Serpents of the Grave

The shield-hall of King Arnan lay wrapped in winter’s cloak, and silence filled the long nights as the snow gathered. The hearthmen remained inside, drinking and keening their weapons as they waited for spring, but there was a hollow sound to their laughter, and men watched the shadows, for there was a curse on the Kingdom of Hadrad, and evil stalked the great hall, where a blinded king lay helpless before his dying fire.

Arnan had never recovered his sight after he had been accursed, and now even though men still called him king, in truth he ruled nothing. Old women tended him, and his only guard was an old man almost too weak to bear his shield. Men whispered that the doom of the Undergods followed him, and no power could aid him.

Thane Crune was the man who truly ruled here, yet his power was faded now. He had led the great fleet north to Vathran to mete justice upon Hror, but the battle had been a terrible defeat, and many upon many warriors had not returned from across the sea. Crune himself had been sorely wounded, and it was whispered that he had fled the field, abandoning those who followed him. Even now he lay abed, unable to rise or fight. Some believed he would die, and that perhaps he was cursed as well.

And now, in the fallow deeps of winter, a new darkness stalked the hall. Here in the shadowed great hall, death moved unseen. By night men lay with their mail on, swords close to hand, and yet too many times bodies were found when the day came. Men and women both were found ripped apart and left in pools of blood. The bodies sometimes bore rent armor and broken swords, and so all men believed that some spawn of the underworld stalked the nights.

No one would speak of it, as though to utter it would give it power. Men worked by day, close to the fires, to grind a keener edge on their swords and to carve on the steel the sign of the Speargod, so that he might deliver them and make mortal-wrought steel deadly against the unseen powers of the night.

Haldr went forth by the light of day to hew more wood for the fires. He had been a guard of the king, and it was he who had failed to slay Crune in single combat and led the kingdom into darkness and ruin. No man spoke this accusation, but he held it in his heart. He blamed himself for all that had passed, all the dead, and now he did penance for it. He was no hearthman now; he cut wood and hauled water and spent the watches of the night listening for the footfalls of evil in the shadows.

He walked with a limp, now. The leg wound Crune gave him with his treacherous dagger had not healed properly, and it still pained him. Under his cloak, his back was scaled like a serpent by the burn-marks left by his mail when it was heated by the fire. It hurt him now as though it were still fresh, and it woke him sometimes in the night from dreams of flame.

He cast the load of wood down in the pile beside the firepit, stacked it well, and then turned and went back for more. He did not look any man in the eye, and he avoided even the serving women. He knew the king slumbered in his chambers like a dotard awaiting his death, and he cursed himself anew for it each time he passed the seared place beside the fire where he had failed.

Outside, the snow had been laboriously cleared away to make a path. It was more like a tunnel, as the snow was heaped up so high on each side even he could not see over it. The sky was cold and low and gray as old iron, and he knew more snow would fall by nightfall, or soon after. He waded out to the chopping block and took up the axe again.

He heard a sound then, like a wolf’s howl, but lower, so it was more like the moan of a dying man. It came from far away, and he stood on the block so he might look over the snow and toward the forest. Draped in snow, the woods looked almost black, the shadows brooding beneath the weighted boughs. He stood for a moment and watched, and it seemed to him something shadowed moved in the hidden darkness beneath the trees. Night was coming, and it was hungry.

o0o

With darkness the cold pressed against the walls of the shield-hall, and men huddled close to the fires for warmth as the chill crept in. The inside of the hall itself became a strange, dark place, the pillars like the boles of ancient trees, as though the forest itself had invaded and half-devoured this place for men. The darkness away from the seething fires was as mysterious and cruel as the places between the stars, and the men gripped their swords and would not take off their armor, and they looked out into the dark like men camped in a wilderness, seeking for the glimmer of inhuman eyes.

Haldr kept away from the fire, his back to the light, looking out into the dark. He felt something tonight, a sensation creeping against his flesh that spoke of something inimical out in the night, and he resolved he would not lie down and await the touch of death. Perhaps he would die, but he would die with sword in hand and with his eyes open. He sat with his sword bared across his legs, running his thumb up and down the edge, feeling the sharpness of it, the small nicks and scratches on the well-worn steel. His mail shirt lay heavy on his shoulders, and the scars of his burns seared him as though the metal were still hot from the flames.

