by Matt Turner
“It’s funny that you think you can still give me orders,” Vera sneered, but over the pounding of blood in her ears, she could hear something more—the echoes of heavy, ragged breathing as something scuttled through the darkness toward them.
“This is not a game!” Seth bellowed. “RUN!”
“Legion!” the Oriental man called out over his shoulder. “I found the Horseman!”
“Perfect,” a hundred slippery voices whispered in unison.
A single arm crept into the dim light cast by one of the torches mounted on the wall. A single face emerged above it—the face of Jezebel, dripping blood and saliva from its gaping, hungry mouth. Ten feet above, another pair of arms dragged themselves along the ceiling. As more and more of the monster’s bulk came into horrifying view, Vera realized it was the only way that Legion could possibly move in the hallway—the abomination’s mass was so great that not even the forest of squat, stubby legs protruding from its belly could properly support it. It took up so much space that the way that it had come from was completely blocked off—there was only one possible escape.
At least fifty faces were mounted on the front of the wall of flesh that bulged and twisted and made its way toward Vera. A dozen of them opened their mouths up to impossible widths. Tongues like snakes lashed out of them, wrapping around the unconscious soldiers and dragging them inside the shuffling behemoth. Legion did not even chew; with a single swallow, the soldiers were gone.
“Hellooo, little fly,” the faces whispered, their eyes fixed directly on Vera. “Come join usss.”
It was undoubtedly the most horrifying, disgusting sight that Vera had ever seen, as the small army of faces chuckled and burped up fluids that dripped and dribbled onto the stone floor. Legion’s flesh was like a swamp, constantly churning and shifting from the monstrous creatures held within… Vera nearly knelt over and vomited at the rancid smell.
“But firssst…” Legion’s attention shifted to Seth. “The heaven-man. You reek of Paradissse…the tassstesss you mussst have…”
“What?” The Oriental man looked back and forth, trying to see who Legion was talking to. “What are you talking about?”
“Vera. RUN!” Seth ordered in a voice like iron. In an instant, the grip she had on his mind was wrenched away as he whipped around and slung her over his shoulder. Before she could even voice a protest, he fled down the hall in a dead sprint.
“No good running, little fliesss!” the wall of flesh squealed in glee. It seized the Oriental man with several arms, ignoring his cry of revulsion, and rushed through the hall after them like a giant worm, propelled by its army of limbs and slippery flesh that sloshed and scraped against the ancient brick. “No essscape! FOR WE ARE LEGION!”
22
John jogged through the mazelike corridors of the hellish dungeon, the beam-cannon over his shoulder. The corridors rocked with the sounds of distant screams and explosions. Whatever was happening, the Kingdom was obviously far too preoccupied with it to be dealing with him.
Wherever the fighting is, that’s where the other Horsemen will be. He did not know what he was going to say when he found them, for he himself could not properly find the words to describe the feeling in his chest. Was it hope? he wondered. Maybe, just maybe, if he could find forgiveness—maybe it wasn’t even quite that; he didn’t know what it was exactly—from Tituba, then maybe they could all change. Maybe even Hell itself can change too, he thought hopefully. He was self-aware enough to realize how idiotic the sentiment sounded, but—
He rounded a corner and came nearly face-to-face with Imperator Sisera and five strange figures following in his wake. The commander of the Praetorian Guard had an instant to blink in confusion before John shot a dozen vines at him, intent on ending him for good.
Much to his surprise, a wall of darkness suddenly rose up from the shadows of the corridor. John stared in confusion as his barbed vines vanished into it just a few inches away from the Praetorian’s face. As swiftly as it had appeared, the black void vanished, leaving just a few stumps of his vines in its wake. What in Heaven?
“Horseman.” Sisera nodded.
“He wants to hurt us,” one of the Praetorian’s companions muttered. It was a pale, emaciated thing, wrapped in a few filthy rags. John could not make out the face that it hid in its trembling hands. “We should end him—make him go away…”
“No,” another voice snapped. A dwarf crept out from where it had been hiding behind Sisera’s legs and peered up at John. “This is part of God’s plan,” it said in a small, high-pitched voice. “The Horseman is meant to be here.”
