They had returned to the small grove of trees that fringed the coast, knowing the boat was only a few hours trek from where they had set up camp. If things were as bad as everyone said, escape was not far away. Wendell had collected a pile of old wood to build a decent fire. He sat on one knee upon the forest floor, stacking the shorter pieces to stand very similar to a teepee, with enough room between two of the pieces at the front to reach in with his hand. At the centre of the fire he added a ball of knotted, dry-grass and a few lifeless twigs.

From his bag, he fetched his tinder box and struck a flame, shielding it from the night air, his left hand cupped as he placed it with care inside the stacked pile of wood. The grass caught with ease and filled the small space with smoke, causing the man to dip low and blow, aiding the flames. It took two attempts, with the second seeing to it that the twigs sparked to life, more and more added until the flames were strong enough to lick the underside of the logs.

Soon they had a roaring fire, burning through anything they deemed worthy to challenge it with. A rabbit Wendell had caught and skinned earlier that afternoon, was placed in an iron skillet and set on top of the flames once the fire had burned the first lot of wood down to embers. Wendell made sure the flames were kept fed while the flesh of the rabbit sizzled, its headless body shrinking slowly before his eyes. It was a pity they had no butter, he thought, or salt and pepper to add flavour. Instead the carcass was left to cook in its own juices, the smell enticing enough.

“Supper isn’t far away,” Wendell said, turning to seek out Kes’tral.

Kes’tral stood with her back to the campfire. Her pale gaze trained on the dark trees as they shifted in a gentle breeze. The leaves seemed to rattle, shaking as the wind moved through. What was out there? She wondered. There was something, a strangeness that she couldn’t put her finger on. It made her feel nauseated, just like the time she had pulled infection from a wound on Wendy’s arm. The sensation was similar to being drunk, or hungover. It lingered like a bad taste at the back of her mouth. So she stood, searching, listening and trying to work out what it was that had everyone they came across, racing from the land in fear.

Wendy has convinced her to return with him to the shore, but really, she wanted to go inland. If there was an infection in this land then she would help the world fight back.

He called and she turned and was confronted by the stink of cooked flesh. She bent, picked up her bag and moved closer to the fire. Dropping down beside the flames with a whumph, Kes pulled a selection of herbs from the pack. Their scent was stronger then the rabbit, something akin to garlic.

“Wild ransom,” she explained and offered them to the man. “You want them?” It was a long, grass like plant which was a pale white at the bottom and green on top.

The low sizzle as meat cooked in the skillet and the odd crackle of flames had distracted the man from the fact that he could hear nothing else of their surroundings. Not even the leaves shivered overhead and, though Wendell thought he had imagined the wind, sitting so close to the fire, he realised all of a sudden how hot it was without it.

Cautious of the heat that radiated through the flesh of the rabbit, he took it by one of its severed ends and flipped it in the pan. The movement was swift and well practiced, seeing to it that both sides of the carcass would be browned evenly before he added enough water to make sure the meat was cooked through properly without burning their meal.

Perhaps the wind had not stopped and he had just imagined it. Maybe, he thought, it was just hotter near the fire because Kes’tral had moved to join him. She offered up herbs and he nodded his agreement, anything to lift the flavour of the meal was worth trying.

“Sounds good,” he said, accepting her offering.

He bunched the herb and twisted them between his hands to break the lot in two before it went into the skillet, followed by a cup and a half of fresh water from his canteen. Wendell chose not to feed any more wood to the fire pit, instead allowing it to burn down while the rabbit was left to simmer away.

When the pirate got to his feet, he turned, not sure why. Kes’tral had said the land was sick, had She sensed his unease too? Wendell stepped over to his pack and took up his torch. He held it against the flames that remained until the torch caught light and he was able to raise it to a comfortable height. Just as he suspected, the flames did not fight and bend in the breeze, for the wind had completely fallen away in a matter of seconds.

He looked at Kes’tral, brow knitted with concern. “I have a strange feeling,” he sad, and ducked, taking up his long sword in his free hand. “I think something might be out there.”

There was something comfortable in the way they communicated with one another. After all, they had been travelling together for over a season so it had been important to learn all those verbal shortcuts. Kes knew that she irritated Wendy, but she also knew that the man took himself far too seriously. At least he trusted her.

The ransom was thrown in the skillet and she joined him as he stood. She curled her hand around the wooden staff, leaning against it. “Yes,” the women replied, quiet. “There is something…” the night was eerie with the wind missing. But it meant that she could hear more clearly. What was that noise? It sounded like a spider, though a spider had never been so loud.

