An Unfortunate Beginning Read online

  I scanned the landscape and noticed a pathway leading off into a narrow valley. There wasn’t anything else here to see, so I stood up, brushed myself off and started walking. Well, stumbling was more like it. I’m not very skilled at hiking in slippers. Guess I need practice.

  Ragged cliff walls guided my way to a smooth valley that led me out of the dreary basin. After a few minutes, a faint scratching sound came from the outcroppings above. Although there was no light to see by, I thought I saw gleaming eyes peering down at me. Another shiver ran down my spine and I leaned over to pick up a long, sharp rock. The hair at the back of my neck stood on end while I held out the stone like a dagger, wishing I had a real weapon. I hurried forward and fell over a large boulder, almost swiping my leg with the pointy end of the rock. After that, I slowed a bit, knowing I’d regret it if I didn’t. I tried not to think about bleeding alone in the dark.

  The valley’s twists and turns grew wider, until I rounded the final curve and looked out at a horizon covered with hills made of crushed stone. I stepped onto a gravel road and saw a gate nearby along with a guard tower.

  I didn’t like where this dream was going. I was starting to feel like one of those unfortunate extras in any TV series who get written in just to be killed off. With a sigh, I trudged onto the road and away from the gate. I stared at a dark peak in the distance while I listened to the scuff, slap, scuff, slap of my slippers as I walked. It was hard to tell how far I had gone, because there weren’t many landmarks to speak of, aside from the scrub brush that lined the road like burs on clothing.

  Just when I contemplated throwing myself onto the road and trying to wake up from this mind-numbing experience, a sound snapped me from my thoughts. Hooves clattered and I turned around to see an interesting sight. Four creatures resembling horses were pulling a long wooden carriage, and alongside it, two figures rode on two more of the animals. As they approached, the black horse’s bony silhouettes and silver eyes made me take a step back. The caravan creaked up beside me, stopped, and two men dressed in black leather armor jumped from their mounts.

  One soldier walked in front of the other. He stared at me and when his gaze fell on my slippers, his brows knitted into a frown.

  “What in the name of all things holy are those? Nigel, look at this odd one.” He pointed at my feet and scratched his head.

  His friend joined him and said with a straight face, “Pete, why’s it always us? Last time it was the odd fellow with the painted face carrying the chicken, and now this.”

  “Boy, what are you doing out here alone? No one’s allowed to roam around Slag’s territory as they please. Not unless you’ve got orders, or you’ve got a death wish.” Nigel inspected me curiously. “You don’t have orders, do you?”

  “Uh, no. Actually, I was just trying to find something – anything. I have no idea where I am.”

  Pete piped in and his mustache wiggled as he spoke. “Well, there’s no way to un-see you now. You’ll have to come with us. No one’s allowed out of the city – you should know that. We’ll take you up to Valen. Prince Braylon or Grentin will know what to do with you.”

  “What did you say?” I sputtered. Was I dreaming about my story?

  “Ah, your innocence won’t help you. Prince Braylon doesn’t take pity on anyone. Even if you look like you belong in a room lined with mattresses so you don’t hurt yourself.” Pete grabbed my arm and dragged me to the back of the carriage, which I now realized was encircled with iron bars. Dirty faces stared down at me as the other soldier unlocked the door.

  “Make room for one more!” he hollered and shoved me up the steps and into the carriage prison.

  I fell onto my hands and knees as the door clanged shut. The creak of the lock and rustle of footsteps were drowned out by the whispers around me. I felt a hand on my shoulder as I was helped up. A middle-aged man with a cloth cap on his head met my gaze and said, “You’d better sit down, young man.”

  No sooner had he spoken than the carriage lurched forward and I toppled onto its dirty wooden floor. Pain stung my knee.

  “Ah!” I lifted myself up and slid onto the bench beside the man. My sweats were torn and in the hole I could see a bloody scrape. Gravel bits were lodged inside my flesh. I used the edge of my shirt to brush away the dirt and blood, wincing as I worked.

  “You okay, son?” the man beside me asked.

