Open Chronicles The Basilicus Keep

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Darkweaver

Darkweaver

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Lore Maker II
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Near the Cairou river, Anirian Territory, Western frontier

"Don't try and go near that keep, master carpenter. That infernal place be cursed - sure as the sun sets and rain falls. People that wander down there don't return these days, believe you me."

The old farmer adjusted a laced shawl over her shoulders, anxiously glancing past her farmstead to the castle of black stone lurking in the distance. Hugo turned away from the door leading from her humble porch into the cottage, pushing himself up by his hands and shading his eyes against the afternoon sun, following her gaze. The castle nestled deep inside a great cauldron of earth, allowing only its tallest structures to protrude, like some great splinter scarring the rocky plains where no crops could grow.

"Your door ought be in a right state now, Madame Ailore." He said this while his gaze lingered on the keep, before he remembered that he should demonstrate the validity of his words, and went straight back to her door, pulling down its handle and opening it. "See? New side of the frame here. Fits like a charm now. Took the liberty to oil these hinges too."

"Thank you, stranger. Well, you've certainly earned your keep, but you still haven't listened to my words, now have you?"

"'Course I have, madame. It's simply that I'd never dare approaching that keep in the first place, so I don't see why I should need such words." He brushed his hands off dirt and sawdust, then rewarded himself with a swig of ale from a nearby mug given to him by his host. This farmstead offered the best viewing point to Basilicus Keep by a mile. He was so close now he could feel his bones tingle with the anticipation.

"You're not the first scavenger to come through here, you know. Lots of 'em around, loitering, poking through rubble. Ever since his lordship fell into a great silence and barred his gates. We haven't heard from him in nearly a year, and it no doubt spawned all sorts of rumour. People claiming he up and left the keep with his whole retinue - to others blathering about dark magic being afoot, gripping the keep in some sort of sleeping curse or turned them all into blithering stone!"

Hugo smiled wanly at the venerable woman, tugging at his own beard in faux suspense.

"Who knows? Could all be true. I even heard the lord had cursed himself after betraying his fallen comrades. The very soldiers who had fought tooth and nail to conquer this castle for him, claiming it from the Cortosi. Some of those souls," he went on, planting his mug on the railing more harshly than intended, "are even said to haunt him to this day."

A pregnant pause emerged between them, where the woman stared at him as if he had gone mad. Hugo cleared his throat, deciding to make it plain that he was speaking in jest - clearly it hadn't been plain enough, so he added:

"It's either that, or he could be a devout royalist."

"Bah!" She threw her hands in the air, derision dripping from her stance and words. "None of those things, I'd wager! Nay, I suspect it to be much more devious. People talk too much, too often in the day and too full of themselves! Empty barrels boom the loudest, that's what me father used to say. Everyone's a bloody poet these days, I swear. But now you listen here, you'd best avoid those shady strangers. You might not wish to tell your name - and I have respected that wish - but you seem an honest, hardworking lad. Don't throw in your lot with those basket-breakers, these hedge-sleepers and twiddling ne'r-do-wells, you hear? It'll bring nothing but trouble for you, so praise the Republic."

Hugo drained his mug in a long, few gulps while she boomed her speech, then went to pick up his black beret - the one thing he hadn't been able to relinquish for his secret stash of equipment. It might have jeopardised his role as a simple carpenter, but fortunately for him, here in the far-flung Anirian reaches the farmers couldn't tell the difference between an old officer's hat and an artisan's headwear. He donned his hat with millitaristic precision, turning his head away from her so its insignia didn't gleam too brightly in the sun.

"No need to worry on that account, madame. I'll grant them a wide berth. I don't imagine them to have any need of my services. Farewell now, be certain not to let any rot fester again in that doorframe." As he departed, leaving the farmstead and heading towards the cave that held both the old tunnel, his meagre camp and the rest of his hidden equipment, Hugo muttered to himself: "But perhaps I could have need of their services."
 
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It definitely wasn’t every day that a hedge-sleeper managed to find his way inside a cave of which to spend the day and night away. This one was no hedge knight in definition, not by any means, though there was some similarity. They both slept under hedges when they could find them, yet the man in question was no knight in status. Rather, he was simply a mercenary.

Sure, the farmland had farms and farmers, and farmsteads had plenty of pigs and chickens and fish if a body of water was given. Yet such nourishment wasn’t the mission of one particular person in this environment. Cavernous. That was the word for it. Made sense given that it was a cave and had a camp in it even if it was under someone else’s name.

The mercenary had lit a fire. After all, there was plenty of tinder and kindling already and only a fool wouldn’t use the fuel. Or would he? Either way, he needed something to cook his meat, and it was squirrel on a stick for his efforts. Granted, this might just be one encampment in a number within the labyrinth, but he didn’t care.

