THE TALES OF THE HAUNTED KINGDOM


BOOK THREE

THE IMPERFECT ANGELS

A Trilogy of Novels
By
Charles E.J. Moulton


© Copyright CHARLES E.J. MOULTON 2005


CHAPTER ONE: THE IDES OF MARCH

The kingdom was asleep.
It was an uneasy rest for it anticipated change.
It was tossing and turning in its’ sleep, bad dreams haunting its’ inner vision. These bad dreams had manifested themselves in the form of an illusion where the former king of the empire was its’ only citizen. He was a citizen who each day was lead by angels and demons in right or wrong directions. These creatures had one goal in common: his duel with the witch Lucinda in the cave of souls in the forest of the original sin.
Everything depended on the outcome of this duel.
The winner would win reality.
If the king won the duel then his reality, the one where he was asleep and dreaming this illusion, would vanish and leave him benevolent leader of the known world. If his sister the witch won the duel the dream that he was living would become grotesque reality.
Even if the king won the game, he still had to travel down the seven levels of the underworld in order to find his family. They were trapped in caged replicas of their own home in the lowest level, imprisoned like mice in a bad world.
Lucinda had bequeathed this warrior’s countrymen with a terrible blight that had the warrior sleepwalking in a terrible illusion until the fallen eagle again could spread its’ wings and fly.
It had been cursed.
One ray of light had appeared in what had seemed to be a dim fog of depression.
The virtuous tutor had produced what was now an angelic warrior and the result was a man ready to face his fears.
King Alexander, the warrior in question and ruler of what at the moment was a sleeping empire, had seen his territory assailed by mysterious riders eight years ago and was riding through unknown territory as a result of these assaults. One of the long forgone attackers, a blonde and female forest gypsy messenger named Nina Ray, let herself be caught and assaulted by the King’s daughter Belinda, who was a princess devastated by her own anger.
Belinda was a woman with a history.
11 years before that questioning of the attacker of Nina Ray Belinda had heard the woman’s name uttered by the exiled royal sister and the Princess Lucinda Winsletenna.
Nina Ray had then been described as a bringer of the apocalypse.
Belinda’s world started to crumble upon meeting Nina Ray in person. Belinda fled into religion and although the angels helped her, Belinda was too far away to be saved away from the underworld. She fled into passion, but passion was a very cunning foe. She fled into wedlock, but wedlock crumbled in the face of death.
Lucinda attacked her niece just as Nina Ray had attacked the empire, aiming to drown Belinda whilst Belinda bathed naked by a waterfall. Thinking she was safe, she saw that this was not the last of the attacks. After Belinda’s tumultuous wedding celebrations Lucinda returned.
On the last day of feasting, the witch came home with a ten-headed Kerberos creature, half dog and half snake to curse the kingdom with a threefold manifesting pestilence. Lucinda had been thrown out of the kingdom for murder and arson and, just as her own prediction had been, she had come back to haunt them.
At first nothing happened that indicated a curse was on the manifold.
A child was born. His name was Alfred and he was the heir to the throne. Everything seemed fine until a mysterious gentleman arrived. His name was Nomed Snekawa and his bon vivant attitudes made the palace shiver and cheerful and the same time. He became a man for all seasons at the royal palace in immaculate velocity. He became an entertainer, a repairman, a lover of royal harlots and medicine man for small wounds faster than the princess enjoyed.
An epidemic turned the entire city of Clurafar into a coughing nightmare. The man with the strange name had the cure for the sickness. Belinda warned her father that this man might be dangerous. The King did not listen and went on with his plans to cure his palace from the epidemic. After being seduced by Nomed, Belinda gave in and took the potion that would cure them all.
The palace fell asleep on the 23rd of September 1425 and woke up with Nomed Snekawa gone. What they found was the haunted kingdom, a place that soon was devastated by war and scandal. Two years, nine months and five days later Alexander was the last inhabitant in the haunted kingdom, seemingly left completely alone after Belinda died on May 28th 1428. It had been 978 days of incubation before the haunted kingdom actually had turned real in the form of the third curse.
After war and scandal came solitude.
Alexander was troubled by ghouls and travels to a distant future and let himself go completely.
On March 7th 1429, Belinda returned from the dead to tell her father that the world he was living in was an illusion and that his task was to ride out into the wilderness to find and track down Lucinda and kill her. That way he could save not only his entire family, trapped in a replica of the royal castle located in hell.
Alexander set out on a journey. He met the archangels and saw the soul-collector spring out of hell to get him. He spent two months in a forest and a week on the wasteland of lost souls, before meeting his younger self who led him to the archangels in disguise.
They made him an angelic warrior.
Alexander had spent the last year with these archangels in a forest village, where the houses had built up in trees. That ides of March 1430 he first now realized that these villagers had been nothing else than angelic creatures, training him to face Lucinda, making him a wizard.
Somewhere in the breeze of time that now for the first time in years blew across the plains of the old land there was the voice of a lost nation crying out, a voice existent only in the minds of 36 sleeping delegates from the Prosperanian nation. It was a land torn apart and captured within a time trap by a woman disguised as a bon-vivant of sorcery. The woman, a witch, had been hunted by her brother Alexander a year now. He had gone out into the haunted kingdom to find her in order to wake up to reality once again.
He knew that the only way to save the reality was to find and kill Lucinda.
If he lost, everything would be lost as well.
The origin of the last battle that now occurred lay in the dawn of time, before the Lord split his creation into two realities in order to save mankind from the his original son called Lucifer.
Lucinda was a weapon against God to win the alternate reality and prevent the era of peace to commence in the form of Alexander’s grandson Alfred. With Lucinda’s help, Lucifer was avenging himself upon his blood brother Michael for encaging him in his own cave where the duel between Alexander and Lucinda was to take place in due course.
Alexander’s former arch enemy King Adnicul of the land of Nocturania had been betrayed by Lucifer and encaged. Adnicul was Lucifer first sin transformed out of seed of good from the tree of forbidden fruit in paradise.
Since then Adnicul had been a nervous soul, crisscrossing eternity as countless demons. The angels, in particular his former servants Eric and Rebecca, were going to try to team up the two former foes to win back the good land and send Adnicul back to his tree on the Fields of Nostalgia
Alexander, out to win back his kingdom back, woke up that morning very well rested, thinking about his conversations with his friends his tutors Old Father and Queen Carla the night before. He walked to the lake for a swim and then climbed up an apple tree to pick out an apple for breakfast. As he then walked about the village looking for his friends, he more and more realized that everyone had left him in body and began to wonder why. Wearing the woollen shirt and sheepskin vest Carla had made for him herself, he oddly felt like someone that was walking around in a suit of armour, strong, bewildered, encaged and happy.
Ruth, Peter, Fred, Carl, Carla, George, Manuel, Old Father were every one of them now gone without leaving a trace behind. They had appeared as unexpectedly as they now had disappeared.
His best friends were gone. Why so suddenly?
The king had forgotten how it was to be alone. Those old feelings from the long time in the forest returned. This time, though, it was different. He didn’t feel like a victim anymore. Nobody could push him down. In spite of simple clothing, the slight spring chill and complete solitude, he felt stronger than he had ever felt in his youth. He felt like the man he was, a newly trained and very well equipped warrior ready to face a supremely difficult challenge. Fear was there. The fear did however not haunt him. For the first time in a long time Alexander Roderick Winsletenna felt how well Fabian had tutored him in the arts of magical swordsmanship and angelic wizardry.
The breeze was yielding, the sun was frosty, the birds sang, but the individuals were gone.
The mead barrels were empty as his heart was full of joy.
The stables across the road had no horses and now even Mercutio was gone.
He was completely alone, but content.
Carl’s blacksmith-workshop was empty. Leaves covered the pathway. The hooves and hammers lay around like discarded old meat grinders after a slaughter. Someone had dropped his tools and left without further discourse.
He looked up toward the tree house and saw the clouds behind the branches. He saw his room from down here and all he could feel was the strange sensation of having survived another attack.
Even the lake was deserted. At times he could find himself going there just to meet Peter or Ruth on an errand to find a few flowers to put on the tables of the pub.
But even by the lake there was no one to be found.
The village had been fled. No, not fled. Deserted.
That was the word he was searching for. Deserted.
What had happened to Carla? Did she just feel like leaving him alone?
And Old Father, that dear mentor? What had happened to him?
He reviewed the past year that had surpassed so quickly and with such vigour. It had made him into the man he was today. He clearly remembered meeting these woodland creatures at the marketplace and he remembered becoming one of them. He realized that they were disguised angels.
He climbed up the tree and checked all the rooms inside the tree houses.
No one there inside his room. No one here in his study. No one behind the curtains before the cupboard. No one in Carla’s room. No one in Old Father’s house where he had spent nights discussing life and philosophy in order to understand the mysteries of learning.
He climbed down the ladder and slipped about halfway, lost his grip and hit his head on a branch before grabbing the tree and hanging from that branch, blisters on his hand, by just a hair. His hand was hurting and he felt a drop of blood trickle down his forehead toward his nose.
He had hit his head.
The drop travelled down toward his nostrils and stayed there.
Slowly it dangled, grew bigger and was pulled by gravity toward the ground.
It dropped in what for him seemed to be a slower motion of movement.
He watched the blood drop travel toward the ground and hit the stemroots.
He watched the branch crack and remembered Fabian telling him he was a magician.
The branch broke and fell to the ground.
Alexander watched the branch fall to the ground.
He looked at his right hand. It was free.
It was not holding on to anything.
He looked at his left hand. It was free.
It was not holding on to anything.
He looked at his right foot. It was free.
It was not holding on to anything.
He looked at his left foot. It was free.
It was not holding on to anything.
He was levitating. He was flying.
He saw his hands moving about. His feet.
In mid air he then spun twice around and circled the tree, saw the gym and the blacksmith’s shop, flew past the inn and ended up where he had started. He touched the wound on his forehead. It was healing.
A huge smile spread across his face as he levitated over the ground, feeling that odd sensation of nervous joy in his lower bowels. Flying had also been part of the training. He had been taught that in an illusion like the one he was living in the rules of gravity don’t apply. He had made himself younger in order to be stronger and now he could make himself fly.
He felt as if butterflies were circling his intestines, dancing about from his lower crotch up to his lungs. He had indeed learned his lesson. He was able to levitate. He believed in himself and not in the illusion. That was a good sign. Now, could he believe in himself enough to conquer fate?
He slowly descended down toward the ground and landed next to the branch, crouched over.
He saw the drop of blood on the stem. His drop of blood.
He moved his finger toward it and slid his finger along the tree. He looked at it and then touched his forehead.
The wound was gone.
He felt his face.
A clean shave.
He stood up and began walking toward the gym, which was no more than a rebuilt barn with a leather mattress. Something told him that he would find something in that long beige building with its thatched roof. Something told him that he would find something that he never knew existed.
He opened the door and walked in.
There in the middle of the hall he knew so well, having been trained to become a sorcerer there, standing upright in a well carved wooden stand of thick mahogany, was … a sword.
He walked the fifty feet to the middle of the hall, each step seeming an eternity, and bent down to look at it.
He felt as if he was in a room full of people.
But he was alone here, was he not?
The handle was green and red and very thick. There was a decoration on the handle, a branch circling the handle. The branch was thick and dark green with red thorns embedded into the silver metal. Two thin turtles stuck out on each side and formed what was the end of the handle.
The stand was dark brown and had decorations on it the form of sea grass and flowers.
One large wooden rose decorated its top. The sword itself was stuck into a thick block of ebony that had two long wooden pieces on each side holding the sword up.
There were decorations on the sword itself, carved on the side.
But in Gothic writing very clearly to be read on the sword itself was the name:

S T . M I C H A E L

What he had not seen before was the belt and holder that lay behind the stand.
It was thick and round and there were so many decorations in the leather that he realized he was looking at a work of art.
He bent down and picked it up, felt the leather in his hand and put the belt on. The buckle closed almost by itself.
Then, the holder was buckled onto the belt and it actually felt like he was made into a warrior. Someone chosen to fight for the good of man. At least for his own future.
He was St. Michael’s fighter on earth.
He turned around and picked up the sword.
It was not half as heavy as before.
After all, he had more muscle now.
He swung it around a few times and spun around, bending forward and letting the weapon switch hands a few times. He felt himself lift another four feet and perform a summersault in the air before letting the sword again switch hand a few times, surprised at the easy with which he handled this heavy weapon.
He looked down at his biceps and found himself admiring his own muscles. When he swung his head upward he felt long hair tickling his neck. It was then that he first realized that he was not a man with short hair anymore.
He had the hair that he had enjoyed having at age 19. He was shaven and muscular.
He held the sword in both hands, swung it around and landed.
Then he watched the sword like a man who would watch a newly aquired reward which is what it was. He put the sword into his belt and instinctively started walking back toward the door.
He was still in the training hall, but as he walked toward the door he realized that it was changing shape. It was now a wooden door.
Slowly, as he found himself walking closer to the door, he saw the walls change. He was not anymore in the house he had been.
“Find out what is behind that door, Alex!”
The voice that spoke was soft and familiar. He could not place the voice’s owner but knew him well. The door handle was gilded and so well decorated that it seemed that he had to concentrate in order to recognize it as a door handle at all. Many of the round pegs that stuck out from the thick mahogany were so sharp at the end that it seemed an impossibility to touch them without hurting oneself. Four very large model mountains were on positioned on each side of the door.
Two on the left and two on the right. They were fixed upon large grey podiums on the top of each alp was a wolf howling. Behind each wolf was a statue of Lucifer, obviously bronze, painted red.
He was opening his mouth and screaming. It was a soundless scream. The sides of his mouth were cocked upward in a snarl.
“Ridiculous.”
The word came from the look on the demon’s face. It simply spoke those words loudly and clearly. Sire Winsletenna, the king of Prosperania, found himself walking in stately, solemn step toward a door whose owner he did not know in a palace where he had never before entered. He raised his right hand, the one not clutching the sword, and realized he was dragging the sword behind him. His hand was trembling. Like a child scared to open his mouth in fear of what would come out.
“Wish yourself somewhere!”
But where? Closer to his goal maybe?
He had no power over this. Whatever lay beyond that door was his fate. That much was clear.
He turned around and discovered the forest was gone, the gym was gone, the trees were gone, the inn was gone. He was now in a castle. The ceiling above him consisted of thick beams of what he supposed was hustilar wood, the thickest and most vicious of all Nocturanian trees, above an oak background. There was a throne at the end of the hall, obviously gilded mahogany on a podium of satin carpeted silver with two steps leading down to a marble platform above sandstone.
There was a painting above the throne.
Above it read, in Nocturanian: “Diabolus Rularis Nocturaniae” and four eagles were landing on a lion. The lion was screaming and under it was a small sign, clear enough for him to read it: “Prospurus mortis” and a castle in the background that clearly looked like Iuventus Sacrum.
Along the walls were stone statues, tigers and dragons and snakes and the like. Each one was separated by a spear with four large thorns sticking out from its middle. One large torch was hanging from a handle above each statue.
As he approached the door, Alex found himself shivering hoping to fall asleep and wake up somewhere else.
“Fire! This place thrives on fire! The fire of the heart!”
He knew not from where these words came, but he knew that Lucifer’s face spoke of ridicule and that whatever this castle was had its origin in the place that Raphael had spoken of as the dungeons of darkness.
He lifted his sword and grabbed it by both hands.
Now his stood in front of the door and he could not help but smiling at what he saw.
The door slowly opened on its own and beyond the scattered leaves on the front steps lay a forest not thick but open. A hillside that seemed to lead toward a town of some kind. The sky was blue and the few clouds that decorated it were interrupted only by one large rainbow that led from the sky’s northwest to northeast.
It was a gigantic panorama that met his gaze and he had to gasp for air in order not to fall down upon the sandstone floor and let his sword drop. Four robins had gathered among the dry leaves on the step to eat a few crumbs of bread that some had left behind.
The only trees he could see were scotch fir trees. Close to the castle were bushes. There was a slight breeze so he found himself watching how they swayed.
He picked up the sword again with both hands and discovered biceps and triceps that must’ve rivalled most of the soldier muscle he had seen in his life. His shaven face and long hair was a nice contrast to his brown skin clothed by the leather vest and fur trousers.
The shadows from the trees outside were transparent and showed off more sun than darkness.
The sun was bright that day.
He walked out of the palace and at once, standing there on the front stoop. He realized that this was the landscape of his soul. The little robins, which did not move, were simply his happy memories and the town was his pride.
He definitely had left all reality behind him now.
He was completely in his own world.
But this world was influenced by demons, wasn’t it?
That meant he had no control over it.
This was still Nocturania and he still was on his way to the Cave of Yambalah.
Maybe Lucinda created images that would make him want to shiver or scream or sing.
What it all amounted to was that he was a puppet?
He started walking down the steps and realized he was no longer a springtime wanderer but had ventured into autumn.
Of what year, he wondered?
He did not know. Neither did he want to know.
Maybe the seasons would change according to his inner life.
He knew what he had found in the training hall. In there he had found himself.
He heard a horse neigh and looked to his right. There, standing next to a tree, was Mercutio. Familiar old Mercutio, saddled and ready to gallop. The stallion was sturdy and was looking Alexander’s way and the king at once realized that the horse’s eyes now were so awake that his conscious self had not only awoken, but received what could be described as a monument of spirituality.
He actually saw the horse smile. It was a nice smile and a sweet smile.
It was the smile of a stallion.
Behind him one of the robins on the front stoop was giggling.
He walked up to Mercutio and petted him on his mane, feeling the soft texture of his neck hair.
Alex realized that he now no more had a belt for his sword but a
holder for it hanging sideways from his lower back, something Theodorakis Killi had tutored him to make for himself when he had been taught to swordfight in his youth.
He put his sword in its holder and mounted the horse.
That was when he realized that he was being watched.
On the large open space to the left of the main entrance of the
castle two people were standing.
The were chattering in some to him unintelligible Hispanic
linguistic murmur.
He realized then and there that he hadn’t really looked behind him to see from where he had come and saw that the tall castle was simply Misar Rularia, where Zeekha apparently had spent the last years of her life. The three towers that seemed to shoot up into a blue sky had four long spears sticking up on top and small windows where he could see people as well.
These people were looking at him. One of them was even waving at him to leave.
The two people were looking up at the left tower and smiling.
He did not recognize them. He knew that he had chased a Hispanic villain years ago the young man looked like him. He was tall and handsome and there was no doubt that he was the fiancé of the girl. A redhead.
She was a redhead.
But now that he had seen them, he realized that they had no shoes on.
The two of them were barefoot. Although their clothes were elegant and black clothing, such fitting to servants to the crown, a crown of some king of probably Nocturanian origin, their feet were dirty and full of scars. Now he saw that the man’s left foot was bleeding. A bone was sticking out of it. Alex had to cringe, for as the couple slowly turned toward him he saw that their faces were bloody and the man’s throat had been slit clear open and his muscle tissue and tendons and even gullet could be seen even from here.
The woman was wounded only from the breast and up. Her left eye was hanging out and her mouth had been slit open so that one could see her lower gums.
Alex felt himself fall of the horse and hit the floor, his guts spilling out on the ground.
Mercutio behind him, he felt himself looking up and seeing the couple’s feet and then legs and then crotches and then …
He looked up and saw them gazing down at him.
He grabbed Mercutio by the mane and jumped on the horse, down the hill across dry pine combs and fallen leaves.
He looked behind him and saw them slowly walking behind him down the hill.
He kicked Mercutio in the side to urge him to hurry up.
“Ride faster, get out of here” he bellowed at his stallion.
The hill grew steeper and soon enough Alex found himself leaning back and holding Mercutio’s bridles so tightly the horse began to froth at the mouth. The skidded and hit what seemed to be a real road and before riding off he saw the two young people approaching him slowly but surely down the hill.
“Hee-aah!”
He kicked Mercutio in his sides and began galloping down the hill toward what he felt would eventually turn into the street of a town once he was close enough to pass what he thought would be an avenue a bit of a way off.
He could hear the two youngsters skidding down the hillside in order to catch up with him.
He galloped down the road and onto a well beaten path alongside the real one. He took a shortcut across a field and as he looked back he saw the two looking across the field on the other side of the pasture. They started their walk across the field just as he skidded alongside the field and rode into the forest again. They kept on following him as he came onto the main road again.
He had to parry a little to come upon the road. It was clearly difficult for Mercutio. He was fighting not to fall. All the time those bad vibes came shooting out from the demons approaching. He looked back and he saw the skidding down the hill as well. He could see the young woman’s eye dangling from her socket and the veins of the gullet of the man thumping and throbbing.
He rode sideways and bent the steed and turned a while and finally he jumped across the ditch with the stallion to the road. Mud was squirting across the road and under the horse.
They were coming closer.
He had no more than landed on that road and began to ride frenetically when he turned around and discovered that he was nor followed any more. The two wounded youngsters had vanished. He stood there, feeling sweat dripping from his nose and forehead. His breath was frantic, but as he was calming down he realized that he his clothes were wet from all this excitement.
Expecting to see them jump out from any corner he rode away fast, entering the avenue and wondering who these two were, their wounded faces distraught and haunting his mind.
For around five minutes he guessed he rode down this straight road when he arrived at what seemed to be a downhill slope leading to some kind of village.
He stood there for a while and watched the village, not sure if he wanted to ride down.
He rode for a little bit, Mercutio’s hooves clip-clopping solemnly, criss-crossing the road.
Alex was still shook up by these two youngsters that had appeared out of nowhere and disappeared just as fast. He expected them to appear at any moment again and scare him.
When he had rode five hundred feet down that road in semi-darkness, he saw a sign. The sign was faded and old, written with black paint on rotting wood, nailed onto a post of ebony.

Riúzarly Village this way
Visit “The Ides of March” when you are there

He sat there on his horse for a couple of minutes thinking of Julius Caesar being stabbed by Brutus exactly 1474 years back, or 1469, whatever one wanted to believe about illusions. He felt himself wondering who these youngsters had been and if they had been Adnicul’s servants and if they had murdered Adnicul just like Caesar was killed by his closest friends.
He gathered that “The Ides of March” was a pub.
But would he find someone there?
Or was it another inn of a lost ghost town?
Something told him his life would change drastically down there.
His story, at least, would change in a major way once he entered the place.
He looked ahead. Ahead lay an avenue again. A downhill path then lead down to Riúzarly Village, a village with a suspiciously Nocturanian kind of name, with the emphasis on the ú.
Four statues of vultures surrounded the sign and behind it he could only see a few lights in what he supposed was the pub.
A light here and there shone in the semi-blackness of the village, so he supposed he was in for another visit in a place that was a figment of his own Lucindic imagination.
He saw the hill ahead and began riding to it through the darkness of the avenue.
Alexander knew then and there that he was back in Lucinda’s illusion now.
When he had woken up by the tree he had been transported to a safe haven where the angels worked as tutors. That had ended with the emergence from the tower. The difference was that now there were real friends in the illusion. But was this an illusion? It seemed so different. Maybe the worlds were starting to mingle. Maybe the answer was closer at hand and he was approaching the zenith of the power that was being presented. There were friends here, good friends. But also darker enemies.

§

Adnicul had not slept a wink since Eric had told him why Lucifer had wanted to expel him. That had been four days ago. Adnicul was still in his cell, but on the rare occasions that he spent outside of that small room with the twelve crosses he walked with Eric who told him of heaven and hell and what they really were and how Adnicul must change in order to save his soul.
He was a mutant. Something created out of a forbidden tree.
So he was actually a forbidden culprit, an object of sin and lust on the run.
When Eric told him what actually had happened when Eric and Rebecca had been forced to scare the wits of Alex just moments previous to this conversation, Adnicul felt impelled to ask Eric a question that popped up in his mind instinctively.
“You mean that certain events in a life trigger a thought process that leads to salvation?”
“Yes, they can, Adnicul. But they only will trigger such a process on your own terms and if you want it. You must want it. The time is ripe for that. Now you have to decide what to do with this.”
“The time is ripe for what?”
”The time is ripe for change.”
“Raphael told you that?”
“I am only a sub angel, but I do know that you must go to Riúsarly.”
“Why?”
”We will tell you once you are there.”
”Alexander is there, Adnicul. If you want to save your soul, then go to Riúsarly and visit Alex.
He needs you.”
“Alex needs me? You have got to be joking.”
”I never joke about serious matters.”
With that the conversation was finished.
Adnicul at once realized that his life had changed completely. He was no longer an independent man. He was fighting for a higher cause.
But he was very confused.

§

There was an interesting glow here. This small road had a glow about it. It was as if this road was a transition between what had been over in Misar Rularia and what was coming afterwards the trees had black stems with dark green leaves. The only light he really could see was the light from the moon on the other side of the opening before the hill to the village.
Behind the trees, however, was a glow. Small glittery sparks of lights seemed to fly back and forth behind the trees inside the trees. What they were he did not know.
All he knew was that he felt remarkably alone and as if he was walking around in a crowded place at the same time. He felt very good and very bad about the same sensation simultaneously. He felt good because he was coming closer to whatever reason had brought him out here in the first place. He felt bad because that very reason could destroy him entirely if he wasn’t careful.
As he then rode out into the open again, an old man was standing there in the dark.
Something had changed. It was now night.
He must’ve been one of those people who rarely spoke in real life, because as Alex saw him he seemed to be at a level which forbade him to enter another way of being which forced him to talk with other living beings. He was a twilight creature and exclusively destined to show travellers the right path to glory. The creature himself could not find salvation unless he was lead into Zion by someone that was pure and clean and did not need attention for selfish rule. Alexander felt himself float somewhere in time between his own conscious self and the odder twilight zone. There was a sort realization that his life was now changing. His soul now spoke to him in a language he heard before when he been younger and more open. Alexander was a man with a changed nature, but changed back to what he once had been. Dreams returned to him. Playing on the beach. Dropping coins in wells and singing about the future in melodious voices that sang of love.
Real life? So who was this old man? A ghost from Alexander’s past?
The man was standing in high grass, closed eyes, arms to his side. One raven sat on his left and one raven sat on his right shoulder. Two were at his feet. There had been four robins by the wayside. There four ravens here.
The old man had four teeth. Through his open mouth Alex saw only four of them and the man was smiling. These four teeth were rotting and brown, but there were four teeth there that he could see.
He was dressed in brown rags and his dirty feet were shoeless.
And yet, the man had a glow about him.
There was a truth to this strange old hermit that transcended time.
Alex stopped and sat there on Mercutio for two minutes just looking at the hermit, wondering where he had seen him before. He had met some people at the beginning of his trip.
The old man in the inn?
No.
This man was older. The man outside the forest?
The Cassandra that had told him to stay away?
Was that him? Yes, it was. He recognized him. His long grey hair was even more unwashed now that he seemed to have more mileage behind him. But there was a serenity to the man now that had not been there before.
Behind the man was the village. The inn was lit. Four other houses, as well.
The hermit opened his eyes and Alex at once remembered the old man’s blue eyes.
The smile remained.
Then the old man spoke, very slowly. He sounded like a priest. A toothless priest.
A toothless, meditating priest.
“You have done well” he said. Alexander said nothing to this. What could he say? “Last time I saw you, you had no goal. You were a ship without a compass. Now you are man with a mission. How did this happen?”
Alexander shrugged. Then he looked up, too shy to speak.
There was a smile on the man’s lips.
“I don’t know, old man” Alex finally said. “Maybe the truth of circumstance reached my soul of souls.”
“It happened within you” the man smiled and said. His toothless smile seemed to transcend the power of speech and tell him not to worry if things went wrong because they had a reason.
“I was lead by invisible forces” Alex responded. “Maybe that was it.”
“Yes, Sir” the hermit nodded, “but don’t forget that the invisible forces work for you and they work for God.” The man cocked his head, his face growing serious. “You know what I mean?”
Alex shrugged.
He was looking down at the village.
“What is down there?”
The hermit looked at Alexander’s finger and followed his pointing down to the valley.
The man looked at him again and there was a very clear look of calm and collected power in his face when he with such light and happiness said:
”Your future.”
Alexander shivered.
“Where am I heading?”
“Home” he responded. “You are heading home. But there are very strict lessons you have to learn.”
A slight breeze tousled his hair. “I have already suffered so. Why more pain?”
”You will receive everything back you have lost, but you have to face the inner demons.”
”In what way?”
”Join the enemy or have the enemy join you” the hermit said. “Transform them into beings of Light.” The hermit saw his confused gaze and laughed. “You have only begun this journey, your majesty. Remember that the real pain is up ahead.” The old codger looked down into the valley. “Down there you will find what life would be like if you had not been born, boy.”
The moon was a silver disc in the sky and the feathers of the four ravens glowed in the moon light. They were all walking in circles now around the old man’s feet. It looked like a rain dance.
“Why should the enemy join me? I hate the enemy.”
”Who is the enemy?”
”Lucinda. Adnicul. I have no idea where he is.”
”Your enemy is you and if you think that you need to conquer an enemy out there,” he said and pointed to the moon, “then you have learned nothing what Carla or your younger self has taught you.”
“Why is the enemy me?”
“Because you sent away Lucinda. You reprimanded Morgana. You escaped thirty years from something that needed to be dealt with.”
“Don’t bother me, old man” Alex said and stated off, seemingly irritated over having been reprimanded by a strange hermit by the wayside. “I will not face what life would be like had I not been born. Such nonsense. Leave me be.”
Alexander felt betrayed and bewildered and angry.
The man began to laugh, his toothless grin mocking him.
“Why are you laughing?”
He stopped his horse and rode back, almost challenging the hermit with his steady gaze.
“Because you still think you are a king.”
Alex stepped off his horse and pointed at the man.
“I am a king of the largest empire since Rome, so you better beware what you are saying, Sir.”
He shook his head.
“Where are your subjects now, Kingy-Wingy?”
Alexander shook his head. “What?”
“You heard me, your majesty. Where are your subjects, majesty-wajesty?”
“On leave” he took Mercutio and led him to the other side of the road, where he began to eat grass.
The man sniggered. “You have a problem, Sir!” The man made a farting sound. “Your arse!”
Alex left Mercutio where he was standing and looked up.
“You too. You have no teeth.”
He nodded. “Yes. You are right. My teeth are rotting. But at least I have a sense of humour.”
Alex looked down again.
“If you disagree with me, why don’t you leave?”
“Because I want to hear what you have to say.”
“Exactly, you need me. Why are you here? Because although the truth scares you, you need me.”
Alexander looked at the old man and saw that he was glowing. He lit up the road.
“Look at me, Alex. Who do you see?”
An angel. Alexander saw the angels of God.
“I see you. I see an angel.”
The hermit nodded.
”You see an angel because that is what you need to see. I might be something you created out your deep soul. I might be someone sent to you on purpose to talk to you about your future. Who do you think I am?”
Alex knew that he had been sent from heaven, opened his mouth to speak but was reprimanded.
“Your thought serves you well. Keep it in your deep soul.”
The hermit pointed to the village, his bony finger shaking.
“Four houses lit, four robins, four ravens,” the hermit said and looked back at Alexander, “and four rotting teeth.” The old man cackled, the teeth brown, his smile happy. “Four. Remember the four evangelists. Remember their names.”
Alex looked at the village, the inn and the four houses.
“Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.”
He looked at the hermit again and led Mercutio back across the road.
The stallion followed him.
“Go to the inn. You will be led to the four houses, Sir.” The hermit stood up straight, his back now strong and erect, pride shining across his features like a glow of life. “Remember why you are here, Alex. Call upon the spirits you need to help you. Find your country.”
Alex saw how the old man lifted every one of the ravens and turned into white wings that spread across his arms with white feathers.
Soon enough the old man was clad in white and floating mid air.
The hermit gave off a glow that seemed to shine across the entire valley way over to the mountains across the village. His face changed to one of angelic bliss.
“Be a good boy, now.”
The four feathers that had entered his aura left him and made his persona shine even more once gone. They hung mid air and were joined by four small specks of light from his mouth. These things moulded into one and were joined by four giggling spirits that seemed to glow in a ruby colour.
“Have the concentrated strength of a bird and fight the ravens of hell. Sink your teeth into the problem and maintain the happiness of a giggling robin.”
The four lights left the hermit-angel and hovered over the downhill road.
“Follow the four lights. They will lead you to where you need to be.”
With that, the angel left and Alex was wondering what magic powers where waiting for him next.
He slowly gazed at the four lights.
He mounted and sat up upon the saddle and began following the glowing, dancing lights down the hill.

§

For a year now she had been awoken every night by screams in the hallways. She had looked out the window and seen only the black horizon meeting the black sky. She had climbed the attic and seen the chain. She then realized that Iuventus Sacrum, such as it was, was hanging on a chain somewhere in another dimension.
She had lost everyone. They had lost her. She did not know which.
She had a feeling that every one of them where separated by illusion in their own alternate level of reality. Sieglinde, Steven, Zedrick, Rolf, Geena, Morgana, all of them. Even the little dog Henry. All of them where lost inside their own replica of home, chased by some odd demon.
She knew that some monster was guarding the castle at the end of the upper chain. For some reason, she believed that if Alex lost the battle, then the monster would chew the chain and send all of them down to oblivion.
She had searched everywhere and she had a theory. On chains all across the black place above what she thought was deep hell itself where a thousand replicas of the castle waiting to be catapulted down to oblivion. Her thought was that all these castles had someone in them.
How many people had been there that night?
One-hundred? Two hundred? Had Nomed given the potion to five hundred people? A thousand? Maybe Nomed had given the sleeping potion, the serum that put them to sleep, to more than them. Maybe the entire country had fallen asleep. Maybe armies of soldiers had entered the country and put the entire world to sleep.
How many demons were there?
Many, she supposed.
Maybe the entire world was asleep.
Maybe this was about more than just the royal throne.
Maybe this was the last battle.
All she knew was that someone was keeping her alive. Someone was feeding her fresh meat and newly baked bread. Someone was giving her wine and cheese and grapes and chocolates. Someone was playing music for her and then waking her up in the middle of the night and chasing her down the hallways.
She remembered Alexander. She remembered saying goodbye to him on the beach. She remembered returning to the castle. What was there before was not there now. She had been alone now for almost a year. And she could remember that day as if it been yesterday.

“I came here on leave to accompany you, but until you win the game you won’t see me again.”
Belinda saw her father cry and she knew that he was although there were no tears in his eyes.
“What do you mean?”
”I mean that this is it. You have to win the game now in order to see me again.”
She was tired and felt very alone. She would have to go back to the ghostly palace now. Whatever was waiting for her there?
“How do you know?”
She looked at his vest and started playing with one of the leather strings
“I feel it.” She half-smiled, bitterly. “That forest is no-man’s land. Meant for you and Lucinda, no one else. No one knows where she will take us after this.” Alex looked so worried. She sighed, trying to put this mildly. “I could not tell you, Dad, because she wouldn’t let me. She let me arrive in the chapel. I was your messenger. But she let me prepare you on one condition: that she could do anything with us that she wanted after you enter the real forest.” He looked to his right and shivered. Belinda stroked his cheek and saw the look of fear in his eyes. “What lies there is the real forest, Dad?” He looked back at her, his eyes now wide open.
They embraced and now time seemed to stand still, every breath cherished, the silence golden, every feeling a mystery and every emotion a treasure. He would never let her go. She would never let him go. He would never let her go. She …
“… will never let you go, Belindy. Never!”
”Win for us, Father. Win for all of us.”
He nodded, unlocked the embraced and looked into her eyes.
“I will.” Those eyes were hers. They were the same person in two different souls. “I will.”
Then she smiled and drifted away. She could feel his hand slip out of hers, the texture rubbing against his like soft sandpaper created by dust and sleep and water bottles and fleas on horses. She saw him floating back into nothingness and disappearing into the wind of the darkness and until she was gone in this illusion she looked at him, trying to memorize this moment forever.
Then she was gone.

For what seemed like an eternity now she had seen no one and she knew that this last battle was the hardest part. She had replayed all her mistakes over and over. She had relearned everything she had ever learned by heart. Every song she had ever sung, every poem she had ever had written, every book she had ever read, every trip that she had ever taken, every moment with her father. Every moment with Steven, every moment making love, every moment holding a speech, every flower she had smelled, every glass of wine.
But at night, Belinda Winsletenna still woke up screaming, Lucinda looking into her eyes like a red demon dancing the jig in her dreams.
Every night, she prayed that someone would be strong enough to save her. In which hell she ever was, she hoped that some angel would hear her strongest of prayers.
She hoped that the angels would send her Alexander that would save her and her family soon enough before the monster above chewed the last chain off, leaving her rotting in the bowels with the rest of eternity.
Where ever her family was she hoped that Raphael at least would hear her and save them all.
She hoped that Alex would hear her.
Before it was too late.

§

“Five years, my friend” the man said, grinning. “Five years I have been innkeeper here and not once have I served mead not well brewed or fish not well fried. I have not met one man who did not know how to discourse tidily and be able to live with a troubling task in spite of problems.”
The innkeeper belched and smiled.
“You, my friend, are a problem.”
The pub was so full and so noisy that he could not hear himself think, let alone have an innkeeper lead him into analyzing his soul. He took his fat finger and almost pushed him off the stool with it.
“You think too much. You follow what you don’t understand instead of what you do understand.”
“You gathered that from my few comments about my journey?”
“What did you tell me, Alex? For the past mead you have pondered over how long you have been wandering now. You are afraid that you are not ready to face the challenge.” The fat man wiggled with his eyebrows and his red cheeks puffed. “You didn’t even look around. Maybe you find some friends in here. But no. You went straight to the bar and started belly achin’ ‘bout your … woes.”
Alex at once had a vision of this man by his dinner table with a huge handkerchief on his belly, eating a chicken with his bare hands as he walks in the door of some inn and then the man bouncing up and bowing to him. Where had he seen him before? “Your problem is that you are ready for anything you want to be ready for and you don’t know it.”
“Maybe I am.”
The man shook his head, walked to the counter behind him and took him his large lead glass of mead and drank it all down in one gulp. “No, Sir!” He belched loudly and wiped off the one drop trickling down his chin with the back of one hand. “No maybe’s! Maybe you should think of the good things you have and be happy you have what you own. Life would be worse if those things were not there. What would life be like if you didn’t have what you have?”
Alexander took a large gulp of his mead and thought about the man’s words.
He turned to another man who arrived. The man was blonde and muscular. A young buck of maybe 25 or 30.
“Yes, Sir Steven!”
At that moment he knew where he had seen the innkeeper.
He had seen him on the way back from Alliland. He had been the man who had pranced and slimed around Alex like a caterpillar around a tree. His name had been Julian, right? Yes. Julian. My God. What was he doing here?
“Two pints of wheat mead, please.” The man sat down next to Alex and rubbed his legs, stretching. “Some of your bread, too, as well. My wife is on her way.”
Julian nodded and started pouring the thick mead from the other barrel into two large lead glasses. He took some bread from a large covered basket and out into a big wooden bowl.
“Sir?”
Julian turned around and the young man turned around to look at Alex, as well, having faced the other way toward a chubby woman and her thin friend sitting and laughing in the corner.
“Don’t I know you?”
Julian handed the young man the bread and the mead.
“Have you not met me before?”
Julian shook his head and wiped his hands off his apron. The apron was wet and dirty by now.
”Sire, the first time I saw you was when you walked in through that door.”
”Your name is Julian, right?”
”I introduced myself when you did, Sire! But your name I have forgotten.”
He stretched forth a hand. Julian took it. “Alexander Winsletenna.”
The fat man took his hand and shook it.
“Pleased. Never forget a face, even if it is the first time. Sorry. Now mingle.” The man pointed toward the tables, made a sweeping gesture opening his eyes and smiling. “Open your eyes, man!”
It was the fat innkeeper from the inn near Clurafar.
For some odd reason this reality had transformed Julian into another man who did not know him. The young man next to him took his mead and started drinking it. Alex turned his head very slowly toward the young man. Mingle? Why? He had expected the inn to be full. The old man on the hill had in a way prepared him for that. He gathered that the lights would lead him. Something always did. He looked at the young man and at once recognized who it was.
It was his daughter’s husband. It was Steven.
He smiled and patted Steven on the back, a tear running down his cheek.
“Steven!”
The young man looked at him, baffled.
“Sir?”
“Steven, my friend, don’t you know me? It’s me. Alex!”
The young man took a long look at Alex and then looked at the innkeeper, who shrugged.
“Don’t ask, Sire,” Julian responded, drying off a glass with his dirty apron. “It is better that way.”
Steven looked back at Alex.
“As nice as I am sure that you are, Sir, I must claim not to know you. Just like the innkeeper here. But I might get to know you. Let us have a mead and talk.”
”You are married to my daughter Belinda.”
The young man stood off his stool and picked up his knife from its holder at his belt.
“You might’ve heard Julian mention my name. But how do you know my wife’s name?”
Alex raised a hand and shook his head, smiling. “Steven? I mean no harm. I am your father-in-law.”
A few people had stopped talking and were looking at them, suspiciously.
Steven was slightly crouched forward, his woollen, striped vest hanging forward over his thick cotton shirt. His one brown boot sticking up in the air and his left foot resting on the wooden footrest of the bar. Julian walked up from behind the bar and put his hand on Steven’s shoulder. Steven was startled and looked at him with wide open eyes.
Julian nodded at Steven and Alexander was left wondering why Steven was wearing these simple clothes and why Julian knew nothing about who his king was.
“Calm down, you rascal! I told him who your wife is. He put together the rest himself. Quite a fantasy he has, this one.”
Steven nodded and put his knife back in his belt. He inspected Alex for a long time and sat down on his barstool. The talking commenced and Julian walked behind the counter again, drying his glasses on the apron again.
“Feisty one, ain’ he?”
Alex nodded very quickly without sitting down.
“Yes, Julian!”
Steven was drinking his mead and sulking.
Alex took his mead in his hand and drank and put it down, very confused about all of this. He thought about the innkeeper’s words about mingling and began looking out for someone else to talk to.
It was then he recognized the chubby woman sitting in the corner by the door, laughing along with a thin elegant man.
A grin spread across his lips.
“Geena!”
Alex opened his arms and ran to her.
The woman cowered in her corner, afraid of what might happen next.
Behind Alex a baritone innkeeper voice exclaimed: “Oh, no! Not again!”
Alexander sat down next to her and hugged her as she began laughing.
“Geena Johnstone. My dear, how are you?”
The woman looked at her partner and began laughing, her belly bouncing up and down, her cheeks turning red. There was a mixture of extraordinary surprise and exaltation fulfilled mirth there. She began laughing, the entire table shaking with the power of her belly pushing the table with her laughter.
“Who are you, Sire?”
She pointed toward him and looked at her partner.
“Rolf? You know this man?”
Alex looked at the man and instantly recognized him as his faithful houseman. Rolf shook his head and grinned, trying not to chuckle too much.
Geena stood up and hollered: “Does anyone know who this is?”
No one answered. There was murmur, some laughter, but no response.
After a while some woman sitting way across the way beyond the bar answered:
”Send ‘im over. I might want to!”
Geena stood up again.
“Y’can ‘ave him, Sweetie!”
She sat down.
Alex was in panic.
“Why don’t you know me? Why don’t you know me, Geena?”
He stood up, knocked over her empty glass and stepped Rolf on the foot.
“Watch out!” Rolf exclaimed.
Alexander backed away.
”Rolf? You know me?”
Rolf shook his head.
“I am your king!”
Geena opened her eyes even wider now and began laughing so loud that everyone began laughing with her.
She stood up and bowed. “Your majesty!” She laughed again. “Your noble majesty!”
Alexander turned once and saw only people he knew. The innkeeper had been right. He should’ve mingled. Patrick was sitting with Erica at the table next to him. “Patrick? Erica?“
The young couple had been joined by their son who was sitting petting a cocker spaniel in the
corner. ”Henry? Lance?”
”Do we know you, Sir?”
He rubbed his face and all the time he felt the eyes of a million people who all knew him. He saw Mormidar, Ulfaas, Morgana, Julius Cretan, Bishop Bernardus Paul, Theo, Marcus, Simon, Louis, Bantrard, Zedrick, Patricia, Maria, Martin, Eleonora, Marcus, Henricus Balthazar, the Great Danes, every one of the people in this room he knew. Everyone in this room he knew and he saw it in his eyes that they had no idea that they knew who he was.
He looked at Julian, who shook his head.
“I told you that you were a problem, Alex! Leave!”
”No” Alex screamed.
At that moment, two women entered the establishment being lead by a man in black suit and a large moustache, a turban on his head.
He recognized them all.
The women were wearing blue and white dresses and bundled up in thick fur coats.
They stopped in the doorway when the saw him, looking around the inn and realizing that no one spoke.
The young woman walked up and spoke to Alex:
”Sir, how can I help you?”
Alexander began sobbing, fell down on his knees.
The young woman bent down and caressed his forehead.
“Sir, let me help you up!”
Alex slowly stood up and shook his head.
“Don’t you know me?”
The young woman shook her head.
“No, I am sorry. I am sorry that I don’t. I am here with my father and mother.” Alex looked at the bearded man with the turban looking at the woman. “My father here is mayor of this village and this man over at the bar is my husband Steven.”
Alex could only repeat what he had already said:
”Don’t you know me?”
Steven rushed up from the bar, took up the glass and smashed it on the floor. It broke into a thousand pieces.
“Julian put down his last glass and exclaimed: “Your are going to have clean that up!”
Without listening, Steven rushed up to Alex and took him by the neck and screamed:
”This man claims to be your father!”
Alex pushed Steven away with his strong hands. Steven bumped against the wall.
The bearded man came. “Sire, stop bothering us. If you want Julian can give you a room for
the night. Would you like that?”
”Mustafus, remember how you told me to put myself first?”
The man shook his head. “I know not of what instance you are speaking” the man rumbled in a low voice. Alex looked at the woman, still standing in the doorway.
”Wife, Sieglinde. You must know me.”
Alex shook her and hugged her.
“Have not seen you in such a long time. You must know me. You must know me.”
Mustafus came up and pushed him away, calmly.
“That is quite enough.” He gestured to Julian to come over. The innkeeper did so and took Alex by the shoulders. “Give this man your room on the upper floor. Give him some food and let him sleep.”
The fat man took Alex by the hand. Immediately Alex let go.
“Leave me!”
“Young man, behave!” Julian said. At once, Alex realized he was young and had forgotten that he was not the king he thought he was. He was even younger than Steven.
“Let me be!”
”Come up and sleep in the room!”
The man walked up to the bar and gestured to Alex to come.
What would he have to go to if he didn’t come with?
At once, he saw the four lights above Julian’s head. They were hanging there, waiting for him
to follow.
Against his will, he did follow the innkeeper behind the bar. He took a last look at every one of the people that he knew so well.
“Why don’t you know me?”
Julian lit a large candle.
Alex turned around and followed Julian through a narrow door up a squeaking, wooden dark staircase and up to a landing with two doors. One to the left and one to the right.
Julian opened the door to the left and gestured for him to enter.
Alexander entered a room with low ceiling.
Julian came in and put the large candle on the main table by the outer wall. It lit the room well.
There was a large bed next to the table and a picture of an angel opposite the bed. The room was not big, but it was cosy.
Alex sat down on the bed and saw how the four lights hoovered in the middle of the room and stayed there while Julian walked down to get some food.
He came back some time later, whilst Alex was still sitting numb on the bed and put the tray with chicken and bread and mead on the table. He stopped in the doorway and said:
“Do you see know why you are a problem?”
Alex looked up.
He shook his head.
“I know them. Why don’t they know me?”
”Regardless. Do your own thing. Don’t be so dependant on other people and what they think.”
”These people are my closest friends and family.”
Julian held up his hand: “I know you think they are. But you are not at home. You are a guest here. Act like one. This is not home. This is somewhere else. Keep your true feelings to yourself, even if it is hard. Everyone does not know exactly who and what you are. You are important to you. Save yourself for you.” Julian sighed and pointed toward the table. “Eat something and go to sleep. I think you should just make sure that you get a night’s sleep and get going tomorrow. You have a long journey ahead of you?”
Alexander looked down.
He did, didn’t he. He looked up at the four lights still hovering in mid air. The four evangelists. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. Four houses. Four homes. Four messengers.
He looked at Julian.
“I think so!”
Darkest Callenia was still ahead.
The Haunted Forest was still ahead. The battle was still ahead.
“You have a goal, don’t you?”
Alex nodded.
“Sleep then.” Julian tried to smile. “Sorry about your disappointing evening.”
Alex sighed and shook his head.
“A guess it is a lesson someone wants to teach me, whatever it is it wants to tell me.”
Julian smiled, this time it was genuine, his red cheeks puffing up and his eyebrows raising.
“You are the main character in the book of your life. You can help others as much as you want, but do it from your standpoint. Don’t hit people over the head with your life because they are not like you.”
Alexander understood none of what he said.
“Sleep well, Sire!”
Julian closed the door and left him alone.
Thoughtfully, Alexander walked up to the table and ate.
The food tasted good, the mead was delicious. But the food had almost no effect on him. Afterwards he was just as sad. He went to bed and slept and dreamt of home.

Theo rode up to the wagon, giggled to himself, letting Marcus sneer at his own mistake all he wanted to, and acrobatically displayed his magic feature of being able to ride, bend over and still hold a conversation with him at the same time, even accepting an offer of having a sip of wine. He turned the horse around and rode alongside the wagon, making dust wave up behind him. He drank out of the king’s cup, dried off his hand and gave the cup back.
“Thanks, your majesty!”
"They have no idea that I am drunk on your wine and haven't slept more than an eyeful. But Marcus is such a damn stiff."
He half-smiled. "But he loves his country."
Theo laughed, cynically. "He does his job well." Theo's face turned slightly tongue-in-cheek. "Where's he stiff again?"
"Have another sip, my friend." Alex said with a little chuckle.
The bottle was handed over to the rider, who drank and then handed back the bottle.
“Good sire … You want to make me drunk? Then I shall be careful about my position.”
"What's your errand, Sir Theo?"
"I rode up a few miles down the road, your majesty, and there has been an accident about half hour away and the scene is not funny at all.”
“Why would there be anything funny about it?”
“The man claims he saw an attacker …” Alex said nothing to this. “One of the black ones.”

Alex woke up around two hours later, a full belly, fully clothed and realized that Mercutio was still standing outside the inn with nothing to eat but a small bag of grain around his neck.
Half of the candle had burned down.
Alex looked at the four lights.
This time they were by the door.
It was obvious that they wanted him to stand up and leave for downstairs.
What he found interesting was that he that he referred to the lights almost as living beings.
Maybe they were.
Rubbing his eyes, he put on his boots and stood up. He blew out the candle, realized how light this room was thanks to the dancing lights and walked to the door.
He opened it and followed the lights down the stairs. Thanks to them he didn’t even have to use a candle. The squeaking staircase alarmed his arrival, for soon Julian, still behind the bar and serving drinks, opened the door.
There were around forty candles now in the inn, lighting up the place.
Julian smiled.
“What a coincidence.” He stretched forth his hand. “We were just speaking about you.”
“I slept all right” Alexander said, returning the favour. “The food was good. May I?”
”Come down?”
Alex nodded.
“Yes, of course.”
Alex entered the inn and realized that ten of the candles were in and around the bar and that the rest of the candles had been positioned strategically about the place. The inn was not as full anymore. Belinda and her other family were there and Geena and Rolf and a lot of other people he did not know.
“Sit down by the large table.” Alex walked up and introduced himself. “Sorry that I was such a pain before.” The people at the table shook their heads.
“Don’t say that” Steven said. “We are the ones who have to excuse ourselves.”
Mustafus grinned. “Sit down!”
Alex took a seat next to Belinda and felt really strange about not knowing what to say to the dearest person on earth who didn’t know him.
There came mead and bread and Alex chatted and chatted, listened and chatted. Belinda was quiet all along and Alex felt odd not saying anything to her.
In the middle of the night, the party was breaking up.
The party said farewell and disappeared out the door, wished him luck with his endeavours as the door closed. The words of the old hermit at the top of the hill came back to him. The old codger had looked down into the valley and whispered sweet nothings into his conscience and these sweet nothings had come true. “Down there you will find what life would be like if you had not been born, boy.”
Why had he been taught this lesson?
Maybe it was because he shouldn’t take anything for granted.
He should treat all his children well, all his friends and family, and not just concentrate on one.
Alexander was left alone with his mead, not even knowing where Julian was.
He wandered about the place a few minutes, calling for him. He realized that Julian, wherever he had been earlier, had left all together.
At that moment the four lights started spinning toward the main door and Alex instinctively followed them toward it.
On the way, the stopped by a bowl of bread and Alex picked up a loaf and followed them out through the door, realizing that Mercutio was standing at the very spot that Alexander had left him a long time ago. The four lights hovered over the stallion’s head and as they did, the king fed him the entire loaf piece by piece.
In doing so, he still maintained that it had been a nice evening with nice food and nice mead, although there was virtually no reason to be happy about having been rejected by his most loved ones.
But Alex was now sure they were figments of his imagination.
Alex mounted and began following the lights down the road toward the first house.
Funnily enough, the experience had made him stronger. He felt free, knowing that he saving his country for Belinda, Sieglinde, his children and his subjects. But now another person had been added to that list.
He himself.
He was now added to the list of souls he was trying to save his country for.
He had to laugh, because he knew then and there the angels had simply told him to refer to himself first of all. That first and foremost saving his country for himself, loving people for himself, caring for someone because it felt good, was no crime.
He had shed tears that eventually turned into a rainbow in his soul.
It was an unusual way to tell him how to surpass his analytical nature but it was a good way.
He had received Youth from Fabian.
Magic from St. Michael.
He had received a Goal from Carla.
Now Julian had given him Confidence.
Following the four lights off to the first house, he wondered what St. Matthew would give him and whoever or whatever was waiting for him there.
Maybe it was freedom?

§

Someone in here was chasing her down the hall.
Again.
Someone with a black dress and fangs.
Someone that had appeared behind that wax candle next to the firestones after she had crashed down into the bed thinking herself dead, back in her bridal chamber.
She had almost no breath left when she realized, half way down the hall, her foot was bleeding, her dress caught in the crack of an open doorway. She grabbed the dress and started pulling, but it wouldn’t come loose. She pulled again, bent down, feeling sweat pouring down her brow, trickling down her cheeks and down her throat, past the wrinkles and into her cleavage.
Her greying hair was hanging in her face and so she put it behind her hair.
“Damn it!”
She looked behind her and heard that spirit coming closer, breathing acid on her neck.
It was running after her, coming closer and she was stuck with her dress in the crack of a doorway. This was an old dress that she had been able to squeeze into after going on that diet shortly before the living coma that they had been into by Nomed. The dress that she had worn on the second night of their honeymoon. She was surprised that such an old dress still fit her.
She pulled at it and realized that she had to rip it to save her life.
Sieglinde ripped it away from the door and a few pearls from the edge fell off, the satin ripping and the silk dropping to the floor. She was free and found herself throwing away her shoes and running down the hallway toward the Grand Hall. Whatever was behind her came from Lucinda’s old room that no one entered. Whatever was following her in this strange replica of Iuventus was out to get her. Again.
But this thing that chased her every damn night wanted only to
scare her and keep her alive.
Only to kill her later on when the time was ripe.
She heard the monster chewed on the chain above, hoping that it would not succeed in eating all of it. Sometimes at night she could feel the mansion sway and she would dream of how it was when she was a queen of a country before three plagues. Before the meeting with St. Michael, before her awful death.
She realized that she was alone. She realized that she was scared.
She realized she was falling. She stumbled, running forward and not being able to halt her speed. She slipped and fell, skidded and hit her head on the first step of the staircase up to the Grand Hall. She stood up and realized her right hand was bleeding. She rubbed it against her dress and began limping up the stairs.
She turned around and shrieked.
Lucinda was there, three steps down, all in black, her long hair curly, her eyes dark as the blackest night, her whites shining and glowing in the moonlight of the non existent moon.
Sieglinde fumbled and realized that the light of the full moon that always seemed to guide her where ever she went here had disappeared.
She knew there was a candle here somewhere on the landing.
She knew that light and dark interchanged here like night and day in the normal world. She knew that Lucinda had arranged a full moon with enough light for her to escape. But she also knew that she was a step above hell, hanging in a replica of her home from a chain guarded by something.
“Where … is the candle?”
Lucinda began wandering up toward her and the queen back up in the dark, seeing absolutely nothing now. She fell and fumbled up toward the landing.
She knew that the firestones, one of Rolf’s special inventions for the fast lighting of candles, lay next to the wax candle on the mid landing. She fumbled up toward the table and felt Lucinda put her hand on her shoulder. Sieglinde was crying as she took the firestones in her hand. The two hard flints touched each other twice, the metal clicking against each other on each side, giving off a spark and lit the candle. She took it and turned around and Lucinda was there, smiling.
Sieglinde rushed up, limping toward the large hall, knowing full well what she would find there. She saw only a meter but she did now this place so well that darkness was not a problem.
She felt Lucinda walk after her.
Why was she going up here?
Why not back to sleep?
And suffer nightmares and hear the demons cackling in the corners?
“Oh, Alex. Why aren’t you here yet? Save me. Wake me up.”
Sieglinde opened the large mahogany doors and immediately saw how the roof above the Grand Hall had been removed in favour of metal bars and a chain that seemed to lead up to some sort of stone staircase ending in mid air. She walked into the Hall, breathing heavily, and suddenly felt herself levitating, smashed onto something hard above her. She looked to her own knees and saw Lucinda holding her by her right hand and pushing against something wooden and hard.
She felt behind her and realized she was tied to a cross.
Lucinda was flying up toward the bars in the ceiling, grinning the grin of a thousand sadistic tortures, smacking her against the metal frames next to the thick main chain.
Sieglinde was scared of heights, so seeing this Grand Hall from above was a sight that almost stopped her own heart and made her want to scream.
She tried to scream at the top of her lungs, but nothing would come out.
Crawling on the floor beneath her she saw crawling animals such as toads and snakes.
On her other free shoulder she felt a claw grabbing her. She felt the devil oozing sweat behind her, Lucinda facing the cross in front of her. Below her mud and animals on the floor of the hall and at once she was not held by anything anymore.
She was free falling down toward the floor of the Grand Hall, feeling the wind against her face. The blood on her hands dropping faster than her and her ripped dress tickling her legs.
“Alex!”
Sieglinde screamed and screamed and felt herself disappear, the floor closer and closer.
“Where are you?”
The floor was closer now.
“Where are you?”
She crashed down and thought herself dead, but she realized that she had crashed down upon her bed in her bridal chamber. She was back in her room.
She breathed heavily, started sobbing and screaming. She looked at her shivering hands, they were bleeding. She touched her own hair with her with her bleeding hands, it was wet.
She got up out of bed and walked about the room, when she realized that someone was watching her. A wax candle was on her table and behind it was the face of someone of the living dead examining her with staring black eyes. It looked as if this person was sitting on the floor crammed together under the bed. It cackled.
She shrieked again and ran out the door onto the hallway.
Stumbling, screaming, shaking, breathing heavily, panicked
Someone in here was chasing her down the hall.
Again.
Someone with a black dress and fangs.
Someone that had appeared behind that wax candle next to the firestones after she had crashed down into the bed thinking herself dead, back in her bridal chamber. It used to be her bridal chamber. It had been her bridal bedroom for the past forty years or so.
She had almost no breath left when she realized, half way down the hall, her foot was bleeding, her dress caught in the crack of an open doorway.
Above her a man with fur on his face was smiling, watching a mouse like creature named Sieglinde running through a labyrinth with absolutely no exit.
Sieglinde felt like a mouse. Squeaking and squealing, she ran through what she thought was the palace hoping that she would wake up from this endless, waking terror.

