The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

What does death look like in the world of The Fantasy Trip? I’ve been reading the comments and ideas in the Discord channel about how characters die, the way strength is used to represent character death and fatigue, and the special relationship to magic it has (is there Strength in all things that live?) and it made me think of a story to write. In this story a character with a unique relationship to death searches for a powerful sorceress who he hopes can explain the experience he has had - the two are then thrown into a situation where they must rely on each other’s secrets to survive. The story is called, “The Tower”

The Tower
By D. H. Austin

Prolog - A Death

He was on the ground now. His shoulders and head rested against the stone of the castle wall where it bulged outward near the ground. His left hand throbbed in pain and the right was numb. Bodies lay all around him, and above him the battlements were silent.

Everything was death.

The sun was bright and high in the clear, blue sky above him. Many birds were circling but there were no sounds. He was afraid to move his head, unsure of potential sharp edges that might cut him from his cracked and damaged helmet. He tried to look down at the ground around him, but his swollen face got in the way of his vision. With great effort he rolled, onto his side, and then he saw them. There were many. They were tall and vaguely human-like, and they had thick long legs, four long and thin arms, and massive feathery wings. The garments they wore were simple long dresses with no sleeves split up to above the knee and colored in muted yellows and browns.

It seemed they did not notice him or that they did not care that he was watching them. One of them came close, kneeling near a fallen soldier, and it reached a hand through the armor and drew out a wisp-like thing. It then stood and released the wisp into the sky. The wisp rose like a leaf caught in a wind going higher and higher until it was out of sight.

The tall thing had the face of an angel with wild golden-brown hair, but he could not tell if the thing were a man or a woman. Its countenance was pure contentment, bliss even, and its eyes radiated calm. At one point it turned to look at him. His eyes met its eyes, and he began to cry. He wanted to sigh, feeling he had earned this, this moment at life's end, but his chest was weak. He had fought with every bit of him. All of his strength and all of his training he had given in this one, his first, and last, battle. This death was not a bad death, he thought.

The thing continued to look toward him. Slowly, its expression changed to one of surprise and it seemed to become agitated, distraught.

He lifted his left hand, in pain, and turned his palm toward it, saying, "You are not what I imagined you would be."

It was startled, and its wings rose high in the air. Its arms waved up and down and then it called out in a loud voice, "Marge, we got a problem here."

Others of the beings heard the call and came rushing over. A much taller one among them, who wore a green dress with gold edges, came and put a hand on the one who cried out, and said, "It's okay, Eloise. Sometimes the body will still appear to have life even when they have died. In any case, they cannot see us. I told you that, remember?"

The one, Eloise, he heard, raised two arms, and pointed at him, and then moved her pointing fingers to the left and to the right.

His eyes followed its fingers.

There were gasps and one high pitched scream from the winged angels.

The one in the green dress covered her mouth with two hands and reached out with her other two arms and pushed the ones near her, including Eloise, back. It then took two giant steps toward him and kneeled beside him on the ground.

He was not afraid.

It lowered its head, bringing its eyes right to his. It peered at him, and with one hand wiped away the tears on his swollen cheek. "This," it said its voice soft and low, "is not normal. You see me, man, and I see you are not at all dead to this world."

Being gentle, the thing took off his helmet, stroked his hair a few times, and smiled.

"I am Margerory Avaladeris Sofian," it said. "We are not here for you. You should not see us. I do not know what to do with you. Who are you, and what do you desire? What do you want?"

He tried to smile, but there was pain.

He said, "My name is Alan, Robert’s Son, of Dastrane. I want to be alive again."

It was Margerory's turn to cry.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Interesting, Terquem!

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 1 Part 1

“What is the value of sentience? Our world teems with magic and things that have the illusion of life. Where is the strength of a living thing? From where does the flow of magic originate? Is it simply the need to know love? If a living thing does not long to be loved, can it said to be alive? Many have lived within me. I have not loved them, but I hoped I would. I am The Tower.”

“So, you’re alive?” She asked.

“I am a sentient being. I do not know if I am alive or not, though I think I once was.”

“Why do you think that?” She put her hand, gently, on the banister, now strangely aware of the tower’s possible humanity.

“I have a name, but no one has used it for a long time.”

She was curious now. Her original fear was fading.

“Name,” she said, “what kind of name?”

“I remember being called Alduen, Alduen Beaumont. I can almost remember that I was Alduen, but maybe I wasn’t. Maybe it is just the name of one of the people entombed within me.”

She froze at the top of the stair, as the fear came back. The tower felt colder now. The stone seemed darker. The light, which had been visible through the narrow window on the floor below her, grew faint as dark clouds gathered above the moor.

“Are there,” she swallowed, hard, “are there many, entombed?”

"Within my walls and floors," The Tower said, "no, not many, but some, and more in the catacomb below. But, that is enough about me. Why are you here, Lisa of Callinwitch? What brings you to The Tower?"

"You know who I am? You can see me?"

"I sense you. The Aben Moor sorceress is known to many of the creatures who have lived within me. They have talked about your coming."

She turned quickly, looking back down the curved stairs. Nothing was there.

"Monsters?" She asked.

"Monsters, yes, I suppose, and others. Some are just creatures looking for a dry place out of the moorlands all around us. Other things which only appear alive, and are less alive than I am, can be found below."

"The dead roam your cellars?” She asked. “Maybe your corpse is among them?" She tried to be interested in the mystery and less afraid of the situation.

"For certain it does not. I don't know why, but what of me that has become The Tower was hidden, hidden away for a very good reason."

She kept looking back behind her to the left, watching the stairs and the floor below as it grew darker. She had brought torches, naturally, but she was not yet ready to create light that others might notice. She wanted to know more about The Tower, about the previous occupants.

It had been three weeks since she left the home that she had known for the last forty years. The journey was not far, and there had been many stops along the way. Her home, well, the place that had been home, belonged to the previous Aben Moor sorcerer, Duncan Rhoanee. Lisa inherited the property on the coast, and the title of Aben Moor sorceress, when Duncan disappeared thirty years ago. Their relationship had always been a difficult one to describe. To the people of the moorlands, they were a wizard and his apprentice, while to those who knew them closely, they were more than that, more and at times less.

The tower itself was many miles inland and to the northwest of the town of Callinwitch. Between the coastal town and the high Aben Moor there were many smaller villages and settlements and Lisa had made it a point to try and stop at each one along the way. She had always tried to live up to the responsibilities of the title she had inherited, and the people were always glad to see her.

Her magic, learned from Duncan under years of tutelage, was known to be powerful, mysterious, and something to be feared. She was the protector of the moors. Hundreds of years ago the Witches of the Moors had chosen a human mortal to train in the ways of spells and gave that sorcerer the knowledge and abilities to draw power directly from the moor itself to keep the balance of wild magic and learned magic under some control.

Many wizards, who did not understand the secrets of the Aben Moor, had come to try and tap into the wild magic for many years. Some would come to challenge the witches directly. They died. Others would try to find ways to grow their own strength by spells that were not right or not balanced to the moorland’s energies. They suffered from fates worse than death. It was the task of the Aben Moor sorceress to protect the moor from these misuses of the strength of the moor.

Duncan had first told Lisa about the tower when she had turned twenty-three years old, the year he had left on a mission he had said was of great importance to the balance of the moor, and never returned. He had warned her of the tower, but he did not give her many details about its dangers or its origin.

What Lisa had learned about the tower was not much more than what Duncan had told her. He had said it belonged, originally, to the first Aben Moor sorcerer, and that it was in the very center of the moorlands.
He had said it was abandoned for a good reason, and nothing more.

A threat had come to the moors and Lisa was sure the reason was tied to the tower in some way. That is what brought her. She was not prepared to find that the Tower had reasons of its own to wish to be left alone. They would need to agree that only a compromise would satisfy them both. It would take a dead man to make them understand.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

wonderful, well written and inventive. I liked it allot.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 1 Part 2

The Tower was quiet now, as if it had no more to say to her.

When she had first entered the tower, she was greeted with a warning, but Lisa had assumed that that was an old spell left to frighten less intelligent creatures, those who could understand the words, away. It wasn’t until she had reached the top of the stairs at the second floor that it began to dawn on her that it was the Tower that was talking.

She was alone and so had no way of knowing if she was hearing the Tower’s messages in her own mind, a type of magical message, or if somehow the Tower was able to make sounds of its own. If the Tower was truly a sentient being of some kind, it must have a way to tap into the magic of the moor itself and use that magic to talk. This was a rare kind of magic. It was not uncommon for inanimate objects to possess this magic, a gate was the most common type of object of this kind, but to be sentient (unlike a Gate, which worked on set parameters established by its creator) was rare.

She had told no one where she was going, when she left, and had kept her destination a secret along the way. There were common stories about the tower across the moor. The stories never intrigued her, but Duncan's warning about the tower had always made her curious. Stories about curses and evil spells that were the sort of stories parents would tell children to encourage them to be well behaved, were of no consequence to Lisa.

“Don’t make bad choices,” the stories would always say, “or you will go to the tower where people are never seen or heard from again.”

She wondered why Duncan had never warned her that the Tower was a being that could access magic itself. He must have known, she thought. Although the working of spells was not common, among average folk, the understanding of how magic worked was well known by nearly everyone.

“There are two kinds of magic in the world,” Duncan had told her the first day of her training, when she was just a girl of thirteen. “Both kinds of magic,” he said, “where created by tapping into what most people would call strength. A living thing has a life force, or strength of life, and as long as the thing continues to live that strength is a measure of the life force of that being. A living thing loses some of its strength when it works or exerts itself beyond simply existing, pushing itself, or when injuries or illness take a toll on the life force, sometimes leading to death.”