She darted her hand out, touching Wendy on the arm as a long, spindly leg came into view, creeping across the leaves towards them. Bigger than any spider she had seen, it was the size of a small dog and it didn’t feel right. It was wrong, whatever it was, or wherever it came from it was wrong. Her headache intensified and she back up against Wendy.

“There are more in the trees,” she whispered. “Don’t let it touch you,” she warned, her voice deadly serious for once.

This was silly, Wendell tried to rationalise with himself, believing himself in that moment to be no better than a child, excited by silly, childish stories. The small, invisible hairs on the back of his neck, however, disagreed, the horripilation of the skin of his arms seeming to agree as tension wound its way through his body.

“No, I don’t like this. I don’t like this at all,” he said.

Wendell raised his weapon, ready to swing at whatever invisible foe stalked them through the tree line. Was he going mad, he wondered, was that the sickness spreading through the land, madness? For he certainly felt as if he were going mad.

The pirate kicked his backpack, both to get it out of their way and spill its contents, hoping to draw out or scare off whatever it was that stalked them. His throwing knives were displaced and littered the ground at the edge of the camp where his bag had ended up.

Kes’tral touched his arm and he flinched, realising his senses were heightened. He hadn’t dared to steal his gaze away from the tree line, but as the woman spoke, Wendell dared to look up. The man had often laughed at people’s fear of spiders, but what crawled across his line of sight now was absolutely terrifying, spiders bigger than he had ever seen, larger than was right.

“By the gods,” Wendell mouthed, their dinner forgotten. “Stay close,” he warned, putting them back to back.

His gaze did a quick sweep of the ground to make sure the creatures were confined to the trees. When the first dared to venture closer to them from a branch overhead, Wendell raised his torch, causing the giant insect’s skin to sizzle, its legs curled up. The creature made a highputched sound, one echoed by its friends, as if to hiss at the pair. That was when he swung his blade, batting it from the sky and into the surrounding shrubs.

Kes jumped when his back touched against her own, their meal to their side and long forgotten now. With wide eyes she stared at the creatures and realised that she didn’t have time to study them, not if she wanted to live.

One scuttled across the forest floor towards her and she swung her staff. The wood flipped up beneath her hands, catching the underbelly of the arachnid type creature. It hit with a disgusting thud and crunch at the animal screeched at her, front legs waving in the air as it rose on the rear pairs. She could see teeth, by the gods, she could see razor sharp teeth and she swung her staff again, smacking it down hard on the top of the beast. The screaming stopped and the animal dropped, dead. It’s legs twitching as the last life fled from the body.

She barely had time to stare, as another of them seemed to fly out of the tree line, leaping towards Wendy. She swung her staff once more, caught it square in the middle and watched as it was thrown off, back into the darkness. It wasn’t dead, it would be back. Kes set her back to Wendy again.

“It’s going to be a long night,” she said softly.


Of th

A surge of adrenaline raced through him as he felt the weight of the beast through his sword. Terror-stricken by the thought of them being overrun, Wendell did not right away notice as the creature he had struck, crawl out of the undergrowth to charge at him. It latched onto his leg, biting down on his trousers only to catch the loose fabric.

Kes’tral said something, but the man was left frozen, deaf and dumb.

Terror left him rigid with fright, to see the creature close up was enough to give him nightmares for the rest of his days. He batted at it again, this time with the torch, realising its dislike for the flames he had held at its feet. The spider let go of his leg and moved from side to side, faster than he liked, its front legs raised as if it was considering a second lunge at the man.

Wendell was all too aware of why people seemed to do a little gig on the spot when faced with such things, wanting only to get out of the way of the insect at his feet. He stomped at it as it neared him, trying to crush the creature under foot. An opening afford him a heavy swing of his sword, severing the spiders front left legs from its body. It spun on the ground in front of him, pathetic in its attempt to continue its pursuit even when faced with certain defeat. Another swift swing ended its life, though the small achievement did little to ease the tension Wendell was under.

There was no time to think, only act. The spiders were coming from everywhere. They needed to be quick, fight and stay alive.

“Don’t let them bite you!” Wendell warned. “They have teeth!” He swung his weapon again, cutting through a thick, sticky line of silk, only to stab a second spider as it fell to the ground.

