Eighteen

It took some convincing, but Marcus finally got Sir Caldwell and the other soldiers to help him pile up the bodies to burn in a giant pyre. They didn’t really understand why he wanted to burn them; they would have been happy just to leave them to rot out in the open. Marcus didn’t really have the time nor the energy to explain to them the concept of spreading diseases, so instead, he used his intimidating size and increasingly short temper to persuade them.

During their grisly work, Marcus noticed something that caused his hackles to rise. Embedded within the monsters’ malignant, putrefied flesh were bits and pieces of clothing. The cloth was equally as deteriorated as the creatures themselves, barely recognizable as anything once worn, but he could still tell. These… things were once people. It was something that he didn’t want to believe but was distressingly obvious.

When he brought up his observations to the others, they refused to listen to him any further. They were already begrudgingly piling up the corpses of the monsters and their friends at his request, so their capacity to listen to him was already maxed out. They just couldn’t fathom these monsters were once human.

Sir Caldwell even went so far as to threaten to strike him down should he continue with his ‘inane ideas of the origins of these monstrosities.’

Once the pyre was lit and burning hungrily, sending plumes of thick, roiling smoke into the early dawn air, Marcus dragged himself over to Alissa’s waiting carriage. He hadn’t slept in three days. He had fought tooth and nail against what he could only assume were the living dead and then had to drag over forty bodies into a pile, stack them several feet high, and then gather enough wood to set them alight. It had been an eventful time, to say the least, and now he wanted nothing more than to curl up into a ball and die.

A dreamless sleep would be the next best thing. Unfortunately, he wasn’t that lucky.

The city was empty. An unpleasantly warm wind blew through the hollow buildings, broken windows, and empty doorways, providing no resistance. Cobbled streets ran between the vacant houses and looted businesses. Smoldering rubble bridged a few of the roads, cutting off those sections of the city.

Marcus turned his eyes skyward. The black haze that had settled over the city choked out the sun and tinged what little light did break through with an ominous wan. Over the rooftops, he could see plumes of smoke adding to the haze, an orange glow visible at their roots, which was obviously the origin of the hot breeze. The city was on fire.

Not knowing what else to do, Marcus picked his way down a random street. The more he looked, the more he could see signs of the travesty that had befallen the residents. Smears of blood painted the street and the houses lining it, like some vindictive god painted the most abstract and macabre painting imaginable. The more he walked, the more it was evident that a massacre had occurred. Although he saw no bodies, the amount of blood spilled all over the street, and the trails of crimson fluid leading out of the houses told him that there were no survivors.

He didn’t know where he was going, but the fires were to his back , and the air was starting to clear as he moved further away. He still hadn’t found another living being—no birds, no scavengers, not even insects. The city was completely dead.

He walked for an unknown amount of time, his mind struggling to piece together fragmented memories and incomplete thoughts. He didn’t know how he came to be inside the city or what had happened around him. It was like his mind was nothing but a jumbled mess, and every time he tried to put the puzzle together, it would fall apart, leaving him struggling to recall where he was.

A large wall emerged from the ground in front of him. He couldn’t remember if it had always been there or had just suddenly appeared. He spun around, his mind reaching for anything that would tell him where he was. Stone stairs carved a switchback up the towering wall, creating a narrow path all the way up to the wide parapet.

From atop the wall, the buildings inside the city looked small, their clay-tiled roofs coated in a thin blanket of soot and ash that had been falling like snow. A powerful gust of wind whipped his crimson cloak against the steel armor covering his body as he looked over the city, the air rushing inward, feeding the firestorm consuming the city.

It would only be a matter of time until there was nothing left.

That knowledge filled him with regret and despair. He felt like it was all his fault, like whatever fate had befallen the city, he could have prevented it. But no matter how hard he tried, he just couldn’t remember why. Shaking his head, he turned away from his forgotten shame and looked over the ocean of darkness surrounding the burning metropolis.