  “Sure—never better,” I mumbled as I looked around. Three other men of varying ages were in the carriage with me, and their eyes remained down.

  “The name’s Malick.”

  “I’m Nim,” I said and shook Malick’s hand.

  Malick craned his neck around and whispered, “You look to be around my boy’s age. He was taken by Slag’s men and recruited. That’s why I’m here – turned myself over to his army so I could rescue him. If he’s still the boy I knew…” One of the men shot Malick a wary glance, and he responded with a shake of his head, ignoring the other man’s concern.

  “You wanted this?” I looked around uneasily at the iron bars.

  Malick gave a short nod, then frowned. “How do you come to be by yourself all the way out in Slag’s territory? A boy as young as yourself should be far away from here. Where’s your family?”

  I shrugged and said, “I don’t have any family, except my aunt. Don’t know where I am or how I got here. I’m lost.”

  Malick’s eyes darkened. “That’s bad luck, son. I’ll look after you if you can stay close and I’ll help you escape once we find Red.” He straightened and studied the other men in the carriage carefully. Each met his gaze and looked at me in turn.

  “Do you know each other?” I asked.

  The reaction was immediate. Malick clamped his hand down on my leg, sending painful spasms through my bad knee and the other men glared at me before returning their focus to the dusty wooden floorboards. I felt Malick’s hot breath on my ear as he said in warning, “What are you trying to do? Get us all killed? Keep your voice down.”

  “Ow – right, sorry,” I whispered.

  Malick let go of me and adjusted his hat to cover his ears. I was sore where his fingers had gripped my leg and my hands drifted down protectively. Malick muttered back, “Sorry about your knee. I’m a bit on edge. This plan is my only hope – Red’s all I got.” He sighed and patted my shoulder. “Nim, these are my friends. They’ve come to help me out.” One by one, the men nodded at me as their names were spoken.

  “Hello,” I said under my breath, not wanting to peeve off Malick again.

  It was just my luck to get arrested in my slippers. I leaned over to inspect my skinned knee and blew on it like Mom used to do when I was a kid. The cool air lessened the pain. As I watched my blood darken and dry, I couldn’t suppress a nagging thought: What if this isn’t a dream. What if it’s real?

  Chapter 4 - Art Imitates Life

  The landscape from between the bars of my moving prison began to change. Instead of flat rocky fields, pointed stalagmites started to clutter the earth and I thought I saw water glimmering at their bases. A rotten smell filled the air and I couldn’t help but crinkle my nose in disgust. Who would want to choose to live here? Oscar the grouch, or maybe my old PE teacher, Mr. Miller.

  I pinched my nostrils with my fingers and realized the dark pointed spire I’d been walking toward before getting put into the carriage had disappeared. “Hey – where’d that tower go?”

  One of Malick’s friends shook his head as though I’d just fallen off the turnip cart and pointed through the bars. I turned and craned my neck to see a huge castle perched on a rocky hill. The road was leading straight for it and we were close.

  Voices and clanging grew louder as we neared the outskirts of a town. I clutched the iron bars and tried to see ahead of the carriage. More soldiers on horseback trotted past us, saluting the men leading our caravan. Signs hung over shadowy doorways, announcing taverns and lodging to passersby. Other storefronts appeared to have been long since closed and were boarded up: the butcher s
hop, bookstore and apothecary. Men dressed in black leather armor wandered through the streets and none of them seemed to notice the faces peering out at them from inside our carriage.

  I was struck by the fact that there were no women or children here. The faces I saw were dark and angry. There were no smiles or words of friendship in this place. Everything was bleak and hopeless. No color in this world, unless you considered black a color.

  “Nim, stay awake. We’re almost there. We’ll be in the dungeons soon enough, and hopefully one step closer to freeing my boy,” Malick whispered into my ear. He adjusted his dusty blue tunic and rested his hands on his knees.

  Minutes later, the carriage stopped, making all its prisoners sway toward the front. Men called out from nearby, “More recruits!”

  Keys jangled and boots scuffed on the gravel outside. The door swung open. With an annoyed scowl, Pete said, “All right, one at a time. Let’s go.”

