84. (After the Dark Has Come.)

(This story is still in draft form.)

It has been three weeks since the sun last rose over our horizon. This endless night continues, unabated. As I kneel before the king, he is troubled. "Reports," I tell him, "Have started to come in from our outlying farms. The crops are dying."

"Dying? They're dead, scholar, and you're trying to coddle me. Don't." He watches me, a gruff expression on his aged face.

"As you wish. There is... something else of note, my liege." I hesitate to impart the next bits of information to him. Already his burden is heavy, and what I have to say borders on unbelievable. But, as he says--it is not for me to soften the blow. "Strange creatures have been seen in the fields and in the northern forest. Descriptions are... uncertain, at best, but they appear as best we can tell to be something like rats the size of large dogs."

The king laughs, but it is a hollow noise. "I should be surprised," he says, smiling as empty as he laughs, "But I find that very little surprises me, as of late. Rats the size of dogs. Have you anything else, Elvic?"

"Nay, my liege."

"Very well." He gestures, and his Right Hand stands before him as I move aside. "Sir Aaron, take a sortie of soldiers out to the farmlands. Find me one of these... rats, and bring it back that Elvic might study it and learn of its nature."

Sir Aaron, First Knight, rises from his kneel and nods. "Alive?" The question is more for me than for the king. Sir Aaron is a good man, and I have known him since he was but a child. I nod at the king, deferring to his opinion.

"It matters not," our king replies. "But if it is possible..." His shoulders shrug.

"As you wish, my liege." Sir Aaron turns and strides out of the king's hall, his cape billowing in his wake, the coat of arms of his lord rippling with the motion.

"You can tell me little of this night, scholar," the king says to me as he rises from his throne. "For that I do not blame you--you are not an astronomer, the revolutions of the celestial bodies are not for you to know, nor are you a magician. If this is witchery--we may be well and truly helpless. But, perhaps you can tell me of the things that are coming out of this dark."

"Perhaps, my liege."

He takes the queen's arm, and together the two of them leave the hall, leaving me with only my thoughts. I make my way out into the courtyard, eyes on the empty sky above me. Not a single star shines, and no glowing disk of the moon. Since sunset three weeks ago--to the day? I cannot remember, with nothing to keep time but an hourglass--the sky has been utterly devoid of any form of illumination.

In my wanderings I find my way to the castle wall. From there I can watch Sir Aaron's sortie traveling along the torch-lit east road. By the king's command--and my suggestion--after a week without the sun we began to erect torches along every roadway, outside every shopfront and home, around every field, and along both the castle and town walls. If we cannot have the sun, we must make our own light.

The town wall is half a mile distant, but from here I can see the four huge signal fires burning above the gates, alerting travelers of our presence. Once every hour, an archer fires a burning arrow into the sky in each of the cardinal directions. It has been a week since these measures have proven fruitful, but we must not give up hope that there are still people out there, somewhere.

I give the sky one last baleful glare and begin the trek back to my quarters.

***

I wake to a fearful pounding on the door of my bedchamber. "I'm awake," I call out, none-too-polite. "I'm bloody awake, stop your racket and give me a moment, would you?" I don't know how long I have been asleep. I don't know, truly, if I ever was. "I'm coming, damn your eyes, I'm--Oh, my lord." It is the king's son, prince Obellas. I immediately bow, and begin to apologize, but he waves it off.

"Save it, Elvic, now is hardly the time," Obellas says. "After all, the old man has sent me--a prince!--to fetch his councilor. Truly these are mad times." He sneers as he turns away and, not for the first time, I am unable to draw a line from the sweet boy of his childhood to the man he has become. He has simply changed too much.

"Indeed. For what reason am I summoned?" We walk and talk, as it is evident from his tone and posture that there is no time to waste.

"Sir Aaron has returned with that which he was sent to procure."

The scene that greets us when we reach the king's hall is, to say the least, shocking. Sir Aaron stands before the king's throne, on which our liege rests, hunching forward, fingers criss-crossed before his mouth. The First Knight is covered in blood on one side. Two more knights, looking pale, stand behind him, fully armed.

"--tore his goddamn throat out," Sir Aaron is saying as we enter. "Like it was a wolf or a bear, but..." he gestures, at a loss for words, and I notice the corpse before him.

"The descriptions were accurate, then," I call out, to make my presence known. "Like a rat the size of a dog. A large dog. At least, in profile." The beast is solid black, but covered not in fur--instead, its body is skinned like that of a frog, in lumpy, soft, wet hide. "Strange that is has no eyes... You were unable to capture one alive?"

