“Will there be more?” Erik asked.
“Undoubtedly,” Turk replied.
“Great,” Bryon added.
“Then we should stop,” Erik said. “Put the torches in the middle of the tunnel. We can lean against the walls.”
“You mean for us to sleep?” Bryon asked. “With those things out there?”
“I will stay awake,” Erik said.
“I’ll never be able to sleep in this tunnel,” Bryon said, but moments after he leaned against the tunnel wall, he was snoring.
Bryon was soon joined by three other dwarves, Turk the only one staying awake with Erik.
“Go to sleep,” Erik said.
“I will stay awake,” Turk said, “with you.”
“I will be fine,” Erik replied, “and when we stop next, you can stay awake, and I will sleep.”
But he knew it was a lie. He would never sleep in this place, one where his dreams wandered the realm of the living, where the undead dared to tread past the boundaries of the mind’s fantasy. He felt them as soon as he entered this place. He even felt them outside the tunnel, in the valley of the Gray Mountains, as they passed through the Fangs. They were there, just out of the light’s reach. He could smell them, hear them, feel them.
He had destroyed Fox and Patûk Al’Banan—men he had killed in his world, cursed to haunt Erik in his dreams. While he stayed in the Lord of the East’s keep, he saw them, in a waking dream. They came to him, and he knew it was one of the few times they could actually kill him. But Ilken’s Blade was with him, and when he struck them down, they burst into a thousand points of light, and he knew—how, he didn’t quite know—they were gone forever.
So, Erik wondered which man he had killed would be leading the undead now. He heard their breathing, their shuffling about, and their cursing, but they weren’t quite as aggressive as they once were. Perhaps the Shadow had yet to find them a new leader. It didn’t matter. Erik would stay awake and keep them at bay, and when they woke, they would not only face the undead but living demons as well.
11
Erik awoke, the torches in the middle of the tunnel waning, flickering with the last bit of light they had to give. He rubbed his eyes. He hadn’t meant to sleep, and his slumber was dreamless. He stood. The tunnel looked so pale, the waning light against the gray stone. His companions still slept, and rather soundly. They didn’t even snore. They didn’t move, not even the lifting of the chest with each breath. He touched his cousin’s shoulder. It was cold. His skin was pale. He was dead.
His slumber wasn’t dreamless. He was dreaming now.
“When will you realize that I know I am dreaming?” Erik asked the darkness. “This doesn’t scare me. They are alive, in my world, in the land of the living.”
He spoke to the darkness, and he could feel the presence of the dead, but his dream felt different somehow.
“For now,” the hissing chorus said, coming from the darkness in all directions.
“Shall we do this, then?” Erik asked, drawing Ilken’s Blade. “Will we fight until I wake? How many of you will I destroy tonight?”
They said nothing. They were scared. Erik smiled, but there was no mirth in the gesture, and his smile quickly faded as a shadow extended across the palely lit space in which he stood. He turned as he heard footsteps, and a figure came into the faint light.
“You,” Erik hissed.
Rotten flesh hung from his face, and tattered clothes and broken armor hung from his body. Both an arm and a leg looked as if they had been sown back on, and, around the stitching, his skin had turned black and rolled with the swarm of maggots that ate at his dead flesh.
“You remember me, do you?” the dead man said. His voice was ripe with the condescending tone of nobility.
“I do,” Erik replied. “I remember trying to give you mercy. I remember you being a fool. I remember you sending men to their deaths without care.” Erik looked at the stitching about the arm and leg. “It seems the trolls did get to you, yes?”
The dead man scowled, revealing a mouth of blackened teeth.
“You are a pompous little shite, aren’t you?” the dead man asked. “They warned me about you.”
“Who? Them?” Erik asked with a laugh. “I must be really getting under your skin, at least, those of you who still have skin.”
“Laugh all you like,” the dead man said. “You think you are so powerful. You remember me, but do you remember my name?”
Erik tried to think, but he couldn’t recall it. He remembered despising the man, thinking him a coward and cruel man, but he had never thought to commit his name to memory.
“Sorben Phurnan,” the dead man said.
