The tower

They are walking through the woods, insearch of a new home. Debra was having nightmares.

THE TOWER
CHAPTER 1
"There are monsters on this road," a fellow rider on this road said.

"The monsters are in your head? Ben! You know that?", Tevaria said as he looked at him.

"The beings with pointed ears." Ben said,

"I see do you have anything else to say?" , Bern said as she glared at him.

"They dabble in the dark arts?" Ben said . as he cracked the reins on his horse's withers.
.

"They do?", Tevaria said, trying to calm his nerves.

"Don't they?"., Ben said as he rode off.

"Do you think that he is right?” Bern asked as she chewed some tack.

Tevaria knew that he had not seen anything unusual. What were they talking about? There were no monsters on this road, Maybe they were joking! I don’t think so> He lived in this forest and had seen nothing like that to have existed there.

‘What about what they have seen?” Debra asked, “Could there be monsters!”

“They don't exist. They are tall tales told to travelers. So they won't journey any further than this. Not without a guide, they will supply. If you wanted this? But I know different don't I?” ,Tevaria said.

Bern trying to remain calm. She was fidgeting with her hands, wringing them out. Debra sat beside her on the driver's seat.

“Tevaria, don't you know better than to do that? You are tempting the fates by saying that,” Debra said as she watched him with wide eyes. She waved her right hand at him as if she was scolding a child. She was the child he, the adult. He laughed as he saw her do this.

He smiled at her. There was a great feeling that he was on the right track.

“Nonsense. There is nothing there that I fear," Tevaria said and slapped his rein on his horse's withers.

“Careful what you say, Brother. They may be listening to you,” Bern said as she drew up her whip to strike her horses.

“I don't think that the fates are listening to me,” Tevaria said as he glanced at her.


When he chose to ride there at this time, however, one of the horses had refused to heed what Bern tried to tell the horses with the whip.

Tevaria grabbed the horse’s reins. to obey what she desired to do.

A hint of a smirk began to appear on Debra's face. When the horse settled down. She clapped her hands. As if she was pleased. Her blue eyes sparkled.

Bern and Debra were less confident than his choice of this road. They remembered that the last time they passed the tree. Debra was frightened.

Tevaria rubbed his eyes as he rode through the mist rising. Even though he knew this region. seeing that tree where he often decided to go right. But today he went the other way. He rode through this region since he was but a boy. The road had a few things that could pose a threat. He heard the birds in the trees singing there and saw animals on the way. Nothing seemed amiss. He smiled as he rode here.

”Why have you decided to go this way?” , Bern said as she looked questioningly at him.

“Its the usual way I go there, isn’t,” Tevaria said as he peered into her face.

As she rode on the coach carrying supplies that they will need to set up new house.

Some travelers didn’t return from going there. Without a hide nor a hair being found of them.. The other people sent search parties there to find them.

Tevaria was sat with the leader of the caravan called Caca who had thinning hair, sitting with his legs crossed and wearing a robe, Tevaria had a full head of hair, he wore a breastplate with an eagle on it of his kingdom. They were talking. Tevaria was drinking tea.

Caca said,”The others are worried that something is with us. They suspect that it is here because of you and your family.”

“That I feel that you are watching us! What are you afraid of?” Tevaria said his eyes were resting on Caca’s hands at the moment.

“We are leery of what you and your kindred are offering to us? We feel that someone else is watching us now that you have joined us! We believe that whoever is watching us is both, malevolent and violent, but it isn’t us who is doing this,” Caca said.

“Than who is it?” ,Tevaria said as his hand was now pale at the moment he reached for his cup of tea.

Caca peered over Tevaria’s shoulder as well Tevaria. He could not shake the feeling that someone was watching them. As try as he might to see if there was anyone doing this. The only thing he could see trees and brush. However he knew that that Caca was right in saying this to him.

Tevaria’s throat was dry as cobwebs are sticky. He did not believe what Caca had just said to him. Why were they being picked out of the group of people there. He looked at Caca with an air of misbeleif on his face.

