Dead Curse

Red flames crackled in the fire-pit, flickering and weaving a dance of shadows and light inside the tavern. The few tables in the common room were empty, but three men sat at the counter. Three unusual men, by the innkeeper's standards. The one in the middle held a tankard of ale, which was still mostly full. Long, dark hair framed his pensive face, and rested on his shoulders. A silky blue cloak obscured the remainder of his body. The other two were rather odd. They were bulky, broad-shouldered men, with the hoods of their black cloaks pulled up over their heads. The innkeeper stayed away from them. One of them looked as if he had gray skin, and when he had genially offered them a drink, they had shaken their heads menacingly. They had not moved or spoken since.

The innkeeper set the now-clean mug down on a shelf behind him and cleared his throat. "Well fellows, best be off. It's getting too late."

The man with the tankard looked up and sighed. "How on earth did it begin?"

The innkeeper looked at him, a sorrowful expression crossing his face. "You're new to these parts aren't you?" he asked gruffly. "Well, it's a strange tale as I see it," he said slowly. "I believe it began five years ago, on that cursed bloody day. One man's fortune brought hell on us all."

The man looked up, a strange glint in his eye. "What happened? Did someone find a cursed treasure?"

"What in the world are you talking about?" the innkeeper growled. "There wasn't such nonsense - and you'd better forget about gold in these parts. You won't find any that's worth the price," he added darkly. "Where was I? Ah, yes. It began five years ago. On one night -- similar to this one -- two of our hunters found an old man on the road. We thought he had come across some highwayman. I tell you, the bruises he had, and that look of hopelessness in his eyes. He couldn't speak; his tongue had been cut out. Not that he didn't try. He waved his arms around and wrote strange letters, and we simply thought he was mad." The barman placed the clean glass on a shelf behind him. "But something was very wrong with him. Damn his luck that we found him!"

"What happened then?" the man demanded.

"Some strange illness was in that man -- or a curse," the innkeeper replied. "Whatever it was, it got into the healers. Within two days they fell dead - but - but they came back! They were walking! We couldn't believe our eyes. One day we're burying them, the next they're walking in the street, all four of them! But they were different. They were rotting, mindless! As soon as night fell, they attacked us! Some say people killed by them became like them. And I believe them. Hundreds of them stalk the sewers by day. And you know very well what happens at night. They come out, looking for us."

The man did not speak for a while. "A curse, eh?" He handed the tankard to the barman. "Well, goodbye, I'm off. Sundown's near."

The innkeeper nodded and the three men rose from their stools. "May the gods preserve your life tonight. I'll bar the door behind you," he said, walking them out. He closed and locked the large double door. They heard him slide a bar in place behind it.

"Well now," said the man who had asked the questions. He looked around in the empty street, breathing the chill evening air. "Shall we have a look at this?" His two companions stood motionless and silent and as before. The man grinned. "Well Gariben, what have you gotten yourself into this time?" he asked himself. "The living dead in the streets! How terrible!" His grin widened.

Gariben was a well-known name. It was the name of a thief; the name of a hero; the name of a madman; the name of a magician; the name of one without fear - or at least, that's what the rumors claimed. What Gariben was, only he himself knew. One thing was certain, he interfered where there was trouble and caused trouble where there was peace.

Gariben stood and waited. He felt the innkeeper's eyes watching him from an upper-floor window, wondering what on earth this man was doing out here in the night, unarmed and undefended.

A metallic grating sound echoed through the town, followed by a deafening clang, as if some vast gate had opened. The innkeeper snatched the curtains, flung them over the window and barred it shut. Gariben hummed softly to himself. Groans filled the air, and somewhere a scream. Gariben started. The nonchalant delight in his face had vanished; his eyes were focused. Another scream and he started sprinting in its direction. The two silent men followed him without hesitation, their cloaks trailing behind them like ravens' wings.

They ran past houses and shops, all locked and barred - and some with strange figures groping at the windows and scratching at the doors with long white hands. There was a snarl and something leaped at Gariben from the rooftops. He couldn't see it; but he could smell it. A rotten miasma of decaying flesh and disease. It almost grabbed him, but Gariben danced away on nimble feet. The thing turned towards one of his companions and lunged.

The man's fist collided with the creature with a muffled thump before it got its hands on him. There was a crash as the creature flew away and smashed into something. Gariben hoped it wasn't a house - holes in walls were something people didn't want here. His companion moved forward on stiff legs - like a statue that had just learned how to walk. His mouth opened and a great cloud of fire billowed out. The creature howled, and Gariben saw it for what it was. It had once been a man, but now it was a writhing, threshing body of rotting, maggot-filled flesh. Then the fire engulfed it, burning it into ashes. A faint glow of red light had appeared in his companion's eyes.

