by Troy A Hill
And its strength. If I had been fighting a normal human, I could use my undead strength and push my arms in. The beast had strength to match mine, and it kept my hands and my blades out to the side. The creature pushed my arms out. All I was able to do was lock my arms and keep from getting closer to that wolf-shaped mouth full of fangs.
Despite the wounds in my wrists, I twisted and aimed a kick for the creature’s crotch. I connected. Instead of the fleshy bits I expected to damage, I found rounded flesh. A female shifter. I jerked my foot back before she trapped it.
My awkward stance was what the beast needed. I felt it alter its balance point. She flashed a kick out, and her claws gave her purchase on the slick ground. Her other foot connected with my gut as her claws relaxed their hold. Merda! That was a powerful kick.
I sailed back and over the heads of the guards as they struggled to stand. Penda’s campfire and our chairs flashed under me as I descended. I twisted in the air and try to guide my feet between obstacles. The strong kick flung me past the fire. I hit a chair in my skid backward, knocking it over. Father Adda yipped in pain. At least I had my feet under me.
My slide took me against the flap to Penda’s tent. He was crawling out as I hit the linen, and our bodies connected enough to slam him off balance. His breath whooshed out as my slide knocked him back.
Feet under me, I crouched. Hands down to steady myself, ready to leap or run. My eyes found the shifter. She kicked out again and knocked a guard off balance, and he tumbled into the others. For a brief second, her yellow wolf-like eyes found me.
I thought, even from this far away, I sensed the panic in her gaze. In the split second before the guards charged her, she bolted back into the forest.
“After that creature!” Penda bellowed behind me.
39
Whispers in the Dark
“Get the hounds on it!” Ludló bellowed.
“They’ve scattered, milord,” the hunt master called. He whistled, trying to coax the dogs back towards him. They didn’t respond, so he moved into the trees. I stood and moved out of Penda’s way.
The back of my neck got the chilled sensation again.
“Be careful, dearest,” Gwen sent. “Afon and I are running as much as we can. The path here is rocky.”
I sent my mind out, scanning the area. Nothing on the first pass.
An agonising scream split the night. It tapered off just as the bleat of the sheep Gwen heard. I found the wrinkle.
“This way!” I yelled and charged into the forest. This wasn’t the way the shifter had run. But it was where the scream had come from.
I skidded to a stop at the sight. The white glow from my blades lit up the eerie scene. Two dogs lay dead, their white laced fur showed not a mark other than age. The hunt master, who had just been whistling, would do so no more. His newly aged, parched skin and now shockingly grey hair told me we had trouble, more than we wanted.
“What in Thunor’s crotch did that?” Penda exclaimed.
“The cloud,” I said. “Like the one that attacked Dunstan and I in that cave. There’s another one here.”
“How do you know it’s not the same one?” Ludló asked. He had come in on my other side.
“Tell them dearest,” Gwen sent. “We’ll sort it out later.”
“Gwen killed it yestereve,” I replied.
“How do you know that?” Penda stared into my face.
Another scream. I clamped my eyes shut. The hairs on my neck continued standing straight up.
I located the wrinkle again. A hundred paces away. Back in the trees, where the men had charged after the shifter. This time I tried to keep my mind locked on it as I ran, but it faded almost as soon as I found it.
Another body slumped in the forest came into view. The guilder guard who had reported to Penda. Dried, wrinkled skin, stark white hair. As though he had his vitality and life sucked out of him. Deodamnatus! One monster to deal with a night was enough. I didn’t need a second one.
Cries as men continued to pursue the shifter farther and farther from our camp. Whimpers from the dogs, hiding or running scared. Something else drifting around the edges. Like the wrinkle of the cloud, but different.
I kept my thoughts locked on the second wrinkle and ran. Then I lost it. I could run or concentrate, not both. I slowed and found it again. Then it blinked out. Like it sensed my mental touch.
“Merda!” I swore out loud.
“Gwen, Seren!” I shouted with my thoughts. “I need help! We’ve got two of them!”
