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He barely managed to close his eyes in time, before the cavern exploded in blinding light.
Unearthly shrieks of dismay followed. These cries were nothing like the sounds spawned by throat or lungs of the living. Instead, they came out as wet, gurgling yowls with a faint, female undercurrent, as if a voice not of this world forced itself out through their rotten bodies.
The bright flare felt as if it might burn through his eyelids. Daring to blink his eyes open, he found the underdwellers cowering and retreating, their limbs shielding their terrible eyes. At once, he spotted the exit he had been looking for.
This was their chance. Perhaps their only one.
"Follow me!"
Charging for the other end of the cavern, a narrow corridor shot off from this deathtrap of a hall. But it was blocked by a towering figure, rising ten feet above them, bedecked in rusting gear, rotting leather and cleaned bones, all knit together by the same fungi that swarmed the entrance.
It had been too far away to be rebuked by the light. It stared down at Hugo with white, leering eyes.
For a moment, fear gripped his heart. But before it could overtake him, he envisioned the man who had allowed these creatures free reign, and red, burning rage subsumed his cowardice instead. In a roaring battle-cry, he charged the creature, both blades drawn.
His fury caused him to forget his own words of caution to Grul, spearing the creature with both swords, one planted where its heart should be, the other in a burning eye-socket, crashing into the wall together, his swords sinking into softer earth, pinning the creature. Its arms went around him in a sickly embrace, and a cloyingly sweet voice rippled out from its chest:
"You left us, Hugo . . ."
Hugo's enraged eyes flared wider open, peeled by astonishment. Claws sank into his ragged coat on his back. Leaving the swords stuck in the creature, he pushed up a knee between them, then, with his boot planted against it, he kicked himself free of its arms. Claws of bone and thorn ripped through his coat, grazing his leather armour.
The creature's reached out for him, like a mother desperately clawing for her infant, pushing itself and the blades gradually up. Hugo grabbed a third, shorter sword on his back, and with astonishing speed and ferocity, began hacking the restrained creature to bits.
At the end of his work, its torso split for its legs, its dislodged arms wriggling like worms, he stood panting, sweat and filth on his brow. The wound he had inflicted on its stomach revealed something . . . an old and torn gamberson of yellow and green, along with a silver medallion of a cockatrice.
The third blade fell out of his hand, clattering on the ground.
"Darius . . ."
He would recognise these pieces anywhere. The young man-at-arms swam before his vision again; his cocky, wide smile, his large forehead and impish, wide-set, nut-coloured eyes set against a shaggy mane of black hair, arms lazily cupped between his haunches. Wearing this gamberson, his eyes had been so full of life, eager to laugh and quick to join in a round of carousing and banter, always there to drive the jest home. For every scolding or discipline Hugo had given the boy, he had merely grown bolder, more outrageous in his pranks.
But there hadn't been a braver soldier in the Guard than him.
Now, he was reduced to this. A shambling abberration, writhing to touch him as if to remember its former life, its final whisper still lingering around it like an unholy aura. Hugo's jaw quivered, his fury melting before blackest sorrow. He fell to his knee, cradling the silver medallion in his palm - the pride and joy of Darius, seeing himself as a favourite of House Basilicus. Tears streamed down from his eyes, and he pulled up the medallion to let it touch his own brow.
Darius, you bloody bastard. You always strove to get the last laugh, didn't you? Even in death you mock me, though your good-natured smile has rotten away . . .
While Hugo struggled to reconcile himself with the sight before him, the underdwellers worked through their respite, beginning to recover after the blinding light . . .
The narrow corridor loomed before them. A door to salvation - or to their doom?
Grul
Unearthly shrieks of dismay followed. These cries were nothing like the sounds spawned by throat or lungs of the living. Instead, they came out as wet, gurgling yowls with a faint, female undercurrent, as if a voice not of this world forced itself out through their rotten bodies.
The bright flare felt as if it might burn through his eyelids. Daring to blink his eyes open, he found the underdwellers cowering and retreating, their limbs shielding their terrible eyes. At once, he spotted the exit he had been looking for.
This was their chance. Perhaps their only one.
"Follow me!"
Charging for the other end of the cavern, a narrow corridor shot off from this deathtrap of a hall. But it was blocked by a towering figure, rising ten feet above them, bedecked in rusting gear, rotting leather and cleaned bones, all knit together by the same fungi that swarmed the entrance.
It had been too far away to be rebuked by the light. It stared down at Hugo with white, leering eyes.
For a moment, fear gripped his heart. But before it could overtake him, he envisioned the man who had allowed these creatures free reign, and red, burning rage subsumed his cowardice instead. In a roaring battle-cry, he charged the creature, both blades drawn.
His fury caused him to forget his own words of caution to Grul, spearing the creature with both swords, one planted where its heart should be, the other in a burning eye-socket, crashing into the wall together, his swords sinking into softer earth, pinning the creature. Its arms went around him in a sickly embrace, and a cloyingly sweet voice rippled out from its chest:"You left us, Hugo . . ."
Hugo's enraged eyes flared wider open, peeled by astonishment. Claws sank into his ragged coat on his back. Leaving the swords stuck in the creature, he pushed up a knee between them, then, with his boot planted against it, he kicked himself free of its arms. Claws of bone and thorn ripped through his coat, grazing his leather armour.
The creature's reached out for him, like a mother desperately clawing for her infant, pushing itself and the blades gradually up. Hugo grabbed a third, shorter sword on his back, and with astonishing speed and ferocity, began hacking the restrained creature to bits.
At the end of his work, its torso split for its legs, its dislodged arms wriggling like worms, he stood panting, sweat and filth on his brow. The wound he had inflicted on its stomach revealed something . . . an old and torn gamberson of yellow and green, along with a silver medallion of a cockatrice.
The third blade fell out of his hand, clattering on the ground.
"Darius . . ."
He would recognise these pieces anywhere. The young man-at-arms swam before his vision again; his cocky, wide smile, his large forehead and impish, wide-set, nut-coloured eyes set against a shaggy mane of black hair, arms lazily cupped between his haunches. Wearing this gamberson, his eyes had been so full of life, eager to laugh and quick to join in a round of carousing and banter, always there to drive the jest home. For every scolding or discipline Hugo had given the boy, he had merely grown bolder, more outrageous in his pranks.
But there hadn't been a braver soldier in the Guard than him.
Now, he was reduced to this. A shambling abberration, writhing to touch him as if to remember its former life, its final whisper still lingering around it like an unholy aura. Hugo's jaw quivered, his fury melting before blackest sorrow. He fell to his knee, cradling the silver medallion in his palm - the pride and joy of Darius, seeing himself as a favourite of House Basilicus. Tears streamed down from his eyes, and he pulled up the medallion to let it touch his own brow.
Darius, you bloody bastard. You always strove to get the last laugh, didn't you? Even in death you mock me, though your good-natured smile has rotten away . . .
While Hugo struggled to reconcile himself with the sight before him, the underdwellers worked through their respite, beginning to recover after the blinding light . . .
The narrow corridor loomed before them. A door to salvation - or to their doom?
Grul
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