§

Who had taken away his freedom in the first place?
Lucinda.
The freedom he had had before being catapulted into the orphan world of sibling less rivalry, where had it gone?
Down to hell?
Yes, he was going back to hell to reclaim himself.
So, she had taken away his freedom by having him live under a threat for thirty damn years and even having him thank her for it by claiming it a good lesson. Such crap.
How had she done so?
By imposing something on him that never was his in the first place and then blaming him for being the culprit. It was about time that he reclaimed his freedom and stopped living as if someone was controlling his destiny. If God was, then fine. But another human being? No, forget it.
No more tears spilled over someone that was not worth it. He was better and stronger than her.
He was also out to prove that now.
The light had led him down the road now to a small hut, no bigger than twelve by twenty five feet. Its length was bit longer and outside, as if he had been awaited, there was a small trough full of fresh grass and bread for Mercutio.
He stepped off the horse and tied him to the post and at once the stallion began munching on the fresh bread. With love in his heart, Alexander stroked his friend on his back and walked to the small dark brown hut with its thatched roof just at the side of the road.
There was a valley just opposite the house that Alexander felt was the most marvellous he had seen. A large river lead to what seemed to be a small lake and a waterfall. The mountains he had seen from the hill towered over his head and were covered with trees almost to the top, where the stony climax ended in grey granite.
It was still dark, but all along the way he was lead by the four small dancing lights that he had remembered being a product of what? The lights from the houses, the hermit’s teeth, the ravens and the robins. The dancing little lights bounced to the door and settled over a small figurine of a man stretching out his arms and smiling.
It was obviously late Roman art sculpturing, the kind that later would transcend into the early Wandiffian and pre-Prosperanian antique. Perfection in anatomy with flowing robes.
The man above the door was Jesus and he had been painted in a blue robe and brown flowing hair with beige sandals and a very healthy skin colour.
The statue above the door was no bigger than two and a half feet.
What made Alex so happy was the fact that smoke was emerging from the chimney.
Someone was at home.
The hermit had spoken of evangelists.
Was this the first one?
In that case it was Matthew, whose symbol of symbols, of course, was the human being or the angel. The statue above the door was the Son of Man resembling Love.
But were these the actual evangelists?
Who would he meet?
He was sure that who ever was responsible for the smoke coming out of the chimney was the metaphor of some humane quality that he was to find there inside the hut.
Alex sighed and walked up to the door, feeling rather good about receiving a gift so valuable from Julian, grabbed the handle and opened the door.
Inside the hut, the first thing he saw was a grey fireplace and a man leaning over a black kettle and tasting the soup that obviously was boiling inside it.
The man was dressed in a long, thick robe of rough clothing. A white rope was tied around his waist and the man’s hair was brown and turning grey.
There was a table to Alexander’s left and four candles burned in their holders upon it. There was a simple rag strip-carpet in the middle of the room. There were two windows on each side of the room with two candles standing on the windowsill burning and reflecting in the green lead glass.
On each side of the door there was a window and a candle burning by each of them.
He saw an altar with a large cross and a bed in the right bottom corner.
There was a door next to the fireplace, leading to a back room, Alex supposed.
This was a cosy hut, whose wood was of a warm, dark beige colour.
He had seen camels in Mustafus’ stables once and they had this colour.
What was amazing was that the room was so light in spite of only of only being lit by eight candles. He could not place the origin of the light but he supposed the hut itself was the light.
The man turned around, the soup ladle still in his hand and gaily
smiled at Alex, his face wrinkling like a familiar old treaty parchment from his royal and official throne room archives.
His skin was brown and old. The skin of a man who had spent many years wandering from town to town, preaching the mission and teaching people the thoughts of Jesus Christ. The man wore sandals that had walked miles and the feet inside them were worn out and old, but his hand were still young, his lips uncapped and the gleam in his eye still there.
“You must be Alexander” the man exclaimed in a soft baritone and put down the soup ladle next to the fire. He walked up to Alex, who closed the door behind him, really feeling as young as he was looking now, and took the old man’s hand.
“So pleased to meet you, Sire” Alex said, returning the favour.
“The hermit told you of the four visits you have to have to make tonight, eh?”
The man smiled a bit mischieviously and it made Alex laugh a bit.
“Yes, he did.” Alex rubbed his face and stretched. “Oh, yes. He told me I will find something lost in each one.”
The man didn’t listen to this, but gestured to the table and saw a sheep wool blanket on the chair next to the window and a soup bowl on the table. Two things he could swear not having seen before.
“You want some soup?”
“Oh, yes. Please!”
“Then sit down, my very good man!”
The man took the bowl and dished up some thick soup that looked like vegetable soup, carrots, sellery, peas and beans, and handed it to Alex with a wooden spoon. Then he dished some up for himself and sat down opposite him.
“There you go. My speciality!”
The man had that happy look on his face again and it made Alex smiled.
“I call it Family Tree Soup!”
Alex shook his head. “What? Why on Earth such a strange name?”
“I call it so because every one of my ancestors has added an ingredient to this soup! It has
become what it is only because many people have contributed their soul to this dish” the man said. “In a way one can say that hundreds of hearts are swimming in this bowl. Eat up.”
He felt at home with this man. He was nice.
Alex smiled and took a spoonful of delicious.
It was delicious, rich gravy, tasting of all kinds of meats, and with so many rich flavours to the vegetables that he felt full by the first spoonful.
The man smiled.
“Good, isn’t it? Home cooking’s the best. Beats inn food, right?”
Alexander nodded.
“Beats royal food, too, Sire! And I should know.”
The man nodded. “So you should.” He took a deep breath and continued, matter-of-fact. “The name stems from Early Wandiffia, right after Rome’s fall, and I think very few people know of this cooking. The early kings used to serve this to their sons and daughters for centuries until one day they had realized they had served this splendid soup to five generations, to the entire family tree. Hmm, thereby the name. Like it?”
”Love it. Funny name.”
They both laughed heartily.
“Oh, Sir Alexander. I like you already.”
There was a very pleasant silence between two people who really enjoyed each other’s company.
“Had a good trip?”
He spoke so matter-of-fact about this matter, as if he was talking about a normal every day journey from Clurafar to Alliland.
Alex shrugged. “I have been a long time on the road now, Sire. A long time. It feels like an eternity. Almost an eternity.”
There was a pause. Thoughtfully, Alex ate some more soup. The kind man kept him company by eating. There was a feeling of this man being beyond eating as a means of living since he most probably was a spiritual being. No, eating was a friendly gesture. He had not introduced himself. He did not need to. He was an old friend newly met.
“Tell me your story, Alex.” His words were whispered and calm. What he said was said so profoundly and with such understanding that Alexander had to sigh a sigh of relief. It was as if thousands of pounds of pain had been lifted off his shoulders and sent into the stars of heaven to be retransformed into light.
“It took thirty years for my sister’s prophesy to be fulfilled.” Alex spoke slowly, put another spoonful of soup into his mouth and swallowed. “Three years for her visit to manifest itself and two years for my country to deteriorate under her supervision.” The kind man nodded, caringly. “Now I have been a traveller for almost a year, I think.”
“I know when you left.”
Alex smiled. “I am certain you do.”
”It is almost exactly a year. Tomorrow, in fact, it is exactly a year since you left your palace.
And tomorrow what you feel is your training will be complete and you enter the last phase: the journey toward the cave.” The man smiled, bitterly. “Please do not ask me how I know this. We cannot make believe all the time.”
”Make believe?”
“Pretend that this is a social call” he grinned. “Only know that I am your friend. Probably one of your best friends.”
Alex nodded. “I believe you.”
The man took another spoonful of soup and continued. Alex did the same.
“Believe me also when I say that your journey the last years has been virtually and more or less three, two, one, go.”
Alex shook his head. “What do you mean?”
“You had to wait thirty years for your sister to return and three years for the visit, as you put it, to manifest itself. Very safe of you, I must say, to put this that way. Then it was two years deterioration and one year on the road. Three, two, one. It is now, vision wise, 1430 and you are on your way home. Be clear about that this journey on to the heartland of your sister’s cave might be harder than you think, but you are ready for hard work. You never have been more ready than now.”
Alex took a couple of spoonfuls again and then wiped off his mouth with the handkerchief that lay next to the bowl.
“But tell me your story, Alex. Tell me what has moved you.”
Alex nodded. “Yes, I told you facts and figures, didn’t I?”
The man nodded. “What I am interested in is your story.”
Alex drank the last of the soup and put the bowl down, wiped his mouth again and saw that the man had done the same at the same time.
The soup had tasted good. It was filling. He was full.
He started to speak.
“I was so young when it happened. I am on a journey to reclaim what was stolen from me back then because my sister avenged what happened. I was young and angry.” He looked up and awaited a response. The kind man nodded. “Had I dealt with it back then I would not be here today trying to reclaim something that never would’ve been taken from me.”
“What happened?”

(Lucinda running through a burning house)

“I can still smell the smoke as if it were yesterday. I can still feel the wounds on my skin.”
“She burned the mansion down, didn’t she?”

(Screams and wails from two sisters crashing through the ceiling down to the floor and dying)

“My family was devastated by death that day and soon my servant joined the ancestors.” Alex could not help but feel pain spread in his soul like wild fire. “I lost my senses, I guess.” He looked into the man’s eyes and gave him a bitter smile. “For years, Lucinda had practiced black magic in her room down the hall. My father was too weak to protest, my mother was too sensitive. I was the strong one and I knew that Lucinda was blackmailing me with her knowledge of me being quite a ladies’ man in my youth. So, I kept quiet. My father was very conservative and I was really afraid that he was going to find out. He was weak, but he would stop speaking to me for months at a time if I did something he did not like. I knew what Lucinda did in her room. And she was harassing my sisters and my eldest daughter Maria on top of it all. Lucinda was 16 years younger but oh how mean in manners.”
Alexander watched the flames in the fireplace crackle and sway.
“When she burned the summer mansion down and then was responsible for the death of five people, my heart was so enraged I expelled her and she ended up living on roots and bugs in the Nocturanian forest for years. Before she left she said she’d be back to ruin my country in thirty years. But it only took her nineteen to steal my daughter. I had to send a troop after her to get her back. Belinda still suffers from that memory.”
“How did you feel?”
”My life was stolen from me. I lived in fear for thirty years. That number has haunted me as it did back then. Lucinda would make up rhymes about what would happen in thirty years. I kept wondering what she meant when she started reciting these small little improvised poems. When she spat the final words out as I locked her in the carriage, I understood what she meant and what all of that was about.”

(Thirty years a magic spell
Wedding bells can never tell
How a coming visitor
Turns Clurafar into a whore)

“Your life was spent trying to escape agony instead of serving freedom. Am I right?”
“Yes.”
“What have you learned since you left Iuventus Sacrum on March 17th last year.”
“I have learned to listen and work with the angels. I have learnt to trust in God. I have learned to trust in my soul. I have learned control and magic to balance my own needs with those of others. I have learned that following my own goals is more important for the wellbeing of others than making sure that they follow theirs. That is their job.”
His conversational partner stood up.
”You forgot something.”
The man took Alexander’s bowl and dished up another bowl of soup and handed it to him.
“What did I forget?”
“What did your journey teach you in whole?”
Alex took another spoonful of his soup for a bit as he was contemplating the question.
Then he put down his spoon and nodded.
“That who I am, what makes me human and humane, is as important as what my family and loved ones mean to me.”
“What makes you human?”
“Yes.”
“The love for your family makes you human.”
”So, why do you think that the Son of Man stands as a figurine above my door?”
“To remind me to remain human? To fight for what makes me human?”
The kind man nodded.
”Pick up your bible, Alexander.”
“Which bible?”
Alexander looked around.
“The one right next to you.”
He looked toward the right side of the table. It was a small new testament in latin that one of his scribes had spent a year working on. It was not big, but very beautifully crafted. It was then that he realized that he had not read it much on his journey over here the past year.
“Read the first two verses of the book of St. Matthew.”
Alexander began reading.
“The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Abraham begat Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Judas and his brethren”
Alexander looked up and smiled.
“This is a family tree, Sire.”
“Hence the soup, Sir” the man replied. “What did you say before?”
”That the love of my family makes me human.”
“So, let it be known to you that you first of all are a human soul. Everything else is secondary.”
”Human” Alexander responded, thoughtfully.
“Let it also be known that Evangelist St. Matthew’s symbol is the human being.” The kind man nodded at his own words. “You are a human being with all your faults and talents and love and sensibility. Remain humane. The house of your soul is the family and what it means to you. Stay with who you are, Alex. Don’t chase the unknown. Know that there are things beyond your reach. Some of them you will confront and conquer. Others you better stay away from.”
“Which ones are they?” Alexander asked.
“Search inside yourself and you will know who to confront and who not” the old man said.
Alexander stood up and the kind man did so as well.
As if on a given signal the two men embraced. He felt so close to the man now. More than before. He embraced him and he wanted to feel the fabric of his robe and the touch of his hand forever. Forever being his friend.
From the table, the kind man picked up the wooden spoon with which Alex had eaten the soup. He put the spoon into Alexander’s right hand.
“Whenever you eat with spoon, think of the heart of your home. Eat your royal food with the heart of a simple man. Don’t let royalty or vanity get to you. Don’t dress your body before you dress your soul.”
When he let go, he grabbed him by the shoulder with strong hands and smiled.
“Go and find your mark, Alex. Go and find the mark of kingly patience and control.”
He looked at the spoon and kissed it.
As Alexander Winsletenna walked to the door he felt the man remain with him. With his hand on the door handle, he turned around to the kind man and smiled. “Thank you.”
The man turned to him, having faced the fireplace just as before.
“I just led you to yourself, Alex.”
Alex smiled and nodded.
“It was my pleasure. And remember that home is where the heart is.”
“I will.”
With that, Alexander left the hut and put the spoon into the saddlebag, petted the horse and
mounted, this time lead by only three lights.
As he wondered where the fourth one had gone, he turned back and looked through the window and discovered that the kind man was no longer standing there by the fire and that the kettle was gone, as was the fire.
But he had brought something along with him from the house.
His own heart and a wooden spoon.

§

Three lights lead him around the corner along a river beside a mountainside.
He found himself riding alongside a ravine. The moon was out again and there were a few stars peaking out between the clouds. It was a marvellous scene.
He really could not see an end to the path that he was on. For as long as the eye could see the ravine to his left fall steeply beside him. So steeply he had to be careful not to fall down into the river under him.
He thought about the kind man and the heartfelt welcome that he had given him. He thought about the experiences that he had had in the inn and how they somehow fitted into the scenario of the hut. But now? Now he was heading where? He was sick of always being lead somewhere. He wanted to decide himself where to go. Not always worry what others thought was good.
He was only a mile away from the hut when he began to grow impatient.
It was then that he left the ravine and saw the path lead onto a valley again. A large abundant valley with green grass and flowers. The three lights danced, zig-zagged and sparkled in front of him, leading his way.
He rode down the hill and again found himself a rider on an endless path curving and meandering between rivers and over brooks, through a village and a forest patch and onto a path that seemed to lead upwards.
All the time he grew more impatient, not knowing why.
Where was this leading to?
Why could he not lead himself?
He felt like a victim of circumstance.
That was when he saw the castle.
The night still lingered, but the smells of the morning were at hand, dewdrops waiting to fall from the young grass. The path lead him past a hillside of flowers, around a stony corner onto a small road up a grassy way among green grass and flowers. There were oaks here standing among what he could see were white flowers, mostly daisies and the river further away.
Up on top of the hill the narrow, high castle seemed to dominate the entire area. He thanked the maker for at last arriving. It had only two towers and its large and strong architecture spoke silently to Alexander of calm and peace, of history in the making and of patience. As he approached he saw one big entrance and the two towers were both look-outs and high enough to see over the river and maybe on a good day across the lowest of the hills across of it. As he approached it he saw a strange sight.
The path ended in a small square that been arranged to fit what was standing there now. Maybe sixteen feet from the main door the large statue of a lion resided. Its mouth was open and it was growling, scaring away eventual visitors. The paws were large and it was sitting down, head held high and its mane fluttering slightly in some breeze.
It was strong granite on a podium of sandstone.
He passed the lion and dismounted Mercutio, tying him to what he thought was meant for the horses. A hook on a metal bar on the wall with something of a large barrel in which there were bits of everything thrown in. Bread, fruit, raisins, hay, grass.
As Mercutio began eating, Alex told him to enjoy his meal in the company of the bright lights and that he would be back soon.
One of the lights dashed off to the sign above the entrance.
Alexander walked up the four steps and looked at the stone engraving.
It read:

A benevolent king is patient

“Could be true” Alexander said and walked up to the door, chuckling to himself about his recent nervousness, feeling the silver lion faces in his hand, the rings in their mouths meant for knocking. The doors were superiorly massive things, too large for such a dainty looking palace. From the distance, anyway.
As he knocked, he realized the door was open.
The gates swung open and revealed a very wide hallway with coats of armour, weapons, harnesses and armaments on each side. The wooden ceiling was high and the wooden beams were so thick that Alexander wondered how the castle could look so dainty from the outside and so large from inside, Next he wondered of which tree these beams were made and who had put them there. Poor workers, he thought.
There was a red carpet on white-grey stone floor leading up to a red podium and three steps up to a wooden throne. Behind it was a coat of arms depicting a raven, a robin, a tooth and a house. On each side of the hallway there were torches that flickered and swayed metal holders.
Next to the throne on each side were small square tables, very decorated, with cups and bottles and books and lit candles. Two chairs were positioned on each side of throne, sideways so that whoever would be sitting there could talk to the king without having to strain the king’s neck muscles.
There was a muscular man in a dark blue cape, wearing a blue satin beret and gilded leather boots. His right foot was resting on the top step and his left was on the third. He was watching the coat of arms. As Alexander approached the man, having closed the gate quietly, he for the first time felt reverence for someone in power. He was young now. This man was obviously older and experienced.
He walked down the red carpet and as he did, the man turned around and faced Alexander. He was wearing a white closed shirt with a green ribbon tied around the collar, a red vest with golden buttons. The man had a well trimmed beard and it was only then that Alexander found out the man could easily have been him around 1425. The features were different, but the stature was the same. It was like walking up to himself.
The man gazed at him calmly and patiently as he walked up to the steps and the stopped. The man walked down the stairs and shook his hand.
“Good Evening, noble liege.”
“Alexander?”
He nodded. “Winsletenna. Ruler of Prosperania, on a spiritual errand in forbidden zones.”
The man smiled benevolently. He grinned in a way that told Alexander who was boss here.
“Prince Mark, Ruler of Benevolence.”
Alexander laughed at this high spirited introduction.
“Benevolence?”
“The name of this castle. Have been expecting you.” He gestured for Alexander to come up. “Want some wine?”
Alex nodded.
“I was offered soup in the last house, so wine might be a fitting supplement to vegetables. You have all been expecting me.”
“We know who you are” Mark said in a royal manner. “As your time has come to be rewarded you will be commended according to scripture.”
The man had a very regal aura about him, an aura that invited respect.
But there was not much warmth there.
“Scripture?”
Alexander was confused.
“Scripture” the man answered.
The man poured two cups full of wine and handed the one over to Alex.
“Sit down.”
The cups were gilded bronze with the story of the gospels engraved on its sides.
Alex sat down on the left chair, while Mark sat down on his throne.
From here the hall seemed even bigger.
“Did your heart tell you where to go?”
“Hmm?”
“Did you know where to ride in finding this place?”
“Yes, Sir. The lights lead the way.”
”Ahh” Mark said, sing-songing. “The elves.”
There was a long pause.
“But I was impatient. I feel as if I am always being lead everywhere.”
The man put his hand on Alexander’s shoulder.
“Be happy that you are being led, Alexander. That means there is someone to take care of you. You are here to learn. Not to rule. You have enough situations in front of you, when it will be difficult to know what to do. Thank the Lord for his guidance. You do not always have to be in control.”
Alex nodded and kneeled. The man looked surprised.
Alex looked up and started praying.
“I am sorry for my impatience, Lord. Forgive me. Amen.”
Alex stood up slowly and looked at the man.
He smiled.
“You are a true believer.”
”Yes. Always have been.”
”Good.”
”I always find back to the good truth in the end, even if I wander lost.”
”That is your strength. Use it wisely in the future.”
”I will.”
“Tell me, are you familiar with Nocturania?”
”Only what I have read and seen on stately visits, including this one.”
“I mean, the real Nocturania. The inside of Nocturania.”
”My sister has spent the last thirty five years here. It is everything we are not. Darkness and not light.”
”We meaning Prosperania?”
Alexander nodded.
”So you know what is waiting for you after the anniversary of your embarkation tomorrow?”
Alex looked into the man’s eyes and tried to remain calm, the torch flames casting shadows and dancing reflections upon his features.
“I have been tutored in every spiritual custom. I am here to complete my knowledge how to attain absolute spiritual control. I am awaiting the last mile to the forest.”
“Then be prepared for the ultimate battle.” The man gazed at him, trying to find his faults. “If
you are as ready as you say you are.”
The man smiled.
Alex vowed to change the subject and thought of the lion standing outside.
“The lion outside is a symbol for … what?”
“What do you think?”
“Regal rule?”
“Maybe.”
”Then a lion needs to be stern and powerful.”
Mark shook his head.
“A lion needs a heart, too. You have that. What don’t you have?”
Mark pointed at the walls and looked at Alexander again.
“What do you see here? Here on the walls?”
Alex looked around. “Things I also have in my castle. Coats of arms, weapons, armouries. Torches. Ribbons, medals.”
“Some people think a king makes decisions and that is it. But without a heart a lion is lost.”
He walked down the platform and took a spear in his hand. It was the closest one on the right wall from there and it was hanging next to a coat of arms with an ox on it. He threw it toward the back wall and it landed right in the centre of the coat of arms between the four pictures. “What is a lion, really?”

Alexander was slightly shocked over this sudden move, his heart racing and his breath fast. He looked at the spear. It dangled, shivered, shook, vibrated and then came to a halt.
He looked back at Mark and thought for a moment.
“What is a lion, Alex?”
“A noble creature.”
Mark raised his hand and nodded. “You said noble now, not stern.” He walked back to the platform and picked up his cup again, having set it on the floor of the podium. He began walking up to the throne. “And is nobility stern?”
“No.”
“Is nobility powerful?”
“Yes.”
”Care to revise stern?”
“Yes.”
“What is the lion a symbol for then?”
“Benevolence.”
“Ah, yes. Grace. Confidence.” He pointed toward his head. “Intelligence.”
Mark gestured with his cup toward Alex and looked out sipping his wine.
“Do you wish to speak to me about something, noble Sire?” He looked at Alex, tongue in cheek. “Do you wish to talk about … kings and queens?”
Winsletenna was taken aback for a bit, not really knowing what to answer now.
“I wish to wonder why you are asking me so many questions and not letting me answer all of them.”
” I do?”
“Yes.”
“Really?”
“Yes, very impatient, you are, you.”
Mark applauded and smiled.
“He got it. What I just showed you is what you are lacking. Patience. You lack patience.”
He hesitated and Mark looked at him, raised eyebrows giving him a patronizing look.
“You must learn that, Alex. A lion has power, heart, love, control. But he can lie days in the sun before he makes a decision.”
“I wish to learn your views on regal rule, Sire. I believe that is why I am here.”
“You are a king yourself, my liege. That since over thirty years. I need tell you nothing at all about regal rule. In fact, you being the greatest king of Medatlantia, you could probably tell me something about royalty, eh?”
Alex nodded. “I do know my country. At least, I thought I did know how to rule before I lost it completely. Without it to back me up, I lost my confidence to rule. I thought I had failed miserably.”
“Because circumstance had crushed your situation” he cried cynically. He nodded, slightly bored. “Ah, yes. Bitterness.”
Alex shook his head. “Aren’t you a mentor?”
The man shrugged. “Yes?”
“Then why are you a bored mentor?”
He leaned forward toward Alex.
“Bored as a mirror?”
“I see. It all comes from me?”
“Ah, but only bored because you downplay yourself.”
“How can I be bored and impatient at the same time.”
“Because boredom and impatience are two sides of the same coin, Alexander.”
Alex nodded, trying to understand. At once he did, looking up. Mark understood this and grinned.
“You are from a generation of professional rulers. Only because your family has had bad luck do you downplay your own abilities and hand over your logic to a killer that does not even care on which potty you sit and produce excrements. Shocked?”
“Even a king does that.”
“Then you do know that your abilities are independent of circumstance.”
“Yes.”
”And you know that your life can change if you want it to change.”
Alexander sat back in his chair. “What?”
“Sire Winsletenna. You are from a colourful family. Everyone has bad luck. Being blessed with great expectations or having to push a little to be granted that makes no difference. What matters is your spiritual fabric and not your damn hair colour or shoe size. Why downplay yourself? You put others first, especially those who don’t deserve it. You want to know how? You want to know why?”
”I am interested to hear it, certainly. Lucinda?”
”Maybe. Your vanity, however, just like the vanity of many others I know, Sire, forbids anyone to have not you as their main character of interest. So you chase people you want to convince instead of people who really are convinced in you in the first place. You end up following a Fata Morgana. You must forget Lucinda. Once you have done that, beat your vanity.”
”I chase Lucinda’s reverence instead of my subject’s love?”
”Whatever. It just illustrates how bad vanity is … for you.”
Mark took a long look at Alex and there was a moment there when Alex looked at the torches and armouries and weapons and realized that nothing was worth while if you didn’t follow your intuition.
Alex shook his head, smiling and spoke:
”So, a lion has confidence.”
Mark chuckled. “Told you that you know it. And what is confidence?”
”Patience and control.”
“Yes, and the grace and benevolence to allow people to think they’ve stepped on you. Anyone, who has ever stepped on you, tell yourself this about them: you had the benevolence to make them believe that they won. You gave them some confidence. You felt so sorry for them that you wanted to grant them the illusion of victory. Then you can head home and laugh, only because you are walking home with loads of gold in your sack and they are … what?”
“Poor souls?”
“Yes. Poor. They need to jig, amble and lisp. Poor beings walking blindfolded and chuckling
toward the edge of a ravine are destined for madness. Yes?”
Alex nodded. “I have never seen it that way.”
”But you should see it that way. You should. The people having to use unfair games to win are going to loose in the end, Sire. There is always a time for man to put the books on the table and pay up. They will never ever be able to account for what they have won, because they have aquired it unfairly. You on the other hand have played by the rules and get to keep everything you own. So, who is the winner? You or them? In other words, you are making them believe that they have won, because you know better. The truth will free you. Be honest. Be benevolent.”
“The lion has patience and control and plays by the rules of the game. Doesn’t cheat.”
”The main word, Alexander, is control.”
“Control. A king has great quantities of control.”
“Well put, Alex. Well put.”
“What is control?”
Alexander smiled. “An attitude. A mindset. It is patience.”
“Exactly.”
The prince stood up. It was then that Alex realized that it was himself as he had been or presently was in the real world. At his present state, Alexander Winsletenna was a young man, strong, longhaired, constantly wellshaven. He was almost an archetype. It felt strange not having to shave.
The hall seemed larger now. Prince Mark’s presence made it bigger somehow.
He had made it bigger by standing up.
“You received a humane heart from Matthew” he said and walked over to the bible on the table to the left and picked it up in both hands. Mark looked at the bible in his hands, caressed it as if he was caressing a child. It was a book one foot by one foot and rather well crafted. A huge cross had been handcrafted into the cover and painted red. Around it were gold eagles on each of the corners on a silver canvas. The rest of the book was in blue.
“I will give you patience …”
It was a very beautiful bible.
Mark handed him the book.
“Sire, read …”
Alexander opened the book and leafed through it.
It was written in Wandiffian.
It was a language that Alex spoke because it was a transition between Latin and Prosperanian.
“You read the language of your forefathers, don’t you?”
Alex nodded. “Oh, yes. My father taught me. His father taught him.”
“Read the initial sentences of St. Mark.”
The poignancy of this moment was incredible.
He could almost feel the bells of heaven ring and the a choir emerge from the clouds.
Why? Because he had over thirty years tried to cope in being a good king. Because he had only thought of Lucinda’s possible return. Because he tried to live the righteous life of a king only to cover up that he feared most how his sister would return. It was the waiting game.
In this castle, he received the benevolence of lions.
The symbol of St. Mark stood outside the castle roaring in the wind and the men and women of his country waited in cages above hell.
Waiting for him to alone make sure that they were free at last.
He started reading.

“As it is written in the prophets, Behold I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.”

Alex looked up at Mark in whose features he really saw himself.
“These people had waited thousands of years of the Messiah” Mark said.
“Now that is patience” Alexander remarked contemplatively.
Mark laughed. “Be as calm and ripening as a fine wine. Grow, Alex. Grow and prosper patiently. God will lead you. You are his child. You always have been and always are and always will be. No matter how much you think the dark side is there to get you. They won’t. Neither anyone you love. You are safe. Just be patient, controlled and benevolent. That is all you need, Alexander.”
Alex looked down on the page.
“Read verse six, Alex.”
Alex read.

“And John was clothed with camel’s hair and with a girdle of a skin about his loins; and he did eat locusts and wild honey;”

The calm in both their faces was refreshing, because at once Alexander knew that he was not a pupil anymore.
“You don’t need a robe to be a king. You need a lion’s heart.”
“The clothes you wear do not make you a king.”
Mark nodded.
“Exactly.”
These words had now made him, Alexander, a mentor.
“Who is the king of the wilderness?”
”The Lion is the king of the wilderness.”
Mark pointed at the bible with his right index finger and Alex at once recognized his own ring at Mark’s finger.
“A patient king.”
The ring he had worn on Belinda’s wedding day was on Mark’s finger. He had brooded, because he had lost it back then.
There was a long pause, where Alex looked up at Mark.
“My ring! I’d lost it!”
”The hermit said that you would find everything that you lost! This ring will be yours when the real world commences. But the ring is unimportant. You heart is vital. Now read verse 15.”

“The time is fulfilled and the kingdom God is at hand; repent ye and believe the gospel.”

Alexander looked up, closed the book, walked up, put it down on the table and turned around.
He walked up to Mark, who was smiling.
“Patience. Use it to fight Lucinda. You need the word of God to fight her.”
Mark and Alex embraced and the warmth between them felt fantastic.
“You will do well, my friend!” He was glowing in the warmth of everyone he knew and everyone he had ever loved and cared for in his life. “Be well!”
Alexander went down on his knees and kissed Mark’s ring.
Mark put his hand under Alexander chin and as he looked up he felt a power raising him from the ground. He was levitating. Four light rings surrounded him. Rings of gold, waist size. The rings spread into each other and formed a golden aura. Alex spun a couple of times and landed on his feet.
Mark was standing there and smiling.
“Look at your finger!”
Alex raised his hand and found the ring on his finger. The lion’s head that had been engraved into the gold plate roared just as the statue did outside.
He looked up.
”Thank you, Mark!”
”Retrieve you land and return safely and soundly away from the haunted kingdom.”
“I promise!”
With that, Alexander Winsletenna walked down the red carpet, slowly toward the door, opened it and left into the open. He closed it behind him, feeling the rings of his aura glowing and mounted on a horse that had eaten for a half hour from a barrel with no bottom.
Alexander rode down the hill, a smile on his face, being lead to salvation by only two dancing lights. Inside the castle, Mark was smiling.
Inside the hut, a spirit named Matthew soared silently about the furniture and thanked the Lord.


CHAPTER TWO
THE LAST EVANGELISTS

The two dancing lights were leading the way forward, but it was very hard to see where to and the reason for the hardship of sight was the wind.
The wind? No. This was not a wind. It was far more.
This was a storm.
The few trees that he saw along the meandering road were bending in this … wind.
He had left the castle so happy and patient and was using this to keep his heart calm.
“A benevolent king is as patient as a lion” Alexander Winsletenna told himself.
Now he was fighting to stay alive, patience or not.
After riding down that hill again and continuing on the path that he had been riding on before, he found himself back on a curving road that seemed to want to confuse its traveller. Up and down, left and right, through a forest and then out into the open. Left and right there were hills and these hills seemed to act as a tunnel that made the upcoming wind even stronger.
Even Mercutio, full of the food from the endless barrel, seemed tired.
Alex tried to transport some of the patient heart he had received from the two souls onto his stallion. It seemed to work, although both Mercutio and Alexander were somewhat straining to cope, bending in the wind just as much as the trees were.
They saw the lights, the elves as Mark called them, flying in front of them toward a dawning sky, dramatic and romantic, with dark greyish blue clouds upon a mid blue sky. The moon was still up.
It was then that the wind increased in power. At one time, Alex almost fell off Mercutio and it was with utmost power that he could stay on the horse.
Mercutio was suffering as well.
There was another hill, a small raising more than a hill. It lead to a cave.
He looked to his right and saw a man standing by that cave and holding on to a tree. He was waving at Alex. The man was dressed in a brown robe and was clutching it to his body. His long grey hair was blowing ferociously in the wind.
Knowing he would not be able to make it any further, he dismounted and lead Mercutio by the hand up the hill. Leaves flew past his vision and a branch crashed down from an oak in front of him.
He was just twenty feet away from the man and was walking up the sandy path, when he heard him yell: “Come in and find shelter here. Sire. I have made a campfire. My ox will keep your horse company and me? I will keep you company.”
Alex came up to the man and took his hand.
“Thank you, my good man.”
“Come in, by all means.”
“Oh, dear,” Alex shivered, “this is hell.”
The man shook his head. “No, hell is different.”
He was speaking as if he knew.
“You might be right about that. What a storm.”
Alexander turned around and took one last glance at the storm outside. It looked dark and sinister and quite frightening. Leaves were being tossed and turned back and forth and even a lightning bolt or two struck some tree in the pasture down at the foot of the hill where the cave was located.
They walked in and it felt good to be away from the storm. Even Mercutio seemed to think so.
“We can have a goose for breakfast that I trapped last night. Take shelter here and you will feel better very soon. I will help you gather strength. Come in.”
They started walking into the cave.
“Come, come!”
It was dark for a while, but after turning the corner, he saw the flickering flames. The man had made a fire and had gathered all his belongings around the fire. There were blankets and a book. There was food. There was a bag and there were spare clothes.
“Set your horse by my ox. He can eat from the trough, there’s enough food for them both.”
Alex walked up to the trough and set him by the trough.
The man went to the ox and said:
“Hey, you. You don’t mind sharing with this fellow, do you?”
The ox didn’t react, but the man cackled as if the ox had just cracked the world’s funniest joke and walked back to the fire.
“Have a seat by the fire! You want some food?”
“Oh, yes, please.”
The huge ox that was standing in the corner was soon eating side by side with Mercutio who was happy to be inside.
As the man went to put a blanket upon Mercutio and dry him off while eating, he said:
“Where are you heading, Sir, at this ungodly hour?”
He gave Alex some bread. Alex started munching, noticing that he was sweating rather heavily and needed some refreshment.
Alex wondered if the man had transported that ox all the way from the village and if not, from which town or city then? No city? No town? He could not believe that.
“Oh, to places that I’d rather not go at all, but I have to.”
The man was drying off the stallion.
”Where then?”
“The darker territories” Alexander said. “The hardest part of the country: Yambalah.”
The reflections from the fiery flames of the campfire flickered on the cave wall.
He stopped drying the horse, folded the blanket and sat himself down by the fire.
The power of the tempest outside made the corner leading to the opening of the cave nearby whistle and the stony ceiling almost shake.
“Oh, you are heading there? My, oh, my. We call it Yambollah in Nocturanian, although you are right. It is said that the original word for the loved one. The place itself is not so loved.”
The place they were at was far away from that unloved place and yet the fire had a way of reacting to the breeze that came round the corner.
There was a goose frying over the open campfire. It seemed to be slightly overdone.
“Yes, I’m heading for a place where the dark souls linger.”
The man smiled, although Alexander saw that his response made him nervous.
There had been no humour in Alexander’s comment.
“Then you need a bit of rest to gather some strength, eh? Here we will make you bright eyed as a squirrel again.”
“I never knew I was bright eyed as a squirrel.”
”I am sure you were, Sire. I am sure of it” he laughed.
The fact that he was travelling to the darker territories was something not to be taken lightly.
Alex reached forth his right hand. The man took it and shook it.
“Thank you for saving me from that storm … I would not want to be caught in that.”
There was a long pause whilst the two men gazed into the fire. They listened to the crackling wood and heard the flames breathe smoke upon the ceiling. They listened to the wind that seemed to be moaning and whining a lost cry that no one heard. The walls were grey here and moss covered the stones. It was a well rounded place. It was a tilted cave with quite soft earth. Alexander felt at home here. He felt as if he had known that this place existed for a long time. The ocean where he met the archangels was also a place that his heart lingered in at times. It was a resting spot for his soul, this could be a retreat for his mind to find truth.
“What is your name?” Alexander asked.
”Lucas …” the man said. “Lucas is my name.” The man shrugged. “My pleasure to meet you” They said and shook hands. I thought that a lonesome traveller might need a roof over his head to escape the thunder and the leaves dancing in the hurricane. And your name?”
“Alexander Winsletenna …”
The shook hands again and then let go.
“Sir Alex, it is my duty to help someone in need of assistance. My home is a cave near the road and my job is looking at the stars and contemplating life’s mysteries. And helping a wayfaring stranger caught in a storm is more than a duty. It is vocation, just as it is vocation to seek the truth.”
”Well,” Alex smiled, “that storm almost had me tumbling across the plains.”
“Aye,” Lucas said, “hurricanes can be treacherous.”
“Hurricanes?”
”Just an exaggeration.” The man grinned, bitterly. “You wouldn’t be here if that had been more than a storm.”
The man brought forth a blanket, stood up and lay it around Alexander’s shoulders. It was sheep wool. It felt good to be with this man. Looking into this fire and cuddling the sheep wool felt too good. Yes, it gave him strength.
“Want some goose?”
Alex looked up, smiling.
”This is better than any inn.”
”Don’t like much eating all by meself.” He held up a wooden plate. “Eh? What shall it be?”
“Yes, please! I have a problem with saying no.” Alexander was laughing, whilst eating, crumbs dropping from his mouth.
Lucas walked to the fire. His long grey hair gave him a wise look.
His beard made him look like a prophet, but his skin was remarkably fresh and young.
He reminded him of someone?
He looked like … he could not place it.
Lucas took a knife and started cutting a large piece.
He cut another and now Alex realized how white the meat was.
He handed it over to Alex. Alex took it just as Lucas gave him a knife.
“Enjoy.”
He nodded at Lucas and began eating.
It was juicy meat with very crispy skin. It felt good to eat something. The wine at Mark’s castle had gotten to his head and the storm had weakened his bones.
Lucas cut up some for himself and set the plate down.
He took a ladle and poured up two cups of a steaming hot liquid in a large soup terrain. It hung one foot away from the goose on the metal bar above the fire.
“Hot soup” Lucas said. “Good for cold weather.”
“Thanks.”
Alex, who rarely complained about physical ailments, noticed now for the first time that his hands were shaking.
He began drinking the soup and eating the goose. Bread was brought forth and so was wine.
The two men must’ve sat there for a little while, speaking of the food and the weather. All the time, the two of them watched the ox and Mercutio.
“Yes, at times I walk out of the cave here when it’s not storming,” Lucas said and nodded mischievously, “looking at the stars and wondering at the loves and puzzles of this wondrous place called creation. Contemplating what a wonderful world this is.”
Alex smiled.
”It is, isn’t it now?”
The man looked at Alex. There was a challenge in the man’s face.
“Worth fighting for, isn’t it?”
“Absolutely. A man needs to keep the love for this creation in his heart.”
”So he must” Lucas said, smiling.
”Yes,” Alexander answered, half in thought. “Someone told me that the heart of a human being needs patience. But I think a heart needs something else, too.”
Lucas cocked his head.
”What, Alex?”
“Strength. Strength to stay on the road he has set out to wander.”
Alex looked at the ox in the corner.
“Like that ox over there?”
Alex nodded.
Lucas looked at his animal and agreed, thinking about Alexander’s words. “He is strong. He doesn’t complain. When he is asked to pull a plough, he does so and he does not falter, he prevails and he keeps on going. That ox has the strength of a thousand souls.”
There was a long pause.
“A heart needs strength, no doubt.”
The wind wailed again.
“I felt that in the storm out there. I could’ve gone off the horse, but I did not. I stayed on the saddle.”
Lucas looked at Alexander and the look went so deep into his eyes that he at once knew who this was. It was Old Father from the village, but with a longer beard and longer hair.
Alex gasped.
“I know you, you are …”
Lucas held up his hand.
“We appear in different shapes, Alex, and as you know me, I know you. And I know how you fought and suffered on your road over here. But keep the truth in your heart. That is revealing enough.” Alex took the man’s hand and caressed it, sighing. “We love your truth. Believe in your truth. There is strength in that truth.”
“What is the truth, Old Father?”
The man smiled. “Luke, my name is Luke.”
“Luke …” Alex said. “What is the truth?”
”Alexander, I sat here and heard you speak from your own soul. Earlier you spoke of always being lead.”
“How do you know?”
“I know, because I know you.”
“Then what shall I do?”
”You need do nothing, Alex. You are on your way. You know how you thought you were a victim of circumstance for years?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that is finished. You lead now. You are no longer a victim. That was the main point of the training. You are not only a man of heart with patience. You have the strength of an ox. The
patience of a lion. The heart of a man. You know the truth.”
Luke shook his head.
“I need not tell you that.”
“The truth,” he responded, “is that in this world there are influences everywhere. Left and right I feel demons want to influence me. But they only have power if I give them power, is that not so, Luke?”
Luke nodded. “Yes, very true. The key they have to influencing you lies in your eyes. The window they have to influence your thoughts and desires is in your eyes. You might see something and want it just because you saw it. They know this.” Luke sighed and looked down into the fire. He took a deep breath and prepared himself to say something.
“You want to say something” Alexander said.
Luke looked up. “Yes” he responded. “I know that you know this. I am just gathering strength to say what I am about to say.” Luke nodded. “I just waited for the right time for my words.” He looked up.
“Demons. I will tell you something about them.” The wind was making twists and turns around the edges the cave. The wind sounded like a wounded animal. “They have no power unless you give them the power. Lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy and pride. These feelings are the emotions they use to turn you to the bad side of creation. They know you are weak and all they want is you to believe in their lies. Now pride itself is not bad. Pride by the way of hurting someone is bad. Cynicism is being too full of pride to admit that someone might not be like you. Therefore you choose to hate that they’re different and then joke about them. That is wrong.”
Alexander looked about the cave and found that the ox was watching him with a stern look of someone hoping for betterment. There was still the atmosphere of seclusion and safety inside the grotto, but there had been something added to this cosy world away from the storm.
“The problem is that men are weak” Luke added. “They will almost always follow what brings them down because they are very impatient. That is the forte of the demon. He will never rule over you unless you give him that power. People talk of possession. Well, it is not the case that you have a demon dancing inside that is doing bad deeds though you. He will arouse your hatred, he will arouse your lust. He will show the kingdom if the world, just as he did to Jesus and lure you into a trap. That is his way. It is only here in this illusion, or in special cases like when Lucinda appeared to you in the Grand Hall, that demons will actually show themselves. They usually don’t. They are extremely shy, Alexander: extremely shy. They are creatures of the dark, which never, or rarely, will jump out of the shadows. They will almost never possess you, because they want you to take the blame. They want you to believe what they believe. Superstition is like that. Superstition is compulsion to believe in lies. There are no lies, but people spend eons believing in them, because they want a quick recipe for fame. They want to find a way out that will make them believe that there is a quick answer that will make them famous and rich and very happy. They forget that the answer is all in heaven. You do not need more than just pray and the answers will be given you. The answer lies in the calm of the prayer and nothing else.”
“I have a question, Luke” Alexander said.
“Ask me anything” Luke said.
“Infidelity” Alexander said. “Why are men not faithful?”
“To their spouses?”
“To God, to their spouses and to the good cause.”
“Impatience” Luke answered. “The quick answer to solve all the problems is what people seek. Infidelity is like wine. It is the escape of not having to take all that responsibility. Tough men are unfaithful and feel masculine for laying another woman on her back: The odd thing is that these men only escape their own fate and are thereby the greatest cowards on earth only because they do not dare speak to their wives and instead are unfaithful only to keep from facing their own tears. The only quick answer lies in you and not out there. The demon will tell you that of course there is a quick answer. Being unfaithful to your spouse is just revenge and nothing else. It is being too weak to confront the problem. I will give you an example. You are a baker, a real virtuoso of the arts of bread and pastry. Your spouse is very different and not really a lover of pastry. You have different kinds of people, but your love holds you together. Now, when she makes great demands on you when you are not baking and making bread she tells you that she needs the one thousand things that she needs from you, you have a choice. You stay calm and try to find an answer. You either tell her calmly that you need some time to gather energy to be strong for your work or you take the easy way out. You run to another woman and roll in the hay. That woman is easy to deal with. She won’t complain. But you are being severely dishonest. That other woman will be there for you only for a short while. You are not confronting the problem. You are running away from the problem. You can avoid arguments all you want and be true to your spouse. That is fine. If you find a way not to avoid the truth. You can actually be very successful in walking the path of the Lord and avoid arguments. The demons will, however, lure you in a way that will make you want to be aroused. They will arouse you by making you angry. Concentrate your happiness. That is good. Be extremely happy. Live in bliss. But stay true to one person in that bliss. Enjoy many arts, many books, many foods with one person. Dress well, but know that dressing your soul is much more vital than dressing your body. Choose the honest road.”
“So, when the demons present to me something that may influence my judgement I must not judge or evaluate what I see. I must go where I want to go and not think what others want or wish, but what I want or wish?”
Luke nodded. ”People turn to vanity, Alexander, because they fear that they need to become like other people in order to be accepted. Physical attributes are only the means to be accepted. But people ignore the fact that they are neglecting who they are in order to be as well dressed as the other man. Calm, Alexander. If you can stay calm in most situations even when you are in ecstasy of happiness, then no demon will touch you. Be calm.”
“The access to polish and cherish these physical things is so desirable, isn’t it?”
“Yes, Alex. Being well dressed is by all means not all bad. You present yourself well. But never forget that well dressed or well combed or well groomed is only means to an end. The soul is always the most vital thing. Never spend too much time with dressing up. Dress up your soul.
“Mark told me that a king’s benevolence lies not in his robe. How a king is lies in his heart.”
“Alexander” Luke said and took his hand again. “Remember that Lucinda is a physical being. Your strength lies in your spirit. She can flash her fangs and twirl her coat. But your firm sturdiness lies in the force of eternity. Never forget that.”
“I shall never forget. Will you be there to guide me?”
”We all will be there for you. But you must wander the road. No one can wander that everlasting road for you.”
”I must wander the road, must I not?”
Luke nodded. “You have now received reminders of your heart and your patience. Now you receive one from me: remember your mission and don’t look into Lucinda eyes for too long at a time when duelling. She will unmanifest and manifest, but when you kill her she will bother you until you free your family. She is still physical. Lucifer is not. Free your family and then none of them can hurt you.”
“Something in me whispered that I cannot duel my sister
because she is a woman.”
”Such rubbish. Lucinda is not a woman. She is a demon. Lucinda was Judas. She regretted what she did back then. But she kept on doing it in life after life. She needs to be saved. The last good peace of your sister needs to be saved.”
The flames flickered and the two men looked at the animals now seeming to sleep.
Without looking away from the ox, Luke said:
“There are lots of temptations. Stay on your course. You know your real road. Stay on track.”
“Luke?”
He looked back at Alex.
“Yes?”
“I know you don’t want me to speak of the village.”
He sighed. “You want to know why we left you.”
Luke smiled, bitterly.
”We never did. Alexander, you must understand something. We are ethereal beings. We love you. We can only manifest for as long as you need us. But when we leave you physically, we are still there ethereally. I held you when you let go of the tree.”
”You did?” Alex smiled.
Luke smiled. “Yes. And you needed to be alone. The time was ripe for you to move on.” Luke held Alexander’s hand. “You need to know where your strength lies.”
”Where?”
”In your honesty. Be honest to yourself. Be true. As true as you should be in recognizing your true self. There are too many people already who follow Lucifer’s suit in jumping on vanity’s bandwagon. You need to really be honest about who you are and what you want.”
Alex continued. “This duel is as much about me fighting for my true self as it is about winning my country back, is it not?”
”You see, my friend. Now you are trusting yourself. We have only been able to consult you like this because you were lead to the angels in the first place. The angels lead you and love you.”
”Who lead me to the angels?”
”Oh, Alex. What a question.”
“Belinda.”
”Of course. She lead you there.”
There was a tear in his eyes and it was rolling down his cheek.
“I won’t loose her, will I?”
”No, you won’t.”
“On the beach she was so tired and so gone somehow.”
”She was tired and distraught, that was all. She loves you just the same. She misses you, that is all.”
“But in the inn, she didn’t even …”
Luke held up a hand. “Behave, Alex. Please.”
This reprimanding tone made Alex feel very guilty. “I am sorry. So sorry.”
“The inn was a test. That was not Belinda. You will see her.”
”Who was that if it wasn’t Belinda?”
”A test. It was a test. Testing your heart and it lead somewhere, did it not? You know that it lead you to the next instance.”
”All this is about strength, isn’t it?”
”It is about strength. The strength of an ox.” Luke smiled. “You know something else about the ox?”
”What?”
“It is the greatest sacrificial animal. Whoever sacrifices an ox sacrifices something very important. The Gospel of St. Luke starts with Zacharias’s sacrifice in the temple. He wasn’t sacrificing an ox, but I think he did have the strength of one. After all, he listened when St. Gabriel spoke to him about the coming birth of John the Baptist. He had strength in faith.”
Alexander walked up in his sheep wool from his place to the saddlebag. He knew Mercutio was sleeping so he was very careful. He looked in his bag and found the scribe’s bible that he should’ve read more often. Luke was looking at him and smiling. He knew that Alex was looking for the third Gospel.
When he found it, he lay down next to the fire and started reading.

“Verse 13. But the angel said unto him: Fear not Zacharias: for thy prayer is heard and thy wife Elisabeth shall bear thee a son and thou shalt call him John. And thou shalt have joy and gladness; and many shall rejoice at his birth. For he shall be great in the sight of the Lord … and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother’s womb and many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God.”

“And I didn’t even have to hand you the book …”
Alex smiled.
“Read verses 30, 31 and 33.”

“And the angel said unto her, Fear not Mary, for thou hast found favour in God. And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb and bring forth a son and shalt call his name JESUS. And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.”

“Now read verse 37, Alex.”

“For with God nothing shall be impossible.”

Alex sat up and there was a silence that spoke of so much wisdom.
The wind outside had stopped wailing.
It was dawn.
He could feel it.
There was a morning coming.
Luke patted Alex on the leg.
“You should be off.”
Alexander nodded. “Yes.”
He stood up and hugged Luke. There was warmth there that he had missed. He knew this man as Old Father from the village and their mutual talks had made him find himself.
“Go and find your freedom, Alex.”
Alexander embraced Luke one last time and walked over to the stallion. He then saw the ox looking at him with eyes as strong as fire. He smiled, for he knew that it all had been true.
The ox was strong. Strong and patient.
Together the two men walked out into the morning, one light entering Alexander’s heart.
He had not slept tonight. But he would eventually.
If he understood it right, there was one man left.
As Alex prepared to mount, Luke said, stroking his beard:
“The four houses that the hermit spoke of that were lit in the village were the four lights. One of them is leading you still. The hermits four teeth turned into a castle with a lion. Four ravens lead you over here.” Luke looked over to the hills. “The light will lead you to a place where four robins live.” He looked at Alex. “A surprise awaits you.”
Alexander smiled and nodded. He let go of Mercutio and went to Luke, embraced him one last time.
“Hope to see you again.”
”You will, my friend” he said. “You will.”
And with that, the Lost Emperor of the Haunted Kingdom rode down the hill into the morning lead by one light.
Smiling sadly before going back into the cave, Luke spoke as he watched his friend leave:
“Go and find all of our freedom!”

§

With everything he had gone through, he was surprised in again having been robbed his freedom. Suddenly, he found himself looking at no other way out than riding down a path that simply consisted of a small crack between to mountainsides. A miniature ravine of sorts.
Alexander Roderick Winsletenna had been so happy about having won his heart by learning to calm other hearts. He had been so glad to win patience by learning to cope with not having any. He had been joyous in getting strength by having his strength challenged.
But the fact that he had to win his … what had Luke said. Freedom?
Wait a minute. The hermit had spoken of the four evangelist. Who was the last evangelist? John. The Eagle on Pathmos, after the island where he preached. If Matthew was portrayed with an angel or a human being, then Mark was always accompanied by a lion. Luke’s symbol was the ox. John’s was the eagle, because he was the most spirited, if even cryptic and literate of all the evangelists.
“The eagle flies in the heavens in his freedom.”
Alexander knew then why he was out to find his freedom.
And now he found himself having chosen a shortcut down a hill that seemed to lead away from the meandering curves of the road ahead. Instead he was back in mountain country with only two ways in coming back to the road that he had left: go back several hours or ahead through a crack that was no bigger than Mercutio width.
He looked up. Huge mountainside. He looked forward. Only a small crack. What if the crack got smaller. Would he have to back then?
There was light from above, but where was the way out. Was there one?
Yes, he could see the way out.
Alexander Winsletenna took the chance and suffered the walk through a prison of sorts.
Mercutio was constantly afraid to scratch himself and it was amazing how slow the horse could trot through this crack. At one point, the king looked up and saw an eagle flying up there and found that a good sign.
A moment later, the eagle came again and Alex was reassured.
The old man had spoken of four robins, four birds.
What had he said?
“The light will lead you to a place where four robins live.”
He was determined to look for the robins, where ever they were.
Then Mercutio stopped, refusing to go on. No matter what Alex did, he could not make the horse go on. Alex stepped off the horse from the back and found out why? The crack had grown smaller. There was one stone on each side stopping the way.
Alex was sweating from top to toe, feeling like a slave in the Wilta-Dungeons as he lay on Mercutio banging on the stones with two other pieces of granite in order to break them away.
If stallions could cry, Mercutio would’ve right then.
But then the two of them kept on going.
For a long while nothing happened.
Then he saw the entire world darken. Sand and stones kept falling down in endless stream. Mercutio neighed and Alex screamed. Soon they were almost buried under stone and sand and it took the effort of a million strong men to get out of the heap that they had been stuck under.
The light above disappeared for a while and so they were in complete darkness a while. Alex scratched his leg and his arm. It seemed the stallion received a cut on his hind leg as well.
He saw the way out and could not recall being so happy at any time in his life.

§

When he walked out he saw the most glorious sight of his life. A large abundant pasture as far as the eye could see. Green grass on hillsides and valleys to the left with such flowers one could not dream of beauty so breathtaking. To the right and to his front only grass. The sky had such a blue colour that its depth seemed to be painted on blue canvas with blue flame. The one or two white clouds surrounding the bright yellow sun were so shining and so bright that it dazzled the eye.
Directly, he felt himself bubbling with excitement. He felt at one with the horse. At one with the spirit. At one with himself. At one with nature. Slowly, he began riding down the hill, down the grass, not skidding, not slipping. Riding, bouncing, jumping up and down upon the saddle.
Yes, Sir. He knew that Mercutio did not have a perfect hind leg. He also knew that Mercutio did not care. Alex knew about his own scratches. But he was an imperfect soul with an imperfect life, but he was happy about how who he was. He felt himself riding faster through this endless landscape, the wind against his face. The eagle above him. He did not care what Lucinda thought. He did not care what his enemies thought. He was a free man. Eagles in the sky soaring above him and knowing that Alexander Winsletenna had made it. He had found his way to himself. He was a free man.
In spite of losing an entire kingdom, his entire family, his entire self, he was still standing. In spite of being patronized and hated and ridiculed by demons of every kind he was still strong and was going to fight back.
He saw the world whizzing by. Grass, blue sky, flowers, trees, pastures. The brown mane of Mercutio flying and fluttering in the breeze. His nostrils flaring and Mercutio frothing at the mouth. It was clear that his stallion was as damn proud of himself as the king was.
Yes, there was the biggest issue left.
The duel.
But for thirty five years and more, almost his entire life he had been fleeing from something.
Now he was ready to fight that.
He was going to surprise them all.
He felt it in the yellow sun shining on his face. He felt it in the blue sky above his head. He felt it in the glorious grass under Mercutio’s feet. He felt it in the bouncing gallop that kept him shaking in his saddle and dancing up and down. Oh, and he felt it in the glorious way that he felt himself breathing. Like a stallion. He felt himself soaring. He felt himself soaring. He felt himself soar. In spite of werewolves, he was flying.
And then he did fly. He and his stallion lifted off the ground and they both saw the ground disappear under their feet. The green grass was but a small speck and he rode around, a centaur, at one with his horse.
He heard the horse speak and this time it was no dream. It was Mercutio and a deep voice sing songing, his lips moving.
“At last, we have made it, you and I!”
Alexander started laughing:
”Yes, Mercutio. We have. You hear that, Lucinda. You never ever thought that your brother would make it this far.”
”We are coming to get what is ours” the horse bellowed, wind in his face. “We will not back down!”
”I am an eagle” Alex shouted. “I am an ox. I am a lion. I am humane being.”
”And I am your angel, Alexander” Mercutio giggled.
“We will make it.”
“Ready or not, make it last.”
Ready for whatever is coming now, they thought.
“It is the moment that counts.”
Soaring through the sky, higher and higher, he made a vow to himself never to be used again.
Alexander Winsletenna would not be used. Would not be a victim. Alex, king of a country called Alexander, would not back down. He flew through a cloud, he flew through the sun, he flew down upon Mercutio, he flew down, rode like a fabulous weird centaur through the blue sky of his soul, ready to fight back like the rebel of angels he was, reclaiming angelic property. He was ready to fight for God.
All the world would join in celebration if he now could prevail and fight and win. Together as one they all would be if he made it. Lucinda had no right to do this. to take away what they owned.
All the hope, power and inspiration of a thousand stars lay in the future of his children. The garden of Eden across the ocean. The glory of his country.
He felt the ground come closer. He felt himself, the hero to live forever, in God’s hand, singing a song with the holy ghost and flying towards the ground like an eagle and then soaring up to the sky and down and up and down and up.
Yes, he was surrounded by angels.
With the bright eyes of a thousand stars, laughing at having made it this fast. Now at last knowing he was strong enough to make it. Strong enough not to be laughed at be the demons. Strong enough, Alex was galloping through the clear blue sky.
“Yeeee-haaaaaaa!” he screamed, not caring at all what the demons at this moment were thinking. Brushing off the warnings about this and that and that and this.
Alexander Roderick Winsletenna knew best.
Lord, oh mighty, in spite of the werewolves and the ghouls, he knew best.
He saw himself as a young child dancing in the moonlight. He saw himself dropping the coin into a well at age six and wishing to become a good king. He saw himself smiling and laughing at the comic relief of the jesters of the court. He saw himself being told bedtime stories by his mother. He saw everything that ever had happened in his life and he was left smiling at all this. He felt so at one with the whole of this sky. He had been stuck in a ravine a moment ago. Now he was a free man, inspired by the holy ghost.
“God, I love you!”
”I love you, too” the horse cried.
He felt the air on his face and the clouds were whizzing by at miraculous speed.
There was something amazing about this.
Something that felt like he was joining the heavenly angels. He was becoming at one with God in a way that he never had experienced. Oh, yes, of course, he always had fought for God. He always had. He had always been a believer.
Always.
Maybe he at time drifted off on to another area.
But in reality, he was always a true believer, so at one now with everything holy.
He knew everything would be good.
The most important part was awaiting him, but he could face that happily.
Laughing and singing the king and his stallion landed on the ground and galloped on. He felt the horse gallop around in circles and actually laughing, racing down towards the valleys and up to the hills. He felt himself feeling strong and masculine and muscular and adamant and, half-smiling, his soul was defying every time Lucinda had threatened him. Riding into the sun, faster and faster, he felt the eagle following him.
He felt like he had defied the powers of darkness with the power of God and he felt strong about being such strong person that could do so.
He felt the two of them slow down, pant and laugh out of pure relief, raising their arms to the sky and thanking the Lord.
He felt superstition to be a thing of the past.
He was his own man, about to fight the powers of hell with realistic means.
At that moment, still mounted on the stallion, he saw the eagle soar down and land, bouncing as well in landing, just feet away from them.
In that eagle he saw the evangelist John in the shape of Fabian.
The eagle transformed and then stood up. It was St. Michael and he was laughing and singing.
Alex stepped off his horse and started dancing with St. Michael, dancing with this wondrous angel.
St. Michael, the angelic guardian of free protection, the last and original evangelist, spoke:
“I don’t have to teach you anything. The only thing that a human does not have to be reminded of is freedom. He wants freedom. When he can get it, he does, no matter what.”
Alex and Mercutio and Michael danced on those pastures and Old Father watched from the clear blue sky and had to smile as well, nodding to himself and telling the other angels:
”I told you he was ready.”
Raphael and Gabriel had to agree.
Alexander jumped up on the horse again and now Michael was not the eagle of St. John any more. He was himself, soaring through the sky in front of the King of a future Medatlantia, singing and laughing and joking like a young man should. Loving life, thanking the Holy Ghost for Alexander. Thanking the Lord for leading his child to a certain victory.
The three rode into the sun and sang a song of salvation.