“Who the hell are you people?” John demanded.
“Servants of the true God,” the dwarf said. The torchlight of the corridors flickered across her face, and John took a step back in shock. He knew those features; he had just seen them, in that vision of his and Tituba’s—
“Hello, John Hale.” She grinned. “Our God has been waiting for such a long time.”
A child in Hell?!
Sisera closed his eyes and moved his lips in silent communication. “The north passage is still clear,” he suddenly said. “We will rendezvous with the Eighteenth Legion and take this city back once Legion is done with it. His will be done.”
“Amen,” the others muttered.
John could barely understand what was happening as they abruptly turned and began to retreat back the way that they had come. “Wait,” he said. “Wait just a minute—”
One of Sisera’s companions, a tall, dark-skinned woman, lazily turned around and flicked something jagged at John. He barely had enough time to see its reflection glitter in the air before it slammed into his throat, easily piercing through the bark. Paralysis instantly tugged at his limbs, bringing him down to the floor. The beam-cannon uselessly clattered beside him.
He did not know how long he lay there, useless, staring up at the ceiling, unable to do anything but try to make sense of his angered bewilderment. In the distance, the sounds of battle grew stronger. What the hell is going on? Why am I so useless? John raged at himself. So damn weak—
“Tree-man!” a ragged voice croaked from farther down the hall, interrupting his thoughts.
The leaden weight on his limbs gradually began to recede, until he was able to reach up and tear the blade out of his neck with a wince. Crystal, he realized when it shattered against the floor. “Who’s there?” he called out hoarsely.
“Here,” the voice said again.
John warily made his way closer to the cell from which it emanated and blinked in surprise when he saw the strange creature that it contained.
“What are you?” he asked in amazement. Locked behind a thick row of iron bars embedded in the wall, the strange beast resembled a vulture at first glance—but that did not explain the miniature replica of a woman’s face and torso attached to the claws and ragged dark wings.
“Am Podarge,” the thing squawked through its strangely human mouth. Its beady dark eyes, closer to a crow’s than a human’s, examined John closely. “Am harpy.”
“A…harpy?” Then that made the thing before him… John took a step back. “You’re a demon.”
“Just a little one.” Podarge sighed in disappointment. Her voice vaguely reminded John of the parrot that a merchant ship had once brought to Boston. According to rumor, the governor had kept the bird as a pet for a week until his wife released it out of sheer annoyance. “Free Podarge. Podarge help Tree-man.”
John had heard more than enough stories to know where this conversation was going. “Why should I trust you?” he demanded as his eyes narrowed in suspicion. “You cannot have my soul, demon.”
For some reason, the harpy seemed to find his words hilarious. It let out a few caws of choking laughter as human-like tears streamed down from its cruel eyes. “Souls don’t matter.” It chuckled. “Only eating. Always good eating with you Horsemen!”
A squeal of static suddenly came over the intercom system, and a panicked voice reverberated
throughout the halls. “Evacuate the dungeons!” the terrified soldier on the other side screamed into it. “All personnel, evacuate NOW! Oh sweet Christ—” His voice was suddenly cut off in an agonized scream, and the intercom went dead.
Podarge gave John a cheerful smile, showing off a mouthful of razor-sharp teeth. “Lots of good eating now.” She grinned. “Help me help you, Horseman.”
For a moment, John hesitated—and then, somewhere above them, something slammed into the ceiling with such force that the entire dungeon trembled. John stared up as a series of cracks formed above him, and masonry began to rain down. Past the smoke and dust, he could barely make out something moving through the hall just above them.
What was that? he wondered in awestruck horror at the winding, twisting worm-like thing that scampered above them with unnatural speed. The seconds ticked by, and still more and more of its fleshy body passed overhead. A snake? But it couldn’t possibly be a snake, for as more of the cracks spread and more of the ceiling opened up, he saw that the monstrous abomination was supported by dozens of frantically pumping arms and legs, most of which looked all too human—
“Tree-man!” Podarge called out in warning as a piece of the shuffling monster above reached down through the cracks of the ceiling for John.
