ARC: The Corpse-Rat King

by Lee Battersby

  “Help me, it said. Help me.” Gerd sobbed once. “I leaned my ear against the cold stone…” He demonstrated on Yerniq’ breastplate. “Hello?” He knocked on the guard’s metal chest. “Hello? Who’s there?” He pulled back and stared around at the crowd. “Help me. Please, oh please. Get me out. Get me out.”

  Again he pressed up against Yerniq’s broad stomach, and this time, he could see the crowd lean forward, as if expecting an answer. “Hello?”

  The mob stilled, as if everyone around him was holding their breath at once. Gerd closed his eyes, and held still so long that the guard began to wonder if he had fallen asleep against his gut. Suddenly, the young man jumped up straight, and Yerniq let out a little yelp of shock. He was thankful to realise that he was not alone – several peeps came from the surrounding crowd.

  “The King!” Gerd yelled. “The King!”

  “What? Where?”

  “Inside the crypt! Trapped inside, the ghost of Scorbus is calling! Quickly!”

  He grabbed Yerniq and Ghaf and dragged them forward. The crowd parted, and closed in behind. Yerniq wanted to stop, to dig his feet in and bring order to bear. This was a nonsense story, surely, delivered by a nutcase who needed more than a meal or two to bring him to his senses. But something had gripped the mob, and they, in turn, seemed to have the soldiers in their grasp. They surged forward, Gerd at their head, until suddenly they were in the Hall of Kings , and Yerniq stood at the foot of Scorbus’ crypt, staring down at the cold marble.

  “Right then,” he said, swallowing and looking up at the madman. “Why don’t you just show us…?”

  “Sssh!” Gerd commanded. Despite himself, Yerniq quietened. Gerd leaned forward, and placed his head against the top of the crypt. The crowd, silent to a man, leaned forward.

  “Hello?” he asked, in a high, wavering voice. “Hello?”

  Nothing. The crowd stayed still, collective breath held, but still there was no answer. Eventually, Yerniq straightened. He blinked, and as his eyes opened his entire countenance changed. The soldier took over: his lips curled, his eyebrows rose, his eyes fixed upon Gerd with knowing cynicism. Somehow, without knowing it, his arms had risen to his chest. Now he lowered them, and placed his fists on his hips.

  “Well, now,” he began…

  “Hellllp meee…”

  Whatever air had been in the room left. Yerniq’s eyes bugged. His arms fell. He leaned forward, jaw dropping as he stared at the lid of the crypt. Around him, nearly fifty bodies copied his movements.

  “The King!” Gerd pronounced. “Hear the voice of the true King of Scorby!”

  Three feet away, curled naked against the bas relief figures of the next crypt, Marius frowned. “Don’t over-cook it,” he projected, even as he swallowed and once more threw a “Help me” towards the crowd. Ten years of practice had gone into his ventriloquism act, and he’d only ever performed in public once – a disastrous night in front of an aging duke and his nymphomaniac underage foreign wife. It had been enough to learn that, no matter how skilled he may be, no woman is going to sleep with a novelty act when there are pages in the room. What’s more, he had to concentrate to maintain his dead state, to keep his grey flesh blending closely enough with the granite to avoid casual notice, especially with everyone’s attention firmly fixed upon his neighbour’s tomb. Gerd’s response to his order was to send back a mental giggle.

  “I can see your peepee,” his young offside mocked. “I’d complain to the sculptor, if I was you.”

  “The stone’s cold, okay?” Even Marius had to stifle a laugh at his injured tone of voice. “Just don’t lose them now, okay?”

  “Don’t worry,” Gerd fell across the lid of the tomb, his fingers scrabbling at non-existent seams, “They’re going nowhere.” He raised his head, and howled at the crowd. “Get him out! We must release the King!”

  “Now, wait a minute…” Yerniq began, but whatever note of caution he wished to sound was obliterated as a surge of bodies stepped forward to grip the edge of the massive stone vault. “Ghaf!”

  The young guardsman looked at his superior from his point at the vault’s far end. “You want to be responsible if it’s him and we don’t do this?”

