Quest

Chapter 4 - Gorth

Aven woke slowly. His legs were asleep, and he groaned and tried to wriggle some life back into his feet. He was freezing.
“Sleep well?”
Llmalda’s voice made him open his eyes. He squinted up at her, blinking in the faint sunlight. She was back in her travelling cloak, scarf pulled high across her face.
“Not really. I hate sleeping in trees,” he hesitated for a second, then decided to voice the question that had been buzzing round in his mind,
“Er, did you mean it? What you said last night?”
“About going with you? Yes. Look, I hate to bring this up, but do you know exactly what destroyed Ferngrove?”
Aven felt the familiar pang at the name, but he ignored it.
“What do you mean?”
“There are an awful lot of things capable of that sort of thing. Dragons
can breathe enough fire to burn down a city…”
“It wasn’t a dragon. For one thing, I know what dragon fire does, and the destruction was much more… Total. Secondly, there actually used to
be a dragon in Ferngrove, quite a big one. If it had been another dragon, he’d have fought it off, but there weren’t any marks of dragon
fights. Besides…” He felt his voice give out.
“You find survivors after dragon battles.” Llmalda said quietly.
“Yeah,” Aven took a deep breath, “I think… Well, I think it may have been Chaos.”
He’d become accustomed to glances of disbelief from those he told of this theory, or they suddenly became so terrified they ran for it. Llmalda just nodded thoughtfully.
“Could be. I don’t know much about Chaos… But I know someone who does.”

“Who?” Aven pulled himself upright, eager to hear more. Llmalda looked down.
“Gratchis Verleon. One of my father’s… Old friends.”
“Your father?”
“That’s the problem. I’ve never really got on with my family. Frankly, I don’t even consider them important enough to hate.”
Aven stared at her, feeling disbelief flood through him at the idea. Llmalda caught his expression.
“Look, vampires aren’t good at family with eachother normally, and since I’m… Different I’ve never exactly seen eye-to-eye with my father, and mother’s too stupid to argue with him on anything. The rest of the family… Most of them unwound too far.”
“Unwound?”
“Their bloodlust. It broke, and they didn’t get blood in time. Mother and father have managed to keep to what passes for sanity so far, but almost everyone else in my family has succumbed except them, and my two brothers. And me of course.”
“So this Gratchis…”
“Is unwound. But he’s not affected in the same way for some reason. You can actually talk to him.”
“Oh good.”
“Don’t sound so worried. None of them can stand up to me. Anyway, you’ll have your bag.”
“Yeah… “ Aven shook himself at a mental image of himself trying to hold off hordes of vampires with a few bulbs of garlic and a little holy
water. It was not a pleasant thought.
“I take it your family don’t live round here?”
“Right.”
“So, where are we heading?”
“Gorth.”
Aven’s jaw dropped at the name.
“You’re serious? You do know what Gorth is like, don’t you?”
“I did live there. Don’t worry, the manor isn’t very far in, just a few miles.”
“A few feet is all you need to get killed.”
Llmalda raised an eyebrow at him.
“You afraid, elf?”
Aven glared at her.
“No, just rational.”
Llmalda smiled slightly.
“Look, you’ll be with me. I know my way around, and I’m a DeFang. Very few people would dare to argue with a vampire, especially in Gorth. As
long as we keep a low profile, we’ll be fine.”
Aven hesitated, then grinned.
“Okay, I’ll believe you. How’re we going to get there?”
“We’re going to steal some rides.”

