Interview with the Castle Defender

     Or in this case, self-defense, in case one of the castle’s many scary stories came to life. Besides, if he took his sword with him after the Halloween banquet, Rohane would probably ask him a few too many questions – questions Cavall wouldn’t want to answer, at least not yet.

     So, on Cavall walked, mumbling to himself as he turned a corner to the left.

     “The Western Watchtower…the highest watchtower…” He took a deep breath. The Western Watchtower was one of the places in Meridell Castle that harbored its share of scary stories, but Cavall hoped that the story he was chasing wouldn’t be too scary.

     His ears twitched; he heard sets of footsteps. Then he walked faster, his heart drumming against his chest. Was it the Night Guard, who patrolled the castle every night? Was it the last of the banquet guests, finally headed to bed? Cavall got into a jog, fingers tight against the candle holder, but as he heard the footsteps grow louder, he chanced a glance over his shoulder.

     That was when he ran headlong into a pillar, and as he rubbed his nose and staggered, he felt a pair of arms steady him. He let out a stifled yelp and scrambled aside, making sure to hold the candle away from himself.

     “Cavall! Are you okay?”

     The blue Cybunny turned around at the sound of a very familiar voice. It belonged to a shadow Grarrl who approached him, alongside a green Zafara.

     “Mulligan? Joanna?” Cavall blinked. Then he saw the brown Moehog behind them, who was toting a much larger candle. The kind usually found in a cleric’s holy chambers. “Philip? What are you…” He frowned. “Come on, I said I wanted to do this alone.”

     “As if we’d let you,” said Mulligan, shaking his head. Glancing around, he dropped his voice and added, “We’ll come with you, but if you want, we’ll give you and the Castle Defender some space, okay? You know, to…talk.”

     Normally, the Castle Defender only made an appearance when Meridell was in danger, or when, supposedly, its ruler or any of its worthy knights called upon him. But there were numerous accounts of the ghostly Kougra being easier to summon – and easier to talk to – on one specific night, when the line between the world of the living and the spirit world became only a blur.

     Halloween night.

     “But won’t you get in trouble?” said Cavall, sweeping his free arm at them. “What if you get caught?”

     Philip snorted. “Sir Jaco would probably think this was all a hoot. Bet he snuck around the castle when he was a squire.”

     Joanna, on the other hand, shuffled her feet. “Well…Lady Colleen isn’t too strict, maybe if I tell her I was helping you, or something like that…” She shook her head and pointed at Cavall. “Anyway, look who’s talking. What’d you tell Sir Rohane so he wouldn’t follow you?”

     “I…um, told him I’d be with you guys. To catch up on homework.”

     “Then, isn’t it a good thing you ran into us?” Philip said, winking. “And the Castle Defender did come up in history class at one point.”

     “But not the stories about how Halloween night is the perfect night to summon him when Meridell’s not in the middle of a war!” Joanna exclaimed.

     “Guess we’ll find out if the stories are true,” said Cavall.

     “You sure you want to go through with this?” Mulligan asked. “We’re not gonna call you a Wibreth if you change your mind.”

     Meanwhile, Joanna shot Philip a glare.

     “What?”

     Cavall nodded resolutely. “Yeah. There’s stories of Meridellians – not just knights – who’ve called the Castle Defender for wisdom. For help.” He walked onward without looking back at his friends.

     “You know you can always just ask Sir Rohane anything you want, right?” said Joanna, falling in step beside him. “Why go to the Castle Defender?”

     The blue Cybunny did not answer, and continued, candle held aloft, until they reached a spiral staircase. All four squires stared upward at the tapering line of steps, the rising stone walls, the sparse windows, and the flickering shadows from the candles. When Mulligan placed one foot onto the first step, it creaked with a sound that was almost a shriek, and the Grarrl immediately backed away.

     “They say the Western Watchtower is the best place to find the Castle Defender,” said Cavall, raising his candle over the stairs. “It’s supposedly where he made his last stand during his final battle.” The blue Cybunny took a deep breath and started to climb.

