by Mel Odom
An invisible force scooped up a load of muck-encrusted earth. Water and young toads spilled off the sides of the earthen burden, plopping down into the hole that rapidly drained the nearby marshlands.
Taking cover behind a young elderberry tree, inhaling the sweet scent of the blossoms and aware of the bees working the flowers around him with no concern at all, Haarn prepared a spell, sheathing his scimitar. He touched the symbol of Silvanus at his throat and threw out his hand.
The trees around the skeleton bent and snaked their branches down toward the undead creature.
The beam of red light leaping from the jewel slashed through the tree branches. The smoldering limbs dropped into the shallow water of the marshlands, hissed, and sank beneath the dirty surface.
The clump of mud writhed and jerked into motion. The mud flew into the air and came down in a sprawling mass.
Not believing what he was seeing, Haarn watched as a creature forced itself to an erect position.
Shamblers, also called shambling mounds, lived in warm wetlands and underground caverns. Carnivores, they hunted animals even as big as they were. Haarn generally left them alone unless they unduly threatened a local animal population.
Like the other shamblers Haarn had seen, this one resembled a huge mass of rotting vegetation until it stood and revealed its humanoid shape. Two massive tree trunk legs, each sprouting root-like appendages as thick as Haarn's forearms, supported the creature. While the body of the shambler was yellowish brown, the same as the mud and muck of the marshlands, the two arms showed green as if freshly grown. The arms stretched out over twice the shambler's height, and moved like whips. Only a short distance from the shoulder, the arms each flared out into two pieces that looked like vines.
The shambler snapped out one of its vinelike arms. The arm sailed through the air with uncanny accuracy for a creature that seemed to have no eyes, and struck Broadfoot's shoulder. The attack ripped through the bear's fur and opened a crimson gash nearly a foot long.
Blood wept from the bear's terrible wound and matted fur. Angry and in pain, Broadfoot reared to his full height and started for the shambler. The shambler reacted at once, flailing the bear with the lashlike appendages that made up its arms. More bloody welts opened up on Broadfoot's body, but the bear didn't give ground.
"No!" Haarn yelled, yanking his scimitar free again.
He pushed away from the tree and ran at the shambler, certain Broadfoot would be slain before he could get away. Behind the shambler, the skeleton turned and started into the forest, making its way east again. Before Haarn covered the distance to the shambler, the skeleton had disappeared.
The shambler drew back its right arm again and whipped it forward. The smack of tentacles against the bear's flesh was interrupted by a sucking sound. As Haarn braced himself in the mud, he saw the blue-dyed fletching of an arrow jutting from the lump atop the shambler's shoulders. As he chopped at the tentacle that wrapped around one of the bear's legs, Haarn saw another arrow pierce the shambler not two inches from the first.
Haarn hacked at the arm holding Broadfoot. He brought the scimitar down in a two-handed swing. The blade cleaved deeply into the creature's muck and vegetation flesh and left gaping wounds that would have killed anything mortal. Even the shamblers Haarn had encountered before would have been seriously injured and probably withdrawn from the fight.
The creature released its hold on Broadfoot.
"Back," Haarn told the bear, grabbing a handful of fur and urging Broadfoot away from the shambler.
Haarn stayed with the bear, glancing back the way he'd come. Haarn spotted Druz already fitting a third arrow to her string.
"Aim for its chest," he called. "There's an organ that serves as its mind. That's the only way you can kill it."
Readjusting her position and stepping around a clump of brush, Druz steadied, then fired again.
The arrow flashed by Haarn less than a foot to his left. There was no warning from the shambler as it raced forward again, pursuing Haarn and Broadfoot even while Druz's arrow was in flight. The third arrow took the shambler in the shoulder, and if it hurt the big creature at all, it didn't show in the way it moved.
The threat drew an immediate response from Broadfoot. The bear shrugged off Haarn's tugging hand and gave in to instinct.
Haarn stepped away, setting himself in the mud, and watched helplessly as the bear met the shambler's lunge. Though Broadfoot was the taller of the two, even the great bear didn't have the shambler's bulk. When the shambler slammed into Broadfoot, the force of the impact carried the bear backward. Broadfoot tried to stand his ground, but the mud gave way beneath his clawed feet.
Another arrow feathered the shambler's chest, and Haarn silently acknowledged Druz's skill with the bow. Even with four arrows in it, the dread creature wasn't slowed at all. Two of the shafts snapped off as it fought Broadfoot.