It was this training, Lisa recalled, that she found the most interesting of all. She learned simple spells easily enough, but this life force, this strength and how it is manipulated, fascinated her. The casting of a spell required a wizard to use some of their own strength, channeling this into energy that can be something physical outside of the body, or something only perceived by other living things, illusions, the most powerful and difficult to control magic of all. A wizard could not use up their own strength to the point that they would risk death, but they could easily use enough of the strength they had to drain them so powerfully that their body was rendered unconscious, and then death might be an unintended consequence.

Strength, while the body is not injured or suffering from illness, poison, or disease, returned to all living things over time. This was another thing that Lisa had wanted, all her life, to understand. How much strength does any living thing have, she wondered? Could it be measured?

And how, exactly, does a non-living thing, like the Tower, have, or access, strength, the life force that is the source of all magic?

The second kind of magic that Duncan had taught her about was wild magic. The magic that exists, often, within some living things that have a magical nature, or some forms of magic that can come into being simply because the world is full of living things. There was great magic in the moors, and in the highland moorlands, the place called the Aben Moor, the magic was very strong indeed. Living things there would sometimes grow to enormous proportions well beyond what nature intends. Some places in the moors have ongoing magical effects that create lights, sounds, smells, weather even, that cannot be explained.

The wizard learns to tap into their strength to cast spells. The number and kinds of spells was not great. Most wizards know a few of the most common spells, while a few know many more. But spells are controlled things. A wizard learns the proper way to cast a spell and the results of these spells are almost always the same, no matter who has cast them. These are the spells that most folk are familiar with. Sorcery is something different.

Lisa had learned the spells that Duncan knew. He taught her the way to cast a spell, how to tap into her own strength. He also taught her the secret of the Aben Moor, and the way to draw strength from the life force that is in all things. This magic could not be used to cast those simple spells. This was a secret handed down from immortal beings to the first sorcerer of the moor a very long time ago. With this magic the Aben Moor sorcerer could understand, see, and hear, and interpret the animals and plants of the moorlands. With this power they could know what was needed to heal the sick, aid the injured, restore the growing vibrancy of things, and with focus, transfer the strength of one living thing into another, if needed. This was the gift of the Aben Moor, and the power of the Aben Moor sorcerer or sorceress, to know life and channel its gifts.

If the Tower had strength, and if there was a connection between the moor and the Tower, any sorcerer that mastered that strength could be the most powerful wielder of wild magic in all the world.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 1 Part 3

Lisa was aware of a living thing near her. It was not the Tower she sensed, but something more familiar.

She felt it in her body before it slid over her hand resting on the banister. It was a small snake, and she knew it meant her no harm. She turned her head and knowing the importance of startling it as little as possible, she kept her hand still. Small snakes, until they are known, should always be handled with care, Duncan had taught her.

It was a brown and green garden snake, a small variety, harmless, not venomous in the slightest, making its way over her hand without interest in her.

She could tell it was not well. "Oh, you poor thing," Lisa whispered. She lifted the snake on the back of her hand and let it regain itself as she rolled her hand over and with her other hand gently traced a line down its body.

"You have not eaten," she said.

"This is Suressa," the Tower said. "She came in through the door with a pair of grindylow a few weeks ago and has not been able to find her way out again."

“You understand the animals of the moorlands?” Lisa asked.

“Yes, but don’t ask me how. I have always been able to understand them, but I don’t think they understand me. If they do, they do not listen to my warnings. I often think they come in, when they can, just to frustrate me.”

“It’s not you,” Lisa said. “The ability to understand the language of animals is not a two-way road. There are very few animals that perceive us in the way we perceive them. They are aware of us but talking to them is as effective as talking to a plant. They hear us, but our words have no meaning to them. My teacher used to claim that he could talk to dogs, and they understood him, but I think that was wishful thinking on his part. He loved dogs, after all.”

“He sounds like someone I would like very much. I also love dogs. Once there was a dog that lived under the front stairs for a few years. I would talk to her, but she did not talk back, naturally. She would bark when strangers approached and that was often enough to keep people away.”

Lisa continued to gently stroke the snake on her hand. She was unaware that a stranger had entered the tower.

“My awareness of things does not extend far beyond my walls,” the Tower said, “and having the dog around would prevent things like the man standing in the doorway who is now looking up in your direction.”

“Hello,” the man said. “Who is there? I can hear your voices. I’m sorry to disturb you, but it was beginning to look like rain, and I am lost. I thought this was an abandoned place. I saw no lights and the door was open and then I heard voices. If I am trespassing, I’ll go. I am not a dangerous person.”

She thought it was odd that the man would say something about himself like that. Lisa had no reason to be afraid of the man, but something wasn’t right. She wondered how he was able to get so close to her without her sensing him. One of the first lessons Duncan had drilled into her was how to be aware of the almost imperceptible aura that living things had all around her. Even something as small as a spider, or even a moth, had strength and that strength can be sensed if you are trained to feel it. She felt nothing from this strange man.

The great wooden door on the first floor of the Tower stood wide open.

Outside, the dark clouds had turned the day to shadows and grays almost as dark as the inside of the Tower itself. The smell of rain came in.

Somewhere far off to the east, lightning flashed through the clouds. It was too far off for the sound of the thunder to reach the Tower. The light illuminated the figure in the doorway for a moment.

He was pale. Not unusually pale but fairer than the people of the moor. His hair was thick and short, and light colored like wheat in a field in the sunshine. He had the face of a boy, but he was built strong with broad shoulders.

“Are you alright?” Lisa asked.

“What do you mean?” he answered, and then he said, “May I come in? Is there a fireplace? I could build a fire. I know how.”

“Close the door and come in,” the Tower said, “or you may let in things that are more dangerous than you.”

“Yes, sir,” the man in doorway said and closed the door behind him. “Is there a reason you prefer the dark?”

“I do not see with eyes,” the Tower said. “I am the Tower. I cannot stop you from being here.”

“The tower?” the man said puzzled.

Lisa had left her pack near the door when she entered the Tower. “There is a pack by the door on the ground to your left. You can find a torch there. My name is Lisa, and you have met the Tower. Who are you?”

“My name is Alan, Alan Robert’s Son. You live in this magic tower?”

“No, but it belongs to someone I know. I was just checking on it. It is a coincidence that we are both here on the same day. You said you were lost,” Lisa said, “are you a stranger to the moorlands?”

She was making her way slowly down the stairs. She reached the bottom just as the man was standing up from the ground where he had just lit a torch from her pack.

They were just a few feet apart now, and for the first time Alan saw Lisa in the light.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 1 part 4

Alan was a young man. At least he thought he was. It wasn’t always easy to remember his past. He believed that he was twenty-three years old. That’s how old he was when he went to war. That’s how old he was when he died.

Since that day he had been searching for an explanation.

His searching had taken him south, into the country of Vologna, and into the moors of the northwestern shoreline of the Bay of Myrrcalnde.

He traveled alone. He wasn’t comfortable around other people. It wasn’t long in his wandering before he had begun to realize that he was not keeping track of the days, weeks, or even the passing of the months. Seasons came and went, and he often didn’t notice the turning of the leaves, the coming of snow, or the lengthening of the days in summer. All his thoughts were focused on one thing, understanding.

Understanding a thing he wasn’t even certain he could trust himself to know that it was what he was told it was, drove him. He was told, in plain terms, that he had died, or should have died, or should be dead. He was never clear on the nuance of what he had been told. Even now, standing in front of the beautiful woman who had said her name was Lisa, maybe that Lisa, he wasn’t sure he understood what Margerory had told him on that day on the field of the battle of Castle Herrend. Even now he knew his memory was unreliable. Even now he could see ghostly images in his mind of old friends, the men who had trained him, the women he had been secretly admiring but always too afraid to speak to, and unsure of what was real or what could possibly be just a memory of a story he had heard as a child. A lot of his mind was dark and filled with shadows, but in the light of the torch he held over his head he was now looking at something bright and more beautiful than anything he had ever seen before.

She was a full head, and maybe a little more than that, shorter than he was. Her eyes were large and brown with specks of green and gold that reflected the flickering torchlight like jewels. Her hair was long, past her shoulders, thick, wavy, and though it was dark reddish-brown he noticed that it had small streaks of grey, particularly where her curly bangs danced above her dark brows. Her garments were simple, but well made. She wore woolen pants that were almost as black as tilled earth, a yellow shirt with long sleeves gathered by strings at her wrists and her neck. She had on a vest made of leather and trimmed in fur, and a simple knife in a sheath on her left side on a belt made from braided cords. A snake was wrapped around her left hand. She held that hand off to the side and seemed not to care about it or even think it was something worth mentioning.

But it was not the snake, her hair, or her eyes, or even her shapely figure that stood out to him. It was everything. Taken all together Lisa was the most captivating and beautiful woman Alan had even seen. She was lovely. Her lips were the right size for her face, not too large and not thin. She had a smile on her face, even though she wasn’t smiling. It seemed to shine in the torchlight, hinted at each moment in the corners of her eyes where the slightest of wrinkles were noticeable. Even the creatures that he had mistaken for angels on that day were not as lovely of face as her. Her checks were dainty, her chin rounded and set a little forward. She did not appear to be an old woman, even though the wrinkles at her eyes and touches of grey hair suggested it, and this was the one thing that held him back from being certain she was the one he had been searching for.

“I am,” Alan said. “I am from Drasbia, the city of Dastrane. Do you know it?”

