Werekynd - Beasts of the Tanglewild

by MacNiven, Robbie

  The Miremancers had created their guardian well.

  Some shifted werekynd managed to push through, snapping and tearing their way almost to the shattered gateway of the Keep. At the last moment a great column of mud-bound rocks fell on them, plunging down like a tentacle from the golem’s main body. The werekynd were instantly lost, those not crushed, choked and drowned in the shifting mud.

  “Sir, we have to retreat!” one of Novo’s subordinated – in the dirt it was impossible to tell who – pleaded. The general ignored the man, focussing on chopping through each new section of dirt which present itself.

  It was like trying to kill a ploughed field after a rainstorm. Ulthric could feel his body, already tired when it had entered this fight, burning with exhaustion. Even shifting no longer provided sufficient adrenaline to fight through the wounds and the fatigue. Some of the Protectorate soldiers had simply given up – weighed down by their armour, they slumped down in the mud and disappeared. All cohesion in the human’s ranks had broken. It would soon be a case of every man for himself.

  Roddick was already looking to himself. He’d seen enough. He was bone-weary and bleeding from a dozen cuts. He didn’t care about the werekynd or Bilbalo or the Miremancers anymore, didn’t care about anything. He just wanted to find a piece of stone not slick with ooze, lie down and curl up.

  He stumbled back out of the Bazaar, a shambling mud spectre. He didn’t really know where he was going. Any recognisable landmarks in Bilbalo had been turned to rubble. All he knew was that he had to get as far from that thing in the Bazaar as possible before he collapsed.

  He didn’t get far at all.

  It suddenly dawned on him that he was surrounded. There were shapes flitting through the ruins around him. They made strange, bird-like noises as they communicated. Roddick stopped, turned in a circle. Once upon a time he would have felt fear, before fatigue had numbed his body and his mind.

  Then, abruptly, the fear returned. A figure left the ruins of an apothecary in front of him, stalking with easy grace through the waterlogged rubble. She pulled down her hood, letting a wide-eyed Roddick see her face.

  “Lead me to the thing that did this,” Red said.

  * * *

  Ulthric resurfaced, gagging, Novo’s hand on his shoulder. The general himself was almost totally submerged, battered by gales of mud.

  But they were almost halfway.

  The marsh golem seemed barely sentient, a flailing whirlwind of indiscriminate destruction that crushed and swept away those around it. Ulthric had given up trying to kill it. His focus was wholly on the Keep now, its remains so tantalisingly close.

  And yet so very far. The assault had almost completely stalled. Humans and man-beasts alike had pushed beyond their limits, and the marsh golem was showing no signs of strain. By splitting up, ragged parties of attackers had made it as far as Ulthric had, a few even further, but the last dozen yards were a blizzard of shattered rock and rotting tree splinters, whipped up by the golem’s flailing. Only a few men had tried to make the last push. All had been lost.

  The temptation to just sink to his knees was almost overwhelming. How many of his pack were gone, Ulthric had no idea. He could still see Thomas and Venneck pushing on a little to his left. Novo and a bedraggled band of humans were also making a little headway. Of Vega there was no sign. He couldn’t remember seeing the pack leader go under, but in the chaos it would have been easy to miss.

  Then, abruptly, a single word changed everything.

  “Crowmen!” shouted a hoarse human voice. An instant later and his cry was joined by the ululating shrieks of over a hundred tribesmen. Ulthric staggered round, disbelief warring with his exhaustion. The natives of Crow Valley rarely left their rocky home. They had never stepped foot inside the capital of the Protectorate.

  Yet here they were, feather-clad savages wailing in their guttural language. They’d burst over the banks of rubble surrounding the Bazaar and were wading in with fresh energy, clubs and flint weapons battering aside every mucky limb that sought to impede them. A number remained on the rubble, slinging arrows and stones into the main bulk of the golem.

  The Protectorates and the man-beasts alike hesitated. The Crow tribesmen had never been their allies before. Why they had left their cavernous home now was a mystery.

