Writing thoughts

It is too easy to use the US and UK Politicians for ideas as none of them have anything but to sink into the belly of someone they can use.

Jinny Cave in the story moves from belly to belly to live - her mind moves for what she needs to succeed - I hadn't thought of Politicians when I created her.

It was in fact a joke.

I didn't know about Trump when I wrote the words.

I won't write much more but Politicians decided to find a planet self-destroying and get rid of their most eager attacking Admirals ... bringing your prisoners home is like adopting a pet and not hundreds of thousands of them.

It makes the streets dirty and the Tory MPs and May gave me thoughts of people lying in the streets for that idea.

Just ideas ... Dave and yes, I'm not giving ideas out.

Dave

He’d already picked his Guards and the remounts were ready and would die if necessary although probably with no choice – anyone in the way would be cut down as he made his escape but the children were his and the ‘Right of Droga’s’ would be supreme as Marcel Droga now held the area to the north-west whilst his children would eventually hold territory to the north-east and south-west. Now all he had to do was escape before Stefen took out a potential rival to his power.

The Drunk was born in the West although stories said he was found hanging from a tree but still alive. Life was something the Drunk and life always seemed to be arguing about and seldom was life winning and the Drunk did hang around. The Drunk was big and ungainly and too honest to play life by other’s rules thus casting him as an idiot who was too honest to play dumb. The Drunk worked as a tree-cutter – well – we can’t all be window cleaners – until he met Jinny. He was always attracted to gin even in his sombre drunken state; hearing someone shout Jinny he thought it was time for a free drink and staggered upright for a change, making his way towards the bar and the noise.

Attempting to find the bar he missed, falling down between Jinny’s legs and as he tried to claw himself upright to get his free gin something hit him in the chest and then between the legs – a few emotions entered his life at this point although he thought a few of them had been missing for years whether he lived or not; sinking down he found himself cuddling something as he collapsed and realised that it was a large Cat, and from where he was, it was bigger than him with a bigger mouth. Looking up from the floor he could vaguely see and hear something and he half heard a voice say, “Leave her alone, Mara, you do know where he’s been and that’s every midden in town.”

The Cat leaned down, licking his face and mouth. The Drunk needed the moisture. The Cat looked again at the Drunk then made her way up the bar and Jinny. Without seeming to move she put one very large paw on the bar and then the other.

Jinny rubbed Mara’s head and kissed her gently, “He’s your demand and you look after him. You been wrong before Mara. You’re still trying to match make. I don’t need a man and I don’t need a drunk on at my feet!”

Mara moved off the bar to the bar-tender’s relief and licked the Drunk again. Mara considered the Drunk was hers for some reason; others considered him a log of wood that someone else had cut and left to rot – the competition was hardly steep.

It still took a very long time for the Drunk to be finally sober and in the end they fed him bread and some broth, raising him to his first real taste of food in days. The water that went over his head was Jinny finally losing her temper and pouring it over him. She had little patience as it was and finally lost the little patience she had.

Finally they dragged him out of the bar clinging onto Mara’s mane and he almost sat on her back as they negotiated him from the bar and its beer of little quality into the street.

Jinny Cave was more intelligent than the Drunk but after all the bodies she’d taken over it wasn’t that difficult … her first was the greatest problem. Jinny expected someone to be in the caves and join her mind as she hatched and this was the first time no-one had been there … instead it was a lousy night with thunder, rain and everything and the roads were destroyed by the bombs whilst she floated in the ether and sought for a mind but no-one had come near the caves as the eggs were hatching leaving them no choice but to seek anyone, anywhere they could reach, or die. It is too easy to say her mind was born in a Cave … some humans are born in caves they create for themselves or then other people create their own caves for their children but at least Jinny had the chance to escape and she did, although not to a life she would have sought. Her first landing was someone’s stomach and having landed she demanded to be taken to his superior which landed her in her wife’s belly, who was pregnant and her brain was now in two children. It took her years to finally manage to leave and eventually she found a body that was virtually empty of thought and took it over – it had no ability left to fight back.

