The Corpse-Rat King

by Lee Battersby

  “What do you mean?”

  “Once the dead travel below, we do not leave.”

  “Oh.” Marius surveyed their mean surroundings. “Well, you know, a drape here or there…”

  “Perhaps you will bring some back with you.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  But the soldier had turned away, and gestured to the corpses holding Marius. They extended their arms, and Marius slid further up the wall. When he was dangling at the height of their reach, two more bodies detached themselves from the crowd and grabbed at Marius' kicking ankles. Before he could voice his objections, he was hoisted onto his back, limbs spread wide, high above the heads of the crowd.

  “What are you doing? Let me down.”

  The arms lowered him slightly, until he was at eye level. Marius was just about to issue further orders when bone-strong fingers grasped his jaw and turned his head towards their owner.

  “Don’t forget to hold on,” the soldier said, and let him go. Marius’ bearers heaved, and he flew up into the chimney. Reflexes did his thinking for him. His hands and feet dove for the chimney walls, finding sanctuary in the soft earth and clinging, leaving him wedged in the narrow space like a spider between the rough edges of a pub’s corner walls. For long seconds, the only sound was that of his panicked gasping. When he could trust himself to do so without fainting, he looked back down, and saw the soldier staring up at him. Marius had the overwhelming impression that his stiff, immobile face was smiling.

  “Find us a king,” the corpse called out.

  “What? Why?”

  “You stole his place. You are in our debt.”

  With the benefit of distance, Marius felt a small spark of courage return.

  “And if I don’t?”

  “We will come for you.”

  “And if I never come back this way?”

  The soldier shook his head, slowly, a movement of deliberate malice.

  “You will come back.”

  “What makes you so sure?”

  “Feel your heart.”

  The two men stared at each other for long seconds. The soldier placed his hand over his chest, and nodded to Marius to do the same. Marius inched around until he could wedge one shoulder into the crumbling wall, then slowly, carefully, did the same. He held it there for half a minute, eyes fixed upon the dead face below him.

  “We have your heartbeat.”

  Marius felt life draining away, leaking from his body and dissipating in the heavy air. The soldier waved a hand in dismissal.

  “You cannot escape us. The entire world is home to the dead. Now climb.”

  “Wait.”

  “What?”

  Marius risked a glance at the journey above him, closed his eyes in sudden dizziness, and glanced back down.

  “How will I contact you? Do I call out, or sacrifice a cat or something? I don’t even know your name.”

  “We will know,” the soldier returned. “Now go.”

  “Wait!”

  “No more.” The soldier stepped back, out of Marius’ circle of vision. “The path to the world above is closing. Unless you want to drown, leave.”

  As if summoned by his voice, a spray of fine earth fell on Marius. As he watched, the circle of air below him filled in, the earth rising upwards as if intent upon capturing him. With nowhere else to go, he dug his fingers and toes into the chimney walls and began to climb.

  The most wonderful smell in the world is that of fresh air. It hit Marius as his fingers crested the rim of the hole and clawed at handfuls of rough grass. After the heat and fetid air of the underground realms, the swirling breeze felt like an orgasm. Marius closed his eyes and almost lost his grip, until the pressure of earth against the soles of his feet reminded him of the urgency of his mission, and he scrambled over the lip of the closing hole and lay upon undisturbed ground for the first time in an eternity. Marius wasn’t ashamed to weep. Indeed, he had done so many times as the situation warranted it: to escape a bar room beating; to entice a sensitive woman into his bed; at the sight of a gold riner between his fingers when the purse he snatched had weighed for pennies. Now he engaged in a different type of sob – that which comes from unexpected and blessed freedom. He exhausted himself against the warm grass, pressing his face into the ground and letting his tears and snot soak the grass, until an itching sensation against his cheeks and forehead caused him to stop and twitch his head away. The irritation spread to his neck and round to his throat, then down to his chest. Marius frowned, and wiped his hand across his forehead. It came away with passengers – tiny red multi-legged invaders, crawling over every inch of his exposed hand, biting him with every step.

  “Shit!”

