They had heard the call of the necromancer's stone; they had sensed the dead walking and knew that a crypt had been disturbed. They were hungry now-they were always hungry-and the promises of carrion, ancient and new, brought them running, hunched low on legs that once had been human. Long tongues wagged between pointy teeth, dripping lines of dirty saliva along chins and necks.
They didn't care; they were hungry.
They came up along the road, darting in and out of the deepening afternoon shadows as they made their way toward the large building. One man, a tall human in long gray robes, was up there milling about the great doors. The lead ghoul bent low over its bowed legs and charged, arms hanging low, knuckles dragging on the ground, and fingers twitching excitedly.
Long and filthy fingernails, as sharp and tough as a wild animal's claws, caught the unsuspecting priest on the shoulder. His agonized cries only increased the frenzy. He tried to fight back, but the chill of the diseased, ghoulish touch deadened his limbs. His features locked in a horror-filled, paralyzed contortion, and the pack fell over him, tearing him apart in seconds.
One by one, the ghouls drifted away from the devoured corpse, toward the great doors and the promise of more food. But each of them veered away, shielding its eyes with raised arms as it approached, for the doors were blessed and heavily warded against intrusions by undead creatures.
The ghouls wandered about for a moment, hungry and frustrated, then one of them heard the call of the stone again, to the south of the structure, and the pack swept off to find it.
It was a damp place, with pools of muddy water dotting the earthen floor and mossy vines, covered by crawling things, hanging from the evenly spaced support beams. Danica moved cautiously, the torch far out in front of her, and she kept as far from the sinister-looking moss as possible.
Newander was less concerned with the hanging strands, for they were a natural growth, as were the insects crawling over them, and so were within the druid's realm of understanding. Still, though, Newander seemed even more anxious than Danica. He stopped several times and looked around, as if he was trying to locate something.
Finally his fears infected Danica. She moved beside him, studying him closely in the torchlight.
"What do you seek?" she asked bluntly.
"I sense a wrongness," Newander replied cryptically.
"An evil?"
"Your Cadderly told me of undead monsters walking the crypts," Newander explained. "Now I know he was telling me true. They are the greatest perversion of nature's order, a wrong upon the earth itself."
Danica could understand why a druid, whose entire life was based on natural order, might be sensitive to the presence of undead monsters, but she was amazed that Newander could actually sense they were nearby. "The walking dead have passed this place?" she asked, fully trusting that 1ms answer would be correct.
Newander shrugged and looked around nervously again. "They are close about," he replied, "too close."
"How can you know?" Danica pressed.
Newander looked at her curiously, confusedly. "I... I cannot," he stammered, "and yet I do."
"The curse?" Danica wondered aloud.
"My senses do not lie to me," Newander insisted. He spun about suddenly, back toward the tunnel entrance, as if he had heard something.
Just an instant later, Danica jumped in surprise as a screech sounded from the tunnel entrance, now no more than a gray blur far behind. She recognized the cry as Percival's, but that fact did not calm her, for even then the hunched forms appeared at the entrance, the sound of their hungry slobbers carrying all the way down to the woman and the druid.
"Run, Danica!" Newander cried and turned to go.
Danica did not move, unafraid of any enemy. She saw eight man-sized shapes distinctly, though she had no idea if they were priests from the library or monsters. Either way, Danica saw no advantage in stumbling down the tunnel, perhaps running into a waiting enemy and having to fight both foes at the same time. Also, Danica could not ignore Percival. She would fight for the white squirrel as surely as she would fight for any friend.
"They are undead," the druid tried to explain and, even as he spoke the words, the rotted ghoul stench filled their nostrils. The odor told Newander much about their enemy, and his desire to flee only increased. It was too late, though. "Do not let them scratch you," Newander advised.
"Their touch will freeze the marrow of your bones."
Danica crouched low, feeling the balance of the torch and tuning all her senses to her surroundings. Above her, Percival skittered along a wooden beam; behind her, Newander had begun a low chant, a spell preparation; and before her, the pack came on, hissing and sputtering, but slower now, out of respect for the blazing torch.
