Pixie's Pad

Written in 2014

Ibrahim Lamorde, founder of the fifth regent, sits alone at his desk in an empty palace. The King and Queen have long since left for Tertia, along with their royal escort, henchmen, serving staff and other various retinues. The remainder of the palace occupants have abandoned the building and now only Ibrahim remains, mustering the resolve to see this one through to the last.

A soft wind caresses the window frames, tapping them lightly against the stonework of the palace wall as if in gentle reminder that his time runs short. He stands from the empty wooden desk, its usual splay of paperwork having long since been discarded along with the contents of the drawers, and strides quietly to the window. He reaches out to pull the shutters inwards, and that’s when he sees the first pillars of smoke in the distance beyond the woods.

With a heavy sigh he draws the shutters in and fastens them with the iron hook and loop. The wind still finds a way to call to him, however, and now whistles through the spaces, its lilting pitch cajoling him into motion, taunting him to do something – anything – but not to sit still and await his fate unwavering.

Ibrahim Lamorde’s heart palpitates wildly in his chest as he fights against the realisation of the encroaching force. For the severalth time since the sun crested the horizon scant hours ago his forehead breaks out in a cold, clammy sweat and he struggles to calm himself, forcing his eyes closed and drawing a deep breath. The blackness of his eyelids manifest images of those smoke-columns, grey-black and foreboding with the manner in which they reach lazily sidewards into the pale morning sky.

He grasps at the chair to steady himself, panic welling form the pit of his stomach as he wildly calculates how much time he has, what his options are, where he can go. He looks down at his hands curled around the chair’s wooden frame, his knuckles white, his veins bulging as his blood courses through them. His options are few, he realizes, and every moment he spends deliberating them is a moment wasted.

In a flurry of swirling cloth Ibrahim turns on his heels and strides from the room. He pauses in the doorway, hands clutching the frame on either side, and then crosses the threshold into the cold stone corridor beyond. His boots tap echoes that bounce from wall to wall as he hurries to the end of the corridor and turns quickly, skipping down the polished stone treads of the staircase and beyond into a large hall. Through one window he glances the curling tendrils of thick smoke again and notices with small relief that they seem no nearer, for now.

Ibrahim pushes open a heavy wooden door and descends another flight of steps. He emerges into a store-room full of barrels, chests, crates and sacks that are now mostly empty, supplies taken with the King and Queen as they fled their homeland. He moves quickly to the back of the dark room, to where the cobwebs hang like dirty gossamer and the dust is thick and sticky, and finds a few untouched containers. With great urgency he pries the lids from several barrels and crates until he finds some items of use; a rusting sword, two water skins, a heavy moth-eaten cloak and a tattered rucksack. Food, he will have to find on the move.

At the very back of the room he presses his fingers to the walls and caresses the cracks in the mortar, his fingertips working deftly along the nooks and crannies until he finds what he is searching for and presses a loose stone into a socket. With a shuddering sigh a section of the wall gives way and presents to him a doorway leading into dark emptiness.

Ibrahim pauses to check his pockets and to look back over his shoulder just once. He knows this is likely the last time he will see Brehanna Palace, but holds some hope that this is only the last time he will see the palace fled. His duty was to remain in place and record the fall of the Kingdom until the very last moment, until he heard the enemy pounding on the door of his quarters as he incanted to the planes of magic the very last details of the Kingdom’s demise, but he knows that was a fool’s errand.

Ibrahim Lamorde steps into the darkness and the stonework grumbles closed behind him.