The 9th Fortress

by John Paul Jackson

  24. War

  Apprehensively, Kat was led by Wisp, and following that beaten old tire took time. I stuck to the lagging group with Eddinray and Harmony, and it seemed only I was confused by Kat's sudden shine to the merchant. Ahead, those warriors passed words with occasional nods of agreement and unheard of smiles from the samurai.

  "You believe that?" I whispered. "I've been with Kat forever. We've climbed mountains together for God-sake, fought a Centaur king; he even cut my toes off at one point! Yet there he is…having more conversation with a stranger than he ever has with me!"

  The Angel and Knight shared wiry grins. "No need to be jealous,” Harmony said. "Besides, I'm sure Kat likes you the best."

  "How many toes?" asked Eddinray. "Have a falling out then?"

  "It's a long story. And I'm not jealous of Wisp, okay?"

  "We know Daniel,” added a condescending Harmony, causing me to stop them both.

  "I am not jealous! Guys this is not about being popular, I just don't understand it, that's all. The Apache was the same ilk as Kat, why not show him the respect he's giving Wisp now?"

  "Perhaps our Indian friend was too similar to the samurai?" Harmony considered. "A threat to Kat's leadership?"

  "Leadership," Eddinray pointed out; "requires a commanding of communication my dear, which the Kat is clearly lacking."

  "Wisp on the other hand," continued Harmony, "is an older warrior, an alien thing with no territory to mark, a merchant making a trade and keen to share his wisdom. Why wouldn't Kat embrace this?"

  "He's still a stranger,” I said, expecting them to agree; but all I got was another joke-like grin between the pair. "It is not jealousy!"

  "Sometimes it's best to talk to a stranger,” said Eddinray. "They do not judge a man…Not out loud at least."

  "Yes,” added the angel. "They share experience those two, surviving danger and death at every turn. The Kat and Wisp are kindred spirits."

  "I also share their experience!" insisted Eddinray. "But they are not as gallant as I. They are blood thirsty killers clearly, having nothing of the moral dilemma that tortures the gentleman warrior, who kills because he has too, not because he wants too."

  It was now Harmony and my turn to share smiles. "Thanks,” I said. "Don't know where I'd be without you two."

  "I do,” answered Eddinray, with complete confidence. "Danny you'd be in the belly of the Scurge, and Harmony you'd be locked away in a wizard's cage — if it weren't for me that is."

  "And we thank you very much indeed!" cried Harmony, exasperated. "Godwin, there are times when you need a good kick up the backside!"

  My laugh was cut short by the sight of maggots, slithering up a crack of labyrinth stone. Rodents came next, scurrying every so often along rails with their chubby bodies and wiggling tails.

  "Filthy things!" complained Eddinray, attempting a swipe at them.

  "You fear them?" inquired Harmony.

  Her innocent question caused the knight's body to seize up, his ego badly bruised by her assumption. "A man of my abilities fearing a little rat?" he choked. "The suggestion is comical!"

  "It is far from a comical matter,” she replied. "I detest worms, and they are even smaller than rats!"

  "You fear worms?" he chortled back. "My dear darling angel, what a precious little sprite you are!"

  Eddinray then let out a brief, feminine shriek as one rat squiggled between his legs. Amused, we three hurried on Kat's order to join him and Wisp at another fork in the labyrinth — the hunched over Wisp taking the right route with a step and limp, a step and limp.

  We took the following left and were left speechless by the new corridor of horror on display. Walls were no longer made of stone, but of living bodies — men, woman, and children lashing their bare arms and legs. This was the Hell we'd all been waiting for, the Hell one cannot prepare for.

  "The wall of tears,” said Wisp, grimly. "Be careful on your way."

  Aghast, Harmony and Eddinray covered their mouths at this vision of screwed up skin and jammed together faces. Although I could not see Wisp's expression, I assumed it was similar to Kat's — emotionless, like the dull doctor examining his hundredth patient that day.

  "Save us!" one yelled. "Save us! The flood!"

  "Single file,” advised Kat, starting through the narrow gap between their outstretched fingertips.

  "Help me!" begged a young woman.