"Bloody thing killed two of my men," Sir Aaron snaps, clearly irritated. "We tried to capture it alive but I was left little choice. We found it eating its way through the farmer Mir's grain stores. It was docile until we tried to net it, at which point it went berserk, leapt upon Alrin and savaged his throat. It did much the same for Goil when he tried to stop it with his hands. When I stabbed it, it died easily enough, but it did not bleed."

"These looks like the burns of boiling water," I say, gesturing towards the creature's mortal wounds.

"Where my blade touched it, it burned and put forth a horrible odor. As well, a terrible sound. The metal seems to have hurt it more than the cut itself did."

"Your sword, sir knight," I request, once I have looked the body over externally. He draws it and hands it to me hilt first. I kneel down, and with clumsy hands I cut the beast from tip to tail. What I find is as troubling as the creature's existence. "You say it was eating from Mir's grain stores?"

"Aye," the knight replies. The king, silent so far, leans further forward to get a look at my work.

"I will not call you a liar to your face, Sir Aaron--I've known you since you were as high as my knee, and as such I know better." I hand him back his sword--hilt first--and look him straight in the eye. "Are you sure of what you saw? It was eating?"

"Aye," he replies, looking offended. "We stood and watched it for several moments."

"What was it doing? Down to the smallest detail, sir knight."

"Eating. It took the grain in its hands, brought it to the mouth, and placed it inside, where it was held while the beast chewed. After a moment, it swallowed. Is there anything I am leaving out? Does that define what 'eating' is enough for you, Elvic?" My name shoots from his mouth like a whip.

"Aye," I say, and with a booted foot I roll the corpse over so that Sir Aaron and the king can both see the cut I made. "My only question, then, is where the grain was going after the creature swallowed. Neither of you are animal experts, so I will point out--"

The king breaks his silence: "There is no need, Elvic. All present are familiar with the basic workings of the body. The creature has no..."

It is prince Obellas who finishes his father's sentence, a look of wide wonder in his eyes: "Innards. Guts. Organs. It's... it's..." He lets the word drift off; the rest of us look on in horror as he reaches out and touches the incision; his fingers come away sticky, and still he has no word for what the creature is made of: a sort of black ooze, like honey or molasses.

By now the substance has begun to puddle on the floor. Sir Aaron kneels down and examines it from a foot away. "But... I swear to you both, it was eating the grain. Where the grain went... Look not to me for answers. This is an impossibility."

The king sits back. "It is as empty as the night," he says to himself. "Sir Aaron, take a sortie of knights out into the farmlands and escort the farmers and any foodstuffs you can find behind the town wall. Elvic will accompany you, and keep a log. Should you come upon anything that is... like this thing, kill it. Without hesitation. Take no risks. Do you understand?"

"Yes, my liege," we both answer, bowing.

"Sir Aaron, get yourself cleaned up. Elvic, find a weapon and armor that suits you. You are not a fighter but I will not send you out helpless. You leave in an hour, make haste."

Prince Obellas speaks up again: "I will accomp--"

But the king silences him with a word: "No."

***

I pull my cloak tighter around my shoulders to protect myself from the cold, but all I succeed in doing is pressing my chain mail into my flesh where it is not padded with leather. "That's the last of the grain," I say to myself as I tally up the total of the final wagon, "With the salted meat and what little fruit we found, it's enough to last a while, at least." We are the last, as per the First Knight's wishes.

Sir Aaron stands with his back to me, staring east into the dark past the end of our torch-line. "There is something out there," he says, holding up an armored fist to silence me. "Listen."

I am an old man, and my hearing is not the best it ever was, but I cannot miss the sound Sir Aaron wishes me to hear: a shuffling, the sound of something being dragged along the road. I draw my sword--though I have no skills with which to swing it proper--and back towards the wagon. "Shall we depart?" I ask.

Sir Aaron shakes his head. "I want to see," he says.

"Sir knight, the king ordered us to not take any risks. By now the rest of his knights have reached the town with the farmers and their families. We are the last, as you yourself ordered. It is time to leave."

"Shortly," he replies, walking slowly towards the final torch along the road. With his free hand--for he, too, has drawn his blade--he yanks it out of the ground and holds it in front of him. Down the road he edges, nervous.

I wish to call him back. I wish to urge him to return that we may make our own ways home to relative safety. But I dare not raise my voice, for fear of whatever it is that made that noise. I climb onto the wagon and take the reins in my hands, ready to flee. I am an old man, and a coward--my place is beside the king, not in the thick of things; it takes all the little bravery I can muster to not abandon Sir Aaron and race home alone.

The knight's voice cuts through the night. "Who goes there?" There is no response. My eyes are not such that I can see far enough to make out to whom he speaks. "I am Sir Aaron, First Knight and Right Hand to the king of these lands. Make yourself known, that you may return with us to the safety behind the town wall."

