When I was young, I was often taken to Rye, where French stone shipments arrived with some frequency. My father loved Caen stone, despite its French origins, and used nothing else on the buildings of his manor. Father would lead me to the docks before the sun rose so we could be the first to see the consignments. He taught me to read the stones, to find weaknesses in the great slabs, and to only buy stones that would outlast civilizations. I was often in Rye before the sun rose, before the world woke. It was quiet on those mornings, but you could still hear the town’s pulse. The rattle of handcarts. The waking cries of gulls. The boom of sailor’s voices. The creak of ropes upon pulleys and the rumble of wooden crates dragged onto ramps. The heartbeat of a city at rest.
But here in Norwich there is utter silence. There is no pulse, no heartbeat. The city does not rest; it is dead. And not even the plaguers want its corpse.
Fear rises in my throat like bile. Why would the afflicted avoid a city? I think of the dragon in Bure. The last time plaguers ran from something, Tristan nearly died. But something else pulses just beneath my fear: a wild hope. Could we cross the city without encountering even a single plaguer? Will our journey through Norwich be bloodless?
We pass a thatched, wooden tollhouse and the market square ends at another crossroad: East or west? I stop the cart. We are still not completely past the castle. It is too early to go east. But the western thoroughfare takes us in the opposite direction to where we want to go.
“East.” I call to Tristan, but he looks at something on our left. I follow his gaze across the square to a narrow alley between a row of three-story homes and workshops. A figure walks toward us. A normal gait. No lurching. No shambling.
My breath quickens and for an instant I mourn humanity; I mourn because I have learned to fear my kinsmen even more than I fear the plaguers ravaging our kingdom.
The figure walks toward us more quickly. There is something odd about its head. Tristan and I draw our swords at the same time.
“Stop!” I shout. “I am Edward of Bodiam. What do you want?”
The figure does not stop. It walks toward us at an even faster pace.
“Halt!” I shout. But the figure trots, then runs slowly, then sprints toward us, its arms pumping wildly. The thing shrieks, its cry like the trumpet of Judgment Day in the noiseless city. I get a good look as the figure clears the shadows. The world spins.
Matheus was right. Hugh the Baptist was right. We are in purgatory.
The creature running toward me is a demon.
Chapter 37
There is no time to escape. I leap from the wagon, feeling unsteady from fever, feeling the faint protest of my ankle, which still throbs occasionally underweight.
I have no doubt that the creature is a demon. The left side of the fiend’s face oozes and bubbles as if the flesh were made from melted wax or boiling pitch. The forehead bulges monstrously on the left side, like ten loaves’ worth of yeast rising, a deformation so large that I wonder how it keeps its head from lolling to one side. It wears a torn and filthy white robe.
The demon howls again as it nears us. Tristan canters toward it, his sword raised high in the air, but his horse rears. It is not a warhorse, but I imagine even warhorses would rear at such a creature. The fiend hurls itself at Tristan. Its hands reach forward, its misshapen mouth open. The demon crashes into the rearing horse, battering it with its grotesque flesh, knocks the animal to one side so that it almost topples. The fiend’s oversized teeth rip into the animal’s neck. The horse cries out and tries to rear once more, but the demon’s weight holds it down. Tristan leans low and hacks again and again with his sword, sending spatters of blood and strips of dirty cloth into the air.
Belisencia screams just as I reach Tristan. I whirl and see another demon sprinting toward the wagon from the opposite side of the square. One of its arms is far too big. I run back toward the cart and see another figure emerge from a workshop door. And yet another leaps from a second-story window. This last one falls to the cobblestones, then scrabbles to its feet and runs at the wagon, screaming the gibberish of madmen.
I take position between the cart and the approaching monsters. The first has a nose so misshapen and swollen that it simply looks like a thick cut of meat thrown across the face. The left eye is a black, glistening slit that lies slanted halfway down the cheek. One arm is swollen to an impossible size, as if pigs had burrowed beneath the skin and died there.
