I posted old stuff - this is the newer Astoria Story stuff and needs an edit

Drufus grew above a normal Dwarf size and it wasn’t magic – just good eating from Weena, and at four foot seven inches long he opposed to the Naval Regulation four foot two inches and he’d no intention of ever joining the Dwarvian Navy as if it existed on Destraight.

It didn’t stop him learning ruthlessness from Weena and truthfulness from Rafus but as he watched the Matira’s dance around anything that mattered he felt sickened as he considered the damage inflicted on his country and he felt this was his country as much as he felt Runnel’s daughter – Grisalda – was an evil bitch who should be put down. The Matira’s desires were for themselves and no-one else; especially where Grisalda was concerned.

Rona, to Drufus, seemed to be the only sound one, if you include bonding a Roc, as a sign of good judgement.

Drufus always told himself he was honest but when he looked around he told himself a lot of things to suit his brain’s demands as he tried to cope with a mother who considered sex as a bank and a father who no longer slept with his mother as he considered her demands of gold coins to sleep with her were excessive.

For Stefen; not knowing who the father of Grisalda was should have been a problem but in the end he’d rather it hadn’t been Griselda as the mother of Runnel but some things you can’t choose and Rona seemed to have been born from a different mother; knowing Griselda, from a different father as well.

Runnel herself was as nice as could be but she’d given birth to a killer and a daughter bonded to a telepath – it made Rafus and Drufus seem ordinary and Stefen sent Rona to the castle at Toshon … he didn’t expect her to fly there on the back of a Roc bird; however.

He remembered back on Dwarvia where everything just seemed to fit in and everything was planned but then again, if you didn’t fit in, your life could be brief and rather exciting, and then there was Gereft and Basil.

Half the time it seemed like musical beds as to who appeared where and at what time although keeping Griselda out of his bed was his major success and he owed Rafus for the information from Weena about the plot on Natomi.

Weena was proving an excellent spy-mistress and already several plots had exposed the perpetrators to the ant-hills.

His thoughts went back to the father of Runnel’s children.

Gereft was often seen leaving her bedchamber and Griselda’s … was Gereft the father of his daughters and the father of his grand-daughters or was it Basil Droga, or did it really matter – Basil and Gereft had already run and that was a decision he could understand and was making sure was a one-way trip.

Droga was last heard of at Toshon, prompting Stefen to think again about visiting Toshon, ‘I need to something about that monolith!’ he thought, but he’d never stopped Gereft from visiting Griselda and enjoying her wedding knife.

He actually considered Gereft a better choice for his Kingdom than Basil Droga as the father of his daughters and that would never change. Stefen’s thinking went back again to Rafus and Drufus. Both were always loyal but given that they could have been consigned to the streets, it didn’t really mean a lot. Rafus could write magic but his ability to actually use it was a joke. Drufus could write and use magic but as a magic programmer he always left large bugs in his scrolls and never tested anything to the end.

Weena – his mother – came from the street; never left the street – even slept on the street as the only thing she’d ever known but her knowledge protected Stefen and he turned a very blind eye as she returned to her old trade to gather information although Natomi made sure she was deloused and bathed whenever she returned.

To a given degree for the term and value of his beliefs Rufus felt he’d been taken for a frog; kissed by the Matira’s as a toad and never made a Prince … probably not a difficult decision in their minds but a bad one in his. Could he ever get a belief back or one he knew to be true? To this extent he’d started to visit the temples in Matira and in running errands he found Roseen.

He was no-one’s pawn: king; queen, or anything they felt they could use and on his visits to his mother who stilled preyed her old haunts; hidden from Rafus for her desires, Drufus met Roseen who worked where his mother had; taking up Weena’s old trade.

Drufus finally rebelled against his mother and found her a job as a maid in the castle.

With Roseen in the castle he found his plans were again destroyed as Weena then used Roseen as part of her spy network in the castle and then Roseen was seen once again in the brothels and the temples. Drufus checked the Dwarf Druncheon Temple where Roseen usually met him – like his mother she didn’t want her business interfered with.

The Priests liked his desire to learn and he shared the knowledge of his father with them although they realised as much as he did that the spells seemed to learn more from each other than from his father or him but they possessed their own spells – normally kept well hidden in their vaults and they didn’t have the bugs he introduced into the scrolls.

Rafus and Drufus seemed to know magic but could never use it but his father to a degree was a conduit for magic which he then recorded but a frog was more likely to be a King – even Stefen – than Rafus ever to successfully cast a spell and Drufus was little better.

At one point Rafus had even stuffed Drufus into a box of spells and held the lid shut thinking that it would forced Drufus to incant a spell.

All Drufus incanted was the declining air he needed to breath and hammered on the box until it suddenly went quiet and Rafus opened the box to find his son unconscious.

Grisalda made her own plans which always seemed to be violent … Grisalda … Drufus thought was now like her Grandmother Griselda and Stefen just seemed weary – he’d even moved the Stasis coffins to Toshon away from Grisalda.

When you have people who want nothing in life but to plot and have people react to them it can wear you down, and all Stefen could think of for a solution was an Axe and to his mind it would soon be Axe time.

More often than not, Drufus now found another woman in his bed at night although often he just took a candle into the room and showed her to the Guard outside to remove – the message eventually seemed to work although what Drufus did with the candle afterwards was another matter.