Still, there is no response. Sir Aaron waves his torch in the air, left to right. The shuffling sound is gone; only the crackling of the torches remains. "Sir Knight!" I finally find myself calling out. "We must be off!"

Sir Aaron replaces the torch in its place and climbs aboard the wagon. "He is gone," is all he says. The knight takes the reins from me and the wagon lurches into motion. The noise is welcome to my ears.

"Sir Aaron, your skin is ashen--"

"It was a man," he says, before I can continue. "Of sorts. A man like the creature I brought before the king. Hairless, with black skin covering his whole body. I could make out no eyes."

I merely stare at him.

He continues: "A head taller than me. It was dragging a slain deer; bits of the animal's meat hung from its jaws. It... looked at me, I think, and then walked off the road and into a field, where I lost sight of it."

"We must inform the king," is all I can say.

"Indeed."

***

"We are being followed," Sir Aaron tells me when the town wall comes into view. He is riding in the rear of the wagon.

"How do you know?" I ask, giving the reins a little shake to hurry the horses. I hear Sir Aaron rummaging through the gear.

"Because the thing I saw did not walk off the road," he says. "I did not want you to panic. It pointed at me, then gestured to the darkness, and several more of its like stepped into view. Being a man alone I did not feel it prudent to try and fight them on my own, leaving you unprotected and unable to bring word to the king."

"How do you know they're still back there?" I query, panic mounting. I have not dared to so much as glance behind.

"The road was well lit," he says, and gestures back along it. I follow his gesture with my eyes. "As you can see now--"

"I can see it," I snap, returning my eyes to the road before me and urging the horses faster. The torches that had lined the road behind us are gone.

Sir Aaron lights the arrow on fire and let's fly. It strikes true--as true as it can in the dark--and we hear a horrid screech burst from the shadows. "My God," I whisper.

"With hope, that got the gate guards attention!" he yells over the sound of the wagon, which is now roaring down the road. "Blessed are we if they open the gate!" He lights another and fires, and again the horrible sound rends the air.

Indeed, we're blessed--or at least lucky. One of the other wagons arrived only just before us and the gate was already open. The knight in charge of it, Sir Penly, quickly leaps onto the bench and hurries the horses aside, clearing our path. He shouts something up at the gate guards; they do little. He flails at them angrily. They are frozen in their fear.

We race through the gate and Sir Aaron leaps from the back to the ground, shouting: "Close the gates! Close the bloody gates, you fools!" The guards finally snap into action and comply. The First Knight races up the stairs to the top of the wall, an arrow already on his bow string. I climb down from the wagon and stand before the gate as it closes; in that last second I can see out, I see the last torch as something grabs it and smashes it to the ground, snuffing the flame. A matter of instants later and something is pounding on the gate from the outside.

"Begone, damn you!" I hear Sir Aaron shouting as he launches arrow after arrow down from his vantage point. Sir Penly joins him, and soon the gate guards are firing down as well. The cacophony from the other side of the town walls is like to drive a man mad. I stand there, rooted in fear, heart thundering, and stare at the gate as something strikes it again and again, something tries desperately to get in. The world spins around me and I find the road is reaching up to smash me in the face, and I black out.

When I regain consciousness and wearily rise to my feet, the gate is still. "Scholar," a voice calls out. It is Sir Penly, from the top of the wall. "Come up here."

"What?" I ask dumbly.

"Come up here," Sir Aaron repeats him, without looking down at me. "As the king's scholar you need to see this."

The climb up the stairs is hard on my old bones, but I manage to mount the top. The stench is overwhelming; I press my cloak over my mouth and nose. "Look down," Sir Penly says, nodding over the wall.

I do as I'm asked. At the foot of the wall, sprawled out, are dozens--maybe a hundred--black corpses. At first, they appear vaguely man-shaped, but upon closer inspection the similarities fade: the arms are too long, the legs too short, the neck thrusts forward instead of upward and the head is too long, with a long jaw. Sir Aaron was right, there are no eyes. I shiver; not even the signal bonfire can keep me warm.

"Did you kill all of them?" I ask. Sir Aaron shakes his head.

"Eventually the rest wandered away," he tells me. "Like the first creature, they died very easily; it is their numbers I am concerned about. Their numbers, and this:" He lights an arrow on fire and lets fly; the shot sails through the dark, illuminating...

"Madness," I mutter. Moving slowly through the land on either side of the road are what look like large lumps of shadow. It isn't until the arrow falls to earth near one of them that I get a good look: black, amphibious skin on a round, humpbacked body, with a large eyeless head near the ground and six short, stumpy feet, which shuffle as the beasts move. "The world is madness." The creature starts and rears, revealing an underside as black as its top, and shuffles rapidly away from the flame.