The pack came to within a dozen running strides of Danica and halted. Danica saw their yellow, sickly eyes, but unlike those of a corpse, these shone with inner, hungry fires. She heard their breathless gasps and saw their long and pointy tongues, flicking like a reptile's might. Danica crouched even lower, sensing their mounting excitement.
As a group, they charged, but it was Newander who struck first. As the ghouls passed under a crossbeam, the moss came to life. Like the vines that had held Danica to her bed, the moss strands grabbed at the passing ghouls. Three of the creatures were fully entangled; two others scrambled and spat in horrifying rage, their ankles hooked, but three came right through.
The lead ghoul bore down on Danica, who stood poised and unafraid. She held her unthreatening posture until the very last moment, luring the ghoul right in on her, so close that even Newander let out an alarmed cry.
Danica was in perfect control of the situation. Her torch shot out suddenly, its fiery end slamming the ghoul right in the eye. The creature recoiled and let out a shriek that sent tingling shivers along Danica's spine.
She popped the ghoul in the other eye for good measure, but the move put her torch out of line for a continuing defense. A second foe appeared beside the first, its tongue hanging low and its wretched hands reaching for Danica.
Danica moved to punch it but remembered Newander's warning and knew that her own arm's reach could not match the taller ghoul's. Danica possessed other weapons. She threw her head backward suddenly, so far that it seemed she would tumble to the ground. Her continued balance caught the still-advancing ghoul by surprise and brought an astounded gasp from Newander behind her, for Danica did not fall. She pivoted her body on one leg, her other leg shooting up before her and her foot catching the charging ghoul right under the chin. The monster's jaw smacked shut, its severed tongue dropped to the floor, and it stopped abruptly, hideous red-green blood and mucus pouring from its mouth.
Danica wasn't nearly finished with it. She dropped her torch and leaped straight up, catching the crossbeam support, and snap-kicked one foot into the ghoul's face, sending gore flying. Again and again Danica's kicks pounded it.
The third advancing ghoul had met equal punishment. Newander held his open palm out before him and uttered a few words to produce another ball of magical flame, similar to the one he had used to fight the torch back at the tunnel entrance. As the ghoul came hobbling in, Newander launched the fiery missile. It hit the advancing monster squarely in the chest and suddenly the ghoul was more concerned with patting out the flames than attacking the druid. It had nearly put out the first fire when another ball came in, this one taking it in the shoulder. Then came the third missile, bursting into a shower of sparks as it hit the ghoul in the face.
Danica held her position on the crossbeam and kicked one final time. She knew that she had snapped the ghoul's neck, but the doomed creature managed to get a claw on the side of her leg. As it fell, its dirty nail dug a deep in the down Danica's calf. Danica looked upon the wound in horror, feeling the paralyzing touch taking hold of her. "No!" she growled, and she used all her years of training, all her mental discipline, to fight back, to force the chill from her bones.
She dropped from the beam and scooped up the torch, glad to learn that her leg could still support her. Her anger controlled her now; part of Danica's discipline involved the knowledge of when to let go, of when to let sheer anger guide her actions. The ghoul with the burned eyes spun about wildly, slashing blindly with its claws in its search for something to hit. Its mouth opened impossibly wide in a hungry, vicious scream.
Danica grasped the torch in both hands and rammed it with an overhead chop down the ghoul's throat. The creature thrashed wildly, scoring several hits on Danica's arms, but the furious woman did not relent. She drove the torch deeper down the ghoul's gullet, twisting and grinding until the ghoul stopped thrashing.
Hardly slowing, Danica tightened one hand and spun about, catching the ghoul battling Newander's fires with a left hook. The blow lifted the monster from its feet and sent it crashing into the tunnel wall. Newander came on it in an instant, pounding with Percival oaken staff.
The fight was far from over. Five ghouls remained, though three were still helplessly entangled by the moss strands. The other two had worked their way free and charged, paying no concern to their dead companions.
