Send a spelling or grammar correction to: Tracy Johnson
Back to Empire on the HPe3000 Home Page
The pair of skeletal arms came free, and with hands wrapped firmly around the barbarians throat, the long bodiless limbs dangled like emaciated snakes across poor Ragnar's chest.
At each now armless shoulder the skin bulged and cracked, then broke apart. The crawling carpet of myriad legs and venom dripping fangs burst out anew at either side. The body began to rise amid the torrent of spiders pouring from its hollowed chest.
Emiel reacted in a flash, swift as a lightning streak his blade was in his hand and a voice shouted loud within his mind "SUNNE!" and then the voice was his.
"SUNNE!" Emiel called out, and a joyous gate was opened from inside. A spark appeared. It danced behind his eyes, then mirrored in the golden blade, it skipped along from edge to edge and grew into a flame.
The hanging webs were soon alight and fire flowed out and down the dusty hall. "SUNNE! XRDESERE!" A glad voice called from Emiel's throat, deep and full and not his own.
"XRDESERE!" it called, and the fire eagerly complied.
From tip of blade a cone shaped spray shot out. A liquid flame that bathed the hall and swallowed both man and spiders all within its molten flow. It lasted but a moment, the blade cold metal of a golden hue once more.
The living corpse burned like a torches head. In a frenzied swirl it bounced from wall to wall, then stopped, and frozen still, the flames a fluid yellow-orange skin, it dropped upon its knees. A burning supplicant it seemed. Then whatever force that gave its bones a second life broke free, a swell of fire that billowed forth and faded into steam. The charred remains gave a sidelong tilt and smashed across the floor.
The strangling hands at Ragnar's throat had turned his face a dark shade of blue. He could not pull them free.
Ted dropped his spear and lantern and grabbed at a dead, trailing limb that hung from Ragnar's throat. He pulled upon a forearm while Ragnar sought to break a fingerbone or disjoint a thumb whose jagged tip gouged at the hollow of his neck.
Then as the flames of Sunne took hold and ate away the binding animation that caused the dead knight's corpse to move, a heat broke out that bit at Ted and Ragnar both. A blistering heat that ran round the northman's shoulders and down his chest. Ragnar bellowed out a cry of pain and fury at the relentless grasp, then beneath his clawing hands the bony fingers cracked and crumbled to a blackened ash. They rained as powder upon the floor.
Ragnar heaved, his own burnt hands clutched at his bruised and battered neck. He shuddered at the touch of soot-stained flesh to blistered skin, but pressed at muscles squeezed stiff and coughed out bloody phleghm.
Emiel stepped back beyond the line of dust and watched the fire spread and light the darkened hall. The spiders withered beneath the bath of flame, not one of them escaped. The corpse broke apart after its fall, burnt through to its core its head rolled free, a lump of lifeless coal.
"Gods save us..." Ted exclaimed.
Beyond the charcoaled knightly dead the burning webs revealed a throng of animated flesh approaching. Strung out from side to side, they filled the hall and seemed to stretch a good ways back. Orange eyed and parchment skin, the look of living death was in them.
"Emiel...?" Ted called for guidance, he knew not what to do.
"Run!" Emiel called back to him. "Run Now!"
* * *
Ted took off like a frightened rabbit chased by a hungry wolf. He abandoned his spear and ran empty-handed down the hall, while Ragnar stood massaging his damaged throat. As Ted passed, Ragnar picked up the lantern-spear that had been left behind. Emiel did not notice, he backed away but kept an eye on the advancing throng.
"Hey!" Ragnar called to Ted, "You've forgotten this!" he waved the lantern at Ted's disappearing back. The call didn't even slow him down.
Ted disappeared into the darkened room beyond.
Emiel spyed familiar faces among the animated dead. He sought out one visage with a dreading heart, but there were many and only a few could be seen. The rest were but a head bobbing tall, a flash of movement between one body and another, and a sense of some great mass pushing from behind. He'd stopped retreating while he searched for his wife's face, but as the undead neared, an instinct for self-preservation overpowered his fearful curiosity. Emiel turned and would have run, but Ragnar blocked his way.
The barbarian leaned against the wall, his chest heaving, his ribs aching where they had been bruised or broken the night before. He worked with calm hands, twisting the wire that held the lantern to the spear. Finally it came free. The lantern he dropped carefully to the floor, the spear he balanced for one brief moment, then centered, he raised it, about to throw.
"Whaaa!" Emiel exclaimed nearly colliding with the barbarian, "Run!" he yelled.
"Sure." Ragnar answered "Move over a bit...there." He waved his left hand gesturing Emiel out of his way.
Emiel took a small step to the side then turned back to face the dusty hall. The spear whistled past his ear. It struck true and pierced the chest of the closest foe.
The moving corpse, a man armored in a jerkin made of leather, rent with ragged cuts, was knocked back by the blow, almost lifted from his feet. The spear sunk in, half its length at least, but added nothing more than an extra stiffness to its awkward gait.
"Vatun's beard." Ragnar said amazed. "Let's see how they like a taste of an axe's edge."
"No!" Emiel grabbed him by the arm and turned him half around. "There are too many. Listen to me this time!"
The figures were just yards away, unhesitant, stumbling forward, stiff kneed but quick, and coming close. They were a tattered bunch, their skin was drawn and withered like a prune's, their clothes stained black with blood long dried, some had rips, some no more than rags.
Great wounds they had that revealed a lifeless heart or limbs cut clean or hanging by a thread. Each showed a terrible rending, a mortal harm now ignored, forgotten in this new unlife.
"Then I need to trim some down." Ragnar shook off the restraining hand and rushed to meet these walking dead, his axe raised high for a sweeping blow.
"Fool, Barbarian Fool!" Emiel screamed at him but did not turn and run away.
A conjoined pair were in the lead, the spear that Ragnar had thrown transfixed the first two in line. Using the wooden haft like a churning stick, Ragnar flipped the pair from off their feet as fingers, no more than skin and bone, made desperate clawing grasps, but could not reach his hand. The two came down and tangled several more, half the floor a jumbled mess of clumsy livingdead. Then with a mighty swing he brought his axe blade down. It severed feet and legs as well. Ragnar hacked and chopped, an arm, a head, again and again, until the hall was crawling with disjointed dead.
He'd brought down five at least, the first two ranks, but more came on. As Ragnar struck a dark-robed man and split his head from crown to shoulder blades, a knife dug into him. It jabbed low but above his boots, and Ragnar stumbled as he bellowed out his shock and pain.
A torso-half, sliced clean through by a single blow of Ragnar's axe, had crawled to him, knife still within its hand and stabbed him through his calf. It pulled and yanked to free the blade as Ragnar yowled and shook the corpse-hand free, but the distraction cost him dear.
The half-split, robe clad body staggered forth and slammed against his side. A surge went through the charnel press and several more of the undead passed over their fallen kind. Swinging blind they charged Ragnar and knocked him to the corpse littered floor.
* * *
(To Be Continued)