  Around me, the prisoners stood up and Malick waved for me to follow suit. I shuffled to my feet and squeezed in behind him. One at a time, we filtered out of the carriage and onto a large gravel drive. The enormous stone building loomed above us.

  Down the road, a tower rose into the gloomy cloud cover, disappearing from sight. The castle walls wrapped around its base and seemed impenetrable. Wind blew past, whistling in my ears and I shivered as a chill touched my bare skin.

  Guards walked out to meet our group, and I felt their curious stares as they studied my clothing. I focused on my ratty slippers and gave an unhappy sigh. Anything would have been better than what I was wearing now and I had a feeling things were only going to get colder in the stone castle. Wasn’t this enough misery for one dream?

  “Oy! Pay attention—fall into line. You try anythin’ you’ll get run through, you hear me?”

  Startled to find a rotund guard yelling at me, I hurried to catch up to Malick, who had already begun to walk through a doorway. We were guided down two flights of stairs and at each level it seemed to grow even colder.

  Rather than continuing further into the bowels of the castle, we turned through another doorway. Rows of iron bars lined a large room, creating four prison cells. A crowd of people were already in them, except one, and they moved back against the rocky walls as we approached.

  “Brought you some friends,” one of the guards said as he pulled a large key ring from his belt. He unlocked the empty cell and shoved Malick’s friends inside. “Well, are yeh waitin’ for an invitation? Get in—but don’t get comfortable. We’ll be back to sort you out.”

  What did that mean? I didn’t get to wonder too long, because the guard grabbed me by the arm, tossed me inside along with the others and locked the door. Malick caught me just as I ran into him.

  I watched the grumpy soldiers filter out of the room as I rubbed my arm, and then I took in my surroundings. If I had ever been unhappy with my old room, this was reason enough to be thankful. The prison cell was dirty, dark and cold—and filled with sooty, gloomy prisoners. Mom, on repeated occasions, had encouraged me to find the silver lining of a situation. If I had to find one now, I would have to say it was the bale of hay to sit on, but it smelled like it was the bathroom to a family of mice and before I knew it, I was counting all the reasons why I was ready to wake up.

  “Nim, don’t get settled. We won’t be here long.” Malick muttered to me.

  I shrugged. That was doubtful, based on my bad luck. I imagined a conversation with Aunt Holly: “Hey Nim, how’d you sleep?” “Oh great. I dreamt I sat in a cold prison for eight hours. And you?”

  But the thing was, I was starting to question that this was really a dream. Crazy, I know, but everything seemed so real. The strangest thing – the thing that bugged me the most – was the fact I appeared to be in my story. How was that possible? It wasn’t, so clearly I was going crazy. Like, lock-me-up-and-keep-me-from-society-because-I-might-start-speaking-gibberish crazy.

  “Nim?” Malick’s voice pulled me from my thoughts.

  “Yeah?”

  “You all right?”

  Just awesome.

  Time for some answers. “So where are we?” I figured I’d start with the basics.

  “We’re in the city of Valen, or what’s left of it. Under King Slag’s control it’s become a sad and depressing place.”

  “King Slag?” That was too close for comfort.

  “Aye, a self-appointed king. For a long time he kept to his own land to the north, but as he grew more powerful, poisoning the innocent with his evil magic, he’s spread like a sickness.”

  My curiosity peaked and I asked, “And, what’s up with that huge tower?”

  “That’s where Prince Braylon keeps Princess Amerovia, the poor dear.”

  The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end and I glanced over at a couple of the other prisoners, who shared a knowing look and continued to stare at the cold stone floor. The soft whispers from the neighboring cells quieted when her name was spoken and dirty faces turned toward us.

  Exactly as I had written it. It wasn’t completely uncommon for me to dream about my stories, so this wouldn’t be off base. But it just didn’t feel right. I hadn’t filled in any details about this ghost town or the characters I was with now. I had only set the scene. I groaned and dropped my forehead into my hands. Where was this all taking me?