It was serene. Pure nothingness broke against the walls like waves against a rocky shoal, only to recede in absolute silence. An urge to let himself fall into the quiet embrace of the surging waves came over him, but as he started to lose himself in the inky abyss, a feeling of intense wrongness came over him, pulling him back from the ledge.

Marcus’ head spun, his vision blurring. His large hands clamped over his ears as an incessant ringing skewered his brain, dropping him to his knees. Just as quickly as it had come on, the ringing faded into a low hum that echoed all around him. Staggering to his feet, he braced himself on the battlements spaced along the wall.

As his eyelids fluttered open, his sight came into focus, and so did the unending field of twisted figures, all of them staring at him with cloudy, dead eyes.

Marcus jerked awake. An unfamiliar ceiling greeted his groggy mind, and a continuous rocking motion caused his stomach to churn in protest. His limbs were bent at odd angles, not like they were broken, but were still pressed uncomfortably against the walls of the carriage he found himself in. He tried to sit up, his arms bracing against the plush, velvet benches on either side of him, but a pair of small, warm hands came from behind him to push him back down.

“Rest, Marcus.” Alissa’s soft voice filled the inside of the carriage. “You have only been asleep for a few hours.”

Marcus pushed past her attempts to have him lay back down, waving her off with a shake of his head. “I’m fine, really.”

He wasn’t really fine. It had been some time since he dreamt last, so long in fact that he had forgotten all about his nightmares. They had always been lucid, almost indistinguishable from reality, but had never shown him such carnage and destruction. It left him with a feeling of dread that he just couldn’t shake.

“You do not look ‘fine,’” Alissa stated as she watched Marcus rearrange himself inside the trundling carriage. “Your face is awfully pale.”

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Marcus stretched out his legs as best he could, wincing at the stiffness that had settled into his muscles. Alissa had said he had only slept for a few hours, but if his joints could tell time, they would have said it was much longer. “Really, I’m OK. Just a little stiff… and how did you get me in here, and where did my armor go?”

Marcus was sitting on the floor of Alissa’s carriage only wearing his underclothes. His outfit wasn’t anything indecent, but it was most definitely not what he had on before collapsing from exhaustion.

“Those terrible men actually helped me for once.” She explained as she perched herself on one of the soft benches facing him. “They were in a hurry to leave that place and found it more prudent to simply do as I asked. They even assisted in removing your armor… I hope you do not mind, I just wished for you to be comfortable.”

Marcus gave her a warm smile before he nodded his head, relieved to hear that they hadn’t given her a hard time during his little ‘episode.’ Even though they were supposed to be there to look after her all the way to the palace, he had no doubt that they couldn’t care less if she arrived in one piece. “Thanks, I mean it. This is much better than the cold, hard ground.” He turned his head to peer out the open window and the plains slowly moving by. “Say, who’s driving this thing?”

“Sir Caldwell. Many of the horses did not survive the attack.” Alissa expounded, folding her hands in her lap. “So, they were forced to hitch the remaining ones to the carriages in order to transport them.”

“Well, at least he’s finally making himself useful.” He snorted before turning back to her, taking in her regal but frazzled look. “How are you doing? I don’t know how common monster attacks are, but either way, I’m sure it’s not something you’re used to.”

“It is not common at all.” She sighed as a distant look came over her soft features, “I… I have never experienced anything like that before. It is not something I will soon forget.”

Marcus reached over, placing his hand on her slender shoulder and giving it a reassuring squeeze. He wanted to let her know that he was there for her. It was a lot to deal with; he was barely handling everything himself, and he couldn’t imagine what it must be like for such a sheltered girl like her. “So, what’s the plan, then? I can’t imagine they want to push right to the palace.”

Alissa shook her head, her messy curls brushing against her shoulders. “No, there is a small town just over a day’s travel. They want to push through the night to reach it, and I cannot say that I disagree with that proposal.”

“Me neither.” He agreed, finding it disappointing that it took such a horrific event for them to take this journey seriously. If they hadn’t been black-out drunk, Marcus thought that they could have easily repelled the attack. “Hey, Alissa.”

