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Authors: William Horwood
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incarcerated in the Chamber.
He had gone there voluntarily, not to die but to sleep. He had hoped and believed that when he finally woke certain prophecies would have come to pass and the means to his salvation, even his full recovery, would finally be at hand.
That was eighteen years ago.
How he had survived so long was not obvious, but there were small and large footprints in the slime about his chair, discarded rags which had been used to clean him up, and the tubes appeared to have been utilised to feed him water and nutrients. If so, he and his unseen helpers were running out of time. The Emperor’s rate of decay was now such that keeping him alive in his state of sleep had become a losing battle, which was why he had sunk so far.
Now something had woken him to the nightmare of terminal decline to which time had delivered him . . . and down there in the dark, unseen, alone, he was struggling to let it be known that he was awake again.
A finger trembled, an eyelid struggled, lips stuck fast with filthy phlegm tried to part. But even had he opened them no meaningful sound would have issued forth. He was quite unable to call for help from hydden in the normal world above.
What had woken Slaeke Sinistral was a tremor of the Earth, the very same tremor that in those early hours of the first day of Summer had revealed the gem to Stort in Englalond.
Now Sinistral hoped his time had come again.
Life, so long lost to him, was going to return.
Power would be his once more.
Redeeming love, which did not quite elude him in all his long and dreadful years, might be enjoyed again.
He could not smile – his facial muscles were too wasted for that – so he smiled inside.
He could not speak, so the words he uttered were silent ones . . . and strange though this may seem, joyful.
His mouth finally opened into an attempted laugh. All that came forth into the darkness was the hiss of fetid breath and a dribble of gritty phlegm down his creased and straggle-bearded chin.
Yet still he strained to make his body work again.
A foot stirred, his left thigh twitched, his head began to move from side to side, faster and faster as if to hurl something from its brain.
An eyelid trembled once again, then the other too, the top and bottom eyelid struggling to pull apart lashes stuck fast with congealed, hardened, yellow tears, their hairs entangled. He wanted to open his once-beautiful eyes in the dark, to seek light, to see anything . To be trapped as he was by his own decay, able to hear but not to see, to think but not to speak, was a torture for the hydden who once ruled the world.
The part of his body he most needed to move was his right hand, with which, if only he could find a way, he could do a very simple thing: touch a finger to a button that would ring a bell and signal he was alive to someone from the upper hydden world who could help him. He tried to move his fingers and failed, utterly exhausted. He knew that though he was awake now he was also dying fast.
His head stilled and he ceased to struggle, controlling his panic with the same strong will that once created an empire. He decided to rest a little, to recoup, and try again.
His equilibrium returned. Slaeke Sinistral spoke silent words inside his head which, had they been able to break through his skull and be heard, might have sounded like the tolling of a warning bell right across the Hyddenworld.
My Summer has begun and I am coming home , he told himself.
10
R ECOVERY
S tort remained in a bad way for several days after he was taken home and put into the care of Goodwife Cluckett.
She brought order and calm to his life, established the routine of a healthy diet, daily exercise, sleep and no visitors.
Try as they might, his friends Master Brief and Mister Pike could not get past the goodwife, who kept the door on a chain, eyed them beadily and claimed, ‘My master is not yet ready to entertain!’
‘Really, Madam!’
Cluckett invariably closed
He had gone there voluntarily, not to die but to sleep. He had hoped and believed that when he finally woke certain prophecies would have come to pass and the means to his salvation, even his full recovery, would finally be at hand.
That was eighteen years ago.
How he had survived so long was not obvious, but there were small and large footprints in the slime about his chair, discarded rags which had been used to clean him up, and the tubes appeared to have been utilised to feed him water and nutrients. If so, he and his unseen helpers were running out of time. The Emperor’s rate of decay was now such that keeping him alive in his state of sleep had become a losing battle, which was why he had sunk so far.
Now something had woken him to the nightmare of terminal decline to which time had delivered him . . . and down there in the dark, unseen, alone, he was struggling to let it be known that he was awake again.
A finger trembled, an eyelid struggled, lips stuck fast with filthy phlegm tried to part. But even had he opened them no meaningful sound would have issued forth. He was quite unable to call for help from hydden in the normal world above.
What had woken Slaeke Sinistral was a tremor of the Earth, the very same tremor that in those early hours of the first day of Summer had revealed the gem to Stort in Englalond.
Now Sinistral hoped his time had come again.
Life, so long lost to him, was going to return.
Power would be his once more.
Redeeming love, which did not quite elude him in all his long and dreadful years, might be enjoyed again.
He could not smile – his facial muscles were too wasted for that – so he smiled inside.
He could not speak, so the words he uttered were silent ones . . . and strange though this may seem, joyful.
His mouth finally opened into an attempted laugh. All that came forth into the darkness was the hiss of fetid breath and a dribble of gritty phlegm down his creased and straggle-bearded chin.
Yet still he strained to make his body work again.
A foot stirred, his left thigh twitched, his head began to move from side to side, faster and faster as if to hurl something from its brain.
An eyelid trembled once again, then the other too, the top and bottom eyelid struggling to pull apart lashes stuck fast with congealed, hardened, yellow tears, their hairs entangled. He wanted to open his once-beautiful eyes in the dark, to seek light, to see anything . To be trapped as he was by his own decay, able to hear but not to see, to think but not to speak, was a torture for the hydden who once ruled the world.
The part of his body he most needed to move was his right hand, with which, if only he could find a way, he could do a very simple thing: touch a finger to a button that would ring a bell and signal he was alive to someone from the upper hydden world who could help him. He tried to move his fingers and failed, utterly exhausted. He knew that though he was awake now he was also dying fast.
His head stilled and he ceased to struggle, controlling his panic with the same strong will that once created an empire. He decided to rest a little, to recoup, and try again.
His equilibrium returned. Slaeke Sinistral spoke silent words inside his head which, had they been able to break through his skull and be heard, might have sounded like the tolling of a warning bell right across the Hyddenworld.
My Summer has begun and I am coming home , he told himself.
10
R ECOVERY
S tort remained in a bad way for several days after he was taken home and put into the care of Goodwife Cluckett.
She brought order and calm to his life, established the routine of a healthy diet, daily exercise, sleep and no visitors.
Try as they might, his friends Master Brief and Mister Pike could not get past the goodwife, who kept the door on a chain, eyed them beadily and claimed, ‘My master is not yet ready to entertain!’
‘Really, Madam!’
Cluckett invariably closed
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