Adept (The Essence Gate War, Book 1) - By Michael Arnquist Page 0,29

monstrosity shuddered, spines clattering in a sharp crescendo, and went still at last. It slid back down the pike to land in a heap on the ground.

The farmer prodded the body with his saber, studying the greenish ichor spilling out, and then turned away. Wulf was a few paces away, panting and lying on his side in a pool of blood. His dark muzzle and ears were torn to ribbons, and one eye was pinched shut while the other was fixed upon the black creature’s corpse. Gormin started toward him, but a surge of dizziness reminded him that he was in no better condition. His shirt and pants hung in tatters, and blood flowed down his side in liberal amounts to leave red footprints on the packed ground. He took a steadying breath and went to the dog, falling to his knees at its side. Its eye swung to him.

“Worthless cur,” he said in a gentle tone, reaching out to ruffle the thick fur at the dog’s neck. Wulf curled his lip in a faint snarl, but his tail gave a few tentative taps on the ground. Gormin blinked away an unaccustomed burning in his eyes. “I cannot lift you now, boy, but the house has clean water and cloth for bandages. I will have you back to your ornery self in no time.”

With a last reassuring pat, he pushed himself to his feet and headed for the hole in the barn wall. As he neared it, he heard something outside that froze the blood in his veins: a chorus of dry rattling sounds, many strong. He spun and crossed to his pike, still jutting from the ground, and wrenched it loose. If he could defend the narrow opening, perhaps he could keep them at bay long enough to––what? They were alone out here, far from deliverance of any kind. Anyone with a speck of sense, he realized, had fled to the city.

A sudden, fierce gratitude washed over him that his family was safe within the city walls. His jaw tightened. Perhaps the morning light would scatter these foul creatures. They had only to survive the night to know the answer.

Even as he turned back to make his choke point, however, several of the black creatures crawled through the opening and went skittering up the wall. Their yellow eyes were burning slits in the shadows. Gormin’s heart sank as he swung the pike from one to another, and more of the monsters poured in through the hole. The farmer seized his lamp from where it hung on the plow handle and retreated to the dog’s side. There he laid aside the lamp and his pike for a moment, and dug his fists into the thick fur to drag Wulf back with him to the corner where the stalls met the outer wall of the barn. He braced his pike there in the corner, and laid his saber within easy reach on the ground, preparing for the rush that would come. The lamp guttered and flickered beside them but held. A detached part of Gormin’s mind wondered when the oil would be exhausted, how much light remained to them, but he knew it would not matter.

The dog strained to its feet, crimson beads dripping from its fur, and pressed against the man’s side with a rumbling growl at the creatures. Gormin felt a surge of pride at the animal’s courage. The farmer heard a distant hacking sound, and surmised that more of the spiny creatures were invading his house. He hoped they would not damage the charcoal picture. He wished he could have seen it once more.

And still the creatures swarmed into the barn, spreading across the walls and ceiling: a dozen, then twenty, then more. Outside, the last of the ember tinge faded from the western horizon, and true night fell.

CHAPTER 5

“Varkhuls. A great many of them.”

Amric nodded, though he did not need Bellimar’s words to recognize the tracks covering the ravaged floor, or the deep furrows left by their claws in almost every surface of the barn. He and Valkarr were familiar enough with the repulsive creatures.

“They relish digging their prey out from entrenched positions,” Bellimar continued, “and they quite excel at it.”

Amric knelt in the blackened section of the barn to pluck a mangled knot of metal from the floor with his forefinger and thumb, and he held it up for inspection. An oil lamp, he realized. That explained the meager plume of smoke they had seen from