“What’s going on?!” a familiar voice spat from the darkness. Tomas could tell by the gruffness it was the captain.
Gharland and the other men in the company came together from all corners of the Repository, swords drawn and frightened. The captain grimaced upon seeing Tomas and Lynn freed.
“Squire,” Gharland hissed, scowling at Landry, “what did you do? Why are they not locked away?”
Landry gulped, the keys to the cell still in his hand in plain view. He took a step back from the captain.
But before Landry could respond, the whole Repository shook far more violently than before. A web-covered candelabrum fell with a clang from the wall nearby. Tables shook and chairs wobbled and toppled. The marble floor nearby cracked before lifting and splitting.
Those who hadn’t fallen over from the shaking were scuttling away as red-hot steam burst out from the scattered cracks in the floor.
Tomas, Landry, and Lynn were captivated by what they were seeing, taking several steps back but refusing to shift their eyes away from the unbelievable sight before them.
They ducked behind a collapsed bookshelf for cover, popping their heads over to watch as a few more spots of the floor popped open with steam hissing out while the rest of the company fled in every other direction.
“What is that?” Landry gasped upon seeing movement from the jet of steam.
Tomas squinted, the low light and dust-filled air making it difficult to get a clear view. The clouds of steam began to dissipate, then Tomas swore he saw a mass move from within.
Lynn held her breath, grabbing Tomas’s shoulder and whispering, “We have to leave.”
A figure rose from beneath the ground, through the cracks of broken marble and out from the steam. It’s silhouette almost appeared skeletal. Its eyes glowed red like shining rubies.
Tomas heard metal rattling.
Then, a second figure came from below. And then a third.
Within a few seconds, half a dozen of the black masses had risen from the steam bursts in the ground. In unison, they stood on two legs, shaped like men but far bonier and with sharp spurs popping out across their silhouettes.
As the steam cleared, Tomas could make out who they were…
What they were.
Six skeletal humanoids stood with radiating eyes. No flesh hung from their bones, only strips of what looked like leather and chains. Jagged spurs of black bone covered their shoulders and formed a ring of barbs around their skulls.
They were missing hands; the two bones in their forearms simply jutted out from their elbows, like two pairs of macabre scissors.
Off to the trio’s side, Gharland stood with his back against a sturdy bookshelf, his mouth open in horror. Ref, Styna, and Smiling John clustered a little further back but were just as shocked.
Gharland drew his sword slowly as silence crept back into the library. The metal scraped against his scabbard, and the six figures turned their heads achingly slow towards the captain.
Within one second, the skeletons went from barely moving to bursting into a crazed sprint towards Gharland, Ref, Styna, and Smiling John.
Tomas and Landry cowered down as the ghouls headed in their direction, attempting to hide as best they could amongst the shadows of the fallen bookshelf. Lynn was speechless and refused to duck until Tomas pulled her head down beside his.
The things shrieked like birds of prey as they tore towards the others. They were faster than they looked. Their bones clattered against one-another, the chains hanging from stakes in their bodies chimed. Their eyes were unblinking, a fierce red.
Gharland took a huge swing of his sword at the first skeletal being. The ghoul leapt out of the way inhumanly fast before hissing and charging back at the captain.
He had no time to react.
The skeleton’s pointed arm bones pierced into Gharland’s side, knocking him back into the bookshelf with a wail. He rose his sword-wielding hand, blood spitting from his lips, before knocking the pommel of the sword into the bony face of the ghoul attacking him.
The pommel smashed the skeleton’s warped cheek bone, shattering a large part of its ring of spikes attached to its skull.
“Help me, you fools!” Gharland shouted to Ref, Styna and Smiling John who were still paralysed by what they were seeing.
Ref and Styna rushed towards some of the other running skeletons, blocking crazed blows from the sword-like forearm bones.
