Antoinette lay on her bed in her chambers with Brindle curled up beside her. She stared out the window at the distant realm bathed in silver light from the waxing crescent moon. She held the photograph of Robby. “Where are you?” she whispered.
Her eyes drifted to the distant west and the jagged black peaks of The Prince’s Crown. Antoinette shivered at the possibility that Robby was there.
Antoinette fell into a fitful sleep, not sure of what the morning would bring.
Antoinette could see a long pile of rocks heaped as a cairn. A raven stirred upon a sword hilt that had been driven into the frozen ground.
The black bird croaked harshly and then took to the air. Soaring into the cloud-smothered night sky, it floated above a wasteland of endless gray stone draped by miserable scabs of crusty snow.
The broken land rose into black ridges and severe mountains. Two peaks, taller and more jagged than the rest, pierced the lowest clouds like fangs. At the foot of these, as if thrust up through the world’s stony armor, was a dark fortress.
Bastions, turrets, keeps, and strongholds––all irregular and rigid––fitted together diabolically like the gears of a torturing device.
Rising above all was a high tower, wreathed in sharp points of stone like a vine of thorns.
Into the topmost chamber of this tower, the raven flew. It landed on the sill of an open window. Inside was a tall warrior clad in black armor, except for a red inverted crown emblazoned upon his breastplate. The knight was ghostly pale and wore his long, dark hair swept back from his face and tied behind his head. His coal-black eyes flashed red for an instant as he stared down at an object in his hands.
Carefully, as if a father was laying his child to rest, the warrior placed the object into a sturdy chest of black marble. He looked up at the raven and smiled.
The raven jerked free of the window sill, into the night, and dove downward to an iron door ajar at the base of a keep.
It entered through a narrow opening and flew down a winding, torchlit passage. Finally, the raven emerged from the tunnel and perched on a wide chandelier in the midst of a vast chamber hall. Far below, teeming like a pit of black snakes, were ranks of soldiers. Rank upon rank of soldiers in dark armor. They filled the hall till it seemed there was nothing else. They were endless. Armed with spear, axe, blade, and bow, like a great thicket of brambles.
Arrows pierced the air, clanged off the chandelier. The raven flew again, swooshing back up the passage and through the narrow opening of the iron door. Between darkened dwellings, it careened through side streets and raced toward the enormous castle keep at the base of the tower of thorns. The black bird glided over a balcony high on its wall.
There was a feast within, a gathering, at a long, dark table with eleven chairs. The same warrior from the tower was at the head of the table. He raised a silver goblet. Ten other pale knights, grim and doughty, stood and raised their drinks. Their eyes flashed red as they all drank. But when they were finished drinking, their eyes flashed blue.
Antoinette gasped for breath, and started to fall . . .
