by Aaron Bunce
He grabbed him by the upper arm and jerked him back towards the archway. Iona staggered and finally managed to tear his gaze away from the horror, as it smoothly ambled off the ground again.
“Hun, let’s go!” Gor snapped, hooking his counterpart by the arm and wrenching him around.
“Argh…no,” Hun snarled and spat, fighting and kicking.
“Go…while we still can,” Thorben hissed into Iona’s ear. The broker managed a nod, his eyes wide and mouth pulled tight.
“I ran it through twice. Why isn’t it staying down?” he heard Hun ask, as the two men continued to argue. Thorben heard blades stabbing into flesh over and over, metal swinging, cutting and smacking against bone and sinew.
They turned and made it several paces towards the exit, a large form darting out to block them. Renlo held his spear out to block the exit, his eyes nervously flicking between Thorben and over his shoulder to Gor and Hun.
“This…none of this is what we expected. The dead…they’re rising…somehow. Please, let us just go. This isn’t about treasures anymore. We just want to live. Me, my daughter, and Thorben, we just want to live. We’re not fighters,” Iona said, speaking before Thorben.
The guildsman twisted to look past them, blinking rapidly, his hands clenching and unclenching around the spear shaft. He coughed, started to speak, seemed to choke on the words, and backed them up with a threatening jab of the spear. Thorben could see it in Renlo’s eyes – the bewilderment, the shock and horror, but mostly, the fear.
“Please, Renlo, I know you don’t want to hurt us. We don’t want to cause you or the guild any trouble. Iona just wants to get his daughter to safety, and I would very much like to hold my wife and children again. None of us have to die down here,” Thorben said, stepping forward until the spear tip came to rest against his sternum. He met the man’s dark eyes and refused to look away or back down. He trusted that deep down inside Renlo there was a decent man, a man eager to be like the king in the verse he recited for them earlier in the crypts.
“But Gor…” Renlo swallowed his words and looked back to his large counterpart, just as Hun chopped his sword down, severing the ambling horror’s left arm at the shoulder.
He suddenly pulled the spear back and nervously nodded for them to go. Thorben pulled Jez and Iona by but stopped, as a pair of shadows moved through the arch, shambling slowly their way. They were too late.
How…how are the dead moving? Death and dust, I should have been faster. We should have gotten out of here by now!
A desiccated figure appeared from the distant chamber, colliding with the first two corpses and knocking them to the ground. It ran towards Renlo, its limbs and joints snapping and popping, each and every movement a disjointed and horrific mockery. The tattered remains of a white dress hung over its shoulders, withered, shrunken breasts and long wispy hair the only indicators that it had once been female. A long scar marred her face, the flesh under it hanging in a torn flap, exposing yellowed bone and stringy tendons beneath.
Thorben grabbed Renlo and pulled him around, the big man grunting and cursing in surprise. The female corpse wailed and staggered stiffly, clawing at the air where the guildsman had just stood, before tumbling in an ungainly sprawl in the mist.
“There are more!” Thorben cried, as the two in the archway regained their feet and approached. They groaned and clicked, their exposed teeth gnashing the air. Renlo whirled about and caught the first with the spear, the creature giving no indication it felt the bladed tip pierce its body. The big man ripped the spear free, the corpse staggering to the side while its counterpart shuffled in around it.
“Thorben!” Iona yelled as the female lurched off the ground and came at Jez, its teeth and joints creaking and popping loudly. He jumped forward and swung the hammer, catching the creature in the left shoulder. The impact swung her around, the withered flesh cracking and tearing.
“They’re dreygur…like in the old stories. They have to be…the dead that refuse to rest, but it’s impossible,” Thorben gasped, but struggled to believe his own words. Those stories were old…they were just lore. Or were they?
“Iona, get back. Renlo, I need your help,” he yelled, swinging at the dreygur again and missing. A form moved in before the corpse could lunge again, a sword blade erupting through her chest and driving her forward and to the ground.
Hun dropped a heavy boot onto the corpse’ back and stabbed the sword down again and again, punching half a dozen holes in the leathery skin. Gor stomped up, breathing hard and drove his spear hard into the dreygur at Hun’s feet, splitting the skull and pinning it to the ground.