  He pushed himself away, swatting at the angry ants. Their greater numbers prevailed. Marius was forced into a shambling dance, pulling his shirt over his head and using the cloth to beat at torso and legs as he hopped and swung himself about. The ants fought back, moving across his chest and down onto his stomach, heading inexorably south.

  “Oh no, no you don’t!” Marius fell to the ground and rolled, crushing untold assailants beneath his weight. He felt a tickle at his waistband.

  “No, no, no!” A boot flew in one direction, its twin in the other. His trousers fluttered after them, then his underpants. Naked and angry, Marius rolled and swiped, jumped and danced, cursed and swore and threatened undying enmity, until at last he stood above the anthill, waving a fist at what lay below.

  “Funny!” he yelled. “Very fucking funny!”

  He may have heard a laugh, or it may have been his imagination. He kicked at the tiny hole in the grass, bending his toe back and uttering a yelp.

  “I see you’re as in command as always,” a voice behind him said. Marius stiffened in shock, hands automatically cupping his groin. Slowly, eyes wide, he tilted his head to look back over his shoulder. He felt his rectum tighten, and winced.

  “Gerd?”

  Gerd stared at him in impassive silence, his big jug-face grey and still. Marius smiled uncertainly, and sidled over to his undergarments. Slowly, he bent at the knees until he could risk snaking a hand out to recapture them. He flicked his wrist, and slipped the underpants over his ankles in one swift movement, then shimmied into them, eyes fixed upon his former charge. Only once his most essential parts lay under cloth did he turn and face the younger man.

  “How did you get here? You were–”

  “Dead?”

  “Well–”

  “Being carried away to be posthumously tried for treason and sentenced to cremation and dumping in unhallowed ground?”

  “Yes, well, that was what I–”

  “Impaled on a sword because of the betrayal of my teacher and supposed friend?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t call myself–”

  Gerd stepped forward, quicker than he had ever managed in life, and had Marius’ genitals in his hand before the older man could so much as flinch.

  “The dead called me, as I lay in the courtyard waiting to be viewed by Lord Bellux. Do you know how difficult it is for a dead man to sneak away undetected? Particularly when you have to come to terms with being dead in the first place?”

  “No, I–” Gerd tightened his grip, just enough so that Marius’ breath stayed where it was rather then leave him.

  “The only place to hide was in the stables.”

  Marius managed a croak. His forehead knotted. Gerd’s fingers tightened again.

  “Under the hay.”

  “Uhhhh.”

  “The horses shit in their hay.”

  Marius’ eyes crossed.

  “I lay there for two days.”

  Marius’ hands made little flapping motions, quite independent of his desire to have them grasp Gerd’s hand and tear it away from the crushed remnants of his genitals. He tried to look down, to at least say goodbye to them, but Gerd squeezed again, and Marius’ legs deserted their post.

  “That wasn’t even the worst part. Do you know what the worst part was?”


  Marius must have made some sort of movement to indicate that no, he didn’t know what that was, because Gerd gave him one last agonising squeeze. Marius swore the dead man’s fingertips touched each other, before he let go and Marius slipped to the ground.

  “Being fucking dead!’ Gerd shouted, and walked away. Marius decided to vomit, and what little bile remained in his body sprayed onto the grass around him. When he found the strength to raise his head, Gerd stood a foot away from him, watching him with arms crossed. Marius’ clothes lay in a neat pile in front of him, folded and waiting to be put on.

  “I’m to assist you in your task,” Gerd said, his voice utterly joyless. “So get your arse up and dressed before I decide I’d rather be cremated and drag you back to the castle to join me.”

  Marius dragged himself over to the clothes and reached for a boot. He croaked once, and Gerd cocked his head.

  “What?”

  Marius beckoned him closer. Gerd crouched so that his ear was a few inches from his former master’s trembling lips. When he could focus on his stupid yokel’s face without his eyes crossing, Marius swung the boot as hard as he could against the side of Gerd’s head. The young watchdog fell backwards, and Marius collapsed onto his pile of clothes.

  “Get me,” he managed on his third attempt, “some fucking water.”