“Only by reputation,” Lisa said. “It is the capital of Drasbia, a port city on the north coast. Of the three countries of Ibalnd, it is the largest in size. You are a long way from Dastrane, Alan Robert’s Son. You said you were lost. I’d say you were not being honest unless you have been lost for a very, very long time. You don’t look underfeed, or sick, but you are pale, much paler than I was led to believe Drasbian’s are. Is there something wrong with you? Why don’t we sit by the fireplace, and you can build a fire, tell me about your travels so far from home.”

“Thank you,” he said, and then something that was not like him at all to think came into his head. He was curious. He couldn’t remember the last time or the last thing he had been curious about and so when he felt it, he knew it was different.

“There is a snake on your hand,” Alan pointed with his free hand. “Do you always carry around a snake?”

Lisa laughed and Alan thought the sound was life itself.

“No,” she said, “it was at the top of the stairs, and I knew it was harmless. I thought I might put it outside since it doesn’t belong in a place like this. Here, I’ll put it back where it would like to be.”

Alan turned and Lisa walked past him toward the door. She pulled it open just slightly.

A gentle rain was falling. It was a soft, quiet rain. The lightning had ceased. The evening was approaching. A chill from the rain and the coming of night shook Lisa and she shivered.

Alan did not feel the cold or the damp. He was grateful to be behind her where there was little chance that she would notice his lack of a similar reaction.

Lisa stopped before opening the door any further and shivered again.

“Hmmm,” she made a sound. “I think snakes do not like the cold,” she said. “How about we wait until tomorrow. Yes, I think we’ll wait.”

“It is a good idea,” the Tower said.

She knelt as she closed the door in front of her and then released the snake onto the floor saying, “Now, don’t go too far. I’ll let you out when the sun is up.”

While the cold and damp did not bother Alan, the disembodied voice was another matter.

“Who is that, exactly?” Alan asked, taking a step backward.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 1 part 5

“I am The Tower,” the voice said, dramatically, this time.

“You don’t get to say that very often, do you?” Lisa said as she went toward the fireplace built into the Tower wall across from the stairs.

Alan followed, keeping the torch high.

“No, it has been a long while. Do I sound ominous?” the Tower asked.

“Not really,” Lisa laughed, “but I might be the wrong person to give an opinion on that. What do you think, Alan Robert’s Son?”

“I think I’m more confused than frightened. If that’s what you’re asking.” He looked around. A few feet to the right of the fireplace, near a narrow, open window with wooden shutters built into the wall to either side of it, he saw the fireplace tools, but he didn’t see any wood for the fire. “Is there any wood to build a fire?” Alan asked.

The Tower answered, “Outside, around to the south side. There is a bin built into my wall. It is open on the outer face and covered by a slanted wooden roof. You can’t miss it. It may or may not have any wood in it. I can’t really tell because, well, it is outside of me and I only know it is there because it is part of me, but I can’t tell you what is on the ground between the stone walls of it.”

“I don’t understand,” Alan said as he moved the tools closer to the fireplace. There were no ashes. There was no trace of any fire for what looked to him like a long time. The floor of the fireplace had a crude iron grate, and a crane was built into the wall on the left side. There was no pot, no spit, and only three tools, a sweeper, poker, and tongs.

“You don’t understand about the wood bin, or you don’t understand about what the Tower can see, hear, or know about itself?” Lisa knelt and adjusted the grate to be exactly in the center of the fireplace.

Alan found an iron loop on the mantel and fixed the torch there. He waited until Lisa turned her head toward him and said, “I’ll go check the bin.”

Alan walked away quickly. He closed the large door behind him as he went and this time it made a slight groaning sound.

The lightning had passed on to the east but the rain was still falling. Lisa was about to offer Alan a blanket to cover his head while he went, but he was gone before she could say anything.

“I don’t think you should trust him,” the Tower said, once Alan was gone.

“Why?”

“I cannot sense him, himself. I can tell that something is there, when he was inside a moment ago, but I cannot be sure of what it is I sense. A living thing, even as small as Suressa, I can feel. I learn more about a thing the longer I can feel its presence. That is how I came to suspect you were the Aben Moor sorceress. Different things, living things anyway, each have a unique feel. Sometimes I think I can almost see inside the mind of a living thing that is within my walls long enough. I begin to feel strongly connected to them. As they move about inside of me, I know where they are, what they are doing, and I can always feel their intentions, mostly when they intend to do harm to something or someone else.”

“Are you suggesting he is not a living person?” Lisa asked. She had not considered the idea that Alan was an illusion. He spoke, took a torch out of her pack, and lit it. These are not usually things illusions could do, but magic was not ever a completely stagnant thing. She had learned about illusions from Duncan, but only what he knew. Duncan had been the most informed person she had ever known, but he was also quick to remind her that there were things that he did not know and knowing he did not know enough was what drove him to be a perfectionist.

“This I can tell you,” the Tower said, “I have been told about illusions. Warned, even. I cannot see as you do, and I cannot see an illusion. I have learned to know the feeling of a wizard who is casting an illusion spell, or any spell that requires the wizard to keep draining their life to maintain a spell, but I have no way of knowing what that spell is, with one exception, and that is fire. I know when there is a fire within my walls, magical or otherwise.
I can also –”

The sound of the door opening stopped the Tower before it could finish.

Alan came in quickly, his arms loaded with split logs of wood. He dumped the wet wood on the floor and then immediately went to shut the door shouting, “Is there a way to bar this door from the inside?”

Lisa jumped to her feet and took the torch from the mantle.

“Why?” she shouted back.

“I was followed, I think,” Alan said searching along the door frame for a bolt or locking mechanism.

“Followed,” Lisa said.

“I see torches or lanterns, four or five, coming this way along the same path I was on.”

“There is a bolt in the door near the opening side on the bottom. It is made to go into the floor and keep the door shut against anything but a determined force to open it,” the Tower said. “But why would you worry about being followed? Are you a wanted man?”

“That’s not the best way to put it,” Alan said. “I am not a criminal.” He found the bolt, shoved the door well closed and then turned the bolt so it had a handle now away from the door and with his boot he drove the bolt into a hole in the floor. “But there are people that are always looking for me. They want me, but not because I did something they didn’t want me to do. Most of the people looking for me want me to do something for them that they cannot bring themselves to do. Bad things. They think because of my past, because of what they might have heard about me, that I am a killer for hire. I’m not. That doesn’t stop them from asking me to be one. I don’t like it when they won’t take no for an answer and that is usually when things get ugly.”

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

If you are reading this - I just reloaded all the first parts with edited versions (minor changes).

I am not a professional writer and I don't have a proper education in the craft. I tried to make a distinction between when the Tower is capitalized and when it is not, important to the story. I hope I did it correctly.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 1 part 6

“You think these people coming are looking for you?” Lisa asked.

Alan turned to her and shrugged, then he let out a long breath and said, “It happens, sometimes, but maybe I overreacted this time. I’ve told no one I was coming here, and I haven’t spoken to anyone who recognized me or knew of me after I told them who I was, for a long time. Maybe it isn’t anything to be concerned about.”

Lisa seemed to sense Alan was embarrassed. He was a large man, and for just a moment he seemed to shrink just a bit. He dropped his shoulders and lowered his head.

“I’m sorry,” Alan said at last. “I really don’t handle people well. I’m not good with people, you might say. You could even say I frighten a few people, but I never mean to.”

Lisa approached him and smiled a broad, warm smile. She reached out her hand to touch his arm and Alan reacted by drawing away from her.

“You’re scared of me, Alan, Robert’s Son?”

He was startled by the tone in her voice.

“I’m not afraid of you. I just don’t want you to be afraid of me.”

She reached for him again, taking his wrist. He did not pull away, but he lifted his head, and his face was hard. His jaw was clenched. His eyes looked straight into hers. He had brown eyes. She had not noticed before. His eyes were a distant brown. They were kind eyes, but they were eyes that seemed to be looking from a place far, far away.

“It’s not what you think,” Alan said quietly.

His wrist was cold. As cold as stone, but she felt his heartbeat in his wrist, strong, slow. With each breath his heartbeat came faster.

Lisa drew upon her power, reaching out to him to feel his life, his strength. At first there was nothing, a void like she had never felt before, but then it came at her in a wave. A warm feeling assaulted her senses, not a fire, not an explosion, but a warmth, like being under the blankets you know, bundled in the arms of someone who cares about you more than you realize. It washed over her again and again like the sea against the cliffs. Wild, and somehow restrained it kept coming and coming. It was intense and had a power that grew gradually overcoming her senses little by little. For a moment she felt she would be consumed by it, but it never reached that point. It became stable. It was strength. There was no doubt, but it was not life. Alan, Robert’s Son was not alive, and he was not dead either. He was something she could not explain.

“What are you, Alan, Robert’s Son?” She asked.

“I really don’t know. I don’t have an answer, but I have a story. I am looking for the one who will listen to my story who I believe will know. I am looking for the Aben Moor sorceress. I was told her name is Lisa. You said your name is Lisa, but I was told the sorceress is a crone, and you are not a crone. I have been confused about so many things for so long that I’m beginning to think I don’t remember anything correctly at all. I don’t know where I am. I’m not sure I know where I’ve been or how long it has been since it happened, but I want to know. I want to find someone who will help me understand what has happened to me and why.”

Someone pounded upon the door. A voice, a woman, called out, “Is there anyone here? We seek shelter from the rain. The door is shut. I know it can only be latched shut from the inside. I see your light from the windows. Please, the rain has soaked us. May we come in. We mean no one harm.”

The Tower spoke.

“It is Lydia Commonhearth. She is a woman of a small hamlet to the northwest. I have known her presence within me before. She was frightened to know I was able to speak to her. She came a second time with question, most of which I could not answer. She has been worried about what I am and what is drawn to me, but she is a good person.”