  "She can't be more than sixteen years old!" said Harmony, mortified. "And the children, these poor children! What could they have done to warrant such a sentence?"

  "There are no children here,” said Wisp, over his shoulder. "Look closer angel…do not let them trick you into their forlorn hands. This is what they want."

  These words in mind, I surveyed the face of what I thought was a child, and repellently, that young expression instantly wrinkled old and toothless before me.

  "How did they get here?" asked Eddinray, bringing up the rear.

  "We wander insignificantly in the labyrinth," answered Wisp, "as these souls did in life. Aimlessly frittering ones time away with no cares, no hopes or dreams. They are waste. All of it waste."

  "The flood!" they moaned. "Coming! Do not leave us to it! Pull me from this! No more!"

  "Eternity they spend in the wall of tears," concluded Wisp; "and the hands of time move slow here."

  The merchant ignored them, as did his new disciple, Kat. Unfortunately, Harmony, Eddinray and I were not as thick skinned.

  "Do not leave us!"

  "It's coming!"

  "The flood!"

  "God help us!"

  "You help us!"

  Caught off guard, Harmony was suddenly snatched by the wrist and pulled into a frenzy of tugging arms and skewed faces. A stubbly man with a hairy chest held onto her, and lustfully he gorged over her unblemished skin.

  "Alright my darling'" he said, his lips dotted with sores. "How about a rub?"

  "Help!" she grimaced, fighting him. "Godwin!"

  Already on the case, the knight was in amongst them. The monster clutching Harmony meanwhile lovingly slobbered his tongue over her mouth. "Been a long time since I've tasted a woman!" he groaned. "A long time!"

  Incensed, Eddinray whaled, slicing the groper's arms from the wall. He then yanked Harmony by the wings and safely from the walls clutches. Gasping, the pair watched as those decapitated limbs rejoined the wall of tears with a slithering will of their own. The large creep then laughed, trying to tempt Harmony back with his tongue.

  "Fiend!" roared Eddinray, preparing to stab that face.

  "No Godwin!" Harmony cried, taking hold of him. "He's not worth it. None of them are."

  "She's right,” I said, looking back. "Be more careful! Come on!"

  And so we continued in stricter formation. Word quickly passed around the wall that we travellers were not here to help, thus their begging ended, and a vile barrage of cursing and spitting began.

  "You scum! You dirty, filthy scum!"

  "Better than us? You're no better than us you rotten knight! You stupid, prick ugly samurai!"

  "Hells high and fucking mighty coming through!"

  "There's a boy over there! You'd leave a child to face the flood? A child?"

  "They'd leave their own mothers this lot!"

  "Keep walking you selfish bastards! That's right, and don't look back!"

  Thankfully, we found their cursing easier to ignore.

  The lamenting tapestry stretched onto exhaustion, and we five endured it without rest or conversation. Relief came when Wisp led us a curving right turn and finally away from the morbid sights, if not sounds — we would be hearing their pathetic whining in the background for some time yet.

  This fresh section of the labyrinth had no wall of tears, but those numerous iron grates at our feet, and the remains of recent travellers bunched in mounds against the walls. Across our path lay one ravaged corpse. There was a longbow over the bile and guts, a quiver full of arrows and a red bandanna. There was also th
e blood, spattered liberally.

  "It's him!" yelled Harmony, running to the pieces.

  "A friend of yours?" asked Wisp, recovering his old breath.

  "We knew him,” I said, gathering round. "Christ, there's nothing left…"

  Apart from weapons, there was no identifying trace of the Apache in this collection of organs and bones, but we all knew it was him. "The perils of the labyrinth,” said Wisp. "Experience is not nearly enough."

  The green-skinned merchant crouched to wander his hand over the bloodied chunks.

  "The soul has moved onto something very small,” he said. "A fly perhaps. There is nothing we can do for him now."

  Sombre faced, Harmony bent to retrieve the bandanna "We never should have let him go,” she said, folding it through her fingers.

  "Take his weapon,” Kat ordered, prodding her clasp. "You have none."

  "I can't do that!" she exclaimed. "It is disrespectful! Besides, I cannot use a longbow."

  "Neither could he,” was Kat's cold-hearted reply, flippancy that made my blood boil.

