I’m at Chris’s cafe in Balham, just up from where I live in Tooting. I’m having the' Special A Breakfast', which is special because it has bubble and squeak in addition to the usual fry-up suspects.

Sitting opposite me is Ella with her new husband. He has the face of a lion and he’s a total wanker. Full of himself, going on and on about his job in the city and all the expensive shit he doesn’t really need but buys anyway.

“Oh Mar,” says Ella, putting her hand on top of his. “Don’t pretend you regret buying that thing.”

“Well yes noogie, you got me,” he says with a smug smile. “You ever had a go on a decent jet ski Doon? There’s nothing like it. If you get a top of the range model, you can really open it up on the water you know? Give it some proper welly, buzz the windsurfers.”

“I’ll stick with my bike thanks,” I say. “Less wet.”

Jesus. Is that the best I can do? Less wet.

—-

“You alright Slayer?” asks Andraya. We’re packing up camp and I guess I’ve been sitting on Veppi’s tree stump staring into the middle distance for too long, instead of getting on with gathering our things.

“Had an unsettling dream last night,” I tell her. “That’s all.”

“Do you want to share it?” Misty asks, “might be some meaning to it I can unravel for you.”

“No, it’s alright. Let’s just get going.”

I’m not really feeling that talkative this morning. It’s like the cordiale has given me a speech hangover.

—-

We’re at Three Farms an hour later, standing at the edge of a field of wheat. It’s early morning and it looks like it’s going to be another fine day, but the rising sun seems to be struggling to warm this place. It’s unnaturally gloomy and cold, and I’m finding that spooky as fuck.

I’ve been in places in the real world that have freaked me out a little - cemeteries after dark, old buildings, that kind of thing. I once stayed in a hotel in Stamford about two hours north of London. It was eight hundred years old, and knights used to rest there on their way to and from the crusades. The staff told me it was home to the spirit of a slain muslim warrior who used his last words swearing to haunt the knight who killed him. It followed the knight home from the holy lands, and finally succeeded in scaring him to death in his bed at the hotel. The avenged spirit has been there ever since, and takes delight in frightening guests for fun. There was definitely an unsettling presence at that haunted hotel, but nothing so tangibly eerie as this place.

There’s a dread here that’s palpable. I feel it in my heart as we walk across the field towards the farm house. There’s a tightness in my chest, a heavy unease. I look over at my companions and I can tell they’re feeling it too.

“Woah there,” says Veppi, stopping suddenly. “It just moved, up there. Look!”

“What did?” I ask.

“The scarecrow. Over there. Look.”

All scarecrows are terrifying given the right circumstances but the one waving its arms in between the rows of wheat just ahead of us looks especially pant-shitting. It has the head of a slaughtered pig. A huge boar’s head, tusks and all, with the neck crudely sewn on to its misshapen sackcloth body. The pig opens its mouth and silently screams at us as it shakes its fists. Stuck into its leather gloves are blades from shears, Freddy Krueger style.

“Prepare yourselves,” Andraya cries.

I draw my sword from its scabbard and adopt a convincing looking stance that I didn’t know I knew.

Mistle mutters a spell, plucking alchemical paraphernalia from the air and concocting something in a cork stoppered bottle. She shakes it, and I see flames swirl in the liquid.

Andraya twists her thy, eyes flickering across the screen that only she can see, before pulling something from a holder on her belt. It’s a small hand bow of some kind. I watch as she draws a bolt fletched with multi coloured feathers from a tube-like quiver, and kisses it before loading it into the bow.

“Come at us you fuck!” shouts Veppi. “If you dare! You maggot ridden wurst. You slobbering sack-of-straw pigcrow freak. Porcine headed monstrosity fuck!” It seems his contribution to our party is ill thought out random taunts and insults. Then he stops. “Why isn’t it coming towards us?”

The scarecrow is still yelling, silently, and still windmilling its arms about, but it isn’t taking any steps in our direction.

“I think it’s stuck on a pole in the ground,” I say. “Plus, I don’t think it has any legs.”

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“Looks that way,” says Andraya. “Maybe it’s just meant to warn intruders. Or maybe it’s just a really good scarecrow, and has nothing to do with the haunting.”

“I could torch it anyway?” says Mistle, phrasing it like a question. “I got this firewater brewed and ready to go.”

“I’m dying to give flare another go,” I say. “Could I at least try that?”

“You could,” Andraya says. “But it doesn’t have any eyes. They’ve rotted away.”

I feel something then, a powerful sense of imminent danger. It’s difficult to explain. I’m suddenly made aware of something malicious approaching us from behind.

I whip around to see three of the scarecrow monsters rush at us. They have the same dead pig heads and Wolverine fist blades as their distracting friend, but unlike him they’re very much mobile. The largest of the three is leading the charge, and it takes a kind of speed-shamble at Misty with its arms thrashing. I shout a warning and take an uncharacteristically fearless leap at the fucker, bringing my sword down from above my head, landing a powerful chop into the monster’s shoulder. It knocks it off balance and I go tumbling down with it. There’s no blood from the wound I’ve inflicted. Just dust and hay.

