Hello, and welcome back to the gates of Enverdolmal.
I hope as always that you all have been well and that this finds you in good company and good health.
This next chapter is...personal.
So much more than the others.
It is a Special Presentation.
A Celebration of sorts...
An honorary event that will tie into the main storyline in much the same way as the others, but with deeper and often more profound effects.
On 10/26/2023 My Godson was taken from this world...
He was murdered...found discarded in a waste bin in Milwaukee, Wisconsin...
His name was... IS Prince Mccree.
He was the firstborn to his parent, an amazing and caring pair of individuals who mourn his passing daily.
He was
Adventurous.
Curious.
Protective.
Brave.
Compassionate.
He wanted to change the world in one way or another, and even at just 5 years old, he knew that he would be famous one day.
Someday.
His passing has changed the way we view and react to the dangers of the world around us.
He has become a new and profound pillar of society.
A beacon of hope.
A new Star in our eternal sky.
The Wisconsin Assembly has officially passed the Prince Act in order to enhance and improve our Wisconsin Amber Alert system.
Our High Prince will be the light that guides the souls of other lost children.
He will forever stand vigilant as the Guardian and Protector that he always wanted to be.
That he always seen himself as.
This chapter has been really hard for me to write...
To even think of...
But I will honor him.
I will write for him.
I will tell his story.
He will do in my stories, in Enverdolmal, what he always wanted to do here on Earth.
I won't keep you any longer.
I appreciate that you all continue to return and read my works.
I hope that this piece finds you safe and warm and in good standings with all of your family and friends.
Seriously folks, don't take that for granted.
Life is not only short, but random.
Without further ado, I present to you all:
They don't deserve you. Part 1.
-------------------------
Printice sat on the edge of his little bed.
His tiny, shoed feet dangling over the cold wooden floor.
The cracked and shabby walls shook violently around him in the dark.
He could hear the shouts and screams of the people of his dorpie as they fought for their lives, for his life, all around him in the dead of night.
They fought the Urdu Goblins.
What the adults called "Khaki-gobs" due to the sandy coloration of the fur patches that covered their forearms and lower legs.
Dozens had come from the low-lying caves of Dyvulzold, the great and looming Vulcanic mountain to the West of his little village.
This wasn't the first time that they had done so.
Nor -he hoped- would it be the last.
For that would certainly mean the end of his short life.
Of course he was afraid.
Scared out of his wits!
Terrified.
But he was also brave.
Above all of this, he was confident.
Confident that the adults that battled around him would keep him and all of the other children safe.
They always had.
They always would.
A massive explosion -a sound far louder than any that he had ever heard in his short life thus far- went off somewhere to his right.
From what his five-year-old brain could remember, the dorpies tavern was over in that direction.
His five-year-old brain was correct, and that tavern had become very quickly overrun and destroyed by a group of reeling and rampaging Khaki-gobs.
The foul things had swarmed the establishment, slaughtering the small group of unaware patrons, and ripping apart the meager bar.
Seeing his livelihood torn asunder, and having a bit of a panic, the owner of the tavern had come up with quite the idea.
One that would rid his place of the things, and more importantly, allow him to make a timely escape. He stuffed his wipe rag into the opening of the bottle of ale that he held, lit the end with the ember at the tip of his cigar, and simply set the place ablaze before making for the back door.
The resulting explosion did exactly what he had wanted it to do, none of the Khaki-gobs would see the next day.
But alas, the large store of cheap and highly flammable hydromel that he had kept barreled in the basement would cause that explosion to do a bit more damage then he had anticipated.
The blast was devastating.
Several huts around the tavern in either direction were instantly flattened, and anyone unfortunate enough to be caught nearby was nearly disintegrated from the heat wave that wafted outward from the blast zone.
The women, children, and elders who had been in the houses nearest the tavern were killed in an instant, many inside of the flattened homes, the rest buried and burned alive beneath the rubble.
The owner of the tavern had not run but three steps before he was erased from existence by the flames that poured from the back door.
The blast had arguably caused more damage to the village than the monsters who were invading.
Printice flinched from the sound of the explosion, the walls shook just a bit more after the shock wave that followed.
Yet still he didn't move from his spot on his little bed.
As bad as any of it sounded outside, he would be okay.
He knew it.
His Pop-pop had promised him that much.
His Pop-pop never lied to him.
He gripped the edge of the bed and clasped his eyes closed tightly.
He forced his mind to drift away.
He needed a distraction from the very real and very scary events that were transpiring around him.
His Mum's vibrant, beautiful face was the first thing that came to him.
Bright and clear in the halls of his blooming memory.
She had passed nearly three years ago, yet even in his youth, and after so long, he could not forget her.
He would never forget her.
His mind "remembered" her as she had been before the sickness had taken her.
Before her cheeks were gaunt, pale, and sunken in.
Before her hair was tattered, thin, and patchy.
Before her eyes were greying and cloudy, a shadow of the sparkle and shine that was once there.
In his mind she was vibrant.
Radiant.
Golden-blond hair that flowed behind her, long and gleaming.
Brilliant blue-green eyes that twinkled both day and night.
Full, healthy cheeks.
A perpetually pale, yet pearlescent-pink blush.
She had been his world.
Before the goblins had started to come.
Before the illness had begun to spread among his people.
Before she took her last, ragged, tired breath.
