Abaara shuffled down the slimy, lichen covered corridor, pulling his black robes further along his back in an attempt to shroud his being from this godforsaken palace. Shoulders hunched, he cradled a package shrewdly wrapped in cloth close to his chest. He cast a haughty look behind him, sliding his hands along the decayed brick wall as he found a recess. Pushing against it, a hidden door appeared and he scuffled inside. It led him through a dirtier, grimier hallway and Abaara’s heart jumped in his throat as the bones of small rodents crunched under his feet. He made his way to the end of the narrow passage way with what little light he had, and flicked open the wooden latched door leading to the servant’s quarters . A fire crackled and popped, and Abaara observed a tall menacing figure looming ahead.
“You’re late, Abaara,” the man said in a low growl. Abaara dropped to his knees in a clumsy, hasty bow.
“I-I’m sorry-"
“I’ll have none of your excuses now,” the tall man said.
“The King is waiting.”
With that the two men continued through the quarters. The clicking of the tall man’s heels and the pathetic shuffling of Abaara mixed with the occasional squeal of a rat were the only signs of life in the dank musky quarters.
They turned sharply and passed through another barely visible crudely made door and were close to the castle’s main hall.
The castle of South Raastar was once a beautiful sight. Black slate blocks created the main base, gothic wrought iron gates surrounded lush green gardens. Stone gargoyles sat atop high spires and inside, a rich tapestry of dark reds and gold were splashed throughout. The history of the castle were even richer; tales of a King who killed forty thousand men and used their blood to stain the carpets red; Kings who ate from solid gold plates, and drank from ruby encrusted goblets. South Rastaar was once the biggest trade route for all of the land, bringing a vast amount of wealth to the country. But war ravaged the land, and the once great armies of a failed old King were replaced by the barbaric and savage army of Varkaan, the man who now resided as ‘King’.
Varkaan’s castle was not of its former splendour. The rich tapestries and carpets were stained from years of misuse and the entire castle seemed as if it was falling to pieces. The people had changed with the uprising as well: gone were the wealthy merchants and upper class society, to be replaced with beggars and the likes of gypsies. The servants and royal courtiers that once flocked to the castles were now seedy, opportunistic fools who grovelled at the King’s feet, hoping for their chance to steal the throne.
Abaara tripped on a loose stone, waking him from his nervous reverie. The tall man threw him a dirty look from over his shoulder, and motioned ahead. The pair were nearing the castle’s main hall; a stream of yellowed light shone before them and the damp musky smell that hung in the air lingered away. They were indeed in the main hall, for his stomach twisted with anguish as Abaara heard the barking noises of Varkaan. The King was waiting for him, for how long, Abaara did not know. They entered the hall and there he sat; the Barbarian King on his throne, a wolf’s skin draped over the back.
Abaara’s face fell as he heard the screams of a young girl entwined with the booming roar of the barbarian King. Abaara chanced to look upwards at the King, his eyes darting to and fro to drinking in the scene before him. Varkan’s face was ruggedly handsome; dark brown deep set eyes, chiseled jawline covered in thick stubble and shaggy shoulder length black hair framed his face. The King was slouched lazily across his throne one leg dangling over an arm rest. His head rested on his thick dark skinned arm, and the other, the other was rolling a link of a chain between his fingers.
With dismay, Abaara’s eyes followed the chain to a poor girl at his side. Her hands were shackled together, and Varkaan yanked the chain hard, and the girl had little choice but to fall on his stomach. She let out another whimpering cry, to which Varkaan backhanded her across the cheek. Tears sprung at her eyes and her hair fell to hide it. The King ran a rough hand over the cleft of her back to her rump and pulled her closer to him as she squirmed to get away. He roughly pinched her plump breast and laughed hard as she spat at him.
“Send her away,” he ordered abruptly, his deep voice ringing throughout the hall.
He pushed the girl off his lap and she fell, her hands slapping against the cold ground. A servant appeared from the darkness and dragged the girl, who by now was reduced to tears, by her chains. Varkaan growled as she left, a coy smile playing at his lips.
“She’s a pretty little creature, is she not?” Varkaan boomed, eyeing the pair in front of him.
“My lord,” said the tall man, bowing on one knee.
The King acknowledged him with a bored look.
Abaara gulped.
“Is this the man?” the King breathed, taking a step towards him. His black eyes glistened with greed, and he licked his lips hungrily.
“Are we ready?”
Abaara shivered and nodded. “Y-yes my lord.”
“Then we’ll go to my chambers,” He said, standing. He made a formidable appearance, and the room seemed to tremble in fear.
Once safely within the King’s private chambers the tall man pushed Abaara forwards. With trembling hands, Abaara laid the package before the King. The king eyed it suspiciously, before growling, “Proceed.”
Abaara spread various instruments across the table. Varkan stared at them inquisitively, although he had no idea what instrument did exactly what. Abaara attached a narrow tube to a pronged copper instrument with exact precision. The tall man was mixing something in a large tankard of a deep violet hue. Varkan paced backwards and forwards, ringing his calloused hands together with impatience. The tall man turned and handed him the tankard. Snatching it, Varkan tentatively brought it to his mouth.
The concoction smelt vile.
“It’s a sleeping draught alright,” he said, pleased. The tall man bowed.
“I am here to serve you, true ruler of Rastaar,” said the man, kissing Varkan’s knuckles.
“I have no inclination to ever do you harm.”
Varkan gave a wry smile at this, before downing the contents of the tankard. Wincing, he fell to the bed. Abaara stepped forward. The King stared at him, his eyes full of malice. Abaara knew if he did one thing wrong, he was as good as dead. Things slowly turned black, and Varkan felt himself slipping into unconsciousness.
