Chapter Eleven: Julian…

“Were you expecting anyone?” Julian asked, tugging his tunic over his head and shoving his feet into his boots.

“No,” Persephone replied foggily. Her neck wound was already healing, but the thrall still had her in its grip. “It must be for you.”

The Vampire opened the door to find Clover behind it. “Have you come to feed?”

“No. We’ve been summoned to the Chancery right away, but your room was empty so I figured you were here.”

Julian was already closing the door behind him. “Any idea what it is?”

“Bad, that’s all I know.”

By the time they reached the Chancery, Julian’s boots were laced and his hair was neatened. He took the ring Vel had given him out of his pocket and slipped it on, running his thumb over the stone made from Yani’s ashes.

“Now you’re all here, we should get started,” King Hrothgar began, already seated in his high-backed chair hehind the huge wooden desk. He looked haggard - his face was drawn and dark circles sat heavily under his blue eyes. Julian and Clover quickly settled themselves between their companions. “Another village has gone dark.”

“Gone dark?” Brady echoed. “Like Bratus?”

“Heimdal is a trading town east of Bratus that we regularly trade with,” the King said gravely. “Three days ago, a shipment of goods we were expecting never arrived. I sent a small scout group out to see if the caravan had been intercepted by thieves or demons on the road, but they found nothing. When they continued on, they passed through a village that would have been a likely rest point for the caravan.”

The Soul Forge frowned, his aura shifting for Sypher to speak. “And I’m assuming they found it recently abandoned?”

The King noticed his battered, bandaged torso and frowned. “Yes they did, but none of the two hundred residents have shown up in surrounding towns, and there was blood found in some of the homes.”

“How can we be sure they’re dead with no bodies?” Gira asked.

“What did Bratus smell like when you first entered?” Hrothgar asked.

“Rot,” Elda replied. “Death and rot. It was sweet, sickeningly so.”

“My scouts smelled the same, but there were no bodies.”

“You want us to investigate the village?” Clover asked.

“Only those of you who are able. Fennix has already struck your name from the list, Sypher.”

The Soul Forge cocked his head. “And who is going to keep me here?”

“I am,” Elda decided quietly, turning to him with pleading eyes. “We almost lost you to the Wraiths. You’re too valuable to lose. Please, stay and heal. Gira will stay behind with Clover to help you and Bennigan research the monoliths.”

Dark brows pulled together over even darker eyes, the light in his one red iris flickering with his emotions. “And let you go out there alone?”

“I’d rather go alone than come back home without you,” she said softly.

“Fine,” he sighed. “But you take Gira. Clover and I will manage the research just fine.”

“Deal.”

“When do we leave?” Julian asked when Elda faced her father again.

“Right now,” the King decided. “Your job is to ascertain where the residents of Mulvenny are and if they’re really dead. If this is going to become a problem we’ll need to get the word out to the larger cities. They may well begin to see refugees arriving at their gates.”

“Alright. We’ll return as soon as we’re able.” Elda turned back to her husband. “You’d better get to Fennix every day. No skipping. And if Fennix isn’t free, Persephone will help you.”

He arched an eyebrow. “Yes ma’am.”

“And don’t try coming after us.”

“Ember wouldn’t let me anyway.”

“Good.” She stretched up onto her toes and kissed him, smiling against his lips when his aura shifted before the end and she found Vel looking back at her. “We’ll be back soon.”

“Relax,” Julian grinned. “I’ll bring your lady back in one piece.”

“You mean she’ll be the one bringing you back in one piece,” Vel replied.

“Exactly.”

Elda surveyed the group for a second. “Gira, you can ride on Cain with me. Brady, do you think you can handle the journey with Julian?”

“I’ll do my best,” Brady grinned.

Vel chuckled. “Try not to kill him.”

“No promises,” she winked.

The flight to Mulvenny was cold enough to leave everyone huddled inside their clothes, the wind so harsh it turned Julian’s cheeks scarlet. Cain flew low over the trees to try and lessen the chill, but winter was taking a firm hold of Valerus.

