White Demon

>> Chapter 2 C <<

It is past twilight.

The Emperor's meeting with his captains, knights, and Generals has been going on for hours into dusk.

The meeting is held in the highest room at the tallest tower of the palace.

Knights standing beside the Emperor hold up flame torches for them to see.

At the center of the hall is a large platform displaying a table model sizes of important buildings in the land, and parts of the landscape in the kingdom.

At the center of the platform, is a model of 'The Kremlin'.

The Kremlin is the official name of the Russian Emperor's palace.

The Kremlin was built by the Great Great Grandfather of Emperor Raspuntinzil: Emperor Gochev the Terrible, about four hundred years ago, in the 15th century.

The Kremlin is the home of the Royal Family, it is the seat of Power for all of Russia.

"We have them held up at the creek bed," the Emperor says.

He points with a baton at a silver streak that runs across the green patches on the table model.

The silver streak represents the creek bed.

"We can cut them off from the river at the south before they can get close to the foreground of The Kremlin," the Emperor says.

He points at the model of The Kremlin on the platform.

"We need more men sire," one of the Generals says to the Emperor.

"Yes I know," the Emperor says. "We are bringing in reinforcements of five thousand men tonight, a hundred thousand more infantry are coming from Western Europe in three days, but for now, we fight with what we have, Captain Roscoe will mobilize more men, he will send in troops drawn from all regiments and also part of the palace reserves, all Royal Guardians will be activated by tomorrow morning, they will stand on duty inside the palace floors and hallways, how many Guardians do we have in the palace," the Emperor asks, he looks around at his men.

Everyone remains silent.

"You mean no one knows how many Royal Guardians we have right now in The Kremlin," the Emperor asks authoritatively.

"About five hundred men strong Your Majesty," Captain Roscoe retorts.

"Then let that five hundred men be on Guard in the palace and always around the Royal family," the Emperor says.

"When the reinforcements arrive, we will press forward to the hideout fortress of that ungrateful rebel Rotkov, I will teach him a lesson he has never learned up till now!"

"Ay, Ay, sire," the men mutter.

They mumble in a none rhythmic chorus, cladded with an inaudible mutter.

"Yess, we will take the war to him," the Emperor says. "He thinks we don't know where he is hiding, but we do know, and we will find him, and we will bring him to book!"

The Emperor speaks, with some confidence in his voice and stance.

"Ay, Ay," the men mutter.

"We hope that everything comes to plan by tonight," the Emperor says.

"Captain Roscoe are you ready with your men?"

"Yes sire, five thousand men will secure the creek bed tonight," the captain says.

"Ay," the Emperor says.

They close the meeting, and they all leave the hall.

The knights lead the way with flame torches.

*********************

Somewhat after dark, Maiden Clara meets Captain Roscoe by the palace hallway, he walks with a band of knights.

"Captain, captain, can I see you for a moment please," Maiden Clara beckons on Captain Roscoe.

He stops briskly, along with the knights.

"How may I help you, madam," he says.

"Please, what about the guard boy that I asked about, when is he coming back here," Maiden Clara asks the captain.

She is looking very worried, enough to rouse the empathy of the captain.

"What guard boy," Captain Roscoe says.

"The same person the Duchess spoke to the Emperor about this morning?"

"Yes, yes, he's the one," Maiden Clara says excitedly.

She is excited because she knows the Duchess will be happy to have Omiji back.

Captain Roscoe stares at Maiden Clara for a moment.

Even by the flame torches hanging on the palace walls darkly, his eyes can be seen as icy with no emotions depicting his eyes.

"I'm afraid, they all will be sent to the regiment at the creek bed," he says.

"There's a war going on there."

He swings around in military style and continues with the troops.

The troop of knights continues their march away towards the main exit doorway.

Maiden Clara can't believe her ears.

"What did you say, sir," Maiden Clara asks, but the captain walks with his men.

Maiden Clara pursues the captain in brisk long strides.