Tevaria said,”I see. Do you suspect that there is a reason we are being watched by this presence, Do you know why it is happening?”

“We don’t know, why they are watching us, but it began when you joined us?” Caca said as he looked at him.

“There has to be a reason, though. What is this reason,” Tavara said as he lifted his cup to drink some more of it. It tasted bitter, but it helped wash down his food from his mouth.

“We haven’t felt this until you joined the caravan,” Caca said as he rose to leave that area.Tevaria reached out to grab him by the arm. A few others of his party were watching them, one of the drew his sword from his scabbard. Tevaria saw this. He put down his hand from reaching Caca's arm to not find himself facing a swordsman.

###

Later Tevaria was sat on his saddle thinking things over. He noted that the others were ever watchful of them. He was suspicious of their eyes watching them. He felt it was them, but from what he had just been told, it was something else watching the caravan. His blood was running,cold. How he wished he had not taken them.

Debra sat with her hands in her lap. Her long brown hair fell to her shoulders; she was radiant and loving. At the moment, she was sat with her mother, Bern, who had blonde hair that fell to her waist; she was plump. At the moment Bernia was gnawing at her lip and knew the others of the caravan viewed them as a threat.

There was a calm breeze blowing from the west. It was a good day, or they believed it to be. Seeing squirrels running toward the trees on each side of the route. Birds chirping in the trees, it looked like it was a good day on this road nothing to fear.

They were on the road journeying for days. Tevaria rode beside them on his mighty steed, and was formidable or so, she believed what with his wearing his breastplate, he had a red cape on his back.

####

Debra smiled and began to recall what had happened before they left their community.

“Remember when I walked into the house. I screamed,” Debra said her eyes were wide with horror. Her shoulder shook with the fear that she was feeling when she saw what she found in her home.

“No! ! do not remember the incident that you were talking about.” Tevaria said as he reached out to brush Debra’s red hair from her eyes..

“Well, I walked into the kitchen. I saw two raccoons reaching into a jam jar. You should have seen them.” She giggled, Remember what their paws were red. They were covered in jam.”Debra said, there was a big grin on her face.

“Oh, that time. I do recall that happening,” Tevaria said. He faintly smiled as he recalled it.

“Well, there were raccoons in the house. They found a jar of jam, took to the top off and ate two-thirds of it,” Debra said. She reached out to draw his hand away from her face.

He wore leather gloves on his hands. Tevaria recalled the raccoons covered in jam. They looked so funny he could not, but laugh. Which he was fight to stop it. Bern joined him in his laughter. Imagining this having happened to the raccoons.

Her daughter Debra was having nightmares. Since they left the community. She had left. She began to cry as she went to sleep.

####

These nightmares were of a tower that stood above the trees and brush that made up the region. She could not see anything that resembled that near here. It involved a grey tower that would rise out of the mist. The tower was ancient, and they would see the ruins. Where this tower stood. It had hexagonal windows in it.

The structure surrounded by ruins, Debra believed that this structure was a part of a castle. She felt that she should go to it. This tower was in the direction that Tevaria was headed. It felt as if she was drawn here, Ever since she came to the bank of fog.There was a wooden door there that was closed.

There would be skeletons and bodies strewn about this tower. Some rose as they approached reached for weapons to defend themselves from them. The one neaerst them drew up his mace, and swung at it. Barely missed them.

The other bodies began to advance toward them. They were dressed in armor and leather garments. Some of their eyes even glowed with an unholy fire. They too, would attacked them

"When I would climb up the stairs to this expanse of the structure. Spider webs encased the opening through the door, they would drape across the stairway going up the stairs, where I had been drawn.

When her feet touched down on the stairs. They wobbled, crumbling away from her as it turned to powder beneath her weight. She grabbed the wooden banister to secure her survival going up the stairs. Clung to it like seaweed on stones beneath water.

I would find a skeleton of a woman lying on her back. The robe had deteriorated to mere blue fibres that were riddled with holes in and wore the cloak with a hood on it. Its eyes would glow. Its eyes glowed with a flame that was red in hue. An amulet with a chain on it was held in the skeleton’s hands. It would have a ring on the third finger of its left hand.