  FIVE

  According to some, the castle of the Scorban King was the largest building in the world. It sprawled across the range of hills that marked the highest point of Scorby City, the capital of the Scorban Empire, and therefore, according to those self-same people, the world itself. Scorbans called it the Radican, as if giving it a name might imbue it with its own culture, its own personality, its own existence separate to the whims of those who occupied its dwellings. In truth, it was more like a small, glorious and self-important village – a maze of buildings and compulsively-washed streets that glowed in the sun like a reflection of the King’s magnificence.

  Of course, this was its owner’s intent. The light at the heart of the world, some called it, although those who called it that were as intent upon smarming their way into the King’s favour as they were of preventing anyone from measuring the dimensions of any other palace, just in case. It was the glory of glories, the most exalted set of buildings in the cutlery-bearing world, the point around which all activity, interest and gossip flowed. It was the alpha, the omega, and the north point of all compasses. It was in exactly the opposite direction to that which Marius was shuffling with determined steps. By the time they reached the hillock that marked the outer limit of the village of Terfin, Gerd had pointed out this anomaly on no less than a dozen occasions.

  “May I remind you,” he said again as they crouched behind a hedge and gazed down at the ramshackle gathering of huts and ditches that some farmer in more prosperous times had dared to call a town, “that we have a mission to accomplish?”

  Marius reached out without looking and clamped a hand over his companion’s mouth. His finger and thumb pinched Gerd’s nostrils shut. It would make no difference to the dead man, but it helped him feel better.

  “You have a mission, dead boy.” He waggled Gerd’s head from side to side. “I have a thirst, and a need to bathe.”

  In truth, he wasn’t sure it was worth the effort to do either in this village. The ragged collection of wooden round houses looked as if a spray of water might cause them to crash onto each other like so many sticks. Marius had seen better constructions in a school for the blind. The only direction not represented in their construction was vertical. Every other point of the world was fair game, and, it seemed, the inability of the builders to collect or manufacture a single straight piece of wood had bordered on the perverse. It wasn’t that the village was badly constructed, Marius thought. He had seen badly constructed buildings before. It was just that, if he was feeling cruel, he could imagine the builders falling over whilst holding a bundle of sticks and being too knackered to do anything other than live in whatever arrangement the sticks fell in. Down on what could optimistically be dubbed the main street, a motley collection of farmers dragged themselves out of their front doors and towards the building farthest from Marius’ perch. Each time the door opened to admit another weary soul, an undertone of conversation leaked out. Marius waited, watching the trickle of men slow, and stop. When no more appeared on the street he let go his grip on Gerd and stood, brushing himself down and shrugging his shoulders in anticipation.

  “Don’t wait up,” he said, stepping onto the hillock. Gerd grabbed his ankle.

  “I could stop you.”

  Marius licked his lips. The first cold ale of the evening slid down the throat of his imagination. The first warm barmaid was already in his lap.

  “Boy,” he said, slowly sliding his other boot down his leg so that it fetched up against Gerd’s fingers and crushed them into the ground. “You and all the armies of the dead couldn’t stop me.”

  He stepped from the hillock and strode along the centre of the road into the village. At every step he expected to hear Gerd’s leaden footsteps behind him, or at least a hissed curse from where the stupid boy cowered in the bushes. But nothing was forthcoming, not even a whispered insult. Marius laughed silently. Even dead, Gerd was a coward. The difference between the two men, Marius decided, was that he was a man of intent. And his intent was to get drunk, washed and bedded. Tonight. Tomorrow, he and whomever passed for a smith in this mud hill would strike a deal over the melting of the crown. Then he would buy himself a horse with which to ride to the nearest port, and set sail for somewhere where the dead were left out for the birds to scatter. Hell, he thought as stepped up to the tavern’s entrance, I’ll settle for a mule if that’s all they have.

  The door swung open onto a scene Marius had encountered countless times. He had spent a lot of time in piddling little hinter towns, where the poor rubbed up against the edges of whatever kingdom claimed dominion over their scrubby fields. After a while, the tiny poteen taverns all began to resemble each other: a few rickety hand-assembled stools gathered around one or two even more rickety tables; a bar, if the villagers were lucky, made from the largest logs that the fit amongst them could haul into town and hew into some shape with their axes, and if they weren’t lucky, just a set of shelves with a woman in front to dole out the potato spirits and keep track of who owed how many pennies; if it were cold, some sort of fire, and if they’d thought ahead, a chimney. If not, a fire anyway, and walls black from the soot. Marius had spent long enough running from one petty crime to the next that even such grimy and depressing surroundings counted as some sort of welcome. He’d spent too many wet nights cowering under hedges and in hollows, alert for the sound of angry footsteps, not to appreciate a roof – any roof – over his head. He slapped his hands together in anticipation of the sour burn of rotgut, and stepped inside.

