An Ultra Violent Fairy Tale by Pete Bertino - HTML preview

23 AN ULTRA VIOLENT FAIRY TALE

On different places of the castle were towers like the prison they’d come from, however these were taller and round and topped with cone roofs and atop each was a black flag with a green and orange infinity symbol. The flags lapped in the wind as the bus drove through the entrance of the castle that was guarded by Marshals manning cannons in front of a tall black iron gate connected to a high wall of stone that ran the outer perimeter of the castle.

The bus stopped through and halted in a wide courtyard, Paradine stepped off the bus with Rance pulling the blindfolded captain along. Their booted feet smacked loudly on the stone floor as they approached a door that was tiny compared to the three story high room it opened into. Paradine looked up at the castle wall as he entered, always in disbelief that something with walls so high could exist or even be built by hand but this was one of the old castles that was filled with strange magical things and even had a gas well in its bowels somewhere to give this place electricity, though The Lady didn’t usually put the lights on.

The ceiling was so high it was shrouded in darkness since most of the crystal chandeliers hanging from long gray chains attached to it were dark. The room was massive and the echoey sound their footsteps made were loud and they all unconsciously began to walk more softly. The room was breezy and the blindfolded captain walked until Rance barked at him to stop. The captain was taking short breaths as he stood still, then Rance pushed him forward and he let out a surprised cry with his head darting everywhere at once as Paradine approached him from behind and quickly snatched the blindfold off.

The captain stood under the only chandelier that was lighted though not very brightly, he found himself looking up into it then looked behind him as Paradine backed away out of the weak circle of light. Then he looked forward and saw her, she sat in shadows where only the shine of the sickle moon lay. She sat in the mouth of a gaping skull of a dragon that had a long dog like snout with very large teeth, though this creature had one of its two fangs broken. Her face looked like a white mask with black holes for eyes in the pitiful moon light, she wore a thick black shroud that covered her body like a fog, her left hand was as brown and rough looking as leather, her fingers were twice as long as a normal person’s fingers.

On her right hand she wore a thick rawhide glove that was covered on the front and back with metal sheeting literally riveted to the bones of her hand. On the tip of each finger were five inch long blades riveted to her hand through the glove as well, beside her strange elongated looking feet sat a mask of some sort. He’d heard Paradine tell another captain it was a mask for a combat sport, called either hickey or hockey.

He couldn’t think straight as he looked upon her face that was a patchwork of scars like she’d been scalded or burned, her eyes that were twice as big as his, showed color again one green and the other orange, her glare was horrific. Her two toned eyes stared into him, he felt his testicles shrivel as they sparked and her iris’ looked to be boiling like water. Then she began to rise, one half of her did.