The Corrupted

by Robert Earl - (ebook by Undead)

  Fargo howled with delight and, resisting the lure of scorched flesh, turned to find more victims.

  By now, they were running in short supply. Despite their starvation and their empty hands, the witch hunters had fought with a bloodthirsty savagery that had driven all before them. Here and there, knots of figures still struggled, and in the strange, shifting darkness of this new world, Fargo could see one of his brethren running down figures that had fled into the night.

  Most of the witch hunters were already feasting. The cauldron of stew lay spilled and forgotten as, all around, they tore the warm flesh from the bodies of their prey.

  Fargo felt his own hunger seize a hold of him, and turned back to finish off the man whose throat he had torn out. As his teeth tore off the first sliver of delicious meat, he could hear Vaught howling with the joy of victory.

  “Blood for our god!” he bellowed to the uncaring stars that glittered above, “Blood for the Blood God!”

  As Fargo swallowed, he suddenly found that he could remember his god’s name after all. He wiped a smear of blood from his lips, turned instinctively north, and mouthed the word in silent prayer.

  “Khorne,” he whispered, and from somewhere deep inside him, a voice answered back. Comforted, he returned to his feast.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Kerr was woken by the stabbing light of a brilliant dawn. He opened his eyes reluctantly and squinted across the glittering steppe. After the borealis that had raged the night before, it seemed almost dull.

  He yawned and stretched within the cocoon of his furs. Then, steeling himself against the chill, he rolled out from beneath the carriage. His teeth started to chatter, even as he pulled a rabbitskin jerkin over his head, and by the time he had started to make the breakfast fire, he was shivering.

  He had barely started to cook when the carriage door squeaked open and Titus bundled out onto the track they had been following.

  “Morning boss,” Kerr said, barely looking up from his tinderbox. Titus made no reply, just wandered off to stare silently towards the north. It wasn’t until Kerr had got the fire going, the flames twinkling gamely in the light of the morning sun, that he noticed what was wrong with his master.

  “Sigmar’s bones, boss, you should wear something against the chill. Aren’t you cold?”

  Titus turned reluctantly from his study of the northern skies, and looked bemusedly at his apprentice. Despite the fact that ice crystals were already forming on his beard, all he wore was a nightshirt. It clung to his body, tight enough to made him look like a sack of lard.

  “Cold?” he asked. “What do you mean?”

  A sudden gust of wind sent the flames higher, burning one side of Kerr’s hand even as it froze the other.

  “I mean it’s freezing,” he said. “Look.”

  He opened his mouth and yawned out a cloud of white vapour. Titus watched it without much interest.

  “Yes, I dare say you’re right, but anyway, it’s time to go. We don’t have time to waste. I want to go north, after Grendel, I mean,” he added, vaguely.

  “Right you are. I’ll have the bacon ready in just a minute.” Kerr brandished the frying pan at the sorcerer much as a villager might brandish garlic at a vampire.

  “No.” Titus waved away the suggestion. “No time for that. Just feed the horses and we’ll get going.”

  Kerr’s jaw dropped. He looked from Titus, who was already hoisting himself back into the carriage, to the frying pan he still held in his hand.

  “Come on,” Titus snapped. Kerr frowned as he kicked out the fire. He snatched a quick glance at the empty immensity of the steppe, and then stooped to gather the remains of the kindling. They would be glad of it before they left this barren place.

  “Come on!” Titus yelled, a touch of genuine rage in his voice. Kerr winced, and threw the wood into a pannier. As he went to check the horses’ harnesses, he frowned uneasily. First the wizard’s lack of appetite, and now his lack of temper.

  Maybe he was sick.

  “Never mind the silly old sod,” he muttered to the horses, who twitched their ears in agreement. Satisfied, he vaulted up into the drivers seat and, snapping his whip in the air, he sent the horses trotting reluctantly forwards, towards the haze of the north.

  When Kerr suggested they stop for lunch, Titus grunted a negative. That was unsettling, but when he refused to stop for dinner, Kerr started to become alarmed.

