Age of the Undead, page 20
part #1 of Zombicide Black Plague Series
Gaiseric took hold of the counterbalance to the dunking chair. “Hulmul, do it now!”
At the thief’s order, Hulmul stood up, his robes whipping around as though a cyclone were swirling around him. Several crows dove down, but the birds went spinning away as they struck the whirlwind that surrounded him. Then he lifted his staff in both hands and the whirlwind expanded.
Gaiseric felt the arcane tempest dragging at him, threatening to tear his fingers loose and send him careening through the air. Only by exerting every last speck of strength was he able to retain his hold.
The crows, with nothing to anchor them, were knocked about the torture chamber until, finally, they were sent tumbling out into the tunnel. Gaiseric watched as more and more of the birds were pushed from the room. When no more of the creatures were buffeted by the wind, he shouted to Ratbag. “Now!”
The orc had used the iron maiden to anchor himself. Now he stood up, hefting the insidious metal cabinet in both arms. Ratbag’s body was blasted by the tempest, but still he managed to slowly march to the end of the tunnel. With a heave, he sent the iron maiden crashing into the corridor and rolling down the tunnel. In its tumble, the face of the sculpture triggered the pressure plate and caught. From hidden reserves, a great gout of corrosive gas was sent billowing into the tunnel.
Gaiseric could see the crows, struggling against the wind, trying to return to the torture chamber. The birds were caught in the cloud of gas, their feathers sizzling away from the bodies. One after another they dropped to the floor, flesh dripping from their bones. None could escape the deathly fog. Hulmul’s spell hurled every wisp at them, and the pressure of the iron maiden kept the trap expelling gas until its reserves were finally exhausted.
Hulmul waited until no more gas bubbled up from the trap before he dismissed his spell. Exhausted, the wizard sagged against the torture rack. “Malicious, you are avenged.”
Gaiseric started over to see if Hulmul needed aid, but an excited shout from Drahoslav turned him around. The duelist had taken shelter in the alcove, bracing himself against its sides. In doing so, he must have pressed a hidden latch, for now the back of the alcove stood open.
“I think this is what we were looking for,” Drahoslav declared. “The witch hunters’ vaults!”
Chapter Fifteen
The temple-fort’s vault reminded Hulmul of a wizard’s laboratory, though he’d never seen one so well stocked, not even Vasilescu’s. There were several shelves of material components with everything from unicorn horns to the legs of colossal spiders, virtually any exotic substance the student of the mystic arts might need to further his research. Granted, much of the material had rotted from age and neglect, some of it was almost unrecognizable for the patina of dust that clung to it, but the sheer quantity of it all was impressive.
One side of the vault might have been an alchemist’s shop, tables piled with potions and elixirs of every color and consistency, the motley variety of vessels of every size and shape that could be imagined. Hulmul saw narrow-necked amber bottles cut with elven glyphs on the sides, hollowed horns with hidebound seals painted with orcish symbols, and even bronze flasks branded with dwarven runes.
There were racks of miscellaneous apparatus. Hulmul noted ebony wands and crystal balls, skull-topped staves and athames with ripple-blades, devilish jade idols and waxen effigies. The shrunken heads employed by goblin shamans to commune with spirits. Dismembered hands coated in pitch that were used to bring unnatural sleep upon a household. Wolfskin belts with clasps fashioned from human fingerbones, the province of the sorcerous shapechanger. A veritable menagerie of arcane devices.
The wizard felt cold inside when he considered that all the items in the vault had been seized from people suspected of necromancy. How many of them, Hulmul wondered, had truly been guilty, and how many more had been innocent victims of inquisitorial zeal? It was the old argument between the Wizards’ Guild and the Order of the Witch Hunters. Was it better that one necromancer go, free rather than unjustly condemn ten innocents? Or was it, as the witch hunter maintained, acceptable to sacrifice ten innocents lest one necromancer remain loose to spread evil in the kingdom?
Before the black plague, Hulmul could have answered that question. Now, having seen the magnitude of destruction visited on the land, he wasn’t sure. It wasn’t merely the ten innocents caught in the hunt, but all the potential victims of a free necromancer.