  It was swiftly resolved. Over the rubble, her crimson cloak as yet unstained by the filth that choked the city, strode Red. A hollow-eyed Roddick followed in her wake.

  “Red!” Novo shouted, struggling to be heard over the war cries of the tribesmen. “You came back?”

  “Push through!” Red answered. She’d slung her bow, realising it was a useless against the golem. Instead, she began to forge through the mire to link up with the head of the attack. The golem started to respond ponderously to the sudden arrival of more humans, swiping aside the first rush of tribesmen with the near-contemptuous blow of one of its main trunk-arms.

  But the crowmen were already achieving their aim. They were drawing all the marsh golem’s attention. Suddenly the bubbling ooze between Ulthric and the Keep began to settle.

  “Keep pushing!” Novo shouted.

  “Thomas!” Ulthric snapped. The human had come to a halt in the mud, staring at his sister as she struggled through the mire past him. The sound of his human name snapped the boy from his stupor.

  “There’s no time,” Ulthric said, knowing what he was thinking. For her part, Red ignored her sibling. She was glaring up at the Keep, her expression a mask of furious determination.

  “Go!” Novo was shouting. “Go, go!”

  They’d made it. The treacherous quagmire underfoot became gradually more solid, and suddenly they found themselves scrabbling up broken stones and shattered masonry. Novo, two of his bedraggled officers, Red, Venneck, Thomas and Ulthric had made it through, along with a couple of Vega’s pack. Vanniken joined them a moment later, his battleaxe gone. He spat out a wad of dirt, panting with exertion.

  “No time to stop,” Novo said, hands on his knees as he regained his breath. “We have to go up.”

  “It doesn’t look stable,” Thomas said, staring up at the Keep’s exposed guts. The ramp of rubble from the fallen south facing would take them so far, but eventually they’d have to start climbing through broken, unstable stairwells and along sloping, caved-in hallways.

  “The Miremancers are at the top,” Ulthric growled.

  “We go up.”

  Behind them the marsh golem continued to tear apart the crowmen and the remnants of the Protectorate and werekynd attackers that had dared to challenge its master. Spurred on by their screams, the ragged band that had made it through began to climb.

  Above them Duke Lorenzo, Vega and the Miremancers waited.

  Warpwood Dreams and Tangled Destinies

  The Miremancers were waiting for them.

  They’d made the old council chambers their lair. The austere, echoing stonework of the Keep was no longer recognisable, replaced instead by blooming black fungus and a carpet of rotting, tar-like mulch. This was the heart of Bilbalo’s crushing entropy, a cancer to be cut out. The entire chamber seemed to stir as the allies entered.

  The first figure Ulthric noticed was Vega. The Miremancers had him on his knees, one pinning him on either side. They were stooped, cloaked creatures swathed in decaying sackcloth, whatever features they once possessed lost in the cloying darkness beneath their cowls.

  The third Miremancer sat upon what had once been the Protectorate throne, now a giant, blossoming green marshspine. Before him, laid on the end of the council desk, was Lorenzo. Eyes closed, flesh white and arms crossed upon his breast, he looked dead. His hair was gone and his skin slack and old.

  Vega moved as they entered. His broadsword was lodged across the chamber from him, stuck into the flank of the Miremancer’s living throne. He was slicked with mud, and his fur tangled with blood streaming from a half-dozen fresh wounds.

  As Vega looked up Ulthric saw something he’d never witnessed b
efore. He saw the fire in his old rival's eyes doused.

  “Get back,” the leader of the great pack managed through broken fangs. The grip of the Miremancers holding him tightened, and he hissed with pain.

  “We were beginning to wonder if any but this weak dog would make it through,” the marsh sorcerers said. Their voice bubbled and popped not from the three cloaked figures, from the filth surrounding the allies. The sounds made the humans shudder and raised muddy hairs along the flanks of the werekynd.

  “This is our city,” Novo said, striding across the chamber towards the Miremancers, his sword drawn. “We didn’t come to bandy words with you, filth.”

