Chapter 20: 20. Monsters

Monsters

Keir sat on his horse, grateful for the green cloak that covered him. There'd been a nasty cold snap the day before, there wasn't any snow yet, but it would be coming soon.

The cold didn't stop the work. It was only an hour or so after dawn and the refugee camp was full of activity. Barracks were being set up, as were storehouses to hold supplies, the shacks were no longer enough for the refugees. Over two thousand newcomers from all over the region had arrived in the last two weeks. They'd been found in pairs and small groups, huddling in caves, on cliffs, and in the thickest woods, hiding from demons, struggling to survive. Protected by ghosts they had made their way to safety, where after a few meals and a chance to heal they were put to work or placed into the army.

Now many of them were preparing the wagons for the march to Kodor, where they would hopefully find food and weapons to survive the winter.

His bodyguards were going over their equipment, making sure everything was in order and ensuring they had enough ammunition to hold off a small army. Having fought the demons once, Keir wished they could bring more.

The quartermaster began bellowing orders for the wagons to fall in. This was copied by sergeants and corporals, who brought order to the chaos of soldiers, many of whom were only half trained, and civilian teamsters who had never worked in a proper military formation.

At least the draft animals were manageable. There was a critical lack of horse and oxen, the cavalry having taken nearly all the horses, and the oxen killed by demons. What few they had were desperately needed for the defence works at the base of the pass, and bringing supplies into the camp.

Keir had solved that problem by creating zombie draft animals. Many of the surviving animals were injured, lamed or sick from poor feed. Killing and animating them had been a mercy for the poor beasts and created a tireless work animal. When they'd run out of animal corpses, they'd turned to the thousands of dead demons. Strapping them to the wagons had been an interesting trick, but it worked with enough straps and poles, now they had more than enough beasts of burden to carry tons of supplies.

Now there was one last thing to do.

Raising his hands above his head, Keir wove together several hundred basic ghosts. The onlookers cheered in delight, at the now daily spectacle.

At first the ghosts had been feared. But as more and more refugees reached the camp alive, telling stories of demons being slain by their ghostly guards, feelings had changed. Now most of the refugees and soldiers saw the ghosts and zombies as saviours.

Grinning with delight, Keir set the ghosts to flying in a complicated pattern over the mountain valley. All of the dead soldiers who would travel to Kodor were waiting at the military camp below, these ghosts were almost purely for show.

As the wagons and soldiers left through the large gate guarding the top of the pass, Keir sent the ghosts off to patrol the area. There hadn't been any surviving demons sighted within ten miles of the camp for over a week, it was still best to be careful. The camp was well defended by both living and dead soldiers, but there were likely tens of thousands of demons in the region.

Those demons were the official reason Keir was joining the supply mission. The demons were giving the camp a wide berth after their defeat, they wouldn't be as cautious about the soldiers and wagons marching through their territory. They'd need a steady source of reinforcements and magical defence.

Getting into position just in front of the lead wagon, Keir frowned as Von fell in beside him. He still resented how the mage had used the geas, forcing him to answer some simple questions rather than trusting him. The few times they'd spoken in the days since had been less then pleasant.

“Mage Von,” he said, forcing himself to sound pleasant, something made easier by his soft and airy voice.

“Good morning, Mage Keir. How is your school going?” the mage asked.

“Quite well. All of my students can visualize magic now, to varying degrees, Elder Leo and Sister Kaja are very good teachers.”

There were several moments of silence, which Keir was unwilling to fill.

“I'm glad to hear it. Over the winter if you would like to expand the classes, I can make some of the other Council mages available to you.”

“I'm always willing to accept help from the Council.”

Once again there was silence. “Come the Spring, the Eldritch Council wants us to head east, to the Alliance territory behind the Shield Mountains. They're already proclaiming us heroes for our success here.”

“And what does General Ajani have to say about it? I'm not exactly up to date on current geography.”

“He thinks we'll have trouble reaching a suitable pass to march the refugees and soldiers across. But he agrees that it's our best option, we'll need them for reinforcements and supplies at the very least.”

“Well then, that is what we shall do,” Keir said.

“You usually like to have a say about plans and strategy. You don't have any comments to make now?”

“It makes sense. I can't build a proper army from ruins and whatever survivors we might find hiding in the wild.” He was enjoying seeing Von's discomfort at his basic answers. He wasn't even being purposefully unhelpful, there really wasn't much for him to say. Getting to what was left of civilization made sense, so he had absolutely no reason to oppose it as long as it was possible.

“Fine. I'm glad you agree,” Von said. With a flick of his reins the man took his leave, heading up the caravan to talk to someone else.

Keir made himself grin, acting as if there wasn't anything wrong with the world.

***

The caravan of nearly fifteen hundred living, made up of soldiers, cavalry, workers and mages, alongside three thousand physical dead and a thousand ghosts made good time. Keir guessed they could cover just over thirty miles by the end of the day. The road to Kodor hadn't been used in several months, grasses and a few small bushes had started to grow on it, and there were some ruts caused by rain, but it was still fairly smooth and the well packed dirt was easy to march on.

There were many signs of fighting and desperate last stands along the way. Cracked and gnawed bones left where the demons had slain and eaten their unlucky prey. Abandoned and broken weapons, often stained with blood, sometimes still held in a desiccated hand. Trees damaged by small explosives, or brought down by demons to capture whatever poor bastard had been hiding in it.

Keir raised skeletons when there were enough bones to use, more often he raised ghosts. He not only poured magic into his creations, but the anger and rage that filled the air around the caravan. The dead picked up the broken weapons and got into line, ready and eager to kill any demon that was foolish enough to show itself.