“Go,” Thorben shouted, pushing Iona back towards the arch. Renlo and Hun jumped in front of them, stabbing and pushing another of the withered creatures back, its wail like a frigid, north wind.
They passed through the arch and into the hub. A hand clamped onto Thorben’s arm before he could follow and spun him around. Gor’s ashen face leaned in, his eyes wide.
“What is this, Owl?”
“I tried to tell you,” Thorben growled and ripped his arm away, taking a large step back and lifting the hammer threateningly. “Back there, at the crypt, I tried to tell you but you wouldn’t listen. We saw it in the other crypt, after the archway almost smashed us to death. They’re dreygur, just like in the old stories. The plants, the roots and trees growing on the crypts…I believe they were planted there for a reason…maybe to keep them from rising somehow. I don’t know why or how, it’s all so…well, none of it makes sense. They’re dalan…they’re magical. Maybe a part of them never really dies. All of this is beyond me.”
Thorben refused to shrink under the man’s glare, and lifted the hammer to strike when he shifted.
Gor smiled. “Dreygur? The dead…returned? What do you mean, ‘part of them never really dies’?”
“You saw it yourself. I can’t explain it…I’ve never seen anything like it, in any crypt on any other delve. The tales about the dreygur are old, back to Fanfir and ancient burial rites, but so are the dalan. They are just supposed to be stories, but think about it. We know the dalan are shapeshifters, beings of incredible power, grace, and magic. Where does that magic go when they die? Priests believe our soul escapes our bodies after our passing, and is either taken to the black lake of sorrow, and then the underworld, while a select few are chosen and taken to J’ohaven’s hall. What if the dalan’s magic remains in their bodies, after everything that makes them mortal leave? What if it is that magic that makes the dreygur live beyond death?”
Gor watched him, his forehead scrunching up.
“That is why you’re here, I guess, because you are crafty enough to ask all of those questions. I’m not like you, Thorben,” Gor said, surprisingly using his name. “I’m the hand of the fates, the guild’s muscle. I hurt people that need hurting, kill those that need killed, and collect that which needs gathered. Right now, they’re in our way, so I kill.”
And stab me in the back as soon as I turn, Thorben thought.
“Only a fool refuses to ask questions.”
“I like this new you, Owl. It’s like you found your stones, but the fates have already…”
“The fates be damned, Gor, and you along with them. I’m getting Iona and his daughter to safety. Everything else can wait,” Thorben interrupted and turned, pushing the broker and his daughter toward the exit.
Renlo led them into the tunnel to the crypt’s entrance chamber, Hun right behind him, the bag of relics clinking and rattling at this belt. He followed quickly, the ivy rustling quietly underfoot. The light from the next passage grew brighter as they followed the gradual curve, but Renlo planted a foot and stopped. Hun ran into his back, nearly skewering him with the sword.
“What the…” he groused, as Renlo swiped him with an elbow.
Thorben stepped cautiously out around the two men and swept the adjacent chamber with a quick glance. Renlo had stopped for good reason, as a small group of dreygur ambled slowly away from t
hem, moving in a rather unmotivated fashion towards the crypt doors and the maker’s shanty beyond. The massive, ghastly statues loomed on either side of the shambling horrors.
“Seven of them,” Renlo whispered, leaning towards Hun.
“We push through them, quick-like. You saw them back there, they ain’t fast or strong. Then there’s nothing between us and the exit and we walk in the sun again,” Hun hissed back, his nose squeaking quietly.
Thorben watched the horrible, withered creatures hobble through the ivy and counted. Seven, he thought, the hammer’s handle growing clammy against his palm. One in the first crypt, another in the room beyond the waterfall, and the guild took down three. That’s five. Twelve sarcophaguses, twelve dreygur. He just had to trust in the guildsman to get them through the creatures, and then he could figure out a way to get Iona and Jez to safety beyond that. Perhaps he could negotiate a new deal with Gor, if the big man didn’t kill him outright for his blasphemy about the fates.