They were putting mental pins in him to melt his feelings to Roseen. He knew now that the Scrolls had worked on and for him to a degree but he couldn’t get the magic right, no more than his father could.

He written some of the Scrolls – in fact most of them but every Scroll seemed to have a fault in it so whatever he incanted from them never worked as it should. When his father tried however, nothing ever happened. When he tried it always went wrong, no matter how much he read the words.

They never worked as they should, and that was just another beating from his father who could write magic like a drunk can swill beer but then swayed and staggered afterwards and so did the magic.

Grisalda taunted them to get a reaction but they found the magic reacted more to Grisalda than it ever did to them and that made them wonder.

Magic had never been strong in the Matira’s but was it strong in the Droga family or did it come from somewhere else?

Chapter XIV - Gutter Kids

Griselda, almost under duress gave birth to three children, ignoring the first born as a matter of course.

Laseith was the greedy, violent domineering baby who always fought for the fullest nipple; Routani received constant headbutts as she tried for food, Mioned was under the guard of Bonnie Leligan and Brunie Dumie and fed by a wet-nurse but with her eyes bound twenty four hours a day by order of Peter Jamesson.

Arturo didn’t have first memories; he didn’t have any memories of his birth – just a desire for survival which didn’t include a bath. His mother – Dirtesia – was good looking for a Dwarf whose blue eyes were considered unusual amongst Dwarfs, adding to her value but she still lay at the bottom of a life too difficult to imagine as life.

A fragment of something she’d never understood – just that she was there at the bottom – once part of a well-to-do family until bombs left her as the sole remaining member of the family with nothing and she hadn’t gone below ground like some of them as that seemed to be wrong somehow – she was a Dwarf and Dwarfs stayed on top of everyone. To survive, she sold her body to anyone prepared to pay.

Arturo was thrown into a cot as his mother earned their food until he was then thrown out of the door and the mud and sewage and rain were his usual bath. He’d climbed through so many mud pies he though the drain was a friend and probably one of the few in his life as he watched life float by and invented whatever he could as he also watched other refuge float past and he envied it for its ability to get away.

Eventually he found the Temple of Druncheon who first of all emptied buckets of water over him and then found him something to wear and fed him.

More and more as he drew away from Dirtesia, she attacked him if he ever went near her – demanding that he beg to support her and he now began to find anywhere to sleep when the Druncheon Priests would not allow him to stay at the temple – yes, he begged but Arturo considered that he needed the money more than his mother who had coins sewn into the parts of her bed she did not require and often charged a good golden penny for her blue eyes and promises.

Finally the Priests accepted him as a Novice and he remained there and studied but the Priests watched him – even to the Priests in their tolerance, you needed a lot of tolerance for Arturo.

Arturo still tried on occasions to talk to his mother but she demanded he paid her the rate for when she slept with men to speak to her; Arturo, never having slept with a women did not understand the desire that made men pay for women nor had the money to pay to his mother to speak with her, and again found her attacking him with a club and he left hurriedly afterwards, realising now he would never know who his father was.

Laseith didn’t take long to find the gutter although she’d now slit her gown to thigh-high and at a young age was already sizing men up as her mother did. Routani was more restrained but it wasn’t that difficult when compared to Laseith. Like Arturo, when out of the castle Laseith also sought temples although for some reason she chose the elven god – Alf as her temple which swiftly kicked her back into the street and she sought the human’s God – Astoron. The temple of Druncheon already knew her and that was another temple that had kicked her back into the street so there was only Astoron.

The Priests of Druncheon seeing blood on the robes of Arturo also threw him out.

Peter Jamesson still had no real idea who the father of Laseith and Routani was but Griselda and Gereft were both dead, so he would never know but again he had no idea who the killer was – Gereft had been executed as someone had to be but it didn’t tell him who had killed Griselda. Mioned was hidden and would stay hidden although she was now in a long room for most of the day – a table ran the length of the room with two doors at the end if Mioned could ever find her way to the doors.

Mioned with her eyes bound couldn’t see anything but her hearing, smell and touch were now very acute. She’d smelt the candles and her senses felt the heat that would burn her and she also felt the nudges of other Guards as they past to try and throw her into the flames.

Now she felt arms take her very gently and she was moved.

She knew from the smell of air to her left a door was open and she could sense the steep steps and she was released to step out to a different smell and it smelt wet, if not damp. She put her hand out gently and felt feathers.

The stone was cold through her light slippers and many things are – especially the lack of a mother but then, who wants a mother to do nothing more than kill you but now she felt something warm and comforting. She could feel a mind looking into hers. Two people lifted her and her hands were gently guided to its neck, then the voice spoke in her mind.

It was something alive and as hands held her and strapped a belt around her she seemed very light; she vomited as she was lifted into the air and then lost the rest of her stomach as something in her head said, “if I left you behind, you would die. Some of us Rocs made a treaty with the wooden people – the few that still remain after the bombs and I am a Roc and my name is Taren Roc. We still seek a world but now we have to settle for an island; it’s called Dagril. You’ll need to bath and wash your clothes when we arrive, the small lake to the north east is better; I will just bath,” and then we need to find food?

Arturo still had problems with his mother on the rare visits to her and when she was free although she started to say, “I should charge you – they think you are a customer. You’re preventing me from earning money,” but she always kept a truncheon close when she met him and their last meeting was one he’d not forget as he ran away covered in blood – they would think he was an unhappy client.

