Shadows

It was exciting, to walk through the castle with the Chamberlain, but it was creepy as well.  Only the exterior walls had windows, obviously, which meant that most of the castle had no natural light at all. The cool white light of the halogens struggled to compete with the light absorbing blackness of the wrought iron walls of the castle.

        Some of the older sections of the castle were lit by yellow burning torches.  These were the most unnerving places of all.  The ever-shifting light of the torches sent dancing shadows across the twisted facades of the black iron walls.  Smoke from the torches hung in the air over Jaron’s head, swirling and stinking like vile creatures of the Netherwhere to frighten and discomfort him.  

        In these torchlit chambers, Jaron’s eyes played tricks with his imagination, and he found himself walking very close behind the Chamberlain, his robot arm whirring and chirping in nervous apprehension.  Here the twisted iron walls might appear to writhe, while that corner took the aspect of a face that watched them as they went.  This was all in Jaron’s head, of course.  

        The worst of these tricks of the imagination came just before they reached the Prince’s antechamber, in a long torchlit hall with not enough torches.

Jaron walked as fast as he could without stepping on the Chamberlain’s feet.  While he was concentrating on the Chamberlain’s tattered red slippers, he thought he saw, out of the corner of his eye, a shadow ease down from the ceiling to land smoothly on the floor.  

        Jaron gasped in sudden horror, but the Chamerlain didn’t pay the figure any nevermind.  Jaron decided it was just another apparition of a tired and nervous mind, though he almost thought that he could just discern pair of slug-like eye-stalks watching from the shadow.  Then it disappeared into the opposite wall and the Chamberlain pushed the double oaken doors out into the glaring halogen light of the Prince’s antechamber.