Lisa released Alan’s wrist, handed him the torch, and then she did something he was not at all prepared for. She leaned into him, putting the side of her head against his chest. She didn’t hug him. She kept her arms relaxed and by her side.

“I am not afraid of you, Alan,” she said, for the first time dropping the rest of his name, “I am who you are looking for. Don’t be afraid of me. Don’t be afraid of who you are. I would like to understand you myself. We were brought together for a reason.” She stepped back.

Alan had never known a feeling like he felt the moment she moved away. He didn’t want her to be away from him. A feeling like he needed to be close to her again beat hard in his chest. He was ashamed of this feeling. He had never been with a woman. He did not know what it meant to be intimate with a woman, even though he had heard what it meant when people learned about his inexperience and teased him. He had been told he was handsome. He had been told many women desired him. But he had been afraid. Originally, he was afraid for reasons of his youth, then he was afraid that anyone who came close to him would know. Know that he was something other than a man. If he could not explain why to a woman, he was sure that woman would run from him in terror. It was something he was not going to have to feel. It was one of a thousand reasons he was desperate to understand.

“Open the door. Let them in,” Lisa said. “We’ll talk later. For now, let us both keep our secrets from these people until we know what really brings them here.”

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Interesting start, keep going! :-)

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

So short, and I'm hooked already.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 1 part 7

Alan crossed the floor to the large door and using his right foot he lifted the latch out of its hole and then with his left hand he pulled the ring set in the door.

The door swung open again with a groaning sound and five people came rushing in out of the rain. The first three were huddled under a blanket held over their heads while the last two came in a little slower and were uncovered and seemed unconcerned with the rain.

“Thank you,” a woman in the group, one of the first three, said. She was traveling with two small people. They were eshians, Lisa knew, but Alan mistook them for children. Alan recognized the other two as Drasbians, one an elf and the other a young, female lizard-folk of the kind with a human like torso and arms with a long reptilian lower body ending in a blunt tail.

Lisa moved toward the woman and helped her shake the water off the blanket she had been holding over her head.

“Hello, and you’re welcome. I am Lisa Wainwright,” Lisa said, “and this is my traveling companion Alan Roberts. We also sought the protection of this tower from the storm. I’m sorry we bolted the door. We were just getting ready to build a fire and settle in for the night and thought it was a good idea.”

“Lisa Wainwright?” The woman asked as she folded the blanket over her arm.

“Yes, I am. Do you know the name?”

“Lisa Wainwright, of Callinwitch. The Aben Moor sorceress,” she said. “Of course, I know the name. We heard in the village you were in the area. Isn’t that right, Fairlyn?”

The Drasbian elf came forward. The elf was dressed in armor, leather reinforced with small iron rings. The armor covered their body from just below the neck to just above the knee and was patterned after a garment Lisa and Alan both knew as a Garmaleen, a type of man’s dress normally worn with high boots and thick socks. The arms were unprotected by the armor, and the elf carried a long pole wrapped in a heavy cloth in one hand. A quiver of arrows hung on a belt on the elf’s side and across its back was strapped a two-handed sword.

“That’s correct,” the elf said. “Princess Tewelden and I came across a merchant caravan to the east just over a week ago and they told us that you were traveling across the moors, alone?” There was a tone of suspicion in the elf’s words. “We are traveling to see the Duchess of Ilzonze and came to the village of Dulvor only two days ago. I agreed to let Lydia show us the way to this tower when I heard of the problems they were dealing with. It seemed we had different reasons for going to the Duchess, but each reason carries a great weight.”

“Why would Drasbians want to deal with the Duchess of Ilzonze, and the country of Vologna? We usually keep to ourselves,” Alan said moving to stand between the elf and Lisa.

The elf tensed and the lizard-folk girl moved behind the elf.

Lydia raised her arms and said to Alan, “Fairlyn is Maowar, of the highland elves who are bound to the treaty of ten kingdoms. Princess Tewelden is gymnagaopthian, or you can call her a gymnaga. They’re not to be addressed with vulgar slang. I am a citizen of Vologna and I welcome our friends from the northeast. Your kind may have adopted the name Drasbia for you council of elders and the country our kind took from them, but they were people of Ibalnd before there was a Drasbia, and you can call them the first people, or Ibalnders, but do not call them Drasbians.”

Alan bowed deeply and said, “My apologies.”

The lizard-folk girl slid out from behind the elf. She was a lovely young girl, not unusual for her kind. She had the body, head, arms, and hands of a small human girl, or eshian, but where her hips would begin there was a reptilian body that became a tail. She had straight, fine dark hair, worn long and lose and decorated with glass stones and wooden beads painted in bright colors. Her eyes were blue. She wore a long blue dress that was slit where her lower body began. She stood on her tail and came to about five feet in height. She wore bracelets and jewelry on her wrists, her fingers, ears, and dangling from silver rings on a narrow leather belt around her waist. A bright yellow jewel was fastened into a wrap of silver wires that coiled around her head and rested just above and between her large eyes.

“We accept your apology, sir. You are a north-man, a proper Drasbian, I suppose,” she said. “My name is Shirrellain Tewelden of the house of Lady Shirrellain Amuresse, Queen of the gymnagaopthian kingdom of Sur Wida on the Tides of Evenwater. Can we rest here with you?”

“Yes, yes please, Come in and rest,” Alan said moving back away from the elf and gesturing toward the fireplace. He bent and began picking up the firewood he had dropped.

“I am the Aben Moor sorceress,” Lisa said making a space for the rest of them to come well into the tower and then went to close the door continuing, “and I was traveling alone over a week ago. I met Alan on the road, and we found each other to be good company. He was on his way to Callinwitch and I said I would be returning there soon, but I have a few more villages to visit, Dulvor was next on my list. You are Lydia Commonhearth. The tower has told me you’ve met.”

“Lydia Manakee. I was Lydia Commonhearth but my husband was killed recently and now I go by the name my mother gave me when I was born. This is my daughter,” she pointed at one of the eshians, a frail young halfling woman of about thirty years in age with curly, light-brown hair, “Gwenna Sorran and her husband, my son-in-law, Cooper Sorran.”

The halflings smiled and each raised their left hand with the palm turned toward Lisa and the fingers spread apart. “Hi and hello, traveler,” they said in unison.

“Your daughter and her husband are eshians?” Lisa asked. “I don’t mean to offend you, but I hope you aren’t trying to pass these two off as your children. We have no reason to begin a relationship with misleading information, do we?”

Once again there was tension in the room. Alan had gathered all the firewood he had dropped and moved beside Lisa. The elf and the gymnaga moved in closer to Lydia.

Lydia gathered her children close under her arms and said, “Let me explain. If you are the Aben Moor sorceress, and I’m not sure I want to believe you, either, then you will want to know what we must tell you. There have been dark and evil things growing in the north, beyond the moor, and to the east, in the free lands of Ibalnd, and all of it is beyond simple folk like me. I came here only to get out of the rain. I think now I have no other thing to do but to ask for your help. We need your help.”

End of Chapter 1

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 2 part 1

It was not difficult to get a fire going. Alan arranged enough wood within the fireplace to make a comfortable but not large fire and placed the rest of the wood he gathered on the stone floor that extended to each side of the fireplace to a few feet. The five travelers, one by one, retrieved their packs, which they had left on the stones outside of the tower where the stairs climb to the door on the first floor. The door was closed and latched, again, and the group gathered around near the bottom of the stairs inside the tower.

“If you have cloths you can change into, and get out of your wet garments,” Lisa said, “we can check to see if there are empty rooms on the second floor where you can change in private. I have some light cord in my pack, and I will string a few lines of it up near the fire where we can dry what you are wearing.”

Alan took the torch and raised it above his head. “I’ll go up and scout it out. If I find it is safe, I’ll let everyone know.”

“I don’t like stairs,” Princess Tewelden said as she explored away from the group looking at the walls that made a small, enclosed area under the stairs. “There is a door here. Where does this lead?”

“That is the door to the storage room under the stairs and then to the stairs down to the cellar,” the Tower said.

“So, it is true,” Fairlyn said. “There is a presence here that is aware of us, can hear us talk and can speak.”

“I am the Tower,” the Tower said. “You do not need to be afraid. I cannot see you, so your privacy is safe. I cannot read minds, but I can hear you and I can feel your presence, well –”

“Thank you,” Lisa cut off what the tower was about to say, “we appreciate your warnings.”

Alan’s voice came from the floor above, “There are three rooms on this floor and another stair going up. Two of the rooms are empty and have working doors. The other is full of furniture, but it looks like most of it has been smashed up a bit.”

“I’ll change in here,” the Princess said, standing by the door to the storage under the stairs.

“I’ll change with you,” Fairlyn added.

“Then it’s the second floor for us,” Lydia said, and lead the eshians up the stairs.

As they were going up, Gwenna turned and looked for Lisa. When she had made eye contact with Lisa, Gwenna said, “I’m adopted. We’ll hurry and be down as soon as we can. Then we’ll explain everything.”
Lisa was able to fasten two lines of cord from rings set into the stone walls where torches might have been used when someone lived in the tower. Wet clothes could be placed over the cords to dry in the warmth of the fire as the room became cozy and comfortable.

Alan managed to find four unbroken stools on the second floor and brought them down the stairs. He placed them in a semicircle around the fireplace, and sat on the floor, cross legged. Lisa sat on the stool closest to him. The princess reclined on the floor, her lower body coiled around her, and Fairlyn and Lydia took two of the other stools. Gwenna sat on the last stool and her husband sat in front of her on his knees. One stool remained unused.

“What do you know of Cidri?” Lydia asked when everyone was settled.

“I’ve not heard that word before,” Lisa replied. “Is it a disease?”