"They arrived after the torches went out. I have already sent word to the other knights to man the wall," Sir Aaron says quietly. "You must return to the king, and tell him what you saw. The order needs to come from him--but we must pull our people behind the castle wall. If one of those things out there decides to push the gate... the town wall will not hold." He puts an armored hand on my shoulder. "Elvic. Convince him. We are already carting all of the food into the castle in preparation."

"I will," I say, trembling. "You must continue to fire the signal shots."

"Aye. They're our only way to see if anything is coming up the road now," Sir Penly replies, his voice bitter.

"If anyone is still out there," I continue as I mount the stairs and descend, "They need to know where to go for safety."

"If anyone is still out there," Sir Aaron says, looking me in the eye, "Let us hope they do not meet and of our new 'friends'."

***

"Would that you had brought us one of the corpses," the king says, "That we could see it ourselves." His voice shakes; he is a brave man, and was his father's First Knight before he was king. It pales me to hear such fear in his voice. "We will do as Sir Aaron suggests. Had I another messenger I would send him; I hope you do not mind relaying the word to him personally, Elvic?"

"I hesitate, but your word is law, my liege. Once the evacuation is underway I will stay with the First Knight until he falls back to the castle walls himself, acting as your voice." I bow low, chain mail clinking as I move.

"You will not travel alone, Elvic," a voice to my left says: Prince Obellas.

"My son, you will rem--"

The prince holds up a hand: "Nay, father, I would like to see this for myself. If it so displeases you, chastise me when we return." He sneers at the king, a look of bold defiance in his eyes not for the first time.

My liege pauses pauses; then: "As you will." He returns to his chambers without another word, visibly angered.

"You are not right to vex him so," I say as I turn to leave myself. Obellas falls into step beside me.

"It will not do to have the royal family holed up in the castle. Our people need us, and need hope. It has been a long night for them, as well." He smiles; it is an odd expression. "My father is not the man he was, and he forgets this."

"Perhaps."

At the castle wall, the two of us procure horses from the stable master and travel through the town streets, telling all we see of the king's orders. Half-way to the town wall we hear the great horn sounding from the castle's central tower, signaling the people to move within the castle's protection. The prince muses, wondering who the king found to blow the horn.

"Likely some upjumped bodyguard," he says, answering his own question. "He has never been one to follow with tradition."

"He is the king," I respond. "Tradition is what he makes of it."

Obellas snorts, choking back derisive laughter, and falls silent.

At the wall, Sir Aaron climbs down to greet us, leaving Sir Penly to watch the road. "The earth rumbles," he says, frowning. "I know not why. The road has been quiet; the lumpish beasts remain beyond the wall. We heard the horn--so the town is being evacuated behind the castle wall. And yet, the king's son finds himself so far from that safety." Sir Aaron bows, and smiles as the prince. The two were friends, once, but no longer.

"One need not be a knight to defend the realm," Obellas says coldly. "I would see these creatures. May I?" he continues, gesturing at the stairs leading up the wall.

"By all means, my lord."

As Obellas is climbing, I speak with Sir Aaron face to face. "His idea was that the people need to see a member of the royal family somewhere other than hiding in the castle. It is a good notion, I think."

"Perhaps," the First Knight replies, "But dangerous."

Atop the wall, I hear the prince speaking to Sir Penly. "Your bow, sir." With a salute, the knight hands over his weapon and stretches his tired hands. "In which direction should I fire?" the prince asks.

"East, along the road," is the reply. I can hear the bow's string, but cannot see its path. Obellas mutters an awed curse.

"You say they fear fire and metal?" he asks the lesser knight. I hear him pulling back another arrow and letting it fly.

Sir Penly replies, "Indeed, it's almost as i--Sir Aaron! Something on the road!"

"Something new?" he calls up.

"Something old," Sir Penly says. Sir Aaron scrambles up the stairs; I follow, significantly slower.

"Look there," the lesser of the two knights says, pointing east. "Where the prince's arrow fell, in the middle of the road. Do you see them?"

All the First Knight says in return is, "Aye." Where the arrow fell, still burning, we can see a cluster of the man-like creatures standing in the road, motionless. They are no more than fifty yards from the wall. One of them lets out a low hiss, it's arms raised, pointing at us.

I ask, "What are they doing? Preparing, perhaps? They seem capable of thought--of communication."

"Search me," Obellas mutters. "Damned hideous, though."

"That they are," Penly says. Before his words are finished, the arrow's flame is snuffed out, and we lose sight of the creatures. "Do you hear that?" he asks.

Obellas shrugs, and I am forced to comply. Sir Aaron simply holds a finger against his lips, listening. "Wings," he says.

The prince frowns. "Above us?" he asks. "Birds?"

Sir Aaron shakes his head. "I don't believe so." He slips an arrow onto his bowstring and sets the head alight, pulls back, "Don't let it hit you when it comes down," and fires the shot straight into the air.

