Angels in Black and White (Horror Short Stories)

by Saunders, Craig

  Allies beside you, enemies in front. Rarely was life so simple. Why spoil it by passing out and having to start all over again?

  He tore a makeshift bandage from the bottom of his shirt and tied it firmly round his head.

  Renir Esyn approached him, wobbling slightly on his feet. The nameless warrior was gladdened to see he was not the only one affected by the shifting ground. As he came closer, the war leader looked carefully in the nameless warrior’s eyes. “Are you fit? If you’re not, you’re a liability. Take yourself to Drun. Your injuries are grave.”

  “No, lord, I am not badly enough injured to risk a physician. I am fit enough.”

  The war leader studied him, gazing deep into his eyes.

  “How many fingers am I holding up?”

  “Two, lord. I am fine.”

  “I am nobody’s lord. What’s your name, warrior?”

  He had the sense to look away. “What does it matter? I’ll be dead before suns’ rise.”

  “Can’t you remember?”

  “No,” he replied with all honesty, but then added, “but it is not unusual for memory to take a leave after a blow to the head. My head remembers the sword well enough.”

  “Fine then, but…well, I won’t tell you to leave, but passing out on the end of a pike is no better than being spitted awake.”

  “No, I guess not. I’ll be fine.”

  Renir Esyn did not seem so sure. The man that would be king was weighing his options. Nobody liked to have a man with a head wound at their back – they behaved as if possessed of spirits sometimes – but there was little choice.

  The war leader needed every man he had.

  For a moment it looked as though he meant to add something further, but he just waved a hand absently and strode to stand before the gates.

  The warrior watched as Renir Esyn hefted his axe and stood before the slurred gates. The man who would be king placed the head of the axe against the ground and rested his hands on the haft. After a while, the warrior saw that he had closed his eyes.

  Surely they could not hold.

  Perhaps, with this man leading them, they would die a worthy death. It might be enough.

  No one else spoke. To his right a bearded man hefted a greatsword onto his broad shoulders and rested his chin against his chest. Most of the men wore stubble, or beards.

  The nameless warrior rested his eyes, too. He was weary to the bone, his vision swimming before he shut his eyes on the insanity of the battle before him. Futility, surely. If so, why did he feel so alive?

  His muscles ached, and more than one felt torn. Evidently, they had been fighting for some time.

  They would not fight for much longer. One more push from the enemy and they would fold. They could not hold the opening. He did not know where the rest of the Sturman army was, or why the keep was important enough for them to throw away their lives, but he understood on some deeper level that if their war leader demanded their sacrifice, these men would give it willingly. He would not shirk. He would not running screaming into the night, or fall on his own sword.

  He was a warrior.

  The jarring clatter of weapons from outside halted. It was followed by the pounding of many feet, amplified by the otherwise deserted city streets outside the keep.

  The defenders stirred, the light of fire in their eyes. The eyes were willing, but their bodies were nearing the end. They shuffled forward into a line, using their failing strength to hold their weapons proudly before them. They were rock, but even rock crumbles before the storm, eventually.

  Renir Esyn said nothing, but merely looked at each of them, holding every man’s gaze for a second. He raised his broad, glittering axe to them in salute, nodded, and turned back to the gates as the Draymen rushed in.

  Maybe he had already said his goodbyes and made his speeches. The warrior would never know.

  The enemy poured in, screaming hate in their idiot tongue. Their hair was worn in braids, some had their faces painted. Such observations were irrelevant, though. The warrior looked to their weapons, and their sparse armour. The weight of their bodies would be armour enough.

  They could not hold. The enemy were a torrent, a flood of bristling muscle and steel.

  What did it matter? For the warrior, the present was all there ever was. Tomorrow did not matter. What did tomorrow matter, when all your yesterdays were forgotten?

  With a hoarse cry he swung his sword with all his might. His sword arm was strong enough. With the dagger in his left he parried a blow from a wild haired attacker, turned his wrist and stepped inside the return blow to drive his knife into an unprotected armpit.