     Though he hesitated, Mulligan finally followed him, flinching as more of the stairs sagged under his bulk. “And now…his ghost has bound himself to always defend Meridell Castle, to atone for his failures.”

     “What if there was a ghost squire like that who couldn’t become a knight and so he – agh, what was that noise?” said Philip, halting and holding his candle up over some Spyder webs.

     “Sorry,” said Mulligan, glancing away in embarrassment. “I-I think I stepped too hard there.”

     The brown Moehog groaned. “Calm down, big guy. What, you scared Sir Oakley would let you become a ghost squire, bound to the castle for all eternity?”

     Joanna chuckled. “Why can I imagine Sir Jaco telling you he would do that, just to scare you?”

     “Very funny. But he would.”

     “Now what was that noise?” Cavall said, stopping suddenly. His three friends halted too, and just barely kept themselves from colliding into him.

     “A Miamouse?” Philip replied.

     “Ugh, I hope it’s just a Miamouse.” Grimacing, Cavall took another step forward. “Maybe we should go back.”

     “What? But we’re so close to the top! And I want to see how the Castle Defender shows up! Does he…do a whoosh thing? Or does he just appear out of nowhere? Or…Mulligan, are you all right?”

     “I-I’m fine! If Cavall says he wants to talk to the Castle Defender, then I’m coming with him! At least until he tells me not to come!”

     Joanna put her finger to her lips. “Shhh! Our voices probably carry all the way down…if the guards hear us…”

     On they climbed, until the stairs ended at a trapdoor. Cavall and Mulligan pushed against it, and it swung open with a drawn-out sigh that seemed to bear the collective sighs of many a knight across Meridell’s history.

     “It’s not locked,” said Cavall. As the blue Cybunny looked around and allowed Mulligan to hoist him up, he added, “And there’s…not much in here, either. No ballistae, or catapults, or even crates of arrows.”

     As Mulligan pulled Joanna into the top of the tower, she said, “Maybe it’s really just a watchtower. Or it’s not equipped when there’s a war.” The green Zafara smoothed out her skirt before reaching down to take Philip’s candle while Mulligan took Philip’s outstretched arm. “Okay, we’re here. How do we summon the Castle Defender?”

     Cavall placed his candle on a stray crate and unrolled a small piece of paper from his pocket. He breathed in, stared hard at the words written on the paper, and began to recite them. There was no sound in the watchtower except for his slightly quavering voice, and the metallic slide of his knife drawn from its sheath, and placed reverently next to the candle and the paper.

     ”O Castle Defender, hear me, and come,

     Lend me your strength, power and wisdom.

     Castle Defender, here I stand,

     Be the stalwart sword in my hand.”

     His knees gave way and he found himself kneeling before the crate, the paper, the knife, and the candle, which was blown out by a wind coming in from the barred windows of the tower.

     The wind blew harder, faster, bearing upon its wings the piece of paper and letting it join a few more scraps that had been lying dormant on the floor only a moment ago. The locked grates over the windows rattled in the gale. Then, even Philip’s candle went out, causing all the squires to scream.

     “What’s happening? Is it happening?” the Moehog cried over the roar of the wind.

     “I don’t know!” Cavall yelled, watching the feeble plume of smoke from his candle rising into the air. The smoke twisted and writhed, and then grew and spread until the tower was filled with smoke.

     The floorboards beneath their feet began to shudder, and the wind continued to howl.

     “What if it was wrong?” asked Mulligan, coughing and stumbling against the wall.

     “It can’t be wrong!” Joanna glanced briefly at the trapdoor. “Besides, Cavall is pure of heart, he’s a good squire, the Castle Defender should appear for him!”

     Cavall bit his lip and watched in growing horror as the smoke began to gather in a single place, forming a flickering outline – the profile of a ghostly, barrel-chested, muscled Kougra.

     “It’s him!” Philip pointed dramatically at the last of the smoke, which lightened and took form, creating a suit of armour, greaves, and gauntlets. The Kougra’s eyes lit up with a ruby light – the only source of light in the tower. His glare swept the area, hovering over Mulligan, and Philip, and Joanna, before coming to rest on Cavall, who tried to hide behind the crate.

