The castle loomed in front of Peregrine. It looked the same as it had since the first time he saw it, now over ten years ago. Always surrounded by dark storm clouds with lightning flashing behind the mountains which stood in back of the white marble structure. It was exactly as it appeared in his dreams.
The cost for Peregrine to get this, his first real glimpse of the stronghold had been tremendous. Once he had been a noble in Trolius, but that time was far in the past. All his previous holdings were gone, sold in order to fund his quest to this citadel which constantly plagued his dreams.
But his losses were not only in currency. He had lost many companions both traveling about Arden trying to find some clue of the location of the castle, and in the final voyage across the sea which had finally brought him to where he now stood.
All were gone. All that remained were he and the citadel in front of him which called him with even more strength than before now that it was finally tangible.
After marching toward it for another hour and a half, he entered the storm which had been lighting his way through the night. There seemed to be a finite line between where the storm began and ended, and it did not move across the ground towards or away from him.
He pressed on into the storm, and was immediately bombarded by Herculean winds, pounding rain, and hailstones which bruised his flesh. These did not deter him at all. He continued on with twice the determination; an ocean which hadn’t been crossed in millennia hadn’t stopped him, and neither would a little rain on his journeys’ final leg.
Finally, he reached the castle’s gates, battered and bruised. Three hours of almost being swept up by winds and pounded with ice had left him utterly exhausted, and being soaked by rain didn’t help his situation. The gate was closed, but the castle itself and a small circular area around it were exempt from the tempest; as Peregrine looked up at the magnificent structure, he noticed one of the planets seven moons shining down through a gap in the clouds.
Guessing that the castle was enchanted in some way so that the storm could not enter the area in which he now stood, Peregrine collapsed to the ground, and fell asleep on the rocky soil which blanketed the ground between the mountains and desert.
Peregrine awoke as he had fallen. His body ached all over form the injuries he had sustained in the storm. His assumption that the storm could not enter the area around the castle had been correct, and he had dried out to some degree as he slept. The storm still thundered around him, but looking up Peregrine could see a circle of blue indicating that it was day time.
Regaining his feet, Peregrine now studied the castle more closely. In his dreams the castle had always been a thing of wonder, like nothing he had seen in any of his travels across Arden. But that had always been from a distance. Now that he was able to view it close up, he saw that it was both more magnificent than anything he had ever imagined, and more terrifying.
The fortress seemed to be roughly square at its base, but it had no corners. Every place an edge would have normally been was smoothed into a curve. The walls, all of the purest white marble, were intricately carved with flowing pictures of death. Creatures he had never before seen, attacked humans, elves, and other beings with such ferocity, that even though it was all carved in stone, it appeared so realistic that he could not bring himself to look at it long. Rising above all this was a single spire to which lightning from the surrounding clouds sparked.
Perhaps this was a mistake. If these carvings are any testimony to what lies within, then to go on would be to perish. I left my sword and armor in the desert for fear of the lightning, but now it looks as though I should have chanced it. Despite these thoughts, Peregrine decided to approach the castles’ gate which still remained closed. This also was constructed of marble instead of iron or wood, as were the entrances to most such fortresses. As he touched the stone with his hand, energy shot through his body, knocking him backwards onto the ground, and causing him much pain.
“No. I won’t give up now. I’ve sacrificed all that I had to get here! If you think a pathetic jolt of electricity is going to stop me, you’re wrong!” Pulling himself off the ground, he walked to the doorway again and studied it closely. After a few moments, he decided that it was opened by sliding the door to the right. Bracing himself for the blow, took hold of the door again. The electricity hit him as it had before, but he didn’t let it throw him back. He held on and started pushing it to the right. It slid easily, but slowly. For over a minute he fought with the mind numbing pain which shot through his entire body in order to open it enough so that he would be able to pass. Having accomplished this, he again collapsed to the ground out of breath, dazed, and immensely glad that he no longer touched the door.
Almost an hour passed until he decided that he was in a good enough condition to get up again and finally enter the marble castle. As he walked through the doorway, Peregrine was very careful not to touch the door to avoid being shocked again.
The castles interior was magnificent. Everything was gilded with gold to the degree that any of the kings of Arden would be jealous of it. Every room was lit by the ceiling which glowed in a way which simulated daylight. As Peregrine wandered from room to room, he found everything well kept, but there were no signs of anyone else anyplace he went. After wandering through countless rooms, all having the same level of ornamentation, Peregrine finally came across a staircase leading up. Perhaps I will find an answer to this mystery at the apogee. It can’t hurt to at least go up there and check things out.
As he ascended, doorways branched off to five other floors, each of which appeared to be as magnificent as the first. But he did not pause long to look at these. He continued upwards, figuring that he would be able to investigate them on his way back down. After the last of these it was almost another two hundred feet of spiraling stair before he reached a door at the top, also constructed of marble. This one had a handle to turn, and though he braced himself for another shock, none came when he grasped it. Turning the handle the door opened into a small room with a man dressed in cloths much like his own sitting behind a marble desk. Looking up at the man began to speak.
“I am immensely sorry for you, but cannot help but feel glad, for now I get to leave.”
“What do you mean?”
“I shall explain things to you as the prisoner before myself explained then to me. This castle is some sort of odd torture device. Every thousand years or so, longer in my case, it calls someone to it by manifesting itself in their dreams night after night. Eventually they find it, and that is when their torture begins. After opening the door to this room, or at least I am pretty sure that is the condition, they take the place of the last prisoner. They cannot leave this place. The storm you had to have noticed on your way in never abates, and I have not been able to even enter it since my imprisonment here. Its all right for a little while; there is a vast library of books. If you can’t read, then you will surely teach yourself over the next couple years. Food seems to appear when you want it, and it can be in any form you want. Also, you stop aging.”
“None of that sounds so bad to me.”
“You will tire of being here very quickly I think. It sounds good. You can live as a king does. But with no company, you quickly get board. The person I relieved was quite insane, though he was basically able to tell me what I just told you. As far as I could tell, he had been here for about five hundred years. I have been here almost three times that.”
“What are you going to do now then, since you’re finally free from this prison if you speak the truth, which I doubt you do.”
“I shall go beyond the mountains which lie beyond this castle. None of the books in here tell what built it, or why. I have become quite curious toward the matter. Perhaps I will be able to find a way to break the cycle. If I do, I shall save you, but I do not think that will happen, otherwise this castle would not be standing now.”
“I still don’t believe you.”
“Then perhaps you would like to see me off. When you try to enter that sheet of rain, you will feel a shock as you did when you tried to open the door into the castle.”
“We’ll see about that.”
They proceeded back down the stair and out of the structure. As the other man stepped out of the castle, he touched the door and he was sent to the ground by the electrical shock as Peregrine had been. “Soon, you will wish that you could feel that again. Try touching it now. It won’t do anything to you, you’re its captive now.”
Hesitantly Peregrine touched the marble door again. The man was right about that at least, he felt nothing as he touched the marble. “This means nothing. Let’s go into the mountains.”
Nodding, the man got up and continued into the storm toward the mountains. However, as Peregrine tried to enter the sheet of rain and hail, he was hit by the same electrical force which the door to the castle had possessed a short time ago. “No! This can’t be true!”
“But it is. Hopefully some one will be along to release you in a few hundred years. Personally, I’ve got better things to do right now.”
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