IP: 82.19.140.112
Posted on August 27, 2012 at 02:48:33 AM by arthur & pendragon
She seemed to cross the floor with surprising speed, one moment her shadow fell across him from her place by the window and the next she had hold of his hand. Arthur turned back towards her with a curious expression, wondering what it was that had changed her mind. Her eyes gave him no reply as she began to tug encouragingly at his arm. The King followed, allowing her to lead him through the stacks of unwanted things. She knew the way, her feet finding the paths where the root was clear, where someone with less experience might have found themselves stumbling blindly into dead ends. Arthur knew the castle, the hidden paths and secluded archways that meant he could navigate the corridors in a shorter time than most. This upper level however, was her kingdom, and she knew it in as much detail as he knew his. “Where are we going?” Arthur asked, with a good natured laugh, stepping over a broken stool that had fallen from the pile to land squarely at his feet. Dyna released his hand, moving nimbly up a small, rotten ladder, and Arthur moved towards it after her. His fingers closed around one of the wooden strats, as he lifted his chin in order to peer up into the higher loft. He was just in time to see one of her pale feet, held tightly in a glittering slipper, disappearing from view. The king looked back down at the ladder, doubting that it would support his weight, he retreated back towards where the stool lay. Setting it at the base of the ladder, Arthur climbed up onto the flat top of the seat, before placing a hand either side of the hatch and hoisting himself up into the room above. Straightening up, the King looked around himself as he dusted the dirt from his hands. He turned to Dyna with a smile of thanks, finding an upturned box nearby to use as a seat, he sunk down onto it, his body turned deliberately to face her. “I can see why you like it up here,” Arthur commented, glancing towards the shuttered window before returning his gaze to her, “it is quite peaceful, is it not?” He shook his head slowly, still with the same relaxed smile, “there is no need to apologise,” he reassured her, leaning back against the objects at his back, “we guards our memories closer than most things, some of us by guarding places, some of us by guarding our very souls.” It was not something he would have said to many other people, but somehow, he knew that she would understand, and somehow, somehow that tempted the words onto his tongue, willingly allowing them to float in the air between them. “It does not always make things easy,” he continued, his smile fading slightly, “it makes it difficult for us to not feel alone, but we feel strangely safe none-the-less.” Her hair caught his attention then, those long locks of rich red hair calling out to him across the room. Arthur’s left hand moved to grip his knee, leaning his weight upon his elbow as his feeling of ease steadily grew. “A story?” he asked, with another graceful chuckle, his lips moved to form a thoughtful expression, his eyebrows pinching together in a slight frown of consideration. “Very well,” Arthur said at last, nodding his head in his agreement, “this is my son’s favourite. I think he likes the dragons.” In a Kingdom long ago, there lived a boy. He was tall and slender and quick of mind, and strange things seemed to happen wherever he went. The people in his village were wary of him, whispering to one another in hushed voices that he was a changeling, something from the other world, part boy, part fairy, or worse, part demon. One day, a pair of soldiers rode into the village, demanding to be told where they could find this strange boy, of whom rumours had been heard even at the great palace. The villages told them where to find him, and the soldier’s carried him off, lifting him up off the ground to ride pillion behind the faster rider. They took the boy to the top of the hill where a great lake opened out, and threw him down at the feet of the King himself. “Do you know why you’re here, boy?” the King demanded coldly. He had never been popular, inclined towards cruelty and corruption and the people held no love for him. The boy shook his head. “There is a man marching upon these lands who seeks to kill me and take my crown,” the King explained, “I was told that if I built a tower on that island on the middle of this lake, having consecrated the ground first with the blood of a changeling child, then no man should be able to drag me from it.” The boy looked up at the King and sighed sadly, “A tower will not save you,” he told the King, “your fate was written long ago.” Angry at the boy’s words, the King demanded that he explain himself. “Below the lake is a stone, and inside it sleep a white dragon, and a red. They will rise above the water in two days time, and they will fight. The white dragon represents your great enemy, the red dragon your own fate...” “Which will win?” the King wondered, but the boy only shook his head, a mischievous smile upon his face. The boy was then, suddenly, no longer there. He had not vanished, but no one had seen him get up, and no one had seen him leave, but, in the same moment, they were all sure that he had. The King sat at the water’s edge for two days, as his enemy got ever closer, until, finally, the water of the lake seemed to boil, and out of it rose a dragon of purest white, and another of deep blood-red. The dragon’s fought, their fire lighting up the water below them that stood mirror still beneath them, and the King watched on in horror. The white dragon, in time, killed the red, throwing its body down upon the grass. The King ran. Luck however, had abandoned him. He had spent so long by the lake that he had not realised how close his enemy had come, and he rode straight into the scouts of his enemy. They took him to their master, a man known to be kind and virtuous, a hero of the people, and the good man asked the wicked king for his crown. Remembering the boy’s words, the wicked King agreed, taking his golden crown from his own head and laying it at the feet of the champion. In the night, the wicked king crept into the champion’s tent with his dagger, and raised it high above his head, fully intending to kill the people’s Prince. Out of nowhere, it seemed, just as the blade was about to bite, an arrow shot through the canvas of the tent and went straight into the wicked King’s heart. He fell down dead upon the floor, just as the red dragon had fallen at the feet of the white. The Kingdom rejoiced, and the Champion shepherded in a new age of prosperity for the kingdom.”  |
Replies:
- my own quietness - By Dyna Bowmore August 27, 2012 at 05:25:41 AM
- I am always here - By arthur & pendragon August 27, 2012 at 11:20:38 PM
- but once you've known love how can you find it? - By Dyna Bowmore August 29, 2012 at 06:50:04 AM
- I am always here - By arthur & pendragon August 27, 2012 at 11:20:38 PM
Post a reply:
<--
-->