《The Bearer [Fantasy apocalypse]》
Prison
Small drops fell between the cracks in the stones, forming a small puddle in the middle of the cell. Must have been raining outside.
Deatt''s body hurt all over from the thrashing, leaving him motionless on the cold stone slab that was made to resemble a bed. It was a poor attempt. The guards or whoever was in charge of making them obviously paid no attention while smoothing the top. Jagged pieces of stone pushed into his back, some managing to hit and pierce the exacts spots where he was beaten.
Even in his pitiful state, Deatt regretted nothing. He would rather get another slashing, or die from an infection rather than rot here forever. The only downside was that Nido was in a different solitary confinement. Deatt would like to complain, maybe not for anything else, but he would find the strength for that. It just was not fun to complain alone.
Devoid even of light, the cell presented no way to pass the time, and since he was practically locked to his ''bed'', Deatt had nothing but his own pain to turn to.
It was hard to pay attention required to count the slashings when he was receiving them, but now with nothing but time on his hands, he tried to count all the different ways his back hurt.
He arrived at the number fifteen when he was done. That was five more slashings than the guard had been ordered to give to him. The bastard must have enjoyed it too much to stay his hand.
Deatt just hoped that Nido had better luck than him. He was sceptical about it, with the hate for mutts that seemed to be prevelant even more than other ways of being an asshole here. Hopefully his thick green skin would help him through the lashings at least as much as it helped to get them.
That marked the third escape attempt and coincidentally the third time they had failed. It was desperate, Deatt had to admit. Aside from the fact that he had failed to pick the last iron doors spectacularly - his stone ''tools'' broke almost instantly - the whole plan was rubbish. Running out and forcing their way through the guard hall might have worked with Nido pushing the front, but only for a while. Even Nido was bound by physics at some point. Plus, there was the crate that the guards were hauling somewhere, effectively blocking their entire escape route.
It would be better to stay still and serve the sentence, but life behind bars was exactly what Deatt despised the most. His legs were itching for movement, his hands twitching from their non-use and his mind deteriorating from the confined grey space.
The escape attempts might have come with lashings and incredible pain, but they did relieve the great pressure on his mind, if only a little and for a short while.
So there he was, lying for hours with naught but slowly creeping frustration on his mind. If only he had not butchered their previous job, they might not have ended up here. He might have been fed misinformation, but ultimately, it was his decision to go for the run.
Summoning last remnants of his strength, Deatt turned on his side, so the wounds would have more opportunity to heal. After that he closed his eyes and willed himself to sleep.
He had only a few days in the hole, but he was already fully convinced of their effectiveness. The constant absence of light sounds and any other fruit for the senses made the stay not only utterly boring, but almost insanity inducing. When all you can hear is the beat of your own heart, or water dropping, where the rhythms of the sounds were in such disharmony that you almost thought it was on purpose, it could break you.
Still, all Deatt thought about was how well Nido would make it. He was no dimwit, but these cells would break anyone sooner or later. Deatt included. He was just the ''later'' kind.
So when the doors in the hall opened and light came pouring into the corridor between the cells, a well of unexpected joy swelled up inside of Deatt.
He waited for the guard to come in anticipation. It was the day he would be brought back to normal cells after all. It was like a holiday.
But the rhythmic clapping of iron-capped boots never came. Instead, he heard indistinguishable sounds coming from deep behind the doors. It was too chaotic to make sense of. But Deatt''s best guess, was that the guards were drinking, which would explain why they forgot about him.
His hope shattered at the thought and the joy of leaving for better lodging had bittered-down to a warm anger. In his frustration, Deatt walked around the narrow room, pushing, kicking and punching at the rocks. His knuckles and feet cried at the pain and Deatt focused on it. It was the only thing that could take his mind off of the sour disappointment of his situation.
Remember, when you don''t know what to do. Just do something. Anything.
That was what he was taught, but the motto did feel much better under the open skies, opposed to mossy stone bricks.
With another kick, Deatt loosened a stone from the wall. The give made Deatt believe that he might pull out the whole stone, but he could only move it slightly to the sides, the only part he dislodged was a hand-sized stone. Another joke from the universe at his expense.
During his bout of frustration, that he definitely would not call a manic episode, the guards must have stopped drinking, since the hole was filled with eerie silence once again.
But even the silence could not stay still in the hole. Slowly but surely, uneven sound of walking came from behind the door. The closer the sound got, the weirder it seemed to Deatt.
All guards had the same boots. Leather made with an iron heel and a tip for better coverage, though they were mostly used for more damage when kicking. So they made a metallic clunk with every step, announcing the guard before they rounded the corner.
But instead of regular intervals, the sounds seemed to come at random. The guard must have been drunk to his mind, which meant two things. First, that he was not coming to let Deatt out, second that he was probably coming to do something to Deatt, or to at least make fun of him. So Deatt quickly moved to his bed and sat down, hiding the small rock in his hand.
