James Lowder - Knight of the Black Rose

Now he and Azrael were camped at the edge of the pine forest that skirted two sides of Castle Hunadora’s moat. Soth had decided that Gundar was a fool the moment he saw the castle; only an incompetent would let trees grow so close to his home. Even though the keep’s moat was wide and its walls were high and well guarded, such cover would prove invaluable to a trained enemy. Indeed, Soth had been able to cloak himself in the forest’s shadows and study Castle Hunadora for an entire day undisturbed.

The castle rested atop a manmade mound of earth, a gently sloping hill to its front, a steep, rocky precipice to its left. Thick pine forest grew to the rear and right of the keep, a perfect cover for a siege. Hunadora’s walls were of dark stone, with lighter rock framing the arrow loops and crenelations. The main section of the castle was bordered by a square curtain, with small towers at the corners and in the middle of each wall. In turn, a wide moat filled with fetid water circled the walls, its dark surface broken occasionally by a bloated, white-skinned corpse or a pale tentacle slithering into the light.

Protected by the curtain and the moat, a massive tower and a large keep rose high into the sky. Two smaller buildings squatted nearby, their peaked roofs barely pushing above the battlements. Finally, the gatehouses and main portcullis jutted out from the curtain. This was where all welcome visitors to the castle entered, and on this particular day, a silent crowd of peasants milled in front of the gate, awaiting admittance. The ragged men and women glanced furtively at the bodies hanging from the gatehouses’ roofs and the dark, inhuman shapes that moved between the crenelations, hidden from the setting sun.

“They’re here to pay taxes,” Azrael noted, following Soth’s gaze. “The duke will keep ’em waiting all night if he has to. He lets two dozen into the gates at a time, so’s his men can keep an eye on ’em.”

“Then we will enter the keep now, while the soldiers are still busy with the rabble,” Soth replied. He pointed to the stone curtain, where a half-submerged grate opened into the moat. “That is where we will enter. If what you’ve said about the child is true, his quarters are likely to be underground, where the screams of his victims will not arouse the others in the keep.”

Azrael fidgeted, trying to think of the proper words for what he wanted to say. “Uh, mighty lord, it may not be, er, in our best interest to face Medraut in his laboratory. I’ve heard that he has artifacts of great power stored there, things he could use against us.”

“We need the blood of either Gundar or his son to open the portal,” Soth replied flatly. “Strahd tells me that the duke is a vampire. So unless you wish to hunt for his coffin yourself…”

Laughing nervously, Azrael moved to the edge of the trees. “Are we going to swim across?” he asked.

Soth did not reply. Instead, he grabbed the back of the dwarf's chain mail shirt and stepped into the darkness surrounding the trees. An instant later, he and Azrael emerged from the shadows inside the grate tunnel. The dwarf leaned back against the rusty grate. “Mmmm. You could have warned me.”

Cold water swirled above Soth’s knees, almost reaching Azrael’s waist. It was colored by streaks of indigo and yellow and cerulean from the remnants of discarded potions. Fragments of parchment and half-burned figurines of wood floated against the grate’s wide bars. Farther up the tunnel, small patches of flame covered the water where two cast-off chemicals had come together.

A large bottle containing a pink, spiderlike creature bumped against Azrael’s hip. When he picked it up, the creature rammed itself against the glass, trying to get at the dwarf with its long legs and snaking tail. He snarled at the clutching thing, then pushed the bottle out through the grate. The glass bobbed in the moat, then a tentacle wrapped around it and pulled it under.

“Come,” Soth said, ducking slightly to avoid the low, dripping ceiling.

Glowing lichen covered the walls above the waterline. Azrael waded cautiously behind the death knight. He was glad to have a little light to stop him from stumbling against the walls, but he wasn’t all that certain he wanted to see what sloshed against him.

The worst part of the trip for Azrael was the smell. Although he pinched his nose, his heightened senses provided him with a clear report of the foul odors from the offal and refuse floating around him. “The first thing we’ll want to do when we get through the portal is take a bath for a week,” he grumbled. “Or have our noses chopped off.” His voice reverberated up the tunnel.

“If you are not quiet,” Soth replied, “I will perform that surgery right now.”

After a time the tunnel sloped up, leaving the water behind. At first Azrael was glad to be out of the foul-smelling sewerage, but he soon decided that the drier part of the tunnel was no improvement. A dead giant’s rib cage blocked the way at one point, and other, more disgusting things made it difficult for Azrael to struggle up the incline. Of course Soth managed it easily.

“Doesn’t this place bother you, mighty one?” the dwarf whispered.

“It is not so unlike some I have seen in my travels,” the death knight replied. “Besides, to me the world is not filled with the bright colors and sharp smells you sense. I only remember such things from long ago.”

A circle of light appeared in the wall ahead, then laughter, high and shrill, filled the tunnel. Soth edged forward. The light came from a jagged hole, slimy with spilled potions and stinking from the old bits of flesh caught on the stones around its edges. Beyond lay a huge room filled with glassware and coils of metal, ancient skulls and the stuffed carcasses of unnatural creatures. Tables covered with beakers of rainbow-hued liquids stood in a dozen places around the floor. Musty shelves of books bound in leather or wood or more exotic fabric occupied two walls; cases holding collections of powders as well as rare items used in the casting of spells occupied the other two.

There seemed to be no door, no way into the room save the hole from which Soth now peered. Moreover, no torches or magical globes or any other source of light lined the walls, yet a clear yellow light filled the gigantic hall. The illumination was so complete that no shadows hung in the corners, not a single book or vial lay in darkness.

At the edge of this ordered chaos, very close to the entryway into the sewer, a boy sat upon a high stool. This had to be the duke’s son, Medraut. He gazed into a glass-and-steel structure as wide and tall as a door. Level after level of doll-sized furniture and weapons rested between two thick plates of crystal, sprinkled with small holes; the use for these holes quickly became apparent. The boy lit pieces of paper with a nearby candle and stuffed them into the three lowest levels.

“You can’t hide forever, little worms,” Medraut said in a coarse voice. He rapped the glass with his little fingers. “Come out, come out. It’s time to play.”

As smoke filled the levels, things began to twitch about. Soth couldn’t make them out at first, but as the figures scrambled up ladders to escape the smoke, he realized what was happening. Tiny humans! The captives shouted and cursed and shook their fists at the child, but that only made him laugh.

“The game for today is snakes and ladders,” he said, taking a box from a table nearby. “Haderak, you survived this last time, so you needn’t listen to the rules. The rest of you must pay close attention.” Medraut slid a glove onto his hand and grabbed a handful of writhing snakes from the box. Standing atop the chair, he opened a small glass door. One by one, he dropped the snakes into the bizarre doll house. “Each time one of you gets eaten by a snake, I take a ladder away.” Squinting at one figure, he added, “And you have to move forward, not backward, Costigan, you rotten cheater.”