Untitled by Isaac Wilde

Here’s how Isaac Wilde describes his imaginative, as-yet-untitled novel.

Two teenagers, a half wolf called Seff and a boy named Salmon, escape an orphanage, eluding capture by a police force called the Legion.

Along the way, they are unknowingly helped by a mystical creature called The Watcher, who finally captures them. Salmon manages to escape, and rallies a ragtag army to rescue Seff.

The action takes place on a foreign world in a time similar to Earth’s Middle Ages.

Untitled

An excerpt by Isaac Wilde

Chapter One

The Watcher, so dark that the midnight sky was pale in comparison, looked down upon the empty cityscape below. The scene was quiet, and the roads far below were lit only by the silver wands of moonlight. Even the puddles of murky water that littered the streets were strung in stasis.

Then two youngsters, a half wolf and an athletic but frightened teenager, burst from one of the main alleyways and crossed the frozen nighttime road, their feet splashing through puddles and clattering on the cracked cobblestones. From behind them came a tremendous clatter, and the thunderous shouting of the Legion’s soldiers. The Watcher looked on, an evil smile contorting its way around his face.

Down below, on the damp street, the half wolf turned to his partner. “Can’t you hurry, Salmon? The Legion is getting closer.”

“Bugger the Legion,” muttered Salmon. “My feet are all wet. You do realize that this is your fault, Seff.”

“My fault?” cried Seff. “I rescued you from life in that orphanage, eating that abhorred gruel!”

“I don’t see what’s so wrong with the orphanage oatmeal,” Salmon muttered sullenly, but resigned himself to follow Seff.  They broke out of a narrow side street and onto a dockyard next to the main canal that ran through the city of Asgard.

Salmon looked around, and with a cry of dismay said, “This is hopeless Seff, we’re trapped. The Legion will get us for certain!”

Seff grinned mischievously, revealing his massive canines. Salmon recoiled at the sight, not yet used to having a half wolf for a friend. “We ain’t doomed yet, Fishy-boy. There’s always the canal.”

           

Salmon looked appalled. “You want me to jump into that thing? I’ve seen with my own two eyes people crapping in it. It’s practically a solid with all the pollution dumped into it!”

           

“What choice do you have, Salmon? It’s that or jail,” Seff said with cruel logic.

Salmon sighed. “You’re always pushing me around. This is the last time, you hear me?”

Seff grew tired of his friend’s rambling lamentations and, urged on by the clatter of the Legion, grabbed Salmon and jumped. As they crashed into the water, Salmon panicked. Struggling against Seff, he frantically tried to get to the surface, but instead sank like a stone into untold depths.

The Watcher silently growled. The boy was supposed to swim. He raised a long black arm and began an incantation. He would not disappoint his master.

Seff, his heart pounding and head dizzy from lack of air, strained to find his friend in the murky water. Behind him, he could hear a splash as the first of the Legion troops hit the water. Seff swam deeper, delving into a predatory strength to keep him moving.

The Watcher snapped his fingers and neatly closed the incantation with a word of power. Salmon was filled with sudden buoyancy that floated him into Seff’s arms. Together they pushed up into the night sky.

The Legion had filed into the water. Kar fighters with grappling hooks swinging over their heads were positioned on the banks, poised to throw. They were caught, with no way out.

The Watcher was exhausted from his expenditure of magic, but he needed to save his master’s sacrifices. He snapped his fingers.

Sewage poured out from pipes imbedded in the nearest houses in a humungous rush, sweeping away Seff and Salmon on a dirty wave. There was a clatter of shutters as tired citizens closed their windows and sealed their house off from the ruckus. The Legion, shocked for a second, quickly sprang into action. It was too late to catch their quarry, however. They had been swept away by a tide of rubbish.

The Watcher smiled with the satisfaction of a job well done, and disappeared in a flash of smoke.

Away from the borders of Asgard, a dirty rivulet of sewage water sliced neatly through the clear waters of the crater lake that surrounded the city. It coughed up two groaning runaways, covered in filth and unmentionables.
           

Salmon jumped away from the mountain of muck that had deposited them on the grassy lakeside plain, and began jumping as if possessed, swiping at his body to purge himself of grime. Gagging and hacking in an exaggerated and unnecessary manner, he glowered at Seff.

Seff was looking around, however, utterly awestruck at the scene surrounding the dirty duo. Far in the distance, Asgard stood like a proud sentinel. Surrounding it was the Great Lake, a volcanic crater that was filled with the purest of waters. The lake nurtured countless plants into fruition, spawning a luscious countryside that sprawled down the sides of the goliath mountain for miles. The small swath of dirty sewage freshly deposited there only slightly marred the magnificent view.

Salmon wasn’t going to be kept content for long by looking at scenery. He stormed on Seff, swiping his arms back and shouting angrily, “Sewage, Seff. Sewage! You planned for that, didn’t you? I would have thought even a foolish daredevil like you wouldn’t be brash enough to pull a stunt like that! But boy! I was so wrong!”

Seff lost his tough look and broke down under the onslaught. “Salmon, please. That wasn’t me. All I wanted was freedom, for once in my life. I don’t get that privilege often. I’m so sorry I made you come, I thought you would appreciate being free from the tediousness of everyday life.”

Salmon quieted, holding his hands sheepishly behind his back. “Sorry, Seff, I didn’t mean to shout.” Seff snorted at this, but didn’t interrupt Salmon in his apology. “I want to come with you, to freedom. Really I do.”

“Alright then. To freedom,” Seff said, holding his hand out for Salmon to shake. Salmon took it and shook it vigorously.

“Where is freedom, exactly?” Salmon asked after a brief pause, a confused expression on his tilted face.

“Dunmafest, the wild lands,” Seff replied in a reverent tone.

Salmon paled. Dunmafest was an island nation so harsh that even the Legion couldn’t conquer it. The island was riddled with as many jungles as cheese has holes, and filled with unimaginable horrors and deadly terrors. Salmon couldn’t help but picture their gruesome end at the jaws of some gargantuan beast. But, the expedition in the sewage had changed him, just slightly.

“All right, Seff. If I’m going to get dragged someplace, I’d rather you did the dragging. But this is the last time, you hear me? The last time.”

About the Author

Isaac Wilde plans to continue writing stories, in which he wants to develop interesting plots that reveal fantasy worlds and eras of his own creation.

Isaac is 13-years-old (12 when he wrote the above chapter), and his favorite authors are Ray Bradbury and J.R.R. Tolkien.