Heritage: A Crown of Thorns

Chapter 1 : A fateful meeting (part one)

Part One

Tom hunched over the fire like a cloistered monk. His small camp was walled off from the surrounding frost by his thick leather jacket. His back turned to the metal bench while facing the road a few feet in front of him. The street light above his head was a beacon, but it had already blown its fuse. So his camp was the only light glittering dimly for miles around in the snowstorm engulfing the world around him.

Tom crawled as close as he could get to the fire without burning off his eyebrows. The cold winds whipped his back and the hot flames burned his face. His arms reached out to the fire and his fingers spread as far they could. Soon they puffed up with fresh blood, and their red hue returned after turning blue from the frost.

It had only been an hour since the sun sank into the horizon, but the snow storm moved in with swift winds and light snow showers. And in just a few hours, the storm covered the dazzling night skies and blocked off all possible communication. Which made Tom's cell-phone useless - not as it had any charge, to begin with.

Tom's trembling fingers picked up the crumpled letter in his lap. The letter mentioned an escort arriving at exactly 8:30 P.M. But, the expected company had missed their deadline by a few hours. Tom wanted to leave, but there were no buses scheduled to arrive at the station until the coming day.

So there was nothing to do but wait. But even in such harsh conditions, Tom's spirit did not dampen. His eyes fixed on the fire and his goal to keep it going so that he could live to see the morning light and possibly meet the person that sent him that letter. The fire was like water in a desert, and its dazzling waves put Tom in a trance. Soon, an intense desire to nap then and there crept up from the back of his mind.

Tom knew that falling asleep in that storm would be his final nap. So, he took the leftover dried beef jerky from his pocket and gnawed on it to make it soft enough to swallow. The salty jerky dried his tongue and cracked the roof of his mouth, but chewing it took his mind off the chilling winds and kept the waves of drowsiness at bay.

Tom came up with a list of questions he would ask his potential family to help him concentrate. The priority questions would be about his parents, and then the questions would shift to his extended family. Each question brought spine-chilling sensations with them, but not because of the frost gusts that had grown stronger and faster. Tom, in the back of his mind, could not help but come up with the worst-case scenarios. Because normally, the worst case would be that it could all be a scam, and he would have spent a night in the cold for nothing. But for Tom, the worst part of his ordeal would be meeting his family just to be asked to give up his family name and getting his name stripped from the annals of his family history.

The barrage of questions and conflicting thoughts did their job of helping Tom stay awake. But while stuck in a trance, he failed to notice the changing atmosphere.

Suddenly, small earthquakes broke him out of his concentration, and they were soon followed by sharp noises that cut through the thick fog. The tremors were heavy, as if boulders were rolling down the road, and the noise whiplashed with a screeching cry.

Tom braced himself as if the ground beneath his feet was going to split open and Armageddon would follow in its wake.

Tom tries to get to his feet, but they give out on him. The hours of constant huddling had drained the life out of his lower limbs, and it took him a moment to even feel his toes. But the noises grew louder with each passing moment. He uses the bench beside him to prop himself up and grabs one of the flaming logs. He holds it out in the direction of the incoming sounds.

"Is anyone there?" Tom's legs came alive after a while, and he gingerly walked toward the road but kept off it. He cried out a few times. But, his voice falls deaf in the face of the incoming crackling and thundering booms. His feet were already wet noodles, so running away was not an option. The only thing Tom could do was to wait for the contraption creating such demonic cries to emerge from the icy abyss.

Soon the rumbling dies down and is replaced by deafening silence. Tom's heartbeat thumped in his ears, and his heavy frosted breath echoed softly in the void.

Clop!

Clop!

Clop!

The sounds of hooves barreling down the road broke the silence. The galloping starts out low but grows louder and heavier with each passing moment. And accompanying the clinks of the metal hooves were noises resembling the c***k of a whip, a tug of reigns, and horses neighing in excitement.

Not another moment passes when the thick fog parts and gives way to a wooden carriage - straight out of a classical fantasy - bursting into the scene with a loud Woah! The carriage almost crashed into him. Tom instinctively jolted backwards. The slick pavement and his weak legs made him trip and fall into the snow bank. He landed in the soft snow but after shaking off the scare. Tom gasped both in wonder and in fear of what he saw arriving before him.

Easy does it, girls. We cannot squish another guest.

Tom saw a silver carriage drawn by six snow-skinned mares with a build that put even the best breed of English horse to shame. At the helm of the carriage, pulling the reigns, was a giant with a twisted black beard and a face covered in scars and inked tattoos. The carriage itself was the same size as the bus he arrived in. The massive structure was supported on eight wooden wheels, and its grayish-silver exterior was inlaid with golden threads that ran the length of its body.

The coachman calmed the horses with a few tugs of reigns, and then he smacked the side of the carriage with his arm thrice thicker than Tom’s torso and twice longer. The double doors on the side facing Tom parted, and a small stepping stool dropped with a quiet thud. Tom could see a man standing at the gate holding a lantern outward. He steps down from the carriage and pulls a golden pocket watch from his dark coat. He clicks his tongue at the coachman and puts it back in his pocket.

"It ain't my fault." The coachman spits and curses but with a tone lower than he would have liked to use.

"Master Thomas, I do humbly apologize for our tardiness. We would have arrived sooner if not for someone getting too drunk to drive a coach." Like a penguin, the man stood upright and rigid. Half of his face was covered in a bushy white mustache. He rushed towards Tom, who was once again huddled over the simmering fire like a street tramp warming his freezing face after almost becoming flattened by roadkill.

"Are you my escort?" Tom, like a newborn fawn, leaped towards the carriage with the penguin man helping him walk.

"Yes, my name is Gordan, and our colorful driver here is Oliver. We are servants of her ladyship Lara D Helsing and we are here to bring you to the Helsing Estate." He puts his arm over his shoulder and helps Tom get aboard the carriage.

He then lifts the steps and closes the doors behind him after giving the coachman a stern look. The coachman grumbles and tightens the reins. Gordan taps the roof with his ebony cane with a wolf's head as the handle. And with a roaring Hiya! The coachman cracks the reigns as the horses drag the carriage away at lightning speed.