  There was a moment, when the attackers first flooded into the courtyard, that there was time for fancy swordplay. The warrior realised that he was good at it. The attackers were untutored and ill-equipped. He could have stood all day against such warriors. But it was not that kind of battle. This was not a training ground, as the mounds of the dead testified.

  Then, there was no more room for swordplay. The defenders were forced to stand too close together to swing their crimson blades. It was all about thrusting where you could, or dagger work, or if you were lucky a swift knee followed by a quick killing stroke to a bared neck.

  Only Renir stood alone, his blade whirring. Startling, eerie patterns danced around his head as the light glinted on the steel. Men fought to protect his flanks while the axeman drove the Draymen back toward the gates. His men (and I, I am one of his men for sure, thought the warrior) followed him, side by side.

  A giant Drayman, a foot above a normal man, bore down heavily on the king in waiting. The nameless warrior saw that his war leader was unaware of the threat. Slashing wildly where he had room (the spaces between defenders were gradually widening as men fell), butting and elbowing when he didn’t, he wove his way toward his leader.

  There was no time for fancy. The nameless warrior charged forward, sword finding a path through one man’s face, through a woman warrior’s unarmoured arm, and into the thigh of the giant. The giant screamed in rage as the blade sank.

  The giant turned and thundered a powerful left cross into the warrior. He followed through with a slash from a wood axe, a single headed weapon ill-suited for war, but the nameless warrior had already fallen.

  Turning back to Renir, the giant hacked a Sturman’s head clean from his shoulders and advanced.

  The Draymen found new vigour.

  In the melee, the nameless warrior rose and found his sword lying on the ground. As he bent to pick it up, a blade rebounded from his breastplate but found its way into his arm, drawing a line of blood. He backfisted the offending blade clear and slashed his dagger across a throat.

  He laughed, his pain granting him brief clarity. Renir was all that mattered.

  Renir stood alone. The remaining men could not reach him. The giant was closing all the time.

  There was nothing for it but foolishness. There was always a time for stupidity in battle. The warrior thought this was it.

  He ran, shouldering one man out of the way, and in some hazy sense realised he must have dislocated his shoulder as his sword fell from his useless hand. He saw a bent knee before him and planted one foot on it, leaping forward with the other. He tumbled on the air rather than dived, but reached his target. He stabbed down into the giant’s neck and was rewarded with a crunch as blade met bone, and he fell onto the floor.

  The giant crashed on top of him, and someone, seeing their chance, thrust a sword tip into the nameless warrior’s eye.

  The world exploded into fiery sheets of bright brain-searing light. His face felt warm and sticky. For a moment he could move neither hand, just lay there with hot blood burning his face. The brightness was startling and he closed his one good eye but it did not go away.

  Sharp agony leapt from his lips and he roared his pain as he pushed the giant’s carcass from his legs. He picked up a fallen sword with his good hand and swung wildly. He could see nothing but the burning light, but there w
ere so few defenders left it was almost assured he would hit a Drayman.

  He hit nothing but air. Gradually, each swing weaker than the last, his good hand fell to his side and the sword dropped with a dull twang to the ground.

  The light faded and he could once again see only the otherworldly glow of the aftermath of a battle in the moonlight. With his one good eye he looked around, and saw Renir Esyn.

  No man should wear that smile, thought the warrior. No one should wear a smile full of such sadness.

  Esyn was blooded, deeply wounded across the jaw, but the smile was unmistakeable.

  Confusion got the better of the nameless warrior. He roared again and turned all about, but there were only corpses. They smouldered, and the stench suddenly assailed him. He collapsed to his knees.

  Magic.

  Turning, his head protesting against the movement, but fighting the pain all the time (as he always had, he knew) he saw two men standing at the foot of the stairs that led to the keep. They wore long, cowled robes, one of green, one of sunset orange.

  Preternatural light bled from their eyes.

