This is a little something I wrote back in October with a gloomy looking Hallows Eve approching. I hope you enjoy reading it and would love to know what you think!
The particular morning on which this story begins was very cold. It was the end of October. Still early in the year, but in the northern town that I lived it, it was very late to get snow.
None had fallen yet, though the heavy clouds that hung in the sky suggested that it wouldn’t be long until some started to fall.
I was sweeping out the workshop before Adel came in for work that day. He was probably still sleeping, the lazy old man that he was, but I didn’t really mind. A half-finished gadget was sitting on Adel’s work table, hinting that he had probably been up late the night before working on it. I paused in my sweeping and leaned the broom against the side of the table, leaning closer to get a better look at it.
At this time I had been working for the clockmaker for four years. Since that bitterly cold day, not unlike the one now, that he had found me on his doorstep where I had been taking shelter for the night. It had been only a week before my ninth birthday. But even with my residing in the workshop for these past years, I couldn’t tell what it was.
It was slightly animal in shape, and reminded me of a lizard with long claws and a tail, but only the center part had been put together, and any finished shape was impossible to tell yet. I wanted to pick it up and look more closely. Examine all the intricate little parts linked together to make the final creation move in some way, but I didn’t. It looked extremely fragile, and I could imagine Adel’s sad face when he saw I had broken it.
He would say, “Oh, Oliver …” with a sigh, and look as though his expression might break like the object. He wouldn’t be angry, but his sad face made me feel very guilty and sorry. That had only happened once before, when I was still new at the workshop, and I tripped over a stool and broken one of his favorite clocks. He didn’t know that I had swept up every little piece, and had promised to fix it when I had the knowledge.
That was why I didn’t touch it.
Instead, I put the broom back into my hand and continued sweeping. I found tiny parts that had fallen off of the table, and other less interesting things, like crumbs and a few dead insects.
I collected the parts and tucked them into my pocket, maybe I could use them later one on of my smaller inventions, elsewise I would put them back on the worktable. But usually things such as that weren’t missed.
I opened the door of the workshop and was met with a blast of cold air, making the fire in the grate shiver and die down for a moment.
The main street of the town that had been deserted when I woke was beginning to come to life now. Daylight was beginning to filter it’s way over the mountains and hills around us and land on the dark town. People had risen from bed, and smoke was emitting from most chimneys now. Light was shining from the window of the baker’s shop across the road from me. The smell of baking bed wafted into the air and reached my nostrils, making my stomach growl as well.
As I stood there, the sun’s rays peeked over the top of one of the largest hills to my right and touched the highest tower of the Onyx Castle.
It sat at the base of Sleeper’s Mountain, the largest around us, and had frowned down on the town for as long as anyone could remember. The town elders had said that it had been there when they were children, and when their grandparents had been children. It was deserted now. A shell of the majesty that it had once possessed. Naturally, stories swirled around it like snowflakes in a blizzard, all equally horrifying and sure to keep any trespassers away. Whenever I child were to die, or a person go missing, all the townspeople blamed it on the castle. ‘Bad luck,’ everyone whispered. ‘The castle is just bad luck.’ It had always made me nervous, I didn’t like to look at it. But the black spires and great hulking figure always drew my eyes, even when I had forbidden myself not to look at it.
I suddenly realized that’s what was happening to me now, and I quickly turned away and was about to go back into the workshop when I heard I sound that was like very faint thunder that just barely reached my ears.
I paused, wondering whether it was a landslide some distance away, or something more unexplainable. It was slowly getting louder now before I suddenly recognized the sound.
Hoof beats!
Someone was coming in a great hurry. I was thinking it was probably one of the Baron’s friends, who often arrived as though their visit was of the greatest importance—even though it usually wasn’t—and was going to just ignore the sound when the rider came into view.
He was only a speck at first, but growing gradually larger and larger and a nearly impossible speed. The poor animal must have been positively ridden to death. I thought he was going to go flying past, but when he reached the beginning of the street he slowed down abruptly to a walk.
Slowly now, the rider came forwards, the horse’s hooves made heavy ‘clop’ noises on the stones of the street and I could hear the animal’s heavy breathing even from when I stood.
The rider must have spotted me, for his gaze seemed to be fixed on me, and as he got closer, I could study him and the horse a little better.
The rider wore a knee-length leather coat, that with a twirl of the fabric I noticed was lined with some sort of black fur, which I thought was probably wolf’s pelt. On his feet were high, weather-worn boots that looked as though they had certainly seen their fair share of walking. He wore black gloves, and on his head was a wide brimmed hat that cast a shadow over his features, though as he drew closer, he lifted his hat a little higher, and I could see a pair of ice cold blue eyes framed in a beaten face with a curving crescent scar over his right eye.
His hair was long enough to touch the shoulders of his jacket and was messy and uncombed as well as being a dark, chestnut brown. And trailing behind him was a black scarf that wound loosely around his neck and the tops of his shoulders before lingering along behind in the breeze. It was perfectly angled so I couldn’t see the rest of his face from his eyes downward. There was no guessing how old he could be.