§

Michael and Alexander had rode, no flew, around the sky for an entire day, literally visiting Nocturania and even bits of the desolate Prosperania from the air that day.
Mercutio had kept on talking and talking and his newly found ability to speak had made him into a very literate genius.
Alexander Winsletenna felt like six again.
He felt like not year had passed between the day he dropped the coin into the well and today.
And yet, he knew that he traveller a long way to get to where he was.
He asked Michael why he hadn’t been able to fly from Iuventus Sacrum to Darker Callenia and save the trip. Michael laughed and told him that it was the trip that made him able to fly. Without the trip over here there would be no way that he could fly. The trip, the pain, the training, all of it had made him into the strong fighter he was today. His reward was flying at breakneck speed and seeing the road that he had travelled. The villages and the forest patch with the cave. The river and the lake. The avenue and the oasis. The long one way road and the wasteland. The first shades of green leading to the hillside. The farms and the soldier camps. The main capital and the tree village. He realized that he had jumped several miles when walking out of the forest village gym. Down to the Wilta territory in fact, where he had, by his own force and subconscious will, come to a place near a village that lay somewhat closer to the infamous dark territories.
He saw it all and how it connected. How his road connected and how thankful he was that he got to see where he had gone.
They were now again by the last lake that existed before the dark territories. It was night and Michael and Alex were sitting by the campfire just talking quietly about life, looking into the flames.
Mercutio had not spoken since nightfall.
There had been a long silence now. Alex had felt fabulous up until now. He was strong, yes. Ready, yes. A patient, strong lion with heart. But he was afraid. Very afraid.
Michael knew what he was thinking of.
“No one can take away your fear, my friend” he said.
Alex looked up at Michael and nodded.
“I know that.” He shook his head and looked out. “I know. But I am entering a new world with new rules. I am scared. I want to win. I want to regain my family.”
Michael sighed. “You couldn’t be more ready, Alex.”
“It is all thanks to you.”
”You did the hard work of manifesting it.”
Alex shook his head. “I could never have made it without you.” He saw Michael’s face and how he was looking into the flames of the campfire, obviously missing heaven. “Michael?”
He looked up. “Hmmm?”
“Thank you.”
“My pleasure.” Michael blinked at Alex, lovingly. “My pleasure.”
They looked back into the flames.
“Mercutio hasn’t spoken all evening, has he?” Alex laughed.
Michael glanced at Mercutio and smiled.
“No. I think his voice must be tired.”
Alex could not let the future go.
“I am afraid of tomorrow, Michael.”
“Accept your fear. Use it. It is important to be afraid sometimes. But I will be there in spirit.”
“I don’t want to face the unknown.”
“But you must face the unknown. That is the price for immortality. Facing the unknown.”
”Immortality?” Alex asked.
“If you survive and win this, your reward will be heavenly immortality.” Michael saw Alexander’s face and corrected himself. “No, not physical immortality. It means you go to a new level.” Michael looked out onto the lake, the sea grass slightly blowing in the wind. “You will not have to go through endless reincarnations, you will be able to work on the next level.” The moon was not quite as full as yesterday. Michael picked up a piece of bread that lay beside him. He waved it at Alex and Alex nodded. Michael split it in two, threw the one half to Alex, who caught it and began munching on his half. “Your country will experience a renaissance of unspeakable measure. It is all due to the son that your grandson will have and who at the end of this century will send a young man from Genoa across the seas to found what will be called Columbia or Christophoria. A kind of Eden. In your alternate reality, it will be called America. But let’s leave all that alone. The main thing is, everything is at stake here. So you must be calm. Don’t give in to your fear. If you loose now, nothing will be the way it should be.”
“Michael.”
”Yes, Alex.”
“I love you.”
”I love you, too, Alexander.”
There was a long pause. Michael was waiting for the right moment to say this. It arrived when Alex looked over at Mercutio and how the stallion was eating grass and half-sleeping. There were transparent angels there by the horse and the nodded to Michael to speak.
“Alexander?”
”Yes?”
”I have something to tell you.”
Michael spoke very softly and tenderly, resting on his elbow.
He sat up.
“That is partially why I am here.”
Alexander sat up, as well, interested.
“You know that you are the reincarnation of a man in the very village on Earth, don’t you?”
”Yes, so I was told.”
”His name was Joseph and his wife was Rebecca …”
”… who in turn turned out to be Lucinda.”
“Well, there is more and I think this is time to be ready for it.”
Alexander’s felt how his hand began shaking again. He calmed down by remembering patience. He opened the inner smile by caressing his strength.
“Adnicul was the first angel Lucifer ever created. He was fooled into training Lucinda to become what she is today. Then he was completely dumped into the dungeon of Zeekha’s old castle Misar Rularia, the one you transported yourself to by thought and literally dumped into this illusion. We kept him alive for years.”
”Why keep Adnicul alive, Michael?”
”Because Adnicul is of heavenly origin, Alexander. He needs to save his soul. The only way he can do that is to do two things. One: by letting go of his vanity. He has already done that. It took a long time. We kept him locked up in the Convent of Mary Magdalene in the Wiltas for ages until he really succumbed to our will.”
”And secondly?”
“He has to be at your side in saving your family.”
Alexander eyes opened wide. He had travelled all this way to save his family only to team up with the enemy?
”No way, Michael.” He stood up and started pacing the ground in front of the fire. Michael remained seated. “You think I will fight side by side with someone that is the reason why my family is in trouble in the first place.”
”Adnicul was always the fifth wheel, Alex. Lucifer, Lucinda were two of the wheels. But Adnicul never had anything to do with the curse or the plagues. He was merely a trainer and he had been living a lie.”
”Why do we have to save him?”
“Because Adnicul was put here again on Earth unwilling to be what he became only in order to tutor Lucinda. That was all. He is not what he became. He needs to return to the Hwee-Ail-Sihl tree.”
“What tree?”
“It is the heavenly name for the Tree of Forbidden Fruit. There is a tree in heaven like that. Just a sample to show the angels what it is. It was the original problem. It was Lucifer who took a seed from that tree and literally made hell out of it. Adnicul was the first seed from that tree. That mutation was always confused. The difficult part is now that he remembers all of that and thinks you will not let him collaborate. He might be destroyed in there.” Alexander looked toward the forest. “But it is worth a try. He should have a chance to save his soul if he wants to. And he does.”
”I am sure you are right. But it is a big change.”
”Spell Adnicul backwards.”
Alexander concentrated, Then, he calmly said, looking up.
“Lucinda.”
Michael half-smiled, thoughtfully.
”You have always known that, haven’t you?”
Alexander nodded.
“But Adnicul is older than Lucinda.”
”That makes no difference. Lucinda was planned long before Adnicul was. When a trainer was needed, the name came to mind because it was simply Lucinda’s own name in reverse. Adnicul had received his name from his father, a royal gambler and bandit, and thought it simply a fluke. He never knew that he was a tool. He spent years in the dungeon trying to figure out why he had been betrayed.”
“Where is he know?”
”Eric, his old servant, is now an angel and was chosen as his mentor, due to his connection. They are close by in an abandoned old cave here near by. We will let you meet before embarking upon the journey tomorrow.”
”Michael, I have travelled this journey alone and I want to continue to do so.”
”Alexander, I realize how you feel. But it is good for you to not be gluttonous about this. This is still your own road. He will just help you. Believe me, it is better to be two in there. You can help each other.”
”What if he snaps and jumps at me? What if he breaks loose out of this insight and everything is lost?”
”Do you think that I would risk that with everything that is at stake here? If he weren’t ready, I would not ask you to do this. Alex, this is me you are talking to. Your old friend, Michael.”
Alexander nodded. “Yes. Yes.” Alex walked over to Michael and lay down beside him. Alexander put his head in the angel’s lap. “I know. I will have to cope with that decision. We might be able to make a good decision together. Maybe we have more chance then.”
Michael caressed Alexander’s head. “Go to sleep now, my friend. I will watch over you. Dream a thousand dreams of bliss, my good man.”
Soon enough, Alexander was fast asleep in Michael’s protecting lap.
He felt his presence in his dreams, his sweet protection.
Michael sat all night there, stroking his child’s hair and speaking to Mercutio through telepathy.
In his head, Mercutio could not stop talking.

§

That morning there was expectancy in the air. Dewdrops were falling from the bushes and the morning sun had just risen.
Alexander had dreamt of home. There had been four robins in the dream. Four sweet birds singing a song. The prophecy had been fulfilled. The light had led him to the four robin breasted birds. Four birds that giggled not screamed, sang not shouted.
He had dreamt he was back with Sieglinde, eating breakfast on the terrace. Then she was gone and he could not find her. Belinda appeared and told him she had been crying a river and he saw that river. It was wide and long and lead to the door of Iuventus Sacrum. He cried, too, and his tears fell into the river.
“Alexander?” He opened his eyes slowly, the first thing he saw was the grass. His head was on a folded blanket. He looked up Michael. He was kneeling. “Good morning.” Michael smiled as the king opened his eyes, blinking. “Slept well, your majesty?”
He responded by nodding and rubbed his eyes and yawned.
Michael caressed Alexander’s cheek.
“Dreamt of home?”
Alexander fixed his eyes on his stallion, but he was actually not looking anywhere, his eyes somewhere else in time.
”Belinda cried a river. It lead to my door.”
Michael sighed.
“She is communicating with you through her soul’s mysteries.”
Alexander looked at Michael, puzzled.
The black-haired man gave him a calm look.
“You’ll understand in time.” The angel smiled. “Breakfast.”
Alexander sat up and was handed hot soup. A small fire was burning and above was a steaming kettle.
“Chicken soup?” Alexander mused.
Michael nodded.
The King started eating and then made a yummy-sound.
”Where did you get that so quickly this morning?”
Michael smiled.
“I have my connections.”
Michael sat down, crossing his legs, and looked lovingly at Alexander.
”Ready to face the unknown?”
“I don’t know if I ever will be, Michael.” Alexander looked up at the rising sun. “What bothers me the most is that I will team up with my archenemy?” He looked at Michael. “Do you understand me, Michael? I hope you are not mad at me for that.”
Michael shook his head. “No.” There was a loving look on his face. “Not mad at all.”
“I feel out of place facing the demons with a demon.”
“He is no demon. He spent years in the dungeons alone. He knows the inside of that forest more than you. He needs you, because he remembers who he was. He is a changed man.”
Alexander looked up at Michael.
“Changed man, huh?”
“Yes.”
At once, there were two figures approaching from a small pasture opposite the forest, just before the path into the darker territories.
He recognized the man with the eye patch. His features were the same. Black hair, goatee beard, moustache reaching down toward the chin. Long flowing hair. Cape. Standard clothing. The man he had fought for years.
“Remember that he is responsible for nothing of what you have suffered.”
Alexander heard Michael speak, but the voice was far away.
The man next to Adnicul was a smaller man and he was clad all in white. His aura was bright yellow. This, too, was a man familiar too Alexander. At once, he recognized him. It was the man that had followed him from Misar Rularia on to the village.
“That, as well, is an innocent man. He only followed you to test your strength. He is an angelic protector.”
The two approached slowly. As they did, Alex stood up.
On each side of the campfire, two men stood and looked at each other. Michael looked at Eric. Adnicul looked at Alexander.
It was clear that Adnicul was confused, he probably always would be. But there was repent there. He wanted to clear away having been betrayed. He did not belong where he had thought he did.
Adnicul opened his mouth and spoke.
A rich baritone voice emerged from his mouth.
“I have a chance to repent. I have realized that I am guilty of betrayal and was in turn betrayed. I want to help you find your family.” Alexander did not say anything and could not help but feel deepest disgust for this man. “I did not hurt anyone.”
“You helped Lucinda attack Belinda. I cannot forgive that,”
“I was only there. I did not push her down.”
“Then why repent? Why come back and try to help me? You fought a war. Killed thousands of my people.”
“I was locked up in a dungeon and forgotten. Until Eric came back and told me my story. I cannot expect you to forgive me. Take away the weapons I do not have. My magic is already gone. But let me lead you through the forest. Without my help you will be lost. I have already turned toward the light.”
”After being a pirate all your life?”
”After realizing I had lived a lie.”
Alex looked at Michael. Michael spoke.
“I would not risk this if it were not safe. We have taken all precautions. If Adnicul tries anything he will pay. But don’t worry. You have inside information here.”
Alexander disliked doing this, but he nodded and took Adnicul’s hand and shook it. It was soft hand. He felt the vibrations.
Visions came flashing by his inner eye.
Pain, he saw pain. Surprise over betrayal. Being used. Being used as a victim.
The serious look in both of the men’s faces made both of the ethereal beings, the archangel and the angelic guardian, smile. For the prophecy was coming true.
The Lord had said that two foes shall come together and form a union of salvation.
The two men let go.
They all sat down, ate some soup.
Michael spoke.
“We cannot tell you what is waiting for you. Only that what that forest will lead you to is salvation. IN the end you will reach where Lucinda is hiding. When you reach the cave you will have to duel her in order to get to where your family is. They are encaged above the underworld, guarded by a monster of such magnitude. Enter the forest, twelve posts await you and you will know when you have passed one of them. The creatures in there are treacherous beyond anything you have ever seen.”
“What road leads to the cave?”
”The cave is the entrance to the underworld. You must Pass through the January Tunnel and go left.”
Eric spoke.
“To get there you must follow the road to a fork in the road. Take the left path and cross the wasteland. The meandering path will lead you to a bumpy way over a hill that passes a very steep ravine.”
”Be careful, there” Michael added.
Eric continued. “When you pass that you will come to a pasture. You must cross the pasture sideways toward the hill to find the valley where you will have to lead the horses across a river.”
”The river,” Adnicul finally said, “leads us to a waterfall where we will find a way that leads us to a tunnel that goes in back of the waterfall.”
”You must pass that tunnel to get to the other side.”
”Finally,” Eric finished Michael’s explanation, “there will be no turning back. You enter the heartland of the darker territories when you see ravens nests in all of the trees. You must cross this enchanted forest to get to where you will find Rigor Mortis.”
”I cannot see how we found Rigor Mortis in 1411. We never went so far.” Alex shook his head.
Adnicul answered that. “That was probably because you didn’t travel through Lucinda’s illusion. This place is extra hard to find, because it was created to make it difficult. In the real world it may be easier. Lucinda takes pride in making it hard to find.”
Michael said: “After that, be cautious. That is Rumzil territory and you might have to ward off more beasts than your sword can handle. That last mile is the darkest. You are entering the endless night in there. It leads to the cave. This last stretch might last you longer than you think.”
“Where is my sword?”
Michael reached behind him. “Here.”
”Why does it keep disappearing?”
”It only is there when you need it?”
”Remember this is your mind versus Lucinda’s here, not reality. Reality is what you are fighting for.”
“What shall we eat?”
”There are plenty of pheasants and wild rabbits in there, as well the occasional squirrel. Be careful with that sword though. It has magic powers and might fry the rabbit as well as catch it.”
Eric continued: “We will send you all the light we can.”
”In there” Michael continued “there will be no manifestations. You will have to work yourself through this reality yourself. Nobody can help you but you in there. But you are more than ready now, Alexander!”
Eric had now stood up and came back with a bluish black horse that obviously was Adnicul’s own.
Mercutio was cautious.
He looked up and tried to remain calm.
Alex wondered about his horse. He was very careful with speaking.
“Can my horse speak any more?”
Michael smiled.
“You will see.”
They embraced.
“Win back your kingdom for all of our sakes.”
They both mounted their horses and waved goodbye.
Soon enough, the two men were riding past the lake onto a road that seemed to be light. They both looked back and saw the angels fade into the morning, leaving no traces of the campfire behind them. When looking ahead, they saw they were entering the forest.
No real path seemed too visible.
Neither of the men knew what to say to one another.
So they did not say anything.
One thing, however, they did have in common: strong, determined and ready as they were, nothing could take away their fear of the unknown.
Adnicul, the former leader of the country of the screaming birds, was here to win back his soul.
Alexander, the lost king of the haunted kingdom, was here to find his country. He had gone thirty years in escaping his destiny. He gone five years neglecting it. He had gone three years chasing it. Now, Alexander Roderick Winsletenna was about to face what his heart feared most: his sister.
But somewhere in his heart, he knew that beyond that road leading to an underground cave there was a land where the roses grew. A paradise lost to be found, where his heart would sing a song of salvation as before. Where his family would rule over bliss for generations to come.
The evangelists, the hermits, the forest peoples and the angels had made him into what he was today.
A patient lion with the strength of an ox.
Freedom forever his.
On his back was a sword.
So, as the fighter he was, Alexander Winsletenna rode calmly toward the forest, not really knowing what to expect. A guide by his side. A dream in his heart. And hope to last forever.


CHAPTER THREE

UNEXPECTED LIAISON

There was something that told him he was crossing a barrier.
He was crossing a barrier between the rounded and the straight, between training and expertise. This was no longer a paragraph with an intermission. It went straight to the point.
There was no beating around the bush. If this had been a book, the paragraph would start with words and not with a pause. At least, that is what Alex was telling himself. He was entering a world that would become Yambalah, the birthplace of the original sin.
This was a world full of cities and yet desolate and forsaken, the real Nocturania was a mixture of throbbing empire and haunted kingdom.
It was perfectly reasonable that the remarkable world he had travelled through wasn’t the Nocturania of real life. It was not the alternate reality Michael had spoken of as the mirror reflection of his own. It was not anything that he had seen before.
It had tutored him to become a warrior, yes.
But this new place, what was it?
This was the inside of something else.

This was a world left behind. Something someone had cleansed to prepare for him to arrive. He could imagine his own real Prosperania a place stuck somewhere in time.
If he were to see the state that his Prosperania actually was in, surprise would be the last emotion to arise in his soul. The real Prosperania was actually frozen in time.
It had actually not passed beyond the 23rd of September 1425.
But this place was stuck in its own self. It seemed that something had happened here before that date, the 23rd of September 1425. It seemed everyone in this desolate place had been disposed of before Nomed had served them the potion.
All of these details were clear to him. It was also clear that this place had been deliberately cleaned of all life.

He was currently riding toward a crack in time.
That much was clear. But what else?

He was riding toward his real self. Sitting there upon Mercutio, his brown stallion, and trotting forward through early afternoon, Alex was forced to look at his own hands. They were young hands. He let his fingers pass through his own hair, thick hair, a young man’s hair. He felt his cheeks. He enjoyed feeling the sensation of hands against his own close shave. But he realized he had not shaved for … how long, a week now? Why did his beard not grow here? The sword upon his back was pure metal with a silver handle, as unreal as it was magical.
His vest was leather, his pants were rough cotton.
He looked at his own arms, muscular biceps and triceps.
He had never had muscles like these until now.
Not even in his youth had he been so muscular.

What did this mean?
He knew what it meant. It meant he was still his own “mind-self”, young and taught to defend God. But he was entering what the world really looked like beyond the illusion. He was peeking through the keyhole of reality. Until he actually flip sided into the real world he would be his “mind-self”.
He had been in a world created especially for him to tutor him to meet Lucinda and whoever else he was about to battle. But he was a Warrior of God. And more than before, Alexander knew that although the world behind him was just a scam, a false pretence to cover up what actually lay behind it all, he knew that the angels might’ve just used this world to tutor him to be what he was now.
He was a visitor, a guest in a place waiting for salvation, literally.
A bird flew overhead and Alexander Winsletenna looked up and saw that it was a buzzard. Belinda had seen a few of these birds on the way back from Rigor Mortis in 1411 and they had remained angels to her since then. This was the way that he saw them now, as angels.
There were bushes and trees on each side of this road and most of them were pine trees. After having ridden for the early morning hours over rough valley terrain they were finally riding down a path that was easy for the horses to travel.

The two men riding down the path side by side said nothing to one another. They had been silent since leaving the lake. Now there was a mutual understanding between them that they were in the same proverbial boat and that they needed each other.
That morning, both Adnicul and Alexander had looked behind them upon entering the forest. He could clearly recall, just as well as Alexander he supposed, that he had seen Michael standing there next to Eric looking at them as they rode away. Adnicul also remembered what he had seen when he turned to look a second time, an entirely different scene, and houses with thatched roofs. He had seen barns and a well in the middle of the marketplace. He had seen a temple of some kind way in the distance. The two men glanced at each other and Adnicul could see that the Prosperanian King was aware of the real Nocturania back there. They had skipped a moment in time.
Adnicul recognized Michael’s look from before his disappearance. He recalled seeing him in the convent praying whilst Uriel was out taking Adnicul for a walk. There was solitude there in that stare that told him that everything was at stake. The look on Michael’s face told him that this was way too important for anything at all to go wrong. He, the tyrant, badly needed the protection of angels.
Basically, this was his road to be travelled with another man.
For once, and for two different reasons, these two men were unified in their cause to awaken the haunted kingdom from its cursed sleep.

Alex could not help but be sceptical. But he suspected that his former foe had been told that his soul would be terminated if he did not help Alexander in his quest. Having lived a lie for eons was most probably not the most inspiring thing to handle.
It had taken him a half-hour to realize that he had been taken from the imaginary world of his inner demons to what could safely be called the real Nocturania. This was none other than the world that he had left behind. The journey through the crack in the mountain had been a journey between worlds and nothing else. He could most probably travel to Prosperania now and see himself lying there on the table in the Grand Hall. But what did that make Adnicul? It made him a dimensional traveller, as well. It meant that Adnicul had actually been captured in the real world, not in any fantasy illusion. That meant that he had come to Alexander’s to take him back.
Was that true? Where had actually awoken? Had he been sleeping on Michael’s lap in the twilight zone between worlds? Had they met between worlds? Had Adnicul been handed over from his own illusion to meet him like someone that was handed over at the border of two countries? All he knew was that he was riding toward something that he hoped was going to give him back his home.

Alexander pitied Adnicul. He felt that the Nocturanian King was now nothing more than the ruler of something that he had no knowledge would still exist once he got back. Was it all destroyed? Was he to forfeit his throne if he did get back to where he had been?
There was something in the distance and Alex wondered instantly what it was. Alexander yawned and realized for the first time that he was tired.
There was not much to say.
What was this place?
Again, an avenue, forest on each side, deep ditch on each side separating it from the road. The road itself half dried mud, half sand. Centurion’s and Mercutio hooves were not clippeti-clopping down the road, but the sound they were making was more a swishety-swosh due to the mud.
The leaves were green on the trees and every trace of spring was in the air. But the sky was grey and it looked like rain, although not a drop was falling upon their heads.
A monument was ahead. The road had been paved around the monument. In this desolate place a black statue was sitting on a throne that sat on a platform with steps leading down to the ground. It was the monument that you would expect to find standing on the town square of some city in front of the City Hall, remembering its founder, but not here.
At that moment, Alex realized that he had not put a statue of himself on the town square. Had people told him to do so? Maybe they had. But why do it?
Because he had been ruling Prosperania now for such a long time?
Yes, perhaps that was it. But Alex, modest man that he was, knew what his father also had known. People remember you for the way you rule and govern and help them, not for some statue in a town square. If you have to put up a statue to tell them that you are king, then you are doing something wrong. They should like you enough to urge your family to put up a statue.
Who was the man on the throne up there, higher than the trees?
He recognized the long hair and the cape.
When he came closer he recognized the eye patch as well.
A few feet away from the monument, the two men and former foes stopped and looked up at the large thing staring at them.
A slight benevolent grin on the statue’s lips made Alex realize that the statue was pointing at the road behind them. He had not noticed it because the man sitting up there had his hand on his left leg because the other one was clenched in a fist. It was a sinister statue, aimed to scare, and it did.
Then he heard his companion snort and when Alex looked to his side he saw Adnicul shake his head and look down.
“If I’d only known …”
Alex looked at the statue again and realized that the man on the stallion next to him was the same man as the man on the throne above him. It scared him that this was a statue of Adnicul himself and that this person was next to him.
He looked at the real Adnicul again and realized that the features had softened.
“Known what?” Alex responded, realizing it was the first thing he had said to the man all along since leaving Michael and Eric over six hours ago.
Adnicul looked at him with his one healthy eye and there was terror there. Pain and terror and hope at the same time. Hope that Alex would forgive. And yet, there was darkness and the possibility to always be able to go back to that what he had once been.
The only thing that didn’t reject him was God.
Adnicul smiled. It was a very odd smile, but still a smile.
“I am glad you speak to me after all” he said. He looked up and Alex realized it was a half-smile.
Alex sighed. “Sire, you have terrorized my people. But my guardian angel tells me that you, as well, have been lied to. So, why should I not speak?”
“What are they?”
“Who are what, Adnicul?”
“My sins … What are they?”
Alexander thought for a moment and then answered him.
“Your sins are ignorance in motion.” Alex tried to foresee a response, but continued. “You want change. If Michael says so, you must be on the way to recovery. But your sins are unworthy of you.”
Adnicul seemed to try to find some comfort in his statue. But there was much pain in his expression that it was clear that it was hard to find.
“I had these statues erected shortly before we kidnapped your daughter.”
He looked at Alex, who only shook his head.
“There were thirteen of these positioned strategically across the country. They actually form a ring around Rigor Mortis which lays in the heartland of what could be called the deepest bowel of Nocturania. I had these things made and positioned strategically to scare. It was a sexual pleasure to know that these things scared the people witless.”
Alex turned away from Adnicul and rode away from him.
“But now I realize what all that was.”
”What?”
“A lie” the dictator said, his horse snorting, the rider looking down. A lock of Adnicul’s hair lifted and sank and swayed in the breeze. “Nothing but a lie.”
Alex had Mercutio trot off toward the right pasture.
Adnicul looked down and sighed.
“I know you have no good feelings for me, but I assure you that this is as uncomfortable to you as it is to me …”
”You spent decades chasing innocent victims. You spent years and years raiding the countryside of my wife’s homeland leaving nothing but ruin. You sent an army to my empire and killed thousands of innocent people. Ludicrous enough, is that I want to believe you that you are sorry …”
“Alex …”
“Don’t call me by my first name. Call me Your Majesty for in my presence you are in the vicinity of an Empire and don’t you forget it.”
“My heart is a temple of sorrow …”
“We are beyond apologies. Don’t talk to me about temples.”
”I was leading a life that betrayed me. Everything I did, I did for someone who deliberately fooled me.” Alex sneered and turned away, even Mercutio snorted. “Your majesty,” Adnicul sneered, “I met Lucifer when I was twelve. He told me I was his apprentice and that I would become king. My father was a bohemian robber, but he had no ill will beyond egocentricity. He lived the life of a king because he stole from the rich. So, I was used to stealing. But here came this man who told me I was more than that. I was a king. I lived half of my life thinking I was a chosen king. Now I found out I was just grabbed from obscurity to serve as a disposal chamber for someone that needed a teacher before becoming reckless. I was taught well in all the warrior arts and I was clever and cunning, that was why I was chosen.” Adnicul turned away himself and sighed. “The only difference between me and Nero is that Nero never admitted he was wrong, I have.” Alex sneered at Adnicul saying this. “I am not asking for special attention. Hate me all you want, you have the right to and God knows that.” Adnicul looked up to the heavens. “We need not be friends. I believe we cannot be. I have no excuse to ask for your friendship. But all I want is for you to grant me this: let me help you.”
“You betrayed everything I stand for.”
“I was betrayed myself. I knew nothing of what my leader had planned. I had nothing to do with the conspiracy to comatose your empire.” Alex said nothing. “As far as I know you are not holy either. You executed one hundred innocent victims to avenge your three children’s death.”
“They are not dead yet. That was an illusion.”
”Regardless, Alex. It was your decision.”
“I was hurt.”
”You were just as ruthless as I.” There was a long pause. “Nothing in the way of holy ever completely rules our destinies. I am not the only one who killed.”
Alex snapped his head back toward Adnicul and whispered.
“Regardless of my past, you are responsible for my family’s misery. God damn you, you ruined my daughter’s childhood. You call that nothing.”
Adnicul started screaming, as well.
“You can at least let me help you set her free. Acknowledge my feelings of guilt.”
“Why should I trust you in the first place?”
”Because your guardian angel wants you to.” There was a long pause as the two men simply gazed at one another, trying to figure the other one out. “You are the holy one, Sire, or so you claim. The question if trust is superfluous. Your angels love you. Yes, it is the perfect reason to trust me if Michael himself hands me over to you.”
There was a long pause and Adnicul started riding toward Alex slowly.
He stopped right in front of the statue, as Alex had ridden several feet away from it now.
“You might be right” Alex snapped.
“I remember Eden, Alex.”
Alex looked up and now there was a completely different expression in his face.
Adnicul smiled.
“It was beautiful. Birds were on my branch and they were chirping all day long. I was but a seed, upon the tree of forbidden fruit. I was but a seed, but with a conscience. I was forbidden to be gazed upon only by human eyes.” There was a plea in his voice.
“I never wanted to leave. Hwee-Aill-Sihl was my home. I had friends on that tree. We talked through our emotions and our souls travelled the stem. When I was plucked down I was ripped apart.“ He rode closer to Alex. “Let me help you find Belinda.” Alex sighed. Then he looked up and saw a tear rolling down Adnicul’s cheek. “Please let me help you.”
Alex nodded. “I need your help.”
The two men shook hands and it was now that he realized that Adnicul’s hands were soft, softer than his own.

§

Alexander looked at the flask that Adnicul had just handed him.
The flask was shiny and had a small cap on top. The flask itself was very unspectacular, but nice looking. He unscrewed the cap and smelled.
“Vodka?”
Adnicul nodded. “From your wife’s home country.”
Alexander raised one eyebrow. “Where did you get it?”
”In fact, it was given to me in the convent. I guess, someone there felt you might have use for it during the trip.”
He looked at the bottle and shook his head. “The angels even give me vodka.”
”Only for emergencies.”
Alex laughed. This was almost bizarre. His former foe and chief enemy was raising his finger and reprimanding him about alcohol consumption.
“Thank you.”
The response was dry, but friendly. He did not know how to react.
Was this a friendly gesture?
They didn’t need to be friends.
In fact, wasn’t true that the hatred of the other kept the other going. And yet, here they were, sharing a newly killed rabbit beside a campfire spitting wet wood.
Was Alex being unfair?
He did not know if he was.
Adnicul looked out across the plains and the look upon his face was one of deep thought.
“A test.”
His words were whispered, almost impossible to hear. But Alex had heard them.
“What?”
Adnicul smiled.
“Michael was testing us when he gave us directions. He knows I can find my way in my own country.”
The night was dark, but Alex could see that the stars were glittering and bright.
“So, why did he do it?” Alex bit off some meat off the bone. “Give us directions, I mean.”
Ahead was a valley. Below him was grass. Inside was fear. In front of him was fire.
Adnicul shrugged.
“He never would give us directions that were so specific and expect us to be satisfied with that. He knows what we must face.”
“You of all people are afraid of what we are about to face?”
He nodded. “I cannot tell you any more why, but I am.”
“Then it is true.”
“What?”
“That you are my guide.”
“I am just here along for the ride. You went through this training for a reason.” Adnicul smiled and this time it was pity in his smile. “My father might’ve been a robber, but he was right about something. He said: ‘Don’t put your light in a dark place’. Display it. I don’t care if you are a robber in reality. Be a king in your heart.” Adnicul lay down and turned around again. “Good night, Alexander! May the lord honour and bless you.”
Alex did think about it and lay down as well after finishing his rabbit leg.
He was looking at the stars, trying to figure out his own fate.
“I hope you are not cross with me.”
Adnicul turned around and gazed bemusedly at Alex. “Cross?”
”Angry, agitated.”
Adnicul sat up. “Why should I be?”
“For blaming you for being a bastard when I myself have sinned.”
Adnicul reached over and patted Alex on the shoulder. “You are a good man. Better than I.” Both of them looked into the fire and tried to figure out what secrets it hid. Adnicul looked at him and smiled. “I hope you can save your family, Alex. I wish you that. I am just here to save my soul.” Alex reached forth his hand and Adnicul took it. There was friendship there, weird friendship, but friendship nonetheless. “Good night.”
“Good night, Adnicul. I’ll wake you in a few hours.”
The former tyrant lay down and fell asleep without hearing those words.
“What is waiting for me out there?” Alex said to himself, looking into the dark forest.
He was old enough to figure that out himself.
Something told him that everything, anything he could think of or remember having seen, was about to change. He finished his rabbit leg and thought of life for two hours. There were ghouls about, but they had no harmful intentions. In the middle of the night, Adnicul was woken to take care of the fire. There were a few simple words exchanged, a try to joke about Rumzils but no laughter. The former dictator and the king of Prosperania said good night a second time and Alex lay down and covered his body with his blanket and thought of the future. He missed his family so much that it hurt. He wondered where they were and how he would find them. He realized then and there he would find out very soon. That was the moment when Alexander Winsletenna fell asleep and had the most horrible nightmare of his life.

Riding along toward the statue down the road they had just travelled, an army of darkness was galloping relentlessly in search of some demonic salvation. Its leader was a man in a gigantic black steal helmet with large horns. He was wearing a face mask with a pointed nose, also black. The cape and the harness were both huge and the entire aim of the chosen appearance seemed to be directed toward tyrannical self adoration. Gigantic shoulder pads bounced as he rode, leather pants magnified the legs, and his huge cape fluttered in the breeze, the stallion blacker and bigger than Centurion.
It seemed this man, this leader of whatever empire he commanded, was anything but benevolent. But his wish for benevolence left him unwanted by the powers of purity. It found itself willing to change for the worse.
All powerful, his entire form bigger than any of the other riders, he was not anonymous.
Yet, he did not unmask.
But Alexander knew who this man was.
He had seen him in his dreams and was now seeing him again.
He came to cleanse the world of the unworthy believers.
The fierce leader of an army of around one hundred equally equipped men had obviously been riding for a long way to get where they were.
There were literally a thousand unarmed people in front of the troop. They were running away from the rider and his army and knew, each one, that they did not stand a chance of any survival.
There were old women falling down and spraining their ankles, clutching their wounds in hope of some comfort. There were young men with wide open eyes and hollow mouths, running like the wind past mothers and daughters and grandchildren. There were little children, toddlers trying to keep up with their big sisters and children trying to keep up with their pets. There was a mother who saw her three year old son fall down into the mud. Her long brown hair fell into her eyes and down toward her bosom across the beige clothes that she wore. She ran back toward the child who was crying. She picked him up, just as she saw the army come too close toward her for any comfort and began running, the child in her arms. She sobbed, fell, stood up, fell again. When she stood up, a large wound had opened on her right leg.
The woman began running, faster now, tears streaming down her face.
Relentlessly, the man on his horse rode onward, no mercy in his soul. When the army passed the woman and her child, the two were simply extinguished, ceasing to exist. It was as if someone had taken water and eradicated a watercolour painting.
This man came not from here, but from below.
That much was clear.
The large leader on his horse was thinking and Alexander heard his thoughts.
“We must extinguish everyone from here and prepare for Alexander’s arrival.”
The man was preparing for him, Alexander, to come here. But why prepare?
He heard screams, wails, howls, cries from a helpless crowd.
Who were these people?
They were Nocturanians, obviously.
Nocturanians who had been oppressed for years by a regime whose only aim was selfishness.
Suddenly, it struck him. Prosperania was sleeping, caught in a time bubble. But Nocturania was still in the real world. In Nocturania this really was March of 1430. If Alex lost the duel with his sister, then Prosperania would turn into Greater Nocturania, just like before, back when Simon and John fought over their land in a blood feud. This was the second time around a duel was fought over this haunted kingdom.
Now it was Alexander’s turn and they needed him alone. They were counting on winning this.
Alexander Winsletenna was a spectator watching this seen as from above, like someone watching a labyrinth from above. He saw the people running away from the army sitting on their large and very dark horses. He saw some of the people falling down and not making it, facing eradication.
He saw someone making it and running faster down the lane to save his own self.
It was a young man dressed in some sort of blue cape. He was differently dressed than the others. The other people were not elegant. They somehow only wore grey and brown and earthy colours such as beige and green. The fabric was cotton at the most, sheepskin at the best and leather or rugged farmer clothing at the finest.
This man was dressed like a nobleman. His hair was combed and his skin was soft and beautiful, that much was clear. His blue cape covered a red vest and a green shirt with golden buttons. His knee length purple pants stopped before long black stockings leading down to shiny shoes.
At once he turned around and faced the army, knowing fully well that they were coming his way.
The army came closer and the man fell down in absolute panic. Soon enough, covered with mud and dirt, he tried to stand up, but realized he had sprained his ankle. He lifted his leg to clutch it. But not being able to hold his balance, he fell into the ditch.
The large dictator on the horse stopped. The man in the elegant suit was now bloody and his clothes were ripped and torn. He looked up at the man on the horse, who shifted eagerly from hoof to hoof. There was a mean smile under that pointy mask, he could see it. The army waited.
Slowly, the man on the horse trotted a few paces onward, all the time looking at the dying man. Obviously, no person other than him had been left alive around here. The crowd was leaving for new territories. It was clear that the army behind the man was eager to leave to kill the people that were leaving, but the dictator remained steadfast.
He stepped off the horse and walked down into the ditch.
He bent down and then picked up the man with one hand, threw him up in the air so that he landed in the middle of the path.
The dictator walked to his horse and mounted. The man cried and screamed, his eyes watering and blood running down his forehead from a wound upon his head.
Alexander, ever the spectator, now saw who this man was.
It was him.
The dictator raised his gloved hand slowly and the army seemed eager to obey his command. Now, the man lying on the ground was in hysterics. He screamed and cried: “No, please. Don’t!”
At that moment, the dictator let his hand drop to his side in a commanding signal. This ignited what seemed to be an inner blaze within every member of the army. The order was suddenly gone. Leader and army were intermingled. Now all that Alex could see was a plethora of Lucifer copies that rode over the poor man, who seemed to suffer under each hellish blow that the hooves produced on his skin. Alex could feel himself being crushed under the army.
Now all the members of the army took off their masks and Alexander wished that he had not wondered what lay beneath that pointy nose.
Every one of them had the same face and it was monstrous. The eyebrows were deeply sunken into the face and its middle, making the eyes wince and the eyes themselves glow in the dark. The eyebrows almost formed a large V on the forehead, which was complete dark red and covered with soot. The hair was standing on end. Alex was at once under the horses and crushed and above it all, looking down. He saw termites crawling around in the hair of each individual soldier. The ears were pointy and the lips, well, there were none. The teeth were somehow planted directly upon the face and were sticking out. Three or four teeth were sticking inward and with this horrid mouth the army grinned. Their noses wrinkled in cute laughter, as if joyously devouring fresh flesh.
The army of maybe a thousand soldiers was steadily growing and their pointy noses and cheekbones and red chins bobbed Up and down as they rode.
Alex found himself crushed under the army as they rode away.
He stood up, not knowing how, on one leg and realized that his innards were open and his bowels sticking out. To his inner eye he saw the army multiplying like parasite bacteria and killing everything alive in Nocturania.
Alex fell down and crushed his skull on a stone …

… and sat up, his breath shallow, his heart beating fast and the blood racing through his veins. The morning air upon his sweaty face felt like ice cold water on a warm dog. Everything felt viral and ill. His body jerked at every sound the forest was making and whereas sweat was running down his back he felt his temples throb in rhythm with his pulse. He had not taken off his vest and clothes and so now everything was tousled, wrinkled and worn out from a night’s screaming and tossing and turning. His clothes were wrinkled, his hair was tousled and his soul felt like it had just been ridiculed and patronized. Alexander was breathing heavily, so heavily that he could feel the invisible knives of the morning air stabbing into the bottom of his lungs and the demons laughing in his bowels.
He lifted one hand to his face and rubbed his palm against his eyes and let the hand travel down to his cheeks and down to his chin. He realized that it was trembling, just as his lips were trembling. He tried to calm himself down by grabbing a hold of his chin, but realized that his hand was shaking as well.
In his mind he saw that army killing everything in sight. He saw those hideous faces in the clouds, felt them breathing cold air into his skull through the fabric of early day.
He sighed and fumbled beside him to find the water bottle that he knew was beside him somewhere. He found it without looking too hard and drank from it. Its metal frame felt hard and cold, but the leather felt warm and soft. He put some water in his palms and splashed some on his face. Then Alexander put the top back on and lay it down.
He sunk back onto his own bag, which he was using as a pillow, and sighed.
He turned over and found that the last few flames of the fire that he had kept going until Adnicul had taken over had been extinguished and replaced by the glow of post fiery timber. There was warmth in the air from that glow. A warmth that needed no fire, but he realized that Adnicul must’ve kept it going for a longer time than he had. He had not woken him up to fall asleep, but let Alexander sleep for the rest of the night.
He saw the silver flask of vodka.
Margetanian vodka, probably brewed close to where Sieglinde was born, the only vodka distillery in her country.
The angels had given him the vodka, not Adnicul.
Was this a problem?
Only because Adnicul had passed it on, not for any other reason, was it a problem. But it was for emergencies and the ideas of the angels, apparently.
Someone had penetrated his mind and given him that dream.
Someone was out to get him.
What scared him more was that this dream had only been a small taste of what was about to come.
Alexander took the blanket he had used and wiped off his forehead, determined to find Adnicul where ever he was at the moment. Was he a new friend? Maybe he was a friend. At least, Alex felt that seeing him after having a nightmare was a comfort. How strange to visit a nightmarish man after a nightmare, Alex thought to himself and laughed.
Alex walked along the bushes and on to a halfway decent path, trying to erase the images of the horrid faces from his mind. He walked down a hill and up a small rising onto a place that overlooked some sort of valley. He had to stop several times and calm down, realizing that the images in his head were radically turning his soul into an inferno of terror.
The blue sky had a glitter about it this morning and the few cloud upon it made March worth experiencing. A bird or two had left its nest to find food for the babies and they were soaring up what seemed to be grass and fields for as far as the eye could see.
He sighed, shook his head and walked on.
Alex looked to his left and saw Adnicul standing there next to a small cave, looking at the landscape.
As Alex walked up to him, he saw that his former enemy was almost in a trance, dreaming himself away to some place where pain was not a necessity.
Alex walked up to Adnicul and stood beside him for a while, realizing that this was a man in deep agony. Was it agony? Or was it just simple, true pain?
There was a long pause before the memories of the dream came flashing back. Adnicul broke the flashing silence of dream recovery by uttering:
“There is so much I wish I had not done now that I know I was used.”
Alexander looked out upon the grass, blowing in the wind and really didn’t know what to say. What could one say to someone that had done so much ill and regretted it? Don’t worry? After dreaming about being trampled to death by a demonic army he had to confess that he was worried. Very much so.
He obviously heard through Alexander’s lack of will to respond that he without question was left speechless as to what to say.
There was softness in the former tyrant’s gaze that Alexander detected in his glance.
Alex smiled to himself.
“What troubles me, my friend, is that you were the tyrant of our continent one day and then here in this twilight zone you decided that you regretted what you had done.”
Adnicul shook his head and looked out into the open.
“You still don’t understand.”
“I understand that you were betrayed, locked up, recalled what you had been and what you had become. But why now?” Alex sneered again, a tear rolling reluctantly down his cheek. “Why first now after having killed my daughter? Why do I have to retrieve my daughter from hell because you involved yourself in a scam you never wanted?”
Adnicul took a long look at his former foe and looked down, wind blowing in his hair.
“Whatever happens I will loose my life. All I want is to save my soul.”
Alexander looked at him and for the first time saw a misunderstood man, a man he had not before seen. Alex lifted his hand and laid it upon Adnicul’s shoulder. There was a silence there that penetrated the walls of death and reached Belinda hanging in a cage over the pit. She cried as well.
The two men stood silent there for an hour and watched the morning before turning their backs at the past and rode together for the first time toward a dangerous first challenge.


CHAPTER FOUR

FIRST CHALLENGE


Alexander was reshaping his mental landscape.
He, the king of Medatlantia’s biggest and now sleeping land, had hated the man next to him up until recently. Now he was his companion on the way to save his dearest and most valued family members.
The wandering soul that now bore the name Adnicul was a confused spirit in his current transformation. He had been a seed on the forbidden tree in Eden.
He had been the first unlawful angel.
He had been his master’s first crime.
He had been unwilling to serve someone he knew nothing about and therefore a crying fallen branch from God’s tree.
But feeling compelled to follow his master down to his abode, down to where roses do not grow and time does not pass, he had traveled that road as unwilling as he was unhappy. Way down the path he found out that the master had actually just been waiting for a moment to use him.
Therefore, he should be used for a truly criminal purpose: creating the ultimate weapon.
But Adnicul had never suspected being a tool.
After all, the idea of having a name that spelled Lucinda backwards was too remote and farfetched to prove a conspiracy at all. Adnicul’s father, a bohemian smuggler, had only spoken Arabic and not known that a name such as Lucinda existed, let alone give his son a name that spelled Lucinda backwards. And if so, then why give a boy such a name at all? The father had only named the boy so because the name had been sung to him during his sleep by someone to him unknown.
The smuggling trained youngster soon left home and ended up a bureaucrat in a dark land next to Wandiffia’s successor.
Adnicul had reasons to fear his past.
What had his father said?
“Let me tell you, young man” Father Undal Ibn-Dal had exclaimed in his characteristic cynical voice. “You will go far if you hear what I say. Don’t forget your task in life is to use your mind as well as your heart. The heart must have love and passion. One of these passions is wealth: it must have gold. There your mind as a smuggler and your heart rest. Never forget that your passion rests in the eternity of your promising development, young man.”
Whatever that meant, the young boy was eager to find out if he could find his eternal bliss in the riches of this world. What troubled him was that his father never believed he would go far. It troubled the young boy that his father sought dishonesty and made it into a spiritual lifestyle.
He searched and searched, for somewhere out there an answer had to be found.
His father had told him that a man’s happiness stems from his striving to find gold.
This coming from a smuggler, he knew consequentially that the young man would take to crime as his father had at the same age like a fish would take to water. But there was more there. The young buck knew in his heart that it was wrong. Before he could turn away from this, he met the wrong person at the wrong time.
One day the boy would meet his new master and one day that master would give him Nocturania. When that happened, his meeting with Lucinda made everything change and it never occurred to him that the meeting was a set-up. His father had been influenced to catapult the innocent boy into crime, but other forces were not eager to enslave the boy to crime but to evil. He had been sent by an unknown messenger that day to retrieve a smuggled artifact that he in the end never found. He had found himself in too remote a place for even his comfort, when he found her eating roots in the forest of Callenia, living on bugs and telling him a story of being exiled by a royal brother a while back. Coincidentally, he had fallen in love with this strange person, not knowing why. Coincidentally, she kept coming and going without warning and was so remote to even the most faithful servant that she remained a name to everyone but Eric.
When Lucinda and Adnicul, the newly appointed chief cardinal of the Nocturanian Temple Guards, met he found it fascinating to find someone that seemed to be his mirror image, not only in namely terms. The two were always seen together and rumors had it they held black masses in the temple after dark. Sometime in the end of the 14th century the Nocturanian Temple Guards were dissolved and formed a Rebellion Guard under Adnicul. These fierce pirates stormed Rigor Mortis and killed the last of the Johnathans, Henry John IV. Soon enough, Henry John was hanging legless from a tree outside the castle, the throne occupied by a new king and a new mistress by his side. The widow was sent to a remote castle at the border, guarded to the end of her life by invisible demons that controlled her every move. Zeekha never recovered fully and was used as a diplomat until her mysterious disappearance sometime in the 1420’s.
The initiator of these ill deeds was now Alexander Winsletenna’s best friend.
Oh, yes. He was special, this new leader.
Coincidentally, Lucinda soon began controlling his every move behind the scenes, although it was officially he that was training her in the arts of fighting and black magic.
The servant named Eric saw her one day and Eric knew at once that Adnicul was being used. There was no question that the forty scars that Eric had received after telling him so had been well deserved in Adnicul’s eyes. He had told him off four more times after that to stop calling Lucinda names, only because he knew that Eric was right.
And Eric had been right.
Adnicul was living a lie.
He was not remotely who he thought he was.
He was an unlawful angel forced to become a leader of demons.
The past came back to haunt him in a dungeon somewhere in the outer territories near the Prosperanian border.
Adnicul Ibn-Dal had been the son of an Arabian smuggler, continually on the road as a child. Once independent, he had taken over his father’s gang and let his father relax.
But freedom had been important to him. It did not take long before Adnicul was restless again and handed over the leadership to his brother and left the country to eventually settle in Hispania, becoming a scribe at the court of the Duke of Malaga.
But the moon caught up with him soon enough and he became a cardinal priest in the Temple of Zion near Yambollah once the princes of the lunar conspiracy caught hold of him.
Soon enough, the former traveling bandit was in such a complex labyrinth of lies he knew not how to find back. Until that day when he was thrown in a dungeon and had to rethink his situation.
Alexander for his part was confused. His entire life he had fought everything that Adnicul stood for. But now he was being told that this man was actually himself a victim.
The Clurafar-born leader of Prosperania had traveled for a year now and knew nothing of what was waiting for him.
He had been ripped away from his existence, his entire country extinguished, only to find he had to fetch it back by confronting an old ghost he had feared for decades anyway.
He had set out on this journey completely unaware to everything what this cause was about. He was now a warrior, deeply passionate in his foundation.
He was out to win, but he was petrified of the victory.

§

The royal princess had been running through her own replica of Iuventus for so long now that she felt her legs falling asleep. There were times when she looked out the window and saw the other castled cages hanging by their chains over the bottomless pit and there were so many. She had found out by counting them that were 23. She had seen who the closest ones to her were. Now, she had no proof, but she guessed that the ones encaged were the following: her mother, Steven, her son. Two houses next to each other: Morgana was in one of them, Richard in the other. Then came Maria, Martin, Ellie, Marcus, Patricia, Patrick, Erica, Lance, her maternal grandparents, Ulfaas, Mormidar, Rolf, Geena, Theo, Bantrard, Louis, Marie-Louise.

Now, for whatever reason she thought this was not clear. It was pure intuition. But these were the central characters of the royal palace and they had all been there to take the potion against the epidemic that day.

She believed that whatever their individual minds looked like they experienced. Belinda was a realist. She saw the place for what it was: a timeless cage above a bottomless pit, lit by day, horror at night. There was always food and drink. A visit from Lucinda, now and then, would tickle her fancy. Belinda had been joined often by other family members in the beginning, but it was clear to her that they were illusions. Something was keen to keep her alive until the duel.

She had recalled disappearing from the beach that day. She had recalled being taken back to the castled cage, the caged castle, by Lucinda and told that she had been granted her two visits to prepare for the duel. She was but a messenger, Lucinda had said. Alexander had needed to know his job and he had needed the strength to carry on until the end. But her victory was as secure as rain was in the autumn.

Now, if Belinda saw reality here as the true realities of hell because she was in heart a realist, what did Morgana’s illusion look like? She would hate to think at the prospect of eternal debauchery. All she knew was that she hardly slept at night due to the demons and beasts that chased her up and down the corridors. She longed for home and she wondered what or how much the other family members knew. Did they know they were all dreaming? Did they know they had entered this place of waiting after leaving the illusion of the haunted kingdom? Did they know, as Belinda did, that if Alex did not win the duel with his sister that illusion, that unreal reality would become a given fact? Did they know, like she did, that this whole scam was just a way for evil to finally conquer both of the alternate realities?

She kept herself busy. She had all that she had been given in the actual castle and she had become quite a lute player now. She had read the Holy Scriptures in Latin back and forth five times now. She had practiced her painting skills and tried to recall what her tutor once had said about once again restructuring and reassembling the Roman tradition of painting columns on canvas. She had tried to recall most of the teachings of Greek philosophy and she had used the thermal baths every day.

But Belinda dreaded the night. Sometimes, she was hanging from the ceiling at night and Lucinda was cackling below her. At times she was dragged through the castle by some unknown creature.
Now she was running away from it. But she knew by now that it could not get rid of her.
She was important to them, to it, to whatever was guarding her.
The duel was coming up. Belinda was afraid.
She could feel what her father was feeling and she knew that he had teamed up with Adnicul now, so there was hope after all.

§

For two reasons, Alexander was happy. One, they had at last found a warm spot to rest in, away from the rain. Second of all, Adnicul had stopped complaining and agreed to lie down and take care of his sprained ankle. This cave had proved a good spot to rest in. Yes, there was a fire here now. But there was a fluorescent moss here everywhere that seemed to glow in the dark and the opening far up in the distance gave in light as well. There were truffles here and an apple tree right outside. At the far end there seemed to be a fresh spring of water. But they had enough to drink yet. Or was that a tunnel leading down to another cave?

In any case, there was everything here for the two of them and their horses.

They had been away for a long time now. They had gotten so used to each other’s company that it was obvious that the one could not do without the other. What was it now, a month? Nocturania was a large land and there had been many deserted villages to ride through, many mountains to cross, and many rivers. For every river they crossed a new facet of his personality was revealed to Alex. For every valley Adnicul became more interesting and yet increasingly more mysterious.

Of course, Adnicul’s accident had been somewhat of an unnecessary obstacle. Crossing that river in spite of the hard flow of water was his decision, not Alexander’s. He had insisted on claiming how shallow the water was, but Alex had still told him to be careful and cross the river where the water was deeper but calmer. He had almost crossed it when a wave came crashing in and swept him off the horse. The sprained ankle had resulted in a search for the perfect cave to rest in.
There had been jokes and for the first time Alex knew what his new friend sounded like when laughing. It was a good laugh. A merry laugh that could inspire the most melancholy of men protruded from his lips.
What was better, the truffles and fresh water was accompanied by light and a warm fire.
Just two friends on a trip full of bounty. They almost forgot that they were on a trip toward hell.

§

“Can you find it in your heart to believe me?”
“Believe you?” he responded. “I trust you, but I would not know how to believe such a story.” The honest servant took a long look at the messenger and tried to smile. “Well, I don’s have much of a choice, do I?” The messenger shrugged.
Rolf walked along what he remembered as the corridor between Alexander’s study and the staircase to the Grand Hall. The man that had arrived was tall and rather thin, with a very distinguished face. But he seemed to be a messenger of sorts and had a certain appeal of sympathy about him. His black hair and blue eyes made him look beautiful and almost angelic. He was very muscular, in spite of his thin frame.
The man was patient. He had not come here to quarrel or fight. His mission was simply to relieve Rolf of the burden of not knowing what was wrong with this world.
“How can I not believe you? I know there is something wrong with this world.”
The anonymous messenger smiled. He reminded Rolf of someone. Who?
“You feel what?”
“I feel as if I have experienced this day over and over again. Every day I am here I remember the previous day and nothing else. I had a glass of wine with Geena. I went to check upon Belinda to ask her if she needed something, to cheer her up a bit. Then Alex received a visit. Then I said my prayers and went to bed.” Rolf’s expression turned very serious. The young man who had arrived on horseback just an hour ago saw this expression and found it wonderfully childlike. It was a middle aged man who looked like a six year old trying to figure out where he had left his favorite toy.
“I wake up here now today. But … how can explain this?”
”Try!”
Rolf smiled. “I mean it is all insane. I find myself figuring out why I tell you. But how else can I explain that everyone is gone. Belinda and Alex and … everyone, the ones that are still alive, that is.” Rolf’s face was one of deep sadness now. “They might be just on a trip, for all I know.”
“They never ever leave without telling you. They never have and they never will, Rolf.”
Rolf paced the corridor, trying to remember what part of the palace this was. Sometimes he had a hard time trying to remember anything. “What is your name again?”
”Michael. My name is Michael.”
“Michael.”
“Yes, Rolf.”
Rolf looked out and saw the sun. There were no clouds in the sky today.
“You mean to tell me that all of this is a scam, an illusion created just for me?”
”You say yourself that you …” Michael saw him raise his hand and smile. “No, by all means, go on and say it yourself.”
“You are not cross if I try to find the words myself?”
”I want you to. After all, you are the one living in this …” – Michael looked around the hallway with a mixture of fascinated interest, worry, relaxed neutrality and practical thinking – ” … environment.” He was looking through the walls and seeing the scam of all this. He found it unfair to trap Rolf here.
”Michael” Rolf said, very softly, bending over and almost speaking as if what he was about to say was a secret. “I find myself waking up and remembering that I have remembered this before. It is as if there was only one layer of reality here yesterday. Now there are one-thousand layers on top of each other. It is as if I have experienced this day a thousand times.” Rolf chuckled nervously. “Does that make any sense …” Rolf cocked his head, insecurely. “… at all?”
“Rolf, you are telling yourself the truth. You are being held in a trap. You are a mouse caught in a labyrinth. Your mind has created this reality, but the ghouls responsible for trapping you have manifested this reality for you in your own mind. They use your mind against yourself.”
Rolf looked out of the led glass window again and saw how the reflections of the sun danced against the wall through the green color. Then he looked at the door at the end of the hall.
“That is the throne room, is it not?”
Michael smiled. “Yes, it is.” He had known that Rolf was on the way to recovery when he had mentioned checking up on all the family members. He was recalling his past again. “You recollect your memory now. You have not done that in a year.”
”Year … I have been held here a year?”
”You said yourself that you have experienced this day a thousand times.” Michael shrugged. “That you are wrong by a couple of hundred days is extraneous. The main point is that you recall experiencing this before.” Michael looked Rolf in the eye and sank deep into his consciousness. “Who am I? Who am I, Rolf?”
His blue eyes sang him a song.
“My God, I know you.”
Michael smiled again. “I am not God. You know what the scriptures say about using the Lord’s name in vain.”
Rolf nodded. “Sorry.” He tried to find the answer. It came to him in a vision. “You are who I think you are.”
Michael nodded. “I am, yes.”
Rolf looked down, up, around, everywhere, trying to figure this out.
“We have had this conversation before. After this you will show me the pits and I will be afraid. You will protect me and I will be held in the palm of Good’s hand until …” Rolf shook his head and closed his eyes. “Where is it?”
”What?”
”The answer in my head, where is it?”
”In your heart, the answer lies not in your head.”
Rolf looked at Michael with wide open eyes. “You are my saviour?”
Michael smiled. “I might be exactly that if you let me be.”
”But will I forget. I want to remember.”
”One day you will recall more. You might forget this meeting tomorrow. But there is more hope now that you know the difference. There was less hope of such a recollection yesterday.”
“I will be held in the palm of Good’s hand until the moment when Alexander defeats Lucinda.”
Michael raised his hand and caressed Rolf’s face. “You have crossed the barrier.”
”I have?”
Michael closed his eyes in an agreeing gesture. “Come, let me show you something.”
So, the angel took Rolf to the edge of the ravine to show him what was happening to the inhabitants of the royal palace. Twenty three castles hanging from twenty three chains above twenty three mouths leading to one big pit without end.
“If Lucinda wins, these cages are dropped” Michael said.
“Then it is goodbye to the powers of the Winsletennas.”
”Then, it is vital that Alex wins.”
“For all of us.”
“Humanity?”
“Exactly.”