It took a while for the man to arrive at the passage and he stood behind the semi-opened door for at least five minutes. By that time, Deatt gone through numerous ideas as to what could await him once the guard arrived. It ranged from a mild spanking to a full on brutal murder by that point.
The stalemate of the standing guard and sitting Deatt unnerved him. Enough for him to completely forget about the sense of boredom. Maybe even enough for him to wish the boredom came back. The invisible pressure was too much and Deatt had to break it somehow.
"Hello?" he asked, trying to sound angry and dangerous while he nervously sat on the stone bed.
Suddenly the doors flew open, the sound of them hitting the wall and breaking out of the hinges reverberating throughout the hole.
"I...want...!" a raspy voice slowly pronounced, followed by a short gurgling.
Deatt would have completed the sentence any other day, filling the blank end with a joke on the guards expense, but he decided that if the guard was drunk enough to not only walk like he did, but also sound like he did, it was better to act timid.
"I know...I want..." The guard continued making pauses after almost every word, spitting around and gurgling on something. It was probably bile, making the encounter not only unnerving, but also quite disgusting, even if Deatt smelt nothing except the usual damp surroundings and himself. Still, as a precaution he held his breath.
The guard slowly came into view for Deatt and he could only widen his eyes. The guard was absolutely covered in blood. He was hunched over, slowly dragging one of his legs behind him, probably since it was broken. He held a bent iron baton in his hands, that had something protruding out of it. Something Deatt would swear looked like a couple of teeth.
The guard stopped in front of his cell, looking with empty eyes further into the hallway.
Deatt''s lungs started to hurt as he forcefully kept the air inside. He felt...he knew that he did not want the attention of the guard. Not right now. There was something going on and he would rather avoid having any part it in. It would be way too easy for the guardsmen to throw accusations of murder at him. But if he stayed where he was, inside the cell, he could not have possibly done anything.
Splash.
A drop fell from the ceiling again, the sound breaking the silence around. The guard had not moved.
Splash. Splash. Splash.
Deatt watched the puddle, seeing it''s color for the first time in days, the rays of light coming from the room on the left bouncing off of it''s surface. It was brown.
Splash. Splash. Splash.
Somehow the flow of drops was getting quicker and the guard started twitching.
Deatt looked at the puddle beneath him and watched, as the dark brown slowly, but surely, turned red.
Then, came a final splash and the guard looked in his direction.
Deatt''s blood seemed to freeze and boil at the same time as he gazed at the bloodshot eyes that stared back. He was used to seeing people high on whatever substance they managed to obtain. He was used to dull eyes devoid of life, to eyes that filled with their irises, even to eyes that slowly lost their sparkle, as the life was sucked out of them.
These eyes managed to be a combination that Deatt never saw before.
The guard''s eyes were severely bloodshot, the whites completely gone, the color must have been drained too, replaced by a piercing yellow, the iris covered with a bunch of red spots themselves.
There was a lot you could assume based on the eyes of the person and it was a craft that Deatt had been perfecting his whole life.
So it came as no surprise when the guard threw himself at the iron bars.
"I...WANT!" He shouted as he struggled against the metal.
Deatt could not help but stay frozen on the stone bed, even when the man continued swinging with his baton inside. The keys on the guards belt clang as they made contact with the bars again and again.
The man was mindless. His eyes locked onto Deatt and blood came from his mouth as he continued ramming himself against the cell.
Deatt woke from his stupor when he saw the iron bend. The man''s body must have been turning into mush, but in that process he was successfully albeit slowly making his way inside.
Deatt felt the rock in his hand and stood up. He would not like his chances had the man gotten inside, as he seemed to lack the sense to feel pain. Like a wild animal...no, like a demon the man wore down the only protection that Deatt had against him.
Deatt slowly moved forward, careful not to get hit by the flying baton, or the other arm trying to grab him. Then he waited until the man decided to take a few steps back and run full speed into the iron again.
The bars gave way and the man''s body fell before him on the ground.
Before he could move and start bashing him, Deatt held the rock and swung full force at the man''s head.
Once.
He felt the skull of the man open in the back, but the guard still thrashed around. He caught Deatt''s leg and tried to pull him to his teeth.
Twice.
Deatt felt the soft texture of the man''s brain turn into a puddle, the squishing making him want to vomit. The guards grip loosened for a second, but Deatt could still feel force in the hand.
Thrice.
The guard went still. Deatt waited for an endless minute. Watching the body, waiting for a single twitch. It came and the rock went down another five times.
The guard was dead. He had to be. What remained of his head joined the puddle in the middle of the room. Deatt''s bile gave him no space to refuse when he saw his creation. He vomited right into the puddle as well.
