Chapter One - In Which Young Master William Defeats his Father at a Game of Chess During the Worst Storm of the Century

Without, the night was cold and wet. Sheets of rain fell from the sky and shattered into the ground. Powerful storm winds flung tree limbs down and thrashed the night sky, howling like a murdered victim. A worse storm could not be remembered and would not be recorded for another century and a half. This storm was blamed by superstitious folk in the region for a spate of birth defects in children born over the next several months and for at least one death.

The river, already swollen with melted snow waters from nearby mountains, now surged over its banks– engorged like a bloated corpse, an undead corpse, moaning and gurgling and like a zombie, mindlessly devouring anything in it’s path. Storm drains filled and spilled over; the gutters were clogged with the drowned corpses of stray dogs and feral cats.

The storm raged without, but in the small parlor of Lakesnam Villa the blinds were drawn and the fire in the fireplace burned bright. Father and son were absorbed in contemplation and a game of chess. The former, who possessed only a theoretical understanding of the game but was not-so-well practiced at actually playing the game made a course of such radical and constant change and persisted in putting his king into such sharp and unnecessary perils that it even elicited comments from the rooms eldest occupant - the white haired old lady knitting placidly by the fire.

“Don’t toy with him.” She said to the boy. “Finish the game and put your father out of his misery.”

“Hush, mother, I’ve got him right where I want him,” said the man. But then he paused, unsure. “Listen to that wind,” said Mr. White, who, having seen a fatal mistake after it was too late, was amiably desirous of preventing his son from seeing it. “The sound of it is unearthly.”

The white queen, the imperiatrix mundi, left her mate with an exposed flank in order to draw the trap. She smiled at her superiority. She knew, of course that men rule the world. It’s a man’s world, baby. But when the black and white squares meet at the corner of the board, it will be the Queen that moves in for the kill, not the moribund king. He can only sit and sulk within his square. The White Queen knew this and, had she possessed an emotionally demonstrative personality, would have smiled. Instead, she flung herself diagonally across the full length of the board to assassinate an exposed bishop.

“I’m listening,” said the boy, grimly surveying the board as he stretched out his hand. He had anticipated his father’s error. “Check.”

But the wind,” Mr. White insisted, turning from the game. “It sounds like a banshee shrieking at the windows of a house of the damned.” His son continued to stare at the board, studiously ignoring the sound. “Check. It’s your move, dad.”

“I should hardly think that he’d come tonight,” said his father, with his hand poised over the board. He moved the bishop absently. “It isn’t an equinox or a solstice. There’s no reason for him to come tonight.” He glanced at his mother for support. “Right? Can you think of any legitimate reason for him to come here tonight? “

The white haired woman didn’t bother to look up from her knitting; the White Queen slid silently into place.
“Check Mate,” replied the son.

Mr. White reluctantly turned his attention back to the game. “You win again.”