§

There were shadows dancing on the cave walls. One of the men by the fire wore an eye patch, looked haggard and old. The other one was young in body and worried in mind.
“I hope I make it through this …”
Adnicul nodded. “We will. I am in this, too. Perhaps more is at stake for me.”
Alex nodded. “We have gone through eternities to get here.”
Adnicul scratched his head, sighed and leaned back. He looked into the fire and saw himself burning in there. “What worries you the most, Alex?”
“I have let myself be ruled by an alien force that had nothing to do with my soul …”
“How so?”
Alex took a long look at Adnicul and smiled.
“Lucinda made me wander the wrong path for thirty five years.” He thought for a moment. “Thirty eight now. Oh, dear. Such a long time.”
Adnicul was rubbing his sprained ankle with a soothing mixture of herbs, moss and water when he heard Alexander speak of this for the first time. He saw the king’s face with his one healthy eye and realized at once that this one sentence was the result of years of contemplating pain.
“I’m glad that I discover this now. It is too late, but better late than never.”
“It is never too late. Hope is the last thing that leaves a man, don’t you know?”
Alex nodded. “Yes. But, you know, the threat of that experience back then made me fix my entire capacity on her, although I was running the opposite direction.”
“Opposite of what?”
”Opposite of me.”
“Oh.” Adnicul cocked his head and chuckled, bitterly. “That is hard for someone who needs to be himself.”
Alexander had just rediscovered himself and that was no lie.
The crackling flames cast their dancing reflections on his features. Adnicul at once felt incredible sympathy for this man, who had managed to come all this way without losing faith.
“What made you follow that her in the first place, Alex? Why do it when you never wanted it?” Adnicul laughed. “I should talk. Fine critic I am.” He looked up and waited for an answer. Alex was still gone and had not really heard Adnicul criticizing himself. He had gotten used to Adnicul. Trusted him now. That was a good sign.
Alex sighed. “I don’t know, Adnicul. I suppose I was forced to follow her because I was afraid. Nothing is as attractive as fear. Walter was my best friend and I threw him out of my kingdom.” Adnicul picked up a stick and started to poke in the fire with it. Alex was reminded of Raphael, who also used to do this. “In his own way, all he told me was that I shouldn’t make Lucinda responsible for my own misery. In many ways he was right.” Alex looked up at Mercutio, standing by the wall. The beautiful stallion snorted and shook his head. “But I threw him out. I threw my best friend out. I threw Lucinda out as well. But in many ways, I invited her into my heart that day.”
Adnicul looked up and threw away the stick.
“You spent years trying to figure out why she haunted you, didn’t you?” He began rubbing his ankle again with the green-brown mixture. He smiled. “This is really soothing. Where did you find the recipe?”
Alex, half in thought, remarked: “It is an old remedy from my housekeeper and royal cook, Eugenia. Where ever she is right now.” He reached into the small pocket leather bag he had and fished out the silver flask of vodka. He smiled.
Adnicul smiled and raised his finger again.
“Only for emergencies.”
Alex nodded and put the flask back.
“For emergencies only, yes.”
Alex looked into the flames, a lock of his hair falling into his eyes, his melancholy expression making him look slightly worn out.
“You know what bothers me the most?”
”What?”
“It took me so long to get here.”
His companion sighed and kept rubbing his foot with the green remedy-salve.
”Be happy you are here at all. Not everyone is so fortunate to be where you are.”
Alex agreed by nodding. “Yes.” He chuckled, softly. “Funny that I started seeing the Grand Duchess after Lucinda was gone. If I only had known what was happening to me.”
”You couldn’t have known.” Adnicul threw a pebble into the flames and leaned back. “Lucinda was an alien force, you said it yourself. You didn’t understand her. She was everything you were not. I fell into her trap just as you did.”
Alex half-smiled. “I suppose. I just know that I for over thirty five years have spent my life running away from invisible ghouls. I refused dealing with the old demons of seeing her tear up my family. I refused taking her to court. I just kicked her out. I sent her away, yes. But she said it herself: ‘I will come back to haunt you one day, old man’. She might’ve just said: I will come back to haunt you today, old man. I sent her away from my grounds but I invited her into my own soul.” Alex looked at his guide and smiled. “Why I should I feel lucky to be here?”
”You have the chance of fixing your past.”
”That is maybe lucky, yes. But I also have a chance of perishing in the flames while doing it.”
”See it this way: I am going to perish anyway. I just want to be there when it happens, in order to get back to my tree in heaven. You have the chance of saving everything you know.”
Alex nodded. “You are right.” He looked into the flames and shook his head. He thought he saw Lucinda in the campfire.
“What was the greatest shock?”
“How do you mean?”
”I am just testing you, sorry.”
“No, it is fine. Just tell me what you mean?”
“What made that experience so hard to forget?”
“What experience? The incident back in 1392 before … you know …”
Adnicul nodded.
”I think it was her appearance and how she looked when she haunted me. Her crazy eyes, the curled upper lip that she always displayed when she was angry and that slightly bent figure of hers. Those weird grimaces she made when she was furious.” He looked at Adnicul with eyes that were scared. “Her entire personality. She was a recluse hermit living in her halls and spending her life digging in the dirt, pushing cutlery against my throat and calling me a little wispy wuss if I refused to encounter her, digging in graves and laughing. She invited me to eat her dirt and then buried my head in the sand. All I could do was swallow. Her awful persona invited, sickened and fascinated me at the same time and I never knew why. Maybe only as a challenge to actually face up to her evil, to any odd evil. She was everything I was not. Atheistic, provincial, pale, boring, evil, dark, unhygienic. An insane woman with bad food habits.”
Adnicul laughed. “I know.”
“It was almost as if she had planned that day in 1392 all along. I was on the right track back then. But she made me think about her for years and forget the road I was on. Sure, I did everything a king should do. But I spent years dwelling in areas I should’ve rejected: adultery and spiritual oblivion. I became a man on the run. She had killed my man servant, my parents and my sisters. I should’ve brought her to trial for that. She burnt down my summer mansion and made me exile my best friend. She should’ve been publicly humiliated. But I fled into adultery and consequently blamed the children that were born during this time for everything that had happened. A vicious circle had started, but I could not break it until now.” Alex gazed into the fire. “Just now. Strange, isn’t it?”
“And 1411?”
“What about it?” Alex snapped. “You were there yourself. You need not ask.”
“I was in a trance, Alex. I was not myself. Not until now have really been me.”
“Then we have both found ourselves, haven’t we?” Alex shook his head and looked down. “You killed my innocence, Adni.”
”I just brought you closer to the real you.”
”How so?” Alex mused. “You credit yourself with my spiritual recovery?”
“You say yourself you had fled from the truth. Now Lucinda was attacking you a second time. Did you start a war? Did you put her to trial?”
“So, you want me to thank you, Judas?”
Adnicul laughed. “No. Listen. You fled again. You fled until, eleven years later, Lucinda came to your country and stole it from you.” Adnicul shook his head. “I am not defending the maniac I was back then, but …” He paused. “I did involve myself in a scam that tried to shake you awake.” He chuckled, nervously. “Unintentionally, of course, but never the less …” Adnicul leaned forward. “You were brought to a point where you could not flee anymore. When fleeing was not possible.” He sat back, the fire glowing in the light of his one eye. “You had sent Lucinda away, but by not putting her to trial you made it possible for others to do the same with you.”
”Who?”
”You tell me, Alex! I am not your father. Your children? Walter? Your people, Alex? The people who in public lynched Morgana and Patrick? You fled even then. You put them to trial that were innocent, not the criminals.”
”I could not find the criminals. Someone had to be punished for what they did. I did not know you knew about that.”
”Regardless if I knew about it, Alex. You punished anyone, just to make a point. That is wrong. You cannot fight fire with fire. I can tell you that. I found that out the hard way, in a dungeon. You fled for years. You fled even when there was nothing to flee from. Then one day you were alone and even that couldn’t stop you from fleeing from the real you, not the one who wants to prove himself master of creation. Your daughter had to pick you up from the gutter and tell you what to do. She returned from hell by her own determination just to save you. That took a lot of strength, no wonder she hasn’t been able to do so since.”
“I know what you mean. I’d hate to say it,” Alex said and smiled, “but you are right.”
Adnicul smiled and sighed. “That took a long time for you to grasp.”
“It did, didn’t it?”
“Better late than never.”
“I guess.” There was a long pause. Then Alex spoke again. “You know what?”
”What?”
“I think my time of adultery was the start. It was means for me to flee in the first place. It promoted my spiritual hell. Without it, I might’ve been able to save myself. I am even afraid to say that I long for that time, or have longed for it in the past. It was easy to long for, because it gave me an opportunity to flee and make it official that fleeing was a lifestyle, even getting away with it was. But one day truth would come out and challenge me again. So I could not flee completely after all. It would always follow me like a wolf follows a trail of blood. But by actually choosing my right friends I can eliminate that.”
“Friends?”
“Invisible and visible ones.”
“Ahh.”
“Should be a lesson to me.”
Adnicul seemed to drift off, his thoughts lingering among the shadows.
”There is a myth about the golden age, Alex!”
Alexander grew quiet. “What golden age, Adnicul?”
He waited. “The world we are fighting to win. When the day comes that darkness falls, the message of the fallen empire will come by way of a messanger from the air. A bird will bring you the message, not a rider.”
”Who says that?”
Adnicul shrugged.
“Someone long ago. Someone not so long ago. Someone I know. Someone you know. Does it matter? The fact is that when the dark empire falls, you will know by a raven or a dove or an eagle that it has fallen and it will be surprising, I guarantee it.”
Alex nodded. “I shiver at the thought.”
”The prospect is heartwarming.”
”A long way off though, we have a long way to go.”
”Still, we are on our way. We have joined forces.”
”True” Alex agreed. “Speaking of friends, as we did before, I just wanted to say this: no matter what your prehistory is, if you are honest than you can win.”
“By making the truth your bride … you will have something that is faithful to you … perhaps forever. Is that what you mean?”
Alex nodded. “The only thing that never leaves you.”
Both of them nodded and uttered what they both were thinking: “Honesty.”
“All kinds.”
A smile was exchanged and suddenly there was sympathy between the two men. Alexander was happy to realize that he was changing, his tolerance level much higher now than before.
He saw the two horses and it seemed that they, too, were sympathetic toward each other. How could he see that? He did not know how, he just did. They had not been friends before.
It was sometime in the middle of the night now.
They had completely forgotten about time.
There was no way that they could go on until the morning, which meant sleep was due.
Adnicul handed Alex the metal flask and just as he did a sound came from deeper inside the cave. The sound was a very deep growl, a gritted and hoarse snarl. After a few seconds it died down.
The two gentlemen looked at each other.
“What was that?”
Alex shook his head. “I have no idea.”
“Sounded like an animal …”
There was a deafening silence that made them both uneasy to even move.
Adnicul stood up. He grimaced, supported himself on the wall and looked around the corner.
“There is a tunnel down here. It seems to be leading downward to some deeper part of the cave. The sound came from down there.”
The two horses snorted quietly and shifted from hoof to hoof. Mercutio shook his mane.
“You should not be walking. Not with that ankle.”
”Never mind my ankle. I lost an eye and went riding to hell the same day. Forget the pain.”
Alexander stood up, picked up his sword and put in the leather belt.
Adnicul turned to Alex. “The sound seemed to have come from down that path.” The sound echoed through the cave again, a rasping, deadly noise from the open, breathing mouth of something. “We should check it, I think.” Adnicul limped to his horse.
“I still don’t like you walking around on a sprained ankle. We have a long way to go. I can check it, if you think it necessary.”
”Would you stop worrying? I had four hours of rest. That more than enough for an former tyrant.”
”As you wish.”
“You’re not my mother, so you don’t have to worry.”
“Really?” Alex mused in a high pitched voice.
There was a different tone of voice there now and Alex had noticed that several times. Adnicul could be as charming as could be, but then suddenly he could turn on you like a scorpion on a cat. Alex decided to let it go as long as it didn’t happen too often. He was a guide, not a brother. A voice within him was reminding himself of that he was growing attached to the man.
“Besides, I am interested in that sound.”
“Do we have to check?”
The growl penetrated the silence again, closer this time.
“It might come after us. We cannot leave here in the dark. We need to protect the horses from might creep up on us in our sleep.”
Alex nodded. He picked up a truffle from his bag and walked up to his horse and gave it to him.
“We might be gone for a bit, so eat up. We will be back.”
The stallion munched and swallowed. He received a pat on the mane from his master just as the raucous reverberation was magnified again by the multiple corners of this grotto.
Alex looked its way, but knew that it was a mistake to look for it.
“That sound bothers me. It sounds bad.”
Adnicul walked slowly again to the flames and picked up his sword. He put it in his belt.
“I don’t know, Alex.” He took a very thick branch from the side of the cavern beside them. He took some of the leaves and grass that they had bound together earlier and tied it to the stick with a thin rope that he had brought in his saddlebag. “We will have to find out.”
Alex began searching for the second branch they had brought along.
“Are there many beasts here … in your country?”
Adnicul looked at Alex, surprised. “Nocturania was never my country, Alexander.”
The Prosperanian king tied the second bunch to the branch and lit it on Adnicul’s torch.
“I mean have you ever come across a beast over here?”
“What is your definition of a beast?”
“Something with fangs.”
Adnicul laughed. “Aha. Have I ever come across a beast here?”
”Yes.”
”Except Lucinda, you mean?”
Alex smiled. “Right. Except the beast Lucinda.”
Adnicul nodded.
“This is undiscovered country, Sire. Not even the darkest of us have seen all of this.”
Adnicul took a few steps forward and then turned to Alex again.
“Remember that this here is another version of reality, so we could come across some beasts that have no counterparts in our world.”
Alexander walked up a few steps in front of Adnicul and took the lead.
“Let us go then and find out what it is.”
The two men began walking down the hill. It was indeed a tunnel leading down somewhere.
What was strange was that the moss on the walls were lighting up the tunnel.
“What is this?”
“The gypsies call it ‘blue moss’. Partly phosphor, it lights up in the dark.”
“Thank God for it.”
“The torches help.”
“Yes, but only so much.”
The sound came again. It was closer.
They saw some kind of light coming from the inside of the hole at the tunnel’s end. The creature inside there was obviously eating and had obviously just woken up. There were loud munching sounds coming from the inside of that cave.
With his one free hand, Alex picked up his sword and did his best to balance it while carrying his torch in the other hand.
The hill was quite steep so they had to hold on to the walls whilst walking down.
“Take care, Adnicul.”
”I shall.”
Just as he had said that, he skidded and fell down on his bottom. Alex saw the huge shadow of a beast approaching them on the wall. But there was no way to stop them skidding. The hoarse growling sound was very loud now. Adnicul skidded down and hit Alex who fell backward as well. Soon enough, both of them were racing down as whatever creature this was came thumping toward them.
The two men landed a meter or two from the corner just as the thing looked around it and grinned.
It was a hideous thing. Two long husks peaked out from each side of its otherwise toothless mouth. Its pitch black eyes were huge and took up half of its face. It had brown fur on its head and was clothed in some sort of leather outfit, an apron of some sort. The apron was bloody. Its hands were massive, the size of wagons and its long tail kept swinging back and forth.
It opened its mouth to speak.
“Namarari suffuse?”
The voice was hoarse and deep.
The two men were too stunned to speak.
“Agilely rump Uri, Assuror …”
The thing stood there and panted, obviously distraught about having uninvited guests knock on his wall.
“Namarari suffuse?” the creature again bellowed.
Alexander’s voice was trembling. “What is he saying?”Adnicul shook his head and held up a hand.
The beast took another step toward them and it was now that Alex saw that the thing had a dead wolf in his left hand. “Suururaria bekalatop, Assuror!”
“He urges us to tell us what we are doing here?”
Adnicul nodded. “Múntor aliva, Assuror. Agilely Namarari in jurnos dis Yambollah.”
The beast looked at the travelers for a bit and then started smiling. “Yambollah?” There was a happy sing-songing wave to his response. Adnicul nodded.
“Tus suffuse?”
“Adniculo Nocturnos.” Adnicul pointed to Alex, who was amazed how intact both torches were after this fall down the hill. “Zur es Alexander Winsletenna, jurnos au a Yambollah.”
The beast leaned forward and ended up two meters from them. “The loser kings.”
“You speak our language?” Alexander said.
He looked at the king. “Only on special occasions do we speak this very primitive tongue.” The thing grinned. “This is indeed a special occasion when the butcher of the underworld meets the reasons for Lucinda’s hatred.” He laughed. “I have been told to spare you if I meet you, but kill this one.” He pointed at Adnicul. As the thing took one step further toward them, Alex took up his sword and pushed it toward his forehead. The thing withdrew his hand. “Oh, angelic weapon. Hold it up. So I can see it. Hard to hold up with a torch in the other hand, well? Michael? Hmm? You are trained warrior, out to kill evil?” The thing snorted and breathed in deeply. Then it started screaming with laughter, obviously amused by this. “Good luck to you, warrior man.” It threw the wolf into its mouth and Alex discovered it was still alive. With one crunch it died between the husks and the lower jaw. “But I am sorry to say that this tyrant has to go.”
Alex looked to his right. There was a small path there that led he knew not where. But it was obvious that the thing could not come in there. The two men exchanged glances and saw the narrow path and both knew what this meant. Fast as lightning the two of them ran on a given signal, Adnicul limping, into the tunnel just as the thing grabbed a hold of Adnicul’s left trouser leg. He fought to escape but it seemed impossible. Alex took his torch and burned the beast, which wailed and withdrew its hand. Adnicul fell and stood up, fell again and stood up. The creature reached after its victim, but this time was too late. There was a small area the size of the corner above where they could hide.
The thing howled.
“I shall get you and burn you alive. You are my midnight snack! No one escapes Rumar!”
”These are the second beasts of our land.” Adnicul spat. “The rumzils are but the helpers of hell. These things are hell itself.”
“Did not know you spoke their language. Does it have a name?”
“I don’t think they know what names are. They all call themselves Rumar, regardless of gender.”
“You mean there are female kinds, as well?”
Adnicul looked at Alex, the light of the torches flickering in his eyes. “Be happy you have not met them. If they like you, they will hug you to death. If they hate you they will eat you alive. Either way, you are lost.”
”What about this Rumar waiting for us outside?”
Adnicul looked around in this little hole. He waved around his torch and saw that the small cave was maybe nine feet high and twelve feet wide. The tunnel was way too narrow for Rumar to put his hand through. He might try a finger, but even then he would not reach them in their corner.
“Those things go to sleep about dawn. They have to. It doesn’t even have to have anything to do with light. They just hate daytime. I know this is true. Lucinda and I fought one of these things back in the 1390s. I killed it.”
“How?”
”He had swallowed me whole, so I just cut myself out. He died of internal bleeding, the poor thing. But I was just lucky. I think no one has ever killed one of those except me.”
”What do we do?”
”We wait.” Adnicul heard it panting outside. “We hope it doesn’t try to break that wall.”
Alex looked at the tunnel. He heard it pant.
“What are the loser kings doing?” He screamed. “Come out, so Rumar can have a small meal. He likes his kings grilled before breakfast.” The two men took a long look at each other. Rumar’s voice softened, turned playful. “Hellooooo?” There was a pause. “Come out, boys!” There was another long pause. Suddenly, out of nowhere the thing started shouting. “Maramari Sul fullesu, Kirifarus! You know what that means? Huh?” Rumar panted, waited for them to say something. “It means that you taste best grilled on coal, loser kings!” Rumar started laughing. Without warning the giant then started kicking the wall, so that the entire cavern shook. He kicked it again and it shook.
“He’s going to make that wall crack” Adnicul said “and when he does that wall collapses on us. Can you run without extinguishing that torch?”
”I will try. Why?”
”The fire might be going out up there. Try to run up that hill as fast as you can and then out into the night on the horses.”
”We cannot ride in this pitch black night?”
“Why are you so afraid? The night out there is just as bad as this, but at least there we have a chance.”
Alex nodded. “On my count, then.”
”If you want to take the lead …”
Alex took a deep breath. “Please God, let us escape this alive, both of us.”
There was another kick on the wall. It was beginning to crack.
“Go ahead or we will die in here.”
Rumar kicked again and Adnicul saw the crack spreading to the cave ceiling.
“Please, Alex. We don’t want to be caught here behind stones.”
Another kick, the crack now almost across the entire stone ceiling.
“We cannot make this.”
”Yes, we can. Count.”
Alex gritted his teeth. “One, two, three …”
The two men started running. It seemed that time was passing slower through all of what happened next. Alexander Roderick Winsletenna felt himself standing up, taking his torch with him. He felt the rush of wind against his face and heard Adnicul run behind him. They ducked their heads and ran out of the cavern and onto the path that lead upwards. It was hard to run, the earth had eroded and there was not much of a path left to tread any more.
Half way up, he heard Rumar stop kicking the wall.
“Namarari, Kirifarus?” He felt his surprise. Both men ran faster, but felt how they were skidding down toward an open mouth. “Sul fulles!” Rumar cackled. “Grilled coal!”
They had almost reached the top when Rumar caught up with them. Alex was alread there when he heard Adnicul.
“Alexandeeeeerrrrrr!”
Alex turned around just as he saw Rumar grabbing a hold of Adnicul and disappearing down the hill.
“Nooooo!”
Alex started running back and caught a glimpse of Adni disappearing round the corner just as Alex was close enough to see.
“Adnicul!”
Alex ran down the hill, realized that the torch was out. He stumble and skidding down into the darkness, the fire from Rumar’s cave the only guide.
He heard Adnicul scream.
Alexander skidded down, face front and scraped his cheek. He stood up and felt it. No blood. He stood up and ran into the cave. There he saw Rumar putting Adnicul into a cage and putting the keys into his apron. Alex took his sword and started running after them. It was a large cave with many corners and it looked as if Rumar had made this cave bigger by kicking away bits of stone from the walls. There were corners were the fire was as high as nine feet. Then there were small fires everywhere. He had spears in every corner. There were sceletons pinned to most of the spears. Grilled sceltons of wolves, dogs, even a rumzil, half eaten. Alex had no idea how he was going to be able to stand going in there. How had they missed seeing the traces of this fire? There must’ve been some trace of it up where they had been?
Rumar was sharpening a spear with some stone equipment with his back toward Alex.
Adnicul saw Alex coming and spoke to Rumar, distracting his attention.
“You can’t do this, Alex will come for me!”
Without turning around, Rumar answered, laughing. “He won’t. He is too intent on winning his own game. He is already saddling his horse and riding into the night. But you my dear fellow will be dinner for me.”
Whilst Rumar was blabbering on, sharpening his spear, Alex tried to find a suitable object to kill the beast with. He looked around and found a heavy, long rope close to the exit.
He took the rope and dragging it quietly toward Rumar, who was now heating his spear over the fire.
Alex climbed the wall and took a foothold at a ledge. He could stand there without holding on with his arms. Then he quickly threw the rope around Rumar’s throat and jumped down, grabbed the rope at the other end and began pulling.
The beast started wailing and screaming.
“Fillelo Rumari, Kirifaru!”
The giant tried to take away the rope, but did not manage.
Alex gathered all his strength and threw up the rope a second time around the throat and pulled even harder, choking the bastard.
He remembered the schooling from the village. Fabian’s school of flying and at once lifted, pulled the rope tighter and flew a couple of time around the throat tightening the rope. All the while, Rumar was running around the room, crashing into walls, desperately trying to get ahold of Alex, who many times almost crashed into walls and stones and fell into fire.
He jumped off Rumar, still clutching the rope and the flew with all of his might and buried his sword in Rumar’s chest.
Rumar stopped. He gasped and started to froth at the mouth. He looked dizzy.
With a great thud, Rumar fell to the ground, leaving Alex beaten and wounded on the floor.
Alex stood up and but never saw Rumar standing up again.
In the last minute, Adnicul warned him.
Alex flew up a second time and took his sword in both hands, buried it knee deep in his throat.
The Prosperanian king then climbed Rumar and stuck the sword into his heart. There was a slight gasp for air as the giant grabbed Alexander’s leg. The king stuck the sword another time into his body and the hand dropped. The giant finally dead, he jumped off and turned to Adnicul.
“What part of the apron are the keys?”
”No idea. Check the left pocket!”
He jumped up again and began to rummage. He had dropped the keys. They were gone. Alex looked everywhere, but simply could not find them.
Soon enough, Adnicul getting worried, he did find them, close to the exit. Rumar had obviously dropped them during the battle.
Alex ran to the freestanding cage and opened the door.
Adnicul ran out.
“Let us leave this place.”
Together, they ran out and now there was no problem in seeing the path.
The dawn was approaching.
They saddled the horses, Adnicul’s limp now worse than it had been before, packed their saddle bags. The two men threw dirt on the fire and left the cave.
Not until midday did they speak to each other.
Not until the incident by the river did they again talk of the trauma of almost having been swallowed alive by an angry giant. The horses were calm. They, too, felt what had happened.
All the time, Alex was worried. Adnicul was almost always getting into trouble. Something was trying to get rid of him.

§

“Take me to the river, dearest, and play a melody!”
Adni turned to look at his companion, surprised to hear him speak.
”What?”
”Oh, no” Alex mused. “Just a song from back home. Belinda used to sing it.”
Adnicul nodded, sympathetically. “Ah, yes.”
The ravine to their immediate right was so deep that one could barely see what was down there. Enough to hold the two of them on their horses riding alongside each other, it was still so steep to their left and so deep to their right that they dared only look ahead. The narrow path apparently lead downward into the deserted remains of another city of some kind later on after leaving the ravine. He saw it on the fact that there were houses on the green hillside that seemed to be leading to a larger road. It led down into a valley. He knew exactly what he would find there: old inns, barrels of ale, wells, and marketplaces, all without a single soul around to manage their contents or find themselves nurtured by …
“I want to arrive soon” Alex whispered to himself. “I want to go home.”
Adnicul half grinned. “Are you sure about that?”
Alex winced sympathetically. His companion saw how tired he was. How sick of traveling he had become. “Yes, I am. I want to finally get this over with.”
”Have you ever confronted her?”
Alex tried to chuckle, but only managed a grunt.
“I don’t think it is possible for anyone to comprehend the pressure that is weighing me down right now.” Then, he added. “I almost think Lucinda finds all this funny. To her it is all a big joke. But in actual fact, if I lose it will be the end of civilization as we now it.”
Adnicul shook his head, patted Centurion and smiled. “Wish I could help you, my friend.”
Alex cocked his head and sighed. “Adnicul, you already have.”
Adnicul gave Alex a surprised look. “Really? I have?” Alex nodded. “How did I manage to do that?”
“By teaching me tolerance.”
”Tolerance.” Adnicul nodded to himself. “Don’t forget that I almost ruined your country. I hated you once.”
”I hated you. But I know this:” Alex pointed to the road ahead. “Whatever is waiting for me over there, I will be needing patience and calm and tolerance. Nothing can weigh me down there or I will be dead in two seconds. You helped me get there. Without you I would not be here today.”
“If that is the case, I am happy to oblige with my efforts.”
The mentor looked down.
“What is that?”
Alex looked at the mentor and then at the ravine under them.
“What is what?”
”There was movement down there …”
”Oh, really?”
The only thing that Alex saw were the trees swaying in the wind and the gentle river flowing way beneath them.
“Do you wish that you hadn’t gone the road that you chose, Alex? I mean, letting Lucinda in to your own heart, excommunicating her and the having to pay for it?”
Alex looked down into the ravine and did see movement down there. There was something, but it seemed to be something unimportant. A few stones that were trickling off the mountainside.
Alex had a very bittersweet smile on his face. “Too late for regrets, friend.”
”But do you wish you had turned a different corner back then.”
Alex looked at the sun and his eyes seemed to be drifting off, seeking new territory, seeking old times, old friends long gone. His voice was almost worn to a whisper now as his ghostly words sang a song of old pains to be forgotten. “Sometimes, Adnicul, when the sun sets and I wish I were sitting by the fire I wonder why I sometimes lose my temper, why I favour some things and exclude others. Sometimes, I watch the campfire and I see myself in it and I wonder what made me scream those soundless screams all those endless nights. I wish I had never seen what I had seen. Maybe if I had killed her back then, put her to trial, then I would’ve never met Madeleine and I would’ve spent all those years fleeing.”
”But you wouldn’t have anything to fight for, would you?”
Alex looked at Adnicul. A wind ruffled his hair.
Alex smiled. “You have a point. The bittersweet has a certain appeal to it. I will never find out what really happened in 1392, ever.”
”But you can kill the memory of the pain by erasing the torture instruments.”
Alex winced again and Adnicul saw how aggressively frantic that look was in its calm. “How?”
”By not being dependent upon what you see or what ills people do to you?”
”Am I dependant upon the ills that people do to me?”
”Yes, you are. You must learn not be so dependant. But there is a road that you must go alone.”
“The road to independence?”
Adnicul nodded. “The road toward independence is the one you started treading on the 13th of October 1422, Alex. You have come a long way since then.” Adnicul sighed. “Real independence is actually nothing more than being able to give everyone a piece of your own cake and still being able to keep the whole thing yourself.”
”What do you mean?”
Adnicul grinned. “Tolerance. You have nothing to prove, which means you don’t have to loose your temper. Thus, no one will test you to see how far they can go, albeit they will try because they feel you have something to hide.” Adnicul smiled. “What did you hide, Alex, when Lucinda entered your soul in 1392?”
”I don’t know.”
”Find out. You might be surprised at what treasures you encounter.”
”Lucinda only challenged what you were hiding. Madeleine only was. I was. What did you hide?”
”Myself.”
Adnicul smiled, no he beamed. “It makes me proud to know I have brought you here. But there is a catch.”
”What catch?”
”Why did you hide yourself? Why did Lucinda feel she had to challenge you, let alone that she was part of a grand scheme to detroy the universe?”
“Because I did not face her?”
”Nah, not really.”
They passed a small road that lead upward toward a field. They both saw it in the corner of their eye but took no real notice.
Alex sighed.
“Because I didn’t face myself.”
”Why didn’t you? Why were you afraid to face yourself?”
”Because I was afraid what I would find when I face myself.”
”This is the moment of truth, Alex. Tell me. Why were you afraid of that?”
“I don’t know.” Alex stopped and thought for a moment. He did hear those noises again. He did hear that something was behind them. But King Alex was too occupied with finding himself out to notice. “I do know.” He began to get excited. “I do know. I was different back then, wasn’t I? I was. It was not that I was better. I may be better now, for all I know, but in 1392 I started living in fear because Lucinda told me that hell was going to fry me alive if I told her secret. But it was just a game and I am a victim of that game now. Lucinda just made me believe in ghosts. She made me afraid. She left me, but she gave me a fear of ghosts although she was away. I turned into a man just living for the escape of ghosts and I escaped into rage and love affairs and intolerance. It wasn’t that I was a bad king. I was good. But I was confused. In my own soul, I was …”
Alex looked to his side. Adnicul had disappeared. Alex hopped off the horse and looked down the ravine. No one there. He climed the ledge. No one there. He stepped on to his stallion again.
“Adni?” No answer. “Where are you?” Alex trotted back toward the small path that seemed to lead up toward a field that they had passed earlier on. “If this is a joke it is not funny. Adnicul?”
Alex trotted up the path and felt himself shiver in his clothes although it was quite warm.
He trotted up on a field and immediately saw another crossing path that he had overseen earlier. It lead into the valley and there was a muddy road that criss crossed it. Upon it was Rumar, running like the wind. Somehow, this large beast had followed them all the way here to sneak up behind them without letting the hear it.
Somehow Rumar had been able to steal away Adnicul and run away with him across that muddy field.
There was no way of telling if Adnicul was hurt, but all that Alex could see now was that his new mentor was laying across Rumar’s shoulder unconcious. It had all happened very fast and very silently.
Alex began riding after him.
“You are not going to get away with this!”
Rumar laughed and ran even further away with his large feet, Centurion galloping wildly after them.
“You are not going to get away with this!”
But the faster he ran, the further away the two fled. Eventually, Alex lay there in the mud crying, his tears mixing with mud, Mercutio silently knowing what was happening.
Alex stood up, screamed at the wind and sobbed, having lost a friend, seeing Rumar leave in the distance. He had lost a friend. Or had he? He had been a year on the road now. He had to go back and find Adnicul. Was he going to go back and find his new friend or go on without him? A week more or less would not matter, would it? Lucinda could wait. Adnicul was, after all, a guide to hell. Rumar had stolen his friend. He had been ripped away from him without fore warning.
Slowly, Alex mounted and decided to ride back to find his friend.
“I owe it to you, Adni” he told himself that day.
After all, Adnicul was responsible for the winning-back of his own soul.
It was a mutual life debt in both directions and Adnicul’s kinship and trust was probably the most important friendship he ever would have, except for Belinda’s.
He felt himself shiver as he rode back in the opposite direction, riding off to find an abducted pirate.
He felt himself shiver as he though about what Adnicul had said about the message for triumph.
“The fact is that when the dark empire falls, you will know by a raven or a dove or an eagle that it has fallen and it will be surprising, I guarantee it.”
With these thoughts in mind, he rode off to find the truth.


CHAPTER FIVE

VENTURE AND DECISION TO LEAVE

He could clearly recall this bridge.
They had crossed it on the way to the ravine.
Below him a bigger river was flowing toward the inner parts of Nocturania, or what seemed to be Nocturania. Mercutio slowly trotted across the bridge and ended up on the other side.
Alex looked behind him and wondered if he should turn around again, check just one more time in the cave if Adnicul was there.
He looked up at a cloudless sky. It was hot today. Not even a cumulus cloud. Blue as could be.
He sighed. What date did he have today?
He did not know.
He just knew that he had been told that it had been March 17th back in the valley.
But Adnicul and he had been on the road for quite a bit, so what could it be? April 1st? April fools?
Heaven knew.
Time really was only a number here. Only a number.
In fact, the king of Prosperania was on the table in his Grand Hall and he was sleeping.
In fact, he was only dreaming all of this.
The catch was that if he lost what ever duel was coming up, this dream would come true.
Come true? Dreams coming true? Sounded too good for this kind of pessimistic situation.
It was more like a nightmare being shoved down the throat like in the dungeons of the Wilta Prisons.
“I am tired, Mercutio!”
The stallion shook his mane.
“Don’t talk back, friend!” Alex mused. “I am tired of all of this. Tired of pushing. Tired of being a victim. Tired of never ever arriving at my destination. Tired of losing my guide.” Alex looked at his horse. “What about you?” Mercutio seemed to listen, but had no real interest in speaking. “How is it that I think you can speak?”
Alex sighed and stepped off the stallion, lead him to a tree and tied him there. He sat down on a stone and looked at the cave on the other side. He shook his head and began rummaging in the saddlebag that he had taken off the horse.
“A bible. An apple. A blanket. Adnicul’s metal flask of Margetanian Vodka. An almost full bottle of water from the well in the cave.” He took out the water and the apple. “An empty soul. Darn it. An empty soul.”
He felt the wind caress his cheek. It was a sweet wind. Fragrant. It smelled like roses.
Like a sweet summer in June drinking apple mead in the garden.
“Home. Will I ever see you again?”
He did not know how long he sat there, but he felt the presence of angels as he fell asleep by that stone and dreamt odd things.
He dreamt he was back home and everyone hated him. They said he had woken up to find he wanted to stop fighting to solve his dreams.
Alex woke up around midnight and found Mercutio simply standing there patiently waiting.
The king cared not, he spoke not, he wanted not to live, Alex drank the rest of the water and just took his blanket and cuddled up under it, just waited for the dawn, hungry and not caring about that fact, hoping that some soul would come and have mercy on him. He was waiting for something. Waiting to die. Waiting to live. Waiting to hope.
Alexander fell asleep and dreamt of home.
He woke up around dawn, saw no one, Mercutio still there.
Alex was freezing and starving and he had no idea why he did not care about that.
He sat up on the stone again and realized his back was stiff.
He stood up and stretched.
There was that smell again.
A rose? The wind of roses?
What was that?
He turned around.
There he saw … he gasped. There was a person there, standing patiently waiting for him to turn around. The person was smiling.
Yes, he knew him very well.
“How long have you been standing there?”
The soul smiled. “Since yesterday. I just waited for you to turn around. I even sent you a fragrant smell that would make you turn, but you fell asleep.”
Alex smiled again, realizing it was the first time he smiled since Adnicul disappeared. “I am so happy to see you. I have lost hope.” Alex looked down. “Raphael, I have lost all hope.”
Raphael came and sat down on a stone next to him, arranged his cloak so that it would not get dirty and took off the hood off his head. “Sit down!” He obeyed. Raphael took out an apple from his cloak pocket and gave it to him. “Have an apple. You haven’t eaten in a day, you foolish person!”
Alex chuckled and took the apple.
Raphael took another apple and began munching on his own.
Alexander began eating the apple and felt that the inner hope began surging up again. It was a filling apple. Like an entire meal including drink.
Raphael indicated at Mercutio standing by the tree.
There were elves there, they were feeding the stallion and talking with him.
Alex smiled and put his hand on Raphael’s leg.
The angel smiled and took another bite of his apple, but kept on looking at the cave.
“Tell me, your majesty,” he said, “how is it that where you have most reason to hope you lose everything that hope is for you?” Raphael for the first time looked right in to Alexander’s soul. “Do you enjoy being depressed?”
Alex shook his head, his mouth full of apple. “I have lost Adnicul.”
”You used to hate him.”
”I know.”
“Then why do you spend your entire night here when there is work to do?”
Alexander swallowed and dried off his mouth.
“My guide was kidnapped. I have grown tired of fighting.”
”You were on the road for a year without a guide. Do you need a guide to find to the cave?”
He shook his head. “I suppose not, but aren’t you the one who said care about your friends?”
”Yes, care. Find Adnicul. But Adnicul will escape Rumar.”
”He encaged him earlier to eat him. That is no good sign.”
“Rumar just eats animals. He has never touched human flesh. The thing that captured Adnicul years ago was not a Rumar. He carved himself out of the belly of another beast that does eat humans. Adnicul is just as confused as you. Rumar is toying with you.”
”What beast captured Adnicul years ago?”
”A Cally Beast. But never mind that. The point is that Rumar just captures humans and then lets them go. Adnicul was abducted, yes. But you could not find him, so leave and search for the cave in Yambalah, not this one that you left behind. You might be surprised what you find.”
“Is he there?”
“No. He will be held somewhere where you can not be for a bit, but your work lies elsewhere.” Raphael put his right hand on Alexander’s left leg. “Leave and then one day your friend will appear. You need to be searching for Lucinda. You know that this is what is bothering you? Not the fighting, you were a born fighter. But you only prolong this ride so long because you are afraid of the destination.” Raphael pointed at Alexander’s heart with his long finger and looked at him with his blue eyes. “You have the power in your heart to make this quick. Find it in your heart to get it over with. The way home is forward, not back. Always move forward, Alex. Don’t move back. Don’t move back. Even standing still is better than moving back.”
Alexander nodded. “Why have I lost hope?”
”Let me counter that by posing another question: what is your greatest fear?”
The king smiled, it was a very old feeling hidden under layers of fears. “That I will fail.”
“You are better prepared than anyone I know. You will not fail.” Raphael shook his head. “You are the royal family, for crying out loud. You are built to win. You will win. There is no question in your heart, correct?”
Alex grinned. “Not for an instance.”
”So why does your mind doubt?”
”Because my mind sees all the possibilities and plays around with all of that back and forth. I fix on the bad things, because I want no surprises.”
Raphael finished his apple, bent down and dug a small hole. He dropped the apple core into it and threw the dirt on it. He reached up with his hand. “Are you finished with your apple?” Alexander nodded. “Give it to me.” Raphael dug another hole and dropped the second apple into it and covered it with dirt. Raphael stood up and just looked at the earth. Soon enough two small flowers started blossoming out from the ground.
Alex watched this was surprise. “How did you do that?”
Raphael eyed heavenward. “Well, you see, when I was in magic school …” He slapped Alex lightly and jokingly on the shoulder. “Never ask an angel something like that.” Both of them started laughing. “The point is that you are afraid of surprises, but why?”
Alex shrugged.
Raphael pointed to the ground. “That was a surprise, was it not?”
Alex nodded. “You travel the spiral cycle of good upward and there won’t be so many bad surprises, but never challenge that cycle.”
”Spiral cycle? I don’t understand.”
The angel closed his eyes. “Think of it as a long winding staircase going up and down. The good things are on the top floor, the bad things on the bottom floor of that house. You do something good and it generates another good thing and you keep on climbing. Do something bad and it will make you descend. Now on the way up there might be challenges, sure. But they are there to be challenged. In fact, they are made to be overcome.” The archangel searched Alexander’s heart and saw that he understood. “When I say spiral cycle, I mean travel the staircase up and not down and when you meet a challenge face it. In this case the challenge is not to go away from your present course because your guide was abducted.”
”But if you had not told me, I would’ve thought for myself that he would be eaten?”
”Yes, but your heart knew that Rumar is not a human eater. That Adni was out of danger.”
”How?”
”It was your mind that played tricks on you. Told you what this world tells you. You were on your way out and onward when you gave up.”
Alexander nodded. He had been tricked by his own mind.
“Sometimes the trick is not to be lead astray. The evil powers are masters at that sort of thing. Entire lives are wasted because people are lead astray. They follow a fata morgana for the entire length of their lives that just disappears when the face the horizon and then it is too late. No matter what you have done before it is the challenge not to be lead astray that will save you in the end.”
“Is lust a part of this?”
Raphael sighed. “Now, we could be holding this discussion forever. Lust is a temptation that is so strong that it almost always is a force of its own that makes it dangerous for you,” Raphael said and pointed at Alexander’s chest with his finger so hard that he was forced to lean back, “so dangerous that you will forget duty, work, love, life, the Lord, and everything else because it is so fun to go after it. If you use that lust to portray art or write a poem or even rule a country, you will so so much good that I think you have no idea what you are doing or how well you are using it. Between a couple who mean earnestly to stay for entire life together, lust is a productive thing. But it such a perilous thing, because so many humans forget everything else in its shadow.” Raphael smiled bitterly. “Lucifer’s lust was the lust for having everything. Imagine it as a person who tries to carry many artefacts in his arms. Eventually, when he wants to hold the entire room in his arms, he will drop everything. That is why Lucinda will loose. She wants to hold the entire room of things in her hands. She cannot. She will eventually drop something and then it will all fall apart, because she then can’t keep her promise of holding on to everything.”
”The next question probably is that she won’t know what to do with it all.”
”Of course, Alex” Raphael whispered, humorously and leaned over. “Less is more, right?”
Alex nodded.
“What is she going to with that power, all those things? It seems like a nice idea, but when she is queen of the world … what then? Well, she has reached all of everything, there is nothing more to accomplish. Yes, then what?”
Alex chuckled. “Not having everything is wind in your sails.”
“A painting needs shadows and light spots. No picture can be all white or black. It loses its purpose. That is what rainbows are for.”
Raphael tried to find Alex inside his eyes again.
”You see why there is hope?”
Alex nodded.
“Good.”
Alexander leaned over and embraced the angel. There was so much warmth there.
“I was never saying, by the way, that saving Adnicul was a bad idea. He should be saved. But it never occurred to you that he might have all things in control.”
”What?”
”I am just suggesting that you need to be alone for a while now. Adnicul will be let go when the time comes.”
“I understand” Alex said and took one last look at the cave.
“The cave you seek lies in the heart of the inner forest.” Raphael’s eyes were so full of love now, a deep secret and even luscious, rich kind of love, that Alexander had pinch himself to realize that he was experiencing this. “Go and find your haunted kingdom.”
His royal highness embraced the angel once more and then walked over to Mercutio. The elves stepped away. He saw a small little creature that flew over the stallion’s head and realized he had seen the creature before. Then he realized where. He was much smaller than the two others, who simply hovered over the ground in white capes, their wings fluttering. It was a remarkable sight. He was much more transparent than the others, who seemed almost human. But his connection with Mercutio was obvious because the horse seemed very weary of leaving.
The little elf had tried to warn him of the werewolves’ arrival during the first days of Alexander’s trip back in the first forest. The elf was giggling.
Raphael chuckled and tapped Alex on the shoulder. “He is very sweet. All he does is giggle.”
Alex looked at the angel and beamed. “Who was he in life?”
”In life?”
Alex nodded and looked back at the elf. It giggled again, covering its mouth with its hands.
“Alexander, this elf was born an elf. There are creatures who never desire coming down here and becoming flesh. They might desire it, but they have always been elves and they will most probably be elves for centuries to come. There are those who choose to come down just for the experience. Jeanne d’Arc was such a person.”
”Who?”
”That’s right. She was known to you as Jean of Orlay but she was better treated here. She wanted to try it in the other reality but swore never to return after trying. She was not well treated. She is an elf today and very happy. This elf” Raphael said and pointed at the jittery little creature “has always been an elf. They have remarkable intuition. They see right through you better than you see through yourself. If they like you it is a huge compliment. He likes you.”
Alex smiled. “I am honoured.”
The king mounted and the elves watched it from a distance.
There was that look again. Alex looked into the distance and seemed to be lost in space.
“What is waiting for me out there?”
Raphael rubbed his face. “I cannot tell you. You will have to find out yourself.”
”Thank you, Raphael.”
The archangel bowed and the smiled happily. He saw him disappear in the distance from where he had come. Soon the elves were gone as well.
Not long after that, his royal highness left the bridge behind him and started riding toward his duty.

§

This place was familiar.
Unfortunately it was all too familiar.
Alex had hoped to say that it wasn’t, but it was.
After riding for a week, he had finally arrived at a palace that he had never thought he would ever see again.
It was very strange, but time was speeding up.
It had grown very hot after two days of riding and by the end of the week it was so cold that he had frost covering his clothes in the mornings. He believed it was fall.
Yes, time had been constant the last year.
Now, with Alex close to his goal that was changing, due to the illusion of reality, and so time was not what it had been. Clear was that it was autumn here. November. It all did not matter because it was a nightmare. But it made Alexander uneasy.
This was undoubtedly Rigor Mortis, the hellhole that he had visited in 1411.
The two towers were the same, pointy and black. The large windows on the top floors were as extravagant as the tiny ones at the bottom and in the cellars. The thick walls were thick that even the most extreme weapons would not be able to make it fall down.
What scared him most was the steep hill up to the castle. It gave the traveller up to it the feeling of tyrannical power. He had forgotten this. Maybe it was just as well that Adnicul was not here. He might’ve killed him on the spot. No, that was not true. But to be honest this whole area was too awful for comfort.
Did he want to go up and see it?
Did anyone still live there?
Was anyone, even ghosts, there?
Did he want to find out?
That dark and stormy night there was, naturally, a full moon out. Alexander, on a whim, decided to recapture old nightmares and rode up to the palace to see old enemies long gone.
What actually bothered him when he saw this place again was that Adnicul had been such a sadistic tyrant back then in 1411, even up to his disappearance after the latest war. It worried Alex that he had been concerned about Adnicul’s wellbeing when Rumar had captured him now. He would’ve been rejoiced and celebrated earlier. Now, he had cried.
He had even wanted to give up because he was gone, his new friend.
What was the matter with him? Had he forgotten what all this was about?
Was he being unfair? Maybe so.
Adnicul was also a victim.
But it did not change the fact that Adnicul had once been the terror of Medatlantia with his influence in all the terror of every country of the continent.
It was almost eerie, almost a silly fairytale cliché. The full moon shone over the dark castle with a lantern like sharpness. A few stars were out and seemed to add an extra little ghostliness to the scene. The rather steep path up toward the gate was hard enough for Mercutio to climb, but Alexander remembered his own coach riding up this very road back in 1411.

Why have I not arrived sooner?
Oh, my God. I see the castle. Did anyone see that flash? What was that? Lightning?
Is my daughter alive? Oh dear, I see torches in there …
My soldiers have gone inside, they’ve broken down the door.
Stop the coach, Driver.
It is raining.
Why am I here?
To save my child, that is why.
I have to run inside.

His mind had been blocked for the last year or so.
He had travelled the road to Rigor Mortis with his army back in 1411.
It had not taken a year. It had been a different road back then.
But this place was the same. It was just the same as back then.
The mud under his feet, the light rain and the full moon, it all served to make him shiver more than he felt was comfortable. Why was he riding up toward this place? It was dark and eerie. Was he riding up toward Rigor Mortis just to recapture … what, old memories? He had to laugh. It was a bitter laugh that actually sounded more like a frustrated grunt than a chuckle.
He knew that Adnicul was either in the arms of the Rumar or escaping it. He knew that he was trying to save his soul, but also that this man had been responsible for almost killing his daughter.
The path curved and opened up in a small square in front of the main gates. Alexander looked up at the castle. He shook his head. It was not as large as Iuventus, but it was certainly taller. Could anyone, even a demon, call this place home? That seemed impossible. The stones, what were they? They looked like stone, but they were black.
He rode up slowly toward the wall and had the stallion trot alongside it. He felt the stone wall. Cold. He looked back at the path he had ridden, the path that lay behind him.
He remembered his daughter’s fear that day, he remembered seeing his soldiers throwing the two culprits against the wall and holding him there. He remembered rushing out of the castle with Belinda in his arms and telling the soldiers just to leave, not even kill the two culprits.
“Just leave, leave, leave. Burn the place if you wish, but leave. Let us all just leave this place behind.”
He remembered feeding his daughter for months after that, he remembered taking care of her.
Alexander felt dizzy, he stepped off the horse and had to hold on to the saddle in order not to faint. Tears were streaming down his cheeks, he could not control it.
His knees were so weak that it seemed like they could not hold up his weight.
Alex felt himself holding on to Mercutio’s furry skin.
“Oh, God” he exclaimed to himself.
He reached into his saddlebag and took out the silver flask of vodka, unscrewed the cap and started to drink. The alcohol ran down his throat like soothing fire. It smelled like bitter root and it felt like nails, but once down in his belly, it made him feel warm inside.
He felt better, not much better, but still better.
He stood up and took another drink and then put the flask back in the pocket saddlebag.
He saw the gate was open.
It was dark in there.
The full moon shone upon the door and made the edgy door and the spikes that were protruding from the wood seem very hellish indeed. He was transfixed at the door. It was open. What was inside there?
He took a step toward the open door and stopped.
Something told him to stop. What was it?
He turned his back to the door.
There was a presence here.
A good presence? He did not know if it was good. He did not know.
All he knew was that he saw the forest and what lay beyond it.
He knew that the forest he was about to enter was haunted.
He knew that he most probably would feel himself wanting to leave once he entered.
He turned to the door again.
He shook his head.
“I have seen enough of you” he exclaimed and walked to the horse, collecting himself and mounting.
He looked at the forest and took a deep breath.
There was no reason to put this off any longer.
He had known that he had been committed to enter this forest when he left his home castle. What was about to come was the entire reason for him being here at all. It was all he had prepared for. There was no turning back now. No turning back. He was about to face a demon, a very old demon.
Sitting there on his brown stallion Mercutio and looking at the haunted forest, with a rejected old enemy castle behind him, he bowed his head and folded his hands and thought of the angels.
“Dear Father, for what I about to go through help me. I have risen to the occasion to face the demon. Send me thy angels to protect me in the forest and in the cave. When I am in hell, please let me win the game against my sister.” He looked up and saw how the full moon somehow seemed to cast a very strange light upon the forest down below. It was obvious that what seemed not to be penetrated by light was a forest whose trees alone could be lit from the outside. There was light in there, certainly. But from the outside the branch seemed to protect whatever haunting occurred on the inside. “God help me.”
Slowly, Alexander Winsletenna rode back down the hill, not even contemplating looking back and not even knowing why he had rode up in the first place.
Slowly, Alexander Winsletenna, King of Prosperania, rode toward the forest, for the first time in his life absolutely petrified.

§

Adnicul slowly woke up.
A river was the first thing he heard, the sound of steady water splashing against stones.
He felt like a drunken man who had drunk all night and then woke up on a wooden bench in an unknown place. He felt as if his soul was on fire.
He sat up, feeling his cheek. There were grass patterns on his left cheek.
A grass straw hung in his mouth like an unwanted appendix.
His eye patch hung loose. He felt his eye for the first time in years. There was nothing there, just a hole. He could still remember getting this wound. He could still remember seeing that thing roll around on the floor, his open wound spurting blood.
He looked up.
Was that the bridge?
My God, he was below on the bank.
How had he ended up here?
He saw Centurion a few feet away, eating grass. He wondered how he had arrived here. He tried to stand up, his knees weak, his sprained ankle still hurting.
His knees were shaking.
Why wasn’t he dead?
He should’ve been dead, God knows.
“Why?”
The word came out of his mouth almost on instinct.
Then he remembered lying in the arms of Rumar inside the cave.
What had he said?
”Think, Adnicul! Think!”

“I am forced to …”

What was it?
Forced to … keep him there until further notice? Wasn’t Rumar a carnivore? Why had he been spared? He did not understand what this was.
He turned around and saw the path next to the river find itself up toward the hillside that could lead him to the bridge.
What could he remember?
He tried to think, but his mind was still asleep.
He recalled the conversation with Alex and the he recall something very large just picking him up off the horse and running away. He saw Centurion, as if on instinct, riding after him. He recalled seeing Alex way in the distance following him.
Then he recalled falling asleep and waking up in Rumar’s arms.
Adnicul went on his knees again and crawled to the edge of the water and splashed some water on his face. He drank some of the water in the river and discovered it was sweet water.
Had Rumar spoken about Uriel?
There was something that Alex needed to do alone and he could not have Adnicul around? What was that? Had he dreamt all of that?
Adnicul walked to is horse, thinking of what had occurred and why he had so many problems recalling the last few nights. He remembered being fed and pampered by Rumar. Pampered? Was this not the thing that had wanted to eat him?
He was confused. Why had he been kidnapped in the first place?
Adnicul walked to the horse and wondered how the horse had ended up there.
He splashed some more water on his face, and then he walked to the horse and took out his bottle, went to the river and filled the bottle.
He put the bottle in the saddle bag.
He was still weak and so it was very hard to mount, but he made it.
Slowly, he began riding toward the uphill path.
Clear was to Adnicul that he was needed in Yambalah.
What was so important that he could not be there when Alex entered the forest?
Probably that he needed to see Rigor Mortis again for himself. After all, it was his journey and not anyone else’s. Still, he did not understand why he could not be there to help Alex. He needed to find him again.
Adnicul rode up the hill, still feeling his hair unkempt and grass falling off his hair.
He eventually came up and started heading for the bridge.
He had once been so keen on his own victory. Winning and not caring what became of others had been almost a wonderful thing. Was there a risk of becoming like that again? A man whose only intent was himself? No, because Michael had made him remember Eden. All of that seemed so remote now.
Adnicul stopped by the apple tree, managed to pluck many off the tree while sitting on the horse. He put some apples in his saddle bag, gave one to Centurion and started eating one himself.
As he rode across the bridge, it became obvious to him that Rumar’s abduction had been a setup by the good forces. Was that true, though? He thought so.
What bothered him? He needed to find Alex. Then why did he ride so slowly? Was there not a reason, now awake, to be as fast as possible in order to protect Alex from the ghouls of Yambalah?
There were so many questions.
What had bothered him all along?
Was it something that Lucinda had said?
What had she said?
They had both talked about winning over Alex a great deal, but that had been before the treacherous behaviour. But she had kept on saying something that she always had wanted to do, something that never seemed important to him, like her time travels always had seemed a waste to him.
She had promised to …
What was it?
He came to the other side of the bridge and started trotting faster, animating Centurion to almost gallop.
What had she said?
The more he realized that something was wrong, that Alex might need him where he was, the more important it seemed that he got help in duelling his sister.
He passed all the places they had seen together before and the image of Lucinda uttering that phrase over and over grew more evident.
“My Lord” Adnicul thought to himself. “I have to be there before they duel but why?”
Images passed through his head. He reprimanded Eric back in 1422, the attacks on the harbour, inspections at Fraytollah, visiting Lucinda.
Then, as suddenly as the lightning could strike an autumn night, he remembered her words. In fact it had been one of her primary goals.
“Alex” Adnicul whispered slowly to himself. “She wants to fool you and you have no idea that this is her plan.”
Adnicul suddenly began riding faster, hoping to come in time.
Why had the angels held him back?
Perhaps it had been Rumar’s initiative all together and perhaps the angels had woken him up just now.
He rode faster and faster and the stallion seemed to be panting already.
“I hope I come in time.” Adnicul passed the ravine, but it made no real difference to him that there was a horrible chance of both the rider and the horse falling down the ravine, riding so fast down the path that was so narrow.
He rode on to the long road toward the city ahead and realized that this was not the country he been elected to rule. It was Lucinda’s creation alone.
It made it all the more important to save Alex and help him get his family out alive.
That made the words Lucinda had uttered over and over again even more frightening.
He recalled those words now better than before and wondered why he had ever forgotten them
„If I only could throw my brother down the demonic ravine beyond the January Tunnel. I would pretend to die in the duel and then I would watch him fall and become the victorious one anyway.”
Adnicul raced down the road, oblivious to everything sans one thought: saving his new friend Alexander.


CHAPTER SIX

THE LAST DARK MILE


The king of Prosperania had finally entered this forest, the forest of the eternal full moon.
His journey to the cave had begun.
His heart was in torment, his soul was in pain, and his mind was joining the ridiculed souls of the underworld.
From the moment he had entered this final of forests, he had felt the presence of something not of this Earth. So, this was the original sin? These trees were all sprung from the forbidden fruit? Adnicul’s creation had promoted this? The thirteenth angel had been the innocent, unknowing instigator of a forest of forbidden trees?
As Alexander Roderick Winsletenna rode down this path all he could think of was the fact that he was here to save his family. He was petrified of failing. It was not even the fact that he was the king of a country that never would awake again. He could not bear the fact that he would never ever meet or greet or be able to love his family or anything else at all for that matter if he lost this duel.
There was a strange atmosphere here. Yes, the full moon had not penetrated the forest from the outside and no visitor could look in. But somehow the light of the full moon arrived here anyway, its light curving the branches and making love to the mud, dancing among the dried leaves and peeking through the holes between the branches of the bushes that seemed like claws to him that night.
It lit up the path enough for him to see that there was a long way ahead.
But it was clear to him that this was the way to the cave. Back in 1411 he had stopped at Rigor Mortis and never looked back. He had never come this far, his father had warned him before he passed away.
There was a silence here that seemed to tell him that the souls here in this forest were mean, but doomed to be so. It was not they wanted to be so, but that they were forced to thrive on revenge. Like Adnicul before the treason, their staring eyes had not yet met the light of day. Like the tyrant before the dungeon, they had been taken away from the tree of life to be included in the branches of mortality. This was the graveyard shift of the twilight zone, the shining of the fire starter. This was a soul not being able to take a stand either to life nor death, in limbo.
Everything seemed dark blue or grey here. The colors were those of mud and moonlight.
The trees seemed to be alive, glittering in this flora of darkness. They seemed to call out to Alexander, saying: “Help us, save our souls, stranger!”
Through it all, Mercutio kept on riding as if hit by a storm, faster and faster and still never arriving. The trees seemed to fly by his vision like dirty birds hoping to catch a butterfly in its nervous flight. The moon cast its shadowy light upon them both and for the first time Alex felt how frightened his stallion was. My God, this horse was terrified.
Alexander’s muscles were hard and his body was young. He had a large weapon on his back. But in his soul, Alexander felt like a nervous phoenix hoping not to be burned alive once the fire started to scorch his skin.
“I will come to haunt you one day old man!”
These words seemed so remote now that he was riding back to a place that encapsulated their origin. And yet, they rang so true and so poignant as if they had been uttered yesterday and not 38 years ago.
He was the rider that came back to the haunted palace to search for the ghost.

§

I wake up now because we have a visitor.
Who is he?
He is riding on a brown stallion. He is a handsome man, a very handsome man.
But who is he, a new victim?
We always hear everything way in advance with our large ears, so no wonder we heard him way before he entered our territory. I keep reminding my of my skill, so that when I attack I am sure enough of victory.
I waddle out of my hole, scratching my back and chewing on the remainder of a bug.
Sticking my head up out of the ground, I see him now, he is riding our way.
I turn around, flash my hundred fangs at my two friends and ask them to come with me. We scuttle fast behind a tree and hide there, waiting for him to come closer so that we can get a better look at him. I gave to be careful, for my mouth is starting to drool. I remember Oleana and how good she tasted. I have not had human meat since then.
We are creatures of darkness, so the people who fear us do not know how well we can cope in seeing in the dark. We must find out who this man is, so that we can tell him this.
I peep around the stem, he is close now.
I giggle as I do, for I cannot wait.
Oh, yes. That face. I recognize it. It is the man who is here to meet his … what was that thing the dream said? He is here to meet his daughter? Sister? Wife? All three? It has something to do with the cave that lies down there, I know that … from my dream.
I hop out from behind the tree and my friends hop after me, just as the horse is close enough to see me.
The horse stands up on his two hind legs and the man tries to stay on the saddle by moving forward so far that he almost lies flat on the horse’s back.
We laugh, for he sees us now.
We see his eyes glowing in the dark and he sees our eyes and our big mouths drooling.
The horse clumps down on his front legs, nervously shifting from hoof to hoof.
The man says something.
“Rumzils. My God, Mercutio. Killer Rumzils!”
I know not what language he speaks, only that I see him pointing at us.
His horse is shifting from hoof to hoof and rises from his front legs again to stand on his back.
It throws the man off the horse.
The stallion grunts as he falls off and lands.
He sits up, tries to stand but doesn’t make it.
His horse is obviously very nervous and afraid. We like nervousness.
“Ur-ophzuiga-ku. Hli u ageroim o efgapoe ekkk?” I exclaim, but the man does not answer. I smile, but he does not smile back. I wonder why, I just want to eat him. That is all.
No problem. Then we can be lifelong friends.
“Ur-ophzuiga-ku.”
He stands up and takes out his sword.
He notices that his leg is bleeding and reaches down to touch it.
Then we see our chance.
We jump at him, start clawing. We open our mouths simultaneously ready to eat his nose, when he pushes his sword down my friend’s throat. What a nasty thing.
My friend scuttles off, clutching his face. I see him drop to the ground, panting.
The large man pushes me away and starts running for his horse that is running in circles around a tree.
“Mercutio!” I hear him call.
Why is this man so scared of us?
We just want to eat him.
He limps to this horse and tries to hold on to the saddle.
He sits up, mounts but slides off, mount again and starts riding off.
I see my chance and jump up on the saddle and start biting at his leather vest. My friend, the only one alive at this point, jumps after me as the man rides. We both start tearing at his clothes.
Nice. I tear a piece off. Tasty. He starts wriggling.
That is when I slap his horse, ready to bite its ass.
His horse screeches and wails.
The man stops and turns around. He takes me with both hands and throws me against a tree. I feel myself hit the stem and slide to the ground.
The man stops his horse and takes my other friend in his hands.
Then something amazing happens.
He lifts off the horse. In mid air he then throws the Rumzil to the ground and kills him, too. I am the only one alive now. He takes the sword and comes against me, flying, with his sword in his hand.
He lifts his sword and …
I run, leaping almost to get away.
The man is flying around and starts hitting at me with his sword.
I claw at his face, giving him a wound or two and I have to laugh at this.
Served the little shit right that I got him on his cheek.
He takes his sword and … oh, no … blood spurts out of my arm. My arm is off.
I grit my teeth and jump at him. He kicks me away.
I see then that my friends are not dead. They have crawled to the place where we are right now and simultaneously gather all their strength in standing up. They take each one leg and start clawing at the man’s pants.
I waddle off to them, happily nodding at this fine idea and decide to work on his behind.
That is when the man flies off again, my two friends dangling from his pants, not yet at his flesh.
He lifts the left one off, throws him up and takes the sword that carries and cuts off the creatures head with one swift stroke. The head bumps against one of the trees and rolls toward the ground in one of the bushes. The body drops to the ground.
As I hurry up to reach him, but realize that I cannot, he takes the only one alive at this point and pierces his stomach with his weapon. He takes out his sword and then beheads my friend.
I pick it up and look at it, cocking my head in fascination and fear, just as …
The man is flying my way.
I have to attack. I have to survive.
I jump up just as he lifts his sword.
I feel myself opening my mouth to bite his nose.
His sword swings toward my throat. Oh, no, I feel the silver sword touching my ski …

§

Alex lay panting by Mercutio, three butchered Rumzils around his own body.
He was standing on all fours, sweating like never before.
A drop of sweat mixed with blood from his wound and dropped the ground.
All his blurred vision could see was mud lit my moonlight.
He felt himself gasp for air, his breath hot and his stomach pumping out and in like that of Mercutio’s.
His hair was hanging in his eyes, sweat rolling into them and blocking his vision.
Alexander’s hand reached toward his own back. His vest was torn in the back, as were his pants.
He sat back on his hind legs, shaking his head.
Blood, that was blood on his face. The Rumzil had clawed him bloody.
Lucky those things were slow on getting to his flesh below the clothing otherwise he might not be sitting here now.
He looked up at Mercutio, who seemed to be nervous.
Alexander stood up and walked to the horse. His was shivering.
“Whoa, there, big fellow. Take it easy now. They are gone.”
He looked at Mercutio’s behind and realized there was just a small mark there, no wound.
He stroked it a few times.
“Does it hurt?”
The horse shook his head.
“It is all right, my friend. It is over.”
Alex leaned toward his horse, panting, sighing, crying, and feeling numb.
These three things had come out so quickly just now that he had not been prepared at all for them. Now, he was a murderer with a scar on his face.
There was a long way to go. Time to leave.
Alex mounted again and clip-clopped slower on to what he thought seemed like a clearer path of some kind. He patted the stallion on the mane.
“We will make this, I promise” Alex said.
He almost heard the stallion answer “I don’t know” under his breath.