“The books,” Gaiseric gasped. The thief dashed forward to a wide array of bookcases lined along the wall. He was careful to keep his torch well away from the musty tomes as he tried to read the letters on their spines.
“The library of the lost,” Hulmul whispered as he went forward to help the thief. The volume Vasilescu was interested in had belonged to Arnault Kramm, titled Metaphysical Investigations into Paranatural Studies, a long-winded and not particularly illuminating title. Certainly, it wasn’t one of the twelve books deemed so dangerous that the witch hunters would burn them the instant they were discovered, but as Hulmul looked over some of the illustrious and even renowned magical treatises that had been collected, he feared it might have been judged too mundane by Kramm’s captors and thrown out rather than interred in the vault.
Alaric whistled appreciatively at the sheer scope of the collection… and the task ahead of them. “Like looking for the loose scale on a dragon’s belly,” he commented, shaking his head.
“If we each take it in sections,” Hulmul suggested. He indicated a spot for Gaiseric to start, then motioned Alaric and Drahoslav to other bookcases. He looked over at Ratbag, finding him cleaning bits of flesh from between Fang’s teeth with a nail he’d ripped from one of the torture implements. No, he didn’t suspect reading, at least anything other than orcish symbols, was among Ratbag’s talents.
“Some help here,” Hulmul called to Ursola. Like iron filings to a lodestone, the dwarf was examining the collection of bottles and flasks, sloshing the liquid about in some, unstoppering others so she could sniff the contents.
“Busy,” Ursola said, dismissing the wizard out of hand. She smiled and set one jar aside. It appeared to Hulmul that she had specific items in mind. He remembered her talk about crafting better explosives. He wasn’t sure how pleased he should be if she did find what she needed.
Helchen was looking over the racks of assorted arcane implements. Hulmul watched her for a moment before calling her name. When he did, he thought he saw her slip something under her coat. “The book,” he reminded her. The witch hunter nodded and walked over to one of the bookcases, carefully scrutinizing the titles. Hulmul wondered what, if anything, she might have surreptitiously removed from the collection… and why. If possible, he resolved to keep an even closer watch on her.
After what felt like hours, Alaric finally found the tome they were seeking. It was a battered folio bound in the hide of some reptile. When the knight handed it over, Hulmul leafed through its pages. It seemed a fairly straightforward alchemical treatise, but somewhere among its pages Kramm must have written down the unique formula Vasilescu needed.
Hulmul looked up from the book to find that his companions were all watching him. Even Ratbag had an expectant look. The wizard couldn’t help but delay for a moment, teasing out that extra bit of tension, enjoying the rapt attention of his audience. After all, those who delved into the arcane sciences were showmen at heart.
“This is it,” Hulmul finally declared, nodding to Alaric as he confirmed the knight’s find. “This is the book Vasilescu was looking for.”
“Thank Marduum for that,” Helchen said.
“I’ll thank any god you care to name if this means we can leave.” Gaiseric started toward the vault entrance. He’d just gotten near the doorway when an arrow went whistling past his nose, missing him by a mere hair. The thief leaped back with a moan of horror, diving behind one of the shelves.
Drahoslav and Helchen scrambled forward, bow and crossbow at the ready. Hulmul tucked the book into his pack and followed them. When he reached a point where he could see into the torture chamber, the two were already shooting. Sight of the enemy sent an instinctive thrill of fear through him. Arrayed about the room was a file of fleshless skeletons, bloodied strips of armor and uniform hanging off their bones. Each skeleton held a bow and had a quiver of arrows strapped to its frame. With slow, methodical motion, the creatures drew and loosed in perfect unison, sending a volley of arrows flying into the vault. Missiles slammed into shelves and racks, shattering bottles on the table and sending everyone diving for cover.
“Is anyone hit?” Alaric hissed.
“I’m all right,” Gaiseric replied, “but what in blazes are they? And where did they come from?”
A voice answered the thief, calling out from the torture chamber. “For you, they are emissaries of the grave.” There was such contemptuous mockery in the tone that it was more an audible sneer than speech.
