Lord of Eternal Night by Ben Alderson

6

Iwoke to the itch of sunlight across my eyes, groggy yet comfortable in the creature’s bed. I smiled through the sluggish feeling that soddened my limbs as I put my back to the light, face squished against the down-feathered pillows.

Peaking an eye open, I got a view of the room I was in. The night before I had slept straight after my head hit the pillow.

I could not deny, his room was… grand. The bed far larger than the one I had been provided with. Even as I stretched out, I was miles away from feeling the edge.

It was surprisingly easy to feel at ease in this room. I suppose the glaring sunlight helped, knowing the creature, Marius, would not return.

“Marius.” I spoke his name aloud. It was strange not only having a face to the creature I had grown hearing about daily, but now having his name felt odd. As though I had obtained some divine secret that I could not share.

The strange girl beyond my own chamber door had called him by that name. But hearing it from his own lips made it seem real. As though I had not connected the dots before he told me himself.

All my life I had envisioned the beast I would soon kill. Never did he have a face or name. Now, only a handful of days into my stay in his cursed castle, I had obtained them both.

I allowed myself to lay back in his bed until my stomach grumbled for attention. It was the cue I needed to finally roll out from the welcoming embrace of the sheets. Just as it had been every day thus far, I knew food would be waiting for me.

Out from the warmth of the sheets, the room was deathly cold. The hearth was empty of cinders or wood. It was clear from the uncharred bricks around it that it had not been lit in a long time.

Which left me, naked, in the middle of the creature’s room. With no sign of my clothes around me.

My cheeks warmed at the thought of him seeing me like this, his cold hands removing the clothes from my body.

I could not deny the turn of my stomach, from sickness or something else entirely I was not certain.

Dragging the sheet from the bed, I wrapped it back around myself as I searched the room for something more suitable to wear.

Almost every cabinet, dresser and wardrobe that filled the chamber was empty. Only home to the small creatures that had taken up residence among the dark spaces.

But there, in the top drawer of a grand, wooden carved cabinet did I find clothing.

A nightshirt.

“That will do,” I said, shrugging.

I pulled the stiff white fabric over my head until it draped loosely around my ankles. The sleeves were long and baggy, so much so that I had to roll them up to prevent them from getting in the way.

Before a golden mirror I stood and inspected myself. The glass was scratched and worn; the surface almost impossible to see a reflection.

“Jak, you need a wash,” I told myself. My feet were still stained black with soot from the fire. My face pale and blue eyes ringed with tiredness. I pressed a hand to my stomach as it rumbled again. “But first it is time to eat.”

* * *

The doorto my chamber had been destroyed. Except not by the fire. No. It lay in parts across the charred room, even the brick of the wall that held it up by the frame had come away. It had been caved in. From the outside.

I inched cautiously into the room, careful not to step on an iron nail or splinter of wood. It was early evening and I had been without shoes all day. After waiting in the great hall for someone, anyone, to come in, I had finally given up and went to retrieve my boots.

Luckily they were where I left them. Neatly lined up beneath the window that overlooked the garden. Now, as the sky was painted a dark purple, it was hard to see the world beyond.

I pulled my boots on, thankful for the break from the ever-cold floor of the castle.

The chamber was close to destroyed. Yet the fire had been put out — by what or how I did not know. Nor did it matter. My potentially dramatic action resulted in what I required.

Attention.

The scorched scars reached as far as the outer walls but it had been stopped before spreading beyond. The bed was in ruins. Sheets no more than crispy ashes. The posts of the frame now leaned against one another amongst the mound of burned wood and material.

“What a clumsy boy I am.”

There was a glint of metal nestled within the pile of ashes. I reached for it, pushing the dusting of destruction out of the way until I got a grasp on the item and pulled it out.

The scrying bowl. It had warped slightly. Not completely broken, but enough to feel as though I would not be able to use it again.

It was the perfect excuse not to call upon Mother or the coven. For a moment, a wink of orange flickered across the dull metal of the bowl. It happened so quickly I almost passed it off as something in my eye. But then it happened again. A reflection of an amber glow. I turned behind me, facing the window to catch what I had seen.

Beyond the window, in the darkening view, I could see it.

