Sid groaned while he pinch the brim of his nose. In that pinch a disturbing smell made its presence. It was a rotten meat kind of smell. The kind of smell that lingers with a bloated stag. No, that nip of expiration was mad. Correction, it was the kind of smell that lingered with a gutted stag. The tang of stale blood was so fierce he could taste the iron.
Letting out a heavy cough with a moist bite, Sid sat up with a hacking spit. It was that same black goop. Odd black lumpy stuff that made the grass wilt. Coughing again he let the thick gunk roll up his throat. A sound like gravel in the shallows of his throat before he spit.
Sid sat in the grass for a moment before another scent touched memory. He hacked again, spitting that nasty wad. He sniffed the air. It was the salty brine of sea water. There was also the pungent aroma of a gassy mule. No, wait, it wasn’t a mule it was a....
Sid quickly looked over his shoulder. There stood Abram and that donkey. Abram had his arm slung over the little donkey’s stout neck. The both of them just looking down on that round naked man. That weathered voyaged looked far to joyous for Sid right now.
In a tired blink Sid glanced the donkey over. There was a hint of remorse for the ear, …well he start to feel bad until he met eyes with the donkey.
Those handsome brown eyes blinked unevenly while a top lip curled. Arieo showed that heavy naked man his blocky teeth. Not only that but he flared those nostril with a heavy hot breath. He even growled a bit.
Sid didn’t know donkeys could growl, he glanced back at the voyager. He could smell that twisted hair from here. He turned forward and looked at the grass. How the hell did Abram find him. Not only that, but Sid was not in the mood. He hated adventurers, players, tokens, whatever. He was sure this man was one of those holy catalysts. He wasn’t sure what church Abram played for, but something about the man was different.
Abram had a cheeky smile about his face. He glanced Sid over sitting in the grass. That salty grin growing deeper with each blink. What a sight. How often does one walk up on a big naked man in the woods. Not just that but damn look at that mustache. Even in this dark pocket of the forest. That bold thing had a mystical gleam to it. Sure it could have been the hot breath produced by that wide nose, but still.
“Bad dream?” Abram asked cleverly with a wide smile.
He retreated his arm from around Arieo’s neck. He took a casual step. One hand under his chin, while the other support his arm. He leaned back and got a good look at the heavy man. Those suspicious eyes thoroughly examine the surrounding area while Sid collected himself.
“Sid I has to asks ye.”
Abram looked around the area. Scanning the ground with curiosity. Those suspicious eyes wandered from there to there. Next those swirling eyes investigated the stained trunks. His chin gave a lovely scratchy noise while his hand pet with pondering wonder.
Arieo liked that scratchy noise his masters chin was producing, it slight distracted his tight eye on Sid. He didn’t really care what happened here. The area stinks, bad. That fat man’s a jerk, and there is no number of parsnips to replace that ear. Or apples. Or berries. And to make things worse, ...the grass here is no good. Damn he was a hungry boy this evening. He wonder if his master had anythin-- …what was that?
“What the hells happened here Sid?”
Sid looked at Abram while the man curiously continued to examine. That question though, it hit like a rock over a flat pond. And what I mean by that; is that that questioning splash caused ripples of follow up questions. Sid coughed again with a wet hack, spitting to the side. Cleared his throat before looking at the forest surroundings too.
- 5. 6. Piles of, ….something. It looked like preserves, had preserves smelled like the green taint of spoiled meats. It was black like the gunk Sid hacked up. Also like the goop of Arieo’s rapid rotting ear. Only these piles of smoldering rot were body sized. Human body. The grass around those sizzling piles wilt and wither, before casually smoking with that faint yellow hiss.
Some of the trees had that suspicious goop slung across the trunks. The bark that nasty gunk was splashed along now course with new blight. Trails of those infectious scars still climb over the lower reaching branches. Those lower limbs begin to droop while that blight reaches further along.
“And where be yer damn trousers.”
His master asked while heavy Sid tried for a stand. The round man didn’t have that burnt sword by his side, and that stand took a while. He must be dumb-- There it was again, what was that. Those big brown eyes detect something in the shadows. It could have been the shadow actually. It was kind of breezy that evening it was probably the shadows.
“And why yer ass be so damn hairy?”
Abram laughed forcing Sid to quickly find balance with a turn.
“Haw-Hee?”
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
Arieo pitched a question. It was a subtle question, but one of a new subject.
“Yeah, and what color be wolv-" Abram stopped before he could finish. He looked over his shoulder. It was a playful glare, but also one that was tired of repeating itself.
“Arieo, I told ye already. There be no such things anymore. So, knock it off.”
Sid ignored the two. Like said before the man was rather talented with ignorance. It was that pulse of pain in his back he just could not ignore though. No pulse wasn’t right. It was a dull numb feeling, but it did have slow waves of discomfort. The ache in the center of his shoulders was still raw. Not only that but his arms, they felt as if they had been chewed on. Not just chewed on but savagely ripped at. Like how one of them cowardly traps would snap and tear. The ones with unpleasant iron teeth.
“Sid what the hell happen to ya?” That salty voice continued to interrogate.