"Step back," another knight says, he turns and sees Maiden Clara running after them.

He stops Maiden Clara from pursuing the captain.

"Please can you hear me out sir, but the Emperor said he was to be brought back tonight," Maiden Clara pleads, and she follows the knights.

She stops her pursuit.

It now seems fruitless talking to the captain at that moment for he paid her no mind.

Maiden Clara looks on as the troops march out the exit doorway, and the doors close.

Maiden Clara is sad now for the Duchess.

She is even more scared of what the Grand Duchess might do if she hears such sad news.

But she still needs to tell her anyway.

Maiden Clara walks up the stairways that lead up to the Duchess' courts.

*********************

Zea is by the window since the afternoon.

She sits on a seat by the window.

A lot has gone through her mind sitting and watching through the window.

They never grew up to have play friends in the palace.

It has always been them and themselves alone.

Zea has always wanted to live a normal life.

Not necessarily of much attention by maidens and palace stewards, but a life where she can go to the market, play at the daisy fields, milk the cows and eat goat cheese at the dairy store, down by the riverside.

That's the kind of life Zea wants to live.

That, and not this life of "gold and grandeur", silver and shimmers, which she sees more like imprisonment in affluence, or so it seems.

To be free is all that will fulfill her joy.

Freedom from these high walls.

Freedom, from these high towers.

These high windows, these battlements!

All the Duchess wants is just more freedom.

The Duchess looks through her window across the lands.

The night is getting darker, and the moonrise shines big and bright, soon it will let out its illumination across the lands.

The court door opens and Maiden Clara walks in.

"Maiden Clara," Zea exclaims, she wears a show of excitement in anticipation that Maiden Clara brings some good news, but she sees that she is not looking so happy.

"What's wrong Maiden Clara?" Zea asks anxiously.

Her voice depicts a bit of panic.

Maiden Clara is silent holding her two hands together under her apron.

"What's the matter, Maiden Clara?" Zea asks yet again.

The Grand Duchess goes and sits down by her bed.

"Omiji will be sent to the frontlines to join in the war," Maiden Clara says.

Zea stands to her feet briskly, she clasps her mouth with her hands not to let out a second scream.

"You're joking Maiden Clara, tell me you're joking?" she says.

Her voice is clouded in tears.

Maiden Clara is silent, she bows her head, still holding both hands together.

Zea walks and sits at the tea table.

She pulls out her mirror from her girdle and starts looking at it blandly.

Maiden Clara slowly walks up to her and touches her by the shoulder.

"It's okay child, he may still come back," she says.

Zea begins to cry uncontrollably.

Maiden Clara holds the Duchess up close to herself.

"It's okay child, it's okay," she says.

Zea stands and walks to the window.

"I want to be alone," she says.

"But can I make you some t..." Maiden Clara struggles to say.

"Leave please, leave,” Zea retorts.

"Leave me alone!!"

"Yes, Your Highness," Maiden Clara says.

She quickly makes it out of the Duchess' court and leaves.

*********************

Going far beyond the kingdom borders into the woods (which is East of the lands of the Siberians) which goes Southeast on the way to modern-day Kazakhstan.

Deep across the dense woods of ‘The Great Greens' lies this hill with a scary-looking crooked castle at its peak.

The castle can be seen looking not too quite like a castle, but more of a shack, a giant but shabby building, with a big old cranky wind turbine spinning very slowly right in front of it.

The structure used to be an old windmill which the Revolutionary Army seized and hammered into a shack, a shack with an irregular shape with some battered woods, and some loose stilts.

The castle looks very much like the habitation of a hunchbacked witch, who is cooking up some cauldron, and seeking for whom to give a poisoned apple.

But this old and cranky shack did not belong to any old witch making potions, but to the dreaded rouge General:

GENERAL ROTKOV!

This place is called 'The Black Tower.

It is the camp of the Revolutionary Army.

The 'Black Tower' is concealed deep in The Great Greens.