“Yes, Marcus. What is it?” She said cocking her head in an affable way.

“Those…” Marcus hedged, afraid that his question would upset her , but his curiosity and concern drove him forward. “Things… Do you know what they were? Some of them had pieces of clothing clinging to them.”

She didn’t say anything immediately, only shook her head. “Forgive me. Once I was inside the carriage, I did not look outside. The noises… they were horrible.” She looked up at him, taking her eyes off of her wringing hands. “Do you think me a coward?”

“No, no, of course not,” Marcus reassured, flashing her a smile. “You did what I told you to. That’s how you stay safe. But you didn’t see them? I’m not too familiar with the… wildlife. I was hoping that you might have seen something like them before.”

“No, I did not look at them.” She said as she tapped her chin with her forefinger, attempting to recall her many lessons over the world’s wide array of monsters. “There are many monsters and magical beasts that resemble the human form. Although, they tend to stay far away from our lands.”

“Like what?” He asked, he himself having only experienced the slimes, krillgor, and the six-legged bramble wyrm

“Well, there are the harpies that roost within the eastern mountains. Their large colonies use the sheer cliffs as protection from anything that would threaten them. Only the Dark Striders are nimble enough to climb the rocks to prey upon them. Then there are the goblins. They are nasty and vile creatures that have been ruthlessly hunted down, but they breed so quickly that it is nearly impossible to get rid of them completely.” She explained with a grimace on her face like she had swallowed a bug. “There are also orcs and trolls who are slightly more intelligent and less bloodthirsty than the goblins. They tend to keep to themselves, far away from any human settlement.”

“What about elves? My friend, Jorel , was a half-elf , but he is the only one that I have seen.”

Alissa gave him a sad smile, telling him that the reason behind that wasn’t something pleasant. “Elves distrust humans and have very limited contact with them. The reasons behind that are complicated, but it has mostly to do with the abductions of their citizens over the years and the lack of response from the human kingdoms to their outrage.”

“So, the kingdoms just let it happen?” Marcus asked, his brow furrowing.

Alissa let out a defeated sigh as she shrugged her slender shoulders. “They allow many things to happen. That is but one thing among many. Father… he always taught me that a noble’s place is in service to their people, a sentiment not widely shared amongst my peers.”

Marcus shook his head. He supposed this world wasn’t much different than his own when it came to those in power doing as they pleased, with no repercussions whatsoever. “He isn’t really the shining example of piety.”

Marcus was understandably extremely bitter about what had happened to him . He didn’t hold much respect for the man who could have helped him and instead chose to use him.

“I… I realize that.” Alissa admitted as she looked away from him with a melancholy expression on her face. “But I would still like to believe that his heart was in the right place…”

“…maybe.” He grunted noncommittally before redirecting the conversation. “But those things from last night were definitely not any of those you mentioned. Is there anything else that they could have been?”

“There are the dwarves.” She offered, seemingly relieved at the change of subject. “But I doubt that they would have been responsible.”

“Yeah, it definitely wasn’t them.” He wasn’t surprised to hear about all of the magical beings present in this world; it was something he had been expecting to learn about eventually ever since meeting Jorel, and although he hadn’t personally seen the dwarves or any of the other creatures Alissa spoke of, none of them would have matched what he saw the previous night. “What about undead? Like zombies and ghouls, maybe vampires?”

“I have not heard mention of anything of the like,” she said after a moment of thought. “Perhaps I know them by a different name?”

“Things that don’t die unless you destroy their heads or maybe use magic.” He explained as simply as he could. His only real knowledge of the undead came from video games and T.V. shows like The Walking Dead . Although he couldn’t speak of the quality of the show, especially towards the end, it still painted a very gruesome picture of what a zombie would look like, and he did have to say the depiction in the show was very similar to what he saw.

“They sound absolutely dreadful,” She gasped.

“Huh. So, that’s a no, then?” Marcus chuckled. Still, his smile never reached his eyes. Something was happening. He knew it was but had no ability to figure out what exactly it was.