Belly of the Beast

by Warren Thomas

  Nizar knew the others he heard weren’t zombies. Mogens had stopped their uncontrolled rush after the fleeing army when night fell. He feared losing control of his command as much, or more, than losing the battle. Nizar had ignored the command to assemble, knowing he had to have Tane Kyleson in hand to avoid the altar, and Mogens’ bloody knife. But he knew the zombie army was close behind him, now arrayed in battle formations.

  Muttering a prayer, Nizar felt the dagger turn slightly in his cold-numbed hand. It was pointing the way to salvation for Nizar. Pointing the way to ultimate wealth and power. Pointing the way to Nizar’s personal vengeance on all, mortal and God alike, who had hurt him.

  Reaching the edge of the forest, with Kestsax spread out before him, Nizar paused to shed the gray robes of Dakar. He regretted giving them up, for the multi-layered woolen garments gave a blessed measure of warmth in this cold, dank land. Burying them under a pile of damp, half-rotten leaves, he took a careful bead on the spot the dagger was pointing at. That done, he slipped the dagger under his belt and set out. Soon, he noted all the men, women and children scattered about in huddled groups.

  Doomed, and they don’t even know it yet, he thought with a grin. The world is only so big, with no place to hide from a God.

  But what really heartened him wasn’t the refugees’ lack of real hope, but that they weren’t allowed into the city. That meant Tane Kyleson was also outside the city walls. Capturing him was immensely easier out here. And he wouldn’t have to concoct a plan to smuggle the swordsmith out of the besieged city.

  Pausing every so often, Nizar pulled the dagger and adjusted his course. As he neared the walls he found more and more refugees and battle survivors. He started keeping the dagger out all the time, so that he didn’t pass Tane in the dark and have to double back.

  The cold rain, which was growing steadily heavier, accompanied by fierce winds and crashing thunder, helped to keep others from moving about, thus giving Nizar cover to stalk his prey. Indeed, he suspected that Tane was as numbed by the cold rain as himself, barely coherent in his misery.

  Daybreak arrived, dim behind thick black clouds. Nizar was smiling, for the dagger was pointing at a pair of men staring at a fire under a crude blanket canopy.

  At last, Tane Kyleson!

  Chapter 36

  Dawn arrived with the promise of more cold rain, hard-driven by the gale force winds of a winter storm. The dark wall of clouds loomed over them; it’s crashing thunder rattling wagons at times. If anything, it looked even more menacing than it did the day before.

  Tane cast baleful eyes on the gray city walls, knowing that warm, dry accommodations waited within. There really wasn’t any reason for him and his friends to spend the night in such cold misery.

  He noticed Quinn’s head turn, his tilted eyes narrowing. Tane looked out through the driving rain, trying to discern what had alarmed the half-elf. There was barely a movement to see, just a dark gray land of shadows.

  Then one by one, and in small clumps, he saw shuffling men, women and children emerge from the woodline. It only took seconds for the other refugees to realize the zombies had arrived. Shouts for the gates to be opened erupted from a thousand throats, with Tane adding his to the God-awful din. Helmeted heads began crowded the battlements, but there was no indication that the city’s defenders intended to let anyone inside.

  “Into the moat,” Quinn ordered, throwing Raven over his shoulder.

  The area around Tane was suddenly chaos. Men and women screamed and cried, running wildly in all directions, many dropping to their knees and begging the city’s defenders to save them.

  “What good will that do?” Tane said, wanting to run around the city instead, to get as much distance between him and the zombies as possible. The dark waters of the moat, blanketed with early morning mists, looked cold and formidable. “Maybe they’ll open the dock gates for us?”

  “No,” Armin said. “Quinn’s right. Swim over to the berm at the base of the walls. With the water between us and the zombies, we’ll stand a better chance of survival. Those craven pigs atop the walls might even drop us a rope or two.”

  After shucking his mail armor, Tane helped Quinn strip Raven of her cuirass and boots. Tane shoved Tasheba under his belt, knowing how Raven felt about the enchanted blade. Gods forbid that a zombie or one of Dakar’s priests ever claim that magic sword.

