MudMan (The Golem Chronicles Book 1)

by James Hunter

  A twinge of guilt surged up inside Levi’s chest as he watched the pair battle to live, crying out in pain and fear.

  Pastor Steve’s words lingered in the back of his mind. “We all wrestle with sin, we each have our crosses to bear. You have to die to those darker parts of your nature, turn your back on those baser instincts. It’s not easy, sometimes, but you have to choose the better way.” It’s not good to kill: so says Pastor Steve and so says the Good Book. And that was true. Tonight’s expedition was a relapse, a mistake. But it felt good. That was Levi’s darker nature. He wanted to control it, but he needed to kill—to shed blood, rend flesh, break bone. He’d been created for it and his nature compelled him, drove him onward.

  His blood pumped and his soul sang as he watched the Kobos perish. Life and fierce joy welled up in him, unmatched by the boring routines of the everyday—AA meetings, church services, client commissions, grocery trips. But he also felt sick. Self-loathing writhed around in his guts like a brood of snakes.

  Better these monsters than some hapless mortal up top, he reminded himself.

  And these creatures were monsters. Living down in the stony depths, worshiping dusty, forgotten, evil Principalities and Powers of old. Though most of their kind shunned the surface, that didn’t prevent their raiding parties from stealing into the human world: abducting children for their dark rituals or snatching women—breeders to propagate their twisted race. He saw death in the two remaining Kobocks, saw the murderous deeds swirling around them like a dark cloud.

  Guilty.

  That was part of his gift, too. He could read murder on people. See it in their aura as clear as the stars on a cloudless night in the backcountry. Murder, the greatest of desecrations, left a mark no one could hide, not from Levi’s beady eyes.

  Still, this was a relapse. He’d have to pay penance when this was all over and done with. His hands itched at the thought of the flames lapping at his skin, searing his nerve endings though leaving the skin unmarred—his own unique form of self-castigation.

  He shivered, then rudely shoved the thoughts of guilt away, his bloodlust winning out for the time being. It’s not good to kill: so says Pastor Steve and so says the Good Book. Except sometimes it is.

  He scooped up another load of rubble and sent it flying, plop, thwack, crack. The creature with the mangled leg took a jagged chunk of rock to the throat—its windpipe crumpled inward like an empty soda can. The creature clawed at its ruined neck, its feet drumming on the ground as it fruitlessly attempted to fill its lungs. A lost cause, that. The beast was dead, even if its body didn’t know yet, and good riddance. Levi watched its struggles, waiting for the usual rush of bright-hot satisfaction that came with a kill. The dying beastie writhed on the ground for another few seconds before its eyes grew dull and lifeless and it gave up the ghost.

  Levi watched on, waiting. No surge came. No satisfaction at all. Just an empty spot in his center.

  That was good, maybe. He’d never felt empty before, not when it came to killing. Maybe the AA and church services were working after all?

  A splash floated to his ears and drew his attention away from the body splayed out before him.

  It took only a second to locate the ripple spreading out in the slow moving stream. The third Kobo, the creature with the fractured arm, was gone. Disappeared into the murky water. The smile gracing Levi’s blunt face vanished in an instant, stolen by the tricky fiend. He ground his teeth in frustration, a low growl burbling out from his chest. The beast Needed. To. Pay. Levi couldn’t let it escape, not with retribution so close. The Kobo was badly wounded, and trying to swim through the water with its brutalized arm would be near-impossible. Plus, it would need to come up for air eventually.

  Levi just needed to bide his time.

  Wait and be patient. Patience was hard, though, especially with a victim near at hand. Still, he restrained himself. He wanted that Kobock’s head on a spike, but he wanted nothing to do with that water. Castigation by flame was awful—excruciatingly painful—but the thought of dipping into the water was too revolting a notion to consider. So he waited. And waited more. As he waited, he turned the situation over and over in his mind, his need to dispense justice balanced against his fear of drowning.

  This was taking too long.

  After a moment, vengeance, and his bloodlust, won out. After all, how could he let a little moisture prevent him from executing his duties?