  "Where is your respect?" I asked, thumping my fist against his red chest plate.

  Kat warned me with his squint, slapped away my fist then strode for the next bend, with Wisp hobbling after him.

  "Take the longbow Harmony,” I said, scowling at Kat's back. "It's not right to use it, but it wouldn't be right to leave it."

  "Go on dear,” added Eddinray. "You do need to arm yourself here."

  Reluctantly, Harmony picked up the longbow from the pieces and secured the quiver over her shoulder. "I will see part of you out of here,” she said, wrapping the red bandanna around her forehead, holding back her golden fringe and hardening an otherwise wholesome appearance.

  "Suits you,” said Eddinray, with a hollow smile.

  Walking to Kat, I searched his face for the warmth I had seen before, but there was none of it now. "You don't care about a thing do you?" I asked, watching spittle drool down the prickly hairs of his chin. He didn't wipe it, but brushed me off to take the turn with Wisp.

  "Your friends are a high spirited lot,” I heard Wisp say.

  "They," he snarled back, "are not my friends."

  ***

  Blood mired our way past corpses old and new. Greedy rodents scavenged through theses remains and left with what they could between their front teeth. "Appalling,” gawked Eddinray. "What villainous abomination could cause such gruesome destruction?"

  "Perhaps that?" Harmony suddenly croaked, recoiling at the snivelling creature stood not ten feet away.

  I thought it was a man at first, because some of it was. Holding two curved blades, its human body was as greasy and burly as any wrestlers, but at the neck grew the oversized head of a rat. Two fur-less ears pointed to the sky, it had a protruding snout with sprouting whiskers and a snarling mouth full of razors and disease. Kat removed his sword then rushed back to defend us. With a hurried step and limp, Wisp came too whilst Harmony screamed at another half man/half rat, arriving behind.

  "What are they?" I yelled, arming my short sword.

  "Our home!" hissed one. "Our home!"

  "Just passing through!" stuttered Eddinray. "And may I say what a pretty home you have!"

  "Our home!" both freaks repeated, moving in on us.

  Kat swivelled his katana and the spear of Wisp threatened the air, but the rodent man facing them showed no fear, and presently sprang for the old merchant's unseen face. A match for the mutant, Wisp thrust the spear forward to stick his enemy's throat. The mousy man dropped with a gargle, and Wisp finished it off with a skewer through hair and guts. Impressed by Wisp's swift strength, Kat and I faced the last of them.

  "Our home!" he said, retreating. "Our home…”

  Back and back this cowardly rat went until disappearing behind a corner.

  "There will be more,” Wisp panted. "Too many."

  "Then let's get a move on,” I said, with shifty eyes. So faster Kat lead us down hopeful corridors to heart sinking dead ends, encountering no well, no super-sized rodents or anything else. It was only when our quest for the centre seemed futile, when we questioned the point most in our minds, that we turned a right corner, and were startled by pure starlight. At last, we had reached the heart of the labyrinth…

  "Beautiful,” gasped Wisp, stumbling. "It is beautiful."

  And certainly it was. A healing aroma of syrupy light and tickling pixie dust, the well was a sumptuous garden feature in the middle of a circular stoned enclosure. Like the hedonistic bath of a Roman Emperor, its glazed water were filled to the brim and a rainbow arose from it, shooting beads of health off to the further reaches of Hell, and the souls needing them most. In awe, we stood before its majesty, that resurgent life force.

  "Made it old man,” said Kat, patting Wisp's hunched over back.

  The craggy merchant drooped both shoulders under that tortured cloak — long had he searched for this treasure, and we had found it for him. He limped alone from our group with the spear flopping in his withered hand. I found myself escorting him with a lone eyeball fixed on the enchanted water — could it really repair my sight?

  "You first,” said Wisp, placing a palm of green hair on my back. "Please…"

  A hungry grin curved at the corner of my mouth, but I refused. "This was your quest Wisp. You'll be first."

  The others shared my opinion — my eye could wait a few minutes for this creature to regain his former glory. Taking a grateful bow, Wisp lumbered forth to the pool of diamonds. The spirit of the well seemed to know whenever a soul approached, for it reacted with popping bubbles to this weary presence.

