“That was a close one!” He shouted to the soldier, who would never hear him having had his head shorn cleanly off his shoulders.
Logan choked on his own vomit as the insect clambered over the side of the wall, claws whipping blindly ahead of it. He let fly three arrows from where he sat with his back against the stone of the narrow wall space. The first deflected harmlessly off the insect’s defending claw, the other two sank in deep near its exposed row of eyes and chitinous pulsing tentacle lined mouth.
Corbin rushed in toward the skex side, tucking his legs tightly up under him, and leaping over its swinging claw. He landed squarely in front of the monster, jabbing his spear straight into its gullet, as Logan ripped through one of its eyeballs with another arrow. Pulling back on the spear, it would not budge so Corbin had to let go, as the beast flailed furiously up and down in agony. The hunter quickly danced backward, never taking his eyes off the beast, which was futilely trying to grasp the protruding spear with its oversized claws.
Above them new screeching rang out, as two more of the insects rained down from the second level of the city. In the flickering light, Logan could just make out a hysterical soldier caught in one of the beast’s tails. Several men were running down the parapet toward them when the insects came in. Cursing to himself, Logan knew that he had to shift his attention from his brother and the slavering monster half hanging over the wall, to the incoming threat. He let burst a cacophony of arrows into the creatures’ exposed underbellies before they even came close. The soldiers around him also let their weapons loose, spears and crossbow bolts raining through the air, plunging into the dangerous monsters. One of the skex must have realized there was easier prey elsewhere and shifted its flight back up to another level of the city. The other stubbornly hissed, its mouth quivering in hungry anticipation.
Weaponless now, Corbin was shifting back and forth in a mad dance of survival, dodging the wounded beast’s grasping pincers. Working furiously on pure instinct alone, he danced forward into an opening then backward, rolling to the side to jump over a crashing claw, all the while waiting for an opening. The beast’s tentacle lined mouth had begun working the spear out, pulsing purple flesh gripped tightly around the shaft of it, slowly wrenching the spear away. At that moment Corbin spied his opportunity, somersaulting through the air, he twisted into a dive, lightly tapping off the insect’s waving claw to land back inside and grasp his spear firmly with both hands. He knew it would be futile to pull at the thing with the tentacles wrapped around it, so instead he shoved forward, throwing all his weight into the weapon, crunching it deeper through the beast’s jaw. Then squatting, he wrenched his corded arms straight up into the air, ripping the spear cleanly through the monster’s forehead. No death rattle came from the beast as it grasped into the air for nothing, before slumping forward, almost bowling him over under its weight.
Logan had retreated amongst the soldiers as his quarry came in, the hazy blue strobe light of the Crystal dancing across its back. The group pushed hard against the beast, stabbing it from all sides. Until the monster rolled off the edge of the wall, pulling large chunks of stone with it as it plummeted to its death. Another insect tried to flee the city walls, looking like a pincushion after its battle with the army above. Logan directed the men to attack, piercing the soft underbelly even further. The skex crashed dead on arrival into the parapet following its brood down the side of the wall.
All along the wall, fighting was ceasing as the men and women pushed their enemy back away from their homeland. Those remaining members of the invading swarm forced to retreat back into the night. Cheers erupted at the victory all over the outer city.
“We did it!” Logan triumphantly joined in, jumping up and down in celebration with the men and women around him. But Banner was walking up wearing a solemn look on his face, silencing them. Glancing at Corbin, he motioned for him to follow over to the wall. The man was deep in concentration looking out into the night.
Logan looking confused, questioned his brother who wore an equally disturbing expression. “Take heart little brother, we’ve won the day…victory is ours!” he clapped Corbin’s shoulder halfheartedly, sensing something else afoot.
The praetorian shook his head in denial, “I am afraid not, Logan. What we have won was no more than a minor victory; it would appear they were toying with us. Testing our mettle, the cunning beasts…,” Banner growled under his breath.