Smiling John, still recovering from his burns, lumbered over to Gharland. The captain continued striking the skeleton’s face with one hand and using his other arm to keep the horrific thing back at a distance.
Yet, the skeleton kept pushing Gharland back against the bookshelf, sticking its jagged bones deeper and deeper into his flesh.
Smiling John shoulder-charged the figure, giving the captain a chance to escape. His side was ripped open and bloodied, but the captain did not appear to be badly wounded.
The ghoul screeched at Smiling John before leaping several metres into the air like a pouncing cat and landing back down on top the soldier. Several of the spikes jutting from its bones speared into Smiling John’s flesh as he cried out.
“Help! Please!” Smiling John wept.
The ghoul began bashing its own skull against the trapped Smiling John, piercing his face and head with its bone spurs. Blood spat out with each impact, his one scarred face continuously punctured and left with dozens of ghastly holes.
The ruby-eyed freak screeched but did not slow as it headbutted Smiling John. His screams were filled with anguish.
Landry went to stand and help, reaching to his side for his sword. His fingers were met with nothing. Landry looked down at his belt, stunned; his scabbard was missing.
Tomas realised that the squire must have put it down somewhere. He held on to Landry’s forearm, tugging him back down into the shadows. They had no weapons to use against the creatures… there was nothing they could do.
Landry bowed his head in despair, clenching his jaw to try and drown out the harrowing screams.
Ref and Styna engaged two of the ghouls together, fighting as viciously as they had the night their camp came under attack by the hyena-like monsters.
But even they were quickly outmatched, as the freaks were relentless in their assault. Each strike the ghouls took seemed to do little harm to them.
Styna stuck his sword in to where the heart would be… nothing happened.
Ref punched the warped teeth from the other’s jaw before bringing his sword down and lopping off its lower leg below the knee. The thing fell but did not stop, crawling maniacally towards him with its gut-wrenching shrieks.
Smiling John kept begging for help as he lost his strength to fight back the freak on top of him. It relentlessly bashed its own spurred skull into John’s. His face became a mound of unrecognisable, bloody, fleshy pulp.
“Captain! Help!” he managed to cry as his lips burst and teeth shattered.
Gharland, hunched over and leaning against the bookshelf for support as he bled, refused. He took a few frightened steps back before turning and running for the main doors to the inner sanctum.
“Captain! Wait!” Smiling John shrieked. “Please! Help me!” His pleas went unanswered as his skull completely shattered.
Tomas heard wailing and frenzied shrieks from around the library as the other ghouls caught up with members of their company who had fled into the darkness.
“We have to get out of here, now!” Lynn demanded in a hushed tone.
“We won’t make it ten paces out of the sanctum without those things on us,” Tomas whispered.
“Let’s get some weapons first,” Landry suggested, pointing towards the set of tables not far off in the darkness where their belongings were. “Over there, that’s where the company’s gear is.”
The skeleton atop Smiling John leapt up from the dead man’s body, its ruby eyes scanning the darkness before rushing for Ref and Styna.
“Quick, now’s our chance,” Tomas s
aid.
He patted Landry and Lynn’s backs to signal for them to run for the tables. They sprinted with their heads down, trying as best they could to not make a sound.
Fights were breaking out throughout the sanctum as the Gharland’s soldiers were hunted by the skeletal ghouls. Ref and Styna were slowly being worn down by the three attacking them nearby, trying their best to use their thick, brutish bodies to stand tall. Their strength would be their only hope against the onslaught.
Tomas, Landry, and Lynn raced through the shadows towards the set of tables covered in weapons, books, gear, backpacks, and supplies.
Another soldier from the company ran screaming through the halls of bookcases nearby with one of the ghouls shadowing him, gnashing its blackened teeth.
“Hurry! Hurry!” Lynn said, but the woman froze upon spotting something on the table.
“What is it?” Tomas noticed her sudden, direct stare.
She pointed to an old, dusty book, set amongst the company’s gear, bound in dark leather with strange, unrecognisable symbols across the cover.