He barely had time to realize what was coming for him—an amalgamation of dozens of arms, interspersed with blade-like shards of bone—before he blindly squeezed the trigger of the beam-cannon.
The recoil of the weapon was astounding; it hurled him back nearly three feet as the powerful beam of light blasted forward and cut a pumpkin-sized hole through the center of the giant limb. Somewhere above, there was a shriek of pain as the limb wrenched itself forward, reaching for John with a score of angry, grasping hands. The beam-cannon slipped from his grasp and nearly cut the rest of the limb in half as the beam slashed through flesh and slammed into the stone wall.
Podarge let out a squawk of fear as the light blasted apart the iron bars of her cage.
Then it was John’s turn to scream as the hands seized him by the throat. The beam-cannon tumbled from his limp fingers as the monstrous limb smashed him against the wall. “Shit!” he screamed out as sharpened femurs sprang out of the tips of the fingers, stabbing into the bark of his arms and legs and pinning him in place.
The flesh of the limb bubbled up before him and twisted into the shape of a human mouth. “Little fly,” the mouth said. “Join usss.” It smacked its cherry-red lips together and stretched open wide, drowning him in the rancid stench of death.
Oh God, this is it, John thought as a series of fangs sprang from the bloody gums of the gaping maw. This is really it. Oddly enough, he no longer felt any terror—just a strange sense of indignation that after coming so far, this was how it was finally going to end for him. He hoped Tituba had managed to escape this creature; she had been through more than enough already.
“No eating Tree-man!” Podarge cawed.
Out of the corner of his eye, John saw a blur of motion as the harpy slammed into the weakened section of the limb, talons gleaming in the dim torchlight. The mouth just in front of his face let out a harsh cry of pain—and then John tumbled to the ground as the monstrous being’s grip on him went limp. He managed to nimbly catch himself on the ground a moment before ten feet of bleeding, twisting flesh pounded onto the floor beside him.
The harpy flapped her wings once and gracefully swooped through the air to neatly land on his shoulder. “Not good eating.” She spat a scrap of something red and pulsing onto the floor. “Legion tastes like shit.”
“Legion?” John asked in surprise. He stared at the remnants of the bleeding limb dangling from the ceiling. Above, the hundreds of footsteps of the monster could still be heard—they hadn’t even slowed it down. “That thing is the Prophet?”
The severed tip of the monstrous limb twitched and convulsed as a fresh set of arms began to extend forward. This time there were no hands, only a forest of jagged blades carved from bone.
“Better run, Tree-man,” Podarge croaked in his ear. John reflexively winced; her breath was terrible. “Horsemen are tasty.”
Demon or not, her advice seemed excellent; the limb was already lurching forward like a blind worm. It can’t see us, John thought as he knelt and scooped up the beam-cannon. At least— His mood soured when a series of blinking eyes emerged from the sloughing flesh of the limb. Damnit.
He turned and ran as the tendril of flesh shot after him.
Podarge laughed manically in his ear as they pounded down the hallway. “Just like old times!” she cawed happily. “Always fun with Horsemen!”
First Plague, now her. John silently groaned to himself. He strengthened his right arm with a few extra layers of vine and bark, then blindly raised the beam-cannon over his shoulder and fired it behind. He was rewarded with another shriek of pain as Legion—both behind and above them now, judging by the footsteps—was hit by the weapon. Why do I always end up with the crazy ones?
23
The tightly packed hallways of the dungeon seemed to have been made with Simon in mind. The sheer numbers of the Praetorian Guard were more of a hinderance than a help, especially given their idiotic love for their precious ranged weapons. He rushed forward, the great sword in one hand, and hacked a dozen of them in half with one mighty swing. Their bullets cut into him, true, but he had known far greater pain, and the vast majority of their frantic fire only shredded into their own comrades.
