The Adventures Of Blake Todd

Chapter 1- The Begging

Blake Todd was an unlucky child, his parents died before his third winter. Leaving him nowhere to go but the imperial orphanage. By the time he was five he was already starting to pick fights with the other children, especially if someone had adopted them he would make there last night agonizingly painful. He always attempted to justify is actions by saying that it was his revenge for them being more lucky then him, and that it wasn’t fair that while all the others had mothers and fathers he had to be alone, while all his so called friends left him.

Well that’s what everyone thought about Mr. Todd. In all truth this poor child was naught but a misunderstood boy who was quite often picked on by the kids at the local school. Most children said that his parents had been some sort of demon that was crow like. His skin was very pale his skin whiter than paper. He never tanned nor did he ever burn. Me? I’m his friend, I wouldn’t go as far to say as were best friends but I was his only friend after his pet bird had died. I guess i should start his story.

DING! DONG! DING! DONG! The sound of the great clock tower ringing eight times woke me up in a second. Giving me the feeling of fear you might get if you awake from a nightmare. Of Corse i always had nightmares. I looked about my room two bunks and two dressers, along with one chest was all Todd, and I owned besides the bare essentials like wrym tongue. That’s what we called it anyway but in all truth it was just an ingredient used to make a type of meat pie. However it did look like a wryms tongue.

"Wake up John! Wake up!" Shouted Todd. "What’s all the shouting about Todd, we don’t have to be up til the tenth bell!" I replied rather annoyed by his shouting. "We Start school today John!" said Todd lowering his voice a little. The news of this hit me hard. School! The prison of all children, i thought. But Alice would be there so i got out of bed and stretched outwards. Putting on one of my several school provided outfits that they gave everyone before beginning of the year.

Consisting of a light blue tunic and a pair of clothe pants. The outfits were all the same except the ones for winter. All the kids loved winter that was when we got to train with swords, bows, and learned to track and hunt. We walked down the boring, colorless flight of stairs and grabbed our satchels holding our books and ingredients used for alchemy class. The houses here in the Imperial City were always different the Imperial City was the great mixing pot of the modern world. Up ahead there was a huge crowd of kids near the gate into the inner city.

"What do you suppose that is up ahead John?" asked Todd. "I don’t know Todd, but I have a bad feeling about this" I replied. Thinking of all the things that could have gone wrong at the main gate.Then seemingly out of nowhere there was a massive explosion leaving all in the inner city dead or dying. All around us was chaos. Children and adults were running away screaming. I grabbed Todd’s arm and pulled him back towards the orphanage.

I started to run with his arm in my hand. And he tripped from the sudden unexpected movement from his upper body. I picked him up and shouted over the noise of the crowd "we have to get back!" He nodded his head and we started running back towards the orphanage. As we made it back to the orphanage, we saw a group of armed men searching for something. "FIND HIM. THE KING WILL BE DISPLEASED IF HE ISN'T FOUND!" Yelled a man who appeared to be in charge of the group. "John what do they mean by the king? Who are they looking for?" asked Todd.

In all truth I didn't have the slightest idea. "I don't know Todd. But we have to leave the city." I quickly replied. I took Todd’s hand a lead him to the oldest street in our area. it was abandoned. But that was normal. I started to run, when there was an ear shattering scream. I knew that scream. I had heard it all last winter when Alice had transferred to our school.

"Todd that was Alice, we have to go help her!" I desperately said. “John.... we can't. We don’t even know if that was Alice!" He said. I blindly ran towards the source of the scream, hoping to reach her before it was to late. And what I found there will haunt me for the rest of my life. There next to the general store were people being burned on the cross. The flesh hanging off of pure white bone, and the endless screaming of people being murdered in a most horrific way. As i suspected Alice was there, her body cumbled on the ground in a heap of clothing and books.

 So like a fool in love, I ran across the road to the nearest guard, and attempted a round house kick to his throat. But being only a novice in the ways of hand to hand fighting, he easily caught my foot and then tripped me. He picked me up by the throat, and was in the process of choking me when, I hear a loud Whoosh! And saw the shaft of a black arrow going into his throat. I fell to the ground in and started coughing violently.

Several more arrows were loosed at the strange soldiers. They all fell to the ground and I looked around to see who the archers were. To my surprise no one was to be found. And Todd ran towards me as did Alice. They picked me up by the arms and I proceeded to black out.