Tales of Castle Silverhill – The Ice Mage Incident episodes index
Category: stories
-
The Ghastly Exchange
Tales of Castle Silverhill – The Ghastly Exchange episodes index
- A Chance Meeting
- An Unsettling Invitation
- Drinks and Deceit
- Mind Games
- The Dreadful Device
- Antidotes and Rats
- A Spell of Trouble
- The Flying Four-Poster
- The Disintegrating Spell
- Waking to a Nightmare
- The Half-Pint Hangman
- Never Rely on an Ogre
- Goblins and Donkeys
- The Viaduct
- Secrets and Lies
- The Spellbook and the Device
- The Spell and the Mannequin
-
The Perils of Untying Love
Tales of Castle Silverhill – The Perils of Untying Love episodes index
-
A Worry with Warlocks
Tales of Castle Silverhill – A Worry with Warlocks episodes index
-
Unpleasant Encounters with Fairies
Tales of Castle Silverhill – Unpleasant Encounters with Fairies episodes index
-
Castle Silverhill
Introduction
There’s a bone-aching chill in the air as I stare at the landscape over the battlements of Castle Silverhill. It isn’t a pleasant view, what with a blood moon coating the endless terrain of dunes in crimson, and burnishing the still surface of the moat, which for centuries has been gently eroding the castle’s foundations.
I don’t like the look of the desert. I haven’t been outside during the day since the castle relocated to this world. The heat makes the stones groan worse than usual.
I lean over the wall and gaze down. The moat looks like it might clot at any moment. Even the swirling wavelets, caused by a tentacle breaking the surface, roll away like they’re thicker than water.
Only a handful of stars glitter in the cold velvet sky. I turn away and brush my fingers over the mortar, loosening a fist-sized chunk which falls on my foot.
I hadn’t meant to do that. I know the castle’s ancient masonry is slowly crumbling, but that doesn’t make the pain in my injured toe any less acute.
I yelp. With a low rumble, a chimney stack in the distant east wing topples onto a rooftop.
It wasn’t always like this.
When my great-great-great-great-grandfather built the castle, it used to stay in one spot, as buildings tend to do. Especially large, fortified ones.
That was until one of my clueless ancestors took it upon himself to dabble in magic. Geoffrey was his name. And not particularly bright by all accounts.
According to legend, a century after the castle was built, Geoffrey stole a book of spells from a wizard who had stayed overnight while on his way to Tintagel.
Geoffrey wasn’t known for his caution, and despite his less-than-firm grasp of thaumaturgic principles, couldn’t wait to try out one of the many spells between the book’s covers. While leafing through his ill-gotten prize to choose a spell he liked the look of, a word or two from each page caught his eye. Not being the most literate of readers, he mumbled them out loud.
Forty pages in, he’d said enough to inadvertently cast a spell.
One that had never been cast before because it hadn’t existed until Geoffrey accidentally created it.
And what a spell it turned out to be.
It cursed the entire castle to an endless existence of world hopping. Every fortnight, more or less, the castle – and everyone in it – moves to another world.
As you can imagine, the nomadic nature of Castle Silverhill has its drawbacks. For example, it makes catching a bus home rather awkward. Well, that’s if we’re in a world where buses exist.
And don’t get me started on postal services… To my boundless annoyance, the only letters that get pushed through my letterbox are tax demands, invoices, and bills. Some clearly have been in the postal system for hundreds of years, written as they are by hand on folded parchment sealed by large blobs of red wax.
But, I suppose, the biggest issue is that not all worlds are friendly. Some are downright hostile. You never know what the next world is going to be like, so it’s not like you can prepare.
Apart from being too hot, the desert world we’re in at the moment hasn’t come up with any nasty surprises.
Yet.
We’ve only been here two days, after all.
I sigh, go to the iron-studded oak door at the edge of the castle wall’s walkway and make my way back inside the warren of castle buildings. A few minutes of trudging takes me to the spiral stairs leading to my studio.
My journal lies on my desk, open at a blank page. My favourite pen and a bottle of ink are next to it.
Waiting.
The Tales
You can also find the tales using the “Castle Silverhill” menu at the top of every page
-
Never tell anyone your dreams
We’re having a pint together in the pub, sitting at an old wooden table at the back of the room next to a fly-specked poster advertising a gig featuring a pop group from the eighties. There’s only one other patron in the place. He leans sideways against the wall, his grey hair pressed against a dark patch in the maroon flock wallpaper. He hasn’t moved since we arrived.