  “Novo, wait!” Venneck began, starting forwards after the human, but it was too late. The Miremancer on the throne raised one rag-swathed claw and clenched it in the air above his head. Novo stopped abruptly, muddy gauntlet going up to his breast. He gasped, aged features contorting with pain.

  “Decay all around you,” the voice of the Miremarsh bubbled. “Decay within as well as without.”

  “Not this time,” Venneck said, bounding forwards with a snarl. He slammed into Novo’s back, knocking the old general down onto his knees, and raised his warpwood staff over him protectively. The ancient totem vibrated in his hand, the werekynd seer’s face a mud-splattered mask of concentration.

  Novo let out a cry and shuddered, twisting in a muck coating the council chamber floor. There was a crack of discharged energy, and the Miremancer dropped his arm. Moments later Venneck let his staff go, as though it was ten times its true weight. He was panting, chest heaving, tongue lolling out.

  “I see a little bit of the Tanglewild has found its way into my home,” said the Miremancers as one, whilst the two men who had made it through with Novo helped their general back to his feet. “Old Hrothgar lives on in you, seer. But you are still just a pup. This isn’t the werekynd’s fight. Leave now, return to your forest, and live.”

  “You made it our fight when you turned the humans against us,” Ulthric said, taking a step into the chamber.

  “You already hated each other,” accused the marshland all around him.

  “You brought war on all our homes,” Ulthric continued. “The Were do not forgive slights, nor blood spilled.”

  “Brute animals,” the Miremancers replied. “Dogs so eager to throw their lives away. So be it.”

  One of the Miremancers holding Vega placed his hands either side of the werekynd’s head.

  “No!” Ulthric shouted, launching himself towards his old pack leader. Claws reaching for the Miremancers. Rage boiling through his veins.

  Too slow.

  The Miremancer twisted with a savage, unnatural strength. There was a horrific snapping sound as Vega’s neck broke, his head turned half round. The big werekynd went limp. Ulthric stopped short, shuddering with anger.

  The third Miremancer had risen and placed his hand on Lorenzo’s forehead. As Vega hit the mulch, the three sorcerers tensed, a low susurration, like wind easing through marsh reeds, hissed across the chamber.

  “I can’t stop this one,” Venneck said quietly, retrieving his staff. “They’re too strong Ulthric.”

  “No they’re not,” the Pup growled, and started forwards once more.

  This time it was Lorenzo who stopped him.

  The master and lord of the Protectorate bolted upright, his pale, willowy flesh given sudden motion. His eyes were still closed, but his movement was as fast and urgent as that of an athletic youth. He sprung across the table, ragged robes flying, and crashed into Ulthric before the werekynd could arrest his own forward motion.

  “Ulthric!” Vannicken barked, going forwards. But the Miremancers were moving too, darting through the muck like ethereal spirits. The susurration had risen to a howling marsh gale.

  They struck, the filth around them shifting and reforming, and final battle was joined.

  * * *

  Novo’s men died first. The general was still barely keeping his feet, and as his two subordinates threw themselves into the path of the oncoming Miremancers the chamber itself seemed to morph around them, lashing out with slick vines and marshland mulch. It entangled and tripped them, and the vile floor rose up and flowed over their screaming bodies, filling their eyes and choking their throats. In seconds they were gone, consumed by the corruption at the heart of Bilbalo.

  Their sacrifice was not in vain. Novo had time to raise his sword as one of the Miremancers lunged at him.

  Red had already put two bloodfowl-fletched arrows into the torso of the one coming at her. They seemed to make no difference. She darted back out of its reach, filthy, rag-bound claws swiping the air. A third arrow plunged into the inky depths of its cowl, yet still it came at her.

  Her back hit the chamber wall, the dirt coating it twisting with unnatural, sentient motion.

  “Thomas!” she shouted as the living filth snagged her cloak and pinned her in place, the Miremancer bearing down on her.

