Impaled upon the blade, the undead monster hissed and snarled at the templar, reaching out with filthy claws. There was a horrible sucking sound as it dragged itself along the blade, cold steel slipping effortlessly through its rotten innards. It raked a filth-encrusted talon across Mikael’s face, tearing a long and bloody gash. Snarling in pain, he ripped the thing in two, wrenching his sword through paper skin. The legs and torso spiralled away as grave dust fell from the corpse like rain.
Strong fingers seized Mikael’s shoulder from behind. Hard and sharp, they felt like burning knives as they bit through his armour plate. About to turn, another thing loomed out of the half-dark of the wooden chapel in front of him. Once a butcher, it now had the shambling gait of the undead. It still wore a blood-stained tabard, but the head was caved in and wasted muscle peeked out beneath torn and greying skin. It lunged at him, arms outstretched. Mikael slashed at it, removing an arm, dead blood spattering his neck and face. The creature behind him grabbed at his sword-arm, pushing it down with groping, scraping fingers. The undead butcher pressed forward, reaching out with a claw-like hand, an incoherent moan escaping from its lipless mouth. Mikael grabbed its wrist in a gauntleted fist and broke it. Undeterred, it came at him, snarling teeth - blackened nubs of wasted bone – bared and lunging for his face.
Mikael recoiled. A decaying hand held his ankle. A pox-ridden stable lad, the zombie he had cut in two, dragged its torso along the stone floor. It seized upon the templar’s leg, biting at his armoured greaves.
Legs buckling, Mikael tried to resist the burden upon his arms and chest. Sickly morning light seeping through the stained-glass windows was all but eclipsed as a wall of rotten flesh engulfed him. He tried to roar out in defiance, to summon his courage, but a filthy hand filled his mouth. Panic welled within as his armour cracked against the pressure…
Light pierced the dark, as Reiner smashed the one-armed zombie aside with a deft blow from his broadsword. The templar captain drove after it zealously as it floundered in a crumbled heap of bent and twisted limbs, and severed off its head with a brutal swipe.
The fingers clawing at Mikael’s back and sword-arm were pulled away as the gnawing claustrophobic dread ebbed, nails, still embedded into his shoulder plates, torn from their fingers. Halbranc was behind him and hefted one of the wretched creatures up above his head, a woman, withered and grey, eyes long since decayed from their sockets. She clawed at the huge knight, a morose wail keening in Mikael’s ears as she ripped a long tear in his cloak. Halbranc ignored it and smashed her into the cold stone floor, neck and spine shattering audibly. Mikael held the creature beneath him, stamping hard upon its neck. He crushed its rotten skull with a heavy boot.
Within the dingy chapel, his comrades fought. The place was worn with age, wood cracked and warped. The windows threw murky, dawn light through tarnished glass onto a bloody vista. Valen was bleeding. An ugly ragged wound split his shoulder through his armour padding, the plate-mail long since ripped away. He held his sword waveringly; eyes misted and cold, slumped against a wooden stall. Kalten, and his brother, Vaust who wore a pained expression – left arm tucked tight into his body – protected him. A clutch of undead farm workers armed with rusted scythes and rakes surrounded them.
A cry echoed from the back of the chapel. Mikael recognised the powerful voice of Sigson as he peered through the gloom.
‘In the name of Morr, I compel you, return!’
The warrior priest held a gleaming vial aloft. Its contents shimmered as he uttered a prayer to their god and cast it hard at the foul pack harrying the three templars. The vial exploded into the creatures, dousing them with the blessed water within. Long dead flesh burned against the anointed liquid with a shallow hiss, as a foul stench filled the room. Sigson held his breath against the stink and waded in to finish them through clouds of vile smoke.
Another vial shimmered in his hand, but before he could throw it, a creature, nought but a desiccated skeleton, sprang out beneath the stalls and cut a deep wound in Sigson’s stomach, piercing his steel breastplate. Sigson cried out, dropping the vial, blessed water eking through stone cracks as the glass shattered. He hacked down at the beast with his sword, but the weapon jarred in its collar bone. The zombie cut a deep slash across his exposed shoulder as he fought to get his sword free.