The skeleton would speak. It would tell me what I will need to know. She would hand me an amulet. It would have a ring on the third finger of its left hand. This skeleton was wearing a cloak with a hood." Debra said..

She heard a faint voice cry out from above, “ Come to me! I have something for you to have. Come!”

####

The woods seemed quiet. Nothing moved so much as a muscle but they themselves as they advanced into this region of woods

Her mother seemed to think they had something to worry about. Debra described to them made Tevaria and Bern feel afraid. There had been tales of one such tower in this region that no one had ever found. But the rumors persisted about it being here somewhere here. No one could shake the speakers saying this to the others on the roads here. Everyone spoke of it as being there. Bern thought she was joking with them both; however, her face betrayed no humor in it.

He never saw such beasts as this. That they had found.here.


The mist was still thick as coal is black. The sun had been descending as they arrived here. It had been as quiet as death is an end to life.

Tevaria was quiet now, almost as if he was afraid to speak out loud. His stomach rumbled. What they had left of the food they had with them. Something was wrong, but he could not figure out what it was.

They started out with a group of other people who wanted to find a new place to live. The caravan began to pick up its speed to go there. The group seemed at ease with each other. The group liked members as they traveled these roads. This route was quiet. A calm that nothing would break this calm. It made a few of these people feel ill.

####

On this night they heard wolves howling at the moon.

They drew near a clearing where the trees looked as if they had been set ablaze. It startled everyone there. This made them even more fearful of this happening to them. A few of the members who stood watch did it earnestly. They watched the road that they used to get here, and the surrounding area as well.

It was as quiet as a grave. The silence was similar to the quiet. When they would expect it to be. When a bear brought down a moose to eat. But they did not hear the bear. They did not hear it as it ripped through and tore through its flesh. No grinding of teeth. The mashing of bones being broken and shattered like mere dry twigs. The only thing they heard was blood-curdling silence.

They froze, their nerves were on end. They looked about trying to find the source. This to have made this silence to know that this. It seemed odd that no one. They had seen going in this region. It was as if they all had taken another route. Before they had gone here.

There was evidence that there had been raids. Their hooves sounded like a familiar cadence of horses moving in unison as uniform as it could be. They broke twigs beneath their heavy feet. Crushing the brown leaves to powder. They were so calm. That it grew on their nerves.

Above this region were birds slowly circling about. They began to fly away from where the caravan stopped moving.

The caravan could not see anything. That was alive aside from the birds circling overhead. It made no sense. These birds shouldn't be there. They were usually found when something lay there dyeing.

Just ahead of them, they saw a few horses whose skeletal mass visible through their hides. Their bodies were sporting arrows on the edge of the road. Along with bodies of travelers. if one was to judge them by what they journeyed on..The humans were those on horse back. They looked as if they were similar to the party they were with.

“I have never seen a beast such as this, until now!” Tevaria said as he lifted a hood from a head. His eyes did not move from where they rested. He saw pointed ears on the head. A chill crawled down his spine. His maw grew dry. He knew he hadn’t seen anything like that before. It was what the other people described as being the monsters hey witnessed here.

“What are you talking about?” , Caca said as he looked at the body beneath his feet, as he stood there beside Tevaria. He too looked at the body there. They both stared at it as if they were afraid of what it would do. But it was dead, so what could it do.

Tevaria said”'The being with pointed ears exists as I have found six of them here.”

"What are you talking?", another rider said as he peered at them both and the body laying there.

“These beings do not look like anyone we know?”< Caca said, he began to kick the hand of the body of the woman whose hand lay on her sword hand.

Also another faction here had various types of armor like brigands would wear. Bones were visible. The flesh eroded from them. The other oddity about the figures. The brigands had pointed ears; a few of their ears were still attached. The brigands looked further blood-stained. The beings with pointed ears did not have signs before they arrived. They were the riders.