  Yerniq pondered the question for several moments, then carefully spat on his hands and took up position between two visitors.

  “Right,” he said, sweeping his gaze across the company. “If we’re going to do this, we do it properly. On three, lift and slide towards the bottom. Ready?”

  He paused. “Three!”

  As one, those around the lid leaned into the job, grunting with effort. Gerd cavorted around them, urging them on. Marius’ thrown voice pleaded with them to hurry. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, Yerniq felt the stone shift.

  “Harder!”

  He threw his weight against the stone with renewed zeal. The lid resisted for long seconds, then with a grinding noise loud enough to wake the already-waiting dead King, slipped forward. Men moved from the sides to the top, adding their weight to the line of momentum. The stone slid further forward. A line of black space opened up as the crypt was exposed. It grew wider as each shove from the company opened up more of the hole. Ghaf let go, slipped between two of the workers, and plunged his arm into the gap.

  “I can feel him!” he yelled, then. “No, wait. No.” He looked up at Yerniq, a puzzled expression flitting across his broad face. “No, that’s a skellington. But it’s… yaaah!” He tried to pull his arm out, but it was stuck fast. He pulled again, and again, growing more frantic as his efforts continued to yield no result. “He’s got me! Yerniq! He’s got me!”

  “What?” Yerniq stared at the young guard thrashing about at the other end of the vault. “What are you playing at?”

  “Help!” Ghaf pulled and pulled to no avail. The hole grew wider. “Let me go. Let go, you bastard.” He reached down with his other hand, panicking all the harder when that, too, refused to come back.

  “What is it?”

  The gap was more than a foot wide. Men stopped pushing at the stone. Several of them moved towards Ghaf, grabbing him about the waist and adding their strength to his frenzied efforts.

  “The skellington!” he yowled. “The skellington’s got me!”

  Slowly, the combined efforts of the rescuers began to have an effect. Ghaf’s arms emerged from the vault. As his left elbow emerged, Yerniq gasped.

  “What the hell?”

  A bony hand grasped the young guard’s arm just below the joint. Several of the rescuers noticed, and let go in shock. He shot forward, and they quickly grabbed him once more and pulled. Gerd danced in the shadows, laughing in his high-pitched voice.

  “The King! The King comes!”

  “Help me!” Marius’ voice deepened, became more commanding. Men leaped to obey, overcome by the moment. Soon, a dozen were pulling at each other in a chain, Ghaf’s body at its head. His arms re-emerged. As his elbow passed out of the crypt, the skeletal hand that gripped it let go. Fingers wrapped around the stone edge of the crypt wall. Only one arm remained. Yerniq ran round to the side and reached down into the hole to grip Ghaf’s arm. His fingers brushed bones.

  “Pull, men!”

  “The King! The King comes!”

  “Free me! Release me!”

  “Yerniq! Make him let me go!”

  “The King!”

  Ghaf’s arm finally emerged. The bony hand that gripped it let go to join its brother on the crypt wall. Suddenly released, the chain of straining men fell backwards into a heap. Marius peeked at them from his cramped perch.

  “All right, Your Majesty,’ he broadcast. “Time to arise.”

  As the pile of rescuers sorted themselves out, Scorbus, first and greatest king of Scorby, rose from his tomb.

  TWENTY-SIX

  The skeleton stood above the fallen rescuers and surveyed the Hall of Kings. For five seconds nobody moved, then, as if of one mind, the pile of men found their feet, backing away from Scorbus’ gaze until the bony wall pressed i
nto their backs. Scorbus raised one leg and stepped out of his tomb. Marius gazed up at him. The King was huge: six and a half feet if he was an inch, shoulders broad as a bear; the long arms that hung from his shoulder joints spoke of a physical power that had been used, and enjoyed, regularly. The massive skull swung from side to side as he regarded his freedom, and Marius was amazed at just how large the bones were, how thick, how they radiated such a sense of solidity. Add flesh to them, he realised, and the effect would be overpowering. At the wall, Ghaf raised a quavering arm.

  “Skellington,” he squeaked. The sound attracted Scorbus’ attention. He leaned forward, peering at the guardsman with his empty sockets.