Sigson fell to his knees. The zombie loomed down upon him, mouth gaping.
Mikael was behind it and rammed his blade through its chest. Congealed blood spat from the wound, black and thick like syrup. Reiner came at it from the front, roaring as he lopped off its head.
The thing slumped into a tangled heap. Mikael yanked out his sword and cleaned the blade on his cloak. The last of the zombies was laid, brutally, to rest.
‘Sigson,’ Reiner said urgently, helping the priest to his feet. ‘The binding. Can you do it?’
Leaning heavily on his captain, Sigson rose grimly with gritted teeth, and nodded.
‘Gather them,’ he ordered to his comrades.
Mikael, Halbranc, Kalten and Reiner dragged the corpses into a heap before the priest. Vaust watched, bleary-eyed, his brother laid beside him.
Sigson invoked the binding rites of Morr, that which ensured the guardianship of the body and the soul once the two were separated. It was a labour and the veteran priest fought for breath to intone the complicated ritual. The knights knelt beside him, muttering their own prayers to the enigmatic god of death.
Sweat upon his brow, Sigson let out a long and ragged breath.
‘It is done.’
Reiner nodded and looked at Mikael.
‘Open up the gate,’ he ordered.
‘Yes, captain.’
Mikael walked over to the chapel gate and hefted the thick wooden bar fixed across, trapping the creatures while they destroyed them.
Light washed into the greyish confines, as if reluctant to enter. A group of worried-looking villagers approached the threshold.
‘Is it over? Are we safe?’ an elderly man stammered. Several figures cowered behind him. They seemed afraid, perhaps at the abominations within or perhaps at the Templar of Morr stood before them, his armour wrought with skulls and effigies of death.
‘It is done,’ Mikael told him and turned to Sigson.
The priest, ashen faced, awash with sweat, collapsed. Vaust and Valen were near unconsciousness and the rest of the band was battered and bruised from the battle.
‘Bury them face down and sanctify the ground upon the zenith of each Mannslieb,’ Reiner told them as he stalked forward, ‘Tell me, Alderman,’ he added, a full head and shoulders above the man as he regarded him, ‘is there a healer in the village?’
‘No, I’m sorry,’ the Alderman said fearfully. ‘The nearest is the Temple of Shallya at Hochsleben, to the west.’
Reiner turned to Mikael, his pale blue eyes like pools of ice.
‘Gather the horses,’ he ordered. ‘We ride to Hochsleben.’
Dawn had turned to greying day by the time they reached the town of Hochsleben. Even as they rode wearily through the gates, Mikael sensed a dark mood, as if the place were laden with some unknown threat.
Treading past the town’s threshold, the sentry guards retreated into their gatehouse, nodding a fearful greeting at the dour knights templar. Poor folk walked quickly in groups, hugging rags to their feeble bodies, glancing about at each step. The wealthy rode in closed coaches and with armed escorts, fixed upon their destinations, as if ignorance of their surroundings might protect them.
‘There is fear here,’ Halbranc remarked beneath his breath as they passed a drunken tramp in the street, a bottle of liquor tinkling in his hand with the last dregs.
Reiner kept his eyes forward, gently urging his steed on.
‘It is death.’
Mikael glanced behind him. The tramp shambled off toward an open street. A laden wagon emerged suddenly from his blind side, headed strai
ght for the tramp. The wagoneer drove his beasts heedlessly, intent to get on, to get back, to get away from whatever grim fate had befallen the town. Travelling fast, it would crush the poor wretch!
With a grunt, Mikael spurred his horse, breaking away from his comrades. He rode hard, straight into the path of the wagon, crying out a warning.
‘Halt, halt in the name of Morr!’
At the death god’s name, the wagoneer pulled at the reins, slewing his cart to hasty stop, just avoiding the fearless templar.
Yelping in fright, the tramp shrank into a ball and cowered in the dirt, dropping his bottle to shatter upon the cobblestones. Realising he wasn’t going to die, the tramp sat up and held the broken end of the bottle disconsolately.
The wagoneer shrank before Mikael’s stern gaze.
‘I didn’t see him,’ he pleaded, dismounting to check his load.
Something had come loose from beneath the cloth covering the back of the wagon.
