Emboldened by a sense still foreign to me, I glanced around the corner. There, I spotted those enchained, a young woman, and a middle-aged man. Their brown tunics were so dirtied they were nearly black. It was near impossible to ignore their faded gaze, the black bags below their eyes, the hopelessness in their steps, and their thin purple lips.

Behind them, a man in a green and grey tunic held the end of their chains. He was leading them out of the village, where to, I didn’t know.

Turning back, I bumped into François’s head. He too was staring.

Sitting back down behind the wall, I whispered as quietly as I could, “What should we do?” If this person’s only powers were to induce nightmares, it wouldn’t be hard to run him down. However, seeing as he was able to take control of an entire village there was no doubt that this was the extent of his powers. Not to mention, he probably had collaborators.

François was deep in thought, hand near his gun. “Stay here.” He got up and scurried off in the direction of the mage.

It couldn’t be.

Keeping my eyes locked on him, he found his way behind a house on the mage’s path. François drew his gun, and aimed it straight, his finger on the trigger. I glanced over to the mage. He was just one house away from François.

Half of that—

Four steps—

Three—

Two—

BANG!

Blood burst in a mist. The slaves screamed, covering their ears. Thick chunks of skull and brain splattered everywhere while the birds scrammed out of the nearby trees.

Shit! I hid back behind the wall. What the hell was that!

Everything was hot and clammy, my heart wanted to jump out and my legs were shaking. I had to stand up, it was hard. Looking around, I searched for any reinforcements coming to the mage’s help but there was nothing. Running over to François, I couldn’t speak. I didn’t know what to say… The corpse. It was beyond mutilated.

The demonstration with the block of wood… I saw it differently now if only I did then.

“Let’s go see what’s going on in the church!” Said François, trying his best to act as if nothing happened. He ran off, leaving me with the peasants cowering on the ground, their long hair and distraught faces covered in thick blood. I wanted to apologize to them, to tell them we were here to help them, but my mouth could only tremble.

I was in the wrong for this, but I ran after François, leaving the others there.

#

The church didn’t have the same atmosphere found outside. Here the air was dense with torment. It didn’t take much to imagine what was going on here.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“Gregoire, over here.” François waved me over to the altar table.

Jogging over, the echoes of my steps resounded loudly throughout the nave. It was too ominous. Walking, I finally made my way over to the sanctuary. “What is it?”

François pointed to the ground. Next to the altar, red skid marks showed that the altar had been moved.

Going over to one side, François and I pushed the table. Squeaking across the floor, the thick scent of blood rose from below as the jingle of iron echoed out.

What horrors would we find there?

“Send him first.”

I wasn’t paying attention to what François was saying, “What?” I asked.

“Send the gargoyle.” He pointed to Ligothe.

“Why would I do that?”

“We don’t know if the mage was alone, someone could attack—”

“It doesn’t matter anymore, since you said it, the people down there probably heard us.”

…François remained quiet.

I don’t know why I’d grown attached to the gargoyle; I just knew that I didn’t want to see him die. “I’ll go in first.” Taking the first step, it was like I’d stepped in a pool of miasma. With difficulty, I continued down until the light filtering through the dusty church windows barely illuminated the outline of the next step.

My head passing the threshold, I stepped into hell.

In rows of cages, sleeping bodies were crammed one atop the other in a puzzle of limbs. Their eyes were black, their mouths purple, and their skin grey. They were almost dead, but I could see a few chests rise. And as I continued to stare, I noticed that the pile of humans rose and sunk in unison.

The further in I continued, the more cages came to light and the fowler the smell of excrement assaulted my nose.

“Stop,” whispered François.

Turning around, François was crouched near a body.

“We don’t know why these people are asleep. If that was the mage, these people should be waking up.”

Turning to the people on the ground, I searched for any sign of them waking up, but just as François had said their condition wasn’t changing. “Could he have been a decoy?” I started to step back.

“That wouldn’t make sense. He couldn’t know we were coming…”

“The village,” I said. Just as François thought of the same. But then, I stepped on a bowl and pills clattered on the ground. “Or maybe he didn’t have a sorcery class but a craftsman.” And looking at the victims, they looked to be drugged, not sleeping. It would also explain Fécamp a lot better.

For a whole city to be affected, such a grand spell would need to be used such a mage couldn’t be working as a small-time trafficker. “I think we can keep going.” I think we got the good guy.

“…. I’m still not sure,” said François getting up. “Stay here, I’ll go check the body.”

Nodding, François left, and I took a second before proceeding further into the dungeon. It reminded me of the macabre dungeon's last floor. I never understood how so many monsters and dungeons were created, but things like this. Dungeons where hundreds of people are stacked up like rotted meat, it was no wonder monsters roamed the land.

I continued down the dungeon, but there I saw—

“He didn’t have a core! Come back fast, we don’t know if the mage is still there.” François’s voice echoed through the dungeon, but… it couldn’t be.

“Isabelle, Richard!” In the corner. They were atop a pile of bodies unconscious, lying crooked against the wall. Pulling on the iron bars, I tried to pry open the cell, but it didn’t budge.

“Quick. We have to go!”

“I can’t my friends are here.” I didn’t forget what had happened in Bayeux, but I couldn’t leave them here.

“Isabelle, Richard, can you hear me?”

They weren’t moving, but they didn’t look as bad as the others. They mustn’t have been here for long. Pulling on the rails once again, I still couldn’t reproduce what I did in the macabre dungeon. The iron used here was stronger. Looking around for something to use, I spotted François running over. “Can you—” But as I was going to ask for help, he pulled me along and slid behind a table hidden in the corner of the room.

“Wh—”

He put his hand on my mouth. “People are coming, quiet.” Pulling out his satchel, he reloaded his gun.

Taking my own gun, I whispered to Ligothe, “Go hide on the ceiling, if anything happens, attack them.”

Flying off, Ligothe found a beam on which to perch himself. The dark grey stone from which he was made for the perfect camouflage.

And not long after, three or four sets of steps came down the stairs below the altar.