When the dust settled, Deatt had to stop and think. Something was terribly wrong. He discarded the idea that the men in the room were drinking. The sounds must have been corelated to this man''s state. Maybe there were more, maybe they were even in groups.
He slowly bent down, still suspicious of the body. But it made no movement when he bent down to grab the bent baton and the keys. He did not need the keys for the cell anymore, as the whole wall came down with the guard, but maybe he could use them elsewhere.
In other circumstances, he might have taken the clothes too, but he decided he wanted as little contact with the blood as possible.
He slowly peered down the passage, looking for any signs of other...things, like the man.
Taking careful steps, Deatt stayed as silent as his surroundings allowed him, as he made his way to the door that was now on the ground.
Saying the room inside was in disarray would be like saying a dragon is a lizard. The furniture was thrown about, most broken. Blood covered possibly every surface in the room, some entrails even hang from the ceiling.
That answers the question of if there are more. Deatt thought to himself.
Every instinct told him that he had to escape as quick as possible. The narrow hallways and small spaces made it easy for him to get trapped or overpowered anywhere and he would do anything to avoid becoming that. But Nido was locked in another hole and Deatt would never let Nido die in a place like this...if he was not dead already.
Deatt perished the thought. Nido was alive. He must have been.
The problem was that the other hole was located on the other side of the prison, the plus side, there was a direct path from one hole to the other.
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
Deatt walked over the puddles of blood left in the wake of the other...whatever they were. The amounts of blood were simply inhuman.
It was not long before Deatt saw bodies littered on the way.
One had his face torn off, revealing a skull, another had his legs smashed to bits. The others were in much the same condition. Different mutilations, but dead anyway. But it was not just guards anymore.
There were bodies with the classic white tunic that they all received. The tunics were bled through, almost like an image from a brutal artists painting.
With every step the concern of Nido''s fate rose in Deatt''s heart. There was only more and more carnage the further in Deatt went. Sometimes he had to move through a pile of bodies, hoping that none would wake up just in moment to strike him.
But he was making progress relatively safe, meeting nobody alive. A good and a bad sign both.
Suddenly, he heard the a loud strike of metal to metal, clinging and echoing through the rooms. Knowing the sound would travel much further, along with the fact that it came from where Nido was locked up, Deatt had to abandon the safe approach. He turned to running.
Deatt''s lungs were exhausted and his stamina drained by the time he started hearing sounds of a struggle. Shouting and evil growling came from the guard room he was reaching and so he prepared.
Coming into a fight prepared made a difference, a big one. So Deatt was ready to kill anything that looked at him bad. Taking as deep a breath as his pace allowed, he exhaled, gritted his teeth and sped up.
He turned the corner and flew into the room.
A battle was going on and it was obvious who was losing.
A group of four desperately clawed at the remaining men with sanity. Two guards, still human, used shields they found somewhere to keep the line, having to keep their whole body weight pressed on the iron plates, to keep from faltering. A pile of bodies already forming in front of them. Behind them were three prisoners with makeshift weapons and batons. Two shivs were fixed on wooden poles into improvised spears, stabbing over the shieldmen. The third prisoner was next to them, using the short baton the swat away incoming arms and legs.
And beside the shieldmen, wearing the ironclad boots on his fists, Nido was just crushing a skull of a turned. Nido managed to give Deatt an acknowledging look as he destroyed an arm of a turned with a right hook.
Deatt immediately joined the fight. He ran next to the guard closest to him and bashed his bent baton into the head of the turned next to him.
The short weapon settled itself into the skull, the turned fell down the pile, lifeless. Unfortunately, he took Deatt''s weapon with him.
Just as another three turned came in through the tunnel.
Deatt slid behind the shieldmen, who groaned at the effort of holding.
Suddenly the left guard slipped on some blood, his leg swept under him and the force pushed him to the ground.
Two turned fell on him before the others could help, taking a bite out of his body.
The spearman moved to the man, using his involuntary sacrifice to push their spears through the heads of the feasting turned.
Deatt grabbed the edges of the shield and pulled as hard as he could, trying to dislodge it from the weight of the moveless bodies. Just as the new turned jumped at him, he managed to pull the shield out and press his body against an uneven rock on the floor.
He almost fell at the sheer force of the push, only managing not to falter thanks to the prisoner of the baton holding a apart of the shield. Meanwhile the other turned were getting pummeled by Nido. His every punch sending blood and viscera over the battlefield.
As Deatt and his helper managed to come back into position a turned managed to slide around the corner of the shield and bit at the legs of the prisoner.
Deatt hefted the shield into the air and forced it down at the turned, splitting his head.
The battle calmed as all the turned laid still.
Deatt''s breaths came in sharp and quick as he convulsed from the strained effort. He could only watch as he saw the prisoners simultaneously drive their makeshift spears into the man that saved him just moments ago.
"...want..." he said slowly, reaching his arm slowly at Deatt, before Nido came closer and punched a part of the head clean off with the boots.