  Cautiously, Levi left the makeshift sanctuary of rubble behind and trudged forward, his movements ungainly with the poison flowing through his system. His left hand reverted to its normal form, shovel giving way to fingers, as he crept toward the water’s edge, moving to the place he’d seen the ripple in the stream.

  Then, another splash, not far off, followed by a greedy gulp of air. He wheeled about, eyes running over the surface of the murky creek, finding nothing but uninterrupted swirls of black. He took a deep breath, suppressing the anxiety swelling inside him, and hobbled a few steps closer to the bank. He crouched down, laying his left palm flat against the rocky shore, mere inches from the stream. He didn’t sweat—couldn’t sweat, in fact—but had he been human, great beads of the stuff would’ve rolled down his lumpy noggin.

  Levi redirected the ichor inside him, sending a surge of molten gold toward his palm, calling out to the earth below, probing at the water. After a moment, Levi grunted and shook his head. Useless. The creek was a dead spot in his mind. He could feel the presence of the water, or rather the void it created, but the Kobock in the drink was invisible.

  Nothing he could do about it, then. Chances were, the Kobo’s wound would do it in anyway. Might be, the creature would do the world a favor and drown—a fitting end. Or maybe the arm would go septic. Gangrene was a worry even for Kobos.

  Levi turned with a sigh, resigned to carrying on. There was still plenty of game afoot, after all—

  A geyser erupted on his left, the Kobo with the gimp arm propelling itself through the air, its stone blade, scalpel-sharp, outstretched. Levi moved, but too slowly. The blade plunged into the Mudman’s side, the pain like a lance of flame burying itself in his innards. The Kobo retracted the knife in a flash and danced back, water flying from its body as it evaded. The Mudman hadn’t been expecting such a bold play, and the gash in his side was the price.

  Levi advanced, his steps ponderous, the right side of his body useless now, the puncture in his ribs a spike of agony. As with the wound in his leg, the blow to the gut wouldn’t kill him, but neither was it pleasant. Levi wasn’t sure what exactly it would take to kill him, but he’d survived worse than this.

  The Kobo shot in again, lightning quick, his stone blade thrusting upward, seeking out Levi’s heart like a homing missile. Levi threw up a beef-slab arm, the block narrowly arriving in time to intercept the thrust. The blade stabbed into Levi’s forearm, gouging a deep trench in his skin. The knife tore free, and the creature danced away again before Levi could respond. Despite the Kobock’s injury, it was still fast, faster than the Mudman, and smart, too. Always lingering outside Levi’s strike radius.

  The Mudman moved forward, circling right and pushing in toward the tunnel wall, hoping to back the creature into a corner where he could pummel the beast into a pile of vile, tainted blue meat. He shifted his left hand, letting the ichor beneath the skin melt and bulge, his fist transforming into a spiked mace the size of a bowling ball. The Kobo dove left as Levi lunged forward with a snarl, lashing out with his spiky bludgeon. Levi’s strike was awkward and clumsy, his deadened right leg working against him, but still the mace collided into the creature’s flabby gut with a crack—shattered ribs—swatting the Kobo to the ground like a line drive.

  In a flash, the creature scrambled gracelessly to his feet, one arm dangling, the other outstretched, its blade clutched in a white-knuckle grip. Levi charged forward again, raising his club-hand for a killing blow—

  The creature darted in low, first feinting left, then hooking right, ducking as it shot
inside Levi’s guard and buried the blade up to its rocky hilt in Levi’s good leg. The Mudman faltered at the sudden pain and pressure. He reeled backward, his upraised mace throwing off his already shaky balance. He staggered onto his worthless right leg—a terrible mistake. His weight came down on the numb limb, only to find the leg refused to support his considerable bulk. The knee buckled and he tumbled, his good arm pinwheeling as he crashed toward the ground.

  Except it wasn’t ground that met his back. It was water.

  Liquid—frigid and merciless—surged around him, rushing over his face and dragging him toward the bottom. Levi couldn’t swim—his body was too heavy and dense to ever be buoyant, and all his flapping, flailing, and kicking did little to slow his descent. And, despite his resilience to pain and damage, he did need to breathe. He didn’t have the full range of human organs—no proper stomach, no kidneys or liver, no intestine zigzagging through his center—but both heart and lungs were present, though they functioned only to redirect and channel his ichor.