The bear stood his ground, leaning on the shambler's greater bulk and managing through sheer strength and rage to hold the monster back. The shambler's vinelike arms whipped again, leaving furrows of torn and bloody flesh. During the next attack, the shambler wrapped the two appendages at the end of its left arm around the bear's broad upper body and tightened its grip. The shambler's rootlike feet plunged into the ground and took hold.
Locked down as it was and holding Broadfoot, Haarn knew that the shambler was at its most vulnerable-and most deadly. The constricting power of even a normal shambler could break a man in half. The bear would only take longer.
Haarn prayed to Silvanus for his next spell, then unleashed the power within him as Broadfoot's growls of rage tightened to shrill agony. With the constricting coils around him, Broadfoot couldn't take another breath. If the bear's ribs didn't shatter and pierce his heart, then he was doomed to a slow death by suffocation.
Gripping the scimitar, Haarn hurled himself at the creature. He knew it was aware of him by the way it moved its body, but it had already chosen its victim and the only way it could engage Haarn was to release the bear.
Haarn stepped behind the shambler, praying that his spell would work in time. Holding the scimitar in both hands, he drove it deeply into the creature's broad back. Nearly a foot of steel penetrated the shambler's body before the scimitar stuck. A frantic buzz reached the druid's ears, and he knew at once it was the horde of flying carrion beetles his spell had summoned. He just didn't know if they were arriving in time.
The shambler shifted slightly as Broadfoot's wailing blows finally died away and the bear slumped in the creature's vine-arms.
Fearing the bear was dead, hoping his companion was only unconscious, Haarn shoved the scimitar harder. The wound gaped more obscenely and made sucking noises like a man pulling his boot from mud, then the flying beetles arrived.
Sunlight and shadow alternately dappled the insects' hard carapaces as they streaked toward the shambler. Haarn held the wound open. Some of the beetles flew into the gaping hole, but others clustered over the shambler's back, forming a hard crust of chitin-covered bodies.
Haarn ripped the scimitar free of the wound, satisfied the gorging mass of beetles would keep it open, and sprinted around the shambler. If the creature felt the invasion of its body, it gave no indication.
At the shambler's side, still gripping the muddied scimitar, Haarn brought the blade crashing down into the vinelike arm that was wrapped around Broadfoot. The bear's legs twitched and his eyes were closed, but the druid knew his companion was alive.
Druz stepped into place on the other side of the shambler. She'd dropped her bow somewhere behind her, but she wielded her long sword with grim intensity.
The shambler released its hold on Broadfoot. Weak and helpless, the bear dropped into the mud, but Haarn heard the whoosh of air sucked into Broadfoot's lungs.
Crouching again, pulling the massive tree trunk legs free of the ground, the shambler faced Haarn in eerie silence.
The druid's senses, so finely tuned to everything in nature, registered nothing
from the shambler. During his years serving the balance, Haarn had seldom encountered such a thing. Even corpses, those left to rot and decompose as a natural progression, never resonated such a vacuum.
The shambler drew back an arm, getting ready to whip it forward.
Haarn gave ground, slipping in the nearly knee-deep muddy water. He took a fresh grip on his scimitar and glanced at Druz, who had also backed away.
"The skeleton!" the druid gasped. "Don't let it get away."
"You can't face this thing alone," Druz objected.
"Go! We can't afford to lose the skeleton!"
"I'm not going to leave you!" Druz argued.
Haarn had no more time to argue. The shambler focused on him, whipping its arm forward.
"We both need to get out of here," Druz said.
Haarn leaped to the side, hurling himself from the path of the shambler's strike. The vine appendages cut deeply into the wet ground.
Shoving himself up, Haarn glanced at Broadfoot. The bear still hadn't regained enough strength to rejoin the battle. He didn't have enough strength to escape either, but Haarn knew escape wasn't an option. The shambler had to be destroyed.
Shifting again, the shambler focused on Haarn, whipping its arms at him so rapidly it seemed the air was full of them. The druid turned some of the attacks away with the scimitar, and others he managed to avoid, but his skill and speed wasn't going to save him forever. Already his breath rasped in his throat and the taste of the sour mud made him want to retch. His arm and leg muscles burned.
The shambler ignored Druz's attacks, concentrating on Haarn, who leaped and dived through the water and across the muddy ground as quickly as he could. Nothing human could have moved as fast as he was moving, but then, nothing human pursued him. He leaped again, arcing high over the vines that streaked for him, flipped easily by tucking his knees into his chest, and came down-then what had been inevitable on the uncertain terrain finally happened. His moccasins came down, thudding into the mud, and the loose earth gave way beneath him. Haarn flailed, trying desperately to gain his feet again, but there was no time.