Could care for the hare though. Alas, that blasted rabbit had escaped his crossbow. The squirrel was less lucky though. Less meat, a bit more lean, but it would serve its purpose for the sellsword’s meager feast. He was hungry, he was thirsty, and he had mead and water already amid his pack, along with armor on his person, a sword sheathed at his hip if no helmet on his head.

All he knew was that the old tunnel led to his destination and, in the heat or the cold, Vandor Colton would reach his quarry one way or the other. So, in his black cloak and basking in the glow of the cookfire, he watched his meat roast, but looked to the cave’s ceiling, higher to the sky, and wondered.

Darkweaver
 
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Trekking the half-mile journey back to his camp, Hugo froze in his tracks upon seeing the cave.

Smoke. Faint wisps of it curled up from the mouth, like the nostril of some sleeping drake. These crooked fingers of smoke gently danced away from the cave, beckoning him to enter with glee.

From here on out, Hugo treaded with more care. Coming closer, he rolled the soles of his boots gently from heel to tip with each stride, sliding quietly across the otherwise crunching soil. He hefted the one tool in his arsenal that could be used as a weapon - his hammer. Not much of a weapon, but it would have to suffice.

When he sidled up next to the entrance of the cave - part of the hill that rose like a dark mole on the skin of the earth - the smell of cooked meat reached his nose. For once, his belly was mostly full after working for the farm. Still, another bite couldn't hurt.

He perked up his ears, trying to gauge how many rested inside his camp. A minute or so passed with this, but by the gentle shuffle of feet and clinking of metal - a pot being stirred no doubt - he gathered it was likely to be some lone sentry. Two at most, and a silent pair at that, which seemed unlikely.

One or two he could possibly handle. He considered whether he should hide above the cave in the wild shrubs and sparse trees, observing these campers until nightfall, but he saw no horses outside, so if they proved too many and too hostile, he could always run.

Running, he had come to learn, was the single best tactic to survive when you lived by the sword. If only he could have told his younger self that.

For now, he decided he would try his gift of the gab. Not all strangers were enemies, after all.

"Ho there!" he cried in his army voice, befitting a sergeant calling his men-at-arms to snapping attention. "I see you have taken the liberty of employing my camp. I trust the bedding is soft enough to your liking? Worthy o' this feast of yours, eh?"

At that, he stepped within the entrance of the cave, rank in posture as only the Guard shaped one's spine, squinting his eyes and glancing down the length of his nose at his uninvited guest. The hammer was hidden behind his back with his arm.

Vandor Colton
 
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A cobalt shape skimmed the windy spine of the Cairou like a barbed manta twice-removed from any ocean. Needle-spurs studded its velvet wings; twin tusks jutted from its prow like the business end of some grotesque caliper. Yet the creature’s most arresting cargo was the figure who chose to stand, not recline, upon its ridged back: Vaezhasar Drakspae, sorcerer, opportunist, and—if tavern gossip held a grain of truth—perpetual thorn in propriety’s side.

Spell-plate gleamed around him: deep cerulean lacquered with gold, inset here and there with emerald cabochons that winked like sardonic eyes. His helm, a horned thing fit to crown a minor deity, narrowed to a visor whose slits hid whatever speculation flickered behind them. Lightning crackled between his fingertips in idle semaphore—a magician’s equivalent of tapping one’s foot. Why waste a perfectly good dramatic effect?

Below, the river wound through patchwork farms, each field a neat square of straw-colored industry. Farther on, Basilicus Keep thrust its black parapets out of a sunken bowl of earth, the whole edifice resembling a splinter lodged in the land’s gray hide—an uglier sight than any mountain but somehow more fascinating.

At an unspoken command the sky-ray slowed, beating the air with lazy dignity before settling on a hummock overlooking the cursed fortress. Vaezhasar stepped down, armored soles biting the turf; the familiar gave a respectful shudder and dissolved into blue vapour, as though embarrassed to linger after its master had dismounted.

Hands clasped behind his back, the sorcerer studied the keep—its silent towers, its rumor-haunted gate—much as a jeweler inspects a flawed gem in need of prying. Then, with a satisfied inclination of his horned helm, he started down the slope.

“Hm.”

The word rattled round the hollows of his horn-crested helm like a pebble in a bronze cup. “I was promised something rather more … dreadful,” he mused, gauntlets resting on his hips. “If the local yokels are to be believed, one should find a sucking maw into Hell itself where that pile of stone now sulks. Instead”—he flicked a gloved finger at the keep—“we’ve only a gloomy mortgage in need of paint.”

With that mordant verdict delivered, Vaezhasar resumed his measured advance, spell-plate chinking in quiet amusement at the peasants’ flair for overstatement.

 
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