Night came down and wind bellowed against the walls, shaking the timbers of the roof high above. Men looked upward to the dark and shuddered; only Haldr would not look away from the darkness. He kept watch with his hand on his sword, and so he was gifted to see the darkness move. Something stirred there like black smoke, coiling away from the light, and then he saw red gleams like eyes.

He stood, shrugging off his cloak, and he took the hilt of his sword in both hands and braced himself. He did not cry out, gave no warning to the others. It was his wish to die in the first rush of the unseen, and he would not risk other men saving him from the fate he sought.

It came then, striding on long, half-seen legs, hunched and long-jawed. He saw light gleam on black fangs, saw venom drip to the floor and smoke there like embers. Claws marked the golden boards, and Haldr lifted his sword and planted his feet wide, and as the thing sprang he rushed to meet it with a battle cry.

He could not see the whole shape of the thing, and it roared over him like a shadow made of talons and teeth. He smote a blow against it and his sword broke as though it were made from ice. The jaws snapped for him as he was shouldered aside, and he saw them close before his face. He felt the cold breath, and deadly slaver spattered his face and burned there like fire. A claw crushed him down, and he felt the talons pierce his mail and score his flesh, and then it was gone, and he saw the shadow of it rear up over the fire as men screamed and died.

Blood gouted over the fire and the floor, and men tried to fight but were reaped down and torn apart. It made a sound, like black laughter, and then it moved like smoke, up the heavy wooden pillars and into the shadows above, and it slipped through the smoke hole and into the night. Haldr looked up and saw its eyes one more time, and he knew it mocked him, and then it was gone.

o0o

When the day came, they had gathered the dead, and there were six men wrapped in their cloaks and laid on their shields. Haldr’s mail was rent and he bore new wounds, but none of them dire. His face was burned by the venom, but it was a small pain compared to the burns on his back. He watched them gather the slain, and then he helped pile the wood for the funeral pyre. It was winter, and men grudged the wood that might have been used to keep the cold at bay, but none wanted the savaged bodies to remain.

They waited for word from the king, but he did not emerge from his chambers. Crune lay in his bed, still nursing his wounds, and there was no one to lead. Haldr watched the pyre begin to smoke and blaze in the gray daylight, the smoke turning black as the fire feasted on the dead, and he resolved he would not wait in this place of fear and leaderless men. He would go forth and seek the enemy, and there he would meet the end he wished.

No one saw him gather his mail and don it, the rips in the mesh stitched up with rawhide. He put on his helm and heavy fur cloak, slung his old shield on his back. He took a sword from one of the dead and wore it at his side, and he took a spear from the many stacked against the walls of the shield-hall, and with it as a stave he went forth into the snow.

He did not know where to seek a monster that hunted in darkness, but he knew one who might know the way. He turned his footsteps inland, away from the sea, and though his wounded leg pained him, he forced his way through the knee-deep snow, through the rocks and up into the hills behind the hall. The gray sky lay low and flecks of snow drifted down. Dark clouds hovered out over the forest, as though awaiting the coming of night.

He sought through the black, twisted trees, and he caught the scent of smoke, the reek of strange herbs, and he followed them. No other man would dare to seek the weirwoman Grialle, but Haldr did not care if he died, so long as he died well. He followed the scent until he came to her cave, where sullen black smoke trailed out with a bitter smell, and he took his shield and beat his spear-haft against it, making a ringing sound in the silent hills.

There was a long silence, the sound echoing away, and then he beat another three times upon the shield rim, and he saw motion within the smoke and the weirwoman emerged. She was taller than he had imagined, with pale skin and black hair tied in magical knots and hung with dried flowers. There was a beauty in her, though it was a cold beauty. She wore a black cloak, and went barefoot, even when she stepped into the snow.

“Who is this that seeks his grave in the winter?” she said. “Who is this that comes thus to my door?”

“My name is Haldr, and I do not care if you know it. I am come from King Arnan’s hall to seek your wisdom, for I do hunt for my own grave, but I will not lie down before I am done.” He planted his spear hard in the cold earth and waited, looking on her pale face.

She looked on him for a moment, as if considering, and then she nodded. “What do you seek, hearthman of the king?”