It flies true in a very tight arc, and just as it begins to descend I catch a glimpse of something black, with wings like a bat--and then the light is snuffed out in mid-air.

"This does not bode well for us," Sir Penly whispers.

Sir Aaron simply nods. "We should leave now." The four of us remain rooted in place near the fire. It is only now that I realize the gate guards have fled--when they left, I do not know. There is a wet thump as something hits the ground behind us--all four whirl, facing back into the town; there, on the road, sprawls a what looks like one of the rat-creatures, with leathery wings sprouting from its shoulders. It is large enough to carry off a man, and it is between us and the horses.

"Let us be off," Prince Obellas whispers, starting for the stairs--but Sir Aaron restrains him.

"Wait," the knight says, nodding his head towards the winged creature. Less than a second later, another of them lands; the first moves its eyeless head from side to side, and lets out a high-pitched hoot. Then, with a clawed "hand", it grabs the nearest torch and thrusts the flame into the dirt, rubbing it there until it is extinguished. The second beast does the same with another torch, and in a matter of moments the area below the wall on the town side is drenched in shadow. The only light remaining is that of the signal bonfire, the torches that line the wall itself, and the new end of the road's torch-line, some fifty yards away. As we stand there, wondering what to do, we can hear more of the winged creatures landing at the base of the wall.

Sound comes from the outside the town wall itself: a shuffling sound, and low-pitched hisses. The man-like creatures, it seems, have come closer.

"Well," says the prince, "Will we fight our way through?"

Sir Aaron chuckles, but there is no humor in it. "Only if you wish death. The creature we brought in slew two men, easy as can be--I'll not go wading into the dark to fight who knows how many, even with all four of us fighting."

Obellas snorts at him, but keeps quiet. In his eyes, I can see the resentment clearly. I hear one of the horses give an uneasy whinny, but the sound seems cut off, interrupted.

Sir Penly offers a plan: "We should circumnavigate the wall until we find a road that is not darkened as such." As he speaks, we watch as the end of the torch-line grows more distant as torches are extinguished. None of us hold much hope of finding such a road.

"We've little choice," I say, speaking quietly. "We travel north, to the forest road. There is naught beyond the wall there but trees; perhaps these creatures have not pushed that way. Perhaps it was the farmland that drew them to this side of the town."

"Perhaps," says Obellas, eager for us to be on our way. "Let us be off." Without waiting for approval from the knights, the prince strides off along the wall.

***

"The eastern signal fire is gone," Sir Penly calls out, as we approach the northern gate. "The wall torches are following, but the darkness is not gaining on us."

"It seems you were correct, scholar," Obellas calls from two dozen feet ahead of me. He stops near this gate's bonfire and turns to face us as we catch up with him. "The other two bonfires still burn at the western and southern gates, as well. The creatures must have massed at the farmlands. Why, though, is beyond me."

I stare out over the town, comforted by the torchlight along the streets and buildings. "There is no citizenry here--the people have done as commanded and fled behind the wall."

"Or they've been taken by those things," Penly retorts.

"The fires still burn," Obellas says, standing beside me. "The creatures have not been in this part of the town. We should hurry, before that is no longer true."

Sir Penly nods. "Yes, we must warn the castle guard of the flying creatures--and the king. Likely he'll want to pull everyone inside the castle itself and bar the windows. Sir Aaron, what say you?"

"There is something out there," he says, looking out over the northern forest. Here, the ground slopes sharply down just past the wall, leading down into a depression in the earth that forms the valley the forest is nestled in. The wall looks out over the tops of the trees. "Can you see it?"

"Nay," I say. My eyes see nothing beyond the light of the signal bonfire beside me.

"Come over here," Aaron says, moving a few yards down the the wall. As he does so, he snuffs out several torches in line. "The glare is not helping. Now look, tell me what you see."

"Something... almost like a shadow," Obellas says. "Like the trees have grown taller."

Sir Penly adds, "It looks as if... it's impossible, but it looks as if we are looking at the bases of trees, as children might in the forest, but..." He drifts off.

Sir Aaron lights an arrow on fire and slips it onto his bow's string, then nods out over the forest. "Watch quick, now. I don't think doing this more than once is a wise move." He pulls back and lets the arrow fly out over the treetops in a high, smooth arc.

What we see affects each of us differently. Sir Penley's eyes widen and he takes two steps backwards, a hand over his mouth. I mutter a curse under my breath. Prince Obellas drops to his knees, a look of dark wonder on his face. Sir Aaron just watches as the arrow flies, frowning. "It's time to go," he says quietly.