Renlo and Hun kicked off and ran forward, the two men reaching the first dreygur together. Hun spun it around with a thrust of his sword, Renlo cutting in right after and driving his spear deep into its chest. The dreygur moaned, bits of dust pluming from its mouth and nose. Thorben managed forward as Hun cut down violently, striking the creature in the chest and knocking it off its feet.
The two guildsmen stepped over the body, moving as a team to take on the next. Thorben pulled Jez and Iona along, giving the fallen, emaciated corpse a wide birth. It shook, clicking and moaning, but didn’t get up.
Hun and Renlo took down two more dreygur in short order, their group working methodically through the crowd of staggering undead. Hope blossomed in Thorben’s chest as the two guildsmen cut down another, Jez and Iona picking their way carefully through the scattered bodies. The remaining three dreygur turned, groaning and clicking strangely.
“We’re almost through. Push,” Gor yelled, stomping up behind him.
Renlo readied his spear and moved to strike just as another loud cry rang out from the passage behind them. Thorben turned in time to see one of the dreygur amble out of the tunnel behind them, a piece of its head hanging off, a severed arm clutched loosely in its remaining hand. The female in the tattered white dress appeared next, a hole punched through the leathery skin covering her skull. The other dreygur ambled in right behind it, their bodies chopped apart and broken from the guild’s weapons.
“They’re nothing to be scared of. I’ve seen children put up more of a fight,” Hun laughed and turned, chopping at a horribly thin dreygur. Its eyes and mouth hung open like dark, bottomless pits, its long, jagged fingernails ripping at the air. Hun missed with his first strike, but cut back in a follow-up, the blade bouncing dully off the emaciated corpse’s arm. He kicked the dreygur, staggering it, and moved forward, cutting at its thin neck. The guildsman jerked awkwardly, the sword missing the mark. A dark form surged forth from the ivy, boney, disfigured fingers clutching greedily around his right leg.
“Look out!” Thorben yelled, as the dreygur bit into Hun’s leg.
“Argh,” the guildsman yelled, twisting about and cutting down at the creature. The blade bounced off spine and ribs, but the dreygur only pulled tighter to his leg.
Thorben jumped in to help, but something moved in the ivy between them, the motion barely registering in his peripheral vision. He spotted the dreygur moving in the bushy undergrowth, and then spotted another one.
“In the ivy,” he gasped, jumping back just as the creature lurched into view, swiping for his legs.
Renlo skewered a dreygur, pushing the creature back just as Hun stomped the corpse free from his leg. The dreygur tumbled into the ivy, blood covering its shriveled lips and nose. It opened and closed its mouth, bits of the guildsman’s skin stuck between its teeth. Its body started to shake violently.
Thorben sucked in a breath and turned to Gor, but the big man’s back was turned, his spear jabbing ferociously at a group of dreygur pushing in from the tunnel.
“Fire blasted hells, it took a chunk out of my leg. The damned thing tried to eat me,” Hun snarled and turned, just as the horribly thin dreygur fell over him, the withered flesh of its upper arm hanging loose.
The corpses appeared in their midst, rising out of the ivy, hands clasping and teeth snapping. Thorben smashed the closest in the face with his hammer, the strike knocking its head aside and breaking the jaw loose on one side.
Hun’s sword cut deep into the thin dreygur’s chest, but the creature pushed right through, its hands finding purchase on his arms and pulling it closer, sliding its body hilt-deep onto the blade.
Jez pulled free of her father and ducked right under the arms of one dreygur, falling to her knees as another lurched towards her. Iona hobbled back out of the way, jumping behind the largest of the statues – the six-limbed beast, to avoid the shambling, snapping corpse.
Renlo kicked a dreygur, knocking it onto its back, the withered corpse’s claw-like fingernails tearing off the left sleeve of his heavy jacket. He ducked forward to help Hun, jamming his spear clean through the emaciated dreygur, but it ignored the strike and pitched forward, biting into the guildsman’s meaty arm. Renlo released his grip on the spear and leaned in, tearing the shriveled figure off Hun and throwing it bodily against the wall.
The dreygur hit, grunted, and screeched, Hun’s sword and Renlo’s spear now sticking out of its body like a macabre pincushion. Thorben picked Jez up off the ground, yanking her around and swinging his hammer at the same time. He missed, and pushed Jez up onto a half wall between statues, jumping up to join her just as three dreygur fell forward, clawing at his legs.