What if it was Marius? No. The moon had not reached its apex yet. That was all I knew of the creature before he appeared. It was only in the dead of night that he roamed.

Then it must be the people that live here. The very ones that had done their best to keep out of my way, no matter how I longed to see them.

My heart slammed in my chest as I raced out the room, discarding the scrying bowl back on the floor without a thought. A short run down the corridor and I was there, at the front door ready to find out who lurked beyond it.

But it was locked. Fuck. No matter how I tugged and pulled at the large, circular hand, it did not open. Giving up with a breath of frustration, I ran back to the room, hoping to catch the direction the bobbing glow moved in.

I was left with one choice.

It was easy, pulling myself onto the thin ledge of the window and slipping through the gap that it allowed as I pushed it open. I was thankful for the overgrown grass that I landed upon. It not only cushioned my short jump, but kept my footfalls quiet.

The nightshirt did little to keep out the chill of the evening. Mist swirled around my ankles and for a moment I remembered my first night and the hand that reached for me.

I did not stay in one place to find out if that same apparition returned.

Through the darkening gardens I moved, looking for another glare of light to signal where the intruder was heading. My heart thumped in my chest, palms damp with sweat. But on I pushed, desperate to find someone — anyone that was not the beast.

Blindly, I waded through the gardens. Lost among the towering hedges, pathless walkways and monstrous roots and weeds that seemed to have overtaken what must have been a glorious garden once upon a time.

Then I caught it again. Through the gaps of the hedge I almost walked face-first into, amber light that moved beyond it.

I quickened my movements, frantically looking for a way around the hedge wall before me. The twigs scratched at my hands as I searched for a way through.

“Wait!” I shouted, the glow of light disappearing once again. “I see you, just wait!”

I sliced out a hand, reaching for the grounding element of earth. The hedge split in two, parting enough for me to slip through.

It was a risk, using my power. But the blanket of darkness grew heavier. I could hardly see a hand before my face, let alone someone else see me use my power.

I ran. And so did the person I chased after. I was on the stone path now, evident from the loud patter of my footfalls as I took up chase. There was a faint stinging from the cuts I had gifted myself on the soles of my feet. Yet I pushed on. “Please… just wait!”

As if the blossoming night responded, a noise filled the darkening gardens. It seemed to echo from all around me.

I slowed for a moment, searching for the origin of the sound. In the shadows around me my eyes played tricks. I was certain I saw shapes speeding through the dark.

Then the noise occurred again, this time louder, clearer.

A howl.

I picked up my pace, this time urged on by a sudden, piercing fear that tried so desperately to overcome me. Burned wilder by yet another howl that sounded in response to the first.

The nightshirt blew up around my bare legs. I almost tripped on a cracked slab on the path beneath me, but steadied myself as yet another howl pierced through the settling night.

My prey turned a corner, signalled by the sudden change in course the bobbing flame took.

I followed, boots slapping on the ground.

Closing in, I started to see the person. The girl.

Long black hair flowed behind her, caught in the wind she left in her wake. She wore a dress made from dark materials that seemed to blend into the very shadows we ran through.

And her head, like mine, snapped across the darkness surrounding the path as other noises joined in on our chase.

All I heard, above my own heavy breathing, was the snapping of teeth. The shifting of a shape which ran beside me flickered in my peripheral. I risked a look and saw two pools of red glaring back at me.

It happened too fast.

I slammed into something hard, tumbling in an entanglement of limbs, across the ground.

It was not my cry of sudden surprise that rattled across my skull, it came from the girl I had run straight into.

I felt the wet grass around me. Not the hard stone path.

“I am so sorr—”

“Shut up, you fool!” she snapped, pushing herself from the ground with wide, unblinking eyes. Her focus was not on me, but something in the dark before us. I followed her panicked stare to see what captured her attention.

From the shadows stepped a large hound. No, a wolf. Fur made from melted shadows, so dark I could not see where it started and the night around it began. The beast prowled, large paws padding across the ground slowly as it moved for her.

I shifted my arms, trying to get myself from the floor before the creature attacked, its intentions clear as its maw dripped and its lip curled. But it stopped me from moving with a warning snap of its jaws. I could almost feel the stabbing of its red glare as it stared right through me.

“You took us off the path,” she muttered, voice laced with fear. “You’ve doomed us both.”