Meeting the Cat wasn’t difficult – the reality was the Cat found herself, and her – telepathy has its uses although her companion tended to put men off but women tend to like Cats and her Cat was a Cat who didn’t wait to be fed or have its dirt box sorted; it sorted its diet out itself and didn’t bother to communicate how or when. Her head, some three feet from the ground often meant she found people she seemed to know but what they’re thinking usually led her away from them, shaking her large head as she left.

Basil Droga decided that Toshon would be his first stop. It was well out of his way but he would be relatively safe as news travelled slowly; he could take the supplies he needed before Stefen knew but already Stefen’s people were blocking his route to the north. Would Stefen attack him in Toshon when his children were now Princesses under Stefen’s reign in the east.

Stefen had moved back to Matira after he’d killed Martan Matira in Toshon … at a run, Basil understood and now regarded Toshon as an outpost although the castle built by Martan was large and for want of a better description over-awed Stefen but was too big for him to destroy.

Basil sped and naturally rode down anyone in his way and riding, apart from the pain if you are not attuned to a horse, is something to make you thing and often the wrong thoughts as you thighs are chapped. In Basil’s case he thought about the birth of his children as he rode.

He and Stefen both watch keenly as the afterbirth was cut; the babies washed in good water and then each attached to a breast for feeding. It was one of the few times they ever smiled to each other but leaving the room wasn’t that easy as they danced around each other as if their heels were building a rhythm for a tango and in reality they were as each tapped his foot as he considered his future.

When the computer program built the one floor into each castle it limited the ability to avoid each other and anyone to be precise, but after building the castle the program seemed to have gone even more ‘doolally’ in its antics. Its design were a cross between a hotel; a Guard’s barracks, and a whore-house. It had more hidden pathways than an honest Politician could dream of.

Perhaps Admirals; Kings as they now styled themselves with their Ladies now Queens and daughters Princesses might feel some concept of duty but Basil and Griselda would never feel that and Basil now rode through Toshon and through anyone in his way; until he met the Cat and the Drunk.

Trying to ride down the Cat was not a good idea. The Cat rearing up was nearing five foot and its claws as he rode at the group raked down his horse whilst the Drunk caught him and threw him into a wall.

The Guards in the dark didn’t see anything as they rode, missing their leader who now lay in a spread-eagled heap against a wall and did not appear to be enjoying the experience, “You do have a use, after all, Drunk” laughed Jinny.

The Drunk looked at her and made his way to the fallen rider, ripping his purse from his belt plus a sword and a Golden Dagger.

He made his way across uncut turf to Jinny, who took the Golden Dagger from him and threw it into the trees, “Anyone with a Golden Dagger is dangerous; throw the sword as well. At least his horse ran off and we should do the same. Let’s get out of this and now,” but they watch the riders eventually return and pick up the bent body and the Drunk, Jinny and Cat fitted into the trees – Cats can climb, but so can human-shapes in a hurry and you could worry about the human-shapes of the Drunk, Jinny and at times Cat as they blended into the trees.

Almost in a fit of pique Griselda gave birth to Laseith, Routani and Mioned. Peter Jamesson attended the births; kicked the Magicians out of the room but wasn’t stupid enough to do the same to Bonnie Leligan and Brunie Dumie.

He’d made a point of seeing just how many babies were actually born but Griselda, as usual, set her own agenda and refused to feed the third baby who’d been born first and just laid on the bed as the other two aggressive daughters were delivered; already they were fighting each other for milk … Griselda did not like threes and took the two most aggressive to her breast. To Griselda, already the third baby didn’t exist.

Peter looked at the Guards and then Mioned … already her life would be marred by the aggressive Griselda daughters … a lot of thought went through his mind in a short time and his hand was on his knife belt as he thought until finally he said, “find her a wet-nurse and don’t tell my Lady who it is. Your lives depend on her life. Bind her eyes – if she cannot see it may protect her. You two Guards will look after her for her life and yours, and I name her the first born – Mioned.”

Griselda heard the words and her screams disturbed Routani but not Laseith who gobbled away like a demented weasel. Routani hearing the sound of Laseith returned to her own food.

The screams of Griselda made Peter Jamesson laugh, and he left the birth-room with his two guards and Mioned, telling the Magicians to get back into the room.