To think back, Arturo and Princess Laseith first met in a gutter of their choice; knowing and understanding each other from that moment they met although Arturo couldn’t shake off his life as a young Dwarf hated by his mother for looking like his father, and as his father was never there with his mother selling herself, his mother had a free hand and used it frequently. He paid for his mother’s timing mistakes but still never knew who his father was.

For Laseith, the supposed daughter of the late Queen Griselda of Toshonia and King Peter Jamesson of Ascania … or maybe not … or of a favourite Guard of Queen Griselda’s troupe of mounts … as was also claimed she was shepherded with Guards surrounding her and reporting back.

She hated as her mother had done and killed as her mother had done, and she considered it her right to dominate and kill.

She knew her blood was pure and nothing ever flowed into her mind but she thought of Griselda: her marriage knife; turning the knife as she wrestled it from her mother into her mother’s rib cage … it was easy then to summons Gereft, shout to the Guards he’d killed her mother – she owed it to herself to come and watch him hung the following morning – he should have pleaded for something as the noose tightened although his silence still annoyed her. History often neatly dovetail’s people’s destinies amidst a mound of bodies and Laseith was doing her best.

Her mother serviced the Toshonian Guards and once wrong on her dates became pregnant leaving King Jamesson more than suspicious as to the origin of Princesses Laseith and Routani.

Griselda thought that the Guard would support her and he did; he was found holding her body the next morning and executed.

Laseith learnt from the streets. Playing in a gutter she often ran barefoot along the open sewage ditch following a body as a soldier floated by whenever she saw one. Later, when Laseith was at a barrack party she stole enough purses to buy rags so she could beg as an abandoned child.

One day as she was begging in the street, she tried to trip Arturo so she could rob him after he fell. Arturo as usual had no thought for anyone but himself as he made his way he stepped on her outstretched foot, receiving abuse as it was the foot she meant to trip him up with.

Eventually, time found both of them at the temple of Astoron, who would feed them if they bowed to Astoron, and Arturo, who could hardly walk in a straight line after the beatings from his mother and father, attracted as much emotion as Laseith who carefully dressed in rags ever morning; Arturo’s bruises and trouble in walking were also a good entrance when the Priestesses took over in the evening but once again, timing was everything. Whilst the temple of Druncheon – the Dwarf god – had thrown Arturo out as a young brat, he now he was older and looking better so they allowed him to enter their temple during the day and study their magic’s as a novice whilst he returned to Astoron’s temple in the evening.

Laseith had tried the same with the temple of Alf – the elven god. They, however, kicked Laseith into the street which coloured more than her opinion and language, and they would never allow her back.

Together Arturo and Laseith found Astoron good for food, although to them as they ate and praised Astoron, well food was food and the Priests received donations but in Arturo’s case he had another problem.

His mother had recently died leaving him with an absentee father, no money and he’d would have been reduced to the play level of Laseith if not for the clothing donated to the temple of Druncheon. One night as they gathered at the temple of Astoron, one of the Priests who was on night duty for a change, took pity on him, “as your mother is recently deceased, you can still speak to her spirit?”

“I thank you, Rosult, but my mother seldom spoke to me before she died, except with her hand or a stick, and I cannot see her speaking to me now!”

“Arturo! The Priest is trying to help you!”

“To do what, Laseith?”

“Your mother must have had some money hidden away. Ask her and she will tell you … we can share it!”

“Do you have an offering for Astoron?”

“Rosult; I do not have an offering for you to speak this magic but I would plead that you ask my mother for help.”

“You are in his temple and Astoron always cares, Arturo and in more ways than you will ever know. The ways and thoughts of a God are beyond our understanding and thoughts—”

“—so what does he care about?”

“You take his charity, now let us see if you can take his blessing—”

“I don’t want his blessing—”

“You both take Astoron’s blessings on a daily basis, yet both of you do not accept the sacrifices that feed you. You treat this temple as a food-source and we tolerate that for the pain you have suffered; unlike your ‘Alf’ temple, Laseith, or your ‘Druncheon’ temple, Arturo. They knew you for your worth immediately you arrived and you still haven’t learnt, Laseith. You still haven’t learnt! My God is different and through his benevolence, we feed you and help you leave the streets; you, Laseith, still drag the streets with you … we don’t ask for rewards … we have a saying in this Temple … ‘what goes around, cometh around.’ It will come around for you, Laseith.”

“And what does that mean, Rosult?”

“As you take, you repay although I don’t think the concept means with a sword, Laseith!—”

“Can I talk to my mother, Rosult?”

“Let us see, whether your mother wishes to talk to you, Arturo!”

“I will make preparations … it will take some time and I suggest you purge yourself of unholy thoughts, if that is possible!”

Rosult moved into another chamber and eventually green vapour filled the chamber. The chamber was some twenty foot high and the altar billowed green and then it began to move to red.

Arturo peering around the corner now saw the font in front of the alter turn orange as if it was a furnace that had moved from red-hot but it did not seem to need coals for it’s heat and the colours now merged with the green and red to create an aura of stillness.

Rosult looked over his shoulder to the doorway where Arturo and Laseith peered through, “as you cannot wait, come in and stand before the font. You will see your mother’s face and hear her words. Having heard some of her words, I suggest you prepare yourself but do not touch the font … if you do, you will join your mother on the other side and there will be no return!”

They both moved to stand in front of the font and looked at the image of Arturo’s mother.