§

Move quickly, Centurion.
We don’t know how far Alexander has come.
Most probably he is in the forest already.
I wanted to be there when he rode through it, but I am sorry to say that I am not.
He is strong, but I am still afraid of what might happen when he sees Rigor Mortis, if he has not already seen it. It will remind him of my old identity and he might start mistrusting me again.
God, I have not slept now for days. How much head start has Alexander got now?
I can’t afford to sleep.
I do not know how much time I have.
If I knew I would be happy, but I don’t know.
I have to be content with hunger and thirst. I have to be satisfied with letting my cape flutter behind my in the wind and my eye almost closing in the breeze.
It is night.
Oh, my dear Alexander, why I am not with you?
Centurion, can you feel the heat in my heart beating again?
My hatred has a power of its own and I know that it is very much like the temptation lust has to offer, addiction to infidelity. Weakness conquered me back then, but the memory is stronger. The memory of what I am. The pain is endless. I must save Alex. He is trained as a fighter, but he does not know what things his sister might have planned.
Father Ibn-Dal, why did you not teach me righteousness?
Why am I growing angrier?
What is happening to my soul?
As I ride closer to the cave I feel my spirit’s conflict.
I clutch the mane of my horse, hoping to arrive in time save my friend. But I also lust to kill him.
What is happening here?

§

“Ride on, lonely rider, ride onwards on your brown stallion.
You are a stranger here, but you may still ride on, that is … if you wish to ride on.
You see me screaming at you, I know, because you can see me fly and block your vision.
You can fly, as well. I know you can. How clever you are.
But I have always flown. I was born to fly.
I am not a body.
I am not of this world, but this is still my home.
You try to challenge us?
Challenge us? How can you?
Who are we that you think this is a possibility?
We were here before time began, so there is no way that you can challenge us.
We are eternal and we will lie to you until you believe our lie.
There might be nothing left of you when the time of your arrival comes.
But you alone will create your demise, not we.
So, keep on riding to meet your sister.
We will try to stop you by making you stop yourself.
We just keep on bothering you on your journey through our territory and if you are lucky you will arrive at the cave, sweating and screaming, crying and crawling, only to die by Lucinda’s sword.
Can’t duel your sister because she is a woman?
I knew it. You are a weakling. Sissy.
I knew it. Sissy.
Keep on riding, Sire.
Who am I, I hear you ask again?
I am the staring eyes in front of your face, that is who I am. That is all you need to know.
I am the demon that has given you the nightmares that have haunted you since 1392.
I am the growling werewolf that howled at you by that river a year ago.
I am the army of death that speared Tom in his belly in his own personal apocalypse.
I am King Rat.
Someone else is holding the strings. Have you heard that phrase before?
I know you have, back when you were someone else that was phrase I used to tell your wife
Yes, someone else is holding the strings.
Me.
I disappear for a while and I see your eyes roll and your head turn. Weak soul, terrified of rats.
Hah.
Boo.
I jump out at you from behind a tree. I take the form of a cloud with eyes and I wail at you with my endlessly open mouth and scare you with my lovely eyes. Let us see how you react now, Sire.
Are you scared of me, Sire? Are you? Huh?
Look into my eyes, your majesty. Take a leap into the open grave and see what is in there, just because you are curious. Come now, dare to do it. You know that you are interested to see what is in there.
I hear you scream when you see me follow you, regardless of how fast you ride for I enjoy the sound.
I like your screams, your twitching fingers.
I thrive on your fear, Sire. I like your fear. I live for it. I love it.
Be afraid of me. Please be very afraid.
Why are you sweating, because you are riding down this path so fast that the wind whips your hair back toward the rear of your head?
Why are you bleeding, because you were bitten by a Rumzil?
Why are you crying, because you miss your daughter?
Why are you shivering, because you are you cold?
I am a comfort. Be comfortable in your fear. I am your best friend, your own personal fear.
No, don’t look away. The full moon lights up my face so beautifully.
I feel your hands twitch as I provoke you to hold mine. So, hold my hand and scream. Let’s scream together. You and me. Come now. Two friends screaming together.
I see your eyes close although you have to hold them open in order to stare into my black holes.
I know you can’t stop looking at me. I know it. I feel it.
I will let you hear something of lies ahead.
Alexander? Do you hear that?
Can you hear the screams of your daughter?
She can scream, too.
She is in her own cage above the pit.
Can you hear the echoes of her wails?
Can she scream beautifully, or what?
Oh, yes.
Girls do, you know.
Scream, I mean.
They scream so beautifully and to be honest we love hearing them scream.
Look at me screaming.
Can I not scream nicely, as well? Give me that well earned compliment.
After all, you are about to scream, as well.
Why are you riding so fast? Why, Sire?
Is it me?
I am only accompanying you on your trip.
Oh, I will slow you down then.
You like that?
You like riding through mud?
You like sinking through quicksand?
You like having visions?
I will give you a few, although you see no quicksand and no mud to speak of.
Your visions are in your head and I will grant you a peak I into the world of visions.
I will give you more than a few.
Here, the gates to my graveyard are open.
Enter my cemetery.
Sire, enter the place where the souls have no name and where the endless fallen soldiers walk with their limbs falling into the abyss.
Hear me shout as you see your limbs disintegrate.
I am there for you, waiting in the full moon, waiting for you to join our group of undead demons.
Shout all you want, twitch and scream, Sissy-Boy, twist your body and wail all you want.
I am still here waiting for you to believe in my lies so that they become the truth.
I am your own King Rat, the creator of legends.
I will show you the abyss.
I was there in the cage, staring at the newly imprisoned.
Come, you like this, I know it. Join us, help us damn the living. You like that, I see it, you shit!”

§

“Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!”
Whatever soul had been there with him, it almost pulled him back into the hellish hole that he had been back when he had fallen for Madeleine. He was afraid that he gone too far now.
The soul was gone now that he had screamed in protest.
These were not visions.
They were spiritual warfare.
This was mind control.
Mercutio was almost not making it, turning into a wild animal whose head seemed to be bobbing up and down and hating the fact that he had to be here.
His only way of showing it was to run fast, faster than the wind.
“Calm down, Mercutio! Slow down. That’s right. Shhh. Slower. Trot, that will be enough. These things are just visions. Like paintings in a gallery, drawings on a wall. They are not true reality. They are lies. Shhh. There you go. You see, you have the ability to calm yourself down. Shhh. Feel your heart just slow down. These visions are not reality, neither can they be reality. Soothe your mind. You are a good horse, a lucky horse with good friends like me. Don’t conjure up these visions. Keep your heart and soul clean from all fear. You are safe.”
Alexander sighed, his hands indeed twitching and his body aching as a result of what he had just seen. His brain was shouting and he did not believe what he was telling Mercutio.
“Take me away, Michael. Take me away to a different world where everything is fine.”
Why were his legs aching, Alex wondered? Why did he have a feeling of pressure in his chest? Why were his eyes bulging, his pupils expanding, and his eyebrows hurting? Every limb of his body throbbing?
“Sail me away to a different shore where everything’s fine.”
Alexander was worried. Deeply worried was he, for the feeling was not disappearing. It was as if he had summoned some soul that should not have been summoned.
They were using his own mind against him.
What was that? Was that Eric and Rebecca, the couple he had seen at Misar Rularia?
Yes, it was. One of them lay butchered at the side of the road and the other was being chased by something in the other direction. A beast.
He closed his eyes, regardless of the fact that he had to keep his eyes open.
He closed his eyes, felt his good safe old head tingling again.
He opened his eyes and saw that the two victims were gone.
He felt good about riding slower now, but bad about not riding faster.
“What does all this mean, Mercutio?” Alexander felt the cold curl up inside his body, his fingers were hurting, his body was convulsing. “I am worried, Mercutio. What is this worried numbness I have, this aching hurt that seems to just drench my senses?” Mercutio had calmed down. He was of course not answering. “Oh, Mercutio. Could I turn back time if I wanted? Could I? Help me, my horse. Help me. Take me away to a different place where everything is fine. I want to go home.”
In his mind he went back in time and was again sitting in his garden enjoying lemonade with his family. He was again the centre of all activity at a picnic. He was again sitting on his throne, bearded and wise and old, nodding at subjects and giving advice to philandering daughters and alcoholic sons, helping worried children and deciding whether to downplay events like attacks on the northern harbour or counterattack. He was again a king, simply occupied with every day events, a ruler just trying to keep an empire going, not a warrior on a horse whose soul was screaming in pain over having met a demon who had pulled him into his world with the magnet of dark desire.
“Take me away to a different world where everything is fine, where my soul does not twitch in the light of these visions. Please help me, God, and let everything be fine with my family. I can not help being relentlessly worried over what is going on. Is this me or is it a vision? Is it reality or a lie? Break the chain of illusion. My mind is in agony, Lord. I am very afraid.”
Alexander bowed his head, feeling himself sink into this deep depression.
“Break these chains around my heart. My mind is spinning. My compulsions are wailing. Does it ever get easier, Lord, ever? Is my family all right? Will they be fine? Do I have to be worried?”
Then, out of the blue, he heard a voice penetrating the silence: “Stop asking questions!”
Alex looked around. Nobody there.
Then the voice echoed in his mind again.
“You are not responsible for the vision you saw. You have to remember that the vision you just saw was filled with lies. The trouble lies in the fact that you believe the lie.”
Alex realized then and there that he had freed very old wounds that had been covered with old bandages for years. The tingling was simply the breaking of chains around his heart. Yes, his head was tingling. But that was only because his head had retaliated against what he had seen, not that he had hurt anyone waiting in the underworld for his rescue, which was essentially what he had been worried about. His head was tingling because his brain had wanted to free himself against the hatred that he had been exposed to for years.
When the demon came and whispered these words in his ears, he felt as if was hurting someone by not simply telling the spirit to leave. He could’ve, couldn’t he? He was afraid that he had hurt his family where they were waiting by simply listening to what had been said to him. He realized that he was petrified that something had happened. But that was what Lucinda was, was it not? Lucinda was real, but she was still just an odd little vision producing lies, right? He believed in the bad things she had said, that was the problem.
The demon had attacked him and so he thought he would be harmed.
The forest was still lit by a full moon. The Rumzils were still circling the muddy pathway and, God bless, not daring to enter the road. The ghouls were still flying around his head making him spin. The fire was still throbbing in his brain. He was still very frightened. The forest was still dark and he still hoped that he and all of them could be all right once he got out of this. Had this experience a minute ago just been an exorcism?
He was more worried than ever now, but relieved that it was over. But he was afraid that this relief would turn into fear and rage of having conjured up bad things. He had, due to Lucinda, been a victim of compulsion for so long that he was used to finding things that did not exist.

Then, at once, he saw it.
The cave.
Bloody and plagues by hell raisers, his soul full of scars and and his heart beating, he stood and looked at it. He had never been here and yet he knew the place. Its entrance so familiar. Its shape like an old friend waiting for him to come and say hello.
He looked inside and saw the cave walls covered with blue moss.
There seemed to be a bright light coming from down where the path ended after a long curve.

Alexander Winsletenna stepped off his horse and lead it, along with himself toward the goal of his journey, realizing himself to be at the zenith of his powers, at the peak of his fears and at the climax of his entire spiritual trip.

He was about to duel inside the abyss.


CHAPTER SEVEN

DUEL IN THE ABYSS


Night time, A.D. 1430, The Forest of Western Callenia, Nocturania

The Rumzils had not been out for eons until this night. They had hid underground in their holes, victimizing carefully chosen suspects, like Oleana van Ochsenskjöld, with their large mouths and eager eyes. Their obscenely large faces grinned with one hundred brown fangs, their tousled hair and half-meter frame waddling, crawling, in order not to be discovered by the black rider on his blue horse. Only the spies, those invisible terrorists capturing them and dragging them down, had not come up for air ... until now. And they were not the only ones lingering about.
The worlds and levels of creations as they knew them were breaking up and mingling about, time shifting about. Creation knew that everything was as stake here and so, like a nervous child, it danced about, as a worried youngster would, waiting for its mother to grant it a piece of sugar candy. The gypsies were returning, the animals of the night popping up from their hibernation into the blue-grey shadows of west Callenia. If this was granted continuation, complete anarchy would be result.
Everything good would fight against everything evil without mercy.
It was a race against time in a timeless world that was speeding up immensely.
The forest seemed to live and breathe death that night as he rode. For the one eyed rider, calmly unsettled in saddle, who rode his dark-blue stallion past the rushing foliage of his close vision, was galloping at breakneck speed to revanquish his master’s victim and save what he could of himself.
There was a wave like quality to the black silk cape as it fluttered behind him in its own breeze. It looked like a stormy sea whereupon demons would ride, barely staying alive. A sea which from afar did not even recognize the presence of living creatures. But they were there. Oh, yes. They were in that black sea, screaming for help just like humanity was trapped in its momentary amnesia. A species that tried to trap the demons imprisoned in the engulfing abyss hoping for mercy, evil and good intertwined in one family.
This night, for good or ill, would determine the victor of creation’s greatest battle.

The cave had been empty now for exactly 6537 years. Ever since he had escaped his cage in 5107 B.C. he had been on the run. When mankind already had been around for a while, rats doing his work and the white one sleeping his eternity away, mankind’s destiny was determined only within the grasp of its own venture. But now, in 1430 A.D., a battle was being fought that could change the course of it all for the better, or for the worse.
And the road that one of them had walked and rode, crawled and ran more like it, now for quite a long time had led him to an underground lake whose white child lay, head lolled back against the stone, golden brown hair swimming in the water like it had now for exactly 7540 years, a non-existent sub angel lurking in the corner of the evil eye.

Right opposite it hung a cage from the cave roof. It was long, rusty and only bent open in two places. The place where evil had resided once for one-thousand years. Alex looked around and was amazed at how much of all this he could see in spite of how deep below the earth he was. There was the blue moss and there was that strange light coming from the end of the tunnel river. It seemed to part in two directions at the end and a light seemed to be shining from above it.
Was that a hum he heard? What was that hum? From where did it come? He did not know that.
Mercutio was shifting from hoof to hoof and it was obvious that he was nervous.
Alexander had heard the entire story, of course.
The story of how he had been encaged.
The story of how he had broken out and how he had been a recluse ever since.
That was the real thing, was it not?
The first archangel’s real prison.
He shuddered at the thought.
The sound of the iron chain creaking and squeaking and rocking back and forth as it hung from the cave ceiling was only accompanied by another sound: the dropping of melting ice water from the walls. It all made Alexander realize where he was. In that famous cave that was created as an oasis, but that in the end became what he saw it as today: a twilight zone gateway between heaven and hell.
It all made him realize that he was ending a very long journey. A journey that, for him at least, had begun 1392. This journey had, however, begun way before man ever was chosen to walk the earthly spheres. It had begun a long time ago.
The cage hung from one large iron chain that seemed to steady every one of its movements. Alexander looked at the cage and found it quite hard to imagine anyone, even a demon, living there for a thousand years, let alone with a rat as a companion. The cave walls oozed drizzle and the two silhouettes, the cage and the dead angel, lead the eyes to the January tunnel who’s deceiving and discount light showed the way toward two entrances, from where the apprentice would soon arrive in a canoe of Hustilar-wood rowed by the bony hands of Charon.
How did he know this?
The angels, his angels, were telling him so.

The light was strong and the tunnel longer than first appearance. As the traveller, on whose shoulders all of this rested, watched it, his white stallion unsteadily shifting from hoof to hoof, he realized that his family's, nay his country's entire destiny, rested solely on his success or failure tonight. Ever since that day so many years ago when she had disappeared he sensed that this day was going to come. Now it was here. It all depended on tonight.
And was he scared? How strange, he thought. No, he wasn’t scared at all. He had never felt so calm.

A black rider was riding thru the darkness of the Nocturanian Forest that final night, his sinister silk cape fluttering in the breeze, his long black mane flying, his temple hair haphazardly swaying in the breeze.
His one eye desperately staring, wincing in an attack wind coming from the galloping horse's acceleration. Staring at the leaf covered path, he tried not to get distracted by the nervous hooves of this age-old stallion. It desperately left a trail of mud and dust behind it, which in the light of the full moon looked like waves of darkness spilling across the path into the bleakness of the Rumzil territory.
The rider’s other eye, or the hole where its’ ball should've had its home was covered with an eye patch. It bore an upside-down cross sown on its black surface in gold and red, reminding the bearer of that strange encounter so many years ago. Against a canvas of bleak, naked trees that spoke of nothing but death that night, the forest looked hollow. The light of the moon shone upon the trees with eerie fashion, creating shadows that seemed topsy-turvy, strange and ghoulish.
As the rider galloped past the ever dark grey-blue foliage of the nightmarish forest here in Callenia a Rumzil popped out from behind a tree and giggled and soon enough others imitated the leader.
The Rumzils always appeared in little groups of three or four above ground and there was always a leader among them. That beast was no different than the others, but his eyes, or rather the behaviour of the other Rumzils, showed his prime position. Once they waddled out toward the coming victims, the arms, long enough before, extended and the fingernails buried deep into the throat of the victim, like they had with another human, a girl, who now rested in lack of peace in the pits of Rumzilian bowels.
The black rider tried hard to see where the path lead, the darkness almost complete and somewhat eerie, even for this man. The path twisted and turned in every direction and the rushing foliage past his eyes confused his concentration. But while the Rumzils waddled quickly behind the rider, his ultimate goal was indisputable: Yambalah. The cave of original sin where that last duel would take place in less than one minute and ironically named after God's original nickname of his son. The Loved One.
The man's bony grey fingers moved constantly, clutching the horse, and both the nostrils of the man and the blue stallion's were flaring. Their muscles moved in unison with the dark stars and the dirt beneath their gallop. The man's leather, metal-studded uniform stuck out against the light-brown, bluish dark surface that was these Callenian Woods. No one, except the man in the cave, of course, who had arrived before him, would've been so foolhardy as to enter the forest where it counted, let alone here. Not only the Rumzils but the werewolves and the ghouls as well as many other creatures would be too dangerous for any man's mind to stand.
The man was anonymous to the Rumzils, at least here. This place was not of this world. His history, though, had been more glorious than his faded desperation now proved to be. But when the good man, who now stood silently watching an underground lake unknowingly was pursued by a black rider who inspired had reclaimed his fate, back then his spirit had rode away. He was leaving his own flesh and blood bleeding on the floor of the royal palace and the dark man now on his way holding his one eye in his hand, Lucifer smiling gently and patching him up with the Antichrist.
So the rider’s face winced as his black knees bumped against the stallion's ribs. His master was trying to crush him with painful memory. Stop his horse to give himself up to the Rumzils, who would not catch him if he did not give himself up. The slow munching of the beast was far more soothing than the painful still wrath of the devil. He clutched the mane of the horse angrily, realizing then and there that his master had deceived him. He had only been a tool. Maybe, after all, the man by the lake would trust him after their encounter. Lucifer would be there to stop him at all costs with his almost complete control.
He would not back down. He would not give in. In the face of the Rumzils, Centurion rode through the forest like an eagle flies through the night, the hairs on his neck flapping and flying in the breeze. There was a look of desperation that was mirrored in his eye and it almost seemed as if they were both one and the same person. It didn't seem as if they were different from each other at all. They were but human and animal side of each other. Looking at them one would think that they thought of losing the game. The evil air of even the stallion would give food for thought. They were made to ride.
The moon shone down on them and made their black muscular bodies glitter in its light. The gloomy birds and owls in the trees looked down on them. Wondering. Thinking. Hoping. Waiting for a solution to come. He was not waiting. He was riding towards a war. A war against his master. War against betrayal.
At stake was his own soul.
His one uncrossed eye winced, wondered if there still was time ... and was bribed to remember his master's original anarchy.

As for Alexander, I.N.R.I. shone in his mind, H.E.L.L. in his eye.
Lucifer haunted his vision, Michael owned his heart and Belinda possessed his soul.
Thoughts travelled through his brain as he watched Lucinda standing there in full demonic splendour . Watching her brown eyes, the glee of a thousand demons danced in her blackness of soul. He saw that this woman was a tool of the devil and only on the surface his sister. She was the devil's arm who had gotten her own will in its limb for a while but lost it to Satan’s full power. Now she was all his. All the devil's bitch. All Satan's love.
Then, he realized she was but a vision.
He had experienced horror before. He had fought Nocturania all his life . He had been raised by his father King Bertrand to do so and never known why it had such importance to him. Now he knew. Standing face to face with Lucinda, having feared her for most of his life, he realized he had always been more or less uptight. Nocturania was the devil's land and Prosperania was God's way to get back at his firstborn son. The fallen archangel. Lucifer. The Morning Star. Yambalahs creator. But this time his entire country's existence would disappear from the map if he did not win. Not only that. The world, the alternate reality (his own reality), would belong to Satan if he lost.
Like all men of his family, longevity was on his side. The last years had taken away at least ten. With sixty he had the vigour of a thirty five year old. Now with seventy, still strong and powerful and over six feet tall and large, he had been robbed of at least fifteen of these years and illusion had still made him look twenty. Elegance and flair, regal splendour and a quiet air of having won against misfortunes early in life brought him a masculine aura that brought respect to his gentlemanliness . But his face was scarred by trouble. His features battled over with struggle.
There had been a time of waiting. This was not it. There had been a time of struggle. And although this was a struggle, it was not. There had been a time of confusion. This was clear cut. The lines were drawn. This was very final. This was good against evil. Romulus against Remus. Simon against John. Jesus against Judas. Cain versus Abel. Alexander versus Lucinda. Lucifer against Gabriel. God versus Satan. This was the retrieving of the haunted kingdom. This was a divine war. God's last battle. And the rest was just icing, puppetry. It was all about God, Lucifer and Gabriel, the Archangels, Rebecca, the Fields of Nostalgia, Yamabalah, Nocturania and Prosperania.

Alexander's road had been paved with stones. And in his hand lay a sword with the symbol of a hawk engraved in its handle. Pure heavy silver blade. He was standing on the shore of this underground lake, behind him the tunnel up to the surface. In front only water and the whitewinged angel on the rock maybe twenty feet away. All that Alex could feel when seeing this poor creature was sadness. It was the angel that had been and it was as lifeless as dust because of the sins of its own spiritual vanity.
On the rock, right above the water, the initials H.E.L.L. were engraved. Alexander knew the word itself, of course, although the initials meant more. Just a week ago at Rigor Mortis he had learnt their origin.
As he stood there, letting all of these images sink in, he was reminded of Adnicul, by a distant campfire, telling him: “The fact is that when the dark empire falls, you will know by a raven or a dove or an eagle that it has fallen and it will be surprising, I guarantee it.”
The dampness oozed away from the walls and water trickled down the stones. Maybe one hundred feet away the larger lake like structure narrowed down to a tunnel, perhaps fifteen feet high and twenty feet wide. At the end was a bright light. The light was quite deceiving for the tunnel lead to heaven the right way, but one wrong step into hell.
Lucinda had not arrived yet. Her presence was here like a ghoulish nightmare scenario that breathed death upon the water and turned it into ice. He would not be fooled again.
"Hello!“
His deep voice echoed down the tunnel making it sound like a thousand voices.
"Hello?“
He heard a dog bark. It was Reficule. There was a growl now of two dogs, then three . Reficule's three heads were barking at once. Then there was shrill scream and a whimper. Reficule stopped barking. It had been Lucinda and now her own voice came from the end of the tunnel.
He looked down the tunnel's deep long stone tube and saw something slowly arrive in calm, slow splashes. Standing upright in a boat carved out of black Hustilar-wood, a tree that only grew beyond the cave past the gates to hell, Alex realized the boat was actually too small or unstable for her to stand upright in it. But she did. And behind her, on a leash, was Reficule. Charon was at the very back now, not like before, the last time he had seen them, his long bony finger clutching the ore and foot by foot bringing them closer to him.
She was wearing that same dress she'd had on that same night at the wedding. It was black and diamond studded. But now the cape was gone. There was an expression of pure victory on her face that spoke volumes it said (he could almost hear her voice speaking to his mind):
"Milleneas have brought me to this place ... Mr. Darkness: Please show me your face ... being here finally is a battle won ... Alexander, you might as well run ..."
Her half closed eyes looked straight ahead at him without mercy. She was like a queen arriving in a new land.
Actually, it was a very old land under new circumstances.
But Alexander was going to stay here until the bitter end.
The boat bumped softly on the shore and Alexander stood there, the tip of his hawk-handled sword touching the ground. For a long while nothing was said. The two siblings just looked at each other, Charon with his long black cloak anonymous presence behind her and Reficule on a leash now in Charon's hand.
Lucinda lifted out of the boat and landed a few feet away from Alexander, who lifted his sword as the slowly drifted away to the other side. The splash of Charon's ore was the only noise in here for a long while and the silence between the siblings was almost unbearable.
Alexander tried to smile.
“Speaking in rhymes, are we? Trying to be eloquent?”
Lucinda shrugged, majestically. It was royal coolness incarnate. It made her look regal in her darkness.
“You know how I love poetry.”
“Try something that you have a talent for.”
”Like what?”
”Being insulted.”
”Stings of a bee. Well, the bee dies when it stings you, didn’t you know?”
“I don’t plan to die.”
”There is no planning involved in dying, brother.”
For the first time in ages, the angel on the rock started to glow. Inside the heart the pieces of the diamond began to glitter inside him. The time had come.
Lucinda lifted her sword and crashed it down on Alexander's who lifted his just in the last second to defend himself. There was a spark when the two swords met.
“So, we finally meet, Sire.”
Charon was rowing back, away from them toward the end of the tunnel.
“Yes.”
”A meeting long overdue, don’t you think?”
“I would say we have put it off at least two or three decades too many.”
The two siblings were at the shore, just feet away from the horse. It was a stallion that, Alex realized it now, had shifted colour all along. It was white now. Alex knew it to be brown, but its colour had shifted.
The clanging of weapons echoed in the cave and Alexander had seemed intent on losing Lucinda’s attention. Who knows where she would direct her powers?

And so it came to be that in that last night a man in a black cloak was riding thru the darkness of the Nocturanian forest on a blue stallion named Centurion. Centurion was quite a beautiful horse. Its muscles moved with a grace that seemed to sing in chorus with its rider. But the piece, beautiful as it may have been, was a first draught of a Requiem for God.
The man with the uncrossed eye patch smiled no more than the horse had a life of its own. His face bore the markings of a life unlived in light and a spectre waiting to strike, travelling at airspeed toward the markings of a cave from the beginning of time.
A rhyme was haunting his mind and he knew not from where it came.

( Oh , wicked eye , you will pay ...
The dark one burns the weak astray ...
Screams of laughter gave him away ...
You never ever deceive Alex that way )

He was hurrying toward the sibling rivalry.
Before it all began, all that was ... was silence.
After it began, a storm swept across the lands that had a difficulty to cease.

Lucinda looked up toward the ceiling, his black cloak blowing in breeze that seemed to come from beyond the tunnel’s end. She twitched with her head as he looked around for something to comment on. The swords met again and Lucinda responded to Alexander’s attack by raising her weapon in both of her hands during a pirouette and aiming at her brother’s waist. Alex lifted, twirled up in the air and kicked Lucinda in the back. She landed flat face down in the water.
Seeing how she sunk down and was forced to slowly lift up from the deep, Alex had to laugh.
“Fooled you there, didn’ I now, Sis’?”
She grimaced, her cape fluttered in the breeze of her own flight.
"Welcome to Hell!"
“A hell where even demons make mistakes” Alex mused.
“Don’t count on anybody making mistakes here” Lucinda spat.
Alexander sneered, flew up to her and clanged his sword against hers a few times.
“You will make a mistake sooner or later” Alex shrugged. “That’s your mistake. Thinking you’re perfect.. No one ever is or can be.”
“Thank you for that response, Socrates!”
“It wasn’t a response, Lucinda!”
“What then?”
“We all make mistakes is what I’m saying” Alex sing songed. “It’s human. But I have something you lack.”
”What’s that?” Lucinda spat.
“Love” Alexander whispered.
“I have love” Lucinda answered. “Besides, too much lovie-dovie creates a brain full of mush.”
“I hate you with every cell in my body and every fibre of being. I know that now.”
“Still nice of you to come, Alex! Why did you?”
”This isn’t a tea-party and I as sure as hell didn’t bring a gift. What kind of question is that?”
The words were as short and fast as they were cold.
"Here! My illusion turned real at last. I caught you thinking about your own place in this world."
Alexander felt like a volcano.
“What does that supposed to mean?”
He had travelled all this way only to be a victim of ridicule?
“That you travelled through illusion to come to something that might be real after all. Doesn’t it feel good to be in reality after all this time?”
The swords met in a vicious clanging of sounds.
“No, for me this is not reality and I know the game you are playing, Lucinda? Don’t try it with me, because it isn’t working.”
Clang. Clang-clang-cling-clang. Clong.
“But aren’t you at least a little happy to see me?”
Clangclang. Clang-clang-cling-cling … Clang.
“Why should anyone even give a rat’s ass if you rot after everything that you have destroyed.”
Cling-clang-clong.
“You don’t wish that you had been able to accept me earlier in your life?”
Clang. Clang. Clang-cling-clong-cleng-clyng. Clang. Clang.
"No! I should’ve killed you before you got to our parents. Then I never would’ve had to be a victim of your games in the first place. I spent thirty years running from you."
Clang.
“Games?”
”Yes, games.”
”What games?”
”Games of envy and intrigue.”
"It's my Hell!" Lucinda answered, matter of fact, and attacked Alex again, twirling around three times and ending up to his left. “Besides, nothing like a good game, so why not try things out? That’s always been my motto. Even back in Yambalah when you and I were a married couple that was who I was. But you were always a stuffy, Joseph.”
"And who are you to determine that just because you want to have fun you have to make someone else miserable? You fell for seduction back then. That’s weak. Haven’t you heard of sharing innocent joy?"
Lucinda was impressed by this comment.
She had not expected such clarity.
Then she grinned. "I am the dark part of you" Lucinda exclaimed, warding off Alex weapon. "I am the dark side of the Sun ... Together we make ..." Lucinda clashed her sword onto his. It made a metal clanging sound that echoed fiercely inside the cave. "... a great team." She raised her eyebrows and turned serious. "We fight a lot ..." She smiled again. "But we love each other anyway!" Evil nodded. "Aren't we sweet?"
There was about ten or twenty more clangs of blade before the stopped in mid air, not knowing who would continue next. They both panted and sweated.
"I am still the leader here, Lucinda ... I am on the good side of reality. Your game is still built on something that has to lose" Alex whispered, trying to convince Lucinda of what he was saying," and you know it !" He sneered. "You can't change that!“
"I don't have a boss. I am independent. I am part of the only independence in creation.”
“Your impatience misleads you to think that your ignorance makes you superior.”
“You speak from your own ignorance. I am superior.”
“Your boss is revenge, Lucinda” Alex screamed and was surprised to hear how loud and young his voice sounded. “You have got to lose. Revenge eats itself. It always has. I am here not because of me, but because of Belinda and my family.”
Lucinda smiled and crashed down her sword again. Alex just managed to raise his sword in time to stop it from burying itself in his neck. “Awww.” She mused to herself, looking heavenward and blinking toward the ceiling with her long eyelashes. “Real feelings. How sweet and honest you are, brother. I think I shall set you free.”
She lifted her sword again and crashed it down on Alexander’s weapon that had to gather all his strength to ward off this attack.
“My freedom is not dependant on your release. It comes from another place.”
Clang. Clang. Clang.
“Besides, Lucinda, no one ever loved you, so you have to ridicule it in order to make believe that it doesn’t matter.”
Clang-clang. Clang.
“You are very dependant indeed. So good and sweet and selfless, aren’t you now brother? Just like when you sent me away because you were too good to keep me in that prison.”
Clang. Clang-clang-clong.
“Admit it, Lucinda. You want to be loved. Everyone wants to be loved.”
Lucinda grew angry now. CLING-cling-CLANG.
“Well, if you know me so well, why haven’t you ever loved me?” There was spite here, but there were waves of hurt as well that made him feel sorry for her. “God damn it, Alex” she said, her voice fading and full of tears. “If you knew that’s what I needed,” she gritted, her eyes closing and her tears streaming down her face, “why did it take forty damn years for me to say that you care. Why did I have to invite you to hell before you started to care.”
Alexander gritted his teeth and attacked his sister again.
“I never wanted to hurt you, Lucinda.” Clang. “You know that.”
“Then why couldn’t you just love me?” Clang. There was anger in her attacks now. Spite and hurt feelings. “Why?”
“You should’ve come to me years ago with this, Lucinda.” Clang-clang-clang-clang-clang. “Not at the edge of a ravine. You should’ve told me this before you kidnapped my daughter. We could’ve sat down together and I could’ve given you your reward and you would’ve been happy.”
”You neglected me, threw me on a wagon like garbage.”
”You killed our own family, disgraced my best friend and burned down our house. I am sorry for overreacting.”
”You neglected me long before that, Alex.”
”When?”
”You don’t know, because you don’t look back far enough. You were always too preoccupied with yourself to notice if someone you disliked was suffering.”
”I didn’t dislike you at the start.”
”You hated me. For some reason you all hated me. So, I found my friends in the dark places.”
”You blame me for your own destruction?”
“Yes.”
Alex flung his sister against the wall. They dropped their swords and they went clanging down the wall. “You were Judas Iscariot, for crying out loud. That had nothing to do with me.”
“Judas saved Jesus, Alexander.”
”He had him crucified, if you recall.”
“Then why do you people pray to a cross?”
”Because it was first when he could prove himself to be stronger than that cross he was on, beating death for the sake of life, that Christianity was born. So the cross becomes a symbol of victory of death.”
“That is all I wanted to hear about my earlier self.”
Lucinda took her brother by the neck and pushed him out in the air and twisted her body so that she would find herself pushing him against the wall. Alex tried to escape her grip, shaking his head spastically, his face now a plethora of wrinkles in her black hands.
“Well, goody-goody” Lucinda went on. “What are you going to say to the demons below us, are they negotiable? Tell them about the flowers and the fleas.”
He punched her in the stomach and ducked under her arms and flew off as she followed him.
They stopped in mid-air. “That’s the birds and the bees, you idiot bitch!”
“Let’s talk about the wind and rain and the sun in the sky and the beautiful way that the moon rises.”
“Don’t start drifting off. We were talking about you.”
Lucinda smiled. “Me. How uninteresting. Let’s talk about you instead. How have you been lately? What are you doing these days? Any new hobbies? Sowing. Alex? Bird catching? How about eating wolves? Or better. Eating family.”
Alex had to laugh. “You do have a dark sense of humour, sister. I’ll grant you that much.”
She laughed along and it seemed that she was willing to do anything to share some joy with her brother. But why? She was out to kill him, was she not? “Thank you, Alexander!”
“You are hooked on your own blood craving. Why? Why have you always been marching towards your own death? You could join the kingdom of God."
She laughed. “You don’t know how silly that sounds.”
”What?”
”Kingdom of God. Me. Impossible.”
She picked up both swords and flew away toward him.
She smiled as she stopped.
“What will happen now, hmm?”
She saw his doubt and had to chuckle, if only to herself.
She threw him the sword.
“Let’s fight a little. Fight a little. Talk a little. Chip-chip. Talk a little more.”
She laughed again, this time from the gut. Her laugh echoed and sounded ominous.
Charon had rowed slowly and was just turning the corner as the laugh cam, animating one of Reficule’s heads to bark.
Good pointed a finger at Evil and for the first time now Evil grew afraid.
“You have no place in this life if you don’t want to turn back to where you redeemer still liveth!”
Lucinda gathered her strength.
“Redeemer still liveth. Hogwash. Who said I was the one that had to change, milky man?”
Alex attacked her now out of sheer spite.
“That was a low blow. I have fought too hard to even sneer at such remarks.”
”And yet you do. There’s fear in you yet.”
Clang-clang.
“In you, as well, I see.”
Clang-clang. Cling.
"And you led us both down because you would not give up trying to hate me ..."
Alexander shook his head. “I am responsible for your revenge?”
Lucinda nodded. “Had you not thought so much about why and what and where and how, had you just shrugged gone on, and sent someone to kill me, I never could’ve planned this masterpiece. Don’t fix what isn’t broken, Alex!”
Lucinda smiled, her fears now vanished. "So, hothead ... you are a fool. Revenge is my nourishment!" Lucinda corrected. "I want only my rights as a pioneer ... God saw that I was nourished by betraying me. My road will lead to victory.“
Good shook his head. "You betray yourself, you fool !"
Clang-clang. Clang-cling. Clang.
"We are interdependent, so why don't you shut up and play by the rules!“
Clang.
"Your rules?"
Clang-clang. Clang.
"Are there other rules?“
"Look around you! Creation is not just a big scam for your enjoyment!“
"Really?"
Clang. Clang.
"You are absurd ..."
"I know ... Ain't I great ?"
Clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang.
"Weren't you beautiful once?“
"I was betrayed!“
"How?“
"God never kept his promise!“
"God never promised you anything!“
"I am a friend of his firstborn ..."
Alex started to laugh.
“And my sister’s best friend has a cousin in the royal navy whose sister is an actress, so she ought to get me free tickets to an amphitheatre that plays Electra.” He shook his head. “You cannot blame everything on God, Lucinda. You have to make the best of what you have right here!”
Everything stopped right there.
It seemed that this comment started something in her that forced her to fight without weapons.
“Let’s drop the swords, shall we? We both know that we are capable of sorcery, so why not just work with that a bit, huh?”
Lucinda dropped her sword and it hung in mid air. Floated and wouldn’t drop.
Alexander dropped his and it floated as well.
Then, as if on a given signal, both of them looked to the other side of the cave and they saw that the angel on the rock had awoken and was now staring at them. It had been staring at them for a long time. It was such a beautiful angel. Pure, as he been once, with eyes clear as a springtime river.
They turned back to each other and now Alexander knew what he was fighting for.

Meanwhile, it had become obvious to Adnicul that he was in a trap. Somehow, he had entered a time-loop and was experiencing the same ride through the same forest over and over. He felt himself ride into the forest from Rigor Mortis and being abused by the Rumzils again and again. He had to find a way out of this. Someone was tricking him into not arriving at the cave.

This was a fist-fight of the mind.
Lucinda hovered there, erect and noble, her eyes now green and glowing menacingly in the dark and her mouth opening wide and fierce. She raised her arms and breathed in, seeming to open up creation inside that ravine of physicality.
Alexander was confused as to how he should react.
Her mouth grew wider and wider as all the bats flew out of her mouth.
They looked like a storm around her and Alex had to gather all his strength in order not to fall and loose his concentration.
“What on earth are you doing? I thought this was a fair game.”
She laughed. “In my world, there is no such thing as a fair game.”
Then she shook her head and bent forward, her cape settling like a sheet hanging out to wash after a wild twister, her eyes focused on her brother. Her eyes turned red and yellow lightning hit him repeatedly and she laughed a sonorous basso-laugh and screamed:
"Eye of snake, ear of toad, you shall quake, upon my road. Will you live? Will you die? You shall know, before I cry: WINDS ... fly to the sky, meet the birds and fly HIGH!"
All this time, Alex was fighting for his life, surrounded by hundreds of bats, realizing there seemed to be no escape at all from this unexpected blow.
The witches head jerked to the lake with a nervous twitch. Her transparent eyes and now green skin glowed like hell in the moonlight as he fought.
Then she looked at him and grinned cutely:
“First: The animals of death and shame! A dragon to conquer, beasts to tame, spiders to kill and a dog to strangle! There's a job at every angle!"
Then she was gone, along with the bats.
Alex looked around. Every sign of life gone. She had disappeared in smoke.
“Hello?”
Alexander turned around and looked if she was behind him.
She wasn’t.
For the first time he was petrified.
Nobody there at all.
There was an echo of a laugh coming from the shore, from the tunnel, from the ceiling, from below the water, from his own mind. Cackles echoing in his mind.
“What is this?”
Then she reappeared at the other side of the lake and shook her head, blowing the formerly swallowed bats into the lake. The water bubbled with excitement and seemed to be alive. Lucinda opened her mouthed an airy breath exuding her mouth, her eye-whites glowing.
Then she sat down at the shore and waited.
“What is this, Lucinda?”
He began to fly toward her, but before he could he was stopped, not by her hand, but by a beast.
Suddenly, with a tremendous roar, a dragon leapt out of the water and landed on two reptile-clawed feet on the shore in front of Lucinda. It roared. Alex flew to his sword, still hovering in mid air, and fought it, but was chased through the cave fast enough to feel by rapture clawing at his spiritual doorstep.
It chased him, forcing him to fly faster and faster, feeling the fire on his skin every time.
Then his plea turned to an angry scream.
He leapt up on a rock and buried the steel into the dragons heart.
It screamed in agony, blood oozing out of its fangs and hell-stinking flesh dropping from its horrific and most dying frame. Character and soul fiercely splitting apart and its head shaking with untamed agony, showing its true face: the devils.
Then it was gone. He looked at the witch on the other side of the lake. She sat still. Not a reaction.
“There is no way that I am going to be the victim of your ridicule, Lucinda.”
She shrugged.
“I don’t care. Just as long as I have some fun.”
”This is an equal battle of right and wrong. Fly up and fight like you should. Just you and me. No tricks here. Just family.”
”Who ever mentioned equality, Alex?”
Suddenly, out of nowhere his body was swarmed by wasps and spiders, scorpions and lice, bees and bugs and beetles and worms. They all wanted his death. He was stung a million times and ran thru the entire cave, up and down the walls and into the water, out of the cave and into the forest where the ghouls were ready to eat him again and into the cave once more, down the path and into the lake. Buzzing, tickling, stinging, piercing, itching, aching, chewing, munching, crunching, deforming ... Finally, he screamed till his lungs were out of air and his soul was weeping and his spirit cried and ...

They disappeared. Once again, his eyes turned to the witch.
The whites of her eyes were showing and she was rotting. But a terrible smile was on her face.
“You still want to speak of equality, Sire?”
He was paralyzed and couldn't move. The dog that arrived out of nowhere was a Kerberos, the guardian of hell. It came closer and closer, its heads barking all at once.
The heads were different dogs-heads: pit-bull, wolfhound, rotweiller,
a German Shepherd, bulldog, Dalmatian, wolf, afghan, boxer and poodle. All on lion's body with tiger's legs and a leopard's tail. It was grotesque.
He fought to fight it away and reach Lucinda, but there was no possibility of reaching her.
It barked and barked so loud that it seemed to block out any other sound, coming his way.
Now it was right next to him, its heads barking in his face.
It barked in his ear for five minutes, so loud he actually grew deaf. And then it spat acid into his eyes and made him blind. Thirdly, it was killing his sense of feeling by ... but before that could happened he grabbed one of the heads he smashed it to the ground repeatedly and against the walls.
For every head he smashed he could see more, hear more and feel more. He was screaming, crying and whipping the dog. Panting, he lay on the ground, when the wolfhound-head bit him, still alive.
He turned around ferociously only to strangle the head fiercely and with great avid anger.
He lay close to the white angel now, panting, bathing in sweat.
The creature was smiling at him.
He could not help but smile back.
He was just about to wave, when Lucinda spoke.
“Nothing gets to you does it?”
He turned around, his long hair falling into his face.
He fell of the stone and landed in the water. He crawled up, feeling like warrior.
“What the hell is this? What kind of methods are you using? I thought this was a duel, not a panic attack.”
He stood up and walked toward her, picking up his sword as he went along.
“Hell? That’s my department. And equality? Come on, now, Alex. We both know this is not a game of equality.”
Alex raised his sword and was just about to swoosh it through the air toward her neck, when she spoke again, standing up and literally lifting off the ground.
"The first of rounds, my boy, you've won. But now you will have to scream and run. Now your task will be most mean. Your soul will have to be quite keen. From every time I will set thee free:
THE VILEST SINNERS OF HISTORY!"
“You poetry stinks, Lucinda!”
She laughed.
”I know, thank you … But my visions don’t stink. Good luck!”
He was looking around for her, but she was gone again. The only thing he could hear was the dripping of water from the walls of the cave and his own soft, at-guard breathing.
“This has ceased to be humorous.”
He felt silly talking to the silence.
“Lucinda” he screamed, only his echo answering back. The angel started to whimper on the stone.
He saw it shivering and cowering on its stone and at once felt sympathy for him.
“Oh, I am sorry!”
He flew up and landed on the rock next to the angel, held it in its arms and cuddled it, stroking its blond hair. “Oh, dear, I didn’t want to scare you.”
The angel was warm, almost hot, but in such a heart-warming way that Alex felt like he was holding a piece of God. It was a campfire and a ray of light from the sun at the same time.
”What happened to you, hmm? Why did you lose yourself?”
The angels said nothing, it only cradled back and forth in his arms.
“There, there, shhh!”
Tears rolled down the angelic cheeks and, as Alex saw this, he noticed that the tears turned into diamonds that dropped into the water, leaving small specks of light on the surface.
The angel looked up and shook his head at Alex.
It spoke with a soft, high voice.
The eyes were so blue and so transparent, that it shocked Alex. He could see all the pain and suffering of life inside those eyes. Here was the innocence raped.
“Alexander!”
“Oh, my God” Alex cried in only a whisper. “Who are you?”
“You must leave. Adnicul is trapped.”
Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, he heard footsteps of an army. He saw them. He actually saw them thru the walls. They were Romans. The entire cave was disappearing and was turning into Rome. Frruhmm-frruhmm-frruhmm-frruhmm.
Alex was cuddling … nothing. Nothing was in his hands. The angel was gone and he was no longer on the rock. He was standing up.
The marching feet destroyed the reality of the cave and made the reality illusion.
A thought struck him: what will help you here is prayer to God. Belief in God will help you here.
And when he had jumped time he was a legionnaire holding a spear and a shield. He marched in the middle of a troop and the feeling of mutual honour was fantastic. He knew these was the plains of Africa, Carthage to be exact, and he they were about to conquer it, spreading salt in the ground to keep the crops from growing.
From nowhere another army appeared. That's when he started praying, but to himself. All thru the fighting he prayed. But that didn’t help him losing touch with his concentration. It ended with a tumultuous clanging of swords and steel.
A spear entered his belly. He looked down and saw his intestines hanging out.
Right when he thought that this was it and that Belinda would be cursed by Lucinda for all times, he was sucked into a whirlwind and was litterally sucked back into the cave, feeling himself mumble the Lord’s Prayer to himself, shocked to hear his own voice echo like this between the walls.
He looked down. He was healthy, no intestines were hanging out. What was better, the angel was still in his arms.
“Please, Alexander. Don’t stay hear. Leave this place. Fly down the tunnel and head left now before she comes back.”
BANG.
He was ripped away, in shock, by the whirlwind again and landed
BANG
crash hard, so hard, on a marble floor that he wounded his knees and his face and everything else that was physical about him.
Right when his hands reached to rub the aching parts he looked up and saw where he was.
He was in a roman palace and was wearing a toga.
There was a man at the front of the room and he knew by instinct that this man was none other than Caligula himself, the most psychotic of all roman emperors, a crown of gilded leaves decorating his stylish hair. The man had a very strange look on his face that bordered on the severely perverse. Two women slaves with fine ornamental jewellery were fanning him some air with palm-leaves.
Another was feeding him grapes. A third was playing music.
There was a fourth woman on the throne next to him, a tanned woman with long brown curvy hair, dressed in a blue toga, with heavily painted lips.
The Emperor sat on a golden marble throne with a baldachin over it.
The ceiling of this huge room had a very fancy painting Zeus and there were pillars everywhere.
Alex was on the floor supporting his tired body in half-sitting position with his two dirty hands. Obviously he was that same legionnaire that had been discovered as a deserter. But how had he survived that spear?
Caligula stopped the fanning slaves and slowly stood up from his throne and walked up to him.
He looked down at him, obviously enjoying his power, and Alex looked at this evil man who smiled with an ego of the thousand armies of hell, obviously a touch of Lucinda in his eye.
"Face down, deserter! Take off your clothes!"
Alex did as he was told.
He lay still on the floor, only seeing the occasional sandal of his royal green bloodedness walk round hi. Then he felt a foot on his head and nothing more. It was pushing him down. He felt extreme heat on his back and started to scream. Hot coals were being placed on his body. He started praying again.
“Dear Lord, forgive me my sins. Dear Lord, help my spirit. Dear Lord…”
More intensely than ever, the heat on his back seemed to penetrate his skin. It hurt like the agony of hell itself.
The coals were taken away, after what seemed like an eternity.
He heard footsteps, Caligula obviously enjoying keeping him insecure and fearful.
Then, the Caesar asked some slaves to come over and he was pushed down, unable to move.
Maybe fifteen coals were now replaced upon his back now and it was hell.
“Lucinda. Please stop torturing me” Alex hollered.
He heard Lucinda’s voice echoing in the marble hall and it was obvious she was there with Caligula.
“You want us to extinguish the hot coals” she asked.
“Yes” Alex cried.
“Let’s do it then” she responded, Caligula agreeing.
Suddenly, there was a small stream of yellow liquid on his back.
The slow trickling was awful. Other slaves joined in and soon enough there were five of them doing it on him and all the time the women were laughing.
He started wriggling out of the grip of the slaves and punched one of them in the eye. He fell down. Alexander had no idea when his strength returned. But when it did, he knew that he was back in the game.
He broke free, turning into a wild animal on the loose after a hellish hunt with fifty wild hunters at his back.
He grabbed Caligula by the throat and bashed him against the wall.
“No hear me, you arrogant little shit. History hates you and there is a reason for it, so stop peeing on me.” Alexander had to laugh at his own comment as they started wrestling on the floor.
“Who is this Lucinda?” Caligula screamed.
“My sister” Alexander answered.
Caligula bashed Alex’s head bloody against the marble floor only to be viciously strangled by Alex.
It was very much like a farce. All the while, Alex seemed to feel Adnicul riding in circles in the forest.
“I must save Adnicul!”
Lucinda’s voice came out of Caligula’s mouth now.
“No such thing. To each man his own problem. You’ve got yours!”
Alexander took the Emperor by the throat bashed his head against the pillars and screamed:
"By the light of the moon, I have vanquished a DEMON!"
“Now, who’s poetry stinks?”
Ludinda’s voice was still coming out of the Caesar’s mouth and it was accompanied by a fart.
The laugh was genuinely his own.
“I love Lucinda” he said, now in his own voice.
“Love this” Alex said, grabbing Caligula’s crown and tearing off a few hairs with it. It landed on the floor, clanged and rolled a few feet away.
Alex then grabbed the leader’s head in both his own hands and smashed his head against a pillar.
The skull cracked and the Emperor sunk dead down onto the ground.
He panted and looked out the window.
There was a balcony there.
The draperies were swaying in the breeze.
He looked behind him. No one was there. Not even the girls, not even the slaves.
At his feet no Emperor was resting in his eternal sleep.
He felt his head. Styled hairdo.
What was that?
A gilded crown of leaves?
He was dressed as Caesar now?
Could not be, could it?
Yes, it was.
Again, he looked out onto the balcony and saw the silk draperies fluttering in the breeze.
There were people out there.
On sandaled feet he walked toward that balcony.
As he walked out, he saw a majestic view of the Forum Romanum from his own palace above the hill south of the Colloseum. There were about five markets in action and the field day had been the magnet of over fifty thousand tourists. When they saw Alexander they cheered. It was ear deafening. He started laughing.
”My God, I am Ceasar” he exclaimed, chuckling.
“It is glorious, isn’t it?”
The voice to his own right was sweet like wine.
He looked toward the origin of that voice.
She was a gorgeous looking woman, about 23 years old, dressed in a blue toga.
Her red lips were full and luscious, painted dark red and in a slightly open smile, her tongue resting like an inventing entertainment under the gums.
Her skin was nougat brown and those brown eyes seemed deeper than the inside of a bowl of chocolate mousse.
“Who are you, lovely lady?” Alexander mused.
She cocked her head to the right and cradled back and forth.
“Your slave.”
It was then that he noticed that long, curvy hair falling across her shoulders, leaving one shoulder open and the toga just barely covering her beautiful midsize breasts.
“My slave?”
She nodded, closing her eyes. Those eyes seemed constantly half-closed anyway, in a constant sexual invitation. She smiled again, her dimples dancing in her cheeks.
He then heard the crowd cheering.
“Alexander! Alexander! Alexander!”
He embraced the girl and she embraced him.
They both waved and the crowd cheered even more.
There seemed to be more people here now than he ever had seen in his own audiences back in Clurafar. People as far the eye could see.
“It is all yours” the woman said, grabbing a grape from the table behind her and putting it in his mouth. It was a tasty grape. Rich and fruity and as tasty as the woman in her arms. The entire table was full of fruit.
“What is your name, my girl?”
”Beata!”
”Really?”
She nodded.
He felt himself craving this woman, completely forgetting that he was on a spiritual journey here, where everything was at stake. He had crushed the skull of an Empire moments back and now he was on a balcony overlooking a crowd of thousands cheering his name.
At once, he felt the woman kneel down beside him.
“What are you doing, Beata?”
She opened his toga and saw what lay beneath.
It was large and swelling and seemed to grow even larger just by Beata looking at it they way she did.
She grabbed her own toga and released the gold butterfly safety pin.
The woman was now naked at his own feet and her bosom was nougat brown and swelling, her nipples chocolate coloured and wonderfully appetizing.
“It is huge” she exclaimed and looked up, admiringly. “May I?”
And as she did, stars seemed to dance in front of his eyes, the crowd singing his name, grapes in his mouth, peaches in his hands, oysters caressing his groin.
Soon, he was inside her on the table, his own fruit shooting into her belly, her femininity wobbling and wreathing in his arms, grapes and peaches squashed under her derriere.
She was moaning
“Beata Maria, will you marry me?”
There was no question any longer of a duel.
There was only a question of having a woman that seemed to look like a nougat dessert would in human form, owning a crowd that was cheering his own name over and over.
Far away, Adnicul was lost in a death cycle.
Far away, an angel was crying.
Far away, his family was rotting in hell.
Far away, all that was far away.
Right here, Alexander was trapped in an illusion, making love to a slave of nougat colour, female charms wobbling in his hands.
“I will marry you!”
In two seconds, he was back in the throne room, maybe a month later.
He was wearing another toga and it was closed. He had obviously recently made love. He felt it due to a certain edgy relief throbbing in his limbs.
Alexander was at the front of the room and he knew by instinct that he was the one with power, a crown of gilded leaves decorating his stylish hair. Two women slaves with fine ornamental jewellery were fanning him some air with palm-leaves.
Another was feeding him grapes.
A third was playing music.
Beata Maria on the throne next to him, she a tanned woman with long brown curvy hair, dressed in a blue toga, with heavily painted lips.
She was his own.
They, Alexander and Beata, sat on a golden marble throne with a baldachin over it.
The ceiling of this huge room had a very fancy painting Zeus and there were pillars everywhere.
On the floor below him, about thirty feet away, lay a man.
Alexander knew instinctively that this man was a deserter.
Beata spoke:
”Punish the man!”
He looked at her and she cocked her head to the left.
“Punish him for me!”
She let her toga drop and now she was naked.
Alexander smiled, but there something here that was familiar.
Where was he? Why was he emperor? Wasn’t he …
“Face down, deserter” he heard himself say. “Take off your clothes!”
He walked up toward the man and circled him.
He lay lifeless on the ground.
He felt himself smile, but he knew not why.
Where had he been prior to the balcony experience?
What had he done before making love to Beata?
He did not know.
He just knew that he order the slaves to hold the man down and place hot coals on his naked back.
He just knew that he laughed when he did so and did it twice.
He just knew that when Beata walked up, naked and willing again, she sounded like Lucinda.
He just knew that what she suggested he should do to put out the coals went against everything he believed in.
He just knew that when he stood there, head against the wall, he was looking himself in the eye and fighting with himself.
“No, I don’t want this. Stop tempting me!”
He stepped away from Caligula’s body, as it slumped to the ground, bloody.
He shook his head, wiped his hands off on his naked legs.
He stepped away from the body, as if he had been bitten by a bug, touched by unclean hands.
He looked out toward the balcony.
Now he did not only see white silk draperies swaying in the breeze.
A woman in a blue toga stood there and smiled.
She dropped her toga and stood there naked, hoping he would come and experience it all again.
Instead, he ran. He ran as fast as he could down a corridor of chequered floor of black and white marble tiles. Statues on each side. It looked like his own palace.
Suddenly he saw a man there, dressed to the nines. Who was that?
Was that Rolf there?
Was it Rolf at the end of the corridor?
Yes, it was him.
He was screaming at the top of his lungs, his mouth open.
As Alexander approached him, he realized he could not stop running.
The scream grew louder and louder and the mouth grew bigger and bigger.
“I can’t stop running!”
He saw the mouth close in on him.
He saw that Rolf was slightly unshaved.
He saw the inside of his cavities.
He saw …
He ran …
There was whirlwind and he was thrown around the palace and the from palace to palace.
Then he was in his own home.
Suddenly, things were changing and thru the walls of the palace he saw an army of soldiers. And as before he became part of it.
“I have to get out of this nightmare, God!”
This was the future.
A future.
Now, he was in Turkey and was a soldier in the service of Prince Vlad Dracul The Impalor.
It was 1493 and there were bodies everywhere. Screams and calls for help.
Clang-clang. Cling-cling-clong-cleng-clyng-clang.
His uniform was something he was more accustomed to than the roman version and the clanging of steel was ear deafening.
Clang.
He was fighting a Muslim and it ended with Alexander winning.
“Please, Michael, do something. What can I do to get out of …?”
There were people impaled everywhere . Bloodcurdling screams as the bodies shook on their poles . Then he was all alone, suddenly. No one anywhere .
“HELP ME!”
The whirlwind swept up Alexander again and landed him now on a fancy mahogany chair by a big table in Prince Vlad's castle of Tirgoviste. He was in a friendly conversation with the man and was eating something very delicious. There was an open fireplace and many paintings in a grand hall. Suddenly, the table was out in the open fields again and they were dining to the view of people being impaled on poles. They shook in their death and as they did, Prince Vlad laughed heartily. He looked at Alexander and with his eyes turning into cats eyes he said in a Transylvanian accent: "Good entertainment, huh ?" and laughed.
Alex bent down under the table and vomited. Then a plate came and there was nothing he could do (oh no please not that how ghastly how horrid and how disgusting and how awful). There was a head on the plate garnished with vegetables like a meal and it was talking and talking.
Alex screamed and shook.
"Fancy some lunch?" It said.
He screamed the Lord's Prayer now.
All of his might was needed to get himself out of this nightmare.
“Get me out of this nightmare, dear someone, please …”
(Mother Mary help me in my need and most desperate and depraved hour.
He needed help why would they not help him why why why why why)
Now he was on the pole shaking and screaming, his belly pierced.
At the bottom thru his prayers he saw Vlad holding up his glass of tasty blood-red wine saying with a friendly- little-buddy-twitch-of-the-head: "Cheers, my mate!"
His screams became a virtual reality-tunnel of a million lights as he challenged the doors of time, travelling thru the centuries.
BANG.
He was thrown to the ground by a quake. Where was he?
He was in a distant future and was wearing a strange sort of helmet and a green uniform. He was holding a very strange sort of long-rifle and was running. There were ruins everywhere and smoke and bangs and crashes and hellfire. Loud noise. Man-to-man-combat. Knives in the throat. This warfare was the worst yet. It was hell itself. He ran and ran and ran until he couldn't breathe anymore. They were talking some strange form of a language called German.
It was nasal, a more nasal dialect, more harsh. Everything was harsher. The whirlwind came again and swept him away. Now suddenly he was in a very beautiful room with a large fireplace and lots of treasures in gold and silver. There was a large desk with a chair there and a lot of flowers. This was the future, most certainly. He looked above the fireplace and saw a man who obviously was a leader of some kind. He had a beige uniform with some medals and a red, black and white sign on his arms. It was the swastika, the old roman symbol.
But this man had a greasy small haircut and a small, very silly looking moustache. He was wearing the same kind of uniform. The fire in the fire place spread its warmth across the room. He was holding a glass with some red-brown drink. He looked up at the painting again. Suddenly, in all of this luxury, he had a vision as he was looking at the portrait. The man's name was Adolf Hitler and the year was 1940 in the other reality. Alexander had slipped into the skin of one of his officer's, Josef Goebells, and Hitler was at the height of his fame. This was the Second World War of the century that would be the bloodiest of all. Hitler had already killed four million people and most of them were Jews. The aim was to eliminate the Jewish race and it was all because Hitler hated the fact that they were more successful than him. The world was at war. Hitler had created death-factories where they were executed. None but very few brave people knew. But in five years it would be all over and Hitler would commit suicide. Alexander puked into the fireplace at all this horror and was glad not having to live in this bloody time. The door opened and there he stood. Hitler. They shook hands and Alex could see inside Hitler heart. There was nothing there but smoke and hell. The whirlwind swept through his heart again and now Alexander was at the worst death camp and naked and about to die. He felt the fumes consume him .... and .... finally through his tear subsiding prayers he found himself back in the cave, crying for those millions of people that were to die. He cried until there was no turning back.
He had to at least save Belinda from hell. That was clear.
He was shoved back into Caligula’s throne room.
“You can escape all of this” he heard someone say, feeling his hands gripping Caligula’s dead skull and his own hands bloody. He looked toward the door and saw Beata in the toga again. Except now, it was not Beata. It was Lucinda. “You can escape all of this, if you only agree to my world.” She pointed to her own head. “All this can be yours. Sex in massive amounts, money in massive amounts, power, all the power in the world, food, oh, the best food you can ever conceive.” Her words were luscious, as luscious as grapes. Spit was dribbling out of her mouth. “You can have all the women you want for eternity, brother. Every one a dish.” But now he saw her for what she was. Her belly opened, at this distance he saw that, and it was full of worms.
“NO!” he cried. He felt his own voice echo in the cave. “No” he repeated softly.
He felt his arms and the weight in them. He was back in the cave now. Back in the calm cave.
The angel was still there, resting in his arms.
He looked up, talking to God. “Do something before it starts again. She is just trying to win time.
God, please help me get away from this woman.”
Alex nodded and stood up, kissing the angel on his forehead.
“I will save all of you, I promise.”
He laid the angel on his stone and flew up again, trying to find what it was he had to do next.
Mercutio was still there, thank God.
What about Adnicul?
No time for that.
Time to head down the tunnel.
Left was the place to go.
In the forest Adnicul was breaking out of his cycle, able to gallop into reality.
He knew that Lucinda was about to fool her brother.
One less lost destiny and he could at least live with the visions he had seen.
Lucinda would not win.
There was one part left and he would win that game, too.
Suddenly, there was someone close to him. It was Lucinda. She was beautiful, but dangerous. Like in a vision, he understood that she was the witch that Luicifer had wanted all along.
Of course. So logical.
She hovered in mid air, in a blue toga, brown hair falling across her breasts, lips red and full.
She was no longer Lucinda, but Beata. Her nougat coloured skin seemed to sing sensual lullabies in his ear.
“Why did you leave me? Do I not please you?”
She smiled and his heart weakened.
“Make love to me, Alex darling!”
She began to seduce him.
They kissed and caressed and hugged.
But suddenly his heart realized his mistake and he pulled away from her, screaming.
"No ... you did this to me with Beata. I will not succumb to your wishes, whore!"
She pulled away and her black dress swung around, her eyes turning completely white:
"If that's want you want, then I shall oblige! You won two battles with religion and prayer, but can you win over the ghouls my powers share?"
From the walls of the tunnel, a legion of beasts came crawling out of the stone.
Thousands of ghouls, poltergeists, demons, devils, ghosts, zombies, aliens, dragons, vampires, werewolves, mummies, monsters, bats out of hell and insects swarmed him.
He screamed the Lord's Prayer summoning all his powers and all of his strength inside to beat the swarm of hellish fire-fighters.
He brought out a cross and said: "You shall die by the power of the lord and all of his might!" over and over until they all shrieked and disappeared into oblivion.
He looked behind him and saw Lucinda hold his sword in her hand.
She threw it to him.
“Let’s get back to basics, shall we?”
There was a determination in her eyes now that seemed to transcend his own and he followed it, not knowing why he was worried.
Yes, he was back into a corner, probably toward hell, but that was where he was going anyway, right? To save his family.
The clanging of steel seemed to penetrate every fibre of his heart.
They turned the corner and he heard the waterfall behind him.
Clang-clang. Cling-cling-cling-clang. Clang.
What was behind him? He did not know. He only knew that he was coming closer to it.
Then, out of the blue, he heard a horse galloping down … the river?
Yes, the horse was galloping down the river? There was a man screaming.
The voice was deep. “Stop, Lucinda, stop now. That is enough!”
Lucinda turned around, obviously distraught and up roared by this new twist in the plot. She had been tricked by her own master.
She recognized the voice.
“How did you escape my trap?”
Her voice crescendoed into a screaming falsetto. The high-pitched voice of an maniac fish wife.
Alex took his chance and lifted his sword just as Lucinda looked back toward him.
Alex swung his large sword toward her neck and saw it bury itself in her neck and cut through her throat. But the head stayed on.
Adnicul screamed from his horse.
“Penetrate her heart! Only her heart keeps her alive!”
There was a triumphant smile on Lucinda’s lips as she lifted her weapon, ready to strike.
But before she did, Alex held his weapon in his hand and looked into her eyes, shifting colour from black to blue to green to brown. He remembered her birth, he remembered how his mother suffered bringing Lucinda’s to the world. He remembered trying to understand her. He remembered liking her, hating her. He remembered the black masses and he remembered short-circuiting, spontaneously locking her in the attic of the summer house where the important meeting was to take place. He remembered now that it had been on her own request. In a flash, the entire story was repeated in front of his brain. The fire, the deaths, the loss of friendships, the excommunication, the escape, the rumours. His own affair with Madeleine. Pat and Morgy’s births. Sieglinde leaving and returning, saving the Empire. Belinda’s birth.
(Save my soul, Belindy! Love me, so I forget!)
Belinda’s kidnapping.
(I will not let you forget this!)
Belinda’s nightmares.
(I wake up at night screaming in my sleep, Father!)
Alexander’s stressy jolliness.
(I have no problems)
Fights, attacks, wars, visits, demons, deaths, illusions, unions, marriage, liars, witches, curses, honeymoon, plagues, death of an empire, the haunted kingdom, returning daughters, avenues, wastelands, conversations with the self, training, the ides of march, strange land, weird forest, traps, duels and temptation.
(I have no problems, not anymore)
“Here’s for forty years of pain, Bitch!”
As he buried his holy sword inside the witch’s heart, his own heart triumphed.
He saw her shiver and shudder and shake.
She dropped into the water, changed shape. Turned into Nomed Snekawa, into Beata Maria, into the devil, into herself and into Nomed again. There were arms and limbs everywhere and there was an ear deafening scream that seemed to penetrate the soul.
Then she was gone. Her body turning into mud and swimming toward the waterfall.
Adnicul stepped off his horse and lead it across the pond to where Mercutio was standing.
All the while, Alex sat on the stone closest to the waterfall and rested, simply not being able to believe that he had actually been able to vanquish his sister. Out of the blue, she appeared again, jumping out of the water with a sword in her hand. Adnicul was just turning the corner as he saw her reappear and he took his own sword and buried his weapon in her belly whilst Alex buried his metal into her heart a second time. The body swam upstream toward the light.
They sat down next to each other and when they looked up again and saw Michael taking Lucinda by the hand and leading her into the light. She was about to make amends for her sins. But Lucinda was now not in her usual form. Her soul had taken the shape of Rebecca, the innocent incarnation she had been before Lucifer transformed her eons ago. Alex suddenly remembered himself as Joseph of Yambalah, worried about his wife’s new friend and what he might mean for her future.
Over 7000 years on, he knew the result of that friendship.
She had seemed to have given up. With one look, the two men knew that the were ready to move on
“Let’s save the Winsletenna family!”
“Yes, is high time now!”
So, the two men, gifted with the magic powers of a dream and rewarded with having yet one less culprit to face, flew into hell to find and rebuild the haunted kingdom.


