Snow Melt

Synopsis of The Shadow of the Serpent

First, let me say I really don't like the working title for this fantasy novel because I'm not sure it fits the concept. However, it is what I have at the moment so I'm keeping it for now.

Synopsis of the Shadow of the Serpent

Description: Why is the Valley of the Crested Towers safe from the Shadow Serpents?

For ten generations the Families of the Crystal cavers have endured the Treaty of Serpent Wells. Negotiated by Imperial Commander Forest Grubner between the surviving members of the High Council of the Crystal Caverns and the Jurians, the treaty merged the councils of the ancient enemies into a single governing body that oversaw the ruling of two groups. In the generations since the Princess Alena DeCarlo, surviving head of the Caverns’ council, signed it, the Families have kept the letter if not the spirit of the treaty.

The Families of the Caverns are composed of two different species. The Families of the Inner Caverns and the Families of the Outer Caverns; while the council is made up of prince and princesses, foster siblings one from the inner caverns and one from the outer. Because of the bond that forms between a prince and princess, they are immune to the poison of the Mist Serpent that inhabit the Families original homes, the caverns they fled ten generations ago.

The Families of the Outer Caverns are Elfish in appearance, while the Families of the Inner Caverns resemble extremely tall bipedal lizards. In most cases, the bond that makes the royal pairs foster siblings forms either at birth or soon after. There are exceptions to this, especially in the Anton-DeCarlo lines. There is reason to believe that the sibling bond that holds these two lines together form while the children are still in their mother’s wombs.

Like the Princess DeCarlo, the majority of the survivors were women who were in the birthing chambers when traitors, Serpent Helm troops, took over the main Caverns. Therefore, no one is precisely sure what happened during the Purges. Survivors suspected that the traitors murdered all members of the council and their families, but no one knows this for sure. Imperial Commander Grubner found the fleeing women and negotiated the treaty with the Jurians.

According to the treaty, the merged council follows the same make up as the original Caverns Council. There are three levels, the Inner or High Council made up of prince and princesses, the Intermediate Council made up of lords and dukes, and the Lower or Outer Council composes of counts and barons. The treaty further states, that if there is an Anton prince/princess and a DeCarlo princess/prince they will be the head of the joint council. If these bonds aren’t formed then the next in line is Jurian princes and princesses. Oddly enough, this clause in the treaty is the only part that can be broken and cause the treaty to dissolve.

The first heads of the joint council was a Jurian prince-princess combination, after that, for eight generations an Anton-DeCarlo pair ruled the council. However, in the last generation the Jurians were in charge again. This occurred because of two things, first there was an assassination attempt on the High Council of the Crystal Caverns at an oasis called Golden Caverns. While the princes and princesses weren’t killed, the sibling bonds between the royal pairs were completely severed. The only royal pair that weren’t at Golden Caverns were Prince Holden Anton and Princess Clara DeCarlo.

Three months after the incident at Golden Caverns, Prince Anton announced that he and the Princess DeCarlo had chosen mates and were planning a traditional double wedding ceremony at Teller Caverns. It was during this ceremony that the Serpent Helm Commander Jess Grubner, a descendent of Forest Grubner, attacked Teller Caverns and sealed all the known exits from the caverns. The only official survivor was the Princess DeCarlo who was pregnant.

Because of these two events, the Jurian prince, Torus, and princess, Marinna, become head of the joint council. Recently Prince Torus died or was murdered, it isn’t clear which occurred. The Princess Marinna attempted to pass one of her sons off as a DeCarlo and a prince of the caverns. The problem was neither she nor her son could prove the royal bond was ever formed with an Anton princess. Thus, the intermediate and lower councils split into three factions.

The first faction, which Lord Harris controlled, backed the Princess Marinna’s son Hans DeCarlo. The second faction, headed by Lord Dayton, wanted the Families of the Crystal Caverns to merge with the Families of the Oasis of the Whispering Desert. The third faction, headed by Lord Hartmann, wanted the next generation of princes and princesses, even though they hadn’t yet proved themselves capable of handling their own affairs, to claim their seats on the High Council.

The Imperial Commanders, holding the seats on the High Council for the princes and princesses, refused to back any of the three factions. Instead, they pushed to have the Families of the Crystal Caverns to merge with the Families of the Snow Caverns, which hold sway on the other side of the Whispering Desert. As for the princes and princesses waiting to claim their seats on the High Council, they secretly took refuge within the Valley of the Crested Towers.

The princes and princesses did not intend to flee either to the desert or across it. Their intention was to find a way for the Families of the Crystal Caverns to reclaim their original homes from the Serpent Helms. The only way they felt this was possible was to ally themselves with other enemies of the Serpent Helms. These they found in the Valley of the Crested Towers, whose people had also lost land and kin to the Serpent Helms.

Prince Jarvez Anton and Princess Maria DeCarlo, the traditional heads of the Council of the Crystal Caverns, are the last royal pair to take refuge within the Crested Towers. Like all the other pairs, they have kin, either half-siblings or first cousins, within the Valley. Since their kin in the Valley have different last names than the royal pairs, this relationship is not widely known.

