Hahahaha! Victory

So.

I'll keep the intro short this time (not for any really good reason, mainly because I severely need to take a shit). But:I start a LOT of fantasy stories. I also take forever to finish them, and forever to revise them. Hell, Six Knights and the Assassin (Nearly three years old) could still do with a few revisions, and I plan on doing it sooner or later.

That being said, the downside is that, when you take so long to finish stories, you kind of start to lose sight of where you were headed. So, to work on my brevity in story-crafting, I've been trying out some ''short'' short stories--I try to keep out world building. Minimalize character development. And so on. Just short, basic reads.

Well, I finished my first attempt in two nights. It still doesn't have a name, and this is the just-finished-not-edited at all draft (it'll be a good 10-15% different when I'm truly "done"), but, hey, take a gander at it anyways.

Best of all, I not only finished this...I've done two "Things I Hate"s, two "Dr.Duke"s, and made some really, really solid progress in a still-top-secret story. Hell of a week, huh?

Also already started a second short-short story. Hopefully I'll be able to wring some more juice out of this fruit before it's ready to get tossed.

Well, I'm out. The piece, again, is untitled, but if you're the type that needs a name...'Mountaintop' was my reference/working title.

“I’d advise you to take your time.” The old man’s face was dry and wrinkled; his beady black eyes were so sunken in his face that they were hardly visible. His nose was flat, like a skull’s, and his lips cracked as they brushed together when he spoke. “Haste never got anybody anywhere.” He smiled, and the skin under his eyes folded. It was inexplicably feline.

Gabriel stared in surprise at the wizened old figure; he hadn’t even noticed him until he spoke. He was a stumped, twisted thing; bent with age and weathered by time. Somehow fitting, here, halfway to the peak of the oldest mountain in the land. But, fitting or no, he wasting Gabe’s time.

“Take my time?” He smiled condescendingly. The old always seemed to have some such advice for those that they perceived as young and foolish. And they always seemed to be under the impression that the advice was not merely sagacious, but essential for a happy life. “Grandfather, I appreciate your concern. But now is not really the time to worry about taking my time.” He spread his arms out in front of him. “Look where we are! On the slopes of the Nameless Mountain!” He wondered idly who the gaffer was, and what he was doing so far from the village. Probably a hermit.

The gaunt old fellow raised a whispy eyebrow. “Precisely, my son. Haste is never good in the best of times, and a journey to the Nameless Peak is hardly the best of times.” He coughed once, twice , feebly, “All things run their course, whether you hurry there or not. What you seek will not disappear if you take the time to notice the world around you.”

Gabriel started to tap his foot. He spared a glance upwards, to the twisted black peak so far above. It would be hours yet, even considering how well kept the ancient stone path to the top was. If he hoped to reach the peak before dark...

“Grandfather, I apologize.” Gabe said. “Normally, I would love to waste the time to argue semantics. But just now, I have...a date with destiny.” He hoped that sounded appropriately heroic. “I suggest you head back down to the village.”

A sigh rasped through the skeletal man’s lips. “You think that wanting to be a hero is enough? That acting gallant will win you what has eluded the grasp of so many others?” His eyes wavered, then locked into Gabe’s own. “I’ve seen many young men, racing their way to the top of the mountain, eager to prove themselves. And many I’ve seen marching fiercely upwards, brave companions at their back. I’ve seen men sprint, run, race, and dash by. But do you know how many I’ve seen walking up the mountain? None.” A fiery red flashed across the old man’s rheumy brown eyes. Gabe shuddered at the trick of the light. “And I’ve never seen a man come back down, either.”

Gabriel smirked. “Grandfather, is that what this is about? Don’t worry.” He raised his arm, flexed, let the bulging muscles speak for themselves. “I’ve been preparing for this day for years. The others...they weren’t ready. Prepared. Me? I was born for this. I will pass the trials of the mountain.” He grinned. “I appreciate your concern, but I’ll be coming back down. I’ve got strength, brains, charisma...I’ve got it all. I’m the one the mountain has been waiting for.”

For a moment longer the old man held Gabe’s gaze, uncomfortably powerful for such a frail person. Then, shaking his head, he broke it off. “Then by all means,” he said, sadly, “don’t let me hold you up. Hurry on to your destiny. Though a true hero, I think, would have patience. A wise man counts his steps, friend.” It was an old adage; meaningless, in Gabe’s opinion.

Gabriel opened his mouth to say something, but realized he had nothing to say. Shrugging, he turned from the old man and started to run up the ancient stone steps, carved into the face of the mountain by some long gone civilization.