Deatt stood watching over the dead body, trying to understand the mayhem.
Nido walked over to him, quickly looking over his exposed body before nodding with relief.
Shook from his shock, Deatt turned to the others. They were ready to pierce him with the spears as well, even the guard was preparing to use his shield.
"Not bitten. Good." Nido said, turning to the others. They all seemed to relax just a bit, moving their weapons from Deatt''s face.
"What''s going on?" Deatt said, instinctively turning to the guard.
"We don''t know." he answered, using the opportunity to stretch his back. "It started with a few in the west wing, some prisoners were mauling others, before I got there it looked like this. We blocked it off, but they managed to get out somehow." he pointed to the pile of bodies. "I don''t know why, but it seems to spread with just a bite. It...they..." The guard''s words stopped as one of the turned down in the pile started moving again. He quickly smashed his boot against the assailant turning the head into mush.
"We have to get out of here." one of the prisoners said, his hands shaking with the spear.
"Where can we escape?" Deatt asked the guard again.
"The closest? East wing..." the words trailed of his tongue slowly..
He turned to Nido, asking whether he was ready with his eyes. The half-orc nodded.
"Then we go. Now." Deatt said.
It seemed most of the turned in their immediate vicinity already attacked them, as the path to the east wing was quiet again for some time. The group moved slowly, Deatt with the guard in the front, bearing shields, the others behind.
As with the tunnel before, it was filled with dead bodies, at the start. The further in they went, the lesser the amount.
"No bodies anymore. That is a good sign right?" one of the prisoners expressed. Unable to stay silent in his stress.
The others turned to him wordlessly. The prisoner, understanding the message, shut up and continued walking.
I don''t think it''s a good sign. Deatt thought to himself.
Bodies were good, bodies meant that the man was dead. He would not move again. But when the bodies were not there? That meant they had to be elsewhere. Maybe moving.
They came to a crossroads, the tunnel splitting into two. The left tunnel continued with no bodies. No sings of struggle. No blood even. The right was the complete opposite. Filled with bodies from top to bottom, completely filling the tunnel up.
Sweat fell from the guards forehead as he looked frantically at the tunnel.
"Was that east wing?"
The guard slowly nodded.
Deatt nodded. It was in the theme of his life that the path he needed to take was the most dangerous.
"Was the west wing locked? Or blocked off?" he whispered.
"Locked. I...I have the key." the guard showed the keys on his belt.
"Then lead the way."
"I am not going there."
"Would you rather stay here?" asked Nido.
The guard gulped and gave one last wistful look at the blocked off tunnel to the east wing. Then he turned and started walking into west wing.
It was a sort of twisted luck that both Deatt and Nido were locked in solitary. As the cells were positioned at the outskirts of the prison complex, it enabled them to take a route around the common buildings instead of having to walked through them. Even from a far distance, the various sounds of struggles flowed through the tunnel. It was safe to say that they were everywhere.
They arrived before the doors to the west wing without any trouble. The great steel doors were closed and locked.
The guard held his keys in his hand looking at them.
"Maybe they all ran somewhere else." Deatt tried to assure the man. "But we shouldn''t wait to find out."
The guard put the keys into the lock slowly, before opening the doors. The room inside was empty, no viscera or blood, no bodies. The guard silently waved into a direction and the group followed.
Moving around corners and through narrow tunnels, they made their way to another steel door in safety.
The guard was much less careful here, quickly getting his keys and shifting through them. He forced them into the lock, he turned the valve and...the door did not budge. He struggled, trying to force the door open, but it did not.
He dropped the keys to the ground and fell on his knees. Silently crying.
"It''s sealed..." he said slowly.
"What do you mean sealed?" Deatt asked, letting more of his panic into his voice than he would have wanted.
"We are trapped...we are dead." the man said.
The other two prisoners stopped breathing, confronted with the grim reality of the death sentence in the guard''s verdict.
But Deatt had a different plan. He would not stay and die.
"Nido think you can get through this?" he asked.
"Do I have a choice?" the half-orc replied, looking at the steel door.
"Not if you want us to survive, you don''t." Deatt replied.
"Than yes."
"Alright." Deatt grabbed the guard and turned to face him. "Get your shit together and you might just live. Grab that shield and fucking stand." Even whispering, Deatt could feel his tone turn absolute at the man.
"You two, ready your spears. This will be loud." Deatt grabbed the other shield and walked in front of them. "The tunnel is narrow, so we can stop them here. With enough luck we might just do this. You all just pray that the strength of orc heritage is as strong as they say."
As he forced everyone into position, Deatt prepared himself in the front.
Nido eyed the door from under his brows, sizing them up. Iron, he would believe he could push through, but steel? There was nothing else than to desperately try.
He flexed his muscles as hard as he possibly could and punch with the boots against the steel.