Brady’s arms were locked around Julian’s waist, her teeth chattering so loudly he could hear them over the beating of Syd’s wings. The Tulpar demon whinnied and nickered, unaffected by the cold and excited at being able to stretch her muscles.

She stayed in the slipstream behind Cain, tethered to him by a sturdy chain secured around his middle. Her wings caught the air currents, allowing her to glide effortlessly behind him and cutting the journey time in half.

When the red dragon let out a puff of steam, Julian unfastened the chain to avoid Syd being dragged to the ground. She whinnied and made a show of prancing in the air, taking advantage of the freedom to fly for a minute before finally circling to land beside Cain amid a copse of trees.

“Anybody else get the same creepy feeling we got at Bratus?” Brady asked, stamping her feet to try and warm her numb legs.

“Me,” Elda nodded. Gira slid down from Cain’s back, offering his hand to help her down after him.

“Me too,” he agreed.

“We should approach away from the main road,” Julian suggested. “If there’s anything in that village they’ll expect people to use the main road.”

“It’s walled off,” Brady frowned.

The Vampire arched an eyebrow. “What, you can’t climb?”

“Of course I can climb. I was just worried about you landing on your ancient butt,” she shot back, flipping her wild curls over her shoulder and marching towards the edge of the trees.

“Ancient?” Julian echoed. “Hey! You can’t make a comment like that and walk away.” He hurried after her, catching up quickly and matching her strides. “Sweetheart, what part of me is ancient?”

“Aren’t you like four hundred years old?”

“Closer to five hundred, actually.”

She nodded. “Ancient.”

“You wound me,” he replied, clutching his chest.

Brady grinned. “Well, someone has to knock you down a peg.”

“Ah, jealousy.”

“Jealousy?” She frowned at him.

“Of course it is.” They paused at the edge of the trees, crouching behind the foliage to avoid being seen by anyone that might be looking out from the village. “You feel inferior, so you insult me to make yourself feel better.” He flashed her a smile.

“I see you were raised to be humble.”

“Cain is going to circle in the cloud cover,” Elda said from behind them, interrupting before Julian could retort. “Any movement?”

Brady shook her head. “None. The gates are wide open, no guards to be seen.”

“Do you think it’s the same?” Gira asked.

“Not sure yet.”

“We’ll look for dens and warrens in case it was an Arachna attack,” Elda instructed. “Split into pairs to cover more ground, but the second you find trouble, yell for us. Well take the east gate, you and Brady take the west and we’ll work our way to the centre from there.”

“Done. Be careful.” Julian whistled low for Syd to follow, skirting the edge of the forest with Brady behind him until he reached the shortest open space between the trees and the wall. In his periphery, Elda and Gira were doing the same.

Moving in sync, the group crossed the exposed grass silently at either end of the village and pressed up against the wall, waiting for a shout of alarm. When nothing happened, Julian listened.

Wind blew a door against its frame in a monotonous rhythm somewhere beyond the wall. A shop sign swung on a creaking chain. The gale whistled through empty streets and open windows, filling the village with sound.

But the absence of life was abvious. There were no heartbeats, no footsteps, no cries from children. No cart wheels turned, no dogs barked. The village was deserted.

Julian beckoned Brady and Syd after him, creeping round the wall and beyond the gates. Inside, the scent of rot hit him. He gagged and clapped a hand over his nose and mouth, watching Brady do the same. Syd snorted and shook her head, unable to cover her own nose.

Breathing shallowly through their mouths, the trio began picking their way through empty cobbled streets. The village was verging on a small town, with enough houses inside the walls to make the streets feel overshadowed and cramped. The square in the centre was hemmed in by a temple to Aeon on one side and a village hall on the other. The remaining edges were lined with stalls that looked like they were abandoned at the height of the market.

“It looks just like Bratus,” Brady murmured, a ridge settling between her brows. “I can smell the bodies but I can’t see them.”

“Stay close to Syd,” Julian replied. “If you see anything weird, get on her and get out of here.”

“Weird like what? The pile of bodies causing this stench?”

“Or the demons that will no doubt come here looking for the food source causing the stench.”