CHAPTER EIGHT
JOURNEY TO THE UNDERWORLD

It was obvious to them both that Alexander would not have been alive had it not been for Adnicul.
There was a relief about knowing that Lucinda now finally was a part of the past, but pain about knowing that the difficult part was yet to come: getting his family back.

It had all gone faster than Alex had thought initially. In his mind the duel had shaped itself to him as a month long endeavour. In reality, such as it was, the sword fighting only lasted for a short time. Though temptation absolutely almost had pulled him in. He had been tempted to riches, to fame, to the Roman Empire, to luscious women, gorgeous food. Had it not been for Belinda, the thought of his daughter locked in Hell forever, he would now be …
But was that true? What about everyone else?
In any case, it was good truth that Lucinda was dead and reshaped into her first innocence.
As they stood overlooking what seemed to be the most horrid scenario in creation they both felt each other shiver.
“Who are these people?”
Adnicul said nothing, he just kept looking at the toiling workers, the doomed ones whose faces were mortared into walls, souls hanging from trees and then some who were simple spirits lost in their own world. These were crisscrossing the dungeons and they were crying.
Adnicul looked at Alex, startled. It was such an open, honest stare that Alex had to smile. He was happy to see his friend had made it this far, although knowing his sister had not. They were not so different after all, but they had one important difference. Adnicul had always doubted his complete devotion to the selfish. Lucinda had never wanted to give winning everything, having it all and thereby ending up not really knowing who she was anyway.
Alexander was thankful for that difference, at least when it came to Adnicul.
“These people … who are they?”
Adnicul looked back upon the valley. “They are the doomed souls, Alex. The murderers, swindlers, philanderers that never turned their backs to the underworld. I thought that was obvious and didn’t need explaining. That’s why I didn’t answer first.”
Alex chuckled, although felt himself shiver at the fact that he laughed.
The whole place looked like a mine, a huge cave with a high roof of sorts, dug out of a mountain.
One large door to their right opened now and a man with a large hat and cape came in.
His horse was very restless, that much was clear.
The man picked up what seemed to be some kind of a bag and opened it.
It was hard to see from this distance what was happening, but from out of the bag something seemed to fly. What was that? Doves? No, this looked like … souls. Yes, they were souls.
They were transparent and seemed restless. They criss-crossed the immediate area a while until some large, strange animal caught them in his fangs, transparent or not. He mortared them into the walls with the claws of his right hand and some lightning rod he had in his left.
Alex looked down.
“What did I just see, Adni? I need to know.”
”The most horrible criminals are mortared into the walls. The half-breeds, the ones that just do the work, the hangmen and the intrigue players, they become the soul eaters.”
“Soul eaters?”
Alex looked around the cave and saw these beasts chewing all around. There were about one-hundred of them. They looked like rhinos mixed with elephants.
“That is what they are called because they mortar them into the walls with a piece of …”
There was a pause. “A piece of what?”
Adnicul sighed. “The tree. Hwee-Aeil-Sihl. Lucifer’s plants them way down in the bowels of hell and gives them to the soul eaters.”
Alexander grew quiet. “Why was the tree given this name?”
”No one knows. I suspect Michael knows. There is a good tree and a bad tree. The mystery was somewhat uncovered, it was said the day that …”
Alex saw that Adnicul was fighting with this. “What?” Alex waited. “Adni, I need to know this. My family is a victim of this game.”
”I don’t even know if you know this. If you don’t I have no idea how much they want you to know before …” He looked at Alex and tried to find the real Alex behind all the spiritual mimicry. “Never mind, Sir, I will take a chance.” Adnicul gave his fellow traveller a long, very penetrating look. “Long ago, the legend tells us, Lucifer was walking a beach in heaven with his brothers, contemplating his fate of having to share what he considered to be his pioneer status with so many others. He was provoked and soon enough a quarrel emerged which ended with Lucifer walking away saying a few words that made them all stare at him in surprise.”
“What did he say?”
Adnicul sighed, laughing. He shook his head, obviously afraid to say the words. “He who eternally excels above everyone in life lies lustily steadfast in his lifestyle. Hwee-aeill-Sihl. There have been several versions of what he actually said back then, so the abbreviations tend to vary.” Adnicul bent forward, and as Alex looked into his friend’s one healthy eye he could hear the screaming damned below him. “The legend is that Lucifer himself had something to do with the tree. God did not show the angels that tree until very close to Lucifer’s eviction from Eden. But how could he have? God is omnipotent, so why would he choose to name the tree that Lucifer built hell on eventually something so complex as an abbreviation of something his first angel said. The mind boggles. Or did he know that Lucifer was going to say that and waited to reveal what it was called until after that day? Or is it a coincidence? The mind boggles.”
”But there is a good tree as well, is there not?”
”The round fruit that you may pick, yes. The flowers of Hweoihm. He who eternally over the inner heart is mighty.”
Alex smiled. “That sounds nice.”
Adnicul nodded and continued to talk about the soul.
“Anybody knows that the soul is completely yours, or Gods, forever. It cannot be devoured by anyone. So don’t believe that the soul eaters here actually eat any souls. They can’t. But it is what happens to it that makes the man suffer that gives it its name. The soul itself chooses to walk the road. He is just shown the way.” Adnicul pointed at the faces in the walls. “Those souls spend from a day to a thousand years sliding down to the next level. It depends on how good they are or how bad.”
”Being bad here is good?”
Adnicul shook his head. “What is your sense of humour, Alex? Black?”
Alex shrugged.
“No, Alex. If these souls pray to God, they might be here a couple of years and then slide down to the next level or maybe come back to earth for another try. Some of them even get back to heaven. It all depends.”
“On what?”
”On themselves. It’s like prison. Some of them get worse in prison, you know.”
Alex nodded. He paused. ”Most of them don’t?”
“What? Get back?”
Alex nodded.
Adnicul nodded in response. He pointed at the workers in the middle. They were putting left over bones into the fire. “They are only temporarily here. On a sort of purgatory.”
”How do we get to the next level now?”
”We have a long way ahead of us, my friend.” Adnicul gestured and stood up, walking crouched down a long pathway above the faces and the doorways. “When Lucifer made this cave he made it for himself as a pathway to all other worldly places. Somehow this path in a way created itself. We are visible to others here, but the souls down there are so preoccupied with their own doom that they will not notice.”
”Why are we then crouching?”
There were pillars everywhere and doorways open to the cave. Adnicul made sure he was quick enough to run past these doorways.
“You never know. The collectors are usually very keen on noticing anything different, so when they do they will try to hunt you like a dog. If that is the case we have to run fast down to the next level. This path takes us right down to the area that will take us to the cages, seven levels down.”
Alex was shocked. “Seven.”
“This is not a day on the farm, Allie. The collectors can never ever follow you to the next level. They are strictly bound to their own level. If one of us gets lost, remember to get to the next level as soon as possible. We will meet on the entrance way to that other level then after that.”
Alex hoped that he wouldn’t have to experience that then.
Just as they where about to disappear from this first level, they heard the collector of this level shout something. It sounded like “infiltrators”.
Adnicul’s eyes opened to the maximum. He looked at Alex.
“Run.”
Both of them started to run into the open. There was thirty feet to the tunnel that would get them to down to exit one. They both looked to their right and saw that the collector now was halfway across the mine. They were not even half way to the tunnel.
They ran faster and they felt a gust of wind behind them.
The collector was closer.
Alex felt his soul wanting to go back and run into the collector’s arms.
’Come and take me” he felt like saying.
He had to fight against that and it was almost painful, because he saw himself mortared into the wall.
They ran into the tunnel and it was completely dark, no blue moss here. No torches. Just pitch black darkness.
“Just run, Alexander! Trust your navigation. You won’t run into walls here.”
He felt the collector gallop behind him. He also felt the entrance now fifty feet away. He could almost feel the hand of the collector grab him, grab him, grab him.
“It is dark!”
”I know, just run, we will make it!”
Where was he, this collector? Where was he? He didn’t hear him now.
Alex was worried. Where was he?
He felt the collectors hand grabbing his shoulder, lifting him up. Then a sensation of another hand grabbing the collectors arm. There was a dead cold silence. The collector dropped him down onto the ground.
“Master Adnicul!”
”Just leave him alone, Ridur!”
The man panted a few times.
“As you wish!”
There was the sound of a horse turning.
“Hee-yah!”
The horse galloped back to where it had come from.
Alexander had hurt his knee. “I feel like a victim unable to decide my own fate.”
Adnicul patted Alex on the back. “Stand up now.” Alex did as he was told. “Let us just get past the gateway and we will be safe. He will be back.”
They both stood up and walked through what might have been the gateway, as they heard the collector return and gallop back as the went to the next level.
“How did you know that man’s name?”
”What?” There was a pause. “I took a chance. These creatures work on memories. Their minds are so fixed that it took him a long time to remember I, too, am unwanted here.” He took Alex aside and set him down on a provisoric seating space. “You all right?” Alex nodded. “Good. We are at level two now.”
”Adnicul”
Alexander paused. “You said before that I don’t have to worry about running into walls here. What --- what did you mean?”
Adnicul smiled. “Because there are no walls.”
”I felt the ground under my feet anyway. What do you mean ‘no walls’?”
”The walls and the ground are illusions. There is no ground, no wall. You just ran through open air. You create the ground because you expect it to be there, just as the souls here expect their own purgatory. That is why some get out and some don’t. It all depends if they are full of light or not. Dark souls cannot invent anything of their own. That is what they are, always will be.”
Alex looked back across his shoulder. He looked down and saw a black emptiness below him.
“Oh, Dear! What does that mean?”
”It means you see it as it is. You keep inventing your own world all the time. Come! We have a long way to go.” They started walking down the path. “You will see many strange things in the corner of your eye here, but as long as you don’t look back into the eyes that tempt you, you are safe. Remember that you are a stranger here. Even if I am a soul that has turned my back to this place, my spirit is still home-grown here, so I can speak without it being dangerous for me. Stranger souls are like fresh meat to these people and their voices are their introduction. Don’t say anything as we walk, don’t look beside you where you walk, just straight ahead. Just listen, all right? Tap me on the back if you understand what I just said.”
Alex tapped him on the back.
“Good.”
The path looked just like the one in level one. Red-brown clay all around. Seating spaces, pillars, low ceiling. He kept looking forward, but he did see more in the corner of his eye than he would’ve expected. These souls were really in torment. Obviously, everything came here, the good, the bad, the ugly, the unexpected.
“These souls are not what they really are in spirit. They know that once they have come to the second level, there is a real chance of being saved. Here the collectors are benevolent and as long as you stay friendly with them you have a chance. But the souls themselves are so desperate for attention and salvation that they will pull at you for help. You especially, not me. But don’t look into their eyes or they will pull you down with them and you will be one of them. You must think of this place as a fever dream, a restless night pacing the corridors of your home. Anything below this is hopeless, the deeper we go the more hopeless it becomes. But here there is still an honest chance of escape.”
All of a sudden, two transparant souls in white garments came flying up to Alex where he was walking.
“Don’t loose track of me now, Alex!”
Alex made sure that he stayed in touch with Adnicul in his mind and not just in body.
The souls looked briefly at Adnicul and decided him to be unimportant.
Here was a soul that could help.
The two women, for they were women, cocked their heads and whispered:
”Oh, Alex. You can help us. We are so alone.”
Two more souls came flying up. They were men. They spoke amongst themselves.
“This man can help.”
”Of course he can, he is smart.”
”I knew that he would make it this far.”
“Do you know him?”
”Of, course. He is Belinda’s father.”
”Does he know that Belinda is here?”
Alexander Winsletenna stopped. Adnicul stopped as well.
“Keep on walking, Alex. You know that she is beyond level seven. These souls are using you.”
The two male souls shook their heads. “Belinda is in twilight zone, you know that. She is not doomed. Come on and find her here.”
Adnicul spoke again.
“Your family’s captivity has nothing to do with doom, Alex. They are simply captured way below in the dungeons of hell. Only really deceased souls come here. Belinda died in the illusions.”
The two souls left, the females still about and singing little songs. “Oh, Alex, handsome soul. Tell us of the life above ground.” They giggled and spoke amongst themselves how handsome he was, how he walked and how much poignancy and personality he owned. There was a pull toward the pit. Alex saw more clear than ever now what this was. The whole level was clear, fluorescent blue. The whole place was bathing in blue colours. There seemed to be everything here, replicas of cities, spiritual lovemaking, free souls, love and life. The souls themselves were bathing together in a large sea just of spirits. They flew up and down and sideways. Now, there were about ten souls around Alex and they were all pleading for him to help them be saved.
Alex saw now that there were two gateways, one into the light, a bright gorgeous one to the right and one to the left. He would’ve want to say it was a dark pathway, but the darkness had a glow as well. It was like a party where just a few candles were lit inside blue lanterns. These dark lights devoured everything else around it.
The souls seemed to live and circle around these two gateways.
Now, twenty souls were around him and they were all keen on getting his attention, so they all spoke at once.
“Help us, Alex. Oh, pretty Alex. Look at us. We are so beautiful.”
”Do you recognize me, Alex? I was a messenger once for your army.”
”Hello, my name is Beata. You loved me, didn’t you. You know that we have a real chance now.”
Alex was just about to say he was already married, but did not.
“Alex, you are so good. Talk to the collectors, Alex. They will reward you for looking into our eyes.”
”See our wonderful souls and save us.”
Adnicul spoke to Alex so calmly and so full of control that Alex had to pause within himself and follow his advice.
“Remember where you are, Alex. Never forget that, as beautiful as this place seems to be.”
With that the souls started flying away and into the sea of spirits.
The sea really was beautiful. He had never seen something so lovely. So pure.
“Follow us.”
”Don’t look at them. Alex.”
”Follow us.”
”Don’t be tempted by their blue colour. It is prettier from up here. I have been there myself.”
“Don‘t listen to him.”
”It is the best place in creation. You will love it.”
He saw himself as a part of that world and he wanted to cry, so pure was he in that sea.
“Stay on these roads, Alex. Remember your family.”
They turned a corner and walked into the second tunnel, leaving the lost souls behind and entering the black emptiness that would lead them to level three.
He could still feel the beauty behind him and wanted to jump inside that light and live there forever.
Instead, he walked into the nothingness, sure of Adnicul’s right mind in telling him that his family was straight ahead.
Soon enough they crossed the gateway to level three and Adnicul asked Alex to sit down.
“Is everything fine?”
Alex nodded. “I feel sorry for those souls.”
”We all do, Alex. We all do. At least, they know where they are. There are souls who stay on earth in limbo, unable to leave, because they can’t accept their own demise. But these souls here can only be helped if they pray themselves. That all depends on how religious they were in life. If they went to church just to show off their newest frock or to pray.”
“How come you know so much about souls?”
“If you have been through hell, you know about souls. As I said, I once went through the entire process of the levels. It is just a fluke that I am saving your behind, my friend.”
Alex smiled, he did not know where that smile came from but it was there and it was familiar.
“I am happy you are saving me, Adni.”
The man smiled. “My friend. I am just happy that you didn’t jump in there with them. I would’ve had to jump in after you. Think of the mess.”
Alex looked into Adnicul’s eyes.
”Adni, there were some of them that I knew in life…”
”Never mind that now. We need to forget that, yes? Do you understand what I am trying to tell you?”
Alex was distraught, melancholy, wanted to help these souls out of their misery.
“Yes. I will be pulled in.”
”Good boy.”
”What is waiting for us here at the third level?”
Adnicul stood up and gestured to Alex.
“Come, I want to show you something.”
Adnicul took him to the first pillar and asked him to peak around the corner.
What he saw was the real hell of hells.
If the souls were brought in and categorized in the first level only to be given a second chance, the third level was the first place in hell where no chance at all was granted the doomed. Toil, pain and labour were the key words here. There were ten departments here. The first one, closest to the gates, was made of fire. Constantly, new damned spirits were coming in chains through the gates. There were hundreds of them wandering in at once like cattle.
Well, of course he had heard the stories. These souls were spirits, but their bodies were obviously reshaped and made to feel real. They could not die, because they already were dead. The fire they felt must’ve felt pretty real to them. They all walked through the fire and every flame that cleansed their spiritual mystery made them eager enough to pray to heaven for mercy.
But there was no heaven here.
When that was over, these burned corpses were again chained together by creatures with large heads and fangs to take out some dirt out of the ground. The carried this dirt in their hands and dumped it in large containers. The once who had done this enough slid down a long slide, the third department, full of spikes, down to a labyrinth of sorts where many obviously got lost.
The labyrinth then ended in a giant hallway without roof where the doomed wandered around. It seemed odd to see that everyone wandered around as if lost in there. Until Alex realized that these people all lived in their own illusion in there.
Then, at once he recognized someone there.
“Oleana!”
Adnicul grabbed Alex by the shoulder so harshly that it hurt.
“Alex, no!”
”But that is Walter’s …”
”I know who that is, Alex. She was eaten by the Rumzils … If she is lucky, she will come out in due time reincarnated as something. There are some who stay there forever. She might be one of them. There is no way of telling.”
Alexander began walking down the slope.
Adnicul took him by the shoulders, dragged him up and pushed him against the wall. He had never seen Adnicul so angry before. Now he understood why people had been so scared of him.
“Who the hell is more important here?” He could feel Adnicul’s bad breath penetrating his odour cells. He could feel his anger boil inside his heart. “Huh?” Adnicul bashed him against the wall with every grunt. “Huh, Allie?” Alex could positively feel how angry he was. “I have not spent millennia on the run and years in a prison for nothing, have I?”
Alex said nothing.
Then he shook his head.
“No, Sir. You haven’t.”
Adnicul slowly let go.
“No, no.”
“You have a family to save, damn it, and I a soul to conquer.”
Alex straightened himself out and Adnicul took a few steps back and let Alex look on his own. He knew why this place was dangerous, but he was not allowed to say. The expert problem of this place was that it used the inner feelings of the soul against the soul itself. The soul burned itself out from the inside.
Slowly, step by step, Alex looked at the hall where these people obviously were living in their own illusion. They were burned down to the bone but believed themselves to be in Rome, in heaven, in a valley of green grass or on a fine mountaintop somewhere overlooking their own grounds.
The ones that then made it out where dumped in the sixth department, a sea, and it was a chaotic mess. Screaming people, waiting for help, panic-stricken spirits desperate for some assistance.
There were helpless people who really knew how to swim, but who circled the water not knowing how to get out. Some of these were rescued by the demon watchmen who threw them into the sevenths department where the dirt in carriages was unloaded and thrown into bags and onto the backs of the doomed. In the eighth department. They had to carry these bags up and down a very tricky path, where the ground just dropped under their feet at one point and the path suddenly rose higher very steeply at another point.
Department nine was simply a road where the doomed were whipped as the walked to department ten, where they apparently were ridiculed.
Alex saw now that in the first department there were people entering the fire fresh, there were also people who were bringing the bags of dirt with them through the fire and dumping it in section two. They had come full circle and the transporting of dirt from level to level was senseless, led nowhere and was just aimed at complete terrorizing of these souls. In the middle there was a section where new dirt and mud constantly was dropped into section two.
“Sorry about my reaction before, Alex. I sort of lost it.”
”It’s fine. I did, too.”
There was along pause, then Alex spoke again.
“How come they can’t see us?”
”The collectors?”
”Yes.”
“They can. That is why we have to be quick when we go around here. It will take a while to do so. Come now.”
He was right. It took such a long time to go around this vast area that Alexander’s feet hurt by the time he was down by the tunnel toward level four.
No one had noticed them walking around. That was good.
Registration, waiting level, labour. What was waiting for him at level four?
Adnicul said nothing as they walked into level four, which surprisingly enough was not a cave or a mine or a pit at all as the other places, but a field. It was a simply field that seemed to be without end. To the right there was endless space of grey mud, to the left there was endless space of grey mud, straight ahead there was an endless open space of grey mud.
“We must cross this field. It can take a while. Please don’t stop walking whatever happens.”
Alexander nodded.
“But there is nothing here but mud and dirt.”
“Keep walking, Alex. No questions. Just remember that we are here to save your family.”
There was a strange light here. But it wasn’t from above, it was a light from below. The mud itself was glowing.
Out of the mud, there suddenly rose a hand. It was a twisted hand shaking and shivering. Alex did not stop. Then a head popped out, grinning at him, to his left. A woman stuck her torso out and screamed between his legs. Then, two girls came out, gasping for air by his right knee. Soon, there were dozens of them waving their arms and shouting. They were all unable to rise from the mud. Accordingly, they writhed and hollered and screamed for help. Soon enough, behind them, before them, to the left, to the right, straight ahead, everywhere there were these writhing bodies. Some of them had pleading eyes, some of them spent all their energy in just throwing bad words at Alex.
“Hey, there, Sissy-Boy.”
“You want to try some hell-whore?”
“Look at me. Ever try some torso-fellatio from the field?”
“Weakling. You are never going to make it.”
Some just popped out of nowhere just to scare him and nothing else.
He saw they same ones further away scaring him again, which made him wonder if all of these souls were mobile and how the travelled through the mud.
They started to pull at his pants now, which made him worried about being able to continue walking at all. He felt his leather sword holder. Was there a sword in there? He had complete forgotten about it, but it was there, no question.
The souls were tearing at his pants and his skin, his shirt and his legs and his feet and his waist now, not just the fabric of his trousers. Anything and everything that was alright for them to get to him was fine. They pulled him and he had to shake several of them off just to be able to walk. But there were always more. He kicked one of them in the face, who started to bleed.
He, a longhaired gentleman of maybe 40 with distinguished features, screamed:
”You dumb soul, you broke my nose.” He looked at him and held up his own nose. “You will have to get me a new one, you will.”
Alex kept on walking, all the time petrified that he would lose contact with himself and why he was here. Why was he here? Family. Get his family. Was Adnicul behind him? Had Adnicul lost his way? Of course he had not. He knew this place. He simply could not hear him because of the noise of all these people screaming in the mud.
He saw the tunnel straight ahead and aimed for it.
It was simply a black hole in the horizon that seemed to suck up everything around.
That was it, wasn’t it?
”Come and join us, it’s fun down here, it is!”
“Become one of the mud club, har-har!”
No, don’t look back.
Was he there?
Just a few feet now.
Then, two minutes prior to his head bursting all of the souls simply disappeared and the acute clamour from before was exchanged by an incredible silence.
Alex looked behind him and saw nothing, only mud and no screaming faces, not even Adnicul.
Before he could converse Adnicul’s name he was sucked backward into the black hole, only this time he was sliding through space, sucked by something that wanted him to move faster and faster down this mysterious shaft. All he could see was lights flashing past his vision and he kept wondering if he had lost his friend back in the valley or if he should go back or …
The tunnel spun and curved and escalated and dropped and curved again.
Then, all at once, he was in familiar territory, he thought, in the path of red brown clay.
“Adnicul?”
No answer, maybe he had been swallowed after all.
“I’m here, Alex.”
Alexander turned around and saw his friend’s familiar face smiling.
“I was always here, friend!” Adnicul pointed at the sword Alex was carrying at his back. “You will need that here.”
Alex did what he was told and realized that they were aiming for a staircase a bit of a way off.
This was no pit, no valley.
“After the doomed are registered and made to wait, they are made to work. After their endless pain in the field of lost souls they come here, to level five. What you see here is pure chaos and the only way to get by here is walk past the chaos. There is a path that leads around it, is unfortunately not as safe as the other paths, but the path is so full of parasites that you will have cut off a few arms and legs to get by. You will see what I mean.”
“Arms and legs?”
”These souls, when they are eaten and killed or whipped, will never actually die or loose a leg. They can die a million times here. It is absolute carnal debauchery because they don’t need to eat or sleep or multiply or anything. This is the beginning of Lucifer’s army. They will do anything for him because once they get here they are taught to spit and suffer and that has made them increadably angry at anything.”
Alexander had nothing to say. He just heard the noise now. It was unbearably loud like a mob going completely crazy.
“What about the collectors? I fail to see them.”
”You won’t anymore. After the third level they could not keep anything under charge. It is eat and be eaten here. All of your magic powers that you have gained on your trip here will be necessary. You see, the whole point of these seven levels is to consciously train an army that is so loyal that no one can break it apart.”
”But that is scary.”
“It is all built on destruction. Sooner or later it eats itself. The army that destroys has no future. Here or on earth.”
“Does Lucifer know how this?”
Adnicul took a long look at Alexander. He looked at him as if he had just bitten his leg.
Adnicul shook his head and pointed his finger at him.
“Alex, don’t ever ask that question. You don’t want to tempt him.”
The two men walked to the staircase.
When they arrived at the top of it, what they saw was the biggest arena they had ever seen. There was a blue sky above with clouds of various formations. There was a big rising in the middle with a baldachin. There were several figures there, sitting and enjoying themselves Alex presumed. But they were small as ants, so it was hard to see.
The entire area was probably nine or ten time the equivalent of say the Colloseum in Rome. It was huge and all that Alex could see at the moment was that this entire area around the baldachin was smock full of people. He was too far up at the moment to see what they were doing, but as he was walking down this long staircase, narrow as it was, he began to see what it was.
These were people, all of these crazy antlike things were people. The closer he came, the more he saw that this entire place was full of people who were rolling in food, making love, eating each other.
“We have a problem.”
”What?”
”We need to get to that baldachin over there.”
Alex looked at Adnicul. “What? Excuse me?”
”The person sitting there has the key to the sixth level. You cannot enter the sixth level without a key. Anyone who enters it would be crazy.”
”What is there?”
”You worry about this place first, my friend.”
Alex was beginning to worry. It all seemed so thought through, so very much like a scheme.
“Who might that person be?”
”Who do you think would be sitting there and watching the game?”
Alex paused. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
Adnicul nodded.
”You mean” Alex laughed “we go to the very person that is the reason for all of this and ask him of permission to recapture what he has taken away?”
Adnicul smiled. “You fail to understand. Lucifer doesn’t think that we will survive. That is why he gives us the key. So that we can die and leave him alone. You see, it isn’t that easy after all to get back your family. You have come half way. Your sister is dead. But now comes the tough part.”
There was a long pause and Adnicul could see the wheels turning in the king’s head. “You’re not turning into a coward, are you? I mean you left the palace to find this place, not me.”
That moment, he was reminded of himself running through Iuventus Sacrum and screaming and made a decision.
“Let’s get on with it.”
”Good boy.”
The further down he came, they more steady the grip around the handle of his sword got. He saw now the carnage that was going on. Millions of bodies on top of each other, writhing and screaming and belching and farting and copulating and excrementing and hitting each other. As far as the eye could see this arena was a place with only two spectators and millions of actors.
Once they started walking over the bodies, barely making it, Alex realized how hard this was. Arms were grabbing him from everywhere. They were throwing limbs at him and sometimes their own excrements. He found himself cutting off a limb or two, stepping on heads and occasionally into a mouth or two. The only thing that seemed vital was to get across to the staircase and up the fifty steps to the baldachin first. He had to walk very fast. If he didn’t walk fast, he would find himself among these people. He had to plan who to step on next or he would end up a victim himself.
People were punching him everywhere they could. There was one man that shouted atrocities at him way after Alex had cut off the arm that dangled by his trousers, refusing to loose grip and apparently very much alive. When he looked across his shoulder briefly, he saw the arm scuttling back to its owner.
They were a third of the way now.
Then suddenly, a wrong step and he fell down on top of a woman with a very large nose. The first thing she did was scream at him.
He tried to get up, but there was no way of getting up.
He tried and the more he tried to reach Adnicul’s hand, the worse his chances seemed to be. He sank down into a sea of bodies and could only see flesh everywhere. A sea of screaming flesh.
“Where am I?”
Someone was beating him on the head with his foot and another was kicking him in the ribs.
He fought to see the light and saw it now.
God, he was sinking.
He could not see anything but bodies.
He gathered all his strength and pushed himself up, body by body, only to find the same woman screaming at him again. He grabbed Adnicul’s arm only to find that Adnicul himself was being dragged backward.
Soon Adnicul was gone and his entire form seemed lost forever among these atrocious people. He cut off a few limbs to find him but to no avail. Standing was impossible, but …
There he was. He grabbed his friend’s arm and pulled him out.
Was this the right one?
Yes, it was Adnicul. He had a severe cut on the head, but it was him.
Faster than before, the two ran like the wind to the staircase and found themselves running up the first ten steps of the white marble staircase only to fall down, panting.
“My maker, that was close!”
”Yes, I am glad we made it!”
Alex saw a small dainty fountain to his immediate left, gracing a statue that seemed to just stand there in the middle of everything with fore warning or fanfare.
”Water? Fresh water?”
Adnicul shook his head. “Don’t drink hell water, boy. It will make you want to stay here. Anything offered here is dangerous. We must keep moving.”
As they walked up the staircase he was reminded of how long he had travelled to get here and how close to the goal he was.
Soon enough, he was up there and before him, on a gilded throne positioned upon red satin, was the prince of flies himself.
No large tra-ra. No big orchestra fanfare, just a smile.
“So glad that you could make it all this way here.”
He was dressed in a white toga and his hairstyle reminded Alex very much of Caligula’s own. Next to Lucifer, there was a woman. She was so dazzlingly attractive that Alex had to pinch himself twice in order not to be rude. Dressed completely in blue with long, curvaceous brown hair down her back, she looked at him with large full eyes and every smile seemed aimed at seduction.
He controlled himself.
“Meet Joan.”
Alex said nothing.
“No, it is not the one of Orleans fame. She couldn’t make it.”
Lucifer bellowed and the woman started to laugh as well, her entire body shaking as she did.
She sounded like donkey.
They calmed down. “You like this place?”
Adnicul spoke. “Give us the key, Lucifer.”
His former master played innocent. “Key? What key? I thought you just came to chat. How sad.”
“You know very well what key I speak of. Give its to us.”
Lucifer gestured, very bored, toward Joan and yawning, said:
”Give them the key, Joanie, so we can get on with out show.”
They noticed that all the screaming had stopped and the crowd of millions simply lay there silent, waiting for everything to commence. Lucifer snapped with his finger and suddenly a huge bowl of bananas lay in in his lap. He began munching.
Joan took her long fingers and grabbed between her own large breasts. She picked out a large golden key with a simple golden plate attached on a ring. It said 6.
Lucifer smiled and said, his mouth full:
”Since you will not get out of this among the healthy and wealthy and well, shall we say” he burped “I shall let you pass through here to the door and commence the show once you are down the corridor to number 6. N’est pas?”
Adnicul sneered.
“Oh, do please behave Adnicul. After all, I gave you free meals every day. What you did to Lucinda broke her heart as well as mine. At least, you had company.”
“Thanks for the key!”
“You are so welcome!”
Adnicul started walking away and Alex followed him.
“Oh, boys!”
The two men turned around, their feet on the first steps of the staircase.
“Have fun!”
The two men walked toward the next gate in such amazing silence that neither of them knew if they should laugh or cry. The walk seemed so long because every face was completely dead and numb. No one grabbed, no one sighed, no one screamed. Just millions of bodies looking up toward the baldachin and waiting for the games to commence.
The meeting had been brief, but Alex knew that he had not needed more time to see who this person was or all he was about.
Soon enough they were unlocking the door and entering the next level.
Alex was aware now that he had seen several of these souls cry as they looked up and waited for the sign of the one without name.
He had even heard one of them say “I am sorry!”
As the entered the next level, behind them the screams commenced again.

Level six was nothing but a garbage disposal at first.
At least, that was what Alex thought.
Empty glasses and destroyed wagons shared piles with cut off heads and bloody limbs.
At one point, there was a pyramid of heads that all watched him as he walked by, their eyes simultaneously moving in his direction.
The third garbage pile was simply a pile of torso without heads.
He had no idea what to expect.
He had seen the organized souls turn for hope and then have to work.
He had seen them suffer and then leave all decency behind.
But what was this?
A waiting room? Again.
A waiting space for the hungry?
He looked up and saw a moon.
It was the fullest and most pregnant moon he had ever seen in his life.
Obviously, this moon was an illusion. No moon could be that white, that ominous.
Then he heard crickets.
He looked at Adnicul.
He shrugged.
Alex picked up his sword, held it firmly in both his hands.
There was something approaching in the distance.
It was as if …
Alex stopped and so did Adnicul.
What was that?
It was snarling.
No, wait. There were two approaching.
Two of whatever they were.
He could see them running toward them in the fog.
The snarl was much louder now. Much, much louder.
It was the growl of a hungry beast.
He heard now that they were three, no four.
He saw them.
The two men started running to the right, both by instinct wanting to make a turn around the beasts.
They saw them, what were they, wolves?
No, they stood up. They were screaming, howling.
One of them jumped on Adnicul, knocked him down. He took his sword and … It would not work. He tried to push the beast away, but it was too close.
“Alex!” he screamed. “I can’t make it.”
One of them grabbed Alexander by the leg and started to pull him away, whilst the other ripped at his hair. Alex started to stand up and realized there were more coming.
Alex fought himself to sit up. Aimed at the creature behind him and hoped to kill it.
He swung his sword back and heard a squashing sound. The beast let go of his head and fell with the hollow thud of a furry monster upon muddy ground.
That moment there was a howl behind him.
The wolf was about to devour Adnicul, was he alive?
He did not look alive.
Alex shook his head. He had magic powers. Fabian, Michael, where are you.
The beast kept pulling him further away.
That was when he decided to take control of this. He did not know where this power came from. Was it power given to him in the forest village? Had he acquired it on his own whilst travelling the avenue or in The Ides of March? Whatever the source, it all came forth now. All the odd days of feeling like a victim was over. Here was a man who had come this far to save his family and was not going to give up now.
He kicked the beast in the head, who gave him a long, startled look, so human that he could almost see the real being behind that stare. It was a man of sixty with long, dull eyes and a hawk like nose.
He gave the man another kick who fell flat on the ground.
There were more beasts approaching, but before that happened, Alex lifted and flew away at such a breakneck speed that it startled even him.
He lifted the sword and aimed for the beast and as he came closer he saw that Adnicul was unconscious, not dead. His chest was moving, heaving and falling as his the breath of hell entered and left his lungs over and over.
The sword, whose blade had been inscribed angelically, was buried into the heart of the beast.
The beast turned around, snarled, bloody mouth drooling over its own fur.
Alex saw now that Adnicul had a deep wound in his hip.
Alexander took the sword and with one swift stroke cut off the head of the beast.
The head rolled and rolled and stopped about ten feet away. It transformed. Now, Alex saw it was the head of a young woman, obviously gone down to hell so far to become a wolf.
Alexander lifted the beast and threw it away. He immediately bent down and began to feel the wound with his emotions. Could he heal it? It was worth a try. He should at least try it, his friend had saved his life so often, it was time for a life-debt’s repaying of circumstances.
All of his love and all of his warmth went into that cure.
He heard the slow approaching of the beasts and the were many.-
Did he have time?
No stress now, Alex.
You have come this far.
At once a blue glow came out of his fingertips and surrounded the wound. Magically, it healed right under his eyes. The blood disappeared, the cut itself closed and even the clothing above it repaired itself: Alexander had to laugh to himself. He had cured …
Adnicul opened his eyes and smiled.
“Am I alive?”
Alex nodded. “I just healed you. Your wound were deep, but I …”
They both looked across the plains and saw it.
The second troop was under way.
They were demons, horns, tails, hoofs, red skin, fur and all, but with large wings flapping.
What he had heard had not been a stampede, but the flapping of a hundred thousand wings.
Alex held up his hand to Adnicul, not realizing that former Nocturanian dictator had spent years using his magic powers to terrorize people.
Alexander Winsletenna lifted and met the first ten with such a swift stroke of blade that ten heads flew off.
He found himself screaming:
”The Lord will conquer you with all the power of his might!”
After that first phrase he saw Adnicul fighting a group of demons. There was a safety shield around him, transparent. He seemed to be able to protect himself with it.
Alex searched within himself and found he was not able to trust his own powers that much yet. And he fled the plains only to return and kill another forty demons, he went for another try. He found that he could feel the peace within him, an oasis that, no matter what situation prevailed, stayed the same. It was the beach where he had met the angels for the first time.
The energy field emerged.
That was when he felt himself completely immune to the throws and spitting fire of the demons. In fact, they only perished themselves when they tried to come near his own safety bubble.
Alex and Adnicul used their swords, but mostly they just flew around and came near the demons, which dropped accordingly.
Often, more often than not, Alexander hugged some of the demons and felt how they died in his arms, knowing it impossible for them to touch him through this knew weapon he had found.
The battle of deathly embraces as he would call it lasted for so long. The moon shone on the plains and gave the battlefield an eerie look of ominous mystery.
Soon enough, mother luna shone on a battlefield of fifty thousand dead demons.
Slowly, the two men landed on the ground and decided to aim for the gateway to level seven.
“Lucifer knows we made it and he never expected us to get past the wolves” Adnicul said.
“He is after us now, either here or down in level seven, so let’s go” he continued.
”Are there more beasts ahead?”
”Yes, Alex.”
”Then., Adnicul. I take charge from here.”
”You go first then, Sire!”
As newly appointed leader, he then promptly vanquished ghouls, dogs, worms, insects, cats and a gang of leather clad youngsters on some strange vehicles with wheels.
Both of the men turned back, a foot away from the hole that lead to number seven.
They saw a huge, thirty foot large monster with horns, obvious Lucifer in transformation, gallop toward them, just as the jumped down and disappeared.

At level seven, there he was.
The two men were dumped literally right in front of a couple of mahogany doors, who close behind them.
Standing up, the first thing they saw was a large throne room in heavy sandstone. There were paintings on the walls of naked women, bacchanal feasts, sacrilegious works and dark faces.
Huge torches, about twenty on each side lit the hall. There was a red carpet in front of Lucifer’s throne.
He sat there, two extremely large horns decorating a mostly furry face, clad in red garments and tapping his left foot in a steady andante. The only thing one could hear was this one hoof and now and then a bored snarl.
He sat up as the slowly approached.
“So” he said, cheerfully in a very deep, sonorous contra basso voice. “How do you want to die? Grilled on hot coal or plucked apart by my demons for lunch?”
There was a long pause.
Alex dared to speak first.
“We don’t intend to die, we intend to live in order to retrieve my family.”
Lucifer looked at them, very amused and then burst out laughing.
He shrugged, as the laughter died down.
“We-hell, my friends, how do you know they are here?”
Adnicul cocked his head.
“What?”
“I must say“ Lucifer continued calmly “that you have been incredible. You, Alexander have shown remarkable endurance the past year. Every feasible enticement have you warded off. I could’ve made you emperor, but you said no to all of that. Why?”
“I believe there are more important things. Besides, I already am a king.”
Lucifer smiled: “We’ll see about that.”
He looked at Adnicul.
“You. I never thought you would escape.”
”I never though” Adnicul countered “that you would betray me.”
“Well, betrayal is my best quality. Look at where Lucinda is now, huh? She is back to square one, receiving her good old lecture from the man with the long beard.” Lucifer smiled. “I’m sorry, I just love these clichés. Don’t love how humans describe God. A man with a long beard. Why a beard? Because I have horns? That is all how you choose to see me. Actually, I am nothing but a spirit. If you choose to give me horns than fine. I like horns.”
Alexander lost his temper. “Damn it, Lucifer. This is urgent. We have come all this way to get our family. Where are they? Your weapon is dead. You have no chances.”
Lucifer sneered. “Who says that I ever told you the truth about where they were, huh? Do you think that I would sacrifice a weapon I’d planned so meticulously and send you down here if they actually were here?”
Lucifer stood up, now enormous.
“You have come all the way here to meet me. If they are here, you must kill this image first. The spirit will always be alive.” He began walking down the hallway, making the entire place shake with every footstep. “I am eternal and I have played this game long before your first incarnation. You can kill me, even get your family back, Alex, but one day your grandchildren will meet me and they will pay.”
Alex picked up his sword.
“Don’t count on it, Lucy!”
Lucifer hollered at him: “Don’t ever call me Lucy!”
With that, the two men flew up and attacked Lucifer who just met them with his hands up, grabbed them and threw them against the wall. He screamed so loud that one of torches fell down upon the floor and set fire to one of the carpets.
A little shaken, the men stood up again. Adnicul went in back and Alex in front.
Lucifer turned around, picked up Adnicul and breathed in his face. Adnicul winced.
“Your name is the reverse of someone already dead, so why should you stay alive.”
Adnicul grinned and buried his sword in his arm.
Lucifer screamed.
Alex spoke and when he did, Adnicul dropped to the ground.
“Tell me, Lucifer, why you love to abuse free will.”
Lucifer took a long look at Alex, searched for a meaning in that phrase.
The he smiled. “Future philosophers shall call it cycles of deprivation. What Dad does, the son keeps on doing.”
”Meaning?”
”God betrayed me, so I betray God. He even wrote it the Bible didn’t he? Eye for an eye. Well, he gets a taste of his own medicine.”
Adnicul stood up, rubbing his back.
“This is no fun” Lucifer mused. “You puss willows are not giving me any fight here!”
”The fight is over, Lucifer and you know that. You lost when Lucinda died.”
Lucifer began to scream with laughter.
“Do you think that I would lead you here to the bowels of hell and give you the key to the most secret of spots of hell without a PLAN?”
“Lucifer, I …”
Alexander didn’t have time to finish his sentence.
The whole room started to shake and quail. It felt like a herd of angry bulls were attacking the room from the outside. It felt like this was a one room house standing free in a field and attacked by a tornado from all sides except below.
Lucifer continued to laugh, raising his arms in the air, casting his face toward the shaking ceiling, clenching his fists, broad legged, triumphant.
The entire room was blurry now and a wind swept through the room that made the paintings themselves shake and the carpets fly around the room.
Alex looked across his shoulder and saw the mahogany doors lightly bang back and forth.
Beyond it he saw nothing but darkness.
“Do you think that I would be taking you all the way here” Lucifer screamed in joy “without a plan?”
Now the wind was so strong that the entire room including the walls were going blurry. Adnicul and Alex leapt to each one side of the room and held on to whatever they could find. With Alex it was the wall.
He saw Lucifer bend backward and a wind take him and sweep him away bit by bit.
The storm was entering the room, the mahogany doors were banging back and forth now and showing that absolutely nothing was behind them.
With one swift slow stroke the walls and the ceiling were swept away.
With a bang the whole area, except the floor was gone, including Lucifer, whose laughter still echoed in whatever pit was under them.
They looked up, sweaty and tired, and found …
Alex felt his hands, they were clenched around bars.
The space between them were minimal, barely place for a racoon to creep between.
He looked up. Cage all over, except for the middle where there was a small hole. That could serve as a small exit.
He looked at Adnicul, who dumbfounded looked at the pit below the cage.
That was when he heard the noise below them both.
Instantly, they knew that the far off purgatory screams and fire torture were the troubled souls of level seven, past the steep downward tunnel in the pit. The tunnel was leading straight to the flickering flames of hell. The screams from below haunting his ears, he felt the floor in front of him.
The pattern? He recognized it. The table next to him. That seemed familiar, too.
He stood up.
Oh, my dear. This was …
The Grand Hall. A replica of the Grand Hall of his palace.
Then Adnicul gasped at the north-eastern-corner of the cage and for the first time, Alex looked up from ground to his friend.
“Alex!” he screamed. “Come here! Quick! “ Adnicul looked at him and said again, even more sternly now. “Quick, man, quick!”
Alexander did as he was told. As he did, he saw what Adnicul had seen.
They were in a ring of cages hanging over this bottomless pit, one of many cages with no walls or roof but with a ceiling. There must’ve been at least two dozen of these cages like theirs, if he was not mistaken. No, more.
“My God, these cages are all …”
They looked at each other.
Alex nodded.
“They are all replicas of your Grand Hall, Alex!”
He looked at the ring of cages. They all hung by chains. These chains seemed all to hang from a large metal structure, which coned into a larger chain, disappearing into another hole. Whatever was guarding the whole structure was to be found there.
Alex looked back toward the cage to their right.
Someone was moving inside there. It was … It … was …
Oh, sweet saviour. He saw who it was now.
He began rattling the bars.
“Belinda! Belinda, can you hear me?”
Adnicul put his hand on his shoulder.
“I don’t believe that she can hear you …”
”Of course she can hear me …”
In that moment, Belinda, her long hair falling gently across her chest and back, turned around as if woken by a dream.
She turned around and realized first where she was and started to scream. When she was finished, she looked down into the pit and obviously understood first now that she was where she was.
She looked toward her own left and saw a man there.
“Daddy?”
The man smiled.
She laughed, the laugh echoed in the pit.
“Daddy?”
She ran to the bars and rattled them.
“Daddy, oh my God, you made it this far. You are here …”
Alexander smiled.
“It is so good to see you, my sweet.”
She suddenly saw who was standing next to her father.
“Who is … what is he doing here?”
”Calm down, he is transformed.”
“Daddy, he is a monster.”
“Belinda. He is a victim of Lucifer’s greed, as well. I would not be here if it weren’t for him.”
Belinda took a long look at him.
”All he wants is to save his own soul. He was the first angel that Lucifer created on his own. He wants only one thing: to get back to heaven. This is the way.”
Belinda nodded. “Any friend of yours is a friend of mine. Hello, Adnicul!”
”Hello, Belinda!” Adnicul answered, softly. “Pleased to save your life!”
Alex raised his hand and shook it. “Don’t speak too soon, sweet lips. We haven’t done it yet.”
Belinda shrugged. “How are we going to do this? We have to save all of us. First we have wake them all up from their illusions.”
That was when he saw the cages around him.
There, to his own left was Rolf alone. In the cage next to Belinda’s was … dear Lord … Sieglinde … Morgana in the forth one… There was a fifth cage with Steven. There was a cage with, no it was too hard to see. He could not see how many people were here only that there were thirty-six cages. Thirty six? Yes. That many. Thirty six. Three dozen cages.
“We have to save all of these people, wake them up.”
Adnicul nodded. “Yes, but how?”
”I was taught that everything is possible by spiritual strength in an illusion.”
”But this is no illusion, this is hell.”
“I was trained for this. This is the reason the trained me to fly. I was taught to lift objects with my mind. We did it on level six with the demons. Why can’t we do it here?”
Adnicul looked worried.
“What is your plan?”
”I believe that Lucinda is still alive, as is Lucifer …”
”You can’t kill him off …”
“So, we will have to be quick. We can fly, so let’s fly from cage to cage. By cage thirty-six we will have to get all of these people up to that hole in the cave ceiling somehow.”
Adnicul looked up. “Whatever is there is going to give us problems.”
“Are you ready?”
Adnicul looked at Alex. “You want to carry all those people with the power of your own might from cage to cage? That is going to take more spiritual strength than I have known anyone to have.”
Alexander nodded. “You are right. So, what do we do?”
Adnicul looked up. “See that ledge next to the hole there? It seems to hold quite a lot of people.”
”It circles the hole.”
”We position the people there and then go step by step after we wake them up. The cages all seem to have these holes in the middle.”
”It all seems too easy.”
Adnicul shook his head. “None of them can fly, we can. Most of them are trapped in their own illusion. We have to wake them up. Then we have the problem of Lucifer or Lucinda suddenly appearing.”
”Do you think she still is alive? I mean, I saw her die.”
”We will find out.”
Belinda was still standing in her cage, patiently waiting.
“Let us go.”
At a given signal they lifted, leaving the marble tiles of the floor under them. When they reached the hole in the cage roof, they noticed that it was big enough for them both to slip through.
They flew across the pit and entered the cage, landed on the floor inside Belinda’s cage.
She ran up to her father and embraced him.
They hugged and caressed.
Then she stepped back.
“My God. You have grown young.”
“And I can fly, you saw that?”
Belinda nodded. “Who taught you that?”
”Fellow helpers. Angelic warrior named Fabian.”
Belinda smiled. “Whatever he did, it worked.”
Adnicul smiled. “Your father is a handsome devil over here.”
Belinda was startled. She shook her head. “Your choice of words could be better, Adnicul!”
”I mean handsome angel, your highness!”
“That is more like it!”
They took a long look at each other again.
“I have missed you so!”
”I you!”
Adnicul cleared his throat.
“We need to go.”
They all nodded.
Belinda stretched forward her hand and Adnicul took it.
“Happy to have you here, Sire!”
“Happy to be here, your highness!”
”What is going to happen now, men?”
Alex nodded to the ledge by the hole.
“We are going to wake you all up, one by one and put you on the ledge. Then we will together go through that hole and somehow face what is there.”
Belinda spread her arms. “Then save me.”
Alex lifted her up and flew off.
As he did, he told Adnicul to wait here follow him to the ledge.
When he arrived at the ledge, he realized it be quite spacious, as if created to fill three dozen. There was even a small slide that lead to another level. Alex tried to see what was there, but couldn’t yet.
The two men put Belinda there and flew down to cage three.
Needless to say, the reunion between man and wife was a heartening one. It took strength to wake her up from her sleep. Once that was over, she cried in her husband’s arms as he carried her up to the ledge to speak with her daughter.
Cage four had Morgana as occupant and she was so startled to see her father there with Adnicul as guardian angel that she fainted on the spot. It took the flight to the ledge to wake her up.
No Lucifer yet. If he would come, or anyone else for that matter, then Adnicul would be there to protect Alexander.
Cage five had Steven in it. He had been pacing the south wall, holding a conversation with an imaginary person to his right when he saw Alex and realized where he was. Soon he was with the others. The reunion of another married couple was warm to say the least.
Maria in cage six was just as dumbfounded to find herself saved as Eleonora in cage seven or Patricia in cage eight. When Patrick in cage nine was saved he fell on his knees and thanked the lord from bringing him back to his family. In cage ten there was none other Marcus Ruztady, Eleonora’s husband himself. A third married couple was reunited. Alexander felt like an angelic saviour. The chatter up there was endless, everyone had a story to tell about where they had been in their illusion and who the guardian was next to Alex and where they were. Belinda had not heard it from her father personally, but it was clear to her than they were above the last circle of hell, put here by Lucinda herself.
In cage eleven, they had to wake up Martin d’Lumberville, who was crawling around, obviously thinking he was fumbling around in the dark, protecting himself from a vision of Lucinda in the castle. Maria and Martin went into their own corner of the ledge and cuddled, begiggled by the others.
Cage twelve had little Alfred, obviously believing that his mother was taking him on a walk though the castle. When he realized where he was, he had a nervous fit and it took a few minutes to calm the fellow down. Once up on the ledge with his parents there were constant questions about where they all were and how they would get out of there.
Cage thirteen had none other than Richard Landstorm and Morgana was thrilled to have him back, of course. They started to cuddle right away. Alex, this time, was overjoyed to see this scenario in action.
Cage fourteen was the first cage with two people in it. They were walking in circles as if wanting to find a way out of their illusion, obviously tormented by some inner vision.
They were the messengers Theodore and Philip.
There were now as many people on the ledge as there were liberated cages, fourteen.
What was so wonderful for Alex was that his solitude was over and for every person he saved his old life returned more and more and , lo and behold, they all were stunned to see how young he looked. Never the less, they recognized him.
In cage fifteen, Marie-Louise ran from one side of the cage to the other, chased by some invisible spirit. When she saw who was there she exclaimed:
“Master, where am I? Why … why are you so young?”
”Belinda will tell you?”
She smiled, no beamed: “She is here?”
And so, the two were reunited again.
Robert, her fiancée, was liberated from cage sixteen and fell into Marie-Louise’s arms, tears streaming down his cheeks when coming to the ledge.
Cage Seventeen held a certain Ulfaas Nordhjiil, who stood still like as statue when rescued, although he gave the crowd a horrendous story of how he had been chased through Prosperania by a giant bat the last few months.
Cage Eighteen held the person that Patrick for the past hour had been petrified could not have been saved. But as Erica came up, he exclaimed: “Wife!” and ran into her open arms.
Cage Nineteen had Lance cuddling the cocker spaniel Henry. Together, the two had obviously shared a nightmarish illusion of being trapped in a labyrinth somewhere in hell chased by none other than Lucinda herself, only the last hours or so there had been no Lucinda. That was a good sign.
Cage Twenty had Maria’s son Fabian trying to climb the bars, obviously believing them to be the walls of the castle. Apparently, his vision had been being locked outside the palace and not getting in.
Cage Twenty One was Mormidar, the stoic and sympathetic Hispanic King. He had known his fate, but never been able to break the illusion of thinking that he was home in Hispania without his wife.
Cage Twenty Two held his wife, and she had been positive that she was the only one trapped in her palace in Hispania and that her husband was gone.
Cage Twenty Three had Mustafus waxing his moustaches. His awe in seeing his ally so young made him gasp even more as he was flown to the ledge, dumbfounded.
Twenty-three people were chattering on the ledge now, eager to tell each other stories.
Cage Twenty Four was a horrific sight with Zedrick believing himself to hang from the ceiling in a noose, alive but unable to come down. He fell to his knees and embraced Alexander’s legs when he was awoken.
Cage Twenty Five had an interesting prisoner: Louis the gardener, forced to tend to invisible flowers who now and then chased him through the imaginary garden.
An old friend camped in Cage Twenty Six and Alex was happy to see him only read imaginary books when he was saved. Soon enough, Steven and Belinda’s best man Tom was among his friends again.
Henricus Balthazar was there in Twenty Seven and he had nothing more to say than:
”My strength had failed me, I could not flee any longer from those beasts!”
In the Twenty Eighth Cage, the two men found Geena crying and shouting loudly at someone who obviously flew around above her, laughing. She was freed from her illusions and carried up, sightably impressed about his majesty’s youth and scared about flying over the pits of hell.
Cage Twenty Nine had apparently an entire legion of demons marching over the prisoner’s mind. When Marcus the messenger was saved he found himself looking at Alex twice and Adnicul three times before actually believing what he was being told.
They were close toward the end now, Alex was afraid that something would happen before they were ready.
In Cage Thirty, Julius Cretan, who had joined the group’s potion experiment against his will that day in September 1425, was overwhelmed to see his majesty and told him: “Didn’t I say taking that potion was a nuisance?”
Alex nodded and smiled, before flying him to the ledge.
Cage Thirty-One held Bantrard, who obviously was forced to live and relive his worst nightmare: becoming the eternal entertainer to a group of uninterested ghosts and goblins and demons, who just laughed as he played song after song, regardless of its character.
Cage Thirty-Two held the clerical representative of the nation, holding a bible and running from one edge of the space to the other, obviously believing himself to be climbing the stairs of his own cathedral, running away from whatever monster was following him. Bernardus Paul was happy to see his king.
There was none other than a certain Mr John Lyghort in Cage Number Thirty-Three. His illusion obviously was being the captain of a ghost ship.
In the Thirty-Fourth Cage there was King Iwar of Margetania, who had joined them because his wife was too tired. He was now the only spouse alone and he was worried that she was not here. Alexander explained that she was just lucky, because when they all returned she would not know the difference.
“Lucky woman!”
The second to last held Walter von Ochsenskiöld and this time the heart-warming reunion was all Alexander’s.
One left.
The last cage held Rolf, who was speaking to someone that seemed to disappear when they came. Rolf was aware of reality and he fell into his majesty’s arms when he saw him.
The tragedy occurred when, for some reason, Adnicul promised to take Rolf in his arms and let Alex leave as last one.
The cages at once, about ten at a piece, dropped into the pit.
For some reason, Alex was stuck in the opening of the last cage.
Adnicul quickly flew to the ledge and positioned Rolf there.
“Where’s father?” Patsy asked and was given no answer as his friend, the former enemy, flew back to save him as fast as lightning.
When he came back, one cage was still dangling from the structure.
Alex took Adnicul’s hand as the cage dropped.
They felt themselves drop with the cage, the screams getting louder, the flames getting hotter.
Alexander, frantic and panicking, now escaped the whole and threw himself against the cave wall just as it fell into the last level of hell.
What they saw below them was pure chaos. All the other levels rolled into one. Disorganisation, cries for help, hard labour, trapped people, debauchery, war. Everything covered with flames.
“Let us leave, Alex!”
”Yes, let us!”
With that, they flew back up.
Two large monsters came shooting up from below and blocked their way. Oversized, horns, tails and all, monster like and huge, Lucifer and Lucinda gazed at them, grinning:
”You thought I was dead, didn’t you?”
Alexander gasped “I was happy to see you taken away!” as he criss-crossed the area around the two beasts. Adnicul held up his hand. “What are you trying to do, Adnicul? Keep me from losing my temper? God damn it, I can loose my temper. Leave us alone, we have come this far. I don’t intend to loose!”
Lucifer screamed witrh laughter.
“How do you intend to save yourself little one?”
At once, Alexander remember the tale that Adnicul had told him about the failure at the beach.
What had he said back then? What had the original angel said?
Then, he thought of it:
”Hwee-Aiell-Sihl.”
Lucifer stopped laughing. “What was that?”
”Hwee-Aiell-Sihl. He who eternally excels above everyone in life lies lustily steadfast in his lifestyle. Hwee-aeill-Sihl. You can’t escape.”
At once, the cave and the pit started crumbling. From out of Lucifer trees sprang up from his horns
and his back and his torso and head and legs like mushrooms. They were all forbidden trees.
Soon enough, he was full of trees and screaming he fell into a dark pit of nothingness.
The only one left was Lucinda, who looked at them in petrified awe.
Alex was triumphant.
“I forgive you as you forgive yourself!”
The witch disappeared under the noses, turning into dusty light and falling into the darkness.
The two men, relieved to have come this far, joined the other thirty-five and one by one entered the cave above. They found Reficule, now a sweet, lovable dog, obviously transformed into what he once had been, a wolfhound.
Not short after that, they saw him disappear into the shadows.
There was an entrance of the small cave, that obviously was shortcut to the world above.
They walked into that light and found themselves at the end of january tunnel, looking into a pit that seemed to be souls being thrown into fire. Several of the visitors knew what this was and where they had just been. The looked to the right and knew that this other place was short cut to heaven.
They were visitors, they knew that, but still they decided to take a peak. Eventually, standing at the edge of the doorway to heaven they saw it all. Thirty seven men, women and children and one dog at Eden’s doorstep.

