THE HAUNTED KINGDOM 3 by CHARLES E.J. MOULTON (ereader that reads to you .txt) 📕

fire. There were a few simple words exchanged, a try to joke about Rumzils but no laughter. The former dictator and the king of Prosperania said good night a second time and Alex lay down and covered his body with his blanket and thought of the future. He missed his family so much that it hurt. He wondered where they were and how he would find them. He realized then and there he would find out very soon. That was the moment when Alexander Winsletenna fell asleep and had the most horrible nightmare of his life.

Riding along toward the statue down the road they had just travelled, an army of darkness was galloping relentlessly in search of some demonic salvation. Its leader was a man in a gigantic black steal helmet with large horns. He was wearing a face mask with a pointed nose, also black. The cape and the harness were both huge and the entire aim of the chosen appearance seemed to be directed toward tyrannical self adoration. Gigantic shoulder pads bounced as he rode, leather pants magnified the legs, and his huge cape fluttered in the breeze, the stallion blacker and bigger than Centurion.
It seemed this man, this leader of whatever empire he commanded, was anything but benevolent. But his wish for benevolence left him unwanted by the powers of purity. It found itself willing to change for the worse.
All powerful, his entire form bigger than any of the other riders, he was not anonymous.
Yet, he did not unmask.
But Alexander knew who this man was.
He had seen him in his dreams and was now seeing him again.
He came to cleanse the world of the unworthy believers.
The fierce leader of an army of around one hundred equally equipped men had obviously been riding for a long way to get where they were.
There were literally a thousand unarmed people in front of the troop. They were running away from the rider and his army and knew, each one, that they did not stand a chance of any survival.
There were old women falling down and spraining their ankles, clutching their wounds in hope of some comfort. There were young men with wide open eyes and hollow mouths, running like the wind past mothers and daughters and grandchildren. There were little children, toddlers trying to keep up with their big sisters and children trying to keep up with their pets. There was a mother who saw her three year old son fall down into the mud. Her long brown hair fell into her eyes and down toward her bosom across the beige clothes that she wore. She ran back toward the child who was crying. She picked him up, just as she saw the army come too close toward her for any comfort and began running, the child in her arms. She sobbed, fell, stood up, fell again. When she stood up, a large wound had opened on her right leg.
The woman began running, faster now, tears streaming down her face.
Relentlessly, the man on his horse rode onward, no mercy in his soul. When the army passed the woman and her child, the two were simply extinguished, ceasing to exist. It was as if someone had taken water and eradicated a watercolour painting.
This man came not from here, but from below.
That much was clear.
The large leader on his horse was thinking and Alexander heard his thoughts.
“We must extinguish everyone from here and prepare for Alexander’s arrival.”
The man was preparing for him, Alexander, to come here. But why prepare?
He heard screams, wails, howls, cries from a helpless crowd.
Who were these people?
They were Nocturanians, obviously.
Nocturanians who had been oppressed for years by a regime whose only aim was selfishness.
Suddenly, it struck him. Prosperania was sleeping, caught in a time bubble. But Nocturania was still in the real world. In Nocturania this really was March of 1430. If Alex lost the duel with his sister, then Prosperania would turn into Greater Nocturania, just like before, back when Simon and John fought over their land in a blood feud. This was the second time around a duel was fought over this haunted kingdom.
Now it was Alexander’s turn and they needed him alone. They were counting on winning this.
Alexander Winsletenna was a spectator watching this seen as from above, like someone watching a labyrinth from above. He saw the people running away from the army sitting on their large and very dark horses. He saw some of the people falling down and not making it, facing eradication.
He saw someone making it and running faster down the lane to save his own self.
It was a young man dressed in some sort of blue cape. He was differently dressed than the others. The other people were not elegant. They somehow only wore grey and brown and earthy colours such as beige and green. The fabric was cotton at the most, sheepskin at the best and leather or rugged farmer clothing at the finest.
This man was dressed like a nobleman. His hair was combed and his skin was soft and beautiful, that much was clear. His blue cape covered a red vest and a green shirt with golden buttons. His knee length purple pants stopped before long black stockings leading down to shiny shoes.
At once he turned around and faced the army, knowing fully well that they were coming his way.
The army came closer and the man fell down in absolute panic. Soon enough, covered with mud and dirt, he tried to stand up, but realized he had sprained his ankle. He lifted his leg to clutch it. But not being able to hold his balance, he fell into the ditch.
The large dictator on the horse stopped. The man in the elegant suit was now bloody and his clothes were ripped and torn. He looked up at the man on the horse, who shifted eagerly from hoof to hoof. There was a mean smile under that pointy mask, he could see it. The army waited.
Slowly, the man on the horse trotted a few paces onward, all the time looking at the dying man. Obviously, no person other than him had been left alive around here. The crowd was leaving for new territories. It was clear that the army behind the man was eager to leave to kill the people that were leaving, but the dictator remained steadfast.
He stepped off the horse and walked down into the ditch.
He bent down and then picked up the man with one hand, threw him up in the air so that he landed in the middle of the path.
The dictator walked to his horse and mounted. The man cried and screamed, his eyes watering and blood running down his forehead from a wound upon his head.
Alexander, ever the spectator, now saw who this man was.
It was him.
The dictator raised his gloved hand slowly and the army seemed eager to obey his command. Now, the man lying on the ground was in hysterics. He screamed and cried: “No, please. Don’t!”
At that moment, the dictator let his hand drop to his side in a commanding signal. This ignited what seemed to be an inner blaze within every member of the army. The order was suddenly gone. Leader and army were intermingled. Now all that Alex could see was a plethora of Lucifer copies that rode over the poor man, who seemed to suffer under each hellish blow that the hooves produced on his skin. Alex could feel himself being crushed under the army.
Now all the members of the army took off their masks and Alexander wished that he had not wondered what lay beneath that pointy nose.
Every one of them had the same face and it was monstrous. The eyebrows were deeply sunken into the face and its middle, making the eyes wince and the eyes themselves glow in the dark. The eyebrows almost formed a large V on the forehead, which was complete dark red and covered with soot. The hair was standing on end. Alex was at once under the horses and crushed and above it all, looking down. He saw termites crawling around in the hair of each individual soldier. The ears were pointy and the lips, well, there were none. The teeth were somehow planted directly upon the face and were sticking out. Three or four teeth were sticking inward and with this horrid mouth the army grinned. Their noses wrinkled in cute laughter, as if joyously devouring fresh flesh.
The army of maybe a thousand soldiers was steadily growing and their pointy noses and cheekbones and red chins bobbed Up and down as they rode.
Alex found himself crushed under the army as they rode away.
He stood up, not knowing how, on one leg and realized that his innards were open and his bowels sticking out. To his inner eye he saw the army multiplying like parasite bacteria and killing everything alive in Nocturania.
Alex fell down and crushed his skull on a stone …