Hulmul was shocked to see the change that came upon Alaric. The knight’s visage, strained but in control a moment before, became flushed with a raging fury. His eyes were like specks of fire. He drew his shield off his back and strapped it to his arm. Pulling his longsword, he marched toward the doorway. The wizard could just hear the name that left his lips in a hateful rasp.
“Gogol.”
•••
Helchen tried to stop Alaric as he charged toward the doorway, but the knight shoved her aside. “Gogol!” he shouted as he rushed from the vault. The skeletons outside concentrated their shots on him, but the arrows glanced off the heavy kite shield.
“Dis bein’ der rumpuz!” Ratbag howled, his face full of savage glee. The orc rushed after Alaric, Fang hurrying alongside him.
“Reckless or not, better than being trapped in here,” Gaiseric declared, drawing his sword and following the others. It was a sentiment that made all too much sense to Helchen. To stay bottled up in the vault was to simply invite destruction.
The witch hunter plunged back through the alcove. The scene in the old torture chamber was chaos and confusion. Alaric was in among the skeletal archers, hewing their naked bones with broad sweeps of his blade. Ratbag had been foiled in his drive to reach the bowmen, a pack of less decayed zombie walkers intercepting him. Before he could be completely surrounded, Ursola was at his side, smashing skulls with her hammer. Fang leapt upon a large brute, sinking its teeth into the throat and worrying at the creature until its head went rolling away.
Drahoslav set down the elven bow, deciding a shot was too risky in the swirling melee, even for him. The duelist drew his rapier and engaged the zombies trying to encircle Alaric. He stabbed a walker, burying his blade in its ribs, then with a smooth motion sent the enemy toppling into the cistern. Unable to swim, the walker sank to the bottom.
Helchen had her mace out now, but before she rushed into battle, she spotted the necromancer. Gogol was keeping safe behind a cadre of his zombies, overseeing the fight like a general. In her experience there were two kinds of necromancers – crazed fanatics who practically worshiped death, and cowards so terrified of their own mortality that they resorted to the darkest magic to prolong their longevity. Looking at Gogol, she’d place him in that latter camp. Why then had he risked himself by appearing now?
Helchen grabbed Hulmul’s shoulder and drew him back toward the alcove. “We can’t let him get into the vault,” she told the wizard. “That’s why he’s here. That’s why he dared to show himself – he wants to plunder the vault!”
It was clear to her now, the strange manner of the zombies in the temple-fort. They’d been directed by Gogol, used to drive the companions down into the dungeons. From the evidence in the tunnel, it was clear there were some traps that the undead were immune to, such as the poisoned darts, but there were others that could annihilate even them. The necromancer had used the heroes, sent them down to clear the way for him, gambling that they could succeed where his creatures had failed! Helchen shuddered to think what use Gogol could make of the materials confiscated by the Order. He could set loose horrors unimaginable, things such as the mutant rat they’d seen in Vasilescu’s collection, monsters beside which the rotten hordes infesting Singerva would seem pleasant.
“I need a clear shot to target Gogol,” Hulmul told her. “He’s keeping zombies around him to prevent that.” The wizard struck his staff against the wall in frustration. “I’m not even certain the Bellows would budge those brutes he has around him.” To emphasize his words, he pointed his finger at the cadre around the necromancer. A bolt of arcane energy seared into one of the zombies, but only charred its meaty bulk.
Helchen realized the spells at Hulmul’s disposal had their limitations. If Drahoslav felt hitting Gogol was so uncertain, she knew the wizard’s aim wouldn’t be better. “Marduum have mercy,” she hissed. “We’ll just have to hope we can destroy enough of his zombies that he decides to retreat.”
Even as she said the words, Helchen repented them. It was as if Gogol had heard her. An enormous figure lumbered into the chamber from the tunnel. She felt her breath catch in her throat when she saw the thing. It was the abomination that had chased them away from the guildhall, a creature that had been not merely resistant but impervious to their weapons.