The sound was deafening, the ring of it echoing for a long time. With each echo, Deatt felt his body tense up. With each echo, he expected to see the turned.
Nido thrusted again and again, slowly bending the hardened steele.
When the first turned rounded the corner, the battle started.
Deatt was utterly exhausted, the shield in his arm bent out of shape, one edge slowly digging into his forearm. But he held. The wave was unrelenting, slowly pushing them closer to the door. The prisoners behind him had their backs against the back wall already, having no further space to retreat to.
The guard was lost to the horde some time ago, already dead with a hole in his head.
Thankfully the length of the fight and the rising pile of bodies meant that the turned managed to get to them in lesser numbers at a time. Deatt just barely managed to hold them off.
Nido was in an even worse shape, the boots in his hands already broken up, his fists bleeding profusely from their contact with the metal. But he was close. Just a few more hits and he would get them out.
But his hands did not have the power to form fists anymore.
"Need help!" Nido yelled at Deatt. "Ram it! With the shield! It''s loose!"
Deatt immediately broke formation and ran back. He heard the prisoners curse as the wave pushed on at them, the length of their spears becoming more of a hinderance in the tight corridor.
Deatt jumped with the shield in front of him ramming the door open.
He wanted to quickly stand back up, but he felt his legs give out from under him. He was past his physical limit. Nido, thankfully, was not. He hauled Deatt on his shoulder and ran out, leaving the two prisoners to their fate.
The last thing Deatt heard, was the ragged breathing of his friend. The last thing he saw, the turned running after them, blurred fires flaming greatly in the distance. Then, he blacked out.
At the crack of dawn
Deatt woke up into a familiar kind of darkness. His muscles sore and mind slow, he slowly wandered his eyes around the dark room. Must have been a dark cloudy night, because he could not see the glint off of the iron bars.
He dreamt of running through the city again, jumping over spaces between roofs, escaping a bunch of guards hungry to catch him. His loot joyfully clinking in his closed pockets.
The longing for days past shook the sleepiness from him.
He moved his tired body to the side, the soft bed warmly embracing him.
Soft...soft? Deatt finally realized that he was not in the hole anymore. The events of yesterday''s mayhem flashed quickly through his mind. Images of the gore and violence pushing him to his feet, with beads of sweat appearing on his forehead.
Suddenly, a door opened behind him, bathing the room in a warm light.
Deatt turned, ready to kick, punch maybe even scream any turned away.
Nido was standing in the door frame, holding a lantern in one hand, while dragging a small bag in the other one. His hands were bandaged, though the bandages were flimsy and mostly blooded through.
"You woke up." Nido summarized, placing the lantern on a table.
Now, when the room was well illuminated, Deatt realized it was just a small cabin. It had a bed in the middle of the room, with a table opposite to it. A small fireplace was in the corner, inside of it only ash and grime. It seemed the cabin was long abandoned before Nido brought him here.
Nido started emptying the contents of the bag, revealing a few potatoes, carrots and some other greens, along with a bunch of rope and a few fish hooks. The rest of the bag, seemed to be only sticks.
"How the hell did you manage to outrun them?" Deatt asked, watching as Nido started building a small pyramid of sticks in the fireplace.
"Ran across a few people on the way. Only had to outrun them by that point." the half-orc replied bleakly.
"Oh" Deatt understood. Nido was not the type to kill random people on purpose, but he knew as much as Deatt, that when an opportunity presented itself, he should take it.
"So it...spread." Deatt thought aloud. "What about the military? The royal guard? Has anybody showed up?"
"Not from what I have seen." Nido grabbed an incredibly bent iron plate. He molded it further in his hands, creating something barely resembling a pot. Then he broke some vegetables in his hands, before throwing them in the ''pot'', then he finished it up with water.
As Nido continued cooking, Deatt decided to check himself over. He would probably turn by that point, but a nagging feeling in his head would not let him rest before making sure himself. Thankfully, there were no wounds.
The light bubbling gently danced around the room, bringing a gentle scent of the cooking vegetables. Deatt started salivating at the smell. Compared to the unidentifiable food pastes he was used to by now, the vegetable soup smelled heavenly.
They ate in silence, both still shaken from what happened the day prior.
"What do you think?" Nido asked.
"I don''t know. Maybe it was a spell of some kind? Spreading through spit or some other contact?"
"Why would that be in a prison? Wouldn''t it be easier to just club everyone down?"
"It would. Maybe it was unintentional. I can''t imagine the kind of person somebody would need to be to set that free" Nor could Deatt imagine anyone researching a spell like that. The problem was how someone would control it. Handle the waves of mayhem it brought. No, Deatt doubted that a single person was behind this.
"So...what now?" asked Nido after gulping down the rest of the soup.
That was the question. Even with all that has happened, they were criminals on the loose and because of the escape attempts, the records with their crimes must have been copied and sent into other major towns. If there were even any left.
