardly blame them after seeing the throne; she didn't think she'd dare touch anything that that man had owned either. The pile was starting to grow its own vegetation of sorts, making it look like a tiny mountain in the middle of the room.

  As the old man had said, the walls were littered with markings, but none looked to Layna to be authentic. She got the impression that most of them were from people more recently, simply proving their presence. No doubt many of the local kids used the place as their own haunted mansion, not recognizing the gravity of the events that had really happened here. In amongst the nonsense symbols were several painted red signs. “Nat was here,” and the like. Layna shook her head.

  It took them some time to finally find the doorway leading to the dungeons, and as their mage lights floated down into the dark abyss, Layna felt a sense of dread. The horrible atrocities that must have gone on down here were unthinkable. The almost unreal feel of the upper portion, scrawled with the graffiti of looters and kids, disappeared as they descended. Layna wasn't here to scratch her name on the stone wall to prove her bravery to the local group of kids. She was somehow mixed up in the history of the place, and she felt as though they were getting closer to answers. Answers she wasn't sure she really wanted to know anymore.

  They reached the bottom of the staircase, and a sudden realization hit her like a slap in the face. She stopped dead in her tracks. I've been here before.

  CHAPTER 32

  “I know where she is,” announced the King suddenly.

  Jezebel looked up from the letter she had been drafting. “She?” she asked inquisitively.

  To her frustration, the man ignored her and went on. “She's in a town up north called Dunlop.”

  Jezebel's ears perked up at the word. That was where her little two problems were said to be heading. Again Jezebel begged an explanation of him. “Who is?” And again she was ignored.

  Jezebel felt the pen in her hand bending with the pressure she was putting on it, and she willed her fingers to let go of their death grip. She took a deep calming breath. The King's audacity in his treatment of her was a continuous grating on her frail nerves, but she knew she'd have to put up with it until she maneuvered her way to the top.

  He finally turned his attention to her, and she tilted her head at the strange look in his eyes. It was as if he were focusing on something far distant. “We're going to take a trip to Dunlop, I think,” he said finally, his attention on her once more. “Right away. And bring your hounds.” He paused and then narrowed his eyes slightly, now looking directly at her, and he said sternly, “I don't want her killed though, so make sure you keep them under control. She must be brought to me alive.”

  Jezebel bit back a retort, having learned that the King was not a man who tolerated being talked back to. She simply nodded to him instead. Luckily, she had learned how to handle men like him by way of her father. I just have to hold off the anger until the right moment, and then someday, someday I will be able to throw it all back in his face, and tell him about all the maneuvering I've been doing behind his back, and how bad of a father he had been...She shook off the annoyance, and covered her scowl by bending her head while she curtsied her good-bye as he left the room.

  She sat back down roughly, rumpling her dress. She crumpled the letter that she had been working on as she no longer needed to come up with the excuse. The King had just ordered her to go to the very place she had been trying to come up with a reason to visit. Sometimes things worked out so deliciously.

  She was curious who this “she” was that had the King so worked up. Perhaps some little trollop he had been using for his plaything had gotten away and he had just tracked her down. It seems like too silly of a thing to go on such a journey for, but then again, men have such big egos, and would go to great lengths to protect their pride.

  She hoped that while they were there they could look through the ruins of the Dark King; though it was doubtful that there was anything of value left at the fortress. Despite the horror stories and urban legends surrounding the place, there were bound to be those who were fool-hardy, desperate, or just plain stupid enough who would have braved the stories and gone in to loot the place. The kings of the past had all unsuccessfully put bans on entering its grounds, but this only served to further fuel people’s curiosity. This had led to others putting together pillaging missions to rid it of its notorious history, so one way or the other it was probably empty. The really good things had been burned in the fires directly following the overthrow anyway. Which really was a great shame. The book that Jezebel had gotten was extremely interesting, and it constantly hinted at there being much more knowledge that was not contained in its pages. But it had existed and had been known at some point. And then it had been burned and forgotten. Jezebel sighed at the loss.

  She raised herself out of her seat and tried to casually glance at the papers that the King had been looking through before his hasty exit, in hopes of getting some clue as to where he had suddenly gotten such information. Frustratingly, he had them spelled so that they were blank to peering eyes. Her hands itched to pick them up and try and break the enchantment, but she knew that even in seeming privacy, things were never as they seemed in the palace halls, and she left them alone. She made her way out of the chamber she had been using to discuss the current affairs with the King, and walked slowly back to her own suite.

  In her room, a letter on the table caught her attention and she opened it, reading, “My lady, I have some information on the man you wanted me to look into that I think you will enjoy. If you would please join me at your earliest convenience in the conference room, I would be delighted to share it with you, Devon.” Jezebel placed the letter back on the table and went immediately into the conference room, eager for any news. Devon was sitting there waiting for her and she greeted him, allowing him to speak. “What have you learned?” she asked.

  He smiled one of those smiles that she had begun to recognize as meaning he was extremely pleased with the information he had to offer her. “Only that our King is not who he says he is.”

  “Oh?” Jezebel was intrigued.

  “Yes. Baron Asheron, through whom the King made his claim to the throne due to blood relation, in actuality, has no blood relation to our fine new King whatsoever.”

  “How so?”

  “Well, despite the mysterious disappearance of s
everal of the people who knew anything about it, I was able to find out that Lady Asheron already had a son when she wed the baron. A son whose name was Nathair.”

  Jezebel raised a brow. “And were there any other children in the union?”

  “Several miscarriages, but no live births. Which is apparently why the lord finally named the boy as his heir. The fact that it wasn't his was covered up so that he wouldn't lose face over not being able to produce offspring, and having been forced to name an illegitimate child as his heir.”

  “Hmm,” Jezebel thought. “And what are the logistics of being named the heir with no blood relation in this situation?”

  “I am not familiar with any such circumstances ever coming up, Councilor, but I would assume that since his only true claim to the throne was that royal blood flowed in his veins, he most likely would not have gotten the same reception that he did, had he revealed this fact.”

  Jezebel pondered this juicy revelation for a moment. “How delightful.”

  She did a quick preliminary list of possible uses of the information in her head, before giving Devon further instructions. Perhaps this ‘she’ the King was so intent on finding was someone who knew this information. Jezebel’s presence on this journey could be useful in many ways.

  “Make sure that no one else knows this story, and can't find it out until if and when we want them to,” she ordered. “I have another chore for you as well, Devon,” she said as he started to take his leave of her, and he paused. “I'd like you to start arranging a series of unfortunate events to happen to my father. Now that I am the one in the position of power, I'd like to see him squirm. He's been acting much too condescending to a woman in my position, and I'd like to see him put in his proper place. I have a list of possibilities I came up with the other day around here somewhere.”

  She smiled nastily and he grinned back at her. “It will be my pleasure, my lady.” He continued his bow, and left her to further sort through all that had happened. Her father was a very religious man, of the superstitious sort, and she had faith in Devon's creativity to take advantage of this fact. A wrong sign here, or a bad omen there, and her father was apt to change his whole course of action in order to try and correct whatever mistake he had made in the Sleeping God's eyes.