  “Don’t take this the wrong way, boss,” he said, leaning down from the roof of the swaying carriage so that he could speak through the window, “but I think you might be ill. You’ve got to eat, haven’t you? Keep your strength up.”

  The sorcerer shifted beneath the weight of his robes, shadows obscuring his face.

  “No,” he muttered, as if speaking to himself. “No, I don’t want to delay.”

  The carriage hit a pothole and Kerr bit his tongue.

  “We’ll have to stop soon anyway,” he argued, swallowing blood, “it’s almost night time.”

  To his surprise, the wizard reacted with a strange, high-pitched giggle.

  “No time like night time,” he said. “We won’t stop at night anymore. There’s no more need, is there? This far north, even the animals can see.”

  Kerr frowned. It was quite true that the burning skies grew brighter every night. It was also true that the light they cast was stronger than that thrown by either moon.

  “Then when will we stop?” he asked.

  “Later,” Titus replied. “In the meantime, why don’t you practise your exercises? See what you can achieve. Just don’t focus on anything too near the carriage.”

  Kerr sighed and, knowing that he was beaten, clambered back into his seat and wrapped a sheepskin around his shoulders. Then, taking the stone out of his pocket, he held it in the palm of his hand, and tried to empty his mind of thoughts and distractions. It wasn’t easy. As well as the nagging worry about Titus, he also had the jolts and bangs of the carriage to deal with.

  Despite the turmoil of his thoughts, flashes of aethyr began to appear around him. He watched them, soothed by the purity of the colours as they flickered about.

  There were some glorious reds amongst them, and Kerr focused on one in particular. It was writhing around a granite boulder like an anaconda around its prey, and it throbbed with energy.

  Kerr licked his lips and flexed his hand, ready to lighten the world with a flash of flame, but before he could, he felt something move within him and arc out towards the stone. There was a steam kettle hiss, a pulse of light, and the boulder was gone.

  The horses screamed with sudden fear and bolted, the carriage rattling and bouncing along behind them. Despite the leg shattering mess of the frozen earth, they charged blindly forwards, and Kerr’s world disintegrated into a confusion of pulling reins and spine jarring impacts.

  “Whoa boys! Whoa!” His cries proved as ineffectual as his reins, and soon he was fighting just to stay on the carriage seat. From the box below, he could hear Titus’ cries of complaint, and despite the blur of his predicament, he felt a mischievous grin lift the corners of his mouth. After all, his master had wanted to make good speed.

  He snatched a quick glance back towards where the stone had been, and his smile exploded into a scream.

  He was never sure exactly what he had seen, although he was certain that there was no name for it. Later on, he took comfort from the fact; it proved that the writhing obscenity he had created was a freak, a one off, a lone monstrosity.

  At the time, he had no head for such philosophy. Conscious of the effect his screaming was having on the hysterical horses, he fought to bring himself under control, but he didn’t try to stop their wild flight. Now that he had seen what they were running from, he had to restrain himself from lashing them on to even greater speeds.

  As they careened away, Kerr told himself that the horror couldn’t move. He told himself that it definitely couldn’t run and probably wouldn’t live into the second hour of its horrible li
fe.

  As he told himself these things, he wondered how long it would take his misbegotten creation to find him.

  After half an hour, exhaustion began to get the better of the horses’ panic. They slowed to a trot, and then to a walk. Eventually, they stopped altogether to stand, foam flecked and gasping, beneath the terrible fireworks of the night sky.

  Kerr, still shaking, went to the horses and started wiping the sweat from them before it froze. He talked to them as he worked, soothing his own fears as he tried to sooth theirs.

  “I take it,” Titus said from behind him, “that we were running from something?”

  Kerr turned to face the wizard, and cast a nervous glance over the fat man’s shoulder. Despite the luminescence of the northern sky, he couldn’t see anything but rolling plains.