“A beast stalks the hall of the king by night. It has killed before, but last night it came full-grown into the hall and slew six men. I broke my sword against it and its venom scarred my face.” He lifted his helm to show her the marks it had left. “I would know where the beast lairs by day, and I would know how to slay it.”

She laughed, a dry, jagged sound. “Why would I speak of that? What care I for the men of the king? I cursed him, and I curse him still!”

Before he could think on it, Haldr leaped on her, drawing his dagger from his side, and he struck her down with his shield and then pinned her against the stone, blade to her throat. “It was you who cursed the king? I will let out your life!”

“It will not save him!” she cried, trying to push away from him. “And it was not my wish that accursed him, it was the one named Crune! He sought my power to call up the dark gods, and so I did! Yet he has not repaid me as he promised! I warned him!”

Haldr drew the knife back from her flesh. “It was Crune? Speak! Tell me all!”

“I will, if you spare me,” she said. “Crune has wronged us both, and perhaps we may aid one another, with no need for blood.”

Haldr did not let her rise. “Tell me, and perhaps I will spare you.”

She looked at him with her pale blue eyes, the color of the winter sky. “Crune came to me, seeking a cursing. For him I called on the dark powers, and set a curse upon king Arnan. I told Crune there would be a price to be paid in blood, and he promised me sacrifices, but he has done nothing. Now to harrow him I planted serpent bones in the grave of an ancient warrior, and the Undergods have sent a wraith to take blood until they are sated.” She gripped his arm. “It hunts me as well. At night I hear it. I cannot control it, nor turn it aside. I thought it would slay Crune and return to the dark, but it has not.”

Haldr let her go, stood above her. “If it is slain, will the king recover?”

She shook her head. “That I cannot know. The cursing was powerful, and done by the hand of one I dare not name.”

“Name it then,” Haldr said, holding up his dagger. “Name the cursed god and be done with it.”

Slowly, she stood, pressed back against the wall of her cave. “You know not what you ask, son of men. You hallow and bow to the Speargod – you do not know the old gods.”

“I have heard their names,” he said. The foul ones who were the gods of the old races, who men drove away so they hid beneath the earth. I know Sceatha, the Worm, I know Thurr, the Flesh-Eater, and Marrow, the Cold Lady.”

She laughed again. “You do not know the most terrible of them. This was the curse of Vraid, the Deathless. The serpent who gnaws at the heart, the worm who sleeps under the earth. The dead are his food and his harvest. He is why men burn their dead, for those buried in wormy earth are ever his slaves. They hunger for life even as he does.” She stepped closer and grasped his arm. “It is his son who haunts the dark forest, one of his children who grew from the serpent bones and now reaches his full strength.”

“Can he be slain?” Haldr said.

“Perhaps, but the attempt will claim your life,” she said.

“Show me how to kill him, and tell me where he lies,” he said. “I care not for my life. I will do honor for my king. The king you brought low with your unclean magic. I should kill you for that.”

“Perhaps,” she said. “Perhaps you will.” She let her black hair fall and cover her face. “But not today. Come within, and I will show you what you need. Come quickly, for the day is fleeing.”

o0o

The wind was beginning to moan as he made his way deeper into the hills, toward the black mantle of the ancient forest. Already he saw the marks of the old and forgotten tombs scattered in among the ebon trunks. Snow drifted down, and he passed the fallen stones and worn-away carvings of beasts and dark gods. These hills had been a graveyard for the long-dead race of men who once dwelled here, and it was towards one of their great tombs that Haldr made his way.

Night was coming, but he did not care for that. He did not intend to return. He hurried only so he would be able to see to find what he sought. Once he was beneath the trees, the snow was less, and he moved more quickly. He used his spear as a stick to prop himself up, as his wounded leg was aflame with pain and slowed him.

He came to a hollow, sheltered from the wind, and up the slope he saw the black trees and the ancient stone menhirs that marked the path to the dread grave. Here would do for what he required. He planted his spear in the earth and set down his shield, and then he gathered dead wood from the ground and heaped it up into a bonfire at the center of the hollow. When it was as tall as he, Haldr bent down and took a small pot from his belt, and within the pot was a coal nestled deep in packed dry grass.

He spilled the grass at the edge of the fire and cast the coal into it, blew gently until the grass began to burn. He took a stick and guided the flames until they began to crawl up the twisted, dead branches. He felt the heat against his face, and it was welcome.