Sid looked at the deep porous welts about his arms. He could feel that same sensation over his legs. His eyes couldn’t reach his legs, just barely his toes. The man had a grand belly. That pain though, it perceived as one in the same to those along his arms. Damn they even swell up along his shoulders. Those deep cavities all had a territory of bruising, each a particular length apart. Each vicious dimple release with, …pus? Some sort of liquid leaked from the center.
It was the pain in his back that ached though. It was that deep pain he couldn’t see. An injury that opened more than just a wound. It would become a scar that was more than just a reminder. That ache was an ancient echo.
“Sid?”
Abram asked, waving a hand.
“Ye alright?”
Sid looked over at one of them piles of smoldering rot. In a blink he had a slight vision. It was a small, distorted image of imagination, or memory. In that blink he saw one of them cowardly hunters.
It was a disfigured version of the hunter, but it was him. He just knew. Even in its baneful shape. The stench of cowardly sweat still radiate from that thing. That hunter though, he had a new look to his presence.
Pale-grey translucent skin cling to the thing’s bones. Black veins looking like sick worms could be seen wriggling under that ailing skin.
That hunter had deep black eyes now too. Glossy black eyes, wide like a horse. It was that snapping opening of a mouth that held the memory hostage though. The disfigured hunter had a wide and unsettling mouth.
His jaw, it hang far wider than humanly allowed. And a nasty, ugly tongue glide along rows of razor teeth. That gross tongue rolled from side to side, harassing each pointed tooth.
Teeth half the size of one’s finger. All threatening to jump from that mouth. Those teeth chittered with the same viciousness as the iron traps.
Sid looked at another smoldering rot pile. Again, in a blink there was another vision.
A thick leathery paw. A paw of unrecognition. It was a beast’s paw nonetheless, and those claws that it had. All four of those long vile things each drip with a foul black secretion. That nasty paw swiped at one of them things.
Linen spread for the claws, inviting those drippy boys inside. Black dripping claws tore into the chest of that hunter-thing. No, …tore wasn’t the right word. That thick leathery paw mutilated that chest.
The torso practically exploded with that horrid swipe. Chunks of flesh, ribs, and gods only know what the hell that was, …a lung maybe? The man’s insides were clearly visible now. While the other pieces flew off somewhere in that tree.
The whole cavity was exposed. Veins, arteries, vessels or whatever that inside stuff is called. I’m not frequent with medical terminology. I am sure though that some would understand what I mean when I say; those broken pathways all spit madly. I apologize for doing this so much, but spit, just wasn’t the right word. That exposed cavity barf. Splashing a mess of carnage.
The hunter held his chest, while his fingers and hands began to sizzle. The thing shrieked wildly, looking at its hands.
Sickly fingers rolling with foul smoke, while flesh boiled to a black goop. Grass wilt with a delicate curling. Nothing like that of the hunter who collapsed.
That man or thing, seizure in the dying grass while its chest cavity boil with infection. Thick plumes of sickly yellow smoke rolled while that thing twist in the wilting grass. It convulsed with a wicked scream, before it just stopped. Body now lay limp while the yellow smoke roll with a bubbling hiss.
The skin around its chest decayed uncontrollably with an infection of sorts. It could be compared to the rapid spreading of a rash.
The skin it looked to have spoiled, growing with cellulitis. A highly infectious cellulitis. I’m going to make this quick, because that’s how infectious it looked.
That rotted skin hived with blisters. Swelling with gas or vapor before a thick black collecting of fluids. All happening in a blinking moment. The gasses release with a foul yellow hiss. That black toxicity that leaked, it melted the dying skin in its wake. Each burst of the blister caused a new cavity of rot. Each splash of the burst continued the path of diseased skin.
Everything that black secretion touched, died. Not an instant death, unless one was a cell. But if one was made up of cells, then that process would be a slow and sorrowing one. Unless that big paw just opened one’s chest, like so. Sure, it will most definitely hurt like hell, but it won’t be so time consuming.
“Sid!”
His master tried more firm. Those big beautiful brown eyes though were looking at the shadows. One shadow in particular to be fair. Arieo swore by the legends of the Stallitusks that one of those shadows just lifted and walked into another shadow. He held a blink tightly just to be sure, before looking again. He didn’t know what a wolf looked like, but that shadow could be one. Those big nostrils on that mahogany honker widened, trying for a smell.
“What!”
That fat jerk snapped. Arieo looked at the two men. That heavy fellow, Sid. He always had that fury about him. When they met. During their walk. Even when they were supposed to be relaxing around the cozy fire. That thick man just had an anger that radiate. Where did that shadow go?
“Don’t like that tone Sid.”
Abram said sharply.
“Sid, what happen here?”
“Abram, just stop would you.”
Sid asked, with a wince, while he pulled his loose hair together. It wasn’t a hair pulling wince. Well kind of, but not how one would think. That hair pull wasn’t in the scalp. Sid’s long hair had unbraided somehow and was now matted to his back. Not just matted but it cling like a scab. It even released a sharp snap while he pulled the strands free. He could literally feel each strand gripping to that pain in his back. That sharp snap was tender, lifting with a crunch like a wound that soaked through then dried. It forced his face to tighten with each release. That tender pain roiled an annoyance, and Sid yanked the remaining of that clumped matting free.
“By the thick sweaty crevasses of Fannon.”
Abram cursed. Swirling eyes wide as ever.
“Sid what the actual fuck happened to yas. There be a god’s damn hole in yer back the size of me hand.”