The shambler flung an arm forward. The vinelike appendages wrapped around Haarn's ankles and lower leg with bone-breaking force. Freeing one hand from the scimitar, he grabbed for an exposed root revealed by the sloshing water. His strength held against the monster's but only for a moment. Renewed agony flared through his legs as the shambler reset itself and yanked upward. Haarn's vision blurred, and he almost passed out from the pain as his knees and hips seemed to come apart. He shot into the air.
With astonishing ease, the shambler held the druid upside down by his legs. Haarn spun crazily, still managing to grip the scimitar. Blood rushed to his head in a thunderous roar and caused black spots in his vision, but he clung to his senses.
The shambler stumbled, one massive tree-rooted foot coming up from the ground. The huge body writhed, back arching as it strove to remain erect.
Haarn saw movement in the center of the shambler's chest only a moment before it burst open and revealed the carrion beetles still gorging. Foaming yellow sap filled the wound, and several of the beetles were dead.
Looking at the damage the swarm of insects had done, Haarn knew that even as fast as they worked they wouldn't be able to destroy enough of the creature to save him. As the druid spun again, he saw Broadfoot shifting, striving to get to his feet, but not enough strength remained in the bear. Druz would only serve to get herself killed if she stayed and tried to help.
Haarn prayed to Silvanus as he accepted his fate. The Keeper of the Balance remained neutral in the laws of nature, between predator and prey, but Haarn couldn't believe Silvanus was going to stand by and allow him to be killed by the undead shambling mound summoned by the blasphemous skeleton.
Still, he knew he had to struggle. The fight for life was innate within him no matter how futile that fight appeared. He gripped the scimitar in both hands and tried to summon the remaining strength from his body. He doubled up, curling in on himself, then swiped at the appendage that dangled him so easily. The heavy blade cleaved into the thing's arm, and Haarn felt it shiver all through his dangling body. A fine mist of yellow sap sprayed out, soaking into the druid's clothing. Before Haarn could strike again, the shambler whipped him around and slammed him into the ground like a wildcat shaking a rat. For an instant, the druid was submerged in one of the deep pools. He clawed at the mud with his free hand, slapping cold handfuls over his legs, hoping the lubrication would break the shambler's grip. Effortlessly, the shambler pulled him into the air again. Roaring blood filled Haarn's head, and he stared down at the large rocks that studded the marshlands. If he landed on one of those, his head would split open or his shoulder would be crushed. The shambler shivered again, and Haarn dared hope that the rampage of the carrion beetles had had more of an effect than he had at first supposed. Instead, the druid noticed that he could see through the shambler. The hole was almost large enough for a full-grown man to crawl through. None of the carrion beetles remained alive. There was no hope, but Haarn steeled himself to grip the scimitar again with both hands. He could not die, not without fighting. Frightened birds cried out from the treetops, creating a mad cacophony of screeches and whistles, then a voice Haarn knew-and sometimes feared-rang out from somewhere below.
*****
Clad in fine robes that bore a hood to hide his features, which were further masked by an illusion spell to help him pass as human, Borran Kiosk strode the dockyards of Alagh?n with impunity. No one recognized him, but all assumed he was a rich merchant or perhaps even a lord come down out of Alagh?n or elsewhere in Turmish. The mohrg gazed out from under his cowl and smelled the blood of the living around him. He could almost taste their flesh. His thick purple tongue moved restlessly. One quick flick was all it would take, then the captains, crew, cargo handlers, and merchants would know he was among them. They would all run, fearing for their lives. The image was delicious. "No," Allis whispered. Borran Kiosk growled. They walked, arms touching, down the dockyards alongside a merchanter frigate called Mistress Talia that flew the colors of Sespech. "If you reveal yourself here," the werespider said, "you will only get us both killed." "Perhaps not," Borran Kiosk challenged. "You will earn Malar's wrath. Better to earn his appreciation." The threat grew thin on Borran Kiosk. He gazed along the docks. Even in late afternoon, Alagh?n labored to shift cargo and carry on trade. The harbor was filled with ships of all sizes, flying flags from lands all around the Sea of Fallen Stars. The ships lining the docks were unloaded first. Other ships at anchor in the harbor waited to be unloaded, but some of the smaller vessels-cogs and caravels that serviced coastal waters-off-loaded onto small boats that brought the cargo ashore. Boom arms brought cargo off in huge nets, and the sounds of boatswains' yells and curses to direct the teams pierced the conversations going on around them. Turmishan merchants, their heads covered in turbans and their beards cut square, dickered with ships' captains on the docks or led them to the dockyard taverns and inns where they could ply them with wine, women, and song. Fishermen still hawked their wares from carts, though not many were buying. The clatter of humanity, who were always moving and always noisy, rolled around Borran Kiosk. It was almost too much to bear. "Take it up!" a man yelled from Mistress Talia's upper deck. "She's all together now, she is!" A boom arm near Borran Kiosk shifted as sweaty, grunting men bore down on it. The freighter bobbed in the harbor as the load came off her deck. Water shifted and slapped against the freighter's barnacle-encrusted hull. "She's clear!" the man above called out. A young bard sat on a stack of crates near the boardwalk and strummed her yarting. From the hesitant starts she made, Borran Kiosk surmised that the bard was composing. A smile that the mohrg couldn't show, since he lacked a face, dawned inside him as he heard the words.