It leaps at me from three paces away. I slash and spin, and the demon’s body strikes my shoulder and tumbles to the cobblestones. I stagger to one side and fall to a knee. The creature rises. Blood from my slash seeps into the chest of the white woolen robe. Its good eye is dark as Satan’s arsehole and ringed in red.
“Tristan, they’re plag—” Something strikes me in the back with enough force to knock me prone. I roll onto my back and kick at the grotesque form above me. One eye protrudes from the side of the face like that of an enormous frog; a great bubble of an eye that looks as if it was nailed haphazardly against the melted flesh of its temple. I thrust my sword through that bubble and a rancid brown fluid erupts from it, trickles into my air holes and spatters warm upon my cheek. It smells like rotting milk. The creature does not even hesitate. It continues to claw at me, its shapeless teeth snapping. Do these demons not feel pain?
Belisencia calls for Tristan. The other fiends. I grab the creature’s bloated shoulder with one hand and shudder as my fingers sink deep into the soft flesh. I push the demon backward and try to drive my sword into its mouth. It is too close to me. The tip enters its mouth, but at an angle, and I have to slowly carve my way into its skull, straightening the sword little by little. Blood runs down the length of the blade. The demon makes choking sounds but does not stop clawing at my helm. I withdraw the blade and slash its neck. Then angle the blade deep into its other eye. The creature gurgles and flails like a herring in the net, but still it claws at me. I drive the blade all the way to the hilt. Twist it. Saw at the head until the monster stops moving. Then I kick the body away and scramble to my feet. I sway and look for my next foe.
Tristan’s horse is dying on the cold stones of the market square. Its legs kick and its eyes roll. Tristan staggers in front of the wagon. The demon I slashed at the start of the melee is wrapped around one of his legs. Another fiend lies motionless in front of him. Belisencia stands in the cart holding Tristan’s knife. The body of the very first demon lies on the other side of the cart.
I run to Tristan’s side and together we plunge our swords into the last demon until it stops moving. It takes a long time. These demons do not die as easily as Frenchmen or plaguers.
We scarcely get two breaths before we hear more footsteps. These are on the far side of the square, near the crossroads we passed.
“Get in the cart!” I shout. Tristan lunges half into the wagon bed and kicks at the air. Belisencia pulls at the bottom edge of his backplate until he tumbles.
I climb onto the driver’s box and whip the reins. I lost my branch but the horses do not need it anymore. They hear the demons behind us, same as we do. Their shoes slip and strike sparks from the cobbles as they flee to the east.
My eyes flash across a sign that names the road we are on St. Giles Street. I do not know if it is a good thing or bad thing to be on a road named after the patron saint of insanity. The horses gallop at a pace faster than I have ever seen from them. The wagon rattles and jolts on the stones. Chimes ring out like a servant bell rung by a furiously impatient lord. The castle rises above us.
St. Giles Street circles the great castle motte to the northeast. And as we loop to the rear of the castle, I hear the mad slaps of leather shoes and bare feet behind us on the cobblestones. I glance back. Six or seven of the demons chase us.
“I’ll deal with them!” Tristan shouts. “Just get us out!”
A lane splits northward and I take it. The horses turn so quickly that the wheels on the right side rise off the cobblestones. I let go of the reins and cla
w at the seat to keep from sliding off. A crash sounds from behind me as Tristan and Belisencia tumble against the wooden wall of the cart.
The wagon drops back to the ground and I grab the reins. The demons are a dozen paces back, but more appear from alleys and doorways.
Tristan lifts one of the bags and dumps the walnuts out of it. The nuts fall in a noisy shower and clatter behind us as we go.
“Are you mad?” I shout. We have lost our spare bag.
“Watch,” he replies.
I glance back again. The demons reach the walnuts. They run over and past them without slowing. Tristan brings both hands to his great helm. “How did that not work?”
“You are a baboon!” Belisencia shouts.
The road ends in a junction that branches to the east and west. I have to bring the wagon almost to a halt to make the sharp turn. We turn eastward.
And the demons are upon us.
The cart lurches as fiends hurl themselves at it.
