Later

  It took hours to escape his notice, as he would not let me out of his sight, with the older man keen to have me shut up in the library for several more hours. Busying myself with the study of the history of the barony, work that was in some ways a relief and in others hardly of any great help, for I knew in the back of my brain that I was running out of time. Why time was so very important in this situation, was a mystery to me, for I had a sense that it was of ever increasing importance. The history as I was to discover, involved solely Baronesses with not one foreign invasion after the initial one by the Arns.

  This seemed bizarre to my mind.

  Not one Baroness had had a single son, and not one had changed their method of rule, had reportedly gone to war.

  It was as I was delving deeper into the history of the barony that I thought to investigate as there had been silence from outside the door and a thorough lack of shadow looming from beneath the crack in the door.

  Pleased to discover that Klove was absent, I was to once again slip out from the hallway to the nearby corridors of the east-most wing of the castle. It was there that I hoped to discover the truth to the secrets within the castle-keep.

  It was as I hurried my way over to the tower where I had discovered Sir Hermann. It was up therein that blackened tower that I attempted after finding the corpse of knight missing that I sought to look out through the two large windows.

  The first of the windows looked east gave no great insight into where the creature had come from, looking simply down upon the cliff-side and castle-walls. It was the western window though that gave me a hint of where the beast that had devoured him; the great western tower loomed high above the rest of the castle.

  It cast such a shadow upon the rest of the castle that it could no more be ignored, than one could ignore the moon or the small amount of light it cast over the dark-isle. At once I despised it, and wished that the sea might tear it away from the land, and devour it.

  This irrational hatred of the wretched castle could only grow when at last I caught sight of the very most unlikely of things near it. It happened that the Baroness, it seemed was in the midst of climbing down from it, moving thither towards the library window.

  Using a series of hand-holds she moved with a swiftness that could well have fooled any observers into thinking that the stone ledges were but mere stairs for her. Lit only by the moonlight, as she moved from the west-tower’s high window down to the library she hardly paid me any mind.

  Unable to believe my own eyes, I stumbled out of the tower hardly daring to believe them. I do not recall at once what it was that came to pass, but I seem to have in my shocked state manoeuvred my way from the tower down into the main corridor, and from there to a principal hall on the first floor of the east-wing of the castle-keep.

  Somehow when at last the horror of seeing the Baroness climbing her way about the towers of the castle began to ease its hold over my mind, I was to awaken to find myself seated in a large chair in the middle of a small hall. It was grey, with a small chimney which I lit a fire inside of, keen to have some sort of warmth with which to rely upon to chase away the cold that knifed its way through me.

  It was an unpleasant time, and somehow I soon found myself dozing. When at last I awoke it was to a shriek of pain and horror as a darkened, hideous figure clutched at his hand as one wounded.

  The figure was bald with wispy dark hair to the sides and back of his skull, wide dark eyes and long canine teeth in the likeness of those that the Baroness bore. The figure was dressed in rags and was if he did not bear such a frightful appearance he might well have seemed pitiable.

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  The tall figure writhing in such agony as though his hand were burnt, his hand bearing the symbol of Orcus the light-god of Erebus with there being the strange stench of burnt flesh that tore through the air. It was only at this moment that I took notice of how my pendant of the god Orcus, gifted to me just before my departure from Sieghild no longer hidden behind my robes that I realized belatedly that he must have attempted to steal it.

  The rage that painted its way onto his hideous face, made me trip over myself in an attempt to escape him. Thankfully, just as I put the large chair by the chimney between us, it was only at this moment that the rattling noise of a chain struck louder than before. The mad-man was pulled to a sudden halt, just shy of where I stood, due entirely to the chain that were shackled to his feet.

  Relieved by this, even as I fell back, the animalistic man seemed to almost curse, once he realised I was just out of his reach.

  I was to pull myself farther away; well might I have slipped up the stairs and into the principal wing of the building when a voice thundered through the air, cutting through the air better than any knife could. “What is this? You dare to attempt to lay hands upon my guest?”

  The bestial man, broken as much by time as by her hand pleaded pitifully in that moment, his voice guttural and hoarse from proper usage. “N-no, he-he lie hereupon this seat!”

  His plea of the Baroness was so very pathetic that he might well have pulled at the heartstrings of a softer woman. But not the Lady Varcola, who was made of far sterner stuff than any other woman I had ever met.

  Sneering at him, she was to draw near to him scowling with such fury that the man shrank back frightened, hissing as he went his fangs clacking against themselves helplessly.

  “Back you fool; you will never menace my guest again!” She hissed at him which drew more pathetic pleading from him.

  It happened that she turned away from him; so as to hurry to my side grabbing me by the arm with her froze fingers. Still horrified by what I had seen, I was to attempt to ask after the figure I had seen chained to this separate hall.

  “What could well have possessed you to dare to do such a thing, without my permission?” Varcola demanded impatiently.

  Quiet for some time, I answered her with some sort of spluttered excuse yet even as I spoke I could tell that she was displeased. The anger that flashed from her eyes was such that it silenced me, and induced shakes and trembling in my person. It happened that she would not accept such an outburst.

  In place of humouring me for much longer, she was to drag me to the doors informing me as she did so, “I have had the castle-gates closed though there are three of the wolves still within the courtyard. I should advise you to take refuge amidst the stables and to latch the door closed until Klove comes for you in the morn’.”

  Bewildered by these words, ere any response could be spat out at such a cruel decree I was thrown outside the doors of the castle. Quite how she had managed to lure away the majority of the wolves, seal the gates closed and retain three of the canines within the courtyard all without them attacking was a mystery.

  The wolves still in the courtyard stared with gleaming eyes from where they had been resting near the gates, each of them watching with keen interest as Varcola threw me outside. It was peculiar how strong the lady was, for her vice-like grip over my arm was unlike the soft touch of any woman I had ever met before her, so that her strength which reminded me of that of Minotaurs that worked out in the fields or as monks.

  Thrown from within the building to the tender mercies of the wolves, whilst my legs remained wounded still was a wicked deed.

  You might well have expected me, Sieghild to rage at the doors but the moment I heard them bolted shut frightened I know not at this time how it was to come to pass that I moved so swiftly. My legs ached and burnt (they still do), and I was to plunge into the stables as advised mere inches ahead of the wolves, wherefore I sealed the door shut and backed away from the entrance, for one of them pierced a claw through the wood. The door which had been closed opened and shuttered once more held firm thankfully, against the latter two wolves.

  It was one of the most terrible moment, as it clawed at the ground, then came the inevitable moment that one of the horses panicked, alarmed by the sudden arrival of the wolves. It took several moments to calm it down, to sooth its instincts. There were other horses that required such assistance, ere I could recline against a nearby wall to note down the events of the past several days.

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