  Wizards, surely. No other creature could wreak such destruction, reave so much life in an instant.

  Such a perfect victory, such a beautiful night, sullied by the return of magic to Sturman shores.

  But Renir Esyn was smiling. The smile of a king, one learning how to be a king, perhaps, but it was regal, that smile. Weighed down by the fate of nations.

  The nameless warrior could not smile. His jaw would not unclench.

  He wanted to roar. Victory, for his king. His king.

  Perhaps that was why he hated wizards so – there could be no room for a warrior with a pure heart when beings of such power roamed the earth.

  But what did it matter to him? It was no longer his battle.

  Weakened, he put his good hand out to catch the floor, bending from the waist, but crumpled onto his knees as his strength gave out. Blood dripped down his side, from his armpit. The arm was useless and wouldn’t move. His breath hitched in his throat and he thought he understood. Perhaps he would be making a trip to the physician after all.

  He coughed blood. Renir knelt down before him and took him under the arms to drag him up.

  “Drun!” The king’s shout was deafening in the aftermath of battle.

  “No! No doctor.”

  “But you’ll die! I’ll see no more death here today.”

  “At least I’ll know where I am. I don’t want to wake up and forget this. I want to remember it all. And now I can.”

  The unknown warrior smiled through cracked lips at the war leader. Esyn wouldn’t understand. But it didn’t matter. He understood enough for two men. Most men lived their lives with the knowledge of the past and thoughts of the future.

  But he had been granted a gift. The present. And he aimed to keep it.

  He would live for the now. The perfect moment.

  As he faded, Renir closed the strange warrior’s staring eye. He was surprise to see a smile on the man’s battered face.

  It was a beautiful smile, full of childlike joy.

  He could only hope that when he died, he would remember that smile, and that he too would die at peace.

  Leaning down weakly he retrieved a fallen sword and laid it on the man’s chest, then took both of the dead warrior’s hand and placed them across the sword.

  “See that this man’s grave is marked.”

  “What was his name?” replied the soldier who stood watching.

  Renir thought for a moment. “I don’t know, but he did.” He nodded to himself slowly. “I think he knew himself better than many men. Perhaps that will have to be enough.”

  The End

  Lastly...full circle. Back to children's toys. Here's a little tale about a bear, a cute little teddy bear that'll cut your eyes out and eat your soul...

  Wahaha.

  Ahem.

  Here's Bill.

  Bill

  Jason Eggelton pulled his pillow tight around his ears and tried desperately to drown out the sound of his mother, drunk, retching into the toilet bowl. There wasn't a day that went by without her being sick, bringing back some other drunk from the pub or club, shouting him down when he tried to tell her about his day at school. He loved her. He hated her. Both with the equal passion and confusion of a ten-year old boy on the cusp of his teenage years, his hormones beginning to boil within his frame. He was small for his age. His hair stuck up at odd angles. Every day he went to school in clothes he ironed himself, though, and after a shower - quiet - with whatever he could find in the cupboard for his breakfast in his belly.

  Vodka over cereal seemed to be his mother's preference.

  The retching ceased and there was a groan from the bathroom down the hall. The house only had one toilet. Jason didn't relish the thought of using it in the morning. His mother would leave the puke for him to clean.

  And he'd clean it, because Jason Eggelton was one put together lad. He had, as his father used to say, his shit together.

  His shit was, he guessed, together because of his father. His mother's shit...he didn't dwell, his pillow over his head, listening to his mother's pained moaning from the bathroom, and listening to the voice of his teddy Bill, which was muffled as he held Bill tight to his chest for comfort.

  Bill pushed back against Jason's chest and hopped down from the bed.

  'Bill!' whispered Jason. 'Bill!'

  But Bill was gone.

  *

  Bill sauntered. He didn't waddle, like you'd expect a teddy to waddle what with its stubby legs and arms.

  Bill swaggered.

  The bathroom door was ajar. The handle was too high for him. All he had to do was push the door. It stuck a little on the linoleum, the boards underneath long ago warped from the damp.

