First

Night of Flames

One night, when the moon was high and the crickets sang, and some fool in a hotel somewhere was singing and plinking away on a primitive cousin of the piano, death came to the small village of Seles.

It came in the form of balls of flame which flew from beyond the outskirts of the town, flung by machines of wood and metal, crewed by men, and they smashed into the thatch and shingled roofs of the town and set them ablaze.

Yet even as the fire swooped through all of Seles, down grassy paths and through the homes which had been hastily vacated, there remained a strange sensation of peace.

Even as the fountain cracked and fire raced through the streets, and the two great round cathedral windows blew outward in tinkling showers of glass, it was peaceful.

An odd thing for a time of death.

Flames licked past the central fountain, now broken and draining water into the street. A pot of red flowers, blooming now with spring, fell to the ground and shattered, and at the tail end of the flames came the riders. They rode through the smoke and through the lanes, weapons raised to taste blood.

They found it, and screams split the night as the young and old of Sandora met death before their time.

They were strangely silent for invaders. Their mounted shadows raced along the walls, cast by the flickering remnants of the houses. They were men, in armor, and mounted upon great beasts with horns and hooves which seemed fit to breathe fire. Most wore muted gold or red. Several wore black. It was metal and plated along their bodies, as if they'd grown a second skin. They raced along the byways of the city, as the young and old tried to flee, and they cut them down. They bore at their sides great swords, and carried spears in hand, and gazed with both awe and glee at the destruction they had wrought.

There were among them two strangers, who seemed even more at home in this scene of fire and smoke. The larger wore even more decorated armor, engraved and blazoned with the symbols of power. His face was hidden behind a great helm, and he moved in his armor with an agility that spoke of long hours wearing it.

Like the others, his armor was gold, but split with strange tracing spirals of black, and a red cape swirled behind him. It was emblazoned with a black image—two bulls locking horns.

There was a cluster of men in the remnants of the town square, and he left his steed to meet them. His metal boots crunched on the gravel, and his helmed head swung from side to side, surveying what his troops had wrought.

The men moved aside, wary and yet envious of his power. One, bearing a smoking torch, moved forward. "Great Commander," he said reverently. "This way."

The commander strode forward to gaze down at what the moon and the flickering torches illumed.

A girl lay there, upon a half-shattered plank. She was unconscious, but there was no mark upon her. She lay as if asleep, head turned slightly to one side, hair of a deep brown all around, like a halo.

"Is this the one?" he asked.

The soldier nearest him nodded.

The commander did not usually note such things, but he saw with frank amazement her beauty. It was an odd sort of beauty, foreign to his home and even to this village, far away from his home. Whoever she was, she had not been born here.

He frowned down at her. He felt the soldiers stares like knives all around, and frowned still harder, and a plume of smoke from the torches drifted away. The moon fell full upon her face.

Now there was something else there. He could barely see it, but it had come with the moon, and as he watched the light leave her face, that strange radiance left it as well. She almost seemed to glow faintly, like the moon overhead.

The commander sucked in his breath just slightly, and his surprise was reflected in his voice. "Hm," he said. "Indeed."

He stood with a rasp of armor, and spoke again. "Put her in custody," he said, and turned back the way he had come. One foot brushed a shattered flower pot, fallen from a ledge. Beneath his helm, he was frowning, and as he neared his mount he spoke again.

"Is this really necessary?" he asked, turning to the man next to him, and impatience was evident in his voice.

It was as if the man had stepped from the shadows themselves. He was all in dark robes and wore a silver mantle over his shoulders to keep them in place. The top half of his head was covered by a black hood, bound with a silver cord, and all that could be seen was part of his nose and his mouth. Both were shapely enough to have been a woman's, but his voice made his gender beyond doubt. It was measured and precise, and said absolutely nothing more than was necessary.

"It is his Majesty's, Emperor Doel's, command that we take that girl into custody."

His voice was flat, emotionless.

The commander stopped, unsure. He did not know this man, did not understand him. He did not understand much of why he had come here this night, to a burned village in the plains. He did not know why the village had been burned. He did not know the meaning of the girl's radiance.

He did not understand the man who stood before him, wrapped in the shadows of the burning torches and their smoke, and his concerns made themselves known as he turned, irritated, back to the man.

"Who is she?"

The man turned to him. Nothing of him moved except his feet, and they were hidden beneath his robes. His voice was flat, emotionless.

"That is not. Your concern."

((A))

Much, much later, the bulls thundered out of Seles, to the west, into the darkness, leaving behind pain, hatred, and taking with them a single young girl.

The smoke of burning Seles closed in behind them, and the moon went back behind the clouds as their silhouettes faded away down the long road.

((End))

So here it is again. I'm attempting another novelization. As this is the first chapter, and there's little to say about it, I don't expect much. Feel free to comment as you want, and rest assured more is coming swiftly.

K. Stramin