The Great Greens is a faraway jungle, not always traveled through by the people.

Bordering the foregrounds of the shack is the territories of the KAZAKS.

The Kazaks are not too friendly with the Emperor, so they bore ties with the Revolutionary Army, creating avenues for them to smuggle in weapons, guns and gun powder, cannons, cotton, sugar, and other products.

After the war broke out, no one dares into the Great Greens without security or a Guard of knights, because all around the woods of The Great Greens is a cascade of the brown coat army - The REVOLUTIONARY ARMY.

They are everywhere here, all around the woods, and all around the grounds of the Black Tower.

Here is their base territory.

Tonight, it seems like there's a parade about to begin.

For there is an outspread of brown coat soldiers, about fifty thousand men, standing in straight line formations on the grounds of the Black Tower.

A chant in Russian harmonized acapella is sung by this band of men standing down below the high tower.

They are waiting for the appearance of General Rotkov to come and give them a speech.

Right up the high tower is a room.

High up in this room in the tower is General Rotkov.

He is standing by the window overlooking the parade grounds.

The window is of old Byzantine architecture.

He looks at the crowd down below through the window.

General Rotkov leaves the window and walks to his throne made of black acacia wood and some loose gold linings.

The gold linings scantily grace the headrest of the throne.

General Rotkov, before the Revolution, was the General of the Royal Army.

He commanded the entire Royal Army until he went rogue and wants to take over the kingdom for himself.

General Rotkov has this undaunted desire to have all Emperor Rasputinzil has and more.

He envies the affluence of the Emperor which he feels the Emperor attained through him, the General's military experience as General of the Royal Army.

The General feels indignation fighting for the Emperor, and yet he gets nothing but just mare military allowances and some medals!

He then broke out of the Royal Army and formed The Revolutionary Army made up of some renegade ex-Royal Army soldiers, and some locals.

War broke out in early 1918.

But before the war broke out, General Rotkov danced with the Grand Duchess Zea at the Royal Ball, on New Year's Eve:

"I would want to have you as mine," General Rotkov teased the young Duchess as they danced at the Ball on that very night.

"Am I not too young for you General," Zea asked as they danced the Waltz.

"No you are perfect for me," the General said.

"I can only marry Royalty, General. Zea said.

"And you don't look very much like a "Prince Charming."

Zea sarcastically teased the General letting out a chuckle, innocently.

Now the General wasn't so a handsome man.

He is middle-aged, and a tall lanky man, with a pointed beard goatee.

He wore an eye patch, for he had lost his right eye in battle.

So yes, he could pass easily not to be the Duchess' type.

But the Duchess' words on that very night, which were mare words from a young innocent heart grieved the General.

The General, being extremely egocentric, and teeming with misguided masculinity felt insulted by the Duchess.

But he didn't let out his grief or anger, during the dance.

For his grief (may or may not be) completely because of what the Duchess said nonchalantly, but borne by his grief against the Royal family, and this was made up of more accumulations of envy, hatred, and an unholy desire, borne from a long length of issues he has harbored in his heart against the Royal family over time.

Zea's words now put her on the forefront of the General's 'blacklist'.

But she wasn't aware of this, she never had a clue.

She never knew the magnitude of the words she just said to the General - which was the last flimsy straw on the ‘camel's worn out back'.

But she still danced joyfully with the General on that night.

And at the end of the dance, the General gave her his fur coat because the Duchess was feeling shivers from the unfriendly cold Russian winter night, or so she thought.

The General left the ballroom immediately after his dance with the Duchess.

He had a plan in mind - The War!

He planned to take over the kingdom and forcefully take Duchess Zea as his own and make her his Empress.

General Rotkov in the Black Castle rises from his throne.

He is wearing a black long robe that flows, and a very tall black pointed hat.

He walks to a window and looks through the window.

"Soon this kingdom will be mine," he says to himself.

"It is time!"

He walks straight out to the balcony, overlooking the crowd downstairs.

