The Masque of the Red Death

Ok, so I lied. No discussion of plot or characterization today.

Second post in and I'm already breaking promises. Great start to a blog, huh?

Anyway, I've got a short story by Edgar Allan Poe for you all. It's great writing, and I really need to get around to reading more of his works. Here is the story in question, "The Masque of the Red Death":

http://xroads.virginia.edu/~hyper/POE/masque.html

I'm sure you all must be feeling all warm and fuzzy on the inside after reading that.

What did I think of that? Although I'm a little biased since I'm a huge fan of Poe, I loved it. My favorite part was the clock and the reactions of the revelers to said clock. Although some sections confused me as to what Poe was exactly getting at ("To and fro in the seven chambers there stalked, in fact, a multitude of dreams. And these --the dreams --writhed in and about, taking hue from the rooms, and causing the wild music of the orchestra to seem as the echo of their steps." in particular. It's possible that this is meant to explain the thoughts and emotions of the party-goers and their allegorical equivalents, but really, I have no clue what's going on here. Regardless, it's still downright creepy, and I'm going to chalk it up to me not being able to comprehend it rather than Poe having confusing writing.), the plot as a whole was well developed and original without being too terribly weird. But of course, that's a given, as this guy is one of the most respected authors to have ever existed.  

For those who didn't figure out the allegory, the rooms represent the progression of life to death; blue is birth, black is death. The clock oh-so-subtly represents time and the countdown towards death, and the red masked guy represents death. The prince and his companions represent those who try to outrun death. Fairly straightforward, although I'll admit it took me a while to realize the full significance of the rooms other than the black one.

Assuming I have the time, expect some more of my own writing tomorrow. It's possible it'll be some Descent related stuff, but I'd also love to do a quick short story. It'll probably involve mice. Don't ask why, I just have had the strange urge to write about mice all day. Also, there will be some site updates to make it look a bit more appealing.

Welcome to XYZ/Descent Prologue

          Hello everyone. I'm Andrew, an aspiring writer and creator of XYZ. I like fantasy, science fiction, and very light horror, although I read and write quite a variety of genres. Anyway, just to display a bit of my writing, I've got the prologue from my current project. It's a fantasy/horror novel, albeit one very light on traditional fantasy tropes such as dragons, elves, and magic, that has a current working title of Descent into Madness. In my next post I'll have some quips from the first three chapters, where I'll discuss a bit of the plot and talk about characterization. Thanks for reading, and time for the wall of text..!


I should also note that the font size in this post is a tad too big, but the next step down was too small, and I'd rather have it be big than painful to read.

          Consciousness rose to his brain as a desperate diver would to the surface upon finding himself out of air, except that the man's breathing, though labored, did not come in panicked gasps. The steady sound of it competed with the crackling of a torch a few feet away, the constant rhythm having an almost calming effect in the dead silence of the room. The man focused on it for a few seconds, structured his thoughts, and then tore them down and scattered them. He didn't bother to open his eyes, for he had already counted all the stones in the ceiling and had memorized the location of each irregularly shaped brick, though there weren't many. There was one that he had decided looked like the face of his brother. Or perhaps it was his priest. He wasn't really sure what either of them looked like anymore, or what he himself looked like, for that matter. Maybe he wanted it to look like the face of a sheep. He decided he did, but then realized he wasn't really sure what a sheep's face looked like anymore either. But, he concluded, he could just decide for himself what a sheep's face looked like; after all, who could stop him? He was free to do whatever he liked, reality be damned.

          Upon that most pleasant realization, he imagined he was now lying on a grand bed, wearing shining metal cufflinks, a fashionable dress shirt (that happened to have a few holes), an equally fashionable pair of pants (with matching holes, nonetheless!), and expensive boots that were topped with a silver ring that wrapped around each of his ankles. Next to him was the bright young soul of a lover, crackling to him in warm language while engulfed in a fiery red and orange dress. He almost began a conversation with the woman, but upon failing to think of his first words he sighed.