  Jason's mother's head was in the toilet bowl. She'd passed out. Her long brittle hair dangled in the toilet bowl.

  Bill grinned, and his button eyes twinkled with mischief.

  He turned, still grinning, as Jason peered round the corner of the door jam.

  'Bill, stop it. Stop it right now.'

  Bill couldn't talk, but he was good at expressions, despite being inanimate. Strong, too, and quick and nimble.

  He didn't need to be nimble, though, because Jason was too busy looking at his mother with something approaching disgust, right the way through pity.

  Bill headed back to Jason's bedroom.

  *

  Jason looked at his mother, with her hair hanging in the toilet bowl. He could imagine her sitting on the bowl, with shit caked to her butt, with a line of puke dribbling down her chin, her knickers around her ankles and her skirt hitched up.

  A bottle of vodka lay abandoned in the hall, just beneath a patch of wallpaper that had peeled away from the wall three, maybe four years ago, and had never been fixed.

  Jason could almost see his mother sitting just like that, her eyes vacant, staring into the distance, with her mascara panda'd over her cheeks, her lipstick rutted with acidy puke burns and her lips fat and cracked from dehydration.

  His imagination was good. About as good as it gets for a person at any age, is the imagination of a ten-year old, when they have the tools and language to make the tales that childhood leaves to grow in their heads.

  He decided he wanted to see his mother like that. Some words he didn't have, like abasement, but if he'd known it, it would have fitted perfectly.

  He pulled her head out of the toilet bowl with a grunt and let her hair go. Her head clacked against the porcelain - beige, maybe twenty years out of fashion - then slid to the linoleum with a dull thud.

  He didn't want to pull her knickers down. Some things he couldn't face.

  'Ew,' he said to himself, just thinking about it.

  He wasn't strong enough to pull her up onto the toilet, like she'd passed out having a crap. Giving birth to a little brown fish.

  But Bill was, and Bill came back into the bathroom right then, with a g
rin and packet of child's colouring pens.

  *

  Bill couldn't talk, but Bill could swagger, and swagger he did. He was confident, because he was strong. He and Jason pulled and pushed and heaved until Jason's mother was sitting on the shitter. Her knickers were still up, but when Bill looked at Jason with a question on his face, Jason shook his head.

  Imagination was one thing, but pulling his mother's knickers down around her ankles was something else entirely, and he really didn't want to go there.

  'No, Bill. Just like that,' he said.

  Bill and Jason set to work with the colouring pens. At first, Jason felt a little pang of guilt, but after a while he and Bill really got into the swing of things.

  Colouring his mother in. They even giggled while they drew faces on her face and moustaches and Bill drew a childish penis on her forehead. Jason couldn't help it, and he broke down into laughter, tears running down his face, looking at that stylised penis right there on his mother's forehead.

  He laughed and Bill laughed right along with him, right up until Jason realised his mother might wake up any minute, and she'd be angry and still drunk and liable to belt him really well.

  'Bill,' he said, stifling his laughter with the back of his hand. 'Bill! Enough. Enough. Come on.'

  Jason and Bill still chuckled before they finally fell asleep. It was the kind of laughter that came at funerals, the kind of laughter that's more about release than mirth.

  *

  Three, four years ago, around the time that the wallpaper began to peel from the stud and plasterboard walls of Jason's council house, his mother began drinking and Jason found his father's body in the attic where he'd hung himself.

  It's not the kind of thing a six or seven year old boy ever forgot, but it was the kind of thing that they never really remembered, either.

  Jason's father swung. He remembered that. Swung like someone was pushing him on a swing. There was a kind of musty smell up in the attic. Old newspapers, from back when Jason was born. A slight smell of mildew about the cardboard boxes, and dust, and fibres floating in the air from the lagging that was supposed to keep the heat in during the winter, but really just kept all the moisture in the house so that condensation ran down the corner of Jason's room and helped grow a patch of mould on the wall.