They fell on him, clinging to his skin with their barbed legs. The weight of them all dragged him to the ground, each one weighing at least as much as a short sword. They clambered over each other, biting and tearing, vying for a spot on his precious flesh. One pincer cut into his mangled eye socket, the side of his neck, shoulders, ribs, and legs. Their bodies skittered over him, pincers clacking in their own language of pain. The pain reminded him he was still alive, still fighting. He would have his vengeance.
“You don’t know who I am!” He screamed it, and a great burst of volcanic heat enveloped his body. The beetles tried to get away, but it was far too late for that. Too late when they were within five paces of him, he guessed. He enjoyed the sounds of their cracking shells, cooking innards, and pitiful little screams. When he opened his eyes, the Phoenix pulsed from his superficial wounds and stitched him back together. Their ruined bodies rolled onto their backs, tiny legs tucked in and singed. They would almost be cute if not for their carnivorous nature. He booted one and it vaporized into ashes.
He let the sword spark to life again and held it at his side, waiting. The giant bounded around a tree and curled through another, its jaws gnashing with grim expectancy. Its tail whipped into a few men as it passed, hurling them across the ground. It released its ear-shattering roar but Walter was ready this time. He pushed out from his head at each side with a telekinetic blow, blasting the air around him and minimizing the pain. The dragon’s jaw spread wide as a house and bore down on him. Walter jumped and pushed against the ground, vaulting into its throat.
The light closed around him as the beast’s jaw clamped shut behind. Walter landed on the fleshly floor of what could only be the back of its mouth. When he took a step his boots squelched on soft flesh. The dragon gagged and coughed. The world under his boots shuddered as he struggled for balance. Something big and wet slapped him against the side of the tunnel, drove his fiery blade through its neck and out the other side. It shrieked and a blast of warm, sticky air coursed over his body. He winced at the torrent of sound and the Phoenix pulsed in his ears. Sticky saliva coated his face and arms, gluing him to the side of its throat. It was humid as a greenhouse and stunk like a rotting corpse.
He slid his sword out from its neck and a beam of sun cut through the world of flesh. He dragged himself free of the curved wall and ropes of yellow saliva hung from his side. “Now you will know my name,” he hissed. He raised his stump up, the long blade flickering out. Fire burned in his eye, casting the pink tissue in its amber glow. He rammed the blade into its flopping tongue and clung to his stump with his other hand. The creature wildly bucked and shrieked. Blood spattered onto his body. The flailing beast only served to send him falling down a long stretch of the dragon, all the while carving a great burning line down through its chest.
Daylight spilled in through split halves of the Dragon above him. Blood rained and spurted over Walter in heavy gouts. His descent stopped when his feet squished into a pile of guts. He fought the pressing urge to vomit and covered his mouth, swallowing the burning sick back down. Something glowed violet below his feet under all the organs.
“The gem,” he whispered. Streams of its blood slithered inside his mouth, tasting how he imagined a turd might taste. He spat and wiped his lips, sloughed blood off his face. He stabbed at the organs and blasted them with a cone of fire. The light that had once filled the cavity was fading. He looked up to see great roots working to stitch the cut he’d made back together. “Shit!”
He had to work fast. Stab, cut, slash went his sword, working through the mess of unfamiliar organs. A bevy of vomit inducing odors burned in his sinuses. There it was, a boulder the size of his torso glowing with the light of a dying sun. There were tendrils of flesh holding it in place by the hundreds. He chopped and hacked through them and slammed his boots into the gem. It shuddered and blood sloshed onto his pants. He kicked it again, this time enhancing his foot with telekinesis and creating a Phoenix shield to protect his bones. It came free with the sound of tearing flesh and tumbled from the Dragon’s belly onto the ground below, outside its body. Something crashed into the earth and he felt its torso lurch over to one side.
Walter cut a line up through its side and stepped through its gut. He was back into the land of the living and out of the world that was much too like the Shadow Realm for his taste. Blood flowed down his back as he parted the curtains of flesh to get through. Cheering, maybe screaming reached his ears.