… and sat up, his breath shallow, his heart beating fast and the blood racing through his veins. The morning air upon his sweaty face felt like ice cold water on a warm dog. Everything felt viral and ill. His body jerked at every sound the forest was making and whereas sweat was running down his back he felt his temples throb in rhythm with his pulse. He had not taken off his vest and clothes and so now everything was tousled, wrinkled and worn out from a night’s screaming and tossing and turning. His clothes were wrinkled, his hair was tousled and his soul felt like it had just been ridiculed and patronized. Alexander was breathing heavily, so heavily that he could feel the invisible knives of the morning air stabbing into the bottom of his lungs and the demons laughing in his bowels.
He lifted one hand to his face and rubbed his palm against his eyes and let the hand travel down to his cheeks and down to his chin. He realized that it was trembling, just as his lips were trembling. He tried to calm himself down by grabbing a hold of his chin, but realized that his hand was shaking as well.
In his mind he saw that army killing everything in sight. He saw those hideous faces in the clouds, felt them breathing cold air into his skull through the fabric of early day.
He sighed and fumbled beside him to find the water bottle that he knew was beside him somewhere. He found it without looking too hard and drank from it. Its metal frame felt hard and cold, but the leather felt warm and soft. He put some water in his palms and splashed some on his face. Then Alexander put the top back on and lay it down.
He sunk back onto his own bag, which he was using as a pillow, and sighed.
He turned over and found that the last few flames of the fire that he had kept going until Adnicul had taken over had been extinguished and replaced by the glow of post fiery timber. There was warmth in the air from that glow. A warmth that needed no fire, but he realized that Adnicul must’ve kept it going for a longer time than he had. He had not woken him up to fall asleep, but let Alexander sleep for the rest of the night.
He saw the silver flask of vodka.
Margetanian vodka, probably brewed close to where Sieglinde was born, the