“You killed me, Arturo!” Was the shouted accusation.

“I did not kill you!”

“You killed me with an axe, my beloved son.”

“Did you kill your mother, Arturo?” And Rosult’s voice rose as he looked first at the image and then Arturo.

“She was beating me again. I picked up the axe to defend myself … I did not mean to hurt her.”

“… you killed me, Arturo!”

“It was Laseith. She gave me the axe.”

“You fool. You’re admitting you killed her. Shut-up, Arturo – she deserved it. She was beating you. You were defending yourself. Shut-up!”

“You forced me … you gave me the axe … you made me kill her, Laseith!”

“No-one makes you kill an unarmed woman, Arturo,” and Rosult looked at Arturo with disgust, although I can feel the power in Laseith and you’ve dabbled in magic, Laseith … bad magic.

“For you Arturo, you are just a weak man who will commit evil for anyone stronger. You are weak, your spirit may recover but I doubt that. Your life will be that of an errand runner; a killer of the weak; a Dwarf you do not trust at your back!”

“She kept beating me, Rosult. She would never stop. I was only defending myself.”

“My God tells me you are lying, Arturo.”

“Don’t pay any attention to him, Arturo. You must know how to live from this world … you are a fool, but with me, I … we will rise and I’ll not forget you!”

“I am not a fool, Laseith. I don’t grab at nothing and attack those who would help me.”

“Then produce your pennies, Arturo … that is all you are fit for,” the Priest held his cloth a lot closer than required and he now seemed to shine.

Rosult waved his hand for Laseith and Arturo to follow and left the chamber, “Get you gone from this temple. Never darken it’s doors again. The only reason I don’t call the guard is that both of you have suffered and you will suffer again for this mischief – leave this temple, NOW.”

Laseith, kept from poverty by King Peter … now thought … yes he would do and she plucked Arturo as a willing killer with a history to join her. Laseith always felt she came from the gutter and carried the gutter with her – now she would sure Arturo never left the gutter in his actions.

Queen Griselda, when the mood was on her would slept with anyone and Laseith had little in common with King Peter so it looked fairly obvious to everyone that Laseith and Routani had not sprung from Peter’s loins. Most assumed, in private, they’d arisen from the Guard who was found with the dead Griselda – Gereft with both now dead but people close to Peter were already silently questioning whether Machael Jamesson should be woken from Stasis without Laseith knowing and the guard on him was redoubled. Peter’s health was deteriorating and voices were quietly raised concerning Laseith and the unsolved deaths connected to her. Something or someone had to stop Laseith but no-one was prepared to challenge her or deny her birth.

Gereft was know for his loyalty to Queen Griselda and according to witnesses seemed drugged when he was found with the dead Griselda.

He was quickly hung at Laseith’s instigation with a quick change of staff in the kitchen but no-one, who wished for a long life, was prepared to challenge Laseith and live.

She might not be a Princess but acted it and without Machael there was no direct descendent from Peter Jamesson to take over and she was trying to stop that however they released Machael from Stasis before Peter died and her personal Guard now counted as nil.

With Arturo and Laseith, people watched in four directions at once as both of them were two faced – Routani however seemed mainly harmless but did everything Laseith told her to. Laseith knew she could make Arturo kill, which suited her because then he owed her for her silence.

Arturo, almost as a means of protection made himself as useful as he could by copying the magic scripts he’d learnt in the temple and sworn to never reveal to anyone.

Laseith on the other hand, or any hand, was prepared to reveal everything but her true self, and yet again people around her seemed to have short lives.

Peter Jamesson also had Guards around him more and more, and his food-tasters were becoming fewer and fewer as the days progressed and his meals became shorter and shorter.

Finally an apple laid him low – produced by Laseith; who received a public whipping for it, and a dungeon, along with Arturo and there they stayed for the next ten years.

The island of Dagril seemed to become a little crowded as Mona Roc and Taren Roc both landed at the same lake on Dagril.

Mioned’s eyes were still bound but Rona found that Taren Roc would speak to her as he spoke to Mioned and he guided Mioned using his eyes to help see colours, walk and swim safely.

Mona Roc tended to take off and look for food and often just flew over Dagril, watching, until one day Taren Roc took off and headed for Ascan and Mona flew down and spoke to them, “we Rocs do speak together and your Guards, Mioned are to be executed by the new King of Ascan. Taren Roc will try to save them.”

“They allowed my escape Mona Roc at a risk of their own lives. Without them I would be dead,” tears slowly touched her face as she looked at Mona Roc.

“He will do his best, Mioned.”

Taren Roc arrived just before dawn and cast his mind around to find the minds of Bonnie Leligan and Brunie Dumie, “I am here and will try and rescue you from the exercise yard and this was broadcast to other Rocs and again and again he heard voices in his head. There will only be one chance of success, he shouted in reply. I cannot ask for the deaths of others. It is my reply and my life to do this, no-one else should die.”

The reply from Bonnie was immediate, “How is Mioned. We knew the risks when we helped her to be free; now we are Traitors to King Machael.”

“Who is this King Machael?”

“Grisalda and Arturo are in the cells for killing King Peter Jamesson. King Machael is deliberating but we’re classed as traitors. There is no proof against them.”

“But there is proof against you. I’ll find a hiding place; I’ll try and rescue you at dawn. When I land there are leather garments on my back, grab them and hang on. Hold under leather; get one leg over my back. If you fail? You fall!”