“Where did you get that?” Lynn said.
“That’s the one. That’s the book I found,” Landry replied, grabbing his bow and a small quiver of arrows to hang over his shoulders. “Right before the ground started to shake.”
Lynn appeared stunned. “That’s the tome! The one I was telling you about!”
She grabbed the heavy book without a second thought, its pages warped by years of water damage and rot, before sliding it into a satchel which she slung from her shoulder.
“Time for that later. Let’s get out of this place,” Lynn said.
Tomas did not waste a second looking for his stuff, instead grabbing the first sword he could see. A set of knives were sprawled next to the sword, too. Tomas took one, pushing it down into his belt at his hip, and took another to give to Lynn.
Despite his confusing feelings towards the woman and his inability to separate her from Rilan’s death in his head, Tomas could not allow Lynn to go unarmed during their escape.
“Here, take this,” he said, holding out the dagger in his hand for the strange woman.
“Are you serious?” Lynn said. “I don’t know how to use that.”
“Doesn’t matter. You’re gonna need it.”
Lynn, uncertain, took the dagger. She was not going to waste a second arguing over it.
Just as he felt set, Tomas caught the glimpse of something out of the corner of his eye. Something familiar, resting on the table. Something he had somehow forgotten about.
A small chain with a key around it.
His key, which had been confiscated from him after Rilan’s death and his subsequent arrest. Finally, he had found it.
With a sigh of relief, Tomas grabbed the chain and hung it back around his neck. Right where it belonged.
Over the sounds of steal on bone and the screams of Gharland’s men struggling to stay alive, Tomas heard more bursts of loud hissing. He spun around to see more steam shooting out once again from the cracked floor and mounds of broken marble. Just like before.
“Oh, shit,” Landry gasped, backing away.
“There’s more coming,” Lynn said. “They know we’re here. They’re coming for us, for the tome.”
Tomas moved in with Landry and Lynn as they began fleeing for the main doors of the sanctum, fearful of what was going to come next.
Lynn grabbed the handles of the door before bolting through and holding it open for the boys. Tomas went out first but turned when he realised Landry wasn’t following.
“What are you doing?” Tomas said, turning back. He waved for the squire to follow. “Come on!”
Landry refused to walk, staring Tomas straight in the eye. “I… I’m not coming,” Landry said solemnly.
“What?!”
In the sanctum, steam continued to burst from the ground as more ghouls rose. The men who had survived shrieked as they fought with desperation. Ref and Styna continued to brawl with the monstrous beings but were steadily being swarmed.
“I…” Landry stuttered. “I can’t leave them. I have to help them.”
Tomas shook his head. “Are you kidding me? If you stay, you will die-”
“I don’t have a choice, Tomas. It’s my duty.” Landry drew his sword from the scabbard on his belt. He wasn’t going to argue about it, it seemed.
Tomas felt his gut ache and his muscles tense up. He refused to believe Landry was being serious.
Lynn pulled Tomas’s arm back. “We have to leave!”
“Go,” Landry said. “I’ll see you soon.”
“Landry, wait-”
But Tomas couldn’t finish his sentence before Landry was running back into the library towards the melees, sword held high.
Tomas shouted out after him to no avail, feeling his chest tighten upon realising he was going to lose the only friend he had left.
Please, no! Not again!
Lynn pulled Tomas back through the door, before slamming it shut behind them. The muffled screams and shrieks of the monsters echoed through the dark corridors of the Repository as more crawled from below and attacked those still living.
“Come on, Tomas! We have to get out of here before they find us.”
Tomas shook his head, wiping his stinging eyes as he accepted the truth. He ran after Lynn who was already making her way towards the exit of the Repository. Then, Lynn unexpectedly rounded a corner into another corridor, away from the main doors.
“Where are we going?” Tomas asked, following her.
“We won’t make it outside, not in this cold with no supplies and those things after us,” Lynn said.