What we see is this: the arrow flies through the air, lighting up the tops of the trees as it slips silently by, then illuminating what appears to be a huge, black tree covered in blisters, roughly as big around as a handful of houses all clustered together. In that bare instant of light, the tree moves, jerking back, as if burned--and lifts off the ground completely, showing us that at its base are not roots, but huge, talon-like claws. The foot at the end of the leg returns to the ground, crushing trees as if they were but blades of grass; above the foot is a bend--an ankle?--and father above that, another--perhaps a knee? As the wall beneath us rumbles with the impact, the arrow vanishes into some unknown darkness, and the unfathomably huge creature's leg vanishes, little more than a vague shadow in the distance.

A moment passes, and none of us move. "It's time to go," Sir Aaron repeats.

As the four of us run as fast as my old legs can carry me, Sir Penly asks, panting, "What was it doing? Simply standing there?!"

I take a deep breath, and respond, "We're little more than ants to something that massive! Blessed be that it has not the mind of a child--I wouldn't like to see our anthill crushed underfoot out of spite! But, nothing can be that large. Nothing can be that large!"

"Blessed be that it did not take offense to my arrow, then," Aaron says, as we round a corner; the streets on the northern side of the town are not as straight as the other quarters. "Then, nothing might have killed us." Then, "Stop!" All four of us skid to a halt in the middle of the road.

It is easy to see why: before us, the torches have been extinguished. Just on the edge of the light, one of the winged creatures is pulling itself down the road using claws at the ends of its wings.

"My prince, Elvic, stay back," Sir Aaron says quietly as he and Penly draw their swords. Despite the order, Obellas and I do the same.

"It's about time you did something other than run," the prince mutters under his breath. If Sir Aaron hears him, he ignores the insult.

The two knights spread out, approaching the creature slowly. It seems to be sniffing the air, waving its head from side to side and hooting softly. As the knights near it, I pull one of the torches out of the ground with my free hand and hold it in front of me. Beyond the creature, there is no light; I do not plan on wandering aimlessly through the dark, blind.

Sir Penly strikes first, leaping forward and swinging his blade low at the creature's head. The thing leaps back, though, and the swing goes wide, striking it in the wing. Immediately, the creature lets out a horrid screech, and the skin around the cut seems to bubble--and it lurches at Penly in a rage. The knight saves his own life by holding the sword before his neck: when the creature accidentally bites it, it screams again and stumbles backwards.

Sir Aaron moves in to take advantage of this, rushing forward in a flurry of blows. He strikes the creature twice, and it scrambles away from him--and towards the prince, who merely holds his ground, eyes wide. Penly throws himself in front of it, and the creature collapses on top of him, its teeth and claw clattering against the armor the knight wears.

Another horrid sound comes from the beast--and then from the man, for the claws have found purchase in his leg, and blood flows from beneath a joint in the armor. An instant later, Sir Aaron's sword takes the beast's head off at the neck, and his boot sends it tumbling off of Penly.

Sir Penly grinds his teeth in pain, holding his knee with both hands. Blood wells out between his fingers. "Can you walk, sir?" I ask him. The knight just glares at me.

"It feels like it's completely shattered. That thing was damnedably strong," he says, then spits, "All it had to do was squeeze."

"Come," Sir Aaron says, holding out a hand. "I'll help you walk." Clumsily, and repeatedly cursing through his pain, Sir Penly struggles to his feet, then balances on one leg and leans against Sir Aaron.

"Gentlemen," says Obellas' voice behind me, from where he's standing between me and the darkness, "We're not alone here." He draws his sword from its scabbard again, and bumps into me as he backs slowly away from the line of shadow.

I turn to face what he sees: a group of maybe a dozen of the man-like creatures. My own sword trembles in my hand. Sir Aaron, with his comrade still leaning on his shoulder, says, "Get behind me, both of you."

Sir Penly stumbles away from the First Knight, retrieving his sword from where it dropped. "Aaron, get them out of here," he says, face twisting in pain with each motion. "Take the scholar and the prince and run past me when I distract those things."

"Penly--"

"Don't you dare order me to do otherwise, Aaron. Get them out of here!"

Obellas moves past me, puts a hand on Penly's shoulder. "I'll stay with you. Once you've killed these things, you're going to need help walking to the castle."

The lesser of the two knights hisses out a laugh. Sir Aaron immediately protests, "My prince, I need to get you to--" But Obellas interrupts him.

"Get Elvic to my father. If there are more of these things between here and there, he'll need your sword. Our biggest responsibility right now is alerting the king and the guard to that thing beyond the wall, and to our winged 'friends'." He smiles ruefully at Aaron, a smile which turns into an odd grin. "That's an order, sir knight. Tell my father I'll be there shortly."

Aaron bites back a curse. "As you wish, my prince. Good luck to you both."