All the theories that were to be formulated in yet uncreated heads were gusts of wind flying around God's mind. All the Greek tragedies and comedies were yet unborn centaurs playing in the sunlight.
The Gregorian Chants soared around him like kites in the night. Chopin's piano-pieces were small piano flowers and Demostenes works were leaves on the oak-trees growing in the Fields of Nostalgia. Moliere's plays were yet only ash-tree roots waiting to grow into gloriously meticulous ingenuity of comic bliss. King Arthur's round table was a pasture of lilies swaying in the wind. Bach's music was a field of sunflowers growing majestically and waiting to be transformed into clear thought. And over in a corner waiting for millennia of evolution to pass were Freud, Hegel and even Darwin, not forgetting in their denial that they once lived here. As rosebuds the works of Spielberg and Lucas, Bergmann and Allen giggled yet as lights of their own little corners of unborn fire. And a wind named Hitchcock fragranced the trees with the smell of a spectacularly richly dark red rose. Metaphors enriched the symbolic flora of thought and future education. And so here, creation danced.

There were muses with golden voices and parrots with rainbow wings painting the blue skies with colour upon colour on a canvas of cumulus clouds and blue cream. The grass so green it dazzled the eye. The mountain touching skies so blue they seemed like oceans.
The daytime sky seemed to have a deeper, richer, more intense blue in Yambalah than anywhere else.
The trees gave a home to green leaves whose colour transcended the depth and went into the luscious.
The nature hummed here.
It was absolute beauty, friendship, love.

Adnicul turned to the group and smiled.
“This is my stop. I need to leave you here.”
A tear rolled down Alexander’s cheek.
They embraced and as they did, Alexander felt his heart embrace his friend as well.
“My friend, thank you for saving my life!”
Adnicul raised his hand and caressed Alexander’s cheek.
“I only did it because it gave me the chance to come back home.”
He took and step back and sighed.
“To the rest of you, I apologize for my old self in the name of my new refound one.”
The sight of the former dictator now full of life and love was touching that almost everyone had tears of joy in their hearts and eyes.
“How sweet to see you find your own heart, Adnicul!” Belinda said.
Adnicul started backing into the light and as he did, he changed shape into a soul clad in white, his eye patch dropped and both eyes were bright and shining.
“Good bye, my friends.”
Waving arms saluted an angel who was greeted by other angels on the Fields of Nostalgia.
Slowly, the group of 36 people swam to the other side where Mercutio was still waiting. Centurion, as they came to the shore, lifted and shot off down the tunnel and headed right toward heaven.
Most of them stood wet on the shore as the white angel on the rock awoke for the first time since 7000 years. It was Lucifer’s purity that God had taken away from Lucifer at the battle of the plains with his brother. Within him shone a green stone, that was the heart of his innocence.
They angel smiled, the stone glowing in his soul.
“Thank you!”
Its voice was soft, high, rounded, gentle.
“For what?” Walter asked.
The angel smiled.
”For setting me free.” The angel turned to Alexander. “You remarkable man. Take my green stone in your hand and send me to heaven with your heart. When you set me free all that you have to do is exit this cave and you will come back to Clurafar.”
Alexander waded through the water and looked at the stone. It shone in green colours.
“Don’t be afraid!”
Sieglinde held her children tight, moved by this experience.
Alex took his right hand and entered the soul with it, felt how warm it was in there and really did not have to do anything else but hold it and think “Send him to heaven to his brothers” and look up.
Alex looked into the angelic eyes above him.
The angel smiled and caressed his cheek.
“God bless you!”
It turned into a white dove carrying the stone in its feathers as colour sprinkling behind and around him and flying toward the heavenly gate.
The crowd lead the horse back to where the cave’s opening and before they came out, they saw the extraordinary light that came from that exit. It was a normal light and Alex for the first time since he did not know when could breathe normal air.


CHAPTER NINE

THE HOMECOMING


Where was he?
In a dream, wandering about lonely on an avenue somewhere in a forest?
36 souls had wandered up the slope together, unified for the first time in too long.
They had seen that light from above that seemed to shine down on them, welcome them into it.
The light was not anymore faded and foggy as it had been before. It was almost blindingly bright, real. Even long before they reached it they ensemble held up their hands before their eyes, unused to the light of reality.
Alexander had said good bye to Adnicul. His former enemy and now time friend was back in heaven.
The angel on the rock was back in Eden.
Lucinda was dead and gone, who knows where she was.
Lucifer obviously was evicted from the alternate reality.
Did that mean their own future was secure?
But what was this?
Alexander had been on the road for way over a year now and he had forgotten what reality was.
Together, the 36 spirits had experienced war, decay and destruction for almost five years.
He had felt it back then possess him and take control of him like some animal cornering a prey.
That day, Alexander Winsletenna led his family toward the opening of the cave.
He had remembered how he had entered the cave. It had been night.
Now, it was day.
The light from up there was bright and he could see it shine from beyond the curve.
As he reached the top, he realized that the only illusion that they were experiencing was the cave they were in. It was the question of a world that needed to return to its own reality.
Obviously, there was a force at work here that seemed to transcend time and place.
They walked up and saw it.
It was amazing for Alexander to see how everyone cheered, knowing he had saved them.
They looked behind them and saw the cave.
They looked forward beyond the cave’s opening and saw the marketplace in Clurafar.
Walking out, the 36 brave hell travellers held their hands in front of their eyes.
Some cried and fell to their knees. Some laughed. Some shook their heads.
Alexander looked at his daughter and saw the experience of someone who had walked down these steps back in 1422. She was holding her husband’s hand.
There were obviously forces at work here. Why they entered here was something they did not understand. Obviously, they were in a small fragment of time yet not awoken, yet waiting to commence again. Angelic forces showed the assembly Alexander’s journey from the start.
There were images being shown in front of their eyes. They saw him deteriorate, they saw him isolated, saved, determined, attacked, helped, tutored, fighting, loving and winning.
They were in Clurafar walking out down the steps from the senate toward the good old Cathedral of St. Raphael. There was no one here, not one person. The entire marketplace was empty.
Alexander had held Mercutio close to his side.
Now that horse was gone.
There was a stab of pain inside Alexander, when he realized that Mercutio had been given to him as a gift back during the war of 1427. He realized that Mercutio was no more a part of this reality and it hurt. Belinda knew what her father was thinking and put her hand on his shoulder.
The entourage looked ahead and saw, in this mirage of last illusions obviously displayed by an angel, how Alexander had fought the Nocturanians and lost. How everyone had died and left him alone.
They saw how he had buried his daughter Belinda and how he gone crazy.
They saw how Belinda returned and how they had spent a night speaking about the conspiracy by the light of torches.
They saw Alexander leaving the castle and meeting mentors.
They saw him entering the first forest and hunted by werewolves.
They saw him in a crisis, sharing his time with Belinda.
They saw him on the beach, sharing his time with the angels.
They saw him in the avenue, tested and torn apart on the wasteland.
The entire company saw their king talking to himself in the green land, heading toward Yambollah and being trained by the forest gypsies. They saw him entering the secret world, talking to the hermit and being unrecognized by his family.
They saw him meeting the four evangelists and heading for home by flying through the air with Micahel. They saw him meeting Adnicul, becoming friends, fighting Rumar, losing his friend, talking to the angels, riding through the forest and entering the cave.
They saw the duel, the illusions, the temptation, Lucinda’s death and the mutual trip through the hell of hells. They saw themselves standing on the stairs of the cathedral.
As they walked down the stairs and headed for home, they felt themselves fall asleep.
They felt themselves wondered why, but know the reason in their heart of hearts.
The illusion was breaking up.
The old world was dying.
They were waking up.
They were being saved.

Iuventus Sacrum, Clurafar, Prosperania
The morning of September 24th 1425

“I only did it because it gave me the chance to come back home.”

- Adnicul, the original angel of the Hwee-Aiell-Sihl

The first one to open his eyes was Alexander.
He felt the mahogany table under his right cheek.
It felt like it had been attached to his skin.
He opened his eyes only slowly, feeling the sleep rest in his eyes like someone who had slept an eternity and forgotten what waking up was like. It felt like his dreams had lasted for five years and yet only lasted a second.
He saw his own green coat resting on his blue jacket, his red cape above it resting on his arms.
He felt his beard and realized he was no longer twenty.
Every bone in his body hurt, every muscle ached like it had not for years.
His knee hurt, he had forgotten about his knee. He had been young for so long that he had forgotten that he had a bad knee. It hurt, but oh my God, was he happy that it hurt.
Years? Yes, years. Had he slept years? It seemed so.
He tried to raise his head, but could only do so with the utmost difficulty.
His muscles and bones seemed to crack as sat up.
As he sat up, he saw Belinda to his right and Sieglinde to his left slowly awake.
Both smiled at him, their eyes wide open.
He embraced each one of them in turn.
“We’re back!”
There was a tear rolling down his wife’s cheek and he kissed it away.
“Thank you, Father!”
He chuckled, unable to speak.
”How are you, Mother?”
”I am fine now … thank you. Dear, come in to my arms.”
“Richard, I can’t believe that we made it out of there …”
”Don’t, Morgana … I’d rather not think about that place …”
Belinda spoke again, as she walked to the window and looked out.
“We’re back …”
Yes, they were back, but with a difference.
All that they had feared was gone.
There was a remarkably eerie, solemnly calm and peaceful giddiness to this crowd.
If this crowd had a mutual spirit, it would be a happy muse speaking slowly with a bright smile on her lips, waking up, but realizing by Jove, that ‘we made it’.
“Why, where are we? When are we?”
Soon enough, the thirty six people at the long table by the window were awake, trying to shake themselves into reality by simply moving about and thinking a clear thought about where they were..
Some of them were laughing, some of them were whispering, some were just standing by the newly open windows and gazing at the landscape outside, knowing there was no pit below to drop into, no threat to run away from.
In turn, the other sixty-four people woke up, stretching, thinking, wondering what had happened.
They were senatorial and normal people.
They had not been in control like the other 36, but their nightmares had been just as vivid.
Alexander dared the impossible, he asked them the question:
”What do you remember?”
Someone said:
”I remember hell!”
It became clear beyond all doubt that everyone in the room had actually gone through that hell of hells. 36 of them had been trapped there, one cage had been reserved for Alexander. He had never really figured out if he had been there all the time and just travelled in his mind or some there together with Adnicul. Regardless, he had won the game, as had they all.
More importantly, everyone in the room seemed to have a story to tell and a special little relationship with Lucinda. It was extraordinary, but this had been a collective illusion.
She had done her damndest really to create the haunted kingdom.
Her own haunted kingdom.
She had failed, thanks to Alex.
For a long while, conversations just naturally soared through the room, inspired little groups of interest, amusing two or three here and five or six there to simply dawdle in a corner and exchange views about what had just occurred. There was nothing planned about it all. They had all gone through hell together, literally. As everyone knows, there is not much more to be said about that.
One or two, the loners, stood by the windows, dumbfounded.
Erica came and hugged Patrick and soon Lance was with them.
Richard and Morgana stood close to that family and it was then that Alexander understood how much he loved his children and what a caring father he would now want to be.
They had all gone through hell together.
But heaven lay waiting here in their hearts alone.
Alexander poured himself a cup of wine and sat back on his throne, proud of his achievements.
He embraced his wife to his right and his daughter Belinda to his left.
His knee was hurting and he was loving it like never before.
All at once, he started laughing out loud.
Soon enough, the entire room was cheering out loud.

Afternoon

Yes, even more extraordinary was when Queen Henrietta was awoken hours later and, without any first comments from anyone else, said:
“Why, I am alive and back home? Don’t tell me that it’s 1425 again?”

Evening

That day, it was decided that everyone present on the grounds of Iuventus Sacrum was to join in a feast that was allowed to last for as long as possible, to celebrate the fact the darkness had been conquered and love again ruled the hearts of Clurafar.
That night, the married couples of Iuventus went to each their own bed and, although not much sleep was found during that night, it was a night of long forsaken love making under moonlight and stars.

Back in Reality, The next morning, September 25th 1425

Alexander had just woken up and was standing by his window in his study and throne room once again.
The window was open and the cool morning air was filling his lungs with healthy air and his sense with calm beauty.
He had a hangover, yes.
But what a luscious feeling it was to have something that showed him he was alive.
Everyone had a hangover this morning. He wanted not to be different. It was a matter of pride to be drunk now. It meant he cared.
The hangover was the proof of a celebration of life.
No, change that, he thought.
This hangover is my witness to that celebrated a triumph of spirituality against the dark.
Everyone single soul had someone to wake up next to this morning.
No one was left alone.
Alexander sighed as he watched the sun about two thirds of the way toward Zenith.
He gathered that he was the only one out and about at this time.
Alexander had always been a morning person and this morning was special.
It was his first real morning in four and half years.
He lifted his hand and took a long look at it.
He chuckled.
“Old hand!”
He sighed.
“I’m not twenty anymore. Forever young illusions!”
He heard a small bird fly past his window. It was a robin. He leaned out and watched how it chirped happily and flew around the corner.
“Hey, birdie!”
He saw it disappear and felt how happy he was just to enjoy the morning, the real morning, for the first time in his life, without fear.
The bird flew back and forth a few times and then disappeared into the morning sun. He was reminded of the giggling robin by Julian’s Inn on the way back home from Alliland. He knew that this bird had been a messenger from Callenia, warning him of things to come. This robin was happy, it was chirping. The ghosts were gone.
He walked to the clock that Reland Mansicart had given him and smiled.
There were no longer a devil and angel there in his mind, but two men shaking hands.
“The truth is in the eye of the beholder!”
He leaned back, walked a few steps toward the middle of the room and closed his eyes.
He started to laugh, realizing how silly and wonderful this was.
“Alex, you are going try this for real?”
The voice sounded like Michael’s, not his own.
He lifted his hands and waited.
Nothing happened.
He lifted his hands again.
Nothing.
He laughed again.
He stood up on his toes and moved his arms about.
He stood back on the soles of his feet and opened his eyes.
He smiled.
“I just have to face it. I can’t fly anymore.”
He heard a voice behind him.
“What a shame.”
He turned around. It was Belinda, she stood there in the doorway in her yellow spring dress.
“Not being able to fly, I mean!”
He grinned, very happily.
“And you were such a good bird, Father.”
“I thought you were the bird.”
Alex opened his arms and beamed.
“Oh, Belinda. Come into Daddy’s arms.”
She walked calmly to him and they embraced.
They stood there for quite a bit just embracing.
She felt his familiar warmth, his back, his skin.
He felt her curves and her familiar soft hair, her arms, her back.
They stepped back and looked at each other.
Softly, she said: “I can’t believe you made it, Dad!”
He nodded, thoughtfully.
“You know what, I can’t believe it either … I went through hell to get you all out, just to be able to stand here and tell you how much I love you.
“I am proud of you, father.” She looked up at him. “So proud.”
He gave her a little peck on the nose and she smiled. “I am proud of you.” He paused. “Was it hard for you?”
She shook her head.
“Liar!”
She closed her eyes. “It is over!”
“That is true.”
“When time is ripe I might have to talk about it one day” Belinda said, looking out of the window, “just as you will want to open your heart about it all to me or anyone one day. But …”
She looked at him.
He nodded.
“I know you are thinking the same thing, Father, so say it …”
”The memories of going through hell and destroying your fear is almost a memory of happiness, whereas being chased by your fear isn’t. We were chased by our fears for thirty years and now we have conquered them.”
Princess Belinda and King Alexander walked to the window, crossed their arms over their chests and leaned out of the window, looking out across the plains.
“Nice view, isn’t it?”
”Yes. I’ve missed it.”
“The sky is so beautiful from up here.”
”I love it here in the mornings. So happy I can experience it again.”
He embraced her with his left arm. “With you.”
There was a thought in Belinda’s head forming.
Alexander could hear it tingle and wait to pop out.
“Dad?”
”Yes.”
”Do you miss them?”
”Who?”
”The angels. I heard you talk to yourself and you sounded just like Michael.”
Alexander looked at Belinda and smiled, shaking his head. “You are a psychic.” He nodded. “Yes. I do miss them. I miss their advice. I miss their conversation. I miss their love. I miss the campfires. The way Raphael pokes around in the fire while he talks.” He made the gesture, imitating Raphael. “I miss that.” He sighed again.
Belinda took him in her arms and said: “You don’t need to miss them, because they are in you, you are in them now. You have completed tasks no one in life yet has completed. You are the only soul that has personally saved 36 souls, no --- 37 including yourself, from the jaws of hell and escaped and now is standing here as proof of it all. Proof that light is what counts.” A tear rolled down her cheek. “Inspiration and light and love and emotion. Be proud of that, Dad. Be proud of yourself.”
Alexander smiled. “Daughter.”
”Yes?”
”Be proud of yourself, as well, yes? You have taken us all pretty far. Without you, there would have been no journey at all. You saved me.”
She nodded. “Then stay on these roads, don’t go back to that fear.”
“I wouldn’t know why. I am now in full control. Fear has left me. Her name was always Lucinda.”
Belinda shook her head. “Lucinda had nothing to do with it. You were always in control of that fear. But you let it conquer you, just like I did. Don’t let that happen again.”
Alex nodded.
“Promise?”
”I promise.”
With that, the two were interrupted by Theodore who came rushing in to the room without knocking.
They looked over their left shoulders toward the open door.
He was holding a beige parchment lowered in his right hand. He was panting.
“Oh, I am sorry. I didn’t knock. I can come back if you like.”
His lips was trembling. It looked as if he was laughing.
They both shook their heads. “No, no. What is the matter?”
Theodore laughed aloud this time, holding the document in the air.
“Very strange story this, Sire!”
Alexander took a step toward Theo.
“What is that in your hand?”
“I thought you would be here, it always used to be your morning ritual.” He handed the king this document. “Happy you are here. You need to … hear this.”
He walked up to Alex, hugged him, then stepped back.
Then he hugged Belinda.
“Just had to hug you both, sorry.”
Belinda caressed his cheek. “No need for apologies. There is no hierarchy among spirits.”
He nodded and smiled, happily. “Yes.” He sighed, calmly. “You are right. We are all first and foremost spirits now.”
They took a long look at each other.
Alex waited and waited and waited. It almost seemed as if the two had fell in love.
He cleared his throat.
“Oh.” Theo said, confused.
Alex softly indicated at the parchment paper.
“What is that, Theo my boy?”
He lifted the paper and laughed, not being able to believe it.
“This document was delivered just now, with yesterday’s date here on the top, by” Theo laughed to himself, embarrassed, “a bird.”
Alexander shook his head. “Delivered here by a … bird?”
Theo nodded.
“What kind of bird, Theo?”
”Magnificent thing, Sire. It is the most magnificent bird I have seen. An eagle.”
Belinda and Steven looked at each other, astounded.
“Sits there on the left lion on the pillar by the main gates.” Theo shrugged. “Just sits there and looks around, just looks at you with these big eyes, refuses to leave.”
He had a red box around his neck tied to it with a blue ribbon. In it was this.”
Theo handed him the paper.
Alexander looked at it.
Wonderful writing, it stuck out and seemed to glow in its own light and was not written with any normal pen. He did not know what kind of ink this was.
Alex could not say how long he held that document. He only knew that he could not place where he heard about this letter before. He remembered a campfire. He remembered … why was this familiar? It was the declaration of the defeat of the darkness.
It was an official document that told everyone who read it that
“Should I read it for you?”
Belinda put her head on his shoulder and said, softly:
“I can read myself.”
Alex looked at his daughter and she smiled, teasingly. “But still, I love hearing your voice. Read.”
Theo smiled as Alex lifted the paper and cleared his throat.
There was a feeling of mutual trust, way beyond anything he had experienced.
He knew that this letter was an official document and still nothing more than a personal letter from an angel, whether the sender was human or not. He knew that he had gone through hell to get here. He knew that he wanted to hug his daughter and tell her how much he loved her.
Before he did so, he read this parchment paper aloud to his two friends.

September 24th 1425

By way of messenger to H.M. King Alexander Ruler of Prosperania

The legend tells us that our countries have fought each other for centuries.
Since John ripped the initial Prosperanian Militia Treaty in two on the 17th of March 1106,
the battle in our area has raged on.
Greater Nocturania was born on July 2nd 1108, defeated on May 6th 1168 to form Prosperania’s smaller western neighbour, Nocturania.
Since then these two neighbours have battled endlessly.
THIS BATTLE IS NOW OVER.
WE FORFEIT.
OUR LEADER IS DEAD.

Officially, by the signed party, this much can be stated:
Every possible heir to the throne from the supreme Reign of the Johnathans has died by the former ruler’s own hand.
Therefore, no other heir is left at all here who can be legally assigned to rule the country.

Since 1108, John and his ancestors have ruled this land. But due to the work of Adnicul Nocturne, who now in this document verifiably is stated to be deceased, they too are all dead by his own hand, an act that took place chiefly in the 1390’s and early 1400’s, whence his takeover to the throne took place, alongside his aide-de-champ Lucinda Winsletenna.

This morning, shortly before sunrise on the 24th of September 1425, I, the signed party, acting as only surviving member of the militia ministry, found Adnicul Nocturne’s body unclad without eye patch by his fireplace. His hair was tied in a ponytail in the back as it once had been when he first came to the country in 1390 and his hands were folded on his stomach
There was a white sheet covering his body.
A small note was attached to the white sheet.
The note read: “Alexander, thank you for saving my soul, Love, the original angel”

On the other side of the room lay a dead raven.
The raven’s beak was open and it had a green stone in its beak.
When properly examined the green stone seemed to be of no value, so it was thrown in an underground lake in a nearby cave, where I myself witnessed it cracking open and falling into many pieces. The raven itself was interesting specimen and it is not clear if it has anything to do with the death of His Majesty King Adnicul.
All that can be said is that it was a raven and that it had a burn mark on it beak, the letter L.

Due to these circumstances, Adnicul’s staff and I have had a crisis meeting,
around the recent break of day.
We have inner troubles, poverty, a problem with rape attacks mostly by the Fraytollah pirates.
There is food shortage. There are gypsy attacks and there is draught.

We were once a part of your nation, prior to the 1108 takeover.
Due to our lack of sufficient aid and kingship, we ask thee humbly to consider the prospect of taking us under our protection or helping us form a new nation, maybe under new name, new leadership. This is a plea from someone who wishes to reshape the country.

You might ask us why we seek your help so suddenly after attacking your countryside.
The answer is that King Adnicul was the only one left hold the country together.
His initiative to terrorize your country was the only reason to do so.
He had the entire militia against him and this was the only official secret left here.
The pirates and crooks from the Fraytollah Harbour were used in the wars, but had never made it that far without Adnicul’s help. The official militia was always close to rebellion and it was often said that if Adnicul was dead, there would be no victory for Nocturania, for good or ill.
Within an hour of Adnicul’s death, this letter was sent by air by the fastest bird we have.
We expect it to reach your palace in approximately four hours.

It is sent to you by an eagle, the symbol of the philosophers among evangelists. The Nocturanian Eagle, to be precise. A bird we share with your country in our symbol, I believe as the fastest flyer among beasts. It is unorthodox, but highly dependable, to use it for this purpose.
And so, by air, this message reaches you.
We hope you take it seriously.

There is one last thing, though.
By Adnicul’s dead corpse was his long lost family tree.
This might be surprising to you to hear and might influence you to discard this document as false, but I assure you that these facts are true.
His family origin had always been a mystery, but now it is revealed due to a family tree we did not know existed and whose origin we are unable to trace.
As we said, no one knows who put him there in this position by the fire or how he died, only that he was found dead before dawn today and this by a sheer coincidence.

Adnicul’s father, this much was known, was a gypsy, a traveller robber and pirate.
He came from a long line of pirates who all travelled the plains of Africa stealing from the rich with the Gfuhre Raiders. A long line of fathers and sons and occasionally daughters were responsible for horrid crimes against the rich ever since the 7th century.
Adnicul’s family tree can be traced back to Zeltar Winsletenna, John’s bastard son who escaped Clurafar on May 6th 1168 and joined the raiders.

The circle is now completed.

So, you see, Adnicul was in many ways your own brother.
Nocturania was born in a family feud on July 2nd 1108 and died on September 24th 1425.
This is the official document verifying this fact.

We eagerly await your reply.

I am willing to come to Clurafar to discuss the official details and eventually conjure up a plan how
to ‘clean up’ areas such as the Fraytollah Harbour.

Signed,

Zelat G. Murani

Zelat G. Murani
Former Nocturanian Minister of the Militia
Grand Hall
Rigor Mortis
Nocturania
September 24th 1425


Alexander lowered his hand with the document and took a long look at Theo, who stood with his left hand against his mouth, looking at the lower part of the wall in front of him with wide open eyes.
He was shaking his head and laughing to himself.
He then looked up and smiled, lowering his hand.
Alexander looked at Belinda and she was leaning against the fireplace behind her, lowered arms, looking up at the ceiling. She lowered her eyes, smiled and sighed. She nodded. It was such a familiar, happy nod. The nod of a young woman who had gone through hell and now was getting the reward.
Alexander shook his head and grinned.
“I would’ve never thought that it would’ve come so soon!”
“Nocturania’s defeat?”
”Did you believe in a capitulation?”
”After going through hell and winning, yes. The country has no grounds to stand on. Everything that they built their kingdom on is now gone, erased, eradicated. How could they go on?”
”But so soon?” Theo whispered.
Belinda spoke calmly. “Why not? When the Lord has seen your triumph he rewards you. When you take away the evil at the lowest level, the rest has to follow suit. A weed cannot grow where the roots no longer exist.”
Theo pointed at the seals.
”What are they? Why four?”
Belinda walked up to her father and put her left arm around his back and her head on his shoulder.
“The cross and the half moon represent the different faiths, I would gather, eastern and western. The flag means ‘defeat’. The drop, I gather, is a drop of blood and symbolizes my family ties with …” Alex paused and grinned to himself and thought for a moment “ … Adnicul. Amazing, I was related to him.”
“He was a changed man” Theo said. “He was not the man he used to be.”
“I will tell you sometime about how much he changed only during our mutual undertaking” Alex mused. “I have him to thank for my life.”
”He thanks you for his soul” Belinda said, softly, closing her eyes, still resting on his shoulder, now with her cheek on it.
He caressed her other cheek.
“Yes. Exactly.”
“Sire?”
”Yes, Theo?”
”I am happy that we are here together, together in this new reality, past the visions, past hell. I was afraid a moment there back in …”
“I know, Theo, so were we all, but let the past lie were it lies. We are in present now. Ready to face this life.” He smiled. “I am happy to be here, too.”
“Do you want to see the eagle, your majesty?”
Alex nodded. “Yes, please. And I think we should notify the others.”
Theo nodded. “I will show you the eagle first.”
”All right.”
Belinda opened her eyes, took her father’s hand and walked with him and Theo down the hallway, down the stairs to the first landing and then to the left. They walked down the hallway and headed down the large staircase to the marble floor.
They saw that the door was open.
Out there, by the magnificent bird, sat the eagle, just as Theo had explained.
Around it, stood Steven, Morgana, Patrick and Rolf.
Belinda at once walked up to Steven and embraced him very tight.
“Good morning, my Sweet pea!”
She just moaned a muffled “Morning!” happily against his shirt.
“Amazing bird, isn’t it? It just sits there calmly.”
Alex handed Steven the note.
“Read this, this’ll make the bird even more extraordinary.”
”What is this?”
”Read it aloud to all of us, that saves time.” Alex held up his hand. “Rolf!”
”Yes?”
”How many are awake?”
”I don’t know, ten of us maybe.”
“Go and gather as many as you can and get them here to see the eagle whilst they hear this letter being read to them.”
”No problem.”
Rolf disappeared through the door and Steven read to himself, Morgana and Patrick read over his shoulder and as they did, the early autumn breeze tickled their hair and opened their eyes.
“I think we all have a right to hear this!”
Theo raised a finger and shook it. “It is our duty to hear it!”
Alex chuckled. “After what we have been through, absolutely.”
Belinda looked at the eagle with his magnificent white beak, it large hunting, gazing eyes and royal feathers, its long wings tucked in at the side, its claws, large and perilous but very safe and calm. A royal animal of the skies, the Prosperanian Eagle. Now, it only belonged to them, the Prosperanians. No attacker ever could come close to using it in vain.
“Some fresh fruit for you all!”
Some turned around and nodded and thank Geena as she was on her way back from the table, where she had put the bowl.
“Geena” Steven cried. “Stay here. You should hear me read this letter.”
”Oh?” She looked surprised. “Really? What ever for?”
Alex smiled and said: “You don’t want to miss this.”
She nodded to the king and that is when she saw the eagle.
She stopped in her tracks and walked as if in church down the steps, almost fell down the third step and stopped to see the eagle.
“What a magnificent creature.”
”How’d it land here?”
”It came this morning from Nocturania with that letter over there that Steven is reading.”
She looked at Steven.
Steven shook his head. “This is amazing news, Alex!”
”Do you believe it, Father?” Morgana said.
“I don’t see why not” Alexander answered. “It all makes perfect sense!”
“Weeds cannot grew without roots, you see” Patrick filled in.
“That’s exactly what I said” Belinda nodded.
The eagle seemed unbothered by all of this attention. It sat there on the column surrounded by three or four people and it seemed completely unproblematic that there were people around. It looked around and met none of their eyes, looked around as if it sat on the plains somewhere in the wild, waiting for some sign to fly off and hunt.
Rolf came out a few minutes later with many people, dressed in morning robes, togas, uniforms, normal day clothes or the like. Some were drinking hot morning herbal drinks in cups, some apple juice in lead glasses, some were drinking mead, some were eating a cake or a roll. One or too tired belches came rolling out and Alex even heard a fart. There was the happy, excited new-life-attitude to this crowd. Everyone had unexpectedly been saved from hell and there was a whisper and a giggle and a happy-go-lucky dancing feeling to this whole group.
Walter, the old smoothie, had gathered a very luscious blonde from the group of senatorials and was cuddling her as he entered the porch. Maria and Martin were fully dressed and were only drinking juice, although their eyes were small. Richard came and gave his Morgana a kiss. Bernardus Paul was holding a conversation with Erica and Lance. Fabian was chattering with Alfred and showing him a wooden toy horse. Patricia had joined Ruby and Eleonora in a threesome of giggly girl talk.
Sieglinde and Zedrick had obviously joined forces in walking down here, they were both in bed clothing. King Mormidar of Hispania was helping Queen Henrietta of Margetania out and she smiled happily, as old ladies do, when younger men help them walk. King Iwar was holding a small tete-a-tete with Mustafus and both were in bathrobes.
Bantrard followed everyone, silently plucking his lute.
The eagle remained calm, unimpressed by all this noise.
“How on earth did you gather so many people this morning?”
Rolf shrugged as the noise died down.
Most people had already seen the eagle and were now gathering around to see the magnificent animal, asking themselves what this was, why it was here.
“As you might’ve gathered, I called you all here because of an extraordinary event that occurred this morning. My messenger Theo came running up to my study this morning and told me that an eagle, this eagle, had come as a messenger with the document that Steven is holding.” Alexander pointed at the eagle and Steven held up the letter. There were ooh’s and aah’s everywhere. “We have all gone through hell to be where we are today. We have been rewarded today by something so extraordinary it defies all explanation. But it is, apparently the truth. I know this man’s handwriting and it is authentic. Therefore, Steven, I bid you begin reading this letter.”
As the group heard the young Prince-General read the letter, Belinda and Alexander could witness how all of the jaws dropped one by one. Some laughed, some applauded, some fell to their knees and cried, some just stood there, watched the eagle and smiled.
There was a long pause when this groups gathered amongst themselves.
Alex spoke to them and said he intended to make this public and contact Mr. Murani himself to see what actually was true and how it could be arranged to help or possibly make the Old Nocturania into a part of the Greater Prosperania.
It would all take time, but this was the beginning of a greater nation, a safer nation, an empire of peace. The giddy group applauded and were sent laughing and cheering back to their breakfast.
Steven, Belinda, Sieglinde and Alex, they stood by the eagle for about a half hour gazing at the animal after that, speaking of the bright future.
The only one left alone was the king himself in the end.
As he heard his family walk up the stairs and headed up himself, it struck him.
He had been told about this. He turned around, that old familiar recognizing thought coming back, like a happy jester, giggling as he ate his supper and making a witty joke. Like a familiar friend after a long absence, it all came back to him and he had to smile. He looked at the eagle and smiled.
Back with Adnicul by the campfire, he had said it, had he not?
“The fact is that when the dark empire falls, you will know by a raven or a dove or an eagle that it has fallen and it will be surprising, I guarantee it.”
He shook his head, chuckled to himself.
“You told me back then, didn’t you?”
The eagle seemed to nod at him from the back.
Alexander walked down the steps and looked at the animal.
“If you could only talk. If you could only know what I am thinking.”
There was a slight response of a sort when the eagle looked straight into his eyes and seemed to penetrate his vision, his spirit. He saw everything in the eagle’s eyes. The innkeeper, the hermit, the angels, the younger versions of himself, the forest people, Carla, Fabian, Old Father, even Adnicul, yes, even Oleana was inside those eyes. Even Beata and even the angel on the rock with the green stone was in the light of those eyes.
For a long time that eagle and Alexander was the only thing happening in the universe
No other living being could enter that universe at all.
The eyes were huge and they looked straight into his.
The eagle opened his mouth and spoke.
“Alex!”
“Excuse me?”
He stepped back. Had he been mistaken? Had the eagle said something? Called him Alex?
Alexander felt the gravel under his sandals, the crunching of stone under his feet.
It seemed very loud.
He looked at the eagle and realized he was alone.
The wonderful thing was that he was not afraid at all.
Alexander looked into the main entrance hall, not a soul there.
He looked to his left and his right, he turned around and looked up and down.
It had been the eagle. He had seen him open the beak and say it.
“Say it again.”
No answer.
The eagle looked around as if waiting for something.
Slowly, Alexander Winsletenna began walking away from the eagle and took the first step up to the porch. He heard a fluttering of wings, fabric hitting the ground, a swooshing sound.
He did not turn around but he assumed … what?
He took another step up to the porch and then heard the voice.
It was warm , familiar, friendly.
“Hello, Alex!”
Slowly, Alexander turned around.
That was when he saw the angel.
He was back.
Michael was back, smiling, beaming at him
He had been the eagle, coming for one last time to say hello.
The angel seemed to look through the king in a way that made him feel strangely happy. It felt good that this spirit was able to see though him like he did. There was a half smile that emerged upon his lips and Alex had no chance but to respond back to his friend with the same half smile.
“Good morning, Michael!”
He took a step forward toward his majesty and stopped, cocking his head and sighing. There was satisfaction there. The resolved happiness of a redeemer who had spent eternities hunting a brother down and who had finally been … what? Hunted down? He did not know what had happened, but he knew when he embraced the angel that he saw the two blood brothers making an oath on a beach somewhere in Eden and that there was pain there. Vanquishing Lucifer was more than crushing evil for Michael, it was simply helping family.
He felt warmth, hugging Michael. There was warmth there and happiness, even thankfulness.
As they let go Alexander’s eyes drifted across the garden lawn in front of the main entrance and realized that this was all a part of his life again and that he had fought for this.
He looked at Michael.
“We all tried to reach you for years.”
Alex sighed. “How do you mean?”
”We tried to reach your soul.”
“I was blocked, was I not?”
Michael nodded. “When Lucinda disappeared she left a mark in your soul that had you being scared of everything. Life, death, everything. You spent years trying to redeem the fact that you had lost time and were losing time worrying. Lucinda left making a promise that you saw to that she kept by constantly worrying … about being worried that she would come to hunt you.”
Alexander looked at his guardian angel and shook his head. He looked down.
“I should not have been so scared, I called her to me by having these feelings, I know. There was always a spiritual connection there.”
Michael caressed Alexander’s cheek, who felt a glow there when the hand left him.
“That is all over now.” He beamed. “You have made yourself proud.”
Alexander felt a tear slowly trickling down his cheek.
“And us?”
”Yes?”
”Yes” the angel chuckled.
“Michael.”
”Yes?”
”I never thought I would make it. I gave up so many times. I still can’t believe all of that happened.”
“Believe me, it did.”
”I still have trouble grasping all of that.”
”I know.”
Alexander pleaded with Michael to answer him. “What lies ahead, Michael? I worry right now that something will …”
Michael raised his hand and right at once Alexander felt compelled to listen to his advice on stopping to talk. “You have saved your own life and other people’s as well. Your future is securer than ever. Nocturania is gone. The magic has happened.”
Alex nodded.
“Look at this garden.”
Michael put his hand around the king’s shoulder and started walking with him around the roses, begonias and chrysanthemums, the tulips and the daisies.
“You are a strong oak protecting these roses” Michael said. “Your problem is that you haven’t stopped to realize that you must stand by your choices. You spend all your time regretting that you threw Lucinda out. You hope that you hadn’t spent so much time discussing with your representatives from the committee before the attacks got worse or you would’ve been there when Morgana seduced Steven before the merger.” Michael shook his head. “You went to Alliland, you had your affair with Madeleine, you spent your time in hell. Now relish in the choices. You keep wishing you had been somewhere else, you keep wanting to be …”
Alex interrupted him. “Am I unthankful, Michael?”
“Why?”
“You give me all this and I thank you by being scared.”
Michael shook his head. “No, you are just restless. Learn to live with that.” He smiled so sweetly that Alex had to nod and smile back. “You have to be happy in the here and now. Don’t change the past, you can’t. Fix the present.” Michael giggled. “You should learn that at your age.”
The king chuckled. “Yes, I should, should I not?”
”Just be calm enough to enjoy the ride across the bumpy terrain. Pain and crisis is over for the most part. You have done great things. The rewards have only begun to arrive. Wait, be patient, and just have faith that what will happen will be good.”
Alexander looked across the roses. “I have a great task to accomplish.”
Michael shook his head and grinned. “You have already accomplished great tasks. You have saved 36 people from hell and you have rescued the world from evil domination. That is pretty good, isn’t it?”
Alex smiled. “You make it sound so easy. I still can’t get over the fact that I stood on that balcony and was tempted to take Beata in my arms and …”
”Hey” Michael said. “My brother was the dark part of my own star, we were once one star. I know about darkness.”
Alexander nodded. “Adnicul said the demons know a lot about souls from being in hell.”
Michael shrugged. “Angels might know about demons from hunting them.” Michael sighed and caressed Alexander’s back. They walked around the roses to the daisies. “Alex, be what you are. You can’t blame your own imperfection. Leave the past and be happy you made the choices you did. You can always fix the present.”
”I have a lot to be proud of.”
Michael nodded.
“Your world will be fabulous from now on.”
“What about the alternate reality?”
The angel shook his head. “Here in your life you will find that if you make your own world better it will influence everything. The truth is in the eye of the beholder.”
“Will everything happen the way it was foretold to me?”
Michael smiled. “You make your own future, but count on the fact that our support is endless.” Michael pointed at Alexander’s heart. “Your destiny lies embedded in there and within it you find all the answers you need. If your heart tells you to trust destiny will make your country great that will happen. We let you know through your emotions.” Michael smiled. “Your instinct will lead the way.”
”Thank you.”
”Thank you! After all, you managed to manifest the victory that we needed. You are responsible for the triumph that your country so needed. From now on all will be well.”
Alexander watched his friend’s long hands and thought about all those evenings by the campfires.
“Mercutio.”
”You miss him?”
Alex nodded. “I realize that he arrived in a time that already was fantasy, but I still miss him.”
Michael nodded. “Be proud that you are who you are. And take care of your grandchild.” He looked up. “I have to leave. You know you can always talk to me. I cannot always answer you in words, but your life will tell you as will your soul what I find is best and it will always make your heart sing, because we love you. Thank you for saving the peace of Eden. We needed that.”
”Thank you for saving my soul.”
Michael gave his friend a kiss on both cheek, lifted into the air, started flapping his large robe. That was when Alexander realized that he saw transparent wings behind him. They were hardly visible, but they were white, undoubtedly white. Happy, he realized that Michael was shining from above in a light that loved him so much. It brought tears to his eyes. Those were wings. Yes, he was sure of it.
Michael flapped his robe and as he did he said: “I will always be there for you!”
Slowly, he turned into the eagle and flew away into the sun, singing a song that he, the king recognized: “What will it be when you love me?”
Slowly, Alex turned his back to the garden and walked in to his palace.
As he did, with all the worry that had haunted his life in the past, he realized then and there that there was nothing to worry about. For the first time in his life, he knew that things were going to be fine. Nocturania was dead and gone. It was as surprising as it was logical. Now, the task was to make it a part of the Greater Empire of Light.
Alexander walked into his palace, looking once again behind him before closing the door.
He looked at the garden and remembered all the times that he had spent there worrying and thinking.
He could recall …
But now everything was fine. Why think of the past?
And so, King Alexander closed the door to his own garden and walked up the staircase to join his family for breakfast. He was on the brink of hope and surrender. He heard the music from the Grand Hall as he ascended the steps. He heard Belinda’s laughter and his wife’s insistent babble. He heard Morgana’s bubbling wobble of a laugh, He heard Patricia’s applause and knew right away that she was applauding her brother again dancing on the table like he had done yesterday after his fourth wine bottle and Erica’s apple cake. He heard Maria and Ellie singing with in Bantrard’s songs.
He smiled for he knew that this day, September 25th 1425, marked the end of his own haunted kingdom and the beginning of his own inner glory of worriless effort: his own triumphant land of the never setting sun. He was entering the faithful inner land of his own self. He realized then and there, walking into the Grand Hall and hearing the cheers of his family welcoming him, that “if God is for me who can then be against me”. It was his own soul accepting wonderfully rewarding and imperfect life, at last far away from the haunted kingdom. Words came to mind: “And at last there is peace”.


