Amber and Iron - Margaret Weis [15]
When the Dragon Overlord, Malys, seized control of this part of Ansalon, she ravaged the countryside, laying waste to fields and farmlands, towns and villages and cities. The land was cursed so long as she was in power. Nothing grew. Rivers and streams dried up. Once-fertile fields became windswept desert. Starvation and disease spread. Cities such as Flotsam lost much of their population as people fled the dragon’s curse. The entire area became known as the Desolation.
With the death of Malys at the hands of Mina, the dread effects of the dragon’s evil magic on the Desolation were reversed. Almost from the moment of Malys’s demise, rivers began to flow and lakes to fill. Small shoots of green thrust up out of barren soil, as though life had been there all this time, waiting only for the enchantment that held it in thrall to be removed.
With the return of the gods, this process accelerated, so that already some areas were almost back to normal. People returned and began to rebuild. Flotsam, located about one hundred and fifty miles from Chemosh’s castle, was not quite the rollicking, bustling center of commerce—both legal and illegal—that it had once been, but it was no longer a ghost town. Pirates and legitimate sailors of all races roamed the streets of the famous port city. Markets and shops reopened. Flotsam was back and open for business.
Large areas of the Desolation still remained cursed, however. No one could figure out why or how. A druidess devoted to Chislev, goddess of nature, was exploring these areas, when she came across one of Malys’s scales. The druidess theorized that the presence of the scale might have something to do with the continuation of the curse. She burned the scale in a sacred ceremony, and it is said that Chislev herself, disturbed by this disruption of nature, blessed the ceremony. The destruction of the scale did nothing to change things, but the story spread and the theory took hold, so these cursed areas became known as “scale-fall.”
One of these scale-fall areas Chemosh claimed for his own. His castle stood on a promontory overlooking the Blood Sea on what was known as the Somber Coast.
Chemosh cared nothing about the lingering curse. He had no interest in green and growing things, so it mattered little to him that the hills and valleys around his castle were denuded, barren, empty expanses of ashy soil and charred stone.
The castle he took over was in ruins when he found it, the dragon having slain the inhabitants and razed and burned the castle. He had chosen this location because it was only about fifty miles from the Tower of the Blood Sea. He had intended to use his castle as a base of operation, planning to store here the sacred artifacts he would remove from the wreckage of the Tower. Here, he had fondly imagined, he would take his time sorting, cataloging and calculating the immense value of the sacred artifacts that dated back to the time of the Kingpriest of Istar.
The castle would not only serve as a depository for the artifacts but as a fortress to guard them. Using rock mined by lost souls in the Abyss, Chemosh rebuilt the castle, making it so strong not even the gods themselves could assail it. The Abyssal rock was blacker than black marble and far harder. Only the hand of Chemosh could shape it into blocks, and the blocks were so heavy only he could lift them into place. The castle was constructed with four watchtowers, one on each corner. Two walls—an inner wall and an outer wall—surrounded it. The most unique feature of this castle was that no gates penetrated the walls. There appeared to be no way in and no way out.
The dead who guarded the castle needed no gates. The wraiths, ghosts and restless spirits Chemosh brought to defend his dwelling could pass through the Abyssal rock as easily as a mortal slips through