Possessing the Grimstone - By John Grover Page 0,19
the towers was in flames. Moments later, the first of the enemies’ war machines came into view: a massive catapult, which unleashed another spiked ball into the air as Tolan watched.
He gritted his teeth, swallowed, and prepared himself. Sweat seeped from beneath his helmet.
The first of them came into view.
By Thet, himself… what are they? Tolan thought his eyes had betrayed him. This army before him was something from childhood nightmares.
The creatures stopped their assault on the city walls, and turned in the direction of the cavalry. Their flesh was a patchy gray and charcoal, black lips curled over jagged teeth, and tufts of hair sprouted from their knuckles and muscular arms.
They wore plated armor covered in bones: bleach-white bones of both man and beast. Bone necklaces were strung around thick necks. Their eyes were the darkest black.
Round and rectangular shields were covered in chains, femur bones, and animal hides. Battle axes, pole arms and clubs glinted with razor-sharp edges.
Some of the creatures stood on legs like tree-trunks, while others sat on reptilian steeds, whose saddles dripped with chains sporting morning stars and skulls of their victims. Their tails lashed like whips.
All of the creatures clicked clawed hands, gnashed sharpened teeth, and wore hides of bristling fur on their backs. What really shocked Tolan and all of his men, though, and sent the fear of the dark right down their spines, were the spirits that hovered above each of their enemies.
Shrieking, misty forms floated above each soldier in this monstrous army. They were pale-white with spindly, clawed fingers, like ghosts tethered to each of the flesh and blood bodies. These spirits were bestial, feral, with long faces and jaws, hollow eyes, and misshapen forms. They accompanied each of the foot soldiers, and rode on the backs of their reptilian steeds.
Tolan knew the men were shaken, and that terror crawled inside them, but he led them on, shouting his encouragement and showing no fear in the face of evil.
It was a second’s glimpse of the enemy, but Tolan’s mind soaked it all in with utter horror that he would never forget. He let out a roar and aimed his spear.
Tolan let the spear fly at the first thing that made eye contact with him; it hit in the center of the beast’s chest. The creature squealed and fell down, and the apparition attached to it shrieked, as well, slipping into the air and vanishing. Tolan drew his sword and charged.
The cavalry clashed with this unknown force, and chaos ensued.
Two armies collided, with the enemy army’s axes swinging like mad, chopping the legs off Cardoon soldiers, and ripping open their horses’ throats and bellies. Reptilian steeds pounced onto the horses, biting into their hides and necks as blood flowed like a river.
Cardoon soldiers launched spears and arrows, piercing the tough enemy armor, shattering bones, and gashing gray flesh.
The ghostly spirits reached with long, clawed arms, tearing riders from their horses down to the ground, where axes fell and chopped.
Yellow-green fireballs shot through the charging cavalry, burning both rider and horse into ashes. Screams filled the air, arrows soared, and fire crackled. Men swung at the ghosts all around them, but their weapons went right through them as the mortal monsters clubbed and bashed their stunned victims.
For every creature that fell, the animal spirit tethered to it wailed and vanished. The dual enemies were like nothing the Cardoon men had ever seen: they were powerful and fearless. They slaughtered horses with clubs and axes, even breaking their necks with bare hands. The men would fall and meet their deaths by axe or club.
The enemy pushed on, some with many arrows stuck in their hides, seeming to be impervious to the pain.
Tolan raced through the legion of them, slashing at thick necks with his sword, a man galloping on either side of him until fireballs plucked them from their rides in a cloud of ash. Tolan looked past the carnage and saw two enemy mages standing on a catapult in the rear of the flanks, spinning ghoulish flames in the palms of their hands, heads crowned with hollow skulls with curled horns, bodies covered in black animal skins.
Tolan grabbed a spear from a fallen comrade and raced toward the mages. He kept them in sight and hurled his spear.
It soared through the air with true aim, and ran one of the mages right through. Black blood spurted across his fellow mage, and he toppled from the catapult. Tolan drew his sword and howled.
Claws raked