The Duke Chapter 3

               Upon the high cliffs overlooking the Sea of Serpents on the one hand and Callahan’s Harbor on the other sat a grim castle fortress with lengthily extending towers piercing the clouded grey skies. Ships of all size and shape bustled about in the congested waters even still on this gloomy day for there was much harvesting and trade to be done along the Derelict Coast.  Fisherman, merchants and sea captains each navigated carefully as dock masters barked orders to deckhands who scurried along the piers pushing carts full of equipment and other provisions to and from the moored ships. Dallan Almerieth was nearly crushed under the heavy wheels of one cart clumsily bouncing over the swollen planks of the docks. Scrambling aside quickly he shouted belligerently after the man to no avail and turned once again to his lonely musings.

                After staring at the murky water splash against the barnacle covered pillars supporting the wharf he stood on for some time Dallan’s gaze drifted towards the jagged stony cliffs and he caught a flash of light out of the corner of eyes. A heartbeat later the dreary outer tower of Castle Callahedron rent and plummeted towards the earth. Screams erupted around Dallan who starred in shock at the crest of the cliffs. He was not alone in watching the calamity unfold before his eyes. Even before the first tower had crumbled to the ground a second flash blinded the onlookers and burst through the heavy stone of the main keep, throwing heaps of disintegrating rock spewing over the cliff side, splashing into the harbor waters.   

                Scattered guardsmen ran along the remaining walls of the fortress in some vain attempt at defending the keep from the unseen attackers, but it was not long before the entire castle was engulf in an endless stream of light blinding flashes each hued a slightly different shade of blue.  With an earth shattering wretch the ground beneath the castle was torn asunder and the mass of earth lurched grudgingly over the cliff as if it were a child desperately trying to cling to his mother’s skirts while she was being hauled away by inquisitioners.

The tremendous spray of water and the huge waves spilling of docks snapped Dallan back to consciousness and he started to run into the port district of Fal Talamund.  To his great surprise after going no more than past the first storehouses along the water’s edge Dallan found almost all of the terrified citizens running towards him, back to the harbor. Ducking down an alley to avoid being trampled as wave after wave of civilians rushed on towards the boats moored in the harbor, Dallan sprinted on hoping to reach the boarding house where he roomed  before whatever the others were running from found him. Blessing the Great Sea King for his knowledge of the shady back alleys of Fal Talamund he had nearly reached the apartments when he turned onto a larger street and stopped dead in his tracks.

There, not sixty paces in front of him, stood the looming beastly shape of a snarling fifteen foot Kathreoul, offspring of the Outcast Gods Banished by Tal-Renda from his lofty palace pantheon to roam the desolate lands of earth.