Tall Tales: The Nymphs' Symphony (Scott T Beith's Tall Tales Saga Book 1)

by Scott Beith

  All of my own companions had spread out and entered into separate rows as they began to consort or blend in with the seat-less audience, becoming completely indistinguishable to me before I got a chance to scout where any one of them even were in the room. The only thing I could recognise for sure was one huge blackened marble portal stone that had been erupted from the earth and repositioned up on stage in the centre of two burnt up curtain lines and their frizzy former wiring that spat out from each corner.

  Torches were flaring with a great intensity along all four of its walls, brightly lit as they were in very close concentration with one another. All of the former church pews had been ripped up and scattered along those walls for firewood, while half a dozen glass-stained portraits still glowed up on those slopes of the ceiling, one in between every wooden roof panel, showing detailed images of bubbling lava fissures down in deep sea caves as others depicted heavenly cities up in the clouds. Precious glass artwork somehow pristine and fracture free, giving a mix of milky white, ocean blue and lava red tinges that blended with each other under the pale moonlight outside as it beamed down like a spotlight onto the blank and empty curtain-less stage near where the king and queen sat upon their thrones.

  The whole room was miraculously well preserved when compared to the long and narrow candle-lit memorial corridor we had all just exited from.

  Other than a few patch jobs and some interior decorating problems, for the most part, the building itself was structurally sound. I mean, the stone walls were as dark and grubby as oily tar, much as if they were partially blackened by the ash of burnt felt that once remained there. As about three or four tall roof windows out of the dozen were shattered by what could have been heavy winds or hail a long while ago, welcoming in a winter breeze from outside.

  But with a highly rugged and stuffed up crowd, It felt oddly warm and welcoming as I stood by the centre doorway that split the crowd right down the middle like a knife. A passage that led all the way down to the stage where I could see the king and his queen on large throne chairs, waiting to see if I was the last member of their army to arrive.

  Before the elite guards came in from behind me, I moved to take a spot second row on the left, where some gnolls saw me and scrunched themselves inwards to give me a spot inside.

  We were deep inside their murderous coven, and there was simply no surrender or retreat with every decision we made from then on.

  My own instincts were to just accept the strangers’ invitation and situate myself alone amongst the odour of damp clothes and body heat while a hundred oblivious enemies offered me a spot at the very edge of the aisle.

  I spotted Arlo and Radament who were still together and looking backwards to find where I was. They were both one row ahead of me, but on the right hand side, blocked by many big bodies and faces. We had all lost each other to separate entries as we scattered randomly within the crowd. I gave Arlo and Radament a short smile and the tiniest of waves to let them know I thought we were in a good position and were alright.

  However, their gazes were torn from mine by the clash of metal splintering wood and the doors behind us screeching open. Enslaved members of this world’s horde were wheeling in thick gold cages that grabbed everyone’s attention all at once. Inside them were huge and angry desert scorpions covered under luscious liquid gold scales; the shine from the scales reflected the wall torches’ light and blinded the crowds upon the scorpions gradual approach down the middle aisles.

  Two by two, like a husband and wife walking down the aisle, cages were carefully pulled as those prisoners tugging the carts did their best to avoid letting anyone in the crowd be pierced or severed by the scorpions’ striking tail stingers as they continuously stabbed through the bars of their cages, trying to attack whatever was closest to them. The cages only stopped once they reached the front stage drop below Midas and his throne chair, the beasts staring at him unhappily but submissively towards a male master in a dressing gown who was quick to come down those doors right afterwards.

  That Midas was the skinny scathed man I saw back at Ambarvale. He had a barbed crown of thorns upon his head while long grey strands of hair came out of it and drooped down his face without direction. Like the very land he owned, he, too, seemed like he was in state of corruption and decay. He didn’t look like he ever ate food or washed himself, or ever closed the two baggy black sleepless eyes he had as he jumped down from the stage enthusiastically in order to shake the hand of the overlord who’d brought the beasts before him.