“But…how could you possibly know that?” Logan denied the truth, waving his open hand at the dead skex littering the area. Corbin directed his attention to the tree line again, where the larger swarm waited at the edge of the forest. The valley below was still virtually teeming with the monsters, what they had faced was but a taste of the horde.
“What in blazes would they be waiting for?” He asked himself in awe.
As Logan was about to shake his head, they received their answer. Deep inside the city the cogs of the great temple wound into place, and the bells chimed announcing the new cycle had arrived. Overhead, high toward the ceiling of New Fal’s cavern, the Great Crystal god Baetylus’ pulsating blue light flared blindingly white hot for a moment, forcing everyone to shield their eyes against its brilliance. The light quickly faded, as a long haloed shadow of pitch-black stretched in toward it, lights receding in the shadows wake back up to the ceiling where it floated. The halo surrounding it like a crown until it snuffed completely out, leaving them all in pitch-black.
The only lights that existed now were the thousands of glowing red eyes, peering at the humans from beyond the city walls. Looking at them ravenously, seeming to sparkle with malicious laughter, as the massive swarm closed in on the capitol.
“Baetylus help us all.” Corbin moaned.
Chapter 7
Dull drums beating back in the distance, while the dancing laughter of worms wriggling around through a torso played in his mind. He could sense it slowly unwinding from the taut cord of death that wrapped around his neck. Choking on the clean air, desperately gasping to fill lungs too bruised to hold the stuff, he tried to shout his denial. The smoke flitted by Corbin’s eyes as shadows danced past his vision. Through the thick fog in the distance, an emerald gleamed brilliantly, cutting into the pain with a sudden clarity. The Great Crystal’s singing played in the back of his mind, clearing away the fog and instead filling the world with brilliant, blinding light followed quickly by nothing. Jerking his head up from the wet stone, the dream slowly faded into the recesses of his mind.
“Where am I?” he thought in a panic, as he opened his eyes wider, thinking it would dispel the sheer dark nothingness that surrounded him. He tried to focus his vision in vain, futilely hoping to perceive something, anything at all, in the pitch-black night that surrounded him. “How long have I been unconscious?” he wondered, trying to get his bearings.
Twitching fingers groped along the floor beneath him, making their way up from his waist. Something must have hit him from behind, knocking him face down to the ground. With his breath no longer coming in such awful ragged gasps, he pushed himself up to his knees. Flashes of blinding light cut across his vision, the pain in his side ripping the air back out of his throat and slamming his body to the floor. The crunching of his teeth, gritting together, resounded like shards of broken ceramic being ground under heavy boots.
“Great Crystal, what has happened to me?” Corbin’s mind raced to remember how he had gotten here.
Flashes of insects battling the humans raced across his mind’s eye, but they were only momentary glimpses rushing by in the recesses of shadows. Shaking his head to deny the seeping frustration, the hunter grunted with the effort of moving, deciding that it was more important to get to safety. Steadying his breath he braced himself for the pain that was sure to come and tried to rise a second time. Much slower now, he pulled himself up to his knees, taking deep even breaths. The pain radiated like crawling snakes from the ribs on his left side, but he braced against it this time.
“Where did my weapon go?” he wondered, trying to peer into the murky shadows around his knees, hoping for some miracle to light up his spear. To the right side of his body, the shadows seemed more of a gray, than pitch. His guessed eyes must be slowly adjusting to the lighting or lack thereof. Corbin leaned in toward the grayness, rubbing his aching skin up against the cool damp rock wall that he found there. At that moment, it was more inviting than a campfire. Probing fingers explored the rock with his right hand, until they fit snugly into a secure hold. He stopped for a moment, to catch his breath, and then pulled slowly up to his feet. Those snakes started cruelly biting into his side again, with waves of nausea wracking his body and painful sparks dancing across his vision once more. Damning the pain in his side, Corbin fought on until he was leaning heavily upright on the surface.
