The Arkanist

The Black Ring

         Aera walked to the window, frosted with fangs of ice like prison bars over the glass. Outside, the winter wind howled like a fearsome wolf and the dark clouds hung over the grey sky like great iron shields and from those, came the ash, thick and terrible, mixed with the fair white flakes of snow, tumbling through the waves of wind to cover the world. The mountain rose sheer and black beside the window, running with winding rivers of beaming white so that the rock appeared stark and black as pitch. The peaks disappeared into the dark clouds above. Aera wondered how any animal could live in that.

         From that window, Aera could see most of the fortress, walled and guarded. Along the high stone parapets of the great walls, she could see the dots of soldiers patrolling, watching the valley in the heart of the mountains. She thought that would be boring. From the main gate, was the wide dirt path that cut through the white, and on the right of the gates, were the stables. A long wooden hall clung to the wall where under its thatched roof, black horses and brown steeds ate their meals and were cleaned by men in black cloaks. It was large, and the horses were well groomed, for they were ridden often. The stable appeared to be rather barren though, and Aera knew why.

         A flat tower rose just before the stables from the wall, with torches pricked up its side. The tower housed a large horn at its peak, with two curling horns arcing off the stone face so that the sounds echoed and resounded when it was blown. One bleat of the horn signaled rangers approaching, two signaled enemies, three signaled snow-storm, four signaled snowlion barrage, and five signaled the Oppressive One. Five bleats of the horn have never been signaled since the times of the erection of the fortress when Henrik Vealtorr still reigned. Therefore, the rangers condemned the number five, and have forever hated it.

         Leading from the dirt road, a path turned right, and led to the massive Black Hall, built of hard stone and iron. The structure was enourmous, and rose almost as high as the towering walls. Hulking iron pillars drove into the snowy earth along its long sides, wrought into the shapes of previous Lord Generals, their eyes set with dark chips of marble, cloaked in dusted white. The doors were wood, and white, banded with dark iron with ancient runes etched in black ink upon the white. Of late, snow had settled in the marks. Crowning the tapered hall, was a garden of ice, arrayed in dazzling white shapes that, in the center, fueled a sapphire fire, that flickered to white in the changing winds. Aera could not miss it.

         Rising still just before the hall, in the center of the entire fortress was the Tower of Time, a square rise of stone with a circular clock at the peak, for all to see. At its wide feet, a squared arch yawned so that that the road still ran through. A fountain of ice stood frozen still under the arch. Although the clock shimmered in a cascading white light, mixed with black that shown the time and when it hit the turn of the hour, it rung with a high, pervading boom that shook the entire fortress, and the tower went up to be completely wreathed in white flame, for that one minute, and then licked away with a wisp of black. No smoke was made as the minute ended.

         Aera was looking over at the large training grounds, empty and barren, no more than a patch of cleared mud and dirt, when she heard a loud thump at her door. “Supper,” a deep voice said, and she heard the thump reverberate as the fist banged on the others in the tower. Aera slipped her hands into her furry gloves and fixed her boots onto her feet, keeping her bow onto her back, but reliving her pockets of the daggers. Door open, she walked down the serpentine staircase with the rest of the rangers, like a black river, rushing downstream and draining at the base of the tower. She heard a couple whispers behind her, presumably talking of her bow.

         The commons was empty when she passed through and exited out the somewhat warm tower to the bitter outside, the snow grey and the winds harsh as ever. The first gust was like a claw of frozen steel across her face, scraping, leaving thin, bright sliver-thin slashes in its fearsome wake. Her hood was thrown over her head, as she hurried to the Black Hall in the distance, the light sinking to a shadowy haze, the storm clouds directly above them. The ash sprinted headlong, and the snows with it, screaming, howling, crying, as if an animal was being butchered.