The Deep Dark

Tal, Kingdom of Morgenheim

Fall, 8th Butchermoon, Year 1876

Following a wide crack in the crypt wall similar to the one which had breached the canalization, they left the mausoleum, venturing deep into what appeared to be a set of natural caves. Soon they came across the first ghoul tunnels branching off here and there, worming their way into the dark earth. Eventually, the caves lead them to what could only be the home proper of the corpse eaters.

Echser gawped and stared around in stunned amazement. "By Science..."

He was not sure what he had expected of a ghoul warren: perhaps rotting, half-eaten corpses everywhere, split bones littering the floor, or hordes of the undead sleeping together in disgusting piles...

Whatever it was, it wasn't a treasure chamber.

"Look at them riches," muttered Hornbach, his voice hoarse – no doubt from righteous outrage. Echser could relate. Who knew how long these ghouls had been plundering the graves of his charges? Months? Certainly. Years? Possibly. "Must be hundreds of coins," the old undertaker continued. "Nay, thousands! Gold. Silver. Copper – and all them pretty baubles, trapped inside this filth. It's a fortune, a darn fortune!"

Stefan gazed about in wonder. "Enough to feed a family for generations. Several families! The pearls alone are worth a king's ransom!"

Craven flashed an amused smile. "These are no pearls, my friends, but teeth. Indigestibles ones and all..."

Both Echser and Stefan swallowed hard at that brutal piece of information. Only Hornbach didn't react, walking towards a tiara trapped inside the concave wall. "G... G... Gold. The whole darn thing. An' this ruby ring 'ere. An' that... look at that blue stone, lads, look at it. Big as an egg!" His trembling fingers reached for it.

"Leave it, master Hornbach," said Craven, raising his lamp high and revealing more tunnels riddling the walls and ceiling. "They are traps of a fashion."

Hornbach jerked his hand away. "T... traps?"

"Aye. Ghouls are a cunning breed. You can be sure that they displayed these riches for a reason. You would not be the first adventurer distracted by some shiny trinket whilst being crept upon – and in this business, distraction surmounts to death."

The knobbly lump on Hornbach's wrinkled throat bobbed. "But... the sun's still up!" A pregnant pause. "Isn't it?"

Stefan nodded. "Yes, and you killed the guardian ghoul before he could wake the others, so they must be still asleep, right?" Another pause. "Right...?"

Craven's low laughter was an ugly thing. "Far from it, my stalwart companions, far from it. I am sure most are quite awake by now. Can you not feel their presence? Do you not see their eyes glimmer in the dark?"

Echser almost ran back the way they'd come at that casual announcement, his gaze darting left and right, up and down, like a startled beetle. He saw it then: the eyes... beady black eyes watching them hungrily from the depths of the smaller tunnels. First, he'd thought them to be the odd reflection of gem or gold but those would not move, nor would they blink.

"Science safe us..."

Terror was a strange thing. It could be seething hot like boiling water, or it could be cold. The kind of cold that lurks below a layer of treacherous ice, just waiting for the unwary wanderer to envelop him and pull him down, down into a different world: one without air, without warmth, without hope.

Echser's new world... and he was drowning in it.

"W..." Stefan's voice faltered. "W... why are they not attacking?"

Craven shrugged. "Who knows? If I had to hazard a guess, I would say that someone – or rather something – very special indeed is restraining them."

"S... s... something... s... special?" Echser managed to squeeze through chattering teeth. He felt cold. So cold.

"Yes... Packs as large as this one here are often led by an alpha: bigger, stronger, smarter, and more dangerous than a normal ghoul." Craven reached into his satchel, bringing forth several torches and igniting them. Their light pushed back the dark much more effectively than their small lamps, revealing the suggestion of hideously haggard shapes inside the tunnels. Echser almost shrieked, but the apparitions were so suddenly gone, he wasn't even sure he'd seen them in the first place.

Perhaps just a figment of my tormented imagination?

The smile on Craven's features told a different story. "The question still remains though, why our unseen enemy is holding back. Quite exhilarating, do you not agree? Let us find out together, shall we?"

"I... I'd rather not," said Hornbach, voice trembling almost as much as Echser's body. He still took the torch Craven handed him, though. "We should 'ead back."

Craven shook his head, slapping a torch into Stefan's palm and igniting it. "That may be ill-advised. I am sure most of them are behind us by now. They have allowed us to infiltrate their kingdom for a reason, and I am certain they will not permit us to leave unchallenged. Besides, would you really be able to leave a child down here?"

Hornbach blinked. "What?"

"Can you not hear it? Just listen..."

Echser could hardly hear anything over the thump-thump-thump of his heart and the blood roaring through his skull, but Stefan apparently could.