Tomas heard smashing against the inner sanctum door not far behind them. Someone, or something was trying to break through. More shrieks resonated from within.
“We can make it, Lynn,” Tomas said.
“Don’t you see?” Lynn barked. “Those aren’t some mindless animals up there. They came here to kill us… they were sent here to kill us.”
The statement made Tomas gasp. Lynn could be right. Those ghouls were unlike the beasts that had attacked them in the camp that night. It didn’t appear to be by luck that they had crawled out of the ground at the exact spot they were, right after Landry had found the strange tome.
The Grand Repository had come under attack at least twice. Was it targeted?
“So, what, then?” Tomas asked.
“You’re going to have to trust me.”
Tomas’s eyes went wide. Trust you?!
The girl in the tricorn hat raced through the confusing maze of corridors, her red hair flowing like a horse’s main behind her. She slid to a halt, grabbing Tomas’s arm to slow him down as well.
“Here,” she said, pointing to an iron drainage grate in the floor.
“And what about it?” he asked, confused. He recalled seeing other grated pipes when they had first entered the Repository.
“The Repository has dozens of these pipes all around, to drain excess water when the snows get inside and melt,” Lynn huffed. “We can follow them down the mountain.”
“Down the mountain?”
“I heard one of the Magisters talk about it once,” Lynn explained. “The drains all connect together before going all the way down the mountainside. They end up in a river somewhere.”
“Are you kidding me? Are you willing to bet your life on what that Magister said?”
“If you any other suggestions, now is the time.”
Tomas looked back the way they came. The doors to the sanctum were continually being smashed, with screams emanating from within. Tomas did not want to guess what was happening inside to any survivours still remaining, and could not estimate how long they had before those creatures got out.
“I don’t even know if I can fit in there!” Tomas said.
Lynn bent over, gripping the grate in the floor with her fingers, and lifting with all her strength. The grate barely moved an inch.
“Stay here, then,�
�� she said.
Lynn tried again, heaving as she bent her knees and strained her arms to lift the heavy metal grill.
Tomas considered his options only for a moment, realising he really had no other option than to try this. He knelt beside Lynn, grabbing the other side of the grate and lifting.
The pair slid it across onto the stone floor. The dark hole, now accessible, seemed to drop down into a void of nothingness.
The pit stank of stagnant water and grime. Tomas also realised they had no light or torch to take with them.
It wasn’t going to be pleasant at all.
“You first,” Tomas offered.
Lynn grimaced at him. “None of that chivalrous crap. You can go first.”
“Look,” Tomas sighed, “my shoulders are broader than yours. If I get stuck in there, you’re gonna be stuck, too.”
Tomas gestured to the hole again. Lynn groaned, sitting on the edge of the small dark hole in the ground and letting her legs dangle precariously.
There was no way of telling how steep it was, how deep it sank, and what lay within.
The doors to the sanctum far off burst open with an awful screech. They could hear men running and crying for help. Swords smashing. Monsters howling in the dark.
They weren’t far off, now.
“I’ll be right behind you,” Tomas said.
Lynn smirked nervously. “Is that supposed to make me feel better about this?”
Lynn dropped into the hole with a scream of sudden fear as she was swallowed by the blackness. Tomas closed his eyes, took a breath, and lowered himself into the hole while clinging onto the sides to first ensure his shoulders would fit.
As soon as he realised that he wasn’t going to get stuck at the top of the drainpipe, Tomas made the terrifying choice to let go, feeling each finger release from the edge.
He held his breath and fell.
The first part of the shaft was nearly vertical. Tomas slid down, petrified the walls would tighten around him as he fell. He shuddered upon hearing Lynn’s shouts and screams down below in the dark but kept slipping down with no way to stop himself.
The air grew tight, the last speck of moonlight above fading within a moment.
Starfall (The Fables of Chaos Book 1) Page 49