“Sorben Phurnan,” Erik repeated. “Puppet of Patûk Al’Banan.”
“I was no puppet,” the man sneered and then began to laugh. The chorus of the dead joined him. “Remember my name well, for it is the name of the man who will spell your doom.”
It was Erik’s turn to laugh. Sorben Phurnan meant for his threat to be bone-chilling and scary, but Erik couldn’t help but think it was the pathetic attempt of an even more wretched man trying to act strong and powerful.
“Is the Shadow so desperate for broken souls to lead his undead that he chose you?” Erik asked.
Sorben Phurnan’s smile faded. He was once a lieutenant in Patûk Al’Banan’s army of defectors. Erik knew little of the man, but from what he saw at the battle of the green glen, he wasn’t a very good leader.
“It looks like you became troll dung,” Erik said with a smirk. “It’s too bad you aren’t wandering the dream world as a pile of scat. That might be rather entertaining in what has become rather droll dreams.”
“Joke all you want, Erik Eleodum,” Sorben said. “Your time is coming.”
“That’s what Fox said,” Erik replied, “and now he’s gone forever.”
As soon as he mentioned that about Fox, Erik remembered what someone had told him about his dreams. Most of the time, he dreamed of a wide-open grassy field with a single hill. A weeping willow stood atop the hill, and a man sat under that willow tree. Erik knew the man, from somewhere, but he could never tell and, just as he thought he remembered who the man was, he would awake. But that man warned him, once, about taunting the dead.
Erik’s smile faded.
“Are we fighting or what?” he asked. “I need to get back to my world and fight more tunnel crawlers.”
“No,” Sorben said, “no fighting today.”
Erik heard the sound of hissing and clawing in the darkness. It wasn’t the undead. Sorben looked scared and the shadow in the pale light deepened.
“The Shadow Children,” Sorben hissed. He looked scared as he backed up into the darkness. “They will have their fun with you. I will see you soon enough.”
Sorben cackled, although his laughter sounded forced, and the undead that followed him joined in. The walls of the tunnel shook with their enjoyment, and the dead man continued to back up into the shadows until Erik could no longer see him.
Erik awoke, sweat beading down his forehead. His cousin and the dwarves were already up, sitting around the circle of torches they had made to shed light on their makeshift camp.
“So much for our fearless leader staying awake and watching out for us while we slept,” Bryon said, smiling.
“Why didn’t you wake me?” Erik asked.
“We know you don’t normally sleep,” Turk said, “so we figured you deserved it.”
“I guess I didn’t realize how tired I was,” Erik said. “Are you ready?”
Turk nodded.
They hadn’t walked but a league when Nafer grabbed Bryon’s arm and stopped him.
“I hear something,” the dwarf said.
“What is it?” Bryon asked.
“I hear it too,” Beldar said.
“It sounds like scratching,” Turk explained, “and growling.”
“Great,” Bryon muttered cynically.
“I can’t see a thing,” Erik
said.
A deafening screech echoed off the walls, and all six of them winced at the sound.
“More tunnel crawlers,” Turk muttered indignantly.
“Son of a whore,” Bryon whispered dejectedly.
A scratching sound slowly crept through the tunnel. It was followed by a high-pitched grumble, then several bird-like chirps. Another chirp and grumble, different from the first, answered the first sounds. The noises of heavy sniffing filled the stale air around the company. The noise rose to a chorus of noises inspecting the air. The sound was like a myriad of nails scratched against stone slab, grating at ears and sending shivers up the spine.
“There is more than one this time,” Turk said, a worried edge to his voice.
“Get ready,” Bryon said from the back of their group.
Erik turned to see his cousin gripping his sword with both hands, an adrenaline fueled look on his face that showed a combination of both fear and excitement. Just for a moment, Erik was taken back to their childhood and Bryon’s expression as he prepared to jump down into a deep waterfall. Then the sniffing stopped, and a tense silence filled the tunnel. It was so quiet, Erik wondered if he had gone deaf.
Then, in an instant, an opus of shrieking, gurgling, and screaming erupted that jangled every nerve in Erik’s body, and as that quieted, he heard the scratching of claws against stone. As thin, gray shadows flickered in and out of sight at the edge of the party’s firelight, Bryon pushed his way to the front of the party.