"We''ll climb Hurna, see what the situation is like in Jirfort." Deatt decided. The lone mountain would give them a vantage point from which they could see almost the whole entirety of Jirfort. The humble port town was small enough to make that possible.
"It''s gone. I am sure of that." Nido replied, licking his small tusks. "But if you think we should go."
"I do. I want to see it for myself. Plus, we won''t see just Jirtfort from Hurna, we''ll just try to get a clearer picture of what''s going on." Deatt put the wooden bowl on the table. "Thanks for the meal."
The climb was stressful, although Deatt''s psyche was there to blame. Every rustle of a bush made him almost jump, every silence felt a bit too silent. When they met a deer feasting on the summer grass, he had almost broken his head in two with a rock.
The thought that a crazed man could come from anywhere, hoping to feast on his flesh, it rubbed him the wrong way. Nido made fun of him for that, laughing at his every twitch, even becoming so brazen as to scare him himself, but even he was on edge, even if he tried to hide it.
But both of them paused when they arrived at the lookout on the top of the hill.
Jirfort was no more, in it''s place was a ruined battlefield. What could turn to ash did so, what could crumble, crumbled. Some ships over at the docks were still burning, some parts of the city were blown by explosions, leaving deep craters. Worst of all, the turned were everywhere.
Deatt saw the masses move like ants, moving about the streets that used to belong to humans. But on closer inspection, he realized that they could not be different. The turned men and women of the poor town fought each other. It was a bloodbath. Torn extremities flew through the air, the arm-less turned bit down on their opponents. The bodies were shredded, until they could move no more, though some stopped moving much quicker than others.
Deatt realized that fact even in the prison, where in his first contact with the guard, the man kept moving, even after losing most of his head. But then most others simply fell limp from one stab through the eye. Meaning, that Deatt could never truly be sure when he was rid of the thing.
Deatt had no reason to like the town - he only spent time in prison here - but even then the sight of the destruction weigh heavy on his heart.
"Carnage." Nido summarized.
"Carnage." Deatt nodded. "Well. No reason to stay here. Those bastards might not come all the way up, but it''s not like we can make do with what we have." Deatt hated how little he understood about their situation. The last time Deatt did not understand something fully, it landed them in prison after all. Even now he cursed the ''magical trinket'' that broke on him.
"Where will we go?"
In Deatt''s opinion, there were only three possible answers. First, they could live in the wilderness. He did just complain about the lack of tools and such, but they would be able to slowly acquire them. There were large forests to the north, where Deatt would bet, the turned would never enter. Forests were solitary, fruitful when a person knew what he was doing and overall fairly calm. The problem was that the woods were utterly boring and although Deatt loved Nido like a brother, he would like some other company as well.
Second, they could travel, either like nomads, or on a boat. But that came with it''s own set of difficulties. Especially considering the fact that Deatt was pretty sure he suffered with sea sickness. The rocking of a boat was an experience he would rather never again go through.
The last left was to rejoin the civilization again, if any were left. They might have been viewed as criminals, but Deatt doubted that anyone would actually care. Petty thieves as opposed to a horde of whatever the turned was? They would be welcomed if they would help.
Only two cities came to mind. Zenwall and the magical city of Geroth. Zenwall, named after the great outer wall build by monks in far history, was a logical conclusion. As long as the wall stood and the military there stood with it, the turned had no chance to break in. Geroth was simply filled with wizards. The plethora of spells at their disposal should make protecting the city rather easy. The turned did not seem capable of dodging even strikes from a handheld weapon, how would they avoid a ball of fire?
"Say a number." Deatt decided to leave the decision to fate. If the number would be odd, they would travel to Zenwall, if not, then Geroth.
"Why?"Nido asked.
Deatt sighed and decided by himself.
"Remember Zenwall?"
They traveled mostly through the forest at the start. Deatt decided that traveling by the main road posed too much danger. They had no idea how far the calamity spread, there was a chance that the small settlements were unaffected, but in these situations, he preferred to stay on the safe side of things.
But the city was at least two weeks away, and Deatt knew that they lacked the skills necessary to survive in the wilderness. Nido might have had the strength of an ox, and Deatt liked to see his wit as sharp as foxes, but neither had the knowledge to thrive. Their natural habitat was a bustling city after all.
It started with the sounds of Nido''s stomach. The quiet growling announced the hunger Nido was suffering with. The mountain of muscle required a sizable offering to keep strong every day, meaning that they had to find food, or his pure strength would start to diminish. Not the first time Nido''s insatiable hunger complicated their situation.
Deatt set off to find food, as did Nido, but they both came back empty handed. Deatt saw a couple of black berries on the way, but he was suspecting them to be poisonous. Iron gut or no, even pure-blooded orcs could still die from poison.
With no other choice, they made their way to the road. Deatt knew that it would cut through multiple villages and they just had to hope that the wave of turned was slower than them, or that they would avoid this road at all.