As he appears on the balcony, the thousands of men down below see him, and the crowd lets out a great cheer.

Their cheer thunders across the woods.

General Rotkov raises his hands in greetings to his army, and the roar increases in tempo, the roar rises.

The crowds roar a bit more, then General Rotkov brings down his hand, and the roar subsides.

"It is time," he bellows from the balcony.

The crowd let out a loud cheer as he speaks.

"In not so much time, this kingdom will be ours,” he says.

The crowd lets out a louder cheer once again.

General Rotkov raises both hands again, and then he walks briskly out of the balcony, and into the room.

He immediately walks out of the room, stepping out of the door into a corridor.

He walks down a dimly lit corridor, the guards at the door take a military stance as General Rotkov appears.

He walks past the guards and begins to ascend a very narrow stairway that leads to the highest room in the tower.

At the top of the stairway is a door boldly written with a sign in Russian:

"Только тот, кто хочет умереть, пересекает эту точку без разрешения."

This translates to mean:

"Only those who wish to die cross this point without authorization."

The General opens this door and enters the room.

Now, the General had taken a delve to become a sorcerer, and in this room, which no one else but him and his most trusted servant BUDDY, may enter.

Inside this room, it looks like a mad scientist's lab.

Lots of boiling chemicals here and there, pulleys pulling things up and down, potions, boiling in cauldrons here and there.

This room was originally the engine room for the wind turbine spinning in front of the shack.

There is a large gear system moving up and down at the top of the room, and an inner stairway that leads to the top of the gear systems for the sake of maintenance.

At the top of the inner stairway that goes up the gear system, is a high round window.

There is a pit in the middle of the room, about four foot by seven-foot area.

It looks like an indoor pool, but it is not a pool but a pit boiling with some green liquid.

Bubbles of green and bluish green, pop up rhythmically from this simmering cauldron.

In front of this simmering pit, is BUDDY, General Rotkov's trusted servant.

Buddy is kneeling and stirring the pit continuously.

Buddy has been the General's slave for over thirty years.

Buddy was a slave captured in one of the General's military campaigns for Russia.

He is autistic, and exhibits a characteristic like that of an imbecile, he doesn't speak so well, and he is of Indian descent, so Buddy is dark-skinned in complexion, like a negroe.

Buddy continues stirring this pit as the pit boils from within, there is no fire heating the cauldron, but the cauldron boils by chemical reactions.

General walks up to Buddy stirring the cauldron.

"How is it coming," General Rotkov asks Buddy.

Buddy doesn't speak as normal humans do speak, mostly because of his autism, but he mutters and mumbles words that the General alone understands.

Buddy mumbles some inaudible words.

"Hmmm...really,” General Rotkov says.

"It's not yet right you say, and why's that, hmmm?”

The General walks around the boiling pit.

He goes to a table by the room, there is a very big old book placed open on this table.

It is the Book of The Dead.

The Book of The Dead originally originated from Ancient Egypt in 2027 BC.

It was kept secret in the Pyramid catacombs and crypts of the dead Pharaohs until sometime in the early 13th Century, the Book was stolen from the Pyramids and it finally rested in the safe keep of the Monks in Nepal, that was until General Rotkov stole the book from there, and killed all the monks dwelling in that Monastery!

He burnt down the Monastery after he stole the book, and he executed all of the Monks.

General Rotkov flips through this book and comes to a page where a drawn illustration depicts a ‘boiling pit'.

In front of this page is drawn a werewolf, and some inscriptions written in hieroglyphic signs and words, to mean:

'HOW TO MAKE A DEMON'.

General Rotvov studies the book for a while.

He sees a part of the book that portrays an illustration of a man falling into the cauldron pit.

The General continues studying the book till he sees from the illustrations that a human can be added to the cauldron, and if a human is added to the boiling cauldron, the human will evolve into a fierce and violent werewolf called - a "Demon".

The General lets out a cynical smirk.