Hulmul, however, didn’t know that. Hurriedly searching his pack, he drew out a scroll and invoked its spell. A sheet of flame billowed away from his palm. Several zombies were ignited by the wizard’s magic, toppling to the floor in charred heaps, but the abomination, the real target, remained standing, uncaring that its skin had been blackened or that its clothes were smoldering.
Gogol glanced in their direction, an impish grin on his cruel face. Helchen expected him to send the abomination charging at them. Instead, the necromancer did something even worse. He pointed to the gateway leading to the cells.
The abomination stormed across the torture chamber, moving with a speed that seemed impossible for something of its bulk. Helchen looked on as its huge hands closed about the bars. With a jerk, the monster ripped the entire gateway free from its moorings and sent it crashing to the floor. From inside, a file of walkers shambled into view. Guards and prisoners, their eyes gouged out by the crows, their flesh torn by beaks and claws, marched into the room, animated by the foul energies of the zombie plague. Reinforcements for Gogol’s hideous army.
Nor was the necromancer finished. Imperiously, he gestured to a grating in the floor. Helchen paled when she saw the decayed hands reaching up through that grating, roused by Gogol’s summons. She knew what it was that lurked below. Many suspects expired under torture. With their innocence in question, they couldn’t be interred in a normal grave, so instead they were disposed of in catacombs beneath the dungeons alongside the remains of the guilty executed for practicing dark magic. The plague had reached down even into these blighted crypts and now the damned dead were answering the necromancer’s call. Hundreds, perhaps even thousands of bodies rising from their unhallowed graves! Helchen tried to quell the dread that coursed through her veins.
The abomination stomped its way over to the grating. Ratbag broke through the walkers around him and rushed at the gigantic zombie. The orc’s scimitar ripped into the monster’s body, shearing through layers of flesh and muscle. Without breaking its stride, without even really looking at its attacker, the abomination struck out with its fist. The blow landed with such force that the big orc was sent flying back, spinning through the air to crash against the wall on the other side of the chamber. He sagged to the floor, stunned by the collision. Walkers started to amble towards him, but found their path blocked by Fang’s frenzied efforts as the wolf defended its master.
Unopposed now, the abomination reached the grating. Much as it had with the gate to the cellblock, the creature’s mighty grip tightened around the bars. There was a terrific scraping sound as the zombie strained against the locked trapdoor.
“Idiot!” Gogol snarled at it. “Remove the bar! Remove the bar!”
At the necromancer’s command, the abomination shifted its focus to the steel bar that lay across the grating and secured it to the floor. Taking hold of the barrier, the creature’s grip twisted the metal. When it pulled, Helchen saw the staples that held it to the floor rip free. Indifferent to its feat of strength, the abomination flung the bar aside and returned its attention to the grating itself.
This time the trapdoor’s resistance was overcome in an instant. The grating was lifted away in a single piece, mortar crumbling from the frame. The abomination heaved it across the room, uncaring that it smashed a pair of walkers beneath it when it landed. The enemy hardly needed to worry about such losses, Helchen realized. There were plenty of replacements below.
A moment after the grating was gone, the undead started to emerge from the catacombs. They were even more hideous to behold, their desiccated flesh coated in a fungal fuzz. The dry conditions below acted to preserve the bodies, but until they dried out the fungi would try to draw nourishment from them. Now, as they moved, green powder drifted off the zombies as their sheen of dead mold flaked away.
Helchen felt a horror unlike anything she’d experienced before, watching the zombies climb up from the pit. Every one of them had been killed by the Order, whether by torture or execution. Now, to her, it was like the condemned were rising again to take their revenge.
And she was the only living witch hunter in the temple-fort.
•••
Every skeleton Alaric struck down only increased his rage. “Coward!” he snarled as his sword shattered the skull of another enemy and sent its bones clattering against the torture rack. “Face me, coward!”
Brunon Gogol simply sneered at him. The necromancer waved his hand and a pack of the moldy zombies rising from the catacombs moved toward him, setting another line of guards between himself and the knight. Then the villain gestured at the abomination, summoning the monstrosity to his side. It seemed he wasn’t taking chances that Alaric might yet fight his way clear and charge him.