"Borran Kiosk, Still reeking fresh from the grave, Faced down the Alagh?n Watch — At least, those who were brave. Heroes died that night, Eaten by the… by the flames Of the mohrg's evil wizardry. Borran
Kiosk, just another of death's names."
Borran Kiosk looked at Allis and said, "They sing of me." Allis nodded, but her gaze was on the merchanter. "We are taking this ship?" Borran Kiosk asked, divining her interest. He hadn't sailed much, hadn't been aboard a ship since he'd been brought back from the grave, and only a few times when he'd worn flesh and blood. Nodding, the werespider said, "I booked passage for us to Sespech." "I don't want to go to Sespech," Borran Kiosk said, and he had no intention of doing so. "We're not," Allis said. "That's where the ship is bound. The destination will change when we take over the ship." She looked at him with her opal gaze and added, "You have the power to turn men to you, to kill them and raise them again from the dead, and you have more power than that. The ship will be ours." Borran Kiosk looked at the frigate with clearer understanding and some humor. Turning to face her, Borran Kiosk leaned in closely, so closely that she wouldn't be able to miss the fires that burned in his hollow eyes. "Not ours," he told her. "Mine. They will be mine." Nostrils flaring and color showing on her cheeks, Allis hesitated a moment, pride warred with fear. Fear won, he could see it in her eyes, and she nodded. "As you say," she said. Allis turned from him, giving her attention to the sailor standing at the boarding ramp. "We have passage," she said. "Aye, ma'am," the sailor replied. He was short and lean, his clothing heavily tarred against the elements. "I'll be after havin' yer names, I will. To check against the ship's manifests the quartermaster keeps, ye see. Cap'n Ralant runs a tight ship, he does." He looked up, placed his fingers in his teeth, and whistled. "Hey! Vonnis!" One of the men aboard Mistress Talia turned and looked down. "What do ye want, Durgel?" "Two to ship aboard, sir," Durgel responded. "Awfully damned early, if you ask me," the older man said, taking a stylus and ship's log from under his arm. "We didn't ask you," Allis said. Bristling, the sailor said, "Don't go getting airs with me, woman." Unleashing the anger that filled him, Borran Kiosk spoke and gestured. The sailor at the top of the gangplank grabbed his neck and dropped to his knees. His face reddened, and he couldn't breathe. "Vonnis!" Durgel cried, racing up the gangplank. Allis turned to Borran Kiosk with an angry look. "What are you doing?" the werespider asked. "Getting us aboard," Borran Kiosk replied, "in a manner that will be more… tolerable." He started up the gangplank as the first sailor tried to tend to the second. "You will alert them," Allis whispered, hesitating for an instant before she followed him up the gangplank. Borran Kiosk swept the ship's deck with his gaze. Durgel tried valiantly to help Vonnis, but the sailor wasn't even aware of the magical constriction the mohrg used. The other men around the dockyards kept to their work, and only a few curious stares came from Mistress Talia's crew. Drawing even with the two sailors as Durgel fought to hold Vonnis down while crying out for help, Borran Kiosk gazed down at the man he'd afflicted. "Someone get a healer!" Durgel told one of the nearby crewmen. "Ol' Vonnis is havin' himself an attack of some kind, he is!" Borran Kiosk spoke again, removing the constriction from around the quartermaster's neck. Vonnis gasped like a dog on a too-hot day. His eyes filled with fear as he gazed at Borran Kiosk. "Ye did this?" Durgel demanded, rising and reaching for the skinning knife that hung at his hip. Before he could pull his knife, Allis had one of her own only an inch from his eye. Sunlight glinted on the razor-sharp edge. "No," she said.
