Prologue
People believe that Hell is a place full of fire and spirits of dead people; people believe that no life exists there. They say that if you were to go to Hell, you would live in endless torture.
Yet this is a lie.
If you were to go to Hell, you would find that in fact the only fires were that of the torches that lit the stark corridors, and that life did exist. Life not of the Devil, or spirits; but people, sitting rejected in the dungeons. At least, they had been people. Now only bones remained, rotting in the darkness. And to live in Hell is quite a luxury – that is if you were the ruler of the place, like the figure sitting on the throne in the barren room with rock walls and floor.
The figure was unnaturally tall – around eight feet, a hooded cloak of raven feathers clasped around His neck with a large skull, rumoured to be His father. Nobody knew for sure, as the figure was very select and trusted no one; His woes or worries settled inside His heart, which was as cold and as hard as ice. It wasn’t His job. He had a reputation to uphold.
In fact, nobody really knew if He was human, although he certainly looked like one. Although the hood always hid His face, He had a skeletal torso and His hands and fingers were spindly and white. The eyes burning out of the darkness were a dark, dark green, like some kind of rock pool, and were mottled with black. His teeth glinted in the light when he talked; they were a murky yellow with a diamond inset into each one. He didn’t bother with dental hygiene. He had other things to do.
His clothing, too, was fairly normal: A dark tunic made of bat’s wings, with the cloak swaying around His ankles, which were hidden by onyx boots. They had small ivory horns poking out of the back, travelling alongside the seams. His undershirt had once been a shark grey, but the sleeves had been torn away and it was now sleeveless. A sinister grey kilt was clasped around His lean waist by a wide belt.
A ring glimmered on His right hand, pure silver, like the stud in His nose and the ankh earring he wore. The one unusual thing was the tattoos snaking around His wrists, showing a long adder; the tail around one wrist, the head around the other, with the body travelling across his scrawny chest. The symbol of His office.
He adjusted His position on the throne of bones, tapping one with a long nailed hand. He was being kept waiting, and it was unwise to keep Him waiting. The adder danced on his left wrist, it’s tongue flickering. He was impatient for news from Vurrad, one of His few servants.
He smiled, displaying His teeth, as there came scurrying footsteps as someone charged up the stairs, panting for breath. There came a hurried tapping on the door and He hissed, “Come in, ye ditherin’ fool!”
The door was hurriedly opened and a man stumbled in, bowing and muttering, “Master, my apologies -”
“SILENCE!” Roared the figure, leaping to His feet. “Explain thou self!”
Vurrad started to tremble visibly; his small frame swamped by garments several sizes too big. He bowed as his master, Lord Magari, seated himself and took a sip of wine from His crystal goblet.
“Lord, our plan is almost complete. In a season’s time -”
“A SEASON?” Magari leapt again to his feet and flung the goblet straight at Vurrad with all his strength. Although he was slight Magari was hideously strong. It was a mighty throw and got Vurrad on the nose, instantly breaking both it and the goblet, the crystal exploding in a flurry of shards. Vurrad gasped and instantly raised his hands to his nose, trying to stem the blood, and Magari was there like a flash. Reaching for the dirk he kept at his side, He darted forwards, hissed, “No. My plan, Vurrad!” And thrust.
Vurrad died instantly, the dirk in his chest. Magari gave him a contemptuous kick and stalked back to his throne, seething, as a small boy scurried up and began to pick up the crystal, drenching himself in blood as he knelt. A dark-skinned girl went to join him as Magari watched.
“Girl, come here.”
The girl instantly got to her feet and hurried over, bowing. “Lord?”
“Food and drink! Wine and bird, an’ make sure thou are quick about it!” He snapped, and the girl nodded, bowed and left, grateful to be out of Magari’s angry presence.
Magari watched as another pair of servants started to clean up the blood left on the floor as the boy followed the girl to dispose of the crystal.