Being a Roc means you are easy to see and Taren found a large weather vane which now ceased turning but from a distance who would really notice anything and he just sat and waited.

Dawn finally rose to an early morn and Taren had been busy in thought, if not in deed and as the Guards pushed Bonnie and Brunie into the hanging area there were a number Rocs who now swept into the Guards as Taren hovered over them.

Bonnie and Brunie fought the downdraught of winds as they grabbed the leathers and cocked a leg over the back of Taren and were away as the other Rocs took off in a mighty flapping of wings.

Bonnie and Brunie both felt they knew each other pretty well but were still clinging to each other like grim death on Taren and seemed a good idea.

Matters between King Stefen – as he styled himself, and Princess Grisalda – as she styled herself were never harmonious. Grisalda behaved like a Queen and his Queen was Natomi; his daughter was Runnel, he didn’t know who the father or fathers of Rona and Grisalda were, who were technically his Grand-children. Rona he’d sent away to save her from Grisalda’s machinations.

Now she had taken up with a Roc bird and vanished … deep down he wished he’d put Grisalda on a mountain and left her liver for any bird who was hungry. In the absence of a male heir he’d also been forced to wake up Martan Matira from Stasis and that was another problem he didn’t want but with Weena and Roseen were good spies but Grisalda was already looking to kill him and them, leaving her as the sole Princess.

Roseen watched her back. Maybe that didn’t reflect her concern although she heard the footsteps which hesitated in the mud as they slithered and slid.

She’d believed Natomi when she said she was protected.

She’d believed Weena who told her she was hidden but belief didn’t seem to have much value now.

She was surrounded; used with false promises by everyone and then Grisalda appeared from an alley, “I wanted you to know it was me.”

“I always knew it was you, Grisalda. You’re your mother’s bastard spawn!”

“You’ll die for me and for that. I could have used you? I still can.”

“Instead of men between your legs!”

Griselda raised the jewelled wedding knife.

Where did you steal that from you gutter bitch.

Griselda looked at Roseen, “I will kill you slowly and you will die bitch,” a crossbow bolt took Roseen in the back.

Griselda screamed, “who fired that shot. I want him killed slowly. I wanted to kill that bitch,” and she said this to the Guards who ran up to her, “find the Guard who did this; flay him alive!”

“The bolt is not one of ours, Princess. We don’t use these bolts.”

“Then find who fired it or you will face his destiny!”

Jinny looked at the drunk, “the wind took the bolt but I save Roseen from Griselda.”

“Roseen is still dead, Jinny. I might be a drunk, but I don’t killed people who don’t attack me. You said to stay away and you would sort it … while I can still think … what did you sort, Jinny?”

“I meant to hit Grisalda. She deserves it. I missed … and that is it.”

“It might be for you. You’re still alive!”

“Let’s move. You’re attacking me but you took that Lord and broke him into a heap against that wall?”

“Man to man – it was personal! I didn’t become as Assassin and miss. I broke him for trying to run you, the Cat and myself down – it was personal.”

Dusti moved away. There were two bolts in Roseen’s back.

Dusti was never much of anything until she learnt to kill without thinking – whether this was from her father or mother was optional: both had considered killing for a living before Stefen, who never stayed the axeman when he thought it was necessary for both Griselda and Grisalda moved her away from everyone. Stefen killed when necessary for the Kingdom he was building; Griselda killed for pleasure.

Stefen still remembered Alisia Smith – it was before he was forced to wake up Griselda.

He remembered her gentle walk; the way she moved; her soft hair that she spent so much time brushing every day, and she’d never let anyone else touch her hair; shining in the sunlight when the effects of the bombs had gone and sunlight now penetrated the haze.

Stefen still remembered the day she died; he didn’t realised how deadly Griselda was but Dusti was on her way to Jacque and Maria – eventually – the path would be Spragend then Uguar and Toshon to join with Rona – only now Rona had taken off with the Rocs and Dusti with the Hawks but she would come back.

Alisia was his love, his mistress and someone he should have protected against the liars, smarms and con-artists that offered everything and delivered nothing but by the time he found her dead in his bed it was too late. He arranged for the daughter as they called Dusti who always ended up covered in various things to be taken to Spragen. Steven thought she would be safe and then Nata pushed her towards the wall as the killers called – just crossbow bolts that sprang out from the framework of her room and into her attackers. You don’t attack a sex-shop, twice.

Dusti by next morning was on her way to Uguar and a few others were dead … Grisalda’s people were dying but that would never stop her.

Uguar was a little more sophisticated as they poisoned the food and Dusti did had stomach trouble that didn’t ease until she arrived in Toshon and Jacque and Maria Hawk who lived by the sea.

Jacque and Maria Hawk lived as they chose or survived. They down on the western side, between the western end of the Toshonian coast, where the last magic had broken the countries apart.

Frania was some ten mile away. The castle with all its exploding qualities had imploded.

Drufus would extract a revenge that buried a lot of things but not himself, but we deal with now, and now was something that Dusti, Jacque and Maria left, but they were old folk who Stefen often promised to kill.

Somehow the old folk survived. Who the old folk were, or what they were, was something Stefen had never understood but he took their potions when Grisalda was too close.

They took Dusti into their beach-hut as their own and they tried to see if she could fly.