  The Mudman, a millstone thrown into the sea, drifted down four or five feet before his shoulder blades thudded against the streambed. Hot-blooded panic set in; the rush of water pressed in on his senses, cutting him off from the earth. Even his tenuous connection to the rocky streambed wasn’t enough to sustain him.

  This is it, his mind growled like a bear facing down a small army of gun-toting hunters. This is how I go.

  No, the cool, logical part of his mind asserted. Four, maybe five feet to the bottom, that was all. If he could gain his feet and get his head above the water, everything would be fine. He needed air. Even with one bad arm, he could get to the bank and haul himself back onto dry ground. And chances were, the murderous Kobo would be long gone. He needed to stay calm, keep his head, and pull himself from the drink.

  Slowly he reached down with his left hand, pressing the mace head into the soil, and hoisted himself into a sitting position. The current buffeted his face and chest, threatening to unbalance him. He ignored the sensation, focusing his mind on the singular task of escape. With ponderous movements he pushed himself back onto his left leg, the knife still jutting out of his thigh. He ignored the spark of protest from the limb, far more concerned with being free of the stream than free of the pain. He could recover from the knife wound, but not so long as he was in the water. His healing, his power, his life was inescapably tied to the earth.

  Without the earth, his power was a fragile thing.

  With his left leg firmly planted beneath him, he pushed upward and toward the river’s edge. His head broke the surface a moment later, cool air washing over his skin as he threw his left hand forward. He shaped the limb into wicked hook, which he slammed deep into the ground, driving the blade tip down and winching his battered body from the water. Thank God above.

  He spat out a mouthful of bitter liquid and sprawled onto his back, letting his bare skin soak up the strength of the earth below. Without even bothering to look around, he drew on the stone, his senses seeking out his clever adversary. As expected, the creature was, indeed, gone—at least four or five hundred feet away, and moving quickly through the tunnelways, heading further into the Deeps, toward the Kobock high temple. One of them, anyway.

  Despite the fact that Levi’s stony heart still thudded out a mad beat in his too large chest, his face split into a grin. The High Temple was his final destination, too. Though the rank and file Kobocks were vastly entertaining to hunt, it was the High Shaman, the Mung Gal-kulom, he’d come to kill. But perhaps he’d get a chance to finish off the treacherous underling as well. With a grunt, he pulled the knife from his leg. Levi was not a creature of grand hopes and dreams, but, as he glanced at the pitted blade, he did find himself eager for a rematch with gimpy arm.

  First, though, he needed rest. He cast the blade aside with a flick of his fat hand, pulled himself over to the rubble pile, and set to work burying himself alive.

  THREE:

  Memories

  Levi dragged his body from beneath the pile of rubble an hour later. He stretched his flabby arms and prodded at both legs. Better, much better. He flexed his right hand, curling it into a fist, then shifting it into a blunt-faced sledgehammer. He had sensation again. He let the hand revert to its normal shape and rubbed at the knife wound on his left leg. Completely healed. The massive puncture in his right leg was tender to the touch, but still much improved. He’d packed both injuries full of dirt and rock before burying himself beneath a half-ton of stone, letting bedrock strength seep in while his ichor transformed the raw material into supple, living clay.

  Alchemic magic.

  He pushed himself to his feet with a grunt and started forward, angling toward a clear, complete section of wall. He dragged his left hand along the wall’s surface as he walked, drawing out information with every second. Much had happened since he’d taken his short, but necessary, respite: for one, some semblance of order had been reestablished in the Kobock ranks. No longer was it every Kobo for itself. No longer was the subterranean cavern a madhouse of stampeding feet running every which way. Half of the remaining creatures had withdrawn to the High Temple, joining with their unholy shaman, Levi’s real target, barricading themselves behind the temple’s heavy iron gates.