Penly simply nodds, takes a deep breath, and throws himself at the creatures, shouting wildly. Letting loose a similar cry, Obellas leaps into the fray himself, and before I can see anymore, Sir Aaron has tackled me up and slung my old body over his shoulder like so many sacks of potatoes. The impact of his shoulder knocks the consciousness out of me.

***

I wake to the sound of Sir Aaron pounding on the gate of the castle wall. The knight has left me on the grass beside the road, a torch propped up over me. I sit up, aching all over, and work my way to my feet. "How long have we been here?" I ask him.

"Not long," he replies. His voice is tense, his words are rushed. "Maybe five minutes. I can't tell. There's no one at the gate to let us in. And," he nods down the road we must have come down, "I can't say I blame them." In one hand, he holds our torch, in the other, his sword.

I turn to follow his gesture with my eyes. There are maybe forty yards of torchlight--then utter darkness. We have been followed. Even as I watch, another torch goes out, and the darkness grows closer.

"In the name of the king," Aaron shouts at the top of his lungs, "Open this thrice-damned gate and let us in!"

"There is no one to hear you--likely they've all moved inside." The knight has already come to this conclusion, I think. He is no longer pounding on the door to be let in--he is trying to open it. I watch him for a moment, then turn back to the approaching darkness. "You need not hurry for my part, my friend," I say, wearily. "I'm certainly ready to stop running."

"Someone," he says, "Must tell the king what is happening beyond his walls." He throws himself against the door, and I hear a creak as the hinge moves. "Slip through here," he says, waving his hand at the space between the gate as he leans against it, grunting. "I will follow."

I hesitate.

"Damn it, Elvic, get in there!"

"In the king's name," I mutter, and slip my old bones through the narrow gap--and behind me, I hear it snap shut loudly as Sir Aaron stops leaning on it. I spin around and throw my old bones against the heavy gate, but it doesn't even so much as budge. I try to lift the latch holding it closed, but it is too heavy. "Aaron!" I shout, pounding with my fists.

I hear his voice from the other side: "To the king, my friend," he shouts. Seconds later I can hear him fighting. Several minutes go by as I press against the gate, desperate for some tiny notion of hope--but then silence falls on the other side.

I take a step back, hands shaking; around me is utter darkness--there are no torches. "No," I whisper. "No no no, this cannot be..."

Something slams against the gate loudly, and I jump. Another tremendous slam. I think there are tears running down my eyes as I back slowly away from the gate and turn, running through the darkness towards the castle. Bits of torch-light peeking out from the windows and arrow-slits are my only guide.

Something moves near me, hisses. I stop in my tracks, nearly tripping over myself in the process. I hear the slithery sound of bat-like wings, and even my fear-scattered brain knows why the castle grounds have been abandoned. They must have come from the east and flown over the walls while we were running through the streets.

I let myself drift left, walking slowly, always facing the castle. I pray I am not noticed. A soft hoot to my left stops me in my tracks again; the hoot is followed by a wet crunching sound--the sound of bone being crushed and broken. A shudder passes through me, but I force myself to continue--someone must tell the king.

I lose track of time. The only sounds I hear are the pounding on the gate behind me, and the movements and vocalizations of the creatures around me. Somehow, I make my way to the drawbridge that spans the moat around the castle itself. I feel with my hands--the drawbridge is down, oddly, but once I've crossed it I find the portcullis and gate both closed and locked. I dare not pound on them, so I slide along the wall to my right, keeping my hands on the stonework.

Eventually, I reach my goal: the concealed door at the bottom of the western tower. I find it unlocked and slip inside, closing it securely behind me. Torchlight and warmth greets me, and as I lean back against the wall, I let my tears flow, unable to hold them back anymore.

***

"Where is my son?!" the king shouts at me. He sits on his throne in the audience chamber; around the edges of the room knights and soldiers and guards rest, some maybe eternally. "Where is my son?!" he shouts again, raging. It is a rage in him I have never seen.

"I am the last," I say. I relate the story of our journey down the wall and across the town, leaving out the presence of that thing in the forest. "Sir Penly and Prince Obellas gave their lives that Sir Aaron and I might reach you. Sir Aaron gave his to see me through the gate."

The king grinds his teeth. "Come with me," he says, turning on a heel and striding out the back of the chamber. I follow, accompanied by two guards. "My wife is dead," he says, opening and closing a fist repeatedly. "She took her own life. Would you like to know why, Elvic?"

"I am sorry, my liege--"

"It was not long after the flying beasts landed behind the wall. We pulled those we could into the keep, but many were lost--townspeople and my men both. We had no way to man the gates to the town, which were already closed and barred, and no way to reach them to open them again." He has calmed some, in the telling. "She gave herself over to mourning Obellas as lost. In that, perhaps she was right--perhaps we are all lost."