  “Yes, we were. The thing is… well, I think that I might have…”

  Kerr trailed off, suddenly realising how ridiculous the whole thing sounded, but Titus was nodding his head with encouragement.

  “You cast a spell that got out of hand,” he suggested.

  “I think so,” Kerr nodded miserably, “but I had no idea that I was doing it. It was more like the spell used me to cast itself. Before I could even move my fingers, it just sort of happened, and it was more than a fire.”

  “Ah yes,” Titus looked almost wistful. “It’s always like that when you really connect to the aethyr. Don’t be too pleased with yourself, though. This far north, even those idiots in the College of Light could manage something impressive.”

  “It wasn’t impressive,” Kerr swallowed, and tried not to think about those desperately reaching tentacles. “It was horrible.”

  Titus nodded, this time with sympathy.

  “Don’t worry. It was my fault for encouraging you. I think that we should forget about your training until we return. Up here, things have a habit of getting out of hand.”

  Kerr nodded, and stroked the trembling flank of the nearest horse.

  “Enough of this,” Titus decided. “Your driving has given me quite an appetite. How about that bacon?”

  “Yes, of course,” Kerr said distractedly. He unharnessed the horses, made sure that they were hobbled, and then built a cooking fire. Soon, the bacon was sizzling on the iron skillet. The comforting smell of it rose up with the smoke towards the rivers of colour that twisted through the sky above. Even as his mouth watered, Kerr wondered if such an ordinary smell had ever graced this forsaken place before.

  Vaught woke a full day after his feast. He lay on his back for a moment longer, luxuriating in the fire that burned in his heart. It warmed the frozen earth beneath him even as it sent the blood boiling through his veins.

  In the past, he would have begun his day with a prayer. Now there was no need. He knew that the rage that glowed within his chest was prayer enough, and that the blood that crusted his face and hands remained a worthy offering.

  He smiled, baring blood clotted fangs, and growled in contentment.

  Around him, his brothers began to stir. Some sniffed the air, their snouts wrinkled with excitement as the northern winds brought them the maddening stink of sorcery. Others awoke to find that the last shreds of their clothing were unbearably itchy. They tore them off with fingernails that had become claws, and shrugged off armour that was no longer worth the weight.

  Vaught rose to his feet and gazed around him. His senses had flowered while he had slept. He gazed enraptured at the colour of smell, the taste of light, the soft whispers of heat and cold.

  It wasn’t long until he caught the scent of Grendel’s spoor. Even amidst the turmoil of his fresh senses, the smell of his prey remained as clear as a single star in a pitch black sky.

  He turned to his brothers and tried to tell them that it was time to go, but as the words passed through the slabs of muscle that protected his throat, and between the fangs that lined his mouth, they changed into a ululating growl.

  That was no problem. His brothers understood him well enough, and their yellow eyes glimmered with a gleeful excitement. After so many months spent stumbling about with pathetic human bodies, it seemed that the hunt was about to begin properly. Eager to be off, they gathered around their leader, all of them apart from one. He remained slumped on the ground, a half devoured corpse beside him.

  Vaught growled impatiently and loped over to wake the pup up, but as he bent over the youngster, he realised that the thing that Peik had become would never wake up again. In the centre of the ribbed muscle that armoured its chest, there was the hilt of a knife. Both of Peik’s clawed hands were wrapped around it, locked from the effort of plunging the blade into his heart.

  Vaught sniffed at the body, and then stood back. For a moment, something like confusion flickered across the bulging contours of his features, and the rest of the pack gathered around uncertainly. One leaned down, sniffed, and then lapped at some of Peik’s spilled blood.

  Vaught’s confusion vanished beneath a snarl of rage, and he sent his brother spinning back with a blow from the flat of his hand. Then he stooped, found a stone, and placed it on top of the corpse. The others followed suit, and by the time the sun had risen a cairn had been raised over Peik’s twisted body.

  Only then, their rage sharpened by the effort, did the pack turn to the north and, duty done, rejoin the chase.

  “You must have travelled a long path to become so blessed by our lord,” the horsemen’s new leader said.