* * *

His head was throbbing, his lungs were pounding, and his skin was on fire even in the autumnal chill of the windy mountaintop, but Gabriel had never felt better in his life. He staggered up the final step and sank to his knees, breath screaming in and out of him like a winter wind.

He looked down the mountain behind them, at the thousands of countless steps descending downwards. The ground, obscured by the gathering night, was barely visible through the duskish haze settling over it. Even this high up, only the barest tip of the sun was visible over the distant horizon.

Gabe shook his head. He’d done it. A lot of people failed to even make it up the mountain; it was taxing on even on a well conditioned body. And considering that probable death waited at its peak, many spirits broke before body on the trek up the mountain.

Not Gabe’s. He’d been training for this day, preparing for everything the mountain could throw his way, for years. Day after day of long hours of conditioning, endless nights reading ancient texts by candlelight, education himself on ancient lore.

And at last, he was here. The clouds hovered so close above that Gabe was sure that, on another day, they might have dipped low enough for him to touch, and the wind had picked up howling demonically all around.

But none of that mattered. Already Gabriel’s heart was slowing, his breath coming more even. He turned away from the path.

And, there, just like all the legends told, was a cave.

If he had felt excited before, then there was no word to describe his feelings now. Everything he’d dreamed of waited in that cave. Wealth. Power, Fame.

Only pausing to hike his belt, Gabe strode resolutely into its unwelcoming darkness.

* * *

He heard them before he knew what they were. Crunching, cracking, dry and brittle beneath his boots. Gabe paid them no mind, creeping breathlessly forward, holding his arm out in front him. It was dark, almost too dark to see anything. Far too late, he wished he’d thought to bring a torch.

Then he turned the corner, and a fire torched into existence.

He was blinded, at first, so brilliant was the light from the flame. Slowly, wincing, he squinted his eyes opened and looked around.

This was the end of the cave. A stout, circular room, its walls bleak and blank and grey. The flame hovered in the middle of the air, burning from apparently nothing. Gabriel knew it for werelight from the purplish gleam to its flame. He peered around the small chamber cautiously. If the legends were right, then---

A skeleton. His eyes fell on a skeleton. Human, its bones bent into unnatural angles that made him flinch just to look at. He followed its length, from skull to foot...

And realized that was not the only one. There were more. Beneath his feet. Around him. Behind him, sunk into the walls. Hundreds upon hundreds of skeletons, testament to the failed endeavours of each and every one of Gabe’s predecessors.

A lesser man might have run. Gabe himself, a few years back, surely would have. But he had trained too much, was too far now to turn back.

“Show yourself,” he spoke, whispering. “Guardian of the power that sleeps under this mountain. Ancient spirit. Show yourself.”

For a moment, there was silence. An empty, expectant silence; Gabe didn’t even breathe.

One of the skulls started to shake, its jaw bone clapping loudly open and shut. Then another. And another. And another and another and another and another, until the whole cave was shaking and rumbling, filled with bouncing cackling skeletons.

The tremors stopped. Gabriel let out his breathe. In the middle of the cave stood...

Stood a demon.

Gabriel had never seen a demon, never even assumed they were real, but he knew of no other way to describe it. It stood half again as tall as he did, and two sets of ebony horns twisted downwards from its head towards its shoulders. Thick brown hair covered its head and most of its back, then all of its legs. It’s chest was broad and chiseled and red, but not red like a rose. Red like an ember; Now a blackened orange, now nearly golden as it flared to brilliance, then back again. Like the a chest rising and falling with breathes, the demon’s skin flared from faded dullness to ostentatious prominence.

And its face. Taught and skeletal, red flesh drawn tight against an abnormally steep skull. Flared eyebrows curled in angry hooks over a dramatically flattened nose; the mouth was a tight line twisted into an imperceptible smile. Worst of all were the eyes. Crimson, flaming things; there was enough fire in the depths of those eyes to burn the world to a cinder.

Gabriel’s throat caught, and for all of his training he couldn’t force himself to look away. It was an awesome sight, fearful as it was. If this was just the guardian, what power lay hidden here? What was buried, dormant, under the mountain?

The thought of that power gave him strength. Gabe swallowed once, twice, then forced himself to speak.

“Guardian.” His voice was neither as full nor as commanding as he’d always imagined it would be, but it least it didn’t shake. “I come...I come to risk your trials. To seek the power that you keep locked away.”

He knew what came next. Had known for years, from stories, from legends, from ancient dusty scrolls that were all but forgotten by the world.