Danica dropped into a low crouch, pulled her daggers from their boot sheaths, and struck before the monsters ever got close. To the lead ghoul, the coming dagger probably seemed no more than a sliver, flickering as it spun in the dim torchlight. Then the creature got the point, as the dagger buried itself to the hilt in its eye. The ghoul shrieked and teetered to the side, clutching its face. Danica's second shot followed with equal precision, thudding into the creature's chest, again burying to the hilt, and the ghoul tumbled, writhing in the throes of death.
The second charging ghoul, not a fortunate creature, now had a clear path at Danica. The monk waited again until the very last moment, then sprang to grab the beam and her deadly foot flashed out. The powerful kick caught the ghoul on the forehead, stopping it cold and snapping its head backward. As the head came back, Danica's foot met it again, then a third and a fourth time.
Danica dropped from the beam, letting the momentum of her fall take her down into a low squat.
Like a coiled spring, she came back up, spinning as she rose and letting one foot fly out behind her. The circle-kick maneuver caught the stunned and battered ghoul on the side of the jaw and snapped its head to the side so brutally that the ghoul was sent into an airborne somersault. It landed in a kneeling position, weirdly contorted, with its legs straight out to either side, its lifeless body hunched heavily and its head lolling about, looking over one shoulder.
Danica's rage was not appeased. She charged down the passage, issuing a single-toned scream all the way. She put her right hand in a partial fist, extending her index and little fingers rigidly.
The closest moss-wrapped ghoul, not Danica's target, managed to free one arm to lash at the woman.
Danica easily dove under the awkward attack, went into a roll right past the attacker, and came up a few feet in front of the next ghoul without breaking her momentum in the least. She leaped into the air and struck viciously as she descended. Eagle Talon, this attack was named, according to the scrolls of Grandmaster Penpahg D'Ahn, and Danica worked it to perfection as her extending fingers drove right through the ghoul's eyes, exploding into its rotted brain. It took Danica nearly a minute to extract her hand from the creature's shattered head, but it didn't matter, she knew. This ghoul offered no further threat.
Newander, finished with his ghoul, started toward the young woman. He stopped, though, seeing that Danica had things well under control, and went instead to retrieve the low-burning torch.
Finally free, Danica went back at the ghoul that had swung at her. Her fist thudded grotesquely against the rotted flesh of the creature's chest; Danica knew that its ribs had collapsed under the blow, but the ghoul, nearly free before the attack, fell clear of the moss with the weight of the punch. It came up screaming horribly, wailing away like a thing gone insane.
Danica matched its intensity, hitting it three times for each hit she suffered. Again she felt the paralyzing chill of a ghoul's touch and again she growled it away. Still, she could not ignore the lines of blood on her arms, and her pain and weariness were mounting. She feigned another straightforward punch, then dropped into a squat under the ghoul's lurching swings. Her foot flashed straight out, catching the ghoul inside its knee and sending it face-first to the ground.
In an instant, Danica was back up. She clutched her hands together in a double fist, reached back over her head and dropped to her knees, using the momentum of her fall to add to the power of her chop. She caught the rising ghoul on the back of the head, slamming it back to the ground. The creature bounced under the terrific impact and then lay very still.
Danica didn't wait to see if it would move again. She grabbed a handful of its scraggly hair, reached under to cup its chin in her other hand, and twisted its head so violently that before the crackling of neck bones had finished, the ghoul's dead eyes were staring straight up over its back.
Danica came up with an enraged scream and advanced steadily on the one remaining ghoul. The moss had lifted this one clear of the ground and it hung there still, barely struggling against the impossible bonds. Danica punched it on the side of the head, sending it into a spin. As the face came around in a full circle, Danica, too, spun a circuit and circle-kicked, reversing the creature's spin. And so it went, punch, kick, around one way and then the other.
"It is dead," Newander started to say, but he didn't bother to press the point, understanding that Danica needed to work through her rage. Still she kicked and punched, and still the limply hanging ghoul spun.
Finally, the exhausted monk dropped to her knees before the latest kill and put her head in her blood-soaked hands.
"Druzil?" Barjin didn't know why he had spoken the word aloud; perhaps he had thought that the sound would help him reestablish the suddenly broken telepathic link with his imp familiar.