The huge stallion was a terrifying enough creature by itself without the mysterious rider. A gigantic beast that towered over me, even standing on the porch of the workshop I didn’t think that I would be able to see over it’s head. A long mane fell down to it’s shoulder, and it’s tail was light a long black banner streaking through the air when the animal flicked it. Not surprisingly, the creature was also black.
The rider stopped his horse directly in front of me, frowning down with an expression I couldn’t read without seeing the rest of his face.
I was scared, but managed to keep my heartbeat under control. As much as he did scare me, he probably just wanted directions to somewhere or something as innocent as that. With Adel’s reputation being so widely spread, and the definite lack of clockmaker about, I had seen my fair share of strangers, and I had seen weirder ones then the man that sat before me. Even if he was much more intimidating then Adel’s customers usually were.
The stranger’s hand reached up and he pulled the scarf down from his face. He was much younger then I thought he might have been. With his eyes reflecting such age, I would have expected a wrinkled face. But though another scar ran from the left corner of his mouth to his cheekbone, he appeared not much older then thirty or so.
However, his expression was cold and indifferent and made me shiver at the thing close to malice on his face. But I needn’t have feared, for he cracked a small smile and said in a deep, though soft voice.
“Good day to you, young man.” He said, and I thought I saw a flicker of amusement in his eyes, but I couldn’t have been sure.
My mouth opened and closed a few times before any words came out, and when the did, they were stuttering and surprised.
“G-Good m-morning … sir.”
He gave a soft chuckle and swung off of the horse, who must have been used to that, for he did it so quickly and without warning, I would have thought that it would have bolted. Though I am no expert on any animal.
“You’re certainly up early, aren’t you?” The stranger said, tying the beast’s reins to the railing on the stairs. “What’s your name, boy?”
“Oh, Oliver, sir.” I answered, a little awkwardly, and trying not to sound too dimwitted as he came up the stairs to stand in front of me. “Oliver Willow.”
He was standing a step below me, but still towered over me by a good four inches, and I took a very small and what I hoped was subtle step back so I didn’t have to look directly upwards to talk to him.
“Are you frightened of me, Oliver?” The stranger asked quite promptly.
Normally, I wouldn’t have answered honestly, but the question surprised me, and something told me that he would know if I was lying or not. “Yes, sir.” I replied, pleased that I could at least say that much without stuttering.
“Good.” the stranger responded with a small smirk, clapping me on the shoulder and turning me around to go back into the workshop. “I don’t suppose Master Xadrian is awake yet, is he?”
I shook my head, and was about to say that he probably wouldn’t be up until just before noon and perhaps he should come back then when Adel entered from the back room.
Adel is old. Not the creaking kind of old that you would see in a beggar of an old man, but a vibrant kind that simply suggests that he has seen more things then young people have. Because it was so early, and he had just woken up, his normally unruly tangle of grey hair fluffed up around his head like a mane. And it wasn’t the first time that e reminded me of an old lion.
He was wearing the same rumpled suit as yesterday, and by the severe wrinkles in it, I had a feeling that he had fallen asleep fully dressed as well. There was a heavy coating of grey stubble on his chin and deep grey circles under his eyes, of which the lids were still trying to open over the calm grey pools. In one hand he was holding a steaming mug of what was probably tea and in the other, a small book which I recognized as the notebook that he writes everything down in.
But when Adel saw the stranger, his eyes widened immediately and I thought he was going to drop the cup. I thought he was going to collapse right there, but the stranger moved forwards and gently took his arm and guided him to the rocking chair that sat beside the fire.
I hurried into the back room and carried in another chair for the stranger to sit on, but I found that he had already pulled up a stool from the workbench that made him appear even larger. So I set it by the door and sat down on the floor in front of the fire, hoping that I wasn’t going to be sent away, and I would be able to hear what had startled Adel so.
“I’m sorry to have surprised you, Adel.” The stranger was saying, lowering his voice slightly until it was a steady tone that seemed to sooth the old clockmaker. “But I believe you have some information that I need.”
Adel’s head was bowed forward on his chest, the cup of tea sitting forgotten by his feet and his notebook sitting beside it. He appeared as though asleep, though when the stranger finished.
He lifted his head, and met the stranger’s gaze for a long moment, and I thought that the stranger was going to look away first. But they each held steady until Adel flinched and turned away. “What … do you want from me, Skelton?” He asked slowly, as though taking great care to choose his words.
“Just a bit of information … about The Prince.”
Something about the way he said that made me imagine both words capitalized. I didn’t know what prince he was talking about. As far as I knew, the king had no son, but my imagination had already lept ahead to thinking that Adel may have gotten mixed up in some kind of foreign espionage, and the stranger was an agent, having to go in diguise wherever he went for fear of being recognized.
Adel stiffened when he spoke of The Prince. “Why?” He asked, more sharply then I had ever heard him speak.
“I need it.” Skelton said, using the same soothing tone that he had used before.
The clockmaker paused. Another long hesitation, and when he spoke, he didn’t enlghten me any further on the subject.
“Oliver, take Skelton’s horse down to the stable. Tell Roberts payment with come later.”
I was about to protest, but Skelton’s eyes had turned to me and the cold fire there made me not think of disobeying, so I got to my feet, ever so reluctantly, and hurried out of the workshop.
They didn’t start talking until I had closed the door behind me.