“Bastards!” he seethed, “we’ll kill them all.”
Four tunnel crawlers appeared in the torchlight, all scampering across the walls like giant, four-legged insects. When one of the creatures closed in on them, it jumped from the wall to the floor, growling and snarling on all fours, back arched like an angry cat. It leapt at Erik, but as soon as it was in the air, Turk swung his axe. It dodged that attack, curling itself into a ball initially, but soon reverted to its normal shape and landed on all fours. It screamed and spat at Erik, but the sound changed to a manic gurgling as he brought his sword down upon the monster’s head, and Ilken’s Blade cleaved through its face down to its shoulders.
Erik breathed heavy, almost gagging on the smell of the tunnel crawler’s blood. His own adrenaline kicked in again with the kill, and he felt his heart speed up even more as he knew others were coming. He turned and saw them bounce from wall to wall to roof, lashing out with their hideous, snake-like tongues and sniffing the air around them. Spears and swords jabbed at the monsters while Turk’s axe swiped back and forth, but shadow and speed and a seemingly supernatural sense seemed to thwart every attack. And then the creatures’ own assault would come, quick and then gone, scratching to draw a drop of blood there. It was nothing mortal, but enough to wear down their prey.
One tunnel crawler jumped out of sight onto the roof, and Erik could hear it skittering along above them, in the darkness. He tried to follow the sound and keep his eyes on the other two in front of them, but the thing finally moved out of the darkness above, leaping down onto Beldar’s back, clawing at his throat and face. Beldar dropped his spear and screamed, punching backward. Every time he swung, the tunnel crawler jerked its head sideways only to bite at the dwarf’s knuckles and wrists. Nafer rushed forward and managed to grab the monster around the neck with his good arm. He pulled hard, choking the beast. It gagged and hissed, then threw its head back, throwing its hard, gray skull into Nafer and breaking his nose.
Nafer immediately let go of the tunnel crawler, his eyes watering and blood flowing from his nostrils. As he stepped backward, stunned and clutching his nose, the tunnel crawler released Beldar’s neck, put its feet into his back, pushed him forward so that he fell on his face, and turned to Nafer. It growled, its tongue flicking and salivating as it smelled blood. Nafer knew it was there, but he couldn’t see because of his watering eyes. Just as the tunnel crawler was about to attack, it paused for a moment, and that was enough; Bofim rammed his spear into its ribs.
As he retracted the blade, blood and other body fluids spilled onto the floor. Nafer kicked out at the injured tunnel crawler, and the toe of his boot, capped with an iron plate, shattered the monster’s teeth. Bofim jumped over Beldar, who was still lying on the floor, and brought his axe down onto the creature’s neck several times until the head rolled from its body, and it slumped to the floor in a gray heap.
Bryon blocked another attack with his sword, the heat of his magical blade burning the tunnel crawler’s hand. The monster hissed and jumped up into the darkness of the roof. Bryon lifted his sword, the magic flaring and the light brightening until they could see the creature up there, clinging to stone. Now thrown, Bofim’s spear flew at this one, but it easily dodged the attack, the spear ricocheting off the roof and into the darkness.
The creature appeared in front of Bryon again, and he snapped his sword down hard, with an angry grunt. The tunnel crawler grabbed at the blade with both hands, seeking to push it away, but the momentum of Bryon’s attack was too much, and the steel cleaved through its face. The blade’s magic flared again and, before the creature realized it’s injury, its hands and head caught fire. As flesh and bone burned away, it screamed and howled, frozen from pain. Bryon brought his sword down on the thing’s head several more times until nothing was left but its burning torso.
The last tunnel crawler had reached out, grabbing Erik’s ankle and catching him by surprise. He expected the creature to leap on him, but apparently it had learned from its comrades’ deaths and stayed in the darkness, its clawed hands wrapped around Erik’s ankle, the rest of its body in the darkness. For such a thin, emaciated thing, it had immense strength, and Erik felt himself being pulled rapidly along the tunnel floor. He had lost his torch and, even though he still held Ilken’s Blade, once he entered the darkness, he would be in this monster’s realm … he would also be in their realm.