The gem lay a few paces away from the beast. Strings of ragged flesh hung from it and it was badly cracked on one side. It still glowed with a faint light. Walter strode to it and summoned Stormcaller for the final task. He whirled its tendrils over his head and willed them to twist together into one great lash. Chopped into the gem, it split into two halves, cracking loud as a falling tree. He stared at it, watched the glow of the gem until it winked out a few seconds later.
“Walter? Walter! Shit, you’re a madman.” Grimbald stumbled over to him, one hand pressed to a bloody ear. “Did you mean to go into that thing?”
“It seemed like the easiest way to kill it,” he muttered.
“Huh? Can you say that a little louder Walt? My ear,” he pointed at it.
Walter heaved out a sigh and turned to face the slain creature. It healed where he’d made the start of his cut at its neck, but the healing stopped about half-way to its gem. Roots and leaves were frozen in time there, crisscrossing together in a lattice where its healing had ended. It was a bizarre creature. Baylan would’ve loved to study it. The neck of the dragon had slumped over the side of its split body, its square like mouth broken against the earth.
Walter turned back to Grimbald, who had bent over with his hands on his knees and winced. Walter touched his glowing hand to Grimbald’s head, sent a sliver of the Phoenix’s touch to mend his wounds. Grimbald gasped and shuddered. “It’s so cold. I forgot how cold that feels.”
Walter turned when he felt it was done and Grimbald nodded. He heard footsteps approaching from behind and turned to find most of Scab’s men there, staring at him. A lot of men clutched limbs cut and bloodied, some bent the wrong way. He saw a trail of bodies behind them, unmoving. The creatures from earlier had caused a lot more damage than he’d guessed.
“Thanks, Walter,” Grimbald said.
“Of course. You alright?” he said over his shoulder.
“More or less. The question is, are you alright? You know, after jumping down the neck of the biggest lizard I’ve ever seen.”
Walter swallowed. “Yeah.” A smile flashed and vanished across his lips. The heavy debt of exhaustion was pressing on him. Using the Phoenix and the Dragon didn’t come without a price. Usually, it was merely a sacrifice of one’s constitution, other times they had demanded the souls of those closest to him.
Walter felt the blood and gooey saliva starting to congeal on his arms and hair, prickling his skin. He started brushing it off the best he could with his hand, which coincidentally wasn’t very good at all. A handkerchief flew at him and he snatched it from the air.
Scab grinned at him. “Need another?” Scab had a hand pressed into his gut, blood welling out between his fingers. “Perhaps you could mend my mortal wound first?”
“Probably. Have more?” He decided to make Scab wait. It was soiled after wiping his face and he tossed it on a barb jutting out from the dragon’s back. Scab’s handkerchief was likely clean as a horse’s ass, which was still cleaner than him at the moment. It fluttered in a breeze like a tiny sail from the deadly barb.
“Come here,” Walter beckoned.
Scab shuffled over to him wearing a half-smirk, and Walter healed his puncture wound.
“That — that was something.” Scab started clapping and his other men followed his lead, those that could at least. A few whoops and cheers came from the men. “Can’t say I’ve seen anything like that before!” Scab laughed uproariously over the clapping. He turned and sent approving nods at his crew. Some men who had opted not
to clap seemed to reluctantly join in, likely at Scab’s keen eye.
“Well, well. Never thought my employer would be the one to save my hide,” he laughed.
“Wouldn’t be the first time!” someone added.
Scab shrugged and nodded in agreement. “Right you are, Brunwick,” Scab called to the stout mercenary. “Now what shall we do with all this mess of plant eh, meat?”
“Eat it?” Grimbald suggested.
“I don’t think that would be wise.” Walter furrowed his brow.
“Walt, I know you did it in and all. Mind if I take a trophy? Think one of those canines would make a fine spear.”
“Have at it.” Walter waved to the dead creature. Carrion birds were circling far above the trees, waiting for everyone to make room for them to get their fill.
Grimbald made his way to the dragon’s head and drew an axe. He put one arm under its fat lip and drew it up to its black gums. With his other hand, he started hacking into one of its ivory teeth.