  Both Vikon quickly shed their armor and boots, and then waded into the murky waters. By the time Tane and Quinn waded in, others were plunging into the dark moat waters as well. A tall, dark man with a dagger in hand bellowed in anger behind Tane, making Tane think him unable to swim. He felt sorry for him, but knew he wasn’t strong enough of a swimmer to save him as well. Halfway across Tane saw the first ropes being lowered.

  Thanking every God he could think of, and Kamain twice, Tane emerged from the moat and claimed a dangling rope. He waited for Quinn, who slowly towed Raven across. Tane tied a large loop with a slip knot into the rope for Raven. And only after she was a good two thirds of the way up did either man look for a rope to climb up. At the top of the wall they found Raven missing.

  “Forget the woman,” an angry lieutenant snapped, pointing southward. “You have more important things to worry about.”

  Zombies in the thousands were crowded along the moat shore, starting to wash around the city walls in an unstoppable wave of mindless humanity. Captives could be seen being dragged to a holding area some three hundred paces from the walls. Soon, gray-robed men and women arrived. Tane instantly knew them for priests of Dakar.

  The number of lightning strikes doubled suddenly, then doubled again. Several hit upraised spears and tall towers, blasting men and stone to bits. All the while the zombie horde just stood before them in utter silence, staring up at the defenders with dead eyes and slack faces.

  Then the priests surrounded the captives. Tane watched in horror as the priests ordered men and women dragged to them, where they laid a hand on the hapless victim. Whenever one of the gray-robed priests touched a captive, he or she tensed, then relaxed completely. All life was washed from the victim’s face, showing the world Dakar had a new zombie slave to command. The newest zombies quickly took their places among the others.

  Sweeping his eyes over the crowd of mindless humanity, Tane’s heart hammered as he saw several familiar faces. Everard Boarsbane. Corporal Disa. The Amazon from 2nd Section, Sophie. Even Captain Kenelm was a zombie.

  “Look!” Quinn said, pointing to a group just emerging from the forest. It was too far for Tane or the Vikon to distinguish faces, not having Quinn’s keen elven eyesight. “It’s Sergeant Gareth and Corporal Pendar. They’re zombies.”

  “Damn,” Armin growled. “I was just starting to like Pendar. He wasn’t such a bad fellow after all.”

  Unexpected, the zombies before them erupted in fire. Tane yelped as he jumped back. Armin cursed, stepping in front of Joelle. Though a good fifty paces away, the flames were searing hot on their flesh.

  “Mage fires,” Quinn said, shielding his eyes from the intense light.

  “It seems the Kestsaxian mages have finally waded into the battle,” Joelle said. She glowered a long moment. “We could’ve used them yesterday. The battle might’ve gone differently.”

  “Fat chance of that ever happening,” Armin said just as acidly. “That pampered lot wouldn’t consent to getting their precious hands dirty, much less sleeping on the hard ground and associating with common soldiers like us.”

  “Gods forbid!” Joelle said.

  “At least they’re fighting now,” Tane said, though highly distressed. Men and women he had come to see as friends were dying terrible deaths before his eyes. Corporal Disa’s entire squad was unaccounted for. Everard hadn’t been such a bad sort, after Raven had introduced them and spurred on a few friendly arm wrestling competitions in the barracks. Competitions that Tane recalled her making a killing at in wagers, only to lose playing dice. “I pray that being zombies doesn’t Taint their so
uls in the eyes of the Gods.”

  The cloud bank lurched forward and dropped to the ground, smothering the arcane fires. Tane thought it would envelope the city walls as well, but hastily cast spells by the mages and priests saved them. Joelle was scornful of the mages’ tactics, saying that the priests had really saved them. Tane didn’t care, as long as somebody was vigilant.

  When the cloud bank fell back it revealed a hellish scene. Scorched bodies lay atop scorched bodies. Only Dakar’s priests survived the fiery carnage. But zombies in the thousands were already shuffling out of the surrounding forest to replace the dead. Tane saw no end of them in sight.

  It didn’t take long for the zombies to fill up all available space in the fields surrounding the city.

  “They’re going to charge the wall!” someone cried to Tane’s far left. “Be alert! Repelling teams to the front!”