"William," he whispered, eyes wide as saucers. "That's my brother, I'm sure!" Then the fool started running, and worse still, shouting! "I'm coming William! I'm coming!"

Echser half-expected Craven to do the sensible thing and knock the reckless fool onto his behind. Instead, he merely stepped aside, that infuriating smile on his face growing several teeth wider. He even had the audacity to wink. "How do the people of your fair town like to say: In for a copper, in for a crown?"

Echser had half a mind to rip the spade from Hornbach's hands and crown Craven with the broad shovelhead. He didn't, though. Partially, because he had to catch the torch, the bounty killer threw him, but mostly because he almost had a heart attack when Craven's gloved fingers wrapped around the hilt of his saber. Could the lich hunter actually read minds? It was only a thought, after all, only an innocent – slightly murderous – thought. Then his heart really stopped for an instant, as Craven whipped out the blade in one swift movement.

A whimper escaped Echser's throat, and even Hornbach looked terrified. Never in his life had the alchemist seen a more sinister and intimidating weapon. Large for a saber with a two-handed grip and a basket hilt made from priceless Nocturnium shaped like the grasping hand of a skeleton, the entire length of its heavy blade seemed to be worm-riddled bone. It looked too fragile to be any match for a proper weapon of forged steel, yet somehow Echser knew that this bone was the equal of any metal in strength. It all but vibrated with eldritch energies, but worse still was the feeling that there now was somebody – or rather, something – else with them in the cave. And it was hungry.

Echser swallowed hard, fresh fear clenching his guts. "By Science..."

Craven winked at him, then whirled around and chased after Stefan, all pretense of stealth forgotten. Hornbach and Echser looked at one another in stunned bewilderment and fear, then followed after, walls of crystalized excrement rushing past them.

"Madness," moaned Hornbach. "T'is is madness!"

Echser nodded. "Ah... ah... agreed." His legs felt like overcooked noodles, and every time his boot slapped against the smooth floor in accordance with his hammering heart, he was sure he was about to drop dead from fear. Yet still his legs carried him forward, every step bringing him closer to the ragged edge of insanity. Thump-Step-Thump-Step... The tension alone was almost killing him. Then, all too soon, he was sure he'd lost his mind.

"Is..." gasped Hornbach, only just keeping up. "Is that a... a lullaby?"

Echser almost cried out in relief. Not mad then – but what in Science's name would sing a lullaby down here? He didn't want to know the answer – ever – but of course, the cruel, cruel world had to shove this knowledge down his throat anyway. Stefan turned a final bend and came to a sudden stop, Craven slowing down as well, closing the distance more carefully. Echser had half a mind to stay as far away from the two as possible, but with a glance over his shoulder, he thought he could see movement in the shadows behind them. Movement along the floor, the walls, the ceiling, just at the edge of their flickering torches.

Hornbach must have seen it too. "Mendra's mercy. There's so many..."

They both shared a moment of complete understanding – and flocked to Craven like a pair of frightened sheep to their Sheppard. Moments later, they stood at the entrance to a large, circular chamber reminiscent of an inverted bowl. Tunnels dotted the walls, all sorts of bric-a-brac, bones and body parts littering the floor – all just window dressing for its hideous inhabitant, who, even now, was still singing.

Hornbach made the sigh of Ahn, but said nothing.

Somehow, the lovely voice and the familiar song made what they saw all the more terrible. Squatting in a bed of trash and corpses in various stages of decay loomed a creature from the fever nightmares of a deranged lunatic. It... or rather she was haggard but huge. So enormous that even hunched over and squatting, she towered over them all. Standing upright on her spindly legs, she might be ten, perhaps twelve feet tall – an emaciated giantess with scraggly black hair falling halfway down her back. She seemed bent over an enormous sack, no doubt filled with more corpses.

Stefan's face was as white as freshly bleached linen. "I... I know that voice..."

It was but a whisper, and yet it proved enough to hush the giantess. The silence that followed was oppressive, only interspersed by ragged breathing and a strange sucking noise. It didn't take a genius of Echser's surpassing intellect to deduce its origins.

Suction cups. Echser gaze darted to the many holes leading to the cave. They are watching...

The creature slowly turned its head towards them, the light of their lamps and torches gleaming in huge beady black eyes, then revealing the contours of a long face that still held traces of humanity: haggard, like the rest of her body, emaciated, with leprous patches of skin. The alchemist half expected to see a ghoul's circular mouth but was surprised to see a quite human but incredible wide mouth. It split into a grin that would have been gentle, if not for rows upon rows of small, triangular teeth.

"Ahh, Stefan. Finally, you are here and just in time, too. Dinner is ready."

The young man stared, uttering a single word that still was as stunning as thunder from a blue sky. "Mother?"