“No, not at all,” Lydia said.

“I know of it,” Alan said, nodding his head. “It is a following, a cult, madmen. I went to, I was involved with, some, some people who came into conflict with a large group of the followers of this cult, an army of them. On the northwest coast. In the Barony of Hulde. We were hired by the Baron’s men to defend a castle in the port town of Krandalton. We managed to defeat them, drive them off, but at a great loss. We saved the castle, and nothing else that day. The people who believe in Cidri believe in doomsday.”

“That’s almost it, but not all of it,” Lydia said.

“So, Cidri is some sort of God, or Deamon?” Lisa asked.

“It’s a world,” Fairlyn said. “The followers of Cidri believe our world, Eysturlun, Beauvingia, Ibalnd, even the whole of Hamth is not what we think it is. They have been told, by someone and we don’t know who, that the world is bigger than we know. They have been told the world is Cidri, and Cidri is literally hundreds if not thousands of worlds connected by the gates. They believe in a people who once existed, called the Malorians –”

“Mnoren,” Princess Tewelden interrupted, “they believe in a people called Mnoren, who created Cidri and who control the world and all the magic in it.”

“This is something I’ve never heard of, and I’ve met with travelers from all over, as far away as Evhon and Kijzta,” Lisa said. “What makes them dangerous? I imagine that if they were a threat to other folks, then I might have heard of them. This conflict, Alan, that you mentioned to the north. This is in Vologna, yes? Not in Drasbia, I’m sorry, the free lands of Ibalnd.”

Lydia said, “They grow in numbers and then they lose faith when their predictions of catastrophe don’t come true. It is a strange cult. Most of the time you wouldn’t consider them dangerous. I’ve heard they were in the north, and I know of the battle you talked about, Alan. You were there?”

“I was.”

“I heard,” Lydia said, moving to the edge of the stool and grasping the sides tightly in her hands, “no one survived that battle, on either side, but one man who is not a man at all, but some kind of revenant who walks the world and everywhere he goes, death follows.”

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 2 part 2

“I was there,” Alan said. “I fought, as hired mercenary, beside the Baron’s soldiers. I can’t tell you exactly how many survived that battle, but I can tell you I am not this revenant. Though to be honest, I don’t really know what that is, a revenant.”

“A revenant,” Lisa said, “is a deranged spirit. A walking corpse that is driven by still not well understood magic. The revenant seeks vengeance. There has not been a revenant in these lands since before Duncan’s time, the previous Aben Moor sorcerer.”

“I am not a revenant,” Alan shook his head.

“So, you have trouble with this cult,” Lisa changed the subject. “You want my help dealing with this Cidri matter?”

“Not exactly,” Lydia said. “First, in the hope of honesty being the foundation we build on, I owe you an explanation. I’ll try to keep it short. My daughter, Gwenna, is adopted. She lost her family in the fever of forty-seven, twenty-one years ago. She was just a child then. My husband and I had been married only a year, but it seemed, at the time, we could not have children of our own. We had a small farm on the plateau, between what is now Vologna and Basconde. During those times many eshian folk were fleeing the southern parts of Ibalnd as the fever spread through the islands. Gwenna was left behind, at an inn at the crossroads in Tuellton. We took her in and raised her as our own. Her husband, Cooper, is a hunter and a free eshian, not descended from the Bascondez. He was with my husband the day he died. It is the nature of my husband’s death, and how it might be connected to Cidri, that makes me seek the Aben Moor sorceress. But, you, Lisa, you cannot be her. What are you, thirty-five, maybe forty years old? The Aben Moor Sorceress is said to be in her seventies.”

“I am the Aben Moor sorceress,” Lisa said and then laughed. “My word, I’m starting to sound like the Tower.”

“What is funny about telling people who you are?” The Tower asked.

“Nothing, naturally,” Lisa stifled her laugh.

“Show her, Fairlyn,” Lydia said.

The elf went to a large clam-shell style bag sitting on the floor by the door. The bag was made of heavy canvas dyed brown and tied to the top of it was a rolled fur. Fairlyn untied the fur and brought it back to the group. They flung the hide out, unrolling it, and then let it fall to the floor in front of the fire.

“Your husband was killed by a bear?” Alan asked. “That is a terrible way to die.”

Lisa slid off the stool and went to her knees next to the hide. She put one hand down on the thick black fur, and said, “This is not a bear. It’s a rabbit, but that’s impossible.”

“If you are the Aben Moor sorceress,” Lydia went on, “then you can tell us about this animal. I’m not convinced you are her. You are far too young.”

“I am fifty-three years old. My parents sent me to learn from Duncan Rhoanee at the age of thirteen. I became the Aben Moor sorceress when Duncan disappeared thirty years ago.”

“You can’t be fifty-three,” Lydia said. “I’ve been grey since I was thirty. I’m only forty-five years old and I know I look old enough to be your mother.”

“I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about what I look like to other people,” Lisa said, and out of the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of a surprised look on Alan’s face. “I am Lisa Wainwright, of Callinwitch, the Aben Moor sorceress. You can believe that or not.”

It finally dawned on Alan that Lisa had said the skin on the ground was a rabbit’s skin. He stood up suddenly and pointed down at the skin. “That can’t be a rabbit. That skin is a bear’s skin, and someone is mistaken. That animal was over four hundred pounds, I’m sure.”

“Four-hundred fifty pounds, dead. We weighed it in the village before we skinned it,” Cooper said. “It attacked us on the hunt and killed three men that day before we brought it down with spears and arrows.”

“The magic of the moor can sometimes cause an animal to grow two, three, even four times its size, but not twenty-five times its size, and that would be for the largest hare in the moor, the brown jackrabbit. This is not possible. This rabbit is not of this world,” Lisa said.

“Exactly,” Lydia said. “Can you tell us if this animal came to our world through a gate? Is there a possibility the believers in Cidri are actually right and our world is not what we think it is at all? Is this a thing the Sorceress can do? Can you tell where the magic of this animal comes from, if it is not the moors? I’ve heard that some magic lingers in the skin and bones, and organs of creatures with strong magic bound to them.”

She put both hands on the fur and closed her eyes. Lisa reached out with her inner mind and felt the fur on her fingers with the focus she had learned. If there was magic still in the fur, she would know it, but if she could tell where it came from, she was not at all certain.

The magic was there, and it was strong. She felt the pins and needles on her skin and the sensation of numbness spreading up her arms. It was unfamiliar magic, she was sure of that, but it spoke to her body in the same way any other lingering magic would. She could tell it was not of the moor. It was different. In her mind she saw patterns growing out of the fur and up her arms. The patterns were cubic in design, blocks and chains of connecting smaller blocks moved up, out, under, and back into her skin.

“This is not of our world,” Lisa said breaking the connection between her and the magic. She raised her arms, spoke three single syllables that came from the back of her throat, and then released some of the magic she had absorbed into the air in front of her.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 2 part 3

She cast a spell into the air. A being began to appear. A huge animal with dark fur took shape. “Don’t be afraid,” Lisa said as she moved her hands to shape the spell from the memory of the magic she had touched, “it is just an image. It can’t harm you.”

The image came into focus suddenly. It was a short-eared rabbit, thick in the hind quarters, hunched toward its head. In every way it seemed to resemble a regular rabbit, only huge in every proportion.
Cooper and Princess Tewelden were the most curious of them all about the thing.

Cooper stood and came close to the head and holding up his hands he said, “its front teeth are larger than an eshian hand. I remember those teeth. It took Johan by the shoulder in its mouth that day. I heard the bones crush and break. Then it lifted him off the ground and threw him twenty feet across the glade. He struck a tree, and the impact killed him.”

“I didn’t want to believe it was true,” the Princess said as she slid away from the skin on the floor near her. She could not take her eyes away from it. “It’s so large. How could a normal rabbit grow so large, even with powerful magic? The strength needed to power that kind of spell would be unimaginable.”

Lisa touched the rabbit on the foot and the image blinked out and was gone.

“It was not a spell. And as far as I can tell it wasn’t the effect of exposure to the kind of magic in the moor. This is a magical creature. It is born like this to others of its kind already this large. I know of no such animal in all of Ibalnd, Emalia, or The Kingdoms. It must be from another world, but I can’t tell you it came here through a gate. I just don’t know how to feel that kind of magic. It might have been summoned, but the sort of spell that would summon something like this would have ended and the skin would not have been recovered. There is a lot here I don’t understand.”

“At least you were able to tell us something,” Lydia said.

“If I could tell you more, I would,” Lisa said. “You are all going to see the Duchess to tell her this, take the skin to her and ask for protection should there be more. That’s a good idea.”

“There is more,” Fairlyn said. “Just over a month ago three ships, sailing under the flag of the Empire of Beauvingia, made anchor off the east coast of Ibalnd, near a fishing village of gymnagaothians. My sister was visiting there at the time. The Beauvingians came ashore and approached the village in peace, but it was trick. They attacked when the village’s guard was down and took dozen of prisoners. My sister was among those taken. The Beauvingians took them to their ships and tortured them. They were looking for an artifact that predicted the coming of a great evil and they believed the gymnaga-folk had the artifact. My sister was aboard their ship for three days, but when she was brought on the main deck to be questioned on the fourth day, she fought her captors and managed to jump overboard. She was tied to a gymnaga elder and the two of them managed to swim to shore without being retaken. My sister took the elder to the city of Easton, the capital city of the gymnaga people. She sent for me then, I was just a few days from there in a small eshian settlement to the south of the gymnaga territory. I came as soon as I could. The Princess can tell you the rest.”