It took only about two hours walking by the road, before they encountered their first village.
Unfortunately, the first thing they saw was smoke.
Wooden cabins and other humble buildings were in shambles. The hay roofs burned down, or fell when the wooden walls crumbled down.
They stopped at the sight of the destruction, having a fairly good guess as to what happened.
The turned were quicker and they were moving in the same direction. Deatt just hoped that they moved on already.
They moved slowly and quietly, reaching the first house that was only partly destroyed. There was a crimson red handprint on the door, along with a puddle or two filled with blood.
Deatt slowly opened the door, cringing internally when the rusty hinges creaked. The sound sharp and loud. He waited in the open doorframe for a couple of seconds, listening for any sign of movement inside. When none came, he continued moving further into the house. The signs of struggle were obvious. Furniture was thrown about the rooms, blood about the walls and a scent of iron and ash in the air.
But worse, there were no bodies. The wave of turned swept through the village, taking their denizens as their own. Whole families must have fallen to the evil.
Not that Deatt did not empathize with the great tragedy, but the emptiness of the houses meant one thing for him - nobody would see him steal all he could. And even faced with the kind of danger they saw, he was of the mind to take anything valuable not bolted down. If they were to reconnect with society, he would need some money after all.
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The village was humble, so the house presented itself with only a few pieces of gold jewelry, though Deatt was immediately sure of it''s illegitimacy. The gold was way too light. Still, he took it. They were far luckier in the food department, finding dried meat and fruits, along with a punch of salt. They even found a few flasks filled with wine. Deatt unscrewed the top, ready to pour the wine down so he could fill them with water. Then a green hand gently but firmly landed on his, with Nido looking straight into Deatt''s soul.
"We don''t know when we can drink again." He said, much more sorrowfully than anything else that day.
It was a stupid and unnecessary request. In the midst of chaos, in the danger they found themselves. The turned on all sides. Deatt knew that it was foolish, but he also haven''t drank for such a long time...
Deatt stayed in the home while Nido was scouring the other houses. Looking into the larder and getting out food that would spoil too quickly, he prepared what he would consider a feast.
They had three different cheeses, which Deatt took great enjoyment in cutting, slices of smoke cured meat and some almost fresh fruits. Maybe not the flashy dining of great lords, but it definitely seemed that way after eating prison gruel for three years.
Everything prepared, Deatt watched the main road from a window right next to the table, looking for any sings of the damned. He waited for about another hour before Nido came back.
Turns out, Nido could find alcohol in dilapidated buildings like hogs looking for truffle in the dirt. Before they decided to stay in the big house, he came back with a dozen more flasks, each carrying a different scent of spirits.
"Somebody had their small brewery here." he said contently, putting two small ceramic cups on the table. His eyes shone as they moved over the contents on the table. His beaming smile revealing his small tusks.
That day, after a long time in the slammer, they dined like kings.
The fresh tastes of actually edible food filled Deatt''s mind as much as his senses. The wine an intoxicating vice, warming his body and soul alike.
Nido gorged down the food in a frenzy, the deliciousness of the food euphoric for his starved mind.
For but a moment, both of them forgot about the danger they were in, or the horrific things that must have been happening all around them.
Nido burped loudly as he downed the brown bitter liquid straight from the flask. The sight of his full belly and some drink spilling from the side of his mouth made Deatt smile. He was full himself, though Nido did more than half of the work here. He held his cup, looking outside.
"What is the plan about Zenwall?" Nido asked, rubbing his stomach.
"Hope that they let us in. Find work."
"Work?" Nido almost screamed, but managed to rein the voice into a half-whisper. "We never work."
"It''ll only be for a little while, enough for them to value us and for us to familiarize with the city. Plus, I have an inkling that there will be a grave need for helping hands. Maybe paid with some coin." he sipped from his cup. The day was already turning into a night, slowly draining the light from the day.
What Deatt would give to hear the happy jiggling in a stolen pouch. It was so long since he was able to
He watched the sun slowly disappear on the horizon. When he noticed incoming silhouettes.
"Stop drinking and stay silent."
The half-orc quickly put the cup down and focused. Drunk or not, Nido knew better than to disregard Deatt''s orders.
They both knelt before the window, carefully observing the road.
As the silhouettes got closer, it became obvious they were no people. A group of five turned ran down the road, tackling into each other. They were quick, getting from all the way on the horizon to the outskirts of the village. At that point both Deatt and Nido bent down, deciding that they really wanted to avoid the conflict.
It took only a little while before they heard the heavy steps of the group and for their horror, they stopped right under the window.
This time they only heard groans, and maybe a few dull swings. Then A body fell to the ground and the groups dining began.
The one turned unlucky enough let out harrowing screams as the others in the group feasted.