Jacque and Maria were ‘old folk’ it didn’t matter to them who folk were as they lived away from any folk and helped when they could but King Stefen left them alone whilst Grisalda hunted them down and Stefen via Weena then hunted them. It might not have been apparent but the axe swung low for a lot of Grisalda’s cohorts and Guards.

Yes, her Guards did find Dusti and two went down with thrown daggers whilst the third, to his displeasure received a boot and a dagger protruding from it to give him a new career but not one he would have desired or chosen.

The main problem was Drufus who blamed the King, Weena, his father and Dusti for the death of Roseen and vowed revenge against them and the world that allowed them to exist.

He retreated even more into himself and the magic scrolls that he would make change the world and he didn’t care how.

Drye – still eyed people as prey he could run down and he also could bring down a horse at a run. His eyes were bloodshot with a yellow cast. He moved as and like a wolf but relaxed curled up like a dog if nothing was happening.

Drye was human at times, or as much that he felt like it … he felt … life could trouble him and he could trouble life … he could handled it but Dusti often ignored and looked askance at his interference. Nothing physical past between them, or nothing they would admit to; just a look was enough and Dusti didn’t trust anyone but then Drye wasn’t just anyone.

Drye’s village existed. The mountains protecting it to the south but to the west the sea just swept in.

It was ever more than a floating wreck than anything with the waves hitting the boundaries of Matira and Frania and to the point also hitting them as the waters swept in over the low land.

The wind often changed allegiances before dawn and most huts were now on long legs and they slept in hammocks with netting the crabs could climb into.

Maybe when the water had finally finished destroying everything they treasured, those who still floated would exist.

Drye tried to speak at Council Meetings; usually after he’d had landed back as the sea ebbed and the Elders considered they had secured something to eat but Drye was shouted down.

He stood as tall as he could as a young adult trying to address his elders. Eventually he just looked into the fire and saw an image of ancients arguing old political battles and he saw death of the village.

Drye looked at the broken rocks and broken rules that surrounded them and finally said, “I leave this village and you old men – there is no future with you.”

His mother rose; “Please forgive my son, he forgets himself.”

“No. I don’t forget myself, mother. You do not allow me to forget anything.”

“I am your Mother! I am your Mother! I have tried to bring you to adulthood and to understand how to behave, yet you refuse to accept my authority,” turning to the old men, she continued, “as he refuses to accept your authority. I am done with Drye. My son is no longer my son. He should be banished and driven from our lives. I can not longer speak for my son. He has betrayed everything we believe in. He is no longer fit to be my son or to be in this village – drive him out, now!”

Stones started to hit Drye before he could move and then running he turned to the gap to the south finding a hidden path up a rocky climb as he fell and staggered up again as other stones hit him.

There were rocks to the south, often patrolled by wolves who approached the prone boy snarling at the children who pursued him and the children of the village ran leaving Drye lying there as a wolf sniffed him and licked the blood from him – his arms, his hands, his head. Other wolves moved in until she snarled at them and continued to lick his wounds.

The Alpha Male knew better than to interfere when females treated young. He felt humans were dangerous to wolves and they would be hunted for tonight’s work but would he challenge three females wolves from caring for something they took as their own?

Not if he wished to remain Alpha Male and there were enough to challenge him if he made a mistake.

Drye found he easily adjusted to the wolves’ lifeforms and he began to hunt with them. He also started to understand them but his legs now built up strength; he could feel his teeth almost lengthening as he hunted and shared his prey but his fights with the Alpha Male were becoming more frequent.

His leggings were now reduced to the middle of his body and he often went bare-chested and that was how he met Dusti as he was drawn towards Jacque and Mari that day after a vicious battle that left him scarred yet his feelings to the pack were that he was wrong and once again he left his home or what he’d felt was becoming a home as an outcast.

Drye and Dusti eventually became almost kindred spirits. Dusti, the daughter of a concubine/King – Alisia Smith but Stefen took Natomi as his second Queen leaving Alisia to be hunted by Grisalda and both were protected in the end by ignorance – but that is another story and Alisia became Grisalda’s next target as if she needed one.

Jacque and Mari were Dusti’s third or fourth home and yet another story she forgot as she moved her life and her little thoughts left to her but with Jacque and Mari she found the hawks or did the hawks find her but at last the fear left her.

Drye also made his way towards Jacque and Mari’s huts as hawks rose in the sky. The remains of a road ran east of the huts leaving the road to Jacque and Mari which meant you passed through a crop of trees and then another hundred yards to bring you to the beach house. Drye stayed to the south as he approached. He could see a boat on the beach and he felt at home again. Boats were his life before wolves became his parents as his own parents attacked him.

Jacque and Mari were old folk; usually left alone, even by Stefen. They lived away from people in two linked huts elevated above the sea levels but still standing together with hammocks swinging inside for when the flows were high – they didn’t seek a lot but they gave to those who approached them.

Alongside each hut was a fish catchment container. When tides were high they flooded and sometimes even with fish. Slightly higher than the usual tide level was a ramp and a boat on a long line that dropped to the sand as the tide swept out and floated back in when the tide returned. They lived with the tides and peace of mind including the boat rising to their hammocks when they’d made a mistake, and within that they took anything or anyone who needed help.

Dusti could understand their alarm as Drye approached, she’d felt it when she met Jinny for the first time – it was something you didn’t understand yet understood.