“’E was a fool.” He mused. “Vurrad, Vurrad, I never did like ‘im. Too big for one’s boots. An’ ‘is clothes.” He gave a dangerous smile and began to ponder, drumming on the throne with both hands, causing a weird tune to come from the bones as they vibrated. A season, the idiot had said. Too long, too long! Magari’s plan needed to be done sooner. The sooner the better… all He needed now was the blade… but how to get it…the best way to claim it…? He needed it badly. He craved it yet He had no idea how to get it. But He would come up with something. He always did.
He stood and pointed to the door. “Get out of my sight!” He barked, baring his teeth. The servants fled from the room, shutting the door as Magari found what He was looking for. It was a bone, with little markings on it, written in blood. He turned it over in his hands and then held it to His lips and murmured, “Show I the blade, an’ thou who holds it!”
The bone started to shudder in his hands and he watched as a small cloud of black smoke poured from the markings, to hang in the air in a weird cloud. The smoke cleared and Magari found Himself looking down on a small Isle – there were some woods, the trees whispering in hoarse voices, and a vast body of water, a lake of some kind, shimmering in the moonlight.
He was growing impatient. “Show me!”
Again the smoke came and blotted out the image, fading and showing Him the blade, which was in the hand of a striking girl. Magari found Himself staring.
The girl was alone, sitting by the lake he had seen from above. Her hair rippled down her back, a fiery-chestnut hue. She had big, almond shaped eyes, which were a piercing green, and fine eyebrows. She was quite tall, too; He could tell by the way she sat. A bracelet of strange wooden beads was the only piece of jewellery she wore. Her hands were somewhat large with slender fingers, which were clasped loosely around the hilt of what he needed the most. But He wasn’t watching it; He wasn’t plotting some evil scheme. The girl stood, dusted down her tunic, and walked past him, the smoke vanishing with a small poof.
“No! Ye stupid bone, show me! SHOW ME!”
But the bone stayed still and Magari cursed. He soon went into a sulk and started to think, sitting dejectedly on his throne.
So this beautiful girl held what He needed most in the world. Well, that wasn’t going to work! He had a little voice in the back of His mind, telling Him not to hurt her. But He had a status to maintain -
Wait. Did He sense a brilliant and evil scheme forming…? Ah! Yes, yes…
He gave another smile. That girl better watch out… as Lord Magari was coming.
And he was as ruthless as ever.
Book 1:
The Girl
1: Rose
Maybe if I were to have two Tyrants at my disposal and battle fire I’d lead a more adventurous life, but instead I have to sit here by the lake often and think about Father.
I never knew Father, but I’m told I look a lot like him – the same colour hair, the same green eyes… well. Mother says she was totally miffed when she discovered that I didn’t have battle fire, as I had his eyes, but grandfather Will says it skips a generation.
Yet again, I suppose I fare off better than most and it’s wrong for me to complain about how I live. There are people in the Empire who would kill for a single crust. But I don’t like my life much. It’s just…dull. Repetitive. I wake up each morning, help mother, train, help mother, train… you know what I mean? I just want something to happen. The Empire has been very quiet so I haven’t been in many battles – just one or two skirmishes, never a full on conflict.
Jay helps, a little. He’s always up for a risk, just like Uncle Jo; though he’s more of a handful. Jo says it’s impossible to keep an eye on the little runt. Well, he said that when we were younger. Now he just laughs and can’t answer, shaking his head. Jay is a bundle of mischief - I can’t deny that. But he’s an amazing comrade and I don’t know what I’d do without him. Tiffany, his mother, says that it’s bad enough having Uncle Jo as a husband, but then there’s Jay to look after. You can tell she’s joking by the twinkle in her eye, but I can see what she means.
Mother instead smiles and tells him, “Ye may be a troublemaker, mate, but Troy was the best. Always chased by trouble! He should’ve been toast at least three squillion times, but I ‘spose he was lucky not t’be caught.”
I wondered about Dad often. I always used to press Mother when I was little and she’d always start off with his appearance, and then she’d roll into his life story, which never failed to amaze me – the vows, the adventure…and the trouble. Trouble had a very large role in such an epic.
I stirred the waters silently with a stick, watching the ripples, still lost in thought. I only knew Jay was standing behind me when the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end, as if electrocuted. Mother says that Father used to have that all the time; she could never get behind him without him knowing. That used to be her silent goal.