“Thank you, Fairlyn,” Tewelden said. “My mother summoned me from my home in a village to the north of the capital. I arrived in Easton the same day as Fairlyn. By then, my mother had nursed the elder back to health and learned more about the Beauvingians. It turned out they were not regular citizens of the empire, but renegades, outcasts, followers of Cidri. The artefact they were searching for is some kind of key to working the special magic of Gates. We do not have it. We don’t know what it is exactly. The elder only recalled overhearing the Beavingians mentioning their desire to find a special Gate key.”

The Princess moved around the stools set in a circle around the fire and came close to Lisa and Alan.

“My mother told me a secret of Ibalnd. The existence of five known Gates. She believes the followers of Cidri intend to take control or somehow change the nature of these gates. I must get to the Duchess to warn her. All of this is connected. I’m sure,” the young gymnaga-girl was pleading now. “The attack on the castle that Mister Alan survived, this tower, the strange belief in an end of the world the cultists of Cidri believe in. It is all connected.”

Lisa was confused. “Why would the Tower be involved?”

“There is a Gate in the catacombs below my cellar,” the Tower said. “Nothing has come out of it in many years. Some things have stumbled through it and never returned. It is not protected, but it is difficult to get to.”

“There is a Gate here,” Alan said. “That means there was probably a Gate in the castle I d…”

“Was defending,” Lisa said quickly. “Is there?” She turned to look at Tewelden. “Is there a Gate at this castle the followers attacked?”

“Yes,” the princess replied, “and three others. One is on the southernmost island of Ibalnd. One is hidden in the caves on the western mountains above the Midland Sea, in the ruins of an ancient gymnagaopthian temple that fell to a horrible curse, and the last one is in the forest of Ilopswillow, just to the north of the city of Ilzonze, the city of the Duchess of Ilzonze.”

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Finally catching up! (About to start C1P7)



The chapter sizes are just right for reading here.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 2 part 4

“This is a lot of information to work through,” Lisa said. “I think we all should rest for the night and then in the morning we will go over all of it again. Starting with the location of these Gates.”

“I would like to hear more of the Battle at Castle Herrend,” Fairlyn said looking directly at Alan.

“It wasn’t a particularly special event,” Alan said, “and besides that I don’t remember much about the details.”

“But you were there,” the elf said. “It was the last conflict of arms on Ibalnd, well of any real significance anyway. Four years is a long time for the people of Ibalnd to be in a state of peace.”

“Four years,” Alan said.

“Well, yes, four and a half years, I think. Wasn’t it in late summer of sixty-eight, by your calendar.”

“It couldn’t be that long ago,” Alan said. “It feels like it was just last year.”

“But you said you don’t remember much.”

“Of the details,” Alan sighed. “I fought at the base of the west tower with a company of soldiers I trained with. There were no veterans in our unit, no one who had seen real war. We were rushed by over a hundred orcs, I mean Beauvingians, that morning. They were in a blood frenzy, screaming about the end of the world. Our training didn’t prepare us for that kind of fighting. Everyone around me fell before I understood what was going on. I fought until I was backed against the castle wall and then took a blow to the head. My helmet was cracked but it stayed on and I don’t remember anything after that until I woke up later. The sun was high in the sky and, and there wasn’t anyone alive near me. I crawled away. I don’t know how far I crawled. A farmer’s son found my on the side of a road and took me to his parent’s barn. They nursed me back to health and when I was able to leave I gave the farmer everything I had but for the clothes on my back and the boots on my feet to pay for their kindness. I’ve been wandering south since then but I had no idea it had been four years. I suppose I just didn’t think about keeping track of the passing of time.”

“It has been said that, as Lydia mentioned, no one survived that battle,” Fairlyn said. “You think others, like you, may have survived. I want to know more about that. We need to understand how these cultist fight. It may be that that battle was just the beginning of a war with the Beauvingians.”

“I never went back to that place,” Alan said. “I’ve never met anyone on the road who was there. It might be that the ones who survived want to forget. I know what that is like. A man like you might understand it, if you’ve seen battle yourself.”

“I am not a man,” Fairlyn said.

“I, I’m sorry,” Alan stammered. “I didn’t mean to insult you.”

“It is not an insult to be wrong. You didn’t know. Our people are not like your kind. It isn’t just that we are what your kind call men and women. Our society is more complex than that, but if you don’t know our society, you’re bound to make mistakes. You can call me Fairlyn, or Illoe. If you forget and call me a man or a woman again, I won’t be angry. I just hope you try.”

“Thank you, Illoe. I will try,” Alan said.

Tewelden moved away from Lisa. She ran her hand over her right ear a few times as she moved, unwilling to look in Alan’s direction.

“The place where that castle stands was once considered sacred to my kind,” the gymnaga princess said. “Did you know that?”

“No,” Alan and Lisa both said at the same time.

“There used to be standing stones on that bluff above the beaches where your people have built their town. Many, many years ago, my ancestors would travel to those stones on the shortest day of the year. They would mark on the stones the important events of the previous year, the names of those who were born and who died. Centuries ago,” she went on and came to lie down next to Fairlyn again, keeping her head low, “there was a great war between the elves and the gymnagaopthians and we were driven from that place. For many generations there were no people of my kind on the north shore at all. That is when your people came. My mother told me that she was told those stones were used to make the foundation of the first fortification your people built on the bluff. We’ve asked for them to be returned, but our pleading has fallen on deaf ears.”

“I’m sorry,” Lisa said. She reached for Alan’s hand, and he took her hand in his. “My grandparents came to the Bay of Myrrclande with the second wave of settlers from the Kingdoms. Our family has never been north of the moorlands. I know that it is the people of the Kingdoms who settle your lands and who have been making these changes and I don’t know what I can say other than I’m sorry. When Lord Admiral Torpin convinced the Kingdoms to side with the mainland eshians in their war of independence from the eshians of Basconde a lot of people back in my grandparents country thought it was a message that this meant Ibalnd would become part of the Kingdoms, in the end. A lot of people still believe that is true. The Duchess of Ilzonze believes it. We will need to be diplomatic and that is not something I know much about.”

“That is something we do know,” Tewelden said. “The diplomacy required of a people under occupation by a foreign power. Even if that foreign power appears to be kind. Our interests are not the same on every level. When it comes to a Beauvingian invasion, they must be.”

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

posted updated versions of all parts prior to chapter 2 part 4, with minor editorial corrections. If anyone sees something I missed (I am not a professional writer) please tell me and I'll fix it right away.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 2 part 5

“Alan,” Lisa said, “close the shutters on the windows, please. We need to settle in for the night. It doesn’t do any of us any good to stay up talking about these things right now. Let’s get some rest.”

“Is there a need to keep a watch,” Fairlyn asked, “or can this tower warn us if someone approaches in the night?”

“I cannot sense anything outside of myself,” the Tower said. “I can tell if it is raining. If the sun is shining, or if the wind is blowing, these are things I can feel I do not see with eyes, so I am not a good watch keeper.”

Alan went to the window to the right of the fireplace and unhooked the latches on the wooden shutter that held them open against the inside wall of the tower. He could not see much of the sparse grass and few low growing bushes of the moorland below the window which was more than ten feet above the ground. In the distance, to the west, he thought he could see faint lights moving along the ground. Too low to be lanterns or torches, he called to Lisa, “Lisa, there are lights in the distance. Do you know what they are?”

Lisa came to stand beside him. She took the window on her side and began to close it. She did not look out. “Insects,” she said, “or possibly just the reflection of the moon on the vapor as it rises from the wetlands.”

Alan looked up at the cloudy sky. “But there is no –”

Before he could finish, Lisa shut the window on her side and fastened it in place, then took the other window out of Alan’s hand and closed it, saying, “It isn’t anything.”

“Then we should keep a watch?” Fairlyn asked.

“The tower itself is not easily entered,” Lisa said. She turned and clapped her hands lightly, “I’m going to sleep here, by the fire. The rabbit skin rug will be large enough for all of us, if you don’t mind being close to people you don’t know well. I don’t think there are any beds, but the rest of you can put out blankets and bed rolls where you will be comfortable, if the rabbit skin rug is not to your liking.”

“I can stay by the door for a few hours,” Alan said picking up one of the stools. “If you are worried, Illoe, I can wake you in a while and you can sit by the door as a watch for the rest of the night.”

Lydia and her children put out bedrolls on the skin in front of the fire.

Tewelden and Fairlyn did the same but off to one side, away from the others.

Lisa took a light blanket from her own pack and pulled it over her shoulders as she lay down on the skin.


The room was quiet except for the crackle of the fire and the sound of rain occasionally being driven by a gust of wind onto the window shutters.

Everyone had settled into a sleeping position except for the halfling, Cooper. He sat with his knees drawn up and his arms wrapped around his legs. He was staring at Alan.

“Are you a giant, then?” Cooper finally asked, quietly. “Or a half giant maybe?”

“I am just a man,” Alan smiled.

“You are an enormous man,” Cooper said. “I’ve seen men, elven folk who were taller than them. I’ve seen orcs, well, you know, those Beauvingians, even maetaur folk, but I’ve never met a man as large as you. How tall are you?”

“I really don’t know,” Alan said.

“Six foot four at least,” Lisa said without raising her head from the rug. “I’m five foot nine inches tall on my bare feet. He is probably almost a foot taller than I am.”

“Why is this important?” Alan asked.

“I’ve never seen a giant,” Cooper said. “We don’t have giants on Ibalnd. I’ve heard stories, from the human folk from your country, about giants who are over ten feet tall. Huge folk who can lift a cow with one arm. Some folk say that all giants are monstrous folk who kill and eat other folk, but some say that’s not true, and some giants are kind. If you are descended from giants, I hope you are on of the kind ones. We don’t need anymore folk coming to Ibalnd to cause trouble.”