“The shifter and the cloud?” Gwen sent. I sensed Seren’s mind stirred from sleep.
“No. Two wrinkles that seem like clouds… or something. They’re different from each other. Neither of them feels like a shifter. And I still have to find her.”
“The wolf-shifter is a woman?” Seren sent. She still seemed groggy from sleep. “What is going on?”
Gwen gave her a rundown of my last few minutes in the fight and our discoveries. I paused and tried to sense which threat seemed active.
Another scream split the air and quickly turned into a gurgle. I turned that way and ran. Too many trees to make a straight line. I found him propped against a tree. The other guilder guard.
A gash in his neck. And no blood. Well, not enough to make my demon take note. I remembered the merchant bodies we had found earlier. Whatever had sucked them dry was out here too.
“I will be on my way in a moment,” Seren sent. “I’ll get dressed and head to the grove.”
“Bring Emlyn,” I sent. “You’ll need his backup. Silver weapons. Tell him to wear his chain mail. This thing is both sneaky and nasty.”
“Another few moments, then,” she added.
Penda and Ludló jogged towards me. One look at the dead guilder in the glow from my swords took the words from them. Well, most of their words. Ludló cursed up a storm to rival most of the sailors I knew.
The Mercian king held my eyes for a second. “What do you suggest?”
Good question. “I’ve called in help,” I said, then I closed my eyes and concentrated on the wrinkles. This time, despite my search, I got nothing. The hairs at the back of my neck were still stiff, and my spine was chilled by an icy tingle. I felt as though the entities, whatever they were, had sensed my search and were blocking my magical sight.
“We face three different entities, Your Grace,” I said.
“Don’t ‘Your Grace’ me, Mair,” Penda growled. “Tell me how we find and kill these things.”
“A moment ago, I could sense the latter two,” I said. “They’re blocking me now. Hiding from my mental sight.”
“You can sense those things?” Ludló paled. “Why didn’t you detect them earlier?”
“It’s tricky to explain,” I said. “I have to search for them with my connection to the goddess. Gwen is much better than I am with that magic. Gwen and Afon are trying to get to where they can tree-walk to our location.”
“Tree-walk?” Ludló shook his head.
“I’ll explain later,” I said. Penda kept his eyes fixed on me. “Seren and Emlyn should be here in a few moments, though.”
“Penllyn’s daughter?” Penda asked as if he’d misheard.
“She’s our third,” I said. “Dedicated to the goddess.” I hoped Father Adda was out of earshot and still hiding in his tent.
“The way that shifter threw you, I won’t complain about Emlyn being here,” Penda said. He stared at me for a second. He gave a curt nod, accepting the inexplicable without comment.
“We’ve got plenty of swords already,” I said. “However, I don’t want Seren walking unprotected. Emlyn will have her back.” I raised my second sword and let the energy of the goddess dissipate then reignite. “Magic is what we need to combat creatures like these.”
“Do we wait for Lady Seren and Lady Gwen?” Ludló asked.
Another scream of anguish cascaded into the night.
“No time,” I said as I darted past them. Alone and scattered,
we were getting picked off. We needed to come together and watch each other’s backs. “Get your men together. Scattered about, they’re easy targets.”
Damn, these creatures were getting around. One of Penda’s guards lay dead. His life drained. White hair, dry parchment for skin.
“Mercia, to me!” Penda bellowed in the clearing. “By Woden’s short hairs, all of you to me!”
Near the fires, Penda and Ludló stood, blades and shields in hand. Their men staggered in. I patrolled around the outer edge of the camp, stepping with caution and using my magical senses to search for any of those entities.
A hunter came in with a dog on a lead. He had the leash pulled tight and almost had to drag the frightened animal into camp. The hound stayed close to the human, leaning into the man’s leg and shivering as it watched the dark edge of the surrounding woods.
A guard came back in, his blade glinting yellow in the firelight. He made his way back to his bedroll and grabbed the shield he had forgotten in his rush after the shifter.