  “Good evening, friends,” he said into the meagre light within.

  Country people are a notorious mix of hail-fellow and close-mouthed partisanship. Marius wasn’t sure what would greet his arrival. Singing, perhaps. The murmur of conversation. Perhaps even the convivial clink of earthenware mugs as simple folk toasted each other’s work in the fields. He wasn’t prepared for the sudden stoppage of all sound, or the way the woman behind the rough-hewn bar dropped a bottle to smash unheeded upon the floor. He was particularly surprised by the screaming.

  “Is there a problem?” he managed, before the first villager threw himself from his stool and dove behind the bar. The rest of the patrons followed in short order. Soon, the only noise louder than their pleas to God was made by bottles shattering as each figure crashed over the bar top to land amongst his fellows in the small space beyond. Marius watched in amazement, his hand still on the rough wood door. Slowly, he let it swing closed behind him, and took a step forward.

  “Um, hello?”

  The prayers became a touch louder, a smidgeon more desperate. Marius frowned.

  “Excuse me?”

 
Now several older Gods were being called into play, possibly the first time their names had been uttered outside the penitents’ bedrooms since the King had standardised religion. Marius reached the bar, and leaned over it.

  “Look, what is going on here?”

  The denizens of the serving area screamed as one, and scrabbled to get away. Realisation struck Marius. They were trying to get away from him. He raised his hands in what he hoped was a friendly gesture.

  “It’s okay,” he said. “I don’t want to hurt anyone. I just want a drink.”

  “Demon!” one farmer gibbered. Another rolled his eyes back into his head and fainted. Marius jerked his head back as if slapped.

  “Steady on. That’s a bit…”

  His eye caught a stray bottle on the shelves, the last whole vessel teetering on the edge, ready to plunge towards the floor. Within its depths, a nameless liquid sloshed from side to side, helping to clarify the face reflected in the dull green glass. Marius stared at it for almost a full minute. Then, without thought for the bodies underneath him, he vaulted the bar and landed in front of the shelf. The villagers raced each other around the edge of the bar and banged through the door, screaming into the night. Marius didn’t notice. He reached out and drew down the bottle. It was a typical hand-blown affair, dull of hue, riven with runnels and faults from a too-cool fire. Marius buffed it as best he could with his sleeve, then walked on unsteady legs to stand before the fireplace. He knelt down, and held the glass so that the guttering flames illuminated the liquid within. A face stared back at him from the shining surface. His face, if he concentrated, and added life and animation to it. But not the face he knew, not the face that had grinned back at him from the surface of morning ponds, not the rakish smile and brown skin that had inhabited the looking glasses of whores from a dozen or more towns along the Meskin River.

  The face that stared back at him, his face, was that of a man dead and buried. Grey skin hung loose from his bones. His eyes, so alert and aware of the world, stared dull and uncomprehending. His chapped and darkened lips, the teeth that protruded from between them, the rents and tears across his flesh from how many months spent in the company of shifting rocks and hungry insects… every angle showed the ravages of the ground. Marius blinked, and the lids in the bottle closed and opened with dull slowness. He licked his lips, and the tongue that parodied his movement emerged dried and black. Very slowly, with deliberate purpose, Marius drew the cork from the bottle and placed the open mouth against his lips. He tilted his head back and let the liquor fill his mouth. He swallowed, and waited for the pain of badly-distilled alcohol to send him into paroxysms of coughing. Instead, he felt nothing, not even a slow burn spreading from his gut to his extremities. He emptied the contents in two long pulls, then, as the sounds of weapon-bearing life came to him from further down the street, he placed the bottle carefully upon the floor and stood. He nodded, as if reaching a decision after long debate.