  “Er, you okay son?”

  I slowly straightened up and blinked. I was so far from okay, it wasn’t funny, but there was no need to let Malick know just how mentally unbalanced I was. I flashed a cheesy grin at him and heard him mutter under his breath, “Kids.”

  Whatever was going on, I was going to get to the bottom of it. “So, why does he keep her prisoner?” I asked.

  “You’re clearly not from our land if you don’t know their story. It is a long and tragic one. They were once in love and set to be married. Their union was going to bind the neighboring kingdoms. Prince Braylon was appointed to the throne here in Valen after his parents died, and Princess Amerovia is King Richard’s daughter.” My blank stares prompted Malick to give a more detailed response. “He is the ruler of Revel Green, the land from where we come.”

  “Get to the good part, Malick. No need to bore the boy with the details,” one of Malick’s friends chimed in.

  “Oy, if you’d stop interrupting me, I could get to it,” Malick shot over his shoulder. “So, the prince was always a bit of a daredevil – I hear the ladies like that in a man. Well, anyway, he and the princess were out for a ride and they traveled too close to the outskirts of Slag’s territory where they were ambushed. Prince Braylon’s heart was pierced with the magic from Slag’s staff, and since then, Braylon’s been under the evil one’s control. Princess Amerovia was taken prisoner and bound before she could use her magic to help.”

  “The princess has magic?” I was surprised, I had never written anything like that. To be honest, I hadn’t written most of this. Definitely a dream.

  “Indeed. You see, the Elder Tree is the life force of our land and Princess Amerovia is linked to it with magic. It is her job to keep it healthy. From every generation, a child is born that is linked to it and when one protector dies, a new one is born to take his or her place. Only the protector can heal the tree and tap into its energy. Since the tree was killed and drained of power, the princess can do nothing but sit in her tower alone.”

  I assumed he was talking about the tree I’d seen earlier. “How was it killed?” I asked, frowning.

  “There you go leaving out the important parts, confusing the boy,” one of the men said from the corner of our cell.

  “We may not be in our land anymore, but I’m still your commanding officer. Leave a man to tell a story in peace, would you?” Malick responded. He ignored the muffled comments that followed and instead, looked at me. “The Elder Tree was set ablaze right after the princess was captured, but without her there to heal it, the earth began to die and a deep sadness fell over the hearts of her people.” Malick pulled off his cap and s
queezed it in his hands.

  I was mesmerized. My story was so much richer than I had written it, or even imagined. My curiosity took over and I wanted answers. I leaned forward and asked, “Isn’t there a way she can still save the land?”

  “It is said that the Elder Tree has a seed within its roots that, if planted by the protector – our dear princess – will reawaken the tree. But King Richard has sent me and my men to search it many times over and we never found such seed. I’m not sure if he’s in his right mind anymore – he may only wish it so he has some kind of hope to hold onto. But even if it were real, it must surely be dead since so much time has passed. The sad ending to this story is, since the princess is the only one who can heal the tree and save our land, and she’s locked up tight in her tower, we may never see the light of the sun again.”

  I remembered the black shiny stone I had found in the trees roots. “You ever seen it? What’s it look like?”

  “The seed? It is said it glows blue and is warm like the sun on a summer’s day.”

  Well, I definitely didn’t have the Elder Seed in my pocket then.

  There had to be a way for this story to end well. I thought of the beautiful face I had pictured when I wrote the princess’s character. If I could catch a glimpse of her, this dream couldn’t be so bad. “Why hasn’t King Richard tried rescuing her from her tower?”

  A noise outside the room echoed down the hall and he paused for a moment. When it became clear nobody was there, Malick continued in a soft voice, “Everything is in deadlock. Prince Braylon convinced King Slag it was in his best interest to keep her in the tower as a threat to her father. King Richard has a mighty army, but his weakness is his daughter. As long as she’s safe in her tower, he will not fight. Slag made it clear if any step was made to free her or attack Valen, he would throw her from her tower. But we all know he’s more concerned with the problem it would make for him if he were to kill the Elder Tree’s protector.”