Urdresh the Abhorrent
Member
- Messages
- 12
A somber figure trekked across the green swell of gently sloping foothills, the slow clicking steps of his steed leaving smoldering welts of rot in the grassy swards as it trod ever on. The beast was a horrific vision: what at first might have been mistaken as a glossy sheen of sweat upon closer inspection would have been revealed to be a malodorous ichor of necrotic gel oozing from the decaying flesh and sinews. Lurid off-white bone protruded at grotesque angles from portions of horseflesh too decomposed to remain even vaguely intact, whole chunks of grey-black meat sloughing off in moldering, fly-riddled globules upon the path.
The horse's rider suffered no such hideous malediction, no swarm of flies nor blistering buboes of decay. He wore a weathered cloak over a frayed, flowing robe, each the deepest hue of black, and beneath a billowing shemagh limned with gently clinking golden baubles strung upon delicate gilded cord, there glared out across the chilly valley the vacant countenance of death. Instead of naked bone, however, this grim visage was comprised of dark iron, concealing whatever face truly lay behind those vacuous, lidless sockets.
The masked rider pulled his shemagh tighter around him as a fell breeze kicked up over the weald, stirring the placid grass fields. In the distance loomed the ominous and oppressive silhouette of the Spine, that unyielding mountainous blade risen up from the tough eastern soil whose crowns were ever capped in white and beneath whose peaks dwarves toiled in their chasmic halls of stone.
The rider paused. With a slow, languid shift of his head, his gaze was drawn to a disturbance in the nearby long grass. There was a crack of rushes being crushed under a clumsy foot, then a gasp, and then silence.
“Come out,” the rider spoke. His accent was strange. Like his headdress and golden trinkets, it denoted him as a man of the far western deserts, but the dialect was difficult to place. His voice itself was at once both disconcerting and strangely melodious; a sibilant hiss saturated with authority, devoid of uncertainty, a serpentine whisper.
A man in a wispy green cloak with a traveling pack tentatively stepped out of the grass. “Sorry, I wasn't spying on you! I was camped out in there, you see. Strange rumors abound in these parts. Pays to take precautions, friend.”
There was a pause in which the silence grew in the traveler's ears into the scream of unseen locusts.
“What rumors have you heard, friend?” The question split the roar of tinnitus like a knife and the traveler nearly jumped in fright. He looked round surreptitiously, as though someone out in the middle of this vast valley may be listening in on their conversation, before he began to rapidly collect his belongings, including a ratty, grass-stained blanket, back into his bag, exiting the long grass at last to stand face to face with the rider.
“Strange ones... They say these roads are haunted, you know. I don't doubt it. From what I've heard there have been battles here. Battles new and old. That leaves behind a lot of foul blood, you know, soaks right into the soil, turns it sour.”
There was another pause. “Yes,” the rider agreed in another sibilant whisper, his gaze wandering languidly back to the road.
“All manner of horrid things have haunted these mountains. The undead roam free, and those... creatures... from the tundra..” The rider's attention snapped firmly back upon the traveler. “Well, this time they're bandying some stories about some screeching wraith wandering the crags and foothills, screaming bloody incantations to the dark powers, rousing who knows what from sleep beneath the mountains. I don't truck with such ill omens, eh? Best to let them pass right by me. Hence, the hiding spot, y'see.” He gestured amiably to the long grass.
The rider looked from the grass to the man without reply. At length, he said, “You had better regain the road swiftly, wanderer. You've lost much of the day to idleness and the sun quits the heavens soon once more.”
The traveler looked up suddenly and sharply, a look of forlorn realization overtaking his doughy features. Indeed, the sun was only just now beginning to crest above the mountain peaks, threatening to soon descend behind them. “Curse me for a fool! I can't lose a day's worth of travel! Ah, but I don't want to risk the wraith of that horrible spirit! I'll just... I'll just keep to the long grass. I've made a nice little camp site behind the rushes, if you care to keep some company tonight?”
