(no subject)
Well, I said I would write the first line of the first chapter before I went to bed tonight. Tell me what you think and be brutally honest please.
From behind the heavy panelled wooden door, the sound of her screams tore along the corridor and through the massed courtiers. Dust motes seemed to pulse in time with the wailing, dancing in the shafts of light that pierced the leaded window, apart from candles, the only source of light on a dark day.
Inside the room the air was rank with the stink of disease. The queen writhed on the bed, her usually lustrous red hair was almost black with sweat and plastered to her head and pillow. The thin shift that she wore was drenched also. Nurses tried to tend to the blisters that had exploded on her yellowing skin but she would lash out if anyone came near her. The door burst open as more maids bundles in desperately trying not to spill the hot water that they had carried up from the kitchen, four floors below. Water was spilt as the tub hit the floor and one of the maids was rewarded with a sharp slap across the face from one of the elder women in the room. Before the door closed a dozen pair of eyes peered into the room. Each desperately trying to gauge their tenuous positions, each dependant on the tortured wrecked body trapped in the room they were barred from.
It was on the fifth day that the screaming finally stopped. Outside the castle, the sky was grey and heavy. Rain had been falling steadily for days and still showed no sign of stopping. It matched the gloom within the thick stone walls. Voices had barely been raised above a whisper all of the time the queen had been in her chamber. But now there was silence. The courtiers became restless. Their self serving devotion, just in case she lived, was coming to an end. There was not a man among them that didn’t believe that she was dead. Smiles began to tug at the corner of the mouths of some, tears in the eyes of others. All stood as the chamber door opened and Jherhom, the queens First Minister came out among them.
He was an old man, had served her father. He wasn’t tall, certainly shorter than the queen who verged on the statuesque and was indeed considered too tall by most of the men she towered above. His hair was grey but damp with sweat. His ornate black robe covered a stooped thin body that was beginning to rebel against the duties it’s master forced it to. You could imagine a thin voice from a thin man but when it came it was deep and forceful.
“The Queen lives.” That was all that he said. The corridor emptied in a matter of moments, smiles now wiped from faces, tears running freely. The proclamation echoed throughout the realm.
Those words had been spoken over 350 years ago. They had passed into history and legend and remained as vibrant today as they did then. The reason….the Queen still lived.
I was on a bit of a roll so it may go on a bit.
From behind the heavy panelled wooden door, the sound of her screams tore along the corridor and through the massed courtiers. Dust motes seemed to pulse in time with the wailing, dancing in the shafts of light that pierced the leaded window, apart from candles, the only source of light on a dark day.
Inside the room the air was rank with the stink of disease. The queen writhed on the bed, her usually lustrous red hair was almost black with sweat and plastered to her head and pillow. The thin shift that she wore was drenched also. Nurses tried to tend to the blisters that had exploded on her yellowing skin but she would lash out if anyone came near her. The door burst open as more maids bundles in desperately trying not to spill the hot water that they had carried up from the kitchen, four floors below. Water was spilt as the tub hit the floor and one of the maids was rewarded with a sharp slap across the face from one of the elder women in the room. Before the door closed a dozen pair of eyes peered into the room. Each desperately trying to gauge their tenuous positions, each dependant on the tortured wrecked body trapped in the room they were barred from.
It was on the fifth day that the screaming finally stopped. Outside the castle, the sky was grey and heavy. Rain had been falling steadily for days and still showed no sign of stopping. It matched the gloom within the thick stone walls. Voices had barely been raised above a whisper all of the time the queen had been in her chamber. But now there was silence. The courtiers became restless. Their self serving devotion, just in case she lived, was coming to an end. There was not a man among them that didn’t believe that she was dead. Smiles began to tug at the corner of the mouths of some, tears in the eyes of others. All stood as the chamber door opened and Jherhom, the queens First Minister came out among them.
He was an old man, had served her father. He wasn’t tall, certainly shorter than the queen who verged on the statuesque and was indeed considered too tall by most of the men she towered above. His hair was grey but damp with sweat. His ornate black robe covered a stooped thin body that was beginning to rebel against the duties it’s master forced it to. You could imagine a thin voice from a thin man but when it came it was deep and forceful.
“The Queen lives.” That was all that he said. The corridor emptied in a matter of moments, smiles now wiped from faces, tears running freely. The proclamation echoed throughout the realm.
Those words had been spoken over 350 years ago. They had passed into history and legend and remained as vibrant today as they did then. The reason….the Queen still lived.
I was on a bit of a roll so it may go on a bit.