Chương 51: Roar of Steam

The workers panicked as black-feathered arrows rained, throwing themselves back toward the locomotive in a chorus of screams. Wretch and Edmund rushed forward. The rail was nearly finished, a single bolt left to hammer.

"Get the bloody bolts in!" Edmund roared, shield raised. Wretch grabbed the man on the ground with a spear stuck in his neck and dragged him across the grass as a holler of laughter echoed through the white mist. Half human, half mad. He had hoped the worker was alive, but a glance proved otherwise: glassy eyes staring into nothing. Wretch let the limp body fall. Something sliced through the air. He rolled to the side, nothing came. Damn tricks of the fog.

The workers rushed for the train, leaving Edmund to stand by the half-finished tracks. A man with a hammer ran past. Wretch caught him by the collar, dragging him close with bared teeth.

"Get the bolts done or we're all dead!" The man froze. Either he understood or Wretch's visage was enough. A volley of arrows whizzed toward them. Edmund appeared, shield raised high. A shockwave burst from him, scattering the projectiles. The worker scrambled to his feet and struck with the hammer. Two hits of metal rang and the metal track aligned.

"It will hold!" he cried.

"This is real! Inside. Now!" Edmund roared as shapes flickered in the mist, circling the stranded train. They sprinted for the spiked door. As they passed the spear-struck corpse, a series of forceful spasms rocked his body. They didn't slow down. Arrows chimed against metal. Elenya waited by the door, shoving workers inside with haste. Astrid stood to the side, waiting for her turn with clenched hands.

"Orderly, you dimwits!" Elenya shouted. A whizz came from the fog. Wretch heard where it was headed and stepped in front of Astrid, back toward the fog. A series of dull thuds erupted from his back.

"Perhaps we should go now," Astrid stammered. Elenya seized her by the back of her coat, hauling her off the ground and tossing her inside like a piece of yelping luggage.

"Kid!" Edmund called as howling laughter erupted from the mist. Wretch climbed inside as black arrows chimed against Edmund's shield, the captain dashed in right behind him. The cabin was a whirlwind of tumultuous voices and movement. The other door was open and Dalynja's armored hunter threw himself inside, slamming it shut as Elenya did the same on their side.

"ORDER!" Edmund roared. The echo made his shout reverberate like a haunting voice, cooling the chaos like water on red steel.

"Anyone not a hunter or soldier, sit down. NOW." The workers crawled into their bunks or sat on the floor, revealing the gaps of missing men. Dalynja's crew was intact, the massive dog growling at the door.

"Full speed," Edmund commanded.

"Hunters on the roof. Man the cannons. We're leaving." Fuel was shoveled into a hungering furnace. Boiling steam vibrated through shuddering pipes, and the hatches to the cannons screeched open. A wave of howling laughter slithered inside with the curling mist.

"You hear that?" Wretch asked, yanking a black arrow from his back and healing the wound with a pinch of flame. Astrid nodded.

"You're hurt!"

"I have scales now. They're tough." They climbed to the roof, where the cannon crews jumped into their seats, furiously turning handles and gears. A screech from the rails and they began to move.

"Cannons, on my mark," Edmund called. Wretch squinted into the passing fog, catching a brief silhouette, fast and inhuman, weaving between the pale trees on all fours.

"They're following us." Edmund glanced to the hunters, then to the soldiers. Their machines vibrated with pressure while Wretch covered his sensitive ears.

"Fire at will." The cannons screamed, pressure ripping the mist apart, tearing earth and tree into splinters. The train rushed forward, faster and faster while yelps and laughter echoed around them. Gulner and Dalynja shot bolts at the darting silhouettes. Astrid, on the other hand, crouched on the floor, clutching her hat.

"The mist, it's thinning!" she shouted over the roar of the engine. She was right. The white fog broke into glimpses of dark pines.

"We'll make it!" Gulner cheered. The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Then the brakes shrieked. Wretch and Astrid clamored to the roof. Edmund peeked over the railing with wide eyes. In the light of the headlights, a crude barricade of felled trees lay over the tracks. Their escape was blocked.

"Shit!" Edmund hissed.

"It's an ambush," Elenya growled.

"They have us right where they want us."

"BRACE!" Dalynja shouted down the open hatch. The train plowed into the logs. Wood splintered and bark shot through the air. Momentum shifted in a violent pull. Wretch clung to the railing, claws latching onto the metal. Elenya clutched Astrid to her chest with one arm and gripped the metal with the other, enough strength to bend it. Had they been at full speed they might have powered through. As it was, they ground to a halt in a cacophony of cracks and splintered branches.

It felt a little too easy, didn't it, Wretch thought, unsheathing the Blinking Blade. Edmund yelled orders to the cannon operators. Yelps and abrupt laughter echoed from the thin mist around them. The cannons fired again, exploding with a deafening crunch that shredded the nearest tree line. Beneath the roaring of the metal beast, Wretch picked up something else. Footsteps. A lot of them.

"They're coming."

"Reverse us out!" Edmund shouted down to the train operator.

"We go back to Stonemourn!" Metal ground against metal. The engine screamed, but the train refused to move.

"We're stuck," Astrid whispered.

"Let's keep the high ground!" Dalynja roared. Her armored fighter raised his head, exposing him for a moment. A black arrow punched through his eye, another dug into his throat. He choked up blood, hands clasped around his face. Edmund and Astrid were already at his side. Edmund yanked out the crude arrows and Astrid's eyes lit up as she mended the wound.