“Very well.” The demon’s voice was all earth and fire and power, an earthquake contained. “What do offer, should you fail?”

Gabe gulped. He knew what came here, too. Had known all along. This was the point of no going back.

When he spoke, his voice was firm and loud. “My life. I offer my life.”

For a moment he let his imagination take his mind by the reins, and he thought the demon’s invisible smile increased just a smidge. He blinked, and it was gone. “Very well,” the demon rumbled again. “Very well, brave hero. Then we shall begin.”

At that moment, Gabriel was mortally thankful that he didn’t have to fight the demon, to pit his pitiful body against its own throbbing puissance. It would have been hopeless. The mountain had been the physical test, he realized. Walking through the cave of bones had tested his courage.

But here. Here, the demon would test his wits.

“I will pose three riddles for you,” the demon purred. Gabe nodded. The legends said as much. “Answer all to my satisfaction, and the power I guard is yours. Fail, and...” The hooked eyebrows raised themselves ever so slightly “...and what you offered is forfeit.”

His life. Gabe, more slowly this time, nodded again.

“Very well.” The demon’s eyes narrowed to flaming slits. “The first question I pose tests your wisdom, your knowledge, your understanding of the world you have lived in.” Gabe felt a ripple, part fear, part adrenaline. This was beyond what he’d read of. Beyond the legends. Nobody had ever come this far and lived to come back to tell the tale.

Not yet.

“Long ago, in your world,” said the demon, “there was once a great king. To you he was known as the Tyrant, the Cruel. Many names. King Alexander.” The demon paused, and Gabe imagined he could see its form pulsing, almost corporeal. He wondered if it was truly alive. “This King was overthrown by a man who is still sung of in your halls to this day. A man’s whose children’s children still lead your people. He was known as the Just. The Saviour. The Glorious. King Damien.”

Damien drank it all in like a smooth wine, all of this was basic history, known to every citizen of the Kingdom.

The cave glowed bright as the demon‘s entire body flared up; it’s eyes were a roaring inferno. “The question, brave one, is this. History names him an usurper, a rogue warlord come from afar who seized upon the unrest in Alexander’s kingdom. But that is not the truth of it. Tell me. Tell me the secret of Damien, who he really was, and how the Kingdom truly came to be his.”

Gabriel knew the answer. It was one of the most precious pieces of information he’d ever gathered. The scroll that had held it had been near legendary. He had spent monthes chasing it, following a trail of increasingly more obscure scholars, venturing into parts of the Kingdom where men hadn’t set foot in centuries . He’d nearly died many times in the journey, and at the end he had been rewarded with a mere page, a scant collection of words that had crumbled once he’d finished reading them.

But for all that, it was worth it. Gabriel swelled, and began to recite what he knew. “Alexander, tryant though he was, wasn’t a fool. He saw the foundations of his dynasty crumbling. He knew that his rule and his life wouldn’t last; the whispers of rebellion were starting to grow above whispers.”

“So he devised a plan. Sent his own son, Darryn, abroad. Told him to go outside the Kingdom. To build an army. And, in one years time to return.”

“And so he did. And in the space of that one year, the whispers grew to shouts. Rebellion seemed inevitable.”

“But then, from nowhere, came the conqueror. Damien, at the head of a host of thousands of foreign warriors. They swept through the Kingdom like a hurricane, scattering any resistance. They say that Damien himself beheaded the Tyrant. He took up rule, and soon proved himself a wise, able leader. Complete chaos was avoided, and the bards have sung of Damien as the Kingdom’s savior ever since.”

The demon smiled and nodded. “And his secret? The truth behind it all.”

Damien smiled back at the demon. “Damien was no foreign warlord. He was Darryn, the King’s own son, returned from a year in the lands beyond, a famed warrior in his own right outside the kingdom. It was Alexander’s own son that invaded the Kingdom, Alexander’s own child that stopped the rebellion that would have destroyed the Kingdom from the inside out. Alexander’s own blood that took his life. Alexander, cursed by history as the tyrant, saved the Kingdom and preserved his own bloodline in one devious, visionary maneuver.”

This time, when the demon smiled, he let his teeth show. They were as black as coal, and as polished as knifes. Fireglass. Obsidian, like the mountain. “You are wise indeed to know such a thing, traveler. Very few know men have known what you’ve just told me.. It is a secret that could tear down the foundations of the Kingdom. You have answered my first question to my satisfaction: you are indeed wise.”

One. One question down. Gabriel could hardly fight back the quivering that threatened to over take him. Two questions left. Two questions between him and penultimate power. Between him and destiny.