Aven clung to the back of his pitzen and feverishly wished he were better at riding. He’d never been able to afford a pitzen, so he’d had very little experience actually riding one of the huge hounds. Llmalda was having a few problems with her mount, although admittedly that was because the creature could smell the vampire and was spooked by it. The landscape wasn’t helping. Aven had never seen a more… Desolate place. Grey and mud brown were the dominant colours, the whole place looked as if someone had burnt it down. Which might be what had happened. Several times. He shivered as he glanced back down the road. They’d gone through a few villages, if you could call them that. The houses looked as ruined as the landscape, and the Norns… He shivered again as he remembered the dull eyes, their expressions only changing when they saw Llmalda. And then it was to terror. Even he’d only gotten a few curious glances, but he couldn’t believe elves were common here. The Legends of Caerth, the Black Lord ruler of Gorth, once a goodly elven hero were well known, and Aven remembered his father telling him them when he was a child. Despite the stories, Aven doubted that very few elves would dare to actually visit Gorth. He gradually became aware that it was getting darker and glanced up. Storm clouds were gathering.
“Oh terrific,” Llmalda muttered, “Some god’s got a sense of drama. Just what we need.”
Aven grinned.
By the time they entered a forest, it was raining heavily. The trees provided a little shelter, but Aven was already soaked to the bone. Llmalda didn’t even seem to have noticed the rain; her gaze was instead fixed on the overgrown path infront of them. Aven felt the fur on the back of his neck prickle. He was about to speak when suddenly something burst out of the undergrowth infront of them. It was one of the ugliest things Aven had ever seen, all spikes and fangs and scales. Gleaming, orange eyes rolled madly and it roared, the sound an almost physical force. Llmalda’s pitzen, already unsettled by both the weather and its rider, decided that this was the last straw and jerked her off with a yelp. She landed heavily as the huge dog batted at the dark creature with a paw before turning and bounding away back down the road. Aven managed to unfreeze in time to see the creature turn towards Llmalda, drool dripping from its jaws. Aven’s fingers closed around his bow, and the next moment he’d loosed three nearly consecutive arrows. The first two bounced off the creature’s skin, but the third plunged deep. The creature’s snarls turned to howls and it turned, plunging back into the forest. Aven jumped down from his ride and dashed over to where Llmalda was pulling herself upright.
“You okay?”
“Yeah, I hate those things. You did well to hit it with an arrow.”
“You’ve seen them before?”
“Couple of times. I’ve no idea what they are, and they taste horrible.”
“A little more info than I needed.”
“Sorry.”
Aven glanced towards his pitzen. Or rather, where it had been. There was now simply a set of tracks, already sinking back into the mud. He swore. Llmalda shrugged.
“Never mind. We’re not far, we can walk the rest of the way.”
“What about the storm?”
“You think it would be possible for you to get any more wet?”
They started off again in damp silence. Aven slowly became aware of a change in the trees. When they’d first entered the forest, the trees had been tall, dark conifers. Now… They were almost dead, skeletal black branches stabbing at the cloud-strewn sky as if they wanted to rip it open. Llmalda noticed his gaze.
“What’s the matter?”
“I can’t help noticing…well…the trees…” Aven trailed off. Llmalda
nodded.
“I know. I think it’s the manor, it almost seems to affect the forest.
We should be able to see it soon…”
Almost on cue, a gigantic clap of thunder rumbled through Aven’s ears as they rounded a bend on the track. A massive fork of lightning split the sky apart, for a second illuminating the dark, towering shape of… Aven’s jaw dropped. When Llmalda had said manor, he’d pictured a large, slightly sinister house. Not… Well, the word castle wasn’t enough, it was a castle. It had turrets, and they had turrets, and they had battlements, and they had spikes. There didn’t seem to be a single flat surface on it, every bit of space was clustered with gargoyles, railings, spikes, black flags and creeping black plants, as well as various other things Aven was rather glad he couldn’t identify. The building clung to a massive rocky outcrop, looking almost as if it had grown there, a narrow track leading up to it surrounded by skeletal trees. There didn’t seem to be many windows, but those that did exist were dark and seemed to be filled with black glass. Heavy clouds were gathering above the place, and the air tasted strangely metallic. Aven glanced at Llmalda.
“This is your home?”
“Was my home. I daresay there’ll be mixed reactions to me coming back, let alone you.”
“How am I getting in, anyway?”
“There’s only two ways a non-vampire can get in. One is as an initiate; the other is as an entr�e. I’ll say you’re an initiate.”
Aven stopped dead and stared at her.
“What?”
Llmalda matched his gaze.
“Basically, someone who is thinking about actually becoming a vampire. By choice.”