  It was a foreigner who had a fancy white desert robe. Like one of The Badlands’ pharaohs I had seen in the Hotel Capricorn Pyramid, that man was clearly responsibly for training and delivering those monstrosities to him. A dwarfish goblin who seemed to be very chummy with the king and the profits that would ensue working with a king who could clearly turn anything he desired into gold.

  It would have been a horrible way to die, as with skin as strong as metal no spider could defeat those scaly beasts. Nor were they all we had to concern ourselves about. That goblin overlord was just one of many mercenaries to walk down the aisle – second to the Sand King Ariss, who brought with him a full fleet of pirates and five or six gold flying ants that were pushed up onto the stage. Along with other warlord archers who came on Treadfall crickets with legs bending unnaturally backwards because of two knee-joints on each leg that could be retracted and spring off of.

  He had many generals of which he had entrenched with gold riches. Pilly being one of the archers who was already in attendance but last to jump onto stage and be welcomed by the king, hugging him real superficially, only to then have to bend down and kiss the ring that sat on his finger, before taking her side among all the other loyal lieutenants.

  On the left side of Midas’s chair stood his queen, who smiled wickedly as she talked to the desert goblin imp who came up to greet her like family, unveiling one large ostentatious gold key that hung on a chain around his neck. What appeared to be the master key to all of those cages his slaves were trying to heave up the side ramps and get up onto the flat level elevated stage.

  Midas’s great hall began to dim, the lights being smothered out intentionally as those with wooden oil lamps took them out from the walls to carry, moving them towards the cage but being vigilant not to bring them too close to the double stacked crates filled with oil drums just before the ramps of the stage.

  There was a lot to watch out for, but I couldn’t keep my eyes off Midas’s Queen Camilla. She looked so unfamiliar to the virtuous dame we all loved and depended on back home. This one was someone who seemed broken and crushed on the inside, but was as tough and fierce as a goddess of war on the outside.

  She had two long swords that looked like they could link into one sharp thrusting pole, but there were no banners on her back but rather something else much more confronting. She had wings like a fiery dragon, although tucked up and painted black, which made them hard to see in the lowered light. They were proper metamorphic wings like the angels were said to have, but these were drenched under a thick black tar-like oil. It was an oddity of nature so extraordinary I wouldn’t have even mentioned it to anyone if I couldn’t see it and re-see it again and again before my own eyes.

  But then I started really looking around at the others among me, seeing scales instead of skin of the stranger beside me, watching him take off his metal claws so that he could scratch his head and unveil a part of the hood that hid his eyes and face.

  When he saw me looking at him, he smiled in greeting, two sharp canine fangs were present within his teeth. Horror hitting me quietly as I realised the nightmare was real and we were not as prepared for what would come next as we had originally thought.

  I wasn’t a witness to deceit or a magic trick; the wings Camilla had weren’t synthetic or created from dusty moisture and shadow. These monsters were the real deal, not fake sculptures and puffy fantasy like the ones I could create.

  “So this is it, my brethren,” Midas called out
, the room falling quiet the second he did so. “It’s the end for us, we are all that’s left of our homeland,” he continued to shout. “Our scouts have confirmed their whispers to be true… They have in their possession a new, much stronger crystal than the one before. Free of cracks and glitches. Enough to eliminate us for good,” he warned his crowd. “So I offer you all this one last chance. Not to grab and steal what you need to survive the month. But to finally make a stand, to take their land for ourselves!” he roared.

  The crowd mildly begun cheering to his announcement of immediate war, his wife disappearing like dust only to grip the gateway stone, followed by an explosion of light that sparkled out from the vertical bubble of our world as the sight of our castle from the dark mountainous hills came into view from the blackish blue portal she had constructed.

  “No tolerance. No forgiveness. No surrender,” he incited. “Show any one of them mercy, and I’ll personally consider you one of them,” he threatened, falling quiet as a soldier jumped onto the stage and whispered something in Midas’s ear, interrupting that moment.