I glance back and see one demon halfway into the cart. Its lips are swollen to horrifying proportions, thick as sword blades, bulging and glistening across half of the monster’s enormous face. It hisses. Massive jaws open to reveal oversized yellowed teeth, each tooth thicker than my thumb.
Boil-covered hands claw for purchase at the back edge of the wagon, where another demon looks to be dragging behind us. More demons reach for the cart. I glance forward and notice, for the first time, the great cathedral of Norwich. The spire stabs the sky like a sword, white in the sunlight. The Bishop’s Gate lies past that great church.
I peer over my shoulder. Tristan grunts as he kicks at the boulder-jawed demon. Belisencia cowers at the opposite wall and makes hesitant jabs at the hands holding the back edge. Another demon leaps at the cart and scrambles into the wagon near Belisencia. A thick globule of skin, as big around as a shield, dangles from its chin and sways with the jostle of the cart. Belisencia screams and kicks at the creature. One of her feet catches the dangling skin and sets it rocking like a cauldron in a gale. She grunts and kicks at the creature’s legs.
The cathedral ward opens up ahead of me. I follow the curving road around the ecclesiastic buildings. We are close. So close.
Tristan gives a cry of victory. I glance back and see both the demons that were in the cart now rolling on the cobblestones. Several of the pursuing fiends stumble over the fallen bodies.
The elaborate arches of the Bishop’s Bridge lie directly ahead. I slap the reins, shouting at the horses, but they need no encouragement. Froth spatters back from their mouths, lather blossoms on their necks, but they run. God bless the poor creatures, they run.
I look back once more as Tristan hacks at the hands of the dragging demon. Our wagon outpaces the other monsters, and many of them do not run so swiftly anymore. Perhaps they have given up. I feel a stab of apprehension. I have learned to fear those moments when our enemies grow quiet.
Tristan slashes at the pair of grotesque hands that clutch the back of the wagon, taking two fingers. He positions himself for a better angle and hacks down toward the monster’s wrists with a swift precision. But the demon gives a roar and lunges forward at the same instant, pulling its bloated chest into the wagon. The sword blade buries itself into the fiend’s back instead of severing a hand.
Thick folds of pinched skin obscure most of this monster’s features. The eyes are barely visible, black raisins in mangled dough. Tristan draws the sword free, then uses his hands to shove the monstrous, sagging face backward. It is a struggle. The two fight a silent battle of will and leverage. Tristan gains ground with each heartbeat. The demon pounds at Tristan’s helm as its neck arches backward farther and farther. Tristan wedges a booted foot under its chest and shoves. The demon screeches and tumbles to the cold stones.
But it takes the last sack of walnuts with it.
Chapter 38
I hear the walnuts crashing and rattling to the stones behind us. The demon lies on the road, still clutching the sack, staring at us with misaligned black eyes. Two more demons run toward us; they pick up their pace as if regaining lost motivation. I do not look at them. All I can do is watch the flood of walnuts washing violently along the road, skittering in all directions like a routing army seen from far away.
Tristan and Belisencia look at one another, then slowly turn their heads to look at me. I am already yanking on the reins, even as I watch the walnuts tumble and roll. Each of those nuts is a day of Elizabeth’s life. A day I get to spend with my angel. And I will not be cheated of a single one.
“Leave them!” Belisencia shouts.
Tristan vaults from the wagon, his sword in the long guard—pointed forward in two hands, one leg thrust forward. He and I have faced death together too many times to not understand each other. He knew even before I pulled the reins that I would stop the cart. He understands that my salvation depends on those walnuts.
“Are you mad?” Belisencia shouts. “Leave them!”
I leap from the driver’s box before the horses come to a stop. I am not as fancy as Tristan. I take position beside him, holding my sword at my side and in one hand, ready to cleave in whatever fashion I can.
“Belisencia, the walnuts,” I call. “Use the extra sack!”
I do not look back to see if she responds, because the first of the demons catapults through the air at us. Tristan is clever. The long guard, apparently, is perfect for impaling leaping demons. His lanky, bubbling-faced monster throws itself onto the blade. My sword master did not talk nearly enough about the best methods of fighting demons and dragons.
