The Written Read Online Free

grounds. The
tall bell tower rose high above the trees, with glass windows and
balconies punctuating its thick granite walls. The bell had been
silent for decades, and the man couldn’t remember the last time he
had heard its doleful pealing. Workers and other people were
milling around the gardens and taking in the brisk air. The man
nodded to a few familiar faces as he walked across the lawn towards
an open doorway. The cold grass underneath his boots was slippery
and looked well tended to, clipped short and tidy, if not a little
brown. There were a few beehives to his left amongst the trees.
They seemed lifeless and quiet. There was a calmness floating on
the chill breeze. An armoured soldier standing by the door saluted
him with his spear while staring straight ahead.
    The man strode inside the arch
and felt the warmth of the busy building on his cold skin. He
rubbed his hands and shook the mud and ice from his boots and
listened to the sounds of cooking and working echoing on the stone
walls. With a tired sigh the man walked on, up a few flights of
stairs, down a few corridors, and around a few corners until he
came to a simple oak door. He pushed it open with a bang.
    A woman jumped and dropped the
bundle of tunics she was carrying and put her hand to her chest in
fright. ‘Oh! Farden, it’s you,’ she flapped her hand like a
fan.
    ‘Same old.’ The man threw his
hood back and smiled at the girl. Elessi was his maid and somewhat
of a friend to him, and had done a bit more than just picking up
after him over the years. She always seemed to be wearing a
cherubic smile or a concerned frown, and her deep brown eyes were
always wide, as if she had just been handed the juiciest tidbit of
gossip. Farden would never had admitted it, but Elessi’s
stubbornness had kept him on track more than once in the last few
years.
    Blowing her curly brown hair
from her round and blushing cheeks, the maid started to pick up the
dropped clothes. ‘You could have knocked,’ she said, flustered.
    ‘To my own room? You shouldn’t
be sneaking around in here.’ Farden threw her a quick smile to melt
her icy stare. He threw his cloak on the small bed and sat on the
windowsill, watching the trees shiver outside.
    ‘Gods know someone needs to
look after you magick lot. Where’ve you been to this time? Oh! Is
that blood on your side?’ Her face instantly creased up with worry
and she rushed to the window to see.
    Farden glanced down at the
roughly-bandaged gash that the dragon had given him along the right
side of his ribs. He waved Elessi away as she tried to see the
damage. ‘Don’t worry about it, you know it will heal… Elessi calm
down it’s fine!’ He shooed her away gently and covered it up with a
shred of tunic.
    ‘Well what was it this time?
Another minotaur? It was a bandit wasn’t it, I knew it.’ Elessi
stood there with her hands on her hips like a scolding mother.
Farden looked at her.
    ‘Elessi, we’ve known each other
a long while, and you’ve seen me heal from worse wounds before,’ he
said. She just raised her eyebrows at him. He stretched and
grimaced as he moved around. ‘I’ll be fine in a day,’ he said, then
closed his eyes and leaned back against the stone to end the
matter. ‘It was a wild dragon. They hunt magick.’
    ‘Well no matter what it was, it
looks bad to me. At least let me put a poultice on it to bring out
any poison,’ Elessi asked. ‘You’re not indestructible, Farden and
gods know I’ve told you before, jus’ like his lordship in the bell
tower!’
    ‘A thousand times,’ muttered
Farden, listening to her earnest rustling. She moved to a nearby
jug of water and brought back a wet cloth. The chambermaid dabbed
the crusted blood from his ribs and Farden clenched his teeth.
There was a moment of silence. ‘Sometimes I think you like throwing
yourself into danger all the time,’ she said.
    Farden didn’t answer. Instead
he opened his eyes and stared at the leafless trees waving