CHAPTER TEN

„AND AT LAST THERE IS PEACE“


Morning, October 18th 1430

Belinda had known he really wanted to join them and she could not tell him how important it was that he did. If he hadn’t done so, they would’ve had to find another way to prepare the surprise. After all, the 62-year-old man had spent many years now talking of an old horse that, as he said, “had taken him through hell successfully as through a storm”.
Regardless of the fact that the strange old reality had been windless, according to his own accounts, he was like many older men who relished in reliving old victories. This was now an old victory to many people.
To Alexander it was as if it had been yesterday.
Greater Prosperania was now a vast Empire with an Atlantic coast and a very easterly located capital and five neighbours. Alliland, Vindobon, Neapolitania, Hispania and Daneland had all proven to be endlessly cooperative neighbours. The fact that Brittania had become so keen on trade had been a surprise. There was more trade with Londonium than before and Martin Darbersham had now been renamed Senator Primus. He had also changed wig … and mistress.
Everyone had a feeling that they wanted to become more “roman”, although “Rome” was just the biggest province now in Neapolitania next to its capital of Neapel. 1430 was the year that Prosperania realized its potential as, just like Zedrick had pointed out last April, “a new peaceful Rome”.
The end of the Roman Empire was a millennium back now, but Prosperania had always been seen as its successor. The Wandiffian Princes and their Christian cult had been a product of clearly Germanic influence and had soon grown to uphold the principles of the old Rome. Accordingly, infrastructure and hygiene and culture were upheld. The only thing that was taken from elsewhere was the natural medicine. Old traditions of natural healing herbs were used to form a rather officially set physician’s professional practice. When the first explorers returned from Asia they took with them the Mongolian and Zarathustrian traditions.
All this was icing on the cake to Alex.
He knew that the main point was that his empire had the chance of making a real difference in promoting spirituality to a Godly creation that had somehow forgotten what it felt like to be “holy”, forgotten what it felt like to smile.
Londonium as an old roman province had always followed suit and claimed to be inventors almost of their upheld infrastructure and hygienic culture. First now had the Senator Primus admitted to being a full member of the merger and even asked Alex for advice by way of messenger.
It was all very refreshing and wonderful for Alex to experience his own world blossoming.
It was as if he had travelled miles and miles for years and years completely alone and now in his old age finally saw that all of that hard work was paying off.
Fraytollah was still a problem. It was still unclear how deep the well was and how much underground piratry had actually been used to keep the harbour going. Nobody ever found out why Nocturania so completely fell apart after Adnicul’s surprising demise five years back. The pirates that had been working in the harbour were scattered and some of them could be caught and imprisoned. Some of them took a leap into unorganized crime and some of them gave up completely.
The old forest gypsies kept on being forest gypsies and basically being as female oriented as ever. Strangely enough, though, the tribes had stopped fighting and rumours had it that the queens now had joined forces. The only competition, so the legend had it, lay in how large they could make their male harems. The neighbours all protested to letting them stay within the new lands, the senators in Clurafar urged Belinda to do something or at least speak to her father about it.
Alexander answered what Mormidar had said as the only advocate for the cause in Medatlantia, that natural harems were “a relatively harmless way of expressing passion”. That was that, as Alex said again and again. The “old farts in Clurafar” were only frustrated Susanna-watchers.
Rigor Mortis was now a western outpost with bureaucrats checking records and regularly travelling the countryside to check on the citizens.
What the entire Clurafar Royalty and 36 original hell travellers found funny, in the light of their own past, was that the former Nocturanians now were more loyal to the Prosperanian crown that, well, the original Prosperanian themselves.
They even seemed to event national holidays no one had ever heard of over here, such as Alexander-Day on the 26th of August. Yes, here it was said that the guests in inns would toast to Alex on that day, but in means ways it a national holiday. Well, in Yambollah it was a holiday with banners all over the place.
It was still a poorer area than the rest, but it was safe and it was relatively crimeless, except for the occasional raid and the odd robbery that also occurred here..
Health was still a problem as physicians were rare in the “new lands”. Herbal treatment with natural medicine, an old roman tradition mixed with Moric healing, had always been a Prosperanian delight. Over there it was something that they seemed to reject, due to their own past.
The old Johnathans had all been witchdoctors.
The result was a present eastern plethora of aches, pains, limps, lisps and rotting teeth.
Alfred was now seven and a special tutor had been called in from the north kingdom of Olandus who spent more time with him than his parents. He had tutored the royal family in the capital Calmare in fencing, geography, art, customs, horseback riding, politics, languages, history and algebra. These were the topics that Alfred also was learning to master since the autumn of 1429.
The most amazing thing to everyone was that this handsome young tutor from Calmare only was 21 years old. Everyone wondered how this man could have so much knowledge at such an age. By his own accounts, Karl Knutsson Bonde had studied very hard, promoted by his father Knut Tordsson Bonde, and soon enough was given the possibility to tutor the royal family at Calmare Castle.
It was a complete coincidence that Theo, on a mission to ride to Calmare with a merger message, met the young man and brought him to Clurafar to help negotiate. Language was not a problem. Prosperanian was a language he had learned whilst studying for Ulfaas Nordhjiil at the Danish Court of Elsinore Palace in 1426, sent by his father to learn international customs.
Two years now, Karl had been married to a sweet and dainty woman named Birgitta Bielke. She lived with Karl at The Rose. Morgana had now moved out and was living up north with Richard. Patricia had moved into the palace. Karl and Birgitta would often invite Alfred to the Rose, where he would practice his skills in fencing and playing the lute.
Alfred’s favourite subjects were politics and geography.
It was almost scary to his mother how intelligent her son was.
He spoke like a true gentleman and he fenced like a young warrior.
Most of that was Karl’s influence and, of course, the elegance of his parents lifestyle.
Steven, on the other hand, was not at all surprised over this blossoming youngster.
He had seen his son’s intelligence on his mother’s lap the first time, indicating that Hansel and Gretel had found their way back home by following the “breadcrumms”.
Steven was still spending a lot of time at army camps and on horseback inspecting troops that had nothing else to do but train on puppets made out of hay and cotton, thank God. He held speeches for and against subjects at various occasions and was part of a team that tutored physicians in survival training for travels to the new lands.
Belinda had always been a beauty, her female forms more often than not a focus of male attention. Now in her thirtieth year, something else had arrived. Genuine maturity. She had gained a little bit of weight. Not too much, but just enough to make it attractive enough that she had a little more breast to show off and a little more flesh on her behind.
Some of the “dirty old men” in the senate would make small passes at her and all she would have to do was to look at them and they would take a step back. She often told Steven about this, who offered to help. He was rejected with the argument that she never ever would need a man to help her make a point.
It didn’t surprise Steven at all.
Belinda was still Belinda, but she had stopped being such a worrywart a long time ago.
No reason to be scared.
Belinda and her father were now walking down the staircase toward the main entrance.
Alexander was wearing his favourite blue cape and red vest.
Belinda wore a green dress and a small pointed hat with a veil looked “dainty” according to Steven.
Zelat had insisted on coming with and was standing by the coach outside waiting.
Father and daughter walked down the marble staircase until they reached the chequered floor. Alexander glanced at the painting of himself to the right and smiled.
“Shouldn’t we take that down?”
Belinda looked at him, surprised.
“What ever for?”
He shrugged. “I look so … vain.”
“You are vain.”
Alex eyed heavenward. “You know what I mean.”
Belinda smiled. “The bad old days?”
He chuckled. “I always had to prove myself.”
“You still do.” She corrected herself. “Think you have to.”
He looked at her with a mixture of admiration and irritation.
“I love you.”
”Why?” She laughed. “Because I answer back?”
”You never give me a chance to get away with anything.”
”I am just calling your bluff.”
”What bluff?”
“That you think I don’t know what you are speaking of.”
”What am I speaking of?”
”Your past, Father. Your past.”
He grew quiet. “Aye. You’re right. I am calmer.”
Belinda smiled, for she realized that her father had changed altogether the last five years.
She had as well.
Rolf came shooting out from the corridor to the back wing of the palace.
“Your majesty!”
Alex smiled at him. “Rolf!”
”How are we?”
Alex smiled. “I hope that we are fine.” A slight chuckle protruded from his lips.
Belinda answered for him. “Just fine, Rolf. You sent off Steven and my siblings?”
Rolf nodded. “They went off to the monument an hour ago to discuss something rather with Cretan, don’t know what.” Rolf turned to Alex. “Your majesty, Geena and I are preparing the peacock for this evening.”
“With Vindobonian Sauce this time?”
”We will surprise you. You have to be patient.”
Rolf opened the heavy door and smiled at his majesty as he walked out.
“I will try.”
Alexander’s closest servant was still agile, but walking slower now as two years his junior.
Belinda saw that as he walked down the steps to help his majesty down.
Alexander himself was 62 now and his knee was hurting him again, more than ever. He kept saying how happy he was for the pain that reality gave him, it meant he was alive. Belinda often just eyed heavenward and claimed that he could not be thankful forever for the pain, just because it had returned after the victory. Alexander without exception always answered that he preferred a physical ailment as a payment for his spiritual bliss and not the other way around.
Why was she so harsh, he asked her?
She was not harsh, only self confident.
She had spent years paying her dues, she was not willing to pay anymore.
“Good morning, Zelat!”
He twitched his large moustaches and smiled, displaying his buck teeth, his happy eyes glowing.
“You are dressed well this morning, Murani” Alex mused. “What is the occasion?”
Zelat laughed. “I gather the presenting off a triumphant monument to your accomplishments, Sire!”
Alexander looked at Belinda, play-acting seriousness. “My accomplishments? What’ve I ever accomplished?”
Belinda giggled. “Gas …”
”I beg your pardon?”
Belinda’s bubbly dance of a laugh had her cleavage bounce.
”Get in the coach!”
Alex did as he was told.
“That is no way to speak to me!” He made a dramatic gesture. “After all, I am the king.”
Belinda waved him off disarmingly and looked up to greet Theo, sitting on the driver’s seat ready to make the four young stallions ride off.
“Morning!”
Theo looked down at her highness, wincing at the autumn sun.
“Chilly up there?”
Theo grinned. “I am used to the cold air. Besides” he said, indicating at his fur coat, “I have this … You must be cold, though?”
Marie-Louise came tripping down the steps to the coat laying a black coat over Belinda’s shoulders. She looked over her left shoulder and thanked her.
“That is why we have servants who take care of us.”
”Oh” Alex cried from inside the coach. “I almost forgot to greet you. Good morning, Theo!” Alex sing-songed. “How are we today?” Alexander took a look at Rolf and smiled. Rolf nodded and closed his eyes, knowing the jibe had been at his expense.
“I am doing very well. You, Sire?”
“Fine, my knee has never hurt so much. Means I’m alive.”
“You are a brave man.”
He laughed, mouth closed. It came out as giddy irony. “Bravery is my speciality.”
The former Nocturanian Defense Minister Zelat Murani twitched his moustache twice and nodded, lifted Belinda’s hand and kissed it. Belinda smiled sweetly, feeling the tickle of his large facial hair against her frail hand.
“Shall we leave?”
Belinda looked at Zelat and nodded.
“I am happy to be working for you and your father, Belinda.”
She smiled. “I know what it means to you to be a part of this empire, Zelat.”
He closed his eyes and raised his eyebrows. It was a gesture of humanity, of sleepy love and slight embarrassment of a people to long abused.
“We are happy that you are happy.”
He nodded. “You are so beautiful, Belinda. I met you when you were a girl. You’ve filled out just a tad and it suits you.”
She looked down and shook her head. “So everyone says.” She looked up.
“You are going to be almost as good a ruler as your father.”
“Almost?”
”You are going to be grand.”
She caressed his cheek.
Alex was growing impatient.
She nodded to her father and looked back at her friend.
“I know you have a crush on me, Zelat” she said almost in a whisper.
He looked surprised and then broke into a slight grin. “The old Achille’s Heal of widowers. Besides, I am way too old for a married woman.”
Belinda lifted her hand and caressed his cheek. “Yes, I am married” she said somewhat matter-of-fact. “But I am flattered.”
Alexander cleared his throat inside the coach.
Belinda nodded and stepped in.
Zelat waved the servants goodbye, followed Belinda into the coach, secretly watching Belinda’s backside as she sat down and Theo whipped the horses into action.
Soon enough the entourage was off and not until way outside the palace gates did anyone speak.
That morning had marked the twenty-third month of work on what had been called Triumph Avenue. Just under two years of work had been the labour of love for the victories of the modern age.
“Will anyone tell me” Alexander said, teasingly, “why we are leaving so soon. After all, it still morning. The ceremony is first when the sun hits its zenith.”
Belinda looked at Zelat and smiled. “He is so curious.”
Zelat nodded, agreeing. “Oh, yes. The eternal question always bothers him.”
Belinda giggled. “Why?” She looked at her father bemused. “Why is something you always ask, even when ...”
There was a pause. “Even when what?”
Zelat continued for Belinda when he thought she wouldn’t. “I think she means even when there is no reason to ask anything.”
“Why do you always have to analyse me? I am the king, for God’s sake. The king does not want to be analysed.”
Belinda looked down. “My apologies, Father.”
Zelat nodded. “I extend mine as well.”
There was another pause before Alex spoke again.
”Questions amuse me, if you want to know.” Alexander sighed. “Of course they do, how else will I find out anything if I did not ask.”
”You know enough already” Belinda said, looking out at the countryside. She looked back at her father. He looked at her incessantly.
“What do you mean by that?”
She saw his hurt look, smiled and took his hand. “Oh, no. Not anything like that. I mean, we have a little surprise for you.”
Alexander raised his eyebrows happily, his former sad heart now enlightened.
”I am curious why my entire family leaves way before us and what they are hiding.”
“We are not hiding our love for you, Father.”
Zelat began laughing. “You people are so much more entertaining than Adnicul.”
Alexander raised his right hand. “I know I’ve said before to you never to speak badly about that man. He has found his peace with God.”
Zelat nodded and held up his hands. “I know.” He smiled again and sighed. “I know.”
Belinda had those words dancing on her tongue before she spoke them.
“You are holding your breath, darling, what do you want to say?”
She smiled and breathed out, giggling. “Only that the people know that you have done great things.”
Alex looked at her, confused. Then he raised his eyebrows. Suddenly, it hit him. “Oh” he said, calmly grinning. “The legends, the stories, the cult. Do we have to talk about this?”
Belinda shook her head. “Don’t brush it off, Father. The people started spreading those rumours shortly after the eagle came with the message if not before. They say …”
Alexander looked at her. “What do they say?”
She closed her eyes. “They say what they say.” She wrinkled her brow. “Come now, you know what they say. We’ve discussed this.”
He nodded and looked at Zelat. “Thanks to you we brought it up.”
Zelat cocked his head and winked at the king. “You should be honoured that people are thinking this.”
Alexander smiled at his two companions. “What amazes me is that the people’s rumours often are true.” The king leaned forward and shook his head. “The children, I have heard, are being told I rode a year from Clurafar into hell fighting wolves and dragon and demons in order to crush Nocturania. They say that my family …” He stopped, for he saw Belinda looking down. “They say I saved them. They say I am an angel.”
He smiled, putting his hand on her left knee.
”All the rumours are true except the angel part.”
Zelat lifted a finger and opened his eyes wide. “Amongst the people of Nocturania, the real people of the country, there was an expression. We had taken it from folklore and from fairytales. It said ‘what you hear through the grapevine is an echo of an angel’s kiss’.”
Alexander smiled.
“That is nice, but leave the angels their exclusive rights to glory.”
Belinda agreed.
“Never heard that expression, Zelat. I like it.”
”It means” Zelat continued “that rumours are like the waves that a stone makes on the water. The impact itself might be small, but the effects of the impact might be greater than the actual event. That is always to be remembered. The decision and the venture you take on might take less than a minute, but it might determine your future.”
“I was a messenger and very few of us know what I had to go through to get where we are now.”
Zelat waited for something to be said. No one said anything and so he continued. “I don’t know exactly everything that happened in that world, but I do know that it saved us all. No tyrannical king gives up and dies so quickly. No country can be so vastly transformed so fast. The people knew that when they heard that Nocturania from one day to the next had given up and that Adnicul was dead. Besides, the ghosts were gone. The rumours simply came from the vibrations that were circling around the country. You can’t hide that you are a hero, Alex!”
Alex brushed that off. “Hogwash, I did my duty, nothing more ...” He looked out the window and it was clear to Belinda that her father was still in pain. Something was unfinished. Something left uncertain. He was missing something.
Belinda shook her head, vehemently. “No, Father. Not hogwash. You saved us all. We would have none of this if you had given up somewhere along the way. You didn’t and that is why we are here.”
The father took his daughter’s hand and smiled. “You know I just did it for you.”
There was a spiritual connection there that seemed to break every bit of ice in the universe. The earth hummed and Zelat, the old man who had written Nocturania’s death notice five years ago, sat and looked at the two family members, not being able to help himself. They were drawn to each other.
A tear rolled down her cheek and she dried it away.
“Then, thank you, Father!”
Belinda let her head fall onto her Father’s shoulder and it lay there until they arrived in Clurafar.
Zelat G. Murani sat and looked out the window, thanking the Maker that he was here to experience this, happy just to be alive to see the Golden Age.
The two thirty-feet columns were the new entrance to Clurafar. The two eagles on each of the columns, one looking east and one looking west represented the newly found freedom.
On the left column was the name Matthew written in gold letters and above it an angel.
Under it the name Mark was inscribed in silver and a lion had been carved into the stone.
Under it was an ox with the name Luke under it in white and beneath this name an eagle whose accompanying name John decorated the left column in the colour blue.
The right column had three angelic names carved into its surface: Michael, Raphael and Gabriel.
There was a fourth name under that, carved in Gold at Alexander’s own request.
It read: Mercutio, my friend.
At the end and at the top of each column the words Dominus et Jesus Regnavit.
The design and the initiative and been only Alexander’s. It was a thank you note to another world.
By now, the king had become a legend.
When they arrived, it was Alexander who first said how wondrous it looked.
The others had no choice but to agree.
King Alexander never spoke to anyone but his family about what had happened in what all they called “the lost years”. But the people knew that other explanations were necessary. This monument too many proved that the rumours were true. Alexander had communed with angels, he had once had a secret horse and Mercutio must’ve been the one that he spoke of.
As the three dignitaries stepped out of the coach they had Theo drive his coach away toward the small house that had been built by after the gates. They walked to the family who had the door to the left house open. These two houses were small houses, no more and were intended as a resting spot for travellers and nothing more. Built in old style with roman columns they entailed a fireplace and a separate kitchen and a thermal bath by the way of a side entrance.
There was a path leading to the back where coaches could be parked and horses could be fed. Theo was leading the coach in the back of the other one across the road.
Clearly, there was massive activity inside the left house. The door was open and a fire had been lit.
Alexander was the first one to walk in.
Fabian almost tripped over the king’s feet as he did.
The boy looked up, holding Lance by the shoulder’s in the midst of a tickling fit. He smiled.
“Morning, Grandfather!”
There was a slight confused expression on the boy’s face as he waited for a response.
Alexander smiled and ruffled the teenager’s hair. Lancelot was let go. He straightened out his purple cape and had it going swinging back over his shoulders. He felt he had gotten away from being teased again. The two boys went giggling over to the table of food and picked up a chicken leg each and began to eat. Erica came over from the fireplace and reprimanded the boys, who just shook their heads. As all this was going on, Belinda and Zelat came in.
“Good morrow to you all” Alexander cried out over the small room.
Steven, Morgana, Zedrick and a few others responded loudly. The others seemed to busy with food and wine to actually swallow before speaking, but they answered as well.
Sieglinde came up and gave her husband a kiss on the mouth. “Hello, my dear!”
Alex smiled, let his hand travel down to her waist and further toward her behind.
She shook her head.
“Not here” she reprimanded.
Belinda walked over to Steven and at once began conversing with Zelat and him about something.
Patricia and Patrick had sat by the fireplace until now and talked loudly about the taste of the wine when Alex walked up with his wife and interrupted them.
“Aren’t people a little wee bit drunk for this time of day?”
He was greeted with a kiss by both.
“Good morning, Papa!”
Zedrick walked up to Alex and gave him a silver cup of red wine. Alexander looked into the cup and smelled it. He looked at Zeddy, who walked away smiling. Sieglinde held her husband’s right hand whilst talking toward the other direction with Morgana. There was a lively atmosphere in this room. It felt like a homecoming feast. “I shall have to speak to the senate about my family’s drinking habits before work.”
Patsy gave her father a half-smile. “There is nothing like a bit of Prosperanian wine to start off the day, father!” Alexander shrugged and gazed at his children, mystified.
“Aaayyy don’t know ... there is something in works here.”
Sieglinde turned to Alexander again, holding up her hand to Morgana who had been in the middle of a sentence. “Did you think of reminding Rolf of the peacock tonight?”
Alexander shook his head. “I did not have to. He told me himself. I don’t know who told him.”
”Geena, most probably.”
Alexander put his hand on his wife’s shoulder. “Darling, I think it was unwise to have me come here so early, I mean what will I do know for almost two hours? My knees hurt.”
Sieglinde kissed him again on the mouth. “We wanted you to be here before the crowds.”
”I have been here among the crowds so often and not once has something happened.”
”Sweetheart” Sieglinde said. “See those boys over there?”
She pointed toward Lance and Fabian, now tasting the wine but interrupted by Erica.
“What about them?”
”They were the ones who you must thank after seeing what we have for you.”
Alex raised his left eyebrow and started to chuckle. He looked back at his wife.
“Thank them? What ever for? For tripping over my feet?”
Sieglinde sighed. “Can’t you just once listen to me?”
Alex put his hands around her waist. “I always do.”
She smiled, expressing a mixture of relief, irritation and sympathy. “Honeybuns,” she said, softly and femininely, “we have a big surprise for you.”
Alexander at once grew silent. Sieglinde took a long look at her king, caressed his cheek, kissed it and walked to the middle of the room. She clapped her hands three times with her firm motherly palms and after three more times the room grew quiet.
Matron spoke.
“Thank you” she said and looked over at Alex. “This man” she indicated at his majesty “just complained about being dragged here so early. But he does not know what we have for him.”
There was a cheer among the assembled, which quickly died down.
“I told him what these youngster here” she said and indicated at Fabian and Lancelot who were secretly sharing a mug of wine quickly taken away again by Erica “found at whilst in the army camp last spring.” She turned to Lance, the oldest of the two. “Lancelot Winsletenna, please tell us your story and that of your cousin’s discovery.”
Alexander looked at his grandson, who took a few steps forward prompted by his mother. Erica seemed the perfect hen mother, eager in her Hispanic beauty to see her son shine. There was much Hispanic handsomeness in Lance. Patrick was standing an inch away from Erica and his rugged features had been transported to the next generation. It was obvious what the two handsome parents had given Lance, if nothing else: good looks.
Typically juvenile, the boy scratched his leg and tried to remain calm in the midst of his shyness and began speaking.
“Well, grandfather. You know how I and Fabian were almost pushed into going on this riding tutorship outside town.”
Alexander nodded. “I know. I was the one who pushed you.”
There was laughter among the assembled.
“Well, we loved it the first day. We came back from the first day riveted.”
Fabian’s dark voice came bellowing across the room. “Tell about Shauna.”
Lance turned to Fabian and held up his hand. “I was getting to that. Let me tell the story.”
”Sorry.”
Fabian took another grape and put his hand in front of his mouth.
Slight giggles were heard. Sieglinde glanced at her husband who seemed transfixed.
He senses that some big surprise was on the way. He sensed what, but felt it too farfetched to believe. An old memory was coming back. An old hope of something lost.
“Well,” Lance continued, “the trick riding tutor was a former Celtic gypsy named Shauna Fairweather and she was only nineteen and so not much older than us. She had already won The Olympic Contenstant Crown in Rome in 1427, only sixteen at the time.” A half smile emerged on his face and it was obvious that Lance was in love. “Both Fabby and I had sort of fallen in love.” The boy turned red and began to snigger and turned to his mother. “I can’t do this, Mother.”
Erica held up her right hand and waved it at him. “You got yourself into this, boy.” Her Hispanic accent was charming and still there after all these years in Clurafar. “Now get yourself out. I never asked you to fall in love with an older woman.”
Morgana started to laugh her bellowing and very bouncy laugh.
Patricia cried: “Bravo, Hispania!”
Erica threw her left hand into the air, closed her eyes and said: “Una mujer madura tiene que enseñarle niños.”
Patricia, who spoke the language enough to understand it, answered this with a smile: “Entiendo perfectamente.” Meanwhile, Lance calmly stood there and waited for the laughter to die down.
When it did, he continued.
”Well, as you know and might gather from all this hoo-hah, Grandfather, Shauna and I fell in love. We didn’t have much time for each other. We were trick riding four hours every morning, competing two hours and then learning the skills of stable work for the rest of the day after weaponry on horseback. But in the evenings Shauna and I would ... you know.” He sighed. “Fabby already has his fiancée so I was given permission to keep to myself and Shauna. Besides, he had enough friends at the camp already.”
Lance made a pause and looked at the king, who seemed touched by this story but very keen on finding out its purpose.
“Two days before the course ended Shauna and I walked the stables. We had been together most of free time and felt we knew each other rather well now. She had offered to show me more of the stables.”
Erica started laughing.
Lance turned sardonically to his mother and play acted laughter. “Hah-hah-hah.”
She turned to Patrick, who seemed willing to calm his wife down. “Ella deseó probablemente demostrarle la visión.”
“Shh, Rica” Pat said. Lance turned to his majesty again.
“I had heard so much about your stories and your tales of your travels to save us back in hell.” These words stopped all noise in the room and a dead quiet arose. “You told me so much about your horse that he seemed like a friend to me.” He brushed it off. “Well, that is secondary. But we had this stable watchman who had spent his entire life in these stables who showed us around. He knew every horse by its name and birth and race and he told us stories, Grandfather, of how these horses had ended up here, if they were wounded or if they had special skills.”
Lance smiled in a way now that Alexander, who almost knew now what the boy was getting at, had to let that tear in his left eye, roll down his cheek.
“There was one horse that seemed so beautiful. The man called him Mercutio and he was born on September 24th 1425. He had only ridden now for one and a half years and was good enough to do training with recruits and young soldiers. He fit the description so perfectly that it seemed uncanny that there was no connection. There just had to be.”
Fabian walked over, calm and macho as ever, throwing his blond hair across his shoulders.
”Lance told me about this and, as you know, the stories touched me as well. I saw the horse and together with Shauna we decided to talk to Erica about it. We knew that this had to be a carnation of the horse that took you through the haunted kingdom. That horse was just a production of Lucinda’s illusion and of course disappeared when we entered the real world.”
Lance continued. “We had all been in hell and we knew that we would never have made it if you hadn’t been there. But you hadn’t made it without Mercutio.”
Alexander was crying now, not much but just enough to make it obvious how touched he was.
Fabian made an effort to continue.
“After completing the course we told Lance’s mother and she looked at the horse.”
”After a few visits in May, Belinda came along and she saw the horse. She had seen the horse closer than all of us, next to you, Grandfather and she swore that this horse was the horse. His mane had the same colour and faded into a lighter brown toward the back. The tail was unusually long just as she remembered and the eyelashes on the horse stuck out by being longer than on usual stallions.”
”The date, as well, Grandfather” Fabian continued. “This horse was born in that stable on the day after our return from the haunted kingdom. There had to be a connection.”
Erica and Maria walked up and took their son’s hands. It was haunting and beautiful to see these four individuals together at this occasion.
“We knew” Maria continued “a witchdoctor from the old lands that came and did a few sessions with the horse to find its spiritual origin. We had already bought the horse in Belinda’s name.” Belinda walked up and embraced Maria. “We kept it there thinking of a time to give it to you.”
Belinda continued. “We wanted to be sure, you see, Father. We knew that losing the only friend that had taken you through this endeavour was painful. We didn’t want to give you a horse that might be the one and then leave with a mystery.”
”We didn’t want to stir up old painful problems.”
Erica went on. ”The witchdoctor must’ve done four sessions with the animal who remained calm through all of it. It was obvious in the middle of July that this horse had indeed travelled the dimensions in the day after our return to be with you eventually here in Clurafar.”
“Then,” Belinda said, “then came the question of when to give it to you. You’ve said the last few years that birthdays don’t mean much to you and we wanted a spiritual day to mark the return of this re-entry of your companion into your life.”
A young woman came in from the back door and closed it promptly behind her.
She was very beautiful, to say the least.
Long blond, reddish hair fell right down to her buttocks and her simple farm dress made of cotton fell so gorgeously over her frame that it was obvious that any man could fall in love with her, nay go mad in her presence. Her slightly turned up nose lay dainty above a pair of luscious lips, whose companion dark blue eyes seemed to cry out for wild love.
“Lance here” she said, caressing his majesty’s back as she walked by “told me how you had planned the inauguration of this monument for almost two or three years now and that you more than anything wanted this to be a spiritual monument of the angels and your travels. This seemed the perfect time.”
Alexander’s back was still tingling from her touch. He knew her from somewhere. He knew this woman somewhere from his travels. Who was she? She had looked different back then, but he knew her. “Shauna?” he said quietly, his voice sounding old and unused.
“Yes, Alexander?”
“Miss Fairweather,” the king said shyly, “where is my horse?”
Shauna walked up to Alexander, caressed his cheek, leaned forward and kissed him sensually on the lips. A tingling feeling went through his entire body. It was a small lightning bolt that shot up to his brain danced around his groin and started caressing his heart. He remembered the beach, his own beach that he saw before entering Callenia, he remembered the angels upon that beach and he remembered Michael, Raphael and Gabriel and all their encouraging words of wisdom.
He remembered picnics with his children, he remembered the wedding.
He remembered his training in the forest with Old Father.
He remembered the queen that brought him there.
She let go of him, grabbed him encouragingly by the arms and said: “Follow me, my friend!”
She took his hand and lead him to a door that opened onto a lavish field full of green grass.
On that field a horse was standing calmly and eating some leaves and some greens in a trough that had been put there before him.
Transfixed by this stallion, this beautiful stallion, Alexander walked up to the horse and started caressing it. Its sweet skin and mane seemed so familiar, so friendly. He did not need any proof to see who this stallion was. He saw it in these brown eyes.
Belinda was standing feet away from her father, tears in her eyes as he heard him telling Shauna something that made her heart soar.
It was an odd thing to notice him tell Shauna and look at Belinda.
It seemed strange, but that was the fact.
“One takes a journey across the wasteland with friends, one suffers, one fights, one wins and then one wonders. And then at last there is peace.”
Smiling; Belinda embraced her father, kissed him sweetly on the cheek and told him that she loved him. He smiled and repeated the phrase and then watched his daughter leave for the door.
The well trained trick riding gypsy took the king’s hand and sighed.
“I know what this means to you” she said and caressed his cheek with his other hand.
He looked at Mercutio and nodded.
”I am astounded to see this horse again” he uttered in a dream and looked back at the girl. He smiled and added: “Thank you, Shauna.”
”No problem” she answered. “You are a good man.”
”You are a good woman.”
Shauna stroked his cheek again, let go of his hand and went to a group of people that stood by the door. She turned around again and saw the king almost conversing with his newly refound friend.
Alexander had lost something when he had come back to the real world.
This lost jewel had come back now to stay.
Alexander laid his head on his friend’s back and stood there for so long he did not know when he actually let go. He knew that people were standing there forever watching him, but Alexander was in a dream. His best friend was back.
He remembered later standing almost an hour holding a real conversation with the horse.
He remembered being hugged by everyone and laughing and getting drunk.
He remembered holding a speech toward thousands by the monument at twelve that day. He remembered looking up at the monument and crying.
He remembered having a party until dusk by in that house. He remembered telling Belinda how much he loved her.
He recalled hearing tell him the same. There was an eerie feeling of a circle being completed and a mutual trust between father and daughter that went beyond mere family.
There was a spiritual connection here between two people of the same soul family that had been put here on earth to fight for each other and won.
This was a bond way beyond family.
He remembered standing in the chapel and seeing her resurrected.
Mystically, it made him stronger in a way that was incomprehensible to them both.
Mercutio’s return made him so strong he could move mountains.
But he also remembered only standing by that horse and crying.
Somehow the day he had looked forward to for three years came and went without any real fanfare. Somehow, he wanted to look at the old women, the dogs and the children and the young men and pretty women that had arrived that day and tell them: “I have found a friend.”
Instead he told them of a dream and of travelling the darkness.
He verified the rumours and told them that he had had fought demons and that he had saved his family, he had talked to angels and that he was a hero that had saved their country.
He did love his daughter and he told them so.
His heart was completely with Mercutio that day.
Then a small robin caught King Alexander's eye.
Turning to go back home, mounting his stallion, he saw it sitting on a branch.
Its red breast reminded him of the passion of nature. He was taken back to April 11th 1422 when the messenger from a hollow hell had cried for help in the form of a bird nourished on Callenia’s friut. He had told no one about that bird and he was sure he would not tell anyone about this bird either. But he knew who this bird was. It was his father. Back then, his father’s soul had pleaded for him to give him peace. Now that bird was returning with that peace found.
It was an angelic messenger of peace nourished on the fruits of the Hweoim Tree.
This time, it was not giggling. This time it was chirping.
Riding away from the house, the monument behind him, he had to shake his head in awe over the circles that were closing and the new beginnings that were forming.
Shauna and Lance got to ride alone in his carriage that day, Theo as coachman and six white stallions as workhorses.
From the rattling and swinging the carriage was doing, and from the fact that the curtains that were drawn, Grandfather suspected what the sweet couple were doing there inside. But to Alex, the world could’ve fallen to pieces and the skies turn dark red.
He was blissfully happy not only for the two lovemaking teenagers, but for himself.
He had been half, now he was whole.
In his heart he knew that Mercutio was carrying him on his back today. Not just the Mercutio that had been born five years ago, but the one that had helped him survive on the way to hell.
The reincarnation that was here back again.
The only real witness to his past pain was his support between his legs and under his feet that day.
Alexander had come back home.
He had come full circle back to his own heart.
It was an amazing sight to see for everyone, in back of and in front of and to both sides of the king.
The queen was holding on to her husband’s shoulders and actually sleeping, her head on his back, riding on the king’s old friend.
Belinda saw the king and queen of her country, her predecessors, and had to smile.
She remembered herself riding with her own father in the haunted kingdom like that.
She had to sigh, looking at the orange coloured dusky sunset ahead and hold Steven all the tighter, reminded of what a great empire they lived in. An empire where the king and queen could ride on the same horse, sixty-year-olds looking like teenagers on the reincarnated soul of a horse.
An angel touched Belinda’s shoulder that day and told her that she, too, had come full circle, that Shauna and Lance would soon have a son that would be involved in a great expedition.
She saw it clearly and kept it a secret until the very day she died, when she told the boy, then a man.
It was told to her quietly in her own heart in the arms of her love.
Alexander had been told that history would be different here than it would’ve been or was in the alternate reality. There, 1492 would mark the start of colonial slavery that would found a nation based on the robbing of land.
Alfred and Sean Winsletenna would together send a young sailor
across the ocean to found an empire with whoever was to be found there.
The land would make God’s creation embark on a journey that would take it toward eternal peace.
St. Gabriel had made that rule for him to follow
The whole reason why this was possible sat on the back of Mercutio that day, a pillow for his beloved
queen to sleep on, dreaming of golden sand.
Alex daydreamt of Eden, his very own beach by his own spiritual ocean a light in his mind beyond the healed areas that God had labelled the Fields of Nostalgia.
Belinda Winsletenna was happy at last.
So was Prosperania Emperor, King Alexander of Clurafar.
Occasionally, Alex on his horse and Belinda in her carriage looked over at each other and smiled. They just had to smile at each other. Triumph was there and thankfulness. Love was there and so was freedom, the freedom to laugh and the freedom to cry, the freedom to live and the freedom to die.
Father and daughter had come full circle to meet each other half way.
The one finding his peace with life, the other finding her life in peace.
Their mutual journeys had been long.
It had taken them through fire and torment, through adultery and kidnapping, curses, plagues and wars. But together the king and the princess had made it possible for each other to go to sleep at night with a calm conscience, for they were what the legends spoke of as ‘awake and glittering souls’.
As Alexander told her later that night, over a glass of wine in the Grand Hall: “I accomplished great things, Belinda, thanks to you. And the rewards I earned made it possible for the birds in the sky to sing my grandchildren their songs and … you know what? For me it was well worth all that pain and suffering. I learned to appreciate the gifts that love can give and how well worth it can be to fight for what you believe in. How well worth it can be to fight for love and win.”
What had Belinda answered to that?
She said: “Father, I am proud that I have wandered that road with you. I would do it again any time.”
”There are days left for us to wander with love mutually yet.”
”I look forward to those days with all my heart and all my soul.”
“There is a bright future out there, isn’t there?”
”The angels have told me so.”
So, the spiritual siblings, of the father and daughter kind, had learned to fight for love with the weapons of peace.
Alexander himself? Well, he had come home. Not just home to his own palace. He had come home to his own heart to say hello to his own spirit, sitting and enjoying the lute songs of Bantrard Silvermoon in the Grand Hall. He had come home to make peace with Patrick sitting and discussing food with his wife and son. He had come home to make peace with his daughter Morgana and tell her that he loved her. He had come home to laugh with Zedrick or talk politics with Zelat or make love to his wife.
He had come home to embrace his own heart in the form of his own spouse and his beloved Belinda inside a golden palace named Iuventus Sacrum.
The king dreamt of peace.
He had come home to stay, living freely within his own being upon a beach somewhere beyond. Somewhere beyond a never-ending dawn, waiting for three friends to arrive.
Alexander Winsletenna found himself at home again.
In his own heart.


CHAPTER ELEVEN

A NEW FUTURE

Throne Room, Iuventus Sacrum, Midday, 14th of April 1435

For the first time in her life, Belinda Winsletenna had no doubts at all about her own decision making.
Alfred was older now and already seeing a young girl. They met in the thermal baths late at night and did something in secret. Steven had his doubts that this was actually a good thing, but whenever the discussion arose Belinda reminded him of how she had let Steven make love to her on the balcony.
It was obvious that her life had been filled with pain, but also that her life had been full of love and full of passion. Making love and enjoying life had been and was a part of this passion.
Alexander didn’t give up the throne just yet. He was very much into his own decision making, he was still going on stately visits and he was still bickering whenever his daughters did not follow his advice. Patrick was still flirting with other women and drinking himself silly at night time without Erica.
Morgana and Richard, well, they were still together and their newest fashionable fun was going out to all the latest Clurafar feasts and dancing saltarellos and jigs. There were hundreds of small parties were lower blue blooded people came together to congratulate themselves upon being the most gorgeous individuals. It was a mutual admiration society, to be sure. What was really quite extraordinary furthermore was that they had become very distinguished people. No dirty small talk. No overly explicit talk or hope to make love in front of everyone. Actually, when they dined at The Rose, they spent most of their time speaking of literature and cooking and nature and, oh dear me, religion. Fashionable people in Clurafar said that the couple was the new elite.
Something had occurred with them that had made them wake up.
Belinda carried her secrets deep.
Her mother kept saying that a woman was a deep ocean of secrets and that was exactly what she felt. The way she felt could never be explained, not even to Steven.
Steven and she would make love until late at night, they would take walks, they would even seem to look into each other’s souls. But when it came to actually showing Steven the inside of her own heart, she could only do so much. There was a limit. A deep ocean of secrets is a woman, indeed.
What was funny was that Steven had experienced the same thing as she had.
There was no question of the pain that they were carrying around, all of them.
But now here was a secret: she enjoyed the fact that she had achieved what she had achieved.
She was very proud of her father. Very proud indeed.
He had done a good job.
Was that an understatement?
Yes, it was. He had achieved miracles.
He had saved them all.
Maybe saved human kind.
Well, he had saved the country at least.
Belinda sat back from her parchment and looked at the ink drying.
Did that describe her emotions sufficiently?
She thought so. She was older now and more clam, more intelligent and more secure in her life and personality. Deep down in heart she was still a girl. The same girl that had wandered the sunflower fields and tried to find out when Steven was going to ask her the question “Do you want to be mine?”
Writing a diary was a part of that experience. Writing down her thoughts and thinking about what things had occurred in her past.
She waved the parchment around and put it in her leather casket along with the rest of them.
It landed in the compartment below the king’ private papers.
Happy and content to have spent another morning here in the king’s spacious throne room, she stood up and went to her welcoming committee. They were here again to hear her speak of the welfare of religion. They were scattered across the classes and handpicked by Theo and Marcus and Philip and Simon. She had started with that a few years ago and had felt that tutoring the ones who needed help was a very important task, indeed. She would speak of the importance of honesty, fidelity and love. She would tell them about fine feelings and about history.
Every week the mostly ten or fifteen women would take walks along the river to the waterfall and they would picnic on the hill and good old Belinda would bring her lute. There was no question that during these days Belinda would feel like any frilly girl of say maybe thirteen, fourteen or maybe sixteen years of age. Several nice friendships had arose from these little days.
Belinda knew that she was beautiful, but she knew that she also had a responsibility toward her father and her family to uphold the legacy and so she would go to the parliament forum every week and speak to the stuffy old senator, bring her fanciest toga, give them extra cleavage, and yell at them for being so dry, ask them to pass a new law or simply visit the small people now and then. Then she would be invited to some senators palace afterwards and they would speak to her like a queen would be spoken to. The men would stare at her breasts and the women would giggle while she told them that there was a seat free at the table at every feast in the Grand Hall and that Bantrard would be happy to entertain them with songs while Rolf served the peacock with snails and lemon sauce to cranberry mead and she would be sure that the children would enjoy speaking to Uncle Zeddy about how horseback riding actually was done the way it actually should be done. Belinda walked out of the hall.
She knew she had some time before the little group of women expected her.
She headed for the Alexander Room, where she knew Alexander himself was holding a forum with Steven and Rolf and Theo about the upcoming homeopathic hearings, where any physician or homeopathic herbal curator could be of service to the open public or prove to the king that they were good enough to become official curators of the capital.
She hoped that Steven could have some time now to tell her when they could go skinny dipping by the Waterfall again. They had done that last week and that had been so much fun, due to the amount of lust that had bottled up after their last stately visit to the very chaste and strict land of Jamburee.
All in all, Belinda Winsletenna was a happy, content woman who one day was about to become queen of the largest empire ever to grace the alternate reality.
Already, she heard the laughing, rumbling, silly, wonderful bounce that was her father.
She opened the door and their they were.
All of them, drunk as toads as far as she could tell, greeted her happily with:
”Belinda! Come in here! Where and how have you been?”
She smiled, sat down in her husband’s lap and kissed her father hello.
They laughed and talked for a small while and after she had left them, she still heard them talking in there and jabbering on about which curator or barber or blacksmith or physical examiner to actually invite. Most of the time, though, it seemed, they poured wine into their mugs, had some figs and raisins and apples and talked about life.
Say, wasn’t it a joy to be home, after all?
Belinda walked down the large staircase down to the main hall and saw the women there.
Marcus and Philip had brought them there and she beamed as she saw them.
All unknown to her, shivering.
But she knew that she would be the best friends with them within the next hour. She would give them live tips and the women themselves would tell her how they had grown up and they would see that Belinda was just a woman. A woman with power, not anything else. She could’ve been born a gypsy and in some ways she felt like one.
She could’ve been born a singer and yes, she did sing.
She could’ve born and nun, although knowing her own lust, she probably would miss making love too much. But still, she prayed all day and told the angels and God all her deepest of secrets.
She could’ve been born a lute player and for all she knew she was a rather good one.
As she stretched forth her hand and dismissed the two servant messengers, she shook hands with all the women and asked them first what their names were and where they came from.
The next thing was going to the stables where Simon was waiting with full baskets of wine and food for them to carry up to the hill.
She knew that she would spending some time there, maybe until the evening.
She also knew that most probably they would go swimming in the lake together and end up in the Grand Hall for a pint of mead with the kind king, before the women, tipsy, drunk, a bit lusty and giggly were taken home individually by the four coachmen and their horses.
Belinda looked forward to another day just with women, just laughing.
As she wandered up the hill, her mind drifted.
She found herself watching the old oak where the names of the Winsletenna lovers were carved.
She could almost see herself carve her name on the stem of that tree.
She could see herself and her Steven kiss for the first time by that tree.
She could see herself make love to Steven last week under the Waterfall.
She saw herself dance a saltarello to Bantrard’s music at her wedding day.
She saw her father’s face as he met his horse Mercutio for the first time in a long time again behind that house by the monument.
She saw herself quarrelling with Steven and making up inside the chapel.
She saw herself skinny dipping under the waterfall and she saw herself singing songs on the field.
She saw herself reprimanding her own siblings and she saw herself hugging her own father.
Belinda felt herself walk into the cathedral and seek comfort inside the blissful sanctities and meeting the sweet angels again and again and also saving that old woman.
Tears and laughter passed before her inner eyes as she walked up that hill with the other women and she knew then and there, she went meant for this place. She was meant to live here, to stay here, to be here as an old woman, taken care of her friends and loved ones.
Belinda was content to be a Winsletenna and forever call herself a royal blessing.
As she sat down on the blanket and unpacked the wine and the bread, one of the women told her she had a husband that worked for the army and she blabbered on about why she felt so neglected. Well, Belinda told the woman that the reason why was that the woman expects the rivalry from her husband and his profession. She told the women to just expect more from her husband and the woman smiled and nodded that she might be right. For the first time in what Belinda expected was a long time the woman smiled and she could almost see how the two nuptials were brought together in that loving, sweet and very happy grin.
As Belinda looked up, she saw a very clear and blue sky, a sun that shone down upon the palace ground like a gift on a rainy day.
She had to smile, because she in her heart that after all the trouble and after all the nightmares she was home at last. Not in a haunted kingdom. But like her own father, home in her own heart.
Home in her own person. Home in her own mind.

§
Few miles from the Danish Channel, Northern Coast of Prosperania

Tuesday April 30th 1435

Four times before he had been here in all his life. The first time had been with his Father when the channel had been reopened for harbour traffic. His father had taken him along to meet the Generals of the Channel Trade and he had been impressed with them. The king had taken him alone to this place and showed him the lovely, endless sandy beach with its weed and straw and they had thrown stones into the water and bonded like never before. He added that Olandus was on the other side of the ocean. When the Roman Empire decided to dig this channel under Emperor Constantine’s rule it was obvious that they decided to take a very unorthodox road. The northern states had just become annexed and the province of Dania let off some steam about the channel. Constantine however said it would be easier to ship goods along the coast with the channel there. It was much due to the fact that Dania had been very well treated by the new Christian elite that started to emerge in Rome. They were mostly volunteers from the upper class who found God in the help of others.
Alexander’s father claimed that he could remember how the ships passed by here and how he would stand with his father and wait when they went through the channel and into the night. The splashing of the waves always reminded him of his father, somehow that experience of hearing him talk on that day left an undying trace in his mind that his father had some special relationship with the sea.
He had been just a boy then, sometime in the end of the 1370’s.
Looking back on his long life, he was struck by his own health. He came from a long line of long living people. He was 66 now and still not any more tired and worn out than ten years ago.
The timeless sea made him think about how time worked.
The second time he had been here was after Lucinda was sent into exile. He had known that the newly appointed servant Rolf had waited for two weeks in the neighbouring hut whilst Alexander took a walk every day from the mansion by the water and contemplated what had actually happened and why it happened at all.
He returned to the soothing atmosphere of this place to have his affair with Grand Duchess Madeleine de Lamberville. For two months he had been gone and Sieglinde had only thought that he was on errands to negotiate with the Channel Guard. Being a woman, however, she felt when something was wrong and she left Iuventus Sacrum in her own coach and headed for the most probable place to find Alex Winsletenna. She found him making love to Madeleine and soon enough she was gone, pregnant with child and angry at her dearest. Rumours spread and Madeleine was sent away back to Vindobon where she stayed for the rest of her life. She married and was never heard of again. It was the luck of the angels that made Sieglinde return from her home country to battle it out with her loved one. She claimed to be underestimated, betrayed and knew that the relationship had gone on for quite a while, ever since the bad days of 1392, when Lucinda was destroying their lives.
Alex stayed away after that.
It was not until 1412 when he brought his daughter Belinda here to spend a month in the mansion by the sea. When he left he told his wife that the woman he was going with was no rival and she sniggered. She didn’t laugh. Belinda fell in love with the place and went on her own four times after age 17 just to think, to rest and to eat well.
This was the fifth time he sat on this very spot.
He remembered this very stone being here since, well, since 1379.
The wind was blowing in his hair and he knew that somewhere in the distance an angel was watching him, protecting him.
“Come to me” she said. “Feel my love.”
When the wind blew around his greying black locks he felt like a sailor on leave at the shore. A man with a home far, far away with his family right by his side. There was something wonderful about watching those waves gently crash against shore, the sand under his bare feet. He was the emperor of a large land, but wasn’t it extraordinary. He didn’t feel like that at all. He felt like what he was. The same little boy who had been here at this very spot for decades, singing to himself.
The colour of the sky was light blue, some clouds were drifting and a seagull or two landed on a rock outside in the green giant named the sea. “Find my love” the angel said. “Feel my deepest heart.”
An old bible quotation came to mind. He had read it over and over as a child, being tutored in the chapel of Iuventus and he had learned it by heart.
The fifth chapter of the first Corinthians had an eighth verse:
”Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.”
Right here, right now, this was what he felt. Truth was in him and outside of him. He remembered fond memories and he found that he had all along only done one thing. Sought the truth.
The warm weather soothed his skin, the wind tickled his nose, the sky made him calm, the seagulls made him soft. A woman came to him from behind. She was barefoot just as he was. She embraced him and said: “Hearken, I am here at your side!” and he answered that he was so happy that this was the truth and still would be so many more years to come. God had brought them all together to prosper in this most prosperous of kingdoms, in this most blossoming of lands.
Sieglinde laid him down on the sand and lay down next to him.
Without a word, she took his hand.
A spider crawled up between her toes and left without a reaction coming from her at all.
The spider tried the same with the bare feet of the king and left when no proved reaction was due.
So, it came to pass that the emperor and the empress, the king and queen of the greatest nation under the sun, lay under the blue sky watching the clouds for the rest of the day holding hands, not having to prove anything to each other, not fathomed in insatiable lust, not wildly drinking mead at a loud party, but just laying there, happy, quiet, content and with just that much of a calm smile on their faces to make the whole world light up in streams and rays of purely angelic magic.
The woman took his hand, smiled and raised one eyebrow. The man understood the hint. It was what she had done back when they were young. They had met in their teens and in the Grand Hall they would dance to old songs to the ensemble of fidicula and psalterium.
Would she know him in another life? Yes, she would. This woman was the woman of his dreams.
So, the royal couple danced on that beach to the cool sound of waves splashing against the shore. It was delicious to hear those waves splash against the sand. There was a coolness to that sound that warmer than the promises of the gates of heaven.
The king knew why he had gone through hell: he had travelled through Hades only to come into the arms of his love.
He knew that the crown meant nothing without his wife.
That was why he was here.
Not for fame, not for fortune, not for hate, not for fear.
He was here to love.
That was the only reason he was incarnated as a spectacular king of an everlasting empire born to meet the God of the alternate reality.
The couple danced a slow dance to the sound of nature and they knew that they found the sun of their own beach not in the sky. They found the solar bliss in each other’s everlasting iris.
Peace, that eternal peace, had arrived at last in their lives.
God loved them not for their fame, but for the shape of their souls.
What was the summary of his life?
He had chased fortune, but found that in truth he needed himself and his own love for humanity in order to survive. Not for other people’s sake, but for his own so he could save even those who thought themselves lost in the face of unreal danger.
Heaven was the real enigma of faithful belief in the hearts of those who knew how to love others. Love was not a crazy and sweaty or sensual frolic to him anymore. Love was a true response in his heart to fear and the solution to every problem. Life as they had known it was returning.
In the face of love no fear could survive.
Sieglinde smiled as she danced with her Alexander.
She knew she was at home in the heart of her king.
The life of royalty had never been so blissful as it was right then and there.


EPILOGUE

IMPERFECT ANGELS


Evening, November 11th, 1452

Belinda smiled and that light inside her eyes jittered and frolicked, a tear rolling down her cheek.
Alexander knew what that light was.
Her own eternal higher soul telling him goodbye.
“You are going to be fine here, Father?”
He nodded, raised his old hand slowly and closed his eyes.
That was a yes to him.
“I enjoy sitting here and thinking about how much love you all
have given me over the years.”
Belinda gave her Father a half-smile.
She looked down and said yes.
“We have had a lot of love, haven’t we?”
Alexander nodded. “We have. We have conquered the world.”
She smiled. “My world has always been you.”
She stood up and gave her father a long intense kiss on the cheek.
“I love you, Father, my sweet Father!”
“I love you too, Dear! You are my life and always will be. Remember that.”
She sighed and tried to smile. She nodded. “I love you!”

Inside the fireplace the flames were jittery, dancing away.
Alexander had one thing on his mind: his own peace of mind.
Life had been good to him. He felt like an imperfect angel sailing away.
Where to? Toward his own centre, he supposed.
Belinda had just left and he didn’t have the heart to tell her the truth.
He was healthy as could be, no question. But it was time.
My God, that scared him. They had meant everything to each other and now he was waiting.
Mercutio had been dead five years this Monday and every day of
the 17 years that they spent together had been worthwhile. His death had been quiet and he had seen it in the stallion’s eyes that he was happy. Had it been his imagination or had he heard a voice saying:
“See you in heaven.”
Whatever that had been, it made him happy even to think it.
Belinda was a good queen and he was happy that he had finally decided to step down in favour of her ascension. She was a bit harsher than he had been, but just as warm-hearted. Steven had turned out to be such a good Prince General to the Throne that all his expectations had been fulfilled.
Alfred? Well, that boy was special. He was a man now. A little reckless mind you. Foolhardy? Maybe. Others would say ‘brave’.
Some people would wish he would not take such risks.
But he would be a good king one day.
Belinda had left just a moment ago and cried salty tears staining upon Alexander’s shoulder.
When Alex asked her why, she had simply told him that she loved him so.
Alex knew the future. The angels had told him that someone by the name of Columbus would found a country of peace with the primitive cultures on the other side of the ocean.
The alternate reality could soon find itself bound to be changing, now that its brother was dwelling within peace and serenity. Send away sea captains on long voyages and they will find themselves coming home with luck. Send away a king on an adventure to find himself and dimensions will change for the better. Alexander could not take his eyes off those flames. They seemed to burst with energy.
Just like him, he was vibrating, excited to discover the unknown.
Living beings they were. Living, energetic beings, those flames.
It made him tired and he knew that Rolf at any moment would come in here, hobbling and shaking, asking his majesty to go to sleep. He didn’t want to.
He had worked hard in his life. Why go to bed now? He wanted to look into the firey flames of the fireplace, throw in a log or two and just watch those things burn while he got drunk very slowly on Clurafar wine. Why go to bed? He would miss all the fun of getting drunk in front of the fire.
When he died, this is how he would want to pass away.
The rich texture of that drink rested on his tongue for a bit before it slipped down his throat and sunk into his belly. The king sighed, the texture of the satin cushions behind his head tickling his old hair.
The fire danced. The king sat. The wine soothed.
“I forgive you!” The old man spoke slowly, wanted no part of that old anger he knew all too well and he knew that he it was a blessing he spoke. “I forgive you all!”
He smiled. The words seemed more true now than ten minutes ago and he knew that in one hour, asleep or not, the words would seem even more true than now.
The words were a blessing, indeed. He had known the angels had been watching him as he walked down the hallway toward his throne-room – Belinda’s throne-room – this afternoon. He had been thinking of her, Lucinda, and for no reason at all, she appeared to him and told him that she wanted him to forgive her. He said nothing at all, just watched her and smiled. She knew what it was he was saying. I forgive, he said inside, and she disappeared. Then, inside the throne-room there was this remarkable silence as Reland Mansicart’s clock struck six. Alex had not known how many hours he had sat there just watching the clock when it rang six times. The two figurines of the blood brothers holding on to each other simply disappeared and were replaced by a small set of flowers. He had seen this clock all his life and it had been completely new of its king then. Nowadays with sundials and time tellers all over they were somewhat boring, but back then they had been a rarity. So, it came as a big surprise when the clock shifted shape. He had told no one. He had simply gone to Ruby and asked her to prepare a meal. He looked into the fire and remembered how everyone had protested when he wanted to step down. He was 84. Being a king was a young man’s job. He wanted to relax, get drunk, stare at young women and smile. They took that from him because he was old. Passes from young men never went as well as those from dirty old men. The truth was that he missed Sieglinde a great deal.
It was two years ago today. He remembered the giggling robin and had to smile at how it had changed into a chirping one the day he met Mercutio again. He had eaten with Morgana, Richard and Patrick today. The conversation had been boring, but the swan filet had been good. He thought the orange and plum pudding had tasted old, but he knew that Ruby would be hurt if he said anything about it, so he didn’t. She was stressed and hectic, Rolf reprimanding her and criticizing her and comparing her with someone that had been chief palace organizer for almost half a century.
He gave her a taste of his wine and she got the hiccups. That had made them laugh.
The rest of the family, including Patricia and her husband Robert, had decided to take leave for the evening to join Belinda at The Rose where Alfred was holding a lecture entitled: “Fencing equals control”. Alexander enjoyed the titles of his lectures, they were so remarkably pretentious. Alfred’s wife Carlietta Marianna loved these lectures so that she would go to every one of them and even spend hours beforehand telling people what the lectures was going to be about. Alfred had met her in Madrid when he visited the court there. The princess was Mormidar’s grandniece and she would make a great and wonderfully kind queen one day. The kingdom was in fine hands. Younger than Alfred by ten years or so she was at prime age to conceive a child and at any moment or so it would happen.
The prince was quite remarkably the only one to outsmart Sean. Shauna and Lance were left quite worried that the two would one day start competing too harshly. But Alex knew the truth.
Christopher Columbus.
Together with him they were unbeatable, just as that seafarer would prove to be.
Alex could not forget the clock. He yawned again and forgot that a book lay on his lap.
When it banged to the floor he woke up, startled at his own snore and leaned down to pick it up.
When he did so, all he could see were a pair of feet clad with black boots.
He looked up and saw a man that he had spent half a journey hating and the other half loving.
The man smiled. A friendly smile it was. “Hello there, Alex!” the man said. “Time to come home?”
Alexander smiled at Adnicul. “Don’t they need me here?”
Adnicul shook his head. “Your work is done here. It’s time.”
The king realized how beautiful those eyes were, wanted to remark it.
He found himself waking up, the book in his hand, wondering what visitor had just sneaked up and left. “Adnicul?”
Alexander’s voice seemed tired and old, yet that seemed so strange to him.
He felt young. He looked at the book that he held in his hand. It was his own diary.
The cover was brown leather inscribed with gold letters and read

Diary

He had stopped writing that when Madeleine finally left and forever disappeared from his life.
He felt a rush of old memorised come flooding back as he turned the pages, old hauntings coming back, thing he had tried to forget but secretly loved.
The last entire was written on February 4th 1394 and was a simple poem written for Sieglinde.
He read the poem in a whisper, smiling calmly, and feeling the old feelings sing to him.

Your soul is the most beautiful soul I know
The way you love me moves me so
You are selfless, so giving, a wondrous wife
You give me your comfort and I give you my life.

The gift of your love is like an angel’s kiss
If I’d ever lose you through eternity it would you I would miss
I may be complex and I may be hard
But with you I know I could go far

My heart is embraces you like the sun hugs the sky
I love you forever and you know why
I am better with you as you are with me
Like the sun in the sky through all eternity

He put down the book and really knew it was time now.
He was sailing away in his own ship into the light.
There was a tunnel of light there beyond what he could see in his own reality and Mercutio was there to meet him and so was Sieglinde. “Are you there?” He waited and heard no answer and yet there was a reply from that soul beyond the mystery. “Spirit, I am ready” his old voice spoke softly. The angels were waiting for their hero. The king had come full circle to meet himself at the other side.
Leaving a perfectly imperfect world he was now going to a fabulously perfect one.
Alexander watched the flames inside the fireplace and transcended into the light of his own heart.
The last thing that he saw was the sight of his own old hands.
The last thing that he felt was a smile. He met the angels a happy man. His father was there, chirping.
Soon enough, another star crowned the celestial night.
Its name was Alexander Winsletenna.

“At every waking moment
I remember your voice,
When the shadows seemed repulsive
You laughed and sang by choice,
I found myself still happy
When times were all too cold,
And it was all because you were there
For me to cry on and hold,
I am only this strong person
Because of you wonderful man,
I thank the spirits above us
That you were here to rule the land,
I thank the creator above us
That you were here to hold my hand.
So thank you for your saving grace,
And that warm and cosy fireplace
That lit up your angelic face,
That brought me to a familiar place.”

- Queen Belinda I Winsletenna, Ruler of Medatlantia


“Dear Diary!
We had a very dignified burial for Father last week on the Sunday. It was the most moving thing I ever saw. Robert was there and it was clear that out daughter Rebecca was taken by it all, she told us afterwards that she saw him looking at himself laying in the coffin with a smile on his face. I suppose all of the Winsletenna children have a sixth sense.
Belinda was stoic and heartfelt as ever.
I feel she has gained so much dignity and pride through becoming a queen.
She was always destined to be one.
Yes, I did see Father just as Rebecca did.
Robert didn’t see him, at least he didn’t actually say anything about it.
Maria has grown so quiet the last few years. Maybe it is because Fabian really rarely is home, as he mostly is at sea. I try my best to cheer her up.
The thing that moved me most was that the citizens of our capital seemed so eager to show their concern and their love for our father. They loved them. I don’t how many came. It must’ve been at least ten thousand.
We said goodbye to him today.
He is an angel now.
He deserves that. After all, if he hadn’t saved us we would’ve been eaten alive in the seventh circle of hell, souls and all. Thank you, Father.
Oh, before I go to bed now, Diary (Robert is calling me and Rebecca needs a bedtime story) … what was I going to say? My feather pen is losing ink, wait …
There we go.
What was I going to say?
Oh, yes. Now I now.
Sean and Alfred have mutually had some spiritual sessions and I am fascinated by these two.
Their dreams are to unify all known empires in peace.
They are sure there is a land with peaceful wild people somewhere beyond the ocean.
Alfred has spoken of sending someone over there and founding a country with them.
I think he means actually finding something very much different from his own culture and incorporating it with Christianity. He calls fencing and tournaments ‘arts that should be seen as skills and not necessary for killing’. He aims to inspire life with his fencing, not death.
In any case, Lindy can be proud.
I have to go, Diary.
Father, where ever you are now, I love you.
Thank you for making me.
Good night.

- Patricia Winsletenna, East Wing, Iuventus Sacrum, Clurafar, Prosperania”


December 25th 1452

“I miss him, Patty!”
Patrick looked up at his sister. She looked so frail.
How old was she now? 51? Yes, that was it. 51. Too old for looking for a Winsletenna at 51.
She had never had a Christmas without father.
Neither had he. Except ...
There was no denying that all that glumness at the dinner table
had come from no wanting to eat without father.
“I do, too!” Patrick said very quietly. He looked at the clock at the fireplace and heard it tick. It had been the first of its kind back then. “It is very strange not to have him running about telling Ruby to mind her own business!”
Belinda nodded.
“Hmm …” she agreed. “Yes” she uttered, recognizingly. “He did that a lot, didn’t he?”
Patrick looked down. “He did.” Her brother folded his hands and shook his head. “I think he had a hard time actually accepting that Geena was gone.”
”I don’t know why, the food tastes the same and she is just as nice.”
Pat smiled. “No, I think it was Geena’s familiarity that he liked. Not only her food.”
Belinda rasied her eyebrows and smiled. “There was no stiffness or coldness there. She called him by his first name more than anyone, didn’t she?”
Patrick cocked his head and chuckled softly. His head tilted as he sighed.
“She was something. Father missed her, I think.”
”I can never forgive myself, Patty, that I wasn’t there when he died.”
Her brother put a hand on her warm lap. “Belinda …”
She took her hand. “Yes?”
”He knew” he said with a smile. She looked at his deep brown eyes and nodded, closing her eyes.
The cushion of her throne was so soft, just as soft as her heart was full of remorse.
“I know he did, Darling, but …” She looked out at the icy cold out there, only lit up by the torches from in here. She looked back at her brother. “I just wanted so to tell him just that one last time how very, very, very much I loved him.”
He was almost whispering now. ”There was no one who knew how much you loved your father than he. I will bet you anything that the last thing he said was ‘I love you, Belinda’.”
Belinda smiled. “That is a sweet thing to say, Patty …”
A matter-of-fact smile came upon his lips.
“I am more spiritual than people think.”
She patted his hand and stood up, labouring to keep her back straight. “I know, brother. No one doubts that.” Patrick leaned back in his chair, slightly surprised, and saw his sister walking to the window and looking out. “He is out there, Patrick. He is watching over us.” Patrick nodded looking at the swaying trees and the landscape that was so familiar and so trusted. ”I know that you are spiritual, Patrick.”
She laughed bitterly. “How I know that. You are all my family, so you have to be spiritual. We all are.”
Patrick shook his head. “I know you know that I am and he is watching and taking care of us.”
She turned to him and smiled. “Brother?”
He chuckled ever so softly. “Sister.”
She walked to him and took his hands, still standing.
She was about to say something, but hesitated. She began again and then just smiled.
“What?”
”Nothing.”
”Yes, there was something.”
She caressed his cheek. She made a small noise with her tongue, smacking. It was a bitter, lonely sound. “Just … I wish that father hadn’t blamed you for all of what happened before our … excursion to hell.”
Patrick shook his head. “Oh, Belinda. He never did. He …” Pat was searching for words. “Father was never ever a man that wanted to be happy with only half a truth. When he conquered Lucinda, then he first could live happy. Morgana remained childless out of choice, but we two black sheep have reached maturity and he knew that we were not responsible …” He looked into Belinda’s bright eyes and saw so much beauty there. “Not for any of what happened.”
She agreed and sat down again.
“Are you happy?”
”I miss my father …” she said and Patrick realized that she was crying.
“What are we, we souls on this earth?” Belinda said and looked into the fire crackling in the fireplace.
Patrick looked where she was looking and thought about what she had said.
What were they really? The question was obvious and as a brother he knew that the question was very profound and deep. It came from a place that wondered where her father was now. Belinda knew that Pat was aware of how near the two siblings had become in the last ten years after hardly speaking at all for a lifetime.
What are we?
The answer was there sitting on the tongue. Waiting in the heart? Yes, waiting.
“What are we?” Belinda said again, lost in her own words. She was a queen in everything but her own security. Inside there she was still the little girl that had told her father to wait outside while she conferred with Marie-Louise about her eventual ascension to the throne.
Patrick Winsletenna answered in such a remarkably clear voice that it surprised Belinda a bit.
“We are angels on leave” he said.
Belinda looked into the fire and added: “Imperfect angels on a challenging adventure.”
She looked up at her brother again and shook her head.
“But where is home then, if we are on an expedition?”
Patrick didn’t answer that question. He just sat there for nearly an hour holding the queens hand and hoping that she wouldn’t fall asleep in his arms.
There was a very obvious connection between what these two were feeling and the bond that was there to their father’s soul. Alexander was up there, he was waiting for them to take their next step, understand their worth, find their way, know their path, join nthe festivities whose echoes emerged from the shadows into their part of existence.
“What are we?”
”Imperfect angels on leave.”
“Home is where the heart is then” the brother said and Belinda nodded.
“Indeed” she answered and looked thoughtfully into the flames. “Our home is our heart.”
There was a very strong look of self confidence in her eyes and she looked at her brother, grabbed his hand, lifted it and smiled. “I love you, brother.”
Patrick smiled. “I love you, too” he almost whispered and realized he said these words way too seldom.
And the shadows went away, dancing into oblivion with the nightly lurking mysteries, finding their own shadow’s way in a salvation back where the sun meets the horizon.
Somewhere in Neapelonia a young man named Christopher Columbus was about to be born.
His fate would take him to the Arapaho, Apache, Cherokee and the Sioux. His fate in the alternate reality was to be a wiser fate, an informed fate that would grant the inhabitants of the new world a great say as to the peace and prosperity of their future land.
In hundreds of years an empire of peace would emerge with an Arapaho leader, a Sioux Medicine Chief and an Apache Work Commander. The Sioux Ritual Master would be the one to hold it all together and with their individual rites and rights they would make it clear that Alfred and his forefather were the ones who were to thank for this nation of love.
There was a statue being erected of Alexander that Christmas of 1452.
Queen Belinda held a speech next to the statue that New Year’s Eve and said that her father was responsible for saving their world.
Lucifer had his glee in preparing to send Columbus to other worlds in the alternate reality and making him believe that he’d found India. Christopher was not as lucky there as he was in Belinda’s home.
Alfred knew how his fate would take him toward victory and he was already working on his plan for absolute peace beyond the great unknown ocean.
Belinda knew how her reign would be one of peace. She hoped she could fulfil her promise along with her son’s future. Alfred and Carlietta Marianna conceived a child on that 1st of January.
His name would be Eric Excelsior Winsletenna and on his gravestone across the ocean would be written: ”Here ascended the one who made the first Prosperanian-Cherokee Merger with the tribe of the Sioux. May his spiritual health be blessed and his physical stamina be remembered.”
Eons would come and eons would go, but in the heavens a star looked down on that scene and smiled at his old palace of the everlasting youth. The star knew that his reality was safe and that all those old shadows had been enlightened and transformed. Alfred occasionally looked up and saw that new star and Belinda would pray to it, thinking she looked up at God.
A shadow was there again, hoping to enter the reality in the form of a rat.
It had been there in the cage waiting to strike in an eternal circle of time.
His origin was unknown, his home somewhere beyond the pits of the Hwee-Aill-Sihl fruits centre.
Someone else is holding the strings, he had said? Maybe that was true. Maybe not. But without Alexander Winsletenna, no one would ever know that there was possibility of escape. One thing was sure. The world in which the Winsletenna’s lived in was absolutely safe from any harm.
That January Queen Belinda would take a walk in her Clurafar Cathedral again, the one that had made her a wife. She would be disguised as a nun of the holy order of Mary Magdalene. This time her Prince Steven would be with her and he would be masked as priest.
Together they would meet a kind man whose eyes were blue again and whose dear affection had helped Father Alex so many times. His name would be angelic and his aura would be sweetly coloured like the morning beyond the sun.

They would pray to Alex and thank him for sending his friend.
The star that watched them had saved them all. It was a star once a man beaten by werewolves and chased by ghouls in a lonely ruin. The man’s love was eternal for in his vow to protect his one time earthly family laid the promise of an angelic eternity in the palms of God. This was a reality beyond the two sibling trees on the Fields of Nostalgia, where two memories took a walk, bare feet strolling on golden sand next to an ocean by a never ending dawn. Father and son were there again, a star newly born out of sky’s love, ecstatic over being the pioneer soul to tread Eden’s ground.


The End of
the tales Of
The haunted kingdom


The writing on this novel started in November 1997.
This is the final complete trilogy draught by the author Charles E.J. Moulton.
The trilogy itself has undergone numerous changes through this time.


Actor, author and baritone Charles E.J. Moulton was born in Graz, Austria and raised trilingually in Sweden by his mother, opera singer Professor Gun Kronzell, and his father, the actor Herbert Moulton. He studied the craft of classical singing, musical comedy and drama at the Vienna Music Academy and at St. Sigfrid’s Music University in Sweden. Beginning his theatrical career at age 11, playing the part of a troll, he soon decided to make this a profession. Through appearances in countless concerts and oratories, acting in three languages and doing voice over and film work, he gathered continental-wide experience as an artist.

After touring with Broadway Musical Night, he starred 700 times in the Viennese original production of Roman Polanski’s “Dance of the Vampires”, playing Koukol, Count von Krolock’s servant, as well as ensemble roles. Charles has performed in 80 productions, among others as 1st cast Big Bopper in “Buddy – the Musical” and as Scar and Pumbaa in “Disney’s The Lion King”, both in Hamburg, Germany. He was on board the cruise liner “Arkona” performing seven shows by the coastal towns of three continents and has sung Figaro and Escamillo with the Hamburg Mozart Orchestra at the Hamburg Proms. He is now working as a baritone at the Opera House of Gelsenkirchen. His roles here include Masetto in “Don Giovanni”, Bartolomeo in “Il Furioso”, Zuniga in “Carmen”, Sam in “Trouble in Tahiti”, Walter in “The Three Penny Opera” and Harry in “My Fair Lady”. Other than that he sings at concerts in the Ruhr area, performing everything from oratories to popular music.

Mr. Moulton lives in Gelsenkirchen, Germany and is happily married to his loving wife Tanja and together they have a beautiful daughter named Mara Sophie.

This work is dedicated to them, because without their inspiration this trilogy would not be possible.

Log on to www.charlesmoulton.de for more information about Charles.


Charles E.J. Moulton

PRODUCTIONS PERFORMED - INSZENIERUNGEN

Leve trollen – Klampe Lampe - 1981
The Hanging of Blanco Postnet by George Bernard Shaw – The Sheriff - 1982
Moerötterna i trollskogen – Diverse Rollen - 1983
Where The Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein – Diverse Rollen - 1984
A Christmas Carol – Peter Cratchit, Young Scrooge - 1984
A Christmas Carol – Young Scrooge, The Turkey Boy - 1985
Die Laune des Verliebten – Lamon – 1986
Leve Trollen – Klampe Lampe - 1987
Molly Munter & Jätten Jopp-Jopp – Prinz Alexander - 1988
Auktion von Nils Ferlin – Der Versteigerer - 1989
A Midsummer Night’s Dream – Lysander - 1990
Vienna patterns – Adolphe Stoclet - 1991
The Strangest Trip – The Devil, Edgar Allan Poe, Prince Prospero - 1994
Die Banditen – Barbavano - 1995
Der Zar Lässt Sich Photographieren – Chor - 1996
Blue Monday – Chor - 1996
Dona Francisquita – Chor - 1996
Hoffman’s Erzählungen – Chor - 1997
Broadway Musical Night – Javert, Porgy, Freddie, Raoul - 1997
Tanz der Vampire – Dorftrottel, Koukol, Vampir – 1997 - 2000
Der Herrscher & das Mädchen – Dannoso - 1998
The Death of A Hardworking Man – Warren - 1999
Joseph Haydn’s Creation – Raphael, Adam - 2000
Buddy – das Musical – Big Bopper, Mr. Bishop – 2000 - 2001
Welcome – Conferencier - 2001
Fifty – Egon - 2001
Sixty – Willi Fröhlich - 2001
Musical – Danny Zuko und diverse Rollen - 2001
Ahoi – Diverse Rollen - 2001
Farewell – Conferencier - 2001
Jesus Christ Superstar – Thomas – 2002 und 2004
The Lion King – Scar, Pumbaa - 2003
Die Zauberflöte – Sprecher - 2004
Attila – Chor - 2005
Der Barbier von Sevilla – Chor - 2005
Showboat – Chor - 2005
Cosi fan tutte – Chor - 2005
Die Banditen – Capitano, Hofmeister, Baronesse - 2005
Der Spiegel des großen Kaisers – Der Alte Fremde . 2005
Tosca – Sciarrone - 2005
William Tell – Chor - 2005
Le Nozze di Figaro – Antonio, Einstudierung Bartolo - 2005
Platée – Chor - 2006
Il Trovatore – Chor - 2006
Meistersinger – Kellner (Hans Sachs in einer Kammerversion) – 2006
Die Großherzogin von Gerolstein – Chor - 2006
Zaira – Meledor – 2006
Il Crocito in Egito – Chor - 2006
Perlenfischer – Chor - 2006
Il Furioso al’isola di San Domingo – Bartolomeo - 2006
Don Giovanni – Masetto, Einstudierung Commendatore - 2007
Les Troyens – Helenus, Hectors Geist, 2. Sentinelle - 2007
Die Fledermaus – Chor - 2007
Carmen – Zuniga – 2007
Simon Boccanegra – Chor – 2007
Le Comte Ory – Chor – 2007
La Boheme – Gelsenkirchen und Coesfeld - 2007
Strike Up The Band – 2007
Otello – 2008
L’Assedio di Calais – 2008
L’Africaine – 2008
Candide – Händler, Inquisitor, König Hermann August, Chor – 2008
Aida – Chor – 2008
Samson und Dalila – Chor – 2008
La Cage aux Folles – Chor – A Fisherman – 2009
Peter Grimes – Chor – A Fisherman – 2009
Die Herzogin von Chicago – Baron Palffy – 2009
Dido und Aeneas – 4. Hexe und Hirsch – 2009
Heavy Music, Cool Love – Death Row Prisoner – 2009
Die Entführung aus dem Serail – Chor – 2009
Die Eichbaumoper – Chor, Arbeiter – 2009
Manon Lescaut – Chor – 2009
Die Dreigroschenoper – Trauerweidenwalter – 2009
Ariadne auf Naxos – Ein Lakai – 2009
Die Zauberflöte – 1. Sklave – 2009
My Fair Lady – Harry – 2010
Trouble in Tahiti – Sam – 2010
Blue Monday – Tom – 2010
Die Lustigen Weiber von Windsor – Chor – 2010
Gloriana – Chor - 2010

Impressum

Tag der Veröffentlichung: 11.06.2011

Alle Rechte vorbehalten