  Despite the fact that the two men were riding side by side, it took Grendel a moment to realise that he was being spoken to. He had been too busy listening to the delicious voices that had been whispering inside his head, filling it with sweetness as busily as bees in a hive.

  “What’s that you say?” he asked, turning to his companion and blinking with confusion.

  “I just said that I am impressed by your power. You are truly blessed by our lord.”

  “Yes,” Grendel nodded distractedly. “Ever since I can remember, I have had some power. Of course, in the south the world is full of cowards and fools who try to twist and corrupt the gifts of the gods.”

  “Oh yes.” The horseman nodded, and his eyes became hard. “The south, some of us came from there, and who knows? One day we might return. There are many scores to be settled; many animals to hunt.”

  “I suppose so,” Grendel replied. The two men lapsed into silence, but for once the sorcerer desired the novelty of conversation.

  “So,” he said, trying desperately to think of something to say, “when did you first hear the whispered voice of our lord?”

  The horseman looked at him.

  “As soon as my mother saw me and started screaming, I suppose,” he said. There was no mistaking the bitterness, it was hard and as sharp as iron.

  “Oh. Oh yes. I see what you mean.”

  Another man might have been taken aback by the sudden ferocity in his companion’s voice, but not Grendel.

  “I wonder why she didn’t drown you. A lot of women do, I understand. They’re afraid of what will happen if the witch hunters find their offspring.”

  The horseman laughed, the sound as humourless as a raven’s caw.

  “Maybe she was afraid I would float,” he suggested.

  Grendel considered this for a moment. Then he frowned and shook his head.

  “No, I don’t think so. Anyway, she could have held you under the surface to make sure. Apparently babies are just as weak as they look.”

  The horseman turned to favour Grendel with a long, cool stare.

  “I don’t know. She kept me until I could walk and eat. Then she left me in the forest.”

  “Maybe,” Grendel suggested, excited to have solved another riddle of human nature, “she was too sentimental to finish you off at first sight, so she left you in the forest in the hope that wild animals would do the job for her.”

  “I never thought of that,” the rider said. Grendel, oblivious to sarcasm, beamed.

  “Human nature is really quite easy to underst
and,” the sorcerer explained, “when you put your mind to it.”

  They continued their journey in silence.

  Later, around the campfire, Grendel started to talk again. The next morning, Jubska, the tribe’s new leader, suggested that their honoured shaman should be given the privacy he so deserved, and the next time they camped he was shepherded into a leather tent.

  Grendel was touched by the gesture. In the week that followed, it never once occurred to him that his isolation was anything other than a mark of respect. Although by now, not much was occurring to him at all. Alone in the darkness, his thoughts were filled with the voice of his god, and the things that it told him were so terrible and beautiful that he couldn’t stop the screams from ringing out around the camp.

  His new companions heard them, and were pleased. They had known enough shamans in the past to know that such torments were a good sign, and they thanked their god for sending them such a prime example.

  Even so, on the night when Jubska approached the sorcerer, he did so with trepidation. His imagination had filled Grendel’s sealed tent with every daemon imaginable, and some that weren’t. He scratched reluctantly at the leather flap of the door before speaking.

  “Oh great and terrible sorcerer,” he said, “do I have your permission to enter?”

  Grendel, who had just woken from a terrible vision of what he hoped wasn’t the future, wiped the sweat from his brow and grunted his agreement.

  “It stinks of a herd in here,” Jubska said politely as he stooped to enter the tent. In fact, it did stink. The air was thick with the smell of sweat and stale clothes, and the smoke from the single tallow candle was so acrid that it made Jubska’s eyes water.

  “What is it?” Grendel asked. “I am quite tired.”

  Jubska could see that he wasn’t lying. Dark bruises spread from beneath the sorcerer’s eyes, and even in the candlelight he could see how damp and pale his skin was, but what drew the horseman’s attention was neither Grendel’s fatigue nor his grime. What drew his attention were the sorcerer’s eyes.