Now he must be quick. He drew his sword and took from his belt a small flask the witch had given him, and then he poured the black, tarry poison within over the steel of the blade. He took up a dead leaf and smeared the deadly stuff over the sword, careful not to touch it. When it was done he coated his spearpoint as well, and then the stuff was gone. He threw the flask away and took spear and sword and thrust them into the fire, and the flames turned green as they hissed over the poisoned steel.

He flinched back from the bitter stink of the venom, and then he drew the weapons out of the flame and saw them stained with shadow, like blood in water that seemed to move. He sheathed his sword and took up his spear and shield, just as he felt something cold watching him from the drawing dark. He stood with his back to the fire, lifted his arms and shouted his battle cry once again. He bellowed into the darkness, and the darkness came.

He saw it, like a piece of the forest that moved. It came down the hillside toward him, long-limbed and swift and many-eyed. A son of Vraid indeed, the reptilian demon that lurked under the earth and feasted on unhallowed graves. Haldr braced his spear and lifted his shield, holding it close to his side. He knew it would not buy him more than a moment, but perhaps a moment was all he required.

He saw the long head, like a skull covered with black carrion flesh. Teeth dripped venom, and his face burned in answer. He shifted his grip on his spear, holding it ready, and when the monster lunged for him, he hurled it with all his power.

The thing had not expected that, and the envenomed spearpoint flashed in the light and then it plunged into dark flesh, hissing like red-hot iron plunged into a flame. The night creature screamed and recoiled from the pain, clawing the spear-haft into splinters before it could dig the point from its body. Halr smelled the acid stink of its blood, and then he drew his sword and charged.

The thing rose up before him like a pillar of darkness, flailing many limbs. He ducked behind his shield and a clawed hand struck it with terrible force and shattered the elderwood planks. Haldr reeled back, then gathered himself and rushed in. He struck a furious blow with his poisoned sword, and the darkened steel cut deep. He ripped it free and the night thing threw its weight against him and sent him crashing back into the fire.

He felt the embrace of the flames again, felt them sear his flesh, but he held fast to his sword and burst free, scattering blazing embers in his wake. The pain seemed little to him, and he ignored it, seeking again for a death in honor.

Haldr sought his enemy and saw it was fled, leaving a trail of black blood smoking on the earth. He had struck true after all. His seared cloak and armor smoked in the cold air as the night wind bellowed overhead. He gripped his sword and followed the trail, knowing where it had to lead.

He stalked the trail of blood up the stony hillside, following the stain by the reek of the underworld blood. He climbed between deformed trees, until the slope became an ancient stairway carved into the rock and half-buried. He ascended between dark menhirs that gleamed with witchfire, and then he came to the ancient place of unquiet graves.

Standing stones ringed it in, and even in the cold night a mist clung to the ground, coiling over the earthen mounds. Some of the mounds were covered in stone, some half-buried by ages and layers of leaves. One was broken open, like an egg ripped apart from within, and there he found the beast hunched against the pain of its wounds, eyes blazing in the dark.

There they fought their death-battle, the thing’s claws tearing at him, drawing his blood but never stopping him. He struck again and again with his venomed sword, hacking the unclean thing apart with terrible blows that sheared through the cold flesh. He hacked off its limbs and rent its body, and at last he drove the edge of his blade through the skull, darkening the gleaming eyes, and the steel snapped and left the shard embedded in the thing as it sank down upon the defiled ground and was still, the shadowy flesh bleeding away.

o0o

Haldr staggered away from the stone circle, bleeding from a dozen wounds, his breath like a bellows in his chest, gasping out steam as though he had devoured his own fire. He was wrenched and exhausted, but though the cold and the pain ate at him, he did not die.

He fought his way back down the hill, and fell at last to the earth beside his bonfire. The winds howled above the trees, but here he was protected. The fire would keep him warm. He huddled beneath his scorched cloak, and he drew his dagger and gripped it tight. Perhaps he would not die here tonight. If he lived to see the day, he would return to the king’s hall, and there he would find Thane Crune and cut his throat. Let the one who had called down the curse pay for it with his own blood. Haldr knew not what would come after such a deed, but if he died, he would die knowing he had avenged his king.