  The other half had broken up into hunting parties—four groups of eight—each scouring the intricate and sprawling tunnels, searching for Levi. One of the parties drew uncomfortably close, circling in even as Levi moved, only minutes away at their current speed. For a moment, Levi considered abandoning this expedition altogether, chalking the whole thing up as a failure. It would be a simple task to avoid the hunters, jump ship, and return another night to finish the work, when conditions were more favorable.

  He paused, drumming his fingers on the wall, mind thoroughly divided over the prospect. Levi was not dumb, but he was not overly fond of surprises, and thinking on his feet was no easy task for the Mudman.

  Still, he reasoned, it was better to put this thing to rest good and proper.

  He really did want to curb his gluttonous desire for death, and he knew if he left the work undone, he’d be compelled to come back and mop up later. If this was to be his last splurge, as he swore it would be, he needed closure. Without closure, without completion, he wouldn’t be able to help himself. Wouldn’t be able to control the urge. Besides, he’d already fallen off the wagon—he’d have to give back his three-month sobriety token at his Thursday meeting—so it was best to get it all out of his system while he had an opportunity.

  One last hooray, then he’d start again. And he’d do better next time.

  Repent and purge, that was the best way.

  With his mind made up, Levi lurched into motion. His tree-trunk legs churned, the ground rumbled at his passing, and his fingers brushed over the wall, guiding him as he moved. The hunting party was closing in on his position, but Levi paid them no mind, heading down the tunnel in the opposite direction. He needed to finish what he’d come here for: the shaman. Mung Gal-kuloms rarely, if ever, ventured from their unholy sanctuaries, so Levi was sure that was where he’d find his target. True, the hunting party would be on him in minutes, but he could gain the temple long before they ever reached him.

  He would raid the sacrilegious shrine, kill its profane leader, and disappear, work finished, conscience clear.

  Onward he hurtled, moving not with the zippy speed of a sports car, but rather with the steady, implacable strength of a freight train.

  He ground to a halt four hundred meters later as the tunnel fractured into three branches: one running straight, one hooking left, the other jutting right and ending abruptly in a yawning chasm. Something here was not quite as it seemed. He squatted down, examining the ground with both hands, willing the cavern to confess its secrets. He grunted and nodded: the right-hand path, toward the cliff.

  Cautiously, he picked his way toward the edge of the chasm and glanced down—blackness stretched on forever. A clever lie. He threw his body from the ledge, g
usts of air whipping over his bare skin for a moment before he crashed to the ground, loose chips of rock shaking free from the walls. He stood on a narrow strip of land budding from the craggy cliff face, twenty feet down from the drop-off above. A very clever illusion. Behind him, a wide, downward-sloping tunnel bore into the rock face, cutting deeper into the earth. Next to it, a crude set of foot and handholds had been chiseled into the cliff wall, leading back toward the upper level.

  The echoing cries of the hunting party drifted along the underground air currents. If he could hear them so clearly, Levi knew they, in turn, must’ve heard the impact from his landing. Best to move on. Forward again he trudged, building up momentum step by ponderous step as he shot downward, deeper and deeper. He followed the path for two hundred meters—avoiding a pair of pressure plates and a spiked death pit—before taking a left at another forked intersection. Levi ran with his fingertips caressing the wall, seeking out the heavy iron gates standing guard at the temple’s entryway. Close now, forty or fifty feet.

  The hallway curved, turning into a tight spiral, drilling downward.

  He ran, chest heaving, fingers flexing in anticipation.

  The Mudman rounded the last bend and nearly ran headlong into the sturdy barrier barring the way to his final stop. A pair of earthen pillars, twenty feet high, flanked either side of the hallway, and in between them loomed a latticed-iron portcullis—a three-ton, drop down gate, common on medieval castles. Though the gate impeded Levi’s entry, it failed to block his view of the temple’s interior.

  Elaborate columns carved with profane scenes of inhuman perversion—men and women doing unnatural carnal acts—ran along the length of a wide center aisle. Enormous, wrought-iron sconces decorated each column, each holding orange and yellow fire, which cast lurid, flickering shadows over the whole scene. He spied none of his Kobock prey—they must’ve been in another part of the temple complex—what he could see, however, was more than enough to stoke the furnace of his wrath.