“What do you think it is?” Scab placed one fist on his hip and the other twirled one of the ends of his mustache.
“A big fuckin’ lizard, I think,” Wart said. He had a gash on the side of his head. Blood trickled down his temple and curled under his jaw.
“Hm. A dragon, would you say?” Scab cocked his head at his second.
“A sort,” he snorted.
“No, not a dragon.” Walter heaved out a breath. “Something worse.” Was it a new breed? Or something they just happened to never encounter?
“Out with it already,” Scab gestured.
“Death Spawn. A type I’ve never seen before.”
“That was what I feared,” Scab frowned.
“They die all the same though, don’t they? Big fuckin’ targets on their chests and all.”
“Right you are, my good man.” Scab slapped him on the shoulder.
“No!” A shriek of horror called out. “What have you done?” There was a vagrant woman beside the felled monster. She placed a trembling hand on its neck and recoiled when she touched it. Her skin had the pallor of a corpse and was littered with disfiguring sores. She wore a strange mask on half of her face that wholly covered her eye. Maybe she had no use for it like him. Her sparse clothing looked like it would fall apart in the next heavy rain.
“Are you alright?” Walter took a step toward her and she leaped back. She wore a skewed circlet of beads and leather that clacked together when she moved.
“Who — who are you?” she demanded, looking from Grimbald to Walter. Her eye was milk-white; the dark pupil a swirling spot. That was not the eye of a man. This was no ordinary vagrant. Walter took a cautious step back and seized the Dragon. His eye burned with an amber glow.
“I’m Walter. Walter of Breden. Who are you?”
“Walter.” She looked down at her hand. “Walter, Walter,” she said it, as if tasting the words. “Walter of Breden.”
Grimbald stole a glance at her, then hacked through the canine he’d been working on with a final pop. “This is going—”
“You defile him!” The vagrant woman turned on Grimbald and screamed. “He has served me for thousands of years and now you defile his body.” She whimpered. “What to do? What can I do?” She tapped a curling black nail on her chin. “Can he be saved now?”
Walter peered at Scab and they exchanged raised eyebrows.
Scab cleared his throat. “Might I offer you a drink?” Scab gave her his most rancid of grins. Both of their mouths appeared to be in a similar state of horrid neglect.
“Walter of Breden, you must die for your crimes,” she hissed. She sank into a crouch and one arm twisted over her head, the other coming up from below. Green mist puffed from her hands and from it came a creature like a squid with a blood red eye. Walter’s eye went wide and he fell to the ground as it zoomed through the air, colliding with the man’s face behind him.
Walter looked back to see its tentacles wrap around the unfortunate man’s head. They flexed for an instant and the mercenary’s head exploded like tomato struck by a hammer. Men around him dove and tried to shield themselves from the splashing gore. The squid darted off to the next man, and its tendrils wrapped up another in its deadly embrace.
“Shit!” Walter barked. His heart thundered from his chest to his guts.
Their relaxation had lasted but a few minutes before chaos reigned once more. Scab ducked and awkwardly hacked at the flying squid as it hurled through the air, impossibly taking flight without wings. More squid creatures poured out of that green mist and Walter rose up, slashing at her with Stormcaller.
Her side bloodlessly split apart, and an insect the size of Walter’s torso sprang in and out in an instant. It collided with Stormcaller, sending its tendrils flailing into the air.
“What are you?” he breathed, a mix of wonder and fear.
“Lay down your arms or die!” she screamed, voice hoarse and rasping. She didn’t know who he was. Men drew weapons and gripped their spears tighter. Arrows cut through the air. A swarm of armored bugs spilled from the terrible sores on her arms. They buzzed for the incoming arrows and spitted themselves on their heads, sending the arrows harmlessly careening to the ground.
“I am Marcine, the servant of the great lord, redeemer of this land.” She grinned with a black mouth. “And you! Fight me in my home?” She cackled and tapped her fingernails together.
“It’s not human,” Scab plainly stated.
“Where have you brought us?” someone shouted.
“To hell, that’s where!” a gruff voice replied.
