Help I am struggling with the tense in this
I am struggling with the tense in this one and could sure use some help. Well here goes it: The Lesson Fear filled Francesca, fear that pushed her footsteps forward and drove a knife through her heart.She reached the castle screaming through its front door, < “Reginald, Reginald, you must stop him, my father he has gone to far. “> Her screams were answered by her father’s deep voice,<“Yes my dear Francesca. I know. I will stop him. Do not worry.> <“Daughter --See me-- I sit here cringing in my cold damp skin, though my soul is on fire. I am enraged; my heart is aching, I am filled with shame and disappointment over my only son’s actions. My temper is uncontrollable; I am ready to howl, even though the moon is not full yet. “> <“Oh he must be stopped, He cannot go on doing what he does. I will send for him and then HE WILL KNOW”>
Francesca had never before seen her father in such a state. Taking a chair opposite him she sat waiting for his pen to stop flowing.
Done Reginald looked at his daughter and spoke, his voice filled with pain and rage,
Varick took the letter from his concubine and read.
Dear Son
I demand you come home at once. I have a matter of significant importance to discuss with you. You have outraged me, your continued ignorance to my laws, must be stopped. You have disgraced our bloodline and put a blemish on our family crest.
Did you think the kingdom I bequeathed you would allow you to forgo the rules you must obey?
Your neglect for the spilling of blood, your massacres, and lust for carnal pleasures will become your down falls.
You disgust me.
You have no knowledge of blood. You waste it. You do not know the quality of its warmth .I showed you how to inhale its essence, to bathe in its perfume, to drink of its warmth. Yet you do not do as you were taught. You allow yourself to feel it caress your body invigorating the bloodline within you, but you kill all you have tasted, leaving their beheaded bodies laden across my countryside.
You have jeopardized the family, you have led to our being hunted like animals, and you have given us another enemy to beware of. Your mark upon my family name must be accounted for. “
Come to me Varick, Be not afraid, I will not harm you, but I must teach you a lesson. This lesson you must abide by.
Do not fear me son. Make haste son, do no force me to come to you.
You must walk, for I have put a freeze on your powers, I will instill them when you cross over my threshold.
Sincerely,
ψ
Your Father Reginald.
Francesca slithered away from him, taking flight she heard his rueful swearing beneath the flapping of her wings.
Varick raced through a maze of trees and up the mountain towards the one who summoned him, annoyance fills his heart and mind, anger moves his footsteps.
Cracked branches, fallen onto the foliage covered ground, snap beneath his polished boots imbedding scratches into their leather. Jagged rocks protruded into the path he follows, covered with moss they have caused him to slip several times. From the bare branches of the forest trees owls sit hooting. Screeching bats fly about, from a distance comes the howling of wolves. Their sounds music to Varicks ears, their combined melodies soothing and comforting his tensed body. They help quicken his footsteps. He is eager to get to his destination,
Standing at the end of the forest his fathers castle sits, an aura of evil surrounding it. . Memories of his lives beginning fill him with joy, yet fear. Taking in the view before him, the gray stone cut from rock with its wrought iron fencing enclosing its perimeter, fills him with envy. Its cold and ominous structure is magnificent; it warms the cackles of his heart. A heavy fog loomed over the castles roof.-- matching the gray mist caressing the path before him.
His body became riddled with fear. He did not want to meet with his father for he knew it would be a battle, a complete challenge to his continued presence in Reginald’s world.
Varrick’ father Reginald was old and unyielding to change. He, Varick, would gladly show him the new way. The hell with the saving of blood and thehell with giving life to a new breed. He was prepared to show the depths of evil to his beloved father, prepared to fight for control of the world they both loved.
Standing in front of the castles mahogany door, Varick hesitated, just for a moment summoning up the courage needed to enter his fathers home. With a firm wrap upon the solid door, he stood waiting for someone to answer. The door opened. Varick stared into his fathers’ eyes in disbelief. Reginald stood before him old and emancipated. His skin was pale and his body hunched over. A silver tipped cane is all that held him up. How did he open the door? He looked to weak to even speak, but a soothing voice, seeped through his beautiful white teeth.
Reginald bid his son {“Welcome” }. Varick’ s face flushed with fear. He did not feel his powers return and spoke to his father,
His father’s reply ebbed a flicker of anger forward into his heart.
<“Come son, come into the drawing room.”.>
He admired the room’s furnishings, a huge table surrounded by red velvet chairs. The room’s walls captured the fires glow from the slate covered fireplace. Reginald’s picture hung trimmed in gold over the middle of the fireplaces mantel. The portrait captured Reginald at his best, young and seductively handsome.
Reginald spoke, <“Do not let my appearance fool you my child. It is but a reflection of how I feel. Your dishonor towards our family emits itself through my emotions, my emotions portray my human form.”>
<“Son you know I am the wolf, the bat, the fog and the mist. I am both old and young.”>
<“Like you I cast no reflections in the glass for we are infinity and thus cannot be seen”.>
<“ I am a father of many, not biological. My children are born to me upon their death. I pick them, I groom them, and they are loyal to me. Did I make a mistake by choosing you as my son, by making you the prince of my kingdom in the caves? “>
<“I have rescued you from a life where you were pitied, a life in which you stood an outcast of your society, a kings field servant, a life alone without a mate. I have given you life eternal and you have repaid me with dishonor. I have given you the maiden Francesca for a concubine. Yet for you she was not enough. You have been disloyal to her by claiming other woman. Woman you have replaced her with, women who searching for new blood as we speak”>
<“Son many lives have withered beneath your fangs for pleasure instead of for food. Your thirst is unquenchable and it sickens me.”}
{“You have defiled my kingdom with the blood of those you have turned and left to live. The walking dead left to the hands of man. Do you not know every child born from your fangs is mine? I can feel the stake through their hearts as if it were my own being pierced.”>
<“ A re you ready to relearn the proper ways of our heritage. Do you want to? Or do you insist on bringing a new breed to my fold?”>
Varick looked at his father, his face was handsome now and once more the flames dancing in their pupils seared him with fear.