          The man resigned himself to turning his head as far as he could to his right and opening his eyes, allowing the torch's fire to consume his thoughts, nearly comforting him in its embrace. He lay there for a few minutes (or perhaps it was seconds, or hours, or days; he didn't know that either), not moving, not thinking, but feeling every one of the dozens of points of pain in his body and the thousands more in his mind. He attempted to cast them off, to drown himself in the fire, but to no avail. The pain and the monotony of the room assaulted every part of his existence, and a tear formed in his eye. He cursed himself for ever awakening. He wanted to fall asleep, never to wake again, but he knew they would never grant him death, at least not for a while. Then a thought occurred to him; perhaps if he asked on his birthday they would kill him as a gift. His momentary happiness fled as he realized that he would have no way of knowing when his birthday was. He frowned, troubled by the idea that he wouldn't know at which age he died.

          Presently, footsteps sounded in the hall outside of the chamber. Judging by the fact that their advance was from his left, the man guessed that it was a guard coming to feed him. Having given up on self-inflicted starvation long ago (he had hated the force feeding), the man almost looked forward to his mealtime of bread and water, despite the fact that it only prolonged his tortured existence. But he did his best to ignore that detail. Now he sat and listened to the lock slide into place, and to another set of footsteps, quiet but quick, that had just emerged in the hallway as well. The footsteps crescendoed into a flash of metal and a hastily muffled cry, before reaching an unceremonious end with the slump of a body onto a stone floor. Then the second movement crept it's way in as the handle of the door turned and someone entered the room. The man turned his head up to see whom.

          The silhouette of a woman was walking cautiously into the room, staying close to the wall. After her moment of observation was finished, she rushed forward, undid the man's restraints, and embraced him.

          “I'm so sorry!” the woman sobbed. “It took weeks to find out where they'd taken you. I can't imagine what they must have done, but I'm so glad you're alive...”

          The man wasn't quite sure that he was glad too. But as the wheels in his brain turned and he recognized his companion, a fire of hope sprang into his heart, the sensation more comforting than the one next to him on the wall.

*        *        *        *        *

          Circles were the theme of the room, it seemed. The vast stone chamber itself was circular, and within it were carved three concentric circles raised in pyramid-like steps, culminating in a circular dais roughly four feet tall and two wide in the center of the room. Breaking up the circular theme were three irregular pentagonal windows set high in the wall on the far side of the room, along with a red robed figure in the center of the room. In one elongated hand he held an ancient yellowed manuscript, and in the other he held a simple iron dagger. On the dais sat a relatively large and oddly shaped heart, well preserved but unbeating.

          The man, standing in the center of the seatless inverted amphitheater, sighed as he examined the paper closely. He cast the paper aside, and clasped his hands together and turned his gaze slightly upward as if in prayer. After a second, he chuckled, then broke into louder and louder laughter. At the conclusion of his sadistic merriment, he carefully removed his robe, folded it, and placed it on the ground beside him. He rose the dirk in his hand, and with great precision, plunged it into the object on the dais. Then he slid it out, and centered the dagger over his own heart.

          A slight slide of metal sung through the air, and a moment later a new dagger protruded from the now unrobed man's chest. He staggered backward, and then crumpled backward unceremoniously. The imprisoned man and his rescuer came into the room, the former supported by the latter. After making sure the man could stand on his own, the woman strode to the corpse, wrenched out the dagger, and cleaned it on the deceased's robe before resheathing it. Then she picked up the manuscript on the cold stone floor and examined it.

cyning áræran pyr þénung

the process for creating a divine being

          The woman's eyes rapidly ran through the writing, flickering between the words, the heart, and the dagger as she began to comprehend what she was reading. As if coming to a sudden realization, she opened her mouth to speak, but instead of  words coming out of her chest, the dagger she had thrown appeared. A pale, thin hand grasped it; the hand of the malefactor that had previously stood in the center of the room. The woman let out a gasp, locked eyes with her love one last time, and slid to the floor. Her killer gave his final breath as well, now dead beyond all doubt.

          Alone in the chamber, the imprisoned man stood and stared. He wasn't entirely sure whether he was awake, or whether this was real, or whether he was even alive. All he knew was that his sudden fire of hope had been extinguished. He drew his eyes down to the woman laying on the floor, his love who he never thought he would see again, and he realized that this all was real, painfully real, and that he was alive, painfully alive. A single tear rolled down his cheek.

          The man walked to the dirk that the robed man had dropped, for he felt it wrong to disturb her corpse. A thin, blackish-red blood coated the blade, but he cared not; it would serve it's purpose. He picked it up and centered it over his heart.

          He plunged the dagger into his chest, wishing nothing more than to die.

          He screamed as he realized the eternal existence he had achieved.