It was a human hand. The skin upon it had been removed.
‘They’re from the mortuary,’ the man explained, as if sensing Mikael’s question. ‘They’re to be taken from the town and burned.’ He pushed the hand back into the wagon with a stick from his belt and tied the cloth down. ‘Victims of the Reaper,’ he added, whispering fearfully, and rode off hard down the street without looking back.
Mikael was about to call him back, when a firm hand gripped his shoulder.
‘We have found the Temple of Shallya,’ Reiner told him. ‘Halbranc and Kalten have taken the others there. They will meet us in the house of Morr.’
Mikael nodded. As he rode away with his captain, he looked back over to where the tramp had been sitting, but he was gone.
Whatever ailed this town they must first pay their respects to Morr before any explanation could be sought. There was darkness here; Mikael felt it as a dull ache in his head, a sensation that grew stronger with each moment. He thought of telling Reiner. His captain was a puritan, cold like steel and as unyielding in matters of faith and heresy. Cold and compassionless, the templar captain might put him to the sword if he thought him bewitched. Mikael stayed quiet.
The Temple of Morr was a huge, gothic structure, stark and imposing in the middle of the poorest quarter in Hochsleben. A mist was forming, the day as bleak as the town’s mood. A fine drizzle, exuding from a steel-grey sky, exacerbated the palpable misery felt by the human dregs that cowered in the streets or burrowed into their hovels.
Mikael averted his gaze from them, trying to focus on the monolithic temple. He felt for their suffering, their pain, and pitied them. Perhaps that’s why he had gone to the tramp’s rescue.
A great wedge of stone steps lay before them, spreading out from the black, oak gates of the temple like the over-extended jaw of some huge skeletal head. Two priests, lowly acolytes, scrubbed feverishly at the steps with buckets of water, their arms and knees sodden, red-faced with effort.
‘Morr’s blessing,’ Reiner said to the priests, dismounting from his steed, a stable lad rushing over to take the reins from him. Another boy came over to Mikael’s horse as he dismounted.
‘We seek the head of the Temple,’ Reiner told them, striding up the steps.
‘Morr’s blessing,’ one of the priests breathed. ‘Brother Dolmoth is within the sanctum.’
Reiner nodded his thanks, Mikael close behind him, muttering Morr’s blessings with the other priest as he followed, looking down at their endeavours. Faint, but still visible, a stain marred the stone steps. It was dark and thick, like blood.
‘I thank Morr for your coming,’ Dolmoth told them earnestly. The priest looked ravaged by premature age. There was a shadow beneath his eyes, a worn expression that Mikael believed had come only recently, as if whatever malady seized the town had him in its grip too.
‘What is it that ails this place, priest?’ Reiner’s face was as hard and unmoving as stone.
Dolmoth sagged, as if he could no longer bear an invisible weight upon his shoulders. He sat down upon a wooden stool, bidding the knights to follow.
Harsh grey light seeped through a nearby window, shadows dragging down the priest’s features as if they were made of softening clay.
‘Last night and on the same night for the past six weeks, a body has been left upon the steps of our temple.’
‘It was blood that the acolytes were washing off the steps,’ Mikael said.
Reiner looked at him, slightly surprised. He had not noticed it. As they both regarded him, Mikael felt compelled to continue.
‘The Reaper,’ he said. Dolmoth’s expression darkened further, hand trembling as he drank from a silver goblet; a decanter set upon the table filled with communal wine.
‘The wagoneer in the street said he carried “victims of the Reaper”,’ Mikael explained. ‘At first I thought he had meant death, but he was referring to a murderer.’
Dolmoth nodded, draining the goblet and reaching to pour another drink.
Reiner grasped his hand.
‘You’ve had enough.’
Brother Dolmoth’s eyes, sore and red, held some resistance. But, when he looked at the templar captain, he withdrew.
‘Come with me,’ he said, his voice little more than a whisper.
Dolmoth led them through the sanctum and across the grounds to a small annex, located in the south wing of the mighty building next to a temple garden. The templars followed him without word or query. A feeling of dread and warning grew in Mikael’s gut.
‘The body left upon the steps last night,’ Dolmoth said. ‘Our mortician is examining it. I think you should see it.’