  Venneck was on his knees in the centre of the chamber, warpwood staff held above his head, eyes screwed shut. Thomas had been standing at his shoulder, ready to defend the paralysed seer from the Miremancer’s assault, but on hearing his sister’s scream he spun and lunged at the marsh sorcerer. It sensed him coming an instant before it reached Red, twisting as he barrelled into it. Claws raked the boy’s naked chest, drawing a shout of pain. He tried to punch it, but he was unarmed – his fist merely squelched off the side of its sackcloth cowl.

  “Get back!” Venneck shouted. He’d risen from his trance, giving up on the opportunity to break the Miremancer’s sorcery in order to help his apprentice. Thomas rolled, the Miremancer on top of him, the corpse-reek of the decaying spirit-creature bound within the robes making his stomach churn. Venneck seized his opportunity and smashed the knotted tip of his staff down on the thing’s head.

  The two werekynd of Vega’s pack who had made it this far were no match for the third Miremancer. It seemed to shift in and out of reality, its claws gutting one of the man-beasts even as it darted across the chamber towards them. It took the second werekynd's eyes with a contemptuous swipe, before clawing out its throat. Blood throthed thick and red.

  Ulthric was too busy fighting a dead man to help them. What had once been Duke Lorenzo smashed his jaw with a slack fist. The impact broke the withered corpse’s hand, but it showed no sign of having felt the splintering of bones. It kept pummelling Ulthric with blind strength, its eyes closed, jaw slack. The black magic of the marshland was infusing the body of the dead duke with unnatural vigour, fuelled by the throbbing decay that ruled the chamber. The ferocity of the animated body’s assault kept Ulthric on the back foot, warding away blow after blow, unable to go on the offensive and unleash the werekynd savagery that may have ended this.

  Novo drove his sword into the Miremancer attacking him as its claws scraped across his mucky breastplate. Their necrotising, aging sorcery had nearly ended him. His breath was faltering and his armour felt unnaturally heavy. It was all he could do to stay on his feet amidst the churning dirt, let alone fight back.

  But, amazingly, that one thrust was enough. It pierced the Miremancer’s robes, meeting no resistance. With a hiss like escaping marsh gas, the sorcerer seemed to disintegrate, the decayed robes unravelling. Of what was once within nothing now remained, but with a burst of sickly light something rocketed from the old rags into Lorenzo’s corpse. Ulthric averted his eyes with a snarl as the body was consumed by the light. When it faded Lorenzo was still upright with his eyes closed. A single, black streak of tar-like filth was dribbling from his open mouth.

  He went for Ulthric again.

  Roddick had reached Red from across the chamber’s shifting mass. He dragged her free from her cloak, even as was wall sucked it into its cloying depths.

  “Watch out!” Red shouted, spotting the third Miremancer over the escaped labourer’s shoulder. She sent him sprawling aside just as the sorcerer reached her, till covered in werekynd blood. The impact drove them
both once more into the wall.

  Venneck’s staff struck the Miremancer atop Thomas yet again, and finally there was a wet cracking sound. Again, the chamber flared with unnatural light, a foul presence rising from the decayed remnants of the Miremancer’s robes.

  Ulthric had his claws around Lorenzo’s throat, crushing the unlife from the animated corpse. Former duke or not, he’d had enough of the flesh-puppet’s resilience. But as the spirit-light of the second Miremancer arced into the shuddering body he saw Lorenzo’s limp arm shoot up, in turn gripping him by the throat. The broken hand tightened impossibly, and Ulthric felt his eyes widen as an otherworldly strength crushed the life from him. Even as his own death-grip on the corpse slackened, so Lorenzo’s tightened. He couldn’t breathe. Mud was pouring from the corpse’s mouth and nose now.

  “I have to break their power,” Venneck shouted, dragging Thomas back to his feet. The chamber had begun to fall apart, great globules of filth tumbling from the ceiling as the walls shifted and collapsed. The floor was as unstable as the bogland depths the Miremancers had crawled from. A keening wail was cutting through the Keep, as the grate of crumbling stone heralded its final fall.