"Working fine, aren't we?" Gariben said to the man. He didn't answer. The scream pealed through the night again. "Off we go," he said and resumed running. This time nothing dared attack him; the prospect of incineration was daunting to the undead, and Gariben knew it. He rounded a corner, his companions close behind him, and entered a large empty area. Judging by one quick look and the numerous empty stalls, he assumed it was a market square during the day. Listening closely, he could hear sounds of commotion. Something was going on in the square.

His fire-breathing companion marched forward, smoke trailing from his mouth as it opened wide. A huge column of fire roared out. Gariben saw hordes of white-bodied creatures running away. Some were not so lucky, he noted grimly. "Abaddon," he said, raising his hand. "You may stop." The man closed his mouth, leaving the market square burning. Burning bodies littered the ground. Gariben saw a girl trying to get out from under a burning stall. "Ah, our damsel in distress!" he said gallantly, striding towards her. The girl watched him approach with large eyes. He grabbed her arm and pulled her out.

"What are you doing out here at a time like this?" he asked her, looking her over. She could not have been more than six years old. Her thin white dress was stained and covered with ash. She was coughing uncontrollably, and crying, tears streaking her ash-smeared face.

"He took me out," she coughed, between sobs. She must have inhaled a lot of smoke. Gariben felt a slight tinge of pity.

"The bastard!" Gariben snarled. He paused. "Wait - who's he?"

"The man in the sewers," the girl said. "I don't know his name." She was staring at Abaddon, eyes wide. The sight of the smoking mouth was a new one - she seemed to have calmed down.

"Tell me about this man," Gariben said, sitting down on the ground. He patted the blackened earth. "Sit here, girl. Abaddon, Phobos, be on your guard."

"Why can that man spit fire?" the girl asked.

Gariben stared. "What man?" he asked. "Oh! You mean Abaddon - he's not a man. Now tell me about this fellow in the sewers."

"He lives in the sewers," the girl said.

Gariben bit his tongue. Children! "Why don't the undead attack him?" he asked, a little more sharply than he intended. She didn't know what he wanted from her, so why couldn't he keep his temper down. "I heard the sewers were full of them!"

"They listen to him," she replied. "He took me with him down there."

"The bloody bastard! And he sent you out here to die, didn't he?" Gariben fell silent, thinking. Why would anyone take a girl out in the market square to die? Why take her in the first place? To watch her die? The market square, being what it was, offered plenty of viewpoints all around. That meant the man in the sewers had intentionally sent her out, so he could watch her die. What a bastard. "Very well girl. I'm going to take you to a home so you'll be safe," he told her. "Come on."

He took her hand and walked straight to the nearest house. Abaddon and Phobos followed him, one close behind him, the other hanging back. Gariben knocked on the door; he didn't expect them to open of course. "Open up! I've got a girl who needs shelter here!"

Silence.

"This isn't a trick, I swear!" he shouted. "Open the door!"

A window above opened a fraction of an inch. "Back away!" a voice warned.

"Just come down and open the door," Gariben ordered. "It's safe." The window closed, and a few moments later he heard the door being unlocked. It opened, only a little bit, and an eye appeared in the gap. "Hurry in girl! Get in!" The door opened to admit her and remained open, almost expectantly.

"Well aren't you getting in?" the man behind it asked.

"Afraid not," Gariben bantered. "I'm rather busy out here. Now, answer a question for me, will you?" The man nodded. "Do the sewers run under the market square?"

"Yes I think so," the man said. "But you can't get down there from the market square. There's no gate."

"Thank you very much, sir," Gariben said. "You may close the door. Dark things lurk out here."

"You sure you don't want to come in?" the man asked.

"I'm still outside, aren't I?" Gariben said, with a small smile. He turned away and left he man standing at the door, mouth open. Gariben looked at his two companions, thinking. When he finally came to a decision, he looked at his companions and said, "Abaddon, I require an entrance to the sewers. See to it."

The man strode forward to the middle of the market square. The light in his eyes was burning with new intensity. Gariben backed away, with the prudence of one who knew something was about to happen, and how exactly it would happen. Abaddon’s eyes were glowing with blinding white light. With a flash and the sound of cracking cobblestones, a pillar of fire roared into existence around him. Shards of stone were propelled into the air, embedding themselves in the wooden stalls. Thick black smoke rolled over the market square, choking the chill night air with its sooty heat.

