Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Welcome back to The Border!
Quick Links Announcements
| Home | Member's Blogs |

| Enter Chat Room |

| Today's active topics |


You can also see and join us at:

TPB's YouTube Channel ~ Click to Register
The Vampire Lair on Facebook
and
MonsterVisionTV on Facebook

TPB's Quote of the Day!

We hope you enjoy your visit.


You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.


Join our community!


If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
  • Pages:
  • 1
The Lake District; July 2007
Topic Started: Jul 28 2007, 08:03 PM (797 Views)
lanaia74
No Avatar
Advanced Member
[ *  *  * ]
The golden-haired child sat alone, as he usually did, and wondered whether his Father would die today. Some distance away, across the royal gardens , his nurse was talking to the two sentries who guarded him during the hours of daylight. The soldiers, grim eyed warriors, did not look at him and shifted nervously as he approached.
Archimedes was used to this reaction. Even at four he understood it.
He remembered with sadness the day three weeks ago when his Father, garbed for war, had walked along this same garden path, his cuirass gleaming in the sunlight. It was so beautiful that Alexander had reached out to touch the gleaming plates of iron, edged with gold, six golden lions on the breast. But as his hand came forward his Father moved swiftly back.
“Don’t touch me boy!” he snapped.
“I would not hurt you, Father,” whispered the prince, staring up at the black-bearded face, with its blind right eye like a huge opal beneath the savagely scarred brow.
“I came to say goodbye,” muttered Lionus, “and to tell you to be good. Learn your lessons well.”
“Will you win?” the child asked.
“Win or die, boy, “ answered the King, kneeling to face his son. He appeared to relax, though his expression remained stern. “There are those that think I cannot win. They remember Onomarchus defeated me when we last met. But…” his voice dropped to a whisper, “when the arrow tore into my eye at the siege of Antopolis they said I would die. When the red fever struck me down men swore my heart stopped beating. But I am Atlantean Archimedes, and I do not die easily!”
“I don’t want you to die, I love you,” said the child.
For a moment only Lionus’s face softened, his arm rising as if to reach out for his son. But the moment passed and the King stood. “Be good,” he said. “I will. . .think of you.”
The sound of children’s laughter brought Archimedes’s thoughts back to the present. Beyond the garden walls he could hear the palace children playing. Sighing, he wondered what game they were enjoying,. Hunt the turtle perhaps. He watched them sometimes from the window in his room. One child would be chosen as the turtle, and would chase the others, seeking out their hiding places, to touch them and make them slaves. The game would go on until all the children had been found and enslaved, their legends held the turtle in great honour.
Archimedes shivered in the sunshine. No one would ask him to plat such a game. He looked down at his small hands.
He had not meant for the hound to die; he had loved the pup. And he had tried so hard, concentrating always, so that whenever he stroked the dog his mind was calm. But one day the playful hound had leapt at him, knocking him from his feet. In that moment Archimedes’s hand had snaked out, lightly slapping the beast on the neck. The hound collapsed instantly, eyes glazing, legs twitching. It had died within seconds., but what was worse it had decomposed within minutes, the stench had filled the garden.
It was not my fault,” the child had wanted to say. But he knew that it was; knew he was cursed.