His words quivered in their reply <“ Father we must change, we must prove we are the stronger race of life. We must anoint all to our being, the blood spilled on the ground will mark the earth beneath our land, unhallowed ground for us to own. You must stop trying to control the kingdom you gave me. I shall rise from its caves and build a castle on the land outside my cavern. I shall rule the earth, there will be no life in her sun, life will live only in darkness. Join my quest, let me teach you the new ways. Please do not make me challenge you, for I will fight you to the death. I will pierce your heart myself .”
Reginald could not believe his son’s arrogance. His reply to Varick was laced with a promise of death. < “Varick, your ignorance will be your death. Do you think I am foolish? Why do you think I stripped you of your powers allowing time to stand still before I return the? I will l choose the time they will be returned. I have summoned you here to teach you a lesson and you will learn it, or suffer the flames of its teaching.”>
Reginald feeling pity for his son allowed his powers to return to him, slowly and without notifying Varick he had done so.
Reginald stretched out his arms. The sounds of bats filled the room, their wings gliding them towards their master. Settling down on Reginald’s arm, their black eyes glared at Varick. Rats scurried across the room their path ending in a circle around their master Reginald, a gift to him by his daughter. A wolf leapt from the fireplace, his howling piercing Varicks ears, its girth knocking him on the floor, its paws holding him down. Sharp nails imbedded his skin, ripping his flesh, yet no flow of blood released itself from his wounds. Starring into Varicks eyes it howled a tune of misery and leapt off his chest disappearing into a stream of newly formed mist.
Varick lay stunned filled with a fiery rage. His father was playing with him, and now he would play with his father. He too had pets he could call upon. Forgetting he had none, and unaware they were restored, he summoned forth his powers but they were weak, only one command flowed forth.
A raven entered the room, landing on the fireplaces mantle, its cawing annoying Reginald. Wings flapped, bats met bird in mid air overtaking it, pulling at it flesh with their teeth. Feathers and blood dripped about the room, their droppings infuriating both men. Varick because his pet was being torn unmercifully, Reginald because blood sat wasted upon his castle floor.
Rats curried towards Varick nipping at his legs. With one fast kick they were sent flying into the walls; their dead bodies splashing red upon its gray stones.
Reginald seethed in anger. Varick stood up a crooked smiled etched across his face. The realization that his powers were returning filled him with confidence. Wolves howled in the distance, warning Varick of their presence and comforting Reginald. The bats reassemble themselves. A hand lay cold upon Varicks shoulder, the coldness comfortable and inviting. Behind him Francesca stood, a look of loathing upon her face. Her voice filled with hatred her she aimed her words directly at him,
<” Again you have spilled unnecessary blood, blood that belongs to me. For the rats are mine, I have nursed them, I have trained them. My blood flows through them, my marks is on their neck. You have spilled my children’s blood. Yet they did not die. They live. They will drink of your blood after you taste theirs. >
<“Get down upon the floor like the creature you are. Lick the floor. Cleanse it of the blood you spilled. As it flows to your body, you will be mine.”>
Varick tried to use his powers, Reginald held him back, his mind frozen, no commands able to flow through its core.
Francesca urged him forward, he had no choice but to follow her command.. His cold blood turned warm and he passed out lying stiff upon the floor. The bats he thought he had killed descend upon his body, draining the blood he has just consumed. Lining Varick’s body from head to toe they used their claws to grasp his flesh.
All at once the bats took flight heading out of the castle, through doors opened by his Father. His body is taken back to the place he originally died in. It is dropped upon the moors, behind the hut that was once his home.
The sun rises over manor filling it with golden hues. Its essence is hotter than the fires contained in hell. Its rays cast their reflection over the handsome young man lying on its ground. Cries of anguish emit from his still body. The smell of charred flesh saturates the air. A pile of ashes lies upon the soil Two wolves, their bodies invisible to any mere mortal, climb atop the ashes protecting them from being blown away.
The moon replaces the sun, shadows dance in its image. Bats fly through the air circling around the wolves. Reginald appears from out of the shadows. The wolves rise and remove themselves from their perch. Reginald gather’s his son’s ashes into an urn. Holding the urn within his hands, he takes flight.
Sitting in his chair before the fireplace, he turns the urn over and over again in his hands. Memories of his son’s unwillingness to uphold the art of spilling blood tear a whole through his black heart. His son will now remains imprisoned. until Varick calls him forth again. Anger causes him to stand. Putting the urn on the mantle he speaks:
<“I am sorry my son. Sorry you would not follow the rules of our crest. Sorry I had to teach you a lesson”. >
‘THE END”
I am struggling with the tense in this one and could sure use some help. Well here goes it: The Lesson Fear filled Francesca, fear that pushed her footsteps forward and drove a knife through her heart.She reached the castle screaming through its front door, < “Reginald, Reginald, you must stop him, my father he has gone to far. “> Her screams were answered by her father’s deep voice,<“Yes my dear Francesca. I know. I will stop him. Do not worry.> <“Daughter --See me-- I sit here cringing in my cold damp skin, though my soul is on fire. I am enraged; my heart is aching, I am filled with shame and disappointment over my only son’s actions. My temper is uncontrollable; I am ready to howl, even though the moon is not full yet. “> <“Oh he must be stopped, He cannot go on doing what he does. I will send for him and then HE WILL KNOW”>