Rafus was fussing around Weena who had decided to have – possibly – his child and live off Rafus. The child when eventually born was called Drufus but Weena had become a very loyal servant by then of Natomi and was building on that position including enjoying the sense of relief that everyone in Matira enjoyed of Griselda exploiting her talents somewhere else.

Weena knew she was dependent on Natomi rather than Rafus but Rafus was the one Stefen trusted and although Stefen bedded Natomi, Griselda’s Runnel would provide the heirs and heiresses but so had only produced Rona and Grisalda. Weena still wondered how Rafus could stand with Stefen when Rafus had been fully involved in servicing Griselda but as most the garrison were also servicing her, it seemed a small service

Dwarfs were unusual in that they did allow daughters to rule although given the internecine strife very few females ever survived as rulers, perhaps one reason why Griselda never stopped killing but that seemed to be more a habit, although it was often displayed as a desire but Griselda was gone and Weena now looked after Drufus, leaving Rafus to look after the magic scrolls he wrote but could never operate.

In Ascania with Laseith and Routani now firmly locked onto wet-nurses but Griselda was already planning her future and working out how to kill rivals.

Her immediate thought was yes I will win although as she considered her future she knew she had to kill to ensure it. That she had children seemed a minor problem to ensure she ruled as without marriage she could never rule and she would split Ascan if she ever tried to become Queen but ruling was her life and her children would cement her position and Peter Jamesson’s as well, if she had her way.

Peter Jamesson hid his innermost thoughts as he sat down to dinner with Griselda that evening, having made sure the food tasters were very active before dinner was served. His blood still ran cold when he thought of being in bed with Griselda … it also ran into a lot of other places she had scraped her marriage knife up and down on him while she went insane as she climaxed.

He wouldn’t be rushing to her bed again or not until the scars faded?

Chapter XII - Life

Stefen’s next few years seemed settled although as time moved on it seem to also move backwards as Runnel’s Grisalda displayed more and more of the habits of wanton cruelty that her Grandmother had loved and more and more Stefen had Guards watching his grand-daughter as she moved more and more out of control.

For Princess Grisalda’s part, as she developed in age she also developed in trying to control and to remove anyone she thought might be in her way … especially Rafus who she decided had too much influence with Stefen, and Weena who was close and protective of Natomi which stopped some of her other antics aimed at reducing Natomi’s life.

Stefen knew that Rafus could just about use the name Matira but he was adamant that Weena and Drufus would stay in the castle under his control; in a conversation with Rafus, “you have a distant call on the Matira name. You will not ever have more than that. Your mistress has shown loyalty and so have you but you will stay in the castle and be loyal or with regret, you will both be dead.”

To a degree Grisalda also appeared to accept that as she planned to make sure there wouldn’t be any more Matira’s to thwart her future. Stefen made a point of doubling the guard around the selected few he’d decided to keep in Stasis, especially his relatives, and that was most of them in the containers.

Marcel Droga and Argus Du Storme had their guards and some of the prisoners prepared to swear bond but the reality was that most of the Prisoners as the original survivors called themselves had either gone underground of spread away from the Admirals with the east coast a favourite refuge.

Wolfen were out somewhere; Trons were good at hiding and Minuets moving at speed moved to the north-east and south-east.

Toshon’s People, often called the Old People had survived many attacks from Stefen and Martan Matira but still stayed unless they were under direct attack when they disappeared – protected by something – who knew what but their houses were empty when the Guards arrived and destroyed them and no-one ever knew anything about them, especially when they returned and rebuilt.

Of the Elves there were still only rumours and as the Admirals failed in their attacks they created enemies amongst the survivors.

Rafus and Drufus worked together on developing magic in Matira with the number of Scrolls were growing daily. Seeming to live off each other they progressed, however Rafus could not make magic work – the magic was already virtually on strike; Drufus always left some fault in his like a bad programmer who can’t be bothered with User Acceptance Testing. After several problems they now only used magic on the topmost tower and that was looking threadbare in places.

They very carefully watched as Grisalda – Runnel’s Daughter – started to further develop her Grandmother’s attitudes for power in Matira, yet again, including killing those in her way to success.

Chapter XIII - Magic

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.