‘I had an odd dream last night,’ I say.
Your eyes lift and your gaze darts over my shoulder at the exit.
‘Not another one about leather underwear, I hope?’ you say.
I wince. ‘You promised not to mention that again.’
‘Sorry.’
You drain your pint in two deep gulps.
I’m taken aback. Your tankard had been almost full.
‘I need a leak,’ you say. ‘Just going to pop to the loo.’
You can’t stop your eyes looking past me as you contemplate the pub’s door again.
I put my hand on your arm. ‘Wait. I want to tell you about my dream.’
You sigh and sink back in your place.
‘Alright,’ you say, casting a meaningful look at your empty tankard.
It’s your round, you cheapskate, but I relent and head for the bar, all the time watching you for any sudden moves. But the promise of a free beer keeps your buttocks applied to your chair.
The landlord sees me coming and wipes a greasy cloth over a couple of tankards he takes from under the counter. The pub’s dim yellow lighting oozes off the glasses as he puts them on the counter.
‘Same again?’ he asks.
I nod.
He wipes his hands on his trousers, which, unbelievably, are cleaner than the wiping cloth. The dim light makes the patina of dust and sweat on his skin look like scales. That and the blackness of his eyes give him a reptilian appearance.
He pulls two pints with ill grace, like he’s doing me a favour.
Back at our table, I put a full tankard in front of you.
You murmur something which might have been thanks.
‘My pleasure,’ I say. I take a deep breath and your shoulders slump in defeat.
‘I can’t remember what happened earlier in the dream,’ I begin. ‘Only that there’s this man – about my size and build – who’s opposed to everything I do. I’m not sure why. I have no idea what I’ve done to turn him against me. The thing is, I can’t argue with him any longer. The only course of action is to fight. I mean physically with fists and stuff.
‘Fighting isn’t my strong point, but when he ran at me I knocked him to the ground. He was lying on his back and I shouted, “You’re so anacronymistic!”
‘He didn’t get up, just lay there looking puzzled. “That’s not even a word,” he said.
‘I realised what I’d done.
‘“I meant you’re anachronistic and you use too many acronyms,” I said.
‘He laughed, and I started laughing too.’
My mouth’s dry. I take a mouthful of beer and watch your face for a response.
The seconds tick by.
‘Is that it?’ you say, your expression deadpan.
‘Yes. That’s it.’
Your shoulders lift and you sip your beer, relaxed.
‘A load of bollocks, of course,’ you say. You lean back in your seat. ‘At least it wasn’t another one of your dreams about bu-‘
‘Don’t!’ I interrupt.
I’m flabbergasted. Why are you being so dull? Aren’t you at least a little bit amazed at the creativity of my subconscious? I mean, how many people invent words?
Yeah, yeah. I know. People invent words all the time. The Oxford English Dictionary adds hundreds every year.
But I’m not going to admit that to you.
As a writer, I’m aware that using made-up words can alienate readers. Nevertheless, that’s a rule flouted with extravagance by Shakespeare. The Bard is famous for coining many words. Some put that number around 1,700 though cautious experts say it’s more likely to be in the hundreds.
On the other hand, Shakespeare is considered a genius. With the best will in the world, I’m not quite there yet.
‘You might not be impressed,’ I say, ‘but I’m going to use anacronymistic in my writing, see if I don’t.’
‘Just don’t expect it to appear in the OED any time soon,’ you say. ‘It’s not like it even makes sense. How can you have anachronistic acronyms? Acronyms are a twentieth century invention.’
‘Aha!’ say I, pleased that, despite your earlier antipathy, I’ve piqued your interest. ‘Not true. The Romans had acronyms and before them, the Hebrews.’
You shake your head. ‘Nobody will use a difficult to pronounce word you’ve made up about a naked guy in your dreams.’
‘Eh? I didn’t say he was naked.’
You give me that look, the one that says you know me better than I know myself. ‘You didn’t have to.’
I see what you’re doing. You’re bored with the conversation, so you derail it.
‘It’s a damned good word,’ I say, steering the discussion back on course. ‘Anacronymistic. Remember,’ – I tap the side of my cranium – ‘this is where it began.’
You don’t reply. You pull your phone from your pocket and hold it so I can’t see the screen. You tap away for a few seconds, then turn it to face me.
‘There. I googled it. You didn’t think of it first,’ you say.
‘Oh, come on! Why would someone make up a stupid forum user name like that?’
You roll your eyes and take another sip of beer.
Damn my plagiarising subconscious.