  The gray-robed priests were giving orders furiously, sending axe-wielding zombies back into the forest. Soon, they reappeared with long poles easily as long as the walls were tall. Many were lashed together to form ladders, with others used to make bridges wide enough to pass three men abreast. Tane was impressed by the single-minded speed in which the zombies worked. In no time they were ready.

  “Here they come,” Quinn said. “The true slaughter begins.”

  “Why don’t the mages burn them up again?” Tane said, faced with the daunting task of facing their uncounted thousands.

  “They’ve shot their wad already,” Armin said.

  “Armin!” Joelle scolded. Then turning to Tane, she said, “Remember when I told you magic requires life energy? Well, the mages will have to build up their individual hoards of life energies before they can cast such a powerful spell again. It might not be easy to find that much spare energy in the city.”

  “Not for long, anyway,” Armin said.

  The Vikon couple shared a grim look.

  “This is a more mundane fight coming,” Quinn said. “I’ve seen mages do such things before. It is a tactic to make their enemies wary. In all my years as a mercenary, I’ve never seen magic prove decisive in a major battle.”

  “Blood and muscle wins wars,” Armin said.

  For six hours the zombies came at them in wave after wave of humanity. Most never got across the moat. Though there were hundreds of makeshift bridges, they proved quite willing and capable of swimming if there wasn’t a bridge convenient when they reached the shore. But they never tried to protect themselves from the defenders arrows, hot oil, and thrown stones. By midday the newest zombie arrivals could walk halfway across the moat on the backs of the dead.

  “I haven’t seen such carnage since the Temple War,” Quinn said.

  By late afternoon the priests called off her zombie army and had a black pavilion erected well out of catapult range of the city walls. The priests filed inside once it was ready, making Tane wonder aloud at what they were doing.

  “War council, most likely,” Joelle said. “Their zombies aren’t proving too efficient in storming our walls.”

  Soon a sergeant of the City Guard came by looking for survivors of the previous day’s battle. She ordered them to form up with others below the walls. From there they were marched through the refugee-packed streets to a complex of fortresslike buildings – the Royal Army’s headquarters. There they found Raven sitting in a cobbled courtyard with other “walking wounded,” cradling her head in both hands.

  “Raven!” Quinn cried, breaking ranks to hurry to her side. The sergeant marching them barked an order for everyone else to hold fast, then glared murderously at Quinn. Tane grinned fiercely. Except for Corporal Pendar, their squad was alive and back together again. “You’re all right! Sweet Mother, how I was worried when they took you away!”

  Raven smiled weakly, submissively enduring his embrace before dropping back to the ground quietly. Tane became worried. She should’ve been taunting the half-elf shamelessly.

  “You’re not well,” Quinn said. “I’ll get Joelle to look at you.”

  “No. Please. I’ve had enough magic pushed into my brain to last a lifetime,” she said, clutching his arm to stop him from leaving. He dropped down to sit beside her, letting her lean against him. “I’m just a little weak, that’s all. But I feel better seeing you and the others alive.”

  The sergeant walked over and looked down on them a moment. Tane was afraid Quinn was in trouble, but then the sergeant shrugged and walked back.

  “You boys and girls are here for debriefing,” the sergeant said. “You make sure you tell us everything, no matter how unimportant it seems to you now. If we’re going to win this war, then we need good military intelligence on the zombies. Now, stake out a spot and wait your turn to be debriefed.”

  Tane and the Vikon made their way to Quinn and Raven. They sat together, with Quinn telling her what happened after the battle. Surprisingly, she showed no emotions about Sergeant Gareth’s capture and fiery death. Tane had half-expected her to be terribly relieved, since she had lost their wager.

  “Oh, I have something for you,” Tane said, pulling Tasheba from under his belt.

  Raven snatched it from his hands, tears welling up.

  “I thought her lost,” she whispered, turning to Tane with grateful eyes. Before he knew what was happening, she threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. “Thank you. Anything you want, just ask.”

  Tane felt his face burning under everyone else’s bemused looks. Quinn seemed especially smug at Tane’s distress.