“Where did they come by having these horses?” Tevaria said peering up at the man on horseback.

“I don’t know how?”,Caca said as he peered into Tevaria’s eyes.

There were bushs and the grass covered in blood. Some of these bushes and trees were charred. The Bodies had their ribs crushed. Ohers were cut and hacked to pieces. The trees were marked with a sign of a fire. It was in a circle about sixty feet across. It had crossed the road.

Bern suspected that there were spells involved in this. She approached the area. She saw the horses on the side of the road. They were able to see the end result of the attack on the riders. There were six horses, and their riders' bodies with odd objects looked as if it penetrated the bodies.

A few of the riders had their hands resting on the pommels of their weapons. One of the riders tried to lift her sword from its scabbard, it was halfway out. The blade was covered in a charred appearance. The riders skin melted away from their skeletons or so it appeared to have done this.

The trees, bush, and the foliage seemed to have been burned in the shape of a circle. Their bark was black from a fire that blazed there. Everything there was surprised upon seeing this happen to them.

They attacked the people who were burned there. It appeared that they began to attack without question. There was no mercy found here with their attack on them.

Tevaria climbed off his horse to look at these bodies as they lay there. He grew cold from looking at them, his mouth grew dry, it was as if the bodies would come to life. He knew that they would be dead as dead could be.

He approached the bodies as they lay there. The bodies appeared as if nothing had happened to them aside from being burned to death. Their bodies had been cut by axes and swords. Spears protruded from their guts. Their garments were marked by fire, metal armor was worn by a few of them. The majority were wearing leather cloaks.

He almost expected to see a few of them rise from where they lay. He found a woman dressed in a leather skirt and a bone breastplate with a cape on her shoulders. Her face was contorted in fear as it appeared before her..There was one woman who looked as if she was someone to be feared. Her face had markings on her cheeks. Her ears were pointed and her eyes were elliptical in shape.

She was seven feet tall, wiry build. Her hands had long nails. Her ribs were crushed. Beneath her lay a staff beside her body. His hand was beneath the body. She was the one who nearly drew out her sword. He turned to look at her. Her skin on her face was gone. There was a beige fluid there.

The woman with a breastplate of bones, her skin was nearly bare, there was a bracer on her arms, She wore a green cape, blood stained her face. She wore a leather skirt. What lay beside her arm was a staff of a raven, it was carved. Its eyes were glowing. There were two pouches resting on her side. An axe cleaved her head from her body.

Tevaria found her head laying in a pile of leaves. Several feet away from where her body lay. Her hair was long, her ears were exposed and were pointed.

Debra’s eyes rested on her form, when Tevaria shifted the staff she saw something move from her body, it engulfed her, and began to rise from her body. She looked at him, and held her breath.

The blood covered everything. The bodies were either fighting the enemy or trying to flee from the enemy or its spell that had been cast upon them.

They also wore leather cloaks, and pants as did the rest of the people in this ride to the new region Tevaria wore steel breastplate, and red cape. On his hip rode a heavy sword inlaid in gold and sapphires on its guard.

There were six such beings in this place, they died as did the humans and the dwarves. There was one woman who was without a head. Beside her lay a staff of a raven, he supposed. When he lifted the body of the combatants from her body, this man’s axe head rested on her neck. Tevaria looked at the body and he believed she was a preistess of some other god. Or perhaps even a witch.

He began to look for this woman’s head, he found it beneath some leaves that had been carried over to it. The leaves stuck to the neck where the blood came from, it was concealed beneath them. Her eyes were closed, a stick protruded from her nose. Her body had strange scars upon it. Her belly had lines of dried blood and circles as well. Other squares and in other shapes as well.

Tevaria threw the head up of the woman whose head he held in his hands to Caca, Caca put her head in his lap. He looked at it and did not say so much as a word. He looked it over and threw it back at him.

Tevaria lifted the pouch with the scrolls in it and the pouch with the odd assortment of items that he could not figure out why they were together there. He handed Bern the pouch with the writing on it and also the staff. Bern looked scared of it coming into her hands.