“They eat rotting bodies?” Brady balked, wrinkling her nose.

“You didn’t know?”

“Born and raised at sea, remember?”

“That’s right, you and your band of merry marauders.”

The bear Shifter set her hands on her hips. “We weren’t marauders.”

“Pirates then.”

“We weren’t pirates either!” she protested. “We weren’t sea dogs or buccaneers or any other idiotic slang you can think of. We were sailors.” Her eyes narrowed. “Tread carefully with your next words, vamp.”

“Now where’s the fun in that?” he winked. “If I always said what you wanted me to, you’d get bored and find someone else to irritate.”

“Are you saying you’d miss me if I ditched your rude ass for someone else’s company?” she asked, grinning. After a second, her smile dropped and she scowled. “I am not irritating.”

“I don’t think that’s for you to judge,” he chuckled, peering through the open door of the temple. “Empty. Every damn house and hall in this place is empty.”

“Maybe there’s a den somewhere that we’ve missed.”

“If it were the Arachna, the hole would be right here in the centre of town. They like to start in the middle and spread outwards like a plague,” Julian mused. Brady tracked his progress around the square, sticking close to Syd like he’d asked. “This place fucking stinks,” he complained. “How can it smell this bad and there be no bodies?” He nudged a rotting apple with the toe of his boot.

“Uh, Julian?” He looked up to find Brady’s honeyed eyes wide, all the colour draining from her cheeks. “I think I found one.” He turned to follow her line of sight and sucked in a sharp breath, regretting it the second the taste of death hit his tongue.

In the shadows cast by the temple, there was a girl. Small, maybe seven years old, her hair still held in the remnants of a braid by a straggly pink ribbon. She’d been pretty - beautiful - once.

Her vitality was sapped by the blotchy grey pallor of death, the rich brown of her eyes covered in a milky film. Her jaw hung slack on its hinge, shoulders stooped and arms hanging limply by her sides. One of her shoes was missing, her dress stained with the evidence of whatever wound had ended her life. The braid had been chestnut, but now it was darkened with mud and blood, matted into an untameable mess.

The most unnerving thing about the girl was her silence. There was no whimpering, no wailing, no snarling or crying. No breath lifted her shoulders or ghosted past her lips. She was a soundless shell.

“Spirits,” Julian whispered, inching back towards Brady.

“What is she? Julian, what is she?!” she hissed, gripping his sleeve.

“I have no fucking clue, but do not touch her.”

“The others. We have to tell the others.”

“We have to stay right here until we’re sure there aren’t any more of those things hiding close enough to grab us,” he muttered.

Brady froze, her eyes darting between the shadows. “I don’t see any others.”

“I do.”

“How many?” He could feel her hand trembling on his arm. Her heartbeat raced so loudly in his ears that it could have been a drum beating.

“Lots. Move slowly.” She tried to take a step and he stopped her. “Slower. We don’t want to startle them. Move slowly towards Syd.”

Brady almost made it within touching distance of the saddle before Gira strolled into the square with Elda in tow.

“There you are,” he greeted, striding across the space with Julian and Brady staring at him like he’d grown two heads. “This whole place is deserted.”

“No it isn’t,” Brady replied, still trembling. Julian scanned the spot where the girl was standing and found it empty. The shadows in the doorways and alleys were deserted too, the silhouettes of the deceased residents no longer crowding the darkness.

“We need to leave,” the Vampire murmured.

Elda frowned. “We can’t leave until we know what happened here.”

“We need to leave.”

“My father said-”

“Your father can kiss my ass, Elda. We. Need. To leave,” Julian insisted, willing her to see the urgency in his eyes.

“Why?”

“Because fifteen seconds ago there was a dead child standing right over there and now she’s gone and we don’t want to die!” Brady blurted. “Get your dragon and let’s go!”

“We can’t,” Elda repeated. “We can’t leave if the villagers are still here.”

“And what exactly do you intend to do with the villagers when you find them?”

Elda unhooked her bow from her shoulder. “I plan to send them to the After for the rest they deserve.”