  Three wide steps led up to the water, and Wisp took his time with each; we heard his brutal heaving under the weight of the cloak before at last, he conquered the last step. The water was far from welcoming and ready to open my mouth with encouragement, I need not have bothered — Wisp audaciously leapt into the bath, and was instantly consumed. Hurrying to the stony edge, we searched through the churning bubbles to see nothing of Wisp.

  Two minutes past, and worry set in.

  "He must be drowning!" cried Harmony. "It is water after all!"

  Ten seconds later, I decided to take action with a run up the three steps. "I'm going in!" I yelled, the water reacting ferociously now.

  "Behind you!" blared Eddinray, causing my insides to spasm. I turned to see one dishevelled rat man stuck like a spider to the wall. All of me froze as that vermin kicked itself off from the stone with a mouth closing in for my face. Shutting my eye to the inevitable, I suddenly felt a spray of hot liquid drench me.

  Trembling, I glanced an alarming peek to discover my clothes now covered in the blood of the rat, and Kat standing over its corpse with a dripping katana.

  "There!" announced Harmony, petrified. "And there!"

  More came sniffing around the corner, dozens upon dozens into the centre of the labyrinth.

  "Our home!"

  We were surrounded, the filthy filling the grounds and sticking to every available plot of stone.

  "I feel we're done for!" Eddinray wheezed. "Absolutely!"

  Hastily, Harmony removed an arrow from the quiver, pulled it back on the longbow and fired. "Cumbersome thing!" she moaned, as the arrow hit granite.

  "Our home!"

  Without warning, a violent scream — the raw sound of a being born again — erupted from the well water. Godly light exploded over the circular enclosure, startling all the rats away. We four covered our eyes until the blast had settled, and with the rats gone, the regenerated body of Wisp was free from its cloak, and revealed to us.

  From that point, everything moved in frame-by-frame slow motion. The most disturbing scene played out before me now as I witnessed the spear of Wisp bore like a drill through the centre of Kat's face. "For Grutas!" said Scarfell, tugging his lance free from the wound then examining Kat's brains on the blade.

  The samurai dropped dead. Blood flowed from his open skull as a triumphant Scarfell stepped away fr
om the wells shimmering illumination. "No!" I chocked. "It can't be…"

  No longer was the wizard's flesh burnt to a crisp, no longer was he old and fragile — but younger, virile, and all our doing.

  "Kat!" shrieked Harmony, rushing to his twitching body and falling to her knees. Blood soaked her gown through as she shook him, but nothing could be done. The samurai was beyond hope.

  "He's gone Harmony!" screamed Eddinray, pulling at her shoulders. "Gone!"

  I slithered in a shambles down the steps and away from the wizard, ripping out my sword and taking a chunk from my own chin in the melee. I cried out, pressing my hand over the wound.

  "No one to save you!" Scarfell announced. "No-one at all boy!"

  He reached out for me, so upward I swung my blade, snapping the spear in pieces from Scarfell's hand. I then lunged at the wizard, but he kicked up his feet and flew — flew — over my head, magically levitating above the labyrinth walls to observe the chaos he created.

  "Come back here!" I roared. "You fucking coward!"

  "I will be waiting for you Fox!" he replied, laughing. "At the end…I'll be waiting!"

  Promptly, Scarfell disappeared in a puff of scarlet mist, and spinning sick, my mind sped through thoughts and consequences — Scarfell alive — Kat dead. Numb, I glanced at Harmony, watching her emotional wreck attempt to drag Kat's dead bulk up the three well steps.

  "Of course!" I exclaimed and springing from my heap I snatched Kat's cold wrist whilst Harmony pulled on the other. Together, we grunted and hauled him up those remaining steps as Eddinray held out his sword to the returning rats. "Come!" he dared. "Taste my fury!"

  "No!" panted Harmony, grief stricken as Kat's body began to break down and sift through our fingers. We could no longer grip him, his whole now melting to the faint ball of blue plasma. Quickly and without another thought, I snatched this speck of life in my hand and leapt with a splash into the well water.

  Shell-shocked, Harmony turned to witness the hairy masses swarming a lonely Eddinray.