Debra saw a grey mist rise from where the woman's body lay and follow its head to Caca's body as it sat lay in Caca’s lap.His body trembled as if cold. He lifted the woman’s ehad from his lap to throw it at Tevaria who accepted the head in his hands, he handed it to Bern. The mist began to take the form of the body he had found there. It engulfed her in its mist. Debra sat there her eyes did not shift from where it had arrived. Her breath caught in her throat, her eyes hung on the mist

Bern stared at her, she licked her lips, and closed the cloak further about her body. She said, "Tevaria, what is the meaning of this being brought to me?"

"I think you would know more about this than anyone else here, You have been studying the scriptures of Kai for most of your life," Tevaria said as he looked at the staff which lay in her lap. Debra saw a mist rise from the woman's body and float over to Bern as she sat there staring at Tevaria. Debra was mystified seeing this happen.

"I don't know what you are talking about?" Bern said as she peered into Tevaria's eyes to try to see if she could see why he had done this to her.

Bern seemed as she usually was. Until she fell asleep. Then they heard a voice screaming something they did not recognize. This voice would cause the dead to rise, it would awaken the dead. AS it was just that loud to hear.

Debra woke as soon as this began to happen. She watched a grey climb from where it had been to float toward Benie;s body as she lay asleep. She saw the grey shadow further materialize on her mother's form. It covered her from head to toe. She stepped toward her mother as she lay on the ground. She peered into her face, She saw a very different appearance on her face. Her brow began to change in shape. Her hair had fallen away from her brow to show off her forehead, Her eyebrow was high and now was narrow, almost as thin as a knife’s edge. Her nose was very large after the grey particles had settled on her. Her lips were thin now. It had large nostrils. Her cheeks had grown shallow, they were once plump. Her ears were now pointed. Her chin grew more pronounced, Her cheeks were shallow. Lips were full, her eyebrows were more arched than they had been and razor thin. When her eyes opened. Her irises were elliptical in shape. But the pupils did not shift they simply remained there.

Debra reached out and lifted the staff that Berniaiae now held in her hands. She began to tug at the staff to remove it from her body. Berniaia's hands now held the staff tightly in her hands. So tight that they could not break her grasp away from the staff.

Caca looked at her, his blood vanished from his skin. His eyes were wide with horror. His breath caught in his throat, he reached out to touch Debra's shoulder.

Debra looked at him with a frosty stare. Her eyes narrowed, and she said,"What do you want?"

"Any idea what is wrong with your mother?" Caca said as he reached out to touch Berniaia.

Debra batted his hand away from her mother's body. Glared at him as he drew back his hand from reaching her body. He glared at her, and said,"How dare you?"

"Leave her alone!" Debra said as she turned to face the others there. They were wide eyed, their eyes narrowed to a pinprick. Their skin was pale, this she could determine from the fire's light which blazed there beside her mother.

Bern was talking the majority of the night, if you could call her talking at this voice of sound. She could wake the dead.

Caca was concerned that her voice could draw in the attackers that hit the other traveler on the road. Caca said,"Awaken her. So, they do not find us,"

Debra reached out to grab her mother by her arm. To have her awaken. But she would not. She struck her mother, but she still did not awaken. The loud voice continued till morning. There was nothing that they could do to awaken her. When she went to sleep. The other voice and the image began to become more pronounced as this had happened. When her mother woke. She moved, and on her body was this grey powder that fell away from her body. This dust lay on the blanket where she lay. After a few moments it vanished from view.

She stared at everyone there, looking at her. She asked,"Why are you looking at me? What have I done?"

"You were talking in your sleep?"

"I wasn't doing this?"

"Yes, you were doing this?" Tevaria said as he looked at her as they began to walk toward their horses.


Now they were on their own. Until they found a caravan going there. Their number would cause the theives to avoid them or so he believed.

Those who were cautious with them. The others did not disclose very much about themselves. Tevaira felt that there was something wrong. With the other people of the caravan. They did not eat what they themselves ate.