The Tower's Curse
Once, deep in a dark forest, there was a man with whom all the living things spoke; this man never wanted for anything. He had wolves for friends, and the trees would tell him all of their secrets.
One morning as he was wandering down a forest path with two of his wolf brothers, upon which he had not previously wandered, they came upon an old tower which was slowly crumbling. The trees told him that no one had been seen nor heard around this tower for centuries. The trees and wolves also told him of the tower's former splendor and all of the fine people that had lived there. They then told of the fierce battle which took place and destroyed the entire castle aside from this one tower; for this tower is protected by an enchantment and no one could destroy it. It is decaying on its own, for regardless of any enchantment, it cannot withstand the passage of time.
After he had heard the tale, the man decided he would attempt to get into the old tower and see what was inside; perhaps there was a princess under a spell whom he could wake and rescue from her dreadful imprisonment. Finding the entrance was rather difficult, for although the door had long since rotted away, thick vines had grown all around and halfway up the tower. There was no way to tell where the entrance once had been. Nevertheless, he managed to find it, and after tearing away the many vines, he made his way up the winding stairs to the top of the tower. As his gaze swept the room, he saw how it might have been. He saw it in all of its former glory, and for a brief moment he was a part of the life that the tower once knew. Tapestries depicting forest hunts and brave knights battling dragons hung from every wall. Torches and magnificent chandeliers lit the room, casting wavering firelight upon the dancers. People were everywhere, dancing in all their finery and laughing with one another. In the center of the room, minstrels played lutes and lyres on a raised platform. He could actually smell the boar roasting, hear the mellifluous music that the minstrels played, and feel the joy in the air.
Then the moment was over. He caught a momentary glimpse of how the room really was, with hundreds of skeletons in various stages of decay strewn upon the floor. He heard the screams of the dead and felt their agony, felt the horror that had filled them at the moment of their deaths. He could feel the pain of the war that had raged far below—every injury, every death—all the pain from every one of those people condensed into one single second. Then he, too, fell to the ground, dead. Now his body joined the myriad of others decaying upon the floor. Soon his body would be indistinguishable from the other skeletons which littered the room.
Outside, the trees wept and the wolves howled their anguish while the tower shifted, and one could almost discern a smile upon its cold stone walls.
The tower still stands, waiting for its next victim. Waiting to add to its collection and smile again.