The Dark Lord's Handbook by Paul Dale

Author:Paul Dale [Dale, Paul]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fantasy, Humour, fantasy humor, fantasy humour, epic fantasy, fantasy parody, Dragon, dark lord, C429, Extratorrents, Kat
ISBN: 9781471089572
Amazon: 1471089576
Barnesnoble: 1471089576
Goodreads: 15456561
Publisher: lulu.com
Published: 2012-05-02T14:00:00+00:00

Chapter 29 Machinations

With great power comes the greater responsibility to wield it.

The Dark Lord’s Handbook

The Handbook was pleased. The vessel for its plans, that is to say, Morden, was following the advice he was reading from the book as though it were Canon Law. The sacking of Bostokov had been the first big test of Morden’s will to bring destruction to the world and he had passed; though if he was to be marked down it would have to be for the astonishingly low body count. The streets had not run red from the blood of Bostokov’s residents but from the broken casks of red wine in the warehouses. (Apparently it had not been to the taste of Morden’s orcs.)

But no matter. Morden had a fledgling army, a fleet, and was ready to set sail eastward where he could make his way to his spiritual home of the Great Fortress, gathering his army as he went. Once there, he could raise the fortress back to its formidable former glory and soon after that issue forth with his black army and lay waste the world.

Yes. All seemed well enough. Although there were a few strange things happening that the Handbook had not seen happen before, at least not to a Dark Lord. The sudden appearance of Morden’s father was one. It was well known that paternal issues were in the demesne of the opposition, and often a device used by a Dark Lord to inflict crippling psychological scars. In Morden’s case, however, there was little of great concern. In fact, Morden’s father had quite conveniently educated Morden in several key areas, not least of which was this whole thing about him being a dragon and having unimagined magical powers. Being able to transform into a huge black dragon, breathe fire hot enough to vaporize stone, and fly, would almost certainly prove useful. It also impressed the minions.

What was more, Morden’s father showed no interest at all in crashing his son’s party, or become any kind of paternal burden by hanging around. On the contrary, after a few days bringing Morden up to speed on his heritage and abilities (and he did bang on a lot about how persuasive he could be when it came to humans, especially women), he was off. Had to be somewhere else rather urgently, which suited the Handbook just fine.

The other oddity that the Handbook had not seen before was Morden’s apparent infatuation with the Griselda woman. While Dark Lords often had involvements with women they tended to be non-consensual, or twisted and kinky, or both. Any emotions were always primal, mainly lust driven, and easily understood. Dark Lords had needs much like the next man, except Zoon, who being More Dead didn’t have a single lustful bone in his otherwise complete skeletal frame, and necrophilia had surprisingly not been his thing.

But Morden was behaving oddly. Instead of taking what he wanted and then discarding it once used, as any Dark Lord should, he was being charming.

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