  “Bow down!” Marius boomed. The rescuers yelped, and the smell of fresh urine slowly began to permeate the air. They disobeyed the order. Most of them were clinging to the bony outcroppings for support. Marius sighed. He couldn’t believe it was going to take more than a giant ambulatory skeleton to get this lot moving. He closed his eyes for a moment, deadened his senses, then unfolded from his hiding place and stepped into their circle of vision.

  ‘Bow down” he yelled again, showing off his dead face. On the other side of the crypt, Gerd threw back his hood and joined him. Marius noted, from the side of his eyes, that he too had deadened himself. He stalked forward until his rotting features were a handful of inches from Ghaf’s sweating face.

  “Run,” he said.

  Ghaf didn’t need further persuasion. With a whimper, he peeled himself from the wall and made for the exit at a flat sprint. As if he were the plug holding back the flood, the others swept after him in a wailing, screaming torrent, out the exit and into the great hall. Marius watched them go, a satisfied smile on his face.

  “Well,” he said as the last back disappeared from view, “that was fun. Welcome, Your Majesty, to the first day of the rest of your death.”

  He turned to Scorbus, and sketched out a bow. The King looked at him for long seconds.

  “For Gods’ sakes, man,” he replied. “Get some clothes on.”

  “Oh, yes.” Marius scurried to the pole behind which he had hidden his clothes and slipped them back on. He returned moments later, and held out a pale gold circlet in his hands.

  “You might like this,” he said. “It belonged to… a friend of mine. A king, Majesty, not so majestic and notable as yourself, perhaps, but still…” He bit his lip for a moment, shocked at how much the memory of Nandus upset him. “A King of Scorby nonetheless.”

  Scorbus reached down and removed the crown from Marius’ grip. He placed the circlet round his brow. It fit snugly, and Marius realised just how huge this man must have been, fully fleshed.

  “Perfect,” he said.

  A flurry of voices broke out from the other crypts. Marius blinked. He had forgotten the other Kings in all the excitement. But now they impressed themselves onto the tableau. Demands for information from many, demands for their own freedom from the brighter amongst them, one long litany of “Fuck off” providing a backbeat.

  “Majesties..” Marius stared helplessly at Scorbus. “Please…” The onslaught of protest drowned his voice. Scorbus shook his head.

  “Enough!” he broadcast, loud enough that Marius and Gerd winced and grabbed at their heads. The hubbub died instantly. “I am the King, the original and greatest King.”

  “But…”

  “You will lie here until I see fit to release you.”

  “Oh, I say…”

  “Enough!”

  The room fell into a silence so deep that Marius wondered if the King’s bellow had broken something within him, and he was now deaf to the sounds of the dead. Then Scorbus spoke again, and to his great surprise, Marius was relieved to hear him.

  “I will come back,’ he said softly. “I will free you.” He stepped forward, and laid a hand gently upon the lid of Thernik’s crypt. “When the time is right, I will free you all.” He turned away and faced Marius. “But for now you need stay a while longer, my friends, whilst we make good our exit. Young man?”

  “Ah, yes.” Marius quickly eyed the door to the main hall. “Down the back here, Your Majesty.” He stepped over to an alcove behind the crypt of Belathon, the thirteenth King of Scorby. “During the reign of the Robber Duchess, when the cathedral was locked to outsiders, several of my… well, let’s call them spiritual ancestors, were sealed up in the walls of this chamber.”

  “Why?”

  Leave it to Gerd to ask the questions I don’t want to answer, Marius thought as he ran his hands over the alcove wall, fingers seeking out the minute gaps between the bones.

  “I assume it was an ironic punishment for attempting to loot our tombs.” Scorbus’ reply was laced with humour.

  “Yes, that would be about it.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes,” Marius frowned in concentration. “Really.”

  “Foolish fellows.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why foolish?” Gerd looked between the two older men. Marius glanced back at him.

  “Meet my spiritual ancestors,” he said, indicating the display of bones before him. Gerd stared at them for long seconds.

  “Oh.”

  “Oh indeed.”

  “Then why are we–?”