But when he looked back at the rider, he was already guiding his steed away. It was only then that he noticed the egregious state of the horse which bore him. He stared for several minutes, mouth agape, at the wretched spectacle as it slowly disappeared from view down the valley road, until he could no longer see the glossy sheen of congealed, gelatinous filth dripping off the creature's jutting bones.
“...by the gods!” he whispered, dipping quietly and meekly back into the grass.
The horse's rider suffered no such hideous malediction, no swarm of flies nor blistering buboes of decay. He wore a weathered cloak over a frayed, flowing robe, each the deepest hue of black, and beneath a billowing shemagh limned with gently clinking golden baubles strung upon delicate gilded cord, there glared out across the chilly valley the vacant countenance of death. Instead of naked bone, however, this grim visage was comprised of dark iron, concealing whatever face truly lay behind those vacuous, lidless sockets.
The masked rider pulled his shemagh tighter around him as a fell breeze kicked up over the weald, stirring the placid grass fields. In the distance loomed the ominous and oppressive silhouette of the Spine, that unyielding mountainous blade risen up from the tough eastern soil whose crowns were ever capped in white and beneath whose peaks dwarves toiled in their chasmic halls of stone.
The rider paused. With a slow, languid shift of his head, his gaze was drawn to a disturbance in the nearby long grass. There was a crack of rushes being crushed under a clumsy foot, then a gasp, and then silence.
“Come out,” the rider spoke. His accent was strange. Like his headdress and golden trinkets, it denoted him as a man of the far western deserts, but the dialect was difficult to place. His voice itself was at once both disconcerting and strangely melodious; a sibilant hiss saturated with authority, devoid of uncertainty, a serpentine whisper.
A man in a wispy green cloak with a traveling pack tentatively stepped out of the grass. “Sorry, I wasn't spying on you! I was camped out in there, you see. Strange rumors abound in these parts. Pays to take precautions, friend.”
There was a pause in which the silence grew in the traveler's ears into the scream of unseen locusts.
“What rumors have you heard, friend?” The question split the roar of tinnitus like a knife and the traveler nearly jumped in fright. He looked round surreptitiously, as though someone out in the middle of this vast valley may be listening in on their conversation, before he began to rapidly collect his belongings, including a ratty, grass-stained blanket, back into his bag, exiting the long grass at last to stand face to face with the rider.
“Strange ones... They say these roads are haunted, you know. I don't doubt it. From what I've heard there have been battles here. Battles new and old. That leaves behind a lot of foul blood, you know, soaks right into the soil, turns it sour.”
There was another pause. “Yes,” the rider agreed in another sibilant whisper, his gaze wandering languidly back to the road.
“All manner of horrid things have haunted these mountains. The undead roam free, and those... creatures... from the tundra..” The rider's attention snapped firmly back upon the traveler. “Well, this time they're bandying some stories about some screeching wraith wandering the crags and foothills, screaming bloody incantations to the dark powers, rousing who knows what from sleep beneath the mountains. I don't truck with such ill omens, eh? Best to let them pass right by me. Hence, the hiding spot, y'see.” He gestured amiably to the long grass.
The rider looked from the grass to the man without reply. At length, he said, “You had better regain the road swiftly, wanderer. You've lost much of the day to idleness and the sun quits the heavens soon once more.”
The traveler looked up suddenly and sharply, a look of forlorn realization overtaking his doughy features. Indeed, the sun was only just now beginning to crest above the mountain peaks, threatening to soon descend behind them. “Curse me for a fool! I can't lose a day's worth of travel! Ah, but I don't want to risk the wraith of that horrible spirit! I'll just... I'll just keep to the long grass. I've made a nice little camp site behind the rushes, if you care to keep some company tonight?”
But when he looked back at the rider, he was already guiding his steed away. It was only then that he noticed the egregious state of the horse which bore him. He stared for several minutes, mouth agape, at the wretched spectacle as it slowly disappeared from view down the valley road, until he could no longer see the glossy sheen of congealed, gelatinous filth dripping off the creature's jutting bones.
“...by the gods!” he whispered, dipping quietly and meekly back into the grass.