She -in her passing- had become so much more to him.
She had become his safe place.
He put his elbows on his knees and clapped his little hands over his ears.
Her face materialized before him as the "real" world began to fade away.
The screams.
The booms.
The shouts and shakes and clangs.
Through it all, over it all, he heard her voice.
Faintly at first.
"Be brave my child."
Her words were so soft, so whispered that Prentice's ears could hardly catch them.
But strangely, her words seemed to echo in his tiny head.
She spoke again.
"Your life is not theirs to take."
The echoes grew louder, drowning out the sounds of death and battle that grew greater still outside of the barely-standing four walls.
Her full form appeared before him, bright yellow and glowing from head to toe.
She placed a single hand upon his right shoulder, and he slowly raised his head to take in the sight before him.
Her death gown was long and elegant, reaching down to her ankles and flowing out behind her.
He couldn't tell where her skin stopped and her clothing began, so bright was the aura that she emitted.
So potent and palpable was the pure Aether that her physical form was now composed of.
Printice had seen her face before...plenty of times in the past as he had sought his "safe place" on many an occasion.
But never before had he seen his mum's entire body... and never before had she been so...REAL.
So brilliantly bright.
He stood, sliding off of the edge of his little bed.
His tiny pillow and shabby blanket fell silently to the floor with the motion.
His Mum knelt before him, her hands cradled his little face, gently lifting his chin so that his eyes met hers.
Her touch was soft.
Warm.
As it had always been.
"...Mum.."
He whispered.
The single word echoed softly around the still-dark room.
Suddenly, a wild and roaring wind picked up and swirled around the pair.
Shards of light danced among the wind gusts, shimmering and flashing as they shot passed.
His mother's eyes never left his.
Her hands never left his face.
The Aetheral wind and light seemed to emanate from her, wrapping and sheathing him in a protective shell.
A single silver teardrop left her right eye as she stared into those of her first and only child.
"Don't cry Mumah...Pop-pop will protect..."
Printice began, raising his own little arms and tiny hands to cradle her face in turn.
Her right hand moved, her pointer finger touching his little lips gently in order to silence the thought.
"Oh child...my child."
She began as she pulled him into a tight embrace, one that warmed him from head to toe.
One that brushed all of the fear away.
"They don't deserve you."
Printice closed his eyes against the sudden and intense golden light that flooded the world around him.
Everything he perceived began to vibrate and shake.
He felt her embrace tighten then fade just as quickly.
He felt then his body warm again rapidly from head to toe.
Her final words echoed in his ears.
With every echo, he felt himself shrink and grow an if time was being forced into and out of him rapidly.
He couldn't feel his hands.
Nor his arms or chest or knees or feet.
The light became so bright that even with his eyes closed, Printice could see it all around him.
He realized that he wasn't closing his eyes... he couldn't feel those either.
He began to spin.
No?
Fall?
Float?
He couldn't "feel" anything.
He was simply perceiving.
Speculating.
He had no sense of direction.
All around him was nothing but white.
Bright, hard, white.
He tried to close his "eyes" against the sudden assault on his senses.
His mind could not process so much...nothing?
His head... no, what used to be his head? -he could not comprehend it- throbbed just a bit.
It wasn't pain.
It wasn't discomfort as he knew it...but it felt...weird...he didn't have the mental capacity to put a meaning or definition to it...
But somehow he knew that he was no longer alive.
He didn't know too much as a five year old...but he knew how it felt to have a body.
He "looked" down, only to see all of nothing.
There was a faint yellow glow where his physical form had been.
He tried to move, and found that he could not 'feel' what used to be his body anymore.
That confirmed it for him.
He HAD to be dead.
His Pop-pop had told him that the afterlife would be beautiful.
It would be something he called "Paradise"
His Mum would be there waiting for him.
THIS was not THAT.
He...
He...
He didn't know what he didn't know...
He wanted to cry, but he simply didn't have tear holes...or a face for that matter.
More importantly, he didn't seem to remember what it meant to even cry.
To be... sad.
This all was so... strange.
He wanted to be angry...but the definition of the word seemed to fade away even as he thought it.
So it went with his sudden confusion.
He felt as if he was losing little parts of himself.
His...feelings?
His emo...
EMOTIONS!
That is what his Pop-pop had called them.
His Pop-pop had told him to learn how to control his 'emotions' and his life would be easier.
He always said that...
Well, he couldn't control what he didn't have.
He would have to tell Pop...
Wait.
Who?
He couldn't remember who he was thinking about.
something was wrong.
Very wrong...
Suddenly he could hear her.
His Mum.
Her final words to him began to echo around him once again.
Reaching for him from somewhere off in all of the white
"They...don't...deserve...you..."
Prentice's consciousness began to fade away.
He felt heavy.
Tired.
He would rest...
Yes.
Think about all of this later.
He let the weariness take him.
The whiteness around him became that much whiter.
And he slept.
-------------------------
Welcome back to the gates folks.
that was... heavy for me.
Harder than I figured it would be.
The remaining parts will be just as hard, if not more so...
I will be just fine.
I hope that you all are just as fine.
I hope that you all will return here safely for the next installment, and that no foul thing on this planet finds now or ever.
Safe travels my friends, and as always:
Stay safe.
Stay healthy.
Stay vigilant.
-Redd.