Introducing CamBio-- a new supernatural thriller, fresh for 2007. Feel free to peruse the following three chapters.
With best regards,
Mick Lang
Chapter One:
Service to the Emperor
216 B.C., Xianyang, East Asia
The Emperor’s city had once shone as a brilliant jewel. It glowed with art, innovation and natural beauty. During the span of a single year, the city became engulfed in worry, desperation and growing panic. The parks and villages that were once bathed in the music of birdsong now stood stark and hollow. The birds were the first to feel the advancing darkness and had gone, leaving mankind to fend for themselves. Fountains that entertained the eye with lively cascades of water, now stood dry, silent and filthy. The channels of water had been diverted and filled countless barrels that stood at the ready inside the fortress. The jewel ceased to shine and instead resembled the pallor of an overworked horse that life’s beatings had brought to the edge of an almost welcome death.
Concentric walls and courtyards surrounded the Emperor’s inner fortress. Just inside the fourth courtyard, stood a tall man outside an enormous black door. The door was over twenty feet high, made of iron wood and thicker than the girth of two oxen. The man waiting outside was a foreigner, but dressed himself as an upper-caste member of the Emperor’s society. Between the man and the door stood a tight row of foot soldiers, expressionless and armored with their swords partially drawn. A red sash adorned their waists as a mark of the Emperor’s trust—each had demonstrated skill and honor in battle.
The foreigner’s name was Danhieras and for his precious time being wasted, was beside himself in fury. Although his eyes flitted over the helmets of the warriors in front of him and around the thick, black door, he saw neither—he merely simmered in his anger to have been pulled from his important work at the whim of a mere human. The advancing darkness occupied his only thoughts for the past year—at first he limited his sleep to five hours per day. Now, he would only sleep three—it tended to make him irritable and his tirades were boundless.
He had waited for twenty minutes to get through the previous door as the Emperor’s Chamberlains acted out their individual roles, announcing in established hierarchy the visitors that are granted trust to pass to the inner chamber of the fortress. He had little patience for oriental culture—most here could not pronounce his name, instead calling him “magician” or “astrologer”. He was neither of these. He existed long before the enlightenment of man, trapped in a human form and incarcerated in this world.
Someone rapped twice on the inside of the door and the guards sheathed their swords and stepped aside. The creaking of pulleys and meshing of wood cogs announced the door’s opening, revealing the wrinkled, sneering face of Hsu. Hsu was one of eight chief Chamberlains, trusted to screen all visitors to the innermost chamber. He wore the traditional black robe as all Chamberlains wore, the better to remain unseen and not to disturb the view of the Emperor. Due to his senior position, his sleeves enjoyed contrasting gold stripe that circled the cuff. “To your knees, dog.”