My companions have joined the fray, with Misty throwing her home brewed grenade at the other two scarecrows. It explodes as it hits them, showering them in flaming red liquid. The one that took the brunt of the attack sinks to it knees and stays there burning, like a self-immolated anti-war protester. But the other still comes, only now it’s not just an undead pig scarecrow beast, it’s a flaming undead pig scarecrow beast.

Veppi chucks his pipe at the fiery monster which is a nice gesture but does fuck all to it. The bolt from Andraya’s handbow however, fully obliterates it. It strikes the monster in its chest, and from the hole it makes, a black and purple void spreads. The scarecrow is consumed by it until there’s nothing left. It’s like the monster has been erased from existence, deleted from the game.

Meanwhile, things aren’t going so well for me on the floor. My enchanted blade is stuck deep in sackcloth and hay, and as I try in vain to pull it out, the monster takes a swipe at me. I feel its blades scrape my side, just under my ribs. My leather armour takes the brunt of its attack, but the blades still cut. I feel pain like lines of fire scored into my side, see the blood seep from the frayed leather of my chest piece.

Fuck it hurts, but I’m not cowed by it. I got punched in the real world once, while I was waiting for a night bus. When it happened, I retreated into a kind of standing fetal position, with my hands and arms above my face to protect me from further blows. But now, faced with an even greater danger, I’m not a bit tempted to go full defensive armadillo. Instead, I’m enraged. Fuck this hay filled freak! Fuck his disgusting rotting pig head. With a surge of determination, I yank my blade from the monster’s shoulder, and attempt a surgical strike.

I’ve seen enough zombie and vampire movies to know that decapitation is a sound strategy when facing an undead foe. So I roll away from the scarecow and spring up onto my feet. It’s standing up too but it’s slower than I am, so I perform my surgical strike as it’s kneeling, swinging my sword at the place where its pig head is attached to its chest.

I miss. It lurches back just in time, and the tip of my sword unpicks a few of its stitches but nothing more.

Misty has another grenade ready, but I’m thankful that she’s reluctant to throw it. I don’t want to get any fiery splash from her attack, which must be the reason she’s staying her hand. Andraya has no such concerns with her more precise weapon, and she lets fly a bolt that strikes the monster in its chest, just to the left of the tear I inflicted to its shoulder. A purple hole appears in the wound and crackles a little, but it doesn’t spread like her last attack.

“Get away from it!” Misty yells at me, “Get back!”

The scarecrow lunges at me with a wild swipe of its Freddys, but I successfully evade it this time, leaping sideways and dodge rolling to the left.

Misty throws her fire bottle and it misses, but only just. It strikes the ground at the scarecrow’s feet, and the burst of flames catches its legs and crotch, spreading fast. It flails a few times, a burning horror, until it collapses in the wheat.

It’s over.

We won.

I survived my first real battle, and it was exhilarating.

As the final enemy turns to ash, I feel a tingle like a kind of full body ASMR which gives me a shiver.

“That’s the XP surge,” says Misty “We did well. You did well Doon.”

“We were lucky too,” says Andraya. “Must have had some decent rolls giving us a boost. There’s only a tiny chance that my purity bolt will obliterate an enemy like that. It’s never happened before.”

“That shot was amazing,” I say. “Saved us getting hugged by the wickerman, that’s for sure.”

Mistle hands me a bottle of greenish blue liquid.

“Drink this,” she says. “For the wound in your side. It will stop the bleeding, and restore some of your health.”

“Nice!” I say. “An actual health potion." I take a few sips and almost instantly feel the potion working. "Beats getting stitches. So is that the quest done? We’ve killed the evil spirits and now we get our reward?”

Andraya shakes her head. “No Doon. We’ve only just started. Look over there. We still have our stationary scarecrow friend to deal with. And the gloom has not lifted from this place. We may have dispersed some evil spirits for now, but we haven’t exorcised them.”

The pigcrow we spotted first is still silently screaming at us, still flailing its arms rooted to the spot.

“We should go and see what we can learn from him,” says Misty.

“He doesn’t look like the talkative type,” I reply. “A bit on the quiet side.”

“Have you got pass the bottle?”Andraya asks Misty.

“Not yet. That might work if I did though. You don’t have shimmer?”

“Only the lesser variety, doesn’t work on undead.”

“You don’t have any trix or wyrds that might help Veppi?” Misty asks the otter.

“If there’s any feyleaf left in my pipe once I find it,” he says. “I could get the thing high. Not sure that would do much good though.”

“Should we burn in then?” asks Misty. “Seems almost cruel, with it just stuck there. Perhaps we could leave it alone.”

“We don’t know what it’s capable of,” says Andraya. “Maybe it’ll launch a psionic attack or cast a spell once we get closer. Better a little cruelty now, than an injury we could have avoided later.”

Mistle sets the thing alight with a thrown grenade. “I only have two left,” she says. “Until we rest.”

“I’ll sing a rousing song on the way to the farmhouse,” says Andraya. “That should restore us all a little.”

We watch as the scarecrow flails its arms, burning like a grotesque Guy Fawkes, until it goes still.