Thorben pulled Jez behind the statue and around the other side, his heart thundering painfully in his chest. They ran out from the other side just as the dreygur impaled on Renlo’s spear screamed. Jez ran into his back as he stopped moving, and together they watched the emaciated figure shake and dance. It screamed again, the noise sending a cold shiver running throughout Thorben’s body. It wasn’t a dry, crackling moan anymore. It wasn’t a dead sound.
The ambling dreygur turned as one, shuffling on unsteady feet as the impaled corpse reached down and pulled the spear free. It moaned, fumbling with withered hands, pulling the guildsman’s sword from its body a fingerbreadth at a time, until the blade tumbled into the ivy.
Thorben wanted to run, to pull Jez to safety, but couldn’t seem to move his legs. The dreygur that bit Hun’s leg was moving behind the guildsman, its body shaking and changing, the withered and desiccated flesh crawling and moving. It coiled and jumped, landing on the big man’s back with almost no noise.
“Hun!” Gor bellowed, but the previously impaled dreygur screamed again, the alarmingly human sounding noise filling the cavern and drowning the big man out.
Hun spun, trying to wrestle the creature off his back as it snapped down again and again, biting his neck and the side of his face, teeth breaking and tearing away skin. Renlo ran forward to help, but the thin dreygur burst forward and slammed into him, the impact sending the considerably larger guildsman sprawling back in the ivy.
Thorben watched in horror as the corpses converged on Hun, the stout, muscular man spinning, kicking, and punching, flailing out into the walkway between statues before collapsing under their combined weight. Teeth and nails dug and tore clothing, ripping through and into meaty flesh. Hun screeched and cried, his voice quickly dying in a wet, raspy gargle.
You…need…to…move! he thought, and finally managed to move his feet. Jez sobbed, crying, her body shaking as she watched the mass of undead creatures tear Hun apart, his blood and ripped flesh spattering their bodies.
He pulled the girl forward, but she resisted, and then suddenly broke free. Thorben staggered after her, but refused to leave the safety of the statue’s shadow. He watched Jez jump down, stay low, and disappear behind the next statue down the line. A heartbeat later she reappeared, her father limping next to her. Together they moved back around the statues,
and hugging the far, right wall, cleared the mass of feeding dreygur.
Renlo stood just inside the massive, black doors, his haunted gaze stuck on the ground. He didn’t move, didn’t even seem to draw breath, until Thorben drew near.
“It…it…knocked me right off my feet. H-h-how? There wasn’t anything to it, no weight. I couldn’t get there…I couldn’t help him,” Renlo said, his eyes not moving.
“It wasn’t your fault. There is nothing you can do for him now. Come on, let’s go.” Thorben hooked the big man’s arm and tried to pull him around to the door, but he wouldn’t move. Hells, he felt as solid as a chunk of granite.
Jez pulled on his arm and they moved into the doorway, a massive, presence abruptly sliding between them, knocking Renlo to the side and looming above Thorben. Gor’s fetid breath fell on his face, the hulking man breaking Jez’s hold on his hand and swinging him around.
“Where are you going, Owl?” he growled, pushing Thorben to his knees. The big man stood over him, a glassy, crazed look haunting his eyes. “You’re not leaving yet…not yet,” he said, shaking the shiny, copper coin in the air right in front of his face, “Hun had the bag. Hun had my treasure.”
Thorben swallowed and half-turned, his gaze quickly sweeping over the walkway between rows of statues. The toes of Hun’s boots poked out of the thick, black ivy, the rest of his body covered in grasping, writhing bodies. He could hear claws tearing, teeth biting and tearing into muscle, sinew, and bone. A sick, twisting sensation pulled at his stomach, a sour taste creeping up his throat a moment later.
Gor waved the shiny coin in the air again, then flipped it and slapped it against his hand. “Hun is gone, as the fates decided. His death was to our benefit. We go and claim our treasure.” The big man stomped around him and carefully scooped the spear and sword out of the ivy, his gaze never leaving the feeding dreygur.