I turned. Sure enough, there stood Jay, his fair hair sticking up at crazy angles. He sighed and said, “Will I ever get to sneak up on ye without ye knowin’? I’ve been tryin’ for years.”
I smiled. “Maybe, ye’ll just need t’be lucky.” I looked into his mismatched eyes – one pale brown, the other dark blue. “Mother’s sent ye t’ tell me that if I don’t come in right now an’ get ready for bed she’ll come out here herself, right?”
Jay grinned. “Right!”
I got to my feet, dusting myself down. “She may come out here herself, but it would only be t’chide me gently. She’s too soft really.”
We left, the grass tickling our ankles – it was a lovely dark green hue. After a few minutes of strolling through the still night in silence, Jay pulled back several large shrubs and bowed. “Men first, but ladies just before!”
I laughed and walked into the musty tunnel of rock and Jay followed, carefully arranging the shrubs beforehand. He bid me farewell as he went off to his bed, which was on the floor below mine. His was room eight. I had room eighteen.
It was weird being in this room, because my Father had lived in it too. Lily had been told to have it but she was perfectly happy with her own room so it had been left alone until I was young, when I was instantly told that Rayfires had always lived in there. R was the eighteenth letter of the alphabet. I opened the door and stepped inside the torch-lit room. There was a truckle bed in the corner and a little washroom up a small flight of stairs, and a big desk. A new one, mind. I kept little trinkets I liked in the draws and I had lots of inks, in different colours, arranged in the order of the rainbow across the desk.
From the wreckage of the previous one, which Father had unwittingly broken, Uncle Jo had salvaged me one or two things that remained – some faded pale blue ribbon, a small bracelet, and a piece of parchment with some writing on it. I don’t think Father wrote it but I can never really tell, as it could’ve been anyone. The ribbon was just ribbon but I loved the shade and I kept it in my belt pouch. You just didn’t know when you would need some ribbon. The bracelet had been made of strange wooden beads, and Grandfather Will claimed that it had belonged to my great-great grandmother, Kai, Mira’s mother. I wore it often as Jay said it was a nice bracelet and it shouldn’t go to waste. And as for the parchment, well, I kept it anyway, hoping that someday I could crack it. It wasn’t even sentences, it was just a bunch of words in random order.
I know this is stupid, but I liked the sturdy elm dresser the most. It sat near the desk and it didn’t just have my clothes, but some of Father’s old ones too. I was too small for them but I kept them all the same. There was a dark green tunic, a mellow cream undershirt, and one or two broad belts. Mother says they were his spares. There was also a tricorn hat, black in colour, with a plume of dark blue feathers that faded into indigo at the tip. I don’t know why, but there was also an azure tunic lined with silver folded up, which was practically in shreds, and a cloak of blue. Mother had kept them as she had been planning on sewing it up as it was a nice tunic but she had never had the time. I had never been good with a needle so I hadn’t tried to do it myself, so it lay abandoned.
I knew Father was very tall because I used to use his old tunics as a magic carpet or something when I was little, and when I tried it on these days it hung around my knees like some unstylish dress. It made me laugh, really. The hat slipped from my head to cover my eyes and the last time I tried on the cloak I almost lost a tooth when I’d tripped over it. I used his spare undershirt often as my nightwear, paired with some cotton leggings. It was also vast but whenever I snuggled into it and breathed in its earthy scent I felt somehow safer and more secure.
I pulled it out of the dresser now and just stared at it, mellow cream material, and then got ready for bed, washing my face and brushing my teeth using my toothbrush. It had been carved for me by Bill, who always made me laugh, and Will, his identical twin. He had found several hairs from a strange beast, but they were lovely and soft and as a mouthwash I liked to use cold peppermint tea. Mother said that Father couldn’t stand tea and preferred to use mint stalks instead but they didn’t work for me.
Changing out of my tunic, which was a nice shade of dark blue-purple, I pulled on the undershirt and leggings, soft against my skin, and clambered into bed, pulling the covers up to my shoulders. I hated them at jaw level. Closing my eyes, I breathed in once more the earthy aroma and fell asleep.