Castle — Shadowgate C64

You hold up the torch.

A locked door with no keyhole. Only a brass plate etched with a single word: . You think of your mother, dead of the plague. Your father, who rode east to fight the Orcish horde and never returned. You place your palm on the plate and mean it. The lock clicks open. The castle feeds on sorrow.

You bite your lip until you taste blood. You remember the weeping tapestry. The armor that could not see. The door that asked for grief. castle shadowgate c64

You are the last. The final descendant of the Loftbringer line. The prophecy said you would come, and the prophecy, it seems, has a cruel sense of humor. The heavy oak doors of Castle Shadowgate grind shut behind you, sealing you in with a groan that sounds like the castle swallowing.

In the darkness, a voice—not the door’s, not the castle’s, but his —whispers against your neck: “Put it in the fire, boy. I dare you.” You hold up the torch

The door laughs. “You cannot destroy what you do not understand.”

You lose the torch in the Hall of Mirrors. There are a hundred of you, each holding a flame. You cannot tell which is real. The Warlock's laughter echoes from everywhere and nowhere. You drop the torch—a mistake. But as it falls, it lands on a mirror that does not reflect. It absorbs . The glass cracks. The real you steps through. You pick up the torch. You are learning to think like the castle now. That is dangerous. You think of your mother, dead of the plague

You pick up the Staff.