“The next question,” he spluttered in a burst of eagerness, “Guardian, what is your next question?”

A flame-red tongue crackled out of the demon’s mouth and ran its forked tip along the edges of its lips. “Hasty, aren’t we?” the demon crackled.

“I came here to claim my power,” Gabriel said, feeling giddily reckless. “Not to waste time.”

“You have spine,” the demon observed. It do not, however, as Gabriel somewhat expected, add that it admired a man with spine. “Very well,” it said at last. “The next question.”

The fur bristled as the demon straightened it’s posture, its height filling the cavern. “The second question I pose tests your morals, your judgments, your capacity to think, if you’ll have it. A hypothetical situation: You are a traveller upon a road, walking down a path. Suddenly, you hear screams, and go to find the source.”

“Following the noise, you come upon a group of travelers. They have fallen victim to an avalanche, and are trapped up to their waist in mud, dirt, and stone. Far above them, teetering precariously on the side of the mountain, is a boulder. A gigantic stone monolith. They cry out, tell you that tremors have been coming with regularity, that with each one the stone wedges looser from its fixtures, that with just one more, it will lodge free and roll, crushing them to their doom. With time they could free themselves but...it is the one thing they do not have.”

“Now, you could try to dig them free. But they tell you it has been some time since the last tremor; you have no time. If you would save them, you must stop the boulder. There is nothing around to block its progress. No trees. Only dirt and mud and stone. You dwell upon it and realize that the only chance of diverting the boulder would to be to use yourself, to march towards it, and use the weight of your own body to turn its course when it starts rolling.”

“Of course such an action would likely cripple, if not kill you. There are children trapped by the avalanche. They are begging, pleading; any moment the boulder could loose.”

This smile was the widest yet, almost mocking in its unabashed sincerity. Smoke snaked out of the back of the demon’s throat. “Tell me, traveller. What would you do.”

Gabriel considered it for a moment. Was the demon looking for altruisim? For egotism? A clever, hidden solution concealed in the problems warning? No, none of those were right. Every time, somebody lost...somebody was hurt. He needed a solution that would save everyone. Eliminate the problem.

“I have my answer.” Gabriel said.

“Oh?” The demon’s gravelly voice echoed in the smallness of the cave. “And, pray tell, what is it?”

This was it. A gamble. A long shot. But it was the only answer Gabe had. If it was wrong.... “I would destroy the boulder.” He spoke firmly.

Steam hissed through the smoke in the demon’s throat, laughter? “And how would you do that, traveller?”

“That,” Gabe answered resolutely, “is why I’m here.”

The demon roared; for a terrified moment, Gabe thought it was in anger. The roar tore through the small room like an arrow through a fly, ripping through Gabe’s skull. He reeled, his ears ringing.

“Very good, human,” the demon rolled out, back to his typical bass rumble. “I’ve heard many answers to that question, and very few of them acceptable, but never one that I’ve liked so much as that. You have answered your second question to my satisfaction.”

So there were more than one right answer. To that question at least. Gabriel shook his head wanly, trying to shake off the memory of the demon’s roar. It had been amusement, he realized. Pleasure, in an odd sort of way.

“I expect you want the third question already?” the demon interrupted as Gabe opened his mouth. “Yes? Of course. You are hasty indeed.”

“The third question I pose tests your awareness, your patience, your capacity to observe.” It paused reflectively.

Gabe felt a tension well up inside him. One more, he realized, scarcely able to believe it. One more question, and an unspeakable power would be his. All of those years, working and training, never pausing to breathe, only fighting towards one goal, all in pursuit of an old legend...they were all poised here.

“This is my question, traveler. On your journey up the mountain, there was little in the way of scenery. Rock and sky. Little more. I ask you this:” Flames licked at the edges of the demon’s mouth, pouring out of his throat in ravenous anticipation. “How many carved steps were there on the path to my domain?”

It left Gabe all at once. The confidence. The poise. The hope. The courage. Fled out of him like a hounded fox and left him rooted to the spot, white and speechless, too horrified to speak, to even think.

“No answer?” The demon’s eyes cooled; now they were a faded brown. The fire began to seep out of him; water out of a cracked dam, until it flared all around him, a starving orange brilliance that blinded Gabriel. “Then I claim your forfeit. You should have taken your time,” it finished in a whisper.

The last sight Gabe ever saw before he was devoured, was the demon, smiling one last time, like a two-timing merchant. Obsidian fangs laced with liquid flame, folds under its eyes, inexplicably like some terrible cat.