Gariben walked into the fading smoke. He stopped beside Abaddon. “Not bad,” he said, looking down. A deep pit had been gouged into the ground by the explosion. Gariben couldn’t see anything below. It was pitch black. “We’re going down there,” he told his companions. “I assume it’s infinitely more dangerous than out here, at least for me.” He smirked.

Snarls and howls echoed from the pit. “Oh, they’re waiting for us,” Gariben noted. “Shall we?” Abaddon jumped into the pit, not caring if it was deep enough to hurt him. Gariben heard a splash. “That must stink!” He was suddenly thankful for all the smoke permeating the air. He held his breath, kicked off his boots, and prepared himself for the dive. Something white and ugly appeared in the corner of his vision. He jumped.

The air below was much warmer, he thought. It also stank. He closed his eyes and splashed into what he hoped was water. “Abaddon,” he called out, “Give me some light!” A pair of eyes suddenly shone with white brilliance. Gariben saw that he was in a low circular tunnel, half-filled with water. Abaddon was floating close by.

“Phobos come on!” Gariben yelled. His other companion leapt from the hole into the water. A sword was in his hand, and something’s head was impaled on it. Gariben ignored him and started planning his next move. Only then he realized how unwise he had been. He had chosen a random point of entrance, without any idea where he was going. To make things worse, they were all half-submerged in stinking, sticky water. They would never survive if they faced a horde of the creatures that prowled in the sewers. And finally, they had no way to get out, as the hole they had made was ten feet above them.

Abaddon suddenly turned his head, redirecting the light away from Gariben to a series of splashing sounds coming some distance ahead of him. The light revealed a pale white body, wading through the sewage. “Oh,” Gariben muttered. “Perfect.”

Abaddon’s mouth opened with that air of finality.

Gariben started planning his next move while Abaddon dealt with the creature. He didn't have to.

"Well now," a voice said from the darkness. "Someone was foolish enough to come down here."

Gariben looked up. "Abaddon!" he called out. A hot cloud of searing, red flame erupted somewhere to the right.

The voice laughed softly. "Come now, how many of my minions did you destroy that way? Do you think I am not prepared for that?"

"Who are you?" Gariben demanded.

"That should not concern one about to die," the voice said. "You've made a mistake, my friend."

Something grabbed Gariben's ankles. He swore, realizing that he had not been prepared for something diving underwater. It pulled him down before he could yell a command to his companions. He could not see what was pulling him; it was too dark and the water too dirty. Then he felt something sliding into his side -- his scream filled his mouth with water, and a hand wrapped itself around his throat. He struggled, trying to breathe and cough up the water in his lungs, while fighting the creature at the same time. But the creature's grip was too strong. Gariben fought, but he was out of breath. His lungs threatened to burst with their desire for air.

Above the surface, the owner of the voice waited. Then, a white bodied-creature surfaced and splashed over to him. It was the living corpse. He laughed softly. "Amusing, how the living fight to survive, when that which awaits them beyond death is eternal life." He looked at Abaddon. "This one was skilled - a creator of golems." His hand touched Abaddon's cheek. It was as hard as stone. "Pitiful. Without your voice, they are useless. Therein lies the difference between us. My servants ar--."

"Come now, Necromancer," said a voice from behind him. "You've forgotten something."

The necromancer whirled round, eyes wide. Phobos had lowered his hood, revealing Gariben's face. "What? How?"

"The thing your minion killed was merely a simulcra - in other words a golem of flesh and blood," Gariben explained. A smile danced on his lips. "I was channeling my consciousness inside it, drawing your attention away from the real me. All along, Phobos was me. I knew you'd fall for this because I knew you were watching me. When I saved the girl, it was obvious you were there, watching her."

"Ah," the Necromancer said. "Fool. Why did you reveal yourself then? You had the advantage of surprise."

"Oh, I still do," Gariben said, gesturing at Abaddon. The golem's mouth opened. "For your information, my voice isn't the only thing that commands them." A column of fire engulfed the Necromancer, drowning his shriek in its roar. Gariben waited for the screams to end with the air of one who had done this a million times. He looked at the white-bodied corpse. It lay unmoving. The end of the Necromancer had brought about an end to his magic.

"I don't know why you think you were so great," Gariben told the charred body of the Necromancer. "Thank the gods you faced my golems and not Gariben himself. I'm thirsty. Let's go back to the inn, Abaddon."