He carries the book along as he walks towards Buddy kneeling in front of the pit and stirring.

The General mutters some incantations from the Book of The Dead.

"whd, ie, tm, eon," he mutters inaudibly.

"You see, sometimes, we need to make the greater sacrifice," the General says.

"The sacrifice will always be for the greater good."

He speaks and walks behind Buddy.

Now, the General is standing directly behind Buddy who is on his knees, stirring the pit.

Buddy is about to turn around to look at the General when the General quickly kicks Buddy into the boiling pit.

Buddy falls headlong into the pit, like in a dive, and there was an explosion of bright green bioluminescence.

The pit boils with more aggression.

Suddenly, a struggling figure covered in green slime tries to pull itself out of the cauldron.

Buddy, at this point, can't scream because of his indistinct voice, but by his struggle and mutter, it is obvious that he is in severe and excruciating pain, like being burnt alive.

The figure tries to make it to the edge of the pit in its bid to climb out of the boiling cauldron, but the General kicks him yet again into the pit, and Buddy, now looking more like a gnome covered in green slime, falls backward into the pit a second time.

There is another bioluminescence explosion, this time of red and green, the red is of blood, and fire.

General Rotkov stands aside about five feet away from the pit as he observes the pit boiling in red and green with a great simmer.

For a while, the pit seems to settle its simmering.

General Rotkov flips through the book to see if he got everything right.

Suddenly there is an outburst, then a creature rockets out of the pit.

The creature plunges out from the pit like in a spasm.

It jumps out and stands on its feet at the edge of the pit, it is a werewolf also known in Legends as ‘Demon’.

General Rotkov is held spellbound by the sudden occurrence of this horror standing before him.

He stands spellbound because Demon prevails like a lion on two feet, It looks like a cross between a lion and a bear.

It has teeth like a shark, its teeth are not of normal dentition, its teeth are sharp and irregular shaped, and it has hairs covering all of its body, from its face to its toes.

It can be seen that it isn't happy at all.

Demon wears a very angry countenance, and exposed are its teeth, this beast growls uncontrollably in anger.

Though Demon is looking angry, Demon is not angry at the General (though its anger should be directed to the General for pushing him into the pit) but its anger is now to be controlled by the master of it who is the General.

"Great, great, great," the General yawps.

General Rotkov raises his hand in joy and gladness as he exclaims in sinister excitement.

Demon lets out a high growl into the night.

"Yes, yes,” the General yells.

“I will call you by the name WOLFGAR!”

Demon throws back its head and lets out a high-pitched howl when its master, the General tells it its new name.

"You only have one mission, kill all the Royal Family, kill them all," The General says.

"Bite them, eat them, tear a gash on their necks for all I care, but bring back to me the youngest Duchess, don't hurt her, but bring her to me."

Demon now named 'Wolfgar’ nods at the instructions given to it by its new master.

The General walks to a box on the table, he opens the box and brings out a fur coat's hat.

The hat is a match to the fur coat that the General gifted to the Duchess on the night that they danced at the New Year's Eve Ball.

The General didn't give Zea the hat that night, he didn't come with the hat to the ball, he kept it for a purpose, and tonight is the reason for that purpose.

He throws the hat to Wolfgar.

Wolfgar holds the hat to its nose and it lets in a deep breath.

It throws back its head and lets out a loud howl again.

"Find the match of this coat, she is the one I want, and bring her to me, alive," the General says to the beast.

Wolfgar lets out a nod, it smells the hat once again, it throws its head back and lets out another long loud howl.

Demon, now called Wolfgar, quickly begins to climb the inner stairway that leads up to the narrow window at the top.

The dexterity of its climb is like a monkey climbing a tree with ease.

Shortly, Demon is at the top high window, it looks down at the General, and lets out another howl into the night.

"Do not forget the gash on their necks, tear a gash on their necks, blood, blood, blood," the General yells, and he laughs hysterically.

Demon crashes through the high window, and bolts into the night.