Doors that had remained closed for decades creaked open.
Light spilled into the ebon chamber, etching from the darkness a double row of tall pillars, a high black altar--
--and a corpse.
It was an emaciated, maggot-white sack of bones. A noose coiled around its broken neck, the head cocked at a grotesque angle. Empty eye sockets stared out from a gaunt head, the lips drawn back in an eternal black-gummed snarl.
Through the split doors strode a man, tall, lithe and sure of foot; a silhouette carved out against the burning white daylight. He approached the corpse torn between both fascination and disgust, but he was wise enough not to disturb it. For a moment he stared, as if to clarify some mystery, and then with haste he sought about the chamber, looking behind pillars and beneath the disturbing tapestries that lined the walls. The room was barren and he found nothing.
“Another hollow myth,” he spat. “This man is long dead.”
“I am not dead,” whispered a gravelly voice, “but nor am I alive.”
A brief pause betrayed his surprise. “Then you are Unundu," he said to the cadaver.
“Yes,” Unundu replied, the word little more than a hiss. “And you are Valoc Oreon.”
Valoc ignored the petty sorcery. He had encountered it before. But there was more than simple tricks to Unundu; he had only to look at him, a living corpse, caught forever between life and death, to know that.
“I have heard many tales of your powers. I want you open a gateway to another universe,” said Valoc, who still felt strange openly discussing an idea he had, for most of his life, considered heretical. But his inner ruminations were quickly forgotten when Unundu suddenly erupted into laughter, so dry and harsh it seemed hardly laughter at all, but with such gusto that his limp body rocked grotesquely back and forth.
“So of all avenues you chose Unundu the Charitable?” mocked the corpse with a terrible, rotten grin. “Tell me, traveller, in your strange, faraway land, do blacksmiths forge swords for pauper knights? Do harlots, Valoc Oreon, spread their legs for stinking, undesirable men out of the kindness of their hearts? Is this the utopia you hail from?”
Valoc endured Unundu’s baleful tirade calmly, silent all the while; he was little troubled by the warlock’s venom. Humiliation was of little concern to a man who traded in steel and blood.
“What do you want in return?” he inquired.
Unundu wore a wry smile, or as close as he could come on his withered face. “Throughout my lifetime I created a number of books to store all my knowledge, lest it be forgotten with the passing of years. When Lord Bellore of Carchoros made my end, he took with him several of these. He is no doubt long dead. Bring them to me.”
Valoc considered this. “Is there no other choice?”
Unundu answered with naught but silence.
Valoc grunted and stalked from the chamber. His footsteps quickly faded, and soon even their echoes dwindled to nothing.
***
This is the prologue to a short story I am partway through writing. Unfortunately, as you would know, talent in writing is particularly subjective and therefore I have little idea as the quality. So, racked with uncertainty as I am, decided to post this.
If you took the time to read it, thank you, I appreciate it.
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