“I have never wanted to cause trouble, for anyone,” Alan said. “I’ve not given a lot of thought to being a big man. I guess, where I come from, my father and my brothers, well, all the men and women I knew growing up, were as tall as I am. At least that is how I remember it. My family comes from Goralda, which is in the mountains west of Anthandra, across the sea. My father was a soldier and his father before him. It seemed natural that I would be a soldier to, and I was only a teen when I joined the company of mercenaries that worked the north coastline keeping folks safe from pirate raids and dangerous creatures coming down out of the mountains south of us. I was twenty three years old when I fought at the castle wall. I guess that makes me twenty seven now so I am about as tall as I am ever going to be. I’m definitely no a giant, and I’ve never seen a giant either, but my grandfather fought one, back home, back in Goralda. Tomorrow, I’ll tell you about him and tell you what my grandfather told me.”

With that, Cooper was satisfied and laid down next to his wife on the rug.
Soon everyone was sleeping.

Alan looked upon the people sleeping on the floor of the tower. He wondered what it all meant. He was sure that this woman, Lisa, was the sorceress he was looking for, but now he wasn’t sure he would get a chance to talk to her about his memories, his condition. It seemed odd to him that this group would show up in the same place that he had been searching for, for as look as he could remember, with a story of something that happened to them only a few days or maybe a week or two before.

Four years. Had it really been that long. Four years of traveling, moving ever onward from village to village, chasing answers, being chased, being hunted. He had only wanted to find an end, and now it looked as if all he had found was another beginning.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 2 part 6

They slept. It was a peaceful sleep, a dreamless sleep of tired folk feeling secure within the walls of the tower.

Alan stayed awake for hours and then, when he thought Fairlyn had rested well, he woke the elf gently. They talked briefly about the quiet, and the need to keep the fire going, and then Alan lay down near Lisa, but not too close, and fell asleep.

When Alan’s breathing became steady and deep, Fairlyn woke Tewelden.

Fairlyn whispered into the gymnaga’s ear, “Are you sure you want to do this?”

“I am,” Tewelden answered.

“You trust them, and you think this is the right place to hide the book?”

“I think we can trust the sorceress,” Tewelden said. “I’ve heard she has taken vows of protection. I understand her people expect her to be their champion.”

“Then why don’t we just tell them?”

“I would, but it isn’t because I don’t trust her, or the man, or the folk from the village. The fewer people who know, the better it will be. In time I know my mother will sort out the mysteries. We have copied the parts that we think are most important to the Gates and how they came to be. The prophecy isn’t the problem. What the Beauvingians are looking for probably doesn’t exist, but if they are willing to kill to find it, this book must not be found.”

Tewelden kissed Fairlyn, and then she went to the stairs. She lowered her upper body until it was nearly parallel to the floor as she approached the stairs, moving on her hips and her hands and with a practiced motion ascended the stairs quickly and quietly. She reached the second floor and then found the next flight of stairs going up again to the top floor of the tower.

On the top floor there were two closed doors. Without hesitating she went to the door on her right, as her mother had told her, and after speaking a simple spell the latch of the door clicked. Unlocked now she raised up on to her one knee, the joint of her lower body were her reduced lower legs came together in a single hard bony structure and opened the door.

The small room was a library. There were only three shelves, but the selves were crowded with books, hundreds of books of various sizes filled the shelves and were also stacked on the floors around the bookshelves. Across the room, under a small window was a simple bed and next to that a chair. She went straight away to the shelf in the middle and looked for the best place to conceal the small book she had tucked into her belt.

"Why are you here?” The Tower asked.

Tewelden was startled and dropped the small book.

“Can the others hear you?” The gymnaga princess asked as she recovered the book.

“No,” the Tower said. “I can make my voice heard in any part of the tower or all of it. I can be quiet when I want to be. I do not want to alarm the others, but I am curious as to what you are doing in here.”

“Can you keep a secret?” She asked.

“It is one of my favorite things to do,” the Tower said. “I have kept many secrets for many long years. If you mean no harm to me, or to the sorceress, I can keep your secret.”

“I am hiding a book here in this library. It is the book of the poet Halaga Mo’Tergrunn. It must be kept from discovery until my mother has learned what it is the Beauvingians are looking for.”

“I will tell no one,” the tower said.

“Thank you,” she said. “Why are you willing to help me?”

“A long time ago a man lived in this tower and he had a companion who was a gymnaga woman, much like you I imagine. She was kind, caring, passionate, and joyful. She planted flowers in boxes hung below my windows. She sang and played the mandolin. I miss her.”

“I think that was my grandmother,” Tewelden said. “I must get back to the first floor. When I can return I would like to hear more about her and this man she lived with. My family tells a story that he was a terrible man and that he kept my grandmother against her will.”

“She was a prisoner to his temperament, and to his love, that was true. She could have left him at any time, and often wanted to, but he was a proud man, and a weak man. He used her love for him against her. He never used me to keep her here, but she could not leave.”

“Thank you,” she said and then slipped out through the door casting a spell once more to lock the door again.

She made her way back to the first floor. Fairlyn embraced her, and then the gymnaga princess went back to the place where she had been sleeping and tried to close her eyes and relax.

She fell asleep to the sounds of the wind and the rain and the crackle of the fire.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 2 part 7

In the morning the rain had stopped. The clouds had gone, and the sun was warm as it rose in the east.

After changing back into their traveling cloths, Lydia was first to say, “We should go south to the coast and then west to Ilzonze,” as she packed her belongings.

“That would be the quickest way,” Lisa agreed, “but, I must go northwest. I want to see the village of Reen, and talk to the farmers there. With what you have experienced lately I want to know what they might have seen.”

“How far is that?” Tewelden asked.

“Not far. If we leave soon, we can reach Reen before sunset. I don’t expect anything will give us any trouble on the way, unless we come across one of your rabbits,” Lisa said.

Fairlyn had dressed in her armor. She unwrapped the bow she had covered the day before and set to stringing it rightly. She had not strapped the sword across her back, and it was still lying on the floor.

“That is a fine sword you have,” Alan said, admiring it.

“It isn’t my choice. I prefer a smaller sword but it was the only one available to me on such short notice. I haven’t needed it. Do you have weapons?”

“No,” Alan said. “I also haven’t needed a weapon, for a long while. I work hard to avoid trouble and I haven’t come upon anything in the wild.”

“Not even a troll?” Fairlyn asked. “There are a lot of trolls in the moors. Small ones, big ones, they seem everywhere these days. We spotted one three days ago, but it was a small bull and it avoided us and moved away in a hurry. There is strength in numbers after all. I’m surprised you haven’t had more trouble than you describe, traveling alone.”

“Well,” Alan said pointing toward Lisa, “she’s been traveling alone and she doesn’t seem scared at all.”

“If she is the Sorceress of the Aben Moor, she doesn’t have a reason to be afraid of anything in the moor. She protects it and it protects her, or so they say.”

“It’s true,” Lisa said. “I have a hunch that we will not encounter anything to slow us down unless it is a person or animal in need. I feel the moor, and it knows me. I think we will be safe until we leave the highlands. Eventually, either south of the tower or west of Reen, we will leave the moor proper. We will have to follow the river Ree west southwest of Reen to make our way to Ilzonze through the swamps and peat bogs for two days if we go that way or return to the tower and go south from here. I think that is the safer way, but it will add two or maybe three days to the journey.”

“The bogs will be high with run off this time of year. I think doubling back this way is the best thing to do, if we must go to Reen,” Lydia said.

Fairlyn took up the sword from the floor of the tower and held it out toward Alan. “Here, take it,” they said. “Do you know how to fight with a two-handed sword?”

Alan took the sword from Fairlyn and drew it from the scabbard. He held it in one hand. “It feels like I could use it as a normal sword, but yes I know how to use this. Thank you,” he said putting it back in the scabbard and handing it back to Fairlyn, “but it would be best if you keep it. I won’t need it. I’m sure.”

Lydia helped the eshians pack their things and roll the rabbit skin rug up. Then she tied it to the top of Fairlyn’s bag. She picked up her own pack and put her arms through the straps, snugging the buckles tight and then using both hands she lifted the large carpet bag.

“I can take that,” Alan said, “if you don’t mind.”

Lydia let him take the bag, again he used only one hand.

“You are even stronger than you look,” Lydia said. “Where is your traveling bag?”

“I don’t have one,” Alan said.

“No change of cloths or a bed roll? Don’t you have any food or even a water bag?”

“I make do as I go. I find, I find things to eat. Growing things,” Alan said, “and there has been no shortage of streams and rivers along my way. I guess I never thought about needing any baggage. I’ve, I’ve been looking for something for a long time and it’s all I’ve been thinking about, really.”

Everyone in the room turned to look at Lisa.

“Yeppers,” she said shrugging her shoulders, “he found me. Now, let’s get going. We have a long way to go. The weather is on our side for a change, and it should be a beautiful day.”

They left the tower. Alan was the last to leave, and as he was closing the door behind him the Tower said, “Wait, let the snake out before you go.”

“What?” Alan asked.

“Oh, I forgot,” Lisa said pushing past him to come back in.

She scanned the room and saw the small snake near the fireplace. “Time for you to go,” Lisa said as she hurried over to the snake and gently lifted it from the floor. She moved to stand beside Alan, smiled up at him, and said, “I can’t believe she thought she could eat you.” Then she skipped down the stone stairs toward the grass below and released the snake. It slithered away quickly. Lisa looked back at the tower door.

“Goodbye for now,” the Tower said. “Return when you can. I am always here.”

Alan shut the door behind him, and the group set off toward the village of Reen.