  The words being said, had turned his head in surprise as he began to look out among the entirety of the crowd. “I thought I smelt bath soap,” he chuckled. “Apparently there’s royalty with us today,” he stated with a scary yet sadistic smirk.

  My heart pounded as the soldiers looked from left to right, searching for the obvious intruders in their midst – us.

  “Don’t try and hide, it won’t take long to sniff you all out,” Midas sinisterly provoked. Perhaps potentially afraid of the delay it would take to do so while we all stood stiff and quiet among the crowd.

  My stomach twisted as Arlo was first to speak. “Are you at war with hygiene now too?” he slandered, pulling off his shroud as boldly and as proudly as he could do without noticeable quiver, revealing himself to all. He separated himself into the aisles before Radament could be seen as a similar conspirator.

  The room jolted backwards in a shocked surprise of his presence, although quick to pull spears from walls and the claws and small swords hidden under their shrouds as they created a ring of sharp objects that were pointed to him upon all angles.

  “Wait!” Midas called out, waving his men to stand down. “That’s not how we treat new guests, and I have to say, it was nice for one of you to finally make the effort to come down here. Even if you’re not just a little bit too late,” he stated, jumping down from the stage and coming down to look Arlo in the eyes. “Now, what about the rest of you?” the king asked, a victorious smile already spreading across his face as his eyes scanned the area around the prince, trying to spot the rest of us. “Don’t be shy.”

  “I came alone,” Arlo said, the king scuffing and laughing immediately upon him saying it. Our nervous prince drawing out his sword within the conversations break, while no one around him was prepared for it.

  “Liar!” he responded.

  “You think I would send any of my own people into your madhouse?” Arlo quipped.

  “Evidently you did,” he answered, looking to Pilly, an archer with her bow pointed at the ready towards Arlo and Midas as they stood within a ring of soldiers.

  “Midas, this might be hard for you to believe, but I didn’t come here to fight,” Arlo said defensively. “I came here to negotiate and to help,” Arlo stated, lowering his sword and turning the blade to face the creaky black wooden slats of the floorboards.

  “And who says we want your help,” Midas disputed, starting to advance and walk in slow confronting circles around the prince, absurdly confident, despite only having a rag and some gold linked chains dangling from his arm to arm himself with.

  “You do need my help – whether you want to admit that or not,” Arlo added, his dread becoming more obvious to those around him upon the realisation their king was not of proper body and mind.

  “You’re wrong,” Midas added calmly. “Perhaps none of us want to be saved,” he stated, leaving each gnoll in the crowd staring towards him with eyes of discord and sadness – men and women too afraid to speak up but virtually pleading for their king to see some level of reason and hear what my prince had come there to offer.

  “You killed your son, Midas,” the prince dared to say, the whole room shuffling and stepping back in dread of those words. Everyone looking fearfully to their frozen king, who stopped circling Arlo as his face turned to pure hatred.

  “YOU DID THAT!” he screamed ruthlessly, spitting into Arlo’s face as he ran point blank up to Arlo, ignoring the sword still by Arlo and his own feet while an entire floor shook unsteadily as two mad eyes remained fixed to my prince. The unstable king then retreated as he began to cough sickly as he overexerted himself, taking a second to breathe and recompose himself while his wife held open the gate for animals to pass through, waiting in angst for her moment to let go of the portal and use those blackened wings to fly over and intervene.

  “You think you can stall us long enough for the spire to be reinstalled,” said Midas, “and I’m sure you’re even willing to die for it,” he added before another series of sickly weary coughs. “I respect you for that, so I want you to know that your death was nothing personal,” he stated, followed by the prince drawing his sword and bracing himself for Midas to turn and advance.

  “Fight me for it then,” Arlo provoked.

