Black Gates Lotr Novels & Stories

In the back of my damn head. The further we drive, the darker it gets. I’m talking pitch black creeping in fast, like someone’s slowly pulling a blanket over the town. I look around and shake my head. “What the fuck is this place, Mark?” I ask, right as we roll up to this huge black gate. And not just any gate. This thing is massive and creepy as hell, with a freaking skull carved dead center. The kind of shit you’d see in horror movies. Mark just stares ahead like it’s nothing. “This... is Moon River.”

The map inside was a strip of treated hide marked with wells, stones, collapsed roads, and names scratched out so many times the surface had gone thin. Lorelai spread it across the command table. Her burned palm hovered above Greyhaven’s mark. Light rose through the hide. Lines formed one by one, answering the stones outside. Greyhaven. Blackwater. A buried marker beneath the chapel vault. Three dead roads leading east. Two broken lines ending at blank spaces where the map had been cut. Karl stood behind her, close enough that his breath stirred the hair near her ear. “Stop if it hurts.” “It already hurts. That is not the same as stopping.”

"He’s our problem now. Let’s end this." Silas didn't need a command. He launched himself out of the courtyard, leaping over the rubble of the shattered gate. We blurred through the forest paths, tracking the scent of violet magic and gold. We found him at the very edge of the Black Ridge territory, near the ancient, moss-covered standing stones that marked the border. He had retrieved his violet staff and was tracing a symbol on the largest stone—a gateway spell. He spun around as we skidded to a halt. His face was a contorted mask of hatred and madness.

The ride is silent. Damian drives himself—he doesn’t trust anyone else today. Eli watches the city blur past, nerves twisting tighter and tighter the closer they get to the outskirts, where the Blackthorne estate sits like a fortress carved from stone and ego. When the gates come into view, towering and black steel, Eli’s pulse spikes. Armed guards stand on either side. Damian doesn’t slow. The gates open automatically. “Damian…” Eli whispers. “I know,” Damian says softly. “Stay close.”

Even if it is the last thing I do on this mountain. The first shape appeared among the trees. Massive, dark gray, with eyes like a tomb. Silas Blackthorn had come home.

He knew the path from the book: a narrow goat trail leading to a hidden cave overlooking the battlefield. He found it—a dark fissure in the cliffside, pulsing with a malevolent energy. Inside, on a crude stone altar, sat the artifact: a black cube of obsidian, veined with crimson light that throbbed like a diseased heart. He could hear the distant sounds of battle—the grunts of men, the sizzle of Keith’s fire magic, the unearthly shrieks of disintegrating ghouls. It wouldn't take them long. He had to move.

Chapter 12: The Whispering Pines The Forbidden Grove was not a place found on any map of the five kingdoms. It existed in the "In-Between," a pocket of the world where the veil between the physical realm and the spirit wild was thin enough to bleed. To get there, Lucas, Audrey, and a small, elite guard led by Vane had to leave the safety of the stone fortress and trek into the Blackwood—a forest so dense that the sun struggled to touch the mossy floor.

That was goodbye. Outside, the horse was waiting, already saddled. Gideon helped me up again, his hand steady at my waist, firmer than earlier—as though letting go this time cost him something. He swung up behind me, and in the next heartbeat, the gates of Blackthorn Hall creaked open. Neither of us spoke at first, the rhythm of hooves carrying us through fields lit bronze by the falling sun. Gideon’s cloak brushed against my arm with every shift of the horse.

Nearer still, a large dog barked once, sharp and lone and distinct. Houses of the Holy, Richard thought as they walked up to the hushed Deadmond home.

Everett replied, "no, but we will jump." Everett jumped from the castle tower. She screamed in shock and hugged Everett's body. Everett jumped on every tree and stopped at one of the taller trees. Everett said, "it's alright, you can open your eyes now." She opened her eyes and was fascinated by the beauty of the realm of black mist. There is a colourful light that looks like a galaxy. She thought frightening darkness only surrounded the realm of Black Mist. But that darkness also looks beautiful. "Should we continue our journey? Don't close your eyes," Everett said.