Heart of the Wild, Part I: Fall of Blackburn Keep
Photo courtesy of by Paxson Woebler is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
The Copper River Record is pleased to present a new serial fantasy series from Mackenzie Dysinger, set in a boreal forest much like our own. We hope it will entertain the young and the young at heart.
By Mackenzie Dysinger
A thundering roar echoed across the castle as insidious flames licked the walls, chasing out the inhabitants as they raced towards any hope of freedom. There was the faint noise of clashing swords as the Warden fought back the Beast in the throne room of the castle. The creature only chuckled at the frail Warden’s attempt.
Curling back his lips to reveal his layers of sharpened teeth, the Beast hissed at the man who lay crumpled on the floor, “Give in now, Warden, and I’ll let you live.” He licked his lips as he spoke, his long scaly neck leaning in closer to what was left of the man on the floor. A foul smile crept on to the creature's face as he opened his mouth to finish off his prey.
Just as the jaws of Beast were inches away, the Warden, with the last of his strength, let out a defiant cry and plunged his sword into the animal. A roar of anger filled the castle as both Beast and Warden fell. The flames grew hotter, the pillars shook, the ceiling crumbled and the great refuge of Blackburn Keep collapsed.
The news of Blackburn’s fall spread across the wild like fire. There was no creature in the woods or the rivers that hadn’t heard about the last stand of the Warden, his ultimate sacrifice. As the world went on, outgrowing the stories of castles and kings, the tale of Blackburn Keep became nothing more than a myth, a bedtime story.
Blackburn laid in crumbles. The wild grew over it, rocks fell on it and over time a mountain grew, leaving no evidence of the Warden or the Beast’s great battle for the Heart of the Wild. Forgotten deep in the memories of men, the nightmare seemed to have passed, until one day a small girl fell down a muskeg hole and caused the castle to wake.
I’ve never known a lemming who wasn’t terrified of a dog. However, on this particular afternoon I could hear my dog’s barking quickly come to a halt as the reigning insults of a particular lemming hailed down on her. Curious, I thought, turning my head to the ruckus. It had been a long windy day of blueberry picking. My hands were stained a permanent blue from hours of peeling the reluctant berries off their bushes and filling my bucket. Eager for any type of distraction, I followed the noise of the arguing animals.
“Mika!” I yelled, running towards the sound of her bark.
“You good for nothing four-legged fiend! You leave me be! Let me get out of this hole before I ...well, before I..”
I heard the high-pitched ramblings of the lemming coming from just atop the hill, and saw Mika’s head cocking side to side at the odd creature as if questioning whether it was for snacking or chasing. Seeing me coming, Mrs. Lemming darted back in her hole with a huff. Mika eagerly whined and danced about, waiting for me to inspect her find. Crouching down near the hole in the rocks, I gently knocked on the top like a door. Although I’d never met a lemming, it seemed only proper to announce oneself.
“Hello, Mrs. Lemming?” There was no response, and I had thought maybe I had been picking blueberries for too long, maybe I was hallucinating. I could hear mutterings from inside the hole and feeling worried I had set the poor creature into a frenzy I knocked on the rock again. This time to inform her we were leaving and to apologize for causing such a stir. Mika bent down to give one last sniff. Before I could explain to Mrs. Lemming that we were on our way, an explosion of thorns, clusters of frozen dirt and twigs erupted in our faces. Shocked by both the noise and painful projectiles that now blinded us, Mika and I stumbled backwards.
“I’M LATE, GET OUT OF MY WAY!!!” Mrs. Lemming screamed as she came barreling out of the rock hole, scampering over both of us and racing towards the vastness of the wild. As she scampered past, I thought for certain I had seen her wearing a red checkered musher’s hat on top of her head. Logic told me lemmings do not wear musher’s hats; however, logic and reality also told me lemmings do not talk, or blast humans out of their way with explosives made out of tundra debris.
My cheeks burned from scratches, a painful reminder that the twig bomb was not a hallucination. Given the situation, logic and reality no longer seemed to exist. Before I could completely process this thought, Mika had taken off toward the direction of Mrs. Lemming. The battle cry of the late lemming rang across the tundra as she slipped over a muskeg fleeing from the canine. My dog bounded after the lemming in the musher’s hat and I chased after my dog, hollering for her to wait. My voice faltered and turned into a scream as Mika and I both tumbled to the tundra floor. The ground had suddenly seemed to open up, hungry to devour us whole. Mika and I scraped the sides of the earth for branches to stop our fall but our hands only grasped dirt and mud. It was too late. The strange lemming, my nosey pup and I were all falling down into the depths of the muskeg hole.
Part II is available! Find it here! Interested in Heart of the Wild? Check out Shane Kimberlin’s fictional series “The Wish Belly.”
