Blood covered the walls and the floor. It was warm and sticky and gave the air in the room a coppery smell. The blonde woman was suspended by chains draping from the ceiling like a macabre chandelier. Drops of flood fell from milk colored finger tips to leave red dots on the stone floor. A figure, shrouded in shadow with the light of the crackling fire in the fireplace worked beneath her. Its right hand rose and fell with a thin bladed dagger that cut away at strips of the milky white flesh.
“Darius!” A voice yelled and a man pulled the boy away from the scene with a force he could not resist. The room with the hanging woman faded and came to be replaced with a damp and dark cellar. He found he could not resist the pulling force as they were trains bound around his arms and his legs.
A crimson leather coat fluttered near the door, “You must become one of the night Darius.” Maxim Redmont almost whispered his inhuman crimson eyes narrowing. Isabella stood to his side, always faithful. Darius tried to yell but he found himself unable to speak. “Do it.” The Redmont King said before leaving the room. From the shadows a creature growled and a snout emerged from the darkness baring yellow teeth. Darius pulled against the chains but to no avail as the beast darted toward him.
He startled awake and panting his flesh steaming in the morning cold that gripped the swamp. A couple creatures that had come upon the sleeping Redmont darted away into the undergrowth at his sudden awakening. He lifted his dark grey eyes to look at the cloudy sky above. “Still no sunshine.”
“You will not find much of that here.” Vyssex muttered poking at the fire with a stick. “Even in summer the swamp is a dark place.” The goblin pulled his mole rat cloak closer around his shoulders. Orange eyes peered at the Redmont from under wrinkled green flesh. “But yet you steam.”
Darius rolled over and pulled himself onto the sack that doubled as a seat, “A curse of my body.”
“You call it a curse; I would call being warm all the time a blessing.” The goblin giggled in its high pitch laugh.
“How much further?” The Redmont responded in turn trying to move past the conversation about his curse.
“In a rush to get your life in Order?” The goblin giggled again, “The forest only gets thicker the closer you are to the temple and not many men have made the journey by land.”
“I’ve spent enough life at sea.” The Redmont returned with a scowl, “The forest does not scare me.”
“Of course not, you are the big bad warrior.” Vyssex giggled again.“Soon the swamp will become grassland and then we will enter the forest. Galenous' temple is on a cliff face. Some say he is dead, some say he is alive. If we make it you will find out I know.”
“If the god is alive and feels the desire to even grace my presence. Gods can be fickle creatures who may not judge you worthy of their time.” Darius responded. He had prayed to many gods and none had ever answered his prayer. He hoped he was not making the same mistake again.
“Why do you seek the god of order? You seem like such a wild man.” The goblin inquired with a raised brow.
“Shouldn’t a wild man seek out order?” The Redmont lifted his eyes to the creature.
“Ha!” The goblin laughed, “Men rarely desire peace and calm in their lives. Just look at this continent. War ravaged cities here, war ravaged cities over there. Men wage all their wars and it seems the only results are ever death and destruction.”
Darius had no answer for that; he looked back into the fire and thought of the war in Grand City. The werewolves surrounding him, the guards behind him turning to the darkness and trying to slay him. As he slipped out of consciousness a winged beast picking him up. Just when death was about to take him and he felt calm for the first time in his life since the death of his parents.
He had awoken days after the destruction of the castle in a bed surrounded by dozens of others screaming and dying. He had slipped out the first chance he could and gave them an extra bed for someone more wounded.
He had left the city and ran across a boat to take him across the sea to Elved, some place he could disappear for a while. On the ship a couple of the sailors had been talking of the gods and the mention of Galenous had caught his attention. He had remembered the sense of calm as death took him and he wondered if the god could offer him the same without the consequence of death.
“I’ve been fighting my whole life goblin. It is time for some rest.” The Redmont half smiled an action he didn’t often do. “Death has consumed everything I know. I want to live for once.” The smile faded as his ears perked up, the wind was howling through the low swamp trees again, “Going to storm again.”
“Looks like we will be stuck here another night then.” The goblin sighed and pulled his cloak closer, “Have I told the story of Mygettki the terrible yet?”
“No.” The Redmont lifted his gaze from the small flames, “Please tell me, anything to take my mind off my dreams.”