  “How long have you been awake?” Tane asked her, eager to change the subject.

  “About two hours,” she said, releasing him with a strange look in her eyes. Then she seemed to push her thoughts aside and shrugged. “They spent a good hour watching me to see if I would keel over, then sent me over here.”

  “Who healed you?” Armin asked as she tied Tasheba’s scabbard across her back. “Mages or priests?”

  “A priestess of Sharel. I think,” Raven said. “At least she was the first person I saw when I woke up.”

  “For free!” Tane said in mock shock, which brought a smile to her face.

  “Well... My purse is missing,” she said with mock thoughtfulness. She cut a predatory glance at Quinn, saying, “But since the priestess wasn’t from the temple of Ashtar, I hadn’t given it much thought. You don’t think she stole it, do you?”

  Quinn’s groan brought a low chuckle from her, and then she grimaced and started rubbing her temples.

  “Have you been debriefed?” Joelle said.

  “Yes,” she said. “They weren’t too pleased with my lack of information.” She snorted contemptuously. “Craven bastards couldn’t muster the backbone to march into battle themselves, and then have the audacity to get snotty when a common foot soldier can’t give them exact numbers and such. Ignorant, base-born, whore-sons.”

  “Typical,” Quinn said. “I’ve soldiered for over three hundred years, and in all that time officers haven’t changed one wit.”

  Raven said, “Well that just proves they’re inbred as well as being ignorant, base-born bunch of – ”

  “We get the point,” Joelle interrupted.

  “No you don’t. Wait until you’ve been debriefed,” Raven said. “You might not be as kind as I’m being.”

  A group of ten men exited a nearby door. They all looked spooked, nervously glancing around. The men looked to be as hard-bitten as any Tane had ever seen, and for them to react like that to the debriefing left him nervous as well. The sergeant escorting them out picked out ten more to follow him inside.

  Taking a deep breath and settling down for a long wait, Tane strangely found he’d rather be atop the walls fighting off the zombies than face the officers debriefing them. From the grim looks on the men and women around him, he wasn’t alone in that.

  Chapter 37

  The debriefing proved short, but intense. Tane left wondering just what did he know. No one seemed to believe anything he said, with many of the senior officers quite
hostile in their questioning. Joelle later said they were just scared. Quinn added that they might be looking for scapegoats to save their own heads from the king’s executioner.

  All the debriefed soldiers were assembled at sundown and marched to their old garrisons. Tane and his comrades found all their personal property had been removed from and piled in front of the barracks, which was housing new recruits. The sergeant in command ordered them to find their personal property and fall back into formation.

  Quinn was frantic before locating his pack, with all his personal effects stuffed inside. To Tane’s surprise, he immediately dumped the pack’s contents and began going through his stuff piece by piece.

  “Trusting bastard,” Raven grumbled, shaking her head. “He can’t find it in himself to trust anyone. Thinks everyone is out to steal everything he has.”

  “Maybe he’s been robbed before,” Tane offered.

  “So have I,” Raven countered, “but I’m not obsessed.”

  Tane looked at Joelle and Armin, who nodded as well.

  “Most mercenaries have been robbed at one time or another. Usually by the very people we are hired to protect,” Joelle said. “Most mercenaries forget about it after a period of outrage.” She looked sadly at Quinn’s back. “What he lost must have been very important to him.”

  The others all nodded agreement.

  Suddenly, a mischievous smile claimed Raven’s face.

  “All my things are just dumped on the ground,” she said in an overly loud voice, winking at Tane. She had no “things,” just the clothes she had been “recruited” wearing. She gathered up the few items the army had issued her and slanted a wicked look at Quinn. “I don’t have anything to carry them in. Maybe Quinn will let me keep my stuff in his pack?”

  Quinn’s head snapped up and around, a look of horror spreading across his face.

  “No!” he said. “You just want an excuse to get your thieving Ashtarite hands into my pack! Stay away from me!”

  Eyes atwinkle, Raven eased closer to Quinn, who began to repack with urgency. “Oh, Quinn. I wouldn’t steal from you. We’re soul-mates, lover. Oh...that’s pretty. Can I look at it, Quinn?”