“Mercia! To me!” Penda yelled again. “All of you, get your arses back to camp!”
I made another circuit around the camp. No sensation of the wrinkles came to my mind.
“Someone is difficult to awaken,” Seren sent. “He and Cadoc tried to keep up with Ruadh on mead tonight. Give us a few moments.”
I did a quick head count of the men with us in the camp. Two guards, one hunter, one dog.
Ludló reached into my tent and dragged the Witch Hunter priest out. He was white as a bone. His eyes darted around. I wasn’t sure who was shaking more, the priest or the hound.
“Your choice,” the guard captain growled. “Stay here by yourself or come along and help take those creatures down.”
“Don’t leave me here!” Father Adda gasped.
“Fine,” Penda said and shoved a silver seax into the priest’s hands. “You’re no priest of Woden, but every man does his part. Grab a shield from the fallen and stay in the middle of the group. Swing at anything that isn’t one of us.”
Penda stepped nose to nose with the guilder. “If you turn tail and run, I’ll chase your guild off this island. I will leave nothing of them in Britannia.”
The priest swallowed hard, then nodded.
I looked back at the men waiting by the fire. No one else had come back to camp.
“Where’s Talian and Dunstan?” I asked.
The men shrugged.
40
Into the Dark
Talian I could possibly find. I closed my eyes and surveyed the surrounding woods. After I moment, I found another human, then a second. Distance was difficult to judge. They weren’t with each other.
“That way,” I said and pointed with Soul. “I believe Talian and Dunstan are off that direction.”
“Let’s get the torches out,” Ludló suggested. He and another man swung a tarp off the packs and searched amongst them. With a grunt, he handed a torch to the priest.
“Make yourself useful and keep a light in the centre of the group,” he said and pointed towards the coals of the fire. Then he passed another torch to the hunter and gave the third to a guard. “You’ve got rearguard, Boric,” he told the man.
Boric and the hunter lit their torches with no questions. Father Adda still stood holding his torch in the same hand he should hold a shield with. Ludló shook his head.
“Give me that torch,” he exclaimed and snatched it from the priest. “Slide your arm into the straps on that shield.”
While Adda did so, Ludló lit the torch and held it out to the priest. “Instead of the handle on the shield, hold the torch. The shield will stay put.”
“And don’t burn anyone,” Penda said.
I took point and tried to stay slow enough that the torchlight from the hunter would catch my back. Distance out here was difficult to judge when I was trying to use my undead senses. A hundred paces seemed to only close a third of the distance between us and the human I sensed ahead.
A gasp turned into a gurgle from behind me, and Penda cursed.
Boric slumped forward. Behind him stood Baldwin’s corpse, a blade in his hand, dark as ebony and coated with Boric’s blood. The guard behind Penda spun as Boric’s torch hit the ground. He rushed Baldwin, but Baldwin’s corpse caught the guard’s overhead on his second blade. Then he thrust hard with his first. The man’s wooden shield cracked and splintered. Baldwin’s black blade emerged from the guard’s back and jerked sideways.
Penda was already stepping into Baldwin’s measure. I darted past the others. The dog was yelping in fright and trying to pull out of his collar in retreat. Now I knew what had been setting the dogs off. Our walking corpse of a Mercian guard.
Baldwin was fast and met Penda’s strike. He slid his dark blade down Penda’s sword to lock guards. His other blade thrust forward. Penda was smart enough to move out of line and clip the sword with his shield, not block it straight on.
By then I stepped in.
Deodamnatus! The swords weren’t in Baldwin’s hands. They were Baldwin’s hands. Or where his hands should have been.
My blades glowed again with the magic of the goddess, and I slammed Osmund’s blade in a hard overhead. That drew Baldwin’s left hand upward to block. I thrust in with Soul at his gut. Baldwin recoiled as the magic-infused steel pierced his chest.