Varkan stirred. A voice was telling him to open his eyes. He tried, but they were far too heavy. He tried to move his arms, but his body did not respond to his demands. Slowly, his body returned to normal and he sat up.
“Did it work?” He asked, his voice raspy.
Abaara and the tall man glanced at each other. Abaara cleared his throat.
“I-it seems there was a problem during the transferral. We successfully removed parts of your soul, but the material rejected the containers. So there are seven vials each containing parts of your soul – he waved his hands towards seven glass orbs on the table – but you still have half your soul in your being.”
Varkan groaned. “But am I immortal?”
“A - As long as the vials stay intact, and are kept far away from you, “Abaara hesitated.
“You will be immortal.”
“Far away from me?” asked the king, his eyes narrowed.
"What does that mean?”
“One who wishes to separate his soul from his body goes against God and his immaculate creation. The soul is used to one container – the human body. By severing its ties to that container, one must find a viable alternative, which we have done.” Abaara explained fervently.
“But the soul cannot be fooled. If kept within radius of its original container, it will try to rejoin with it.”
“Sire, if I may -” the tall man interjected. Varkan threw his hand up menacingly and the man shrunk back.
Abaara cleared his throat. “You cannot survive while the containers are here.”
“So we split them up?” Varkan said loudly.
“I’m tired of this already. Abaara, you man leave.”
With that Abaara bowed, and scuttled out of the room.
“Follow him,” Varkan said to the tall man. “Find out where he goes.”
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125,005 Literary Works • 672,801 Reviews
Hi dexterra! I haven't read the first chapter, sorry... So any assumptions made in this quick review which are dealt with in the first chapter, well... just ignore me.
Mmm'kay. Can I give you my honest, honest opinion and have you promise not to laugh? I think your villain is too villainous. My reasons for thinking so...
1) He lives in a dingy, crumbling castle.
2) He mistreats those around him - such as the girl he likes to keep shackled.
3) He is brutish and stupid (like those he keeps company with).
4) He is in a position of power which is not rightfully his.
5) Due to said position of power, he has ruined a once beautiful land.
Now, we've all seen these before. Probably while watching Disney, those guys just love these fairy book villains. But these villains are not the best to base a novel around. Mostly they're 2-D and just there as something for your MC to stand up against and prove themselves. Mmmm... not the most interesting of characters to read about, really. I could just put the Black Cauldron on or something. Much less hassle.
Something important to remember about your villain: They are a person. Someone whose life-choices haven't always been the best, but still... They should be as solid as your protagonist. Even more so in some cases. Why? Because it's interesting! And far more realistic. Think of Voldie in Harry Potter, he isn't just Evil, he was a normal guy (in a way) whose life just wasn't great enough to keep him from going bad. I do hope that's right, I haven't read the books in quite a while..
What jumped out of me most of all was the girl in chains and how he was so over-the-top horrible with her. You obviously do not want us to like him, which is sad. I think there should be elements in every character that you could at least emphasise with.. It's probably because that stood out so much that I'm talking about this for so long. Oh and this part:
May? Also you kept putting parts of their speech on another line. That really confused me because I thought someone else was speaking, when really it was the same person.
This really irked me. You are obviously trying to make him seem very rude and stupid. If I were him I'd want to know every little detail. Could you perhaps at least suggest why your king, who you said from the start others were trying to steal the throne from, will not listen to this man who obviously knows what he's doing about something so dangerous! I just don't find that at all believable.
Other than that, I did find your story quite interesting. I like how you’ve set it up so we can expect some sort of epic quest to find these pieces of the soul. It is similar to the horcruxes thing, but I believe that you can take this idea and give it a whole new originality to it.
I’d enjoy reading it. …If your characters have more dimensions than your villain does at the moment… ;D
Hope I’ve helped!
~EmmaJane~
Hey again!
It seems a bit odd to have just one tapestry going running throughout the whole castle - that would have to be a very large tapestry. And if there is just one then it's singular, so it should be "was" instead of "were", as you have it now.
It's not clear whether it's Abaara or the King that's drinking in the scene here, so you might want to specify.
Can you growl and smile coyly at the same time? I really can't imagine a face doing that. It feels a bit like you have two contrasting versions of the King, and you're trying the put them both forward at the same time, so the character that comes through is quite muddled. Is he a crude barbarian or a sly villain? He could be both I suppose, but he can't appear as two different things at the same time. One would be more underlying and one would be the impression you get at first glance.
I think with the first part of this sentence you're straying into telling instead of showing a bit. We've already figured that he's formidable from the impression we've got so far, and the "room trembling" bit does a far better job of showing it. So I would suggest getting rid of this.
Who is this tall man? He's never really introduced or described, so it's hard to figure out what exactly is going on and what his role is in all the stuff that's happening.
You seem to have switched spellings from 'Varkaan' to 'Varkan'. This, coupled with the fact that half of the time you refer to him as 'the King' makes it seem like it's two different people instead of the same one at first.
The 'H' should be uncapitalised here.
Overall, I thought this was a great chapter. The plot's already getting really interesting and so are the new characters you introduced. One thing that strikes me is that certain elements of the plot - specifically, somebody splitting their soul into seven parts, contained in vessels, to make themself immortal, and the process going partly wrong - reminds me a lot of the horcruxes in Harry Potter. Granted, there are differences between your idea and JKR's, and your plot is completely different, but still, people are bound to notice the similarities. That aside though, I'm really enjoying this story and I really hope you post more soon!