Dolmoth opened a small door to the annex. A corridor stretched before them. Immediately they were struck by the stink of chemicals and unguents.
‘Merrick’s embalming fluids,’ Dolmoth explained and grasping a lantern, hooked at the entrance to the corridor, led them forward.
The corridor was long and dark. Fluttering torches, pitched sporadically in iron sconces, threw little more than a lambent glow onto stark, stone walls that were slick with moisture, black smears visible in the wan light of Dolmoth’s swaying lantern.
‘Are we heading down?’ Mikael asked. He felt the air growing colder and the undeniable sensation of descent.
‘The mortuary is located in our temple catacombs. It’s an area largely unused by the priests and allows Merrick to work in peace.’ Dolmoth had to raise his voice. The corridor was low, the tall, armoured templars forced to hunch beneath the ceiling and Dolmoth ranged ahead of them.
They reached the mortuary. Dolmoth heaved a stout, wooden door open that protested on creaking hinges.
As they entered, the templars stooping further to get through the narrow arch, a man glanced up from a body set upon a metal table. He was thin and wiry, with a silver spike of beard jutting from his jaw and a pepper wash of stubble across the neck and chin. Dressed in a bloody tabard, thick glasses covering his eyes and flecked with blood spatter, this had to be the mortician Dolmoth had spoken of.
‘Greetings,’ he said, masking his surprise.
‘This is Merrick,’ Dolmoth told the templars, stood like giants in the tiny chamber. It was filled with all-manner of crude equipment: saws, blades, scalpels, stitch and thread, with wooden racks filled with phials and beakers, a brown, oily liquid within each. Although small, there was a shabby-looking cloth draped over an open archway at the back of the room, which doubtless led to Merrick’s private chambers. A bucket rested at the foot of the table. Mikael noticed blood seeping down into it from a funnel attached to the slab above.
‘There is little left,’ Merrick told him, as if reading his mind.
It wrong-footed the templar and he flashed a glance at Reiner, who stood impassively as he regarded the mortician.
‘We wish to see the victim,’ he said.
Merrick nodded and gest
ured to the table. He seemed to wither before Reiner’s steely gaze, like most who met the formidable knight.
Dolmoth hung back and covered his mouth. He had seen the victim before, Mikael realised he had been the one who found them.
Merrick flicked a nervous glance at the towering knights, before he concentrated on the corpse.
‘As you can see,’ he began, ‘skin has been removed from the chest, legs, hands and feet and there are marks upon the wrists and ankles.’ Merrick turned the left wrist of the victim over. There was a dark, reddish bruise, harsh and violent.
‘I have heard of evil men who eat the flesh of the living,’ Reiner said, betraying no emotion as he regarded the brutalised body. ‘In backward cultures. They are used in rituals to summon daemons and the dead from the grave.’
‘And these marks,’ Mikael asked, about to touch the bruised skin. before having second thoughts and snapping his hand away. ‘The victim was bound.’
‘I found them all like that,’ Dolmoth muttered from behind his hand. ‘Trussed up like meat, backs arched, pain etched upon their faces.’
Reiner stared at the priest cowering in the shadows. Mikael detected the faintest sneer. His captain deplored weakness, almost as much as he deplored the evil creatures that it was his lot to destroy.
‘And the lack of blood,’ Merrick said, stooping down, a pendant, on a chain around his neck, slipping free of the tabard. ‘The victims were all partially exsanguinated.’
‘Bled by a daemon,’ Reiner muttered darkly, concentrating back on the corpse.
‘That pendant,’ Mikael said, ‘was it given to you by a loved one?’ There was a longing in the young templar’s voice as a memory sparked of his life before the temple.
Merrick’s face darkened, his expression edged with regret.
‘It was my wife’s,’ he said, looking at Mikael. ‘She gave it to me before she died. Plague took her long ago. For a time I had my son, but a riot in the town, three months ago, claimed his life. He was crushed to death by Imperial cavalry sent to quell the disorder. He had nothing to do with the rioting. He became embroiled…’ Merrick stopped himself, before his emotions bettered him. Sternness crept across his face and he tucked the pendant away, closing his eyes briefly as he a muttered a prayer.
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