He could hear them laughing, cheering, and crying out in victory, their voices so distant and, yet, so loud. He could hear Sorben Phurnan. But still, the dead man’s laughter sounded forced, afraid even.
“Turk! Bryon!” Erik cried out.
He could hear the tunnel crawler growling, hissing with glee. At first, he tried kicking out, but then, he felt paralyzed, as if the dead were holding his arms and legs still from the other side, reaching through to him from the dream world. He didn’t smell their stink, or sense the chill of their presence. Rather, he felt hot, like fire blowing against his face, and if shadows could grow darker, they did.
He saw a flash of light, and a small hand axe twirled by before a spear flew overhead. He heard footsteps and shouting, and a quick scream and hiss before he felt the grip on his ankle release. He then smelled burning flesh before the intensity of the light began to increase, as did the stink of burning.
As the light faded again, Erik started to get up, knowing his companions were there, watching him, waiting on him. Bryon had even offered him his hand, but he needed just a little more time to gather himself, to make sure he didn’t piss himself and accept he wasn’t dreaming, but truly still alive. He sat up, staring at the pile of burning tunnel crawler, its body rapidly turning to ash as had those of the others who had felt Bryon’s blade. Erik took a deep breath and shook his head; he hadn’t been that frightened in a long time, and they—the dead—would have felt it. He had felt them, but they weren’t close. They were distant, waiting. Erik raised an eyebrow.
“Erik, are you all right?” Turk asked, putting a hand on the man’s shoulder.
Erik looked up at his friend. Despite his shorter stature—although rather tall for many dwarves—he had gigantic qualities about him. He was well-muscled, even more so than the strongest-looking men, and his beard had grown even longer, forcing him to twist it into four braids and then twist those braids together. But the dwarf had a warming smile, and the biggest thing about Erik’s friend was his heart. His concern was genuine as his eyes looked down at Erik, just sitting there, and, at that moment, Erik felt blessed to be a
mongst these warriors. He pushed himself to his knees and then his feet. Now, looking down at his dwarvish friend, he put a hand on his shoulder and nodded.
“I am now, thanks to you,” Erik said with a smile.
“I didn’t do much,” Turk replied. “It was mostly your cousin and his elvish sword.”
“How hard is that, giving your thanks to something that is elvish?” Erik asked, and Turk answered with a short laugh.
Even though the elves had retreated into the vast forests of Ul’Erel long ago, a contempt and almost hatred between them and the dwarves existed. It was ages old and deeper than any wound.
“As I have learned to love men as much as I love my brother dwarves,” Turk replied, “I think I have also learned to let go of my disdain for elves. Of course, I have never met one, but I do hope, if given the chance one day, I would give him or her the opportunity to prove themselves deserving of respect as one of An’s creations … even if they do have pointed ears.”
Turk and Erik laughed together, and it felt good to experience some semblance of happiness in such a dark and evil place.
“Disgusting,” Bryon said, his nose wrinkled in a look of repulsion. He spat on the pile of ash that was once the tunnel crawler trying to carry Erik away into the darkness.
Turk stared into the darkness, a scowl replacing his recent smile.
“What did you see from the sword’s burning light? Were there more?” Erik asked.
“Many more,” Turk replied. “There must have been two dozen lurking in the darkness, but when Bryon struck the one that had a hold of you, his sword flared, even brighter than before. It was as if it could sense the presence of the Shadow.” The dwarf pointed to the pile of ash that was once Erik’s attacker.
But what Erik had felt was something different, something just as dark and evil, but not the Shadow. It wasn’t cold and distant, but hot and suffocating and, even though the dead were there, they waited, in the distance, far away, just as afraid as Erik was.
“Before that one caught fire, several others came to try and get the body, no doubt as a meal later,” Turk continued, “but they were consumed by the flames. Several ran as they caught fire, setting alight more tunnel crawlers and so on until the whole tunnel was alight with burning monsters.”
Dragon Sword: Demon's Fire Book 1 Page 10