Kes cursed, swearing aloud as she batted another of the fiends away, this time hitting it hard enough to make it crunch. “How many are there?” She demanded, although she didn’t really expect an answer. The woman couldn’t move her staff quick enough and was forced to kick one that got too close, this was getting ridiculous!

Wendy was having better luck with his sword and torch. She bent, curled her hand around on of the logs on fire. She let out a cry of pain as her flesh singed, but she gripped the flaming brand and waved it, catching it against two creatures that had advanced. They caught and screamed, legs twitching they dropped to the ground.

Kes swung again, staff and burning log raised in fury as she kept fighting, spinning, kicking and brandishing her weapons. Sweat coated her skin, her heart hammered so hard for so long she was afraid it might burst. The log itself had seemed to fuse against her skin and she groaned.

Were there less of them? Kes found that suddenly there was time to breath and pause. She panted, tossing aside the log and a chunk of her skin with it. She hissed in a breath of pain, clutching her hand to her chest as she yelp. She swung her staff at a final creature and watched it die. Wanting to make sure she moved forward and stamped until certain it was dead.

The onslaught was endless, enough to put the man off his dinner, the skillet now riddled with severed insect legs and bits of sticky twine. The defeat of two spiders hadn’t filled him with any more courage than the first, but after three or four, he wondered, no, hoped, that they had a chance of surviving this unscathed. Even if they did, he realised, he was sure neither of them would be able to get any sleep tonight.

The creatures didn’t seem intelligent, per say, rather it was their persistence that frightened him the most. No matter how many they took down, more followed in their wake. How had they found the pair and why had they come? Wendell could only be certain that this was not normal, that it must be part of the sickness spreading across the Plains of Bohar. Were these creatures the ones the driver of the caravan had hinted at, were the spiders crawling up out of the earth? They couldn’t be, unless… death walks the earth, he recalled her saying, would these things bring death with them? Wendell wasn’t willing to find out.

As another beast descended from overhead, Wendell swung his torch with such intensity that it left his hand. The torch spun through the air and rolled as it met the ground, shedding light in the clearing of the camp, enough that they could both see what they were fighting without issue.

Kes’tral had cried out, causing the man to turn, not quite sure why. Was he willing to defend her or simply make sure he wouldn’t be next? The pirate noticed that the makeshift torch she clutched in her hand was the source of pain, realising then just how capable Kes’tral was of defending herself.

Something jumped at his back and without thought, the man threw himself on the ground, crushing his attacker. A second spider seemed to recognise his vulnerable state, scuttling towards him like a pig might make a beeline for a scrap bucket. His throwing knives in reach, Wendell took up one of the weapons and pinned the spider to the earth, its legs still walking on the spot for a moment before going limp with its death.

There was a pause and Wendell sat up as Kes’tral dispatched of their last foe. He sat panting, not sure if it was exhaustion, excitement or relief that had left him in such a state. The canopy above them was littered with long white threads of web, the ground with the disfigures remains of their enemies. Were they safe, was that the last of them, he wondered.

Kes’tral discarded the burning log and seemed to cave in on herself, clutching her hand. The sight of her in pain urged the man to his feet. He moved to kneel, taking her hand to look over the burning flesh.

Wendell made a displeased sound, glad it was not him, but sorry it had been her. “Can you heal it?” He asked, was that how the magic worked? She had certainly healed him before, but perhaps that was different?

With Wendy’s torch on the ground, their battlefield was illuminated and it was frightening. Kes sank down further, peering up at the strands of white webbing that hung, broken and tangled, swaying in the breeze that had returned. She sucked air in through her teeth, holding back a whimper as he took her hand.

The woman shuddered, staring at the little threads before looking down at the mass of bodies and still twitching limbs. She wasn’t one to usually suffer from bad dreams, but suspect that this, coupled with the sense of adrenaline would be enough to cause her trouble.

Can you heal it? He seemed concerned and Kes’tral looked up at Wendy as she knelt. She fumbled, trying to reach for her canteen only to find it out of reach. “Please?” She asked him to pass it, her gaze caught with his. It hurt, the skin had blistered and peeled away from flesh down to the bone in parts. She shivered, shoulders quaking and lashes lined with hot tears. “I can heal it…” she admitted, “but I can’t…it would take my concentration. I wouldn’t be able to defend.” She swallowed, it was something that might have to wait until the morning, or whenever they felt safe enough.

Kes looked him over, scanning his features before looking down over his shoulders, broad chest, his arms. With her good hand, her fingers followed her gaze, exploring carefully. “You’re not hurt? They did not get you?” She sagged with relief.