There was no sense trying to figure out which way to go since leaning on his left side would not even be an option. Corbin figured his ribs must be broken to keep hurting him so. In this darkness, he would be completely defenseless with a such an injury if one of the skex came upon him.
“What was that?” he had not realized he was already shuffling along, his whole body leaning into the wall, until his foot stopped short by something on the ground. Not wanting to risk bending over, with the potential of never getting back up again, Corbin prodded the object with the toe of his boot. The dead man’s arm slapped wetly onto the ground. The whole thing must have been severed in one of the insect’s bloodlust. Again shrieks rose into the night air as another monster was filling it’s abdomen with human meat. Corbin embraced that anger, spurring his legs faster toward the path ahead.
Soon he came upon an area of the wall that glowed faintly luminescent in the shadows, casting a glow of green haze from a moss the city had planted as emergency lighting. Around the floor of the area, Corbin spotted dead bodies, torn and mauled by the flesh-eating insects. He also eyed a sword one of the men had strapped to his waist. This would be worth the risk of bending over for, so he carefully made his way down to a crouch, racking his body with the pain in his side. The weapon was much lighter than it appeared, metal reflected in the green glow. He balanced it in his hand, moving left to right, feeling the weight of the new sword.
Corbin set forth again, back into the engulfing shadows, with his pointer finger nervously tracing circles over the blade’s hilt. Sounds of battle were echoing off the stonewalls ahead, but still he could see nothing.
”Is this how the roc-bats live in the valley?” he wondered, thinking of the blind flying creatures who let out shrill screams, like banshees, to guide their travels.
Leaning against the wall, and taking the pressure off his ribs again, he cocked an ear to listen ahead. “It sounds like a drunken man is laughing just around the bend.” He thought. With renewed vigor Corbin set forth, still guided by the stone, an image of men celebrating their victory was playing in his mind at hearing these new sounds. Again the luminescent green light oozed into the shadows where the laughing man was sitting propped against the wall ahead.
“Sir…where are the others?” he tentatively asked, speaking low in case there were skex in the area, and looking around into the dark for the man’s companions.
Still laughing the man dreamily looked up, his unkempt brown beard dripping foamy spittle. The clouds parted in his eyes as the man focused on Corbin’s face and the laughter stopped.
“I killed three of them, lad.” He soberly explained.
“Three of who, do mean the skex? I don’t understand…are you okay, friend? Where are the other soldiers I heard a moment ago?” Corbin fired the questions out not giving him time to answer as he leaned in closer.
“Others…I got three. Killed three of the bastards before they got me.” He directed Corbin’s gaze to his hands, where they were clutched tightly around his large belly. For the first time since he woke, Corbin truly came out of his stupor and became fully aware of the world around him. This man was dripping blood from a deep gash that ran across his entire midsection. So much blood covered the stone that Corbin’s boots were sticking in it where the stuff pooled around his feet. The world lurched as his body rejected the contents of his stomach onto the dying man’s legs. He quickly tried to wipe the vomit from his face and instead smeared some of the dying man’s blood across his chin.
They were both in shock, staring at each other in silence. Until the man’s eyes glazed over again, the bubbling laughter gurgling out of his mouth, his hysteria began building in crescendo, to the point where Corbin was not sure if it was actually laughing or screaming. Knuckles white, he shoved his blade with a crunching sound up through the poor bastard’s jaw and into his skull. He watched in sick horror as the old soldier was released from his painful drawn out death, until the madness faded from his eyes, drifting into peace, and then slowly he pulled the blade out. He had never killed another man before, even though he knew this was the right thing to do for the tortured soul, every nerve in his body grew cold at once. For the second time his stomach lurched forward, this time with nothing to give to the aching world.
