The Beast

Chapter Thirty

As soon as the doors opened wide enough, the more ambitious men surged forward, blazing torches held aloft as they let forth battle cries, Lord Celic and the rest following more cautiously.

Nothing. The men ahead let their shouts die out as they were met by no creatures, only the small echo through the castle's corridors responding in the otherwise complete silence. Torches swung around in the darkness, revealing nothing that resembled a monster. The castle was empty.

Still ever cautious, the men stood, remaining crouched in their ready positions, their ears attentive to any sound, only to hear nothing but themselves.

Suddenly, a laugh broke out, starting as small chuckles before graduating to something more raucous that rang through the air. The men all turned and stared at the man responsible, Lord Celic wiping a tear from his eye.

"So it was all superstitious nonsense after all," he exclaimed between wheezing breaths. "I should have known! Monsters! How preposterous!"

The men staid their silence. They had lived differently from the Lord--they knew what he didn't. Each had a sort of additional sense obtained from years of wandering through the less tasteful parts of the city that let them know when a quiet was intentional or not. It was an ominous feeling of heightened paranoia that more often than not proved to be true.

"Alirght, I suppose the rest shouldn't be a problem, then," Lord Celic said, cockily strutting forward. When the rest remained where they stood, he looked back with a frown. "Well, come on. Don't tell me you're all afraid."

Chagrined by the lord's cavalier attitude, however foolish they believed it to be, the other men followed reluctantly.

"Split into groups," the nobleman commanded. "We'll cover more ground that way."

When the men begrudgingly divided themselves accordingly, Celic gave each a direction, and they went their separate ways.

"I gots a bad feelin' about this," one man muttered as the nobleman led them on through the cavernous hall they had been directed to.

"We'll be done soon enough," another spoke seriously, his face stony with determination. "The treasure will be worth it.

"If there is a treasure," a third snorted quietly. "Could be a ruse like the monsters."

The stony-faced man glared at him. "Do you really believe nothing has been keeping others at bay this long?"

"Wossat," the first man hissed in a whisper, looking around frantically.

"He said--"

"No, no," the man hushed him. "Listen."

Lord Celic paused, noticing the men had all come to a halt yet again. His patience with the thugs was wearing thin.

"What is it now," he asked irrately.

"Shh!"

The nobleman's temper flared. They, the lowest scum of society, no better than the dirt on his boot, had the audacity to shush him, a man of noble birth, whom no one else would ever conceive to attempt to silence? No one told Lord Celic what to do.

"You dare to silence me," he shouted at them, drawing his sword. "You'd do well to remember your place and hold your tongue before I rem--"

"WHO DARES TO ENTER THIS PLACE!"

Lord Celic and the men crouched suddenly, whipping their heads around, looking every which way to find the source of the booming voice that filled the halls with sound, but found nothing. When the echoes died out, Celic gulped then raised his voice.