The other two leap. I spin away from one and manage to bury my blade in the other’s neck as it crashes into me. We fall with a clatter to the stones. Small, dark circles flash in front of my eyes. The armor is too hot. Sweat washes in rivulets down my face. The demon rises, my sword still buried in its neck. Its arms are enormous and grotesque. Like flesh growing unchecked and without direction. Bubbling like boiling water. There is no shape to the arms. Only knotted, twisted flesh, like God’s half-mashed and discarded clay.
It takes the blade in one hand—the perfect fingers in that roil of flesh make the creature even more repulsive—and pulls the sword from its neck. I rise to my feet as the sword clatters to the stones and the demon leaps again. I put my hands between it and me, grab the monsters pulpy neck, and squeeze. The creature snaps its jaws at me. My hands sink through the gash in its flesh. I rip at the neck. Sinews pop, sounding like saplings torn and twisted. Muscle shreds. Blood spurts toward my visor and I close my eyes. The creature’s head is nearly off and still it pounds at me with its blubbery arms. It is like being struck by swinging pigs. I gather the last of my strength, give a long cry, and snap the demon’s spine with a crack. The swine arms stop swinging.
I open my eyes. Tristan stand over the last demon and twists his sword in the monster’s neck. Blood covers his armor in streaks and beads. Footsteps echo in the distance. Howls echo through the city, growing louder.
I look back at Belisencia. She is picking up walnuts and tossing them in the sack, one at a time.
“Are you a baboon?” Tristan shouts. He takes off his helmet and runs the edge along the cobblestones, scooping walnuts into it. He dumps the nuts into the sack and scoops up more of them.
“I don’t have a helmet,” she replies. “Maybe we shouldn’t have stopped!”
I take my helmet off as well and use my hand to sweep walnuts into it. Sweat trickles from my hair onto the cobblestones. The footsteps grow closer. I feel ill.
Between the three of us we manage to gather most of the remaining walnuts. I crawl along the road, reaching for solitary nuts in distant crevices.
Tristan stands and straps his helmet back on. “More of those things, Edward.”
I stand slowly, stoop, and catch my breath.
“What’s wrong, old man?” he says.
“Nothing,” I reply. “That creature hit my breastplate hard. Just need to catch my breath.”
He sta
res at me, the great helm hiding his expression. “There are only three,” he says. “I’ll take them. You get the rest of the walnuts.”
I shake my head and stand straight. “You want all the glory.” I hold my sword in the long guard and take a deep breath.
The demons hurl themselves at us.
I hit the cobbled road again.
The impact blackens my world for an instant and fills the back of my nose with the taste of fire. I struggle against the creature, but I have so little strength. My sword is in its stomach, but it does not seem to care. One of the demon’s eyes is as large as a bracelet. The monster gouges at my visor. Its twisted teeth clack against the bevor at my neck. It gibbers as it searches for openings in my armor, making desperate groans and growls. Its hands batter my helmet, make my ears ring. I push at its chest. A thin black tongue thrusts out from its neck in a bloody spray. Not a tongue. The tip of Tristan’s sword. I shove the demon’s head to one side hard. Tristan pulls the blade back and hacks two-handed at the neck. Once, twice, and the third stroke cleaves the head from the body. Blood spurts as the misshapen head tumbles to the cobblestones. The arms continue to rake at me for a three or four heartbeats before the demon realizes it is dead.
“Excellent strategy,” Tristan says. “Letting it get on top of you so that I could kill it easily.”
“Shut your mouth, you baboon,” I say. He helps me up.
“I’m glad we shared the glory, Edward.”
I wave him off and we pick at the last of the fallen walnuts.
“Ed,” says Tristan.
“I hear them.” More footsteps. Many more. They come in far greater numbers than we can fight. These are not just plaguers. They are stronger, faster, and more intelligent. I reach down to pick a walnut from a groove between two stones and nearly topple over.
“Get in the back, Ed,” Tristan says. “I’ll handle the horses.”
Nostrum (The Scourge, Book 2) Page 20