Careful not to disturb the soldier’s body, Corbin lifted the goggles from around his neck. He knew he had to remain pragmatic. Despair aside, these would help him see in the pitch-black. The miners of Parian wore them when going into deep caves. With the set tightened around his head, he twisted a small dial on the strap, adjusting the emerald quartz lens in place and lighting up everything before him. At first, the area was framed in a dim green glow, like the moss, then everything blended into life as all the other natural colors began seeping through the shadows. It felt like looking through a shaded screen at the world, nothing quite as brilliant or focused as normal light from the Crystal would provide. However, he would trade this diluted view any day for what he had just stumbled through.
“Maybe the soldier has something else useful?” he wondered, rummaging through the man’s utility pouch until he found something. “A small animal skin tube of Medi-gel!” Corbin excitedly thought, flipping the wax seal off with his thumb, as he hiked up the side of his torn shirt, revealing the long gash across his ribs, which was caked with dried blood and dirt. He gingerly squeezed the tube, spreading the healing gel over his wound. A hiss escaped through gritted teeth, as the gash sizzled close, leaving a long rounded white hard nub across his skin. Finally, he began to feel some semblance of being balanced out again. Looking around him and the dead soldier he found nothing else along the wall but all about the city, he could hear the battle still raging.
On his feet again, Corbin started out at a steady pace, still leaning on the wall for support. It was not long before he realized the air fully filled his lungs once more giving him renewed strength and clarity. The mining goggles functioned properly, bending the light with their special lens, revealing a good yard ahead of filtered view. To the right he found a steep stairwell cut into the wall leading up to the next level. Corbin fell into his hunter’s crouch, sensing the need for caution as he climbed the steps. At the top of the stairwell, sounds of clashing weapons and shouting came closer.
A large skex, with its back to him, stalked from left to right and then back again, staying just out of reach of its quarry. There stalked three more of the monstrous insects around a group of people fighting, including his brother Logan who was smack dab in the middle of a pair!
Corbin quickly scanned the area to get a better understanding of the battlefield. Between himself and the nearest winged monster, sprawled across the ground, lay the carcass of another skex, its head littered with arrows. “Logan must have dealt the beast its deathblow.” He thought. Torn pieces of several people littered the ground all around the grisly scene.
His brother must have lost his bow as he was now holding a metal staff that he used to parry, first the large insect in front of him and then the one to his back, barely keeping the beasts at bay. The woman at Logan’s side was a soldier by the looks of her. She was firing her pistol at the insects in between d
odging their attacks. The other was a citizen, who must have been caught on the walls when the attack began. He was bleeding from a bad wound on the side of his temple. The man was holding a long spear, frantically waving it about in the dark to keep the insects at bay. Right by Logan’s feet laid Elder Morgana’s laser rifle, but none of the group could possibly see it in this pitch-blackness.
Corbin, crouching low to the ground, made a dash to the fallen insect, hiding behind the armored plates of its thorax. Peering around the side of the dead monster, he could now see his brother better. Logan took three steps forward, bringing the largest insect’s snapping pincer in, then a backward dash with his staff, slamming down on the claw and slapping it to the stone floor. The beast was enraged and brought its tail in hard, stinger dripping with sticky poison. Though he was clearly tired and drained of energy, Logan was ready for this, dodging quickly to the left, opening the way for the insect behind him to take its sisters barbed stinger squarely in one of its eyes. A high-pitched screech erupted from the thing’s quivering maw and the two struggled to separate, flipping over to the side of the wall.
Just behind where the blinded insect had stalked from was one of the city’s defense turrets. It was an enormous weapon, made to shoot down any monstrous insects, sauria-lizards, or even roc-bats, that came too close to the city’s borders. It resembled one of Logan’s small hand crossbows but was as large as two riding elks. The defense spear had a giant stone seat that would house one city guard while another worked a hand crank, which they used to pivot left or right. Corbin felt an idea forming, noting there was still a handful of massive spears loaded onto the side of the mechanism.
Secrets of the Elders Kindle Version Page 7