worse and, with the adrenalin from the recent excitement wearing off, he was feeling as bad as before. His wound needed urgent attention. There was nothing else for it. ‘If there’s light, could be there’s villagers within. One of them might be a physician, or know where we can find supplies.’
‘What about the thing I saw? What happens if it attacks us?’
Brodar Kayne gripped his sword tighter and tried to disguise the weakness in his voice. ‘I ain’t dead yet.’
The granary was an old cylindrical structure set back near the fence that surrounded the village. It was built on a low platform accessible by a short set of wooden steps. A couple of holes set high in the structure emitted the faint glow of torchlight, but no one answered when they knocked on the door. On further investigation they found it was barred from behind and likely barricaded within.
‘Shit,’ said Brodar Kayne.
A twig snapped behind them. He whirled around, his sword in his hands and up to strike before his ears had barely registered the noise.
It was the Wolf. ‘Like that then, is it?’ he asked. He sounded almost hurt.
‘Where did you get to?’ Kayne asked.
‘For a walk. Needed to let off some steam.’
Kayne noticed Sasha and Isaac staring at him. ‘What?’ he said.
The girl had an astonished look on her face. ‘I’ve never seen you move like that before,’ she said.
‘Like what?’
‘Like… that. I thought you were hurt.’
‘Ain’t the first time I’ve been hurt, lass. I got a lifetime’s experience of not dying. My body’s learned to take care of itself without any help from my old brain. There’s no substitute for experience.’
‘You must teach me!’ Isaac said excitedly. ‘Oh, I’ve read a lot about swordplay, but to learn from a legend such as the Sword of the North… Now that would be a dream come true!’
‘If we manage to survive the night I might just do that,’ the old Highlander replied. ‘Now probably ain’t the time, though—’
‘Saw some nasty shit,’ Jerek cut in abruptly. They all looked at him. ‘Villagers choked to death. Some with entrails hanging out of their arses,’ he added darkly. ‘Just like that cow. Killed a couple more strollers, too.’
Brodar Kayne felt a shiver run up his spine. ‘That thing you saw, lass. Think it might be responsible?’
Sasha thought about it for a moment and nodded. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘And it’s out there somewhere.’ Her hand went to the crossbow under her cloak.
Kayne rapped on the granary door again. ‘Let us in,’ he said as loudly but amicably as he could manage. ‘We’re friends.’
There was no response.
Jerek strolled up to the door and slammed a boot into it. It hardly budged. ‘Open the fucking door!’ he bellowed. When there was no answer, he reached behind him and unsheathed an axe.
Kayne was about to restrain him when suddenly he heard it: a susurration, as of a handful of snakes slithering over snow. The air smelled rotten, like a dozen corpses left to rot in the sun for a week. He knew that odour, had learned to read the signs when he served the Shaman as the protector of the High Fangs.
An abomination was approaching.
As one they turned. There it was, emerging from behind rain-swept trees like a nightmare made flesh. Its torso was humanoid in shape but supported on two thick tentacles instead of legs, and it spouted a dozen writhing tendrils in place of arms. They twisted and curled obscenely, probing as if tasting the air. A small and vaguely human head perched on top of the body, but it possessed no eyes or nose or ears – only an oversized mouth frozen in a death rictus.
One of the tendrils snaked out in their direction, paused for a second, and then retracted. Suddenly the lower tentacles pushed down hard on the muddy ground, raising the abomination high into the air so that it hovered above them. The head began to vibrate, faster and faster until it became a blur.
Jerek shifted and then his axe was hurtling towards the horror, end over end. It sank into the puffy grey flesh, splitting it open. From the sundered chest of the abomination poured a torrent of pus, as though a giant blister had burst. The stench made Kayne want to vomit. The head continued to vibrate, and then the abomination was writhing towards them on its hind limbs like some gigantic spider preparing to engulf its prey.
‘Get out of here!’ he yelled, pushing Isaac and Sasha away.