Dusti was the wrong side of the blanket; Jinny was the underside of everything as she tried to take over Dusti and move to another body – quite difficult to do when someone belts you in the rid cage as Dusti did. Jinny crossed Dusti’s body from her list of possible targets amidst a warning from the Drunk who she also could not penetrate partly due to his addled brains that he would kill her in Dusti’s body if she ever tried; provoking an impasse, but Jinny was ready for any better body and mind; mind you the current body seemed stable and maybe the mind could be developed.

Roseen told Drufus the Matira’s would control him and Drufus thought about that as he looked into the black water and watched his love die quickly – the Matira’s had controlled him. His magic expanded as it matched his emotions and he watched the spirals move until they climbed from the bowl and spread into his mind and he saw Dusti and Drye arguing as they moved away, then he saw Jinny and the Drunk arguing and finally he heard their words as they both admitted they had been aiming for Grisalda but somehow the arrows swerved and hit the wrong target. It didn’t take much for Drufus to understand why … Grisalda had her own magic from somewhere and he suspected it was from his scrolls.

He knew they had saved Roseen from the tortures that Grisalda would have used to slowly kill her but he would face them in his own time and with all of his magic he could bring to bear as he knew now how to use magic. The pain of Rafus beating him finally unlock the thoughts that allowed him to understand magic in terms of himself. All of them would pay for Roseen’s loss but they wouldn’t just die. They would be buried within the cosmos, the ground and would await Destraight and its denizens when the bubble finally burst.

He’d loved Roseen but this just wasn’t to do with Roseen, it was to do with the beatings, his treatment by the churches, that Stefen hadn’t stopped Grisalda from hunting his love and already he’d copied the scripts with a Guard he could trust waiting to take them to a boat and cross over to the Lodge. There had been no respect for his love or him and no protection for them … King Stefen and Princess Grisalda would learn respect by the time he’d finished.

Stefen and Rafus were arguing, “What do you mean you can’t find, Drufus. He must be somewhere?”

“I’ve checked the Scroll Room; he’s practically lived in there since Roseen’s death.”

“Find him, I need this scroll read. He said ‘he’d prepared it especially for me. It protects me for the next hundred years from anything’.”

Grisalda as usual barged into the room and snatched the scroll from Rafus’ hands, “Any idiot can read a scroll, I’ll read it.”

“Grisalda! If the final words go wrong, we might be protected but what else will be left?”

“I’ll read them, Stefen. I’ve heard Drufus stammer over them enough time; at least I don’t stammer.”

“No, Griselda! We need Drufus!”

Drufus from his point by the seashore watched the sky.

Mona Roc in the sky could feel the tingle of magic starting. She could sense the magic emanating from the bags on the horse and immediately swooped down to pluck the horse and carry that to the Lodge. The Lodge was encircled by water but within it’s boundaries there were two lakes. One to the east and one to the west. The Lodge in the south of what was, for any description, an island.

She dropped the horse from a height of a few feet and the horse took off at a gallop, leaving her facing Taren Roc, Mioned, Rona, Bonnie and Brunie and as the spell started to take place.

Grisalda, as usual, ignored everyone and continued reading the scroll, “Mordunt, Gazia, Etplna—”

“What have you—?” Stefen’s voice slowly died as nothing seemed to happen. He ran out of the room and to the top of the tower. Nothing seemed to have changed. The sun had set and he could hear the noise from the kitchens. The sentries were still patrolling. The dogs were howling in hunger – Drufus’ spells had failed yet again but there was a shimmer in the air above the castle. All he could were suns in the sky magnified and red lights hurtled towards the castle as the ground rip up into the air in front of his castle with a bubble created around the castle.

Stefen’s mouth moved as he watched but words failed him as a mountain of earth descended upon the bubble darkening his vision and now he truly sank into the depths with only light from the bubble surrounding the castle and town as everything descended and the colours vanished as the land descended.

Stefen could now see his land and it stretched as far as he could see and that wasn’t very far. The light from the bubble seemed to have some radiance but there was no sun, just a glow. Grisalda plunged into everything into the ground whether she had the faintest idea of the results of her actions or not and now she plunged his kingdom into the ground.

Stefen remembered Drufus promising him that he would not be hurt and that a last spell at the end would be for Stefen which was a pity as Drufus was the only consistent Magic Scroller to continuously screw up his spells and the final spell moved Drufus not Stefen as it took Ascan into four hundred years of sleep and transported Drufus to the Du Storme castle but it did, in a localised form, give four hundred years sleep to isolated areas and isolated people including the horse bearing his scrolls.

Mona Roc had risen again to follow the horse and now crashed down – no else apart from Rona had moved and now Rona froze in the stirrup high grass as she followed the path beaten down by a frightened horse that had been given some flying lessons by Mona Roc.

Yes, Drufus delivered magic code that obliterated half the world but his problem amongst others was his inability to actually write decent magic code that did exactly what it said on the scroll. Some still outside the area he decreed still had the protection of four hundred years in a bubble but stayed above ground.

Drufus forgot to matched his spells together so some places sunk beneath the ground, others didn’t. Some Dwarfs and others slept for four hundred years but others didn’t and not everywhere sunk into the ground and for Drufus himself it was completely different.

Chapter XV - Arrival

Drufus arrived at the Du Storme castle and the Du Storme castle was unusual.

The only piece of it really above ground was the Gate-tower abutting the Storme inlet leading down to the Storme sea. A bad pun but Du Storme’s were bad at everything.