“Where’s the gem on this one?” another voice asked.
“Up there!” A man pointed up at the treetops with his sword. “Fuckin’ spiders!”
At least twenty spiders drifted to the ground, each almost as big as a man. They dangled on thick ropes of webbing, their hooked legs reached for the earthen floor. Their bodies were coated in a black pelt and there was a violet hourglass painted on the underside of their abdomens.
“Spiders, why did it have to be spiders?” Grimbald gripped his axes with white knuckles. His arms trembled and his knees wobbled.
“Doesn’t matter what they are, just kill them. Careful of their pincers!” Walter shouted it for the others, as if that had needed saying. It seemed like right thing to say anyway.
“Burn like your pets!” Walter planted his boot and eight red orbs of fire vaulted from his fingertips. They smoked in the air and wound to Marcine. She clawed her hands and dragged them up, as if resisting a great weight. A wall of roots sprouted from the earth at the last second and his fireballs collided with it, throwing lengths of burning fiber into the air. A piece landed on a spider and sparked its hair ablaze. The beast squealed and it fell from the sky.
“The Great Lord Asebor comes for you.” Marcine’s black lips tugged into an insidious smile. “You are marked, bound to return to her arms.”
Walter felt the brand on the back of his neck burning, as if it were inflicted for the first time. It was in the shape of a figure eight and marked him as Death Spawn food, the Shadow god had said. He would be no person’s, nor demon’s, meal. “I welcome you all to taste my fire. Bring him, bring the rest of your friends and save me the time of hunting you bastards down!” he spat through gritted teeth.
The spiders fell on the mercenaries and the wood erupted with screams of pain. He was intimately familiar with the sting of poison. It was a horrible pain, one he’d be reluctant to use on his worst enemy. “Call them off and I’ll let you live!” He pointed with his stump and his sword of fire materialized from it.
“Are you attempting to bargain with me?” she laughed. The flesh of her shoulders parted like an opening book and a swarm of hornets billowed out. They vibrated and shimmered in the air. There were hundreds of them, maybe five-hundred.
“Stop. You can’t stop me, you’re just not strong enough, Marcine. You’re too weak, too stupid, and too fucking ugly. Why do you think Asebor left you in the middle of th
e forest?”
She recoiled like she had been slapped and pain spread across her face. “You know not of what you speak! Die!” She snarled. The hornets formed two separate masses, black as storm clouds and buzzing towards him. Walter snapped his fingers, imagining where the insects were in flight. Fire filled the air within the twin masses of hornets in the shape of a chomping Dragon’s mouth. The Dragon’s fire crackled in the air, feasted on their tiny bodies. The hornets turned to clumps of ashes, drifting in the slight breeze. The Dragon fire was gone, wisps of smoke the only evidence it was ever there.
“What-how?” Marcine stammered. “It is true.”
“You are nothing,” Walter said and took a step toward her. “Call off your pets and I’ll let you live.”
She growled and spat. The putrid mist formed around her and new squids danced from its green abyss. One darted at him and he sliced up with his blade, splitting it up the middle. Its bloody halves collided with his chest and fell away. Another came and he cracked and slashed with Stormcaller, willing each of its tendrils to destroy the five that remained. Two made it through Stormcaller’s onslaught. He inhaled and tilted his chin up, watching them come. At the last second before hitting him, a Phoenix portal split the air and opened behind Marcine. The squids hurled through the blue portal and out the other side, latched onto Marcine’s arms.
“No!” her jaw dropped and her white eye went wide as a saucer. She had a squid on either arm and their red eyes flashed and tentacles squeezed. Her tissue ripped, bones cracked and snapped. Her head went back with a scream. Their powerful tentacles closed through the air, streaked it with her blood, and severed arms thumped onto the earth. She shrieked and the ragged remains of her arms writhed and spurted blood.
“The problem with you lot is that you never listen.” Walter walked towards her, crossing his arms around his back. “Never know when you’re duly defeated.”
Marcine collapsed to her knees and started sobbing.
A New Light (The Age of Dawn Book 5) Page 7