Deatt felt ill in his stomach as he heard the ripping sounds of human flesh, as the turned gluttonously devoured their brethren.
Then a bad situation turned worse. The familiar sound of ironclad boots sprinting to the group interjected their feast. Though these had the tenacity and sheer force of power of the other turned, these also had something else. A rhythm.
When they arrived, suddenly all sounds stopped. The eating turned stopping their gruesome feeding.
"I...want." he heard. The two words chilling him down to the spine.
Why did they suddenly talk again? Why did they stop? How could they turn calm?
Deatt could not help his curiosity, as he gently and slowly peered down the window.
The group of six turned to five, with their last member laying on the ground, dead. They ranged from big meny to woman. Most clothes in simple robes, or humble tunics.
They all looked forward, at the turned opposite to them.
He must have been one of the guards at Jirfort, wearing their grey uniform along with the boots.
This turned acted...differently. As if observing the group before them, his head bobbed as he turned to the others. Then they finally landed on the dead turned on the ground.
He bent down, pulling out one of the corpses hands with a loud crack.
He bit down on it, blood dripping on his boots.
"I...want." he said. Though the voice was still strained, it seemed less so than the one Deatt heard before.
The guard started running into the direction the group came from and suddenly the rest followed.
Deatt continued watching the way with a new weight on his heart. If they were to continue this road, it meant that they would probably encounter them at some point. Weaponless as they were, the prospect did not seem especially attractive to Deatt.
"They''re gone?"
"Yes. But we got bad news." Deatt said, turning to Nido. "They are organized."
___
Nido was getting a bit weaker, but it was a necessary sacrifice. Deatt decided to go to the road for food only every three days, trying to lower their chance of a head on collision with the group, while still preserving as much strength as possible. But his green friend suffered for it. Deatt would have to treat him for something when they were safe. If they got to the point.
Thankfully, their next two visits showed shined some gold their way. It was quite a while since Deatt''s purse clang so nicely. That should last them at least a few weeks in the city.
Nido looked at his feet as they walked through the forest back to the road. Instead of his low hum and easy-going attitude, a hollow husk of hunger and depression made his way through the short bushes and overgrowth.
He was like that whenever he had not eaten for more days at the time. The last time they gone through yet another empty village, they weren''t very lucky - the food there was starting to rot already. Deatt just hoped that the next one would contain some cured meat.
What Deatt decided to count as lucky, was the absence since the guard incident. It seemed almost like they were crowding elsewhere. Hunting for prey if Deatt had to guess.
The village they were coming to was bigger than the other ones, some of the buildings even made out of stone, with a lords manor in the middle, along with a church.
Deatt had already frown accustomed to the desolation, not paying any mind to the rotting viscera and entrails they encountered on the way. It smelt something awful, but he was used to it by his first year in prison.
The pair made their way through the small wooden houses, grabbing anything of value, or anything edible. Of course the latter meant something a bit different to the two. Deatt encountered Nido eating a whole block of butter that miraculously survived until their arrival. The half-orc just shrugged at the surprised Deatt and gulped it down.
Other than that, the houses seemed already ransacked, hinting that there may just be a few survivors from the villages. That left out the church and the manor.
The churches were not especially known for their stock of food, so the two of them decided to head to the manor.
They faced doubts almost instantly, especially when they noticed the building was boarded up from the outside.
Every window or doors were blocked off, as if to contain something inside. What the ''something'' might have been required very little imagination. Or at least that was what Deatt thought at first.
But when encircling the building, to make sure that it was actually walled off from every side, he was surprised by a message written with chalk over the wall.
"WITCH TO ASHES" it said. Deatt seriously doubted that any survivors would have the time to write the message on the building if it was meant as a prison for the turned. Now thinking about it, he doubted that they would even have the time to board up the building as carefully as they did.
That was when he decided to enter. He heard multiple stories of malevolent witched, cursing someone''s first born, sucking the life of a field, or making the crops grow mold. Some part of him believed the stories of course, there was no reason to think that people gifted with magic would also be miraculously good folk, but he also believed that many were misunderstood by the frightened populace, or simply made up.
He was hoping that this might be the latter.
Nido grabbed an iron axe that he brough from a small smithy and started digging into the back entrance to the building. It was facing the other way than the road, so it was a bit harder to spot.
A giant door appeared before them, from strong wood, and an iron handle with reliefs. Their lavishness almost made Deatt knock, but he decided against it. It would be better to see the ''witch'' before she would know of them.
They opened the door to a great hall. Silver chandeliers hung from the ceiling, great flights of stairs on both sides led to a second story and furniture covered with leather invited them inside. What they did not expect was the amount of locked up crates and that most of the things were covered in a great layer of dust.
"A ghost manor." Nido decided. Though Deatt obviously disagreed with the hasty statement, he had to admit it fit the eerie atmosphere of the place rather nicely.
"Better dead than running these days."