Birds began to sing in the tall trees and Archimedes smiled as he looked up at them. Closing his green eyes the boy allowed the bird-song to flow into him, filling his mind, merging with his own thoughts. The songs began to have meanings then, that he could decipher. No words, but feelings, fears, tiny angers. The birds were screeching warnings to one another.
Archimedes looked up and sang: “My tree! My tree! Get way! Get away! My tree! My tree! I will kill you all if you stay!”
“Children should not sing of killing!” Said his nurse sternly, approaching where he sat but halting, as ever, out of reach.
“That is what the birds were sing,” he told her.
“You should come inside now, the sun is very hot.”
“The children are still playing beyond the wall,” he argued. “And I like it here.”
“You will do as you are told, young prince!” she snapped.
His eyes blazed, and he could almost hear the dark voice within himself whispering: “Hurt her! Kill her!” He swallowed hard, quelling the rising tide of anger.
“I will come,” he said softly. Rising to his feet he walked towards her, but she stepped quickly aside to let him pass., following him slowly as he returned to his own rooms. Waiting until she had gone, Archimedes slipped out into the corridor and ran to his Mother’s apartments, pushing open the door to peek inside.
Cheris was alone and she smiled as he entered, opening her arms to embrace him. He ran forward and embraced her, pushing his face against the soft flesh of her bosom. There was never anyone, he knew, so beautiful as his Mother, he clung to her fiercely.
“You are very hot,” said Cheris, pushing back his golden hair and stroking his brow. Filling a cup with cool water she passed it to him, watching as he drank greedily.
“Did your lessons go well today?” she asked.
“There were no lessons Mother, Stagra is ill. If I had a pony, would it die?”
He saw the pain on her face as pulling him to her she patted his back. “You are not cursed Archimedes. You have great gifts, one day you will be a great man!”
“But would the pony die?”
“I think that it might,” she admitted. “But when you are older you will know how to control the power. Be patient.”
“I don’t want to kill anything! Yesterday I made a bird fly to my hand. It sat for a long time before flying way! It didn’t die! Truly!”
“When your Father returns we will all go to the sea, and sail on boats. You will like that! The breeze is cool and we will swim.”
“Is he coming back?” Archimedes asked. “Some people say he will die against Onomarchus. They say his luck is finished and the God’s have deserted him.”
“Hush!” she whispered. “It is not wise to voice such thoughts. Your Father is a great warrior. And he has Uric.”
“Onomarchus beat him before, two years ago,” said the boy. “Two thousand dead soldiers. And now Onomarchus raid our coastline, others are turning against us!”
She nodded and signed. “You hear too much Archimedes.”
“I don’t want him to die…….even though his doesn’t like me.”
“You must not say that! Ever!” she cried, seizing his shoulders and shaking him hard. “Never! He loves you! You are his son. His heir!”
“You are hurting me,” he whispered, tears in his eyes.
“I am sorry,” she told him, drawing him into her arms. “There is so much I wish I could tell you; explain to you. But you are very young.”
“I would understand,” he assured her.
“I know, that is why I cannot tell you.”
For a while they sat in silence, Archimedes warm and sleep in his Mother’s arms. “I can see them now,” he said dreamily. “There is a plain covered with flowers of purple and yellow. And there is Father in his golden armour. He is standing buy the grey gelding Achea. And there is the enemy . Oh, Mother, there are thousands of them. I can see their shields. Look! It is not only Onomarchus, there are others , they have followed his call, I don’t know all of them, so many! How can Father beat them all?”
“I don’t know,” whispered Cheris. “What is happening now?”
“The battle begins,” answered the child.





Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Melanie
Member Avatar
The Wild Goddess...
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
Dreams

I hear the gurgling of the stream
It lulls my spirit into dreams
A bird is singing ‘top a tree
Such sparking pure serenity

The breeze it whispers ‘cross my face
Filled with the magic of this place
My soul was empty, filled with pain
Such magic makes me whole again

The mountain crags, so staid, so calm
Like lying in a Lovers arms
They steady me and make me strong
Fill me with courage to go on

For soon I leave this place behind
But it lives on within my mind
So when life’s cares seem all too mean
I’ll close my eyes again and dream

Of sitting on this mountain grass
Of rivers sparking, as they pass
Of trees that whisper in the breeze
That touched my soul, and gave me peace
Posted Image

A wise man can see more from the bottom of a well than a fool from a Mountaintop. Unknown
Posted Image & Posted Image
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Melanie
Member Avatar
The Wild Goddess...
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
Well I have returned from my travels renewed and refreshed... its impossible to put into words what this place does to you - I think it is something you have to see for yourself, so I'll post a few of the hundreds of photographs I took.

We stayed in a cottage in a little village called Coniston which is next to Coniston Water... we had a stream that ran down our back garden and the view was of the 'Old Man of Coniston' (the only mountain I made it right to the top of!!!)

Posted Image

Day One (Sunday) and there were just the three of us as Ruth and Paul had got stuck in the floods on the way up from Wales... We climbed the Old Man of Coniston, which is a walk of 8 miles and we climbed 2800ft... this is Leigh and I at the top (Cold and bloomin knackered!)
Posted Image

Day Two (Monday) Ruth and Paul arrived... it was Pauls 30th Birthday so we did rather alot of drinking! This is us at the pub in Coniston... from left to right is Paul, Ruth, Me, Leigh and Rachel
Posted Image

Day Three (Tuesday) Ruth and Paul went to climb the 'Old Man', Rachel was in bed sick and Leigh and I went to see Castle Rigg Stone Circle and Hadrians Wall

Posted Image
Posted Image

Day Four (Wednesday)
We went to Ambleside which is next to Windemere and went to see a really nice waterfall there..
Posted Image

Day Five (Thursday)
Posted Image
This day was really stormy... so we went to find a Stone Circle called Duddon Bridge which was about a 5 mile walk from the road... when we got there we had to be really careful as the farmer had a bull in the field (which was luckily sleeping) while we explored the stones!
Posted Image

Then we went to see Aira Force (the waterfall where Wordsworth 'wandered lonely as a cloud'!)
Posted Image
Posted Image

Day Six (Friday) Paul, Ruth and Rachel went to try to climb Sca Fell which is the highest mountain in the Lake District. Because Leigh had injured his knee on the Monday and couldn't climb too far, and I am not fit enough to climb that one we did a 6 mile walk up the Old Man (but not to the summit) in the morning,
Posted Image
then in the afternoon I went out on my own for an eight mile walk round Coniston...

Posted Image
Posted Image

When the wanderers returned from Sca Fell I have never seen anything more wet in my life. They had had to turn back as the weather had turned in on them with hailstones, driving rain and mist so thick they couldn't see in front of them...
What a holiday!
Posted Image

A wise man can see more from the bottom of a well than a fool from a Mountaintop. Unknown
Posted Image & Posted Image
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Deleted User
Deleted User

Absolutely stunning..... I don't live that far from the Lakes, in fact I am looking for a Holidayu home for us around here at the momen.... A weekend retreat.

Mel.. it looks like the weather was pretty good for you?
Quote Post Goto Top
 
Melanie
Member Avatar
The Wild Goddess...
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
I didn't know that XSAS... you could have come and visited us for a nice pint at the pub!

It was off and on... I have never seen rain like it can rain up there - not even in scotland :) We were lucky really considering the state of the rest of England!
Posted Image

A wise man can see more from the bottom of a well than a fool from a Mountaintop. Unknown
Posted Image & Posted Image
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Deleted User
Deleted User

Next time your up let me know.. I would love a pint with you guys.
Quote Post Goto Top
 
Deleted User
Deleted User

Beautiful Mel. :yes:
Quote Post Goto Top
 
Melanie
Member Avatar
The Wild Goddess...
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
Will do :thumbup:
Posted Image

A wise man can see more from the bottom of a well than a fool from a Mountaintop. Unknown
Posted Image & Posted Image
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
lanaia74
No Avatar
Advanced Member
[ *  *  * ]
Brilliant simply brilliant! :wineglass: :yahoo: :devil:
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mystical
No Avatar


Very beautiful pictures Melanie. Sounds like you really had a nice trip.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mystical
No Avatar


That was lovely Melanie :wub:
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
tigerlily
Member Avatar
Newbie
[ * ]
Great pics :) Looks like you had a fab time
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Deleted User
Deleted User

Looks like a fantastic place Mel.

Glad to hear you enjoyed it so much. :bigsmile:
Quote Post Goto Top
 
Melanie
Member Avatar
The Wild Goddess...
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
You would have loved it too babe... its so full of magic there :wub:
Posted Image

A wise man can see more from the bottom of a well than a fool from a Mountaintop. Unknown
Posted Image & Posted Image
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Deleted User
Deleted User

I can tell by the pictures it is a place Iwould definitely enjoy.

maybe some day I'll be there. ^_^
Quote Post Goto Top
 
1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)
ZetaBoards - Free Forum Hosting
Fully Featured & Customizable Free Forums
Learn More · Sign-up for Free
Go to Next Page
« Previous Topic · TB's Photo Gallery · Next Topic »
Add Reply
  • Pages:
  • 1

Web Hosting Reviews
Web Hosting Reviews
Skin Created by Xarina of Rapture & Zathyus Networks Resources.
This theme is best viewed in firefox.