"Druzil?"
There was no reply, no hint that the imp kept any link at all opened to the cleric. Barjin waited a moment longer, still trying to send his thoughts along the outer passageways, still hoping that Druzil would answer.
Soon, the priest had to admit that his outer eyes had somehow been dosed. Perhaps Druzil had been slain, or perhaps an enemy priest had banished the imp back to his own plane. With that uncomfortable thought in mind, Barjin moved to his low-burning brazier. He spoke a few command words, ordering the flames higher and trying to reopen his mysteriously unproductive interplanar gate. He called to midges and manes and lesser denizens; he called to Druzil, hoping that if the imp had been banished, he might bring him back. But the flames crackled unimpeded by any otherworldly presence. Barjin did not know, of course, of the magical powder Druzil had sprinkled to close the gate.
The priest continued his calling for a short while, then realized the futility of it and realized, too, that if Druzil had indeed been defeated, he might have some serious problems brewing. Another thought came to him then, the image of the imp returning to the altar room at the head of the skeletal force with ideas of overthrowing the priest's leadership. Imps had never been known for their undying loyalty.
In either case, Barjin needed to strengthen his own position. He moved to Mullivy first and spent a long moment considering how he might further strengthen the zombie. He already had given Mullivy a patchwork armor plating and had magically increased the zombie's strength, but now he had something more devious in mind. He took out a tiny vial and poured a drop of mercury over Mullivy, uttering an arcane chant. The spell completed, Barjin retrieved several flasks of volatile oill and soaked Mullivy's clothes.
Barjin turned to his most powerful ally, Khalif, the mummy. There was little the priest could do to enhance the already monstrous creation, so he issued a new set of unambiguous commands to it and set it in a more strategic position outside the altar room.
All that remained for Barjin was his personal preparations. He donned Percival clerical vestments, enchanted doth as armored as a knight's suit of mail, and uttered a prayer to enhance this protection even more. He took up the Screaming Maiden, his devilish woman-headed mace, and rechecked the wards at the room's single door. Let his enemies come; whether it was a traitor imp or a host of priests from above, Barjin was confident that the attackers soon would wish they had remained in the outer passages.
Newander moved to comfort Danica, but Percival got there first, dropping from a crossbeam to the woman's shoulder. Danica's smile returned when she looked upon the white squirrel, a reminder of better times, to be sure.
"They sense the raising of the dead" Newander explained, indicating the ghouls. "The meat of their table is the meat of a corpse."
Danica shot him an incredulous look.
"Even if they must create the corpse on their own," Newander replied. "But it is the raising of the dead that brings them." Newander seemed to doubt his own words, but he knew nothing of the necromancer's stone and had no other explanation. "Ghouls will flock to undead from anywhere near, though where these wretches have come from, I cannot guess."
Danica struggled unsteadily to her feet. "It does not matter where they came from," she said.
"Only that they are dead- and will stay dead this time. Let us go on. Cadderly and the dwarves might have met troubles farther in."
Newander grabbed her arm and held her back. "You cannot go," he insisted.
Danica glared at him.
"My spells are nearly exhausted," the druid explained, "but I have some salves that might help your wounds and a curative spell that can defeat any poison you might have suffered."
"We have no time," Danica argued, pulling free. "Save that poison cure. My wounds are not so serious, but we might need that before this is ended."
"Only a minute for treating your wounds then," Newander argued back, conceding the point concerning the spell but adamant that Danica's scratches at least should be cleaned. He took out a small pouch. "You might be needing me, Lady Danica, but I'll not go in with you if you do not let me tend to your wounds."
Danica wanted no delays, but she didn't doubt the stubborn druid's resolve. She kneeled before Newander and held her torn forearms out to him, and, despite her own stubbornness, she had to admit that the gashes felt much better the instant the druid applied his salves.
They set off again, Newander bearing the torch and his staff, Danica holding her daggers, stained darkly with ghoul gore, and the newest member of the party, Percival, wrapped nervously about Danica's neck and shoulders.