     “You,” the Kougra intoned, his voice a deep rumble that cut into Cavall’s heart and thrummed in his ears, and seemed to echo all around them at the same time. “Why do you summon me, when Meridell is not at war? Is this a game to you?”

     At first, Cavall could not speak around his chattering teeth as he shivered. He looked to his friends, before finally deciding to stand up and speak.

     “I-I-I w-wanted to…to ask you…s-something,” he mumbled, his hand finding his knife. “P-Please don’t hurt us.”

     “T-That’s right,” said Mulligan, pulling himself back onto his feet. “M-M-My friend…h-he’s of pure heart, h-he’s a good N-Neopian…” The Grarrl then placed himself in front of Joanna, who was hugging Philip tightly.

     The Castle Defender stood in front of the crate and then pointed down at the trapdoor.

     “Leave us,” he hissed. “He’ll return to you safely. I swear this upon my sword.” A huge broadsword suddenly materialized in the Kougra’s gauntlets, and he held it, point down into the floor.

     Mulligan looked at Cavall, who just nodded.

     “Y-You sure?”

     The Cybunny tilted his head toward the trapdoor and watched his friend usher the Zafara and the Moehog back through the trapdoor – leaving him with a giant Kougra ghost with an equally giant sword.

     Following the click of the trapdoor, there was silence. The ghost of a scowl flitted across the Castle Defender’s face, and his voice boomed all throughout the tower.

     “I said, leave us. Leave this tower. I know you’re still listening behind that trapdoor.”

     Cavall could hear several footsteps shuffle down the stairs below before fading into nothing. Then the Castle Defender peered down at the small, still shuddering Cybunny in front of him.

     “You aren’t a knight, or the king of Meridell, or a Meridellian in dire peril. Why do you summon me, when you could so easily summon your master instead?”

     Cavall focused on his feet. “Because…I wanted to ask you for advice, about being a knight. Because…”

     “Who is your knight-master, that you saw fit to come to me?”

     “Ah, it’s Sir Rohane, um, if you haven’t heard of him, he’s from Trestin – “

     The Castle Defender’s expression flickered into something…less stern, and more reminiscent.

     “The son of Sir Reynold, the greatest of his line, to whom I am indebted for freeing me from Ramtor’s chains. Then, why not ask him, a decorated, worthy knight of Meridell?”

     “B-Because, because…” Cavall’s words trailed off and he kept his head lowered. “Because, sir, I don’t know how I did it, but I’m not really pure of heart like my friends say. Like the legends say, those who summon you…anyway, Sir Rohane doesn’t know the real me. I don’t know if you know who I really am…”

     “I see.”

     “Huh?”

     “I will give you one piece of advice, youngling. You say your master does not know the real you? Be yourself.”

     “But I – “

     “Would you prefer that he find out from others, rather than find out from you?”

     Cavall was silent.

     “Be yourself,” the Castle Defender repeated, and the Cybunny could have sworn that the Kougra’s tone had become somewhat gentler. “You can only keep your true self hidden for so long. It’s only a matter of time until it comes to light – whether through you, or through some other way. Now, what was your name again?”

     “Cavall.”

     “Like one of Meridell’s most famous folktale heroes, eh? Anyway, that is all the advice I have for you, young Cavall. Now, go back to your quarters before your master starts looking for you.”

     The Castle Defender faded until he vanished into the air, leaving Cavall all alone in the tower with his knife and his candle still in its holder. The bit of paper from his pocket commingled with the detritus on the tower floor.

     He sighed.

     “Be myself,” he said, not without a sour note. “Easy for him to say.” Cavall put one hand into his other pocket, and his fingers closed against a gold pendant. He traced the “W” on it, and the engraved sword bisecting the letter.

     My name isn’t Cavall, and I shouldn’t be a squire. I’m a liar and a fake. My parents were swindlers and thieves. I don’t know where they are now, but every day, I’m afraid they’ll show up again, and find me, and take me away, and…

     He dropped back onto his knees and buried his face into his hands.

     And the Castle Defender should never have appeared to me.

     The End.