"My liege, there is one mo--"

"I found her in his room, sobbing. When I went to comfort her, she pushed me away--and I saw behind her, a passageway, hidden in the wall. I assume she had come across it accidentally, going through his things as mothers do. I left here there, in his chamber--a mistake, now, I think--and entered this passageway." His voice is tired, weary--and old beyond his years. As he talks, we enter the prince's chambers. There is a pool of blood beside Obellas' bed, and, as the king said, a passageway in the wall that I was not familiar with.

"My liege, whose--"

Again, I am interrupted. "I entered this passageway," he says again, as we do the same, "And found this." He gestures with a hand, which then falls to his side. Before me is a scene of horror: a flat table, across which is a corpse long-dead, with a dagger in its heart. The age and gender of the person is not known to me. On and around the table are strange carvings, filled with what looks like dried blood. The room reeks of death and decay, and other strange, unknown scents.

"Witchery," I breathe. "This is a place of dark magics."

The king heaves a great sigh, his shoulders slumping slightly. "How long would you say that body has been without life?" he asks me, though we both already know the answer.

"About three weeks," I reply. "Since the sun set."

My liege sobs, great tears rolling out of his eyes. "When I returned to my wife, she was dead--she had cut her own throat. She took her life--because of this. Because this night--this awful, endless night--somehow he brought it down upon us!" His grief turns so easily to rage, and he slams a fist against the stone walls. "Why?!" he screams. "Why?!"

"You know why," I say quietly. The king's sobs cease, and he looks at me with such rage and pain in his eyes--but it is not a rage and pain at me, but turned inwards, at himself. "You were right to do what you did. But now you see what your son has wrought, and you ask why--but you must not blame yourself."

"He is my son."

"He is a madman." I put a hand on his shoulder. "But you did not make him that way. This is his doing." We stand there in silence for some time. Then, from below us, we can hear shouting, and a pounding noise--then a crash. "The gate has fallen," I say to no one.

"So this is how it ends," says my liege, turning his back to me. "This is how it ends." Without another word, he strides out of the prince's chambers, his sword in his hand.

Ridiculously, I remove the dagger from the corpse on the alter, turn it over in my hands. The blade is wide and flat--it would not enter a man easily. Obellas must have fought with this poor soul before finishing him, forcing this horrid weapon through his sternum and into his heart. The wound is very exact: directly through the middle and into the organ, instead of between the man's ribs. His lungs are untouched--he must have screams. How is it that we did not hear him? Tasting bile in my mouth, I leave the dark chamber.

I move to sit on the bed, beside the pool of the queen's blood, and bury my face in my hands. Below me, in the halls of the castle, I can hear the fighting moving back and forth as the king and his men push and pull at creatures I dare not imagine. I hear the hisses and screams of the monsters, the shouts and cries of my people... but soon it is only the creatures I hear. A great sob wracks my body.

Eventually, silence.

Behind me, the door creaks open, then closes quietly. "Father seemed upset," the prince says. I don't look back at him. "I can't say I blame him."

"Then the king is dead?" I ask our betrayer.

"By my own hand, of course. Where is my mother?"

I nod my head at the puddle of blood on the floor.

"I see. Well, it was a cleaner death than what I had planned."

Only now to I turn to look at him. "A clean death?" I ask. He's closer than I realized, nearly standing over me, his eyes transfixed on the blood. "To die clean is to die defending those who cannot defend themselves. And you wonder why he made Aaron his Right Hand over you."

Obellas chuckles. "Sir Aaron the Brave, the Highhearted, the Right Hand. I'll give him this--when I found his body, he'd piled up many of my soldiers. I didn't expect anyone to put up such a fight unaided." He puts a hand on my shoulder, giving it a reassuring pat.

I stand up quickly, teeth grinding together, and turn to face him--and already the wide-bladed knife in my hand is between his ribs, through the chain mail like so much parchment, through his flesh as if it were nothing. I feel it puncture lung, push sideways. "There is no thing," I hiss, "That hurts a man more than hurting his children."

"Scholar--Wha--" He is interrupted by a spurt of blood between his lips; it runs down his chin.

"Your father loved you unconditionally. His only regret was not giving you Knighthood, not making you his Hand. He broke tradition because you were not worthy. And it killed him. Remember that, when you're rotting in whatever hell your monsters came from." And with a twist of my wrist and a shifting of my weight, I slide the blade into his heart. The prince falls bonelessly to the stone floor, into his mother's blood.

I stand over his body for several minutes, hands trembling. My eyes move to the door. Already the pounding has begun, as the princes servants try to reach their master, alerted somehow of his death. I spit on his corpse as the door gives way and black, eyeless shadows rush into the chamber. When they come for me, I close my eyes, and do not resist.