He impaled a screaming soldier on his great sword, then used him as a makeshift shield as he rushed forward. A grenade landed at his feet, but Amaury was there to kick it away. It sailed over the heads of the front line of the enemy and exploded somewhere in their rear, sending body parts and scraps of masonry flying like shrapnel. The blood and gore spattered on the floor was so thick that Simon had to watch his step for fear of slipping. He let out a bellow of triumph as he hacked down man after man, easily slashing through their expensive armor.
“I am Lord Simon de Montfort!” he screamed as he punched a Praetorian in the face, reducing his skull to splinters with one blow. Beside him, Amaury used the confusion to bury a knife in the eyes of another soldier, wrenching a shotgun from the man’s grasp. “I am the Butcher of God! Come and die!”
“Flamethrower, ten meters!” Manto called out in warning.
Amaury calmly ignored the gunfire that lashed the walls around him, knelt, and took careful aim with the shotgun. He squeezed the trigger, and within the enemy’s ranks, an explosion of fire emerged.
Simon could see the fear in their eyes now; he could even taste it with each spray of blood that splashed over his face and onto his outstretched tongue. A stray bullet carved a furrow across his chest, but he paid no attention to it as he seized the man whose face he had shattered and hurled him headlong into the confused, panicking mass of the enemy. “Who’s next?” he screamed at them.
Before they could reply, Amaury raised his shotgun again and blasted away at the torches mounted on the walls. Darkness swept over the hallway, and the panicked enemy opened fire once more, but the illumination of their weapons only gave away their position. Simon did not need the light; he charged forward into the blackness. Bones and armor crunched with every swing of his sword. He closed his eyes tightly, not wanting to be blinded by the brief, frantic illuminations offered by the gunfire, and let out a mocking laugh as he carved through the enemy’s blind, terrified ranks like an Angel of Death. The screams of the wounded and their own deafening gunfire worked to his advantage even more; they could not see him, not hear him, until his blade had already torn them in half.
“FEAR ME!” he bellowed, drunk on his own power. The great sword let out a screech as it slashed against the wall, so he adjusted his stance and was rewarded with a scream as he slashed open something warm and pulpy. One of the soldier’s own comrades finished him off with a few scattered blasts from his machine gun, so Simon thanked him by eviscerating him as well.
“Retreat!
” a panicked voice ordered somewhere in the crowd. “Retreat!” A dozen others quickly took up the cry.
Finally. Simon slashed forward again, burying his blade in another soldier’s head. Took them long enough.
“Retrea—oh fuck, RUN!”
To Simon’s surprise, the gunfire died away—but the press of bodies around him was moving forward, not away. Do these fools know what retreating is? he thought nastily. He raised his sword again and opened his eyes. Through the twilight, he could just barely make out the shape and sound of dozens of soldiers frantically sprinting past him. In the darkness from which they ran, a new sound began to emerge—the squishy, pulpy sound of a vast worm wriggling through corridors far too small for it.
What’s happening? Simon thought in confusion. The crowd of terrified soldiers quickly became too dense even for him, so he wedged himself against a crack in the wall as they fled by. “Amaury, what’s going on?” he bellowed over the panic of the crowd.
“Incoming, one hundred meters!” Manto yelled back. She and Amaury were just beside him, it seemed, but the noise of the retreating soldiers was so loud that they could barely hear one another. “It’s—” Her voice cracked in fear. “Oh Apollo, we’re fucked.”
“The fuck is that supposed to mean?” Simon demanded. He squinted into the darkness, trying to make out what was coming, but it was difficult with the panicked crowd and all the damned noise.
The outline of a single soldier stumbled into the very limits of Simon’s vision. She staggered forward, clearly terrified—and then Simon heard her distant shriek as something shot out from the darkness, wrapped around her torso, and wrenched her away. What in blazes…
“Get the fuck out of the way!” a familiar voice screamed from the darkness. A machine gun blasted in the depths of the hallway, and Simon had a brief glimpse of a tall figure sprinting through the outskirts of the crowd, a woman slung over his shoulder. Vera?
“Move, goddammit!” She fired another burst over the man’s shoulder, illuminating the crowd and the horror rushing toward them.