Inside the Valley of the Crested Towers, Princess DeCarlo finds her mother and half-brother, but only after, she has married Lord Calvin Jessup a man old enough to be her father and one of the most powerful Lords in the Valley. The Serpent Helm Commander Morris Grubner and his troops murdered Lord Jessup’s first wife and eldest son in an ambush. Lord Jessup’s youngest son and next in line for the title isn’t well liked by most of the council. Recently someone on the council raised a question concerning the legality of Lord Jessup’s marriage to his first wife, which if proven would make Lord Jessup’s youngest son ineligible to inherit the title.

In addition, Prince Karloff, of the Families of the Crystal Caverns and a survivor of the assassination attempt at Golden Caverns, is trying to negotiate a treaty between the council of the Crested Towers and, Karloff claims, the Families of the Crystal Caverns. Actually, Karloff has allied himself with the Grubners. Lord Jessup, who leads a faction opposed to the treaty, doesn’t trust Karloff.

To give his negotiations legitimacy, Prince Karloff invited Prince Anton and the Princess DeCarlo to attend the negotiations. However, the Aton-DeCarlo pair appointed the Princess Adela and Prince Jason, both survivors of Golden Caverns, to represent them at the meeting. In addition, unbeknownst to Karloff, Prince Furcell and Prince Davis, contemporaries of Karloff, have decided to attend the meeting as well, they are angry with Karloff for not informing them of the negotiations as he had promised to do when he signed an agreement with them after Golden Caverns.

Of the three surviving Grubner brothers, there were originally five, only Travis is going to attend the meeting. The other two, Morris and Clave, are persona non grata within the Crested Towers. The Serpent Helm Commander Tyron Morpheus killed the two oldest brothers. Morpheus, the youngest son of the Princess Dora, another Golden Cavern’s survivor, has a personal vendetta against the Grubners and is in the area of the Crested Towers.

The people of the Crested Towers can’t reclaim their stolen land without assistance of the Families of the Crystal Caverns, any more then the Families can reclaim their land without assistance. The reason for this is that the lands of both factions claim contain Serpent Helm outposts and infestations of deadly poisonous Shadow Serpents. The only ones immune to the poison are the royal pairs, individuals that are descended from both the inner and the outer caverns, and dragon cats, which eat the Shadow Serpents; a few other individuals do have a high tolerance of the poison, but not immunity.

The Serpent Helms, who are human or elfish, can live in serpent-infested areas because of an antidote to the poison. The problem with the “antidote” is its side effects. Anyone living on the serpent-infested land must consume the antidote on a daily basis to survive. However, besides being highly addictive, the antidote has an effect of the libido, especially when a Mist Serpent bites the individual, and the genetic make-up of those consuming it. In addition, the dragon cats, which normally only feed on the snakes and other vermin, attack and eat anyone consuming the antidote. All these together make the antidote’s use over long periods and several generations undesirable.

The bond that forms between a prince and princess is unique. It gives them the ability to know what the other is thanking, saying and doing. In certain cases, the other experiences the emotions experienced by one. This can be disconcerting and upsetting to those witnessing it. Only two things that can sever the bond permanently, one is death and the other is consuming the antidote to the poison of the Shadow Serpents, which custom forbids the royal pairs to drink. If one or both of the royal pair do consume the antidote, then after the bond is broken they respond to the other side effects in the same way everyone else does.

The events at Golden Caverns, which play into this story, are these. The prince and princesses who attended the meeting received large doses of the poison antidote in their food, and then someone locked them in chambers with the poisonous snakes. The antidote severed the royal bonds; the prince and princess remained locked in the chamber for week or two before they were rescued. What happened at Golden Caverns, no one knows for sure, the survivors couldn’t remember anything after they consumed the antidote. It’s known for sure that by the time rescue troops released the prince and princess from the chambers, the princesses were pregnant.

Prince Karloff and Imperial Commander Costar arranged the meeting at Golden Caverns. Jon Morpheus, Tyron’s father, was the only person ever charged for anything. Despite evidence to the contrary, the Imperial Commanders overseeing seats on the High Council found him guilty and branded him as a traitor. This didn’t change Princess Dora’s opinion of him, but it did cause Karloff, the presumed father of her oldest son, to remove her first born from her custody.

Once Prince Anton and the Princess DeCarlo enter the Valley of the Crested Towers, they find there is something very odd about this valley. For one thing, the poisonous serpents can’t seem to get a hold in the valley. There are Shadow Serpent pits scattered in the mountains that surrounding the valley, but those snakes that do get into the Valley die without leaving offspring. It isn’t clear what protects the Valley, it could be magic or it could be a natural phenomenon no one is sure, but something obviously protects does it from the Shadow Serpents.

The Serpent Helms want the Valley; because it’s the only place they can survive without consuming the antidote. The antidote’s genetic effects have begun taking its toll on the Serpent Helm population and unless they find somewhere where they can live without it, they will become extinct. On the other hand, the Families because they rely on the dragon cats to keep the population of Shadow Serpents under control can live any place as long as they take the proper precautions’ to ensure that the cats are healthy and in good breeding condition. An interesting breeding note about the cats is that the larger the Shadow Serpent population in an area the larger the cats litters are and the more often they mate.

Word Count = 2,035