End of Chapter 2

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 3, part 1

The walk to the village of Reem was quiet. A heavy sense of purpose hung over them. Lisa tried to engage them in conversation, asking the others questions about their lives at home, but avoided Alan.

For much of the way Alan walked behind, at a distance, from the others. Lisa walked in the lead with Lydia. After a few hours they stopped where there were several stones suitable for a short rest of the legs and ate some dried fruit and bread.

Alan approached where Lisa and Lydia were sitting and said, “Lisa, can I speak with you, in private?”

Lisa rose and followed him to stand apart from the group.

“Is something wrong?” She asked.

“I don’t belong here, with these people. I wanted time to talk with you,” Alan said, “about, my past, about certain things. I don’t understand what we are doing now.”

“I promise we will talk, Alan, this is only a minor delay.”

“You don’t understand. They think I am a monster.”

“No one thinks you’re a monster, Alan. I just met you. I don’t know anything about you but I know you are not a monster. What makes you say this?”

“I died. At that battle, I was dead, or supposed to be dead. Something happened I don’t understand or even remember, and since then I have been running from people who say I am a monster.”

“I will help you understand, if it is within my power. For a couple of days we will just have to put it aside. I promise. I see how this bothers you, but you need to see that these people and I, none of us, think you are a monster.”

She smiled at Alan, and then said loudly, “We should get moving again if we want to reach Reen before nightfall.”

The countryside had a long, gently downhill grade as they left the highland moor and came to the Reen River. They followed the river west, toward the small village. The sun was getting low in the west and the sky was filled with colors thrown eastward by the clouds in the distance. They began to see the tall, peaked roofs of the village barns in the distance and just ahead of them there was a herd of small shaggy, highland cows. A girl, probably no more than ten years old, was standing among the cows with a long switch, a thin willow branch stripped of leaves. The cows moved about languidly, but the girl was motionless with her back to them.

Alan ran forward from the back of the group and took Lisa by the arm. His grip was hard.

“Something’s not right,” he said.

The others stopped. Fairlyn moved closer to the naga princess and the halflings moved behind them both.

Lisa was stunned by Alan’s intensity. She couldn’t find the right words. Lydia pulled Alan’s hand off of Lisa’s arm.

“What’s wrong with you?” Lydia said. “They’re just dairy cows.”

“No, the girl,” Alan said. “Something isn’t right, look.”

“Young lady,” Lydia called, “Are we near Reen?”

The girl did not respond. She didn’t move at all.

“Stay here,” Alan said, “Fairlyn, can you be ready? Cooper, come with me, but stay back.”

Alan walked slowly toward the girl. He pushed a cow to his right when it moved in his path. The animal let out a low mooing sound, and jumped a step causing the bell on its neck to clang loudly.

The girl kept still looking away from them.

Lisa did not stay where she was. She followed Alan.

Moving even slower now, Alan circled around the girl until he was in front of her, and Lisa came up behind him.

With a stifled scream, Lisa stumbled back covering her mouth.

The girl was dead. She was pale, her eyes vacant and covered in a milky film. Her mouth sat slack jawed. Her skin was pallid and pale. She stood somehow, like a statue. Her feet were overgrown with grass that seemed to bind her in place.

Alan turned and then saw that Lisa had followed him. He leapt to her and pulled her close to his side, and then his head spun from side to side searching in every direction for any threat.

“What, what is it?” Lydia called.

Cooper came around and saw what Lisa and Alan had seen. He stumbled back, tripping over his feet and falling on his back. Gwenna and Lydia ran toward him, while Fairlyn drew an arrow.

“This girl is dead,” Lisa called. “It’s impossible. She is dead on her feet. Something evil has happened here.”

Lydia ran toward the girl while Gwenna ran to Cooper's side.

“Stop!” Lisa cried. “Don’t go near her.”

Lydia froze in her tracks.

Alan pushed Lisa toward Lydia, saying, “Wait, let me get closer.”

He moved toward the girl, staying directly in front of her lifeless stare. He waved his hands, and looked all around. “Margerory, Eloise, are you here?” He asked.

“Who are you talking to?” Lydia asked.

“Alan, be careful,” Lisa said.

He came close to the girl. He knelt on the ground. He reached up and put his hand against the girl’s cheek. She was warm.

“She isn’t dead,” Alan said. “She’s still warm.”

Lisa ran to them. She put her hand next to Alan’s. The girl’s skin was warm, just like Alan had said. She felt the girl’s neck. Her pulse was faint. She gently pushed Alan to one side and then leaned over, putting her own face right in front of the girl’s lips.

“She’s breathing,” Lisa said. “We have to get her someplace out of the weather. Alan, help me —”

Lisa went to take the girls arm and then the girl moved.

She twisted, violently, away from Lisa and a sinister hiss passed her thin lips.

The girl’s head snapped to the side and fixed her lifeless eyes on Lisa. Slowly she raised the switch in her hand.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Chapter 3 part 2

The girl swung the switch toward Lisa’s head.

Alan, thinking quickly, dove at Lisa, enfolding her in his large arms and rolling across the grass away from the rooted girl.

It was like the girl did not see him move Lisa out of the way and she continued to violently swing the switch from side to side. She snarled and hissed like an animal in a cage. Her reach was not far and due to her small size and young age her strike was not powerful. The switch made a soft swishing sound as it passed through the air around her.

“What is this?” Lydia asked. “Is she under some strange spell, or is this some natural disease the likes of which we’ve never seen?

Alan came to a stop some fifteen feet away from the girl. He held Lisa above him in a tight embrace. Her dark reddish-brown hair fell over his face. He held his eyes shut and said, “Are you alright, Lisa?”

She was panting hard. Lisa’s breaths came quick and fast. Her heart pounded in her chest. She could feel the cold unlife-like radiance from Alan’s skin. She brushed her hair aside, and placed her hot, flushed cheek against Alan’s.

The feeling of her warmth calmed Alan. He pulled her closer to him, and then she whispered into his ear.

“Thank you, Alan. You’re quick, for a man who doesn’t know if he is alive.”

“I’m sorry if I hurt you,” he said.

“You didn’t,” Lisa whispered. “Let me up, please.”

Alan pushed Lisa into the air. She seemed lighter than she looked, but maybe it was the adrenaline. His trainers had told him to be careful of the strength that came from fear or anger.

She was able to draw her legs up under her and stand easily from the position Alan had lifted he into. Lisa then stepped over him with one foot, took is right hand in both of hers and tried to pull him from the ground.

“Oof,” she huffed, “You’re heavier than you look. She heaved again and Alan let her help him get to his feet.

“You’re much lighter than you look,” He said.

“Thanks. I think,” Lisa said.

The others had moved in around the small farm girl still swinging the switch to-and-fro.

“I’ve never heard of anything like this,” Fairlyn was shaking her head with her arms crossed. She had but her strung bow across her back and was slowly circling the girl, keeping out of reach of the switch. “I don’t think she could have hurt you with that branch, but I guess caution was called for. Lisa,” she called, and pointed to the ground by the girl’s feet, “look at this.”

Lisa brushed herself off and walked behind the girl to where Fairlyn was standing and looked in the direction the elf was pointing.

The plants tying her feet to the ground were beginning to snap. Small vines curled with a life all their own up trying to tie her down to the ground even as larger vines were torn apart. In only a few moments the girl would be free.

“She’s Breaking free, Alan,” Lisa said. “I don’t want her hurt, but do you think you can subdue her? Do you think you’re stronger than whatever it is that is animating her?”

“I can try,” Alan said.

He moved to the same place as Fairlyn and Lisa, then gently encouraged them to move back even more. He gestured to the others to also move back, saying, “Stay clear, everyone. I don’t know what will happen but I’m going to try and pick her up.”

He crouched low and held his arms out wide to his sides. Alan watched then girl’s swing, back and forth, back and forth, and then just as the switch was as far to the girl’s side as it could go he lunged toward her.

He came at her from a low angle and wrapped his arms around hers just below her shoulders and then with a loud grunt he pulled the girl off the ground. The plants binder her snapped loudly and as they tore they cut into her flesh. The wounds were not deep, but they began to bleed a dark thick green tinted blood.

The girl went limp immediately in his arms.

“Alan, get away from there!” Lisa shouted.

Alan tried to step away and felt the plants wrapping around his boots. With a more determined effort he lifted one foot after the other and took giant strides away from the place where the girl had been trapped.

He was about to break into a run when Lisa cam up beside him and said, “Let’s move a hundred feet away, back the way we came.” She placed her hand on Alan’s arm and guided him as the two moved quickly but not at a run back away from the place.

When she believed it was safe, Lisa said, “Stop, here. Put her down.”

Alan lowered the girl to the ground.

Lisa had pulled a cloth from her belt and was wiping the blood from the girl’s ankles. She pulled the last bits of green growing things from the girl’s low soft shoes. “Lydia, come here,” Lisa called. “Bring some water.”

In a moment everyone was gathered around the girl, on their knees and trying to help.

Lydia lifted the girl’s head and tried to wash away the film in her eyes. Gwenna and Cooper each held one of the girl’s hands, Fairlyn helped Lydia by moving the girls matted hair away from her face and Tewelden was gently rubbing the girl’s legs above the cuts and scrapes she received from being freed.

Little by little the girl’s breathing improved. She began to blink her eyes, but she did not speak. Lisa had gotten bandages from her pack and a small jar with a salve and was beginning to dress the girl’s wounds.

“She squeezed my hand,” Gwenna cried out.

With a start the girl suddenly bent upright and let out a curdling, long, agonized scream.

Re: The Fantasy Trip inspired Fiction, The Tower
 

Thinking about maybe picking this up again