Into History

The Lost Empire

Chapter one

Into History

As Leonore approached his hovel, with its dirt floor, and its mud coated walls, interlaced with willow and reed with its thatched roof, he wondered if this poor man’s hovel was what his life would amount to. This small hut Leonore called home, other then his small collection of books which he stored elsewhere was all he had. Leonore built his hovel on this spot cause of the view it offered him of the expensive and mysterious forest beyond. For reason which Leonore did not yet understand, he had always had a passion for this forest named “The Forest of Virtues.” This forest is what Leonore spent all his spare time investigating, but the villagers of Alkalis feared this forest for generations. There were those from the village that did not look kindly on anyone that would interfere with the sleeping evil of the forest. Alkalis, a modest sized village with its tavern, and the inn where at harvest time merchants would stay until their business with the peasant farmers, and the blacksmith was concluded. Alkalis faced away from the Forest of Virtues, this is to say that every building front was built opposite the Forest of Virtues. The elders of the village have told for many generations that Alkalis is the oldest city of the age of the ghost, and that the progenitors of Alkalis came from an age of long ago. The buildings in Alkalis were built of stone with their shingled roofs, and the Goth Cathedral was the oldest known church in the Kingdom of Haven. The Goth Cathedral from the entrance which is located at the center curved gently backwards until they came to a point at each end. Each end of the cathedral went one and twenty-five feet, and from there the back of the Cathedral had equally spaced points, five of them from the center outward. Between these points were gentle curves that housed massive windows which looked back on the Forest of Virtues. Leading up to the entrance to the Goth Cathedral is this beautiful flag stone walkway, each side of which curved, from the entrance the walkway had gotten narrower the further from the cathedral you were. When you entered the Goth Cathedral, the first thing you saw was a pedestal made of granite on which sat nothing. The only features on this giant sized pedestal were these shallow impressions, which ran to the front edge where they ended with deep gauges three in each impression. After you passed this pedestal you entered the church auditorium, where row after row of ornately curved pews built of oak gradually dropped as you neared the pulpit. As you neared the pulpit, which was centered on the central point along the back of the cathedral, there were other pews more ornate then the pews that lead you here. These pews are for the chorus, from where they sang those heaven inspired songs on the day of worship. Anathema, a process in which the church uses to excommunicate those they say are heretics. This, is one of the processes the elders of Alkalis used in controlling the fear the villagers had of the Forest of Virtues. Rarely have the church elders used this process of anathema, but in the past they have used it, and on one of those occasions it involved Leonore and his parents. Leonore never knew his parents, he was raised by a family of importance, and was never told a thing of his parents. Leonore didn’t know the names of either his mother or father, and he made a promise to himself that one day he would found out who they were and what happened to them. The folks that reared Leonore, they were loving parents to Leonore, and they gave him the same love they gave their other child. A daughter the same age as Leonore, she was an invert, where as Leonore was a more out going. Her name is Daniella