The Shadow Awakens
Arathudria slept for eons, since time everlasting, and beyond time. What is sleep? What was time? Arathudria’s mind was scathed with holes, his memory in pieces. What is mind? What is memory? It had been so long since he had seen the light of day. An endless night everlasting he had slept. Forgetting what form, he once took, what hue of flesh, tint of fur, shade of eye. Memory, yes, slowly Arathudria regained and reorganized memories.
Arathudria was once King of the Blessed Ones, who ravaged the face of the Earth, biting, feeding; tasting fresh blood. It had been so long! The taste of blood was a longing in his bones that had been forsaken for time immemorial. How long has it been? Does day still turn into night? Does the moon still rise for his people to flourish under its deathly pale shimmer? How long? Are any of my people left?
Arathudria yawned, his jaw crackling like thick broken twigs as he inhaled air, into his lungs, for the first time since . . . forever! Light entered his eyes, horrid, ghastly, sunlight! But the light could not touch him here. I am safe, in this . . . stone, sulphur, lime, yes: this cave. I am safe as long as the sunlight does not reach me. He had to wake, and quickly.
Other bones snapped and contorted, creaking limbs, attached to leathery membranes. Wings, yes bat wings. I was born of the bat.
The urge to taste blood was excruciating. He could not live without it, not fully live and move in this world as he once did. Blood! I must have blood!
A shrieking peasant beast crawled within reach of one of his clawed fists. Arathudria struck hard and fast, clutching the creature that screamed and writhed. He bit down on the furred rodent to suck life bringing viscous joy from its veins and flesh.
It was as if he had reached for lightning and touched the Creator. Rejuvenation flowed from his lips and fangs, deep into the pit of rancid and decaying flesh that had lain rotting for millennia. The life bringing juice dribbled into his pores, his arteries, pumping blood to his forsaken heart.
Glimmer!
‘What fine day it is brother,’ Camellios shouted while riding by on his prancing grey foal. ‘The sun is burning brightly, ever so bright! Is it not wonderful to breathe the spring air and ride through the fields of many colours?’
Arathudria nearly lost balance on his mount, his prized racing stallion, Ketfolix. What madness is this? This never was? This could not be? Is it me? Arathudria?
‘Why does my Lord look so forlorn?’ Camellios asked, reining in the foal, his little brother glanced upwards with great concern. Though there was that childish grin he wore whenever he was playful. ‘Is it your head or your stomach, my Lord?’ And then he grinned even wider as he flourished a free hand in a deep bow from the saddle, ‘What ails ye’, my Count?’
Arathudria gazed towards the glowing beacon in the sky. The sunlight did not bother him. It was not that. It was the fact that the sun was not bothering him that had him so perplexed. My brother: Camellios?
Camellios suddenly looked quite troubled and put fingers to lips to whistle, and the thunder of hooves sounded to the west. Arathudria looked there to see a vanguard of riders approaching, amongst them was a beautiful woman with raven locks, eyes like jet stones and impressive bosom. My wife: Annabetha, my darling, long lost, wife?
‘Hi Ho, what troubles you, my Count?’ Annabetha asked when at his side. She rode a sleek pale mare with silver bells entwined within the ashen mane. ‘You look as if the Dark Lord stepped in and stole your soul.’
Glimmer!
Arathudria’s mouth was dry, yet he tasted fresh blood. He gorged on the filthy rat for all the life he could gain from it. Another crossed his path, perhaps drawn to the carnage, or some trick of his powers returning. He snatched the beast and squeezed its flesh till bright red juice drizzled onto his forked tongue. A wellspring of health coursed through his veins, life! He was alive again! Blood! More blood! More bloody blood!
Glimmer!
Count Arathudria Dra’Kulus read the letter of his wife’s suicide note. Tears stained the fine paper, blotting the fresh ink: he had never shed so many tears. In his heart a terrible ache had awoken, blinding agony that swept him on a path of boiling passionate rage! He swore vengeance on those that had kept him from her side, those who had sent false word that Arathudria had died in battle. And so, his beloved wife had taken her own life, as: in the words of her letter, ‘there could be no life without my One Love’.
Arathudria howled like a wolf baying at the moon. He screamed like a madman whose mind is torn asunder. Storming through the castle, he killed men, women and children at will, by instinct, he was bred for murder, though never before this day would he say he had taken a life without justice being served. I care not for justice this day!
His sword was a venomous viper, claymore glowing crimson in the lantern lights that showed piles of dead or wounded. None were to be spared: he picked them off like flies, stabbing the fallen here, blade through an eye socket or throat as he searched for fresh victims.
But this was not the extent of his thirst for anarchy, as he progressed towards the Holy Grounds, where he would make his Covenant against God. There he would renounce all ties to the Church and sell his soul to the Maker of Darkness. Only then would he have the strength needed to avenge the loss of his Annabetha.
Glimmer!
Arathudria roared with vehemence, his cry was that of a raging red dragon: the crystal palace shuddered. Bats swarmed above: screeching in a flurrying dance on the air. He stood and picked them off, one by one, savouring the fresh, warm, thick and delicious taste of bat blood turning stone back into bone, decay into fresh flesh, he sank his fangs deep as they screeched in agony and triumphant worship.