They passed a few villages and farms, hacked out of the thick pine forest that covered the region. They looked much the same as when he'd last passed through the area three centuries ago. Some of the abandoned farm equipment looked different, and most of the windows had large glass panes on them, something only the rich could afford in his time. But the architecture, the charms and symbols carved into the wood, it was virtually identical.

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There weren't many signs of fighting here. The people had fled before the demons reached them, heading for the city or the keep. Even the houses were mostly in good shape. Some had had doors broken down, either by demons or scavengers, other than that however they could be moved into and tidied up within a day.

A little after midday they stopped at one of the larger villages, which had a working water pump. As soldiers lined up to fill their canteens and the animals were given a short break, Keir went to one of the houses that had its door torn down.

It was one of the smaller houses, and it looked to be in poor condition even before being abandoned. The pale blue logs were split and cracked in places, the paint faded almost entirely away, and some of the windows were cracked.

Stepping inside, he saw the body of an old woman. Her throat was slit, seemingly by her own hand judging by the small knife still clutched in her hand. She'd been gutted and half eaten after dying. Looking around the room, he saw a shrine to Mother Sun and Father Moon, a large blood stain lay before it.

He could guess what had happened. She'd been unable or unwilling to leave, when the demons came, she'd prayed for salvation and then ended it before the demons could get her.

A cloth covered book laid on the floor, a foot or two away from the blood stain. Curious, Keir picked it up and looked inside, it was the Creed of The Mother. On the first several pages was a list of names and dates, members of her family going back four hundred years, when they were born and when they died. The last names were for three men, who would be in their twenties now. It didn't say when they died. Above those were several other names, all of whom had died previously, carefully written in simple characters.

One date looked out of place. Beside the name Mira Svoboda and her birthdate sixty-one years ago, was a sloppily written date of her death, done in charcoal rather than ink. It was three months ago.

Carrying the book outside into the clean air, he looked out at the village again. It couldn't have held more than fifty or sixty people who were farmers and trappers. The area wasn't known for its rich farms, they'd grow enough for themselves, selling a little extra to the keep. Trapping furs in summer would earn them hard cash from the city. They would have been prosperous enough to have decent lives, even if they didn't have many luxuries.

And it was all gone.

He knew war was destructive, he'd fought most of his life. But there had always been a point to it. Even the few times he had sacked a city, there was a reason behind it other than simple bloodshed. This village could have provided workers, supplies, soldiers.

All the people the demons killed could have been made useful in some way, even if it was just an example of what happens to rebels and traitors.

He'd seen the refugees and heard the stories. Refugees were always a problem and stories could be exaggerated. Seeing the village, knowing the demons hadn't even bothered to loot it for food or supplies, only coming to kill the last human alive in it, he started to realize what he was fighting and how far he would have to go to win.

Going back into the house, he began reciting a spell, using the words to help weave his magic. The corpse began to writhe and convulse. A high pitched whine, almost a laugh, came from its lips. It's skin turned white, its nails grew long and sharp. It lurched to its feet, a loathsome leer twisted its face into something truly monstrous.

“Go, slay all the demons you see. Make them know terror,” he told the monster.

The monster shrieking with laughter, ran out of the house searching for prey.

His bodyguards watched him, confused and looking a little fearful.

“Regua,” Floria said, “what was that thing?”

“A monster, far more powerful than a zombie or a ghost,” Keir answered.

“Why don't you make more of them?”

“Because they're almost uncontrollable. If I ordered it to fight in a group, by the time it was done not only would the enemy be dead, but it would have slaughtered anyone who got too close to it. When it fights it loses all reason and only thinks of blood.”

“So why did you make it?”

“Because other than us, the only things left here are demons. It can kill as much as it wants until they manage to destroy it, without causing us any problems.” The monster vanished into the forest, he could still hear its laughter. “Come on, lets get something to eat.”

***

Lost River Bad Lands

The man didn't know what his name was anymore. Names didn't matter to the demons and weren't necessary for work. Work was all that mattered now, that and living to work another day. If he worked hard he might be allowed to die. If he didn't work, the demons would do far worse things than kill him.

Lifting the meat into a wheelbarrow, he ignored the groan of pain, the pleas for a quick death. He couldn't help the meat. If he tried he would become meat himself.

He wheeled the meat along a path cut in the rock by tens of thousands of feet and wheels, coming to a pit. Carefully he tipped the meat into it. If he wasn't careful he would fall into the pit himself, no one would pull him out, no one would dare.

Humming loudly so he couldn't hear the never ending screams, the clicking of teeth, or the wet slurping sounds that came from the pit, he hurried away to get more meat.

An overseer crawled over to him, it's dozens of long limbs made it look a little like a centipede. “Come,” it hissed.

Putting the wheelbarrow to the side of the path, he followed the demon, keeping his head down. He had to jog to keep up to it, the overseers never slowed to let humans keep up with them. If a human couldn't follow it closely enough, the human would be replaced.

They went into the caverns where the demons lived. Few humans entered it, fewer came out. The tunnels were lit by a glowing slime that covered the walls, the dim light was barely enough to let him see.

Eventually they came to a large, dark cavern. He heard clicking and rattling come from the darkness, a large shadowy shape sat in the middle of the cave. The overseer grabbed him by the back of the neck, pushing him to the ground.

A voice that sounded like spiders skittering across rotten silk came from the shadowy demon. “Answer truthfully. What power brings the dead back to life?”

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