He slammed a blade hand at me and tried a side strike with his other. Penda twisted his blade around and continued to stay locked together, binding the undead’s other sword hand. With Baldwin’s arm extended, and the Mercian king punched hard with the edge of his shield into Baldwin’s forearm. Bones cracked.
Baldwin took a jerking step back from me, sliding off my blade. He shook the arm Penda had just broken. I swear the bones realigned themselves, and the corpse dropped into guard stance, both arms whole and functional. Damn it! He dropped into the same stance I preferred. One blade overhead, point forward, the other blade guarding his front.
Penda and I took half a step forward. The Mercian king and I made a good team. He seemed to have a sixth sense about combat, much like Emlyn. We both wanted to see it react first.
Instead of a swing or a thrust, Baldwin’s corpse flexed downward and leapt. That damned dead body soared overhead into the trees. Instead of blades, fingers and hands grabbed at branches and pulled him into the treetops. He swung out of view, and my magical senses couldn’t track him.
The dog yelped and groaned at the same time the hunter wailed and collapsed. His torch rolled on the ground. The black cloud retracted two probing arms of mist. It flew into the trees.
“Let’s get to Talian and Dunstan before they do,” I called and raced ahead. No time to deal with the dead now.
A hundred paces later, I found a rock wall where the ground sloped upward. The first human I sensed stepped into the path. My swords still glowed with The Lady’s magic and illuminated a familiar figure.
“Lady Mair,” Talian called.
I smiled. Talian, alive and whole, was a bright spark in this dim night. Hugging with swords in hand is awkward, but I pulled him in for an embrace. He stood for a moment, then returned it.
Penda and Ludló, along with their lone surviving guard and Father Adda, gathered behind me. Everyone except Penda had a torch gripped with their shield hand. The yellow glow helped some, however, the dark gloom of the forest pressed in around us. With Baldwin and that damned cloud out there, waiting to attack, none of us felt safe.
Father Adda trembled. His eyes darted around, his gestures fast and jerky, as though he expected a monster to appear at any second.
“Where’s Dunstan?” Ludló asked.
Straight to business with him. Even he and Penda had a haunted look to their eyes. Their movements were fluid, not exaggerated like the priest’s. Still, the set of their shoulders was high and defensive. Each kept their gaze shifting along the landscape and into the trees overhead.
“He… he went into the cave, milord,” Talian stammered. “He took off to follow the s
hifter. I didn’t want to leave him alone out here, so I followed this far.”
“Taking on a beast like that in a dark cave isn’t to your liking?” Penda said. He grinned after a beat. “Sometimes you have to let fools be fools,” he added. “At least now you can lead us in.”
Talian nodded and swallowed. His eyes weren’t as nervous as the priest’s, but he wasn’t comfortable either. From all we had been through together—from my demon breaking out under Onion Breath to the battle against an army of the undead and Lecerf’s pet shifter at the abbey—I knew he had the backbone to stay in the fight. Tonight had unhinged us all.
“What now?” Ludló asked, looking at Penda. The Mercian king locked his eyes on me and raised an eyebrow.
“One monster at a time is my preference,” I said. “Once Seren and Gwen arrive, we’ll have more help.” I didn’t mention magic, but with that damned priest along, he was sure to see some tonight. If Baldwin’s corpse or that cloud made another attack.
“Inside with rock walls and a ceiling to give us protection,” Penda said. “I like it.”
“I’ll take lead,” I said. “Silver weapons only.”
The passageway looked tight. I was small enough to fit. I stepped in and waited on the others to line up. Behind me, Talian carried the torch Ludló previously held. After him, Penda and Ludló followed by the priest and our last Mercian guard, Igil. The latter two kept the torches.
“Sheath your seax,” the guard growled at Adda. The priest didn’t have a sheath and looked perplexed. “Slide it in yer belt,” he grunted. “Now, take hold of my belt. I’ll be walking backward to watch behind us. You guide me. I warn ye, priest. Every knock I take from a low-hanging rock or every stumble because you didn’t warn me of something on the path, and I’ll repay you in kind when we are out of this mess.”