"Captain!" Elenya's voice cut through the chaos.

"We're target practice up here. Let me and the rat go! We'll clear the way." Edmund hesitated. Wretch met his eyes and gave a nod.

"Go!" he said, raising his shield as another pelt of arrows shattered against the train. Wretch threw his coat aside and vaulted over the spikes, landing on the wet grass. A moment later, Elenya followed, landing with enough force to make the ground shake. Beneath the train, ruined logs and twigs jammed the mechanism. In front, shifting silhouettes barreled through the fog with high-pitched laughter.

"That will take a minute to clear up," Elenya said, spinning the halberd in front of her.

"Let's thin them out first. Whatever they are."

"They will find no weakness here," Wretch answered, cracking his knuckles. A twitch tugged at the edge of his mouth.

"But they don't know that yet." A series of scratches came from the door behind them, followed by a groan. A shivering worker, paler than the mist, stood on the other side. A form pushed past him. Lukka, a dog the size of a small horse. Dalynja the Beast-breaker's pet, if you could even call it that. It gave them a glance and its eyes lit with fire. Its fur twitched as protrusions rippled outward, bark like that of an oak cracking as it grew into thick sheets, encasing the animal in natural armor.

It opened its maw wide. Something moved within, thorned vines reaching out from its gullet like writhing tentacles. The door slammed shut behind them.

"The three of us," Elenya said.

"Against whatever they are." Neither Lukka nor Wretch answered. A wall of yelps and screams grew closer. Finally. Wretch let the flame loose. His back erupted, his white shirt torn to shreds. Two massive dark arms burst out from his skin, each lined with rows of sharp teeth and glistening with newborn fluids. They unfurled like grotesque flowers. Their weight forced him to one knee. One claw, still quivering and growing, thumped against the grass. A figure lunged out of the mist, covered in slick fur.

Newborn muscles moved. Wretch's massive black palm swatted it out of the air, cracking bones and sending it crashing into the dirt. Its laugh was replaced by a dying wheeze.

"Damn!" Elenya said as she stepped forward.

"Barely got to see the thing." More figures burst through the fog. Bolts whistled from above the train, one skewering a creature in the eye. A cannon roared, evaporating another, painting the mist red. More took their place. Wretch planted both extra arms into the ground and lifted himself. He saw them clearly now: dogs bent into the shape of men, matted fur, slack jaws, some melded together with extra arms or multiple frothing heads. Elenya took the brunt of a charge, ripping through two with a single strike.

"Duck," he called. She moved without hesitation, rolling backward. His oversized claw flew over her head, crunching two hounds into broken heaps and the teeth lining the limbs ripping through a third. An arrow whistled through the mist, burying into his chest. These arms are powerful, but if they get close, I'm easy prey. The pack must have sensed it too. A dozen creatures sprinted out of the mist with exposed teeth, spitting saliva and swiping with sharp claws. But Wretch had more to give.

He switched from calculated strikes to a wild thrash, throwing the arms around him in a whirlpool of ripped fur and broken bones. Better than I imagined, Wretch thought as the teeth that lined the sides of his arms ripped out the bowels of a hound, which screamed in agony. To the side another hound rushed toward them. Another beast shot from the mist. Lukka, black arrows littering the armored bark. The vines from its mouth coiled around the hound, yanking it into a maw filled with teeth.

Wretch had no time to look further. A howl filled with ecstasy came from the mist and a figure shambled forward on uneven legs. An unsophisticated mess of fur and jutting claws, its core bloated and squat, dragging something through the dirt. Its head was wolfish but wider than the rest of its kin. Half a dozen hound-like grins merged into an asymmetrical mess of jutting teeth and eyes. Several extra claws quivered from its back. A long drooling tongue dripped semitranslucent spit that fizzed against the grass.

Nice form… It looked like an entire wolf pack twisted into the semblance of a hulking brute. In its paw-like hands it clutched a massive cleaver the size of a man, the weapon stained with deep red.

"So you have weapons?" Wretch growled.

"So do I." Wretch struck, one arm lashing out like a battering ram. It was faster than it looked. The uneven legs lunged to the side as it raised the cleaver. Its eyes lit, revealing its name: Dagdag the Acid Cut. The cleaver swooped downward. It plunged into his animated flesh, severing one of his giant limbs at the forearm and shooting pain up his nerves.

"A Blessed," he spat.

"Perfect." What remained of his grotesque extra limbs shuddered, then shrank, reabsorbing into him. Even that short burst of usage had cost him a fourth of his flame. He landed in a roll and threw his Blinking Blade in one fluid motion. The beast retaliated with a regurgitation, spitting a string of bubbling saliva. Dagdag slapped the Blinking Blade aside and Wretch sidestepped the projectile. The acid-like liquid melted part of his trousers. Around them it was chaos.

cannon fire roared overhead, laughs and screams from all around. Elenya was to his left, stopping the tide of creatures like a rusted steam valve. Wretch and Dagdag stepped toward each other, the beast's cleaver dragging into the ground and the hunter's claws quivering. It smelled foul, wet fur and rotting breath. The malformed mouth laughed, its long tongue hanging slack between jutting teeth. Wretch flashed a crooked smile of his own.

"Your pack lies broken before us, now come."