“There’s a choice involved?” Aven asked sarcastically. Llmalda glared at him, her gaze hitting him like a hammer blow.
“Amazingly enough, not everyone we bite ends up as a vampire. People only tend to get turned for… Well, basically for power or for romantic reasons.”
“Which one am I supposed to be for?”
“Dunno. Which one do you want?”
Aven watched nervously as Llmalda lifted the heavy, black, bat-shaped knocker on the even blacker doors. They weren’t ordinary doors; they were seriously heavy duty. They’d probably stop a battering ram. Which was probably the point. The knocker thudded into the wood with a bang that almost shook the ground they were standing on. Llmalda counted under her breath.
“…ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen…”
A small hatch in the door slid open. A masked face peered out.
“What you want?”
“Let us in Igor.”
The face jerked back.
“Mistress Llmalda, I sorry, I not realize it was you! I open door now.”
The hatch slid shut and there was the sound of scraping bolts. The door creaked open, the sound drilling into Aven’s ears. Llmalda strode in, and Aven followed her. He got his first good look at Igor as he slid the bolts back again. He was short for a Norn, with patchy brown fur intermixed with huge welts of scar tissue. He wore a rather scruffy black cloak and a balaclava-like mask over his face. Llmalda nodded to him.
“Where’s my father?”
“I’m right here,” a new voice, it’s silky tones filled with barely hidden menace. Aven looked up. They were in a huge hall, the walls covered with trophies and tapestries, and with a massive black gantry running along the walls. A huge, deep purple staircase led up to the balcony. Standing on this was a tall, elegant looking Norn. His fur was pale grey, his eyes as dark as the perfectly styled hair that looked almost painted onto his head. He wore a black suit, with a long black cloak billowing out behind him even though Aven could have sworn there was no breeze in the room. The pearly tips of fangs gleamed over his lips. Aven heard Llmalda curse slightly under her breath.
“I’m surprised to see you back here so soon Llmalda, after your rather dramatic exit.” The vampire started down the stairs, seeming to almost
glide along. His piercing gaze hit Aven, almost reading him. He smiled coldly.
“What is this? The equivalent of an apologetic box of chocolate?” His gaze was fixed on Aven’s throat. Aven began to wish his torc were a lot
bigger. Llmalda stepped infront of him.
“No. This is Calec Nemte, my fianc�e.”
Aven stared at her, trying to hide his shock. The older vampire bowed to him.
“Then I am at a disadvantage. I am the Count DeFang.”
“Charmed,” Aven managed to mutter. The Count smiled at him. It was not a pleasant expression.
“Will you be staying for dinner?”
“In what particular respect?”
“Hah! Interesting choice Llmalda,” he swept over to them, and held out a hand. Llmalda glared at him.
“Just passing through.”
“Indeed. Your room is how you left it Llmalda.”
With that, the older vampire swept out of the hallway. Aven watched him go, then turned back to Llmalda.
“That went well.”
“Hah!” Llmalda laughed bitterly, “He’s playing with us. We need to get out of here as quickly as we can.”
“Vhy vud yov vaant to do zaat?”
Aven spun round at the voice. Framed in an archway at the other end of the hall stood a female vampire in a long, figure hugging black dress.
Llmalda fixed her with a glare.
“Mother. Calec, this is the Countess DeFang.”
The Countess was a very stern looking woman, beautiful but with a face as sharp as a knife. Her fangs were very prominent, and the glittering tips drew Aven’s gaze like a magnet. She smiled, an expression like ice.
“I vud haave zought zaat yov vudn’t vaant to be zeen viz uz Llmaaldaa,” her voice clicked and grated, a strange lilting edge to it. It made Aven’s ears ache just to hear it. Llmalda watched the older vampire carefully.
“We’re just passing through.”
“Reaally? Vhere aare yov heaading?”
“Brellin.”
“I zee,” the Countess’s gaze moved over to Aven, “Aand yov dezided to bring…ziz…viz yov. Interezting. He lookz very…”
“If the next word in that sentence is appetizing, things will go very hard for you.”
The Countess laughed, which was not a pleasant sound.
“Of courze. I do hope zaat yov vill be ztaaying ziz time.”
The Countess glided past them, definitely not making enough sound as she moved. Her stare was fixed on Aven’s neck until she passed him. When she’d vanished through the door the Count had gone though, Aven shuddered.
“They do have that impression on people, yes,” Llmalda muttered. There was a cough from behind them. Aven turned, half expecting another vampire. Igor stood there, watching Llmalda.
“You have bags?”
Llmalda shook her head.
“No, we won’t be staying long.”
“Wise.”
“Right. Igor, I need to get into the crypts, can you distract them while we get in?”
The masked Norn nodded.
“One request?”
Llmalda cocked her head and looked at him.
“What?”
“I come with you when leaving? You only one who not treat me as dirt.”
Llmalda grinned.
“Sure. Just keep the family off my back and we’ll all get out of here.”
Igor nodded and hurried away through a doorway, leaving them alone. Llmalda sighed.
“Come on, we won’t have that much time.”

Chapter 3

Chapter 5