Drufus, spinning through the air arrived to find himself between a lake, a town and just outside the entrance as he froze into a sleep although anyone knowing Drufus would have trouble differentiating the difference.

In this case the soldiers picked up his immobile body, carried it into the castle and left him leaning against a wall with his arms sticking out – they would be good if you were passing and wanted your back scratched and handy for hanging rags on.

Sir Facid wandered below ground. It wasn’t difficult. Apart from the entrance everything was underground with light filtering in and everything stank.

Sir Facid’s castle had been buried even more in the turmoil but it did allow for extensive planting and already the corn, vines and woods were feeding the demand for food, drink and furniture for a large area and that fed his treasury and the troops he needed to defend his treasury and paid a bonus for the damp and smell.

Sir Facid possessed harbours to the north and south; if he and Sir Charles could stop fighting over the northern harbours but as Sir Charles had little money, few troops and the need to buy food from Sir Facid, the degree of control and his relations with the new King Machael of Ascania were a little touchy but Sir Facid, for some reason, paid a visit to his frozen Dwarf every week as if he was a personal ornament.

The Dwarf arrived outside the castle some four hundred years ago and had been guarded ever since. Sir Facid often found himself staring down at the immobile Dwarf to try and understand the expression on his face. Both of them stood immobile, almost trying to outdo each other.

According to the Guards, Sir Facid won every-time but you didn’t become a Knight by being out-stared by a frozen Dwarf although his clothes were now very ragged with the two cats that often slept at his feet and added to his state, but the Dwarf was hardly any better dressed either.

Sir Facid didn’t know the name of the Dwarf but couldn’t imagine what would send him into a trance for four hundred years although the smell was probably enough to send anyone to sleep. Sir Facid’s nose could not turn up any more if he tried. There was also the smell of the castle which had been underground for too long.

With the ploughing and seeding above there were few times the roof could be opened and when it was usually rain, snow and freezing ice came in, however that almost seemed a relief as it penetrated the castle and the smell. Wine went off – often with an appropriate explosion.

Grain and meat went bad, cider became vinegar – Sir Facid might as well have inherited a burial site instead of a castle.

He looked at the Dwarf’s expression of puzzlement and realised he would never know why he looked puzzled when suddenly the Dwarf’s eyes open and he spoke, “this place stinks – can’t you find a window to open … perhaps … I know a spell to take out the smell?”

“Who are you and why have you been stood here for four hundred years?”

“My name is Drufus and I need your jakes and urgently!”

“Then Poofus is probably a better name—”

“I need the jakes!”

“Fine. Go west; south; follow you nose for fresh air … the sea, rocks and mountains await you”.

Drufus quickly found himself facing strong winds and a stormy sea as he caught up on a hundred years. It was some time later that he finally returned and explained to Sir Facid his history. The look on Sir Facid’s face indicated that he might as well have saved his breath.

It wasn’t helped by Sir Facid’s joke that he owed him four hundred year’s rent, which to a race known to be extremely careful with their money wasn’t well received and Sir Facid’s final question to him, “do you really know magic spells,” imitated the descent of a lead balloon?

“I invented them but Dwarf magic means you must have spells written down and physically hold the scroll when you read the spell – I was taught magic at the temple of Druncheon.”

“From what I’ve heard you then used it to bury towns, castles and cause destruction on a massive scale that only now is starting to settle!”

“They killed Roseen. Grisalda is below ground as she should be. I would bury her mother – Griselda – if I could.

“You are too late Drufus; a guard killed her, but her daughter Laseith follows on in the family tradition, so kill her instead.”

“You seem to be unscathed, Sir Facid. Your castle does not seemed to be touched.”

“Yes, Drufus – a computer glitch built this castle underground, whilst other castles were built above ground but all of them are impervious to your spells. The towns and people were the targets of your spells not the computer built castles. We are lucky that most of our castle is underground so we can farm above but we did receive a large amount of land deposited on top of us. The good point is that we did not receive great waves – the rocks protected us from that but virtually the whole of my castle and rooms might as well be in my deepest dungeons. If you can write a spell to clear and perfume the air, I am sure we can come to some arrangement for your future which currently looks extremely bleak.”

“I would appreciate a bath and a change of clothes, first, Sir Facid; if that can be arranged, but I am sure I can write some magic to clear the air?”

“I am sure we all would appreciate that, Drufus. Especially as you have been there for a hundred years. My people will attend you and perhaps the spell could be written? Haste would be appreciated.”

Chapter XVI - Horsing About

The same could not really be said for Rona, Mona and the horse they were following, especially the horse. They were now on an island and it was an island that you could enjoy but Mona wasn’t enjoying anything as thoughts crossed her mind and their minds … food was the first thought but angry distant thoughts were demanding justice and the din was deafening – both Taren and Mona looked at each other. The thoughts might be distant but the clamour seemed all too close – it didn’t feel like a welcome after four hundred years from your brethren.

Lakes, cornfields, trees abounded. Perhaps freedom beckoned although given the size of the island it was not likely to be waving flags. What didn’t seem to beckon to them was hundred year old food. It might have been protected along with them but it seemed to have aged more than they had and right now all they wished for was privacy.

Mona and Taren Roc rid themselves of waste as they flew without caring where it landed. Rona and Mioned on the other hand … on the ground … behind some trees and some large leaves beckoned her urgently. Age has no respect! Bonnie was already following them. Brunie was making his own arrangements.