allthekeys (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
allthekeys) wrote2010-10-24 12:30 am
allthekeys) wrote2010-10-24 12:30 am
Entry tags:
[Courtyard and Grounds]
Courtyard and Grounds:
From the front gatehouse of the walls, the courtyard takes up a large expanse, with a smooth, cobblestone-paved road curving towards the front doors of the castle proper. Large, imposing statues of dragons, mounted knights, and armored warriors are spaced out, weapons, wings, and talons arced over the path in places. Many of the statues along the walkway have a banner hanging from a weapon or other convenient fixture; a black gryphon holding a golden pheasant in its beak, on a black-flecked white background; "Um alle Ruhm Handel" is embroidered on the bottom of each. A tall, wrought-iron fence capped with sharp points blocks one side of the road from the gate to a yard by the walls, while a low stone wall, just tall enough to be difficult to see over, blocks the other side; simple thatch and tile roofs can be glimpsed over the wall, while the fence gives a view of a thick, lush garden, overgrown and landscaped such that it's impossible to see var into it.
Worn spaces in the stone of the yard suggest that it may have once hosted other traffic, but now the yard is typically populated by a number of the armor guards, endlessly running through combat and formation drills occasionally broken up with exercising hawks and hounds, with several on watch on either side of a path to the front doors of the castle. A stable and a few outbuildings stand along one side of the yard. The fence continues around the yard to the walls of the castle proper on its side, while the wall comes to a large gate with a smaller service door beside it. The front doors of the castle are two large iron-bound double-doors; a small balcony overlooks, difficult to see from below.
Stables and Outbuildings:
On the other side of the fence from the road and the yard, filling much of the visible space between the fence and the outer walls, stretches a lush garden; narrow paths wind through stone walls and artificial small hills, with archways and trellises coated in climbing flowers. Blooming shrubs and close-packed flowerbeds, grown to look almost wild save for how overgrown and tightly planted they are, dominate the area; the sound of running water from carved fountains scattered in hidden corners throughout the garden is audible. Access to the garden comes from doors in the castle proper and a set of gates in the fence around the yard, although the guards will stop anyone attempting to tamper with the locks and the ways out may be difficult to find from within the castle. Only two of the gates are unlocked.
One unlocked, rusted gate nestled close by the wall in the fence seems to stand unnoticed, allowing access from the yard to the garden paths. Down one path close to the wall, the high trellises of the garden give way to a stone maze. The maze covers a large area of the courtyard normally hidden from view from the ground by the gardens, with heavy, faintly moss-grown walls. Voices and footsteps can occasionally be heard within it, and the roof of a white gazebo can be seen just peeking over the top of the wall somewhere within the maze. Anyone venturing in will find that the maze wanders out further than the scale of the courtyard. More curiously, anyone who manages access to the battlements above will find that it looks normal and that the gazebo is nowhere to be seen.
The Town:
The large gate and service door in the smaller internal wall give access to what seems like the remains of a small town, the homes of servants and craftspeople brought into the walls of the castle; some of the shops are active and accessible. The gates to the town are currently locked, and the guards beside them will not allow anyone to pass.
The Wall:
Surrounding the courtyard and the towering castle is an imposing stone wall that stands at least five stories high. Every five hundred paces is a watch tower, and a gate blocks any attempts at leaving. The gate is heavy iron, with a drawbridge pulled up on the other side of it.
Metal soldiers walk the wall and guard the entrances to the watchtower, and anyone with the ability to fly will see that all that can be seen beyond the wall is a dense, impenetrable fog. The faint tang of salt in the air may puzzle them, but the source cannot be seen.
The Ruins:
The wall's main gate opens to the ruins of what was once clearly a grand town. Here, the buildings have collapsed, and only outlines and stone remain in some places, while others host desiccated wooden structures that are ready to collapse at a touch. The inhabitants too have fallen; in most places, only bones remain, but here and there a desiccated corpse may be found. None of them show any signs of a violent end or struggle, they simply appear to have fallen where they were standing. In dark corners, shadow, and deep places, the evidence of the apparent cause of this remains - strips of fog remain yet, drifting hazily on the sun-warmed air.
However, it seems that some have survived this encounter, if the frozen could be called living. Where the fog clings, the people remain, stuck in time, in mid-action. Under a tree in a park, its dirt still damp with fog, a class of children is frozen in a mixture of rapt attention and distraction as a young teacher gestures to the tree itself, a grand example of its species. Under an eave, a beggar sits, legs gone, hands held plaintively upwards, in the direction of two piles of bones. These and many more are reminders of this once-grand metropolis, frozen so long, but the fog continues its recession, edging away from the frozen remainders.