  “The chamber is about three feet wide, but it tilts downwards for about eight feet. Underneath it is the first of a series of storage chambers. Break through the flooring, and we can… Aha!” Marius sunk two fingers into the eye sockets of a skull, and pulled. Slowly, a section of wall swung outwards. “This way, your… what the hell?”

  A wall of bricks stood where the secret crypt should be. Painted across it, in white bright enough to be read through the gloom by even living eyes, was the message ‘Secret passage closed due to repair works’. Marius read it, then read it again.

  “Oh, shit.”

  Gerd and Scorbus saw the sign over his shoulder.

  “What now?”

  “We could break it down,” Marius replied, looking the bricks over. “I mean, we’re strong, aren’t we?” He tapped the wall experimentally. “Dig down, meet workmen, get crushed under a falling eave… maybe not.” He sighed, and looked back at the entrance to the Main Hall. “Everyone will have run off, surely?”

  All three eyed the entrance.

  “Unless you have any other options,” the King said, “Then grasp the nettle and make our play.”

  “Yes,” Marius slowly slid across the floor and peered around the corner. “Nettle grasping. Sure.” He stared into the corridor. “It seems empty. Come on.”

  As one, the little group sidled out of the Hall of Kings and into the corridor. Marius stopped them behind a pillar, in the space before shadows gave way to the expanse of the main hallway. “I can’t hear anything.”

  Gerd shook his head. Scorbus waited, his huge skull staring unblinkingly at Marius. Slowly, Marius stuck his head around the pillar and breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Empty,” he said. “Come on.”

  He scurried out into the open space, Gerd at his heels. Scorbus followed more slowly, head swivelling as he took in the massive splendour of the great hall.

  “My word,” he said at each new sight. “My word.”

  “You don’t remember this, Your Majesty?”

  “Oh no,” Scorbus paused to run a bony hand across a balustrade made from thigh bones. “I built the nave and the central church, and the hallway we’ve just left. But this…” he gazed upwards, at the interior surface of the massive dome above. “How on Earth did they manage that?”

  “Yes, well.” Marius stared at each exit in turn, half expecting to see someone gazing back at him. “Perhaps we ought to leave sightseeing for another time. We really must–”

  “Wait.”

  “What?”

  Scorbus’ gaze had fallen from the dome, and now rested upon the lone figure in the middle of the hall. Tanspar had long ago given up calling for help. The only sound that now emerged from the embalmed body was gentle, hopeless sob
bing.

  “Who is that?”

  “That?”

  “The King,” Gerd interrupted. “Recently killed in battle. Bravely killed.” Gerd’s face was a mask, and Marius quickly turned away from it. Scorbus strode towards the bier, his heels clicking loudly on the stone floor.

  “Tanspar” he broadcast softly.

  “Oh, oh thank God,” Tanspar replied, his voice breaking with relief. “You can hear me. You can hear me!”

  “I can hear you.”

  “Where are you? I… I can’t see. Who are you?”

  “My name is Scorbus.”

  There was a long pause, while the young King digested the name.

  “What?” he said, eventually.

  “I am Scorbus.”

  “But… but you can’t be.”

  “I am.” Scorbus reached out and laid a hand on Tanspar’s shoulder. “I am the first King, and I am honoured to meet you.”

  “But… this is a trick. I am captured, aren’t I? This is some Tallian–”

  “Tanspar. You will listen to me.”

  “But…”

  “Listen!” Scorbus’ command echoed through the hallways of Marius’ mind. He winced, and shook his head. Tanspar fell silent.

  “You are King of Scorby. Ruler of the coastal lands and all the seas, commander of the air, representative of the Gods above all.” Scorbus said. “You will comport yourself as such.”

  “I… yes. Of course.” Tanspar’s voice changed, firmed up. “Of course. What is it you want?”

  “You cannot see because you are dead, my Lord.” Scorbus turned to Marius, who mouthed ‘embalmed’ at him. “You are embalmed, and while your life has ended, you will soon be amongst equals.”

  “I’m… equals?”

  “Those who ruled before you. You lie in state in the Bone Cathedral. You will soon be laid to rest in the Hall of Kings.”