  “Don’t flatter yourself in thinking your death might be worth my valuable time,” the king smugly quipped. “If it were any day but today, then yeah, maybe, but your death won’t be by my hand tonight,” he added, leaving the ring of soldiers and walking away from Arlo. As with a forwards wave of his hand he ordered all of his grunt soldiers to follow him onto the stage. “Start deactivating the portal, dear!” he called to his wife as he moved back towards her and the puddling blue bubble to our night time world. “Forget about his friends. Just make sure he’s left here in the darkness,” he said to his wife before venturing off through forward gusts of her wormhole.

  I had to make a choice of whether I was going to stay or go. I was being pushed forwards by a crowd desperate to make it through the portal before its slow and wobbly collapse. But before I could spot any of my friends, my shadow re-emerged from mere absence, puffing out as it covered Arlo’s back in a thick hide of cloudy leather while Camilla stood unknowingly behind him.

  Unbeknownst to either of us, she had already snuck up behind him and attempted to stab him but was both caught and shocked by a hump that padded the impact of the blades, as with it, the inability to retrieve two swords from that mist as it continued to swallow and grip onto them. Her struggle was short lived, as she had no choice but to release them and disappear into the air when Arlo realised what had happened and swung his own sword back in defence.

  The queen’s huge wings were fully expanded out, like a gothic black butterfly, she herself was made half of smoke and half of flesh, constantly vanishing and reappearing around the room like a ghost, collecting materials from all corners but doing so too fast for either Arlo or me to properly scout. Once again my dark protector had made a decision without my knowledge or instruction, as from a blobbed hunch gripping Arlo’s back, it took the form of a man that chased the queen, wielding her very own short twin blades upon two of its four ambidextrous grown hands.

  My shadow a hydra as each hand and head severed by the slice of her wings, built two more to keep the queen preoccupied, gifting us one short chance to escape. But before I could break free from the rushing crowds, the queen clicked together two rings on her finger and created a spark that set her wings completely on fire. Powered by the oil she lathered her wings and walls with, in one dive she tackled and pushed my shadow up against the wall, smothering it under a blanket of growing and searing flames.

  My shadow shrunk and shrunk until it was no bigger than a child, as without eyes to convey what it wanted to say to me, its head turned to look for me but failed and then burnt up with the cinders. That was the very last time I ever got to see it, or get to know what it was and how it
was so different to all the constructs that I had made before it.

  It was so lifelike to watch that dark avatar die. To me it felt almost as if the death of a family member or friend, enough to force my own intervention as I threw back my hood and yanked out my hidden necklace, breaking it from its chain just so I could smother the light in between my fingers and sift together one mighty claw to strike at the fiery queen, who remained close to the left wall, unaware of my presence.

  I thought I came at her as quick as a lightning bolt, my condensed claws screeching as they sliced through hot stone church wall with one fierce lashing swing. But just like my protector, with a single puff of smoke, she had disappeared. I spun in circles, wondering which angle she was going to come at me from. Bugs, amphibians and four-legged critters of all natures known to me were beginning to grow out of the ground as I felt the panic of the mistake I had just made, fearing for my safety as Arlo stepped over animals puffing into dust under the fires while the queen reappeared along the wall near to us, bending down to pick up her twin steel blades once again.

  In mere moments, the majority of gnolls had already fled the room through the portal before the fire began to reach the roof and cover all four corner walls. The queen’s horde of gnoll minions all arcing their backs and dropping onto all four limbs before they vaulted through the gateway portal, leaving only a tiny group of gnolls remaining behind in wait.

  As from 10 to 100 degrees in the space of a minute, I was already feeling the heat weakening me and stalling my judgement. Each rapid blink made from sweat hitting my eyes was potentially a moment Camilla would appear beside me.

  The retrieval of her swords made her the most deadly weapon and, with a leap, I was already half expecting, she still managed to catch me off guard. She had clipped my winters cloak with the tip of her blade as I was yanked backwards to the floor in quick defence by my prince, the two of them lunging and thrusting in all directions, rumbling the floor and bringing down the roof with the strength of Arlo’s heavy bursting swings against wall and floor.